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Some Powder Rules

Brett Gardner-Smith

Given the relative dearth of snowy days over the last several seasons, it may be helpful this morning to go over some powder-day protocol.

First of all, be selfish. You moved here, or you still live here, because of days like today. Days that are filled with fresh, untracked snow.

When these days come, you must disregard your loved ones (just for a few hours). You must not wait around the house while they look for their gator and their warmer gloves. You must not indulge their sudden need for a latte at 8:45 a.m. And you must not agree to go with them to rent some fatter skis.



Get up early. Write a nice note. And then creep silently out of the house and make your way to a lift that is about to start turning.

Second, invoke the 8-inch rule, even if it’s not quite that deep out there. The 8-inch rule allows you not to come in to work until at least 11:30 a.m. It allows you to blow off previously scheduled meetings. It allows you to pretend that you have only one purpose today, and that is to make turns through fresh snow.




Third, look for your friends. But don’t agree to meet them. Don’t ask them to pick you up. Don’t tell them you’ll wait for them.

“Look” for them, as in look to see if they are in your line, as in look for them deep in the trees, and as in look for them at the bar at the end of day.

Lest you think I’m being a tad harsh here, consider that it snowed hard all day on Tuesday. There was 4 inches on Ruthie’s by 9 a.m. yesterday and reports from the field indicate that the handful of skiers that did venture out found mostly untracked snow over the early December firmness.

And then it snowed and snowed throughout the day, turning Highway 82 into an ice rink. And it was supposed to snow 3 to 6 inches last night.

Today’s forecast is calling for another 1 to 3 inches and a high of 26 degrees.

And the wind has been blowing steadily from the north/northwest, nicely loading some of the steeper slopes around.

Does this sound like a situation that you, as a free citizen of this great nation, should ignore? I think not.

Now, maybe this is all hype. Maybe I will have awoke to find that Wednesday was not a powder day. And maybe it hasn’t really snowed 9 feet at Kirkwood near Tahoe since Saturday.

But I’m not taking any chances. I’m going under the radar and going up the lift.

If you need to, just consider this day an early Christmas present. After all, today is likely to be much fatter than that Christmas bonus envelope.