Tuesday, January 3, 2012

XTREME XPERIENCE

Helloooo! So, first blog post of the new year. Yay. Today, I would like to talk about an XTREME XPERIENCE I had. The last XPERIENCE, in fact, of 2011.

Snowboarding.

First, let me just say that I am not an athletic type. As far as exercise goes, I enjoy workout videos, pilates, and the elliptical. But sports? That's not really my "thing". My husband, however, played sports his whole life. He's all for XTREME XPERIENCES of the Sports variety (not the roller coaster variety. He will not get on a roller coaster). So when his family mentioned that they were going to stay at a ski resort for a few days, he was like, "LET'S BUY REALLY NICE SNOWBOARDING EQUIPMENT SO IT CAN BE OUR NEW XTREME HOBBY." (paraphrasing) And I said, "HECK, YES!"

So that's what we did. We BOUGHT snowboarding pants, jackets, boots, helmets, goggles, snowboards and bindings. Why would we rent this stuff when it's obviously going to be our new XTREME hobby?? So we were all set for the XTREME XPERIENCE. But this ski resort trip? Hasn't happened yet. It's happening this weekend. But we bought all this stuff last Wednesday in preparation and then decided to go snowboarding last Friday, like a pre-XTREME XPERIENCE XPERIENCE. You know? So my husband, my sister in law, my brother and I all hopped in the car and went to the ski resort to snowboard last Friday.

I was pretty nervous, but also excited because I had all this cool new equipment that made me look seriously XTREME. I imagined myself acing it on the first try, as did my husband. We were going to be awesome. My husband's new favorite word is 'shred' as in, shred some snow with our mad snowboarding skillz.

We got to the bunny hill. Everyone has to start at the bunny hill, even us XTREME peeps, just to get the hang of it before we do some serious shredding. Surrounded by small children and parents teaching these young ones how to shred, we fastened our front binding and hobbled our way to the top of the hill. Please note, trying to move with one foot strapped into a snowboard at a perpendicular angle to your free foot is XTREMELY CHALLENGING. But it was all good. We were fine.

Just to give you a visual, to the right of the bunny hill was a ski lift, to the left was a black tube thing which separated people going down the bunny hill from people going UP the bunny hill on some sort of moving escalator type thing. In my mind, the black divider was something to bump into to make myself stop if all else failed.

Anyway, it was time to go down the hill. I strapped my other foot into the binding and WHOAAAAAMYYYYGOSHHH. Snow is SLIPPERY, people! Like...really slippery. Especially while on a snowboard. I was pleased to see my companions having equal difficulty with the slipperyness of the snow. We were noobs together, and that made everything okay. So, okay, time to go down the hill. Little kids were going down the bunny hill no problem, so clearly this would be easy. I jumped/slid/waved my arms forward so I was at the edge, and then...it was go time.

ME: WHOAA THIS IS FAST!!
I am smiling at my speed, because speed must mean skill.
ME: AHH, THIS IS REALLY FAST, GUYS!
I look back to see my husband has already fallen. I am nearing the end of the bunny hill with TOO MUCH speed, and now I'm scared because I don't know how to STOP.
ME: AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! (High-pitched girly scream)
**BOOM!*

*Um...that was me crashing into the black divider. HARD. Which made an XTREMELY loud noise.

LITTLE KID GOING UP THE ESCALATOR THING: Are you okay?!?!
ME: Yup. I'm fine. Thanks.

I got up and basically fell down the rest of the bunny hill. This happened three more times, except instead of crashing into the black divider I fell hard on my tailbone. Yes, all three times. After that I could no longer snowboard because I was in XTREME PAIN.

SO. That was my last XTREME XPERIENCE of 2011. My bruised tailbone is still healing. And we are going again this weekend.

I am scared.

But now I am equipped! With what, you ask? With HIP PADS. I vainly did not buy these when we bought the rest of our equipment because I didn't want my hips/butt looking ridiculously large, but now I DON'T CARE! I shall go to any lengths to prevent more XTREME PAIN. So clearly, I am serious about the sport. Serious enough to put my vanity aside, embrace the hip/butt padding, and ready to be an XTREME SNOWBOARDER ONCE AND FOR ALL!

Of course, I probably won't leave the bunny hill. But still.

5 comments:

  1. hip/butt padding??? dude, if I had only known there were such things!!!!!

    I haven't gone skiing/snowboarding in over 10 years :(
    but I do remember loving snowboarding.. I personally think it's way easier than skiing.

    Have fun.. it'll take practice, but you'll see once you get the hang of it, it'll be super super fun.

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  2. I went skiing once with my high school(it was the yearly senior ski thing), and it was awesome.

    Of course I fell down a couple times, but not as much as the guy that always had to pick on me during class, so it's all good. Plus the resort we were staying at had a sauna. For an achy first time skier it was heaven. ;)

    Ack, now I want to go again so bad....

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  3. Oh my gosh! I'm so sorry I'm laughing, but you wrote your experience so well! Ha ha!

    And I've never been skiing or snowboarding and I live in Utah. Yes. Shame.

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  4. Sounds like it was wild! I have to admit, I am not a very daring type so I stick with much more boring sounding activities LOL:)

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  5. @Hannah After going this time, I really wished I'd taken advantage of those high school trips! Snowboarding is so much harder than I'd thought. The place we stayed in didn't have a sauna, but needless to say I took a nice hot shower afterwards :)

    @Chantele LOL, I was laughing while writing it! I looked like a total spaz. You should try it some time, especially being in Utah!

    @Lindsay Oh, I'm not a very daring type either--this was a fluke! A very expensive fluke that I unfortunately will have to keep up with since we bought all the equipment, lol! I would much rather have stayed in the lodge with coffee and my laptop...sigh.

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