Well, this post sat in my "drafts" folder for the last several days, because it felt like a recitation. A report. A convoluted one with too many commas and run-ons. I was going to dress it up, disasemble the timeline, fix the sentences that my fingers tapped out while I was half asleep, but finally realized it was never going to get done. But hey. Not every post can sizzle...I was just a little reluctant to post so many of them that lack said sizzle. So now, without further edits, I give you...

Hello and welcome to An Altitude Problem, the blog hoping to wake up to snow. Not that I want it to be snowy from now on, but if I could get out my skis in the morning, that would be a little bit exciting. It has been snowing, but not seriously, for the last two days. I have also been riding my bike to work since I have been spending my days in the office, feeling the cold air in my lungs, arriving feeling invigorated. Aspen leaves litter the ground like lost gold medallions, fat snowflakes drift down, whispering in the windstill silences, scurrying along the ground in swirling ribbons when the wind blows. Dry grasses rustle, and Andy, loping along bedside me, bounds through them in search of birds, his golden head dusted with white, grin revealing a lolling tongue. This morning, to my horror, he followed several birds when they flew over the lake, landing with a splash, scarcely noticing the water and he raced through the waves splashing on the shore, then plunged into deep water, steaming into air colder than the cold water, and swam in circles. I left the rec path and rode down to the water's edge, coaxing him out, telling him he would catch a cold, that no bird was worth pneumonia, but he heard me not, instinct having taken over. After he had finally splashed ashore and shook cold water all over me, I caught his collar and attached his leash to it, and rode along the lakeshore toward the Marina, Andy straining against his collar, trying to pull me into the water with him. I was hard-pressed to keep my bike on the shore in the soft, damp dirt, and by the time I hit pavement again, my tires were carrying a thick layer of clayish dirt. I dropped Andy off at the office and rode down to my LBS (local bike shop), where I had seen a bike wash, but the hose was frozen. I parked my bike, heavy with all the mud, in the office for the day. The ride home knocked off some of the mud, and I kept Andy's leash on and rode slowly, to keep from running him too hard. Making him commute on foot keeps him very well behaved. He spent the day on a futon in the office, occasionally barking at strangers visible through the door before flopping back down and sleeping again. And now, he is asleep on the living room floor.

It has been a wonderfully active week for me. Well, except for those three days last week... I did spend Tuesday night on the bathroom floor, thanks to either a bug or a bout of food poisoning, too weak from all the vomiting to move any farther than a few feet from the toilet. BBD brought me a sleeping bag, and I spent sixteen hours lying on it, using the backpack that held my dirty laundry from Kansas as a pillow, sitting up every half-hour or so, my body, against my will, attempting to get rid of whatever it was that had made me so sick. The next two days, forcing food or drink past my lips was risking another violent reaction, so I spent all day Wednesday on the couch, answering the phone once to make plans to go hiking on Friday, and hoping I would still be alive by then. On Thursday, I wobbled my way to work, held down half an apple and a dry slice of toast, and by late afternoon, attempted, and succeeded in holding onto a bowl of soup that my friend made for me. And as soon as it became clear that food was my friend again, albeit a friend I still wasn't crazy about, I started guzzling Gatorade, preparing for Friday.

On Friday, I woke up four minutes before my alarm rang at 5:00. I can do that, for some weird reason. All I have to do is go to sleep focusing on the time I want to get up, and almost without fail, I will wake up then. I still do not rely it, though, because the moment I do, it will let me down. But it is handy so that B does not have to awake from a dead sleep when I get up early. He says things that he does not remember the next day, and would never say while awake when awoken from deep sleep. And then wonders why I am offended the next morning.

At six, I picked up my friend from Frisco, and we both had a brief moment of panic when she walked outside into the early dawn gray, and realized her car was not in the driveway. She stood there staring at the spot where it should be parked, then went inside to check the garage, just in case it had gotten moved, then came back outside, laughing at herself. Since she lives so close to Main Street in Frisco, she often walks to shops there, and after spending the afternoon in a bookstore, she left and walked home, forgetting that this time, she had driven there. We retrieved her car from Main Street, dropped it off at her house, and finally, Andy still asleep in the backseat, hit the interstate, looking east, where Gray's Peak and Torrey's peak were silhouetted against a pink sunrise.

