I have a job!

Friends, I have been in a dark and terrible place. A place where you are powerless, unable to communicate with the world, unable to reach the people around you. Where the comforting sounds and sights of the places and people you know are lost to you.

That’s right, my friends, I have been without internet. I have had a long immersion in the communications technology 1990s, and I have suffered greatly at it hands.

But that’s not really an excuse. I mostly haven’t been writing in this blog because I’m lazy. Also, because it takes a while to build up the requisite level of confusion and chaos in my life to actually be able to write about it. No one comes to read this blog to see how organised and together I am as a human being. They come instead to marvel at my continued existence in the face of strange circumstances and abiding personal incompetence. And so I am proud to return to the internet and say “Yes! I am alive.” And also “My life is impractical and silly.”

There are a few stories I probably should have written here as they occurred, so I will try to fill in the backlog in some kind of coherent way. In the meantime, this is what I have been doing:

In May I quit my job and went to Canada. Quitting one’s job is wonderful and I encourage all of you to try it. In Canada I wooed a lady, climbed a little and sent people emails about monoskis. In June I flew to New Zealand for the winter and waited for it to snow. It didn’t snow and I spent most of my time in Christchurch where the weather was horrible. Eventually I bought a car and could leave, which was very soothing. I think I may have confessed to having a soft spot for Christchurch in the past, but now I think it is a grim and depressing place where it rains all the time. It finally snowed in late June and I drove up to Broken River for another season of skiing and poor personal hygiene. In slightly crazy news, I am working at Broken River. As in having a job. You read that correctly. I perform services in exchange for financial remuneration. It is a strange turn of events. Fear not, I have not completely sold out. I am the backup cook – I cover the real cook for two days a week feeding the staff and guests. This may come as a surprise to many of you who have no idea that I have any kind of culinary skill. It is certainly an ongoing surprise for me. My experience in this job can be best summarised in two adjectives: Terrifying and greasy.

Cooking at BR is terrifying because I have no idea what I’m doing. I am completely untrained in this field and have almost no relevant experience. The only experience I have is cooking as a volunteer in the BR kitchens last year when the chef left the mountain early in the season and there was no one else to fill in. I have never worked alongside anyone more competent than myself or had any real tuition to speak of. The full-time cook, Ray, has given me a bunch of valuable advice which has enabled me to cut up roast chickens and do some other useful stuff. Without him I would be in considerable distress. Each night that I work the guests ask me what we’re having for dinner and I strenuously avoid answering the question because I’m worried that if I actually tell them they’ll know when I’ve screwed up. If I say “Roast chicken” and then we end up eating leftover cake, that looks bad. But if I just pretend that I was intentionally using the chicken to make the oven smell savoury while I reheated some cake that looks like I’m some kind of Heston Blumenthal food genius. Which I am not. People regularly come into the kitchen to ask if I need a hand and I often tell them I don’t just so they’ll go away and I can sob and tear at my hair and swear quietly into my pots in peace. Apparently the food has been OK, which I can only attribute to beginners’ luck.

Cooking at BR is greasy because, well, there’s grease on everything. Especially me. I don’t have enough clothes to change for every meal, and I don’t have time to wash my clothes while I’m cooking so everything I wear gets covered in grease. This isn’t so bad if I’m just doing my usual two days a week, but at the moment I’m cooking for five days to cover for Ray while he goes to Australia to watch a live Pink concert (this is, incidentally, about the most misleading piece of true information I could possibly give you from which you could form a first impression of him – whatever you’re imagining about him, it’s hilariously wrong), so you can imagine what it’s like. Also, I don’t bathe enough. It’s hard to be motivated to do so when you know you’re just going to get covered in grease again. A reliable witness has testified that I smell like felafel, which is a nice way of saying oil. It is actually disturbing how much oil and butter and cream and salt and stuff goes into food when you’re cooking for lots of people. Also, deep frying. Night after night I cannot tell if I have just smoked out the kitchen and dining room (which is often) of my glasses are just covered in a thick coating of fat (which is all the time). There is a block of lard which sits on a shelf in one of the store rooms and glistens malevolently like something from a Stephen King novel. I try not to make eye contact with it.

 

I have just one more meal to make to get through this five day stint. I’m not entirely sure what it will be, but I have enough back-up cake now that it doesn’t really matter. God help my arteries.

