Lonely Ride Up the Mountain

This past winter will be one for the record books because of how warm it has been. Right now is the end of March but the weather thinks it is the end of April, if not May. Then Mother Nature decided to throw us a curve ball today with a cold front that brought temperatures at my house down to almost freezing. Unfortunately my truck did not like the sudden drop in temperature and decided to not let the radio work on my drive to the morning gym, Alta ski area. This is the 3rd time it has happened in the 7 years I have owned the truck. The simple fix is to allow the truck to warm up slightly, turn it off, and turn it back on. As the drive is not very long, I just drove to the ski area without the radio.

I had hoped my wife would like to ski with me for an hour this morning. She is not a fan of the freeze/thaw cycle we are having right now. In spring skiing, the snow starts out frozen solid. Imagine an ice-skating rink stuck on the side of a mountain. It is like that and if you don't know how to carve turns, skiing can be a little scary. Without my wife to join me, the ride up the mountain felt extra lonely.

There are also a number of displays that show up on my radio like time and outside temperature. Without the radio working, I couldn't see those either. I like to know the temperature so I can see it change over the 4000 vertical feet I climb to get to the ski area parking lot. Generally there is a 10-degree Fahrenheit difference but I had no idea today. All I could do is guess.

It is amazing how I have come to appreciate little modern conveniences for the short drive to the ski area. I thought about that and how technology provides feedback about the world around us. Something as simple as knowing the correct time is very comforting. Couple that with all the information we can get at our fingertips thanks to Smartphones and the Internet and we have the ability to be very aware of what is going on around us. Unfortunately we do not all take advantage of that information and there are a lot of ignorant people in the world. But that is a topic for another post.

The iPhone is Still a Poor Phone

Today I started with several meetings. Normally I would take them at home and use my home Internet connection. However I had a short break between my two morning meetings and my afternoon one and I wanted to get some exercise. My favorite winter exercise is skiing and so I drove the 25 minutes to Alta and used my phone for the meetings. I also had my computer if I needed it but I wanted to try something new to see if it would work.

My company uses Microsoft Teams for all of our meetings. Fortunately you can install Teams on your mobile phone for free. Yes, they want you to have an account with them but they also allow you to log in with just a meeting ID and password. I copied the information for my meetings onto a PostIt note and stuck it to the back of an Android phone I got to replace my home land line. When I got to Alta, I didn't bother getting out of my car and just logged into the first meeting.

I never really carry my Android phone anywhere because it is so large. That one quality made it perfect for my meeting this morning. Looking at a tiny screen can be tough for meetings and I wanted the largest one possible without having to pull out my laptop. The meeting went well as did the one after it. Then I could go ski for an hour before having to head home before my next meeting.

My experience this morning reminded me how poor my iPhone is as a phone or in this case how poor it is as an Internet connection. Lately my iPhone has lagged significantly with presentations to the point my view has lagged by several slides. That was not the case this morning. When I carried 2 phones it never was a contest as to which phone performed better. If I actually needed to talk with someone, I preferred anything other than my iPhone. I thought 5G would fix that for Internet connections but discovered that isn't the case.

Now in all fairness to Apple, my current iPhone is a 12-mini and needs to be replaced. I hope that Apple has spent some time improving their phone capabilities. Unfortunately given their past track record, I doubt that is the case but am hopeful. 

Artificial Intelligence Being Wrong

I recently visited Alaska to do some skiing and spent time away from my home ski areas Snowbird and Alta. First off, Alaska is a whole new kind of cold when it comes to skiing. I'm glad I opted to bring my warmest gear. 

While driving to the airport after a day of skiing at Aleyeska, I got a call from my ski buddy Jim. He said that AI told him Snowbird would be closing for midweek skiing at the beginning of April. Normally Snowbird stays open daily until it gets close to the end of the season and then it closes during the week and is only open on weekends. That normally doesn't happen until May. This is important as my buddy Jim will be coming to Utah for a week in April to do some skiing and that is kind of tough to do if the ski area is closed.

Yesterday I visited Snowbird and made sure to ask around if they announced any changes in their schedule. They have not. This begs the question how AI came up with a false schedule change. The answer is very important as it will help you understand why AI often provides the wrong answer to questions.

There are multiple ways that AI came up with an answer to when Snowbird would switch to weekend only skiing. The simplest answer is someone speculated on a date and the AI found such a posting and incorporated it into its knowledge base. This often happens in real life. Someone will state a guess as fact and we all believe the person. My dad once told me that magnets are created by hitting a piece of iron with a hammer really hard. While that may be one way to create a magnet, that is not how they are made. I recently corrected his misunderstanding. Doing the same thing with AI is a bit more involved.

