Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Things the cats eat, take TWO!

Here's what we found when we came home from Canada.... 6(?) granola bars? *edited 4/1/09 - nope, I just looked at the full size photo and there are SEVEN wrappers!!*


Tuesday, March 24, 2009

We're BAAAACK!

Hey - we're back after a great week of sun, snow, great company and LOTS of skiing. We were able to ski every day - not usually true. We had deep, deep powder and that resulted in high avalanche conditions the last two days in particular (1/2 day or less each day)..... Here's a few pics from Karyn's camera -





Bill's birthday was excellent - as one might expect! Cheers to 70!


They even made him a cake!!!!!

Friday, March 13, 2009

Getting ready for the big birthday.

Dad’s turning 70. Ordinarily I wouldn’t advertise. I’m not sure he’s too proud of an average 47, or 53, or maybe even 68, but this year is 70! It’s getting to be that time when you take advantage of a birthday, and get the kids together to have a little fun! These days Sperry, Laura, Karyn, Andrea, Rich and I are all awfully busy, and its getting harder and harder to escape the daily grind. Dad on the other hand, retired, energetic as ever, has some things on his agenda.

We’re going skiing! Dad has invited us all to head up to Canada, and have a few days of skiing untracked, untouched fresh Canadian Pow! Last year Dad got his 1million feet suit from CMH, and this year Sperry, Karyn and I are heading to Cariboos for a celebratory week. Think snow for us, things haven’t been great heading through last month. Friday is Dad’s big day.

Check out Sperry and Dad’s last trip to Cariboos. video

too many posts, take 2 - things the cats eat




yes, all the ramen PLUS the styrofoam packaging.... not pretty later either....

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

More blogs than you can handle, part one

So, today you get to hear about last weekend.... Our friend Boomer and his friends, from Iowa and Chicago, drove out to ski for a week. We joined them for dinner Saturday night and then skied with them on Sunday.....

You can see more on YouTube.....

The oven door fell off the oven at the house that Boomer and crew were renting so the remainder of time required in the oven by the chicken pot pie looked a little like this....

It was awesome to see everyone, as always and we had a GREAT day of skiing, sitting in the sun and enjoying the company! Can't wait until the Iowa crew comes back in April, right Boomer?

stay tuned...... more Brown adventures to come!

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Monopalooza 2009


Great weekend!



Karyn and I shot out to Salt Lake City this weekend for a quick visit with some old friends… This year’s annual Monopalooza. Somehow I’ve been more and more involved with the organization, and participation in the event as the years go by. I think those two go hand in hand.

With our busy schedules, we popped out there after work, somehow managing to meet in the Pikes Peak parking lot within minutes of each other. Running for the bus, we headed into the terminal, and met up with Kerry. We had plenty of time, and chatting in the boarding area, a fella next to us felt obligated to discuss the drinking laws of the state.

Does anyone know what the laws are? This is what I gathered from the long weekend.
1) no beer can be served over 3.2%
2) 1 full beer can arrive at your table if the previous beer is empty.
3) 1 full cocktail can arrive at your table only after the previous glass is removed.
4) All drinks are metered. Don’t even try to order a shot with it.
5) If you order a second drink, you have to order food with it.

All of that worked out just fine, but it was still kind of weird.

We arrived at the MonoPad around 10:30, we stayed at Wolf Creek, just down the mountain from PowMow, or Powder Mountain for the non-locals. I’m always amazed at how time flies when you meet up with old friends. We had a quick beer, chatted it up a bit, and it was suddenly after midnight…

The weather reports had been predicting snow all week, the snow reports were not agreeing with the weather reports. Things were really looking good when we headed out to SLC, we knew things had been warm, but with some snow every day any ice issues could be resolved.

Kudos to Scott G, who always sets up the schedule for MonoP. This year we were setup for 2 days at Snow Basin, two days at PowMow. Some discount tickets purchase locations setup, and a series of meeting places, and events for the whole weekend. If you’ve ever been to a MonoP, you’d know how the community and schedule work together. I think it was put best by Boomer “so Scott, this schedule here means this is exactly where we are NOT going to be and exactly when?” Of course we all have great intentions!!!

The first day we headed down and over to Snow Basin. We picked up a couple discount tickets each. This was a pretty fun day, the winds were up, and the light was down… We had a great day on the mt despite the low light, and winds. The mountain was the location of the downhill in the 2002 Winter Olympics. All of the buildings on the resort look to have been built for the Olympics, and at that for the upper class. The buildings, bathrooms and generally the resort was very fancy. We left early, and headed back to the pad.

Every year the Seattle crew purchases all the Double Bastard sold in Seattle. I think they even try to buy up all that is shipped into the state. They always bring along some great beers to the MonoPad.

The second day we woke up to 6 inches of snow up at the PowMow resort, and changed the plans on the schedule. To most of us who’ve been to a MonoP, this is no surprise. We headed up to PowMow, with a spare discount ticket to Snow Basin. The 6 inches were great, we ran all over that mountain, the clouds were still overhead, but there was plenty of tree skiing to be had. That night we had the dinner event at the monopad. About 40 people were at the pad, Boomer and Jason hooked us up with chicken and ribs. Some others brought Vietnamese rice flour dumplings, and I heard there was some salmon chowder.

MowPow was the only resort in Utah to report fresh snow for the day. In fact, the weather reports had swung 180 degrees, and are now predicting sunshine and warm weather for several days to come. This isn’t a great sign for a ski trip. The weather report did have some good news somewhere… There was a huge storm swinging into the San Francisco area. It’s only a matter of time until that hits the Tahoe area.

