In quick non-running related news I got a pair of new climbing shoes last weekend! Here’s a lesson for you all from your Aunt Paula: don’t repeatedly leave your climbing shoes in your car after long, sweaty climbing sessions. They will start to smell. And they will smell so bad that you will have to get a new pair of climbing shoes because you simply cannot wear them around other people anymore. Big lesson there. Anyway, I am now the owner of a pair of La Sportiva Katanas! They are definitely more of a performance climbing shoe than I was using previously (5.10 Sirens), but I tried them out last Monday and loved them.

Excitement for the Katanas.

WEEKLY TRAINING

Monday – Bouldering session during lunch, then an evening redemption run! I made up the hill repeat workout from Nick that I bonked on last week. 20 minute warm-up at Green Mountain on the trails and then 4 x 5 minute hill repeats running 5 minutes up at 10K pace and jogging back down for recovery. It was pretty brutal but definitely a good workout.

Killer sunset on the drive back from Green Mountain.

Tuesday - 5 mile run on the High Line Canal with Laci, my Wild West Relay co-captain. It’s so nice to be getting back in running shape and to have five miles feel nice and easy. We also did an ab workout afterward.

Laci, me and Jenna after WWR last year. 2nd place medals!

Wednesday - Rest day. Duck poutine,  chicken and waffles and sour beer were calling my name at Euclid Hall.

Thursday - Oh you know, another rest day? Oops. In my defense I was exhausted and had a long run planned for Friday.

Friday - Long run at the Incline/Barr Trail! I started with the Incline which I got up in 39:04. I had wanted to break 38 minutes but it was also exactly noon and super hot so I will cut myself some slack. I then continued up the Barr Trail past the Incline but ended up turning around earlier than planned because I went through my entire water supply faster than anticipated. I got back down to the parking lot after an hour and 40 minutes, which was short of my original goal of at least 2 hours on my feet. Plan B: the Garden of the Gods. I refilled my water bottle and then finished the last 20 minutes of my run at the Garden of the Gods. My plan B running plan is someone else’s annual vacation. Pretty lucky girl here.

Saturday - Does picking up a race packet from Mile High Stadium count as a workout? No? Okay darn. Another rest day for the books.

Sunday - Leg 3 of the Colfax Marathon Relay! I ran on a charity team running for the Chill Foundation, which is a super cool organization that helps at-risk and underserved youth have a chance to snowboard. Even though I am a skier at heart I still think it is an awesome organization. I was even willing to run in a race for Chill! You may have noticed I’m not exactly entering races every other week here. Anyway, I have done relay races (e.g. the Wild West Relay and the Epic Relay) before but I have never done a relay race as short and urban as the Colfax Marathon Relay. It was semi-challenging to figure out how to get to the relay exchange but don’t worry I got there with five minutes to spare. My teammate handed the baton to me and off I went down beautiful Colfax Avenue! My leg was interesting…and I seriously ran right by Casa Bonita? It was kind of weird to be running next to marathoners and relay racers simultaneously because it was difficult to pace correctly. I’m sure the marathoners LOVED having us relay racers whiz by them too. I ended up running my 5.6 miles at 7:50 mile pace, which I was happy about. Let’s just say that my roommates and I had a housewarming barbeque on Saturday so I was perhaps not completely well rested and refreshed.

Molly has a great idea for the course next year! You hear Run Colfax organizers?

WEEKLY TOTAL - I don’t have a fancy Garmin so this is a complete estimate but 23 miles for the week? My goals for next week are definitely to take less rest days and to get my long run up to 2:15-2:30. Also huge thank you for bearing with me through these training blog entries (Hi Mom!). It honestly is just helping me be accountable. And write blog entries regularly again. Win win?

My blogger/Twitter friend Heidi emailed me this past Thursday and asked if I wanted to do a bib transfer for her friend Piper who could no longer run the Mt Evans Ascent. I thought about it for two seconds and then immediately accepted! The Mt. Evans Ascent, also known as America’s highest road race, is a 14.5 mile race up the road to the summit of Mt. Evans with about 4,000 feet of elevation gain. It’s going down on Saturday, June 15. I figure if nothing else it will be a great training run for the Pikes Peak Marathon. It should also be fun since Heidi is running it along with our other blogger/Twitter friend Lynne. You know your life is great when you are copied on an email that includes this: “Guess what Lynne?! Paula has lost her freaking mind! She’s running Evans with us!” Lost my freaking mind, yep that’s about right.

Anyway, in addition to signing up for more races I did do some actual training this week. It’s possible that my Week #1 was a little overambitious after taking so much time off from seriously running, so I definitely had to do more recovering this week than I would have liked. I have a feeling it will all pay off in Week #3 though!

WEEKLY TRAINING

Monday – 30 minutes of bouldering on my lunch break. Five mile run at upper Mt. Falcon in the evening. Felt okay.

Tuesday - 1.5 miles at Green Mountain! Originally planned to take Tuesday as a rest day, but instead decided to meet Nick (@fxdgear) and some other runners for hill repeats at Green Mountain. Couldn’t find the parking lot, made them all wait for me. Then absolutely died on the warm-up and called it quits. Totally not embarrassing at all, nope. My legs were not on the same page as the rest of my body. Went home and drank wine, so it all worked out.

Wednesday - Rest day! Saw the Rockies play the Yankees for a $1.

