For the most part the city of Las Vegas is irrelevant to my life, that is except once a year when I come here for the SIA tradeshow. It’s fine, I don’t really mind it. But after 47 or 48 hours the ready button pops and it’s time to get the fuck out.
So … about this year’s trip? Reconnected with my little Transworld family—Nick, Annie, Muzzey, et cetera—and went with the flow. About eight cab rides a day. Lots of old friends, lots of “what have you been up to”s? A three hour sushi dinner. Wandering though an empty shopping mall in Ceasar’s Palace at 2 a.m. enthralled by the Roman sculpture and ceiling murals. An award’s show. Coffee three times daily. Sore feet. Not enough fresh air.
Nick and Ben, two hours into the three hour meal.
Anyway, saw Draplin, saw Schiff, saw Bridges, saw Kelly, saw George, saw Mikey, saw Tina, saw Jessica and Brian, saw Bobby, saw Carboy, saw Huffman, saw Cartwright, saw Cody and Kim, and so on and so forth. But finally, when you’ve been socializing non-stop for two days straight under greasy, florescent lights with about zero alone time and also consuming more than average amounts of booze and less than average amounts of water and vegetables, you sit down for a second on the bed to rest and suddenly you don’t like anything anymore, everything seems dull and dirty and chore-like. And that’s when it’s time to go.
Huffman and Catwright—on to the next dance party.
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“Inshallah,” the feature article I wrote about last winter’s India voyage, was just posted to the WWW. If you’re here then you have time to fucking waste so go there and read. Also, surrendering my fate to the cosmos once again and boarding a plane to Spain in two weeks. I’ve been reading my Hemingway to get ready.
Photo: Bergeri
In other news, I cannot tell a lie. I got paid by ESPN to predict the women’s top three finishers for an “X-Games Preview.” Haha. Go here for the full story. Pretty funny how things actually turned out. Hey, I did my best.
My picks were this:
Slopestyle:
1) Jamie Anderson
2) Cheryl Maas
3) MFR
Wildcard: Janna Meyen
Pipe:
1) Gretchen
2) Torah
3) Kelly
Wildcard: Jamie Anderson
The actual results were this:
Slopestyle:
1) Jenny Jones
2) Spencer O’Brien
3) Megan Ginter
4) Kjersti Oestgaard Buaas
5) Hana Beaman
6) Kimmy Fasani
Zero out of zero! In my defense, Janna, MFR, and Cheryl didn’t even show up to the event. Not sure what happened to Jamie.
Pipe:
1) Torah Bright
2) Kelly Clark
3) Hannah Teter
4) Ellery Hollingsworth:
5) Kaitlyn Farrington
6) Gretchen Bleiler
Two out of the top three, not bad I guess. In my defense, Gretchen double scorpioned on her first finals run and didn’t make it back up to wage war on the other two.
Anyway, that’s all I have to say about that.
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‘It is awfully easy to be hard-boiled about everything in the daytime, but at night it is another thing.’
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Did you notice? It’s January. Nobody I know claims January as their favorite month, and I don’t think I even have to get into the reasons why. It doesn’t matter—what matters is that we endure. Below is a brief list of things that help get us (i.e. me) through these dark, dark days.
Happy Hour: It’s cheap, cheerful, and delicious. Besides, when it gets dark at 4:45 there is no reason to abstain from drinking before 5:00 and absolutely no reason to be awake past 10.
Rock Documentaries: Pete Seger: The Power Of Song, Patti Smith: Dream Of Life, Shane McGowan: If I Should Fall From Grace. They entertain, they educate, they inspire, and they remind you that compared to the truly great and talented you will never amount to anything in life.
Coors Light: It’s not because I’m from Colorado—it’s because of the frost-brew liner and the low alcohol content and the fact that it somehow makes most situations better, more festive, more poignant.
New favorite songs delivered from friends via iChat: It’s magic how they suddenly appear on your desktop like that. The Arcade Fire doing Talking Heads’ “Naïve Melody.” Galaxie 500, “Strange.” Wire’s “Used To.” The Zombies, “Whenever You’re Ready.” I’m a lucky woman.
Trader Joe’s California Rolls with brown rice: I thought non-sketchy grocery store sushi didn’t exist but I was wrong. Three bux. Comes with ginger and wasabi. Tastes sweet and fresh like the ocean breeze.
Spooning: One of life’s most excellent activities is only enhanced by the frosty January air.
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When it’s been raining and snowing and freezing raining and snaining and basically failing to get light out at all in the morning, when after doing that for about five weeks straight you wake up one morning and the sun’s out, it’s making a pattern on your wall and your cat’s laying there in a pool of it all squinty eyed, well then you look out the window and get all excited and the world is yours for the taking.
Billy pilots the frontside 5-0, Jamie is the hype-man.
Tony went up and around and down the triangle thingy. Awesome.
And so it was that we all piled in cars the other day with big plans to go down to Harrisburg outside Salem and skate the new Dreamland park there. Little did we know, about twenty minutes south of Portland a massive cloudbank had the land in the grips of freezing dampness. Basically, somewhere past Oregon City, we entered Spooky Hallow.
Out of focus. Head cut off. But still—you can’t deny the power of the frontside Smith. Jamie knows.
