Skiing – Petersen's

We had an excellent day on Saturday skiing at Camelback with the Scouts. The weather was a very nice 40 – 45 degree day with clear blue skies. The slopes were loaded with fresh packed powder snow. The conditions could not have been better. In fact it very well may have been one of the best days, weather wise, of skiing that I’ve had.

We had 13 scouts join us. Their skill levels were as varied as it could possibly be. We had several first timers who tried either skiing or snowboarding. My son was able to join up with another scout who had similar skill levels. They took off for the intermediate and expert trails. I didn’t see the two of them for about two hours. The first time skiers were able to pick up enough skill so that by the afternoon they were able to come down the easier trails from the top of the mountain. We had one bad incident where one of the boys took a bad fall and injured his shoulder. He tried to get some air over a bump and caught the edge of his board. He landed on his shoulder. if it wasn’t for this one injury, the day would have been perfect.

Since we were a group, we were mostly in the lower Sun Bowl lodge. It was the first time I was in this lodge at Camelback. The food there was nothing to write about, but the parking and accessibility. Wow. I was parked within 75 feet of the lodge. Had I known how close and accessible it was, I would have packed a cooler.

The one memorable fall was with my friend Dave. He was wearing black ski pants and a blue jacket. We were making our way down the bottom part of the run when a newbie girl came down the hill and lost control. She came right behind him, interlocking her skis with his and giving him a great big hug. All I saw was this black, blue and pink blur with snow flying. After the fall, she bounces up all bright & bubbly and says “Oh my bad, so sorry” and skis off. Mean while, Dave is a crumpled pile on the ground trying to figure out what just happened. As he recovers and we regroup, I’m thinking “Gee if you were so sorry, why didn’t you help the guy up”. Of course I had more colorful language at the time. This is one of the drawbacks to skiing in the Poconos. Due to the close proximity of the city and the suburbs, there are a lot of people on the slopes who just can’t ski. They think that just because they can survive getting down the mountain that they don’t need lessons. Oh, if only Vermont wasn’t so far away…..

Well, there are some changes that are occurring in the house. Cathy has gone back to work, part time. She is really enjoying the challenge.

The challenge is actually two fold. One is being back in the work force and having to deal with a job. The second is trying to manage a household and the kids with a reduced amount of time. Since I’ve never been a fan of folding laundry, Cathy typically does most of the folding. Well, with time being short, you can guess the size of the clean laundry pile.

The kids are out of school today, tomorrow and Monday. And I have no idea why school is out. Seems like they are off from school almost as much as they are in. Since I have more vacation days than I can use, I took the days off from work to stay home with the kids, so Cathy could go to work.

With having a day off today, I pulled out the ski gear. I knew that I was going to have to replace both Jill’s and MJ’s boots. The local ski shop has a great deal on kids gear. I can pick up second hand gear and trade in last year’s stuff. I can keep them in correct fitting ski gear at a price that won’t bankrupt me 🙂 I was able to trade in their old ski boots and get correct fitting ones for $42 for both. The gear is ready…Now the clothing. MJ and Jill are trying on their ski pants and jackets. Very doubtful that I’ll get off easy withthe clothing.

Tomorrow there is a few things around the house that needs to be fixed. With Cathy off to work, I’m hoping we have time to do the fixin’ and go to either a movie or bowling.