Reasons for Thanks

I talked with the doctor today and my Fibula has healed well.  (with the help of a lot of screws) The Tibia is still awful looking, but I can now put full weight on the leg!  When looking at the X-rays, the doctor pointed out several pieces that he said he was literally putting and holding in place with his thumb during surgery.  There were so many splinters of bone it was a complete jigsaw puzzle.  Bleh.  It still looks pretty bad to me, but to the doctor, who honestly is the only one that knows what bad really looks like, it has healed enough for me to walk a couple of weeks in the boot without crutches.  After that, I'm free of all this.

Now that I'm limping around without the crutches, I'm thankful for several things, and I'm noticing more and more by the hour.  I imagine that I will continue to notice things that I can now do that I just couldn't a day ago.

First of all, I'm thankful for all the people that helped me through the worst of this mess.  Thanks to my friends who got me home from Montana, my wife who has since driven me everywhere for the past 9 weeks and has put up with my numerous lows in dealing with this.  I also need to give some thanks to the people at work that helped me get through the day when I couldn't carry anything.

Things that I am really happy about:

1. I can walk/limp without crutches.  (Now would be the time for one of those awesome pimp costume canes)

2. I can DRIVE again!  (I think that Brenna may be the one more thankful in this particular case.)  I might hug my Honda when I get home, but the 2 feet of pollen coating it would just make that idea gross.

3. I have been cleared to get back on my spin bike!!  While it's not riding through the trees on my favorite possessions, it's a major start down that trail.

4. I can carry my own coffee back to my desk at work without fear of wearing it or endangering others.  (one of those small yet oh-so-important elements of every day life)

5. I can walk down stairs instead of scooting down on my rear end.  (I won't feel like such an invalid but the kids won't like that I'm harder to catch and climb on.)

I'll stop now, but life is getting back to normal and I feel encouraged that I will be able to do something aside from sit by a pool when I head to the deserts of Nevada and Utah in 6 weeks.  Now I have to get stronger, drop some couch surfing weight, and get back to life as normal.

A comparison but not really...

A fellow co-worker was reading through this blog and compared me to Evel Knievel.  Heh Heh...

I enjoy fast paced and somewhat risky sports but I'm hardly a daredevil.  Just look at the Red Bull website or any number of GoPro videos if you want to see what I do NOT do.  Well, at least things I don't do anymore on the skydiving front...It's official though, I injured myself much less falling out of airplanes/helicopters than I have done in several other sports.  I only broke an arm in 10 years and 730 jumps back in my skydiving days.  Hence, Skydiving is way safer than wake boarding, road and mountain bike riding, ice skating (lame story), and skateboarding down stairs.

And NO there is absolutely nothing wrong with my statistical sampling there...so just take your mathematics degrees and stuff them.

In the humorous moment of thinking about the comparison of me to Mr. Knievel, I went to the one source that could give me some random trivia for the day.  Al Gore's interweb* thingy directed me to this other thingy called Wikipedia, which I guess is becoming the repository for all of human knowledge and will eventually become self aware like Skynet  and destroy us all... 


Back to my random trivia after a collection of tangents.  Sorry.

Evel Knievel broke a lot of bones...and by a lot I mean, “The 433 broken bones he suffered during his career earned an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records as the survivor of "most bones broken in a lifetime."[2]” Wikipedia: Evel Knievel

Holy Cow!  How did he even walk after his career was over...or did he?  In retrospect, I will probably break bones again since I don't really have an intention of quitting the sports I love, but I hope to hold out for at least a decade before the next skeletal catastrophe.  This current one sucks worse than any of my others.

I'll see a doc this week and see if I can actually walk without crutches anytime soon, and I'll badger him to let me on my spin bike.  I'll let you all know how it goes.

*No, Al Gore didn't actually claim to invent the Internet...He's just a typically self aggrandizing politician and not very good with phrasing in interviews during an election season.

Ski Whitefish Video!

Finally, Timewaster Studios has come through with another amazingly-awesomely-mega-super-fantastic video.  ah...yes, I'm somewhat biased about Timewaster Studio projects being awesome and all. 

I was only slightly bummed that I was sitting on the couch with a shattered leg and unable to actually get footage of the guys myself.  (Not that I would have been any better at praying to get a good shot as I hurtled down the slopes than the rest of the crew...but it would have been more fun for me.)  Yeah, I'm selfish I guess.

Never fear though my loyal readers and fans of Timewaster Studio projects!  I had my friends go out and ski with cameras strapped to them in my stead, and they filmed everything they could until the cold zapped the batteries.