Thursday - Rest day again! Two days in one week is okay right? I actually probably would not have taken a rest day on Thursday under normal circumstances but I had tickets to see Zac Brown Band at Red Rocks so you know there was that. ZBB > Pikes Peak Marathon, sorry not sorry.

Friday - 2 hours of bouldering and climbing at Thrillseekers with Anne and Fran. Followed by 150 sit-ups. I believe in fun cross training activities!

Saturday - 2 hours of Mt. Sanitas in Boulder. My Wild West Relay teammate Jeremy (who is also a legit ultrarunner) organized a 12 hour run at Mt. Sanitas this past Saturday. I thought 2 hours would be sufficient for me. Had no idea that Mt. Sanitas = the Incline of Boulder. 1255 elevation gain in 1.8 miles. Summited twice in 2 hours for 7.2 miles with total elevation gain of ~2500 feet and loss of ~2500 feet. Graham and Cooper ran the first lap with me, but I was on my own the second. 10 minutes into the second lap I really thought I was going to have to turn around early but I kept pushing and made it.

Summit #2!

Sunday - Easy three mile recovery run on the Highline Canal. Passed a pony on the sidewalk. Typical Cherry Hills Village.

TOTAL - ~17 miles

It’s a good thing I already  decided that I do not care about mileage totals. However, my goal for next week is definitely more mileage and less rest days!

The most intimidating race profile I have ever seen.

The course.

You might be asking yourself why Paula why? Good question. I ask myself that often! The answer is just because. I want to run the Pikes Peak Marathon to prove to myself that I can do hard things. I think it was Walt Disney who said, “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.” And also there are really sweet finisher jackets.

Anyway, how has the training been going? Up until this week, to be honest, it has not really been going anywhere. You see April turned out to be a bit snowier than anticipated and can you really expect me to pass up skiing for running in the snow? Absolutely not. I maintain that skiing in April was useful cross training though. I did a lot of hiking to sidecountry terrain (e.g. Lake Chutes at Breckenridge, the Cirque at Winter Park/Mary Jane, and the North Pole at A Basin) and you can’t tell me that carrying your skis while walking up the side of a mountain in heavy ski boots at 11,000 feet isn’t a great workout!

Hiking to the North Pole at A Basin.

I have zero regrets about how I spent my April but as soon as the calendar switched over to May I knew that I no longer had time on my side. I had to start actually training! More importantly, I had to start running hilly trails on purpose. Unfortunately the only way to become better at running hills is to suck it up and do them, and it has definitely been a painful process. I have three months or so to be ready to run up and back down an entire mountain, no big deal.

WEEKLY TRAINING

Monday - Five mile run at Three Sisters/Alderfer. Felt mostly strong on the hilly sections.

Tuesday - Rest day. I actually put on running shoes and tried to go for an evening run but I just could not make myself do it. So not in the mood!

Wednesday - 90 minute bouldering session at Thrillseekers followed by 150 crunches.

Thursday – Four mile run at Wash Park. Super boring. Lots of geese.

Friday - 90 minute trail run at Matthews/Winters. Semi-muddy but doable. Good confidence building run! Felt pretty good on hills. Finished strong, feeling like I could continue.

Saturday - Four mile run at Snow Mountain Ranch outside of Fraser. Had fun running with ladies from my church (we were on a women’s retreat). Didn’t feel great but it was good to have a recovery run at altitude with some stellar company.

Sunday - Stopped at Lookout Mountain on the drive back to Denver. Got in a 40 minute trail run that was equally downhill/uphill. Finally making progress on hill running skills!

Weekly Total - 25 miles ~

I’m not one to focus solely on mileage, and especially in this training cycle I am focusing a lot more on quality than quantity. If it takes me an hour to do a hilly 4 mile run on trails that seems more beneficial to me than getting a 7 mile run on sidewalks. Based on last week it also looks like I have a much more cohesive plan than I really do. I hate having a training plan that tells me exactly what I have to do on what day. I like having the flexibility to move days around so that I can do hard runs on days when I have the will and time to get the most out of them (see Tuesday). I also have a lot of hobbies, and I will be throwing occasional days of climbing/bouldering and CrossFit in the mix.

I do have a general training plan from Jerry Armstrong (@endurancejer), and that has been perfect for me. I’m really excited for June; actual excerpt from my training plan: “Go buy some new shoes and stuff… whisper to a stranger, ‘Fear me.’” Yes.

Goals for Next Week: Get in a 2 hour+ trail run and at least 2-3 other hilly trail runs. Have fun!

Lately my life has seriously been benefitting from a lot of cabin time in Grand Lake, Colorado, and I was up there this past weekend with a group for a few days of mountain quality time.

Cabin view on Sunday morning.

On Saturday night (okay and day) we all played a card game that my roommate’s boyfriend taught us called “Contracts”. We had so much fun with the game that we probably played for five hours over the course of the entire day.

Cabin staple.

Back in Denver on Monday morning I was talking to Ashley, one of my best friends from college, about my weekend when I realized that the cabin card game sounded eerily familiar. In fact it sounded a lot like a game called “Oh Hell” that Ashley taught me while we were studying abroad together in Buenos Aires. A quick Google search for card game rules confirmed that the games were in fact the same. No wonder I had enjoyed Contracts so much at the cabin!

Perito Moreno Glacier in Patagonia, Argentina.

Iguazu Falls near the Brazilian/Argentine border.

