Big December inc!

(For those of you who aren't up on the lingo on teh_intraweb (the internet), "inc" means "incoming"

First off, I got all the files and information transferred over to me for my new position, and I am now the Executive Director of the Alberta Music Education Foundation...and more than a little overwhelmed. What a lot of stuff!!! This is going to be quite the ride.

Woke up this morning and stepped outside and said "hrm...it's kind of cold". I then scraped off my car (as I've done already 2 dozen times, at least), and turned it on to that oh-so-familiar whine of protest. This was interesting; Jazzy (my car, thanks to the JZY in the liscense plate) hadn't complained yet this year when turning her on. A numbness creeping into my fingers and a quick look at the thermometer gave a very quick explanation why: it was -25 degrees. Holy hell.

While walking downtown, I made the mistake of taking a deep breath. Oh how I'd forgotten that lovely "lungs freezing" sensation.

Been out skiing about 1/2 a dozen times now. The hills are really starting to get into good shape. More lifts are opening every day and the snow keeps falling. Yesterday I went out with Dave and it was just a spectacular day. Some fresh powder on the ground, no wind, and not a cloud in the sky. I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera. There's really something incredible about skiing at 9,000 feet and looking around to see nothing but mountains and blue sky. Was a nice, crisp -15 or so up there. Cold, but not too cold, and cold enough that you don't start sweating.

Bonnie and I decorated our place for Christmas last night and it looks great. I'll try to take and post some pics tonight. Until then...

Woot!

Winter is definitely here. If that snowstorm last week didn't convince you, it'll be today's balmy temperature of -12 Celsius (about 10 Farenheit). Just check out this weather report!

http://www.theweathernetwork.com/weather/caab0016/


Nice and cold.



SO 2 big things to report. First, Sunshine opened up last Thursday, officially starting the ski season. A couple runs had been open here and there, but with Sunshine we actually had a full hill and some good snow conditions. Let me tell you, my new skis are just incredible. Good buys! Good buys!

Got up before 7 (for the first time in forever), had a nice Breakfast at Melissa's, and headed up to the hill. We got there at 8:30 and were skiing right at opening. Huzzah! Do you know what the first day of skiing on a ski hill that has had snow for over a month looks like? I'll tell you what it looks like : beautiful, fresh, wide open expanses of completely untouched powder.

We had full runs where the powder coming off my skis was hitting me at waist height or higher. How about that!! Here are a couple of photos for you








Maybe now I'll start to hear about some travel plans. You can't pass this up!

As we were sitting at the lodge having beer, we had a funny thought - we had been in that same lodge after a day of skiing less than 6 months ago. How about that? Didn't really feel like we'd left.

I actually tried to also take a picture of the powder going over my skis, to show you all just how deep it was, but alas, there was too much and it just shows up as a white picture. (how's that for pain and suffering?)


The other news is that I've taken my first "real" job. I am going to soon be the Executive Director for the Alberta Music Educator's Foundation - a registered charity in the province that promotes solo study and teaching of music in all forms. Hey! Cool! Should be right up my alley and I'm excited to tell everybody what the job entails as soon as I know myself. What I've gathered so far? I'm pretty much running my own business here - only it's already set up. Should be a great experience.

White for 6 months

Winter has been flirting with us for a while out here, but it has finally arrived. The first sign? The ski hills opened!! And I went skiing!

Ok so, it was kind of a joke, but the point is, I had my skiis on my feet and snow underneath them, and the snow was inclined at least enough to get me moving.

Let me tell you, that felt good. What's even better is that the snow, in the thin strip of available skiing terrain, was good enough that I could bring my new skiis and try them out. Dang are they ever nice.

Before I build this up too much, here are the pictures. Went up to Norquay for a couple hours after work. It's pretty laughable.







Kind of a snow road down the mountain. It was actually pretty busy though - line up at the lift about 3-deep the whole time. And everybody had a great time and was just happy to be out there.

Definitely funny to look to your right and see all that grass.


However, that's all changed. It snowed for about 8 hours straight yesterday and it looks like we might done with grass for the forseeable future. Check out these pictures, taken this morning. It's pretty windy so it knocked it all off the trees, unfortunately






Sunshine opens up on Thursday and things are looking great. check out the webcams at

http://www.skibig3.com/onmountain/webcams.cfm

The bottom picture is exactly the same location that I took one of my skiing photos from. What a difference!! Amazing.

Still waiting for all these ski-trip bookings :p

Bad news: despite the recent snowfall (2 days of it), we may be looking at a slightly post-poned ski season this year. Tragedy!! We've had snow on the ground for about 3 days now. Not a ton, but definitely a nice covering. It's nice to see the mountains looking like this again

Finally bought a winter hat and coat yesterday. I, for one, had no idea that coats are so expensive - it was quite a shocker. Now i just need some new goggles. *hint hint*

Anyway here are the pics that I took on my way to work this morning. Some standard type shots, but things never stop being beautiful around here

October is bo-ring

The threats have finally scared me into making a new post on this thingy. I apparently have a ravenous reader base that gets antsy when there is nothing new posted. Here you go. I throw this blog into the blog-o-sphere in the hopes that I don't get hurt.

Why haven't I written anything? Because nothing in happens in October. It's too cold to climb or hike, it's too warm to ski, and there aren't any tourits. Actually, it's blessedly slow. 5 months of people who left their brains at home and went on vacation is enough, thank you very much.

So what have I been up to? Well, not much. Just counting down to ski season, which the website tells me is precisely 6 days, 19 hours, 7 minutes, and 43 seconds away from this moment. Hey! That's pretty short!

It's next Thursday and you can bet your ass you know where I'll be at 9am that day. It's starting to feel quite a bit more like winter. It's below freezing every night, and 2 of the last 3 days we've woken up to snow. A lot of it melts during the day still, but it's lasting longer and longer. This morning I slid down the street on my way to work too - a winter driving on Halloween.

For those of you thinking of coming out here for the ski season, here are some webcam photos for you of how things are looking.

http://www.skibig3.com/onmountain/webcams.cfm

Not bad, not bad.


In other big news is that they took down the blue construction fences on the main street yesterday. The end is in sight!! After spending the summer in a cage we can finally enjoy our main street again. Sure, it's still under construction, but it's all details now. Hopefully they'll be out of here in a couple more weeks.

The only other bit of news also happened yesterday: the internet cafe is open for 4 hours less each day until January. That means instead of working 8 hours/day, 5 days/week, I'm going to be working 12 hours/day, 3 days/week from 11am to 11pm and have 4 days off to ski and otherwise be a bum. Hooray!!! The best job in Banff just got better :p

So I have to say - my little scheduling book that's filled with all your vacations to Banff is....less than filled. Let's start getting that fixed :p