Welch Village

Finally made it out for some decent MN skiing. There's a few other places that are better, but these hills were much better than Buckhill or anything at Sundown Mountain in Dubuque. I went to a place that all Iowans recognize: Welch Village. It's been at least 15 years since I was there last, but I still remembered one of the runs.

We went down almost every black diamond, save for the moguls. I still want to try them, but maybe another time. I did fall twice, once because I crossed my ski tips and once because someone sort of skiied over me as we were unloading from the lift. Oh well. It was really hard for me to get back up. My legs are too fat and not muscular enough, thus I felt like the blimp queen of 2011.

Before the skiing, I was supposed to work on a project at work and do all of the other millions of things that I didn't get done this week. One of them was write a development plan and goal plan, which is actually fun for me. There was a strategizing meeting about goal planning at work and while those things are usually bogus, I really did find it helpful. The comment that sticks with me is: "The movie of your career should have you in the lead role." I guess that for most people, that makes sense. But I'm denser than most people and have often let my job's progress get bounced around by other people or have tried to fit a mold that I think other people want to see. This one is better.

Anyway, I've spent the last 2 days at work popping ibuprofen like a fiend and covering my right eye. I desperately need glasses and develop eyestrain,  neck aches and sinus pressure and grind my teeth until my jaw aches for days. These symptoms  make me want to crawl into a miserable hole until 2013.  I hate feeling like that and thus realized that if I worked today, I was going to be a miserable excuse for a person. So I said I couldn't be a volunteer on this project and went skiing with 9 people that Jim and Amy know.

Upon my return, I feel human again. Skiing is delightfully fun. I want to race. I want to go to Colorado! I want to exercise! I want to walk my doggie and find another dog to play with and volunteer. And tomorrow, I will go back and do the work that I missed and visit my coworker's party and try to forget that I may or may not have drunkenly asked questions about my boss's gonads. To be fair, he had just ended a story about gonads, strippers, fraternities and one night stands....