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tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-92418602014-12-15T15:59:24.619-05:00Explore Cross-CountryThings I've learned and done on skinny skis since taking it up 28 years ago at the advanced age of 27cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-28621139774966596952014-12-15T15:59:00.000-05:002014-12-15T15:59:24.638-05:00We've got you coveredFinally went out for a ski in the woods out back. What I found did not surprise me, though I marvel at it every time I encounter it.

Snow cover is very complete, even after many days with high temperatures solidly above freezing. The sun is so weak this time of year that the snow is actually dense and crunchy nearly everywhere.

With rain and warm temperatures, we don't have the full depth that 12 inches on Thanksgiving and a couple more storms with two to four would leave us if we'd gone into a real winter deep freeze. But the same weather pattern in late February would have melted the snow so fast you could practically hear it sizzle.

Warm water lies close to the surface in the saturated, unfrozen ground. You ski where you can, because you can, not because you have to. In a full-on winter with complete coverage of deep snow, a ramble in the woods would require skis or snowshoes. That's the kind of winter we hope for every year. Optional skiing is different. You get to slide and glide on thin cover rather than just trudge, but you could trudge if you had to. You can ski on snow so thin that snowshoes are ridiculously unnecessary, using the gliding qualities of the medium more than the flotation ability of the ski.

Looks like one more good day of this kind of skiing before another rainstorm. We're in the last shortening of the shortest daylight, so the snow cover may actually continue to hold up in a lot of places. But where it has been groomed it has been thinned and damaged by the machinery, making it more vulnerable to hostile weather.

cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-15333657101144101792014-10-16T13:47:00.000-04:002014-10-16T13:47:06.447-04:00Just when you thought NNN couldn't get any cheesier...This doughnut box of NNN Basic bindings just arrived from Fischer. The Big F shows no qualms about throwing in with No!No! No! regardless of what tumbles out of the pipe.

The front end has one less screw securing the toe piece. And they've gone back to a completely detached heel plate. So drilling remains more complicated, just to attach a less secure binding. They get kudos for consistency.

In the end I suppose it only matters as much as which way you have the toilet paper come off the roll. Of course I have an opinion on that, too, but it's no more a winnable argument than the much stronger one against NNN. For some idiot reason the system thrives in the marketplace. Since it basically does what it says it does, holding your boot on the ski and imparting some measure of control, its inferiorities survive under the aegis of marketing. Make it cheap and available and you will sell a bunch. Sell a bunch and you will be viewed as a serious contender.

Rottefella may have realized that most skis get purchased and set aside. They might get used a little at first and occasionally thereafter, but why lavish materials and good design on something that is going to spend most of its time leaned up in a corner before being donated or unloaded at a yard sale. Since the screws are probably the most expensive parts in the binding, eliminating one from every binding adds up over the course of a production run.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-69970990973954096232014-03-24T10:14:00.001-04:002014-03-24T10:14:38.674-04:00Granulated grindMarch sun combined with resurgent polar temperatures create transient snow conditions that drive classical skiers insane. So much for the idea of using classic skiing to build my fitness base. These are skating conditions until the definitive warmup makes either klister or a non-wax grip pattern work consistently.

Because the temperature has been dropping sharply at night, any areas that thawed because of the strong sun or an overall daytime high that went above freezing turn into chopped chunks, cobblestones and curbs. Don't stay out too late, no matter how good things seem during prime time. "Fast" is fun, but sliding out of control on a bumpy, icy chute will be more of a workout for your whitened knuckles than any other part of your physique.

After some sort of brush with a nor'easter Tuesday into Wednesday the temperatures appear to be on the rise. Could we at last have reached the mooshier phase of spring skiing and the real onset of cycling? It has to happen eventually. Even in the Year of No Summer (1816) the weather during the absent summer was more like a particularly nasty April than an endless winter. And the factors that led to that are not repeated now. The June blizzard of 1816 would have presented tricky waxing conditions in spite of wintry snow depths. The temperature rose after the storm, it just didn't stay up in good agricultural range.

I'll take my June skiing in a high-elevation ravine, thank you, and enjoy real summer conditions down where we all actually live.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-11343944422092448702014-03-03T11:48:00.000-05:002014-03-03T11:48:40.224-05:00Hunting the Wild Cream CheeseThe Year of the Polar Vortex seems to be grinding glacially toward the inevitable end of winter's reign. March has come in like January. No telling how it will go out. Perhaps like a "normal" March comes in. We're still looking at daytime highs only in the 20s, with nighttime lows in the single digits below or above zero until the end of the week. At that point the forecast shows the days warming to the mid 30s. If this signals a change to genuinely warming temperatures, cream cheese season may be upon us.

When the snow base is beyond firmly frozen, more like sedimentary rock than anything that wafted down from a cloud as mere water, the thawing process softens the top layer each day as the sun gets strong enough, to create a layer like the food cited in the title. It takes an edge and guides a turn with savory sweetness. Each hard-frozen night saves the leftovers for another serving the following day.

In the Great Ungroomed, this process is all that makes skiing possible when the surface would otherwise be boiler plate. On groomed trails the morning granules provided by the tiller give way to this accommodating surface just in time to let the later skiers enjoy a treat after the early chirpers have shoved the granular surface aside in their haste to grab something more like the winter now slipping away.

Cream cheese also allows for ski skating on terrain that was never groomed for it. The firm support under the soft top layer lets skinny racing skis venture well off the trail where terrain and forest cover permit it. Access still depends on a very smooth snow surface, especially if you find yourself shooting some tighter gaps on purpose or accidentally.

At the end of the day, be off the snow before the temperature drops below freezing again! The cream cheese reverts to ice until the sun returns.

Daylight Relocating Time starts this Sunday, moving cream cheese hours later in the day. If you use trails that are regularly groomed this may actually add a full hour (or more) to the skiing day. If you have to wait for softening it merely shifts the usable period. But if you get stuck having to go out after work this will give you a bigger window. And if the temperature returns to mid-winter range you always have your trusty groomers to granulate it for you each morning.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-80590997458886589792014-02-11T09:28:00.000-05:002014-02-11T09:28:36.557-05:00Muscle Memory EncoreOn Sunday another unusual opportunity to ski came up late in the day. To get the most out of the short time slot I used skating skis.

Skating isn't really harder than classical, but it uses the skiing muscles differently, which can feel harder when you're out of shape. In classical the skis stay together, parallel, so when you're reduced to trudging it feels more natural. The same plod on skating skis really feels like a pathetic waddle. So I went harder than I should, to try to stay in a speed range that flowed smoothly.

Almost the same distance I skied on Friday using classical skis took only two-thirds as long.

I was already stiff from the classical skiing. It tormented muscles that had been unmolested for more than a year. At my age the pain ramps up over a couple of days, so I was peaking when I went out to skate. Interestingly, the pain of skating decided not to wait. It detected the pain I was feeling from the classical outing and said, "hey! Me too!"

In spite of my stiffness, muscle memory provided accurate technique, as it had on Friday. I went through the motions. Fatigue made me sloppy, but I had no doubt about what I was trying to do.

Experience hurts at a time like this, because the body remembers moving at a certain speed. I wasn't trying for race pace, but I'm so deteriorated that even an easy pace was shredding me. I never had much patience for dry-land training. Back when I got out regularly I could fudge the dry-land phase and make it up in the early season. Now that I can't count on getting out there at all, let alone early, I would have to choke down a much longer period of dry-land alternatives to be almost ready for my chance at real skiing.

A longer period on classic skis would help. If more opportunities come along I will try to use the classic skis to regain some sort of fitness base. Skiing is absolutely the best exercise to get ready for skiing. Everything else you might do is simply to get you to the snow again.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-7421940036560035752014-02-07T21:49:00.000-05:002014-02-11T09:31:36.606-05:00Who woulda thunk it?Muscle memory is an amazing thing.

I went out on the groomies on classical skis this afternoon for the first time in at least a year, maybe two. Admittedly, waxing conditions were as perfect as they get. Still, I never expected to be able to set the kick and lay down such a fluid stride when all my groomed-trail classical has been imaginary for so long.

I have no stamina. I can't maintain the rhythm on the climbs. But the body remembers even if the cardiovascular system and all the tweaky little supporting muscles burn out quickly.

Classical requires precision that skating does not. Skating requires some basic commitments, but classical depends on repeated subtleties to get sufficient grip from a ski without too much grip wax on it. It's easy to remind me of playing music, so it reminded me of playing music. To get a good sound you have to be in the right place at the right time with just the right amount of force. This is especially true on a fretless, bowed instrument like the fiddle.

As it happens, the weekly String Band has finally come around to playing a tune I took up as a challenge on my own about five years ago. I downloaded some sheet music for it because I had it on a Darol Anger CD and wondered if I could ever get a handle on it. Turns out that five years of practice will get me a half-decent toehold. Hell, I've got my whole foot on there.

Ordinarily I set my chair back just a little at the weekly jam and struggle gamely with the tunes. I make no pretense of being one of the top players. But the evening our leader introduced the idea that we might take up Banish Misfortune, the others in the group each gave an opinion and then turned to me.

"It's like this," I said. Then I ripped through the A part with a precision that surprised even me. Apparently, the practice had set the tune in my mind and muscles so thoroughly that I couldn't even mess it up when playing out loud, alone, for a room full of people. Muscle memory.