Another way that AI can come up with false knowledge is through inference. We are having a particularly warm winter here in the western United States. When temperatures get above a certain point, snow starts melting quickly. This week we are expecting record highs and AI could recognize that when the average temperature gets above a certain point, Snowbird switches to weekend-only skiing. Unfortunately temperature is not how Snowbird determines when people are done skiing. They look at hotel reservations at their lodges as well as a number of other factors and will try to keep the daily schedule as long as Mother Nature allows.

The important thing to gather from this post is that Artificial Intelligence is often wrong. I don't know how many times I have asked Google a question only to have it spit back the wrong answer. While I have not kept close statistical records, I feel like I get the right answer from AI only about 20% of the time. It may point me in the right direction but I always verify the answer and augment what I am told with real human intelligence.  

Improving Problem Solving Skills

Monday I had the day off and looked forward to spending the morning skiing with my grandkids. I arrived at Alta ski area early and eagerly awaited their arrival. When my son pulled into the parking lot, he delivered the bad news that my oldest grandson had forgotten his jacket which also contained his ski pass. I could hear my grandson crying inconsolably in the car and I felt really bad for him. Instead of giving up on the situation, I started thinking about solutions to the problem that didn't involve driving the hour back home to get the jacket and pass.

Coincidentally, yesterday I found myself facing a tough computer problem for work and I found it difficult to face it. Instead I wanted to give up and drop the issue in someone else's task list. I spent the morning skiing at Alta but I would eventually have to show up for work. I knew I would be working until 8pm so I had the freedom to ski until 11am. I thought how easy it would be to just quit my job and spend the rest of the winter as a ski bum. That would not be financially prudent and so I skied my last run and headed to my home office.

My work problem related to setting up a Digital Clean Room (DCR) in Snowflake. I'll spare you the details but it looked like the configuration details were entered correctly as I could see my team's data set as well as the other team's. When I went to connect the two, the system tried to do something and eventually spit out an error. The error indicated my team had misconfigured something and so I researched how to fix it. After about an hour of in-depth searching, I confirmed I did not have the correct permissions to fix the problem and so I created a very detailed e-mail to the team and made sure to include someone that had the power to set things right. I then followed that e-mail up with a direct e-mail to the person with proper permissions to fix the situation.

I had done the best I could and waited for my colleagues in Japan to start their day as they had the permissions necessary to get things working. Once they arrived in the office, the DCR started working correctly and the problem no longer existed. I could move forward and didn't need to quit my job.

So what happened with my grandson? My daughter works at Alta's ski school and I knew they have extra ski clothing in the event a kid shows up unprepared for the weather. I walked into the ski school, found my daughter, and quietly asked if she had a ski jacket we could borrow. She quickly found one in my grandson's size and I walked it up to my son's car. Then I escorted my son and grandson to the ticket office where we looked at getting a single day pass to replace the forgotten season's pass. It cost my son $5, which will probably come out of my grandson's souvenir budget the next time we go to Disney World but we solved the problem. We then had a wonderful morning skiing.

Everyone enjoyed the ski day and midway through it, my son remarked that he now understood why I left him in the car one ski day when his ski pants broke. He was 17 at the time and perfectly capable of coming up with a solution without my help. Instead of waiting for me to finish skiing, my son went into the resort ski shop and asked for some duct tape and didn't take "No" for an answer. Once he had the tape, he gave his pants a temporary fix and then joined me on my second run. We had a good afternoon and didn't let a broken side-zipper ruin the day.

It is not uncommon to avoid problems when we encounter them. It happened to me when I faced the DCR problem. The best thing we can do is stop and take a deep breath. Then we need to look at all possible solutions and pick the best one. Fortunately for my grandson, I possessed some knowledge he didn't have and could craft a solution that didn't involve a lengthy drive nor an expensive purchase. Asking for help is how I solved my DCR issue and also how my son solved his ski pants one. You just need to be sure to ask the right source for help. 

Making the Most of Spare Time

This afternoon I find myself with a spare hour and am not quite sure what to do with it. I want to be productive and active (sitting and writing my blog is not active). My neighbors keep bringing over treats and I can't help but sample them. Sure I could plop down on the couch and watch a movie or show while I gorge myself on candy, cookies, and other various Christmas goodies, but that is not a good way to prepare for all the food I will eat in the next week or so.

I could go tune another pair of skis. That at least keeps me active as it is a lot of work walking back and forth the length of the skis. I might not get a lot of miles traveled but I do get a fair share of steps. Unfortunately tuning skis makes a mess and I have already cleaned myself up for the day. I guess I'll pass on that.

I could go through my Christmas list and make sure everyone is shopped for and gifts are wrapped. Well, I actually did that yesterday and did not see anything forgotten. Everything is wrapped nicely and ready to go under the Christmas tree. My son even sent me the clue I am supposed to give my grandkids letting them know they will be going to Orlando in February. We should have a great time. 

