FIRST DAY OF THE SEASON!

well, it's been pretty darn cold in seattle recently and we even got some snow in the city (rare) but 2 sunday's ago (12/07/08), before there was much more that a hint of snow in the mountains a group of friends tested out luck and a promising forecast up at chinook pass. chinook is on the east side of rainier and the pass is somewhere around 5000 ft. which is probably about as high as you can get on a paved road in the central cascades. this pass is typically closed between nov. and june/july depending on the snowpack. since winter has been slow to come out here it was still open. anyways, we lucked out and found some pretty good snow (i.e. pow, pooh, etc.). even though cover was kinda thin we built a couple of real small jumps & jibs and had a blast.

it feels real good to know that something that brought me so much joy when i was 10 years old and riding in the front yard in wisconsin on a plastic mogul monster snowboard that my parents (aka Santa) got at Farm & Fleet still brings me the same amount of happiness now that i'm 30.

the first 5 pics (green jacket) are me, the rest are friends. the last one with the giant pooh slash is my favorite.

ok, 1 more

hoen's been helping me get the snowmobile to look pretty bitchin'. PROOF.

hood's not done yet but the chicken's lookin' good.

grrr

ok, so it's been a long time. here are some pretty pics from when i went hunting. didn't kill nothing (damn crafty deers) but tried to kill two things (chukars aka big partridges(sp?)). hmm, that didn't come out right. here's some pics, i don't feel like typing. bye bye.

Whoo?

blast from the not so distant blog past

Berry Picking

On Saturday (Aug. 30) I borrowed Nollie and went up near Snoqualmie Pass to go huckleberry picking and to start scouting snowboard lines for the upcoming season. It was pretty cold up there and we had on/off rain. The huckleberry bushes hold a lot of moisture so my hands got pretty wet and cold and Nollie managed to get pretty wet. We'd pick for a little while, head back to the truck to warm up, and drive to a new spot and start over. There are a few hunting seasons open right now (archery for elk & modern firearm for bear) so we were pretty decked out in blaze orange and Nollie got to wear a bear bell. I tried to fit her with a vest but it didn't last to long when she walked through the dense brush.

Last year I went to this spot for my first day of hunting ever. I was looking for grouse but all I saw was a black bear and a flock of ducks (widgeons, i think). I think the bears love this zone due to the abundance of food (berries). Anyway, we picked until we were cold/bored and headed home. Some of the berries were still rather small and super tart, so I think the picking will still be good for a few weeks as these berries ripen. This area gets awesome in the fall when the huckleberry bush leaves turn red. I'll probably go back next weekend to try and get some more. Hopefully it'll be warmer.

This was the highlight of my holiday weekend as yesterday I cleaned and today I worked. Lame.

Soon....

it's not even september and i'm already watching at least one snowboard video a day. plus, i got 2 new shred magazines in the mail this week. i hear parts of colorado even got up to 1 foot of snow this week. stoked!

ZOOM

ok, here's some stuff that i've done in the last month or so. i caught a fish in greenlake! to date, it is the only fish that i've caught after buying my rod/reel/license. a good ol' worm & bobber helped me land this lunker.

i rode the YARR bike in the dead baby bike race. YARR bike is a bicycle that topher put together a few years back using parts from a pink little girls bike and some womans 10 speed. that's right it's a hybrid pink & silver girls bike with pink grips and pedals, 16" wheels, and best of all a COASTER BRAKE. according to sarah, the dead baby bike race was featured in an episode of gray's anatomy. i went to the start of the race at el chupacabra on phinney ridge to see what all the fuss was about and to see all the mutant bikes. when they fired off the starting gun i got stoked and decided to ride along. the race went down 65th st which is steep as hell.

