Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Thank you and burnt kneecaps.

I was going to pull a Hayleyghoover and thank each and every one of the nice, thoughtful, and wonderful people who commented on my last blog post. However, literally everyone said something reassuring and helpful, so I think I am just going to cast a blanket "thank you" over everyone who reads and comments on my blog.

One thing that occurred to me while I was reading your comments was that, in dwelling on a few mean comments or hateful people, I was almost, in a sense, taking for granted how many of you are amazing. There are a ton of you who comment saying encouraging, witty, helpful, sweet things all the time, and a few usernames I recognize commenting nearly every time... You guys are the best. I feel like I have my own little army over here on my blog of people who just seriously are a little bit better than the rest of the people on the Internet, so thank you. Thank you for making haters completely irrelevent.


So instead, I am going to talk about water skiing!

Today, instead of doing the long list of errands and chores I have to do before leaving for London, I went out on my family's boat for the afternoon. It was 87 degrees today and beautiful out on the water, and I am so glad I decided to go because I had a blast.

Usually I just go innertubing because I am not much of an "extreme sports" type girl, but today my dad brought the waterskis, something I have never tried and have always been terrified of.

My brother went first, and did pretty well. He did spend an entire weekend wakeboarding with our cousin Josh a few weeks ago when we were in North Dakota though, so he had a little knowledge of what he was doing. My dad went next, and it was a really odd sight for some reason. You always picture your father as the man of the house, the one who goes to work, unclogs the toilet when it gets plugged up, sits on the couch and commands the remote - seeing him being pulled behind the boat on skis in a life jacket with a big goofy grin is just not a sight I am used to. He was surprisingly good though! He used to waterski a lot back when he was my age.

My mom just had nasal surgery and couldn't go, so it was left to me.

My dad was like, "Wanna go, T?"

Ummm.

"Come ON. Just try it."

"What if I fall? What if I panic?"

"Just keep your knees up by your chest and your feet together. Come on, let's fit these to your feet."

The next thing I knew I was neck high in freezing water with skis strapped to my feet, armed only with "knees up, skis together", and before I knew it, I was freaking WATERSKIING.

For about ten seconds. xD
But hey! My dad AND brother were super impressed. They told me no one actually gets to standing on their first try.

I had all sorts of water up my nose and I was hacking and coughing lake water out of my lungs, but I tried three more times, never staying up any longer than my first try.

Finally, arms sore, nose and lungs aching (though I did get better at plugging my nose as soon as I knew I was going to fall), I gave up. I'll try again next time. The biggest accomplishment for me was 1. Jumping in the freezing lake water (I'm a cold water wimp) and 2. realizing that waterskiing is not in fact as scary as I thought but actually kind of fun.


In other news, I slathered on the sunscreen but still managed to get burnt kneecaps. Just my kneecaps. That's weird.

Days until I leave for London: 5

28 comments:

Aleesha said...

Ohh you crack me up!
Im glad to see that you atleast tried waterskiing. I've done knee boarding and it is so easy! Maybe next time I'll try the skis!

Anonymous said...

I prefer driving the boat. I've always been afraid to water ski and I probably always will be, which is weird if you think about the incredibly stupid things I've done on a Sea-Doo...

avantgardeallie said...

congrats!
tomorrow you will probably be really ache-y but its VERY worth it.
i wanted to thank you,
not many people thank their viewers/readers as much as you do.
this is my first time commenting but i've been reading your blog for a while and i love your writing!
keep it up
-allie

Kristen said...

I'm so glad you had a fun day out on the water! You are very brave. I will never, ever water ski. I stick to swimming. It's what I'm somewhat good at. Your sunburn reminds me of when I was eighteen months old and went on a family trip to Florida. My mom put sunscreen on me but I got burnt from about the middle part of nose to the top of my eyebrows, just right in the middle of my face. My mom was lovely enough to take pictures : ) Hope all the preperations for London will go smoothly for you and have a safe trip!

ThePeterIs said...

Lovely rebound. You make leaving good comments worth it.

alyson said...

Waterskiiing is a lot of fun, good job getting up on your first time!
I'm trying to comment more because I love reading your blog.

Brooke said...

I can't say I've ever had burnt kneecaps, but I sympathize anyways.

Morgan Johnson said...

I love to see when people on YouTube thank their subscribers/Twitter followers/blog readers. It really helps us connect, and keeps us coming back. Most nerdfighters, "famous" and not-so-famous, are really good at doing this. And for this, I thank you.

I got really excited for you when I saw your tweet about waterskiing, even if it was only for 10 seconds at first! I've never waterskiied, and I am kind of afraid to. Maybe I'll try it the next time I'm given the opportunity.

VicMorrowsGhost said...

Here is a photo of me water skiing.
http://tinyurl.com/lxcrtw
Yeah so... you did a lot better than me. :D

Elizabeth... said...

