So January has basically been a spring month. We've had temperatures well over 5 plus degrees and sun sun sun. It was awesome but at the same time it really sucked. But now we finally got some fresh snow and hopefully winter will be back soon.
My park riding has improved so much too! I went riding with a liftie called Kyle and he made me hit all kinds of new stuff. I stepped it up from small to medium jumps and next thing will be working on 360's!! I was sooo proud and so excited to go riding again. I'm also considering getting a new board just because I need something softer. I think I'm getting the Lobster park board but I just cannot decide whether or not to do it!
I also got the application papers from my family here in Canada last week and signed them today. I am going to mail them to the application office tomorrow, and I'm so excited! Hopefully everything is allright and they will process it fast so I can stay here for another season:) I really want to stay!
Other than that there's not really any news:) Everything is kinda the same but still awesome! I get to ride ALL the time and that's all I want:)
Thursday, February 7, 2013
Friday, January 25, 2013
Sorrrrryyyy
SO sorry it's been so long!
I don't even remember what I wrote about last time, haha.
But I guess that no news are still good news, right? Anyway!
I never have the time to write because I'm having too much fun ;)
Sooo, bld. 2, room 409:
Nothing new really. We have all gotten into habits by now. Whenever I work both Gabbi and York gets up at the same time because they start about the same time as me. I'm back at 7.15 starts (guess they forgot to put me back after my arm injury) and I get up at 6. Spend half an hour trying to wake up, then half an hour panicking to get ready to leave at 7. Just when I'm about to leave as the last one, Chloe wakes up.
I'm usually the first one to be home so I have about an hour to myself from 4 until York comes home as the sencond one. Then Gabbi, then Chloe. When I get home from work, I'm usually so tired that I crash on the couch for an hour, cook or eat left overs around 5 because I get hungry then, then go to my bed and crash for a bit there and then I finally give up around 9 and go to bed. It is not uncommon that I nap for an hour around 7-8 until 9 when I wake up and go to bed, haha.
Work:
So awesome, never leaving. It's still the same though.
Meet at 7.15, chat a bit with Kieran, listen to the morning meeting, ride down to Wizard, Wizard up to Solar, help set up (but start up crew has gotten so good at it that we never have to help anymore), Solar up to Catskinner. Meet our Whistler guy (because so many people were fired from Blackcomb that Whistler has to send people over)/third guy, set up top of Catskinner because the third one never knows what to do, ride to the bottom with Kieran, set up maze for an hour, Kieran does the line check and I start out at the bottom and then the day has started around 9.15am.
From then on we do breaks until 2pm, then the lift is open until 3pm, I usually end at the top because no one knows how to close down the machinery.
That takes about 20 min, then I ride to the bottom where I meet Kieran and the third guy and we ride to Solar where they either send us home or make us dig snow.
Snowboarding:
Has gotten a lot better! About three weeks ago I slammed my knees into a box and some pretty interesting swelling and bruises did occur, haha. They're all gone now though and my park riding has gotten so much better :)
Last weekend was spent in the terrain garden. I hit a few boxes and jumps 50-50 and straight aired, but stuck to things that I had already done before because I'm a chicken.
When I was riding up Catskinner though, the stupid lift broke down and I got stuck there for half an hour just around closing time! At first I was really, really annoyed, but it turned out to be an awesome thing. When I finally got off everyone had left the mountain and I went to the terrain garden which was empty. For some reason I suddenly had a lot of courage and ended up hitting the "big" jump line finishing with a hib. I landed everything I hit and I felt so good about myself, haha.
Today is friday and my plan for the weekend is to do 180's off of boxes, 180's from kickers, maybe try a 360 of a kicker and definitely try and hit the smallest kicker in the XL park :) I'm very excited and my mind is set on getting a LOT better from now on!
Parties:
I guess you may have figured by now that I kind of always choose snowboarding over parties.
It doesn't happen too much, but I do go out like once a week/ever other week.
It's usually at Moe Joes because we can get in on guest list so we dont have to pay. I do like partying, but the growers just really gets you and I'm always so pumped for riding when it's finally my weekend that I just want to sleep and get up really early, haha :)
It's always better to go out when you have to work, but working with a hang over is the absolute worst thing I know so I usually just choose snowboarding...
I can't really come up with anything else to update about right now. If you do want me to write about anything specifically, please comment or message me on facebook or something so I can do something about it. It would probably make my entries a lot more interesting too, haha.
Now I think it's time for me to go enjoy that I have weekend!
Have fun guys :)
I don't even remember what I wrote about last time, haha.
But I guess that no news are still good news, right? Anyway!
I never have the time to write because I'm having too much fun ;)
Sooo, bld. 2, room 409:
Nothing new really. We have all gotten into habits by now. Whenever I work both Gabbi and York gets up at the same time because they start about the same time as me. I'm back at 7.15 starts (guess they forgot to put me back after my arm injury) and I get up at 6. Spend half an hour trying to wake up, then half an hour panicking to get ready to leave at 7. Just when I'm about to leave as the last one, Chloe wakes up.
