…beyond nice.

I consider myself an intermediate snowboarder, when I’m on the slopes I stick with the blue runs and I know I’ll have a cruising sweet time. Whenever the lifts go over the tree areas, I see people boarding in there, I think, “Those crazy fuckers they’re going to break their stupid necks.” As with the trend in my life where I call people, silly or stupid, I inevitably fall into that category - I am a crazy fucker.

I went boarding with my sister’s boyfriend, Chris, today and the guy being a damned good rider took me riding in the tree area. According to him, riding in the trees was “the best”. I was partially convinced my sister has ordered him to kill me and leave my corpse for the crows, I even announced that to people riding the lift with us. Hey, I’m not going to let those murdering bastards get away that easy! He chose spots with sparsely populated trees since I was new to it. After our first run through the trees, I thought, “Holy hell, where have these trees been all my life?” Riding in the tree area adds a certain element of obstacle course challenge and there is true powder galore. If you haven’t boarded amongst the trees, go now, stop what you’re doing and get in there. If you’ve never boarded, go take a lesson, go up the rope tow a couple times and get in the trees already!

Ever question decisions you’ve made? Advice you’ve given? Up until a couple months ago, I’ve been haunted by an advice I’ve given my sister. A couple years ago, when she had been dating her last boyfriend for about a week or so, she called me up one night and told me, “Guess what? We’re running off to Vegas to get married. I just want you to be the first to know.” It was about 2:30 a.m. on a Tuesday so I was half asleep, and completely pissed off. I told her I thought she was making a big mistake. She was drunk and didn’t care too much for my opinion, we talked for a bit but hung up after neither of us getting anywhere. I woke up the next morning and called her up and asked if that was just drunk talking or was she serious. She was serious. I calmly told her, “Sister, I’ve never begged you for anything in my life. Now I’m begging you, promise me you’ll wait six months before you marry this guy. In six months, I will show up to your wedding anywhere in the world and give you my blessing.” I chose six months because I figured she wouldn’t wait a year, and six months seems like a good enough amount of time to get to know someone…I figured correctly and she kept her promise to me. They broke up after three months and did the on again, off again thing for a few more months which only made things uglier and uglier. She was madly in love with this guy, the whole ordeal broke her heart.

After the break-up, she told me they would have seriously gotten married if she didn’t promise me to wait. She seemed convinced that despite the breakup, if they got married while things were good, the guy would have made good on his vows and treated her well. I felt so guilty, while I felt like her not marrying the guy was for the best, I still wondered if maybe I should have let her live her life. It got even harder when she had been single for about a year (record single time for her since she was 16) and she would sometimes ask me in drunken sadness, “Sister, do you think we’ll ever find the right guys for us?” I replied, “Sister, we’re two of the most blessed people I know of, we have so much to be thankful for and I know we’ll still have much more to come. I don’t think we’re meant to die alone.” She wasn’t too convinced. The question came more and more frequently the longer she was single. I felt worse and worse each time. After a while, I was convinced I might have ruined my sister’s life.

Then she met Chris. Chris loves her in the way that I’ve always wished someone would love her. He talks about her with googlie-eyed sappiness like she is his moon and stars. She seems really happy with him. Now whether or not this relationship lasts, I’m damned happy to not have to feel so guilty anymore, and I’m just so grateful to see my sister happy. She ran into the ex while she was out with Chris recently, she told me the feeling is gone and she’s happy with Chris.

I said all that to say - hawt damned, if I didn’t break that shit up, I would’ve lost an awesome tree boarding buddy.

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This morning, I woke up, checked a couple websites and fell violently ill. I immediately sent message to work that I could not possibly make it in today due to my illness. I knew the cure to my ailments and it could only be provided by a certain shaman-type sitting on top of Skyline Express.

A few posts ago, I’ve pledged my undying love to you all until June, but apparently the season has turned. It’s interesting how I’ve been praying and praying for snow, but the slope was only getting icier and icier…soon as I make a little blog post about the sad state of snow condition, bam, SNOW! I think God has stopped listening to my prayer and He’s only reading about it in my blog, I better make sure my RSS feed is working correctly. Oh and God, if you’re reading this, I would like a few million bucks, a ball of cocaine (non-cut please), an environment friendly Land Cruiser and a free trip to Mount Everest, that’s all, love you…wait I almost forgot, and whirled peas.

As I was driving to the pass, I text messaged my sister’s boyfriend to see if he was heading up. We’ve made a pact to encourage each other to board on powder days.

Me: Call in sick. I’m off to Stevens.

Chris: You and Kevin are killing me! We had a big server crash yesterday so I’m stuck working.

Me: Awww, poor Chris. Where’s Kevin?

Chris: He wanted to head to stevens also. Not sure if he went. 10 inches of powder! I may blow off Thursday and head up.

Me: 10? I saw 20 this morning.

Chris: Thanks for that. I think my day just got worse. Damn. I hope they get more.

Me: Yeah, I said that just to make you feel crappy. I’ve got a screen capture of that snow report.

Chris: Ya could you email that over.

Me: Oh that was my intention. ;-)

Chris: Punk.

Yes, I am going to that section of hell where they put all the people that taunt their friends on snow day. It’ll be a big party, all my friends will be there. Originally, when I took that screen capture, I had planned to use it in my blog to whine about how much life sucked and how I had to go to work with 20 inches (+9 inches from the day before) of fresh powder haunting me. While I was cropping that image, I realized how whiny I’ve gotten and how I really can’t deal with myself writing yet another bitch post – bitchin’ hell yeah, but not bitch. I did a quick cost analysis between how much I would hate myself if I didn’t go versus the amount of work I have left until the next deadline. I’m actually ahead in my task, so I didn’t feel so bad about taking the day off…if I was behind, I might hesitate a bit. I would seriously hate myself for at least the next entire week if I didn’t go.

In between calling in fake sick and taunting my friends, I figured I’ve got some bad karma coming my way. Then, I thought about how I didn’t kick a puppy today like I was planning to, and my showing enough discipline to refrain from committing a bad action should earn myself some good karma. I’m Chinese and part Buddhist, which makes me an expert on reading the karma chart. According to my chart, not kicking a puppy will transcend me to god-like status.

When I got to the pass, I found an awesome parking space near the front from some person that left early. There wasn’t any line for lift ticket, so I sauntered up to the ticket booth with a shit-eating grin on my face. The ticket lady smiled at me and said, “Hi. How may I help you?” I dug in my pocket and said, “Hi, I would like one…of nothing please. I can’t find my wallet.” She laughed while I started digging through my other five hundred pockets, damned ski jacket and its many pockets. Two guys approached so I moved aside to let them go first. I found my wallet and got back in line behind them. While I was waiting, this gorgeous tall blonde girl walked up to me and said, “Would you like a free lift ticket?” I looked at her and she had an unmarred peeled ticket stuck on her finger, and replied, “Really?” She smiled and said, “Yeah, I found this sliding around on the ground. It’s your lucky day.” I was dumbstruck for a moment then said, “Oh my God. Thanks so much. You’ve made my day.”

I can’t tell you how good of a day it was to board on 20+ inches of DRY POWDER. The fact that there wasn’t any line doesn’t hurt either:

Actually come to think about it, today was the best powder day I’ve seen since I’ve started boarding, talk about having a day that was beyond nice.

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