In 2008 I spent a semester abroad in Buenos Aires, and lived with the same host family as Ashley. We went to college together and knew each other through the cross country team but were not necessarily super close friends before Buenos Aires. Last October I was the maid of honor in Ashley’s wedding so you could say Argentina ended up being a bonding experience for us! Anyway, Ashley and I spent a lot of time in Argentina hanging out with Caitlin, another girl in our study abroad program, and Ashley taught us all the card game Oh Hell early on in the semester. We quickly fell in love with the game, and anytime we traveled together or had downtime you could guarantee we had a deck of cards with us.

Ashley, me and Caitlin. Probably waiting for steak. Circa 2008.

Actual Argentine scorecard from one of many games of Oh Hell.

We were so obsessed with Oh Hell that Ashley and I even came up with a two person variation of the game that we would sometimes play in the evenings at our host family’s house. My mom and brother Derek came to visit Argentina at the end of my semester, and I taught them Oh Hell. Of course they loved it too, and we spent many nights in Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego playing Oh Hell.

After Argentina life kind of got in the way of time for card games, and I eventually forgot how to play Oh Hell. Thank goodness I was reintroduced this past weekend! Moral of the story – “Contracts”, “Oh Hell” or whatever you want to call it is one of the best card games I have played in my entire life. From South America to the Colorado Rocky Mountains the game is endorsed by Ashley, Caitlin, myself, Ashley’s family, my family and now everyone who was at the cabin this past weekend. You just need a deck of cards and some way to keep score. It’s perfect for summer camping trips or winter nights in a cabin!

And now I leave you with a parting shot of skiing this past weekend at Mary Jane and the rules to the “Contracts”/”Oh Hell”. Enjoy!

Nothing like some late spring pow! Making turns on April 14 at Mary Jane.

Players and Cards

From 3 to 7 people can play. The game is best when played with 4 to 6.

A standard 52 card deck is used. The cards in each suit rank (from high to low) A K Q J 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2.

Sequence of Hands

The game consists of a series of hands. The first hand is played with 7 to 10 cards dealt to each player, depending on the number of players:

• 3 to 5 players, 10 cards each;
• 6 players, 8 cards each;
• 7 players, 7 cards each

(because of the limit of 52 cards available). Each successive hand is played with one card fewer, down to a hand of just one card each, then one card more per hand back up to the starting level.

Example: With 7 players, the hands are: 7 cards, then 6,5,4,3,2,1, then 2,3,4,5,6,7, for a total of 13 hands to the game. A game should take approximately 45 minutes.

Object of Game

The object is for each player to bid the number of tricks he thinks he can take from each hand, then to take exactly that many; no more and no fewer. Points are awarded only for making the bid exactly, and are deducted for missing the bid, either over or under.

The hook is that at least one player will fail on each hand, because the total number of tricks bid by the players may not equal the number of tricks available on that hand.

Deal

To determine the first dealer, draw cards. The player with the highest card deals first. The turn to deal rotates clockwise with each hand.

The cards are shuffled and cut and the dealer deals the cards singly until everyone has the appropriate number of cards for the hand being played. The next card is turned face up and the suit of this card is the trump suit for the hand. The trump suit beats any of the other three suits played in that hand. The remaining undealt cards are placed in a face down stack with the turned trump on top of it.

Bidding

The bidding in each hand begins with the player to the left of the dealer, then continues clockwise, back around to the dealer, who bids last. Each bid is a number representing the number of tricks that player will try to take. Everyone must bid – it is not possible to pass, but you can bid zero, in which case your object is to take no tricks at all. A bid may be changed only if the next player to the left has not yet bid. Remember the hook: the dealer may not bid the number that would cause the total number of tricks bid to equal the number of tricks available; a hand will always be “over-bid” or “under-bid”. Keep in mind when bidding that not all cards in the deck are in play in any hand.

Play

The play begins with the player to the dealer’s left, who leads the first card. The lead may be any suit (including trump). Play follows clockwise. Each player must follow the suit led, if he can. If not, he may play any other card in his hand, including trump. The player who has played the highest trump card, or if no trump was played, the highest card of the suit led, wins the trick. That player then leads to the next trick. Continue until all tricks have been played and won.

Scoring

The scorekeeper is designated prior to each game according to house rules. The scorekeeper, needless to say, has a distinct advantage, and should be monitored closely for “inadvertent” errors. The designated scorekeeper notes each bid and resulting scores on a score sheet. There are many different ways to score Oh Hell!

In the simplest version, a player who wins the exact number of tricks bid scores 10 plus the number of tricks bid (10 points for zero tricks, 11 for 1 trick, 12 for two tricks, etc.) Players who take more or fewer tricks than they bid score nothing.

Rules for the game courtesy of: http://www.pagat.com/exact/ohhell.html

The last four weeks of my life have definitely been March Madness indeed. The highlights:

• Moving. A pretty major distraction was definitely the fact that I recently moved. Actually it’s probably a good thing I haven’t been blogging. It may or may not have ended up being just a lot of whining about moving. To make a long story short I found out at the last minute that I was moving out of my old house a month earlier than planned. I somehow kind of pulled it together and completely moved out in a week and a half. To be fair, I had a ton of help from some of the amazing people in my life. I definitely could have never done it alone!

  Still not quite settled in at the new house – but hey my new comforter looks great!