I'm usually the first one to be home so I have about an hour to myself from 4 until York comes home as the sencond one. Then Gabbi, then Chloe. When I get home from work, I'm usually so tired that I crash on the couch for an hour, cook or eat left overs around 5 because I get hungry then, then go to my bed and crash for a bit there and then I finally give up around 9 and go to bed. It is not uncommon that I nap for an hour around 7-8 until 9 when I wake up and go to bed, haha.
Work:
So awesome, never leaving. It's still the same though.
Meet at 7.15, chat a bit with Kieran, listen to the morning meeting, ride down to Wizard, Wizard up to Solar, help set up (but start up crew has gotten so good at it that we never have to help anymore), Solar up to Catskinner. Meet our Whistler guy (because so many people were fired from Blackcomb that Whistler has to send people over)/third guy, set up top of Catskinner because the third one never knows what to do, ride to the bottom with Kieran, set up maze for an hour, Kieran does the line check and I start out at the bottom and then the day has started around 9.15am.
From then on we do breaks until 2pm, then the lift is open until 3pm, I usually end at the top because no one knows how to close down the machinery.
That takes about 20 min, then I ride to the bottom where I meet Kieran and the third guy and we ride to Solar where they either send us home or make us dig snow.
Snowboarding:
Has gotten a lot better! About three weeks ago I slammed my knees into a box and some pretty interesting swelling and bruises did occur, haha. They're all gone now though and my park riding has gotten so much better :)
Last weekend was spent in the terrain garden. I hit a few boxes and jumps 50-50 and straight aired, but stuck to things that I had already done before because I'm a chicken.
When I was riding up Catskinner though, the stupid lift broke down and I got stuck there for half an hour just around closing time! At first I was really, really annoyed, but it turned out to be an awesome thing. When I finally got off everyone had left the mountain and I went to the terrain garden which was empty. For some reason I suddenly had a lot of courage and ended up hitting the "big" jump line finishing with a hib. I landed everything I hit and I felt so good about myself, haha.
Today is friday and my plan for the weekend is to do 180's off of boxes, 180's from kickers, maybe try a 360 of a kicker and definitely try and hit the smallest kicker in the XL park :) I'm very excited and my mind is set on getting a LOT better from now on!
Parties:
I guess you may have figured by now that I kind of always choose snowboarding over parties.
It doesn't happen too much, but I do go out like once a week/ever other week.
It's usually at Moe Joes because we can get in on guest list so we dont have to pay. I do like partying, but the growers just really gets you and I'm always so pumped for riding when it's finally my weekend that I just want to sleep and get up really early, haha :)
It's always better to go out when you have to work, but working with a hang over is the absolute worst thing I know so I usually just choose snowboarding...
I can't really come up with anything else to update about right now. If you do want me to write about anything specifically, please comment or message me on facebook or something so I can do something about it. It would probably make my entries a lot more interesting too, haha.
Now I think it's time for me to go enjoy that I have weekend!
Have fun guys :)
Friday, December 28, 2012
Christmas update
Hey guys!
I guess I should just start apologizing for not having written for a long time, huh? haha
But my excuse is still that I'm having way too much fun to write blogs :)
I'll try and cover everything just like last entry:
The tragic (and epic) day of the 16th of December:
As I've probably mentioned I've gotten a friend who's a snowboard instructor. He is an amazing teacher and he knows pretty much everything about snowboards. Anyways, he thinks I have potential and he always takes me park riding on my days of. Sunday the 16th was no different.
The day began crappy because Carson was grumpy for not having slept enough, and I got really grumpy because we went "off piste" (there really isn't off piste in Whistler because everyone loves powder so much, that Whistler just don't groom the big runs, so it's still safe), but I'm not very good at powder so I fell and got frustrated. Then we headed to Whistler to eat lunch and hit the park. Whistler has a pretty good baby park, so that's where I'm learning.
So we start hitting the park and I'm going off a baby kicker which is a small jump. It hadn't snowed in a couple of days so the landing was getting really icy and with a big hole in it. On like my 5th jump off of it a girl hits it before me but goes really slow. She barely made it over, which was why I totally miscalculated how much speed I needed. I ended up approaching the kicker with way too much speed which resulted in me catching so much more air than I expected. That caused me to land the jump, but panic and so I fell over and hyper extended my right elbow.
It really hurt, but Carson didn't see the fall so he just told me to suck it up. So I kept riding the last two hours of the day.
When I came home I was so stupid to take a warm bath because I thought my arm was no big deal.
Turns out it was, because when I woke up I couldn't even move my arm. And I was supposed to work!!!
So I got up(5am), got dressed as good as I could but gave up carrying my snowboard so I just went and told my supervisor that I couldn't work and he told me it was okay and sent me home to go to the doctor.
I didn't really feel like I needed it so I went home to skype my parents to hear what they thought I should do. They sent me to the doctor, so I went.
