2008
MAY 24, 2008 MHSSC UPDATE
Hi kiddies, This is the 30th anniversary of MHSSC's
existence! 3 decades of Mike & Lynne.
Who does anything for 30 years in a row?
Camp starts
tomorrow. I haven't been at the lodge in the last week and
a half, but Elliot Halverson tells me
there's still snow at the lodge despite a recent heat wave.
If the weather
forecast is accurate, we are in for rain showers all week
for session 1: http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/forecast/MapClick.php?site=pqr&smap=1&textField1=45.27843&textField2=-121.71256
We could be on "stand-by" a few times........I'm packing my
umbrella. Right now, as I write this, an impressive
lightning storm is rumbling thru Portland. As most of you
know, we lose MHSSC hall-of-famer Tim Feeney this summer. He moved east, got a government job, and got
his knee fixed. He tells me his ACL rehab is going well and
he's been cleared to start jogging. He sent me a recent
photo and Feeney's looking skinny! He says not going to
Charlies is having an impact on his health too. Rogan
Connell and Eric Baldwin called me
from the new Boston Garden a few days ago, as they were at
game 1 of the NBA Eastern Conference Finals. For those of
you in the Portland area, come join me for the Starlight
Parade run (5k) next Saturday night:http://www.starlightrun.com/ John
Rust and wife Lisa might do it too, pushing their
daughter in a stroller. John tells me that Lisa is training
for a half marathon in Hood River, come July. Here's my
youtube video pick of the week. You might have seen this
already, as it got some national exposure in recent weeks.
You might even cry when you see this one. (you've been
warned) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jocw-oD2pgo
And I'm not
officially endorsing this product, but so far it's working
pretty good for me: http://www.magicjack.com You plug this
magicjack "thing" into the USB port of your computer, then
plug a phone into the magic jack and then you can make local
and long distance calls for the cheap ($20 per
year).........So far it has worked pretty good for me. The
sound quality is not perfect, and it did hang up in mid
conversation a couple of times, but the price is dirt
cheap. They give you a real phone number, voice mail,
caller-ID at no extra charge. Go check it out if you are
interested in saving some money on phone calls. You need
to have high speed internet on your computer. OK, commercial
over. Last time I endorsed something (ING Direct), I got
beat down! So this is an unofficial product endorsement......... ;-) Enjoy the 3-day
weekend.........
Session 1, 2008 update
Hi people of mhssc! Since switching my
internet provider from verizon to qwest, I have hit a
roadblock when it comes to sending out mass emails.
Qwest has limits on the number of emails I can send out in a
given 24 hour period. So starting soon, I'm going to
start using Mike's new MHSSC newsletter account to send camp
updates to you guys. And as you can see, I'll start
posting all the updates on this "secret" webpage.
Shhhhhh! It's a secret. Here's what happened during session 1: Bill Whalley made a surprise visit to camp on day 1
to help train Elliot Halverson on afternoon activity
"stuff". Bill is going to continue his role as surf
camp coach, but other than that, he's done working at camp
for this summer. Also doing short duty was Terry
McLeod. Terry coached session 1, now he's back at
camp mivoden (www.mivoden.com) in Idaho for the summer. A thunder/lightning storm showed up mid-morning on Monday,
so they kicked us off the hill. And on Wednesday, we
had light rain pretty much all day long. Other than
that, it was a good week, weather wise. I heard
rafting was freezing cold. The kids rented those
partial wetsuits to stay warm, but the water was 50 degrees Mark Stegall was saying. The ski and snowboard
racers and Darren's mogulers trained on the magic
mile all week, while the snowboard freeriders and freeskiers
used our terrain park on lower palmer as well as the public
parks. Stormin Norman chairlift was in operation for 2
or 3 days last week. I think they'll only run that
lift when Palmer is closed or on stand-by. Rust/Terry took the kids to
"horsetail something"? for monday rockclimbing.......it's
somewhere east of The Dalles? Anyway, there was a real
live rattlesnake just a few feet off the trail, so all the
kids had to walk by it. There's still some snow at camp, but mostly
in the shaded areas only. On Sunday, arrival day, one
camper kid set up a rail by the skateboard half pipe and hit
it a few times (see pic). In Govy,
there's still tons of snow........About 6-8 feet left where
we usually park out cars out back of Parham cabin.
Palmer has a good snowpack this year, but it's not record
breaking by any means. John Rust got his car stuck in the
snow on Thursday when he tried to drive thru a snow burm on
the way to rockclimbing at Bueleau (sp?). Picnic day was pretty wet, but the kids
didn't seem to mind too much. Mike delayed the
trip to wildwood for an hour so the kids didn't have to be
in the wet for an extended time.
I posted some new staff profile pics and
bios here: http://www.mthood.com/staff.htm Stu Halverson has a funny new pic. If you still work at mhssc and
your bio needs tweaking, let me know. AJ Crocker is back at mhssc coaching
the snowboard racers. (Jon Winslow had major shoulder
surgery and is rehabbing all summer) Joe Sulpizio (nickname "chad") was the only counselor on duty last week. Chris Devens is a new k-staffer. He was a
camper-staff in 2000. Mark (son of Mike) Syrovatka has been helping around at camp too.
He's been working in deep mud and water for the majority of
session 1, looking for the infamous leak in the water
pipe......fun stuff. (see pic) Bill Toney is
back working in the Kitchen too. He might be doing
some firefighting training later this summer.
Our favorite adult camper, Grant Wilson, is
back for another 11 or so weeks of ski race training.
ok, that's all. I can't write about
everybody on staff.........can I? jeez! p.s. A few more pics and stuff about camp can be seen here: http://www.mthood.com/session_blogs.htm
Session 2, 2008 update
We seemed to be locked into a wet and cold weather pattern
up here in the pacific northwest. We got rained out on
Tuesday. Kids ended up going either caving with Joe
Sulpizio or indoor rockclimbing with AJ Crocker and Co. I heard the rockclimbing place was going to deny our
campers from their facility because of the lack of signed
waivers from their parents, but newbie CIT Lauren Manix begged and pleaded with them until they caved in.
The picnic was at the Hood River marina. They played football. The soccer ball and frisbee ended up in the water.........soccer ball was recovered, the frisbee, not so lucky. For the 4th time in camp history, we trained on the Pucci chairlift due to crap weather up above. Wednesday and Friday were our two Pucci days. It was actually kinda crowded for hill space with 4-5 groups trying to share limited space on the mighty Pucci. Rafting was cancelled (cold and rain) and replaced with bowling in Hood River. Joe Sulpizio bowled a 90.
