Wasabi-coated peanuts

I was introduced to these today. Wasabi is also known as "Japanese horseradish," and it's a well-deserved name. These carry quite a punch. Here's my step-by-step experience with eating wasabi-coated peanuts:

1. Upon biting into a couple of the peanuts, your first impression is that a horse has kicked you in the mouth. Your lips burn so much that you think they're going to fall off, and your throat starts to constrict.

2. As these sensations become even more intense over two or three seconds, you spend a few moments wishing for a quick death.

3. The agony subsides fairly quickly, and assuming you live through steps 1 and 2, the peanuts are actually pretty good. I recommend them. Just be prepared for a life-changing experience the first time you try them.

Again

We took the kids skiing again today, and I got in some more runs down the hill. I'm slowly remembering what I knew before, although I'm not trying to get into any kind of championship form. It was cold and windy today, so we only stayed for a couple of hours. It's amazing how drained you get after just a little while out in the cold and wind. A good day overall.

Ugly but okay

I survived my first ski day. It wasn't real stylish, but it was good to get out there. I just trudged up the bunny hill a few times and skied back down. It started to get snowy, cold, and foggy after a while, so that was enough for today.

Between my MS and my 40s, my legs aren't the same as they were when I was in my teens. I can't always trust them to do what I want. It'll take me some time to figure out how far I can push them. (If you want to look on the bright side, though, I'll bet there aren't many people who can ski seventeen years into an MS diagnosis, so I'm grateful for that.) I'm also trying to adopt to the new type of skis. The new skis turn much differently from the old ones. The ankle bugged me a little after I was done, but I didn't notice it much while I was skiing, so that was good.

All in all, it's safe to say that I won't be getting back to the level I was at when I was a teenager, but I want to get back to the level where I can get down a hill in one piece. And I defeinitely can't have my kids showing up me, can I?

Not today

I woke up this morning, looked out the window, saw the snow that had accumulated and was still falling, and said to myself, "I don't think this is going to happen." Sure enough, the weather is bad enough that the little bunny hill I was going to visit isn't operating today. It's only open for three hours a day on weekdays anyway. I'm at work as usual right now. We'll see how things are tomorrow.

Skiing tomorrow

I'm going skiing at the local bunny hill tomorrow to see what I can still do. It'll only be for a couple of hours. Here's hoping . . . .

Life's too short to be smart

I'm going to do a really stupid thing tonight and stay up for the Vikings game. It starts at around 12:30 a.m. Switzerland time. If the Vikings win, they'll be in the Superbowl. I haven't ever been a die-hard Vikings fan, but it's been kind of fun to see the 40-year-old Brett Favre lead the Vikings back to greatness. I've already warned my boss that I'm anticipating some sort of car trouble or train schedule difficulty that will cause me to be late for work tomorrow morning. You only live once, right? And I'm not getting any younger. Might as well go for it.

If I get to bed at 4:00 in the morning, I can get three hours of sleep before it's time to get the kids ready for school. I've worked on three hours of sleep before. Or maybe I can snooze for another hour or two and then make it to work.

We're still alive

There's just not much to report. The kids go to school, I go to work, Stace cleans things and unnecessarily makes our bed every day, and so it goes.

We got Tanner's annual health report back from the school. He's in the 50th percentile for height and in the 10th percentile for weight. When you combine those two facts, his BMI puts him at least as low as the third percentile. (The charts don't go any lower than the third percentile.) So his existence continues to be tenuous.