The doctor sent me right to x-ray then told me she was pretty sure I had a fracture. She put me in a sling because she wasn't completely sure, told me that I had to stay home for a week and to come back two days after because she wanted to make a radiologist take a look at my x-rays.
So I went home and almost cried, then stayed home for a week. That week was the most epic snowfall with pretty much 20-30cm new snow every day. It was the worst week of my life.
Luckily I recovered really quickly and was able to come back to work this monday (the 24th). I was so happy about that even though my arm still hurt a bit. It's getting way better though, and I'm pretty much over it!:)
So that was the tragic/epic day of the 16th!
Also here is a video of me riding the park after the fall, haha:
Bld 2 #409:
Life in 409 is just as it always is. Good.
We decided to celebrate Christmas together. I cooked an epic Danish christmas feast and they all really liked it! We also had secret santas but of course that had to wait until the 25th because that's how they do it in Aus. My secret santa was Gabbi and she gave me a toque that I've wanted for work for a long time. It was epic and I love it soooo much!
On the 25th all the aussies cooked me dinner and it was soo good too.
Besides Christmas nothing new has really happened.
Work:
Still on Catskinner, still working with Kieran. Still awesome. I was so happy to be back at work and the day just got even better when they told me I could go straight back to Catskinner, because everyone told me they would probably put me on the "sweep to sweep" (peak to peak, but when it snows, all you do is sweep the windows) and I HATE working gondolas.
So I've been on Catskinner the past three days, but for some reason they put me on Crystal today. Guess who was a very grumpy co-worker today.. Nah, it was alright because it was a fixed grip, but Catskinner will always be my baby, and I really hate being taken away from it.
Oh yeah and two funny stories from this week at Catskinner:
My christmas present:
On the 25th I was working Catskinner, and as you all know the 25th is the day where english speaking people open their presents. Everyone was really nice and brought all the lifties chocolate and candy. But as you probably know by now, Catskinner is a park rat chair. So what I got from the day was a Ferrero Rocher from the first lady to come to our chair. She wasn't a park rat though. Then I got a hug from a ski instructor I've never met before. And to top it off, some of the park rats that kept using catskinner that day, suddenly dropped me off a broken pen. I just looked at them like "Wtf?" and they said "It's weed!". I got really confused because to me it was just a broken pen and I thought they wanted me to throw it out. So I just said "What?" and they said "It's weed!!" and I didn't say it but I was like "No, it's not, it's a broken pen you freaks". So they just got on the lift and when no one was around I checked the pen out. Sure enough, inside the pen was a joint rolled and ready, haha. I don't smoke though, so I gave it to a co-worker who got so happy that he hugged me. Smoking weed is no big deal in Canada. I've only met Canadians who smoke it, and it's pretty much legal.
Yesterday is a bit of a different story though. And not as funny! I was working top of Catskinner and just watching people getting off it around 2.30 which is half an hour before we close. Suddenly the chair stopped with an e-stop! Catskinner is such an old lift that you have to go to the machine room to reset the stop. So I ran upstairs to fix it, but as soon as I got up, my co-worker called me and asked me why I pushed e-stop. I didn't and I asked him why he did, but he hadn't either. So I was running up and down the machine room to try and figure out what the hell was going on. Nothing worked, so I had to try and call maintenance, which I've never done before. But before I even got to that a maintenance guy comes running up to the lift to help me out. He runs upstairs and before I even get to look around he's called like 7 other people and they all showed up with 5 minutes interval with all kinds of machine stuff. The lift wouldn't start no matter how much they tried, and eventually they decided to clear the line. So they had to switch to our emergency motor. It took half an hour and the poor people were just sitting there getting really cold and I could just stand there and do nothing. It was actually kind of terrible, but now whenever I meet one of the rescue maintenance guys they go "Hey Viebs, nice of you to break the lift!" haha. Should probably mention I didn't! It was a drive fault and there was nothing I could do, haha.
Parties:
Haven't really happened. I've been sick and I was too afraid to get more hurt to go out with my arm, I haven't really been out in like 3 weeks. Except for last friday when I finally went to Moe Joes. It was a pretty epic night though.
Snowboarding:
Has obviously been limited because of my arm. I am finally getting better though, and I will definitely go riding this weekend which is starting as of tomorrow and the following two days. And I will definitely go and make that kicker my bitch after almost breaking my arm!!!
So yeah I think that updates most of my life right now!
Oh and a really big thing I should probably mention.. I think (and really hope!!!) that I've told all my nearest friends so I'm not upsetting anyone now:
I am applying to get permanent residency here in Canada!!! :D :D :D
I love it so much here and I can't bare the thought of having to go home in the fall, so I asked my family here in Canada if he would help me out and he agreed.
And what does all of this mean? Well, it doesn't mean that I don't love all you wonderful danish people (<3 <3 <3) but it does mean that I will be able to come to Canada and work and live whenever I want. I will still be going home sometime to take an education (so I'm not kicking myself out of Denmark, I'm still a Danish citizen), but if things go as planned, I will go back to Canada to live when that is done. This is way out in the future though!