"You can wait in the hall," said Big Scary John. He's a kidder, that guy, but he sure looked scary to me when I first arrived.

Muscle memory. The version of Banish Misfortune we're learning is a tad different from the sheet music from which I began my work. Of course it is. That's the nature of these folk tunes: endless little variations. Sometimes the same title will have two or three unrecognizable tunes under it. Fortunately this isn't one of those. But the variations interrupt the flow of the version I know. I feared it might be catastrophic when our leader first mentioned the title as a future selection. As it turned out, the autonomic nature of the tune gets me back on track immediately, even when my attempt to assimilate a variation derails me momentarily. Likewise, on the trail today, slips in technique did not break up into total turbulence. The body remembers.

As far as skiing goes, I wish I was in better shape. Never a racer, I still got a lot of satisfaction from knowing that I could surprise a few people. It's also just nice to lay down a powerful stride for mile after mile. No telling whether this will be my only indulgence this winter or if I might get into something resembling a routine. It depends on factors entirely beyond my control.

Getting my skis ready yesterday, I taped off the ends of the kick zone so I could get a clean, crisp edge on the glide zone. The memories and the longing it evoked, as I started the ritual of glide waxing made me think of an addict in a movie, holding the tourniquet of surgical tubing tight with his teeth. It's a powerful thing, skiing. Withdrawal had been brutal. I've suffered depression, genuine, medically treated depression, since regular skiing dropped out of my life. I'm taking a risk to dare to take a taste again. I've never managed to stop wanting it. And why should I? As addictions go it's pretty darn wholesome. But it has an undeniable effect on brain chemistry. Thus it has a power that I can prove to you can turn dark. To have a little is to want more, for a host of excellent reasons.

The body remembers. The connections spark with the familiar electricity. The rhythm wants to assert itself. Getting winded is like hearing a tune in my head and lacking the chops to play it at that speed. It makes me want to practice, so when practice is denied the frustration is that much worse. It can grow into despair.

We'll see what happens with the rest of the winter. At least I know I'll be back at String Band next week.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-72035078677043346142014-01-28T17:35:00.000-05:002014-01-28T17:35:35.145-05:00Actually skiingLooking out at the sunny afternoon I suddenly realized that nothing on my schedule would prevent me from going out back to poke around on skis.

The temperature had gotten up to 20 degrees F. The wind was still sharp, but it hardly penetrates the forest. Occasional veils of faint cirrus clouds filtered the sun a little at times, but mostly it was a flawless afternoon.

Two to five inches of hero snow overlay a shallow but firmly frozen base. The top snow was cold and dry, so the waxless pattern of my beat-up old skis did not hold like a crampon, but it was good enough for a trudge around the property. I don't know if the total elevation gain from the house to the top of the knoll is 100 feet. The steeper end certainly rises little more than half that, but it offers a few lines. You might get four turns or a dozen, depending on snow depth and your quick decision making.

Abutting properties have been logged within the last decade. The saplings have grown up into impassible thickets.

I bushwhacked my way back out after attempting to find a way through to the higher slopes of the mountainside. On my own land the trees have not been cut. I traversed to the top of a knoll at the back of the property to ski down.

This hemlock grove is a Deer Hilton. The deer bed down in several locations near each other in the mixed forest. The various tree species offer shelter, buds to browse, and acorns and beechnuts.

So many lines. A little play area like this wouldn't be worth a drive, but it's fine for the back yard.

When you're just poking around, any drop invites you to throw down a few turns.

Tracks are everywhere, from the well-established trails of the resident deer to the zippers laid down by mice.

cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-29135383919978749902014-01-27T15:07:00.000-05:002014-01-28T17:06:54.937-05:00SIN and RedemptionWhen Rottefella's minions announced the NIS binding a couple of years ago it seemed like an egregious grab for market share by forcing customers to choose the inferior NNN system over the sturdier Salomon systems. But, given time to think about it I realize that the SIN plate has accidentally cured all my objections to the NNN system.

Back in about 1991, when the Salomon Profil system came out, it addressed a lot of inadequacies of Salomon's previous SNS system. At the same time it corrected the flaws in Rottefella's NNN and NNN II systems, notably the unnecessary ability to adjust the length of the binding plate to the boot size and the cheesy construction of the bindings themselves. NNN bindings were more complicated to mount, leading to more possible assembly flaws, and they broke more frequently. The adjustable-length plates notoriously came apart where the two sections joined. In early versions, the rear part of the plate frequently sheared right off the ski.

Looking at these problems and finding ourselves selling a particular model of Salomon touring boot much more than any NNN boot, we decided to quit carrying NNN and beef up our stock of Salomon. We could sell with confidence. We could justify our decision on functional grounds. No one told us we couldn't sell NNN. We chose not to.

Function does not necessarily determine whether a product or its parent company can survive in the marketplace. Rottefella licenses NNN to many companies. NNN gets sold in stores where the clerks and the customers don't know any better. The sales people may know other things, but for various reasons they simply believe what they're told about Nordic product.

Meanwhile, the Omnitrak waxless base was killed off by K2 when they bought Karhu and destroyed the company. So the stage was set for this strange time when Rottefella's marketing ploy, the NIS plate, actually turns out to make their product -- if not outright good -- at least good enough.

Point one: adjustable length requires trickier drilling. With the SIN plate, there is no drilling. The binding sections slide onto the plate which is already permanently bonded to the ski. Of course time will tell if that permanent bond really lasts. SIN plate separation could be pretty nasty on a fast, twisty downhill. But nothing has gone wrong yet...that I know of.

Point two: cheesy construction causes bindings to break. SIN bindings have to be pretty robust because of the design of the plate. It's almost idiot proof, which also works well when the skis are sold at stores where no one knows or cares much about cross-country skiing.

The demise of the Omnitrak base means that there's no reason not to settle for a SIN plate ski with whatever waxless pattern they've managed to mold or chisel onto it. The best in the business is gone. The competition for distant second place is crowded with probably adequate mediocrity.

Many of the boots for NNN are reported to be quite comfortable. So that's good. I don't know if any of them have an inner lacing system comparable to the one Salomon has been using on their better boots for at least 20 years, but Salomon can't even be counted on not to mess that up eventually. The Escape/Siam 7 boots this year have what looks like the nice inner boot lacing system, but when you feel around you discover that it's not as separate as it used to be. They're getting perilously close to making those models just another standard boot with an annoying cover over the laces.

Salomon also helped make the choice more debatable with their wide application of the Pilot binding to what had been a stable and functional line of boots and bindings. Pilot started as a skating binding, where its advantages were obvious. I could easily describe and demonstrate how the binding made skate skiing better. This is emphatically not true of the racing classic Pilot binding they introduced and have already abandoned. And the Pilot touring bindings, while they may offer some advantage with the generally wider compact touring skis, sometimes don't work perfectly smoothly for some skiers. I'm not sure how I feel about them, which is a definitely step down from how confidently I could endorse the Profil system in its heyday. At this point if someone wants an NNN boot and a SIN plate ski I can't say they're making a mistake.

The NIS plate does inject complication and annoyance into the world of cross-country skiing in other ways. If a person chooses a Salomon binding and a SIN plate ski, the plate has to be masked with a special shimming plate to cover its little ridges. Otherwise the mechanism of the Salomon binding, particularly the step-in versions of Pilot, will catch on the SIN plate and jam. Rottefella may chuckle diabolically over this, but at the moment their own NNN-BC binding would need a similar adapter because there is no SIN version of NNN-BC.

Alpina supposedly offers a screw-on SIN plate for flat-top skis. How long will it be before an NNN affiliate has to offer an adapter shim to mask the SIN plate as well?

Even after decades of consumer confusion and a certain amount of complaint, the cross-country ski industry moves ever further from standardization rather than closer to it. Looking on the bright side, at least you can hunt around for the best or least worst solution for your particular needs. If the industry settled on a norm, there's a better than even chance it would be crap and we'd all be stuck with it.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-29817413343196340762014-01-21T14:23:00.001-05:002014-01-21T14:23:43.496-05:00Treats vs a Steady DietWhen I lived in Maryland, ski conditions were rare. If I got to ski in Annapolis it meant that a significant storm for that area had brought usable snow that might last only a day. Sometimes we might get a week out of it. Skiing was a treat.

Even if we did not get to ski in our own neighborhood, skiers from the area would make a special trip to western Maryland, West Virginia or Pennsylvania for a better shot at usable snow. Because it was a dedicated expedition, skiing was the main focus of the trip. Whether we stayed in a hotel or camped out, we ate and slept only to fuel and rest ourselves for skiing.

After moving to what we used to consider ski country, I started to experience skiing as part of a more routine daily schedule. I had to go to work, clean the house, buy groceries, and all the other details of a regular life. I did not live in ski clothes for the whole winter the way I would live in those clothes for a whole visit to winterland. Convenience actually makes skiing less convenient. You have to suit up for it and then change into appropriate garb for whatever you have to do next.

Granted, when skiing came to Annapolis I was fitting it in around my workaday schedule. I was younger, so skiing for two or three hours at night didn't wear me out as much as it does now. The excitement of having snow added to my energy. Living in a place where snow is more normal erodes the excitement. It does not come back once it's gone. I have to clear that snow from around my home before I get to play on it.

