B.A.

Brian Anderson was a wee grommet when I first met him. Hugely gifted. It is very cool to see him still crushing it as a pro. Hometown pride.

Gears

Cold nights, shorter days, and staff meetings. My summer is coming to an end. The season changes quickly here. Some of the Aspen have already surrendered green to gold. Hard to believe, but there is an annual occurance come August. That is when I am confronted by the local heads I have known through countless lift rides and waits in the North Face Lift. "Dude, I had a snowboarding (or skiing) dream last night." I love it. Most of the country is suffocating under a blanket of heat and my people are talking about choking on powder.

We are still riding our bikes as hard as we can, skating, wakeboarding, hiking, running, camping, bagging peaks, and working to forage enough bounty to get us through the winter months. Though my role has changed, I am still one who craves winter. I love all the seasons here, but winter has a mysterious draw that sacks many of us when we should be most concerned with tanning.

The new staff at the cademy has arrived and are wrestling with the upcoming struggles. Small school, small staff, large responsibilities. We have a ne Head in Graham Frey. He brought his wife and son and signed on to try and lead our school into a new era of success and stability. The athletic programs have been on a tear. We have had National champs in boardercross three years running. The Alpine team has put two girls onto the US team in two years - unprecidented. And the runners have been making a splash in national competition. But the bottom line is the leadership has been spotty so the overall success of the school is still onerous. So we are waiting and hoping that this year we are finally set on the proper course, shifted into the right gear.

Katie and I are ready to become parents. The baby's room is almost complete. The house is becoming baby-ready. Katie is housing an active little fella. He is a swimmer...or kung fu practitioner. Whatever he is doing he is really getting after it in there. What an insane feeling. I will be a father. Katie a mom. We are going to have a real, live, pooping, puking, crying, hungry little person demanding that we heed him. Gulp.

K.I.A.

We lost a dear family member this past week. Cooper. The cat. Cooper was a good cat. We inherited him when he was eight, when we moved into Tiffany Wardman's house on Gothic Ave. He was the most affectionate and gentile cat I have ever known. He was raised in a house with dogs, so he could stand up for himself when things got heated and he also had a broader world-view as he no doubt thought he was part dog.

Sometimes he needed to be proded to say hello in his hickup-style greeting, but more often than not he would just say it on his own. He liked to be wherever Katie and I were. If we were in the yard, he would find a good patch of yard to stretch and roll on his back. When we pulled in the driveway he would run to greet us. His ability to find the best sunbeam in the house for a nap or the warmest nook between Katie and I in the bed was second to none.

Cooper was tough. I've seen him neautralize many dog threats with his never-back-down approach to combat. When Katie and I moved to Riverbend, Cooper just could not let go of the old neighborhood and continued to run back there - about two miles away. He did this no fewer than 20 times. On one adventure we picked him up with a pellet in his back. Somebody shot him! But he was tough and that didn't even phase him. After the first winter in Riverbend he had warmed up to the place and found good hunting in the surrounding fields. When we moved from Riverbend to Skyland - across the Slate River, we worried he would start running away again, but he fell right into the groove of the new neighborhood. He had a couple late nights that lasted into the following evening, but he would come stumbling in and get straight to the crunchy brown food he loved so much.

Slimey piles of entrails and little rodent heads would greet us almost every day here in Skyland. Cooper had found fertile hunting grounds and was eager to share his bounty. Gross, but thoughtful. Cooper was a good cat.

He dissappeared last week and his remains were spotted this week. He was taken out by either a very crafty dog or coyotes. I don't want to dwell too much on that. He was a great cat. Good company. Katie and I miss having his greeting, soft fur, and Bill the Cat-style poise. We love you, Coop, and hope you find good hunting wherever you are now.