#185 Learning to Snowboard

Mark: Welcome to EnglishLingQ. Mark Kaufmann here with Jill Soles back for another installment of the EnglishLingQ Podcast. I guess we're finally back on our nice sunny day schedule. Jill: That's right. Mark: It's been a few weeks since we could say that. Actually, it was a nice weekend and a beautiful day today.

Jill: Saturday wasn't that great. I guess the afternoon it cleared it. It did clear up in the afternoon; the morning was miserable.

Mark: Was it.

Jill: It was snowing, sleet, there was sleet and icy rain, but then it did clear up in the afternoon.

Mark: That was during our football game we played Saturday morning. We didn't mind. Jill: I was going to say that's the way you like it, isn't it? Mark: That's right. Jill: And then Sunday I think was nice. Actually, we were out of town up in Kamloops for a funeral. We had to leave at like seven Sunday morning and didn't get back until the evening. Mark: Oh really.

Jill: But Kamloops was just clear and sunny. When we came home at night Vancouver was clear as well, so I assumed it was a nice day here.

Mark: Yeah, Sunday was beautiful, yesterday. Yeah, did they have snow in Kamloops by the way?

Jill: Yeah, but not a lot really, maybe a couple centimeters; not very much. Parts of the Coquihalla Highway were snowing very heavily.

Mark: Even when you went through?

Jill: When we went through; when we were driving there. But on the way home the sky was clear the whole drive, the whole four hours.

Mark: Yeah, that's nice. Jill: The moon was big and bright and it was just beautiful, because there is still lots of snow on the Coquihalla, not on all the trees, but it wasn't snowing. Mark: On the road.

Jill: Yeah, it was nice.

Mark: No rocks went through your sunroof?

Jill: No, but three good sized ones definitely hit our windshield. We already have a big crack.

Mark: From before?

Jill: From before, so I don't know if any of them actually made a new ding. You get behind so many big trucks on that highway and gravel on the road.

Mark: There's not much you can do driving around here in the wintertime on the highways anyway. I mean either they don't put gravel down and the roads are unsafe... Jill: …and you're in the ditch. Mark: They put gravel down and you get some damage to your vehicle.

Jill: Yeah.

Mark: Yeah, I told you before that our sunroof was cracked, right? We just got it fixed, but they had to order the sunroof from somewhere in the states and it took 10 days to get here; I don't know why. It's been raining here and we had a hole in the roof, you know? Jill: Not so convenient.

Mark: Not so convenient. I mean they give you this plastic stuff that you can stick over it, but it doesn't stick that well and it sticks less well every day that you're driving around in the rain with it. Jill: Exactly.

Mark: Not to mention the wind is whistling through. Yeah, no, that was not good. Kindrey took it in to the insurance claim center and the guy looked at it and he said this is a new car? She said yeah. Well… Jill: Oh, this was on your new vehicle? Mark: Yeah.

Jill: Oh, I thought it was on your Durango.

Mark: No, no, we would have been alright in our Durango it didn't have a sunroof. Jill: Right, I thought so, yeah.

Mark: So he looked at it and he said well, you need a new sunroof for sure. Your windshield's got dings in it and the paint's got dings in it. Because once you're going to pay the deductible anyway the rest of the claim is covered. So we pay our deductible and then they're going to replace the sunroof, the windshield and the paint job. Jill: Wow.

Mark: So that's a big bill. Jill: That's a huge bill for ICBC. Mark: It would have been, yeah. ICBC is the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia.

Jill: Our monopoly.

Mark: It's our, I guess, socialized car insurance in B.C. Anyway, everyone is insured by ICBC, but they cover road damage, essentially. I have a deductible and in my case it was $300.00 that I have to pay, but then they pay the rest and it doesn't affect my premiums. Jill: No, your rates don't go up or anything, yeah. Mark: I mean it's not good that we broke the sunroof, but at least it's good that a big bill is largely covered by insurance. Jill: Well that they're going to do all those other repairs too. Mark: I know.

Jill: Because they don't have to. They can actually make you do all separate claims in which case you have to pay the deductible each time.

Mark: Yeah, exactly.

Jill: So that's good that they did that. Mark: I guess because it all happened at the same time.

Jill: Yeah.

Mark: I think if it wasn't a new car they wouldn't have done that, because they can't, obviously, tell when the dings happened. But because we just got it they said well, you know, it must have happened because it was new when you got it, so the guy included it all.

