Ski Bum Poet

Most of you reading this probably already know that Shane McConkey passed away on March 26, 2009. I never had the opportunity to meet him, but Danette met his parents once through Jim & Elfrieda Shane (We both heard that he was named after the Shane family and former owners of Goldminer’s Daughter in Alta. Can anyone confirm that?).

At any rate, our deepest condolences to his wife, 3-year old, other family and all his friends. From what I know he made an incredibly positive impact on countless people (not just skiers). Here are a couple of tribute vids on YouTube…and there is also a tribute web site: ShaneMcConkey.org – R.I.P.

UPDATE: I saw on Facebook a great tribute page from Powder Mag. They listed some more links at the bottom including Matchstick’s official statement on the accident.

…we’re cozy in TL riding flexible flyer sleds, eating soup and feeding goldfish And this eve I’m heading into the Uinta Forest for some slednecking. I’ve been thinking about our friends and all the other Altafarians that have been unleashed on the powder this week. Glad for ya’ll.

I noticed a friend’s status update on Facebook earlier, and looks like the town of Alta was in maximum interlodge this morning. This means that lodge guests and employees were in basements drinking coffee in bathrobes. Doesn’t surprise me, it has to be scary up there now…A week of full-on spring sun, tons of soft powder snow, and massive wind load.

Maybe we’ll see ya’all on Saturday for some ski riding…

A conversation with Ellie (our 19 month old) about goldfish, silliness and more…

“A short tour through the visible universe that we can see so far.” Worth watching. In the end it essentially draws parallels between brain cells, and the universe (and virtually everything else beyond a molecular level). This intrigues me because as I child I often had dreams about reality as we know it (or the “Universe“) existing within the brain of an intellectual being of some kind.

…now go build a campfire in the desert, and sit late into the night starring into it thinking more about all this

I noticed on Alta’s pics of the day today they were featuring Grant Howard, son of Alta patroller Sam Howard. The caption to the photo (which is below, BTW) reads “Alta local Grant Howard 2nd Place at Junior Freeskiing Nationals”. Wow…Congratulations Grant! In fact, I checked out the results PDF and for age group 12-14 Alta locals took the top three spots! On the podium with Grant: Riley Rose (1st place) and Casey Rose (3rd place). Also, Tasha Heilweil from Alta took 2nd place in the Ladies Age Group 12-14. I think some young men and women are on a career path already

Altafarians in full force. Way to represent you guys…

I’m over it. At least what we’ve come to know as driving. We went through the first year, with our first baby, 25 miles round trip (and about 1500 vertical feet) from a grocery store. Not complaining, we knew what we were getting into. It was fine, in fact great, when it was just the two of us (and we both had jobs away from home). But dang, it’s pretty far driving in to Heber on a near daily basis. Time to re-think.

Of course this doesn’t include the driving we do to hang out with friends, or ski at Alta.  It’s an awful lot of time in the Tacoma. I think I can speak for Danette as well when I say we have had enough “day-to-day” time in a car, for a lifetime.

Driving back from a killer ski day of cold smoke and sun in Alta yesterday, I was really REALLY making some people mad. And it was because I was going the speed limit on I-80 – 65mph. I was sore, tired, content and relaxed. Just obeying the rules that our “culture of obedience” maintains so thoroughly.

So all you “hurry up and wait’ers”, please read this:

I have recently acquired a TomTom GPS in car navigator. Amongst its many astonishing features, it has a display on it that shows you your estimated arrival time for the route you are traveling … Now here is the kicker; I used to routinely travel at 130% of the speed limit everywhere … I thought that I was keeping myself alert and saving time. My TomTom, however, disagreed. In fact anywhere I traveled (and I routinely drive more than 100 miles) I would only shave off 5-10 minutes of the estimated arrival time! 5-10minuts of time that is then wasted because I wasn’t late to start off with!

Since then, I adopted a new way of driving, I never speed.

5 reasons to drive slower:

• Save gas.
• Save lives.
• Save time.
• Save your sanity.
• Simplify your life.

Danette found (by way of The Wish Jar) an excerpt from a novel by Rick Bass. I really like this, and it has helped push through the winter here in Timberlakes.

Snowflake Image Thanks to SnowCrystals.com

“There’s a point where you can give up on winter–when temptation can enter your soul, prying its way in like cold air through the cracks in your cabin–around January sixteenth or so, and this can make you realize that February’s coming, and beyond February, March.

See, I don’t yet realize that March will be the hardest month. Early February’s the coldest, and often the snowiest, but March, strange, silent March, will be the hardest.

The danger in yielding to thoughts of spring–green grass, hikes, bare feet, lakes, fly-fishing, rivers, and sun, hot sun–is that once these thoughts enter your mind, you cant get them out.

Love the winter. Don’t betray it. Be loyal.

When the spring gets here, love it too–and then the summer.

But be loyal to the winter, all the way through–all the way, and with sincerity–or you’ll find yourself high and dry, longing for a spring that’s a long way off, and winter will have abandoned you, and in her place you’ll have cabin fever, the worst.

The colder it gets, the more you’ve got to love it.”

Rick Bass, excerpt from “Winter: Notes from Montana”

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No pics but I thought I would report that I stayed the night outside of Moab last Saturday, and rode with a serious crew. We camped about 3 miles up Gemini Bridges road, and never even made it to town. That’s my style. REALLY perfect weather. 60ish during days, 30ish during the night.

Not much relaxing to be had though on this trip, at least not for me. Drove down with Kris Gray and his neighbor Jake. Was hoping for some chill time at camp and maybe two ten milers, in two days. But…

Instead, we got there and were rushed off on a 25 mile crank with a large climb to 191 from our camp on Gemini Bridges Road. And yep, that large climb was there to tackle at the end of the ride as well. I was easily 40 minutes behind everyone else when said and done. Basically walked up the big climb back to camp. Oh and the 4 or 5 mile spin on the highway, south back to camp, was pure BS. Not sure who decided that would be the way to go but oh well.

In all fairness I did have have the chance to bail earlier in the ride, and looking back, I probably should have. I was a waste case at camp. Bonked and sore. Stumbled around holding various things in my hands that I didn’t need when I first pulled up. Couldn’t think straight, was trying to figure out what to do next. Finally I just dropped everything, walked over to the kitchen, and had a sport beer and an orange. Suddenly I could think straight again. Ha. So I went about recovering with about a gallon of water and more food than I knew I could consume in an evening time frame.

The group consisted of a bunch of great guys and girls, who all knew one another through work relationships and friendships tied to the Wild Rose Bike shop in SLC. But I couldn’t hang with the riding. The 29er, and the culture around that style of riding, is still way new to me. Plus I’m not in pedal shape. At all. So when my bike broke 5 miles into day two of riding I was ok with hobblin’ back to camp and hiking around in the canyon we were camping in. Good chill time to think, reflect and plan for the coming summer.

Camping in the desert at the end of February gets an A+. But trying to hang with that crew, and my lack of preparedness, scores a D on the riding. Apparently they ended up on a sweet single track at the end of day two, so maybe I could have graded the ride better if my bike didn’t break.

All in all though, I am fired up on the 29er. It’s fully rigid and I feel really pure and powerful on that thing. As soon as I get more pedaling behind me this spring, it’ll feel better yet! I need to be forced fed some fitness