On Friday, some of the staff and campers skied to Govy at the end of the day. (yes, still enough snow to do that!). Mark Stegall and Co. set up a couple of rails for the freeskiers and mogulers. It was pretty much an all-out blizzard yesterday. Dan Meece and Nolan Willard were on the chairlift talking about doing a backflip off of a particular jump on Pucci on Friday...........Nolan, fresh off shoulder surgery, decided against it and told Dan "don't do it, otherwise you'll mess your shoulder".........Dan decided to go for it anyway.........I heard he landed it, but the force of the landing caused his shoulder to pop out........Nolan called it! And Nolan helped Dan put his shoulder back in place. (ouch!) One 13 year old kid rented snowboard boots from Timberline all week. On Friday when he had to turn in his rented boots, he forgot to bring his shoes, so he walked shoeless from the rental shop, into the snow covered parking lot to get on the van. One girl camper ate crap on the trampoline and needed several stitches above her eye.
Session 3, 2008 update
Strange week!
The crazy weather continued. 11 inches of snow fell
overnight Monday. The roads were insane slick,
especially since nobody has their snowtires on their cars
this time of year. As you can see in the photo, there
were 4-5 cars (mine included) stuck in the middle of the
road on that last stretch before you get to T-line lodge. Joe Sulpizio and Dan Rogan helped push my car
to get going again. At the end of a great powder day
on Pucci, I was the first staff member to drive down
from the mountain, and so I was the lucky person to get
pulled over by the Oregon State police officer for not
having traction devices on my car (chains were required at
the time). I used my Jedi mind tricks on him (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnjaUoR15dU)
, so he only gave me a warning (see pic)........but he also
told me to warn the rest of the camp that anyone driving
down Timberline road without chains, would get a $144
ticket. This is not a good thing, when we had
60+ kids up there, plus camp vehicles with no chains in the
t-line parking lot and no sign of a sanding truck anytime
soon. The solution? Ski to Govy and then shuttle
kids home from there! Mark Stegall and
Co. lead the campers down the alpine trail that ends up at
the base of Summit ski area by the rest area. For you
old school mhssc staffers that worked in the early 90's, you
should remember Summit ski area lodge. Anyway, it all
worked out and nobody got a $144 ticket from the cop dude.
I wasn't so lucky on Wednesday when a skunk sprayed me up at
the mountain. Yeah, a real live skunk has been making
the Wy'East day lodge its 2nd home. I didn't realize I
got sprayed until I was helping the race coaches set course,
and I could still smell the skunk........on my clothes!
ugh........(see photo of skunk hiding behind some bamboo)
Nobody wanted to ride the chairlift with me the rest of the
day. I was shunned!
OK, enough about ME. Here's what else happened. The injury bug took it's toll on the freeski coaching staff this week. Kevin Malone went down with some kind of thigh upper leg injury while playing soccer on Monday afternoon with his group in Parkdale. And Nolan Willard messed up his foot in a freak accident......he was walking up the hill when all of a sudden he felt incredible pain in his foot. Not sure of the extent of his injury.
One of the camp busses died on the way to rafting. Mike fired up another bus and went for the rescue. Rockclimbing at smith rocks was an option on Monday afternoon (short day on the hill due to mist/rain). Counselor Joe told me he took the wrong path when leading the climbers to try and find John Rust. He said they walked 2-3 miles in the wrong direction and at one point, they accidentally dropped one of the climbing gear bags and it rolled down the hill and had to go get it.......I think Joe posted some smith rock photos on his facebook page.
Coaches AJ Crocker and Alexandra Andrews wore dresses to camp dinner on Thursday. They looked nice. I propose that Thursday night of each session is "dress up nice" evening. What do you think? I'll send photos if anybody dresses up.
For you Nick
Colavito fans, I just spoke with him. He and
his wife and kids are living in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Nick runs some kind of charter boat business, where he takes
clients fishing for Tuna, Marlin, etc. He says he misses
everyone at mhssc. Also randomly ran into former mhssc
snowboard coach Mike Langdon in Govy a couple days
ago. He says he misses the "Emily
Questions" in the weekly update. So with
that being said, here are a few Emily questions to ponder:
1. If you were to die this evening with no opportunity
to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not
having told someone? Why haven't you told them?
2. Do you think that the world will be a better or worse
place 100 years from now?
3. If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain
either the body or the mind of a 30-year-old for the last 60
years of your life, which would you want?
4. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one
ability or quality, what would it be?
5. If the person you were engaged to marry had an accident
and became a paraplegic, would you go through with the
marriage or back out of it?
pics of the
week: and
more pics here.
Session 4, 2008 update
Frickin COLD on the mountain all week, except on Friday.
Camp is big now, with 130 kids. These next 4 sessions
are also big, then it gradually shrinks after that. A
boarder-cross course was added to the terrain park.
During rafting this week, counselor Chad Kossar blew
up one of the rafts with his mouth. X-Games
super-star Tanner Hall has been cruising thru
Darren's mogul jump and the mhssc terrain park the last week
or so. And somebody said they saw Olympic silver
medalist Lindsey Jacobelis up there too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIEgoYNeFLs& Scotty Veenis and Co. Bbq'd up some dogs at the top of
Lane 5 on Friday. And for the first time in camp
history, some kid was skiing down the GS course while I was
video-taping him, he pulls out of the course and gives me a
hug before proceeding down the rest of the course.
Pretty random! One time, about 12 years ago, a kid we
nick-named "Jo-Jo", did a similar thing, but he stopped
mid-course, clicked out of his skis and did his little "jo-jo
dance" for the camera. Carter Casner stubbed
his toe (see pic) during picnic hoops. He was playing
in flip-flops. Luke Wendel threw a frisbee golf disc
the entire length of wildwood park......very impressive.
Counselor Joe Sulpizio made several attempts at the
mogul lane on Friday......he has some skill, but I imagine
he'll stick with ski racing. Photo man Brian
Robb camped out in his tent on the camp soccer field for
a night, to help save on gas money going home to Hood River.
Session 5, 2008 update
Summer weather finally arrived here in the Pacific
Northwest. 100 degrees in Portland yesterday.
