Archives for January 2009

I AM THE BEST SKIER EVER!

Didja know that? I am. I so am.

Except that I'm not. But when I learned to ski, back in like 1992 or something, even though I was terrible, the guys I was with dubbed me the best skier of the day because I'd obviously had the most fun. So that's been my rule ever since. Whoever has the most fun is the best skier.

And that was me! Me!

You all were completely correct to encourage me. In fact, I think I may be spoiled now for skiing with others. Now I know, it's way better alone.

The whole trip couldn't have gone better. I got up to the north shore of Tahoe at about 4:30pm. I'd read about Ferrari's Crown Resort online, so I drove there first, to check pricing and availability. You can always get a better price at a family-owned hotel. They have a vested interest in selling the room, whereas a corporate desk clerk just can't lower rates willy-nilly. If you're standing in front of the clerk at a small, local hotel, ready to pay, they'll sometimes give you a really sweet deal just to keep you on site. Miguel did just that, and he gave me the best room in the house (room 250 — you should go).

This was from my balcony. The room had a fireplace and a small kitchen with almost everything one would need, up to and including an apple peeler, a cheese grater, and a salad spinner. The only thing that I needed and that was sadly lacking was a bottle opener, but Miguel helped me out with that, too.

Directly across the street from the hotel were the other two things I needed most: Tahoe Dave's rented me great skis and gave me a discount for staying across the street. (So I got a discount at the hotel and then a discount on skis for staying there. Oh, yeah, I bought my lift ticket for the next day at the hotel for a discount, too.) And next to that was Hiro Sushi, which from 5-6pm does all-you-can-eat sushi. Lord. It was as good as you think that might be. You sit at the bar, and as soon as you have one piece left on your plate, the chef asks you what roll/nigiri you'd like next. I was SO full by the end of that dinner that I couldn't even kill the wine when I got back to the room, which was my original goal. Nope, two glasses and I was conked out.

But falling asleep at 9pm means I was up and ready to go by 5am the next morning. This was unfortunate, since I didn't have to get up until 8am (I already had my lift ticket and my skis, so all I had to do was drive the 20 minutes to Squaw Valley.)

So I got up and wrote, instead. I opened the curtains and blinds and sat in the dark with the fireplace and worked, waiting for the dawn, which was worth waiting for.

THEN I WENT TO SKI.

People, I was nervous. The last lift ticket I'd had was still pinned to my hopelessly unfashionable jacket, and it said 2000, Northstar. So nine years had gone by with no skiing. Would I even remember how to put the skis on? I wasn't so sure. (Also, things have gone so high tech! Your lift ticket just goes in your pocket and when you approach the initial lift, the ticket activates the gate to open for you. Crazy!).

 

    Nervous

But I remembered  how to get off the lift. And even how to ski. Just barely. I skidded and plowed ungracefully all down that first short green (which they put at the top of two lifts, by the way. You have only two choices to get off the mountain: ride the long gondola down (no! Mustn't!) or get good enough during the day to go down the intermediate slope to the bottom. Way to put on the pressure to improve).

I overdressed from jump. I figured skiing was the perfect opportunity to wear handknits. No, not so much. It was sunny as hell. The air was still cool to the skin, but after the first run I was dripping sweat. I didn't even have the two bucks in quarters to rent a locker, so I chanced leaving my sweater knit with yarn bought in Brugges in a locker without locking it. I didn't care. Stripped down to one layer of fleece, my snow bib, and jeans, I was good to go. I was even too hot to wear a hat. (I was the only one — everyone wore a hat. I wondered how they weren't burning up.)

Appropriately attired, I did four or five beginner runs. And then I started wondering (AKA getting bored). Could I go down the mountain on that long blue named Mountain Run? I barely remembered how to get my skis parallel on turns — I could do a left turn okay, but a right turn made me feel like a windmill almost every time.

I got close to the edge, where the signs warned that beginners shouldn't go any farther. I stood there and looked straight down the mountain.

I couldn't tell. So I flagged down the next boarder going by.

"Hey! Can an advanced beginner go down this run?"

He hesitated, and then said in a deep Scottish brogue, "I dinna. Ski for me."

I skied a few feet.

He paused some more. Then he said, "Yeah, I think you should be able to make it. I think. Probably. Good luck!"

Then he sped off going a hundred miles an hour or so down the eighty-five degree slant.

And off I went!

I was terrified.

But I did it.

I was elated.

And I did it six more times.

 

    So going past this sign!

It was empty yesterday. No wait at any line. I never had to share a lift, just plenty of time to sit and swing and think.

