Good Lord! I've missed sharing updates with you for...well, the last quarter of 2011 and the first quarter of 2012. In fact, it's been so long since I updated, I think that we were on daylight savings time when I did it back then, and we're back on it now. Yikes. I shall try to make up for it here.
2011 ended really well for us. Christmas was great; another awesome day out with friends getting the tree:
I'm pretty sure that's the last time I saw Joe, too. What the hell?
Anywho...we had an old - fashioned burning of the greens, just like back with old Troop 52. Good times, those pyrotechnics. It's been kinda hard to find free firewood in Bend, now that the housing market has collapsed and no one can afford to build/buy/sell their houses (although Max and I did find four houses being built within bike/trailer distance, and we're gonna try to grab some of that wood to build a floating duck house...I'm tired of the damn mallards using the pond as a day spa and driving the pH up to 9 without giving me babies!).
OK, back to winter...it's been a good one. Fairly mundane, snow pack wise (last year, we had over 50 feet of snow). Regardless, good skiing was had by all:
And, in BIG news...no straps for the first time (a note: as of right now, YouTube is telling me this one's "unavailable". If it's not loading in this window,
try this link):
And, I just need to include this picture. See that nice set of turns in the center of the bowl? Yep, that's MY set! Rufus, you reading this? I skied the bowl on Tumalo, and carved (what I thought were) gorgeous S - turns all the way down, in 2 feet of perfect backcountry powder! I'm finally getting the hang of this skiing stuff!
Anywho...we've also tried out skating (roller and ice):
But, our minds have recently been turning to spring. Max (and I) got our first Oregon fishing licenses (that's right...my vegetarian stance has been altered. As in, I now will eat fish that I have caught. More details later). We've also gotten a couple of awesome days out at Smith (and, as you saw, in the backcountry, and the slackcountry...my buddies and I have climbed up to Bachelor's summit a few times on Wednesday nights and skied down by headlamp. Fun!).
Also fun...Joel, Brian and I have been enjoying our re-entrance into the world of Plow United after a decade and a half! We've played 5 shows since we last updated; here are a couple clips:
Thanks to Kenn, Tommy, and Jesse for uploading!
We've gotten to play with some amazing bands at these shows: the Crash, Jake and the Stiffs, 3rd Year Freshman, the Souls, Samiam (for the record, probably the first punk band I ever listened to while washing dishes at Harrington Dining Hall back in the day...what a rush to open for them...and hang out with their rad drummer, Charlie!), Flatfoot 56, and, of course, Less Than Jake (thanks, as always to Vinnie for the invite, believing in us, and putting out Sleepwalk).
So, all is well. Very, very busy, as anyone who's ever had a 4.5 - year old in the house (with swim lessons, soccer practice, preschool, playdates, and all of the trimmings) will tell you. Speaking of the devil:
I'll leave you with some fun, and I apologize to anyone who can actually read Italian, as I used this to create the captions (with the exception of "Ciao", which, I'm pretty sure, I spelled wrong). Addio!
