Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Yaktrax and skinny jeans.

A while back I tried to send myself to an early grave by going for a run on a particularly chilly and icy morning without anything between my feet and the slip-sliding ice crust but my good old Brooks'.

That was some scary shit, friends. Let me just confirm that for you now.

Thankfully, Lesley read my post and wasn't put off too much by my swears and whining to offer a keen word of advice. Specifically: Yaktrax.

Now, yes, this does on the surface, seem like a proprietary piece of running gear that I don't necessarily need since the weather rarely calls for it more than maybe twice a year BUT I am not just a NorCal suburban runner who has no call for ice-crushing foot devices otherwise.

HO HO no! I am an all-weather gal, people. An all-weather gal that finally put two and two together last weekend and remembered to pack the Yaktrax for a trip up to Tahoe where, dontchaknow, it was snowing like a god damned beast.

Yes it was. That is a way that it can snow - beast like.

The best part came when, in gathering myself and all my clothes to take the dogs out for a DOGS GONE WILD leash-free walk, I actually remembered to strap on the Yaktrax for an inaugural hike up the road.

Can I get a hell yeah? Come on - just this once.



Fine. It was still awesome though. Because I was able to descend the stairs in front of the house, then move down the sloping driveway and up and down the hilly roads which were thick with ice and snow without nary an awkward slip.



Seriously. None whatsoever.

The dogs, however, could have used some Dogtrax because their hysterical asses were slip sliding away, even though it didn't make a lick of difference to them or slow them down on their mission to sniff every muther effing snowball, footprint, tree trunk, other dog, pine needle or otherwise mundane item during our morning and evening hikes.



Dogs are funny like that.

Me, though? I didn't have ass-sniffing to distract my mind from the slick state of the roads, so instead relied on my Yaktrax to keep me upright and moving in a self-propelled direction rather than a direction dictated by the dimensions of the ice beneath my feet.

And, because I'm a fucking genius, I realized that when one returns to the house after a nice stable Yaktrax walk with the dogs, one needn't remove the Yaktrax from one's shoes. OH NO. Just leave those bad boys on the shoes and swap one's shoes for slippers. When one goes to take the dogs out again (which happens a lot more often when there's fun shit like snow and woods outside in which to cavort) one need only swap the slippers for the Yaktrax swaddled shoes.

HOLY CRAP YES.

The clicking that went on in my brain at this moment of realization was loud enough to be audible from outside my own noggin.

Impressive, I know.

Anyway, that's a long way of saying that I broke in my Yaktrax this weekend and I'm sold. 100% sold. Also, I got to snowshoe with the dog in the woods and, while I haven't made a big fucking deal about the snowshoes Bubba gave me for Christmas, you can all rest assured that I've now found a new hobby about which to obsess during the winter months because LO if that's not some awesome fun.

Though I could do without the buried Audi rescue mission interrupting our peaceful moonlit snowshoe. The poor dog - she could have gone on for another hour if it hadn't been for the jackasses who decided to drive their low-profile Audi wagon up an impassible and unplowed street.

Some people just have unreasonable expectations for their vehicles and their own driving ability. Especially when the driver in question is so obviously ill-prepared for a trip to the snow that he's out trying to free his car from the ditch by sweeping snow away with a housebroom while wearing an argyle sweater vest and skinny jeans.

By the way, I did say his. As in, this was a MAN wearing skinny jeans. And an argyle sweater vest. Over what appeared to be a Faconnable dress shirt. With penny loafers WITH socks.

I feel that perhaps the only reason I offered to help them by bringing a shovel and my keen un-fucking-the-car-from-the-snow skills was that they were bigger chicks than me and I feared their blood might be on my hands if I knowingly abandoned them to free themselves only to find them frozen to their broom and one another in the early morning hours.

Of course, you know that after we successfully freed the Audi, with all of its passengers from the set of 90210, got them backed down the impassable road toward the clear road and I began my snowshoe trek back up the hill with my shovel (you know I'm not leaving my shovel) for the third time in 30 minutes (HI, TIRED NOW), they then decided they would take another pass at the impassable road.

And you know they got stuck again.

And you know that I did not go back to help them once again because I can't be responsible for stupid people. And the concept of hiking back up and down that hill again rather than buring my face in a glass of champagne seemed idiotic.



It's champagne, people! Chilled right in the snow! It must be enjoyed right away - at its chilly-mostness.

Wow. There's a throwback term that I'm not even sure is a real throwback term from the old hip-hop days. Sorry for that.

So, to sum up - Yaktrax are broken in. Snowshoes are awesome. Dogs don't have built in foot treading. Metro dudes should carpool with capable snow people who drive cars with a clearance over 3". Always keep an eye on your shovel. I just made up and/or referenced an archaic and grammatically horrifying hip-hop term when referring to my evening's cocktails.

Thanks for playing.

15 comments:

  1. Awesome! I need these for like everyday wear just to get across the fucking parking lot at work. Doing the old lady shuffle is not cute.