For now, I will just be staying a season or two more and then come back to Denmark :) And I will be coming home to visit in the spring!! So save some time for me in May <3
I hope you are all well, because I am the happiest I've ever been:)
I do miss you guys though:(
I guess I should just start apologizing for not having written for a long time, huh? haha
But my excuse is still that I'm having way too much fun to write blogs :)
I'll try and cover everything just like last entry:
The tragic (and epic) day of the 16th of December:
As I've probably mentioned I've gotten a friend who's a snowboard instructor. He is an amazing teacher and he knows pretty much everything about snowboards. Anyways, he thinks I have potential and he always takes me park riding on my days of. Sunday the 16th was no different.
The day began crappy because Carson was grumpy for not having slept enough, and I got really grumpy because we went "off piste" (there really isn't off piste in Whistler because everyone loves powder so much, that Whistler just don't groom the big runs, so it's still safe), but I'm not very good at powder so I fell and got frustrated. Then we headed to Whistler to eat lunch and hit the park. Whistler has a pretty good baby park, so that's where I'm learning.
So we start hitting the park and I'm going off a baby kicker which is a small jump. It hadn't snowed in a couple of days so the landing was getting really icy and with a big hole in it. On like my 5th jump off of it a girl hits it before me but goes really slow. She barely made it over, which was why I totally miscalculated how much speed I needed. I ended up approaching the kicker with way too much speed which resulted in me catching so much more air than I expected. That caused me to land the jump, but panic and so I fell over and hyper extended my right elbow.
It really hurt, but Carson didn't see the fall so he just told me to suck it up. So I kept riding the last two hours of the day.
When I came home I was so stupid to take a warm bath because I thought my arm was no big deal.
Turns out it was, because when I woke up I couldn't even move my arm. And I was supposed to work!!!
So I got up(5am), got dressed as good as I could but gave up carrying my snowboard so I just went and told my supervisor that I couldn't work and he told me it was okay and sent me home to go to the doctor.
I didn't really feel like I needed it so I went home to skype my parents to hear what they thought I should do. They sent me to the doctor, so I went.
The doctor sent me right to x-ray then told me she was pretty sure I had a fracture. She put me in a sling because she wasn't completely sure, told me that I had to stay home for a week and to come back two days after because she wanted to make a radiologist take a look at my x-rays.
So I went home and almost cried, then stayed home for a week. That week was the most epic snowfall with pretty much 20-30cm new snow every day. It was the worst week of my life.
Luckily I recovered really quickly and was able to come back to work this monday (the 24th). I was so happy about that even though my arm still hurt a bit. It's getting way better though, and I'm pretty much over it!:)
So that was the tragic/epic day of the 16th!
Also here is a video of me riding the park after the fall, haha:
Bld 2 #409:
Life in 409 is just as it always is. Good.
We decided to celebrate Christmas together. I cooked an epic Danish christmas feast and they all really liked it! We also had secret santas but of course that had to wait until the 25th because that's how they do it in Aus. My secret santa was Gabbi and she gave me a toque that I've wanted for work for a long time. It was epic and I love it soooo much!
On the 25th all the aussies cooked me dinner and it was soo good too.
Besides Christmas nothing new has really happened.
Work:
Still on Catskinner, still working with Kieran. Still awesome. I was so happy to be back at work and the day just got even better when they told me I could go straight back to Catskinner, because everyone told me they would probably put me on the "sweep to sweep" (peak to peak, but when it snows, all you do is sweep the windows) and I HATE working gondolas.
So I've been on Catskinner the past three days, but for some reason they put me on Crystal today. Guess who was a very grumpy co-worker today.. Nah, it was alright because it was a fixed grip, but Catskinner will always be my baby, and I really hate being taken away from it.
Oh yeah and two funny stories from this week at Catskinner:
My christmas present:
On the 25th I was working Catskinner, and as you all know the 25th is the day where english speaking people open their presents. Everyone was really nice and brought all the lifties chocolate and candy. But as you probably know by now, Catskinner is a park rat chair. So what I got from the day was a Ferrero Rocher from the first lady to come to our chair. She wasn't a park rat though. Then I got a hug from a ski instructor I've never met before. And to top it off, some of the park rats that kept using catskinner that day, suddenly dropped me off a broken pen. I just looked at them like "Wtf?" and they said "It's weed!". I got really confused because to me it was just a broken pen and I thought they wanted me to throw it out. So I just said "What?" and they said "It's weed!!" and I didn't say it but I was like "No, it's not, it's a broken pen you freaks". So they just got on the lift and when no one was around I checked the pen out. Sure enough, inside the pen was a joint rolled and ready, haha. I don't smoke though, so I gave it to a co-worker who got so happy that he hugged me. Smoking weed is no big deal in Canada. I've only met Canadians who smoke it, and it's pretty much legal.
