Friday, 25-Jan

 

Packing the last few things up only took me a few minutes once I got home.

I’d gotten most of my gear ready the night before: layers, snowgear, and swimtrunks. And I was packed not a minute too soon, since Mike showed up about twenty minutes after I had gotten in, all his stuff packed into his car and ready to go.

So, we ate a quick dinner, packed my gear in on top of his, and headed up toward Sunday River.

We’d planned this weekend out a few weeks before – Mike and I would drive up in his car, and Marla would meet up with Mark and Deb in Jamaica Plain. From there, we’d drive up seperately and meet at Sunday River where we were staying, at the condo that Mike’s Dad and Stepmother own.

It was a fairly long drive, nearly four and a half hours, but it went by fast for Mike and I. We pulled in for Coffee fairly early and lit up a pair of cigars to keep us occupied, and then jumped right into one of our usual crazy dicsussions.

This one went even more wild than most – starting out at the bill of rights, we worked our way through each and every one of the first ten amendments to the constitution, discussing which ones were still in place, which ones were being impinged upon, and which had just been thrown out the window completely. From there we move onto our jobs, the Hells Angels, the economy at large, and even discussed a bit of economic psychology for good measure.

Basically, it was amazing, and the drive flew by.

Before we knew it we had missed our exit by nearly fifteen miles, so by the time we doubled back and got to the condo Deb and company had already been there for nearly twenty minutes. But all was forgiven once we got into the condo, cracked open a few beers, and relaxed before crashing for the night.

 

Saturday, 26-Jan-13

 

We were up before 9:00, for once, and dressed within minutes.

Why, you may ask? Well, the smell of waffles, bacon, and coffee definitely help motivate poeople in the morning. I’ll be the first to admit that they motivated the hell out of me.

From there, Mark L. (Mike’s dad, not Marla’s boy) picked me up a ticket at his discount, Mike and I grabbed my gear, and we all rolled out into the cold. Mike, Mark, and I all went to the main mountain, while Marla and Deb headed off into the woods for a day of cross-country skiing.

Our group only lasted as far as the first trail, at which point Mike and Mark realized just how bad I actually am at snowboading. I’m horrible. Bad enough that they ran off on their own, with my blessing, after that first run.

But I was good – gave me the freedom to take my time and roll down the easy routes, going slow and steadily down the mountain. And by “slow and steady” I mean “really fast, then crashing, then really slow, then crashing”.

I had fun anyways, getting three or four runs under my belt before noon. I even met up with the guy teaching my Capoeira class, as crazy as that sounds. It was a good start to the day, but I was ready for a bit of a break and a bite of lunch.

So, I stopped back in at the condo, to find Micki (Mike’s stepmom) making up a platter of BLTs. Now, I like me a BLT, and I like to think that I’ve had some pretty good ones. But Mickis? They were better than any. I couldn’t tell you if it was the sandwiches themselves, the fact that I’d spent the morning slamming my face into ice, or a combination of the two, but either way those sandwiches were amazing.

I chowed down on three, I think, before succumbing to the comfort of the couch for a short nap.

The second set of the day wasn’t nearly as fun as the first, if we’re being honest. The mountain was getting cold, my legs were getting sore, and some of the earlier falls were finally catching up to me.

Basically, I was a wreck.

I made it down two or three more runs before finally calling it a day around 4:00, after a particularly horrid run down what I thought would be an easy trail, but turned into a flat hellscape that I couldn’t get any momentum on. While snowboarding, loss of momentum is the killer, and I ended up just walking over half of the dang trail before I could get back on the board.

But dinner made all my anger and annoyance and frustration melt away. Because it wasn’t just dinner. It was a soak in the heated pool, followed by dinner, followed by partying.

Yep. The condo had an outdoor heated pool. We could see the snow falling all around us and felt the ice in the air. But the water was a nice 85F, more than sufficient to keep us all warm as we swam around and talked with the other people swimming in the pool.

A quick note about heated pools in the winter – they’re awesome, but don’t discount the temperature difference. My beard froze solid in the cool air above the water, and the steam cloud made it nearly impossible to see other people clearly.

But there were other people, other people who wanted to share their beer, and we made the most of it. We shoot the shit about everything, dared each other to jump out into the snow, and even found a way to use the snow to keep the beer cold but not frozen.

It. Was. Awesome.

But even a heated pool gets boring after a while, so we headed back inside to get in on the pizza action happening up at the apartment.

Dinner was excellent, as one would expect, but what was unexpected was the game that Mike’s folks got us all to play – Asshole Golf.

Asshole golf is a game where a cup is placed in the middle of a room, and each party member takes a turn trying to drop a quarter into the cup. The challenge lies in the rule that no bodypart can be used to hold or manipulate the quarter, save ones buttcheeks.

Hence, the name asshole golf.

We hung out late, laughed hard, and drank well into the night before finally giving up to our exhaustion and crashing.

 

Sunday, 27-Jan

 

We woke up slowly – Marla went for a run, the Marks got a few quick runs in, and the rest of us relaxed in the condo or in the heated pool.

The day was honestly a relax and recover, with basically nothing happening aside from packing everything and everyone up before heading back to Boston. Mike and I did stop in at Tilton Diner on the way home, but aside from that it was pretty calm. We worked our way through the few Rush albums that Mike keeps in his car, and lethargically worked our way back South to Boston.