January climbing in t-shirts.

January tends to be generally warm here in Silicon Valley, but this January was breaking records. If not by temperature, then certainly by number of sunny days — we were waiting in vain for precipitation that would bring water to the lowlands and snow to the mountains.

When I joined my buddies on the first January weekend in climbing at Castle Rock, I had packed my dawn jacket with me, just in case I was cold — and I subsequently regretted to not having worn shorts, and envied the boys who climbed half-naked. And since it had not rained properly for a whole year, Castle rock was very dry — which made me attribute my cough to the dust. On Monday though I had to admit that dust could not be blamed — I got an awful fever (I feel like dying from 100 degrees Fahrenheit up) and for the ensuing three days I crept out of bed only when it was necessary to pick up kids from school. On Thursday I dared to drive to Costco — you would not believe how one can get tired by pushing a shopping cart. I had to fold back into my bed for the rest of the day and stop doing crazy things.

Meanwhile, the Martin Luther King Day had gotten nearer — it's a Monday off for all government institutions. Our school had thrown in a Friday off, which back in November seemed like a fine idea — escape for four days to the mountains and pass out by too much skiing. Alas, our uncooperative weather turned it into an outlook of four days wasted around the house. Then I managed to convince Rumiko, who had bought passes for herself and Bryce, to ignore the suboptimal skiing conditions (as they had already paid anyway) — the kids would enjoy being together for a few days.

Poor snow situation.

We tried to plan enough time for skiing, while making Bryce available to his dad on Sunday morning (joint custody). I eventually accepted going in a single car for two days, with only Rumiko, me, and three children (Hippo had to work on Friday and did not spend his vacation on such lame snow). The action was even wilder than my expectations — but perhaps it wore me out after this bad illness, for I still felt not quite fit.

I packed on Thursday, even managed to load Rumiko's and Bryce's skis in the trunk. Yay, no need to install a roof rack. On Friday we got up at 6:45 (just like any regular school day), I completed packing our food (and forgot bread), and shortly after eight we added Rumiko and Bryce, ready to go. We got to Kirkwood by noon, Rumiko and Bryce rushed off to have pictures taken and passes issued, Tom and Lisa and I made fire in the fireplace to warm the "cottage" up, and carried all our stuff from the car inside. Lunch followed — by one o'clock we were on the slopes. For the remaining three hours I kept tracing the children, more or less without break or rest. It's interesting how the offspring, having a friend along, become much less obnoxious and whiney, and ski harder and longer instead.

Biking trip along the coast.

Back at the "cottage", my gaze fell on my cross-country skis, but then I sank into a chair and was glad that Rumiko joined me in preparing dinner. Kids watched The Mask, taught Bryce how to play Scrabble, and as soon as we succeeded in putting them to bed, both Rumiko and I did the same. And we did the right thing; I only got up once during the night to stoke the fireplace, but the kids got up sometimes around six thirty. On the other hand, we could be ready and board the lifts by 9:05 — and that is, I think, our absolute record.

By half past eleven Bryce began to complain about pain in his foot (later identified as a sock wrinkle), Tom joined him, and together they convinced Rumiko to take them both back to the "cottage" for lunch. Lisa, however, insisted on further skiing, and we made four more rounds on the only usable run. Eventually I lured her to have lunch — she just threw some pasta and cheese into her mouth and proceeded to entice the boys to go play out in the snow.

From the cliffs, you can watch birds and sea lions lounging on unaccessible beaches.

It gave me a QUIET hour, when I could sit, drink coffee, while nobody yelled (why are kids so horribly noisy and yell at each other from a half-foot distance?), nobody argues, and I could put my feet up on the table and do NOTHING. My well-earned rest soon ended, as we still had to go back skiing — that is, after changing the soaking wet youngsters.

Snacks followed, then tidying up the "cottage", packing — and I spent two hundred miles behind the wheel driving home. This time with a refreshing stop-over in a Vietnamese restaurant in Tracy. We made it home by ten o'clock in the evening, and I have to say that it's been a while since I felt this exhausted. Fortunately, there were two days off ahead of us, and I was able to more or less sleep throughout Sunday. Hippo went back to work on Monday, and I took the kids for an lesson with horses at Gary's ranch.

Paths among fields are very comfortable to ride.

Summer weather lingered on, and we chose bikes instead of skis on the weekend, taking Rumiko and Bryce out to Wilder Ranch. We hoped that the animal pack principle would take over and the kids would whine less, but we did not quite succeed. Lisa simply does not like biking much, and I'm afraid that until she grows up and gains mass, it's not going to get better. In a way I sympathize; she's thin and her bicycle, when compared to her own weight, is absurdly heavy, and she has to work awfully hard. In the end, Rumiko had provoked her to "a race", and she pedaled a bit more then.

We had a camera along, so naturally, there were no pelicans there. At least the sea lions from last time stayed around, and the children had some motivation to stop and gaze down from the cliffs. Then Bryce's pedal fell off, and our trip was over. Hippo had soon found the missing nut laying a few yards away in the grass, but we did not find the right tools to fasten in permanently, and we had no choice but to retreat cowardly.

And thus we were not lucky with bike riding, either. After miserable skiing, another set-back. Yet worse than our failed winter frolicking is the fact that a major shortage of water is about to happen; fresh grass had not yet begun to grow and everything is depressingly gray-brown. Then one cannot really enjoy even the sunny days, and wishes to hear rapping of rain-drops on the roof again.