HUGE lift lines on Friday as everybody and their dog was
there skiing/snowboarding on two chairlifts. Andrej
Jerman beat Scotty Veenis in a game of one on one
picnic hoops, 12 to 10. Speaking of Andrej, I got a
video order from a kid on Friday that requested Andrej's
autograph and he gladly obliged. In picnic softball,
Boston RedSox fans beat "the world". Carter Casner did a little calculating and he figured
that between all the ski and snowboard camps, between 18,000
and 28,000 pounds of salt was spread on the hill on Friday.
Former mhssc coach, Tommy Eckfeldt, is now coaching
the US ski team. Way to go Tommy! The terrain
park now has a snowmobile to help with setting up and
salting. Mark is stoked! Former mhssc
mogul coach, Jon O'Brien was on the hill this week.
He was coaching his Wasaatch (sp?) freestyle team.
Counselor Colleen Pruss turns 21 on Monday (June 30).
Party at Charlies! She is also coaching this week, so
it's still a "school night" for her (no puking!) It's
time to vote for MHSSC employee of the month for June 2008.
If you worked at camp this past month, and have already gone
home, you can email me your vote. Otherwise, I'll get it from you this
week at camp. (Ineligible to receive votes are Mike,
Lynne, John Rust, Robin).......that's all I have for this
week. More stuff happened, but last week was a blur
and my mind is blank. Some pics to enjoy:
Camp maintenance dude, Robert Johnson, made us a camp logo sign for the top of Lanes 5-6. Robert is quite the artist. Check out some of his other stuff here. That's new coach Willy Johnson in the logo sign photo (not Robert, the actual artist).
Session 6, 2008 update
I had help writing this week's staff update from kitchen
staffer Michelle Schmitt. Part l is my stuff,
and part II is the Michelle stuff: If YOU want
to contribute to the weekly staff update, let me know.
I could use the help. Michelle wrote some entertaining
stuff.
Part l: Counselor/coach Colleen Pruss celebrated her 21st birthday at Charlies. Below are a small sampling of photos that were taken that night. As you can see in the Charlies group photo, attendance was plentiful. We had two more staff birthday's this week: I turned 43 on picnic day and CIT Ben Carroll turned 18 on the 4th of July. During my birthday bash at Charlies, the power went out in all of Govy. It was pitch dark with no emergency lights in the bar. Somebody yelled out "happy birthday". The power came back on about 48 seconds later. Also turning 21 a week or so ago was counselor Evan Mikkelson......I think he turned 21 a day or two before he arrived at camp. Evan ran two marathons in recent months, best time was 3 hours, 9 minutes (crazy fast) There was an impressive lightning storm on the mountain on Tuesday morning, delaying the chairlifts for an hour or so. Thick fog and some more lightning on Friday, shut us down for the day. The coaches made it up both chairlifts, then we stood at the top of lane 5 for 34 minutes before Timberline decided to close Palmer. Kids then had the options of Oaks Park amusement park in Portland, Smith Rocks rockclimbing and a few other options. MHSSC Employee of the month for June 2008 was a tie. In fact 2 votes separated 9 different people for top honors. So, with that being said, the EOM winners are counselor Chad Kossar and snowboard coach Mark Stegall. CONGRATS!! 3rd place was a tie between Luke Wendel and Alexandra Andrews. And 2 votes out of 1st were the following staffers: Elliot Halverson, Michelle Schmitt, Willy Johnson, Stu Halverson, and Bill Toney. Also receiving votes: Kevin Malone, Jason Hey, Scotty Veenis, Dan Meece, Scott Kern, Sean Decker, Nate Reuter, Ian the digger, Ryan Anderson, Andy Shephard, Bill Whalley (surf camp) and Liz Edmunds. The 2nd to last photo for the week was of the race coaches at the top of lane 5 on friday's fog day......can you name the coach in the background making yellow snow?
Robin's youtube
video pick of the week, contributed by former staffer Steve Heuer:
http://youtube.com:80/watch?v=Qc91beIBRPg
As of 2:17pm on July 6, it has only 57 views.......I'm
curious to see how many hits it has after MHSSC staff
newsletter people watch it. Speaking of former
staffers, Maria Schilling recently ran a marathon,
and Emily Longfield got a new job with big time
advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy. Her job title is
"creative assistant".
BREAKING NEWS:
John Rust and wife Lisa are expecting baby #2! Lisa is
3 months pregnant! CONGRATS!!
Michelle Schmitt's staff update: Colleen's 21st on Monday, everyone was hung over, except Alex, because she's not 21. Robin turned 43 years old. It was super hot on Monday. Nolan started skiing again. The new (to us) snowmobile had its first day in the park on Wednesday. It was glorious. Tom and Adrien and Matt got their CDL. Chad popped a raft on Tuesday rafting while entering oak springs. Friday fog day. Couldn't see the chair in front of you. Activities were mixed up. Cliff jumping turned into chilling at Timothy Lake and challenge course included a wild game of lap tag and miniature tanks. Neil found $200 in $20's on the ground, it belonged to a camper. Robin made up a story about killer bee attack. Bill Toney left for the summer on friday. Camper Juan got hit with a rock and got stitches. This session was huge and stratton was here! Camper-staff Joaquin spilled bacon grease all over the entire dish area-it made a huge mess. Luke got a hole in one playing disc golf at timber park-hole 14. 4th of July, Rick gave Michelle a big 4th of July hug. Friday was CIT Ben's birthday. Palmer Lodge smells funky. AJ told the Tichy guy he was an arrogant %$&#. (censored) Camper Brandon Heller wore a hot dog suit on friday after they came down from the mountain. Supposedly his brother has a banana suit.
Session 7, 2008 update
Again Michelle Schmitt helped write the staff
newsletter. Her version of what happened last week can
be seen below my stuff.