Another result of regular skiing is a higher standard of skiing. I recall my eager fumbles for the first few years. Every bit of progress was great. I would visit New England and feel like I must not look too bad out there. After a couple of decades living up here I know how I looked. I've seen a lot of other people look that way. The innocence was nice while it lasted. Knowing better is a burden one cannot put down. Indulge the innocent, but you cannot rejoin them. Well, I can't anyway.

I still enjoy skiing in the woods in much the same way as I always did. It's an ancient style of practical skiing. But on the highly refined crack cocaine of modern grooming with performance gear I can't settle for a wheezy wobble. Better to avoid the groomies altogether than remind myself of how far I have fallen. If by luck I happen to get into some kind of shape again I can sneak in the side entrance and try to zip around a little.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-68680157879472147232013-10-24T13:59:00.000-04:002013-10-24T13:59:45.731-04:00The coming ski seasonCold winds and shortening days used to signal the approach of the winter fun season in New England. Whatever was lost of warmth and light was a positive step toward freezing the world to receive and retain the snow.

Into the steadily colder world we would go, training steadily to acclimate to winter conditions. You don't want wait until the snow arrives to start getting yourself in shape to get around on it.

Snow would accumulate all winter. The snowpack would consolidate. Thaws might reduce it, but almost never destroyed it completely.

Some people do an amazing job of maintaining their faith that this winter will be a good one. No matter how many times we get little or nothing, the true believers never falter. If it depended on belief alone we would never have a muddy winter. The Red Sox would always be in the World Series, too.

I have always recommended versatility. If you have several winter activities that take advantage of different conditions you can shift among them as conditions require. But I have to say that raw, damp weather and mud provide the fewest opportunities.

When people try to talk to me about the coming winter I change the subject or get out of the conversation as quickly as I can. That can be hard when I'm supposed to be selling skis. Since I no longer get to eat the steak it's hard enough already to sell the sizzle.

When I lived in Maryland, I would watch a usable snowfall melt away in hours before I ever got to ski on it. Now the changing climate has brought the same kind of challenge to this place that seemed so far north when I arrived here. This picks off more potential time slots as more of them are icy or slushy. And that's if they're not open mud.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-88677732604275316352013-02-19T15:04:00.000-05:002013-02-19T21:13:19.956-05:00Chore skiingBefore the next storm brings rain and snow I slithered around the woods to gather pine cones. They're great for starting the woodstove with less than enthusiastic firewood.

I slung a 5-gallon plastic bucket for the cones over my shoulder with an old piece of climbing webbing so I could have my hands free to hold my poles. A job like this is much easier than when I skied out with a bow saw and an axe to cut dead pine because I had run out of any kind of firewood. But it's far from the groomed trail experience.

I'm bushwhacker at heart. Just as I used lift-served skiing to get concentrated turn practice so did I use groomed trail skiing to stay in shape for trudging forays on obscure trails or no trail at all. In both cases I spent as much time as possible in the woods, although I had to be forcibly weaned from groomed-trail cross-country skiing. I could get back into that habit. But even at the height of my addiction I would never spend the money and time to travel to a ski center on my day off.

Skiing around the woods looking for something stupid like pine cones or dry sticks gets to the roots of skiing much more than recreational sliding on machine-prepared surfaces does. Skiing was part of practical daily life. It was enjoyable even as it was utilitarian.

A friend of mine living in Seattle, who dated a Norwegian woman living there, noted that she had a very unadorned style of skiing that casually covered a lot of ground very efficiently. It was well practiced from childhood in its native environment rather than consciously studied in a place to which it had been transplanted centuries after its invention.

The skis I used today are at least 15 years old. They're very similar to the ones on which I started skiing almost 30 years ago. All the waves of innovation that have created products targeted at very specific types of skiing can't change the fact that a relatively traditional touring ski can go almost anywhere. Maybe I can't keep up with the gear addicts on their exquisitely designed perfect tools for the back country or the immaculately prepared track, but those aren't always the most comfortable people to hang out with anyway.

On old skis, with old boots and old poles on a sunny afternoon I wanted nothing I did not have right there.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-35926914832716227022013-02-15T10:37:00.000-05:002013-02-15T11:50:06.143-05:00I am an alcoholic bartenderWrite what you know. Sell what you're into. Share your buzz. People look for an informed perspective when they shop for a product.

Bicycling got me into the bike business. Cross-country skiing got me into the ski business. Like many participants, I fell into the commerce side in search of some deals on gear. And here we are.

My current shop job financed and equipped my descent into full-on addiction. I sold the gear, I taught lessons. I went on trips, though nothing worthy of bragging. No one needs to hear about my private tree-dodging exploits on frumpy little mountains no one's heard of. No one cares about my daily training runs on classic or skating skis on groomed trails I had the opportunity to use frequently enough to count as a regular program. Every one of those doses fed my need.

I reached my high or low point, depending on your view, when I operated the retail concession at Jackson Ski Touring. It was one shot after another of the pure stuff. It surged through me, impaired my judgment, lured me into a variety of social blunders, but I didn't care, as long as I could get onto the trails and feed the beast within me.

My addiction definitely affected my job performance, but not entirely badly. Since our target demographic was addicts and the addictable, looking like a happy participant made me a better host. Like any partyer, I had some people who liked to party with me or at least felt neutral, and others who found me offensive.

I tried to conceal the extent of my addiction by downplaying the amount I was using, sometimes using secretly. I was absent or tardy because of it. It was the most important part of my day, for sure.

Here in Wolfe City I have no hope of skiing as much as I did in Jackson, or even as much as I used to in Wolfeboro before 2000. I have almost no chance to go at all. Forced to detox, I don't want to use again at all, lest I awaken the longing. I'll talk it up and change the subject if anyone asks how much I get out.

"Been skiing today?"

"No."

The word lies there, a cold brick. I say nothing more. The conversation moves on.

Two students have signed up for a group lesson on Saturday morning. Neither of our two casual part-time instructors are available. The last time this happened, only one staff member here had ski gear. He lives in town, on the other end of the trail system, so he skis to work and home again. We scraped the lesson off on him. I told The Management that was my plan again.

"What about you? Why don't you do it?" he asked.

I can't. I just can't. When a tiny bit is nowhere near enough, it's way too much.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-32070399438966368572013-02-07T14:25:00.000-05:002013-02-07T14:51:19.976-05:00Epic Proportions!

Winter storms have a way of growing into monsters as they make their final approach. What was going to bring an unspecified "measurable amount of snow" in the forecast of five days ago is now a behemoth named Nemo. Someone heard from someone that the Portsmouth, NH, area could get 42 inches! Buildings are already collapsing at the mere thought. Especially anxious people have already fired up the generator and started to asphyxiate the family because the power could go out by Saturday morning.

Then the temperature is predicted to bounce up to around 40 by Monday. Will we even get a week of trail operations out of this? We shall see. Meanwhile it's great to hear the rumors fly.

If we can have skiing for Massachusetts Vacation Week (Feb. 16-24) we'll have made as much money as we could. No one seems to turn out for winter after late February anymore. This could be because winter itself so seldom turns out anymore.

Local dedicated skiers will use whatever they can find for as long as they can find it. If snow falls we will groom it.

The Wolfeboro Cross-Country Ski Association is studying the feasibility of snowmaking on selected trails. The technology is improving. Is the cost prohibitive? I don't think hordes of people will show up to use manufactured snow for cross-country, but a devoted core group will. It's just the next stage in using technology to compensate for the natural systems we've disrupted beyond repair. People skate all year on indoor refrigerated rinks, ride bikes in spinning studios, climb fake rock walls in indoor gyms and ski downhill on frozen concrete splattered onto mountainsides all over the Northeast.

Once the Holodeck is perfected no one will have to care what it's doing outside.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-84048656299813703002013-01-31T17:03:00.001-05:002013-01-31T17:03:45.256-05:00Deinventing Cross-CountryAs our little corner of New Hampshire faces the second horrible winter in a row, we have plenty of time to think about how we can go forward into an uncertain future. Undetermined it may be, but probability favors more wet and warm winters than bountifully snowy and crisply cold ones.

When cross-country skiing reached its height in the early 1980s, skis were all sized the same way, by traditional lengths. Grip patterns were becoming more popular than kick wax for traction. Materials were evolving rapidly to make skis easier to maintain than traditional wooden models had been. Trails only needed to be six or eight feet wide except perhaps on downhill turns. Many touring centers didn't even add leeway there.

Grooming was rudimentary. Because touring centers in snowy regions still expected to get at least a couple of heavy storms, grooming centered more on packing loose snow than grinding up frozen stuff. Tilling equipment for those frozen conditions represented the major investment for touring centers trying to expand their offerings.

The emergence and explosive growth of skate skiing from about the mid 1980s ushered in big changes in trail and equipment design and in grooming needs. As overhead costs for touring centers increased it was harder to run a commercially competitive center without investing in trail widening and grooming machinery. But people still had the money to spend on winter fun and winter still seemed to be delivering its part of the bargain most of the time. Cross-country could still say, "We're a lot cheaper than downhill!"

Cross-country is still cheaper than downhill, but only because downhill is ridiculously expensive. And the industry has done such a good job discrediting traditional size touring skis that consumers are more confused than ever about what to get and where to use it.