Yesterday is a bit of a different story though. And not as funny! I was working top of Catskinner and just watching people getting off it around 2.30 which is half an hour before we close. Suddenly the chair stopped with an e-stop! Catskinner is such an old lift that you have to go to the machine room to reset the stop. So I ran upstairs to fix it, but as soon as I got up, my co-worker called me and asked me why I pushed e-stop. I didn't and I asked him why he did, but he hadn't either. So I was running up and down the machine room to try and figure out what the hell was going on. Nothing worked, so I had to try and call maintenance, which I've never done before. But before I even got to that a maintenance guy comes running up to the lift to help me out. He runs upstairs and before I even get to look around he's called like 7 other people and they all showed up with 5 minutes interval with all kinds of machine stuff. The lift wouldn't start no matter how much they tried, and eventually they decided to clear the line. So they had to switch to our emergency motor. It took half an hour and the poor people were just sitting there getting really cold and I could just stand there and do nothing. It was actually kind of terrible, but now whenever I meet one of the rescue maintenance guys they go "Hey Viebs, nice of you to break the lift!" haha. Should probably mention I didn't! It was a drive fault and there was nothing I could do, haha.
Parties:
Haven't really happened. I've been sick and I was too afraid to get more hurt to go out with my arm, I haven't really been out in like 3 weeks. Except for last friday when I finally went to Moe Joes. It was a pretty epic night though.
Snowboarding:
Has obviously been limited because of my arm. I am finally getting better though, and I will definitely go riding this weekend which is starting as of tomorrow and the following two days. And I will definitely go and make that kicker my bitch after almost breaking my arm!!!
So yeah I think that updates most of my life right now!
Oh and a really big thing I should probably mention.. I think (and really hope!!!) that I've told all my nearest friends so I'm not upsetting anyone now:
I am applying to get permanent residency here in Canada!!! :D :D :D
I love it so much here and I can't bare the thought of having to go home in the fall, so I asked my family here in Canada if he would help me out and he agreed.
And what does all of this mean? Well, it doesn't mean that I don't love all you wonderful danish people (<3 <3 <3) but it does mean that I will be able to come to Canada and work and live whenever I want. I will still be going home sometime to take an education (so I'm not kicking myself out of Denmark, I'm still a Danish citizen), but if things go as planned, I will go back to Canada to live when that is done. This is way out in the future though!
For now, I will just be staying a season or two more and then come back to Denmark :) And I will be coming home to visit in the spring!! So save some time for me in May <3
I hope you are all well, because I am the happiest I've ever been:)
I do miss you guys though:(
Friday, December 14, 2012
Sorry!!!
It's been so long since I posted last time. I'm so sorry! There's so much to do and so little time to write blog, haha.
Anyways, I'll try to cover everything that has happened to me since last post.
Bld. 2, #409
My roommates are my Whistler family. Gabbi and York are the parents (Gabbi proved this by walking into me and Chloes room in the middle of one of my cough fits (I'm sick at the moment) with cough sirup - she would not even let me pour it myself) and Chloe is my big sister who lovingly looks out for me while never letting an opportunity of picking on me go by.
It's christmas in room 409
Work:
Is so good. I'm seriously never leaving. Here's why:
Anyways, I'll try to cover everything that has happened to me since last post.
Bld. 2, #409
My roommates are my Whistler family. Gabbi and York are the parents (Gabbi proved this by walking into me and Chloes room in the middle of one of my cough fits (I'm sick at the moment) with cough sirup - she would not even let me pour it myself) and Chloe is my big sister who lovingly looks out for me while never letting an opportunity of picking on me go by.
It's christmas in room 409
Work:
Is so good. I'm seriously never leaving. Here's why:
When your office view is this, you don't ever quit that job
I have been placed on the lift that I wanted the most for the season, so I am as happy as it gets.
The lifts name is Catskinner. Catskinner is my baby. It's right next to the pro's park so there are always people coming down again and again that you can have nice conversations with. And cool tricks to watch when no one is at the lift.
Apparently I am good at start ups. Start ups are the crew that meets at 6am to start up all the lifts and check that the machinery is okay. So this week has been 4 shifts of 6am starts. Which means I have to get up at 5am. This week was really hard because I'm sick and had to get up that early. Today is finally my friday though, so I am pretty happy! Next weeks schedule says four more 6am starts, so I am enjoying being able to sleep in the following three days!!
6am starts are not so bad though. I have been snowmobiled to work some days, which is SO AWESOME. Other days I've had to start up the gondola and that's the worst thing in the world.
Also it only takes about half an hour to finish the start up, which usually means (if I've been snowmobiled up to a lift near Catskinner) that I get to just sit and relax until my crew comes up and we can start up our lift. So it's basically an hour pay for not as much work.
Parties
Parties has been limited the past two weeks. Mainly because I've become friends with a snowboard instructor and we've been snowboarding together to make me better, so I've turned down partying to avoid being hungover. I also caught that cold so I've been sleeping so much the past week.