At seven o'clock, we started hiking, Andy springing around us, excited to be outside and hiking when he is normally just waking up. We were planning on climbing Gray's first, then Torrey's, but we took a wrong turn and ended up doing Torrey's first, which we later decided was probably the best route, steeper, but shorter. Since one of us (me) was still a bit gaunt from a thirty-six hour crash diet, and one of us (not me) had just had the stitches from a bike crash taken out of her knee, we didnt set any speed records. On top of Grays, at 14,270 feet, we sat in the sun on an absolutely windstill, warm morning, and marveled that it was past mid-September. Andy fell asleep and began snoring, we ate some granola and felt a little drunk on the view.

Back at the Jeep, after nine miles and 3,600 feet of hiking, I peeled off my backpack, unzipped the pocket that held my jeep keys, and my fingers, instead of closing around the key, slipped through the mesh lining. I stared stupidly at the pocket Andy shredded last winter looking for treats, the last time I wore the jacket, once holding my keys and ID, now holding only my ID. Fought a surge of panic, and quickly checked all my other pockets, just in case. Finally reluctantly opened my phone to call B to come rescue me. No service. By this time, we had attracted a bit of attention, other people at the trailhead noting that while they could break into a vehicle, all lacked the criminal know-how to hotwire it. And then, the person parked next to us, until then absorbed in whatever it was he was doing, suddenly turned around and asked if we might be looking for our keys? Because he had found some about halfway up Torreys, and had put them on top of a rock at the trailhead. We checked the rock, and sure enough, they were mine. Relieved, we hit the road for home, bouncing over the rough 4wd road back to the interstate.

On Saturday, B spent the day at home. It was strange and wonderful. I cooked mahi mahi in a cajun glaze and served it with bourbon sauce and mashed potatoes and salad, lunch at home such a huge novelty that we even ate at the table. Early evening, we were done cleaning, stacking firewood, all our jobs for the day, so we drove up to the top of Loveland Pass and hiked to the false summit of Mt Sniktau. It was too late to hike another mile to the actual summit, but we were still rewarded with a beautiful view, sun dipping low behind rainclouds gathered over the ten mile range.

Sunday, we attempted to go to church, that's another story. We never got it done. We did spend the day waiting for the rain to go away, watching football, and finally went to work and stripped blankets, bedspreads, and dry cleaning from several units to be cleaned and returned later. Monday and Tuesday we both worked long hours, and I commuted by bike, oddly enjoying the snow, which brings us to tonight, and my having spent far too long at the computer intstead of readying the house for us being gone next week on our fall vacation to Florida, since Marci will be staying here for several of those days with our animals.

Welcome to An Altitude Problem, home of a blogger who is tired and achy after a flying trip to Kansas, minimal sleep, and a long, long day of work. I ran last night, since my bike tires are still flat, thanks to several "goatheads", Kansas's most common thorn, and used muscles I have not used for several months. I should do that more, since my legs are a bit stiff from it.

On Wednesday, the lumberyard in Scott City called Bobby to tell him his new garage door was in. This forced us to have to make the choice whether we were going to go install it now, before our real estate agent begins showing the place with it's garage door all caved in from a windstorm a few years ago, or wait until we had a little more free time in October. But who are we kidding, free time in October? We hope, but we can't be certain. Since Marci was planning on leaving for her vacation at noon on Saturday, we had to be back by then, so we finished a few loose ends and odd jobs, then, late Wednesday evening, hit the road in a very packed-full Subaru, dog in the backseat, his head out the window, his jowls flapping in the wind, drool streaming back from the corners of his wide grin. We pulled up to our house in the wee hours, in fog that only revealed about three highway dashes ahead of us, threw some sleeping bags down on the floor for padding, and crawled under a light blanket, the only bedding needed on a foggy, warm Kansas night.

