Demos/Repairs
Hot Wax

— sign outside the rentals shack at SkiBowl

you know what i would like? if i had time to 1) clean the house 2) finish writing my book 3) write a post about skiing in Oregon (“It’s either rain or ice, or sweet, sweet powder and spring skiing, do you have a preference?”) that gives the subject its just desserts. If i only had one of those timepieces like Hermione, I could twist twist and get it all done, but alas, alack, etc.

My daughter loves to ski, we just found out. (Lie. We’ve been knowing it.) she’s been begging to go skiing for a few years — she’s eleven now — and Steve finally got around to taking her for the first time last year? She loved it loved it, nothing above it, she’s our little hotdog. “We’ll go again next weekend.” Next weekend turned out to be… yesterday!

god.

okay, we’ve been busy. Do i ski? not anymore. my entire family used to ski (mom’s side), my boyfriend growing up was a total maniac (him: “You can’t go, you wouldn’t be able to keep up.” me: “Screw you, anyway.”) So i started skiing with other friends, friends who didn’t insult me, WHEN I WAS 16. (that’s old for skiing, around here.) Downhill, cross-country, tore the shit out of my ACL (that sweet little bit of cartilage that holds your knee together), refused to have surgery because I Am Stud.

me, spring skiing, age… whatever. (a long time ago.) wearing a tank top, bibs, my goggles, happy as hell getting a tan and flying as fast as I could go. Guy next to me starts singing, I wish I was in/Tijuana/having sex with an iguana… and goes hurtling down the mountain.

Pure bliss. Good times.

Then one day, i was skiing at Mt. Hood Meadows, crappy conditions, and I was standing balanced way up at the top of this icy, icy run, pointing my skis straight down, teeter-tooter, teeter, and i thought, I could be swimming somewhere warm right now. Or doing yoga and drinking mint tea. What the hell am I doing at the top of this damn mountain? And how am I going to get down it? (step/slide/step/slide/glide glide glide was how.)

Unlike some people, I’ve never looked at a mountain (climb it, why? because it was there) and thought, Need to conquer. No. I look at mountains and think (tiny voice), You don’t scare me, cussing mountain. OK, let’s go drink at the lodge now! (Hot Apple Pies, mmmmmmmm…)

Steve telemarks. Do you know what that is? No, I don’t, either. Maybe he’ll be sweet (“you wouldn’t be able to keep up”) and leave a note in comments. I think it involves downhill/cross-country/total insanity/back-country and having the need to carry an ice ax with you, in case you need to build an ice cave and hide out ’til spring.

My ex-boyfriend was a studly jock and all, but Steve? Steve is from Iowa (no mountains) and Colorado (all the mountains) so he knows how to paint a barn and ski Loveland AND A-Basin AND Cooper, wooooooooot.

For vacations, I’ve been to Sun Valley, Denver, Banff, Vail. (when I asked my sister-in-law if I was dressed fancy enough for Vail, she said, all casual, “Eh, it’s not Telluride.” Steve was all, “Or Aspen, God. It’s not Aspen.” Everybody, Ha, ha, ha…)

Oh, God, of course, what was I thinking. It’s not Aspen.

Seriously, i am not snow bunny, so i find the whole thing kind of hilarious. But I do enjoy the apres ski, yes, I do.

But then he discovered his Love Of Hockey and stopped skiing. And my mom’s family stopped skiing years ago, when it got too fancy and all.

Me? I still long for the Caribbean but whatever. I live here and I can’t fly anymore (inner ear problems).

Anyway, back to Wacky Girl. We all had a blast, even tho she was the only one who skiied, and it did us all good to take a fast vacation. Stayed the night at an inn in Government Camp, hiked and played in the snow, had dinner at a the Rat’s Cellar and watched the snow fall, bought candy bars at the little store and watched American Idol… Then got up and skiied and played in the lodge for all morning.

Blew out of there, had lunch at the Elusive Trout in Sandy (my other favorite mountain restaurant/pub), drove through Boring (“the town that lives up to its name) (HA! KIDDING) (not really).

my favorite sign on the way home

BORING
OREGON CITY

Are you looking for a boring-ass city, somewhere in Oregon? C’mon over this way…

We were home by 3.

And we have the rest of the weekend left.

Maybe we should head back up tomorrow?

Question for the day is: Do you ski? Do you like it? Does it scare you? How about water skiing? How about lying at the beach? That I can handle.

xoxoxo HAPPY FRIDAY.

