Lots of Stuff

Hello everybody. This is only the third post I've ever done (I think). That's not very many. But I know you were all desperate to hear from me, so here you go.

Everything is going well way up here at the top of the world. It is finally starting to get cold and the snow just started flying today (if I finish this post before midnight, otherwise the snow started yesterday). My classes are going pretty well, although maybe not as well as last semester, but it’s ok, I’m still having fun. The Lake Superior Professional Rally was two weekends ago. It was up in Copper Harbor, so me, Ariel, and Chad went up to watch it and to do some biking. – I just got distracted by a music video on YouTube. – Biking that day was the first time I had fallen on my bike in a long time. I had just tightened up the laces on my shoes and felt good. Then I stopped halfway up a big rock sticking vertically in my path, unclipped my left foot, and fell to my right side because my foot wouldn’t GET OUT OF THE PEDAL (which is what I thought as I was falling to the wrong side). My knee landed on a rock, and I stood up cursing and hopping to the delight of Chad and Ariel.

Speaking of falling…

My parents just got me some new pedals, Crank Bros Acid 1. Jake says that he likes them, but only because they are green. The day I picked up my pedals, I ran to and from the store, while my roommate Tyler rode my bicycle. He had a meeting in one of the academic buildings, so I had to ride my bike back to the dorms (~200ft away). I had my box of pedals firmly in my left hand and the right side of my handlebars firmly in my right hand. This worked fine, until I decided to shift the left side with my right hand. Not good. At least this time it wasn’t. The bike wobbled, bounced, and then skidded to a stop on its left side, sending my box of pedals and my knee sliding across the sidewalk. (one went further than the other). All I could do was get up as fast as I could to start moving again, and wait for the pain of the road rash to set in. Ouch.

And now back to the rally race…

We only got to watch one turn. At our spot, the paved road continued straight, and a dirt road curved off to the left. The cars were supposed to follow the dirt road. We were on the outside, at the straight beginning part, and I had gone back to my bicycle to get food. From my new location, I could see the cars headlights as they approached the turn. I happened to be in that new location for the best time. The car I was watching was not slowing down. I went about 15ft past the dirt road, stopped, backed up, then peeled out as it took off in the appropriate direction. It was fun to watch the wave of people back up as the car neared them. No one would have gotten hurt, but it was cool to watch.

Everybody seems to be getting new stuff these days. Tyler just bought a new snowboard, with new bindings and boots. And Ariel bought new skis and bindings. She got Solomon Mai Tai’s. Twin tip, strong flex, and cool looks. I did get a new shirt out of it though, because I was at the shop the whole time and at the end asked the store owner/salesperson/the only guy there, if I could have one.

Ariel’s new skis brings me to a new point, a ski vacation to Utah, “nice” (said in a slow cool person tone). This year Ariel, Jake, EJ (Ariel’s brother), and I are going. Because EJ starts school on the 5th of January, we want to leave around the 27th of December, and stay until the 3rd or 4th of January. I was wondering if we could do Christmas sometime before then so that I could go too. Maybe if I tell you now, all of you can work on that, talk about it, and decide on some earlier day. That would be better; at least that is my thought.

So there you have it, another post by me. And because I don’t like trying to fit the pictures into the middle of the text, here are some in a different post. Enjoy.