cross-country tr (tangentally skiing-related)

it's challenging to find the right words to express all of the thoughts in my head. over the past two weeks i've finished grad school, ended my internship placement and accepted a new job. one of the exciting aspects of this all is that the new job is on the other side of the continental divide.

the stoke around these parts has surely played a part in my move towards actualizing some of my dreams, and for that i want to thank the community.

after returning from 5000+ miles of driving, i'm in full decompression mode. catching up on e-mail, drinking coffee and basically relaxing. thought i'd throw up some pics and a few remarks from my recent trip. hopefully i've figured out how to resize them, link to the hosting site, etc....

http://img74.echo.cx/img74/7072/friedcurds7kx.th.jpg
one of the best things about the first portion of the drive, while speeding through wisconsin, was the fried cheese curds. i highly recommend.

http://img74.echo.cx/img74/1551/offi...ache1ti.th.jpg
my friend, officer mustache, seen here in a top-secret rear-view mirror photo, thought that my right foot was too heavy as i drove through north dakota. i think the suby's out-of-state plates influenced his decision to put down the donut and pull me over. "what are you doing here?" and "where are you going?" were the only questions he asked me besides "do you know how fast you were going?" besides having a great mustach, he was a charmer.

http://img74.echo.cx/img74/4163/carsleeping3ou.th.jpg
luxury accomodations in eastern montana. as the people in calgary or other places nearby could probably report, that altough it's not raining in the photo... the conditions were pretty wet and not tenting-friendly.

http://img74.echo.cx/img74/5295/glacier19xl.th.jpg
driving through glacier national park on the going to the sun road was amazing, even if it was kinda dank and rainy. a very verticle kind of place, and a nice introduction to my soon-to-be town of residence.

http://img74.echo.cx/img74/4503/welcome4tx.th.jpg
i've been told that the camera adds a few pounds. not sure how to account for the rest of them though. once the rain stopped, the skies/sunsets were postcard material. i'm excited about taking up residence.

http://img273.echo.cx/img273/9716/tetons6zr.th.jpg
after hanging out in kalispell for a while, and trying to start thinking about how i might afford to reside in such a place considering my loan debt and wimpy income (sigh) the trip moved southward... to the tetons.

http://img273.echo.cx/img273/3936/bubbas6zr.th.jpg
the girlfriend/co-pilot directed us here for lunch on our first day in jackson. we then went back for dinner on the same day. mmm.... bbq.

http://img273.echo.cx/img273/8871/to...vous4kf.th.jpg
we didn't even need to use the tram y'all were going on about in that other thread to reach rendezvous peak.

http://img273.echo.cx/img273/2127/helmet2gk.th.jpg
but we did take a ride up with the tram with some dudes with parachutes.

http://img273.echo.cx/img273/9133/gliding1tf.th.jpg
my hair looks sexy as i glide towards the village, no? for some reason, the girlfriend and her guide took off five minutes before me and my guide... and they landed a few minutes afterwards. apologies to the dude who had to be strapped to me instead of being strapped to her.

http://img273.echo.cx/img273/5619/badlands9sc.th.jpg
the badlands weren't too shabby either. thank goodness for air-conditioning in the car. it was hot out there.

http://img273.echo.cx/img273/5539/cornpalace2pn.th.jpg
the obligatory corn palace photo.

it was a crazy journey. most of the best parts of the trip weren't captured by the digi-cam. there is something calming and wonderful about speeding through the landscape, watching the countryside. there are some crazy people out there, including those folks who were walking past the window of ann sathers the other morning as they prepared for some kind of special parade that was to happen in chicago. the hot cinnamon rolls were bomber, but we didn't stick around for the parade.

thank you to everyone for providing the stoke over the years. when i came to the community, first at that other place, it was to escape from a dead-end cubicle job. i've met some genuinely awesome people and on many occasions been inspired. it'll be nice to have more to share with the board than a defense of pittsburgh now and then. hopefully there will be some maggots up in the northeastern montana/big mountain area or interior british columbia area at some point that i can ski with. i'm excited to learn new things and expand my skills. (or is that "skillz"?) props to the maggots.