• Country music. I have been going through this really confusing time in my life where I have gradually been accepting the fact that I like country music. I was actually looking up tour dates for Florida Georgia Line the other day, and you don’t want to know how many times I listened to “Sure Be Cool If You Did” by Blake Shelton while teleworking on Monday. I can’t fight it anymore.

  I admit that I love this song.

• Mary Jane. I had the chance to ski Mary Jane for the first time in March and I was impressed. The mountain was a blast, the views were great, and the ski traffic was nothing compared to what I am accustomed to battling. I have had the Epic Local Pass (Keystone, Breckenridge, Vail, Beaver Creek and ABasin) for the past three years, and after skiing MJ I kind of decided that I was ready for something new. I’m officially switching to the Rocky Mountain SuperPass next year which gives me Winter Park/Mary Jane and Copper plus six days at Steamboat and three days at Monarch. I’ll probably also throw in a four-pack at Keystone and ABasin because old habits die hard. Plus let’s not forget how much fun I had at Copper in February! I’m already excited for next ski season.

  Mary Jane trees are kind of awesome.

• Marathon. After taking a five month break from running I signed up for the Pikes Peak Marathon. I might be crazy. No seriously, this is the first race I’ve ever signed up for where I have actually thought that there was a legitimate chance I might not cross the finish line. The Pikes Peak Marathon is definitely a whole different ballgame compared to the Chicago Marathon I ran in 2011. Luckily I know some really awesome runners here in Colorado. I consulted my go-to running guru Jerry who helped me construct a loose training schedule, and as long as I don’t get too distracted by rock climbing I think I will be able to do it! Feel free to come watch me suffer on August 18.

Slightly terrified when I look at this picture.

So far April is shaping up to be a lot more low key than March, and I’m really okay with that. It’s nice to only be living in one house again! Also I was finally able to get back to climbing tonight after a month long hiatus due to a strained tendon. It’s amazing how much I missed climbing on walls the past four weeks. And hey, I was still able to climb an easy 5.10, so I am hopeful that I didn’t lose too much ground.

On the wall again.

The glory days when I could use all my fingers.

Of course my injury occurred early in the evening before I even had a chance to at least have fun and get in some good climbs. I had gone to Thrillseekers after work to meet some of my friends for bouldering and top roping, and I was upstairs warming up in the bouldering cave with Anne and Abby. To be fair I was doing a pretty bad job of warming up that evening. I normally do a few warm-up laps on a practice wall on the first level, and since I found myself in the bouldering cave I just did a really easy V0 problem and then went straight for the V1 that has been my recent project.

Thrillseekers. Don’t be fooled by how ghetto it looks. I love this gym!

The V1 project included a few “crimpy” moves. Crimping is climber jargon for a type of hold that is too narrow for your entire hand and instead requires reliance on finger strength.

Crimp grip.

I don’t know exactly what happened (obviously I was not paying enough attention!) but I was holding on to the crimp hold when my foot slipped off one of the foot holds. My hand stayed on the crimp hold as I kind of awkwardly fell off the wall, placing pressure on my fingers that were holding the grip. I came off the wall and immediately had this weird shooting pain from my fingers up to my elbow. It hurt to bend my fingers, and I sat out for ten minutes.

One of the people in my climbing group helped me tape my fingers on my left hand to give them more support, and I got back on the wall and tried to do another problem. No dice. I couldn’t put pressure on my left hand on any holds that weren’t easy jug holds, which basically eliminated everything in the bouldering cave. I headed downstairs to my normal warm-up area to try doing my usual warm-up route. I felt okay until I reached for the one overhanging move on the route. There was immediate shooting pain from my left hand to my elbow, so I dropped down to the floor.

At that point I was about five minutes away from wanting to cry so I decided that maybe it was time to call it a night. Climbing is already enough of an intensely mental sport and not being able to climb any of my normal routes because I couldn’t put pressure on my left hand was just making me mad! Once I gathered my things I went to turn in my lock to the front desk, and I talked to all three of the workers about what had just happened. As a runner, I’m pretty accustomed to the stereotypical running injuries. If I had tendonitis or shin splits I would absolutely know what to do. Hurting my finger and having pain all the way up to my elbow? That was a new one for me.

The Thrillseekers workers and I all determined that I had not ruptured a tendon, since I had not heard a pop when I fell off the wall and was not in excruciating pain, but that I probably had strained it. I remember thinking, “Okay strained tendon, I’ll take tonight off and be back climbing on Thursday!” Nope. The workers all told me it would be fine, I should ice it, and that I’d be back to normal in four weeks! You should have seen my face. Four weeks? I normally like to hit the climbing gym 2-3 times a week. How was I going to survive? I immediately called my brother Derek in the hopes that he maybe had experience with a similar injury.

Belaying my brother.

Lucky for him my brother had never had an injury similar to my strained tendon. He did have some good insight though. I was explaining to him that I would at least take one week off completely before trying to go back to the climbing gym, which seemed totally reasonable to me. It’s probably a good thing I phoned a friend. Derek, the voice of sanity, told me I’m not allowed to climb next week and that I need to take a good 2-3 weeks off and then work my way back gradually until my hand feels 100% again. I suppose I agree. As I sit here typing this I can’t deny the fact that my finger/hand hurts. It hurts to fully extend my hand. You can’t climb if you don’t have complete trust in the strength of your hands.

