Life At The Bottom

The end of another year

2008-12-27T07:22:00.003+13:00

So I haven't felt like blogging in awhile and I know why. It's because so much has changed yet again from our so called "plans". I should know better than to think that things will ever turn out the way that I might expect. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but it does kind of get on my nerves sometimes. One of my good friends always has a laugh at my expense for the zigzag course that Kirk and I are always on. No we're going this way....wait...no that way....hold on...no...I think we're supposed to go over here! That's how it feels sometimes. Does everyone go through their life decisions feeling this way or is it just us?

Anyhow, so we didn't end up buying the cool house across the street. The housing market crashed and the house that we are currently living in did not sell. Then the financial markets tanked and our business suffered some setbacks that made us rethink purchasing the house of our dreams. We deliberated and cried and tried to think of anyway possible that we could work out buying the new house, but in the end it really felt like the wrong thing to do. That was hard to reconcile because our hearts were set on it and everyone in town knew that we were lined up to buy the house. It felt like the worst day of our lives when we sat the builder down to tell him our bad news. He was very gracious and understanding about everything. We felt like the biggest jerks in history and had to wade through the shame in our little town where news spreads like wildfire. Thankfully most people seemed to understand our situation being that we were not the only ones who had suffered some financial losses. So we're just living in our little one bedroom one bath fixer upper waiting for a different housing situation to come to light that may suit our needs without breaking our piggy bank. It was the right thing to do to turn the new house down, but it was certainly painful. Our financial adviser keeps telling us the benefits of "delayed gratification". We have already had many lessons in delayed gratification and just thought that this time we wouldn't have to wait to get what we wanted. Well we were wrong and I'm okay with it because I'm familiar with this process. It will be worth it to wait. It always is.

Despite the disappointment about the new house we did have a great year overall. We have many blessings to be thankful for and I know in reality I have very little to complain about. We are currently enjoying a wonderful Christmas vacation in Las Vegas, New Mexico in a beautiful mountain setting with good friends. Who can ask for anything more than that!

Good news!

2008-07-18T11:14:00.003+12:00

We finally received a contract on our Denver house! Woohoo! We are so excited since this had to happen in order for us to be able to purchase the new house being built across the street from us here in BV. This is the a current photo of where the new house is in construction. Very cool! So the next step is putting our fixer upper house on the market which hopefully will happen in the next week. I know this is all very confusing. Too many properties! How did we get here? Well I know the answer to that question and it all seemed to make sense to us at the time. Too bad we didn't have the foresight about this housing crisis or we could have sold our Denver house for a lot more money. Oh well. I'll just be glad to finally consolidate our money into one property that we love instead of 3 that we don't. So, if you just happen to know anyone interested in 3 acre lot on Trout Creek Pass with a tepee and a shed on it or a cute in town 1 bedroom 1 bath old house with lots of character send them our way. The new house will be finished in September so we're hoping that the house we're in now will sell fast. We're pretty anxious to move across the street since this will be the first house that we have ever owned that has a garage, a guest bedroom, a second bathroom and plenty of storage. A couple of days ago we were on the verge of giving up hope that this was all going to work out because we were running out of time. It also seems that a couple of people around town were waiting for us to fail so they be the next buyer in line on this house. This of course made us want it even more. I think we've become a bit possessive since we've already mentally purchased the property. Although we do have a lot of friends here who have rooted for us all along and seemed to have more faith than we did that it would work out. Fingers crossed!

The best summer yet

2008-06-30T07:06:00.003+12:00

I have to say that this is my best summer yet here in Buena Vista. I've finally met some great friends with similar interests which helps this town finally feel like my home. It was a hard transition for me to uproot my life from Denver and put a distance of 125 miles between the friends and family I have known all my life. Kirk has always felt at home here since this is where he grew up, but I on the other hand didn't really know what to expect. I just knew that I was willing to give it a go because I felt like the Denver city life thing was old hat and I was ready to try on the "mountain life" that has been Kirk's dream ever since I've known him. I'm not going to lie and say it was an easy adjustment for me. I think part of the problem was living in the tepee. We were somewhat isolated up in them there hills which impeded us from having much of a social life. We did meet a few people in town that we became friends with, but I have to say that I continued struggling with feeling confident that this was the right place for us. The other part of that was the continuance of living in a temporary situation. We had moved around and traveled for so long before settling here that I was couldn't help feeling like a small potted plant. It wasn't until we bought a permanent structure of a home last October where I was able to break out, dig in and expand my roots. Living in town has opened up a whole new group of friends to us. I can't explain how good it feels to walk around town recognizing faces, waving to friends and having the sense that we really do belong here.

