badmigraine

Come on, guys. X-ray vision? Ever seen an x-ray? You want to see skeletons? I think the ability to fly would be my choice, but it was a tough call. For a long time, I thought the ability to defecate in big wads of the local currency would be enough for me. Say a minimum of about US$5000 per stool, at the current LIBOR rate, adjusted for inflation of course to 2003 dollars. I drop one almost every day, say 5-6 per week, so even if constipated that works out to $100,000 per week, or $1.2 million per year. Keep in mind a lot of this would be tax-free too because I don't t

Different cultures have evolved different manners of conceiving and expressing individual emotion. Just as it is commonly said that women are light-years ahead of men when it comes to thinking and feeling about relationships, so are some cultures rife with the means of expressing feelings while others rigidly limited. Look at Italians for example. Not only is it normal to go around expressing deep feelings and opinions about feelings, they also have an entire range of sophisticated as well as vulgar means of expressing them. Watch a couple of Italians at a cafe. Even without hearing

Here's a thorough long read about the deadly avalanches in British Columbia this season. http://outsideonline.com/outside/features/200304/200304_thin_white_line_1.html

I've never lied in my life.

What's the most I've drunk in one night? Though I may not be able to beat some of your beer/booze drinking records, I think I can safely say that there is one thing which I've drunk more of in one night than anyone here... When the Japanese/Columbian dominatrix who was my girlfriend in LA in the early 90's told me to drink a certain special liquid, I did what she said, as many times as she said, just to avoid another whipping! Those were the days. I can't believe I left that relationship just to go to Japan...

And she was wearing a black string bikini!!

I refuse to admit or deny anything. By the way, did I mention that I dated Lucy Liu a couple of times (lunch dates)?

Amazing how the US has bungled it so badly that a nation whose corrupt, sadistic leader is despised by his own people and the entire Arab street ( including Bin Ladin!) can seem like the saintly victims while the US appears as the evil bully oppressor. Leave aside for a minute any issue of whether this war is justified or wrong or what have you: the sheer ignorant incompetence and blockheaded stupidy of the US leaders boggles the mind. What a total and colossal failure...emasculate the UN, destabilize the entire world order, blow up yet another third-world country of people whom fir

"Tsumaranai mono desu ga..."

And Mogs, we have to work on improving the dollars-to-days ratio. I am hurting after the expense of visiting the Goods. If I am in the US next winter, I will have this sussed out.

Kambei, no problem stepping into Flows on the move. It is a bit trickier than clicking into regular step-ins for 2 reasons: 1. Your boot has to slide into the rat-trap or footstrap area from behind, instead of coming straight down from above, as in a Clicker, Switch or Burton SI system for example. This was no big deal for me after the first few tries, but I did almost wipe out at first because it is not a movement I had ever done before while skating. 2. You have to bend down and flip up the hi-back. This was easy enough for me, but I envision falling on my face 1-3 times

And before I forget, senior year Jennifer Beals ("Flashdance") was sleeping with a guy upstairs from me. We'd see her go up the stairs around 3 pm, hear the bed banging, then see her flounce off a couple hours later. And Jodie Foster was in a couple of my discussion sections of "Freud and Philosophy" or maybe it was some class about semiotics.

Just to remind everyone who forgot the last time I mentioned it, I went on a few dates with Lucy Liu back in the late 80's when I was a law student and she an undergrad at the U. of Michigan. The day I first noticed her, we were hanging out at Fuller Pool. And there she was in a skimpy black bikini. My friend was going to go over to talk to her, but I beat him to it! He was so mad, he took off in the car and I had to walk home. It was worth it though. In those days she wasn't famous of course. Just looking like herself and being a lot younger.

Riding with Mogski can be like riding alone...he goes so fast that unless you floor it you will soon be on your own! YEAH!!

snowboard_freak, I have the boardercross ones (stiffest) and the all-mountain ones. I use the boardercross ones because I like a stiff hard fast (remember, I have to keep up with Mogski, a skier!) unforgiving ride where the edges slice as clean as you please and you can see the smooth, long trenches in the snow when you ride back up the lift. My sis is currently "borrowing" the all-mountain ones, but I doubt she will ever give them back. The first time she tried them, she noticed a difference and now is less wary of ice and hardpack. Rather than write a lengthy disquisition on how t

Well, Ocean, if it makes you feel better, getting into Flows in deep powder would involve some brushing out of snow that would soon go back in again...just about every binding is hard to use in that kind of snow. I would say that having so much snow around that bindings are hard to operate is what technical experts call a "Happy Problem". I picked up a pair of Burton Rulers today...on sale for $120. They seem to hold the foot down just fine!

http://www.skijapanguide.com/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=003847

The rented Chevy Blazer wove back and forth over the yellow line as the rolling tink of an empty soda can under the seats punctuated the silence. It was nighttime rush hour on the fringes of Salt Lake City. After a big dump day at Snowbird, the mood was "pasta/garlic fix". "I could have sworn it was around here, on the right..." I said, staring out the side window. The Blazer drifted across the line toward a forest of oncoming headlights. Seventy wandering minutes later, the Blazer coincidentally re-appeared on the same street. This time Mogski is at the wheel. "I thought

...but not on others?

Today we got some "Youth size 5" Burton Ruler boots for my wife, for only $68! The adult ones are $179! Great news! Now if she will only agree to wear grown-ups' underwear from Victoria's Secret!

eruption

Reading some of the comments here, I get the feeling some posters haven't yet experienced the kind of terrain I am talking about, or they ski/board a different style, or they are still near the beginning of their great lifetime voyage of sliding and haven't yet found enjoyment on this type of terrain. It sounds like this may even be a theoretical issue to some. Folks, I am not talking so much about extreme backcountry avalanche terrain here. Rather, I am talking about pretty much the same old mountains we ride even in Japan, but you can just come down anywhere you want in the resort area.

Yeah, you're right, we have to start somewhere. But when I first read this article a couple of months ago, it seemed to me to be not only a very small, step, but also a step in the totally wrong direction--a step toward even more unnecessary regulation and predatory, tiered pricing practices similar to that mountain where you still have to buy a 1,000 yen license to snowboard. I think we should start somewhere else, this approach is all wrong. First, it perpetuates the rather Japanese myth that it's required to have an elder of unquestionable, liver-spotted authority pretending

I've no hope for a better solution or even any solution to this problem in Japan. After boarding this year at Park City, Snowbird, and Brighton in Utah, at Sierra-at-Tahoe and Squaw Valley in Tahoe, and Big Sky in Montana, the situation in Japan seems even more absurd. At those resorts, there is hardly anywhere roped off. You go up the lift and come down where you like. If it is roped off, it's because it's a rock field that will ruin your base, or it's an impassable course with a cliff or a long uphill runout. At some of these resorts, it's hard to make any distinction between

I strongly prefer silence and the sounds of nature...the wind passing through the pine branches, the occasional bird, the subaural hiss of falling snow blanketing the mountain. Music is distracting and an annoyance to me on the slopes. It ruins my rhythm, prevents me from hearing other people slicing thru the soft snow or scraping toward me on the ice, and adds extraneous/unwelcome emotions, thoughts and images to the mountain experience. Lately I am sliding in places and at speeds that require full concentration and maximum muscular effort. Unless it is draining, scary or demanding,