— wm

“Give the people a new word and they think they have a new fact.” — Willa Cather

“It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”

— J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, 1999, spoken by the character Albus Dumbledore

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”

— J.K. Rowling, “King’s Cross,” Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, 2007, spoken by the character Albus Dumbledore

“Words are loaded pistols.” — Jean-Paul Sartre

Hey, you kids, yeah, you over in the corner there.

I’m still having nightmares about pulling cafeteria duty. Thanks a lot for the damage, just fyi. Be good! Don’t just try, do it! happy spring. please don’t drive your cars too fast, these kind of things can go bad really quickly. I know.

love,

me

ps last night I hit 70,000 words in my novel. You know what that means? I have a book, my friends. Here are 21 Tips for Writers in 21 Days from the Attic Institute and Biff Zine (thanks, Anne T.!) and… Open Library! (thank you, Terri!) OK, back to writing.

Maggie Mashia for School Board, yes. If you are a Portland, Ore. resident, please give her your vote at election time.

When I find a good recipe, I cut it out, put it in the drawer, and then I can’t find it when I look for it.

Generally, I should say, that’s what I do.

Some are clipped and stuck on the fridge with a magnet, some go straight into a scrapbook/cookbook I made, and lots go here under the Recipe Club category.

Last week, FoodDay ran a story called The Pantry Principle, ie use what ya got. (Recipes are linked at bottom of the article.) We (and by that I mean, Steve) made the vegetable bouillion, and tonight he made the garbonzo/pasta soup. So good! I promised my sister I’d link — there you go. As someone recently told her, “Have fun with your husband who cooks!” hahaha. Yeah, thank God for husbands who cook. Lot going on over here with my retirement. How will cooking fit in? Oh my.

bon appetit, y’all.

— wm

“He said that, by god, D.H. Lawrence was right when he had said there must be a dumb, dark, dull, bitter belly-tension between a man and a woman, and how else could this be achieved save in the long monotony of marriage.” — “Cold Comfort Farm,” Stella Gibbons

Reading this week:

Boy, oh boy, it’s been awhile since I made up a reading list, hasn’t it? Know why? Because all I do is read. And write. A lot of writing going on over here. It’s getting tedious, but I’m through the ugly sections of the book now, thank God. Nothing like staying too long with a gnarly character you’re ready to have leave your headspace and go to Jupiter or anywhere, really, just not my mind, anymore, thank you.

Now, here is a reading list my former boss put together, of her favorites from last summer. And I keep misplacing it. In my purse. Ha. Ha. Yeah. It’s a big purse, get up off my back, would ya? No wonder my arm is killing me, lugging that thing around. Also, may I pause her to say how refreshing it was to have a boss who loved to read? My bosses have never been big readers, not even the ones who edited the books section of the newspaper. Ha! Except for a couple of you, and you know who you are. The End.

(That’s how they say it in the novels.)

So she and I would talk books all the time, and it made me happy. But then one day I realized, my arm was killing me (and of course the tendonitis is in my right arm, which I use all the time, as I am right-handed), and… I realized another thing. Instead of talking books, and checking out books, and shelving, repairing, discarding and ordering books, I wanted to get back to writing books.

So I put in my notice and quit and now we’re all happier. Except for my students, they’re a little irate, but they’ll be fine. I promised I’d send them copies of my books, see? There ya go. One of them wrote me a note that said, “I, too, write books!” and I thought, A kindred spirit, go, go, go authors!

Anyway, back to those titles… If I put it here, it doesn’t matter if I lose it, see? I’ve downloaded “Life of Pi” onto my Kindle, and yes, I did start it, but that’s as far as I’ve gotten.

I’m reading all these classics for my book group is why. (“Rebecca,” “Cold Comfort Farm,” “Heart of Darkness.” Am brainiac. But you already knew that.)

Happy reading!!!

— wm

“Dog House: A Love Story” (Carol Prisant)
“Life is So Good” (Richard Glaubman & George Dawson)
“Letter to My Daughter” (Maya Angelo)
“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” “The Girl Who Played with Fire” & “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” (Stieg Larsson)
“Little Bee” (Chris Cleave)
“Life of Pi” (Yann Martel)

“Life isn’t a support-system for art. It’s the other way around.” — Stephen King, “On Writing”

My husband and daughter, playing a duet.