Because Fischer started the compact ski craze with the Revolution one-size-fits-all micro skating ski, the compact ski genre started with something ridiculously short. If the compact ski had developed from the other end of the spectrum, slightly shortening awkwardly long skis rather than creating a whole class of awkwardly short ones, skiers might have drifted to a new norm on downsized long skis rather than being fed the attractive but less workable notion that they could get around perfectly well on some dinky waddling board.

The short fat ski is a creature of soft ungroomed snow. It requires a substantial boot and binding to make it work to its full potential.

The short skinny ski is a creature of groomed trails. Skinny is relative. A traditional or near-traditional length touring ski at 60, 62 or 65 millimeters is wide enough to provide flotation in ungroomed snow. A compact ski of those widths is not. Also, the longer ski has more length between tip and grip in which to make the transition from a good turn-initiating front end to a properly supportive kick zone.

The more skis require groomed trails the harder they are for people to use in the casual way they liked when cross-country was popular.

We could save cross-country skiing in this country by rolling back the options to a few simple choices that will really do what the advertising says they will. Make them versatile and make them cheap. People are more likely to buy something on the off chance they get to use it if they don't have to worry about where they'll find the money.

By scaling back the skis, touring center operators can scale back on the costs. Someone could operate a center with smaller trails if they could get grooming equipment that would fit them. Smaller centers could operate on land that might have gone unused in the winter -- certain kinds of cropland, woodlots not currently being harvested, golf courses, parks. With a little imagination, anyone interested in skiing could learn to exploit short-lived snowfalls in many places.

Skating screws up the balance. It's great fun, but it needs that wide, smooth, expensively-prepared trail. There will still be a place for centers that cater to skating, as long as the climate doesn't warm so much that no one can count on operating enough days to cover the overhead.

Ironic that cross-country faces collapse because they tried to broaden their appeal. I'm saying that they just chose the wrong way to do it.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-35108909089506625222013-01-12T13:09:00.000-05:002013-01-12T13:09:17.376-05:00Park and Ski ain't happeningMy plans to try park-and-ski commuting have failed on the usual problem: When there's snow there's no place to park. Big G's failed on the fact that he would already have driven much further to get a reasonable ski distance from which to launch that phase, so it seemed kind of silly.

In any case, the places we hoped to hang cars do not get cleared because no one in the normal population uses them in the white months.

The white months themselves seem to be turning gray and brown again. We need a new plan. Probably several plans.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-16552262783802599802012-12-18T12:00:00.000-05:002013-10-23T14:39:42.612-04:00What's cross-country skiing worth to you?A recent article in Cross Country Skier magazine reported (in a four-page valentine to the behemoth of New England cross-country skiing) that a day pass to Jackson Ski Touring costs $21 now. A quick check of the Ski NH listings of cross-country ski centers shows that Jackson sells the most expensive day pass of any area in New Hampshire, but only by a dollar over Waterville Valley and two dollars over Bretton Woods and Great Glen.

Great Glen? Really? Their website advertises 40 km of groomed and backcountry trails. Backcountry is a code word for ungroomed and possibly ungroomable, which in many common snow conditions means virtually unskiable. You decide if it's worth the drive to the top of Pinkham Notch and a $19 ticket.

A lot of areas offer a day pass for $12 or less. They may not offer 76 or 100 kilometers or a view up the skirts of Mount Washington, but how much can you really ski in a day? The old argument that cross-country is cheaper than downhill is still true, but that's mostly because downhill is now absurdly expensive with lift tickets commonly well above $70 on weekends at major mountains. The merely ridiculously expensive $21 trail pass looks downright economical. And according to the Cross Country Skier article, executive director of JSTF Thom Perkins says that the $21 ticket does not meet their expenses.

Ski areas depend on season pass revenues for the bulk of their income. Day skiers are unpredictable. They go with the weather. They decide on a whim. To guarantee some level of operating funds, ski areas have to convince a lot of people to throw down a bet before a flake hits the ground or a cold cloud even gathers in the sky.

Cross country skiing, especially in New England, depends on expensive grooming equipment run by skilled technicians. Some areas have experimented with snowmaking, which is another large expense. The downhill industry tells us it is one of the biggest drivers of their pricing. So the claim by cross-country ski areas that their sport is cheaper than downhill faces a growing challenge if they're going to invest in infrastructure to put down a guaranteed surface of manufactured snow on a significant amount of terrain. Will people love cross-country skiing enough to pay what it really costs to provide it? History hints that the answer is no.

The same issue of Cross Country Skier had an article titled "Beyond Grooming" in which the author put forth the radical notion that a skier could get some wide touring skis and heavy boots and ski the trails they use for activities such as mountain biking. Wow! Make your own tracks? That's the craziest idea since hippies invented cross country skiing in the late 1960s! The article was also an advertisement for Rottefella's widely licensed NNN-BC boot and binding system, since the war on 75 millimeter has never ended. Word to the wise: find yourself some good beefy 75 mm boots and bindings for your exploring skis if you plan to go far from the car and you might be trying to drive some turns. System bindings from Rottefella or Salomon are made with a lot of plastic and plenty of small parts just for the sake of skiing performance that is only debatably better. Old boring 75 mm bindings are simple, durable and readily repairable in the event that you actually get snow conditions that will permit you to venture away from groomed trails in this era of warming winters.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-55182230960023531442012-11-19T19:06:00.002-05:002013-10-23T14:40:34.817-04:00Holiday decorating"Are you guys all caught up?" Beth asked as she came into the shop on Friday morning. It's the kind of imprecise question that often precedes a job assignment one of us would not have come up with for ourselves. When Beth is making the assignment it often reminds me of a girl interrupting a great greasy game a bunch of boys are playing to get someone to play house.

Big G was safely elbows-deep in a bunch of preseason base waxing for some of the local racer kids, so I got pulled into Beth's project, decorating the shop Christmas tree. I tried to make a stand and say we shouldn't decorate before the Friday after Thanksgiving, but she wouldn't hear it. Besides, no one will come in on Thursday night to do it.

She should know better than to leave me unsupervised. Something about the configuration of one of the ornaments, a snowman holding snowflakes on a black wire in front of himself, suggested something more sinister. I wonder how long it will take anyone to spot it.

It's the little things that help the day go by.

Later I discovered I could record sounds on my phone and use them as my ring tone. For the rest of the day it belched. Now it meows. A whole new world beckons. The problem is that even I don't recognize it as a phone call at first. I also pissed the cats off by following them around all day trying to get the perfect meow. I still haven't gotten the one I want. When they meow they want you to answer, not shove a phone down by them and wait silently for them to do it again.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-86118128156165789362012-11-08T14:22:00.001-05:002012-11-08T14:22:32.633-05:00Transportation SkiingAs someone who commuted by bicycle in a place where it seldom snowed and the snow that fell seldom stayed, I looked forward to trying to use my cross-country skis for transportation once I moved to the Frozen North.

Global warming quickly combined with the fact that the Frozen North's reputation was quite exaggerated already. Also, like everywhere else in the United States, transportation infrastructure was entirely committed to motor vehicles. That's changing now, but only very gradually.

The best years for daily skiing were the otherwise dark ones I spent running a retail concession at Jackson Ski Touring. Whatever else might happen when dealing with a staff and clientele that could be patronizing or duplicitous (big word, JSTFers -- look it up!) I had pretty good odds of getting out on the trail.

Along with the relief of returning to Wolfeboro came the realization that I had probably skied my last. The trail quality at Wolfeboro Cross Country can often rival that of its large, smug and more expensive cousin in Jackson, but our small staff can't assure that much of it will be ready for employees to take a meaningful training session before the shop opens. Everyone has to wear a stack of hats here. Gone are the days when we could tag out for a scamper on our own trails.

After three winters basically without skiing, a trudge on the rail trail on my 200cm back-country skis now sounds downright attractive. Forget the beauty glide, the perfect stride, Blue Extra kick wax or a ripping skate over hill and hollow. I never even took the storage wax off my performance skis last year. I might have gotten out twice on rock skis. But the farther I get from the beautiful rush of fast skis on good grooming the more willing I am to settle for a ski-like plod witrh some long, pointy planks and heavy boots. It's a good walk enhanced.

Parking, as always, is the key. You have to have a relatively secure place to stuff the automobile when you switch to the skis. If snow is falling will you be able to get the car out of its spot or will the road crews have turned it into a monument to Shackleton's Endurance? My colleague Big G and I think that we might find a usable spot at a reasonable distance out the rail trail. Big G has the advantage of someone who might be convinced to drop him off, thus eliminating the need for parking on those days.

When snow fell in Annapolis I would stay up all night if I had to, skiing around the neighborhood and the nearby Navy housing. Until the plows caught up, local cross-country skiers would go as far as the snow cover let them. I remember racing a jogger through the Naval Academy one day. The snow was the perfect depth to make our speed nearly equal, but I had a slim advantage. I hope he was as ready to puke as I was by the end of our sprint. We never got closer to each other than about 30 yards on our parallel lines across one of the parade grounds.