The next morning, we were woken early by a deafening cacophony of birdsong outside our open window, a novelty since we moved to Colorado, and by a dog who was anxious to eat some dogfood and go outside. We went to my parents for breakfast, and i got my bike out of the car and put the wheels on it, and took it for a quick ride around Marienthal. I pulled up to my parent's house and was greeted by two yellow striped kittens, purring loudly and winding themselves around my ankles- my mom's latest rescue, after they were unceremoniously, anonymously dumped on the Heartland Mill yard a week ago. Over breakfast, mom and I schemed our day, wondering when we would get the time to get down to the state park and ride some trails, and I asked Bobby if he thought the kittens weren't completely adorable, hint, hint, while they made themselves at home on his lap. I went outside, and noticed a goathead sticking into my bike tire. I plucked it out, and for my trouble, was rewarded by a loud hiss. I had forgotten about the goatheads. Thick, heavy slime tubes are a must in Kansas. Three years without a flat in Colorado, but one mile in kansas, and and the rubber was left puddled under my wheel. As it turned out, all my plans for mountain biking in the park were not to be, since the only tubes to be found in the small-town local Alco store had Shrader stems, and my rims will only accomodate a Presta stem. Dad, bless his heart, took my tubes to Co-op to get them fixed, filled them with slime, and in the process of airing it back up, what do you know, I broke the stem. I finally had to give up, leaving my bike in a useless $2000 dollar pile of aluminum and stainless steel. I borrowed my dad's bike, late in the day, and we did go to the park, but after we had sat on a picnic table and changed both of his flat tires to big, thick tubes, we only had time for a half-hour ride, but my mom tackled the singletrack with her bike-path cruiser like a pro, big, narrow tires rolling over difficult portions without skipping a beat. We finished our ride, threw the bikes on the car, and raced the clock back to Scott City, where I needed to be by 7:00 to have dinner with Bobby and some of our friends.

The next morning Andy let us sleep until 9:00, exhausted as he was by the life of a farm dog. A quick breakfast, then I moved a cord or more of firewood from our shed to my dad's yard, displacing mouse nests, spiders, frog skeletons, and damp, moldy, heavy chunks of wood that have been sitting under the trees, soaking up the runoff from our eaves, for four years. I finished at noon, and after lunch, cleaned the house, washed windows, removed and washed storm windows, and helped Bobby clean the shed and place struts on the new garage door to sturdy it up against future 100mph windstorms. We dragged into the house and dropped into chairs around my mom's dinner table, saying hello to Grandpa and Grandma Unruh who were there for dinner, and we were tired, dirty, sweaty, and mosquito eaten, wondering how we used to work in the heat all day. It wasn't even so hot, only in the 80's, but humid and windstill, not something Kansas is used to, and neither are we.

At 6 o'clock the next morning, Andy was up, and so were we, frantically cleaning the fridge, removing all sign that the house had been stayed in lately, the last odds and ends, pipe fittings and paint cans, pushed, stuffed, and shoved everything into the car, leaving half of the backseat for Andy, and stopped by my parent's house on the way out of town. And Bobby finally gave in to my begging. When we left the yard half an hour later, Andy was not the only animal in the car. Two yellow kittens were winding their way around the back of Bobby's head, purring loudly enough to be heard over the car's engine.

On the way home, trying to beat noon back to Summit County, Andy slept uncomfortably cramped in the backseat, two yellow tiger-striped kittens slept in our laps, and we tried out names for the cats. They are identical, as far as we can tell, so one of them sports a permanant marker spot on it's head, put there by a big red Marks-A-Lot. That one took a shine to Bobby, so naming privilages fell to him, and I took on naming the other one. I already know the name I wanted. Max sounds, to me, like a wonderful name for a big, beautiful, yellow tomcat, as they will someday be. Bobby thought Marks-A-Lot looked like a Paco. And that is how it comes to be that I sit here with a small yellow Max draped over my arm, eyes contented slits, paws reaching up from time to time to adoringly brush my chin, purr rattling loundly while I type, Andy stretched out at my feet, farting and snoring, his paws in the air, and Paco trying his hardest to climb the clothes rack sitting in the dining room. Never mind that we are also babysitting Frau, Marci's fat brown tabby cat who is so overwhelmed by a new house and three new, high energy animals, that all she can do is hide and hiss. This place suddenly feels like a zoo. Bobby wonders if he has gone insane, allowing me to fill the place with yellow canines and felines.

