20180213 – Valentines Day Meal; Some Snow 35″, But We Need More

Up and off skiing early as I’m leading the Leisure Ski Group. Four of us this week. We get our marching orders early and set off. Have a great morning skiing, good snow, coffee break as always. Manage to ski until 13:00. It’s pancake Day (Mardi Gras) so ski leaders get beads issued.

Wendy was volunteering at the Hospital so I go to Tipsy Tuesday – pass on the Margaritas.

In the evening we go down to the new Wholefoods (AKA Whole Pay Packet) Supermarket. Wendy’s orgasmic with excitement. No it’s not for shopping but a quiz. Can you believe have a pub quiz in a supermarket. Questions were very hard. Usual obsession with music rounds and dammed if we didn’t get the only Brit question wrong. “Queen Elizabeth is to Windsor as Henry 8th is to ????”. My answer “Hampton Court” as I immediately focused on Windsor Castle / place. Correct answer “Tudor”. We left early as we got fed up trying to decipher what the quizmaster was saying, mumbled the questions out as if he was chewing on a sticky toffee pudding. And no it wasn’t just our English ears, even our American friends struggled. There should have been bonus points just for hearing the question.

Up early and out skiing with Helen. Blue bird day and snow was pretty good. Awesome mornings skiing, gained loads of my confidence back, thanks to Helen. My skiing really seemed to come together, although still not as fast as I used to be, but who cares. Mountains are just so breathtaking.

Lazy afternoon and pick Wendy up from the Christian Centre at 16:00.

Off to the Blue Boar Inn with Bob and Marilyn for a Valentines day meal. Food, ambience, service and company was awesome. Not too expensive for the quality, would certainly go again for a special occasion. Smart move to take two of our own bottles of wine and pay the $15 corkage fee.

Yeah, 7 inches of snow overnight and it’s still coming down.

Lazy start to the day to let the snow clear, thankfully it doesn’t stop at 12:00, carries onto 17:00. We get 12″ go champagne powder in 24 hours. Good day skiing with just a few white outs at the top. Ski until 15:00 then go to the quiz.

Wendy wins the shout out at the quiz, so she gets a Helly Hensen backpack – good prize. Sadly we don’t win the quiz. That’s what you get when there’s only 4 of you in the team and as usual there’s a daunting excess of those inane music questions – whatever happened to good old quizes that used to have sensible topics like science, history, geography, literature etc.

Another awesome day here in paradise.

Lazy start to the day. Read the Times and get the depressing news from back home, makes me appreciate being here so much more. Do the crossword. Go ten pin bowling with a regular group from the Newcomers club, two games and shoes all for $6. Pop home to pick up my cross country skis. Do a 3K loop in the fresh snow dumped on us yesterday. Gorgeous sunshine; -5C; improved time by 25%; avoided any fall. Hardwork – wot no lift. Nip in the liquor store for a bottle of interesting Armagnac I’ve had my eye on and been lusting over, if it’s not up to my expectation of it Wendy can drown it in lemonade. Pop in supermarket for a free sushi sample. Wander over to Starbucks to get some more coffee – try a luscious sun dried Ethiopian Kayon Mountain Farm small lot reserve. Get a free sample of their Cafe Verona. Drive round to the Christian centre and drop the gas guzzler off for Wendy. I walk home in the fresh blue sky sunshine.

Then it’s dinner at Bob and Marilyn’s. Papa Murphy’s pizza. Made fresh in front of you and you cook at home – possibly even within my technical ability – awesome pizza and not expensive.

Blackout ski day. At least it’s on a super busy Saturday so not too bad.

We go to the Salt Lake Aquarium with Carol, Angela and Mitch. Not a bad little aquarium, 3 hours just enough for an 8 year old.

Then it’s a quiet evening in. Watch the L B Johnson biopic “All The Way”. Excellent and informative on the civil rights struggles of the 60’s. Makes you appreciate political compromise and dodgy dealing to achieve an end result.

Pick Randy up and go down to the gun range with his arsenal of weapons. .22 LR, 1911 .45 ACP and a ‘pistol’ AR15 compact platform 8″ Barrel with 300 Blackout ammunition – looks like an AR15 to my uncultured eyes. Have a great couple of hours, especially enjoy the .45 without a silencer. It makes sizeable holes on the target that you can so easily see. Quite pleased with my accuracy. Unlike last year when hitting the target was a minor miracle, with that .45 I can get some good groupings. Red dot sights on the .22 and AR15 are amazing. Especially love the grip safety on the 1911.

Think I’m getting nerdy.

Then pick Wendy up at the supermarket but alas she’s not ready so I have to adjourn to Starbucks – such a tough life.

Afternoon is an Apres ski party with PCMSC, at another one of these amazing homes around here.

14″ of snow overnight. Presidents day (bank holiday). Recipe for overcrowding. Takes the bus just under an hour, 30 minutes to do just 200 yards. End up being very un American and walking.

Slopes and lift lines are the worst I’ve seen. King Kong looks like an infection of flies slithering down, more skiers than muslims around the Kaba. My it’s cold – thankfully. Get a few runs in and a coffee. Now there’s first in that I get back to the locker after George.

Nip down to walmart for some ear defenders and targets.

In the evening Helen and George come round for dinner. What great company they are. Just never stop laughing and joking. And of course put the world of politics to right in just under 3 hours -not bad eh! Fantastic evening.