Look into My Appointment

On the seventeenth of January I wrote that I left work with enough time to get to Santiago Street by 330.  I walked to the train but missed BART.  The 28 was okay even after I stopped at the dentist to look into my appointment.  Later at at the clinic I met with the doctor, who indicated that my weight had gone up.  I recounted my exercise and eating and we were both perplexed.

I went to the bank and called my friend and walked home where I settled into work.  I stayed downstairs because I preferred to be alone.  I finished up with my trial notes quickly and noted that one of my slips of paper needed to be located.  I went up to talk to the parents and told them that the birds would be expensive and they told me they would help.  I asked dad about taxes and he gave me his accountant.  Mom also told me that my sister wasn’t away over the weekend but when I called her she said it wasn’t likely that we would meet.

I left a little later with a bag of stuff for my trip and noted that dad was still looking at tax stuff.  I caught an the train to my friend’s house and had dinner.  I drank a beer and finished packing.  I was asleep at a reasonable time.

The next morning I got up early and walked to 16th with my friend getting chai on the way.  We took a train to West Oakland  and then went to Mac on the next one.  Next we caught an Emery-go-round to the Amtrak station and sat down for a while at Peet’s.

I ran to grab a NYT when we went over to the station.  We boarded the Zephyr as it was about to leave and they set us up with a small sleeper.  We settled in for news, books and conversation.  I talked about properties.  Getting to Martinez we tried to decide what to do during our trip.  We looked at the cars in the yards outside Benicia.  At Sacramento we relocated to the observation car just long enough to spy a good spot in the dining car.

We sat across from a couple from Fort Bragg and split a garden burger and a salad.  Later we returned to the observation car and sat with a guy from St Louis.  During this period I had to return to the sleeper to have a quick conversation with my sister over the phone.  She told me she was in Tahoe and was skeptical about seeing us in Truckee.

I returned to the observation car and my friend and I talked about trains, planes and family with the Missourian.  In between conversation and spectacular views I shared my misgivings about my sister but decided that I could check in with her later.  We passed Emigrant and Yuba Gaps and then decided to take a quick nap.  Unfortunately, we had missed Soda Springs by then and couldn’t see it out of our cabin window.  In fact our nap was interrupted pretty quickly after that because we had arrived in Truckee.

I noted there was a fairly large cargo train keeping us from detraining and the streets were fairly icy.  At the hotel the clerk gave us the preferred room.  I texted my sister as we settled in.  After I walked about the hotel to see what amenities there were we took a walk around town and settled on Bar of America.

I noted that we had an ok meal and I noted that the waitress looked like someone I used to know.  We returned to the room then and the two of us took time away from each other for a while.  My friend wanted to a nap and my sister continued to seem disinterested in visiting Truckee.  We went back to the same place a few hours later to have a drink and were in bed around 10.

In the morning of the day I wrote this I was up at six but left at 710 and found that the bus to Squaw was late.  I texted my friend a few times and at Squaw I got equipment and dropped my bag at the center before standing in line for coffee.  Then I bought my ticket and discovered that the large gondola was on wind hold so had to return to the smaller one.  While riding with a group of little kids I noted that the mountain was indeed quite windy.

I had been carrying leftovers from the night before the whole time and was relieved at the top to get a locker for it.  Then I had a second cup of coffee and made it onto the slopes by 1030 which I considered especially late.  My first trip was to the Shirley on the back side and when I made it back to the top I decided that I wanted to stay on that side because of the snow and the crowds.  However, it too was placed on wind hold after several runs.

I went down to the Arc and ate my leftover pizza then and thought I would go down to the lower mountain but saw the bar and decided to get a drink.  There were locals there and I struck up a conversation with a Canadian and a lady gave me her seat as she was leaving.  It started to snow.

I was definitely going to head down to the lower mountain then but discovered Siberia so tried that lift.  I found the wind was terrible the first time but the second it was better.  The third time I was happy.  I just remember that I was catching patches of fresh snow and that was fantastic.  I had been going over the edge on the left of the top of Siberia-- a run that that generally scared me-- but the snow was really good.

My last trip up I went down that same incline at the steeper end and immediately caught an edge.  My leg went the wrong way and as I was trying to make a correction I heard a pop in my leg and went down the hill backwards a hundred feet.  I managed to get my right leg below me to stop but my left ski was quite a distance above me.

A maintenance guy and a regular guy appeared with my ski then and helped me get my ski back on.  I told them I was fine but knew I would pay for the fall.  I was getting a pretty good head rush as they were leaving.  They said bye and I took a long time getting down to the bottom of Siberia.

My leg hurt a lot but I knew it wasn’t broken as I descended to the lower mountain.  It was raining when I managed to start in on the cat track and after a bunch of turns I decided to call it quits.  My leg hurt and I had a hard time making the rental center to drop off my skis.

I interacted with my friend while I was looking at the bus schedule and was bummed that I wouldn’t get to see her old coworkers but that was inevitable.  I had about thirty minutes until the shuttle showed.  Ironically, I got a beer at the Dubliner sitting next to the same lady that had given me her seat at the Arc.

I rode to Truckee then and spent the whole ride talking to the driver about California water policy.  In town I walked to the hotel and interacted with my friend.  She told me I had sprained my ankle and tried to help.  Later I left her alone and noted that my sister was definitely not going to eat with us that night.

We had a drink at the Bar of America until Moody’s called us and shared a delicious meal.  My friend asked the waitress for a bag of ice and then we went up to the family room and started to write.  She sat writing postcards for a while but eventually quit.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.