Saltz McDrunkington's Summer Ski Festival 2012, part 1

On Saint Patrick's Day, most people have parties and get wasted... and that's about it. I went here:

That's the view from the top of Mount Ellen, part of Sugarbush Resort, where Jake works. Kevin spearheaded a little revival of Saltz McDrunkinton's, a party we had probably 8 years ago that I think the full name of was "Saltz McDrunkington's Irish Pig, Booze, and Graphic Design Festival." It wasn't a huge deal, but we got Dustin, Amanda, Adam, Kristy, me, Kevin and the almighty Mysterio all the way from CT to come hang out with the booming household of Jake and Tara up in Vermont. Jake promised "spring skiing" (i.e. no woods, just tons of slush and light jackets). It turned out to be in the 70s the whole weekend (and 80s the following week), so this turned out to be quite the rarity: Skiing in summer, while it's actually March (and still technically winter).

I hadn't skied in 2 years and was pretty bad the last time out- in fact, I threw out my back worse than I ever have before and sat in the lodge for 3 hours by myself, then lay on a floor for the entirety of the day after. Good times.

This trip started out looking like it may be the same. The night before, I got drunker than I meant to (damn southern comfort) and was completely robbed of the only thing that would help me out, sleep. A sick baby upstairs + a house with like 12 people in it + me sleeping on a couch in the dead center of the house= me waking up 40 times and sleeping probably about 4 and a half hours of interrupted sleep. I also stubbed my toe so bad when I went to bed that, after feeling blood dripping through my sock, I realized I had pretty much knocked off my entire toenail. GOOD START. 

The next morning I had a horrible headache, felt carsick from riding passenger to someone driving manual (always seems to happen), felt incredibly hot dressed in a sweatshirt when the sun was blinding me, felt stiff and hurt, and was extremely worried I was in for some trouble. When I put on my 15 year old rear entry boot and nearly screamed from the pain in my half broken toe, my nerves weren't exactly calmed. But somehow I made it to the top of the enormous mountain, and gave it my best shot. 

After 1 run, I told everyone I would be spending the day in the lodge, playing with my phone until it died. Nothing makes a man feel more like a fat slob than skiing for the first time in 2 years with in shape people who have skied all winter (or at least more than twice in 2 years). Turns out that I'm in pretty bad shape. And even if I wasn't, holy lord did I forget how hard skiing is when you don't normally do it. I completely forgot how many tiny little leg muscle twitches were required just to stay balanced and not explode on a flat spot, much less on steep, mogul-ey slush/ice terrain. My legs were on fire, worse than I can remember. And even though I'm a fat pig, I bike and hike- my legs are pretty used to this stuff. But not skiing, skiing is a whole different story. 

But, after convincing myself to give it 1 more run, then 1 more run, then "this trail has more snow, no moguls and is easier, I'm sticking with this one," I ended up being out there for like 5 hours and having a great time attempting to remember how to ski. I had sparse moments of feeling it and remembering what the hell I was doing, but most of it was me awkwardly trying to not explode. But it felt real nice to be out there again, and I'm very happy that it was a "it's spring skiing, it's just great to be out here" kind of day. That, and the fact that Jake, who rules at snowboarding, was skiing all day. He was surprisingly good for someone who hasn't done much skiing, but he was all for taking it easy and hung out with me on the wimpier trails for most of the day. And what a beautiful day it was. Here are pics: 

Mount Ellen is either the 4th, 5th, or 7th highest mountain Vermont (thanks internet), but it certainly felt like we were on top of the world- I haven't been on another mountain where I could see that far in every direction- where I felt like I was on the highest point in the world before. It was pretty amazing.

Jake t-shirt skiing. RONDO!

Here's Dustin shredding the end of an all mogul trail. I did not ski on this trail.

A lot of the trails looked like this- just huge patches of dirt, grass, mud, rocks, etc. I was surprised they were even open, but they did have enough snow to get from top to bottom, so I guess if people wanted to give them a shot, why not?

The section before the chairlift line became a small pond by the end of the day.

Here's muscle Amanda and Dustin having a good laugh:

And here's Jake right after a wipeout on our last run, that I missed because I was exhaustedly taking a break and staring at the ground instead of watching him eat it. Other than Adam messing around and falling a few times doing stupid stuff, I think this wipeout was really the only one of the day, and it wasn't much. 

Dustin's instagram of Jake, Kevin, Mysterio and I hanging out at the lodge. 

It was a good time and I knew by the level of exhaustion I felt, I'd be sleeping well that night. 

We loaded up, stopped at a sweet grocery store and bought way too much food, then headed home for BBQ and beers. I showered up, and by the time I got outside, Kevin had, instead of relaxing, set up a slack line in the yard. Apparently the point of this is to be able to balance on it, then eventually do jumps/tricks. I was exhausted and just wanted to sit down, so I didn't partake. It looked pretty hilarious though. 

I really like this one- a pretty girl in a meadow looking curiously towards her mongoloid lover:

I had to take a super fall-esque emo shot of Amanda against a tree. It only seemed fitting on a summer day in winter to take a fall picture. 

I also couldn't resist taking too many pictures of Wyatt. He's incredibly adorable. 

"Hey guy with a camera, I'm cute!"

"See? Even when I'm tearing up, I'm adorable."

"Ok, that's enough."

We finally sat down for some grilled goodness, which Jake cooked on a webber grill missing a leg, held up by rocks but still crooked, inside a full sized broken grill. We then took the party inside, as it became freezing fast. Damien threw a fit for attention, 

"LOOK AT ME"

then Jake and Adam did this, whatever this is:

With sick Wyatt sleeping upstairs, we took the party to the basement, where this happened: 

Kevin + alcohol= Kevin with no brain, and tonight was no different. As seems to be fairly standard with parties at this house, an art party broke out and some pretty awesome stuff was created. 

Something I've missed a lot at our little get-togethers has been being DJ and playing all the hits we used to sing along to in college. I brought it all back that night though, creating a spotify playlist to rival my best radio shows. So many hits, so much singing along, solid amounts of air guitar. It felt fantastic and was exactly what I needed to punch my lonely winter doldrums in the face. In fact, I was so busy DJing that I forgot to take any pictures of the completed art, which was pretty good. Dustin's involved sticking a squashed beer can to half a bottle of dripping paint on canvas. It was pretty sweet.

Tara partied with us until Wyatt finally woke up, which was great. She's been in mom mode for awhile, so it was real nice to rage it up with her. As the hours went by, people slowly fell to the night, including Jake, who fell asleep in a wooden chair with a beer still in his hand. Kevin, Tara, Kristy (who disappeared and came back with pizza, score) raged until Dustin got up from where he was sleeping 20 feet away, and turned off the lights, leaving me staring in silence at Kevin's glow in the dark dress. Looking back, this was the perfect ending to the day.

I honestly considered sleeping on my aerobed (which I took out of my trunk and un-boxed at 3 in the morning) in the garage, but I figured I would probably freeze to death, and it was just a bit too weird to sleep in the garage. So I dragged it downstairs to the basement instead, and when drunktarded Jake got up and wandered upstairs at 6 in the morning, I took his spot on the couch for a glorious but way too short 3 hours of sleep in addition to the 2 or so I got on the aerobed. I knew I would feel nothing but wonderful the next morning. It felt awesome to spend such a full day of quality time with awesome people doing stuff I hadn't done in forever, but I was fairly certain someone would have to build a people-sized spatula to scrape me off the couch in a few hours.

currently listening to: Bon Iver- For Emma, Forever Ago