Ski

Well, if a girl stops being impressed with what you do best, it pretty much leaves one option...

Ha, she knows your coat/pants and always looks for you in the park...one of the jumps you did at some random time really left an impression. If you have this effect on 16 yr old chicks, you must do pretty good... After I dropped Ty off with her Aunt and cousin in the lodge, I went back down to kick him in the back of the legs to see if he liked it...but he was gone. Probably for the best.

I don't want to rag on them as a group since every other liftie has been great when catching for the kids I'm with. Heck, I just wrote a bunch of props to the lifties for the other day. When I'm alone, I don't really care if they catch the chair---although it's nice when they do. This was just totally f'd up. BTW, Nick, Ty was hanging out behind you when you went over to the obnoxious table by the video games...she wanted to say hi to you so badly but was too shy.

So what was the deal with the kid "catching" chairs at the bottom of Iron Horse at 11:30 this morning? He's the guy with a beard, but not much of a mustache (there's another guy with a full beard and mustache who was catching them just fine). Anyway, the first time we go to get on the chair, he doesn't even touch it and my 6 yr old gets wacked so hard that she cried halfway up the lift. So when we lap back around and get to the lift I asked him to please catch the chair, especially when there's a little kid getting on. What's he do? Just as the chair gets to us, he put his hands behind his back. WTF? I tried to take most of the impact, but I have to also lift her onto the seat a little, so she got hit pretty hard again. I turned around from the chair and asked what his problem was and he told me to fuck myself. Nice... It also happened to my friend's little boy, but his dad was able to catch the chair himself the second time. But it ended my kid's day with badly bruised legs. Pretty screwed up thing to do.

A guy lets his friends use his small vacation condo for a couple of weekends and there are assholes out there that call that a crime and whine like little bitches and make grandiose accusations that are unfounded. Exactly how unfounded? Complete and total exhoneration in a court of law. This is America and what you tried to do was very Castro-esque. I understand people like you completely. Most people would take the high road and ignore your pathetic attempt at smearing a great contributor to our ski culture like Mr. Carlson. But I'm not that nice. I hate people that do what you do...that have nothing better to do than hate and be jealous of hard working, forward thinking people. If you had any class, you'd apologize to him for what you wrote. But that's way beyond you, just like it's beyond people like Durham district attorney Mike Nifong---you have a personal vendeta and you are out to attempt to tear people down for some unexplaind reason. You admitted you didn't read the court papers, yet still claimed an innocent man guilty. A man that has led my home hill back from the dead...

Wow, I really feel bad for Craig on this one...it's like his boss just walked up to a baby and slapped it. There no good excuse. When I called Sno this afternoon to make sure they weren't closing early because of the snow, they sorta made me feel like an idiot for even asking----which I took as a good thing.

Yeah, it's supposed to hang on here in the NE Poconos until about 2am, then lighten up. This entire storm has been fluffy poe...I cleared our deck with a broom, then shoveled our driveway in about five minutes. This snow will make it hard for them to shut the lifts down on 4/1...there's going to be so much freaking snow in parking lots and everywhere else. Should be a good turnout this wekeend and next.

Well, Rt. 81 sucked, but not as bad as Valentine's Day...I pulled into the lot around 7:30pm and there were a few dozen cars and about a foot of snow in the mostly unplowed lot. I guess the big RV right by the Phoebe Snow had something to do with tomorrow's comp. There was easily a foot of snow that had been pretty tracked out on Boomer, but you could still find untouched lines down the sides. Cannonball was actually a little better and by 8pm it was snowing and blowing so hard, that tracks were getting filled in. The most interesting run was when I went up the Iron Horse lift to make my way up and around the top of Long Haul to Upper Fast Track. There was so much deep snow that you couldn't pole or skate---you had to duck walk. It took at least five minutes to get from the lift to Upper FT. Then, it was so deep on the flat run-in that I had to pole all the way to first little headwall. But down from there was pretty cool...you had to sit back a little to keep your tips up and ride your tails a little. But the best part was the steep headwall on Lower Fast Track. Half the slope was an untouched foot of light powder. I finished with a few more Cannonball laps. Okay, guys, that was interesting---now go groom the hell out of it. Powder is fun for a change, but I'll take an icy hardpack any day.