I recently met a great group of women who are all active outdoors people too. We decided to start mountain biking together and it's been a blast! Last year I was really into running and was able to check off running a marathon from my life list. I've been looking for a different activity since my back still aggrevates me when I run and I think mountain biking is the ticket. It's low impact on the joints and it's a great balance of adrenaline, technical thinking and good ol' heart pumping aerobic exercise. I never thought I'd be a mountain biker much less pick it up at 36 years of age, but isn't it the darndest thing that life can still suprise you.

So lately our lives look like this: wake up between 7 and 8am (alarm clocks are only used when absolutely necessary), have a liesure coffee and breakfast on the couch, walk to our office which is 5 minutes from our house, get some work done, leave around 5pm, walk 5 minutes back to our house, grab our gear and go down to the river park which is another 5 minutes away. Right now Kirk is really into kayaking because the water is so high, but occassionally he's off on a mountain bike ride. I usually ride down to the bridge to meet a couple of the gals for a mountain bike ride and then Kirk and I meet back at the house at dark to eat dinner and go to bed. Then we do it all over again the next day. It's pretty awesome to be so close to the activities that we love. We always think back to our Denver days when it took us between 30-60 minutes to drive home after work and then another 45-60 minutes of driving to get to a place where you could kayak or mountain bike so your actual activity time was pretty limited. We feel very fortunate to have carved out the life we now have, but we did make quite a few sacrifices to get here...so essentially we feel like we earned it.

Stepping up in the world

2008-06-07T05:09:00.003+12:00

Today has been a long awaited day for us. We worked on our bathroom after work last night until 11pm and it was soooo worth it! We now have a working shower and a functioning toilet! Woohoo!

We've been showering at the local gym now for the last 14 months. When we lived at the tepee last summer we would come to town to work out and have a hot shower. I remember looking forward to indoor plumbing as we were buying our house in town last September. However since we moved in we were not brave enough to shower in the existing avocado green tub that was coated in a thickness of mold. We finally got around to ripping out the tub a few months ago and have been living with a construction zone in the bathroom ever since. We bought a corner shower and Kirk worked very hard to finish installing it two weekends ago. He's now a master plumber and carpenter. :) It felt like it took forever but it was time to call in the drywaller who came last week to put up some new walls and finish them off for us. We had to take out the avocado green toilet (boohoo) so the drywaller could refinish the walls behind it because the bathroom was in such a bad state of disrepair from the previous owner. She never took the time to deal with the leaks or the mold or anything else. So we set up the good ol' camp toilet from the tepee days in our shed outside and have been using that for the past 10 days. It didn't feel like too big of a deal since we had lived like that for so long before. Overall though we have been pretty anxious to get our bathroom up and running.

Kirk got up yesterday morning and laid the new linoleum that he had been cutting to size the previous evening. It turned out really nice for a first timer! After work yesterday we went home and Kirk installed the new shiny white toilet while I finished painting and then he worked on installing the shower doors. It looks like a totally different space now which is so exciting because it was pretty gross before! It really is the nicest room in the house now. We woke up this morning and tried out the shower. Ahhhh! I can't even put it words how lovely it is to shower in my own house. I'm so tired of public showers and the nastiness others leave behind...hair, band aids, dirty washcloths, athlete's foot, etc. Ack! I've been thinking back on how long we've had to deal with public showers. South Pole for 2 years, traveling for 5 months and living here for 2+ years. I think we've earned a private bathroom. :)

Gas Tax Holiday

2008-04-28T14:19:00.002+12:00

John McCain is proposing to repeal the $0.18 gas tax for the summer, calling it a gas tax holiday. What a freakin' stupid idea, we have been on a gas bender since the 70s and this clown wants to hand us more of the drink that we have overused, exploited, fought wars over and down right wasted. Not only should we not have a gas tax holiday we ought to be marched into the nearest drug treatment facility where we are weened and shown how great our dependence on oil is and how it is the prime ingredient in everything we do, eat, drink and shit.