Today, after locking Frau in our bathroom with all her cat-stuff, litter box, food, water, scratching post, box, bed, etc, locking Max and Paco in the guest bathroom with their own collection of litterbox, etc, I loaded up Andy in the Subaru and went to work. At noon, I was at a stopping point, so we took up our friends on a lunch invitation, and grilled, and ate on their deck, while the dogs kept themselves very distracted by the ten-pound cow femur bones given to us by the butcher in Kansas and hauled back to Colorado with us. I left Andy there, where he got to go an a walk with his doggy friend, and we went to work for another seven and a half hours, delivering clean dry cleaning back to units. And now, it is late. I am so tired I am amazed I am still making sense...at least I hope I am. It is time to let my head fall back and do what Andy, Max, and Bobby are already doing- let the eyes close. No, I should not. I should go get ready for bed, then actually go to bed. So much work, going to bed...At any rate, until next time...

Hello and Welcome to An Altitude Problem, where, two hours after I first picked my way across it in my bare feet to take Andy outside this morning, the ice on the deck has finally turned to water. I sit here in my pajamas, having a fairly leisurely morning, although I do have two arrivals to ready for guests checking in today. The last several days have been busy for me, getting ready for Labor Day weekend, but now, the check-in mob of yesterday is over, so until someone complains because I did a shabby, hurried job and missed something in my rush to get everything done by 4:00 pm yesterday, we are sitting tight and crossing our fingers.

Winter is fast approaching. After everything checks out on Monday, we start deep-cleaning units, dry cleaning bedding, inventories and purchasing and restocking broken coffeepots, crock pots, lampshades, pillow shams, hangers, irons, hair dryers, stained or torn bedding and shower curtains, repairing or replacing broken blinds and light fixtures, giving sixty units a thorough once-over to get them ready for guests who think that, although they rented a condo from us at 2/3 or even half the price of other management companies, "for what they paid" their vacation should go without a hitch. The way the downturn in the economy has most directly affected us, other than about a 20 percent drop in bookings, which we could still absorb because of our unusually high occupancy rate other years, is that people are still coming to the mountains, but only a few out of each party are skiing. The rest are making snow angels, drinking coffee, buying tee shirts, soaking in the hot tub, watching TV, and spending time in the condo with hot chocolate in one hand and note pad in the other, making lists of the shortfalls of their condo, hoping that, when presented with proof that they got screwed and paid good money for a dump of a condo, the company they rented it from will give them a discount, or possibly even a free stay. We had more whiners and refund-hunters this year than we can ever remember having in years past. Which means our condos had better be sparkling, well maintained, well stocked and well organized, and our guests had better be impressed, in spite of their efforts to find fault. Our job depends on it. And never mind several new owners this year who freak out over the tiniest power waste, like a stereo left on standby, or a light switch dimmed all the way, but not off, and, of all things, demanding that we iron the bedspreads before each guest. As if we have the resources to do that when we are spread so thin as it is over the winter. The nature of a seasonal job. Overstaffed in the summer, understaffed in the winter. We are hiring a new year-around maintenance man this winter and have guaranteed him hours in the summer, and are crossing our fingers. Oh, we will give him enough hours to keep him around all year, but it may come at the cost of our own hours. But the plan is to actually start taking days off. One day a week in the winter, two in the summer. By the three of us doing this, the company should not have to pay a lot extra for another employee. After all, paying three people to work seven days a week can be about as expensive as paying four people to work five days a week. We shall see. I predict B still working every day. He just tends to get a bit uneasy on his days off, unless we leave the county.

Speaking of which, he did do a very odd thing and take an in-county day off this week. We had been planning for some time to take a day, pay for lift tickets, and ride Keystone. In the end, we didn't want to spend the money. Spending money becomes painful for us this time of year, after a summer of cut-back hours, and with labor day weekend comes the looming charge on our credit cards for ski passes that wont even be used for another eight weeks. Instead, we rode West Ridge, taking the jeep up to the trailhead to save us four miles of uphill, then riding three miles uphill and over the top of the ridge, and down the other side, into Keystone ranch. It is the smoothest, longest downhill ride in the county, I think. One has three miles of climbing for six miles of downhill through sage covered hillsides, damp forests, stream crossings, and views, with some tight switchbacks thrown in. All the way up, B kept asking me how far yet, and I finally told him three more switchbacks, which turned into five, and he was a bit out of sorts by the time we had ground our way to the top. But about half way down, after he had forgotten all about the climb and was nicely drugged by the adrenaline rush of the downhill, as well as by the high produced by warm sun, pine sap and sage, and the whoosh of soft loam under knobby tires, he stopped to take in the view of a sky a bit smoky from wildfires west of here turning Guyot and Baldy and the Gore and Ten-Mile Ranges purple and gray, turned to me, and announced that he was glad he had married me. I replied that I know I am irresistable, but what had brought on this sudden revelation? And he began naming the names of people he knew who had not married me, had not even thought of marrying me, and for that reason, had never been reluctantly dragged out on a beautiful day, dragged, whining and sweating, up 1000 vertical feet, and forced to coast down a winding trail through forests and hillsides alive with squirrels, chipmonks, and ptarmigan, and feel that sudden flood of well-being and joy at being alive and surrounded by earth and sky and sun and wind.