Luckily I have other things I can do to keep me busy during the next few weeks. I can still run. I can still go to CrossFit (perhaps with some modifications). I can still ski. But I will for sure miss climbing. You don’t really appreciate what you have until it’s gone – and I can’t wait to be fully back at the climbing gym in a month!

Spalding Bowl dropping into Resolution Bowl.

Skiing at Copper this past Friday was really just the kickoff to a four-day ski weekend, which included a three-day backcountry hut trip in the Aspen area. My cousin Jen enters the 10th Mountain Division Hut lottery system each year, and, thanks to Jen, I have had President’s Day Weekend 2013 at Margy’s Hut on the calendar since spring 2012. At the last minute Jen suggested making our ski weekend really ridiculous by tacking on a day at Copper on the Friday before President’s Day Weekend. Since my answer to anything involving skiing is always yes, I found myself at Copper ready to give it another chance.

The only other time I had ever skied Copper Mountain was last January on a weekend ski trip with some friends from college. If you’re a snow enthusiast like myself you’ve probably blocked most of the painful memories of last winter. I’ll refresh your memory: there was no snow. My experiences at Copper last season involved underwhelming icy runs on the front side of the mountain. There were no back bowls open. Like McKayla Maroney, Paula was unimpressed with Copper.

Pow pow!

This past Friday I started to have a sneaking suspicion that I was maybe going to like Copper Mountain when we woke up to reports of a six inch powder day. Our group was on the mountain by 9:30 and took a few warm-up runs on the frontside of the mountain. It was okay but still nothing to write home about. Then we dropped into a run in the Resolution Bowl, and it was a total game changer.

Best word in the English language: “Open”!

Beautiful.

The fresh snow made Resolution Bowl, an area that had been closed when I was at Copper in January 2012, an absolute blast to ski. The conditions at Copper were honestly some of the best that I had seen all season. We broke for lunch, and I was already pretty satisfied with how the day had gone. After lunch our group planned to head over to Copper Bowl because one of the lifties told us that it had just opened. We took the Storm King lift to make the traverse over to Copper Bowl a little shorter, and when we got to the top of the lift (okay T-Bar) the ski patrol was just opening Spalding Bowl. Since we were right there we decided to take a run down Spalding Bowl.

Freshies in Spalding Bowl.

I was a little sketched out about going down Spalding Bowl because, as the picture above shows, we were basically in windy, whiteout conditions at the top of the ridge on what was unfamiliar terrain for me. The only way to get down was to ski though so I took a few turns and instantly realized we had hit the jackpot. My group was among the first ten people to ski down Spalding Bowl, and we were making fresh turns in deep powder. It was the kind of powder that just makes you instantly smile. I may have been making some woo noises on the way down.

Cousin Jen in the powder!

We followed the run down through some powdery trees and shot down to the bottom of Resolution Bowl and then rode the lift back up to do another lap. By the time we got back to Spalding Bowl the run had been pretty tracked out and ski patrol had closed the bottom section through the trees. That first run down Spalding had definitely been something super special that we were not going to duplicate.

Newest member of Team Copper. I’m a convert!

After our last run down Spalding it was 3:00 and we decided it might be a good idea to save our legs a little bit for the rest of the weekend. We called it a day, skied down and grabbed a round of beers. I was still smiling from how great the day had been.

Overall I think I learned an important lesson at Copper: you can’t judge a mountain by its frontside in a year with no snow. I owe Copper Mountain a sincere apology. It’s awesome. And it’s so awesome I just might be jumping ship to the Copper pass next year. Bowls just as epic as Vail without the hellacious catwalks and $25 parking? Done and done.

The worst part about Valentine’s Day, however, has nothing to do with social media humblebrags or sad meals at chain restaurants. The worst part of Valentine’s Day is the terrible jewelry and advertisements that are forced upon all of us, single and betrothed alike. I’m talking to you Jared, the Galleria of Diamonds. In the age of Hillary Clinton taking names and kicking ass why are we still subject to such terrible jewelry?

Pandora Bracelets

The premise of Pandora bracelets is that you buy a plain chain and then buy charms customized for the special lady in your life. What a unique, thoughtful gift! Except not. I really hate everything about Pandora Bracelets. First of all, they are not attractive. They look straight out of an airport gift shop. And that is not a compliment. Nothing says “Hey I put as little effort into buying you a gift as possible!” like something from an airport gift shop.

The commercials are really what put me over the edge. Not only are the bracelets ugly and cheap looking but we are subjected to screenshots of a woman happily showing off her Pandora bracelet with a soccer ball charm because she’s a soccer mom. Because that is precisely the message we want to sell young girls. Forget math and science let’s just teach girls to become orange slice slinging soccer moms wearing Pandora bracelets. Ugh.

I designed my own Pandora bracelet on their web site and the cost at the end was $1,855. I mean sure I was just haphazardly clicking on random charms but still. The fact that you have to pay more than $30 for a Pandora bracelet is a travesty.

So ugly.

Shane Company

I am not completely opposed to the Shane Company based on the ugliness of its jewelry. From what I can tell the Shane Company has some attractive enough pieces. My beef with the Shane Company is purely that I find Tom Shane’s voice incredibly annoying. Nothing is more upsetting than hearing Tom Shane on the radio when I really just want to hear some Ke$ha.

I understand that Tom Shane founded the company and I’m sure he’s a great guy but can we please get someone else to read those radio ads? Perhaps Ke$ha is available?

