ummmm, what grass?

i've been parking by this sign for a week, and only just started to appreciated the glorious irony of its message when i got to work this morning.

so i took a picture.

(in case you were concerned, link o' the days will return with the next post)

he he he.... 

it's beginning to look...

a whole heck of a lot like christmas.

18 inches saturday night, followed by 5 more inches sunday morning.

sunday on the mountain with my sister-in-law, jamie, was right up there with the day rob and i had at monarch 2 seasons ago. i mean, wow. waist deep, super cold, low moisture content snow. i choked on it a few times when making big turns. check out the picture of my iced-out beard below.

16 more inches on the summit last night. that's around 40 inches on top of the ski area, in 48 hours, from this storm.

wow.

just an unbelievable day. 

the coming five days

the next five days for me will resemble the following...

wednesday - sleep late (9:30, maybe 10 if i'm lucky); tidy the downstairs of the condo; fish through town from about 11 to 2, since that's the "warmth window" when trout will be most active; clean upstairs of condo so that we have a nice clean home for thanksgiving break; greet jenn with a big smooch when she gets home from work.

thursday - ski on opening day for a few hours; soak in hot tub; help jenn with thanksgiving side dishes; eat thanksgiving dinner with jenn, jamie and her roommate, mary; loosen my belt and watch "a christmas story," a thanksgiving tradition.

friday - maybe fish, maybe not; maybe a home improvement project with jenn, maybe not; jenn and i will probably go over to russell's in the evening and have some drinks with russell and lexie, brett and kate, and tommy and sarah.

saturday - no idea.

sunday - no idea.

happy thanksgiving to my friends and family! i love you all, and hope each of you have a wonderful break.

link o' the day:

if you have a high speed connection, and like to download live music, check out this site. it has thousands of shows from hundreds of bands, in wav or mp3 format. lots of favorites that will keep you coming back (ryan adams, keller williams, etc.), and hundreds of great local bands you've never heard of. as of this writing, i think the server is temporarily down, but hopefully it will be back up soon.

i have officially crossed over...

to the scary side of obsession.

folks, my good friend bcb - and fellow fly fishing nut - fishes in the winter. fishes with gloves cut off at the fingertips. fishes with 2 pairs of long underwear and 3 pairs of socks on under his waders. fishes when it's so cold that ice forms in the line guides on his rod. fishes when a good day is catching 2 trout.

and now, so will i.

if all goes as planned, i'll be joining bcb on a super-secret stretch of a colorado western slope river on sunday. i will be cold, and i probably won't catch many fish, but dammit... i will be fishing. with good company, too - bcb has good fish karma, knows what he's doing, and can be gloriously, inappropriately funny.

link o' the day:

folks, there's a comic strip dedicated to libraries that's actually pretty funny. combine the cynicism of dilbert and the whimsical, good natured mischief of calvin and hobbes, and you get unshelved. or maybe i just think it's really funny because i work in libraries. anyway, click on comic strip archive at the top, for previous years.

here's my favorite one of all time.

major dumpage

well folks, the mountain is reporting 16 inches in 24 hours. not a bad start. the ski area will open next wednesday, the 23rd, with hopefully a good bit more skiing than the single run it opened with last year. today's high is expected to reach 25 degrees, but it's 11 am and still in the single digits. as a result, i can look out my window and see the mountain - and howelsen hill, for that matter - blowing smoky snow against a perfect blue sky.

winter is here. just like that. we left for my library conference in denver last thursday to blue skies and 55 degree temps. we drove back sunday night to a foot and a half of snow on rabbit ears pass. the storm started in earnest just as we descended off the pass and into yampa valley.

link o' the day:

like most folks, i love good food. also like most folks, i like to laugh. jason sheehan, the very funny food critic for westword - denver's weekly alternative newspaper - makes me laugh while writing about food. check out a recent column.

a decision has been made

folks, i've decided on what i'm going to do with my blog that's new and different. at the end of every post, i'm going to give a quick little annotated link to a website/article/news story that i think is funny or weird or brilliant or whatever.

all right, i guess that's not really all that new or different. but maybe i can help people get to the really cool or really absurd stuff on the internet a little easier than if they were doing it on their own.

first link:

when you search the keywords "miserable failure" in the google search engine, you get the official whitehouse.gov biography for george w. bush. read the bbc news article about it.

i love google bombs.

new mp3...

well, folks, i bit the bullet and paid the $14 required by my favorite mp3 ripper. they gave me a 30 day trial, then took it away from me and told me to cough up. i had refused to pay for awhile, but couldn't hold out any longer. i know some of my tech-savy readers will tell me there are still free ones out there, but this one is just so damn easy it was worth it. fourteen bucks for life - i can handle that.

anyway, here's a very sparse version of rodeo clowns from russell and me. to get some of the rust out, we played for the kiddies at lunch last week.

the new incarnation of big pants is doing well. the new bassist is holy-crap-good, and we've got about 20 or so songs (including 2 new originals). we're recording a demo on thursday of next week, which we'll shop around to bars to see who wants us to play this ski season. i'll keep you posted.

possible new names for the band:

the misunderestimated
ro-tel romeos
avian bird flukes
scooter libby experience
the pandemics
the polemics
armed with vegetables
rove is burning

water on the brain

new song, folks.

explain away

wash me in the sound
don’t let go until I drown
drag me on the beach then walk me around
wash me in the sound

the leaves will fall all over me
red skies breathe over the sea
and I never really know just what you mean
but the leaves will fall all over me

let the rip currents take them away
until they’re too far out to be saved
i didn’t want them in the first place, anyway
let the rip currents take them away

it’s a war between water and stone
always changing in this tidal zone
and all these people wanna share their hearts and bones
it’s a war between water and stone

the bluffs fall away at my feet
and the waves keep time with my heartbeat
and there’s no sense in trying to be who they want me to be
i just can’t explain away what I’ve seen
i just can’t explain away what I’ve seen
i just can’t explain away what I’ve seen

fun with pictures

hi all...

still struggling on where i want this blog to go. but in the meantime, look below for some pics i found as i was cleaning out old emails this morning. from last winter and this summer respectively.

it is a gray and blustery morning here in the mountains. the clouds are blue bottomed and layered, and they pass quickly over the valley, out of sight behind the ski area. the wind makes its way up the hillside across from the college, moving the grass in waves and cycloning dead leaves from the gambel oaks.

beautiful, but unfriendly. no precipitation yet, but it's the first day that actually looks and feels like winter.

hope all is cozy and warm with everyone.

me getting my ass kicked in a game of awale with russell's son arik. he is one bright kid.

me taking a break between runs on buffalo pass last winter. tommy has a snowmobile, and a group of 3 or 4 shuttles each other up untracked faces for powder runs (when i'm lucky enough to get to go).