Kirk's Birthday/Last Day at Monarch

2008-04-26T03:36:00.014+12:00

Kirk's 39th birthday was April 13th which was much cause for celebration seeing this is his last year in his 30's. We're preparing for the mid-life crisis next year. Ha ha! Kirk's birthday wish was to have a bbq party in the parking lot of Monarch since the 13th was also their closing day for the season. We haphazardly pulled together some 80's looking ski gear to fulfill a cheesy theme. We loaded up the trailer with our grille, some chairs, a table and coolers full of beer and food and took off early in the morning so we could arrive in the parking lot in time to get a good spot. We pulled up close to the front since tail gaiting is popular on the end of season day so the parking dudes save the closest spots for the people with trailers. Looking around our setup was pretty minimal compared to some of the other folks. Several people had set up decorated tents with full bars and people gathered around in costume. It was great people watching! We set up and then some of our friends started showing up. We took a few runs on the hill and then came back to fire up some lunch. We fed anyone around who ventured into our bbq since it was that kind of party. Unbeknown to us the ski area was having a bbq contest and sent judges around to each "camp" to judge their food. They bypassed us since we just had boring brats and burgers. The winner was a gang who were parked next to us that served pulled pork and homemade green chili. They said the winnings might just cover the cost of the food. Hmmm...I think we were better off spending less time cooking and more time enjoying the atmosphere and the last runs we would take until next winter. It was the warmest day of the season with sunny blue skies, great snow conditions and people having fun everywhere we looked. As the day came to a close Kirk and our friend Olivia decided to go for the last run of the day in their birthday suits. They hiked to an outlying run that ends in the parking lot and I waited with camera in hand. You can't even really tell they are naked in the photo. Good thing since this is the internet after all. They ducked into the trees before the end of the run and walked up to the bbq amidst cheering and laughs. A good time was had by all! We've decided this now needs to be a yearly event so next year we plan to do it bigger and better so be there or be square!

April 15, 2008

2008-04-16T07:50:00.007+12:00

Isn't life grand? I love the saying, "Wanna make God laugh....have a plan." So true it is! We've zigzagged and sometimes circled through all sorts of plans in the 5 years that we've been married, so why am I still surprised when we end up in a totally different place than I expected? Human nature I guess. Buena Vista sure has been treating us right though and no matter what the road ahead brings and how unexpected it is, it always feels like the path we were meant to tread. When I turn around and look back it all seems to make more sense then when we are actually going through it so I can only have faith that the future will bring us right where we're supposed to be despite my plans, fears and worries.

These thoughts give me comfort when there is something that I really want that I may not get. What I'm referring to specifically is a house that is being built just across the street from our current little home. Kirk and I had been wondering for awhile who owned the lot since it sat empty for a long time with the exception of a slab foundation. We serendipitously came across the house plans when the builder came into our office to get copies from us. We looked over the plans and loved them! Then we saw the address and realized that this was the house that was going to be built right across the street from us. We quickly asked the builder if he already had a buyer for this house and he said he didn't. I told him, "You do now!". We couldn't believe our luck! The builder is a local guy that designs and builds one custom house a year here in BV. He has a couple of houses in town and a few outside of town and they're all very cool compared to other options which are either new/newer stamped out standard cracker box suburban houses (blah), old completely run down houses (double blah), or the overinflated lots to build on that have ridiculous covenants (can you say "boomers"). This house however, incorporated a lot of the ideas that we had designed into our own house plans at one point. It felt too good to be true because we also love the location we're in now, we just hate the house we currently live in. Our current house was built in 1910, it's maybe 600 square feet and it needs a lot of TLC. Ever since we moved in we have been talking about how nice it would be to just live in a new house where you wouldn't have to fix things all of the time. Don't get me wrong, I know new houses require maintenance too, but not to the degree that we are dealing with now.

