I spent the past 10 days before the semester began visiting my brother, Matt, and his wife, Ericka, and their dog, Zoey, in Mammoth Lakes, California.

They didn’t have an Internet connection, so I had to rely on a local coffee shop, which provided free wireless—a beautiful concept. However, I only checked my email every few days, and obviously, did not blog at all.

Sometimes you just have to live life and say nothing of it.

But in case you’re curious, I did a lot of snowboarding (photos), managing to nearly kill myself only once. I fell and slid 300 feet down a steep slope before being able to stop myself. A shot and a beer immediately followed.

I also went cross-country skiing (photos) a couple times, once at night, where we found ourselves, and the two dogs with us, surrounded by a pack of coyotes. Fortunately, no dogs were eaten.

Also, since my brother and his wife are rock climbing fiends, we traveled a half hour south to Bishop for top rope climbing and bouldering. I’ll post these photos later.