U-hauls and BBQ's

We haven't looked back since driving East. I thought that we had a lot of stuff since we had to rent a U-haul, but I was corrected. Some of the folks that I work with told me that they would give anything to go back to the days when moving meant just renting a U-haul. In a matter of a few weeks we have managed to unpack most of our boxes, lose two feet of snow and sample most of the fried food options in the fifteen minute vicinity.

It would take a bubba-ean effort to list all the fried food options in the restaurants in the northwoods, but I don't want to waste the web space. When Drew(my boss) and I were in Madison, he made the comment that he didn't care where we ate, just that he would like "tasty food that isn't fried" because that doesn't exist up here. I like fried food as much as the next guy, but sometimes it doesn't seem necessary to fry pizza.

In an attempt to eat something not fried, we hosted what may be the first block party ever on our street. We had plans for dancing black bears, tricycle riders, ferris wheels, gravitrons, but after much neighborhood debate decided to keep it simple for the first rendition. It was nice that everyone on the street was able to attend. Brooke, Brandt and I (everyone) started off our block party by walking to the Post Office and getting our mail. We proceeded to have a nice little BBQ in the "I can't believe it is this nice in March" weather.




Brandt was nice enough to arrange to have the street barricaded off. You might be asking yourself why we would need to have it blocked off at all?



Well, you never know who might try to drive through. Even though they don't live on the block, we let Drew and Kristi join us as they were former residents of the street.

It was unseasonably warm again today. 72 degrees and sunny. I was lucky enough to clean the outside windows and we were called to an emergency BBQ at Drew and Kristi's house.

ridge hike 001

ridge hike 001
Originally uploaded by brooke.creagh.

Hiking the Ridge

One week and counting...

Jay and I spent a few minutes yesterday writing down everything we hope to accomplish in the next 7 days while we are still in Bozeman. Here is what we came up with:

-Hike the Ridge at Bridger Bowl
-Go to Big Sky and ski/snowboard
-Soak in the hot springs in Norris
-Skate ski to Mystic Lake (around 10 miles uphill)
-Buy a vacuum
-Visit Madison River Brewery and the Bozeman Brewery
-Eat at Dave's Sushi (one last time...boo hoo)

and last but not least PACK!

We can check at least one of those off of the list for now. We got up at 6:45 this morning and had breakfast and packed some sandwiches and made it up to Bridger Bowl in record time. Because it was President's Day, most of the town beat us up there for the 5 inches of new powder. We got at least one run in before it was tracked out and Jay and his bud Eli decided it was time to start hiking up to better powder. I ducked out of the first round of ridge climbing, nerves. They both had a great run and were very encouraging so we all hiked up. Eli was nice enough to snap a picture of Jay and I at the top of the mountain. The wind picked up right as we got to the top and I was having a really hard time on the narrow traverses on my snowboard so we went down sooner than we had intended but still were able to get some sweet powder turns.

After lunch we did a shorter hike to a lazy meadow run. I was really tired and offered to head down to the bar at the bottom of the hill and buy the guys a pitcher. Bribe did not work though as they wanted "one last run" and started hiking again. I went down and waited for them and enjoyed my beer until they strolled in. All in all, a very good (and tiring) day of skiing for everyone. We are heading to the Madison River Brewery this evening for "Dead Night". Jay is hoping to relive some great high school and college memories to the sounds of the Greatful Dead...then we can check another one off the list.

Living in a one street town

I(JAY) recently accepted a full-time position as the Wilderness Program Director at Camp Manito-wish. I will be in charge of all wilderness trips from overnight to the extended 55 day trips. Camp Manito-wish is located in Boulder Junction, WI (Musky Capital of the World) a town of about 900 people. There are only two real streets and they T one another. We are moving at the end of February and I will start March 1. Part of the deal is that we get to live in a cabin on camp property. It will be fun to have a little cabin complete with the wood burning stove with just a short walk to the lake.

We have been talking about getting a puppy. It looks like it will happen either this spring or this coming fall. I'm leaning towards a lab or retriever and Brooke is looking at spaniels.

This is pretty different from my vision of attending law school in the fall, but sometimes life takes you down different paths. We don't have it all figured out, but we are excited about figuring it out.

Brooke and Rob bootin' up

IMG_0393
Originally uploaded by brooke.creagh.