By the time we got home, 18 miles later, he was back to wondering why, exactly, he had had to marry someone who insisted on always taking the hard route, thanks to a new trail I led him down that ended up being more uphill than I remembered. Although he has done more biking this year than any other year, and his skills, as well as his legs, have improved massively, I still do more riding than he does, which meant his legs were done by the time we got back to the Cove, while mine still felt fairly fresh. He pedaled and scowled, and balance was restored. There were no more unexpected compliments. It was a relief to know things were back to normal.

We ate when we got home, then grabbed our swimsuits, drove the Subaru up to the trailhead and retrieved the jeep, then went to the pool, where we swam, then soaked in the hot tub until we got too hot, then sat in chairs and soaked up the last slanting rays of sun as it dropped behind Buffalo Mountain. We pretended we were on vacation, and schemed our next move, what we should do if and when we are not doing property management, where we should go after Summit County. Although we like it here, it is possible we find ourselves influenced by the transient lifestyle lived by most people here. They are here for a break, and sometimes the break becomes permanent, and they find it possible to stay here their whole lives, but most of the time, the high cost of living, the floods of people who can work a job that pays less than their living expenses for a year while they decide who they are and what they want come and go with the seasons, taking all the jobs, leaving permanent residents with two options- find something extremely lucrative to do, something that can support life in a resort town, or leave. We would hate to leave Colorado, and leaving our friends here would be hard, but we could leave Summit County if another oportunity presented itself. Yes, I would miss being five minutes from world-class snowboarding, but if I could spend more of the year on my bike, which really is more my thing than snowboarding anyway, would I miss it so much? Especially since, now that we have snowmobiles, we really don't need a resort to get epic turns in deep powder.

My parents were up here last weekend for my dad's birthday, and for the first time in I don't know how long, i did not work while they were here. Instead, they brought their bikes and we spent a lot of time in our saddles. Grandma and Grandpa from Eagle met us on top of Vail Pass and Grandma, Mom, Dad and I coasted down 12 miles to Frisco on the bike path. About a mile or two down from the top, my Dad accidentally rode off the trail, hit his front brake, went over the handlebars, and landed in a heap- not something one wants to see their 50 year old father do. He sprained his wrist, and in the absence of any first aid gear, I tied my windbreaker tightly around it to lend some stability and keep the swelling at bay. He rode the rest of the way down, and we met Grandpa at the Island Grill at the Frisco Bay Marina, where we sat on the upper deck, quenched our thirst and enjoyed views of lake and mountains until the wind and rain chased us away. I rode back to Vail Pass with Grandpas, retrieved the Jeep, went back to Frisco and loaded bikes and people, and returned home to find Bobby and dad seasoning steaks, a birthday cake on the counter.

The next morning, fueled on a breakfast of birthday cake, Mom and I hit the bike path again and rode from Dillon to Frisco, with the plan of turning around when we got to Frisco. When we got there, however, my mom was still feeling fresh, so she called Dad and got permission to extend our ride, and we rode around the entire lake, over Swan Mountain Road. It was no small climb, especially for a flatlander, but with all the bike riding and exercizing and healthy eating she has been doing lately in an attempt to show her body, which gave her a cancer scare this summer, who is boss, she pulled it in fine form. We made a detour at Sapphire Point, an overlook far above the lake, and rested and enjoyed the view, then coasted home. Since my jeep was parked at Dillon, we ate lunch, packed up the car, then she and I rode our bikes down to Dillon Marina, bringing our total for the day up to 18 miles, where Dad met us, we loaded up her bike, and they headed home.


And now, it is time for me to go do something with my day. I am going to take Andy to his best friend's house, where he can romp and wear himself out, and maybe I can go on a longer ride this afternoon than usual.