snow retreat recap

Long time no blog! So brace yourselves for a recap of epic proportions.

The first week back in general was pretty filled with fun. It was great settling back in and catching up with people again, and I found myself occupying a slightly different niche than the one I had left back in December. Not to say that this is a bad thing, on the contrary, I find that this branching out may actually be better for me, so hoorah for that. The first week was also pretty successful in the academic and health aspects. I actually did my homework for the most part, and what I didn't do was really not my fault. Honestly, if you say it is due on Friday, I would think it'd be due Friday afternoon or something. Not Thursday at 12 AM. Though it is technically Friday already, but whatever, my TA is dumb. At least now I know. Anyway, I was pretty healthy last week too! I went to the gym four days and legitimately worked out and felt pretty damn good. Eating healthier and snacking less, as well. Hopefully this pattern will continue.

This weekend a bunch of people from my hall drove up to Lake Arrowhead for our winter retreat. It was a total of about 25ish people so it was quite comfy and fun for all. We left Friday evening after dinner and arrived at the ginormo and luxurious mansion later that night. It was freaking huge and amazing and we definitely had fun playing sardines and exploring. Bonding activities were fun as usual, and then we all tried to turn in early because the following day would be activity filled and energy was definitely required!

However, this plan failed pretty epically. I went to bed around 12:30, decided it would be a good idea to make win sandwiches with my friends at around 1:00, and then ended up back on my pillow by around 2:30. Oh also, I was sleeping in a room filled with about 10 people and MAN do people breathe loudly! Not only snore because there was plenty of that, but BREATHING! SO LOUDLY, EVERYWHERE! I did not get a wink of sleep and I dragged my grumpy and moody ass out of bed at 5:30 to get ready for a day of snowboarding.

We got to the rather sad little resort around 8 and to our dismay, found out that only two lifts were open due to high winds. One lift was up an almost completely flat span of space, and the other went up a bunny-hill like run with three options for coming down. Also, it was not snowy, it was icy. Hard and cold and...ICE. Yeah. Going into it I was pessimistic about the conditions but I turned out to have a pretty fantastic day on that one hill, minus my moment of eating shit when trying to jump.

Speaking of! The boredom that the existence of one hill created encouraged me and my fellow snowboarding buddies to try some of the easier freestyle terrain. I successfully did a box and a jump, hoorah! I did completely eat shit on my second try at the jump though, I landed straight on my ass and slid a good 15 feet down the icy ramp. My hat and head parted, and it was sadly laying there being red and lonely for a while before my plea for help was finally answered. My butt is sore as a motherbitch, but it was totally worth it. Funnest ever. But yeah, a day of snowboarding for 8 hours will pretty much kill you. I was dead tired.

On the way back I also had a near-death experience. My friend decided to test out the 4-wheel-drive function of his new Land Rover on some steep snow banks and he deemed it an appropriate time. So he tried it, and it was pretty effing scary/badass all at the same time. Our car was tilted SO much I swore I was about to die and the glass would shatter and we would get in so much trouble etc. etc. but Land Rovers are a good deal! We are alive and live to tell this amazing story of adventure and risk. Haha, I didn't have one of those "life flashing before your eyes!" moments but I did worry about getting in trouble for forging my parents signatures for the release of liability for the trip. I definitely pictured myself in a hospital bed all bandaged up with my parents and RA yelling at me. Oh, conscience.

The rest of the night was filled with lounging around, the most amazing shower, a delicious dinner, and then a fat cuddlepuddle in the observatory. Overall a great ending to a great day, but I was feeling kind of sick and very exhausted so I retired early.

We left the cabin this morning at around 11. Maneuvering around the piles of people's crap was definitely hard, I felt like an 80 year old woman with severe arthritis and aches and pains etc. The drive back was really fun, we sang along to old-school songs and played around with the other car of people heading back. It was quite clever and fun.

Irvine welcomed us back with 85 degree weather, so the girls and I deemed it a good idea to sit in the park and simultaneously tan and study. We lugged our textbooks and happy selves to the beautifully sun-drenched Aldrich park and proceeded to lounge around and do very little homework, as expected! It was really fun and we were all having a great time until an epic bee decided it would be fun to terrorize us. So our party was broken up, and we headed back. I did get to climb a tree today, and it made me happy, so hoorah. Parks and picnics and good friends and sunshine make me happy.

Since then I have not really been doing much. Avoiding homework, watching the Golden Globes, looking at/tagging facebook pictures, the usual.

Sorry for a boring recap post, I promise next time I'll be more interesting and tell you about interesting things like failing at ordering food and the indecision that plagues my life. Also about the good happy times that happen, but for now I am too tired and too bored with myself to do anything to spice up this post.

Have a happy week!