Jill: Well that's great. Mark: And what's more, we were able to say well, we're going to be driving the rest of the winter. Can we just do the sunroof now and fix the rest of it later and he's written it up in such a way that we can. Jill: Oh wow!

Mark: Yeah.

Jill: I didn't know they'd let you do that. That's great. Mark: So that was great. Anyway, the sunroof is fixed now. It's much nicer driving that car. Jill: Maybe the kids will like it now.

Mark: I know.

Jill: More quiet.

Mark: That's right. Yeah, other than that, yesterday was a beautiful day here. My dad and I went up snowshoeing. Did you talk to Mike, by the way? He started snowboarding.

Jill: I did. Mike our programmer, one of our programmers, was off for a couple of weeks and he said he went six times, six or seven times, every other day he said.

Mark: If not more; quite a few, yeah.

Jill: Yeah, that's great. He just decided to take it up, didn't take any lessons and he said he just got on and went down the hill and it just worked for him. Mark: Which is great.

Jill: I know.

Mark: I don't know, I just wouldn't have thought that, but why not? That's great. Jill: Yeah, it surprised me too, but that's great for him. Mark: I mean I've never tried snowboarding. I know you're a snowboarder. Jill: Not really. Yeah, I have attempted for a few years, but I've lost interest. Now I'm going back to skiing. Mark: Oh yeah. It's more the snowboarder lifestyle that appealed to you. Jill: Yeah, right. Well, no, I won't talk about the stereotypes. I have a few friends who are big on snowboarding, so I shouldn't say anything. But, no, skiing, I think I'll stick with that. There's no learning curve anymore. Mark: No. That's my argument all the time. Jill: Mike said that he thinks snowboarding is way easier than skiing.

Mark: However, he's not a skier. Jill: He's not a skier, so I think that that's probably true. Because I think to learn, initially, you can be a decent snowboarder quite quickly; whereas, it is difficult to become a good skier. You can ski down easy runs and look pretty bad pretty quickly, but it is difficult to get good; whereas, I think with snowboarding once you get the hang of it you can pretty much go down most of the runs.

Mark: He said that. I have heard that it's easier to pick up than skiing, however, if you've been skiing your whole life. Because snowboarding didn't exist when I started skiing, so to start something new when I don't ski that often I just can't see myself doing it. If I have five days of skiing I don't want to waste two of them learning how to snowboard. Jill: Exactly.

Mark: I only have five days, I want to ski.

Jill: I think if you've been skiing your whole life and you want something new, maybe you're a little bit bored or you want a new challenge, sure, go for it; try it. Or all of your friends snowboard and usually snowboarders don't go down the mogully runs or the black runs, often it's the blues that they go down. Mark: If they do go down they wreck them. Snowboarders, get off my hill!

Jill: So yeah, I think if you have a reason to pick up snowboarding that's great if you're already a skier. I think, for the most part, if you're already a skier and you enjoy skiing why not just continue skiing. Mark: Why did you take up snowboarding, might I ask?

Jill: Because I stopped skiing. I skied a lot when I was a kid into my sort of early teens and then I, basically, just gave it up. I just lost interest and I would go maybe once every couple of years kind of thing. It's not like I'm a fantastic skier anymore or anything like that, so I just thought it would be fun to try something new. Mark: Yeah.

Jill: I had some friends who did it and I just thought oh well, I don't really ski anymore anyway. I have a good friend who's a good snowboarder and she wanted to get all new gear. She sold me all her stuff for pretty inexpensive, so I just bought it all and now I've only used it three times or something. Mark: Oh really?

Jill: It really wasn't a very good investment, shall we say, considering I also had to buy brand new boots. Mark: To fit you.

Jill: Those were, I don't know, two or three hundred dollars or whatever. So yeah, I just thought I'd try something new. Mark: Did you ever take lessons? Like Mike said he went… Oh, you did.

Jill: I did. I took two lessons I think. My little sister and I did and it definitely helped. You know, it was an hour or an hour and a half the two of us together took one – we took two actually – and, definitely, they helped me so that I could turn and I could actually go down the whole hill without falling. But my problem was then I needed to keep going several times and then I think I would have got the hang of it. But because I sort of just went and then maybe didn't go again until the next year, you lose it all. Mark: Well that's where I've got to hand it to Mike. I don't think he's been on the mountain, you know. I mean I don't know, but he's tried skiing two or three times in his life, you know, I don't know how long ago, and all of a sudden he decided I'm going to snowboard. He had time off, he went up there and he said he went like 10 times. He started out on the bunny hill, the rope tow beginner hill, for two-three days and then he graduated to the green runs and then the blue runs and he said he even the last day he attempted the steeper black run, which he said was a mistake. But, at any rate, even the fact that he… Jill: You could always toboggan down. Mark: Sitting on the back?