Back to Work

I have great news. Because it is me, this great news is tinged with a hint of anxiety but I will get to that below. I got another article published! This time in NZSkier magazine, which is the premier means of magazine based snow related communication in New Zealand. Of course I'm quite chuffed, but I actually knew it was getting published ages ago, so some of the excitement has worn off a little. In fact, it was published so long ago that I had vaguely convinced myself that it was a sincere, heartfelt tale of my strong connection to Broken River ski field and its loyal community of clubbies and staff. In fact, I was actually thinking it might be a bit embarrassing to have something serious and honest and emotional in the public domain that was associated with me.

But, dear readers, you ought to know me well enough to be assured that I would never write something that might conceivably come back to embarrass me or my friends in a public setting. Who would be so foolish as to put something potentially embarrassing and awkward onto the public record?

Well, me. Obviously.

To my great relief, the finished article is not at all sincere or heartfelt. But to my consternation and dismay, it's snarky and disrespectful, just as you have probably come to expect. In it I describe Broken River's neighbours, Craigieburn, as "the nicest kind of sexist", list a number of ways to avoid paying for things at Broken River, make snide comments about some of the volunteering habits of the local clubbies and document a few legally dubious activities conducted by my friends. All in a nice way, of course.

Now the BR clubbies will forgive me for my indiscretions, because they're nice and they already know I'm a nincompoop. But when I wrote those fateful words about Craigieburn, a field which takes its reputation pretty seriously, I never imagined that I might be spending any time there. But now it looks like I'll be over that way quite a lot, and not only are they likely to look harshly upon me for my association with a rival ski field, I've now publically dissed their founding fathers in the one publication they're actually likely to look at and read. I may be the only person ever to curse that too many people read NZSkier magazine.

By the by, my bit of the magazine is linked below (pictures by Joe Harrison, BR stalwart, rad skier and all around good dude). But seriously, if you can buy this magazine you should. Or look at the ads or something. Keeping small publications like this alive keeps the dreams of dirtbags like me alive.

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BxqrPZnL2_zhY3ZtdTYyWWRVNDQ/edit?usp=sharing

Also, skiing in a few weeks? Is anyone else excited?

Dear readers

Hey folks,

Thanks for reading my blog. Every extra page view feeds another lump of coal into the fire of my dirtbag soul. And now, if it's not too much hassle, I'd like to ask you to do me a favour.

I recently had an article published in Vertical Life magazine, a climbing rag based in Melbourne, about my trip to the Bugaboos. The editors saw this blog through the facebook page of a mutual friend and liked it enough to ask me to write for them. The magazine is available online, so it won't cost you anything to download and read (it's also pretty cool, making it excellent value for money). If you download it, that will increase their circulation and help their business and it will make me look good for writing a witty and informative article. Maybe they will ask me to write again. You don't even have to read it, just downloading the mag is enough.

You can get it here: www.verticallifemag.com.au

The article has photos and words and stories about catching chipmunks in pots and climbing things and a detailed explanation of The Snafflehound. It's great (or at least mediocre).

Thanks.

The Problem With Having Money

This trip is the first time I've taken time off work to go somewhere. Every other time I've gone away to do fun stuff I've either been a student or quit my job before I left. Stictly speaking, I'm unemployed now because my last contract with the ACT Government ended the day before I flew out, but they have said they'll give me more work when I get back, so for all intents and purposes I'm just taking time off work.

I think most people would be happy with this arrangement. Indeed, many people do their travelling like this - fitting trips in around work. In reality, I am fitting my trip in around frisbee, and work aligns fairly well with frisbee, but the effect is the same. And the knowledge that I'm returning to a job in Canberra has completely eroded my capacity to not spend money.

For example, when I arrived in Rossland my old boss offered me a very good deal on some skis that I have been coveting for a year or so. Skis that I absolutely don't need. So I bought them. And a new helmet. And goggles. I would have bought gloves too if he'd had anything in my size. On my last two flights, I had bought and eaten so much food before the flight departed that I forgot to eat the complimentary snack they gave us. I didn't even surrepticiously stuff the tiny bag of weird nibbles into my pack - unthinkable under normal monetary conditions. On the way over here, when my instincts were still sharp, I ended up walking off the plane with my snack roll and the roll that was supposed to go to the person sitting next to me. She was asleep and didn't seem like the type to eat the roll and then I didn't want to be all "Here's the roll the air hostess brought you while you were asleep (p.s. I'm really creepy and have been saving this roll for you)" and it was awkward and basically it was better just to hide the roll and pretend the whole thing never happened and then eat it later on. Anyway how I got the roll is beside the point. The point is that on one flight I saved 200% of the normally available rolls and then on the other flight I saved 0% of the available snack thingys. That's a pretty big drop (in percentage terms).