 

It kind of made the long steep downhills more scary, though. Either I had expert skiers flying by me, going fifty, or there was NO ONE around. A lot of the trail was high and narrow, with plenty of room to go wrong. But plenty of it was wide, too, which made slaloming around without regard to getting in anyone's way SO FUN. Usually when skiing, I manage to knock over at least one person, and it's usually a kid, and I always feel SO badly. But yesterday, none of that.

 

I skied for about five hours (didn't even waste time eating), and then I had to get back on the road home. 

This is on my way up for the last time. You can tell I'm tired, but I had to retrieve my sweater from the locker (it was still there) and ski down one more time.

 

But oh, so happy.

It was THE BEST!!!!

No, really. Yay.

Apparently, I have energy to burn. I am dying to go skiing. YEARNING.

I love skiing. Love it with a passion. I'm not that good at it, but that doesn't really matter to me. I can do the intermediate slopes if I go really slowly, and I adore a long, slow green.

But I haven't been in nine or ten years. Every year I talk about going, and sometimes I get as far as starting to organize a trip. Someone always wants to go but then the timing doesn't work, or something comes up. Every year I am disappointed that the snow has melted without me crash-landing in it.

This year. I'm going skiing.

Like, today. I think I'll go today. By myself.

Dude, it would be easier for me to go overseas to a country I've never been before than to go to Tahoe by myself. I don't know why it's making me nervous to think about, but it is. I know guys do it, go skiing and snowboarding by themselves, just because they feel like it. Do girls? Do you?

I'm going to drive up this afternoon. I don't even have a hotel reservation, which is very unlike me. I called a couple of places — everyone has rooms available. I figure I'll just get there and look around, ask for a good price at the front counter. I used to work at a hotel and it was always easier to give a great rate to someone smiling at me at the front counter than someone on the phone.

Then tomorrow I'll get up, rent skis, and hit the slope. I think I'll do Squaw Valley. Then back home in time for dinner with the pocket vegans.

I'm telling you this so that I don't chicken out. It's not the drive, or the skiing, or the lodging, or the eating by myself that has me worried.

It's the lift line. Standing in line by myself. That's going to be weird, right? Or not? I don't know.

I feel like a challenge, though, and I feel like snow. It's supposed to be sunny and 41 degrees tomorrow. I'm so there. I'll keep you posted. (Twitter feed, above to the right, will be chock-full of little tweets, so keep your eye out….)

Don't I look bad-ass there? (I'm not bad-ass, so I like it when I look that way.) I'm really high here — maybe three stories up? There's an indoor staircase that Lala climbed to take the photo.

Here I'm lower than the previous photo. Note the floor below and the little man climbing behind me for some kind of scale.

I find it amazing that I got that high under my own power. That's the best part of rock-climbing, seeing people use just their muscles to go in a direction we don't normally go.

I love La's orange mohawk in this one.

Trying to see around the corner here….. not enough handholds…..

Coming down! I love coming down. Yowza!

1. I like coffee. But I am sad we are out of milk. Ever since I went off sugar, I've needed milk in my coffee, something I never used to want. Mmmm. Whole milk. 

2. I like yoga and rock-climbing. They seem to feel similar, but on different planes.

3. I like getting up early and writing on the weekends while Lala sleeps. Harriet is too old to sleep with us all night now — she pees on the carpet and the other day she fell off the bed. So now she sleeps in the living room with the rest of the menagerie. But in the early morning, I  carry her outside to pee (she's all soft and sleepy and sweet — I love that), and then bring her in and  put her up on the bed. Lala and she get some good cuddle time then.

4. I like the internet. Isn't it amazing?

5. I really, really, really like falling asleep on the couch, especially when Lala is watching TV and knitting. There is almost nothing better than that. She probably wouldn't know that by how grumpy I act when she wakes me up to go to bed, but it's true.

6. I like you!

BONUS ROUND

In the WE LIKE category, we like holding things like babies, especially Waylon:

He could seriously hang out like this all day.

What's up?

This looks like he's in motion, but I got out my camera and took the shot AFTER Lala pointed out that he was HOLDING HIS PAW. Just hangin'. Paw-holdin'.

But you know that we are equal-opportunity holder-like-babies:

We like it. But Clara's laser eyes tells you how she feels about this.

Back to work for me! Rock-climbing later! Woot!

Okay, so it finally feels real. I got the contract in the mail, and the check payable to me upon signing with Avon for the three book deal.

