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.