nairb codex

A few weekends ago I flew up to Anchorage to visit my brother. I always enjoy visiting him because we have such a good relationship.

While there, we decided to go to Alyeska, both Saturday and Sunday for some snowboarding (Aaron skied). Saturday the weather was reasonable, although the mountain was pretty crowded. Sunday was a different story. Being that it was the Super Bowl and the fact that it made for a desolate and chilly day. Adria joined us on Sunday, so it was actually a family affair. The temp was right around 0F with windchills around -20F. To give you an idea of what snowboarding in this type of weather is like, imagine this: you have zero desire to stop on the mountain (for any reason), you can’t sit still on the lift because doing so you’d probably freeze solid (why Alyeska doesn’t have covered, a.k.a. bubble,  lifts baffles me), talking or taking pictures is pretty much out of the question (except in the lodge), and any amount of skin exposed is destined to become numb (and red). That was probably the coldest conditions I’ve ever snowboarded in, and I’d think twice about doing it again.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m really glad I got a chance to go boarding at Alyeska. According to Forbes, Alyeska is the 4th snowiest resort in the world. The snow was really nice, especially since it had snowed about a foot total in the days prior.

One thing that would make Alyeska infinitely better would be to upgrade their chair lifts. All of them should have a bubble and even better yet would be seat warmers. It’d also be nice if all lifts had the safety bar with foot rests so you can rest your board (or skis) as you ride up. The inside of my left leg was particularly sore from riding the lifts all day and having my board dangle below me. I guess that creates a lot more stress on your leg than you’d imagine.

The drive to Girdwood (where Alyeska is) is quite nice. The mountain is located near an inlet. On your way to Alyeska, you can see the water flowing in to the inlet. With all the snow & ice, doesn’t look like anything all that exciting. On the way home, most of the water has already flown out of the inlet, so you get huge chuunks of snow/ice mixed with mud that kinda l0oks like cracked earth in the desert, but on a much larger scale.

While on the mountain, we had a great view of the inlet and surrounding mountains. Because of terrain, clouds tend to hang low above the inlet around the peaks in the area. So I think technically when we were at Alyeska, we were above the clouds (and almost in the clouds on Sunday).

After getting in quite a bit of physical activity Saturday & Sunday, it was decided that we start playing video games, Onimusha: Warlords. Although it took almost all day, we were able to beat the entire game (with a little help from an online guide). That was a lot of fun, as I haven’t beaten a game from start to finish in quite some time.

I can’t imagine I’ll be going back to AK anytime soon, or ever for that matter. Aaron & Adria are moving back to MN in May, so the motivation to go back is pretty much gone.

I know my last post was pretty blunt and a bit harsh, but I wanted to officially say that I’m not mad at her and I definitely don’t hate her. I just couldn’t continue with the relationship we had. We’ve since talked, and although I don’t expect us to be best friends or anything, I think we’ll keep in touch from time to time.

So it’s been awhile, but I am back. 2008 was a hard year for me, with only the very beginning of the year being truly happy times for me. The rest of the year I spent slowly spiraling down into a dark existence, hitting rock bottom right around the end of the year.

In the past year, I’ve lost most of my self confidence, been consciously depressed, including pissing off most of my friends who attempted to keep in contact with me, losing about 25 lbs, and finding out I’m anorexic. I spent the majority of my time trying to make someone love me the way I wanted, even though I realized a long time ago that that would never happen, and turned out to be a rather expensive endeavor, all for nothing. I kept turning to her out of complete and utter loneliness, only for her to turn a cold shoulder every time I needed her. Read the rest of this entry »

Hofbräuhaus

On the last day of August, I flew to Vegas for the day to go to my friend Svihla’s wedding. Svihla and I worked together in Germany. I’ve always really enjoyed going out for drinks with him and his stammtisch group. This year, Svihla brought his wife-to-be over to get married in Vegas. The ceremony was short, sweet, and performed by a German woman who worked at that chapel. He has requested that I wear my lederhosen as he and his wife would also be wearing tracht. Although I love wearing my lederhosen, this posed somewhat of a situation. As I was onlly going for the day it would have been easiest just to wear lederhosen the entire time, but obviously everyone will stare. I ended up wearing jeans to Vegas with my lederhosen in a small bag. I changed just before the wedding and ended up wearing my lederhosen home on the plane. Read the rest of this entry »

So first off, let me just say that I ripped off the title of my blog from my friend Brad. Thanks buddy!

I’ve been back just over 24 hours and all I can think about is being in Munich. Not only does Oktoberfest kick ass, but seeing all my friends and being able to spend time with them truly makes me happy. Every time I visit Munich since I’ve lived there, it just makes me want to move back. The quality of life is infinitely better than what the States has to offer. The friends I’ve made there are some of my closest friends in all the world.

Note the virgin White Russian in Martin

This time around I got to see a lot of friends I don’t normally get to see when I visit you Munich. That was a definite added bonus. I was especially happy to see Michelle, whom I haven’t seen since before I moved back to the States since she went back to Taiwan (more than two years ago). I also had the pleasure of meeting her baby boy Martin. Such a cute and cool kid. Fun to play with and very smart for only being 15 months old. We taught him how to cheers, and shortly thereafter he wanted to clank glasses every time he took a drink of his virgin White Russian. Read the rest of this entry »

So I hopped on a plane and flew to Chicago for the weekend to meet up with some old grad school friends. E is one of my closest friends in the world and my former roommate in Germany and Ranger would probably die if he were to stop talking at any given moment, but we love him nonetheless.

Chicago Waterfront

As both E and I didn’t get to Jimmy’s place until after 11pm, there wasn’t much time before we had to go out. We each ate 2 pieces of arguably one of Chicago’s best deep dish pizza joints (it was very good). This actually proved to be a bad move as those 2 slices of pizza thoroughly filled us up. We went to a near Jimmy’s place briefly before deciding to head over to Bucktown. Cool place, talked with some of the people, and by the time we were about to leave, the place was packed to the gills. We got home around 4am as some bars in Chicago close at 4am. Read the rest of this entry »