Winter Sports

Not the Olympics, though they are fully awesome, yes? No, I am referring to the trip I took to the great South West (and SW air provided fully awesome travel arrangements, including a change of flights to accommodate snowmaggedon) to give a paper and visit my brother and his family. The paper presentation went well, but the truly magical aspect of the week was getting to spend so much time outside doing wintry things.

Now, I am not much of a wintry things kind of person, in general. J and I made a snow fort and had a snowball fight in round 2 of the snopocalypse, and we go sledding, but that is about the extent of it. My brother G, on the other hand, is a passionate outdoorsperson, whose kids have been skiing 12 times this winter, and who loves nothing better than sneaking out to the mountain that is 40 minutes away from his house for some cross country skiing.

So, G and I went cross country skiing twice, about 3.5 hours each time -- it was amazing country, lots of powdery snow and beautiful views from the top of the mountain. Our dad drove out and joined us for the weekend, and he and G's son O all went downhill skiing in Santa Fe.

Now, I've been downhill skiing before. I fall down a lot. But not this time! I don't know if it was the two days on the cross country skis that did the trick, but I spent all day skiing blues and didn't fall down at all. Felt in control, and was able to control my speed -- the slopes were great, nice and wide, so in those moments where I did feel a bit on the edge of losing control, I could just ride out the feeling to the other side of the mountain, and turn.

At the end of the day, O, G, & I went down a black diamond run, over moguls and through trees. THAT was harrowing, but I managed it! Lots of fun.

So, we're calling that a cross-training and mental rehabilitation week -- four weeks to Marathon! Still no word on the job front. I defend my Dissertation on 22 Feb, and am spending this week prepping for the opening presentation of the research. The defense is at 7:30 am, which some folks seem to think is kind of early, but I say lets get it over with!