See I told you!

This is mount snow from the base as of 2 pm today. :) We're opening November 7th! WOO HOO!

Here comes the snow again....

Yes folks, the blue is snow..and the red dot is where I live. And NO this isn't at 3 in the morning when it is SUPER cold...nope this is from about 9 oclock. I just got home and noticed the precipitation was a bit different than when I left...yep, you guessed it...SNOW! I know, it is only October 28th...but I'll take it! Hope you all have a wonderful Halloween. Ours won't be white, but I can have dreams of sugar flakes dancing in my head...oh, wait, I'm mixing holidays and weather...I'm just so happy!

Do you have any idea what the street value of this mountain is?

Ok maybe it isn't THAT much snow, but this is an awesome sight to wake up to...that it is snowing just about an hour and a bit north of me! WOO HOO! If I haven't expressed it on here, I am SOOOOO excited for the snow/winter and this is just one more thing to tease me and keep my excitement high! Welcome, winter...now that the colors are almost gone, I will take all the snow I can get! :)

RISE AND SHOUT...

...the cougars are OUT! As much as I love my Utes (which has grown since I've left, well, at least for the football team) I am actually sad that BYU lost last night. I wanted another epic game, but this time between two teams who may have a chance at a big payout (even a possible national championship)! Now, it will just be the same ol' rivalry with the added possibility that the Cougars would be out to defeat the Utes just so they don't get the chance the Cougs missed out on...I'm sorry to all my Cougar fans out there, and I'm sorry for all my Ute fans out there who now have to really worry about losing to the Cougs for pride issues, not BCS dreams.

hiking in the woods...

With autumn arrival, and the wonderful spring/summer rains we had, I knew this year was going to be much better than last year for color. Unfortunately, sometimes cameras can't show what it really looked like. But these are some of the best from my Sunday and Monday hikes with friends. Sunday was with a friend locally (you know a nice outdoor walk on a Sunday) and Monday another friend and I drove up to New Hampshire (a whole 45 minutes) and hiked in the Pisgah State park...JUST WHAT I NEEDED! Amazing views, great colors, no people and even a great dirt road entry that Jeepers got a thrill on! Hope all your autumns are as vibrant and fun as mine has been! (Perfect timing for peak colors and a three day weekend!)

A wonderful fall ride with a few friends and adventures

Five incidences which made our beautiful ride even better or at least more memorable:
(1) the ride started off with one of our riders getting a flat...and not just any flat. A screw went through her tire/tube and dented her rim. I rode home and got a new tire for her, one man fixed her rim and the other helped finish off the tube replacement, and 45 minutes later, we started off.
(2) It was seriously beautiful ride...see pictures:

(3) Part of our ride lead us to a hike-a-bike section, that on this day and at this time had a TRAIN in our way. Well, when we started down the hill the train was stopped, then it slowly started as we were contemplating how to get on the other side. Then, with only about 15 cars to go to the end, it stopped again. So, you can watch in the pictures what we did (and just as the bikes went so did we!) ;) Oh yea, one of our riders decided to RIDE the train...it was classic.

(4) The ride was so up and up and up, and for 63 miles it was a good tough one, that I was so not ready for.
(5) finally: On a bike path, on which we road for only about a mile, we had a run in with a gaggle of people who had stopped on the path, blocking it almost completely. The two guys had sprinted off in front of us and so we got to watch them approach the group which split when they came close. So we rode on, as the group closed up again. Then they started to part when we came up, but one lady was a bit different in the group. In a very concerned way, she very seriously told us to NOT RIDE OVER THE CATERPILLAR! Watch out for the caterpillar. No seriously, it was a simple black and brown one slowly crossing the path, like the 50 others we had already seen. OK!?!?!? We got about 5 minutes of laughter out of it...so have all my friends I have told...ONLY IN WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS!

Not all apples are created equal...

So, being in New England, I have learned of the GREAT apple tradition here. Apples are HUGE! (as in big and a big deal) Apple picking is an activity in which many New Englanders participate. A good friend of mine went apple picking (2xs) and returned with so many pounds of apples I can't even start to estimate the mass. So, yesterday, she had her own apple festival. The apples in the picture are only a representation, not NEARLY all of them are shown here. I showed a bit late, but it was seriously an all day activity: making apple sauce, pies, turnovers, the butter will be finished today...and who knows whatelse we were in the process of making. (I was there for 8 hours myself...making the apple sauce, turnovers, and funny objects with the left over crust :)!) She makes these goodies and gives some of the goodies away, but she will freeze the pies and turnovers, uncooked, for a later date. Apparently, even though she makes a dozen or more pies, they don't make it till Thanksgiving :)! I'm sure this year I will help in making those disappear before pumpkin pie time! Another GREAT New England traditional experience...that ends this time in having YUMMIES!

Chasing the little white ball, in the rain, in VT

On Tuesday afternoon, I got a call from one of my friends up at Mount Snow asking if I could make a foursome on Thursday in a charity golf tournament for a fellow ski instructor who passed away in an auto accident long. Of course I said yes! So, Thursday morning I calmly left my house at 10 o'clock and drove only 1.5 hours to a wonderful course in central Vermont. The pictures in the show are not really capturing EXACTLY what happened, but while the course was wonderful, the weather was less than ideal. You'll notice that the weather goes from sunny and gorgeous to dark and gloomy. Imagine that when it is dark and gloomy it is also POURING! I have never played in such weather. In fact, the mountain across the valley from us (Okemo Ski resort) ended the day with a dusting of snow on the top! WOOHOO! Only fitting for a bunch of ski instructors to be out playing in such weather.

This is a picture of my winning drive. You can see two yellow markers: the one closes to you, the viewer, is the men's drive, and the one about 15 ft back is marking where mine stopped. In scramble tournaments, if you don't know, there are contests within contests, and I think we missed the closest to the pin shot, but this one we didn't, although the story is funny. I was walking down the fairway, thinking, WOW that was a beautiful shot, I might be the longest drive in my foursome. Sure I started about 30 feet in front of them, but wow, wouldn't that be cool. As I approached I was recognizing I was the longest ball in my group, so I was feeling pretty happy, especially because this had happened at one point when a strong, cold cell had moved in and it was so wet I could barely see. We all gathered around my ball when one of the guys said, hey, you have to mark that. Uh, with what, what are you talking about (still focused on the fact that my ball was being chosen for play on a LONG drive situation)...with the long ball stick. Oh, well it is up there about 10-15 feet already...no no, not that one, that one is the men's...you need to go back and get THAT ONE (he points rather dramatically). WAH! I had walked right passed it about 40-50 YARDS back! So, I went and got the WOMEN'S stick and marked my ball with pride :)! Turns out I won, and everyone after us had seen my mark and was VERY impressed. As were the other Mount Snow team, who won the tourney. So that means that 8 of us went and 5 of us left with goodies from the proshop (I got a $35 dollar coupon at the shop!). Hope I get to play next year...I'll mark my closest ball too, because I KNOW I was closer than the woman who won, I just wasn't paying attention! ;)

They might give me a heartattack, but...

here is something we can "rise and shout" about...sorry, BYU fans, I just had to.

Utah (6-0) is the first team to become bowl eligible this season.

I know it is because the bowl qualifications are soft (6 wins, please!) and because we played on Thursday (hey, I didn't make the schedule!), but that is kind of a cool thing for a little ol' school like Utah to be able to say after beating (albeit after time had expired) the team (Oregon State) who just knocked off the number one team last week, in USC! A win is a win is a win...I'll take it and the becoming bowl eligible first. What about a UTAH/BYU national championship game? Too bad they play each other in league or that could be awesome! GO UTES!