legionnaire

Well, I've returned from Vermont, alive and unharmed (save a little bit of windburn.)

The trip was really really fun, each day was better than the last. I went up on Saturday afternoon with my friend Vera from Philly, and we got into South Burlington around midnight. Feeling like we needed to get a drink, we asked the night clerk at the Best Western where we were staying where to go. Apparently, the only place within walking distance that was still open was the Holiday Inn bar, so we walked over there.

It was hilarious - every single person in the bar was white, and you coud tell immediately by looking at the dance floor. The band was awful as well. I just wished I could have provided a video feed so everyone could appreciate the hilarity. Two guys tried to pick a fight with me, despite the fact that I was just sitting at the table with my friend, drinking a beer and not saying anything. I've noticed that for some inexplicable reason I seem to inspire some deep-seated ire in the hearts of your typical proto-simian American male. I've never understood it, but I've learned to live with it.

Anyway, the next day we went skiing at Mad River Glen. It was freezing cold, around 0 degrees at the top with 15-20 mph winds. Vera's just an intermediate skier, and the coverage on the black diamonds wasn't great (no snowmaking at Mad River) so we stuck to blue squares. It wasn't bad, a good warmup day, but we only got in about 4 hours of skiing, it was all we could handle with the snow.

That night my other friends Mark and Cynthia arrived, and we had dinner with them and went out drinking late into the night.

The next day Mark, Vera and I headed over to Stowe to check that out. It was better than Mad River (albeit much more expensive) and had a lot more snow. Also, the weather was picture perfect, about 20-25 degrees, ideal skiing weather. Stowe has more terrain than Mad River, so we amused ourselves checking out a bunch of different runs, and Mark is about my level so I had someone to challenge me on mogul runs.

That night we went out for dinner and drinks again. Unfortunately at this point I started to realize that my friends Mark and Cynthia, who have always been lots of fun, have sort of degraded into full-blown alcoholics (3 drinks before dinner, 3 drinks during dinner, at least 3 after dinner, than buying a six-pack on the way home to drink in their hotel room before going to bed as standard routine.) It's kind of sad, I can see it start to wear on them both, but it's kind of a hard thing to point out to someone.

So after going to bed (I only managed to have two beers the night before, before I was so tired I was ready to pass out) we got up the next morning and decided to make the extra-long trip to Jay Peak (it was about an hour and a half drive each way.) My first question: Why has no one ever told me about this place before? Jay Peak is amazing - easily tied with Sugarloaf for the best skiing I've ever had on the east coast. It's like western style skiing - tons of terrain, tons of snow, and not crowded at all. Their big thing is "glade skiing," which is trees that have been thinned out of all their brush but they keep the trees there - they encourage you to ski through them, and it's well worth it. It was amazing, so much snow, so beautiful, no one else around. I'm definitely going back there as soon as I can.

So here I am, back at home after the 5 and a half hour drive from burlington, feeling tired but oddly a little wired at the same time, and ready to get back into my work routine tomorrow and get some things done.

I hope everyone else has had a fun week, and I'll talk to you all soon.