Somebody stole Mike Syrovatka's skis on Tuesday morning. He had them stashed by some tree near the bottom of the magic mile. I watched two lost snowboard girls wander across several race lanes, lost in the midst of never ending slalom and GS courses in lanes 1 thru 6, when one of them finally stopped and yelled "where the Fuck am i?". Then without hesitation, she proceeded to ride thru our GS course. Darren Owen told me that John Rust did a front flip on the trampoline........and that he might try a back-flip later on this summer. The bus wouldn't start back up in the middle of Scott Kern's CDL test. dead battery! Some random lady helped jump start the bus and luckily the DMV people let Scott finish his CDL test (which he passed) despite the situation. There is a camper-boy here for 4 weeks who spends the majority of each meal time, bussing tables. He's not a camper-staff. He just goes around taking plates/glasses from campers and staff and delivers them to the bus trays. *Reminder that the session 8 picnic will be on Thursday, NOT Wednesday. Another long lost MHSSC coach made a return to camp after about a 20 year hiatus. He might be the tallest mhssc employee in camp history at about 6 foot 6 inches........Ray Dicius coached at camp in the mid-80's. Ray was here coaching his step-son, Mark. Also making an appearance last week was Matt Brown. Matt tends to show up on Palmer about every 2 or 3 years. Carter Casner grew a porno mustache (see photo). The ski race coaches made a rare appearance in the terrain park on Friday, setting up shop on the quarter-pipe for cold hot-dogs and some excellent big-air entertainment, including some big air hits by famous dude Tanner Hall. That's Steph Peters standing on John Rust's shoulders in some of the photos below. And additional photos can be seen on the session blogs page. Last week's youtube pick of the week went from 57 views to 248 views in one week's time. And the mystery yellow-snow dude from last week's photo on the fog day was Leo Menard. Ever wanted to know how to salt the mountain or do dishes at camp? go here. Tom Lowney suggested that we should produce a CIT training video.
MICHELLE
SCHMITT staff update:
Mermaid update!! She is still on land! Needs to swim!
She was super pissed for the first time ever. Tanner
Hall visited our park. All the homies sesshed with
hitman at the mountain on friday. Andy the actor decided to
leave 3 weeks early. Everyone is sad and will miss
him, even though he was just acting when he told us this.
Maks wore sandals for the first time ever in public.
Nate and Alice came back from their vacations. There
was a camper, Jay, who randomly cleaned all week. He
did more work then some of the camper-staff. A camper
got his braces stuck on his lip. There was blood
everywhere. Someone vandalized the rental van.
The windshield was broken out and the tires were slashed.
Scott passed his CDL. Counselors Joe and Brian left
for the summer. Neil claimed the soda was extra good
this week. Evan and Chad skied off the summit on Friday.
Mark rolled the new (old) snowmobile on Thursday. It
was gloriously hilarious. Mark bailed!! Robin puked
during his picnic run because a bug flew into the back of
his throat. Dual GS on Friday. Carter had a
porno stache.
Ray Dicius
Session 8, 2008 update
8 weeks down, 6 to go. AJ Crocker lead the mountain bikers on Tuesday.
She said one of the girls in the group was walking her bike on the trail when she fell over and bruised her
calf. John Rust brought cherries on the hill
from his orchard. Speaking of cherry orchards, one of
the afternoon activities on Friday was taking a group to
Mike and Lynne's house to pick cherries. Jay,
the camper that picks up dishes and cups during meal times,
would not accept a $1 tip. He's here for 2 more
weeks. Rainer Hertrich, a local guy from Hood
River, has skied over 1700 days in a row now........I
couldn't find a recent article, but you can read up about
his record feat here: http://www.lubbockonline.com/stories/081906/nat_081906046.shtml
A camper girl snowboarded into the rocks this week to avoid a collision with a skier. Scary moment! She came away with a scraped up elbow and broken ribs. She was sent home early, but plans on coming back in a couple weeks when she heals up. She said her helmet saved her from a much worse scenario. As you can see in the photos, Darren Owen ate some salt. It was funny, although he said it upset his stomach. Also in the photos below, you'll see video dude Dan Meece's car stuck on a big rock out back of Parham (govy cabin). He started up his car, put it in neutral, set the parking brake, then went back inside the house to get something. I happened to be looking out my window when I saw his car start rolling down the hill. If that last big rock wasn't there to stop it, it might have kept rolling into the blue roof house. Mike Annett helped Dan tow his car out of there with his truck. Also, you'll see a photo of Mark Stegall holding up an airline magazine that has a photo of him snowboarding on mt hood. (Brian Robb photo) Some of the counselors couldn't get the bus to start up after several attempts......then an 11 year old camper yells out "is the bus in neutral?".........as you can guess, the bus started right up after listening to the 11 year old. Kelsey Baron and Lloyd Carney passed their CDL drive tests. Kelsey, Tom Lowney and myself, saw a snake on the wetlands boardwalk during the picnic run. Kelsey doesn't like snakes. The MHSSC facebook staff group is up to 131 members. Why haven't you joined? http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2261481583 If you have some good camp photos, upload them to the facebook group! Evan Mikkelson and Kelsey Baron started up a mhssc recycling program. They have recycle bins in the dining room and basement of the main lodge.
I think Michelle Schmitt was too tired to add her version to this week's staff newsletter update, so that's all I have for this week.........game over.
Session 9, 2008 update
Still skiing to the parking
lot as you can see in the photo below. Jason Hey longboarded all the way from Govy to the lodge. There
was lots of theft this week with people losing I-pods, cash
and other assorted items. Ted Ligety ripped up Darren's mogul lane and then hit the tabletop jump,
doing a crazy 360 with his backpack on. He landed in
the backseat and everybody thought he crashed......but he
rode his tails and kept going like it was nothing. I have it
on video.....maybe I'll youtube it. Coaching
quote of the week came from Joe Reis. Joe tells
his group of 8 kids: "If you don't pole plant for 3
turns in a row, you have to buy me a double latte". Michelle Schmitt and Arielle Richard want to
build and live in a treehouse somewhere out back of the Coho
lodge for summer 2009. Thomas Lowney celebrated
his 20th birthday this week. Roger Bay bbq'd up some
water-buffalo burgers at Parham on Tuesday night. (see pic)
There was a random deer seen walking above the upper Palmer
snowfield on Monday. It looked lost. Dan
Meece did a 1080 in the terrain park. Kitchen
staffer Elle Noordzy, took a wicked crash in a slalom
course and tore her MCL. You can see a photo of her in
the start gate, just a few minutes before she ended up in
the ski patrol toboggan on the very next run. Chad
Kossar and Darren Owen did their gross eyelid
pose for the camera on friday. It's almost the end of
July, so start thinking about who you want to vote for,
for MHSSC employee of the month for July 2008. See
Robin to vote. If you already went home but you worked
in the month of July, please email me your vote.
The upcoming Session 10 is declared "nice camp" (4th annual.....originally invented by Terry McLeod). Everybody is encouraged to be more nice to each other this week. In honor of nice camp, here is my youtube video pick of the week: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4 (I've sent this out before, but thought it was appropriate to use again)
Session 10, 2008 update
We made it all the way thru
the month of July with snow coverage all the way to the
parking lot in the mile canyon. But as you can see in
the photo, that is about to change. Still though, the
walk to the parking lot will be minimal the rest of the
summer. There's still a crapload of snow on the
mountain with only 4 weeks of camp left.