Then it occurred to me that I would need bindings for the new skis. Normally I'm protected from impulse purchases of bindings because the ones I like are hard to find. But not in Bozeman. There are three stores in town that sell them, which is three more than I've ever seen anywhere else in the world. I'm just going to walk into the store, hand over the skis and get them to mount new bindings. I won't even have to dodgy up a drill bit with duct tape. It feels like cheating.

The problem with having money is that it makes it way too easy to buy things. I've had money before, but always with the caveat that I might never find a job again. But with my newfound confidence in future paycheques I've had an astounding insight into the world of stable long-term employment. Has it really been like this for you people all along? Why didn't someone warn me?

I'm not sure I can survive this new arrangement. For a start I'm swiftly being overwhelmed with stuff. Admittedly, some of it I didn't buy (or at least not recently) - I've also gained two towels and a painting. I'm also struggling with food. This morning I went to a bakery (it was gluten free - huge mistake) and when confronted with two ostensibly tasty options (that were actually gluten free) I briefly lost control and bought both of them. Which turned out to be OK because I ended up missing lunch. But if I had stumbled across somewhere to buy lunch later in the day I probably would have bought several of those too.

I can only hope that I return to safe, predictable unemployment soon, before any permanent damage is done and/or I buy furniture, at which point all will be lost.

Details

The people have asked for details, and here they are (although a bit late - the full update is to follow). This is the message I sent Marie on Facebook to commence "Operation Date Maud's Hot Sister 2: The Date That Would Not End Even Though Both Parties Wanted It To".

"Ola Marie,

Every night I lie awake, tossing and turning, thinking of our night together in Whistler. Of our meal, or our drive around the town - the lake, the ski area car park. Or later, at your house, when I lay waiting for you, ready for romance.

Maybe we went too fast, maybe we wanted too much. Maybe we looked for too many answers, when the power of love comes only from questions.

And so I find myself in Whistler once more, wondering if there is a second chance for us. For love.

My phone is broken, but my heart beats strong. Tell me when you are free. I cannot wait to see you again.

Love always,
Juan"

To which I received a mixed response. She accepted my friend request (which I would have advised against), but she did not reply.

More details to come.

Our Love Does Not Need A Second Chance

I was going to write about how I ended up in Rossland and all the things I've done since landing in Canada (don't worry, it's a short list), but let's be honest. Pretty much everyone reading this blog is only interested in my abortive romance with Maud's Hot Sister.

I will be honest. Things are not going well on the Maud's Hot Sister front. And not for want of trying. In Whistler, it took no time at all to assemble all the necessary elements for wooing: A rudimentary knowledge of Mr Big's seminal romantic-rock classic I'm The One Who Wants To Be With You, a collection of friends to provide alternating moral support and coercive social pressure according to my somewhat variable motivation, a sweater vest, Maud's Hot Sister's address, the complicitude of Maud's Hot Sister's Sister (Maud) and, perhaps most importantly, a backup singer with a voice of pure gold to hide in a bush and sing the harmony/backup parts that make Mr Big's hit so loin stirring good.

Indeed, all of the pieces of the puzzle were in place to provide a surprise rendition of one of modern music's greatest songs to Maud's Hot Sister while she listened from the balcony of her own house. Short of turning up in her bed scantily clad and surrounded by candles and rose petals it was the most romantic thing I could think of that was free, and I've already tried the other option.

The only piece missing was Maud's Hot Sister. Who was in Vancouver THE WHOLE TIME. I can't help but think that someone should have alerted me to this possibility. I don't take this dating business lightly - I could have gone to a lot of trouble and considerable expense for nothing.

The apparent up-side of Maud's Hot Sister being in Vancouver was that she was heading to Rossland a few days after I arrived and it synched up pretty well with my plans. And so, on Wednesday, rather than candles and bubble baths and sustained self loathing, I met Maud's Hot Sister at a Starbucks in Vancouver and the two of us set out on the 9-ish hour drive to Rossland.

In the uplifting feel-good comedy that will eventually be made about my life, this car trip will be represented as a montage with some kind of folksy adult contemporary soundtrack and gently shifting images of the two of us smiling at each other, looking at the the beautiful scenery, maybe sharing a stack of pancakes that later generations will look back on as an example of poor role-modelling for healthy food choices.

But none of those things happened. Oh God how I yearned for pancakes. For the sweet release of ice cream and maple syrup. For diabetes.