That sounds like so much fun despite the whole "water up the nose" thing that is insanely uncomfortable.
I don't understand the knee sunburn though, that's just very very strange, I hope it doesn't hurt too much.

Caitlin said...

Urgh, you know what's the worst?
You know when you get water up your nose, and then you kind of go upside down and your nose starts burning? ICK.

The only time I've ever been on a proper boat was when we were in town one day and decided to go on the ferry that just goes out a bit and then comes back in.
There was that time I went on the Yellow Duck in town to, which is like a little bus that takes you round town, and then it goes into the water and becomes a boat.
I wish I had a boat ):

And there's no point in commenting just to say something mean; if you don't like something, just go away.
It's always fun to leave nice little comments (:

Me said...

I've never done that, mainly because I've never had the opportunity. But if I did, I'd love to try.

And yay for being in the Kristina Army. :D

Natalie said...

I'd love to go waterskiing, but I have this vision that I'll go flying, break my legs, then crack my head open. Sounds like fun though and next time, you will STAND.
And the kneecap tan? I was once on holiday with my friend and we were reading in the sun, so we ended up with book shaped tan lines on our legs where we'd been resting the books. I love weird stories like that, they make me chuckle.

comelygrace said...

lol awesome story. I like to think I'm an adventurous and extreme sports person...but I tried snow boarding and couldn't even stay up longer than you did on water skis. In fact, I'm pretty sure my longest run was like, half as long as your water ski venture. FAIL!

Ski is such a weird word.

About to go watch your shoe video now! :)

Anonymous said...

You know, I do love most kinds of extreme sports and all that, but I envy you for having the guts to go waterskiing. I have an intense phobia of being in water where things might lurk and bite my ankles ever since I stepped on a huge jellyfish whilst sea level traversing. So yay for you :)

And I've had that burnt kneecaps thing before. It's incredibly odd.

Little Miss Sunshine(: said...

aww oh well at least you tried!(:
im sure youll do better the next time! :D
keep trying and dont give up, kay?(:

acroatic said...

Haha, that's funny.
I've never tried waterskiing myself, but I'll have to the next time I go up to our family's house in Lake Placid, you make it sound fun! (water up the nose and burnt kneecaps aside...)

Anonymous said...

I've never tried waterskiing. I'm the biggest chicken. But I have been burned on my kneecaps before, when I was out on the lake. And only my kneecaps. It's weird. And painful. But it went away fairly quickly. YOU ARE SO COOL! You actually waterskiied!! Even if it was for only 10 seconds. he he.

Johnny Rollerfeet said...

congrats on the water skiing. it's not easy, but it gives you one of those exhausted feelings that makes you feel accomplished. so worth it.

btw, many of the other 21,800 viewers are what I like to call "nerdlurkers", like me. we quietly watch and wait for calls to action (like Parselmouths or Chameleon Circuit CD releases), and do what needs to be done usually without comment.

for us, i say thanks to you, hayley, alex, and several other nerdfighters for entertaining us.

disasterpastor45 said...

shmist - water ski fail for her

Sile said...

oh i've had burnt kneecaps before. oddly enough it didn't hurt...
lucky me. :D

Tessa Jones said...

The only one time I ever...or maybe attempted water skiing was 10 years ago. I was 5 years old and we were out on the lake with my Dad's friends. And we went boating and people were water skiing. So...I decided to try and wore the beginner skis that are roped together.

So I'm in the water, waiting for the boat to start and then BOOM, my little body gets totally out of formation and because I forgot to let go, I was a human submarine for the past-oh I don't know....10 seconds?

I don't know if I have the will to ever try it again...

Sam Y said...

That's really impressive that you got up on your first time! I went on my cousins boat and attempted waterskiing about three times and completely failed every single time. I didn't even make it to all the way standing...haha.
So congrats to you! And I'm glad you had fun :D

nicoleeeyyynyquil09 said...

I think I might try waterskiing.I've always been afraid to when asked...like im just going to end up doing the splits and hurting myself but I might give it a shot now.

Yes we are the good people of the internet. :)

RhianonLives said...

I'm weirdly excited for you that you're leaving for London so soon!!

Rachel said...

I've always wanted to try waterskiing, but then I remembered that I'm capable of tripping over air, so I thought against it. Wakeboarding sounds fun too.

There should definitely be an official Kristina army. I mean shirts and everything. [=

I agree, the whole burnt-kneecaps thing is very odd. I was at a folk-fair festival field trip, and my whole entire face got sunburned. It was redder than a tomato. And then the next day at school, everyone laugh at me. My geography teacher gave me a liter of water because she 'knows about sunburns' Hehe.

I'm glad I get to be in the blanket of thank you-ness. We'll always stick up for awesome people like you. XD

Unknown said...

When my family when on a boat, I was too chicken to water ski, but my brother and sister tried and it took them a couple of tries before they stood up. Nice job!

Sammie said...

Oh Snap! I can't waterski to save my life...props to you!