Session 10 was "nice camp". The staff was nicer I think, but the weather was not so nice. It was mostly cold all week........Tuesday was windy & cold with some intermittent rain showers. And then Friday, we went from "stand-by" to "lifts closed" when some rain and thick fog took over the area. Chad Kossar beat Kelsey Baron 21-18 in ping pong. Some random red-neck dudes in a red truck shot Wink Maslow with a b-b gun as he walked into Parham (govy cabin). Robin beat Maks Gorman in a game of H-O-R-S-E for $1. Michelle Schmitt ate shit while cliff jumping. Colleen Pruss passed her CDL test with a score of 96%. Mark Stegall coached the snowboard racers this week as AJ Crocker took the week away from the hill to attend this year's smith rocks rockclimbing camp. Quote of the week. Chad skied the GS course on Wednesday and then said "Who set that course? That was the best GS course I've ever skied at Mt Hood Summer Ski Camps"........course was set by Scotty Veenis. Scotty then suggested that he put on a course setting clinic for the other coaches (he was joking). An anonymous staff member at the staff table suggested that a high percentage of sunscreens on the market can possibly do more harm than good. We added a new long distance staff member this session. His name is Pietro and he's from Italy. He's a 3rd year medical student and he's here helping out the race coaches for 3 sessions.
Smith Rocks update from Evan
Mikkelson:
smith was awesome. the climbing camp went really well. all
the campers learned a huge amount and had fun. the group
ended up getting along really well too. on thursday we set
up a tyrolian traverse into the mouth of 'the monkey', a
several hundred foot free standing pillar. the kids clipped
into a rope and pulled themselves across from a rock on the
land side into to the mouth, a little cave in the pillar,
then climbed out of the mouth to the top, and did a 200'
rappell to the ground. we only had one mishap, when camper
Shelby caught her hair in her belay device halfway down. I
had to lower another camper down to her with a knife, and he
ended up cutting 4 inches of her hair off in order to free
the belay device. she was bummed but she learned her
lesson, and all the other campers learned from her lesson
too. I'll send you a pic or two when I upload them,
Evan
MHSSC Employee of the month for July is "Rasta" Nate Goodman. CONGRATS NATE!!
'Scott Kern was 2nd place in the voting, followed by Liz Edmunds, picking up the bronze medal. 4th
place was a tie between Rick Millett, Alice Winter,
and Michelle Schmitt. Also receiving votes were Sean Decker, Darren Owen, Elliot Halverson, Roger Bay,
Lloyd Carney, Kevin Malone, Chad Kossar, Scotty Veenis,
Raleigh Butler, Mark Stegall, AJ Crocker, Evan Mikkelson, and Jason Hey.
A few anonymous email comments from mhssc employee of
the month voters:
I vote for Chad for employee of the month. I was constantly
impressed with the way he took the initiative and did things
without being asked. He was a real leader among counselor
staff.
i will
vote for SCOTT KERN. he never sat for more than a second
because he was always doing things. he should win. yay!
I'll vote
for Chad (counselor). He seems to work his butt off, is
pretty level headed and does the right things.
Rasta
Nate killed it in the park.
A few people have voiced their opinion that the MHSSC employee of the month award is flawed. The main "argument" is that not everybody can witness what all the other employees are doing during camp. Which is totally true. For example, how can a terrain park "digger" see what kind of work ethic one of the ski race coaches has? Anyway, it's not a perfect system, but everybody that receives at least one vote, will be recognized in this staff newsletter. And I can tell you from past years that the mhssc employee of the month winners have gone to just about every category of worker at MHSSC: race coaches, mogul/freeski coaches, snowboard coaches, kitchen staffers, counselors, videographers, and office staffers. (and now a winner from digger staff) One person, one vote. It's how we do things in the USA. If you don't like it, "vote for pedro"......."That's all I have to say about that" (Forrest Gump)
Robin's youtube video pick of
the week:
1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckscMng3L4w
**the fine print: Sorry for the lack of exciting
photos this session. I wasn't in the right places at
the right times for decent photos this week, so I had to go
with Chad eating a giant hamburger, a colorful bus in the
t-line parking lot, and Nolan sitting by a
tree at the picnic to fill up the page. If anyone
wants to contribute camp photos to this silly little
newsletter in the future, please forward them to me!
Session 11, 2008 update
Where do I begin? Do
you want the good news or the bad news first? Let's
start with the bad news. Watch this August 5, Portland channel 6 news story.
Now that you watched part 1, here's the follow up channel 6 news story that aired on August 8.
And just for fun, here's channel 8 news story version of what went down.
ok, we were in the Oregonian newspaper too.......part 1..........and part 2
So yeah, it was an anxiety
filled week. We didn't know if camp was going to be
shut down with 3 sessions to go.......would we still have
jobs come session 12 and beyond? And what would happen
to all the incoming campers who have non-refundable plane
tickets? Drama! The good news is
that camp goes on. I know I'm short on details, but I can
tell you that there was some staffers that really stepped up
big time this past week to help with "operation save camp".
Clackamas County officials closed the trampolines, skateboard ramps, and challenge course. Rafting and cliff jumping are also suspended until further review. |
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The "war room" where Mike and Co. chat with a lawyer on the phone. |
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First aid/CPR qualified personnel at camp was one of the issues with the county, so a class was quickly organized on the soccer field. About half the staff (including Mike Annett) was able to attend the 4-hour class and get certified. |
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Mike met with the county inspectors and the local media on Friday afternoon.....It was either "pass" or camp gets shut down in less than 36 hours. We passed....Camp continues as scheduled. Three more sessions to go. |
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Other stuff happened at camp this week, but it's all a blur. Lift lines were huge, which is rare for August. Last day you could ski all the way to the parking lot was August 6. I wonder if that's the latest we been able to do that? Enjoy the Olympics! I look forward to men's basketball and track and field. What's your favorite olympic sport? Former staffer, Spencer Raymond is in Beijing working with ESPN for the Olympic games. Spencer's olympic blog page: http://www.dispence.org/
Coaching opportunity Tory
Amorello wanted me to pass on:
Can you put a note in your next camp update that if anyone
is interested in a coaching opportunity in Colorado, please
let me know. It would be coaching at a small, independent
school with a combination high school/USSA/FIS program. The
salary includes food and housing, and there is potential for
working in the outdoor program, in the classroom and in the
dorms. Anyone interested should get in touch with me at tory.amorello@gmail.com and I can give more details.
