Snowshoe

There are few trips I look forward to more than the ones where I get to go snowboarding. I love traveling, but if I was being interrogated for some strange reason (and even stranger, if said interrogator was interested in my traveling preferences) and asked, "Tahiti or snowboarding?!" I'd probably roll snowboarding.

One of my most favorite places to go for for ski/snowboarding, is Snowshoe. It's a six hour drive from Raleigh, and is arguably one of the best resorts on the East Coast. If you can't fly to Colorado, Utah, etc., it's the place to be for those of us in the South.

View from a run at Silver Creek

I learned to snow ski from my father when growing up in Arizona. I don't really remember learning, but sometime around the age of 10 I was having tons of fun on skis. However, nothing gold can stay and when I saw my first snowboard at the age of 13, I had to try it. 

I was hooked.

Putting bindings on the new board in 2012 

Even better is that I get more serious and have more fun riding with each trip. Caroline bought me a new snowboard for my 32 birthday a year and a half ago, and I'm even more amped for my next trip (which is TBD). I'm now riding a 2012 Never Summer Legacy, which is a full nine centimeters longer than my old board. Considering that one is from the 90's, the extra length really boosted my speed and turning abilities, since I'm now a bit taller and definitely heavier than high school Khaner.

After spending the first day on Snowshoe mountain and then some at Silver Creek, I spent most of the next two days at Western Territory. I'm told the two runs at Western (Cupp Run and Shay's Revenge) are some of the longest runs and have the biggest vertical drops on the East Coast, and it was truly exhilarating to dominate both.

Amazing time, made even more so by my amazing friends who went with. Hope to squeeze one more trip in this year, and maybe treat myself to a huge Japan or Europe snowboard trip when I graduate from MBA school next Fall!

** - If you're super interested in my setup, my bindings are 2011 Burton Missions. I set em to 15 and 13 degrees (left and right), raised the height of the backs, and set the back's angles more forward. I definitely notice the improved stability of the back end of the board at 13 degrees, and felt much more powerful on my heel with my backs angled forward.

Adventures in Water Heating

Aside from days spent as a marketing/comms guys, and evenings at school, I spend a fair amount of time doing/fixing things around the house.

I learned a lot from my Dad, who made me help him out around the many houses we lived in growing up. We did a lot of large projects together (several sprinkler systems, roofing, etc.), but I learned the most when we built our house in Charlotte, and I was at a ripe learning age of 15 or so.

But as any good Walker man, we learn a lot from trial and error. So it should come as no surprise when I took it upon myself this weekend to fix our water heater that general mayhem would ensue.

Element in question

For the past two weeks (ever since the weather has gone crazy) it's been shutting off, prompting me to get under the house and hitting the reset button. Well my better half suggested I try and follow my best friend's advice, and replace the heating elements. 

My immediate thoughts on heating elements for water heaters:

• They actually keep the water in the tank. DO NOT REMOVE as a first step
• DO NOT have your wife underneath the house when you remove the heating element, she will voice immediate concerns about having to reshampoo her hair
• Shut off the water to the tank before removing the element
• Drain the tank before removing the element

I'm sure if I took the time to read the manual, I would've known to follow these steps in the appropriate order - but hey, Walker men right???

After all of this, we still don't have hot water to the house, so a repairman has been called. But I did learn a ton from the process! 

Also another key lesson - do not have your wife pour hot water on your head to rinse out the shampoo. I had to watch the Superbowl with a bag of ice to my head because of the burn!!

Regardless, we looked back at the experience as kind of a funny one, and I'm sure when we have hot showers again, we'll laugh even harder. Cheers to being a homeowner!