Well, the ski trip went alright I guess. We stayed up in New Hampshire with some family friends. Actually, I didn't know what state I was in for like half the trip, hahaha- I thought I was in Massachusetts or something, since we flew to the airport in Boston. Well, I played a decent bit of Unreal Tournament and Quake 3 with the kid, who goes by "Mr. Mike"- cool stuff. It was like a 2 hour drive to each place to ski though, blehhh. The first day, we went to Killington; second day- Loon Mountain; third day- Waterville Valley. It was icy everywhere (that's bad), it just wasn't a very good year for snow anywhere in the country.
I'd actually already been to Killington before with my cousin & his college buddies like last year (I think. After awhile, every place starts looking the same, and you can't remember which year you went to which place.). Ummm, Loon Mountain had this really cool rental system; it was like all computerized and everything had barcodes- that's the only place I've ever seen that stuff. Actually, if I'd bought my equipment like years ago, I'd have saved a ton of money. I've skiied (& rented) enough times to pay it off probably like 4 or 5 times over by now. (I use the term "ski" pretty loosely. I actually haven't skiied in awhile, I always snowboard nowadays. But "ski" is just so much easier to say and type, so that's the word I use.) And the problem with renting your equipment all the time is that sometimes you get stuff that fits well, and sometimes you don't. The first day, I got these really terrible boots, and they gave me blisters on my feet.
On the first day, it was particularly icy, and coming down a black, I skidded out and like belly-flopped down about half the mountatin, hahaha, it was great(ly embarassing), hahahah! Oh, and I hate how when you ski, you get snotsicles- when snot drips and then freezes half in, half out of your nose (a pretty common occurrence, I'd say). And also on the first day, I hurt my finger like really really badly. it wasn't even a real accident, either. I was kneeling with my toe-side to the mountain, and was trying to flip to heel-side, and I guess I wasn't careful, but I bent my left middle finger extremely far back. It finally stopped hurting like yesterday, but now it makes a popping sound every time I squeeze my hand into a fist. ACK!
On the second day, on a lift, I started thinking about the whole idea behind skiing, and it all seemed kinda silly. I mean, seriously: a machine takes you up a mountain, then you come down the mountain, you repeat as necessary. It's terribly simple, yet people are willing to pay so much to do it. What's the point of it all? =/
Other than skiing, we visited the campuses of Wellesley, MIT, and Harvard. I don't really know why my parents wanted me to see Wellesley; it's like uhhh, you understand that I CAN'T go here, right? But oh well, we didn't stay long. We didn't stay long at MIT either. =( Such a pity- that was the only school I really wanted to see. We went on a Saturday, and they only have tours on weekdays, arg. We spent forever looking at Harvard- ehhh, it's pretty much exactly what I expected when I think of Harvard.
We also visited Lexington, and I got to thinking: were the Minute Men related to Minute Maid? =P Umm, yea, visited Walden Pond too, not really all that cool. Ehhh, well, I guess that springs from the fact that I didn't find (what I read of) the book Walden all that impressive either. The whole concept behind Thoreau's little excursion just didn't appeal to me. Quite frankly, I think living an ascetic life like that is just silly; if you wanted to deprive yourself of the benefits of modern society, you might as well be Amish or something, geez. (No offense to Amish people or anything. =P)
Oh, today, after we'd done everything and visited just about everywhere, my brother accidentally formatted the memory card on our digital camera. D'OH! And my dad had been such a pain in the butt the whole trip about taking pictures. Well, my mom had told me this anecdote earlier that day along the lines of: There was this guy who went to an estate sale, and was looking through this dead guy's photo album, and he realized that: a picture is really only valuable to it's owner. The picture reminds a person (or a few people) of an incident in their lives, and when their lives are over, that memory disappears, and the picture loses its meaning. Of all the pictures in the photo album, maybe the owner's kids would take a few, but the rest would be left there- a lifetime of memories that mean nothing. Like, my dad has one picture of his grandfather in his photo album, and to him, that means something. But even if he were to give it to me, I wouldn't know who the man in the picture was. The picture loses that much meaning with each passing generation. And well anyways, that's why my mom said she doesn't make a big deal out of pictures any more- because in the end, they won't really matter. But she said if it makes my dad so happy to take pictures, it really doesn't hurt too much to pose for him sometimes. Makes sense, I guess. =/
I'd actually already been to Killington before with my cousin & his college buddies like last year (I think. After awhile, every place starts looking the same, and you can't remember which year you went to which place.). Ummm, Loon Mountain had this really cool rental system; it was like all computerized and everything had barcodes- that's the only place I've ever seen that stuff. Actually, if I'd bought my equipment like years ago, I'd have saved a ton of money. I've skiied (& rented) enough times to pay it off probably like 4 or 5 times over by now. (I use the term "ski" pretty loosely. I actually haven't skiied in awhile, I always snowboard nowadays. But "ski" is just so much easier to say and type, so that's the word I use.) And the problem with renting your equipment all the time is that sometimes you get stuff that fits well, and sometimes you don't. The first day, I got these really terrible boots, and they gave me blisters on my feet.
