White strip of death

October 10th!! October 10th!! These resorts are taking this race to be first a little too far. So on Wednesday, October 10th, 2007, Arapahoe Basin will officially become the first ski resort in the nation to open for the season, which is news to me because I didn't realize ski season began when there are still green leaves on the trees and I will probably be out doing something in shorts and a T-shirt.

But in the never-ending challenge to be the initial provider of something, be it skiing, news or a laundry detergent that actually does get out red wine stains, the blurring wheels of technology revolve at blinding speed to churn out what the masses want. Never mind the fact that outside of the ONE strip of snow, the high country is bone dry.

Take a look for yourself

My friend Dana will keep alive her streak of four consecutive years of snowboarding on the first day the first resort opens. She knows it is flippant but it just helps crave her Jones for carving some turns - even if the snow beneath her board has the tensile strength of a Slushee that has melted sitting on a park bench and then stuck back in the freezer.

The race to offer the first chance to ski in the year has been an on-going battle between Arapahoe Basin and Loveland. But as a member of the esteemed (cough) media, I can tell you being first isn't always being the best.



Facts change, stories change, and quality gets tossed out like an overripe banana in the race to be first to bring you (insert said product that you can't live without yet somehow managed to for the previous X amount of years of your life) before anybody else did.




Never mind substance, let's just stick with flash, that will distract the audience long enough. Until they realize they have been flimflammed too long.

ARTIST OF THE POST

Laura Veirs - funky, folksy and bizzare imagery.