Open Hearts by Jane Seymour

There is nothing (I repeat nothing) I hate more on this earth than the Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman jewelry at Kay Jewelers. It’s called the Open Hearts collection, and Dr. Quinn’s tagline is, “If your heart is open, love will always find its way in.” My first problem with this tagline is that Dr. Quinn is ending a sentence with a preposition which is, hello eighth grade English class, a huge grammar faux pas. My second problem with this tagline is that calling the design of the jewelry a heart is a huge reach. The Open Hearts collection could more aptly be named the Open Swan collection or the Open Butt collection.

I don’t think this really resembles a heart.

As if the base model weren’t bad enough, there are several variations of the open heart design, the worst culminating in a mutilated angel.

So many questions. Why does this exist?

Is this a bow?

A butterfly?!

Dear Kay Jewelers, Please leave Jesus out of this. Love, Paula

Dahhhhhh.

Make it stop.

I can’t. I just can’t.

I think we’ve pretty well established the fact that the Open Hearts jewelry is absolutely hideous. Unfortunately, the commercials are just as bad as the actual jewelry.

The commercial opens with an artistic shot of Jane Seymour in a sunny studio with classical piano playing in the background. But of course. We then get a Jane voiceover (she’s British?!) about some touching story with her mom and hearts and something, something. Really I was just distracted by how she keeps obsessively painting the same design over and over. In red paint. I’m concerned about the mental health and safety of Dr. Quinn at this point. Then, when things were already questionable for our leading lady, Dr. Quinn says that she agreed to work with Kay Jewelers as a jewelry designer. The answer to any question that Kay Jewelers is asking you should always be no. Especially if it involves jewelry design. You don’t want your name on that shiz! Kay Jewelers likes to say that every kiss begins with Kay but what I would really be interested in seeing are the statistics on how many divorces begin with Kay. 

This is what my nightmares look like.

The commercial transitions to some shots of Jane inside a Kay Jewelers showing them her crude paintings, er “designs.” Her next mistake was actually setting foot into a Kay Jewelers. We are then forced to look at the finished products before the commercial cuts back to Jane STILL obsessively painting her design over and over. She reveals her secret desire for her design to become the international symbol of hope and love. At the end of the commercial I’m fairly convinced that Jane Seymour must be on a lot of drugs if she thinks her design is going anywhere beyond the walls of Kay Jewelers, the Wal-Mart of jewelry stores.

Anyway, thanks to Jane my new favorite hobby is now to send my closest friends Open Hearts e-cards from Jane Seymour’s website to let them know how happy I am they opened their hearts and let me into their lives. Although I had some technical difficulties getting the e-cards to actually work. The verdict is still out!

So, people of the world, let’s band together and make this Valentine’s Day the best one ever. Just say no to ugly bracelets, jewelry companies that have annoying ads or unattractive jewelry design. Say yes to things that don’t suck. Let’s make Hillary Clinton proud.

I started the XGames weekend out on Friday by skiing at Breckenridge Mountain with a few of my girlfriends. I had not skied Breck all year, and I was excited to check out the mountain. Unfortunately, I quickly remembered why I had been avoiding Breckenridge when we started skiing. The snow was iffy and the crowds were too much. Don’t get me wrong I really have had some fun days skiing at Breckenridge in my life. Generally though it’s my least favorite mountain on the Vail Resorts Pass. I would just rather be skiing Keystone, A Basin, Vail or Beaver Creek as a rule. The fact that I have a least favorite ski resort on my season pass is a slightly ridiculous Colorado problem. Anyway, luckily all of us ladies were on the same page and after a few hours of shredding we headed into town for some early apres ski. French fries with Siracha mayonnaise at Empire Burger definitely did the trick!

Eventually I headed up to the Aspen area on Friday night to meet Gracie and our friend Ari. We grabbed dinner and then headed to bed early for a day of shredding at Snowmass. The snow situation at Snowmass was not fantastic but it’s such a fun mountain to ski that we still made the most of it!

Happy Australia Day at Snowmass!

Slopeside lunch. Gracie made me an amazing sandwich because she’s the best.

In the afternoon, Gracie, Ari and I all headed over to check out the actual XGames at Buttermilk. XGames weekend is always a great time to ski in Aspen because everyone is at the XGames, not skiing at the mountains. We thought it would be fun to catch some of the events though, so after skiing we began the logistical nightmare that is trying to actually go to the XGames.

The XGames hire National Park Service shuttle buses for extra capacity. This one is from Bryce Canyon National Park.

The journey began with us driving to Aspen, since there was no parking available outside of Buttermilk. Once we drove to Aspen and found parking we then had to walk until we found a bus to the Games. There were tons of people at all of the bus stops so we took a rogue approach and tried to find a more obscure bus stop. Miraculously it worked as Ari flagged down a bus on a random side street.

At the actual Games site we were herded through some muddy entrance gates until we finally got to bag check. I stopped to take a picture and got yelled at by security but oh well.

My illegal picture.

It was a day with a high of 40 degrees in Aspen which meant disastrous things for the snowy walkways at the XGames. There was also a slight slope that the spectators had to walk to up to get to the viewing area. You do the math – we were slipping all over the place.