On the first day, it was particularly icy, and coming down a black, I skidded out and like belly-flopped down about half the mountatin, hahaha, it was great(ly embarassing), hahahah! Oh, and I hate how when you ski, you get snotsicles- when snot drips and then freezes half in, half out of your nose (a pretty common occurrence, I'd say). And also on the first day, I hurt my finger like really really badly. it wasn't even a real accident, either. I was kneeling with my toe-side to the mountain, and was trying to flip to heel-side, and I guess I wasn't careful, but I bent my left middle finger extremely far back. It finally stopped hurting like yesterday, but now it makes a popping sound every time I squeeze my hand into a fist. ACK!
On the second day, on a lift, I started thinking about the whole idea behind skiing, and it all seemed kinda silly. I mean, seriously: a machine takes you up a mountain, then you come down the mountain, you repeat as necessary. It's terribly simple, yet people are willing to pay so much to do it. What's the point of it all? =/
Other than skiing, we visited the campuses of Wellesley, MIT, and Harvard. I don't really know why my parents wanted me to see Wellesley; it's like uhhh, you understand that I CAN'T go here, right? But oh well, we didn't stay long. We didn't stay long at MIT either. =( Such a pity- that was the only school I really wanted to see. We went on a Saturday, and they only have tours on weekdays, arg. We spent forever looking at Harvard- ehhh, it's pretty much exactly what I expected when I think of Harvard.
We also visited Lexington, and I got to thinking: were the Minute Men related to Minute Maid? =P Umm, yea, visited Walden Pond too, not really all that cool. Ehhh, well, I guess that springs from the fact that I didn't find (what I read of) the book Walden all that impressive either. The whole concept behind Thoreau's little excursion just didn't appeal to me. Quite frankly, I think living an ascetic life like that is just silly; if you wanted to deprive yourself of the benefits of modern society, you might as well be Amish or something, geez. (No offense to Amish people or anything. =P)
Oh, today, after we'd done everything and visited just about everywhere, my brother accidentally formatted the memory card on our digital camera. D'OH! And my dad had been such a pain in the butt the whole trip about taking pictures. Well, my mom had told me this anecdote earlier that day along the lines of: There was this guy who went to an estate sale, and was looking through this dead guy's photo album, and he realized that: a picture is really only valuable to it's owner. The picture reminds a person (or a few people) of an incident in their lives, and when their lives are over, that memory disappears, and the picture loses its meaning. Of all the pictures in the photo album, maybe the owner's kids would take a few, but the rest would be left there- a lifetime of memories that mean nothing. Like, my dad has one picture of his grandfather in his photo album, and to him, that means something. But even if he were to give it to me, I wouldn't know who the man in the picture was. The picture loses that much meaning with each passing generation. And well anyways, that's why my mom said she doesn't make a big deal out of pictures any more- because in the end, they won't really matter. But she said if it makes my dad so happy to take pictures, it really doesn't hurt too much to pose for him sometimes. Makes sense, I guess. =/
posted by Dear Daniel at 10:10 PM
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