Admittedly, it took me a while to give a rip about editing the video what with the accident and all, but there was some great stuff on there when I got around to editing!  Several hours worth of stuff actually.  As is the norm for most of my vacations, we had the GoPro's running constantly and the footage adds up.

Well, it's spring now so I'm positive it's the ideal time to get a bunch of hits on a winter ski trip video!

Enough with the rambling intro to this video.  I'm sure the gang has been looking forward to it, or they have all forgotten about it due to the length of time that has lapsed.  I just hope they didn't fall asleep reading the opening remarks here.

There...I'm done yammering...for now...

Enjoy everyone, and thanks to my good friends for the support!

Whitefish Montana - Post 2

The group of us had a great day on the slopes.  Snow fell off and on throughout the day and there was also some sun that made the powder snow sparkle on the tree lined slopes.  The trees themselves were brightened as the light hit the pillows of snow piled on the branches.  As I had heard about Montana, "If you don't like the weather, wait a few minutes."  It changed constantly from blowing snow and zero visibility to blinding sun and blue skies. 

As the second half of the day progressed, the group of us would separate and re-join for a few hours as we all skied and boarded what we could. 

I could have used the spiritual help 20 minutes after taking this picture...

On the second to last run Paul and I stopped by to visit Big Mountain Jesus.  A statue of Christ that was built to honor members of the U.S. Military 10th Mountain Division, and it has stood there for the past 50 years. As a side note, this memorial has been subject to some legal debate on whether or not to allow it to remain.  My opinion is that the local government should have the power to allow or reject the display based on local majority opinion even if it is on "Federal Land".  It's not like a 6 foot tall statue on a ski resort mountainside is all that obtrusive and offensive.  If you don't like it, either don't look at it or you are free to not ski that run.

Paul, Nathan and I took the last lift up to the top of the mountain as the lifts closed.  The clouds had socked in the summit and the wind was whipping snow off the peak.  It was a really inhospitable looking place, but our coats and gear just made it fun to look at.  It's strange to be standing in a place like that, and to be perfectly encased in clothes that protect you so that you are comfortable even when the world outside would try to kill you in a short period without them.  We skirted the peak and looked over the deadly looking drop-offs that were marked as black diamond trails.  I really wonder if dropping into one of those trails would have been any worse than what proceeded to happen.

(Important tangent for all you readers: this next part of the trip sucks way worse than the eating heaps and heaps of humble pie as mentioned in the previous post, so if you have to choose...)

Down a trail from the summit,

Smiling,

Friends Nearby, 

Laughing,

Wind Rushing,

White Snow Made into Clouds,

Steep Rolling Trail,

Oh, NO!!! Off Balance,

Turn!

Save it! Save It!

A Red Flash.

Black.

Cold snow on my face...

Please, Oh Please, Don't Let It Be Broken...

And that, my friends, is about as choppy and rapid-fire as the last moments of that run feel when I recall them.  (and it's painfully obvious from that artful bit of writing that I'm not an English Major either, but I never wanted to have a job that required me to ask "Do you want fries with that?") 

Paul was first there and Nathan shortly afterwards to help as he had to come back up the slope a bit to reach me. 

I knew it was broken.  The leg moved in a way it shouldn't when I shifted it.  The concern on both their faces was evident.  Paul stayed with me and Nathan rocketed down the slopes to tell the Ski Patrol, and from that point began the one of the most limiting and agonizing injuries I have ever had.  Agonizing not so much related to the pain, but more related to my need to move and the need to be independent.  I am trapped for a time in a body that won't let me do what I want to do. 

The Erector Set

I sat in the snow for about 20 minutes with Paul watching up the slope to warn anyone coming down that we were in the way.  The Ski Patrol arrived (without the trumpet fanfare I had imagined for some reason) and they were skilled and really wonderful people.  We actually had a couple of laughs as they splinted me and loaded me in the sled. We were so far out on the mountain that they couldn't get a snowmobile up to me.  They helped me slide into some form of sled and strapped me in.  I was covered in a vinyl tarp to keep snow from flying in my face as they towed me.  We were flying down the mountain from what I could tell, and the sled would pitch violently from side to side as the terrain changed.  That rolled me several times onto the broken leg.  I could hear the guy say, "Sorry man." when it happened.  There wasn't much to do aside from just deal with it.

When we arrived at a ski lift somewhere along the trail, (I don't know which since I was totally disoriented by the sled ride) they attached the sled to a chair and sent us up the lift to where a snowmobile could reach me and tow me to the clinic. I don't ever want to have to make that trip again. Having a broken leg and getting tossed around in a coffin like sled was the stuff that nightmares are made of.

