High Altitude Excellence

Not only is my friend Jen a badass paramedic, driving shrieking ambulances at mach speed to the scene of tragically injured San Franciscans in high drama scenarios, but she's also really good at hosting ski parties. I'm not sure what the correlation is. It could be that both involve adrenaline. Mostly, I think it's that she's just good at everything--baking, maps, ballet, German, boats, cocktails, you name it.

When I find something she's not good at, I'll let everyone know. I'm thinking I'll be able to stump her with ceramics or maybe the circus arts, although she probably has a high-power kiln in her basement...and 10 years of tightrope training under her belt, somehow.

A few weeks ago, Jen (pictured above, middle) brought a few of us up to her family's cabin in the Sierras. Under her professional leadership, we engaged in quality mountain time, upgraded with organic cocktails (note: Jen used frozen strawberries for ice) along with breakfast featuring home-made marmalade--not to mention a back country snow shoeing expedition (see above pic), second-hand glasswares shopping and Winter Olympics viewing while cozied up in hand-knit blankets next to the wood burning stove.

I wish I had thought to call up my extreme mountain firemen friends, although they were probably IN the Olympics for one death defying sport or another and therefore otherwise occupied.

I took this picture while tree skiing, my first time ever veering off the groomed runs. Renegade blue square skiing at its finest.