Typos are bitch!
One Enjoyable Night!
Last night wasn't one for the Ages...but I'll take it! No weather, everybody made it to work on time, and we groomed the Mountain from Wall to Wall. We groomed every Groomable Acre...and did some plowing to get ready for the coming weekend.
Getting every groomable acre done in a single night used to be like finding a needle in a haystack, or finding the Holy Grail! Last time I remember feeling this good by accomplishing this feat, it took thirteen shifts (when we had twelve shifts scheduled) back in the BR275 days.
Last night we got'er done with seven BR350 shifts. Three winch shifts...four free cats. Granted, excellent conditions made the going good, the winches made quick work of the steep ungroomed trails that we hadn't gotten to before last night. My Swing Shift winch Operators are animals...no dilly-dallying with these guys...they take no prisoners!
I'm still high from one of last night's projects...the one I was called away from twice the night before. I even got a little Free-Fall action on three of the passes! Normally, we'd winch anything steep enough to get a snowcat to toboggan into free-fall, but this little corner of my Mountain is thick with lift towers and outbuildings, while trees and other potential pick points are MIA so no winches need apply. Oh, we could park a groomer at the top and use it as a winch anchor, but that's so last Century!
What can I say...the only thing that kept last night from being perfect was the high cloud cover. It wasn't deep enough to obscure the moonlight, so our world was totally illuminated, but it did hide the moon from our direct gaze. We did catch a short unfiltered glance at Earth's only Natural Satellite shortly before it set into the approaching storm front's harbinger clouds. What a beautiful icy sight! I imagined what our moon would look like in the heavens if the moon was made of snow instead of the gunmetal gray Moon Rock that the Apollo astronauts collected on the moon and returned to earth for study.
I saw some Moon Rocks back in the 70's on display at the California Academy of Science in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. For a total NASA-head like me, that was a wonderful thing to see!
Friday night is the night of the Full Moon. It will be a stunner! If you think tonight's Moon looks unusually big, you're right. It's the biggest full Moon of 2010. Astronomers call it a "perigee Moon," some 14% wider and 30% brighter than lesser full Moons of the year.
I hope the forecast is off, I want to view the Perigee Moon in all it's glory...I may see it through the cloud deck...or not. Time will tell...
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