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Ever since my man vs boat experience, I have been a bit reluctant to ride a bike in Vancouver. I figure I need to face my fears and get out there.

I bought a bike and started bike commuting. I might be the only person dumb enough to take a bike from Vancouver to downtown Portland, but I have never been much for fitting in. Actually, I do not ride the entire 11 miles. I grab the Yellow Line in North Portland.

I get a Tri-met pass for work, so minus the cost of the bike, my commute is now free. Woohoo.

Going over the Interstate Bridge in the rain, wind, and dark is less than my favorite activity in the world. Otherwise, I enjoy my commute better than sitting in traffic.

Next step, move back to Portland.

Many of you probably watched the Super Bowl last Sunday. You also probably watched the commercials. To throw out some shameless self promotion, I had the pleasure of being apart of one of those ads. Ok, it was not me directly. Although I do enjoy Doritos and not wearing my Dockers.

In the third quarter Google had an ad. You can watch it below. They called it Parisian Love. Between seconds 36 and 40 search of ‘AA 120′ is made (a flight number). This referenced my employer, FlightStats.

There has been a ton of chatter in our office the last couple days, but in general we are all really excited. One of our marketing people said he would never be able to top an accidental Super Bowl ad appearance – career over.

I do have to say it is nice working for a team and product with such high credentials.

I was finally able to go skiing last night. Huzzah. This brings my all time total ski trips to six, hence the two hands thing. For my sixth trip and that I have not skied in two years, I was pretty excited about my progress. I was weaving and curving with the best of them and my confidence is getting better. James even told me I should run a Black Diamond – nah, next time.

Conditions reminded me of late March. Old, packed snow. Lines were very short, we never had to wait more than 15 seconds.

How about some stats?

• About three hours – just after 6:00-9:00.
• 15-20 runs.
• $15. Meadows has super special deals after 6:00 or something.
• Five crashes including the two below.
• One yard sale. Skies off, 20 feet apart and 30 feet behind me. Poles off. Boats unbuckled. Snow in pants. Six inch wide, three feet long, and four inch deep hole, 15 feet behind me.
• One failed lift entrance. Some snowboarder tried to join James and I on the four person lift. He took about three of the spots. My attempt to give him more room failed when I noticed the lift railing between my legs. Adjusting back found myself face first in the snow under the lift. Stupid snowboarders.

A good night, a good night.

The weather hates me. It probably is just fine with other people, but me – hatred. In the last week I have had three failed ski trips.

It all started the weekend before last. I wanted to go night skiing sometime during the week at Mt Hood. After attempting to recruit ski buddies, I found the lifts were closed except on Friday and Saturday due to lack of snow and insanely warm weather for mid-January. Turns out, some lifts were open later in the week, but I had already ditched hopes. Fail one.

For several months a friend from the college dorms was planning a XC skiing trip. I was ready to go this last Saturday, but it turns out it was 40 and raining. Not too fun. Fail two.

After seeing the lifts open later last week, I attempted to reorganize another trip. I got to work early this morning, so I could leave at 3:00. After meeting my ski buddies for the day, we made our way to the mountain. If the foreshadowing did not give it away yet… Closed. All three places. Fail three.

What does a guy have to do to get a little ski around here?

One of the perks of working at Conducive is a free parking pass. Parking Management Company (PMC) is kind enough to organize the logistics of this sweet deal. PMC has about 300 locations in Portland, Salem, and Vancouver which I can now use anytime I want.

I found a problem though. After looking and looking, I could not find a map of the locations. If my normal lot is full, I could not find an alternative easily without skimming the list. On the weekends, I want to find a location close to the weekend activity of choice. So, I made a map. I hope somebody out there finds this as helpful as I think it will be for me.

View PMC Parking Map in a larger map