XM radio versus C89.5 FM

Usally when I'm driving, I'll be listening to XM Radio or KOMO AM 1000 for traffic updates, but I happened to be in the Ranger yesterday (which has no satellite radio) so I flipped on 89.5 FM, a pretty cool local high school radio station that plays dance music.

Apparently their Fall Pledge Drive is going on this week. It's the time of year when they beg for money from listeners so they can stay on the air. I guess Seattle Public Schools cut off their funding years ago. That's gotta be a tough job, especially since their listener base seems to be mostly high school and college kids. It all reminds me of an episode of Saved By the Bell.

I just have to put in my two cents regarding paying for public radio. In 2003, I felt cheated when I paid for an underwriting spot with them. If I remember correctly, I paid for a week's worth of underwriting for the last week of November (when people would be getting their snowboard gear). Unfortunately, the Fall Pledge Drive that year ran way too long, and went right into my "underwriting week." Instead of moving me back a week, or another time in December, they decided to run their pledge drive right around my underwriting ads.

Oh well, I just try to think of it as my $1,500 donation to their pledge week. Even though now that I think about it, I could have paid for almost 10 years of XM Radio, while listening to 150 channels instead of just one.

Again, just my 2 cents.

Still, not to take anything away from what C89.5 does. Maybe one day I will feel compelled to donate some $ to them again (especially if satellite radio ever goes bust). But until then, I'm happy listening to the exact same songs on XM Channel 81, with a few exceptions for certain remixes.

Opening weekend at Crystal Mountain

My friends and I decided to go hit the slopes after a dismal 2004/05 winter season, even though historically for us, opening days/weekends have sucked (in the past, we've had lots of injuries and damaged snowboards and skis from hitting rocks and trees).

The only place open in Washington this past weekend was Crystal Mountain. I always thought of it as a skiers mountain, maybe because I went there mostly when I skied a lot, but mainly because they never really got into making decent halfpipes and terrain parks.

Nevertheless, the terrain there is always fun whether I'm on ski or board.

The drive up there only took 1 and a half hours from Bellevue. I was shocked when we pulled into one front row parking spots around 7:30 AM. There was a helicopter above and you could hear a lot of avalanche control being done. I was excited, expecting no crowds and lot of snowboarding.

We paid $45 for our lift tickets, which was a discount from the $50 regular price, so our first instinct was that there were "preseason" conditions. But thankfully we were wrong. The conditions were amazing. Not a single rock or tree branch showed through the groomed terrain, and there was powder to be had in a lot of places.

On the downside however, I don't think Crystal has a full staff yet. They only had 4 or 5 lifts operating all day, the average wait time was 45 minutes to get on a lift (until about 2:30 PM when things really died down), and they had no shuttle service running all day. There was even a long line that ran alongside the entire lodge to get lunch.

I think Mt Baker opens on Tuesday. I might go up there midweek to avoid the crowds, and then next weekend I might take the dogs up to Snoqualmie so they can play in the snow.