To ski or not to ski?

That was precisely yesterday’s question, as I could have hit the slopes, but I wasn’t really motivated to drive almost one hour to Snowbird for two or three hours of spring skiing. In spite of cool and beautiful conditions, I procrastinated, went running at 8 am and after a leisurely breakfast, decided that I was done for the season. Peruvian express was no longer running and I didn’t want to have to ride the tram or stay on Little Cloud. All told, I had my Snowbird “fix” for the year. If May 16 stands as my last day, I will have skied 86 times and racked up more than 1.5 million vertical feet for the season; an absolute record since I’ve lived in Park City… Not to be outdone, at 4 pm this afternoon, I got my mountain bike out of the shed and went for my first ride of the year up in Round Valley. If the Shakespearian question was about skiing, mountain biking was the answer!

Addicted to running?

I started running around the end of July of 1977. At the time, I lived in Westchester County, New York. Quite stressed with a new job, I needed a physical outlet that would take me a minimum amount of time and that I could practice daily. I was then working at Beconta, a sporting goods distributor heavily involved in the ski industry, which among many, had a consultant by the name of Tom Leroy who was in the 1968 movie “Ski the outer limits.” Tom was a congenial fellow as well as a runner and he strongly encouraged me to make running a lifelong habit. I’ll always be very grateful to him, whatever he does and wherever he lives today. At any rate, I never would have thought that road running would become my favorite sport and would even take precedence over skiing. When I ruptured my Achilles’ tendon last year, I did suffer a lot more from not running for three and a half month than not being able to ski. One reason is that running is a highly addictive activity as it causes the body to release endorphins, a natural analgesic that produces a sense of elation that is very hard to do without; for instance, we run in the morning, but late afternoon we always feel a strong urge to go out for a long walk and we end up doing it. Another benefit of running is that it provides a personal time capsule giving an opportunity to think freely, be exposed to a stream of creative ideas and more receptive to a whole variety of sensations. There’s also the feeling of being very light and almost invincible, just like a bird. Finally, there’s the “health factor” which manifests itself in many ways, starting with good metabolism, a complete physical workout, and what I feel is protection against a lot of little pain, aches, ailments and even depression. Of course, hip, knees and ankles need to hold up under the physical stress, and they do if we make sure to keep the duration and the intensity of the exercise under strict control, extending that delightful dependence for another day...

George is visiting Park City!

President Bush’s jet, Air Force One, touched down at Salt Lake City International Airport just before 3:00 p.m. Wednesday. Since he has nothing better to do, he came to Utah to “shake” the state's rich republicans to get some money for John McCain’s campaign. The first fund raiser was at a mansion in downtown Salt Lake where Obama signs were prominently displayed in yards and in car windows; the cost to attend was only $500. The evening fund raiser took place right here in Park City, and the $3,500 price tag reflected the higher altitude and attitudes. Now, if you factor the cost of the 747 flight, that of the C-5 cargo plane carrying all the armored limos, the presidential chopper to get him to Park City and back, not counting all the secret service folks and the fleet of army helicopters watching for Osama bin Laden and his herd of Afghan goats, the cost of moving George Bush around must have been in the $250,000 - $350,000 range (most of it paid by us, taxpayers), so let's hope the money collected did offset this “investment,” but I wouldn’t bet the farm on it, and I’m not even mentioning any “carbon footprint!” At any rate, after spending what I hope was a quiet night with us, the president is visiting with Thomas Monson, the new president of the Mormon church to compare his “born-again” god to the Utah equivalent (which according to the LDS faith is far superior) and perhaps switch religion; this however is doubtful as over the years our commander-in-chief has proved to be very stubborn. But since Mr. Monson is also prophet, it could be that Mr. Bush just wants to know his horoscope for the week or get an indication as to when the barrel of oil will hit the $200 level. Whatever happens, that would have been a worthwhile trip for our small community. There were no tourists in town to scare off and any publicity is always good publicity!

