warning: may cause permanent damage.

Murphy’s Law states that whatever can go wrong will go wrong.

I am the spokes-girl for Murphy’s Law.

No.  Really, I am.  I am your bona-fide, Chronically Accident Prone (CAP) girl.  If I was wrapped in a box and put on the shelf, there would be a huge label – - WARNING: May cause permanent damage.  I am the girl that falls up the stairs as well as down. I walk into marble pillars as clear as daylight.  I make the last payment on my vehicle only to have it totaled the very next day. You can find me trapped in three different elevators in three different buildings in the same month, or stuck in an MRI machine during a power outage (because why would the generator kick on, right?).  

Unfortunately, my CAP-ness occasionally invades lives of other innocent, unsuspecting people.

One time this happened at the local YMCA.  I was running on the treadmill, and somehow managed to get all tangled up in the cord of my iPod.  While attempting to unravel myself, the iPod suddenly flailed over the top of me and clocked some passerby in the head!  Wide-eyed, I turned to ask if he was okay.  This turned out not so brilliant, since, you know, I was still on the treadmill.

So, not only does the guy get ambushed by a flying iPod, he then gets mowed down by yours truly. I don’t mean for these things to happen.  They just do.  Seriously, the more poise I try to be, all the more damage ensues, and if there is a chance, even a 1/100,000,000th chance that something will go wrong in a random situation?  Oh, you better believe it will.  To be around me, you need a four leaf clover, horse shoe, and a constant supply of salt to throw over your shoulder. 

“Maybe we should just wrap you in bubble-wrap?” suggested a friend.

My inane ability to attract misfortune swells to epic proportions when I am around someone I like.  In high school, my friend Tiffany threw a huge party.  A bunch of us were outside, including this kid I had a major crush on.  The last few days had been pretty rainy, so the grass was wet and muddy.  During a game of partner tag, (Yes, I did just admit to playing partner tag in high school. When you are done making fun, you can continue reading.), I found out the hard way that my shoes lacked traction on slippery ground.

Running away from the current tagger, I decided to be bold and go for the hand of my crush.  Only, when I tried to stop, I slid.  By that, I mean I wooshed past the boy, several others, and slammed right into a tree.  After impact, I fell backwards and landed in a pile of dog poop.  Needless to say, the boy I liked never spoke to me after that night.

Que sera sera, right?

On the train

So, here I am, sitting on the train, just passing Skyttorp. Good thing I am on the train now and didn’t try it an hour earlier, as the train I would have been waiting for hit an elk (yeah, one of those *big* things) and never arrived.

So, once on a train that did arrive, albeit ten minutes late, we were packed like sardines. I would not be kidding if I said there were 40% more people on the train than there ought to have been.

It does give you an opportunity to peoplewatch though, which is always interesting… You can tell that most people exhibit some sort of jaded acceptance of the situation. Even the staff does. In the end, I only had to stand for half the journey and could sit for the rest.

I may ponder a bit on baking and other things tomorrow…

The Feast of All Saints

 

I have only experienced going to a cemetery every November 1 since 2003. Never had I thought of it as a time for family. It’s only this year that I realized that. My family went there at around 6 in the evening. We brought a tent, food(of course), chairs, tables, a blanket, a portable tv, and a radio. My niece also brought her mini chessboard and we were lying upon my dad’s tomb and played while the rest of my family either talked or watched tv. It is like camping out in the open which I never did before with them. It felt nice. ♥ It wasn’t just us though. There were like millions. Ok that’s exaggerating. It seemed like it, though. The cemetery was filled with too many people. Our neighbor in the cemetery(why does it sound funny?) was present, just like last year and my family and theirs developed somehow a friendship. One member of their family was talking to my sisters like she can’t stop. I can overhear so even I know her entire life story now. We went home sometime at midnight and that was that. Til next year.

 

 

XXVIII. A battered limestone head

In the clauted (cleated?) gyre of the Age of the Good Remainder:

After feigning death, the secondary wife of the white
Moth pharaoh
Provides part of the key to unlock the wooden shrine
Of the mysterious occupant of the Dessoae tomb,
The faceless hero with a battered limestone head
Sheathed in pearls, his skull pierced with a gold arrow.

The noble face on the unstained coffin had been broken
In the notorious century following its discovery,
Needlessly mutilated by the hostile scrutiny of scholars
Seeking clues without the holy quality of mercy.

Forty minutes before an unequalled storm of rain and fire,
Earthquakes and gravity halted the discredited work;
Two upper spans of majestic high-ceilinged rooms
Were obliterated.