With any luck Big G and I will come out of this winter slimmer and happier than we have been in the previous three years. Because the rail trail is level we don't have to worry as much about ice-like surfaces as we would if we had to climb much or set edges to turn or stop. This could be good, or at least better than nothing.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-49816668791692936762012-10-27T14:50:00.001-04:002012-10-27T14:50:59.041-04:00AsteriskFrank Zappa was wrong. The crux of the biscuit is not the apostrophe. It's the asterisk.

When it comes to human-powered equipment the answer to almost any question is "it depends." In addition to cross-country skis I could say this about bicycles, kayaks, hiking and climbing boots, snowshoes and a host of other equipment that's simple to use when properly chosen and correctly applied.

Many a ski sale starts with a long explanation about all the different kinds of ski and skiing. You can streamline it to some extent, but customers ask questions. Before you know it you've spent 45 minutes you would have preferred to spend with the lunch they interrupted, giving someone who came in with no idea at all a general picture of what their opportunities are. It is never meant to confuse them or bore them to death or make the salesman look smart. It is only intended to put a new skier or a skier making a change of equipment onto the most enjoyable ski for them. It's intended to build the sport, one satisfied skier at a time.

In Jackson the touring center management was looking for something more along the lines of a prostitute turning as many tricks as possible with no backtalk. Show some respect for your betters! Get 'em in, get their money and get 'em out! Quit wasting people's time with long-winded explanations and big words! It was amazing how much advice we were expected to take from a bunch of people who had never been in specialty retail -- perhaps not in retail at all.

As much as I may sympathize with people's wish for the simple pleasures of the world to remain simple, even something as basic as food or sex becomes extremely complicated in a hurry.

If I could sell someone the perfect set of skis time after time with just six well-chosen words it would certainly free up the rest of my time for a long list of other things I enjoy. Indeed, the opprobrium leveled at me at Jackson Ski Touring has made me gun shy about approaching anyone with my previous good faith and optimism. If not for the fact that the vast majority of customers compliment us on our thorough and informative presentation I might quit bothering at all. Given the quality of equipment the industry is putting out these days and the unreliable winters I already have enough challenges to my enthusiasm.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-80896855936973707802012-09-27T12:28:00.000-04:002012-09-27T14:04:39.623-04:00Winter lovers getting antsyYou have to ask yourself how much of the Old Farmer's Almanac prediction of a cold, snowy winter is based on ski area ad revenues in Yankee Magazine. "Secret formula" indeed. Sunspots. Precession of the Earth's axis. Woolly bear caterpillars. Full-page ads from Killington. Ka-ching! We have your prediction.

Every winter is going to be great until it turns out to be lousy. The progression goes like this:

1. "Maybe it'll start early! If we get an early hard freeze and a good Nor'easter in November we could be on snow in early December and keep it going until April!"

2. "It never really snows until late December at the earliest. We're still on schedule. Squirrels have been hiding a lot of nuts! Surely an animal known for dashing out in front of cars has powers of prediction beyond our comprehension."

3. "It never REALLY snows until January. Skiing at Christmas time is more of a treat than a regular thing we can count on. We're fine."

4. "The big stuff moves in in February. Just use your rock skis for now."

5. "It could still turn around. You know it never really comes down deep until March."

6. "There's probably enough for good spring skiing up high."

7. "F*** this! Where's my bike?"

Whatever will be will be. But hard core skiers are not known for philosophical acceptance. Businesses that depend on their optimism can't afford to look casual about it either.

I'll be hiding in the back because I'm a lousy faker. I care, but I refuse to get all wound up over it.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-24080145526540196892012-03-05T09:55:00.000-05:002012-03-05T09:55:07.014-05:00SatisfactionBack in the days when I thought of myself as a good skier I would start to feel the elation of a good, vigorous ski as I headed out the door. It wasn't always that easy, but during a good active season the momentum would build in waves. Even my bad moods were good. My good moods were insane.

The past three winters have dismantled all that. As a result I have conducted an accidental experiment. Starting with a fit, athletic specimen I have reduced him to a sedentary blob, aided by the pressures of work and life. Now I have some hint of how normal people feel.

Normal is awful.

The recent snow came too late to save any of the high-earning periods of our commercial season, but it did open the trails for a weekend. Grateful skiers and snowshoers appeared in crowds of one or two. Those ones and twos added up to a full parking lot from time to time, but the shop remained mostly quiet. As a result I suddenly got to ski two days in a row after the winter of nearly complete inactivity.

Warm days made the surface slushy. The first day, on Fischer RCR Crowns, the track had been nearly obliterated by skiers, snowshoers and stomping teenagers who trample all over the trails with a plastic sled. My half hour plod didn't change me much. The second day, however, my results varied.

The day was warm, the surface was slushy and the trampling teens had been back. Based on my observations from the day before I decided that waddling on skating skis would be marginally better than waddling on the classical skis I had available. I went for about 40 minutes on the widest soft rental skate skis I could find. They weren't as wide as my old Atomics, but they would have to do.

It was my first real workout since January 2011. Bike commuting is good steady exercise, but it does not work the body as thoroughly as vigorous cross-country skiing does. In the summers I used to paddle a kayak. In any season without skiing I used to train with weights. Choosing to use my time on other things, those activities have disappeared from my schedule.

As an experiment it set the stage for conspicuous results.

I finished my haphazard waddle feeling quite a bit of the usual euphoria. All the effects were there: higher body temperature through the afternoon and evening indicated increased metabolism well after I finished skiing. Annoying cheerfulness indicated the release of endorphins that had seemed inaccessible under the sludge of inactivity.

Weak propelling muscles and a deteriorated cardiovascular system make you slow. Weak steering and stabilizing muscles make you sloppy. Trained reflexes call for the right action at the right time. The body remembers. But early fatigue in the support system makes the response inaccurate.

Because many of the stabilizing and steering muscles are pretty small, they tone up quickly. This is why form returns rapidly once you get to go out on a regular basis. This late in the season, regular skiing seems highly unlikely. Who knows what next winter might bring. I no longer plan for anything. Understanding how the body responds to an activity makes it easier to adapt when the opportunity does arise. So in a matter of a week or two at most I will probably be getting my posterior accustomed to regular bicycling again rather than trying to hone anything related to skiing.

Reality has a way of slapping euphoria right out of you. I could say something glib about how we should all just go ski, but honesty compels me to admit that many problems remain that can't be addressed by any artificial mood enhancers. Maybe a few minutes of escapism are the best anyone can expect. Nothing really gets fixed because too many points of view need to be accommodated.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-55548623453082183062012-03-02T16:07:00.000-05:002012-03-02T16:07:21.269-05:00Skiing is a nutrientExercise is not a luxury. I wonder how the political climate in this country might change if the majority of people got out for a nice walk or bike ride every day. The feelings of frustration and irritation so common between factions might disappear almost entirely. They creep up so insidiously that a person's outlook can shift drastically toward greater darkness and anger by nearly unnoticeable steps.

For a cross-country skier that activity forms a critical part of metabolism. Because cross-country skiing is the most complete exercise you can perform on land, it activates every system of the body. You burn food more efficiently. You hydrate more thoroughly. You tone every muscle. A body accustomed to that suffers from the loss of it. A mind accustomed to it notices the difference. Everything slumps.

Snow has arrived as winter enters its final phase. The season begins as it ends. It's too late for most of us to get the confident, calm feeling that develops over many weeks of skiing. But the wretched season has crystallized the concept for me that skiing needs to happen. Everyone who works in this business needs to get out there and do it every day there's snow. It's not an indulgence any more than being properly fed is an indulgence. It makes us better at our jobs. We serve our customers better. We run the business better.

In the economy in general, a more humane attitude toward the work day would go a long way to making life much sweeter and the population healthier. How about this: everyone gets two hours in the best part of the day to take a jog, a walk, a bike ride, a ski or an indoor exercise class, and get lunch. It doesn't come out of your pay as long as you do something active. Self-propelled commuters can substitute somthing else for the exercise hour, like an art class, chess games, writing or a music lesson. You can't take a double lunch or just go smoke somewhere. You can, but you don't get paid.

We have to live by the experience, not by the numbers.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-87205105195398025422012-01-30T18:46:00.001-05:002012-01-30T18:46:37.867-05:00Cross-country skiing in New EnglandDid New England ever really have the winters depicted in popular myth? If they ever occurred, they don't anymore. We can't even seem to get an average winter most years, let alone an epic one.

Whether the decline in cross-country skiing is really due to changing climate or to a long-overdue acknowledgment that snow conditions are normally inadequate south of the mountains, the sport is clearly dwindling. The people who love it love it, but fewer and fewer people are falling in love with it. It's too unreliable.

Resorts in the mountains will still be able to provide skiing for something like a full season. Skiing belongs in the mountains. We may revise our standard of what a full season means, but mountain weather will probably produce snow for many years after it has become rare around the middle and southern part of New Hampshire and all of southern New England. One or two big storms every couple of years won't be enough to support sophisticated grooming equipment at a touring center if the rest of the time they get meager slush, rain and mud. Sliding around on cross-country skis will be a novelty, not a lifestyle.

Every time we get a storm, calls come in. People want to believe. Personally I feel more and more like I don't have time to waste encouraging people to pursue an activity they won't be able to keep doing regularly even if they want to. With all the uncertainty about the nation's and the world's economic future, should people really be wasting money on a mere sport, and a dying one at that?