Thanks!
Tory
Session 12, 2008 update
Last session (11) was full
of drama, but this week felt pretty much back to normal.
White water rafting was back up and running. The only
difference is that Clackamas County requires that we use the
Deschutes U-Boat employees as our boat guides. John
Rust road his bike to work on Monday morning.......he
road from Govy to Timberline Lodge. That's one
less car on the road, so the smog factor was reduced by a
factor of _____? Global warming is saved!
ok, I'm not a comedian. Long lost 80's mhssc employee Lynn Gibson has been located. She has two kids
and is a nurse in the Portland area. If you want her
email address, let me know. I'm sure she'd love to
hear from some of you other 80's people. Also Ara
Papazian (from the mhssc 80's) has been on the snowfield
in recent days, training with the Tichy and Fuxi camps (booooo!)
Ok, Fuxi gave me free sunglasses and tropical lip stuff, so
I retract my "booooo". And Terry McLeod came
for a 2 day visit last week. He brought his twin tips
and did some laps in the terrain park. Terry can spin baby!! (stock footage). Some Colorado ski
camp set a slalom course on Darren's mogul lane on
Friday morning by mistake. John Rust just left
for Japan for a week with his wife Lisa to visit family
members. He'll be back in time for adult camp. Craig Bowden and Tommy Eckfeldt were on the
mountain this week coaching with Rowmark. The mhssc
staff is getting really small. But so is the number of
campers. I think we have about 50-55 kids this coming
session, then 30-35 adults for the final week. I
just ran the Mt Hood Jazz 5k run this morning in Gresham,
finishing in 3rd place in my age group and they even gave me
a 3rd place medal (ok, there were only 4 people in my age
group).........Jason Hey had the photo of the week
(see below). I think it's facebook worthy. And I
added a couple more media links to the session 11 update if
you want to scroll down and check those out. Mike was
on two portland TV stations. 2 weeks of camp
left.........rain and thunderstorms are in the forecast for session
13..........bring it on! We can take it.
Thursday (August 14) was the 6 year anniversary of Kees Nederhand's accident on the mountain. His memorial is still up there at lift tower 8.
Session 13, 2008 update
Mother nature was not kind
to us this week. Monday: lightning storm, lifts
closed. Bowling and surfing were the days activities. Tuesday: partly sunny. Wednesday: big
time rain, lifts closed. Picnic at Wildwood park was
cancelled (see photo of deserted wildwood park), so Michelle and Stu cooked up burgers at the camp
lodge. Thursday: wind, fog, rain, lifts closed,
but we rented 2 snowcats for 2-3 hours of training on the magic mile
canyon. Friday: the sun returned!
Darren Owen found a dead mouse at the top of lane 6. Last weekend, Scotty Veenis, Eva Gonzales, and Jay-Hey went to the Tom Petty concert in the Gorge Amphitheater (see the sunset photo below). Dan Meece went to the Jack Johnson concert on Wednesday night. John Rust and Kyle Darling (and their dogs) hiked to the top of Mt Adams last weekend. Their descent was in the dark but they said the moonlight was very bright. Eva got goose-bumps after watching the men's olympic 200m sprint. CIT Sam Campbell is a youtube sensation performing the cyclone. Gregor Druzina was on the mountain this week, coaching his team. Michelle Annett came up to work the camp office for a few days while Mike & Lynne were playing in a tennis tourny in Sunriver, Oregon. Snowboard coach Rick Millett was a camp counselor this week.
John Rust just got back from a week in Japan. In John's words: Amazing trip - hot springs with a 13 course dinner - dinner in downtown tokyo at a restuarant closed to host a party on our behalf with cuisine that is almost impossible to describe - climb of fugi on the really only good weather day of the trip and one day spent at japans biggest theme park with this incredible roller coaster. felt like a true vacation but im sure I will be tired.
Somebody stole AJ Crocker's
car last week. In AJ's words: On thursday night I left my car, full of everything I own
(minus my bikes, computer, and a few snowboards), parked
outside my house in SE. It was locked, I had the keys. In
the morning, I went outside to grab some clothing (ALL my
dirty laundry was in there) and found an empty space where
my car had been. My registration had just expired, so
Ifigured it got towed or something. Unfortunately, that
wasn't the case. The police put the car on some kind of list
and WHAM! they found it 3 days later, parked on SE 22nd and
Washington. **UPDATE: I
saw my car today...they knocked out the back window with a
rock, screwed up underneath the car, and took everything
except my trash from inside the car. JERKS! But it should
all be fixed in a few weeks, and the insurance company is
covering most of it.
Michelle Schmitt gave me
her update for session 13:
One more week to go! Kids dying
their hair unnatural colors seems to be an epidemic around
camp. Rick was a counselor this week. A little camper
got his hand slammed in the door. It was possibly
broken, so Tom took him to the hospital late at night.
Turns out it was just bruised. The weather was
somewhat miserable. Monday and Wednesday were rain
days. Cat skiing on Thursday. Friday was
glorious! Almost no staff left. Mike and Lynne
are gone this weekend at a tennis tournament. Adrien
was a digger the past two weeks. The camp picnic was
cancelled this week due to rain. Instead, we had a
picnic dinner at the lodge. Hood-to-Coast started
Friday, making it almost impossible to drive anywhere
between Timberline and Sandy.
If you worked in the month of August, 2008, and you've already gone home, please vote for MHSSC August employee of the month by clicking here. OK, whenever I request people to vote for mhssc employee of the month via email, only like 3% of the people actually follow thru........so just do it.......it takes 20 seconds. Otherwise the only people that vote for August EOM are the remaining staff who work session 14..........which is like 11 people. VOTE NOW! please?
One more week of camp left........adult camp!
 |
"Move out of your comfort zone. You can only |
Session 14, 2008 update
Game over! 14 weeks is
now in the rear view mirror. Here's what happened
during the last week of camp. It was the annual adults only session. Head digger Nate
Goodman (Rasta Nate) got buck naked in the mhssc terrain
park on his last day and did a big ol' back flip. I
wasn't there, but I heard it was captured on video tape and
a few digital stills. Rick Millett did an
airport pick-up on Sunday, ran out of gas near ski bowl on
the way home........got rescued by Tom Lowney with a
can of gas.........then next day, Tom forgot to fill up this
same van with gas, and he ran out of gas when he was driving
campers around. Jason Hey rejoined the K-staff
for the final session of the summer. Grant
Wilson crashed in a GS course during session 13, and
ended up with a detached retina.......which required
immediate surgery. There was an adult mogul camper
that would sing his way down the mogul field.