I could go for a walk but that is what I will be doing in an hour anyways. No need to double up on that. Besides, I spent the morning skiing at Alta with all of the skiers that decided to go to my ski area instead of staying at Park City as there is no snow there. There is enough to keep one run open but with the hoards of people trying to ski the same run, it is probably chaotic.

I have checked in with my parents and offered condolences as they had to put their dog down yesterday after a good 19-year run with the pet. Needless to say they are besides themselves with grief. I understand as I thought it to be a particularly bad day when my wife had to put our dog down. That is why I checked in on them.

I supposed I could go clean the bathrooms in the house but my wife did that earlier today while she needed to kill some time. We also worked together to take out the garbage as the garbage men will arrive tomorrow and we want to make room for all of the Christmas wrapping paper. 

Writing in my blog is not that active but it did take 10 whole minutes to put this together. Now I only have to fill 50 minutes. What to do? What to do? 

I Thought a 4K Monitor Would be Enough

True to my word I am trying to stay busy during my Holiday break. This morning I got up early and skied for an hour at Alta before it started getting crowded given how many runs are open. I did do a bit of exploring so that when we get a lot more snow, I know what other parts of the mountain look like. I also managed to see an old family friend, Junior Bonous who turned 100 in August and he is still making it up to Alta for some turns.

I came home and got some food before heading to the ski tuning room to scrape and brush a pair of skis for Christmas eve. Then I headed to my office and put together a ski video describing the early-season conditions at Snowbird. It is a bit different than my usual videos.

One comment I have received is that I sound so monotone as I narrate my ski videos. Today I opted to create the video first and then add the narration afterwards without a script. I'm not sure I will do that again as I think it took a lot longer to create the soundtrack than normal. I also wanted to say a lot more and ended up leaving many of my comments out of the video.

Creating the narration track at the same time as the video required me to have both Garage Band and iMovie running at the same time. My Mac has a 4K monitor and so one would think I have more than enough space to do everything. That is not the case. I like to use iMovie so it takes up most of the screen. I do the same with Garage Band. A second 4K monitor would really be useful but I don't have one readily available.

I remember when I first started using the 4K monitor. It is the same resolution as 4 HD monitors running at 1080p. I thought it would be easy to divide up the screen into 4 sections and have them act as 4 independent screens. Nope. Once you have a high-resolution monitor, you use it all. I like being able to have my web browser take up more than a quarter of the screen. I also reserve extra space for my e-mail window. It just goes to show that no matter how high a resolution monitor you have, you will use it all. 

The Start of Christmas Break

Yesterday I worked the last day of the year for my company and now I am on Christmas break up through January 4th. I always appreciate the 2 weeks my company provides to relax at the end of the year and spend time with family. This year I plan to maximize my time off and get a bunch of personal projects completed.

Last night my wife and I checked into the local Marriott so we could use the pool and hot tub. I had hoped my grandkids could join us but they are fighting the flu and courteously stayed away. Instead my wife and I had an enjoyable evening before checking out and coming home. We only needed the stay to meet my requirement for 25 nights to remain a gold member of the Marriott loyalty club.

This morning I woke up and headed skiing alone to Alta. I wasn't totally alone as I met my daughter who is an instructor up there before she started teaching a large group of kids. I skied Alta yesterday before work and thought they could use a lot more snow. They got 3 inches of snow overnight but probably need a good 3 feet. I skied around the mountain today looking at the general condition of things and then decided to come home when the runs started getting crowded.

Once home, I talked with my wife a bit and then headed to the ski-tuning room so I could wax some skis. The waxing process is somewhat lengthy if you run through the whole thing. First you have to run a file over the edges to make sure they are sharp so you can carve a turn on ice. Then you need to put a coat of wax on and hot scrape them to pull any iron filings out of the base. After using a steel brush to make sure no shavings remain, you get to wax them again. They need to sit overnight before scraping and brushing them. I don't know if it is fortunately or unfortunately, but I have about 7 pairs of skis and so if I stay on top of ski maintenance there is always a pair ready to ski on.

Like usual work weeks, I plan to ski every morning and then do something productive. I have a number of YouTube videos I want to create and so I will be spending some time in front of the computer putting those together. My wife and I are getting ready for all the vacations we plan to take next year and so that will require a bit of research on the Internet. Right now we have 3 trips planned to Disney World. If you haven't noticed, that is where our grandkids want to go. It might explain why we have annual passes and own a condo there.

I think the most important trick with the Christmas break is to not sit around watching really bad low-budget Christmas movies. Trust me, there are a lot of them out there. If you must, spend some time in front of the computer but then get outside and do something healthy for yourself. I like skiing as it is great exercise and I otherwise hate to exercise. 

