If You French Fry When You Should Pizza.....

You're gonna have a bad time - Tad McKowski. "Stan Darsh"

Joe and I set out on our first skiing expedition on Wednesday. Now I use the term skiing expedition lightly as it is a couple hills built on a landfill in the middle of the city.....but whatever, skiing is fun regardless. I wake up to see that it is snowing outside, which is pretty awesome....powder, here I come. This means that I can cut even harder than normal, as I have no doubt that I will hope right back into the saddle even though I haven't been skiing since I have been able to legally drink alcohol....sadly, that is a very long time

I wake up and put on every piece of clothing I brought to Stockholm. I have so many clothes on that I think I lose about 8 pounds on the metro on the way to the ski hill. We get up the counter to get our ski rentals and the lady asks Joe what size boot he needs. He responds "48" she double takes....umm, let me see if I have that. We don't normally get giants here. She thens asks him how tall he is, to which he responds 190 cm. She then asks me the same two questions. In any situation, my 170 cm is not exactly impressive, but after the 190, I believe she thinks I am a midget. "Let me head to the kid's section and see what I can find."

We get to the bottom of the hill and realized that instead of a chair lift, they have a T-bar lift. Neither Joe nor myself have ever used one of these. However, we see a bunch of 7 year olds successfully navigating it, how hard can it be. We get to the front of the line, and Joe hops up to the plate. Of course there is a cute girl working the lift, making it that much more nerveracking. He is on a snowboard, so he has it pointing out front with one foot in boot and the other out. The girl asks if he needs help, but of course we are big boys and can do it ourselves. Joe misses the first two that come at him as the young kids behind us let out collective groans. I am not a mind reader, but I believe they are thinking "who are these old clowns that can't figure out how to get up the mountain?" Finally, Joe catches the third one that comes by. Sweet, now it is my turn. As I am about to grab the first bar that swings by, I hear three noises. A clunk to the ground, an english obscenity, and the laughter of kids behind me. I look up and Joe has fallen off his T-bar and is now rolling down the mountain. It was truly one of the great sites I have seen in Stockholm. I go ahead and grab my T-bar and head up the mountain as I pretend to not know him.

I manage to hop pretty quickly into my skiing routine. Making cuts, hitting jumps.....pretty awesome. I do quickly remember that skiing is quite a workout on the legs. After our first run down, we collect to hop back in line for the T-bars. Never have I been more nervous for something so simple. The girl sees us coming this time and walks up to help us the way that she does when the toddlers come up. Joe, has another train wreck, but not quite as spectacular this time. It takes him about 4 attempts to finally grab a T-bar, but no rolling down the mountain. After a couple runs, we get the hang of it all. We are comfortable enough that when the girl offers to help Joe, he says "I got the hang of it now." Sure enough.....fall number two, rolling down the mountain again. Amazing...

After 3 hours of skiing, we hit up Max on the home. I certainly wore way to many clothes as it really wasn't very cold. Next time I will remember to not wear quite so much. We have our 2nd to last Swedish class, so we gotta hurry back. We have pharmaceutical phrases to learn, and I gotta soak up my last couple hours with Frida the amazing Swedish teacher.