Nathan got this picture before we decided to pull off the ski boot.  Looking back on it, I should have paid for the boot right then and there and had someone destroy it cutting it off my leg rather than what we did.  It took two people to stretch the boot open as much as possible and then we all pulled. 

Take my word for it.  Don't ever do that

Nathan hung with me when I made decision to pull the boot off my broken leg in the clinic. The medic's comment about "You Bama boys are tough." when it was over did make me feel a bit better. I'm sure he has had the opportunity to see the worst in people when they are in pain.

Feeling better with my brand new full leg cast...and loads of pain medication...

The things I have learned and will now pass on to you so you don't have to do this stuff for yourselves: 

Seriously people, please learn this stuff on your own from here on out.  I'm done being the example.

If you are skiing and find yourself saying, "Hey, I'm tired, but I have one more run in me." At that moment you are supposed to just stop and come back tomorrow.  Always leave wanting more.  I believe that this rule may apply to many other sports that risk injury.

Unfortunately, I learned this lesson at the end of the first day of the trip, and after a lovely night in the hospital, I was back in the Lodgepole house where we were staying.

I want to take the time to give my absolute appreciation to all the guys on the trip (Paul, Nathan, John, Way, Carper, and Andy)  You guys are true friends and were wonderful to have around helping out after my accident.  I can't say enough good things.  It really meant a lot to have your company, daily ski stories, and assistance while I was there.  When I get out of this cast and can move again, I'm going to throw a massive party.  Carper...Uh...plane tickets?  I may have to delay catching up with you until I can make it out to Colorado.  It will happen though.

I also have to thank my wife and friends at the office for helping me out now that I have gone on for 2 months without writing about this incident.  I owe my wife a trip to Hawaii or something since she has been driving me everywhere for the past 8 weeks...if I can ever save up enough after paying for the erector set leg.

.

Way and John on the lift...Twins?  Nah...

I will have the video up in the next post, and I think it came together pretty well.

Thanks again everyone.

Snow in Whitefish (This was written a long time ago now)

I am an active person to say the least.  I am apparently also a fragile person (skeletally).  Which is a seriously messed up combination when I think about it.  I mean, how screwed up is it to have the desire to do the sports I do and then have a skeleton that shatters like so much glass when I make a mistake?

I went on my first serious snow ski trip with a group of guys as I noted in a few of my previous posts.  It was stellar.  The flight out, the beauty of the mountain.  The vast amounts of snow.  Trees coated with white powder so thick that they didn't even look real.  It was everything I had imagined.  But...there were a couple of points that didn't quite go as well as I had hoped.

Point #1: Humble Pie:

I don't like humble pie.  It tastes like a big pile of steaming....well you get the idea.  I went to Montana with aspirations of being able to pick up snowboarding like I have many other activities.  Pretty quickly and easily.  I mean, all those guys riding on the snowboard videos make it look easy!  I didn't have the right mindset, and the mountain knew it.  Nathan was very patient and stayed with me on what had to be the steepest "bunny slope" that could be imagined.  Not that it mattered.  His instruction was good.  My execution was pitiful.  I rode the lift up, and then fell.  (Not right under the lift like I had worried, but finding myself not being able to stop I had to do something...)  I then put the boots in place on the board and promptly fell over.  I also found that when I put the snowboard in the direction I wanted to go it went -- and by "went" I mean accelerating to 400 mph with only meager inklings of control.  *crash* 

Out of my element. 

I was seriously frustrated on the first run.  The second run was better although I nearly hit the lift tower on my descent.  That run showed promise, but as soon as I threw the board into a toe side turn I found myself face up with my ears ringing.  All the while I was thinking, "I could do back flips on a wake board, why is this so difficult?"

The third run had me gasping like a person that hasn't ever worked out in his/her life, but I could stop myself and turn for the most part.  Oh, and crash.  I had that crashing part of the lesson NAILED!!  Yeah baby!  Nathan didn't even have to teach me anything.  I was good at it like I was born to do it.  sigh...

We then took the lift to the top of the mountain.  There was no way I going to give into the fact I had only 3 short runs on a snowboard under my belt and should have given in and just taken the day on the bunny slope.  If I was going to embarrass myself and spend time beating my body into snowbanks, I wanted to have a long run of it. 