You Can't Unsend a Text Message

This morning I awoke to my mobile phone announcing I had received a text message. I immediately rolled over and went back to sleep without reading it. Later when I got up and got ready to go skiing before work, I read through the message from son in Ohio. He made a comment about how he can take his whole family skiing on Christmas Eve out there for the price of a single lift ticket at Alta. That includes lift tickets and ski rentals for his 2 girls. I immediately thought about sending a response letting him know that people get on airplanes to come ski Alta and nobody would do that to ski Ohio. I mentioned my response to my wife and she responded that I probably shouldn't send that. I kept my comment to myself and headed up skiing.

Early in my career at Oracle doing technical support work, I responded to a fellow coworker with an angry sounding e-mail about how he wasn't doing his job and shouldn't expect me to do it for him. That didn't sit well with him and he replied being sure to copy my boss. I realized that I probably should have waited a bit before responding to his original e-mail and sent something much more professional. I responded to him with an apology stating that I sent an e-mail without taking the time to properly articulate my thoughts and that I did not mean to offend him. That smoothed things over but probably wasn't ever forgotten.

While skiing this morning I continued thinking about my son's text message and realized that my son is probably missing family close by and would appreciate a positive response instead of me making fun of Ohio skiing. I got home and responded that it is great that the whole family will be skiing on Christmas Eve even if we won't be at the same ski area. He liked my response.

This experience reminded me that you can't unsend a text message. While you may want to quickly respond in the heat of the moment, sometimes it is best to sit back and think about the best response. Your quick joke may not be received with the same jovial spirit with which you sent it. When anger needs to be diffused, you may be adding fuel to the fire. In my case, my son is missing our Christmas traditions in Utah and needed reassurance that it is fine for him to have Christmas at home with his own family. 

Latest Ski Season Start in a Long Time

Friday night I returned home from Japan and fell asleep right at 8:30pm. I slept all the way until 6:30am, meaning I got a solid 10 hours of sleep. I must have been tired due to having a 36-hour day because of flights and crossing the International Date Line. Fortunately I have not really had any jet lag to deal with.

On Saturday morning I woke up and got ready to go skiing at Alta with my wife. All of the resorts in Utah are hurting for snow as this is something like the worst start to ski season in 30 years. Alta has 4 lifts running and I am glad to got to make some turns. I did feel a bit rusty but quickly started carving and quickly felt comfortable.

I headed off to Japan the day before skiing started at Snowbird and Alta. While in Japan, I had a free day and looked at trying to ski somewhere there. They are set up for business travelers so that when you walk into the rental shop they will rent every last piece of equipment you could possibly need including base layers, goggles, helmets, and gloves. I checked the resorts a quick train ride from Tokyo but they won't open until this weekend. I also looked at the resorts in Hokkaido, Japan's North island. Unfortunately they had something like a 7.6 magnitude earthquake and that closed down all the resorts up there. Ultimately I didn't end up finding a place open for skiing other than an indoor area that I have already been to. Yes I could have gotten an extra day by going there but opted to do something else.

Having my first ski day on December 13th means this is the latest I have skied for the first time in the season for many years. Last season I skied 126 days. With such a late start, I will have to work to get 100. It is a noble goal and I hope to make it.   

Two Hurricanes in the Pacific

In the winter time I have one of the tabs in my browser set to the weather page at Alta Ski Area as it guides me on what to expect when I go skiing. That information is useless in the summer time and so instead I focus on hurricanes. While this may not seem to effect me as I reside in the landlocked state of Utah, it actually does. Furthermore hurricanes have a huge effect on vacation and travel plans. An Atlantic hurricane can really screw up flights throughout the entire country.

I have been watching NOAA's hurricane site for about 10 years and have seen something today I have never seen before. There is currently a hurricane south of Hawaii named Iona. Fortunately it is on a westward path and Hawaii is safe, for now. Behind it is the tropical storm Keli. I wouldn't expect there to be hurricanes so close together as the first one should be pulling energy from the ocean that would be required for the one behind it. That is probably why Keli is only a tropical storm and not expected to grow as it continues west and well south of Hawaii.

While I have seen multiple storms in either the Atlantic or Pacific oceans at the same time, I haven't seen two additional storms starting to form with a probability greater than 60% to become named storms. The furthest west storm is just east of Keli and has a 70% chance of turning into a tropical storm. A little bit closer to Mexico the conditions are a bit higher for storm formation as it has a 90% chance of forming into something of concern.

I am not worried about a hurricane making its way to Utah but I have seen storms like that send copious amounts of moisture my way. While it could be devastating for those near the coast, it could provide the Western United States with some badly needed precipitation. For some it will be bad, for others it will be good.