We got rained out on Wednesday and so about 2/3 of the adults went on the surf trip to the Oregon coast. The Ecola State park road to the surfing spot was very narrow, and the bus (shorty-40) ended up in the ditch when driver Tom, pulled over on the right side of the road to avoid a car coming the other direction, but there was no room to spare on the shoulder (is that a run-on sentence?). It all happened so fast and it was a little scary. As you can see in the photos below, the bus was on a pretty good angle with tires off the ground on the drivers side. All the adults climbed out of the emergency door in the back. How close was the bus to rolling over? Not sure. Those busses are pretty bottom heavy, so we were probably safe. It took 2 (expensive) tow trucks to get the bus out. We were only about 1/3 mile from the beach, so some of the adults grabbed their surf gear and walked to the beach. Other than the bus thing, I think the adults enjoyed their attempts at surfing.......we got back to Govy at midnight. Long day. Nolan Willard didn't really lick that big slimy green slug (see photo below) although the Ecola State Park ranger dude said it was safe to do and that his tongue would go numb if he did.
We also took the adults to White Salmon River in Washington State for the rafting trip. There was a random adult snowboarder (not a camper) trying to poach slalom courses on upper palmer on the last day.......This guy was a bit of a jerk and Darren eventually told him to "suck balls".
MHSSC Employee of the Month for August went to _____________? I'm going to leave the polls open another few days and will replace this paragraph (on Sept 4) with who won and the runner-ups. So far only 15 people have voted: the 12 people that worked on the last day of camp, plus 3 people that voted via email so far. So if you worked at least one session during the month of August, 2008, please vote now via email. Do it NOW. Polls close when I get back home from a mini-vacation coast trip (sept. 4). Speaking of the coast, I think Eva, Jason, and Darren........and maybe Rick and Mark might come down to the coast too this coming week to do a little surfing and hanging out. Anyone else care to join us? Seaside, Oregon.
As you can see in photo below, there was still a ton of snow left on Palmer for the last week of camp. Enough snow on lower west lane for training, although nobody was setting courses down there. I'd say this year was the in the top-2 snow years in my era on the hill.
So there you have it. If
you have some favorite camp memories from summer 2008, email them to me and I'll post them here in the next
newsletter.
Post Camp 2008 update
Camp ended a week ago, and
here are some stuff that's been going on since then.
A handful of staffers headed to the Oregon coast for surfing and relaxation the week after camp ended. (see photos below). Nolan and Malone are considering become surf bums and purchasing VW vans to support their new sport. If you've never seen the movie "Karate Kid", you probably don't understand the Malone/Darren crane kick photo below.......here's a link to the key scene in that movie. Coach Sean Mailey celebrated his 30th birthday on Charlies on Saturday night. He hired a band.......charlies was rockin'. Malone and Jason Hey were party guests. There was some random lady at Charlies that night that reportedly peed her pants. Rick Millett shaved his facial hair and got a haircut since camp ended. He looked different. Speaking of Rick, a camper just sent me this youtube link.........**correction from the session 14 update: Darren Owen didn't say "suck balls" to the rude snowboard man who was poaching race courses........Darren told the guy to "lick balls". I'm not sure which is worse......suck balls or lick balls.......what do YOU think?
MHSSC
employee of the month for August, 2008 went to Jason Hey! Congrats Jason.
1st runner up (and one vote behind Jason) was Elliot
Halverson. Also receiving votes: Roger
Bay, Kevin Malone, Scotty Veenis, Michelle Schmitt, Luke
Wendel, Liz Edmunds, Thomas Lowney, Evan Mikkelson, and Rick Millett. It should be noted that Thomas
Lowney voted via a facebook chat session....first time
in camp history somebody voted using that method.
Here's an anonymous message about runner-up Elliot: my
vote for employee of the month is elliot. and you can tell
him that if you want or just let him know that someone said
he was AMAZING in the office and thank you so much for
reading all those books and writing all those books worth of
safety information......
Former mhssc video asst. dude Jeff Moore is officially engaged! He's getting married to Natalie next summer. He met Natalie at mhssc a few years ago. Congrats Jeffy!
Former mhssc counselor Shawna Riley is headed to France later this month. In her words: I am leaving for France on Sept 21 to work at two different farms for two months. The first farm is an olive farm in Nice where I'll stay for six weeks. Then I'm off to east of Lyon to work at a research center for sustainable agriculture. Both hosts sound very interesting and will offer two very different experiences. This is a great mesh of three things I've wanted to do for a while: international travel, improve my French, and work on a farm (unbeknownst to most of you).
And an update from former mhssc
mogul coach Will Wasson, who does an annual ski trip
to Chile each year: the snow has
been great here in chile today i was at a truck stop <mc
Donalds standing in line with Herman the herminator from
Austria and Jean luke Brusard the Canadian gold medal mogul
skier joined my group with 2 friends for some snow cat
skiing. In the company of Two gold medal skiers on the
same day (also 2 of my favorite skiers) I go home next week
after 6 weeks of Snofari Expeditions here in Chile. It
has been a good season with lots of snow. my son starts
kindergarden this week and i am ready to go home.
All the best to you and MHSSC
Cheers
Will Wasson
Did anyone lose their cell
phone? This phone was found at Parham when we cleaned
up the place on the last day of camp. It's a verizon
phone, with a built in camera. Will delete this when
phone is claimed.
Early October 2008
update
BREAKING NEWS:
There will be 15 sessions
next summer, instead of the usual 14. OMIGOD, say it
aint so! Another week in ski boots!
Apparently in 2009, there are 15 weeks between Memorial Day
weekend and Labor Day weekend, instead of the usual 14
weeks.
Palmer reopened in
mid-September and I heard the training has been excellent. Mike Syrovatka has been up there coaching son Mark for a number of days. Former mhssc coaches Craig
Bowden and Dave Kerwynn were also on Palmer
coaching a group from Rowmark last week. Craig joined
me at Charlies for 3 tacos for $3
bucks last Monday night. Rain has since
moved into the area for the time being, so I imagine the
lifts might be on standby this weekend. They painted
the bedrooms in the main lodge at camp and installed new
carpet. The rooms look a lot better.
