shred some gnar

I always try to spend government only holidays doing something fun. This past weekend was no different. Since all my friends have significant others and it was valentine's day, I decided to go skiing. The original plan was to go to Snowshoe for multiple days, but instead I took a day trip with a buddy from church and one of his friends to Massenutten. The picture at left is of some goats that were living at the top of the mountain. The large bearded man off camera told me they are probably strays from a nearby farm. Now if you are from Vermont or out west the conditions at Massenutten were atrocious. Only 3 black diamonds, which weren't very challening, and plenty of ice instead of snow are characteristic of Virginia skiing. But when you live in a flat, cool, snowless existance in Hampton Roads, it is heaven. I had a blast just being in the mountains with snow. I enjoyed laughing at folks who fell alot on the bunny slopes as well as at myself when I fell learning how to ski backwards.

Speaking of winter sports, the Winter Olympics rule. What rules more than the Winter Olympics? DVRing the Winter Olympics. There is no better feeling than fast forwarding through figure skating and figure skating-related events, and the endless interviews/Bob Costas talking about nothing. My Olympic viewing is quite efficient.

In other news, I have officially found a name suitable for the new ride. Her name is Gabriella. If that is too many syllables for you, you can just call her Gabby.

Hosed

So every Wednesday a bunch of friends and I go to the same restaurant for wings. So this past Wednesday I'm driving to wings when a friend calls. I'm sitting in the parking lot when a man walks up and motions as if he would like to talk to me. I open the door and ask what he wants. "Money for groceries for his family", he says. I give him all the cash I have, $2.11. He asks for more. I say no. He asks if I could go to an ATM. I lie about how I don't have a nearby bank account. Feeling guilty, I offer to take him to the Hardee's across the street and buy him a bucket of chicken for his family. He says he wants something healthier for his kids. I collect my thoughts and suggest that I go to Farm Fresh (a grocery store) and buy his groceries for him. I thought that surely he would accept. He said that Farm Fresh was too expensive and he wanted to go to a cheaper place for groceries. He still wanted the ATM. Now here is the really sad part. Most people would have walked away from this guy so as not to feed a bad habit. I gave in and got him $20 from the ATM. I got hosed. He asked afterward if we could pray. I said sure. I forgot his name and therefore prayed a really awkward and impersonal prayer. I need to work on how I handle people asking me for money.

Norfolk Froze Over

I feel so fortunate. I absolutely love snow and Norfolk got some! It was amazing to wake up on Saturday morning to my roomates yelling, "Snow"! I got out of bed and looked outside to a gorgeous blanket of 4" outside. To think that 2 months ago I looked out the window to 2 feet of water on the street is just nuts. I've included a few pictures for your enjoyment. Some of the highlights of the snow include: not working Monday, a random snowball fight with some 5th graders, doing donuts in a local parking lot and fishtailing all over town, a 3 mile run today in the snow, laughing at how Norfolk literally has no snow removal system, and wearing snowpants and rolling around in the snow.

In other news, my roomate, Jeremy, bought a house last week. I've been uncertain as to where I would live when my lease ran out in May, but now I'll be moving in March. Don't worry, it's not a big move. I'll still be in the Larchmont neighborhood of Norfolk, only about 1/4 mile away from where I currently live.

Workouts

As I sit here watching the State of the Union Address, I think I should provide an update. I have been kind of busy this week as my chemistry class wrapped up. I took my final on Wednesday and I'm glad it's over. I'm not good at chemistry but I learned some good science. I think I passed my test and now it's time to move on to Fluids and Electical systems.

I decided to change up my normal workouts this week. I usually run between 3 and 4 miles on running days, but Tuesday I decided to run to the tennis courts which is about 3 miles. So, run 3 miles, play tennis, run 3 miles. I played tennis until dark, then began to run home. I had forgotten that to get home, I had to run through a neighborhood that is a little sketchy after dark. I also neglected to realize that I looked a little out of place with my tennis racket sticking out of my backpack. So as I'm running, I see a group of what looked to be middle schoolers. I hear one of them say, "That dude looks intense". I can only assume this was due to the shin splint pain. Then one of them started following me on his bike. All of a sudden he asks, "Are you trying to lose weight?" Humbling. I didn't know what to say so I said yeah.