Fortunately I am not headed to Mexico, Hawaii, nor Florida in the near future and so I don't need to worry about changing vacation or travel plans. If I planned to go to Hawaii next week, I would keep those plans as none of the storms seem to be headed that way. If I planned to go to the west coast of Mexico, I might be watching the storm forming there but probably wouldn't change my plans either. The Atlantic has been relatively calm this year so far and continues to look that way now. With that being said, now is a good time to pay attention to hurricane forecasts as this is the time of year when it really gets interesting.  

Technology Improves Our Lives

This morning I woke up at 6am and ran through my usual morning routine of breakfast. Then I got ready to go skiing. It is early November which means lifts are not really running at Alta and so if you want to ski, you get to hike up the hill and earn your turns. My daughter joined me today.

Yesterday we did the same thing and had the luxury of clear skies. Today we started driving in a rainstorm that turned into snow the higher in elevation we drove. We arrived at the Wildcat lot in a full-blown blizzard. My daughter and I don't care as we live by the philosophy that there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing. We got our skis ready and started climbing the hill while it snowed heavily around us. 

I felt incredibly comfortable as I hiked up the hill. We both made sure not to overdress as that would cause us to sweat too much which would freeze and make us cold. Instead the breathability of our Gortex-like shells kept the water out and allowed our perspiration to escape. I thought to myself that even though I was outside, I felt comfortable enough as if inside.

Technology constantly makes our lives better. I would not want to trade places with the wealthiest people of 200 years ago because of our many modern conveniences. Clothing is just one example. The many uses of electricity also come to mind. We can use it to keep us warm in the winter and cool in the summer, not to mention run our computers, light our homes, and power our entertainment devices. Yes, I am happy living right now.

Technology Can't Compete with Mother Nature

Mankind has achieved some really amazing things. Just thinking about all the technological advancements that allow me to post to this blog illustrates some of those achievements. Looking at advances in transportation, housing, food production, and many other areas leads one to believe that we can do a lot.

Tuesday we had a nice snowstorm here in Utah and so I decided to drive up to Alta Ski Area on Wednesday morning before work and see if I could make a few turns before the lifts start running in earnest. In addition to snow, Tuesday's storm ushered in colder temperatures and Alta has started making snow. Making snow is a fairly simple process where you spray tiny water droplets in front of a large-powerful fan that keeps the water in the air long enough to freeze before it hits the ground. The key to making snow is having cold enough temperatures.

I put on all my equipment and started hiking up a run called Corkscrew. It is the same run I hike at the beginning of every season and Alta is kind enough to allow people like me the chance to do so. They also have their snow makers cranking out snow so skiers don't have to worry about rocks in the middle of the run. The only problem is that you don't want to spend too much time in front of the snow makers as it can be cold and wet. During the course of my hike, I passed no fewer than 5 snow makers blowing snow 50 to 100 feet in the air.

Man-made snow has a much different consistency than natural snow. It is great for a base layer on runs that are skied frequently as it is more ice than Mother Nature's soft-fluffy flakes. The ice is more durable and does not get scraped off the mountain nearly as easily. The downside is that it is ice and not very fun to ski. I would much rather have natural snow fall from the sky and get compressed by hoards of skiers. Still the technology does allow us early skiing when Mother Nature doesn't cooperate.

As I hiked up the trail, I saw the remnants of Tuesday's storm and marveled at the uniform consistency. The snow blanketed the entire mountain without the need of strategically-placed machines. Even though Alta's snow makers cranked out a lot of fresh snow, it paled in comparison to what Mother Nature provided. Yes mankind can do some amazing things but we still have a long ways to go to catch up to naturally occurring phenomenon.

Carnage and Destruction

Last week I tried to ski every morning before work only to have my plans thwarted by avalanche danger. The huge snowfall coupled with rapidly warming temperatures created an unsafe environment for driving the canyon between the Salt Lake valley and the ski areas up Little Cottonwood Canyon, Snowbird and Alta. For the first 3 days, I could go to a safe area closer to home and tour to Alien Tower at the top of Suncrest in Draper. Then the warming temperatures melted a lot of snow and I decided it was no longer worth it. I waited patiently and was rewarded on Saturday morning with a safe window where the canyon opened enough to drive to Alta. Then I had to wait until the sun went down for them to open it again. It meant hanging out at Alta until after 7pm even though the lifts stopped running at 4:30.

As the canyon is closed again this morning and probably won't open until Saturday, I used my early morning time to create a video of Saturday's drive up to Alta where I filmed about 80% of the trip. In the video you can see most of the avalanches that crossed the road during the previous week. I missed the first one which is when I decided that I should probably pull out my phone and capture video as others might be interested in the carnage and destruction.

What is it about carnage and destruction that attracts viewers to video sites like YouTube? I get a lot of views of my skiing videos but this one will probably turn out to be one of my most popular. Should someone ask how to get a bazillion views of their video, I would recommend including natural disasters or other train-wreck ideas. People just can't help but watch.