My vision was sparkling with the lack of oxygen and the panic of realizing that I had no business going up to the top.  The summit was socked in with clouds and blowing snow.  Visibility of maybe 20 yards at best.  Nathan and I managed to get lost even at the slow pace we were keeping.  He seemed to make his turns so effortlessly, and I was flailing around with my heart maxed out at 185bpm and sweating up a storm.  It turns out my first run down the mountain was on an intermediate blue trail that included sheer looking drop offs and loads of trees and narrow ski paths.  Wild times.

I crashed hard toward the bottom (for the bajillionth time) and bruised my knee.  I was done with the snowboard for the day on the 4th run.  Of course, I have some of my horrible performance on video, but the one part that I am really proud of I don't.  In the last segment of the run, we found the terrain park and some pure powder snow.  I actually hopped up on one of the wooden box slider features and rode it across and followed that up with 3-4 great sweeping turns on the board as I came to the end of the run.  It really felt good, and for 30 seconds, it looked like I knew what I was doing on a snowboard.  There is actually something to snowboarding that could be a blast if I practiced a little more.

At that point, I had eaten enough humble pie though for the day.  I traded in my snowboard for skis so I could ride the whole mountain with the rest of the gang that we had out there.  I planned on swapping back to the board in the morning and spending more time on the bunny slope.  Everyone else in the group was skiing and had been all over the mountain and had great stories of all the places I hadn't been yet.

 Off we went.

The blue trails were amazing and the black diamond trails weren't trails.  These so-called black diamonds were just sheer cliffs inviting a swift and sudden death.  Around us were vast scenes of Flathead valley and Whitefish Lake thousands of feet below, and the sun would glint off the lake and illuminate the clouds that clung to the mountain.  Even on the intermediate blue trails, allegedly gently sloping runs had a tendency to just disappear in front of you.   After a moment, you would realize that the trail didn't end, it just got that steep.  I skied pretty well and felt confident doing it.  I determined it was a great idea to split the day between the board and skis. 

Whitefish lake below on an intermediate slope...

I have written and re-written this post several times now.  Not that it would make any difference to someone reading my stream of consciousness gibberish.  My attempts have gone from Negative to Positive to Pitiful, so I have decided to bail and give you a partial story.  You know... a cliff hanger...where the hero gets away, and the girl, and wins, and all that bull...

Ah, the bitterness...  Time to stop writing again...  It's taken me over a month to get this much together...  I hope you enjoy this blog...

The video is coming soon.  It also took me a month to even think about watching the stuff.  The Timewaster Studios project is close to complete, and it's a positive and fun piece.  I promise to get it up soon.

I'll leave you with the start of the last run of the day.  We had skied all over the mountain and decided make a run as the lifts were closing. 

cue the ominous music... 

Snow, Hikes , Math references, and Rocks... Intrigued? No wait! Come Back!!!

Yes it's true.  Snow will slow down a good hike in a big way.  I mean who can possibly go post-holing through hip deep snow and keep the same pace as one would during summer?  Well, while this first statement is completely true, it's not what happened to us.  We only had an epic amount of 4 inches of snow to deal with, but I'll maintain that our hike was slow-motion-ified even by this minute amount of white.

How could such a short and fun hike be so slow? 

Well, there were a couple of important factors which I will outline in one of the most important mathematical equations seen in years.  If you discount little ones like Relativity and Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem...

Children from the deep south + Snow = snail like progress and constant mischief

The sound of the kids yelling "POW POW Freshies!!!" echoed through the forest whenever they found untracked snow in a clearing.  As to the Pow Pow Freshies joke, you would understand if you watched loads of stupid snowboarding shows featuring overpaid 19-year-olds skiing impossible lines off cliff faces and speaking some form of ski-bum slang that I find amusing.

The kids stopped as often as dogs on a walk.  Picking up and throwing snow at each other was the real order of the day, so we were moving at about a mile an hour.  (that's a generous speed estimate there...)

Here is Brenna with her patient face on.  This was required because every few steps Aiden, without looking, would just chuck a snowball over his head toward anyone behind him.  You had to be paying attention or you were going to have it on your head.  He thought this was the funniest thing he had come up with...EVER.

We also discovered Aiden was putting the snowballs in his pockets to save them.  He was soaked pretty quickly but seemed completely immune to the chill.  There is something about kids and snow that makes them not notice temperature.

An example of the sneak attack snowball.

Notice that Ansley was not in any of the fight pictures. She wisely avoided her brothers to avoid becoming collateral damage.



As the snowball fights raged on, we were actually on a hike.  The idea, at least, was that we were heading up to Arch Rock in the Smoky Mountain National Park.