Like any good XGames spectators we headed over to the viewing area to try and watch one of the snowmobile events. Except when we got to the viewing area we could not see the event at all. So there we were standing on a slippery slope, watching the snowmobile event take place on a big screen projector. I imagine that spectating the XGames is somewhat like what attending the recent presidential inauguration would be like. Sure you might be there in person but you’re really just standing there and watching it on a TV screen just like everyone else at home.

Still really cool to see how big the features were in real life.

Obviously we gave up on the snowmobile event. Even so we still weren’t quite ready to give up on the XGames entirely. We tried to stay for the Calvin Harris concert, however, when we got over to the concert area we again faced the same issues with huge crowds (average age of the crowd: 14) and slippery slopes. I don’t know about Gracie and Ari but at that point I was basically at my breaking point. We took a deep breath, fought our way out of the crowds and left the XGames to head back to Aspen. It was probably the best decision of the afternoon.

I can see how in theory if we had gone to Aspen solely to watch the XGames, were wearing crampons for better grip on the snow and had arrived at 9:00 am to stake out good viewing spots they might be fun. We did none of those things and were also unwilling to stand around for five hours until the big air competitions started, which definitely would have been more viewable. I did have fun seeing the features and real life and getting a feel for the atmosphere. Honestly though you should not feel bad about watching the XGames on your couch at home.

The rest of our trip Gracie, Ari and I had fun playing the role of “jaded local” when it came to the XGames. Gracie and I made friends with a barista and a liquor store clerk by talking about how the best part of the XGames is not actually going to the XGames. They agreed. We ended up having a lot of fun going out in Aspen on Saturday night and were definitely sad to head home on Sunday.

This was my Sunday morning. How was yours?

Since I had driven up separately after skiing at Breckenridge on Friday I thought it would be a great idea to stop at Beaver Creek on the way home. I don’t often have the chance to ski three days in a row so I really wanted to take advantage of the fact that I was going to be passing through Avon on the way back to Denver anyway. Also, #YOLO!

Paula’s life: not exactly roughing it.

I truly believe that some of the best front range riding conditions to be found right now are at Beaver Creek and Vail. I can’t speak for the Winter Park area but Vail and Beaver are definitely in better shape than anything in Summit County and even the Aspen area.

I love me some Beaver Creek.

It was a gorgeous day at Beaver Creek and there was this mystical fog that settled over the mountain. I ended up doing some laps off the Birds of Prey lift – you know just some casual double black runs.

Can you say bluebird?

I skied for a few hours and then grudgingly decided I had to go back to the big city at some point. It’s like I always say: you know you had a good weekend when the worst part was going to the XGames.

So what all has been going on in the life of Paula since we last spoke? A lot. I don’t really want to recap the last month of my life because I don’t want to bore you, but I’ll give you the highlights. Big life changes have included the fact that I am now the proud owner of a new French Press and a snazzy pair of Smith I/OS ski goggles.

Once you go French Press you don’t go back.

I was so excited about my goggles that I had to try them on at home. Yep. That happened.

Other big life changes include the fact that I am ridiculously content with where I am starting my life in 2013. 2012, on the other hand, was kind of this huge, messy transition year. Basically I finished graduate school at the very end of 2011, so 2012 was my first full year as a real member of society, working a 9-5 job and having health insurance in my own name. And although getting a job is what you are supposedly working towards in high school, college and graduate school, I don’t think anyone really warns you about how different this transition is. I survived, and, though you probably couldn’t pay me to relive 2012, I am forever grateful for last year because I learned a whole about myself and just this life thing in general. In the spirit of saving anyone from making some of the same mistakes I did last year, here go the Top Six Lessons I Learned in 2012:

1) It’s okay to not be married and not have 2.5 children.

I was a campus tour guide in college (pretty unsurprising if you know me) and one of the fun facts I shared with prospective students on the tour was that one out of every four graduates from my alma mater gets married to another graduate from my school. Based on my own wedding attendance these past few years I would say this is a true statistic. Spoiler alert: I’m not one of these statistics.

Bridesmaid Paula reporting for duty!

Here’s the deal though – you simply cannot compare your life to anyone else’s. We are raised to believe that life happens in these exact sequences: graduate from high school, go to college, find a job, get married and live happily ever after. My life has looked something more like: graduate from high school, go to college, intern in Honduras, start grad school, move to Atlanta for four months to do another internship because #YOLO, realize I don’t want to work in my field long-term and go through a mid-life crisis at age 23, spend a summer applying for random jobs in ski towns and then happen to have excellent timing and find a real job that I like but has nothing to do with my Master’s degree. For me it’s been less of a straight path and more of a random jaunt around the countryside that has gotten me to a destination that I adore but was never intending to find. The truth is that life is an organic process, and it’s impossible to put it into a neat and tidy box. Actually I think the more you try to force your life to be something it’s not the unhappier you are.

I’m not married, I have zero children and that’s okay. I have friends that are married and have children and that’s also okay. The universe really doesn’t give us a deadline that says you have to married by age 25. I mean I won’t say that I don’t someday hope to find the right person, but in the meantime I’m not going to be sitting at home on Friday nights watching “Say Yes to the Dress.” You’ll find me living my life, which involves going to the mountains every weekend, two hour rock climbing sessions on weeknights, and wine/beer nights with friends. Why would I want to fight that?

2) People are in your life for a reason.