Jill: Yeah, it's great. Mark: Oh really?

Jill: I've done that before; it's fun. Mark: Yeah, yeah, yeah, so anyway, I mean that's great and so he obviously feels comfortable on the blue runs. Jill: Yeah, that's great. Mark: Even the fact that he would attempt a steep black run like that.

Jill: After a handful of times, you know, yeah.

Mark: But it's amazing. You know it's a bit like language learning, if you do it every day that concentration really pays dividends. He went like every day or almost every day for two weeks. Yeah, he made a big improvement and now he's in the groove where he's probably past the stage where he's going to regress like you. Jill: Yeah, exactly.

Mark: He's comfortable; he's done it enough now. He can go up there on the weekend for one day a week and really enjoy himself.

Jill: Yeah, I know. I think that's what you need to do. You need to go at least a few times very, you know, close to each other.

Mark: You need a concentrated effort.

Jill: Yeah, yeah.

Mark: Even when we go skiing -- like at Christmas we go for five days -- I mean the first day you're a bit rusty, by the second day you're feeling better, by the fifth day you're feeling great, as opposed to skiing once every two weeks you probably don't get that. Jill: No.

Mark: Every time almost feels new again, right?

Jill: Unless you're a really good skier and every single year every week or two you go skiing and then I think you're sort of always in the groove of things. Mark: Sure. Yeah, there are some people that ski all the time and, as you say, those are the guys that are skiing today, they're going to snowboard tomorrow, they've got their Telemark Skis that they're going to use the next day and they've got all this stuff because they're really into it. Jill: Yeah.

Mark: Yeah, no, I'm more of a… Jill: …fair-weather skier. Mark: I wouldn't say that. You should have seen the weather when we were there at Christmastime. You couldn't see for the top-half of the mountain. Jill: Yeah.

Mark: You get used to skiing in the fog.

Jill: Well, that's true and just even around here period you're not going to do much skiing if you're a fair-weather skier. Mark: No, although, I guess my dad said he was up on Saturday cross-country skiing and it was cloudy down here, but it was sunny up there.

Jill: He got above the clouds, yeah.

Mark: Yeah.

I've been up on days like that; it's great. Jill: Beautiful, yeah.

Mark: Beautiful, sunny, clear, looking down over the carpet of clouds, yeah. There's a lot of snow up there, so. Jill: Oh, it's crazy. I think there's 400 centimeters or something at Cypress. Mark: Is there really? I believe it.

Jill: It's just crazy the amount of snow that we have on all our local mountains. Mark: Yeah, yeah.

Jill: I think it's been one of the best years ever. Mark: It's been a good year, yeah, well, up on the mountain. It's been very wet down here. Anyway, I was quite impressed at Mike's adventures there. Jill: I know.

Good for him; that's great. Mark: Actually, Henry was telling me he's going to go get some… Henry is our developer who's from France and he's here in Canada on working holiday for a year, so he's going to get himself some skates. Jill: Oh, he's going to learn to skate. Mark: Yeah, because I guess some friends of his go together to the Denman Arena. I don't know when, at night sometime. They have public skating and he's been giving it a whirl. Jill: That's great. Mark: Yeah, I thought that was pretty good. In fact, they should go up to the outdoor rink up on Grouse Mountain.

Jill: That would be beautiful.

Mark: Yeah.

Jill: The only thing with that is then it costs you $20.00 each person, because you have to take the tram up the hill.

Mark: Yeah, that's true. Jill: So even if you're not skiing, you still have to pay your ticket. Mark: Just to go up and skate, although, if you've never been and you're from out of town. I think a lot of his friends are also… Jill: From out of town? Mark: It would probably be a neat thing to do.

Jill: Oh yeah, because there's so much to do up there. Mark: On a clear night there's so much to do up there. Yeah, maybe I'll suggest that to him. Jill: Yeah.

Mark: Anyway, I think that we'll stop there for today. We hope to catch up with all of you next time.

Jill: See you later.