Technology Can Help Make Smart Decisions

Today I went skiing with the adult members of my family and we had quite the adventure. We started at Alta and went looking for leftover powder from yesterday. We skied over to the Supreme chairlift only to discover all the new snow had been skied out. We probed along the ski run looking for newly opened gates to see if we might find something fun to ski. All of the gates remained closed because of high avalanche danger and so we stayed on the main run.

Next we headed over to the Sugarloaf chairlift and traversed over to the Collins side of the resort. We had a bit of a hike but made some good turns and found some unskied snow. Unfortunately it was a long way to go for only a few turns. We kept looking. When we got to the bottom of the Collins chairlift the line looked very long compared to the Wildcat lift which only had a few people in it. Not wanting to wait in line, we headed up Wildcat. At the top, we had a decision to make. We could stay at Alta or we could drop into Snowbird via the Keyhole gate. It is this decision where technology could have helped yet we trusted our own intuition. Well I trusted mine and my wife gave me the look that said she didn't.

There are several options for moving between Snowbird and Alta. Before even considering skiing both resorts in the same day you need to have an AltaBird pass. Otherwise you are stuck in one resort or the other. We all had the requisite pass and wanted to take advantage of it. We knew we could use the Keyhole gate to get from Alta to Snowbird. The trick was how to get from Snowbird back to Alta. One option is to take the public bus. That is always the last resort as we came to ski, not ride a bus. There is also the option of dropping into Mineral Basin and taking the Baldy Express chair back to Alta. Unfortunately it is too early in the season and Mineral Basin isn't open yet.

As we sat on the top of the Wildcat chairlift deciding which way to go, we knew we couldn't use Mineral Basin but knew we could use the Armpit gate on Baldy to get from Snowbird to Alta. With that as our plan, we headed to Snowbird. In hindsight, we had all of the tools necessary to augment our decision. We should have pulled out a mobile phone and checked to make sure we could use the Tram to get up to Baldy. Given the tram closure, we could also leverage the Little Cloud chairlift. Furthermore, we could have verified that the ski patrol allowed people to ski on Baldy. Remember that the avalanche danger was high enough at Alta that we couldn't guarantee Baldy would be skiable.

Armed with only the intuition that we would be able to get back to our car at Alta, we headed to Snowbird. We definitely found the fresh powder we wanted. Those turns at the top of Keyhole are the stuff skier's dreams are made of. Then we carefully threaded our way down the narrow chute that gives Keyhole its name. Once on the main runs at Snowbird we headed to the tram so we could get back to Alta. This is where the adventure began.

We got to the tram and found it to be closed. We are not sure we would have known that while still at Alta as the closure seemed to happen as we got there. The reason for the closure was high winds at the top of the mountain. A quick check of the weather on the Snowbird website would have told us that the winds approached the maximum speeds for tram operation and we might be flirting with a closure. We explained our desire to return to Alta in the hopes of a suggestion from the Snowbird staff. I threw out the idea of heading over to Little Cloud and hiking from it to the top of the tram so we could get to Baldy. Chairlifts can run in higher wind speeds than the tram. Unfortunately Little Cloud was temporarily closed because of avalanche activity in the resort.

We saw our options decreasing with every idea but had a few more. Next we headed up the Peruvian chairlift. From there we had 2 options. We could try to make the short hike up a very steep face which would put us on Baldy. The second option was to ski down to the condo complex below and make the mile walk to Alta. I didn't want to wear everyone out and I do enough hiking so I suggested I would make the hike up to Baldy, get to the car, and drive down to pick the rest of the party up at Snowbird. My wife wanted someone else to go with me and so I picked the kid that kept up with me best while hiking earlier in the season. We started the climb and got about a third of the way up before others on the trail told us that ski patrol had just closed Baldy because of avalanche danger.

That left skiing down to the condos and hiking the mile to Alta. We tried to find other ways to get to Alta as we skied down towards the condos but couldn't find one. We pulled off our skis, threw them over our shoulders, and started walking. It didn't take long to find a ski trail. We put our skis back on and skied across the snow. We found another parking area and pulled skis off to walk through before putting our skis on for the last time. We had to skate up a few slight inclines but we made it to Alta and got the car.

We never wanted to take the bus and that turned out to be a blessing. Right now the public transit system in Salt Lake can't find enough drivers and so they have suspended bus service at Snowbird and Alta until later in the month. It turns out, the bus was never an option. Once again, a quick Internet search would have told us that our absolute fail-safe option wasn't an option after all.

Ultimately we had the technology at our fingertips to help us make an informed decision. Knowing the buses were not running might have been enough to keep me from making the wrong decision to head into Snowbird. In the end though, I did get a good story out of the experience. I also hit my step count for the day before noon.