Small towns are interesting. We agreed on the word of the builder that we could have first dibs at buying the house since we don't have anything in writing as of yet. If I were still in Denver I definitely would not trust that agreement, but here in BV things are different. When a local (meaning someone who's lived here for 20 years or so) gives their word you can count on it especially when it comes to a handshake between two locals (Kirk being the other since he grew up here). The other interesting thing is that word travels fast. We told maybe 2 people that we were going to buy the house across the street and asked them not to tell anyone else until we were sure. This builder has some notoriety because his houses are so different than the norm here and they tend to generate a lot of excitement with real estate agents, prospective buyers and lookie-loos. Since they actually started building the house back in February, the word was out that this builder is working on another house in town so he's had several people inquire about it, some of which are serious buyers, but he told them that he already has a buyer...us! Lately, we've had a bunch of people come up to us saying, "so I hear you're buying that house on Gunnison?". Being a city dweller for my entire life with the exception of the last two years, this small town news network is a whole new experience for me.

I also have a hunch that this builder is tired of selling homes to out of state folks looking to buy second homes or a retirement home and is excited about selling a house to another "local" and a couple younger than retirement age. We feel so fortunate that it's us! So we're keeping our fingers crossed that it will all pan out. We have our Trout Creek property with the tepee and our half duplex in Denver on the market hoping they sell soon. We are continuing to fix up the little house we currently live in so we can put that on the market in a month or so as well. Then we'll be free to invest our equity in a house that we hope to keep for a very long time. Ahhhh.....roots....now that's a happy thought.

Boeing and U.S. get used to it!

2008-03-08T08:01:00.000+13:00

Last week when I heard the outcome of the bidding for the new in air fuel tanker I was outraged that it didn’t go to Boeing but to a consortium of Northrop Grumman and EADS. I thought “how could the U.S. Air Force select a foreign developed Airbus airframe for its’ in air filling station.” Then I thought about the decision along with the sobering statistics regarding engineering and math educated professionals in the United States I began to understand how the decision could have occurred. The United States talent pool of engineers and mathematicians (although skilled) is not currently sufficient to spur technological development let alone keep pace with the number of skilled people leaving the workforce to retirement. Microsoft and others have begun locating development facilities in other countries to make use of the greater number of trained individuals and less xenophobic immigration policies. If WE continue to close our doors to immigration and not promote social policies that help talented individuals go onto higher education then we risk America’s status of innovator and economic power. 90% of the worlds engineers already reside in Asia, South Korea (17% of the US population) graduates as many engineers from college every year as the United States, and with the United States ranking lower than most industrial nations in 12^th grade math and science skills it is not surprising we are losing opportunities to our foreign competitors because we lack the talent to innovate.

GWPP or BSPP

2008-02-12T06:40:00.001+13:00

GWPP or BSPP

I recently received a mailing with a vague return address of GWPP in La Joya California that included a National Academy of Sciences formatted article that tries to make the argument that global warming is not attributable to human activity. The mailing also includes a petition form that is intended to be signed after reviewing the article; however several problems exist with the report, it has not been peer-reviewed, nor published, nor has it been accepted for publication in the NAS journal and the Academy has released a strong statement disclaiming any connection to this effort and reaffirming the reality of climate change. It also applies a postage stamp perspective to research that is occurring across many different land masses, oceans and ice sheets that leaves many of the other studies out in “cold”. In other words the argument is a “cherry picked” set of data that allows the GWPP to try to make the case that global warming is not the result of industrialization.

I thank the person who put my name and address on their mailing list because I am now better armed to combat my _______ in-laws rhetoric with sound arguments based in fact and I remain convinced a problem exists and am more passionate about the steps that need to occur.