In other news, I made pizza dough from scratch. Crazy delicious and cheap. Here is the recipe:
3.5 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1.5 cups warm water
1/2 tsp dry active yeast
1/2 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp olive oil
Mix flour and sugar. Pile on working surface and make a baseball sized well in the flour. Mix water, yeast, sugar, olive oil in a bowl. Pour into well. Be on guard against making a mess, I did. Slowly work flour into water and mix. Knead until it looks like dough. Drizzle with olive oil and flour before baking. The best part is the taste.

Post-Christmas Adventures

Last time I left you on the edge of your seat, wondering what I did after Christmas. Well, the long-awaited answer is here. Back in the fall, my friend Jake and I decided to go on a hiking trip. Let me give you some background because You're probably thinking, "Scott doesn't hike. He might hurt himself." Well, you're right. But I miss the mountains. They are gorgeous and I don't get to enjoy them very often so I figured a good hike would do me well. Jake and I planned to go 60 miles in 4 days which was more ambitious than I realized. Fortunately it snowed 2 feet and we had to cancel that trip. I decided to do 19 miles in 1.5 days. I thought it would be easy. I was wrong. Turns out I need some better hiking boots. After mile 12 my feet were hurting badly. My friend Todd decided to come with me which was a good idea. It was great for us to share what was happening in each other's lives. We saw some great views including the one above at McAfee's Knob and the icicles in a creek. Other pictures are on facebook. I also got to test out my 15 degree sleeping bag as it got down to 12 degrees overnight. I am happy to report that my Big Agnes bag kept me nice and toasty.

After surviving the wilderness, I spent another day in Blacksburg hanging out with great friends before returning toward Norfolk. I say toward because I stopped to enjoy the Hokies play football and spend New Year's eve with some college buddies. I must say the Hokies played well. Stinespring wasn't a complete idiot, our defense played well, and Tyrod didn't disappoint me. It is always good to see close friends you don't see very often. The party was out in the sticks which is just my style. I got to ride a 4 wheeler, play a little cornhole, and my buddy Michael let me play with his whip. I had a blast. That's all for now.

Welcome back

Wow, I can't believe it's been a month since I posted. That's dumb. I hope you had a wonderful Christmas. I was privileged to be at home over the holiday. My shipyard shuts down between Christmas and New Year's so I am forced to take vacation during that time. At the shipyard where I'm doing my training, Newport News, there was no training on the 23rd or 24th, so I went home early. A week and half without work is great. I went down to my sister's house in North Carolina with Mom for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Seeing my niece and nephew along with watching how my sister and brother-in-law love them is really encouraging. Here is Jenna, she is going through a ballerina phase. If you don't think this is cute, tell me and I'll come punch you in the face. I came back to Blacksburg the 26th, celebrated my niece Jenna's 3rd birthday and spent some good time with Dad and Marj. My good friend John Dooley invited me down to his house to smoke a cigar and have a little grappa. The next day we even got to shoot some skeet together. Nothing makes a country boy smile like shooting pieces of clay out of the air.

I will discuss my hiking trip and New Year's in my next post, but I will jump ahead to current events now. After returning to work, my coworkers and I started our next class, chemistry. I am not good at chemistry, but I have certainly learned a lot over the past 2 weeks which is great. I am still running Monday Homework Club in Norfolk. Today had some bright spots. A few of the older kids have made some great strides in reading comprehension and graph reading. One of the younger girls today had to write a sentence about a hero of her's. After a bit of prodding she chose her mom. I asked her why she looked up to her mom and she said, "Because she loves me." I said, "Why does she love you?" And she said, "Because I love her." I soon realized we were in an infinite logic loop. She wrote her sentence. I didn't know how to solve our problem.