I had NO idea how gratifying it would be to get real money for writing, not just the two-copy payment most writers cut their teeth on. Paid? Really? Where's the hidden camera? Come on.

I've been calling myself a writer for so long, even though the first question I always seem to get is, "Really? You get paid to do that?" Then I have to shake my head and say firmly, "Not really, but it's what I do."

Now? Getting a payment in the mail is a validation I never knew I craved. Sure, most of it is going to taxes and bills and fixing the water heater and getting a dishwasher which I hear will extend our marriage warranty.

But I did something really smart. I was talking to Lala in the kitchen, right after I opened the FedEx envelope. My hands were still kind of shaky.  I said, "Maybe now, just maybe, I'll get those shoes I've been wanting for so long. But maybe not…."
Then I decided, hey. I'm GETTING the shoes. I stood up, went in my office, opened Zappos.com and ordered my Dansko Sallys, size 39.

Sexiest shoes ever, shoes that seriously go with every single thing I own, from jeans to dresses. I first saw those shoes on Too Much Wool Cassie, when I met her for the first time in New York five years ago. I remember we were standing in front of Purl Soho, and I said, "THOSE ARE THE BEST SHOES I'VE EVER SEEN." I've wanted them since then. Cassie, we are twinners now.

And it is possible that later today I will go buy a celebratory skein or two of yarn. In the past I've celebrated things (like the completion of the Nanowrimo that led to this book) with really nice yarn made into socks — memory socks. I think I might do that again.
Hooray!

Also, in big news: I HAVE AN ISBN. An ISBN of my own. Actually, I have three reserved, although since I bet they can get changed before publication, I will wait till the books are out to get them as tattoos. But seriously, wouldn't that be a cool tattoo idea? DUDE.

The only problem with rock-climbing is that you can't take pictures of yourself or your partner while you're doing it, because if you could I SO WOULD. So that's just some random guy climbing, and only two-thirds of the wall is showing in that picture.

It was awesome, people. THE BEST.

We got there and it just looked ridiculous. People everywhere in the gym, crawling up insane inclines. I knew I wouldn't be able to do it, and I kinda wondered why we didn't just leave.

But our teacher hooked us up into our gear and taught us how to tie the knots, and then we started up our first wall. Of course, a birthday party of little girls was filling up the easy walls (what a great birthday party!), so our teacher took us to a hard wall. Okay, it was, if you know climbing, a 5.8. That's not HARD, I guess, but it was kick-ass hard for us. I pretty much fell off the first time only a few feet up, surprising both Lala, my belayer, and myself. Then Lala tried and got a little farther than I had.

After a couple more false starts, terrifyingly, our teacher snapped little cards onto our belts that said we were good to climb by ourselves and LEFT US THERE. (This was after she'd reinforced to us several times that if we tied the knot wrong, the climber WOULD DIE. It was no joke.)

We looked at each other. Ack.

We tied those knots and then double-checked them. Then we triple-checked them. Then we thought about running and getting the teacher to check, too, but we managed to stop ourselves.

Then I went up.

And up.

And up.

I kind of just kept climbing. I didn't look down — I just looked at the next handhold, and felt for the footholds. I know I was doing everything wrong, I'm sure, using my arms too much and my legs not enough, but I was going up.

From below me, I kept hearing Lala say "Wow." Then, "WOW!" And her voice kept getting farther away. And while her excitement was thrilling, finally I yelled down that maybe she shouldn't say Wow so much, since every time she yelled it, my heart froze in fear. But I kept going. I went almost to the top! Lala looked across to the staircase at the side of the gym, and she gauged I went up about three stories. DUDE.

Then I just got too scared. My muscles were fatigued and my hands were shaking. I had to stop. AND OH MY GOD I WAS SO HIGH UP! I was above the clouds! I felt an eagle flap by! Lala was just a tiny little orange mohawked speck, far below me on the earth's floor (okay, on the padded blue gym mat, but whatever).

AND I HAD TO LET GO AND TRUST THAT SHE HAD ME.

I am Type A. That was not easy for me. But I did it. I yelled, "Take!" and I let go of the rock wall. I swung in space. I think I screamed, but I'm not sure. Then she lowered me down.

It was amazing. Seriously, it was the best kind of scared I've ever been. 

We're hooked. Totally, completely hooked.

And what goes better with rock-climbing than happy hour at Sea Salt?

 

Oh, yeah. Five buck well drinks (including a very nice Manhattan) and dollar Miyagi oysters seated IN A BED OF SALT. How happy was I? So happy, I tell you.

Fun weekend.