We did have our first rounds night and it was awesome. Rounds is a lifty thing. Basically if you screw up at work, your colleagues can call rounds on you. Then you have to buy a jug of beer and pour them a glass of beer at a rounds night. It comes to be a LOT of free beer by the end of the night and things gets pretty wild and hilarious.
So far I've done a couple of things that could be called rounds on. I have to admit they're legit, haha.
First rounds: Being taken out by my own chair. Twice.
Second rounds: Shoveling snow of a chair for my collaegues but not removing it fast enough so one of them sat down on it and brought it with him up.
So far I've done a couple of things that could be called rounds on. I have to admit they're legit, haha.
First rounds: Being taken out by my own chair. Twice.
Second rounds: Shoveling snow of a chair for my collaegues but not removing it fast enough so one of them sat down on it and brought it with him up.
Third rounds: I actually forgot, but know that there is one. Probably for falling over.
Fourth rounds: Sweeping snow of chairs with broom, then losing broom on chair. I had to call down and tell Kieran that I lost the broom to the chair and he instantly called rounds on me and declared that if the broom didn't make it down it would be a double rounds. Luckily for me it made it down, haha.
Snowboarding:
Holy shit. I never thought I could improve SO much on such a short time. As mentioned before I got a friend who's a snowboard instructor and he is so helpful. Apparently he believes I have potential to be like REALLY good, so he forces me to constantly watch snowboard movies and we go out just the two of us to only work on my skills. It's really hard but so awesome and in just a week I went from only being able to carve to be able to (and to like it!!!) hit sidehits, small kickers and boxes. Still only 50/50's but shit am I proud of myself, haha. I will be bringing my gopro up on saturday so hopefully I will be able to show you guys how my snowboarding looks after a couple of weeks of snowboarding!!
I'm not sure if I have anymore to add at this moment so to wrap things up, here are some pictures of life in Whistler:
First snowboarding day of the year!!
Burger celebration
On the way up to Whistler the day after with Chloe
Don't we look excited?
Epic day of riding with the following idiots ( <3 ):
Stokesy
From left: Stokesy, Trubsy and Laurie(sy) haha
And that's what your knees look like after a day of riding with those guys
Office view, fuck yeah
Or maybe not...
Trubsy being gangstah with my helmet
Epic gullasch in bread bowl
The view from #409 on a bluebird day with new snow
Can you tell it's Christmas in Whistler?
Epic day of riding with Trubsy
On our way down from Whistler peak in the sickest fog ever known to mankind
Friday, November 23, 2012
Winter is here
And life is awesome. It's been snowing the past week, the mountains are open and I could literally not be happier.
I'll do a quick update on everything that I can think of concerning my life here in Whistler:
Training:
I'll do a quick update on everything that I can think of concerning my life here in Whistler:
Bld. 2 #409:
Is where I live. Staff housing is a bunch of houses containing approximately 1000 employees of Whistler Blackcomb, and I live in building 2. Gabbi and York are so sweet and fun to hang out with which makes coming home so nice. Chloe is my roomie and it is just awesome. We try to plan to eat together and do stuff together as often as we can and we've had a couple of nights where we were supposed to get up early but ended up spending hours laying in bed just talking and laughing instead.
Friends:
Are easy to make here! Employees are easy to spot and everyone are so nice. Work gives you a lot of friends too, and my bosses are awesome at calling around the lifts saying "Beers at x, see you there", and then the whole lifty crew goes to have a few beers and laughs at a bar.
Food:
Is expensive!!! Me and Chloe try to shop together and cook together, but sometimes it just doesn't fit our schedule. Noodles are often the way to go even though I can literally feel on my body how bad it is for you. A packet of noodles is about 1 dollar though, so it's just so easy to go for that.
We only have a stove top too, so I constantly have to make sure that what I'm about to buy is something that I can actually cook on my stove top and does not require an oven.
18 Below is a restuarant close to staff housing which opens after mountain hours just for employees. It's 7 bucks for a meal which includes unlimited pop (or if you're trying to lose weight as I am, unlimited water), a bowl of salat, a bowl of soup, main dish, dessert and fruit. It's a good deal if you can drag yourself down there after work, and you will rarely be able to finish your whole meal 'cause there's a LOT of food.
We only have a stove top too, so I constantly have to make sure that what I'm about to buy is something that I can actually cook on my stove top and does not require an oven.
18 Below is a restuarant close to staff housing which opens after mountain hours just for employees. It's 7 bucks for a meal which includes unlimited pop (or if you're trying to lose weight as I am, unlimited water), a bowl of salat, a bowl of soup, main dish, dessert and fruit. It's a good deal if you can drag yourself down there after work, and you will rarely be able to finish your whole meal 'cause there's a LOT of food.
Australians:
Oh my god. They're everywhere!!! I feel like I'll learn australian before I learn Canadian, which was what I wanted to learn in the first place, haha. My roomies are aussies though, and I guess they're okay. Actually pretty much all of my friends are aussies and granted, they're pretty great, but man!! do they have some weird expressions. The most commonly used one from Chloe is the following: "Calm your farm down", which basically means calm down. She'll say it all the time but especially at me when I'm tired and grumpy, haha.
