marylou

Um, it's my understanding the guy was skiing on alpine gear. If that is the case, he wouldn't assume he would need any survival gear. Duh. Or a beacon, since he was skiing alone.

gratin dauphinoise vichy carrots and a fried ham slice...I guess accidentally French, tasty in any case!

It's working, it's open, no chipping in needed. Come on over!

Two things: Officially the WTA supports Alternative E as CBS states. I will say however that internally it is a pretty contentious subject. Alternative E says nothing about decommissioning the road.There is no reason to believe that there might be an attempt to log up in that valley at some point. Personally I wouldn't have a problem with closing the road if it were to be permanent and if the area were also annexed to the ALW. Unfortunately I don't see that happening. Instead what we're going to get is a road that is only open to the inholders, and a huge amount of trail redevelopment up to the DMG area in order to make the trail accessable to stock.

RIGHT ON....wow that is incredible, look forward to seeing something on the news here in a bit.

By the end of spring: Avalanche/snow/backountry competent sometime this year: sell an article to a national magazine all year: continue to whittle away at pain management until hopefully it sits close to zero About as challenging and almost as important: work on getting more core strength, as it seems to be key to almost everything I do in my life

I have one of them there Mountain Hardware Transition tops, made from something they just call Gore Windstopper. It's not all that warm when you are standing around, and keeps you warm when you are working, which says to me "maybe windproof but not all that breathable." This is just from a month or so of use, maybe a half dozen times ski, so the jury is still out. The other thing of note is that it has a nice cut, which I like once it's on, but it is so NOT STRETCHY that it is a total pain in the ass to get the thing on and off. It's a good thing it performs well, or the fact that it is so hard to get in and out of the thing, well, if it was not great, I'd chuck it right out the window. Stretchy is good. My fat ass needs stretchy. Speaking of stretchy and wind-resistant, I just saw the other day that OR has some new gloves out that are stretch fleece that is also windblocking. I did the "blow test" and they were way more windblocky than your basic Powerstretch, could be interesting.....

Well, it looks like the doc was wrong....small muscle called piriformas in the hip rotator area is the cause of the pain. Gentle stretching and moderate exercise (hard to take it easy in this incredible snow we are having!) seems to be doing the trick. Hoping to do some ultrasound treatments in PT starting in a couple of days.

People at work today keep asking me "how was your New Year's Eve?" To that all I can say is that was the nighttime between two real fine days of skiing!

Matt: Just a couple of clarifications. Chainsaws are essentially banned from use in the Wilderness areas except in cases of massive downed trees, and then local land managers can make an exception and allow chainsaws on a case-by-case basis. I don't know the nuances of this rule, but if anyone else does, I'd like to hear about it. As far as NPs and the Wilderness Act, well, surprisingly, NPs DO have Wilderness areas in them, subject to the rules regs and spirit of the Act. MRNP has quite a bit of Wilderness in fact. It's interesting to me as the mission of the NPs is largely to share the natural legacy with as many folks as possible, and the mission of the Wilderness Act is to preserve the natural legacy. Kind of working to serve different ends if you ask me.

now!

Greg, you fail to see my point:

I think it's mighty unfortunate that a lease supercedes the individual's right to access to public land like this. That said, without knowing the terms of the lease for the land, all of this is mere speculation.

Yep, we heard ya the first 87 times you told us.

Okay, I'm a n00b so no snide remarks, but how can you tell B is skiing AT by his stance? I'm learning to ski the new gear and the only thing I'm really doing differently is staying really light on my feet. Still initiating and carving the same way, just (um theoretically) with more grace and precision than on regular old alpine stuff. And what is up with that K2? They make gear for all three disciplines and then they market them all against each other. Lame!!

and now I am hostessing a very quiet chat session!!

But it seems to be broken again.

On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me... chatter!

The snow has been pretty phenomenal the last week or so. I'm not sure how long I'll be able to follow doctor's orders on this whole "take it easy while the injury heals" thing, but whatever. Saw the infamous Beck at the ski hill last night. He's quite a fine little skier, that one.

Hi, thanks for all the input, who knew there was so much to say about a shovel? Took all of your thoughts, plus a few of my own, and went shopping today. REI has almost nothing in the way of shovels, but Second Ascent had a good selection of old and new. I ended up the a Voile XL, metal blade, nice and light, a little more $ than I wanted to spend, but as I've said so many times, the right piece of gear shouldn't be determined by cost. Anyway, what's forty bucks, really?

No, really, I would like to do better than that. I want to get something that is good, and will last me a long time. Hopefully it will make the work of digging a pit as easy as it can be. Budget is a poor standard for buying gear, IMO.

Besides skillzz, which is an ongoing project, I am now almost outfitted for the BC. One thing I still need to get is a shovel. Any thoughts on types, materials, brands?

Saw the doc. He's pretty sure I tweaked the upper end of my hamstring, given some ROM tests and questions. Looks like it will be the typical thing with some PT and some take it easy and don't ski hard for a while time.

just like the regular kind, only more dysfunctional.