My sore bum

My first experience skiing was well... painful.

I'm pretty confident that every single muscle in my legs and back are sore, and yes I spent a lot of the morning on my bum.

But surprisingly, or maybe not so surprisingly (I'll leave that one to you), I was alright at it by the afternoon. In the evening, despite being pretty tired, I was actually not half bad. Can I go down a black diamond.. no.. But I can now glide down a green slope pretty easily.. Attaining some decent speed? Yes.

With that I'll take a little pride.. And despite being sore, it was a lot of fun. Definitely a do again.

As to flying. I ended up not going today, the ceiling came down too low and instead I'm going to be doing it tomorrow morning. We'll see how that goes.. : )

But tonight, I am absolutely exhausted and don't have too much else to say. See you later alligators..

Break.. oddities..

For the first time in what seems like a month, I have a little bit of free time on my hands.

Therefore I feel obliged to reacquaint myself with the art of blogging.

Perhaps, over this next week I can post more than once or twice. That would be pretty darn sweet.

Updates:

This Sunday, Nick (roommate) thought he would play a joke on me and pushed a couch in front of me. Instead of tripping me up like he intended, the base of the couch slid into my big toe and took off the entirety of the nail on my big toe. Besides missing the nail (merely a minor annoyance), the toe has caused me a lot of pain this week and has made it very difficult to move about normally. Oh well.. life is life. And it is getting better, well enough in fact that I am currently at Wisp, MD, attempting to ski for the first time in my life.

I am now editing one night a week at the Technician. Mostly this just involves eating lots of free popcorn and copy editing my section. The only real challenge is writing the unsigned editorial I don't believe in. Unlike regular columns where I have artistic freedom, I am forced into writing the opinion of the editorial board. Which means rewriting the "edit" five or six times until I've made it sufficiently neutral and bland. blah...

I'm on Spring Break right now through next weekend. Originally I was just going to go down to Florida for a couple days in addition to hanging out at home.

But somehow, the break has rapidly evolved. Late this week, my mother (in the midst of a mid-life crisis) decided that she hadn't been skiing in a long time. In reality, its at least 20 years since we've never been in my lifetime.

Regardless, of the physical ailments we are all struggling with right now.. dad - back, mom - knee, me - cold + toe. We are spending the weekend in Wisp, MD and getting a crash course in skiing. (To me, this simply means I will spend a lot of the weekend on my ass, but it seems like it will be fun).

The super cool thing that developed this evening... tomorrow I will be flying a multi-million dollar stunt airplane. Long story short, my Dad (totally randomly) ran into an old friend of his while we were at dinner. He used to fly at American with my Dad and my Dad helped his son get hired at the D.C. Air National Guard. After a couple beers, he asked if I flew like my daddy. I told him that I had never been behind the stick. His response, thats no good son, why don't we fix that tomorrow afternoon.

So tomorrow, after a day of skiing, I will be up in the skies above Maryland doing flips and barrel rolls. And then, this Wed I will be going down to Naples, FL with my grandparents to work on my tan.

I would say this break is shaping up nicely.

Updates will ensue.

And, for those that would like more..
My last two articles from the Technician.. Personally I think they are two of the best I have written thus far.

The first, a satirical letter from Obama, here.

And the second, which oddly is not the exact same as the print version. It would seem as though a copy editor got to this one, making some bad edits in my opinion. But in any case, it keeps with the spirit of the real one, so I'll post it here.

The Beach

There are a lot of good things you can say about the beach. Its warm, its serene, the pace of life is slower..

But for me, the single greatest thing about Emerald Isle, N.C. is the peace and quiet. My days can consist of "nature walks", playing the Wii and lounging.

To me, this is heaven. My life at school is so hectic that I rarely have time to kick back and relax. Do things like... I don't know.. WRITE IN THIS BLOG.

Because the vast majority of my free time at school gets tied up with one of two activities: the Technician and the New York Times. One I work for, the other I read religiously.

There are pros and cons to excessively reading all the news that's fit to print. The pro is that I feel very well informed in just about every situation imaginable, the obvious con, that I rarely have to be informed because I spend all my time with Engineers who don't care.

Honestly, the vast majority of my fellow mech's would probably struggle to tell you the date. No less, give you information on the political climate in Zimbabwe, pirates off of Sudan and the stimulus package.

Now, before i sound stuck up. I want to make it clear that I'm not. One of the things I love about my engineering friends is that they don't care. But every once in awhile it is nice to engage in a little intellectual thought.

(I'm quickly realizing this post will have nothing to do with the beach, perhaps I should throw in a nice quip).

The wake at the beach was 1 to 2 feet today... Mission Accomplished. Get r' done. Yee-haw..

(Also quickly realizing how random I get at 1 in the morning).

In any case, it feels good to pound away at the keys on something that I know 5000 people won't read (perhaps 1 or 2 is really all a person needs). It is really liberating in that regard.. Because I can say things like.. fuck the police or Provost Nielsen is a tool and not get fired.

My movie on Netflix has loaded a little now.. I think it is time to watch..

No worries, I will write again soon.. Adieu..