In reality, it was a long, tiring and inefficient journey with innumerable small stops and some super sketchy driving over a mountain pass in a snow storm. In keeping with the tradition of me driving terrible vehicles in Canada, our ride had bald all season tyres (which means not winter tyres, which means terrifying) and headlights that didn't have either high-beam or low-beam. I couldn't work out which was missing, which in itself is something of a worry. Also, the driver's side seat belt didn't really work.

Anyway, we left late so we slept the night in the back of the car near the top of the sketchy mountain pass. The next morning the storm had cleared out and we stopped in Princeton, then Keremeos, then Oosoyous, and then again in Oosoyous in a different place. Look it up on Google Maps people, there pretty much aren't two distinct places in Oosoyous you can stop, and yet...

The romance between Maud's Hot Sister and I has survived many setbacks. It thrived despite being conducted for most of its life through second-degree text messaging. It persisted in spite of my obviously spurious claims to be half-Costa Rican, my flat out lies about dancing or speaking Spanish, my terrible haircut, my lack of a white suit. Most significantly, it survived in spite of the mutual disinterest of both parties and the fact that it was completely fictional in every important respect. But it could not survive the drive from Vancouver to Rossland. In our 20 hour approximation of a 9 hour journey we went straight from the thrill and excitement of new love and dating to the grim, jaded habit of infatuation held too fast for too long.

And so, dear friends, I announce to you the end of my first great attempt at wooing. Yes, perhaps there is time for love to flourish again. Maybe we can arrange a romantic interlude the All-U-Can-Eat Spaghetti night at the local diner. But really, I think that it's time to move on. There's a whole world of people with hot sisters out there. It's time to make another lucky girl extremely confused and uncomfortable.

Back in Action

Dear friends, this blog is rising from its peaceful slumber in a time of great personal distress. And in times of great personal distress, I turn to the internet for succor, for the wisdom to sooth my troubled soul.

Let's say that you were going overseas, perhaps to North America, and during your trip you might hypothetically be going to Whistler. Now consider that in this purely hypothetical situation Whistler might be the home of a person who is the sister of another person who is well known to you. And to continue our speculation, purely for the sake of consideration, with no necessary relation to the real world, let us mull over the possibility that some time ago you might have taken this person, the sister of the person know by you - the one who lives in Whistler (hypothetically) - on a date which was spectacular in both its awkwardness and in unlikeliness to result in any kind of romantic liaison.

In this purely hypothetical situation, it is not really worth speculating about whether or not your should take the sister, who might, for the sake of argument, be considered hot, on a second date. Clearly, you should. Far more fruitful grounds for speculation would be to ask where you should take her on said date, and what you should wear. And what you should do if she has a boyfriend. That last question seems quite pertinent in our purely academic exercise in abstract thought.

So, I turn to you, wise and noble internet blog readers, to guide me in this time of personal (hypothetical) distress. Where should I take Maud's Hot Sister and what should I wear? A sushi dinner date is out - we've done that and I still wake up in a cold sweat some nights thinking about the bill. A movie is cheap and informal, so I wouldn't need a suit, but it would also go for TWO HOURS and there would be an implied duty to pull some kind of "yawn and casually put your arm over the other person's shoulder" move which I am unequivocally uncomfortable with. Where do people go on dates? What do they do? What do they wear? Why does anyone ever think it will be a good idea?

And finally, sweet internet, if you can think of any good reason why I shouldn't take Maud's Hot Sister on a date, please tell me what it is. At this stage I'm of the opinion that to return to Whistler and not even try to take Maud's Hot Sister on a second date would be unconscionably cowardly. That, of course, doesn't mean that I think it would be pleasant or a good idea.

Although there are a few things going in my favor. I have a vastly superior haircut, I don't have a van that won't start in the rain, and I have plenty of time to shop around my home town for a white suit if that proves to the be wooing weapon of choice.

Also, in other news (since I'm actually posting I might as well get everything out of my system), I recently met up with an old school friend who works for Walmart. It was wonderful to be able to express my gratitude to him for the generosity of his fine organisation showed me during my extended stay in their car park in Penticton (and one other night spent in their car park in Kelowna - which has wonderful views if you're ever out that way). Also, Walmart was the supplier of my much loved octopus towel, which I will be reunited with soon. He also suggested that if I visit him in San Francisco he would be able to take me to the Walmart head office and maybe even find me someone vaguely important to thank in person. I expect that that won't be possible until my next trip to North America, but I look forward to the opportunity immensely.

And for those of you who care, I'll be heading to Canada and the US on the 1st of Feb, coming back to Canberra in time for frisbee training on the 19th.