The ski industry says, "The heck with that! You just need to buy more stuff! If your stuff isn't working, it's the wrong stuff! Buy different stuff! You'll get to use it eventually!" Bless their little hearts. Everyone wants to keep their thing going as long as possible. I'd like to believe the climate could settle down again and that people could prosper enough to play out in it. I'm just afraid that for most of the past four decades we've already been on stolen time.cafiendhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-57155552605448948042012-01-19T13:29:00.002-05:002012-01-19T13:52:06.987-05:00Ski RepairDelamination is a common problem. Skiers are always coming in with one end or the other of their ski bases flapping loose.

Today's victim needed a six-inch section of the tip re-fastened. How to clamp the radius of the repaired tip?

Use the other tip. I waxed the surface of the ski so the glue would not adhere to it. Then with light but firm pressure I clamped the sandwich together. We'll see how that goes.

Last year we had a repair on which we tried to see how many clamps we could use.

It was another tip repair, but we either did not think to use the other ski as a mold or we couldn't. In that case we used a lot of small blocks to secure sections of the curve.

For adhesive we use Gorilla Glue. It's easier to work with than epoxy and has a shorter curing time. Instead of mixing a batch that might be too big or too small we just squeeze out what we need. Not much adheres well to plastic, even epoxy, so we might as well work with something that's fairly easy to get along with.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-9241860.post-29624271181240375362012-01-07T22:06:00.001-05:002012-01-08T18:57:50.337-05:00TediumSundays are so tedious they've started to slop over into Saturday.

Sundays have their own time warp. On a Sunday afternoon, a flurry of activity that would eat up an hour or two on another day will prove to have expended about 10 minutes at best when you check the clock after it ends. This extended boredom has started to attack Saturday as well.

The ground is bare. Hardly any cross-country ski areas have any open trails. The next storm is shaping up to be warm and wet, not deep and white. We lost Christmas week. Now we're fixing to lose Martin Luther King weekend. Our big winter earning periods are getting hammered.

Aside from a bit of maintenance on rental skates and one or two out-of-season bike repairs, we have little to do but brainstorm new directions for this business or new businesses in case this one is too damaged to survive.

If I had known that winter was going to die out in my lifetime, I would not have wasted time learning to ski. I enjoyed cross-country and backcountry skiing skiing immensely, but I would have put the time into bicycle-related skills and boating. I might not even have moved to New Hampshire, although I have enjoyed mountain hiking and rock climbing. For all that I get to do THAT I might as well have stayed on the immediate coast and stuck to maritime pursuits.

Chaos being chaos, you can't change one variable without affecting a whole slew of other ones. Parallel universes are fun to imagine sometimes, but I happen to be aware of only this one. So I chart my course from this point on.

One thing's for sure: this is a great year not to be at Jackson Ski Touring. While that's true of any year, it is particularly true in a year like this, that far exceeds even the disastrous season of 2005-'06. It was a major financial burden to maintain the inventory and staff that Jackson required on the off chance that we might get snow. Fortunately, that bad winter afflicted enough of the country to make the ski industry lenient about credit terms. Even so, the scars have lasted long enough to be considered permanent. This hideous winter only gouges deeper at the same injuries. The devastation of the ski business is once again widespread enough to keep our creditors from sending the leg-breakers after us, but that indulgence is little help when the changing climate seems well on the way to destroying our whole sport.

Cross-country skiing was a beautiful experience. I can't say that any of the memories make me feel like I'm back there doing it, but I can appreciate how much fun it was while it lasted. No single activity can equal it for full-body and full-mind exercise. Because of that, nothing can replace it and its skills cannot be applied to anything else. Parts can be applied to many things, but, without skiing to reinforce them, they will have to be maintained piecemeal.

In 2005-'06, bitter, paranoid and angry after the cowardly treachery of persons still unidentified in Jackson, I enjoyed the winter without skiing. I rode my bike while I watched the addicted skiers curdle with frustration. I felt as if nature itself had jumped in on my side. Now, as cross-country skiing seems to be lurching toward extinction, the fact that I don't get to do it simply merges with the way all cross-country skiers are having it stripped from their lives.

From a business standpoint it's a bitch that we're stuck with all the ski gear in our inventory. There's an investment we will never recoup if snow has really gone the way of the passenger pigeon and the dodo bird. If winter really is just another casualty of human folly, all business related to it will suffer.

I can build and repair bicycles. I can get used to having slow, quiet winters in which to prepare for busy, active summers, at least for as long as I am able to be active at all. I decided in 2005 that I could live without skiing. I still skied as much as I could, because it's fun and good for you, but I knew I could let it go when the time came. Has the time come? We shall see. It seems to have come for me, anyway, given the needs of the business and the rest of my life. Whatever I do with myself after whatever happens to the business where I currently work, I will not invest anything in the future of cross-country skiing. I don't think it has one. Not until the collapse of industrial society allows the climate to rebalance itself in however many hundreds or thousands of years that will take.

Mind you I will be content to let the winter make a fool of me by delivering commercial quantities of snow to save us. I still advise against investing heavily in cross-country skiing, though. I'm afraid it's really finished, for the most part.cafiendhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com


text:
ST. LOUIS — The St. Louis Rams canceled practice Thursday due to an undisclosed number of swine flu cases on the team, just three days before a home game against the Houston Texans.
Coach Steve Spagnuolo would not say how many players had the illness but said five or six players had flulike symptoms, and added that other players had reported symptoms the last few weeks. He anticipated the Rams would return to practice on Friday with a workout that will incorporate some of the elements missed on Thursday.
"It's really more of a precaution than anything," Spagnuolo said. "We're checking everybody, we're just being careful."
Players were seen driving away from Rams Park shortly before noon after consulting with medical staff. Team spokesman Ted Crews said many players received medication before leaving.
"If there was one (player), we'd have to be careful because these guys are around each other all the time," Spagnuolo said. "I think it was the right thing to do."
Two players, quarterback Kyle Boller(notes) and center Jason Brown(notes), missed practice Wednesday and Spagnuolo said both players had flulike symptoms. Spagnuolo first reported Brown's illness on Monday, but Brown was back with the team Thursday and had been expected to practice before the team decided to send players home.
Spagnuolo said he didn't know whether Boller had been at Rams Park on Thursday. He was short on specifics regarding other affected players, saying "all the names are running together."
"I don't want to throw out a name and be wrong," Spagnuolo said. "The important thing is we don't want anybody else to get sick. The important thing is to handle it right, send everybody home."
Coaches and staff had the option of leaving Rams Park, but the parking lot was filled with vehicles Thursday afternoon.
Spagnuolo said the Rams became aware of the situation about 8:30 or 9 a.m., then held a team meeting after consulting with medical personnel and deciding on a course of action.
"There was no panic here," Spagnuolo said. "We took our time."
The Rams (1-12) host the Texans (6-7) this Sunday. Spagnuolo thought it a stretch that the game might be jeopardized.
"Don't send me down that direction," he said. "I'm very hopeful that by tomorrow, even if there's a couple of guys that have to be away from it, that we've taken the right steps and we'll be OK."
In early October, Texans rookie tight end Anthony Hill(notes) was hospitalized with swine flu in the first confirmed case in an NFL player this season. Other players around the league were also sidelined with flulike symptoms.
The Texans were sympathetic to the Rams' plight.
"That's something that has been going around," wide receiver Andre Johnson(notes) said. "I think we'll be fine because we've already had our fair share of it around here, so I'm not really worried about it."
The nation's supply of swine flu vaccine is expected to reach 100 million doses this week, clearing the way for everyone to be protected, not just those considered at high risk. The 2009 H1N1 strain sickens younger people more frequently than the over-65 population who are seasonal flu's main victims.
Through mid-November, about one in six Americans have caught the new H1N1 flu, and about 10,000 have died, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
The new swine flu seems no more deadly than regular winter flu, which every year kills 36,000 Americans and hospitalizes 200,000.
Earlier this year, the NHL's Calgary Flames were criticized when players and their families received the swine flu vaccine while thousands of other people waited in lines that stretched for hours. Two Alberta Health Services employees were later fired.
British Columbia's provincial health officer also said last month that Vancouver Canucks also players jumped the line when they received vaccinations.