Headin' over now...crap, Nick, I'd have given you a ride home.

I can go anywhere in my Wrangler...it's those nutjobs in BMW's I have to worry about.

I almost always have my skis in my passenger seat C'mon, Chippy, they say it's the best of both worlds.

Ha, I'm supposed to shoot East Stroudsburg HS baseball and softball games this coming week...doesn't look too good.

It will be epic (the good epic, not the MB epic).

According to the people in the office, Sno will remain open tonight until 10pm, no matter how bad this storm gets I'll see all you fellow people with bad judgement on the NF...

It's like you work in a Stephen King novel.

I'm not saying you or the other parents are wrong...I'm just saying what I'd do. And to be blunt, Rob, I'd be really disappointed in Ty if she earned a spot in a race and declined the bib because it was a second level race. I know some parents turn down Piche because it's another expense at the end of an expensive season. I can appreciate that. And that makes it a family decision. I guess in a perfect world, I want my kid to always want to take a shot when they are given an opportunity. But there are different dynamics with each kid and each situtation. Maybe it's just best that Ridge wants to back off right now. If so, then that's probably best for him. Let him come back next season and kill it.

Ha, come to Sno this weekend and I'll buy you a few shots, 1st Grade.

Bullshit. Total MILF.

Yep, and if the kid says my home mountain is firing me for being here so go ahead and call and ask 'em why they are such dicks... Who knows, Rob, maybe Sno was out of line. It's just my guess---and the general circumstanes---that they weren't.

The 2008 Racewax.com Ski Team @ Sno Mountain is now full. Thanks everyone!

A lot of PARA parents have blown off the Piche in recent years...but, the way I look at it, it's a chance to go to New England and beat some of the best racers up there. If people want to blow off Piche, then why not also blow off USSA and just ski FIS Open races? I'd never tell my kid to turn down a bib number...

Ski patrollers have been ducking the rope and helping themselves to a closed race course, as well. One time, I'd just slipped a course---which means you snowplow down it to smooth any ruts---on a warm day, then we were waiting for the snow to harden as the sun had just gone down. While we're standing around waiting, two patrollers jumped into the course and destroyed what I'd done. We ended up racing through their ruts. You'd think they'd know how uncool it is to do that. Rob: we all make a choice as to either working in the ski industry or skiing. Sort of sounds like the kid wanted his cake and blah blah blah. Reminds me of the step daughter of the former owner of CB...she wanted to teach, but she was also a CAT and wanted to race. Her step dad told her she had to make a decision because instructors are mostly need on weekends. She decided to teach and her race career was done. She was a great kid and I give her props for not calling some radio station to complain that the world was unfair.

Actually, I'm hoping more for a humble and quiet PA Cup Champion. And she'll hopefully keep her grades up and get a scholarship to a good Ivy League school where she'll invite her 20 yr old hot roommates back here on break for long hot tubs... Plans are all set. You bet.

Rob, just want to run something by you on this...say you own a construction company that's been family owned and always prided itself on hard work and not a lot of hype. Just providing great work and letting your quality sell itself. Then, one of your really hard working minimum wage kids wins a local architectural design contest and gets a chance to fly to Los Angeles for Nationals. If the kid had represented your company well on a day to day basis and was a valuable employee, then maybe you'd even pay for his flight, right? But what would you do if the kid was a whiz with a protractor, but blew off work half the time? What if he'd threatened another employee and was on probabtion with you? What if you don't care about hyping your business---and nobody can convince you that hype at any cost is something you are interested in? That you only care about building great projects... If everything was black & white, then it'd be easy.

Nah, you're safe 'cause the Sno owners aren't that stupid...