Hello and Welcome to An altitude Problem, where a boy, a girl, and a dog are doing what needs to be done. The dog sleeps while we are gone, waking to woof at strange noises, barking in his deep voice when he hears the keys rattling in the door lock, then dissolving into a whining, wagging pile of yellow fur when his humans come inside, stomping snow off their feet and blowing on their frozen hands. The boy goes to work like every other day, answers the phones, takes care of guest's questions, complaints and comments, drives around collecting trash from garages, delivering crock pots and firewood and unclogging toilets. The girl races manically between two jobs, the fun, less flexible, lower paying job and the no fun, but flexible and higher paying job competing for her time and when she gets home to find boy and dog already there, the three of them collapse into armchairs and couches in front of a crackling fire and wish that they did not have to sleep, now that they are finally home. And the dog wants to go outside and play in the snow so badly he can taste it, and lies in the window gazing first at his people with reproach in his eyes, then at the darkness outside, where the wind howls past, cold but laden with delightful smells.

I still feel a bit overwhelmed, to be honest. I am still trying to find a happy medium where I can work two jobs and still have time for such things as taking the dog on walks and going skiing. The fact that the sun sets at 4:45 in the afternoon does not help. Nor does the fact that the low temperatures the last two days have been around -15 degrees.

On a more odd note, B and I are now honest-to-goodness skiers. Neither of us has snowboarded this year yet. We have, however, spent money we don't have on ski gear. How this happened is still a bit of a mystery to me, but retracing the steps, it is easy to see how unavoidable it was.

Turns out, getting a job in a bike shop is great for the summer, but when it's a ski shop in the winter, one kinda ought to ski occasionally so one knows what one is talking about when talking about gear. So I started taking out my skis, a pair of 156Volkl SuperSport Stars, a short, shaped ski that was a great ski to learn on and for smooth corduroy. I thought I was just a bad skier until I went to Loveland Ski Resort for an employees-only demo day, in which ski shop employees from the Front Range and Summit County were invited to demo skis and boards from all the brands we carry. I realized then that it wasn't entirely the skier. The skis I demo'd were fat and rockered and I went home with a whole new idea of what the sport was about- sheer fun, charging through bumps and searching out the crud, dodging trees and finding powder to float over. I went home and Bobby didn't want to hear about it. A couple of days later, he was sick of hearing me talk about it, and he agreed to come into the store to look at some old demo skis we had for sale. The regional manager was in, and came over to meet my husband, the anti-gear guy, as he had come to be known (thanks to me turning down offers of cheap gear because it wasn't free, and blaming him). Ended up, he gave us a screaming deal on a pair of Armada ARV's, a ski that is twice the ski that the skis we had gone in to look at were. I had hoped B would at least buy a pair of shaped skis with flat tails, something he could carve on ice with. Instead, he walked out with a pair of twin tip skis, rockered in the tip, 89mm waist, which isn't fat by today's standards, but considering what he was skiing on 15 years ago, which was the last time he skied, pretty fat and shaped. We took them out and he was hooked. He skipped work the next morning because it snowed eight inches, and went up to A-basin, where he poofed through powder and realized that chop was fun, and that his knees were relatively safe from being twisted with such stable skis.

The next weekend we went to a public demo day at Loveland, and we both spent the day trying out new skis. B demo'd a pair of Armada JJs, a fully rockered ski with a 115 mm waist, and fell in love. I already know what I wanted, a pair of Salomon Geishas, a 98mm all mountain ski for skiing on the resort and backcountry, and we decided we could share the JJs in the deep powder, since the only time we would be in the deep powder would be snowmobile skiing, and when we went out together, I would take the Geishas and he could ride the JJs.

Turns out, JJ's are hard to find. Good thing I work at a ski shop. I finally located a pair they were willing to give me employee pricing on at a partner shop down in Boulder. I drove down and bought them and brought them home to a gleeful B, who now refuses to ride them until we get more snow and no rocks are sticking through. And I ordered a pair of Geishas on pro form, which is manufacturer-direct pricing for ski shop employees, but now I sit here at the mercy of Salomon, who has not decided to ship them to me or bill me for them yet. I am trying to be patient. They said they would ship in 3-5 business days, and although tomorrow will be a full week since I ordered them, there were not 5 business days in this week so they might ship the first of next week. In the meantime, I don't know if I am going to be getting them or not.

And then we both needed boots. My boots were clearance boots from three years ago, really cheap, and bought when I had no idea what ski boots were supposed to fit like. I stuck my foot in, wiggled it around, and decided they were comfortable, and that was that. Turns out, ski boots arent supposed to be comfortable. They are supposed to be tight. You arent supposed to be able to slide your foot around in it like your bedroom slippers. I talked B into letting me measure his foot and discovered his boots were too big as well, besides having been worn last in 1995. Ski boot technology has come a ways since then. We both bought boots. That hurt.

So now we have spent all this money on ski gear. And not just ski gear, but Ski Gear. Big-boy skis. Fat skis that are made for big mountain skiing. Now we have to ski. Granted, we spent less than half of what the general public would have to pay for the same skis, but still. It still stung. But it's fun. It's an adventure. It's a precious thing that we have in common. It's us, living life and prioritizing. Choosing fun over being normal and sticking to our choice. And in a weird way, being responsible. Because if we can learn to enjoy winter, we won't have to quit our good jobs in Summit County and move to Maui and flip burgers just because we can't handle the cold.

So that's our ski story. Maybe it will save us time, next time we are together, if I don't have to explain that we are no longer snowboarders, we have gone to the other darkside. And I feel obligated to tell it so when you see brand new skis leaning against our entryway wall, you will understand that we did not pay full price and you will not judge us for it.

In other news, if you did not come to Colorado to see us this Thanksgiving, you're welcome. By not coming to see us, you did not have to take home this horrible cough that I have. I have hacked so much my stomach muscles are sore. It did not help that I just got back from taking Andy cross country skiing, but it did help him. He now snores, draped between the two arms of "his" armchair.

And now, I must go. I need to get certified to mount bindings and set DINs on at least six different binding manufacturers, and it's an impossibly long manual for each, and tricky test, but apparently I must, so I shall. And on my own time. Time to light a fire and settle in for the evening.

Hello and welcome to An Altitude Problem, where we are too tired to see straight. It has been a long week. We have been running around like crazy people, and I have been trying to keep two bosses happy and not flake out on either, and still grab a run on my skis every now and again, which is not easy to do when your full time job just turned into overtime, and your part time job just became full time. Well, not officially, but I have worked my three days a week job for a seven day stretch this week, not to mention the 19 arrivals this weekend that I have spent the last three days getting ready for. And the few runs I have managed in the meantime.

I am bad at saying no. That stresses everyone out. And it exhausts us. But tomorrow is a day off from the ski shop, and I have a lot to do for our business, but I might also get a few guilt-free runs in if I play my cards right and manage to peel myself out of bed early enough to run down to Dillon, do an inspection there, grab several items from the office, deliver them, and be in the lift line in time for first chair. But it's already eleven o'clock. And I've been to bed too late and up too early too many nights this week.

I realize I am lucky. One of my co-workers works three jobs to be able to afford to live up here. He has slept two hours out of the last two days, because of back to back night and day shifts at his various jobs.

And now, I need my bed. Perhaps there will be time and inclination to write more another day soon. There is much to write about, like Bobby suddenly rediscovering skiing, and all the snow that has been falling, and all the terrain that has been opening early. But another day. Because it's bed time. Goodnight.