Mike and Lynne are currently in Europe on
vacation. I heard they spent some time with former
mhssc coach, Izidor Jerman in Slovenija.
Random story from former mhssc
counselor Laura Dewey
In Laura's words: Hello Robin, I've
enjoyed all the mhssc updates since I haven't been there for
many many years, always just a friendly reminder of my
pre-20 years. Anyway, just wanted to let you know of a very
funny coincidence which one of your pics reminded me of. I
was driving down Little Cottonwood Canyon Friday Morning
around 9am on my way to a windshield replacement appointment
when I see what I thought was a coyote but as I came closer
it was a beautiful white huskie, he was in the middle of
the road looking lost, i stopped and told him to get in the
truck and he hopped right in, I went to the nearest parking
lot (the whitepine trailhead) and yelled and called the
numbers on the tags, no one answered. If you don't know
dogs are not allowed in LCC, so I maybe thought he had
wondered all the way up there from the valley. His name was
Kade. So I let him hop in the passenger seat and took him
down the canyon into the valley. The whole time he was calm
and hanging out in the truck, then he howled into the sky 3
times, it was so cute. Got to the valley stopped at a
friends house and fed him., well behaved dog. Then headed
to my appointment, while I was waiting in the waiting room
Kade just hung out and took a short nap and I got a call
from his owner, who called from Scotty V.'s phone. Him and
Kyle had hiked up whitepine on their way to another canyon
when kade took off, he must have followed his trail back
down to the road and that's where I found him. So found out
it was some fellow Mhssc crew and I was glad such a cute
great dog got rescued and taken along on a small adventure
with me , it made my day.
L. Dewey
Former mhssc staffer Lynn Gibson (late 80's era) took me on a 5 mile run in Portland's west hills this week. Lynn is doing great.
Former mhssc staffer Shawna Riley is currently living and working in France.
Darren Owen helped me install window drapes in my house last week. My house finally looks like a house that somebody lives in now. Before I had towels and/or blankets thumb-tacked over some of the windows.
Check out Rogan Connell's new house here. **You might need to have a facebook.com account to view...facebook is free by the way!
Former mhssc staffer Julie
Janus (late 80's/early 90's era) is building a rockclimbing wall in her garage!
Besides the photo below, you can see more photos of Julie's new garage project here. **yeah,
another facebook link.........why haven't you signed up yet?
Former mhssc mogul coach Jay Panther has been water ramp training to get ready for this winter. In Jay's words: I just got done with the water ramp season in Park City, UT. The training was great and I learned a lot. I have attached a video of the two jumps I have been working on. I hope to do both on snow this winter and maybe even compete one of them. I will spend the next few weeks visiting family. I just got to Louisville today and am really excited to be here and see everyone! At the end of this month I are headed up to Canada for early season training. I can't hardly wait for this winter. Thank you all very much and enjoy the video!
Thanksgiving
Day 2008 update
BREAKING NEWS:
Karen Brazier had a
baby! Karen worked at camp in the late 80's. In Karen's
words: On Friday Nov. 14 at 4:47 pm
Juniper Fruscio Rose was born. Her weight was 6-3 and
height was 19 1/2. All went well and we are home enjoying
everything, even grandparents!!!
Nancy Schmeler saw this photo and
mentioned that Karen looks like she's still 16 years old.
It's Thanksgiving camp at MHSSC this week. There is a group of 11 ski racers (Rust is coaching), and 1 snowboard racer (Luke is coaching her). And Rogan Connell brought his Bates College ski team to Mt Hood for early season training for this Thanksgiving week, including now senior team member Emily Sampson. Last night the Bates team all went and watched the Portland Trail Blazers beat up on the Miami Heat at the Rose Garden: 106 to 68. Blazers scored over 100, which means everybody wins a free taco bell Chalupa. Michelle Schmitt and mhssc maintenance man Robert Johnson are cooking a big traditional Thanksgiving dinner tonight at the lodge. Mike and Lynne are currently in Brazil on vacation. No significant snow in the Pacific Northwest yet, but Rogan says the training on Palmer has been excellent.
Former staffer Spencer
Raymond was on NPR on October 23. In Spencer's
words: I made my NPR debut
today. Here's a link to the audio. This is the 10pm EST news
update and not actually the first time my spot aired. That
was earlier in the day at 3pm. http://dispence.org/npr.htm Just in case you're
wondering, about 20 million people listen to NPR.
Head snowboard coach Mark
Stegall has a new job at Telluride this winter. In
Mark's words: I'm enjoying
Telluride, everyone has been very nice to me so far and the
team program seems very good. I got 1 day on snow so far at
A-Basin, where I ran into Nate Goodman, Mike Syro and Carter
Casner. We are scheduled to open on the 27th and that looks
likely with a mix of natural and man made snow. The
mountain looks awesome, lots of steeps and sick natural
terrain plus everyone says it's UNcrowded. A nice change
from Northstar.
Mark also mentioned where the rest of the MHSSC
snowboard coaches are this winter:
Rick Millett: Big Sky, Montana
Luke Wendel: Mt Hood Meadows (Luke is also the
new head coach for the Aloha/Southridge snowboard team)
Ryan Anderson: Schweitzer Mtn, Idaho
MHSSC ski race coach and Slovenija world cup racer Andrej Jerman got to experience some F1. In Andrej's words and photos: Indeed, I was driving the real formula 1 car. It was from season 2006/2007, but that doesn't make any difference. Now, formula 1 was just fantastic. I was stoked about everything. It's very difficult to explain if you're not in there. You can't imagine how fast it goes if you didn't try it. Acceleration, braking fast corners..., unbelievable and unforgettable. Here are some picks which will tell more than words.
The Discovery Channel bought some Mt Hood video footage from me last week for a series called "Destroyed in Seconds". The story they are doing will be of the helicopter crash that took place up on Mt Hood a few years back. You might have seen this on CNN: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhfJDq_I1HA Anyway, I had some random footage in my collection of tapes they wanted and I'll be sure to let you guys know when the Discovery Channel show will actually air, so I can brag about myself and my cool footage. :)
Stu Halverson and Nolan Willard took a train vacation a month or so ago. They had a 24 hour layover in Portland so they stopped by my place for a couch to sleep on and to play some 80's style Atari 2600 games
.
Terry McLeod also made a
Mt Hood appearance a week or so ago for a PSIA function and
I forced my Atari 2600 on him too. Terry was good at "Missile
Command".
Here's the youtube video that's been sweeping the nation:
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!