SIDENOTE: a few years ago topher let me borrow his van to shuttle some WI friends that were in town for the annual baker snowboard trip and we all got stuffed at gorditos (probably my favorite burrito joint). anyways, after eating a ton we crammed about 7 people into a minivan that was missing a backseat and jetted down 65th. a few people almost lost their burritos when caught a little air when flying through one of the intersections. they weren't supposed to tell topher about the 'jumping of the van', but i guess they ratted me out 2 days later, jerks.

well, riding YARR bike down the hill was fun! skidding out sideways all the way down the hill while trying not to hit some lady on a unicycle. did i mention that this race isn't truly organized (i.e. this isn't some roped off parade course). the race starts and it's pretty much BIKE vs. CAR. this years race took place a week or so after some critical mass unpleasantness. most cars just sat idle and waited for all the weirdo bikers to ride by this time. however, i did see one dude run into a car and then fall down. i helped slow down an ice cream truck (see pic). went to the after-race party, drank some beer, saw some stuff, and went home.

other stuff: i'm now totally legit to volunteer at the seattle animal shelter! i had to go through a general orientation (sat morning), animal shelter 101 (sun morn), and dog handling 101 (another sun morn). technically i haven't volunteered yet, although the orientation hours count towards the 8hr a month volunteer quota. i hope to do the get fit with fido program where you take the shelter dogs on 4 mile jogs. the shelter can be kind of a sad place but so far all of the dogs seem awesome and just want to play. oh, get this, the preferred treat for the dogs is string cheese! i love string cheese.

ok, more crap later.

INTERNET WAR

at least i gave him lazer eyes

camping pic from last weekend

a bazillion of these photos were taken at the campsite on saturday night, here's one of me. photo courtesy of nels and claire.

story still to come, maybe.

just look at that owl, it's awesome! it's got googly eyes, nerd glasses (from mike's bachelor party), and a friggin' sombrero. you don't need a backstory, just enjoy the googly eyes that follow you across the room.

other stuff; camped all last weekend, good ol car camping style. no exercise necessary. drank a lot of beer, ate a lot of food, slept in the back of my truck, and played with an airsoft gun, wrist rocket, and 12 gauge. no nacho's but one corn dog. whoot.

Story to come...

here's some pics to go along with the last post. 1. new 'canoe' rack, topper fits underneath, neat. started sanding and painting some rusty spots yesterday. that rustoleum 'paint over rust' stuff is nasty. had to wash my hands with brake cleaner. 2. bike now has baskets. the baskets have already gotten a lot of comments from homeless types such as, "man you can fit a lot of beer in those" and "hey nice baskets, can i have one of those beers?". back off bums. 3. trailer/snowmobile mess taking over garage.

new crap

here's another picture-less post to bring y'all up to speed:

-been working on the snowmobile trailer. needs a new sheet of plywood, could use some painting, and working brakelights/turnsignals would be nice.

- the snowmobile is slowly transforming into a bitchin' firebird ala smokey & the bandit. to be continued...

-i finally put the baskets on my bike. topher and i 'borry'd' these baskets about a year ago so i'm probably the rightful owner now. bike is a late 60's (i think) schwinn collegitate, so it's fun to ride downhill, but sucks for the rest of seattle.

-hikded annette lake afterwork last wed. fun hike, it was good to finally get back out of the City. i still love how 'far away' you can get from Seattle by just driving about 45 minutes. i really love the Cascades.

-backpacked to island lake with lindsay & nels this weekend. super fun. tried to fish, still haven't caught nuttin'. stupid fish won't eat trout powerbait, raisins, cherries, or m&m's; stupid fish. there was still a lot of snow on the upper part of the trail and most of the lake was still frozen in the middle of july, nuts. fun overnight trip & got nachos in NB! sh*t yeah.

-bought a ladder rack for the new truck. craigslist special. bolted 'er in to the truck bed today, so FISH ON it's canoe time!

umm. ok, bye.

Ingalls Creek 6.20 to 6.21

Went backpacking on the east side of the Cascades a couple weeks ago. Started at the Ingalls Creek trailhead (sorta near Leavenworth) around 5pm Friday evening. Met some other people on the trail and we all camped near Falls Creek. One dude worked for the Seahawks but he didn't offer me any tickets for the up-coming Packers game. What a turkey. Left the tent and sleeping bag at camp on Saturday and headed a little further out on the trail. Made it to Hardscrabble Creek but Ingalls Creek was a litte to swift and cold for me try and cross it by myself. Turned around, got the tent, and hauled ass back to the truck so I could make it back for the cheese party at Topher and Heathers. The end.