I fear Australia Day......................
Canadians:
Haven't met so many yet, but I love the few that I have. They're insane at snowboarding and luckily for me I work with two of them. It really challenges me to board down with them and that's good. Canadians are so nice and sweet and that brings me to my next subject:
Politeness:
Wow, are Canadians polite!! You can't walk past a Canadian without getting a smile or a "Hi!", and they'll always be up for a small chat and they're always very interested in where I come from. I noticed that especially the Canadian people on my chair today appreciated me saying hi to them.
The thing though that really hit me about their politeness is this: In our busses, when people hit stop, it doesn't say stop on the sign, it says "Stop Requested" as if it's up to the bus driver if he wants to stop the bus and the Canadian guy will just be like "Sorry, didn't mean to be in your way", haha.
The thing though that really hit me about their politeness is this: In our busses, when people hit stop, it doesn't say stop on the sign, it says "Stop Requested" as if it's up to the bus driver if he wants to stop the bus and the Canadian guy will just be like "Sorry, didn't mean to be in your way", haha.
Work:
Is awesome! I love it so much. I've been working the past three days, and it's been really great. Tuesday was my first day and I met a 7.15. I met my returning guy which is someone who worked as a lifty last year. He's one of the Canadians and he seems really awesome. We had to board down to the bottom of my chair, which is Catskinner. Catskinner is the chair that I requested so I was SOOOO happy to get to work on it. Was a bit less happy when we got to the bottom of it and had to dig out the whole thing. We spent ALL day just digging and stomping the snow down so it could be a real lift.
The following day was a dry run day which basically meant that we got to the chair, made it run, waited all day because obviously no one was getting on the lift, then went home and was payed for pretty much just waiting.
The following day was a dry run day which basically meant that we got to the chair, made it run, waited all day because obviously no one was getting on the lift, then went home and was payed for pretty much just waiting.
Today was opening day and also my first day working with people.
It seems that the lifty job is just the right thing for me. I LOVED getting to talk to all those people and bumping chairs kept me warm, so the day just went by SO fast.
I'm working on a fixed grip lift which means I have to bump chairs which is basically pulling the chair to slow it down so it doesn't knock people over, it's kinda fun to do and I can definitely feel my arm muscles coming on.
I'm working on a fixed grip lift which means I have to bump chairs which is basically pulling the chair to slow it down so it doesn't knock people over, it's kinda fun to do and I can definitely feel my arm muscles coming on.
Training:
Obviously training is over. It was fun but I'm way more excited about working for real now.
Catskinner:
Catskinner is the lift that I've been working on the past three days. I instantly fell in love with it! Catskinner is located right between an easy run and the pro's park. That means I got all the park rats coming in from one side being cool and all, and all the older people who really enjoy a quick chat before getting on the chair. It made a good contrast and kept me busy and smiling which was really nice.
Dry runs:
Are finally over, and I'm so happy about that. Dry runs is just running the chair without people for an entire shift, which means just about 10 hours. You dig a little snow if you can find something that needs digging but basically just waits around and feels really sorry for yourself that you're not allowed to take ride breaks on dry run days..
Opening day:
I was really nervous about opening day to be honest. I've never worked with both people and a lift, but luckily it felt so natural and I really enjoyed the whole day. People were lined up at the bottom when I loaded the chair to go up to my own, and everyone, literally EVERYONE included my awesome supervisor were so stoked that we all just ran around like happy idiots building mazes and getting ready for the people.
By the end of opening day I was in love with Blackcomb, Catskinner and the lifty job.
Parents on lifts:
Lesson learned. Don't trust them. ALWAYS slow the chair down even if the parent says that their kids can handle it. They can't, and the parent can NOT pull the poor child up on their own. Where does this come from, you might wonder. Here's what happened today on my lift:
A guy came up with his two kids. I asked them if he wanted me to slow the chair down, but he declined. Being a naive newbie I acepted his request and let them load the chair. HUGE MISTAKE. The guy loaded the chair, and the kids ended up just being pushed ahead by the chair, while the guy frantically tried to pull both of them up on each of his sides. Both me and the other lifty was running after lift, basically hanging on it trying to pull the poor kids on. At one point I was actually being pulled up by the chair and had to let go and just jump down. It was insane and the kid was still hanging. Eventually he managed to pull the kid up, but I learned my lesson!!! I'm never ever letting a parent decide wether or not I should slow down the lift.
Snowboarding:
IS SO AWESOME. Snow has been falling the last week which has made conditions so good. I snowboarded sunday and monday and I can really feel how I'm getting better already. Luckily for me some of my new friends are really good at snowboarding and I can go with them. It challenges me in the best way making me better run by run. It feels so good. On top of that I get to ride on work too, so I'm pretty much riding every day, and I plan to be riding park within not very long. I just need to have my switch side completely down before I can start park. But I've already got lots of offers from collueges and friends who wants to help me get starting on the park thing.
