~!~Friday, January 10, 2003~!~
After much planning ,discussion, invitations to friends to go snowboarding, and a lot of freaking money for the gear, cabin, food and lift ticket, the time has finally arrived. This was a trip for the ages, or probably a trip for people before school started. (For some, because some already started school.) The brave adventurers who would be engaging in this snowboarding trip were Anthony, Candy, Henry, Jaime, Rosa, Linda(Rosa's cousin and Henry's sister), and myself. The Magnificent Seven! This day started really boring. It seems when you anticipate something, it just seems to come by slower, but for someone trying to be more social, this was a must go to trip. I had some beef with my snowboarding overalls and Ant wanted a pair of snowboarding pants with a belt, like Henry's did, so we went to Sportsmart and exchanged our things. (This was like at about 3:00PM, and I did not even pack yet...)After that we went to Sav-ons to get a video tape for the camcorder and batteries for my ghetto protable T.V. Cost me 17 freaking dollars! Oh well. After that Ant went to get some windshield wipers because his were getting crappy. Well, I got dropped off at home and packed. Ant came at 6:00PM, picked me up and we went back to his house. Henry just arrived when we did, and Rosa and Linda were already there. The five of us went shopping at Superior for food and snacks. After about an hour at the market, we were done. We went back to Ant's house and waited for Jaime, but Anthony and I went to go pick up some items at my house and to pick up Candy. We were all finally there, and then we took off for Big Bear, but with a stop at the bank for Henry first. We all didn't eat and while at the bank, Candy decided to go buy Arby's. Now, finally, we were off to Big Bear! The drive was quite all right, until we hit the area that led up the mountain. The turns and swurves were really fun at first, but then became nauseating, to me anyways and especially on an empty stomach...blah. But we finally made it up the mountain and now we were trying to find our cabin. Anthony was leading and Jaime was following. Ant was following the directions that he wrote down on a piece of paper. The lady that we called gave it to him, but she forgot to mention to make a left at Big Bear Blvd., so this caused us to get lost. It was funny though because Candy(who was riding with Jaime) called Ant and asked him, "Do you know where we are going?" And Ant said, "Of course I know where I'm going. I'm Coolboi!" So we drive and we never found
Moonridge, the street we were suppose to turn on. So we are at this weird street, and Anthony pulls over and gets out of the car and says, "I'm lost!" Well, we all went out and were messing with the hard snow because most of us never experienced snow of any kind. We then got in the car and we called the lady. She led us to Moonridge and then the connection died out on us. (Thanks a lot, stupid T-Mobile) Ant couldn't find his paper with the directions and the address of the cabin, so just based on memory we drove to find our cabin. We did get lost a little bit because of the weird roads, but we finally found the street our cabin was at, Sylviangren. We drove up the street and looked at the many cabins that were there. Since we didn't have the paper with the address, based on memory, Ant and Rosa remembered the address number as 1607 or something. The lady told us that she left the lights on for us and the door was unlocked. We stopped in front of a cabin that looked pretty nice. Everyone in Ant's car was like "That is a nice cabin!" The problem, it was 1706 and like we thought that someone lived there, so we decided to drive higher up assuming that if 1706 was there, 1607 must be up more. We drove up until Sylviangren became another street so we pulled over again and then Ant got out and went to Jaime's car and said, "I lost the paper with the address!" Linda and I went out to look for the paper, not believing that it fell out or something and then Linda found it in between the driver side car door and the seat. Looking at the paper, we realized that the cabin we stopped in front of before was our cabin. We drove back to it and parked, and then we all got out of the car and ran into the cabin. Candy got dropped by Jaime. It left a mark!