The newest member of my family

Ok, that's a little extreme, but nevertheless, I'm excited. I don't have children now because I'm barely capable of feeding and dressing myself, let alone providing for a human being. Well remember how Guinevere drowned a few weeks ago? Well I found a new car that is suiting me perfectly. I understood that I had a clean slate with which to work. It took me 2 years to find out that I liked Guinevere and I only had 2 weeks to find a new vehicle. I hunted around for awhile and found her in Richmond. Corporate lease car. 8700 miles. $3000 under blue book value. A little more than I wanted to pay, but I have always been taught that it better to buy on value than price. I took her out on a photoshoot the other day and here she is.

I don't know her name yet, so just like we did for Guinevere, I would love to hear your suggestions for naming her. I'm only about a third of the way through the owner's manual, I'm constantly learning new things about her. Lots of buttons and functions, for sure. Next time you and I hang out, ask me for a ride and I will gladly oblige.

It feels nice to be out of the rental car (2010 Hyundai Sonata) and into the new G. I must say that I was pleasantly surprised by the Sonata. It has satellite radio, easy-to-use controls, a nice display, decent handling, and a fairly comfy ride. On the downside, the acceleration was poor and I have a feeling that after a long roadtrip the seats would not be pleasant. But good gas mileage and great durability warrant a recommendation from me. You know I could talk about cars all day but I will spare you. If you have car questions, talk to me.

Thanksgiving part 2

I feel like I should include a little more Thanksgiving related items on here. I guess a Thanksgiving wouldn't be complete without a thorough discussion of what I'm thankful for. I could talk about lots of really obvious and really cheesy things I could talk about, but I'm not going to do that. Besides the family, friends, job, church, etc., I'm thankful for a God who loves me. He loves me despite my comprehensive doubt, fear, insecurity, jealousy, rebeliousness, judgementalism, hypocrisy, idolatry, selfishness, and tendency to treat others like crap. That completely amazes me.

Also over Thanksgiving, I ended my 11 year deer drought. I have finally cured buck fever. Dad and I went hunting Thanksgiving morning, had some great conversation, scared off a turkey, and shot a deer. The best part is I didn't have a heart attack hauling this thing up the hill. I will be taking a hiking trip a few days after Christmas, so jerky all around! One more Thanksgiving story. One of my roomates from college, Steve, got married. Here he is with his wonderful bride, Theresa. It was a great wedding, so many people were there who I don't get to see regularly. It has been a treat to watch 6 of my friends get married this year. I can say with complete confidence and joy that all of these relationships were ordained before time and I can see the Lord's hand in it all.

By the way, I just watched Transformers 2. Totally awesome. A word of advice: don't fall in love with fictional characters. Low chance of success.

Enter cheesey thanksgiving-related title here

Wow it has been quite a month. Settling into my new work environment, watching Guinevere flood and dealing with the aftermath of that, Thanksgiving with the family, I could go on. I've noticed that as I read blogs, I enjoy more frequent, shorter posts than the alternative. Therefore, since there is much to discuss, I will have short entries over the next week. I understand your time is valuable and I'm honored you're spending it learning about my life.

You probably know that I'm a sucker for a pretty sunset so I couldn't resist taking this beautiful picture outside of mom's house. Thanksgiving was pretty sweet. I got to see all my family except my sister, Bron, but I hope I'll get to see her over Christmas. I did the traditional overeating on both Thursday and Friday. I hadn't been home since September, it was great. I think that Thanksgiving, besides Easter, is my favorite holiday. The materialism related to Christmas is obnoxious and something I think detracts from understanding why Christ came to earth. I hung out with my nephew and niece which was totally awesome. The below picture serves three purposes: 1) highlight Connor and I spending time together reading Dr. Seuss 2) Connor and I sounding out words together and 3) We are both working on our reading skills.