Top 5 Steepest Ski Areas in North America

Last night I was putting the finishing touches on my latest video, the Top 5 Steepest Ski Areas in North America when I realized that I needed one more picture for the video. I mentioned High Rustler at Alta but didn't have any pictures of the iconic ski run. I had already shown pictures of the trail map and knew that a quality photo taken from the road would convey the right message.

My daughter is a ski instructor at Alta and I asked her if she had any pictures of High Rustler. She didn't but did have today off and so we drove up to the resort together. Before getting to the parking lot, I pulled off to the side of the road and she took a beautiful picture with my camera. We then spent the morning skiing on our World Cup GS race skis carving high-speed turns on the beautifully groomed runs. A few hours later, we headed home.

Dropping the photo into iMovie was easy and it made for a dramatic scene in the video. High Rustler is really one of those steep runs that even advanced skiers have nightmares about. When I first started skiing it in college, I would have to force any fear out of my mind or it would paralyze me at the top. Today's photo captured that. If you are interested in seeing it, just watch the link at the top of the post.

Opening Day at Alta

Today is the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and it is fitting that I should post about one thing I am thankful for: opening day at Alta ski resort. This morning my wife and I awoke at 7am and quickly got ready so we could head up for the morning celebration. We arrived at 8am and I quickly got ready. I left my wife in the warm car while I stood in the cold line and saved us places close to the front. Eventually my wife joined me followed shortly by our youngest daughter who is a ski instructor at the resort. Today is her day off and so she got to ski with us.

So what does opening day have to do with computers and technology? As usual, not a single thing. Well there is the point I could make about how we got 3 inches of fresh snow this morning and I could have looked up that information on the Internet before getting in the car. The funny thing though is that I would have made the trip anyways. While it is the first day of lift-serviced skiing, it is my 16th day this season and so I had a really good idea of what the conditions would be like. I didn't need to waste my time looking them up.

Hopefully you too have something to be thankful for this Thanksgiving season. Perhaps your item is even much more meaningful than mine. I sure hope so as there are many things I am thankful for. I just chose to list this one today.

Doordash Doesn't Deliver During Snowstorms

Today we have a new person starting on the team at work and so the manager arranged lunch for everyone. That means I got a gift certificate for Doordash. My daughter is home with me because she can't get up the canyon for her job at Alta due to a massive snowstorm right now. I asked her if she wanted to share lunch with me. We decided on pizza and so I logged onto the site to order it. Guess what? That same snowstorm that is keeping my daughter from getting to work is also keeping Doordash from delivering a pizza. I probably should have figured that one out on my own.

My Hackathon Project

A couple of times a year we get to participate in hackathon projects at work. This allows people to work on things that interest them above and beyond their daily work. Our latest hackathon finished a week ago and I had a really great time.

Most hackathon projects are related to the PlayStation but I decided to do something a bit different. Several years ago I came up with the idea of attaching a speaker to my skis so that I would be able to find them if I lost them on a powdery day. For those that don't ski, bindings are meant to release your skis in the event of a fall so that they don't cause damage to your body. Ski brakes then extend into the snow and keep the skis from running away down the hill. The system works great most of the time with fresh powder being the exception. When you lose your skis on a powdery day, it is anyone's guess as to where they are.

My idea is to being able to have the speaker start making noise when you activate it with your smartphone. I bought a $30 microcontroller board with Bluetooth capabilities, a small buzzer, and a Lithium-ion battery. It didn't take long to put everything together and modify a few sample programs to get the board talking with my mobile phone. I could turn the buzzer on and off from my phone before going to bed on the first night of the event.

I woke up the next morning and took the device to Snowbird ski resort to do some testing. The first thing I wanted to check is how loud the buzzer was. Unfortunately, it wasn't that loud. Not wanting to waste the day, I next checked how far the Bluetooth worked. At around 150 feet or 50 meters, I could still communicate with the microcontroller from my smartphone which is more than enough distance. I found that to be encouraging and came home to work on the low-sound issue.

I replaced the buzzer with a speaker but that didn't help at all. The microcontroller just didn't have enough power to drive the speaker very loudly. As I felt stuck with the buzzer, I actually soldered the buzzer to the microcontroller board. That increased the sound output by 3 times. I could now hear the device from 60 feet away instead of just 20.

The next day I headed up to Alta ski resort and waited for the lifts to start carrying skiers to the top of the mountain. We had several inches of new snow and that made for great test conditions. While waiting in line, I ran over to an area of fresh snow and buried the microcontroller about 6 inches deep. I activated the buzzer and didn't hear a blasted thing. It turns out snow is a great sound insulator. While I felt disappointed, I still had one more test to perform: battery life in the cold conditions. That means I spent 2 hours powder skiing with the device turned on and communicating with my smartphone. I had my daughter with me who is an excellent powder skier and we had a lot of fun.