The third day Saturday, we headed back to PowMow, there was still some powder to be had up there. The clouds had cleared, and the ridge to the North East was unveiled before us. The mountain runs a cat that goes up a few hundred feet onto this ridge, but we learned there was also a helicopter that headed over. A good old Bell 206, made a 3 minute run from the top of PowMow over to the top of that ridge. Several of us headed over to the cat after the group photo. But by the time we got off the cat, we realized we had to hurry down if we were going to make it to the carnival at noon. Skipping the hike to the top of the ridge where the heli drops, we skied out the traverse looking for a great location for a little video footage. I pulled off, and skied down first. (The advantages of being the camera man.) I captured 20 minutes of great footage of about 12 monoskiers. Most of them stopped behind me, and waited for the next cat full of monoskiers to arrive. They made it up the cat, but they didn’t head over to the filming location. So the rest departed, as I packed up, and headed out. I ended up breaking the handle of my tripod, and having to hold it like a running back carries a football all the way to the lift. This is not exactly easy when your feet are already tied together. But I made it. The carnival was uneventful this year, that’s a pun. Un event full, aka no carnival. Various reasons for this… we never had a full crowd to gather at the location. This is kind of messed up because it was set for the location of the heli pad. The heli turned out the be ½ price, or $75. So every time we started having a crew building up, someone talked someone else into heading up the Heli. With a 2 lift return the whole trip (once you left the heli pad) was about 1 hour 30 minutes. After exiting the skiing at PowMow, we headed back to the pad for an un-organized dinner out and raffle. I think the schedule suggested raffle first, but turns out we ordered up some pizza, and had dinner at the pad, and raffle after. I manned the shirt sales and distribution, Kerry the ticket sales, and Gordo the raffle itself. We raffled off lots of shirts, DVDs, a brake arm figure, and 2 monoskis. It was quite successful, the only caveat being a few people managed to receive most of the wining tickets.

Storm update: The storm heading for Tahoe is predicted to dump 5 feet of fantastic Seirra Cement onto the unsuspecting mountains of the Eastern Sierra Nevada’s.

The fourth day we headed up for a sloppy day at PowMow, the warm weather was really setting in. We got a few runs in some old pow, and first off the poma lift. But early afternoon the lightning ridge was even a soupy sloppy mess. We still didn’t head out early though; we pushed it to the main mountain close at 4:30. That night at the pad was pretty quiet, we headed down to the local Mexican place, the only one open in eden on a Sunday night. While we were out Boomer had already taken off. Just after we left for the mountain. Guess where he was heading? Snow time! Headed to Heavenly ski resort. About the time we got back from Dinner he had called to report back, rain all the way to Tahoe.

The fifth day I got the early option of driving Karyn to the airport. I was back at the pad just before 8. The rest of us (excluding Karyn) headed to Snow Basin, we spent about 25 minutes trying to sell the leftover discount tickets the whole Pad had purchased. It wasn’t any problem Gordo takes the award for selling the most. This was one sloppy day up on the slopes. Snow Basin hadn’t gotten the 6 inches we did at PowMow, and the weather had not frozen anything up. At the end of the day we headed back to the pad looking for some food at the store, we knew Monday night we were either going back to the Mexican place, or cooking at the pad. We had steaks, fries, corn, and Salad. I called Boomer for an update on the ski conditions in Tahoe. “Today was the heaviest snow I’ve ever skied… And it worked me. If it’s this heavy tomorrow, I’m not going to ski.”

There were only 7 of us at this point at the pad, most had headed out Sunday or Monday. It was quite nice to hang out in the $1.5 million house with just a few other people to enjoy it… By this time, everyone had their own room. I learned this crew always watches a few movies on the trips. Last year’s monoP footage, and Hot Dog. I would think you would be tired of that movie after watching it 26 times. I’d only seen it once, and I was in Junior High. We said our good byes as I headed to bed. It turns out its pretty depressing to hang out the last day of monoP when everyone else is heading for home.

Well I’m looking forward to next weekend, Boomer is swinging through Beaver Creek, and we’ll get a few good runs in at home. If things are on our side, we’ll catch that big storm when it gets to Colorado.

Thanks everyone who came to MonoP this year, it was as it always is, great to see you. Even though we don’t always have great snow, we always have great company!

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Yeah!

So, Tucker and I left last Wednesday for Salt Lake for a few days of monoskiing (or tele skiing, in my case) - I'm sure he'll post up soon about that one.

Friday night I decide to listen to my voicemail. I have one from Dexcom.... I was approved for my CGMS!!! How cool is that!!!?!?!?!

So, I call them back on Monday, 3/2/09, and speak to the insurance adjuster... no problem, I owe them some $$ which I can then file a claim with my secondary insurance for and get that back. okay, this is sweet - how soon can I get it!?!?! March 10th is when they will be able to ship it - 3-day Fed Ex.... hmmmm... then training with a trainer at the Barbara Davis Center.

Only one problem, i'm a geek and I'm going to use it without training, of course.... I leave for Canada for a week of heli-skiing on 3/13/09.... yup, 3 days after the ship date - meaning the day i receive it. Guess I'll get to play with it on the bus to the lodge in British Columbia!

The insurance company just approved it, no denials, no waiting, awesome.

stay tuned!

k