(Poor Candy) Anyways, the cabin was very nice. It wasn't that big, but it was very cozy. There was a living room with a sofa, loveseat, lounge chair, T.V., furnace(a stove-like fireplace thingy), the works! Plus a bedroom with a queen or king size bed, with a closet and a T.V. in there as well. Upstairs was a little room that had two full or twin sized beds. There was a backyard that overlooked the forest, which is pretty cool, but also very creepy. The bad thing...a 3/4 restroom. Not a full one!! WTH?!?! I'm sorry, but I am picky about my restroom space. (When I own my own house, I want a big restroom and closet!) Anyway, after claiming our beds and stuff, it dawned on us that we should unload all of our stuff, so we brought in all of our stuff and plopped it down and made a big pile in the middle of the living room. We found out that the beds we claimed wouldn't fit all seven of us, so we had to move people around. Ant(who claimed the queen sized bed in the bedroom all to himself) and Candy took the two beds upstairs(I sacrificed my bed, *sniff sniff*), Rosa and Linda took the queen size bed in the bedroom, since they are cousins and the only people who would share a bed(Soon to find out that was not true), and Jaime, Henry, and I took the sofa, loveseat, and lounge chair, respectively. (I always wanted to say that, "respectively." I feel more like a journalist. *wink wink*@ Juju) We unpacked our stuff, and made the cozy little cabin feel more like home. After that, everyone went to check out the back or watch T.V. I went to play games on the ghetto SEGA Genesis that was included with the cabin. They found wood in the back, but it was too wet to start in the furnace, so the heater would have to do this night. Everyone was watching T.V and then Jaime discovered something about the sofa. It wasn't just a sofa, but in fact a sofabed! It folded out and then Ant, Jaime, and Henry all got on it to watch T.V. Ant, Linda, and Rosa went into the bedroom to play games, while Henry and Jaime went to sleep on the sofabed(maybe they should have slept in the queen sized bed! haha, j/p), and I went upstairs to chat with Candy and keep her company. We just chatted and caught up on things. Anthony came up and then I got out of the bed(which was really comfortable) and went downstairs. After brushing up and like setting up my sleep area, Anthony and Candy came down and wanted something to eat. I decided to make sandwiches because the real food that we had was for the next 2 days. All of a sudden, Rosa and Linda came out of their room, and I offered to make them a sandwich, and then Henry arose from his slumber and wanted one as well. He said Jaime was awake and I asked if he wanted one. He did, but then knocked out right after. So I made sandwiches for everyone. They said to let Jaime sleep, so I did. After sandwiches, everyone went to sleep. Rosa helped me dry the dishes after I washed them, and then she tried to start a fire in the furnace. I decided to read some magazines and she decided to burn one. I saw one with Kirsten Dunst and told her to burn that one because I don't like her. She ripped it page by page and tried to fuel the fire with te magazine, but was unsuccessful. I had brought a folder with paper so I could write about my snowboard experience, poems, stories, or whatever. I was going to write something, but then Rosa jacked me and started drawing little pictures. Rosa really wanted to go and find her camera that she lost, so first we go and look in the car and around the car. I was just wearing my black Nike Sweatshirt and shorts. It wasn't there. So next she wanted to go walk the neighborhood because she thought that she lost it when we pulled over at the top of the street, so I had to go and change into a jacket and sweats. I used Henry's because it was closer. I also brought my gloves and my beanie. Rosa used my jacket. We walked up to the spot where we pulled over and searched for the camera, but it was no where to be found. Rosa looked up and we saw the beautiful night sky. There were stars everywhere! It was so nice! It was better than the meteor shower that occurred like in November/December recently, where even people in the smog covered city could see it. Rosa's gloves were not keeping her warm, so I traded gloves with her.(I had the expensive ones made for snow, she had some crappy leather ones that cost a lot less) I kept seeing things that were really freaky and things moving, but it was just my eyes playing tricks on me and our shadows. To make things worse, we heard a freaky thing calling. I am not sure what the hell it was, but I sure as hell was not going to find out. I just kept telling myself that it was a bird, just to calm myself down. We got back in the cabin, and warmed up because it was so freaking cold. After a while, Rosa went to her room to go to sleep. Henry got off the sofabed and moved over to the lovesear. I got on to the lounge chair with the foot stool to support me and the coffee table with a cushion on top for my feet, so I was sleeping on this uneven unproportioned "bed," but it was all right. I knocked out at about 4:00AM, and the lady was coming over at 8:30AM to collect the money from us for the cabin. It was freaking $607.50! AI-YAH! So thus ends Day 1.