End of Year Letter

2007-12-28T08:40:00.000+13:00

Wow, what a year…and like everyone else we are wondering where it went. It started out with us house sitting on a very nice estate, skiing whenever we could and working at our “mom & pop” engineering firm (JK Mechanical Design LLC). We had many visitors including a friend from the UK and Jodi’s family who all enjoyed the many amenities of the estate. In early April the owners returned so we moved back to our tipi on April 15^th where it continued to snow on us with the final snow (10”) occurring in early June. It was hard moving back to the tipi after being so spoiled at that estate, but it gave us incentive to finish our house plans and submit them to the county for approval. In late May we submitted and after some back and forth with the building department they agreed to allow us to stamp our plans and we were approved for construction. In the mean time Jodi went for a run in town and passed what appeared to be a great lot that was for sale. Suddenly our plans of building our dream home changed. This lot seemed perfect, next to the river park (we could ride our bikes and paddle from the front door), on the town line where it wasn’t subject to town approval and with the right exposures to build our low energy home. In the end we didn’t buy the lot but it made us reconsider our plans and if we really wanted to live 20 miles away from town. We ended up listing the tipi property and began looking for other options in town. It took us until fall to find a house and we settled on a fixer upper that is smaller than some apartments I had in college.

Like most houses in Buena Vista it wasn’t well cared for and needed some work before we could move in. We lived in the tipi for an additional month while ripped out carpet and sanded and refinished the floors. In the meantime the bears returned and occasionally they would visit, scavenging for food outside but leaving the tipi and its two residents alone (whew!). In October we moved in the house and continued working on it. We took out the old wood burning stove and installed a pellet stove and stainless steel venting. We remodeled the kitchen by removing the old metal avocado green sink cabinet and upper cabinet and put up the cabinets that used to be in our Denver house (recycling at it’s best). We added a garbage disposer which required learning how to add a new outlet and switch. Jodi painted over the grease spattered walls and ceilings and we removed all of the old appliances with the exception of the gas stove. The latest project was removing the moldy tiles and avocado green bathtub in order to replace it with a shower. Through it all we have developed some skill in home improvement and feel that there is very little we couldn’t do ourselves.

Jodi and her friend/running partner Dana decided after running their first half marathon together in the spring that they wanted to set a goal to run their first marathon in the fall. They set their sights on the Baltimore Marathon and they trained every weekend with a long run and several short runs during the week. 6 weeks before the event Jodi was crippled with a back problem, making it difficult if not impossible to train. After visits to different medical professionals with little result she went to the chiropractor and thankfully he was able to help. He discovered that she tweaked her back many years ago and the pain she was feeling was the result of the tweak never returning to its correct position. He manipulated things and she rapidly felt better and was able to train. On October 13^th she and Dana finished the Baltimore Marathon (26.2 miles) in 4 hours 31 minutes. We stayed in Virginia with Holli and her kids enjoying their company for several days. Jodi had a short visit with our overworked friend Rob while I paddled in West Virginia on one of my favorite rivers. I think I enjoyed the journey of Jodi’s training more than she did because we went to many different race events around the state and I watched as she excelled at running. Jodi and Dana even participated with a team of 10 members that ran the Colorado Relay. This was 24 hour 170 mile race from Idaho Springs to Glenwood Springs where each team member had 3 runs, consisting of trail running, night runs and some roads. They were tired but very excited about the event and the camaraderie they shared along the way.

I spent the year doing the usual, skiing until spring when I trade my skis for my bike and kayak to enjoy the local whitewater and trails throughout the summer. In late fall it was looking like the bike riding season was going to continue through the winter. The fourteen thousand foot peaks were bare and our ski hill did not have snow on the advertised opening day. This continued until the first week of December when the skies finally opened and we were hit with two really big storms. Monarch Ski Mountain opened with 60” of new snow. To commemorate this event several friends and I skinned to the top on our telemark skis before the lifts opened and placed first tracks while everyone lined up at the lifts below. So far this early ski season has been incredible with the average day being better than best days that have occurred in the past ski seasons. Every time I ski, ride or paddle I reflect on how I am so glad to be home and so happy I have my wonderful wife to share it with.

Our first year of being in business for ourselves full time has been better than expected. We were able to keep busy and work on some pretty cool projects including several LEED certified buildings. It is exciting for us to see how our industry has changed from “do it cheap” to “how can I save energy”. It was really frustrating if not an ethical dilemma to know that buildings we were working on could be more energy efficient with a little more investment but that increase in capital did not fit with the owners mission of “do it cheap” so we specified equipment that didn’t fit with our personal values. Now because we work for ourselves it is much easier to be true to who we are and do projects that fit our objectives.

