Weekend Bonanza

Saturday was pretty much a bust with the weather...for me at least. I got up, and, after watching the early morning news, was CONVINCED it was going to snow by 11am and be close to 10 degrees. Thus, I headed out for a ride around 9 or so to "beat" the snow, and, just to get something done. We'd had plans since earlier in the week to ski with Jason & Katie Coble, and, felt like I needed to do something on Saturday before sunday's ski adventure, since I'd taken Friday off of the bike. I did an openers workout for the helluv it and headed home. While out riding, it was about...oh...18 degrees. It was pretty friggin cold. There was zero sunshine, and, I was convinced it was going to start dumping any minute. However, upon hitting my doorstep around 10:15, the sun came out, and, all of the clouds parted showing the Colorado bluebird sky. I was quite annoyed! I walk in and get a "I told you so" from Amy (yes...she did tell me to wait!), but couldn't retort with my face frozen; I could only scream and cry as my hands thawed out. For those of you that live in warmer climates, the most painful thing is not so much the cold & numbing of the hands, but rather, the thawing. As your vessels begin to vasodialate, it pretty much feels like (I can imagine, I guess) each of your fingers is giving birth...about 1000 times in a row. The vessels are sooooo microscopically small and the vasoconstricting muscles are just plain frozen or contracted beyond their own control, that, any forceful entry of the blood to the fingers just feels like they're getting run over by a 13 ton elephant. (Damn that's a big elephant!).

Anyway, I ran some errands, and, based on Jason's weather report from his home to PPC, it was pretty nasty up in the hills. The plan was to get on the road while it was still sorta daylight out so, as to avoid going down the west side of Eisenhower into Frisco/Dillon in a potential storm. The weather was super tame, but, it was even colder up there! yikes! We got up there kinda early, so, we hit the outlets to do some shopping. Amy's at that 5 year (or so) mark of her winter cycling clothes, and it was time to start replacing some items. We hit the Pearl Izumi outlet and, lemme tell ya...she friggin SCORED. (**Memo for the dudes with ladies in their lives that are active. Head up to Silverthorne asap. They had tons of stuff on the clearance rack and a lot of their samples/display models marked down BIG TIME.**)She was able to pick up a very nice heavy duty top o' the line jacket for 50% off, a nice long sleeve jersey for 30% off, and, a sicko pair of uber warm winter cycling gloves for 30% off as well. In the past I've thought that I've hit some jackpots, but, this clearly was the mother lode.

We finally were done shopping, and luckily knew which way was up so we could head out to The Coble household. Their house is super cozy and very cute, and, is situated on a pretty centrally located street, in relation to Keystone, A-Basin, and, Breck (a quick shot up and over Swan Mtn Road!). We hit the local sushi place for some dinner, and, I washed it down with a Kirin. I can honestly say that the Kirin was probably the 3rd beer I've actively ordered for myself in close to 4 years. No lie.

We hit the hay, and, woke up to brisk temps of -15deg Fahrenheit, but, the sun was out and the sky was blue. We were still trying to make up our minds about where to ski, but, when the ski report showed Beaver Creek had the most snow, the answer was pretty easy. We hit the hi-way at about 9, and, were on the slopes about 10:45 after parking, tickets, and the first chair. The air temp at this point was still pretty chilly, but, the thermometers at the lift shacks consistently read in the mid-20's. Wind Chill was significantly colder! Being our first day of the year, you work out the kinks in your form, and, get your body reacquainted with different sporting gear (i.e. pissed off feet at ski boots!). We hit a few really nice trails (actually, all of them were stellar!), and, had a blast! We were pretty worked after lunch when we hit the Chutes section wayyy out on the east side of the mountain, and, afterwards, were more than happy to get down to the very bottom to call it a day. We waited out traffic with a lovely dinner to cap off the great weekend, and, were on our way home only to arrive in about 1h5 minutes...a record for me in the fastest drive back without speeding. Good gawd was that an awesome time! great weather, great host & hostess, and just great appreciation for everything we have.

*sigh* now...it's time to get back to work. I haven't worked a full week since about 2 weeks ago...what with the xmas & NY holidays. 5 days in a row is going to stink!

Here are some photos. I couldn't get any real shots of us skiing, simply because it was too damn cold to take my hands out of my gloves while we were on the trail, and, I couldn't get the camera out fast enough. Check out that sweet 1 piece! Sun faded and all!