So, as you know from previous posts, my sister and her bf were in town last week. originally they were going to stay with me the entire time, but then Neil decided to also show up that weekend, so i put li and ethan up in a hotel. a nice one, if i don’t mind saying so, because i’m an older brother and older brothers are supposed to roll large, or at least that’s what i’ve been led to believe by the big brothers/big sisters organization. in any event…
Liana and Ethan came into town this weekend, they’re staying till next saturday. Liana decided that we would do a lot of walking, and boy, did we, as the map above illustrates. Those of you who are not SF natives may not see this as a lot of walking, but trust me, it’s a lot. hopefully the rain will hold off on their napa trip this weekend. other than lots of walking around, liana has spent most of her time curled up on my air mattress, making high pitched “meep” sounds. and i’ve now bought all new sheets and pillows, which i probably needed anyways.
two for one special!
Room a Thousand Miles Wide - Soundgarden, off of BadMotorFinger
Shine - Collective Soul
i know, it seems like my iPod is only filled with early 90’s songs. but these were the first two that came up out of 3000. and yes, i have exactly 3000 songs in the ipod. i love soundgarden, and i liked collective soul, though more so before i realized that they were just a christian rock band that was somewhat subtle about it. or at least to me.
(note: my iPod is playing “Times of Trouble” off the Temple of the Dog soundtrack album right now. I love my iPod. “you gotta hooooold on to your tiiiiiiime till you break through these times oooooooof… trouuble” I miss 1990)
so, anyways. Last weekend Mike was in town, (”but if somebody left yooooou… out on the ledge” sorry, i love this song) doing some meetings down on campus, and i figured that it would be a good idea to take him up to tahoe and continue his education in snowboarding. not that i’m a good snowboard teacher, because i can’t even describe what it is that I do that allows me to passably make it down the mountain on that thing, aside from throw my (recently considerable 
) weight back and forth and occasionally curse loudly.
We left late on friday night, because someone insisted on eating a sit down dinner before we left SF, which seemed like a totally plausible idea at the time, and less so at 2AM when i was straining to keep my eyes open on a pitch black I-80 in the pouring rain with glaring SUV headlights in my rearview mirror. but we got there incident free.
Saturday we went to Heavenly. i mostly stayed on the CA side of the mountain, basically taking the Sky and Canyon lifts and doing those runs. Visibility wasn’t great, but the snow was nice and soft.
shred!
look intelligent!
ow! too hot in the hot tub!
all photos courtesy of Dan
anyways, saturday night we went into Tahoe City for some food. when we came out, the snow had accumulated. like a lot. it was time for my snow chains. I had never put them on before, even though i KNEW that i would be unhappy if my first experience putting them on was in the freezing cold snow. and i was right. wow. but again, everything worked out ok and i even regained some feeling in my fingers later that night.
sunday we did a half day at homewood and then headed back to the city. then i met amy for dinner and had perhaps 8 drinks. delicious!
I had been planning to do another seattle trip since my aborted one last October, which was the weekend after my 3 weddings in 5 weeks extravaganza and i got sick and didn’t want to fly. so this weekend was my makeup.
I flew up friday night and met up with Frank and Michelle, and we went directly to a bar to meet up with Eric, Liz, Di, Marya, Leah, and Matt. was good to see everyone, but i was trying to avoid drinking, though that didn’t stop me from spilling a beer on marya’s cast for her broken arm (i’m so sorry about that). i hope that it isn’t too sticky…
Saturday we went up to Snoquaime (sic) mountain outside of Seattle for what was the best ski day i’ve had all winter. Even though it’s not particularly high (2000 ft compared to Tahoe’s 5000), it looked like this:
and the snow was nice and powdery. Eric and Matt went off to their lessons and Frank and i took off to hit some nice cruiser blue trails. pluses and minuses of the day:
plus:
1. the snow was nice and soft, though not particularly deep. good for picking up some extra speed.
2. Frank and i might be ideal ski buddies. we’re both comfortable on blues, a little wary on blacks, and totally out of our league traversing trees like Josh made us do in the afternoon
3. once we found the east side of the mountain, it was almost empty
4. it started to snow in the afternoon for a nice extra layer of powder
minus:
1. since the mountain is small, you have to scan your lift tickets every run. lift lines took forever
2. i had a bad day on the lifts. i fell a few times getting off and had some weird thing where i actually missed the chair getting on one time and ate it right at the bottom. luckily i grabbed the next one, but it was very strange.
3. it was wet. i was soaked by the end of the day
4. kids everywhere. slow moving obstacles on the crowded runs.
all in all i had a great day but i could have gone without the hour we spent trying to do bunny hill runs with eric and Matt.
that night we had some delicious sushi
and then drank late night followed by delicious burgers from a place called Dick’s. delicious.
sunday we slept late, ate breakfast, michelle did the entire nyt crossword puzzle in about an hour, and then watched the super bowl before i hopped my evening flight.
turns out that marya got cast in a very big deal show, so i’ll probably be going back in april to see her.
Originally uploaded by mloco.
so, because it’s 2000, i went to the Paul Oakenfold show last wednesday. a few notable things about the show:
1. it was on a wednesday night
2. it started at 9PM but no one showed up till 11.
3. you had to literally slide down a tunnel to get to the bar
4. the place was packed
5. the restrooms weren’t near each other, so i went towards what looked like both restrooms and ended up being only the ladies room. then i had to work my way back to the other side of the bar. well planned.
other than that the show was fun. seriously, it was. I love that he’s still using the same synth keyboard sound he used back in tranceport. it’s nice to see that someone sticks to their principles.
One, by Metallica.
there’s something about the intro to this song that just makes me feel very serious about everything. i’m sitting here, watching youtube clips of Conan playing Serena Williams at Wii tennis, and it comes on, and pow! i’m in the middle of a battlefield, taking fire from the enemy. now that’s good songwriting.