~!~Saturday, January 11, 2003~!~
I woke up at 7:00AM due to Anthony's creeping. He jumped over me on the lounge chair, footstool, and table, and like had a rough landing and it woke me up. Some other people were awake , but I forget who. There is this bell that rings pretty loud, and Anthony got it and brought it upstairs. Candy was still sleeping. He told me to go up and record it with his camcorder, so I did. He rang it and she woke up, but she didn't jump or anything. She just kept complaining to Anthony about a loud ring that was right next to her ear. Well it was time for breakfast, and everyone began to do their morning hygiene. I was busy cooking eggs, bacon, sausage, and toast. It was pretty tough to make things even because there was pretty much 12 of everything and 7 people, so a little compromise was inorder, but eventually everything worked out. (Plates were also a problem, but two little plates equals one big one). After about an hour in the kitchen, I was done, and Candy, Rosa, and Linda helped bring plates from the kitchen to the dining table. There were only 6 chairs, so I chose to use the footstool as my chair. We ate the food to gain energy for snowboarding. After breakfast, I cleared the table and washed the dishes. The lady stopped by to pick up the money, and we all put in our share for the cabin. After she collected the money, we decided to get ready for snowboarding. We all got dressed and ready with our jackets and stuff, but we were hanging around for a while and it started to get hot, so the jackets, beanies, and gloves came off. (Not to mention that we had like shirts and sweats on under the jacket because we thought we would be too cold.) We finally left and went to a store near Snow Summit and rented our boots and snowboard. It only cost $20 for both, which was pretty cheap, but then we still had to lift tickets to buy. All of a sudden after we bought our stuff, nature called, and I really had to use the restroom. (Not just number one mind you) It was weird, it just hit me like right before we were going to snowboard, so they took me back to the cabin(because I didn't trust the public restrooms) and yeah took a quickie. So after 5 minutes, I was ready to die. So we drove to Snow Summit, which was not that far away from our cabin, but there was no parking up there, so we had to drive to an alternative parking lot, but that had no parking as well, so we drove to another one located on Garstan. We then put on our boots and got our boards and walked to the truck that transports people to the top of the mountain to the ski lift ticket area. We got in line and bought tickets. They only cost $35 rather than the $50 we anticipated. I wanted a half day ticket, but they didn't go on sale until 12, and I didn't want to wait for an hour, so I just spent 9 dollars more. To make matters worse, the guy at the counter did not believe that I was still a teen. Teen tickets were a lot cheaper and stopped at age 19. I was only 18, but he didn't believe me. So he asked for ID and I went to take it out, but I had given it to the snowboard rental place. They wanted to hold on to it, so if anything happened to the boards we would be liable for it. Eventually he let me have the teen lift ticket. We then were finally ready for snowboarding! We went on the Internediate lift and when it was my turn to get on with Henry, I slipped and fell, so I had to go on the next one with some guy. He was really nice, he helped me up and was talking to me and giving me tips on how to snowboard, and how to get off the lift. When we finally reached the top, I got off the lift, and guess what? I fell. Then I got back up, but I kept falling down. This was just at the top, I wasn't even going down the slopeI couldn't even stand up, so after a hundred falls, I finally made it to where everyone was at. Henry saw me fall down a lot. I went to go buckle up my other foot onto the snowboard and the next thing I know when I look up is that everyone is gone. They all went down the slope, so I buckled quick and then tried to go down to catch up with them. Only problem, I couldn't stand up. I kept falling down and after like a 20 minute effort of trying to stand up without falling down, I got tired, and already hurt my wrist and palm. Not to mention my knees. I then crawled my way to a bench and then spent a lot of time looking at how other people were doing it. They jumped and then were off. So I thought I could do it, so I stood up, but only fell down once again. It was troubling. I was trying to snowboard and then I couldn't even stand on my stupid snowboard. Ant called me and was telling me to go down. I told him I was and like I