We ended the year with a Christmas celebration in Buena Vista. Jodi’s family rented a cabin and we were able to share the Buena Vista experience with them. We went skiing, sledding on our favorite two mile run and ate some really good food. It was nice having family around and seeing our two nieces get excited about skiing and sledding. We’re hoping to make it a tradition.

Well we wish you all a great 2008!

Our house during the storm 12/7/07 - 3 feet of snow

2007-12-28T06:54:00.001+13:00

Fall colors at Twin Lakes Sept 22nd

2007-10-05T03:34:00.001+13:00

2007-08-10T05:02:00.000+12:00

Since deciding that we wanted to live in town and abandoning our plans to build on our property, things have been pretty frustrating for us. We looked at several pre-owned homes around the $200,000 price range and they all seemed to be crap. It's hard to spend that kind of money on something you can't fathom living in. Then we looked at some lots in town thinking maybe the solution was to put a pre-fab home down since they're faster than building ourselves, but if anything went wrong with that we could still be living in the tepee come winter. Plus we haven't sold our property or our house in Denver so we were pretty constricted on pricing. Buena Vista has a pretty hot real estate market right now and anything under $200,000 that is slightly charming is under contract before it even hits the MLS. You pretty much need the inside track. We were just about to give up hope, when we finally found a small house in town. Luckily Kirk's mom drove by it one day and called us right away. With some unbelievable luck, we were able to view it before it hit the MLS. We put a contract on it right away knowing if we snoozed we would lose. So we will be closing on our 565 square foot 1 bedroom, 1 bath little house built in 1910 that needs plenty of TLC on September 5th. Hopefully we move in soon after, but we plan on trying to fix a few things first. We're excited that we have a place to live for the winter and we can walk everywhere since it's in a great older neighborhood here in town.

Here's our new winter abode

2007-08-10T04:58:00.001+12:00

Readying for the race

2007-07-12T11:18:00.001+12:00

On your mark, get set, GO!

2007-07-12T11:15:00.000+12:00

Coming in from the run

2007-07-12T11:14:00.003+12:00

Transition from run to bike

2007-07-12T11:14:00.001+12:00

Starting the mountain bike portion

2007-07-12T11:12:00.000+12:00

Final transition from bike to boat

2007-07-12T11:11:00.001+12:00

Running to the put-in

2007-07-12T11:10:00.001+12:00

Kayaking through a rapid

2007-07-12T11:08:00.001+12:00

Pulling into the finish line

2007-07-12T11:06:00.001+12:00

July 11, 2007

2007-07-12T10:43:00.000+12:00

Isn’t it amazing how fast things can change? I haven’t made a blog entry for awhile for two reasons. One, because our business has been keeping us busy pretty much everyday until late in the evening. Two, because we’ve had a total change of heart and it’s hard to explain that. So here’s my feeble attempt at an explanation. Just prior to Memorial Day I went for a run and passed a lot for sale by the river park in town. I told Kirk about it and suddenly we were getting all excited talking about the possibility of building on a lot in town instead of building on our property (which is currently about 20 miles away from town). After we rode the emotional rollercoaster up the big hill and down the other side, we looked in the face of reality and talked about what just happened. We decided that we really shouldn’t be building 20 miles from town when what we really want is to live in town. We spend so much time at our office and we love walking around town during the day that it just makes sense. We talked about how our current property really did serve a purpose. It was a great thing for us while we were at the Pole because it gave us something to look forward to when we came back. It gave us a sense of having roots. It also provided us with a wonderful place to camp out in a tepee and experience life outside for 5 months last year (and 4 months so far this year). Living outside was a welcome scenario after such a long stint of being stuck inside. So I guess the final conclusion is that our property has served its purpose and now it’s time to move on. It’s hard in some ways because we felt like we had a direction, we had an approved building permit and we were days from breaking ground! It was a harsh slap in the face. Thankfully the building department refunded most of our money and we proceeded to put our property up for sale. We are now currently looking for property in town. We haven’t found anything yet, but we’re not in a huge rush knowing we can live in the tepee at least until the fall. We aren’t sure whether we will buy a lot to build on or buy a pre-owned home. We’re hoping we will figure out the right thing when it comes along. It’s probably a good thing that it worked out this way because we honestly we wouldn’t have had time to start building our house this summer due to our workload anyway.