subset: commoncrawl


text: Welcome to IRL, an ongoing feature where we talk about the gadgets, apps and toys we're using in real life and take a second look at products that already got the formal review treatment. Let's just cut to the chase: this week's IRL is a little schizophrenic. On the one hand, you've got Andy s


text:
Financial News
ITV Investors Tune In To £200m Payout
ITV will underline the turnaround in its fortunes when it unveils plans to return as much as £200m of surplus capital to shareholders.
I understand that the commercial broadcaster will announce on Wednesday a special dividend alongside full-year results that analysts forecast will include a surge in pre-tax profits to more than £450m.
ITV's board, led by Archie Norman, the former Conservative MP who chairs the company, and Adam Crozier, chief executive, will meet early next week to rubber-stamp the proposed payout.
Insiders at the company, which broadcasts programmes such as Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway and Downton Abbey, said the scale of the special dividend - a one-off payment to investors - had not yet been decided. They added, though, that it was likely to be well over £100m and probably close to double that sum.
ITV, which is 7.5% owned by BSkyB, the parent company of Sky News, has seen its shares soar recently, partly on the back of speculation that the recently-agreed takeover of Virgin Media might trigger a bid approach for the terrestrial broadcaster.
The company's improved performance has been generated partly through efficiency savings introduced since Mr Crozier, the former boss of Royal Mail and the Football Association, took the helm in 2010. The economic downturn has had a less severe impact on the company than analysts and shareholders anticipated in the aftermath of the financial crisis.
The special dividend will still leave ITV in a position to spend money on acquiring independent TV companies to bolster its in-house production arm. It recently paid £25m for a controlling stake in Gurney Productions, a leading maker of reality shows for US cable networks.
ITV declined to comment.
on Orange News today
- Sony Cancels Kim Jong-Un Movie After Threats
- Actors Slam Film Cancellation Amid Threats
- Brits Can Bring Foreign Family To UK - Ruling
- White Christmas! Will It Snow Where You Are?
- Sony Cancels Kim Jong-Un Movie After Threats
- Why It's Wrong To Cancel Kim Jong-Un Film
- Putin Backs Recovery As Rouble Falls Again


text:
|The Message (MSG)
|New International Version (NIV)
|15 Because even if he killed me, I'd keep on hoping. I'd defend my innocence to the very end.
|15 Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him; I will surely defend my ways to his face.
|Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved. (The Message Bible Online)
|Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NIV) are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica. All rights reserved worldwide. (New International Version Bible Online)


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Rated 3.7 out of 5 by 2247 reviewers.
Rated 4 out of 5 by MawWorkman Sheraton New York With the number of hotel choices in New York, I chose the Sheraton New York becuase of the staff. There is Tommy, Momhad and team in the club; Gary to hail you a cab; Matthew, Joy and Cynthia at the front desk, Ernesto in the resturant, and many others that will make your stay in New York a wonderful experience. Thank you all for the wonderful service every week! July 21, 2014
Rated 2 out of 5 by 914ar Staffing is an issue Visited over the beginnig of this week And was extremely disappointed with the poor staffing at the property. Check in took exceedingly long at 7:15pm and the Concierge was unavailable by phone for almost an hour. I called a dozen times and was transferred to concierge voice mail before asking someone in guest services for assistance with my questions. I was extremely dissatisfied with the level of service extended by the SNY team and would likely not stay at this property again. April 6, 2012
Rated 2 out of 5 by dsisto High ratings despite the arrival terrific location very courteous and attentive staff at desk After elevator wait, my key didn't work in door the first time. I went back down..elevator toook 13 minutes one way, 8 minutes back with.massive crowds of young people on the room floor, yelling and screaming in hallways, banging doors etc. Unfortunately, the second key didn't work in the door either. I called down this time to avoid elevators. Service man came up and apologized for the other guests behaviour..see below March 22, 2013
Rated 4 out of 5 by lbcm0968 Great location Hotel is in a great location. Very clean, great staff August 20, 2014
Rated 2 out of 5 by latraveler123 Total disappointment I often fly the red eye and would book an extra night so i have my room ready when i get in at 6am to shower and change. I do this every time with other hotels and most often i stay at the W time square and never had an issue. This time around, i decided to try sheraton since it is a little closer to my work and have stayed here before. when i arrived, the lady was extremely rude and that's after she told me that i don't have a room for me since i 'never called' after waiting for quite a bit, she got a room (double bed instead of king) for me. told me i would get 20% off coupon and free incidentals for the incident, but never gave me anything and was so quick to try to send me away. then i got to the room to find out that my tv didn't work. and i had to call it support with wifi help both nights i was there. needless to say, it was a total disappointment. June 22, 2014
Rated 4 out of 5 by REW099 Great location and comfort The Staff , especially the Concierge desk, was exceptional in their help. This was less true of the travel and ticket desk. The people there were brusque to the extent of being rude. August 13, 2014
Rated 3 out of 5 Preferred Check-In Needs Work Preferred (SPG Elite) Check-in line at 3:00pm 12/26 was 4 people deep (non preferred was 10/12 deep). Non preferred line was processed before preferred as only two agents at preferred were busy with two (difficult?) check-ins (complained to floor staff at the time - apology offered - but no extra agents added). There are 4 or 5 stations at preferred check-in - 3 were vacant. I would have been better off standing in the non-elite line for a more expeditious check-in experience. December 31, 2013
Rated 3 out of 5 by gvf136 Good Hotel as long as nothing bad happens We have been here many times and enjoyed the hotel very much. The view from the 44th floor lounge is great. This time, actually it was our last day, the power went out in the morning. Late afternoon, it got dark, there was still no power. At the reception, a manager told me that they can not get an electrician to fix the problem. Later, after complaing several times more, we got a new room. By then it was dark. We were promised flashlights and help to move our belongings. Nothing. So we moved all our things out of the room in darkness, just with the help of my sons mobile phone flashlight. It was a sad ending of an otherwise wonderful 10 day stay at the hotel. The staff at the reception was really not helpful. They all seemed overworked and grumpy. So next time we will try another Starwood Hotel in New York. January 6, 2012
Rated 2 out of 5 by stilltired26 make sure you know the location of your room checked in at the same time as another couple to celebrate a birthday, Both parties Gold preferred. We ended up next to the elevator shaft (sounded like the subway coming through) and ice machine (sounded like it was located at the foot of our bed)--walls so thin, we could hear complete conversations while the ice getters were chatting ALL NIGHT LONG. checked out by 9 so we could make our way home to get some sleep. Our friends had a nicer, larger and quieter room.Go figure... February 25, 2013
Rated 5 out of 5 by Henry75 Great, Comfortable Stay As a frequent traveler to New York, the Sheraton always provides a superior stay. August 18, 2014
Rated 2 out of 5 by BE0416 The hotel room was very dirty and in disrepair I work for a large hospitality company and always fill out reviews as I know it helps us improve. I was severely disappointed in the condition of the room. Your hotel staff is very friendly and the overall facility is great. I think inspections of the rooms would be in order based on poor ratings. It could be a particular guest room attendant's lack of attention to detail. Anyway, thanks for letting me provide feedback. For a $300+ per night room, I expected more. The toilet was clogged when I checked in. Deadbolt wasn't working. Mnibar had old banana and garbage in it. Dad bug and alive bug in shades between window shades. Rug very soiled Hai in tub I was highly disappointed in the lack of detail in the room. I reported the deadbolt, garbage in the minibar and the toilet and the only repair was the toilet. June 21, 2013
Rated 3 out of 5 by westcoastjohnnie Need Improvement I am long time Starwood Member and I think this is the worst experience I have had unfortunately, The rate I paid for this room (through the Starwood website) was less than I was subsequently offered from third party sellers. I was supposedly in an premium room and it sure seemed normal. I had problems with internet access which took three phone calls to get corrected, my room was not cleaned one day and it took two calls to get someone to attend to this. I expected better. February 4, 2014
Rated 2 out of 5 by Unsatisfied15 Poor service culture With the exception of the cleaning staff and conference facility management, the service culture in this property is abominable. Arrived at 3:00 PM to find my room was not ready. Returned at 5:00 to learn that it still wasn't ready as the previous guest had a late checkout. problem was that no one checked the room to learn that the guest had departed (only then did the cleaning crew get started). I finally got in my room at 10:30 that night... June 5, 2014
Rated 4 out of 5 by Swede Stormy Whether We stayed by you before,during,and after Sandy hit New York. Inside the hotel we couldn´t tell there was anyrhing going on outside if we didn´t swiched on the TV. Everything went very smoothly and a special thanks to the receptionist whwo was most kind and helpful. Maybe I think the hotel could benefit from a little more decent breakfastprices. We went out eating breakfast all days but the first. Overall though, we had a very pleasent stay att Sheraton New York. Thank you! November 4, 2012
Rated 5 out of 5 by travelingTrees Best home away from home in New York! All we can say is this hotel gives meaning to excellence in every way. Most striking is a staff that is so incredibly responsive, warm, helpful, kind, and it crosses every area of hotel staff. If "it" all starts at the top, Bravo, Bravo, Bravo! Gosh we hated to leave this place and will always be Sheraton New Yorkers. What a great model for how positive energy just makes the day better for everyone, why not? June 29, 2014
Rated 5 out of 5 by Oh2BRocky Feels Like Home Great Location, Friendly and knowledgeable staff! August 18, 2014
Rated 5 out of 5 by Rich1738 Great update to the Sheraton Our newly refurbished room was great. A bit small, but very clean and fresh. The club lounge was a great value for breakfast and snacks and a good refuge for a nightcap after a show. Staff could not have been friendlier. Only complaint is that as a lifetime gold SPG member I would have hoped for a better view from the 45th floor. Seems like we always get the rooms looking across a side street at another tall building. June 22, 2014
Rated 4 out of 5 by JohnfromToronto Excellent Location The Sheraton is nicely appointed and very welcoming. Although it is undergoing some outside construction it didn't impact our stay in any way. Being on a high floor, combined with a great bed and pillows made for an awesome sleep. We picked the hotel based on the location, which was a short walk from Central Park and conveniently located to Radio City Music Hall, where Cirque du Soleil ZARKANA was playing. Overall very positive, however the hotel was apparently sold out the night before and they didn't have any clean rooms available when we checked in. We had a short wait in the lobby, no more than 15 minutes. The Microsoft experience has computers, free for use, wi-fi (also free) in the lobby and which we used to pick up email and check in/ print boarding passes for our return flights. Overall positive experience June 17, 2012
Rated 5 out of 5 by Emily16 Terrific Location - Service Used points to reserve a room for my son (2 Adults/2 kids). Called the morning of check-in and spoke w/ the front desk. Rika was very reassuring - they were assigned a corner room, a little bigger - so the kids would have more room. Also room was ready for check-in by noon which helped as they arrived early. My family thought the hotel was great, loved the club lounge and the location was perfect. This is my favorite place to stay in NYC. Thanks, Sheraton Towers staff!! April 8, 2013
Rated 4 out of 5 by deedle Shopped around, best price This hotel deals in absolute volume, so check in and lobby tradfic can be a bit hectic. This is not a serene lobby atmosphere to lounge in, but rather an energetic NYC " get up And go" vibe. Taxi service, courtesy of the front door staff is quick and efficient. Rooms are very comfortable, down coverlets are on the warm side, AC worked like a charm. Breakfast prices in the restaurant are overpriced, but thankfully there is a Starbucks in the lobby...why go anywhere else? October 28, 2012
Rated 3 out of 5 by Jay32 THIS HOTEL IS WELL LOCATED. I was disappointed in the room size. There was barely enough room to turn around, let alone no lounge chair that fit into the room - a small chair was jammed into the space between the bed and the window. The window sill was damaged and in need of repair. When we checked in, the room was neat and clean, however no hand towels were provided. There was no dining available in the hotel for dinner, other than room service or eating in the restaurant in the late afternoon.. October 4, 2012
Rated 2 out of 5 by idsord Unavailable Room at Check-in I booked two rooms at the Sheraton New York hotel through our corporate travel agency. Upon arrival at roughly 10:00 PM both my colleague and I learned that there were no rooms available for us to check in and that we could expect a 2 hour wait. As a business traveller, I find this unacceptable. When finally able to check in, my room was missing a remote control for the television. I discovered in the morning that while there was a coffee maker in the room, there were no coffee cups. it took until the last of three nights for this to be corrected. Fortunately, when I needed ice, I found the ice machine next door to my room. I didn't need to see the sign, as I heard people going into the room with the creaky door and the ice coming out of the machine all night. I will likely not choose this property in the future. July 30, 2012
Rated 2 out of 5 by sneeuwaap Good, bad and ugly Good: in-room wired internet is fantastic. I have never had such high speeds. Best hotel internet ever. Bad: Hotel didn't know I was Platinum coming in. Did not get good room. Ugly: Room was an adjoining room with paper-thing walls. On one side were the elevators. On the other was a guest who talked loudly on his cell phone to his girlfriend/wife, who was on speakerphone. To say that I know more than I ever want to know about their relationship is an understatement. December 16, 2012
Rated 3 out of 5 by NYFallTraveler25 A few problems with staff. I love almost every SPG hotel I stay in, but this Sheraton was an exception. I needed a late check out, and I understood the hotel's policy that it couldn't be guaranteed until 9am on the day of check out, but the staff was very unfriendly in the way this was communicated. They just seemed exasperated and annoyed. I understand that they must get this request a lot, but the service just didn't rise to the level of courtesy that I've come to expect from SPG hotel staff. October 30, 2012
Rated 2 out of 5 by outoftown Terrible House Keeping Spent 4 nights in the hotel. When we arrived there was tooth paste on the counter and a letter for a different guest in our room. They had brought fruit in a bowl for the previous guest and it started to rot. They changed our sheet and put sheets on the bed that had holes in them. Sound barrier between rooms is terrible. If you are looking for quite hotel this is not it. The club floor is actually more than 1 level so the room was always over crowded. Not worth the money for the room. My wife also forgot her earrings in the hotel and of course they did not turn up. Terrible Terrible Terrible. With so many other options I would never stay here. Tried to eat in the restaurant in the hotel. After being greeted we stood for 10 mins while the staff chatted about life. There were lots of empty tables so we just walked out. January 7, 2013
Rated 4 out of 5 by Geno57 Courteous assistance Everyone in the hotel and on the staff, were tremendous and helpful in all repsects. Floor staff was excellent as well. I would recommend this hotel to anyone. August 11, 2014
Rated 2 out of 5 by Vijay Very small room, Not good Housekeeping I never expected this from shereton startwood hotel. My room was quiet small, I dont know about other hotels in NY but my room was very conjested. Its like you enter in room and next is bed. My bathtub was just 4 ft length. House keeping replaced only one time shampoo and soap. Never replaced tissues.. They give free walerbottle per day however that also they gave new one the last night. On last day when i asked for bell caption to take my luggage he never showed up. May 7, 2013
Rated 5 out of 5 by Advisor Terrific Staff! For a hotel in this location and with this degree of competition on all sides, the Sheraton New York is a delightful safe harbor in a turbulent sea. It's rooms are quiet, and the staff is amazing - it has been two years since our last stay here, the hotel has been renovated beautifully, and Muhammad in the Club Lounge recognized us immediately and addressed us by name. How many times will you experience that degree of familiarity in a big-city hotel? Simply the best! October 10, 2012
Rated 2 out of 5 by Carl123 Disappointed While the facilities were well designed, the room was not clean, rather than fresh glasses each day, they were just placed back in place. The elevators were more often than not functioning and there were long waits for the freight elevator. The lounge was crowded with a poor selection of appetizers and having to pay for drinks at high prices was not acceptable. In other Club Lounges I have stayed the drinks were complimentary and appetizers were tasty and plentiful. December 7, 2012
Rated 3 out of 5 by Babs It was ok I was at the Sheraton NY, never stayed there for business before. Was not impressed with wait to check in. Lobby was nice, room decorated nicely. Didn't think bed was comfortable at all - sheets were rough? Blind in room was fine at night, but as soon as sun rose there was no way to make the room dark? Could hear people next door - walls too thin. Average large chain hotel - I wouldn't stay here again for business...maybe for personal trip if the price is right. March 4, 2014