Neat stuff I saw this time: trees that got shredded by a bear, mushrooms, burnt trees, caterpillars, lots of flowers.

EDIT: Apparently blogger don't like me or my camera. Pics won't upload. Fart them.

NOTE: The pics were very pretty.

06.15.08 McClellan Butte

started out the day by stopping by REI to swap-out the poles that broke a couple weeks ago. turned out to be a good thing since poles were pretty crucial for this hike. there weren't too many cars at the trail head so that was good. made it a few miles but snow hid the trail near the top. i'd never been on this trail before so it was slow going after the trail disppeared. after a few stops to verify that i was heading in the right direction (using map/compass/gps) i made it to the top. the snow caused a few impromptu glissades (i.e. falling on your ass and sliding down hill), but poles and quick feet kept it from getting too dangerous. found a mylar balloon at about 4500 feet. there isn't much that pisses me off more than trash in the mountains. this has damn near gotten me into fights at ski 'hills' before when yahoos are chuckin beer bottles and cans off of lifts or on the side of trails. grrr. anyways, here are some more purrdy photos of mountains and a pic of the balloon that i dragged back to seattle. oh, yeah McClellan Butte is just off I-90 so you can see that in a few of the pics.

damn near a week ago (6.12.08)

Last thursday I had a drilling job in North Bend (aka the place we always get nachos) so after we were done I took advantage of my proximity to the mountains and headed up for a hike. After checking out snow levels at Snoqualmie pass, I headed back east and hiked Granite Mtn. With the weird weather we've been having out here I was pretty stoked that it was blue bird up there. Only saw two groups of people out there in the 4 hours I was up there, so that was nice. There's still a lot of snow near the top and it would've been nice to have some poles. Oh yeah, I saw some critters on this trip and got close enough to get some good pics! Wasn't sure what the birds were at first but after reviewing Hoen's bird encyclopedia, I'm leaning toward blue grouse rather than ptarmigan. Feel free to correct me. As always, click on the pics to get a better/closer view.

City Fishin' 6.07.08

that's right, i got 2 trucks. woot.

It's early June and we're still getting snow out here. Well at least at the higher elevations in the mountains. With up to 18 inches of new snow up high I was tempted to head to Rainier this past weekend for a splitboard session, but nuts to that it was the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife FREE FISH WEEKEND and Topher was willing to show me the ropes. Problem is Topher's knowledge of the 'ropes' is limited to MN, WI, and boundary waters fishin' and, well, i don't know sh*t about fishing. For those not in know, 'free fish weekend' means you don't need a license to fish in the state (freshwater, saltwater, or shellfish) but you still gots to abide by the state rules/limits. Lucky for me, Topher's got some extra gear and was willing to share it with me. We started out putting the canoe in on Lake Washington near the arboretum by Hwy 520 which is pretty shallow and full of weeds, herons, beavers, turtles, and apparently no stinking fish. I guess our major problem was we didn't know what kind of fish were in the area or what kind of bait/lures would work. We probably annoyed a bunch of rich people as we tried to catch fish that might be hiding underneath their fancy boats and docks. I did manage to hook some fancy lookin' kids raft with my lure and had to board the dock it was sitting on to get Topher's lure back. We paddled out to Madison Park, 'docked' the canoe at a public beach and got beers and pastrammy(sic) sandwiches at a nearby market. Madison Park is a pretty uppidy-rich Seattle neighborhood and we got some weird looks even though we weren't too smelly for wannabe fishermen. On our Lake Washington adventure we managed to catch a bunch of weeds , stick-bass, and lily pads. I don't think we even got a bite. We did see a ton of minnows that thought it was funny to jump out of the water all around the canoe though.

In a effort to redeem ourselves, we went to a dock on the Puget Sound (saltwater) near Golden Gardens. Too bad it was low tide and some 15 year old laughed at us because we didn't know what we were doing. To Topher's credit, I guess he did 'land' a piece of sea anenome (sp?) by accident.

It's cool though. I'm kinda excited to try more fishing this summer, especially after I learn a bit about the sport. I think this weekend was the first time I've gone fishing since grade school. I don' t know if it's because I'm getting older, because I like getting away from 'people', because beer was involved, or a combination of all three but I can see myself getting into this.