    OH--on my blog I did a post about my picky food freak issues. ;)

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  2. I might just have to think about Yaktrax. I really don't if I would/could run in them. I'm sure I'd still fall, but they might be great for the other icy adventures I encounter in the winter.

    And men in skinny jeans must be a California thing. A friend of mine just told me he saw an old man in skinny jeans and he lives in Cali. (Thankfully the trend hasn't made its way east yet.)

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  3. OMG! Never heard of Yaktrax and they have a version for walkers - and slow, hobbly people like myself. Just ordered a pair to try out, but I think I know what my entire family is getting for Christmas next year!!! That Finny - she entertains AND educates!

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  4. You are SO funny Finny! You have surely reserved yourself a place on high by rescuing the girls from their stupidity. Even if you only did it once.

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  5. YEAH! Yaktrax. I loove mine, bought a pair last year and am sure it was the only reason I got to the bottom of my super steep hill in nasty frosts and ice without breaking anything. day 1 i still crept nervously but after that I amazed others crawling and clinging to fences...I was a yaktrax star, and i met so many people who stopped to ask my secret!

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  6. this post is a riot! skinny jeans, with socks an dloafers? Oh, no, no!
    and it looks like you had so much fun! yay for winter time sports!

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  7. Dearest Finny, you have clearly not spent enough time up here in SF, where you would find more people in skinny jeans than not, I'm afraid, gender be damned.

    But it was nice of you to help and I don't at all blame you for choosing champagne over helping them again. Sheesh.

    I hope to make your soup tonight and hope to find an immersion blender on my way home, no small feat as I'm on the bus with no box store in sight. Wish me luck!

    Loved this post.

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  8. I was just thinking about how I coul use a pair of Yaktrax this morning. Which is crazy cause I heard about them one time three or four years ago and have never tried them. And here you are posting about them. It must be a sign.

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  9. I love people who don't learn from stupid mistakes. Well hey, I couldn't make it up the road last time and had to be dug out by crazy and nice lady with shovel and hip-pointy-clingy-things on her boots. But this time, damn it, I'll make it. If only because I'm pretty and rich and dress well and deserve to make it up the road.

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  10. HAHA! You know what you were like, Finny? The Guys in Trucks that rescue stranded motorists out here. Except you were not in a truck. And you're not a guy. And the GiTs might not help a man wearing skinny jeans and loafers.

    But otherwise, just like them!

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  11. Men in skinny pants are ridiculous. I swear to you Fin -- the fashion at the moment is so UNFASHIONABLE. Ridiculous.
    But you helped them and you were sweet about it and then you got to giggle at them for getting stuck again while drinking bubbly. The best!

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  12. Holy shit, you're the young boy with the guitar singing my life with your words and killing me...and not softly! You had me giggling so hard the dog thought I was convulsing and tried to take lifesaving measures by wrestling me from my chair(Not sure how that's going to save me but,hey, she's a dog). I have lived your life, from the icy acrobatics to the Yaktrax epiphanies and it was alot funnier when you told it. Thanks for sharing, I really enjoyed it.

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  13. I had to come back to tell you two things:

    I got the blender on my way home Thursday night (it was one of those days where the stars aligned and all went just right--which never happens so yay) and the soup was so freaking good--

    secondly, Leeor dragged my pregnant ass to see some live music last night and I swear to god that Every Single Guy Onstage Wore Skinny Jeans. And I couldn't stop laughing. Plus they were all like 17 years old and I actually put my fingers in my ears because it was so loud. All I wanted to do was go home and put on my pjs. But they did have good tacos at this place so that was a small consolation.

    Thanks for the recipe! And for giving me an excuse to get a fancy small appliance!

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  14. Montana4me: SO glad there's someone else out there who fully appreciates the greatness of Yaktrax!

    And, in Montana, I imagine you need them much more than I.

    Melissa - Welcome to the World of Immersion Blender Happiness. They are a much treasured kitchen item.

    And I'm sorry you had to witness teenaged boys acting out their generation's worst fashion disaster. Yeck.

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  15. laughed my f'in ass off at this post. skinny jeans are all the (unfortunate) rage in metro detroit as well. my outing club friends had a name for these sorts, but i'm too old to remember now...

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[2013 update: You can't comment as an anonymous person anymore. Too many douchebags were leaving bullshit SPAM comments and my inbox was getting flooded, but if you're here to comment in a real way like a real person, go to it.]

Look at you commenting, that's fun.

So, here's the thing with commenting, unless you have an email address associated with your own profile, your comment will still post, but I won't have an email address with which to reply to you personally.

Sucks, right?

Anyway, to remedy this, I usually come back to my posts and post replies in the comment field with you.

But, if you ever want to email me directly to talk about pumpkins or shoes or what it's like to spend a good part of your day Swiffering - shoot me an email to finnyknitsATgmailDOTcom.

Cheers.