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NovaBay Pharmaceuticals To Present At The 15th Annual BIO CEO & Investor Conference
This release contains forward-looking statements, which are based upon NovaBay's current expectations, assumptions, estimates, projections and beliefs. Many of these statements are identified by the use of words denoting future events, such as "expect," "intend," "will," and variations of such words. These forward-looking statements include, but not limited to, NovaBay's plans and expectations regarding ongoing and future clinical trials, as well as the timing of commencement and receiving results of clinical trials. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed in or implied by the forward-looking statements. Factors that might cause or contribute to such differences include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties relating to difficulties or delays in development, clinical trial, regulatory approval, production and marketing of the company's product candidates, unexpected adverse side effects or inadequate therapeutic efficacy of the product candidates, the uncertainty of patent protection for the company's intellectual property or trade secrets, the company's ability to obtain additional financing as necessary and unanticipated research and development and other costs. Other risks relating to NovaBay and Aganocide compounds, including risks that could cause results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements in this press release, are detailed in NovaBay's Form 10-K and Form 10-Q filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, especially under the heading "Risk Factors." The forward-looking statements in this release speak only as of this date, and NovaBay disclaims any intent or obligation to revise or update publicly any forward-looking statement except as required by law.
CONTACT: NovaBay Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Thomas J. Paulson Chief Financial Officer (510) 899-8809 firstname.lastname@example.com The Ruth Group Stephanie Carrington / Nicole Greenbaum (646) 536-7017 / 7009 firstname.lastname@example.com / firstname.lastname@example.com
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text:
Is there really much difference?
I'm curious - because where I live.. chicken breast costs a bit more than the thigh but do they both offer the same protein amounts etc?
Or is the breast really a lot more beneficial than the thigh?
Thanks to who ever can help me out.
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Thread: Chicken BREAST vs. Chicken THIGH


text:
I live in Jersey. I had a look at apartment around 15 days before I moved in and it was absolutely not cleaned. Owner promised me she will clean it before handover. So I signed a one year lease and made the necessary payments. But when I moved in with my luggage it was just cleaned. Floor was dirty (infact its very old), apartment had roaches, closets were absolutely dirty. Still floor (wooden) has dark spots on several places. Now its almost 6 months I am living with that. I keep everything clean as much as possible. Infact I spend $300 when I moved in. But because of old and rashes on floor, it never looks clean.
Follow-Up Postings:
|You have lived there 6 months and are complaining now?
#1 rule, in any country, do not sign a lease until you see the place cleaned/repaired to your standards.
Yes there are consumer rights but you have lived there for 6 months already. How is anyone to suppose to tell if the floor was dirty before you moved in?
|Yes, You are right gammyt. But I have been complaining from day 1. Also, when I had a look earlier tents were there. And owner promised me to clean as per US standards.
When I came with my luggage I had no alternative than move in because by that time I already left my hotel. Infact with second month rent, I had given her list of issues in written and I have copy of it.
- Posted by fizzlebottom (My Page) on Tue, May 12, 09 at 9:11
|I've moved into some dirty apartments so I feel for you. It's great that you have a copy of the list you gave her. Is it dated? You could maybe suggest that you're going to speak to a lawyer about the list you provided and see if that scares the owner into doing something. Or at least you won't have to clean when you move out. You can show the list and prove that you left it in the same condition that you received it.
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