Siem Reeves

できました!!! i am a geek... but anyways, just finished and sent in another vid of the weekend we just had... on the annual bus trip to hakkoda... a skier friend owns a bus company and takes our group "粉雪友の会"　for a weekend of fun, fun, fun! captain stag was behind the camera this time, so i get to make a brief appearance in the movie, my bung leg braced and holding up for a day of backcountry touring... but it was pretty sore by the end of the day...

Hell no, we have at least till golden week! i feel like i've got some catching up to do anyways... put out my knee twice this season so missed a few days, and my friend yuko is way better than me in the park! still hope to make it 50 this season... so that's about another 10ish more days...

there are definately expensive ones... all depends on brand, what they're made of etc... carbon fibre ones tend to be pricey... personally, i don't think it makes too much difference - mine are some sort of composite so they are the skinnier type (as opposed to the chunkier aluminium ones) but they were a pressie... captain stag has carbon ones, they were half price on sale ;-)

ahh, a good weekend at hakkoda... some excellent skiing... BIG slopes and fun times with good friends... not much video though! ;-) sent in a vid of Appi park and pipe from the weekend before last... unfortunately the girl in the movie is not me, that's my friend yuko! my excuse, i had a legitamately bung leg from a crash at hachimantai the day before, so was using a rather painful wedge to it's full capacity following everyone around in the park let it snow!!!!!

the most recent vid... bad religion... previous vids... the descendents... NOFX... and Cat Stevens (bet that was a difficult one to pinpoint )

thanks, i'll take that as a double sick i was a great two days, even if i spent half of sunday being the camerawoman... the computer nearly died and the new 250GB hard drive almost packed it in completely... horror thoughts of having to recapture a million different tapes nearly put me in tears not to mention all the work on this year's ski movie " title="" src="graemlins/cry.gif" /> but all is well now...

sent in a little vid of the weekend this morning, so stay tuned for some powder, rails, table and experimental camera angles...

got two season passes... both have photos... simple laminated ones... one place we have to get the barcodes zapped and the pass stickered everyday before we start (first day there ever three years ago it was like, what the hell!!! but got used to it now...) - and the other place rarely ever checks our passes... i've only had it looked at about 3 times since the beginning of the season...

has anyone seen the 30sec movies reinacted (that's spelt wrong, i'm sure!) by bunnies? they do titanic, the exorcist, the shining, etc. and pretty much sum up each movie in 30 seconds... anyways, i've just sent in "rabbits", last season's ski movie we made (about 40-50min long) and put on dvd (with chapters, menu pages and stuff too...) but a less than 1min long version...

four days off and off to hachimantai...

Finishing up our three years at the end of July... heading home to NZ for the rest of the winter, getting some qualifications, doing avalanche stage one, then heading to canada for their winter, skiing, working, visiting our friends... maybe staying on for a second winter... who knows? Then back to NZ to think about buying a house, decide what our dream in life is and do it... and i suppose kids will fit in there somewhere... but not till after we are thirty, and that's not for well over fours years yet...

i find woolly hatties are good for when you're chilling out in the building and when you're done skiing, but as i found out the other day when i went against captain stag's advice to wear my helmet, my head almost froze off ;-) i like the earflap variety of hat with dangly things. keeps your ears warm, and when it's really windy, you can tie the dangly things for extra security. obviously, i'm not that stylish, but it works for me ;-)

where did you go in hokkaido, ray? cheeseman:)... i bet it's all the cheese... i've been eating some of the real stuff lately, none of this funny processed stuff they call cheese here! can't wait till i get home and cheese is as cheap as chips!

freerides? sorry to be a dummy, i've just been to the gym so my brain cells aren't working... thanks for noticing i improved... in my first season in japan, i skied more days than i had in my entire skiing career - which started not long after capt stag came on the scene... so i was pretty happy. keep striving to get better i reckon!

captain stag got a cookbook for valentine's day (the shock horror from my students when i told them!)... it was jamie oliver's happy days with the naked chef... i thought capt stag would appreciate the recipe for chip butties - one of his favourites... so in actual fact, he's quite accomplished at making them already...

i'm gonna be one of those people who add their two cents whether it is useful or not... the panasonic 3ccd works wonders for us... compared to our friend's sony, the picture quality seems to be heaps better (that's from editing footage from both cameras and viewing the results in movies i've made)... we have had problems with it needing a head clean pretty often... i don't know if that's usual... but it would do it at the most inconvenient times... other than that, good camera, good size, no other problems. editing... adobe premiere...

just wondering... (i have nothing to do while captain stag is at work and adobe premiere is giving me grief so i can't make the dvd for my students i promised them for graduation )i get a bit tired of immature comments and stuff on newschoolers (newschool skiing site) about girls being inferior skiers... generally, i think girls aren't as aggressive or as fearless as guys, but we aren't that bad, are we? what are your comments and thoughts? admittedly, my goal is not to ski "like a girl" and be more like the guys, but that's because i want to learn to ski harder, faster, and keep up

heaps of backcountry to be explored, some big steep open faces... but i went on a backcountry tour... and a bus picks us up at the road... a freaky amount of powder when the weathers good... definately go equipped... if you go up the ropeway there are two "courses" down the front of the mountain, but basically, everyone just heads down any which way... there is some nice skiing there too. If you are heading by yourself, or with friends who don't know the area, i definately recommend doing a tour (they do backcountry and some runs down the regular side of the hill), finding out the good places

the thing with bitorrents is that you can't avoid sharing, for example, if you leave the computer going while you are at work downloading... when it's finished, it just keeps sharing till you come home and turn it off. anyways, think i will avoid it from now on...

it was a pretty good movie... we watched it in our friend's van (which was parked next to ours) in the hachimantai carpark one night during our wee van camping ski holiday just recently.

my question is, if it was a group of four, how did they get split up? two found their way back, the another still missing?

heard this from a friend... "it was so sad, his sister said the last time they saw him alive, he was playing he was up the front playing with the gps..." a car hit them side on going through an intersection! seen plenty of kids with their heads sticking out of a van sun roof while the vans were driving at normal speeds...

taking a day off either side of that three day weekend to make a nice wee five day weekend... going to hachimantai, sleeping in my van with captain stag, skiing skiing skiing every day!

fresh bluff oysters in new zealand... although i like them battered and deep fried with some lemon... but apparently they are the best to be found back home...

so what exactly is wrong with accepting "huge numbers of refugees" then, 69? do you not think giving people another chance in life is a kind and generous thing to do? coming from a family who fled their country with their lives and the clothes on their backs, i think that japan could definately do with being a little more sensitive.