Drowning in bark chips

Weeding has been Evelyne’s job and it has never been easy as she’s been trying to manage too many flower beds and some large dirt areas that had no protection whatsoever. Bark chip mulch is great around trees, shrubs, and perennials; it creates a favorable environment for earthworms and soil microorganisms and will also reduce the need for irrigation because mulching materials that mesh together are more effective at reducing water evaporation from the soil. So this year, we finally took the bull by the horns and decided to add bark chips to these high-maintenance areas. Our option was either to purchase bark chip by the bag or in bulk. Based on a 2 to 3 inch thickness, I quickly figured out that we might need as much as 5 cubic yards and immediately though big and called a company that would deliver the stuff. Since a large share of the cost was delivery, I upped the order to 7 cubic yards. I was a bit surprised when I saw a large dump truck pull into our house and back up near our garden with its awesome load. Well, I certainly saw big but we almost used it all up and everything looks great. This is one rare instance when bigger is indeed better!

Delayed snowmelt

In spite of an unprecedented 65-year record snow accumulation in town, there’s been a god watching upon this year’s run off, and so far, thanks to a disgustingly cold weather, all that snow has been very, very slow to disappear. Each morning our running route takes us alongside the McLeod Creek which at the moment is rather torrential, but can become quite tame and lazy the rest of the year. Several small, unspectacular bridges made with over-sized, cheap, corrugated pipe, channel the water at various road crossings along the way, and provide us with some good benchmark as to how high the water flow really is. Last Wednesday, it hit its peak with one of the three pipes filled to capacity under our street bridge. A visual clue to remember next time we reach what’s considered to be “flood level” in Park City!

Saturday morning skiing

Around ten days ago, I received a text message from Roger Burnoud, an old buddy of mine in France; he wanted to go skiing with him the following Saturday. Since I know that all lifts are now closed in Haute-Savoie, I assumed we’d have to “skin” our way to some mountain top. I went online to book a cheap airline ticket, almost got a heart attack when I saw the price but purchased it anyway. Since I didn’t want to have my friend Roger stuck in traffic around Geneva I also reserved a rental car, and as I don’t have any ski touring gear, I called up my little cousin Annette Braize to get it from the rental shop she works at. I left my home at 8 am on Thursday to get to Salt Lake airport and after transiting through New York, boarded my flight to Switzerland. We were delayed more than four hours and didn’t land till noon on Friday. By the time I fought traffic and arrived at Roger’s place in Montriond, it was close to 4 pm and already “aperitif” time… We drank quite a bit while Roger was fixing a giant fondue, went right to sleep, but I woke up at 2 am and could not get back to my dreams; at 6 am we were stuffing our gear into the car and headed for Avoriaz. Overcast and threatening, the weather was less than ideal; we almost “died” while we skinned to the top of the “Hauts-Forts,” scared the heck out of ourselves skiing down the fabled “Nant d’Ankerne,” had a “momi” on Morzine’s main plaza before we enjoyed a celebratory lunch. That night we just had pizza, a few more biers and went straight to bed. I slept okay but unfortunately had to be ready at 8 am on Sunday to drive back to the airport. In the three flights that took me home, I was like a zombie and struggled driving after midnight from the airport to Park City. Twenty-one hours in an airplane, ten hours of sleep, five climbing, four driving, and a thirteen minute descent, this was another “priceless” ski weekend!

Dinner is served!

What usually is a “major headache” for most people started when we partially took down the first cabinets of our old kitchen on March 26 and followed by opening up a partition wall. The big “demo” job took place on April 5 and from that point forward it’s been a smoothly choreographed, non-stop process of drywall work, layers of paint, cabinet installation, multiple plumber and electrician visits as well as counter-top installation. On May 1, the electrician joined the final wires together and voilà! While we still missed a few pieces of wood trim, the kitchen was fully ready for operations. The cabinet detail work was finally completed on May 19. Overall, the job was done on time, within budget, without a costly divorce and most importantly to the chef’s full satisfaction!