SNOW, Snow!!!

In a fantastic turn of events Voss received a fair amount of snow on Thursday and Friday. This was coupled with a training "get together" here in Voss. Originally the nordies from Bergen and other nearby places were going to come to Voss, however, it seems that everywhere else got more snow and people decided to stay at home and ski there. The training arrangement was great and included food that hit all my major consideration: delicious, free, no preparing, no cleaning up etc.. (
We started the weekend with a run on Friday night. Luckily the snow that was falling in the town was the sort of snow that is impolite not to throw at other people so we had a snow ball fight throughout the run. Using my prior baseball (2nd grade on the Marlins) and football (I like to think I was the Tom Brady of after school football on the hollowed grounds of Morley Elementary School) experience, as well as my innate American sense of war tactics I was able to claim victory (another of my American traits: willingness to claim victory with limited evidence to support that claim) over the peace loving Norwegians that were born without a sport to teach them that one arm can be dominate. The next day was highlighted with my first ski of the year. While there was not a lot of snow (maybe 4 inches) there was enough to ski on a road to nowhere (it was about 10 minutes of skiing long and then just ended with nothing of note on either side for the whole length). This first ski is always is bit awkward as those of the nordic cult spend many hours during the non-snowy months training on rollerskis which are about 60 centimeters long before switching to skis that can be as long as 210 cm. Therefore the first 10 to 20 minutes of the first ski are spent being generally frustrated at ones apparent regression in skiing ability despite hundreds of hours of training since the snow melted for exactly this opportunity. But, soon the feelings are all good as one reacclimatizes to the new settings and one is left feeling great that winter is finally upon them. However, winter is most likely not here to stay, at least in the town (the surrounding mountains are probably safe), so during the coming month I will have to put back on my rollerski tips in a melancholy ceremony, the horror of which is usually reserved for the spring time. In the meantime I get to wake up to winter!!