Snow Farming & Preservation (How To Keep Snow For Next Season)

Winter resorts, climate activists, skiers and snowboarders, and quite a few others have been fearing the end of white winters for years. Especially the snowboarders and skiers amongst us want winters with fresh fluffy flakes to lightly bounce through as we ride the pillows of white goodness down the mountain in the future.
This post isn’t going to provide ‘fresh’ snow, however it brings some insights on how to preserve the current snow for a great base (and even better future).

Laax (CH) is using two really interesting projects to preserve energy, snow for the coming season, and maximize profits by extending the season and cutting costs.

The first project has become rather widespread over the years: covering the glacier with a protective ‘freeze wrap’. According to the Weisse Arena AG website, this saves 40% energy costs by not having to collect so much new snow with snow-plows. This obviously also has a positive environmental effect.
Additionally, the 20,000m2 blanketing system preserves the glacier and holds 2.5 to 3 meters of snow for the coming season. This allows for early season openings and less risk for resort investors and local businesses.

The second project is one that I find a lot more interesting and innovative. It relies on the same principles and uses the same materials, but in areas where there would usually be cows grazing in the summer (i.e not on the glacier).

“Snow farming is the use of obstacles, equipment and knowledge about management of snow in order to strategically manipulate snow coverage. Often this is done for the purpose of skiing or even preventing snow drift in certain areas like roads.”

So that explains all those ‘randomly’ placed wooden fences along the slopes which I used to think were just to keep the drunk Brits on course.

The fences collect snow which can then be spread to the necessary areas by the snow-groomers.

Now this is my favorite part. To provide a snow park at the start of the season that has sufficient snow for a halfpipe and big kickers, the snow-wizards of Laax decided to fill up the monster-pipe on Crap Sogn Gion (at 2216m it’s not a glacier) with all the snow they could fit.

The huge pile of snow preserved in the half-pipe will get shoveled out at the beginning of the coming season for a fully equipped park from the start of the season.

Laax, as most other resorts, also uses huge water basins which collect the glacier’s melt-water and can be recycled for the snow-machines spraying the slopes in the winter.

Of course the entire winter sports industry isn’t exactly benefiting the environment. Industrializing, commercializing, and ruthlessly exploiting nature’s beauties has got to be one of mankind’s favorite past-times. These projects aren’t self-sustaining zero-emissions operating systems, but at least they are going in the right direction: cutting energy consumption, maximizing scientific research (all projects are under scientific observation and supervision), preserving local businesses, and providing us riders with big pipes and huge kickers all through the season.

Played while posting this post:
Charles Mingus – Goodbye Pork Pie Hat
Cannonball Adderley – Dancing In The Dark
Miles Davis Quintet – My Funny Valentine

You can find more funky tunes in our Playlists section on bonksnow.com!

Far too tired to fall asleep.

I am loving Owl City’s Fireflies at the moment.

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Aren’t dreams wonderful? I am fascinated with all the mysteries of dreaming, believing that these dreams hold deeper stories in our lives. Last night, because of watching too much Halloween specials on TV, I dreamed of ghosts and dormitories and cluttered rooms. I used to blog about some of my dreams before, but for some reason, I stopped dreaming, and I stopped writing. It was as if I had a vacation from the dream world, and now I’m back.

The weirdest dream I had so far was about an old Ninoy-looking man, wearing a Barong, standing on the end of a red-carpeted aisle. He seems to be missing his dead wife so much, wanting to renew their vows despite her death. On the other end of the aisle was a black baby, wearing some sort of a wedding dress borrowed from her dead yaya. The procession began, lead by a snake with a pink ribbon, with the baby crawling after. Reaching the altar in front, the snake raised its head, ready to strike at the baby. And then I woke up.

Happy Halloween! XD

Happy Halloween

Trying to brighten my Halloween, Nick took me to go buy pumpkins. We ended up leaving the farm stand with 10 pumpkins!6 large and 4 small.

After pumpkin picking pick made the deal even sweeter by treating me to Starbucks. Specifically the pumpkin spice latte.

Tall Pumpkin latte

iPhone app. nutritionals for my pumpkin spice latte.

The real thing! What a treat.

Now that I have my coffee I am fueled up and ready to carve.

Nick helping me finish my cat pumpkin.

My cat pumpkin

My sister's and mom's pumpkins.

My niece dressed up as a sock-hop girl.

Carving took forever, now it is time for dinner and a bonfire!