Yeah, so that covers basically everything in my life right now. I'm really living the dream, and yeah, I'm probably not coming home. Every one are telling me to stay for the summer, and it sounds so great. Then they add "and if you stay for the summer you're staying for the winter". So yeah.. My supervisor, Gabe, is on the lookout for a Canadian guy for me, because appearently you only have to date a canadian for 12 months and then you get to stay here.
Of course I miss you, sweet danish friends ( <3 <3 <3 ) but I guess you know how much I've wanted this and well, it's just so much more than I've ever dreamed of :)
Monday, November 19, 2012
First real day of snowboarding!!!
TODAY WAS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Woke up to snow outside again today. It's been raining all week so that in it self was awesome.
I really wanted to go snowboarding but my roommates girlfriend wasn't sure if she wanted to go. We convinced her and she told us later that it was worth it.
After spending a long time in the village getting her staff pass and renting skis for her, we finally caught the gondola up. It started snowing as soon as we got a few hundred meter up the hill, and everything was covered in white.
We finally got up there and I had the best day ever. There was so much snow, so few people and everything was just pure awesome!!!
I don't think I can ever come home! I love this place, this new life and I love the snow and snowboarding, life is truly fantastic here :) I am so happy!!!
Woke up to snow outside again today. It's been raining all week so that in it self was awesome.
I really wanted to go snowboarding but my roommates girlfriend wasn't sure if she wanted to go. We convinced her and she told us later that it was worth it.
After spending a long time in the village getting her staff pass and renting skis for her, we finally caught the gondola up. It started snowing as soon as we got a few hundred meter up the hill, and everything was covered in white.
We finally got up there and I had the best day ever. There was so much snow, so few people and everything was just pure awesome!!!
I don't think I can ever come home! I love this place, this new life and I love the snow and snowboarding, life is truly fantastic here :) I am so happy!!!
Just a few pics of today
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Almost a month in Canada!!
I know I said I would post entries more frequently, but I'm having so much fun I just can't find the time for it.
I started training again monday which was a short day. I actually don't remember what we did though.
Tuesday was awesome because we met at 12 for a BBQ and to meet the returning staff. Then we had a short indoor session where they explained to us that we were opening on saturday.
They gave us wednesday off to prepare for the opening, so me and Chloe tried to get on the free bus to Squamish, but the bus was full so we had to go back home. I think we ended up doing nothing all day instead.
I had thursday off too because they split us up so all could do dry runs and exams.
Friday was exciting because we had dry runs which basically is running the lift without people. We prepared for opening day and just hung out a bit. And got to snowboard, yay!!
Later on we had exams which was boring, but I passed.
I decided that I should probably have a real night out so when I got home I started getting ready. Chloe was up for it too. I had early dinner, but because I had gotten up at 6 I was so tired that I took a nap. From 6 to 9! I wasn't sure if I wanted to go out, but finally decided that since I was already in my clothes I should go out.
So me and Chloe drank some cider with our roommates, then got a cab down to Maxx Fish witch is a bar down in the village. We had an awesome night!
Today I actually promised Chloe to take her up to the mountain for opening day, but we were just too hungover to go anywhere, so we spent all day in bed taking naps and eating junk food.
I think I'm going to go up on the mountain tomorrow though!
Oh yeah and on monday it's been an entire month since I moved to Canada! It doesn't feel like that long at all and I'm very scared that time will go by too fast. I'm having too much fun!! Canada is awesome :)
I started training again monday which was a short day. I actually don't remember what we did though.
Tuesday was awesome because we met at 12 for a BBQ and to meet the returning staff. Then we had a short indoor session where they explained to us that we were opening on saturday.
They gave us wednesday off to prepare for the opening, so me and Chloe tried to get on the free bus to Squamish, but the bus was full so we had to go back home. I think we ended up doing nothing all day instead.
I had thursday off too because they split us up so all could do dry runs and exams.
Friday was exciting because we had dry runs which basically is running the lift without people. We prepared for opening day and just hung out a bit. And got to snowboard, yay!!
Later on we had exams which was boring, but I passed.
I decided that I should probably have a real night out so when I got home I started getting ready. Chloe was up for it too. I had early dinner, but because I had gotten up at 6 I was so tired that I took a nap. From 6 to 9! I wasn't sure if I wanted to go out, but finally decided that since I was already in my clothes I should go out.
So me and Chloe drank some cider with our roommates, then got a cab down to Maxx Fish witch is a bar down in the village. We had an awesome night!
Today I actually promised Chloe to take her up to the mountain for opening day, but we were just too hungover to go anywhere, so we spent all day in bed taking naps and eating junk food.
I think I'm going to go up on the mountain tomorrow though!
Oh yeah and on monday it's been an entire month since I moved to Canada! It doesn't feel like that long at all and I'm very scared that time will go by too fast. I'm having too much fun!! Canada is awesome :)
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