I saw a quote on Twitter at some point last year that continues to resonate with me: “People come into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime.” Reflecting on my own year I can definitely point to people who were there for a reason and/or season but are no longer in my life, as I’m sure anyone can also find in their own life. I will estimate that at least 75% of the people that are the bread and butter of my life in Denver these days I did not even know at this exact time last year. You can’t plan when you’re going to be married or have children and similarly I don’t think you can plan on the people in your life. And there is absolutely no way to know exactly who is going to end up being there for a month or for 45 years. That’s a chance you have to take when you invest in someone, and that’s also what makes it fun.

Me, Amy and Joel at Quandary Peak this past summer.  Amy and I met on Twitter last spring. It happens.

Adult relationships are tricky. They involve so much coordinating of schedules and planning weeks in advance simply to hang out with a friend for a few hours. Gone are the glory days of college when I could walk down the dorm hall and visit ten of my friends. It’s harder to be friends in the real world. But I also think that’s precisely why friendships in the midst of jobs, bills and laundry are special. People that are your friends in the real world are there because they want to be there. There is no obligation to be circumstantial friends because you go to the same college. Your adult friends are there because they want to be friends with you and because they see something they like in the life that you are living. So when a friendship sticks, it’s a pretty cool thing. And when someone leaves your life, it’s a learning experience.

3) You can’t be everything to everyone.

I learned a life shattering lesson this year: I can’t be everything to everyone. I would really love nothing more to be best friends with everyone but human cloning hasn’t made it big yet so I’m not sure that’s in the cards. At the end of the day, you really only cheat yourself and the people you care about when you spread yourself too thin. There’s a finite amount of time in each day, and the best way you can spend it is by investing in the people that invest in you. The whole quality over quantity argument rings true. In second grade it was possible to have a different best friend every day; in 25 year-old land maintaining friendships takes work.

Annual golden aspen sojourn with my friend Britt.

It’s kind of a delicate balance. I’m not necessarily saying that I’m not open to making new friends, since (see Lesson #2) you never know who is going to end up being a great person in your life if you don’t give them a chance. I am saying that you have to make choices sometimes, and I now choose to make people a priority in my life that make me a priority. I love coffee dates as much as the next gal but the people who know you better than you know yourself are essential to survival. You can’t be everything to everyone, but, if you put in the time, you can be something to someone.

4) You set your own schedule. 

Last May I was trying to plan a time to go for margaritas at The Pioneer (seriously best queso this side of the Continental Divide) with my friend Kara and my schedule was so packed we had to plan three weeks in advance. I was that busy. I have no idea why I was that busy because it’s not like I’m the flipping leader of the free world or anything. That moment with Kara was probably my breaking point when I decided that I had to get my schedule under control. It didn’t happen overnight by any means, but eventually I found myself with more free evenings. I started saying “No” more often. When I had no plans for a night I made no attempts to try and find something to do.

Now this is what I call a full life!

Lately my weeks tend to be fairly open. With the exception of my standing Bachelor date on Mondays, I mostly enter each week with no solid plans. I have the freedom to run after work, hit the rock climbing gym or even make last minute dinner plans. I have time to breathe and refresh, and I’m not rushing from scheduled event to scheduled event. I sometimes make questionable life decisions about choosing to go ski over everything else but hey who’s perfect? Realizing that I am the only person in charge of how I spend my weeks is what made a huge difference. After all, I want a full life, not a busy life.

5) Figuring out what you believe is important. 

Probably one of the single most life changing things that happened to me this year was walking through the doors of New Denver Church. Now I absolutely love the community at my church but I’m really not here to push my church or even my faith on anyone else. I will straight up tell you that I was not certain I believed in God at all about a year and a half ago, and reading some girl’s blog on the internet probably would have done very little to convince me of anything at all. I do whole heartedly believe in God now and it’s been quite a journey this past year, but my intent in this is not to be preachy because I’ve been on the other side and that certainly never spoke to me. All I want to say  is that understanding what you believe and why that’s what you believe is important. Pick your poison – read books, ask questions, talk to friends and family – but no matter what I think everyone should understand his/her faith one way or the other.

6) We are all works in progress. 

The best thing about all these fun and exciting life lessons that I had the distinct pleasure of learning the hard way in 2012 is that I am still a complete work in progress. I have the ability to change and adapt and become a better person through whatever I face. It would be disappointing to me if I ever stopped becoming a new person. Luckily I think life throws enough curve balls at us all that we are all forced to change our courses of action every so often. I feel like a very different person in 2013 than I was in 2012, and I’m sure I’ll feel like a different person in 2014 than from what I am right now. While yes that’s a little scary to think about it’s also exciting to know that I can continue to grow. I kind of like that at any given moment I can just decide to join an ultimate frisbee league or buy a pair of climbing shoes. Change keeps things real.

Cheers to 2013!

I made a lot of mistakes last year (don’t we all) but I think the important thing is that I tried to learn from them. I’m mostly just now excited to see what 2013 throws my way. I enter 2013 a little older, a little wiser and with a little less hair.

The most major haircut I’ve had in five years.

Yes, that’s right. I chopped six inches off of my hair and went for some side bangs just to switch it up a little bit. Will one of my top lessons learned in 2013 be to not ever cut six inches of my hair off? Only time will tell.

In the near future I have a lot of exciting things coming up including the X Games, a winter ascent of a 14er and my first ever backcountry ski trip at a 10th Mountain Division Ski Hut. I promise I’ll stop being a lazy blogger and you can look forward to many fun updates on these and other adventures soon!