Now someone reviewing my hackathon project  might think I wasted the company's time by working on a device that has no relevance to video games. The reality is that I have never worked with a microcontroller before and this served as an entrance for me to other hardware projects. I actually have a very good idea for my next hackathon. I will use the same microcontroller board with a few of its analog-to-digital inputs to help create a new type of controller. I won't say more than that but it will definitely be related to video games and how to make them better.

PS5 is Cheap Compared to Skiing

My youngest daughter is a ski instructor at Alta Ski Resort here in Utah. Before lunch I talked with her a bit and she looked into how much she makes per lesson compared with how much the resort makes. It is important this season as there won't be group lessons because of COVID-19. That means she will be giving private lessons all winter long. For an all-day private lesson, Alta Ski School charges $700. Let's not worry about how much of that my daughter will see (not much, if you are wondering). That figure startled her as it did me. I decided that if I was just getting into skiing, I couldn't afford it.

That $700 figure doesn't include ski equipment rentals, lift tickets, or food. So basically, if you need help learning how to ski, plan on dropping $1000 for a single day of skiing. All I can say is, "Wow!"

Now Alta is known as a relatively inexpensive place to ski. When I was in college, I liked Alta because a lift ticket cost so much less than other resorts in the area. Naturally my daughter and I became curious and looked at how much private lessons are at Park City. You can plan on dropping $900 there. We also looked at the most expensive resort in Utah and that is Deer Valley. During peak season, expect to spend over $1100 for private lessons there.

When the PlayStation 5 price was announced, I thought it a bit pricey. Now I realize that I can afford to play video games a lot easier than I can afford to go skiing. For the price of one day of skiing, I can get a PS5 and an XBox Series X. The only problem is finding a store with the new video game consoles.

Finding a Job Amid COVID-19

It seems that you can't watch the evening news, visit an online news site, or read a newspaper without seeing headlines about record unemployment. My youngest daughter, son-in-law, and youngest son are all effected by the horrible job hunting conditions due to the current global pandemic. I'm sure you all have people close to you in similar situations. Hopefully I can share some strategies to help.

Let's start with my youngest son. He just graduated from the University with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. It seems that no matter what he does, he can't get anyone to even look at his resume or return his inquiries. This is an incredibly tough job market for people with experience; It is even tougher for those just coming out of college looking to land a first full-time job. Fortunately my son is married and his wife is a nurse. Her skills are in high-demand and so my son will be heading to graduate school while she pays the bills. As nobody is sure if classes will be held in the fall, he is focusing on online programs as that will be the best option for the foreseeable future. My son also has another internship lined up with a highly respected organization. The requirement for the internship is that he is enrolled in a graduate program.

My son-in-law is also a fairly recent college graduate. His job was eliminated because of COVID-19 and he won't be returning until social distancing rules are relaxed. His wife, my daughter, is also in a unique situation where she will be going to graduate school. That makes finding a job for my son-in-law rather difficult. While my son is looking at online programs, my daughter's program requires her to be on campus and she will be moving from Utah to Alabama. If she can't be in class, they may defer her start until meeting restrictions are lifted. Not knowing when they will move makes finding a short-term job almost impossible. At some point it is easier to just collect unemployment and my son-in-law falls into that category for now.

Finally there is my youngest daughter. She has lost her job twice and a 2-month period. She started the year as a ski instructor at Alta ski resort. March 14th she went to work thinking she would make it through the season before they closed because of COVID-19. The next day, she didn't have a job. Her employer did the best they could with providing a little extra pay to bridge the gap between her next job. Rather than sit around waiting for her summer job to start, she immediately applied to Amazon and 2 weeks after her last day at Alta, she started fulfilling orders at an Amazon warehouse in Salt Lake City. She knew it was only a short-term gig and was glad. Working in a warehouse is not the right job for someone used to being outdoors every day of the week. After a month, she quit so she could start preparing for her summer job. She had been accepted to teach at a ski resort in New Zealand but that country is locked down and a week before her flight was scheduled to depart she was told not to come. So how would you like to lose your primary job twice in the same 2-month period? Fortunately for my daughter has found another job at an outdoor summer camp that is scrambling to open in the next couple of weeks. Let's hope they can pull it off.

So what are the takeaways from my 3 anecdotal experiences? First, this is a tough job market for new college graduates and you might want to think about getting an online graduate degree. Second, it is a tough job market for professionals with only a few years experience. Don't be afraid to file for unemployment as it may provide some badly needed income until you can find a job. Finally, there are jobs out there if you look hard enough and are willing to do almost anything. Sure you may be stuck in a warehouse shipping unmentionables to really bored people for $17/hour, but there are jobs. I hope this helps.