couldn't even stand, but then eventually I saw some more people do it, and then went for it. I stood up, and hopped and I took off! I was snowboarding! Then after a few feet, I fell. The slope split into two. Ant told me to go on the right, so I did. IT looked a lot less flat, and I was doing well, traveling pretty far distance and falling. And I kept picking myself up. It was really difficult, because I got tired of picking myself up, and sometimes I had to turn my body around, with the snowboard attached to my legs, so I was like rolling around, probably looking really funny. I took off my glasses and put them in my jacket pocket, but like they fell off, so I wore them underneath my goggles, even though they fogged up. I kept snowboarding down, but none of my friends were to be found. I then hit this little slope, but I couldn't make it over. I tried to get up and go down it, but I couldnt make the curve. And one time I got up and snowboarded a couple of feet and fell, but then my camera fell, and these guys told me about it which was really cool, but then I had to go crawl my way bac the few feet I had jsut traveled. (Gay!) So after like 15 minutes trying to get up and snowboard and falling, I just decided to take off my snowboard and walk it. It was okay, but then I slipped and started riding on my butt. Some girl on the ski lift yelled out, "If you are going to walk downwards, go in a diaginal motion! It's much easier!" So I took her advice and it was easier. I walked and walked until I reached another split. This time both slopes were very, very steep, so no matter which one I chose, I would slip and ride it. I chose the one on the right. I started walking down and then i just slipped and fell, but since it was so steep, I just kept riding it on my @$$. One of the workers came skiing up to me and started asking me if I was okay and stuff, and I was having a normal conversation with her, me sliding down on my butt and her skiing down on, well, skis. She said that she should probably call for assistance to help me get down the slope, but she saw that I wasn't hurt or anything, so she let me ride down the hill on my butt. She then told me what was coming up, so I could prepare to slide. There were two more steep slopes then I would hit the bottom and be able to walk to the bottom. So I rode and rode...It was really fun! I even learned how to control myself by digging my hand into the snow, so I could control if I was going left or right. On the last steep slope, I was going down and then all of a sudden, I went haywire. I was sliding down, looking down, then I turned, and I was facing the back, then I was sliding on my back and then all of a sudden I flipped over, all the while gripping on to my snowboard, because I didn't want to lose it and pay $500. I flipped over and the snowboard was under me, and then I rode the slope like Superman on my stomach and chest down. It felt so cool and was really really fun! I was going fast too! The girl on the skis was right behind me to make sure that I was going to be okay. I finally reached the bottom of the slope and saw the lift area. It was sad that it had to end. I then said my goodbye to the nice worker lady, and then walked my way to the lfits. I called Anthony, and he told me that they were almost down. So I found a bench to sit at and rest. I saw Candy walking, and called to her. She came to me and asked me how was it. I wanted to tell her about my superman ride and buttslide, but then she was asking if I wanted to go up again. I said no, because I had quite the experience, but then she said that it was a waste of money. I didn't care. I tried doing it and that was good enough for me. I would have never even gone, but to go was an accomplishment to me already. We then walked to Ant and Jaime, who were resting by a van. And like we were sharing our snowboard story with eachother and I was telling about how I struggled to stand up and stuff, and then Candy was telling me "Because you didn't try and shit, at least they(Ant and Jaime) tried, and got the hang of it!" That just pissed me off. I did try. I tried really hard It isn't my freaking fault that I couldn't freaking stand up on my board. And what the hell? Everyone jsut left me, so I was left to do this new thing on my own. I didn't give up until i couldn't do it anymore. I was in a good moood, and I really tried to do it, but I was just not that good. If this was a year ago, and she told me that "I didn't try," I wouldn't care because I probably didn't, but this year I am trying new things, and actually doing my freaking best to be more social and have more fun, and worry less about everything. And then Candy