Ow.

[penk]

So tonight Brian (catya's brother) calls up and says "Hey, lets go snowboarding tonight!" I sort of waffled for a while, then said "Wha da hey, why not!" . Of course the weather report showed single digit temperatures, and I hadn't been on my snowobard for more than 30 seconds in 3 years, but why not!

So off we went to Nashoba Valley ski area - a little bump of a mountain about 20 minutes away. It was remarkably busy for a thursday night, but we parked, changed into gear in the parking lot (wow, talk about feeling like back in college. "OKAY, WE'RE HERE, DONT GO INSIDE, lets SKI!", got our lift passes and off we went.



The first couple runs were really get-aquainted time. I fell twice off the lift (wah!), but finally remembered and got the hang of parking my left foot just in front of the rear binding. (I ride my snowboard goofy foot, which basically means right foot forward - I guess I picked this up when I was skateboarding way back when, but apparently it's a little unusual - most folks ride left foot forward. *shrug*, whatever.

Anyway, first couple runs went great. Things were starting to re-click. I remembered that good snowboard riding can be like really good skiing - it's graceful and just feels wonderful when thigns are going right. And they were! The old patterns were clicking in - I realize I need to really work on my carving, which, when done right, is quite graceful. Basically it's getting up on the edge of the board in the turn, and tracking the edge of the board through the snow, rather than letting it slip sideways. When you see pictures of riders leaning WAAAAAAYYY over, one hand on the snow, in a tight turn, that's carving (extreme carving, but you get the idea :)

So, yea yea, he's leading up to something, right? Right.

Long about the 5th run, I got seperated from Brian. I ended up deciding to run up to the top of the hill and try to catch up with him. The hill is not that big, there wasn't really anyuthing to worry about seperation wise. So I'm on the double-chair by myself, and get to the top. Now, dismounting from a chairlift with a snowboard is a tricky affair at best. One foot stays attached to the board, but canted at an angle (it's always the forward foot, in my case my right). The other foot is free, out of the binding. The trick is to lay the board down on the snow, put your left foot -on- the board itself just in front of the read binding, and stand up. Since snowboarders steer with their back foot, and when in this position the back foot isn't attached to the board, it's very difficult to steer.

Lo and behold, some Einstein has decided that just in front of where folks are getting off the lift is a PERFECT place to stop and work on his bindings. Einey stands there like a deer in the headlights as I come off the lift, stand up, get my balance, and realize Albert is standing right in my path. No chance to go around him, I can't steer quickly enough to make that sharp a turn, so down I go. I don't quite plow him over, but i did knock him down as well.

Somehow I ended up face down, with the board behind me (underside of the board facig the lift), and my ankle at an angle it wasn't supposed to be in. It hurt. Hurt enough that I didn't want to move it. So I just sort of lay there. "My. This is nice snow. Think I'll lie on it for a bit."

Albert is all apologetic. Turns out he's about 13, and starts his litany of "Oh gosh I'm sorry sir, are you alright? I'm really sorry!" "Yea yea, I'm fine, I think." "I'm really sorry, really I am" "Kid, go away." "I'm sorry!" "One more apology kid and yer gonna be snorting fiberglass. Piss off." I'm a helluva charming guy when I'm in pain, really.

Next character to enter the drama is a very nice voice of a youngish woman who starts really asking if I'm okay. She offers to undo the snowboard binding, and I say "Oh, that would be great, thanks." I still haven't moved. At this point I didn't think I had broken anything, but I was really nervous about moving anything in my ankle. I moved my toes a bit, and they responded, so I figured things were still attached. NiceVoice starts fumbling about on the bindings and she declares "I'm going to need to take the boot off, the binding is stuck." Turns out she was tugging on the wrong strap, so I dicate "The blue lever. Pull teh blue lever!" - a quick -kerclick- and a lot of the tension on my ankle is gone. Ahhhh.

Time to move on to phase III. Is Dave disabled? Turns out no, not really. I start the basic pattern of flexing and moving things, as well as bending my knees to get out of the path of skiers that are still coming off the lift. I shamble over to the side of the trail and start gingerly figuring out if my foot is really damaged. The NiceVoice turns out to come from a very sweet ski patrol member, who was doing all the right things - watching my face to see if I was in shock, watching me move around, asking intelligent questions, etc etc.

My take there was "No, not broken. no, not swelling. Good. I think I'm okay." - Unfortunately, it -hurt-. So I spent the next 10 minutes just slowly walking around. Adreneline had whacked into me somewhere around the 2 minute post-fall mark, and I was twitching like crazy. I wished it would stop to see if I was steady enough to ride back down the hill. NiceVoice kept offering to get a sled or the like, but I thought hard about it and decided that it was just a little sore, and I'd be okay. She wandered off, and I decided to pace it out until Brian found me.

Brian came up a few minutes later, and after wondering where the hell I was, we decided to give it a shot getting down the hill. I was able to walk around, and I figured I should be able to ride. Buckle back up, put on the board, and off we went.

It wasn't bad - I could ride, but it hurt... Doing turns on a snowboard takes some decent energy - you can 'waffle' it, but it just looks cheesy, and is no fun. I was afraid to put weight on my ankle, cuz when I did, or turned it hard, it let out a jab of pain. The sort of pain on a really bad charliehorse, to give a reference point. I figured I had a mild sprain.

Once we got to the bottom of the hill (a challenging bit for me), I told Brian I couldn't do anymore that evening. It was about 8:35, so I said he should go ride some more, and I'd meet him in the lodge.

It was a long walk back to the lodge, and I ended up limping pretty pathetically a large part of the way. I could see folks watching "oh, look at the old guy with the snowboard... Guess he rode a little too hard, huh?" (yea yea I know this is me projecting, whatever, deal. :)

So anyway, I'm home now, foot up, ice on it, ibuprofen in the system. Swelling hasn't happened yet, and it's been 2 1/2 hours since the event, so I'm guessing a mild sprain. We'll see how things go for the night. I'm mostly embarrassed - I'm not sure if I pushed myself too hard for the first time out, or I have to remember I'm not 25 anymore, or what. I've -never- been hurt snowboarding or skiing before, and I've been skiing a LONG time.

Aaaanyway, I'll post more after I sleep on things, but for now . Ow.

More news later as things develop :)

Comments

[catya.livejournal.com]

right, but.. you DIDN'T hurt yourself snowboarding down the hill... you hurt yourself trying to get around an idiot. so stop giving yourself grief. :)

[dbang.livejournal.com]

Heh. Reminds me of breaking my foot on my motorcycle...sitting on it while it was at a standstill in the driveway. I was on the motorcycle, and had an accident, but it was not a "motorcycle accident". :-)