Billy. Air. Time.
But oh well, we still made it happen despite lack of sunshine and lack of proper attirement like hats and gloves and jackets. Rad stuff still happened and then we ate Mexican food and piled in cars and that is the end of the story.
Everyone is spazzing out in this photo and it is great.
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“Way far back in the beginning of the world was the whirlwind warning that we would all be blown away like chips and cry—men with tired eyes realize it now, and wait to deform and decay—maybe they have the power of love yet in their hearts just the same. I just don’t know what that word means anymore.”
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My washing machine stopped working on Friday night with all of my clothes and gallons of murky brownish water inside. What to do? I fished out the laundry. Do you know how much a fully soaked towel weighs? I rung it all out in the bathtub and hung everything up to dry, old school style. I then ascertained that the washing machine was, for all intents and purposes, fucked. It’s about thirty years old—it’s had a good run.
Anyway, I’m about negotiate a complicated maneuver this evening that involves picking up two boys I know, taking them out to southeast Foster where I’m purchasing a used machine off Craigslist, making them schlep the machine into one of their trucks, bringing said machine to my house, making them negotiate the old one up the steep spiraling staircase from my laundry room and then the new one down. Do they know what they’re getting into? I’m not sure. But as far as I’m concerned, they’re men—they were born for this.
However, with that said, I really dislike when things happen with my house that I cannot deal with personally. I’m a “single” young woman who owns a house, empowered and liberated etc etc, with pretty much no need for a man around to get things going. Still, when it comes down to it, I’m at the mercy of my 5’4” stature and weakling tendencies, and I’d be lying if that didn’t sort of frustrate me. Having to rely on other people kinda sucks.
Then again, there’s definitely an argument to be made for getting doors opened for you, flat tires changed, and heavy ass washing machines dealt with in a timely manor.
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Nine times out of ten I’m completely thankful that I live the life I lead, that my time on earth is spent in pursuit of fun and not work, that while most regular folk spend their lives on their asses at desks or in front of flat screen tvs bought with money earned at said desk, I have this creative outlet that is free and is a sort of communion with my body and nature etc etc. But then there’s that one time—that time when I fall too hard, too much on the same spot and it hurts just too much, and suddenly it all seems stupid and I’ll ask myself, what the fuck am I doing? I’m too old for this I can’t keep falling this hard my body can’t take it I can’t keep spending all my time hanging out with fucking teenagers doing something dumb with a board and my feet. Does that ever happen to you?
Anyway, beyond nearly biting my lip off last week when my face encountered the ground—and the night before that hanging up and ejecting onto my elbow, after all that, the most painful thing is that I just keep falling on the exact same spot on my knee. I’ve developed a knobby calcium-deposit protrusion at ground zero that takes my breath away when fallen upon. What is it? I’ve been friend-diagnosed as having this: Osgood-Schlatter disease—caused by activities that place repeated stress on the top of the tibia, the big bone in the lower leg, where the tendon of the kneecap inserts. An awesome new development!
But still, all pain aside, life is good for the most part and I’m sure I’ll just keep doing what i do because … fuck it’s all I know how to do anymore….
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Photo: Geery
When you get up early to drive an hour and a half for snowboarding, you don’t really want to hear that it rained last night instead of snowing 25 inches like the weatherman forecasted. You don’t want to hear it but you’re already awake which is the hardest part so eff it you go anyway. When halfway into the drive you discover something’s missing, you figure “I already made it this far” so keep going. However, when you find yourself in the middle of a windy whiteout at the mountain, things become a little more complicated. You see, no one gets hurt when you forget your jacket, but fun is harder to find. Thank god for trash bags from the restaurant in the lodge. Although, a plastic cocoon doesn’t really protect against gale force winds and cold, and there’s the danger factor of falling on said plastic and accelerating headfirst down the hill, which actually happened. Scary stuff. However, the nice thing about going riding is that you often encounter people you know up there, and so when Scott materializes at the top of the second run and just happens to be wearing two jackets (one for insulation!), he shares the wealth and universal harmony is once again restored. And everything works out. The end.
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Resolutions, do I make them? Fuck yeah I’m making them every day of my life. Here are a few things I’ve sworn to do lately:
Stop falling down so much.
Learn to turn off brain.
Eat more vegetables (French fries don’t count).
Get up earlier.
Drink less.
Write more.
Read more.
Live more.
Anyway, a fat lip from falling on my face, a swell-bow, and an indigo patch on my hip—that’s how I welcomed 2009. Thank you, Department Of Skateboarding. But beyond every bone and sinew in my body hurting from several days in a row of stacking, New Year’s was just fine. I didn’t go to the bar. I did drink champagne. I did dance. I did blow up some bottle rockets. I behaved myself and didn’t kiss anyone at midnight. I did spend some QT with good friends and laugh a lot and lose my camera. Welcome to 2009!
We watched the ball drop in Times Square and Derek kept yelling “That Dick Clark sure looks a lot like Carson Daily!” at the TV screen.
Some henna knucks tattoos were administered.
I busted Cougs trying to wear Lance’s pirate talisman.
Apparently ET found my camera ’cause when i picked it up the next day from Justin’s house i found this photo on my memory card.
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