The hike followed a stream up to the arch which had been carved out of the limestone and shale over millions of years. It was very different than the examples we had seen in Utah's sandstone.  The rocks that made up the arch had a thin layered sedimentary look to it rather than looking like the arch was carved out of a more uniform piece of rock.  Each layer was .5-1 inch thick and looked really jagged where softer stone had been eroded away leaving the harder layers exposed.

We had to cross the creek we were following a few times and the kids loved the log bridges that we had to use.  I was just happy I didn't have to pluck a soggy child out of the creek...

We found the trail actually passed through the arch itself and we had to climb a wet and slippery series of stone steps to reach the other side. The arch is almost hidden from view by trees so there wasn't a good spot to actually get a photograph of the entire structure.  Here is Ansley descending back through the arch.

It was a 3 mile hike and took us just under 3 hours to complete, and I think with all the smiles that it was exactly the right speed.

Christmas - New Years and SNOW!

We did things a little differently this year...well not the part about being nearly killed by the avalanche of presents Christmas morning.  In the line of thought from the rapidly approaching ski trip, I might recommend the adoption of a Christmas Present Mountain Avalanche Rating/Warning System for the next Christmas season.  We wouldn't want anyone hurt or lost on such a festive occasion.  We could even practice Rescue and Recovery techniques prior to Christmas morning just in case.  You never know, and you just can't be too safe, Right?

Wow...now just look at that digression in all its brilliant glory.

Now for a few photos to move the story along...or perhaps this post is going to turn into a slideshow rather than having much of a "story".  whatever...

Opa reading The Night Before Christmas to the eager and attention span challenged children...

The stack of presents was phenomenal...  Hence my commentary on needing avalanche rescue training...

To keep the focus on the fact that it was Christmas and that we were there to celebrate the birth of Jesus, there was a Nativity play that the kids starred in.  No theater nerves among this crowd...

And no...the Nativity didn't include Iron Man...  No matter how much Aiden may have wanted it to...

We did things a little differently this year.  Normally will gather for Christmas in Atlanta, and have a great time hanging around with the family and extended family.  The unusual part was that we didn't head to play a ton of golf in Myrtle Beach or Florida.  We opted to head for the mountains instead!

Admittedly, I was a bit unsure of going to try to find snow in the deep south in December.  Normally, we bundle up with our heaviest coats for the two days that might be considered remotely winter-ish elsewhere in the country, so snow doesn't normally even cross our minds.  We took off for Gatlinburg Tennessee at the base of the Great Smoky Mountain National Park (Which turned out to be a place that I am definitely going to return to for some summer hiking.)

Look out Floridian drivers on ice...there should have been some warning flares or something...

I kept laughing to myself about our retired "Floridians" on the trip when they encountered snow.  Perhaps, I wasn't laughing to myself, because Brenna kept punching me in the shoulder saying, "Hey, That's my Dad!"

But we all know the story about when Bill put our van into orbit in Mexico on the speed bumps there,

so who knows what might have come to pass on that snowy road.  

Yep, that joke is still funny...and I'm probably not getting invited back anytime soon!

Lo and behold the morning was cold and the peaks of the pass we had to cross had been hit with a storm that put down about 5 inches of snow the night before.  

Who would have thought!  

And you would have thought the kids had died and gone to heaven.  We had to stop the car and got out to let the kids experience this interesting white stuff that they see so infrequently because they were trying to gnaw their way out through the car door panels, and my orthodontic bills are going to be high enough in the coming years.  I didn't want to find out how much fixing the car upholstery would be on top of straightening their teeth too.

You can imagine that it took about exactly .000267 seconds before someone began chucking snowballs...

Here is Bryce trying to decide if the repercussions of pegging me with a snowball were worth it...he didn't think long before pounding me with it and running!

Par for the course.  Family portrait with only one of the kids even remotely paying attention.

The house we stayed at was a cool place perched on the side of the mountain overlooking Gatlinburg.  I could really see that we would have had some trouble getting there if the roads had iced at all, but we were OK there closer to town.  The snow line was probably above 4 thousand feet, so the white coated the tops of the mountains around us, but not the roads we had to navigate.

The kids loved the fact they had to walk through snow that stayed on the porch to get to the hot tub.  Livin' large...

 I loved the view from the back porch and spent quite a bit of time just looking over the rail at the town and the Smokies.

I'll pause here in an effort to keep this somewhat short enough.  I'll post up the account of our snowy hike out to Arch Rock next, but I needed to get writing on this before it faded from memory and I ran headlong into the rest of the year.

There is some real beauty in this country surprisingly close to my house...

I hope you all had a great holiday season!