freaking tells me that "I didn't even try." That was another thing that pissed me off. I was trying my best and hardest, and I couldn't get it, which frustrated me and got me mad. It's discouraging to find out that you are trying your hardest and you just can't seem to get it. So I was mad throughout the whole ride back to the cabin. I didn't talk to anyone. And not to mention that I was crying the whole way back to the cabin as well. I hate myself, because when I get upset or angry, tears just come out. Oh well. When we finally went back to the cabin, we all just relaxed. Candy apologized to me on the mountain, but I didn't want to talk to her. When we got home, I guess I just calmed down, and everything was back to normal, sort of. Candy had a big scrape on her back due to the other night when Jaime dropped her on hard ice, and like I brought a mini first aid kit, and let her use it. Ant, Jaime, and I then went to go buy some groceries for lunch. (It was like 3 all ready.) There were two markets and we went to both, One was like a convienietn store, and the other was a mini market that had everything we were looking for. We were browsing the store and stumbled upon Hot Cocoa and Marshmellows!!! (They had small marshmellows, but they were all hard and crusty, so we got the bigger ones, and then Jaime was like, "Will they work?" Because he was thinking about the Simpsons episode where Bart put in a big marshmellow and it absorbed all the cocoa and then he had to eat it with a knife and fork!! Haha) Then I saw pasta and stuff and decided that I would make spaghetti for lunch. Ant bought soup for himself, and then I bought some stuff for omlettes for tomorrow's breakfast. We also bought insence, Cool Water smell. Then we went to buy firewood because we bought firestarters so we would have a fire in the furnace! When we got back, everyone looked tired and was relaxing in the living area watching T.V. It was time for cooking. I boiled some water for the spaghetti, and also poured some in the kettle and made the Hot Cocoa for everyone. Anthony wanted to grill the meat on the bar-be-que, so he cleaned and prepared it, but soon found out that there was not enough coal. I wanted to pan fry it. Somehow, BBQ just doesn't taste good, unless you do it right, and by the looks of things, there would be trouble. Anyways, the spaghetti lunch just turned into a big giant dinner, a linner you might say. Anyways, it was a feast! We had soup, spaghetti with meat sauce(I had to make the meat sauce because I grabbed the wrong jar of pasta sauce. We were suppose to get all ready prepared meat sauce. But then Jaime and Henry went to go buy Parmesian cheese and ground beef when they went to return the snowboards and boots.), garlic bread(something I decided to make at the last minute. My first time too! And it was good!), steak, and baked potato. Dinner went well, and after I was slaving over the kitchen for 3 hours right after snowboarding, I was too tired to do the dishes. Trust me, there was a lot of dishes!! (Ask Candy..hehe..she is god! You'll find out what I mean on Day 3) We all were watching "She's All That" during dinner. It ended, and then I remember watching "The Battle of the Sexes" on MTV, then this one dating show called "Taildaters" also on MTV. But eventually I knocked out watching the dating show. (It was about like 8:30 when I knocked out.) I then woke up and jacked Jaime's blanket on the sofabed. Jaime was washing up, but he was cool with it. I would have went to my lounge chair bed, but I was too tired to get out of bed, and move, so I just stayed there. Jaime got out and I was going to get off, but he insisted on me sleeping there, so I did. So after Jaime and I played musical beds, I knocked out, along with everyone else(9:00?), or so I thought. I wake up like 20 minutes or so and I see Rosa and Linda in front of the T.V. (Jaime was also awake watching it with them from his bed, but I didn't know) browsing through channels, until Linda stopped on a movie that was being shown called "Overboard." I heard her describe it to Rosa, and her saying it was one of her favorite movies, then I knocked out. I woke up again to see Rosa and Linda go to their room. I get out of the bed to use the restroom, and then Henry sees me awake. He soon knocks out. I return and get in bed, but it was so freaking hot because the fire was going, and the heater was on, and I kicked off my blanket a little. I go to sleep and then I wake up again in the middle of the night because I was freaking hot. I wake up only to find that someone had covered me with blankets again. (turned out to be Rosa) I drink some water and then go back to sleep.
