By The Numbers

With the season nearly over, I think it's time to break things down by the numbers. Yes, there are a lot more numbers I could have picked, but these are the first 10 I thought of. And I think it's long enough as it is so, without further ado:

One: Dislocated finger! My first ever dislocated joint, too! Sadly, it didn't happen while snowboarding. I put my arm out to block a pass during a basketball game and the ball caught the tips of my fingers. I looked down at my hand and the last joint of my index finger was pointing straight backwards. I freaked out and quickly popped it back in place (I can still hear the little *click* sound it made when I popped it back in). The x-rays say that everything is in the right place (which is obviously good), but it's still pretty sore two weeks later. My students were the most disappointed, though. Showing up in the mornings with a big splint on my finger immediately prompted questions like, "Did you hurt yourself doing a backflip!?" Next time I'll just lie.

One: Student lost. I still haven't forgotten the first week of the year, when I managed to lose a student and break a girl's arm on her first run ever. Fortunately, I haven't lost anyone since. Unfortunately, more bones have been broken...

Two: Clients' wrists broken. But only two total, which really isn't that bad (or at least that's what I keep telling myself). I've already talked about this before, but the obvious truth is that snowboarding is dangerous. The not-as-obvious truth is that learning to snowboard at the end of the season is very dangerous. The snow turns to ice (especially in the morning when beginners are first getting on the snow!) and any fall can easily lead to a broken bone. Every time a student falls I cringe and hope that everything is okay (and people fall a lot when the learn to snowboard, so I've been doing a lot of cringing).

2.5: Pounds of chocolate I've eaten since Easter. Maybe it's just me, but why does every winter holiday seem to involve gluttony? It starts with Halloween (candy) and Thanksgiving (no explanation needed), continues through Christmas (chocolate advent calendar, anyone?) and New Years, and finishes strong with Valentine's Day and Easter. I mean, I was sitting alone in Park City for Valentine's Day, yet somehow I still ended up with sweethearts and chocolate.

Three: Working days left! There are so many reasons why I'm ready for the season to be over. Don't get me wrong, there are still reasons why it's still fun to teach, but they're overshadowed by my overwhelming desire to not be teaching right now. More than anything else, I'm hoping I can survive three more days without anyone getting hurt. I keep saying this, but you have no idea how easy it is for someone to go down right now. One the plus side, five inches of slush make it pretty much impossible to get any speed at all, so it's hard for anyone to get out of control.

Four: Days worked in the rain. Two points here. First of all, four days out of an entire season is pretty good. Compare this to say Seattle, where four days of rain in the mountains is just a bad week. So I won't complain about working in the rain one day a month. And secondly, it's actually kind of fun. Well, at first it sucks. But after 30 minutes or so everyone is soaking and it's not too cold (or else it would be snowing). At that point there's really nothing you can do but laugh at the situation. I guess more than anything else it's just a break from the norm. It gives us instructors something to else to think about and new ways to torture each other (for example, trying to dump water on other instructors while you're on the chairlift).

Six: Days left! The ski season ends next Sunday and I'm still not convinced that we're going to make it. Out of the 13 chairlifts on the mountain, 4 are currently running. And each trail is half-way closed right now. That is, the snow has all been pushed to one side of every trail so that there's enough to ride on. The main trail down to the first time chair lift now has a small stream running through that must be navigated across as well. This is a stark contrast to last Thursday, where at least the whole trail was open. It'll be interesting to see what this place looks like come Sunday. I promise I'll get my camera out there one of these days.

1 - 9: Park City Mountain Resort's basketball record. A few of us joined a local basketball league and we've been getting our destroyed pretty much every week. But we've all had a great time (aside from the game that we had to forfeit because one guy on our team kept insulting the refs -- good times!). The playoffs start on Thursday, I think we're going to be a dark horse.

92: Days I spent on the snow, according to my seasons pass. Sadly, with only six days left I don't think I'll be breaking the century mark this season. But I'll get close. And I think I can count the number of free ride days I had on two hands. That's really been the biggest problem for me this year: working full time as a snowboard instructor is physically and mentally exhausting. So after working 5 or 6 days in a row, the last thing I wanted to do is spend my day off on the mountain. All I really wanted to do was sit in bed and vegitate. If that means I'm not very hardcore, well so be it. Next year I'd like to work maybe 3 to 4 days a week and have some more time to enjoy snowboarding. C'est la vie!

200: Days until opening day next season. Even though I'm totally ready for a break from snowboarding, I'd love to spend another winter in the snow. This is the first winter I've ever spent completely surrounded by snow, and I love it. Speaking from experience I can safely say that it's way, way better than a winter of rain.

Alright, that'll do for now. I'm sure that in the next couple of days I'll think of a million other 'by the numbers' stats that I wish I had used here. Maybe I'll do a second post later this week. But for now, I'm off to enjoy my last three days as a professional snowboarder.