You know you’re a local when:
A local bar owner entices you to come to a show by offering to buy you a shot, and you end up with two. You only have to pay one cover charge for two people. You pay two dollars for two beers (two for one!), and it’s a girl bartender. You don’t get IDed…ever. You...
Fast Times at High Altitude
I’ve said before that living in a ski town is like college, extended into our twenties (or thirties). It’s no real secret that my apartment in chaos tends towards frat house, and when we’re not working we’re drinking (and when legalization goes through, smoking). Reliving the glory days, again and again and again. Now that...
Strawberries
To be completely honest — I’ll make no bones about it (where does that expression come from, anyway?) — this winter has been lousy snow-wise. Some say it’s the worst in thirty years, some say longer. What’s certainly true is we’ve had less snow this year than any in recent memory, and somewhere around half...
Cliffs
I just returned from a three-day whirlwind trip to a few new ski areas in the south of Colorado. It was three days of extreme skiing, mostly for free (thank goodness for that Colorado Real Deal!), and quite a bit of mountain driving. As it turns out, the San Juans, which include most if not...
The Fallacy of Friendship
There is a peculiar fallacy of friendship in the valley. It goes something like this: I drink with you once and we’re best friends forever. [Party Hard, Rock and Roll (Drink Bacardi, Smoke a Bowl)] Here’s my number, what’s yours, let’s ride tomorrow? Right on brother, shred the gnar and hit the pow. (It’s like...
The Asshole
She hands him his $0.64 in change and as he walks away with his coffee in hand, he gestures towards the tip jar: “put it towards your college fund.” We turn and stare at him with our jaws dropped, and as his back is turned I flip him the bird. Perhaps inappropriate, but well-deserved. A...
Obligatory Ski-Life Metaphor
You either have so many choices—such a wide expanse of space, a million lines and a million options—or you have none: a death-defying, boulder-scraping drop off the end, a last minute bail to avoid a tree-trunk, one wrong step and it’s over. You choose your path, the wide frolic or the narrow chute. It’s harder,...
From the mouth
Best and worst part of being a ski bum: Bests: I feel like there is a lot of hustle and bustle in America that just doesn’t seem to apply to me here directly. Sure, lots of Americanisms do indirectly affect everyone living in USA. However, I don’t really feel the hustle and bustle. Life here...
Healthy dose
Being a ski-bum requires a certain tranquil austerity, a profound respectful regard for nature. Mountains are big. They are tall, they are cold, windy, icy, snowy, sunny, slippery, rock-ridden, tree-covered, precarious beasts of geology. Geology and nature, serene though they may seem, are unpredictable. Weather can turn at any minute, or a seemingly solid, soft...
A Ski Video: March 2010
Ski videos are as integral to the ski bum way of life as half-price pints of beer, dollar tacos, and hitchhiking. Please pardon the abominable, er, skiing.
Powder.
Powder days are what ski bums live for. Four, five, six, seven, eight, ten, twelve inches of fresh, fluffy, soft and forgiving sparkling dust from the gods. Powder days are a reason to call in sick, play hooky, get up early, stay out late, rock hard, dance hard, party hard, and pray hard for ever...