~!~Sunday, January 12, 2003~!~
I wake up, only to find Jaime all ready awoken. I was freaking cold now, because the fire died out and like it felt like the heater wasn't working. So I just lied in bed, curled up in a fetal position trying to warm up. I then hear the water running and clinging and clanging going on and take a peak at the kitchen. There stood Candy conquering
Mount Dishpile!!! She woke up and spent the whole morning washing the dishes that was left over from last night. It took her a while too. (That is why Candy is god!) I got up and gave Candy a hug because she saved me from the dishes! Linda comes out of her room and just says, "Man, I'm sore everywhere!" Anthony went to take a shower. (HOT WATER JACKER!!!) Then after Ant got out, Jaime went to take one. After Jaime came out, all refreshed, then I decided to take one as well. So i turn on the water, and put my hand under the water supply. I waited for it to get warm, it didn't even begin to. So after like 3 minutes if waiting for hot water, I gave up and went back and complained about no hot water. Candy was like, "I know...I have been washing these dishes in cold water for the past I don't know how long." Jaime then says, "I know, I was left taking a cold shower like in the middle of it. Which leaves Anthony, who took all the hot water. Hence,
Hot Water Jacker!!! Anyways, Candy finished doing dishes, and I helped her put them away. Then I made Hot Cocoa for everyone, and then went to watch T.V. They were watching Rugrats, and then
SPONGEBOB SQAREPANTS!! (Look a Giraffe!! *Spongebob laugh*) After watching an episode about Crabby Patties, everyone got hungry, so I went to the kitchen and started making the omlettes. Noticing that we still had like sandwich supplies in the fridge, and nothing else but just the omlette, I made sandwiches for everyone on the side. Then it was time to eat. The omlettes were good if I do say so myself, and we watched "Dogma." (Or finished watching Dogma) After clearing the table, and not doing the dishes, this old ghetto, 80's teen movie called "License to Drive" came on, and we all decided to watch it. So we all sat down on the sofabed(Jaime and me), loveseat(Rosa and Linda), footstool(Linda at first then Henry), dinner chairs(Henry), lounge chair(Anthony), and steps near the heater(Candy). Candy then decides to go to sleep. Henry decides to take a shower, right when I was going to. I let him go first, and decided to take one after the movie. Everyone was dead. Like 3/4 into the movie I finally decide to take a shower and I do. It was cool. I felt all refreshed after that. And as I came out, I see Anthony bringing the bell upstairs again to wake up Candy. (Candy got him back yesterday) He rings it, and I think Henry records it. After finsihing the movie, then we started packing up. Got everything together and loaded up the car. It was now time to leave out little cabin that we called home for the weeked. We took off, and headed home. We reach the mountan and start going downhill. Anthony sees people playing in the snow and then he decides to pull over on the side and have one last moment in the show before we go home. We got out of the car, and just stand and watch other people in the snow, and talk for a while. Then we head off again. (That was a waste of time) We go onto the freeway, and this is when I start dozing off, and waking up again. I like wake up at the right moments. Ant gets on the 30 freeway and doesn't know which one to take, so he asks me and I am awake that time to tell him San Bernardino, not Redlands. Then I doze off again and wake up to see him take the 215 freeway, and he tells me to look at the Thomas Guide to see if we could head home this way. We could. Then I doze off again and awake to see this Lexus who didn't have enough space to cut in front of Anthony, try to cut in, almost hitting Ant's car. Ant swurved out of the way, so he wouldn't hit and honked his horn for a really long time. This woke up Linda and Rosa and scared them as well. And that bastard still cuts in front of Anthony. Oh well. After that, the ride home was pretty peaceful. We finally reach Ant's house. We have to wait for Jaime. Ant brings his stuff inside, Linda and Rosa bring their stuff to Linda's car. They have a drive to Riverside coming up. (which is kinda gay because we just passed by it going back from Big Bear) Jaime comes, and delivers Henry and Candy. I unload my stuff from his car into Ant's and so does Candy. Henry brings his stuff into his car. Jaime goes home to sleep. Ant, Candy, Henry, Rosa, Linda, and I stay a while and chat. Then Ant takes me and Candy home. Linda and Rosa leave when we do, and Henry stays at Ant's for a while, but goes home soon. (He goes to Irvine) I finally unload and then go online, waiting for Ant to wake up because we are suppose to go play CS. It eventually falls, and we end up not going. Later on like at midnight, I start talking to people online, and talk to Truong. Haven't seen that foo in a long time, so I ask him if he wants to go shoot pool with the homies when he comes back on Friday to visit. He agrees, and I start inviting people, plus inviting people to go snowboarding for the 50th Anniversary. ($20 all day lift tickets) I invite Ant to go shoot pool for Truong's thing, but I forgot to add "Friday" so he thinks I mean now, so we go shoot pool. Since we do have that bet going. So we go and I lose to that fucker.
I am now down 14-1.
I was down 5-1.
9 Freaking games and not one win!! GAY!! And that was how my weekend ended.
THE FREAKING END
P.S. Thanks guys for a most memorable weekend, and winter vacation memory. It was a lot of fun, and it was pretty good to get away from my life, even if just for a while. You people are the bestest! It's really cool how even though we graduated and all headed our seperate ways, that we still find time to chill and hang out. Thanks for the painful and fun snowboarding trip! You guys are the bestest!
