February 9, 2004

Fragments and Run-ons

It was a very big weekend and it will be years before I can comprehend all of its goings on. Taught snowboarding lessons over one of the most gorgeous weekends we’ve had this year. Took one of my classes to the summit of Mount Bachelor and rode on down. Finally nailed my 360 nose butter. Test drove a 2004 Outback and redlined when I downshifted from fourth into second. Bowling night at Sun Mountain, where Huan Diaz, Boreal Q Tse, Grrzmiquaccorix and others met for a few frames, before the night degenerated into some hardcore ass-kicking on the air hockey table.

Hiked the half-pipe. 50-50 to boardslide on the flat-down box. Busted my thumb. Shane limped into the locker room, muttered something about the biggest air he’d ever gotten ever, and then turned ashen and slid to the floor. Shane hooked up to the oxygen tank saying it tasted like donuts, then strapped into the backboard, then catching an ambulance to the emergency room. A gorgeous sunset in the mountains. Chinese food, an inexperienced waitress and a fish that looked like an ugly dog. Beer and a movie about Japan. Shane with crutches, a foot of gauze and his mind back about him.

Other things. I’ve been playing the Master of the Universe thing so hard, lately, that I’m starting to have dreams about it. The other night I dreamed that I was in charge of writing the code that composes objective reality. It was a program that took the perceptions of every person and wove them into the one true and factual universe. The code was beautiful in its simplicity and elegance, and I was writing it to learn more about someone equally lovely.


Dane, are you trying to say you’re good at snowboarding now? No more penquins to blame falls on? We have to go riding to spring. I wanna see you do rails without using your arse!

Dane is indeed a good snowboarder, but this has not always been the case. Luke has been there since the painful beginning and has seen the penguin attacks, the cracked skulls, the ass-grinds. His skepticism is perfectly valid given Dane’s colorful history (and bruises) of snowboarding.
“Dane, what happened to you?”
“A PENGUIN TRIPPED ME!”
Luke, we totally gotta go riding!