Been a while

Hey so I know it's been a while since we posted last. I don't even know if people are reading this anymore. But I figured I would update it just in case.

We are adjusting pretty well to Portland. Mol and I are both still job searching (along with most people in Portland) but we have kept busy helping Donald with his gardening business. We have worked a few days with him and it's been fun learning how to do some landscaping stuff.

Some of you might be waiting for me to comment on the weather here. As everyone knows, it rains a lot in Portland, especially in the winter. As you can imagine this isn't easy to get used to. Molly has never been affected by the rain and I never understood it until now. Apparently no one in Portland is affected by rain. Everyone just carries on with whatever they are doing. I mean it rains nearly every day. Sometimes multiple times a day and sometimes it's just raining pretty hard all day. I do enjoy everything being so green, but seriously? I have only seen the sun 3 times since we moved here. We had two days this past week without rain and it was amazing. Today was nice and the next few days should be nice too. We'll see.

I'm taking a Wilderness First Responder (WFR) course for the next week or so. It's a medical course where you learn how to deal with emergencies in the wilderness. Should be interesting and helpful for job opportunities and the safety of ourselves and friends when we play in the woods. It's 8-12 hours a day for 10 days so I haven't had a good chance to take the course until now (yay unemployment). My brain is mush after one day. But I did get to use a stethoscope today.

Mol is taking a coaching certification course next weekend. So we are both doing our best to spruce up our resumes. We'll see how much it helps!

Skillz

There seems to be some question as to how Goldberg and I beat Gina and Mol in snow soccer last week. Please watch this video to see my dominating skills as a GK. Keep in mind this is Gina (pro soccer player) taking a PK from about 7 yards away and me fearlessly shutting her down.

Breckenridge

We headed to Breckenridge on the 4th. We rented a cabin outside of town and spent a few days relaxing in the mountains. Some of us are experienced skiers/snowboarders and a few of us aren't. I am in the inexperienced group. I was pretty nervous to board in Breck. I mean it's the Rockies. Plus Molly is pretty much a pro. Learning how to ski or snowboard as an adult is dumb for several reasons A) Adults don't bounce or bend like kids B) Hopefully the survival-instinct section of your brain is more developed, so moving at a high rate of speed down very slippery, steep terrain littered with trees, shouldn't seem like something smart to do C) I hate doing things I'm not good at.


Anyway, I sucked it up and went for a couple hours on the 5th. Molly and Goldberg had gone all day so by the time I got there in the afternoon, they had no problem staying on the easy trails with me. The 7 of us all went on the 6th....for the whole day. The combination of a couple stops at the bar and the lack of any major falls, made it a successful day on the slopes. We were sore but made it home in one piece.

Top of the slopes

Dani and Kaleen (beautiful!)

Mol and I on the lift. Notice the sick purple goggles that I borrowed from Molly's mom.



Note - Skiing all day at 9600 feet, then sitting in a hot tub and sipping one glass of wine = drunk for 10 minutes then instant hangover :(

New Year's

Early in the Fall we decided that we would spend New Year's in Colorado with Daniela. We got a good deal on flights to Denver and tried to get all of Molly's housemates from college to fly out and meet us. But we know that Colorado is a long way from the east coast so it ended up being Dani, Molly, Goldberg, Gina and I. We flew in on Thursday and braved some snowy roads to get to Boulder. The 5 of us stayed in Dani's tiny apartment that was featured in a recently posted video of us getting Chase into the loft. Yesterday Dani had to work some so she left the rest of us to play in the snow. We bundled up and headed to the park for some snow soccer. Molly's choice of teammate was Gina (yeah she plays pro soccer in Germany). So Goldberg and I had to put the two soccer players in their place by beating them at their own game. We then rescued Dani from the lab and went home to eat some salad rolls. We had dinner in town and then hung out a bar for a bit before coming back to Dani's apartment for a small dance party to welcome in the new year. Dani dropped Gina at the bus just before 7am for her flight home so she can get back to Germany in a couple days. Our plans now are to hang out in Boulder for a few more days before meeting a few other friends in Breckenridge. More updates to come.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!