In the meantime, we’ve still made time for the outdoor activities we love. Kirk has been kayaking as much as possible before the water dies down. He also has been mountain biking a fair amount. He participated in the Clear Creek Challenge again this year on June 6^th. It was a 5 mile run, 20 mile mountain bike and a 12 mile kayak. He took 3rd this year which was exciting (last year he took 2nd). Of course his goal was to take first place but he was competing against 2 professional athletes this time around that ended up with first and second place. Those guys were fit! I’ve been training for the Baltimore marathon (my first) that I will do in October so I've been running in a bunch of races. I don't run to win, just to finish. I participated in the Bolder Boulder for the first time on Memorial Day which was a blast. I talked my parents into walking it (6.2 miles) while I ran it with my running partner. It was by far the most entertaining running event that I've been to. My parents did really well too even though my mom suffered a bit of heat exhaustion. I was really proud of them and they're ready to sign up again next year. Cool! I never thought I would ever run this far in my life much less participate in a marathon, so it's exciting. So far the furthest I have run with my running partner is 17 miles. We're supposed to run 20 miles this Sunday. Yikes!

Well, not much else to report. Until next time.....

May 24, 2007

2007-05-26T03:57:00.000+12:00

Well, old man winter is having a good laugh and I'm starting to think it's personal. He’s hanging on like you wouldn’t believe! We stopped for dinner last night before going back to the tepee because the weather all day was cold, gray and dreary. We're not very fond of cooking in the shed while freezing our butts off. After dinner we drove home and before we knew it, it was snowing gangbusters. We headed straight for the shelter of the tepee with our laptop and a movie in hand to occupy our time until we went to bed. That’s our form of entertainment on occasion when the weather is crappy (no internet, or satellite TV at the tepee you know). 2 hours later the battery on the laptop ran out just as the movie was climaxing! Bummer! Oh well. We’ll just have to finish watching it tonight. So we peeked our head out the tepee door to check out how much snow had fallen. Holy snow! 6 inches had fallen and it was still coming down strong. So at 10:00 at night we put on our boots and grabbed a shovel and broom to dig out the tepee and sweep the snow off of it. It was a heavy snow which makes the poles creak under the weight and we were a little worried about it caving in. I was sweeping snow off the tepee and having a good laugh at the circumstance. Here it is almost Memorial Day weekend when outdoor pools are supposed to open for the summer and we’re 6” deep in snow! We didn’t need to experience the winter months in the tepee because we ARE experiencing it now. Kirk and I laughed and agreed that sometimes even we think we’re crazy!! I have to say that I haven’t regretted a day though because I know someday I’ll look back on this time while sitting on my comfy couch in my warm living room watching the snow fall outside with a smile on my face...remembering the “pioneer” days of our lives.

On another note, the other day I received a forwarded email from my friend here in BV. It was an email from a guy who is currently wintering at the South Pole. It was really interesting to read his email and have flashbacks of writing about similar experiences and feelings to my friends and family. It was also funny that I had already seen some of the pictures attached to his email because I am still in contact with a few people that are currently wintering with him as well. Small world! That email brought up a conversation between Kirk and I. We talked about how we don’t have a lot of nostalgia about the Pole. We read these things and look at the pictures and say to ourselves, “Yep, I remember that”. And then we think, “Thank God that I’m not there anymore”. One of our friends is the PA at Pole again this winter which will be her fourth. She is the only woman to have wintered four times! Apparently I am one of 19 women who wintered twice. I read that on her blog. Goes to show you that I'm part of a small pool of other crazies. It's good to know I'm not alone. Hee hee! If you’d like to read more adventures from the Pole go to www.homelessheidi.blogspot.com.