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Wednesday, February 4, 2009

I will teach Muffin how to play Ski Jump


As I suspected, the carnage on the slopes did not stop, it was just not reported at the time and the details are now filtering in.

An Irish man hurtled off a Piste at high speed and killed himself - and a teenage girl sledger impaled herself on a tree.

I won’t even mention the 54 Hamsters who were abandoned outside a pet shop in Graz. Yes – I know – these can hardly be counted as skiing accidents – but I am trying to make my case by boosting the numbers.

I really like winter but I think I am going to have to stop reading the Austrian Times. Cate is committed to going skiing next year so I have about 10 months to get into shape and get my affairs in order before judgment day on the slopes.

On Saturday we encountered our most unhelpful waiter to date – and there is a lot of competition for this title.

We upset him immensely by sitting at a table which was reserved and he told us – when he eventually came near us – that he needed the table in 30 minutes.

He then gave us menus and that was the last we saw of him. He sailed past every five minutes or so but studiously ignored us and we eventually left.

We went to the Bagel cafĂ© near Bobby’s and ordered (you guessed it) Bagels. After a while they told us they didn’t have any plain Bagels and would Sesame Bagels be OK.

Sure we said – we are so hungry we would eat a Duck bagel.

After a further wait they said that they didn’t actually have any Bagels at all but would cook some. We said sure – and while we waited we had a frozen Muffin.

A report in the Austrian Times (where else) says that Crack Luftwaffe fighter pilots were scrambled in a UFO drama over German airspace.

Does this mean that the Luftwaffe has grades of pilots. Crack, Not So Crack, Barely Average, Awful?

Why would not all pilots be Crack pilots? Perhaps most of them have died on the ski slopes in Austria and they have had to lower their standards.

Anyway – they weren’t very good as they didn’t find the UFO so they may as well have sent the Awful Pilots.

I tool Jura back to Lefkowitz and left him with Christian. As you can imagine it was a difficult parting and Christian had to prise my fingers from around Jura’s chubby little jowls. Christian says that if there is anything wrong with Jura (which shows the level of confidence he has in me) it will take ‘few days’ to get it fixed. I bet!

So I had to go down to the basement and bring up Gaggia. Well you can imagine what this was like.

So – let me get this straight – I was left wrapped up in a box for six months and now you want me to make coffee again? Because what? Namby Pamby Prissy Wissy widdle Jura is bwoken - oh how sad!

So Gaggia is now sitting on the kitchen bench scowling at me. I have managed to squeeze out one cup with difficulty but I am not confident that I have its full support and would not be surprised if it explodes and kills us all.

I may have mentioned before that I really love my iPhone. It does all the things that a Handy should and much more besides. One of the really cool things about iPhones is that people develop Applications for them and they can be downloaded from Apple.

There are free Apps and Apps that cost something – most cost about €0.79 which is not much at all. You can’t buy half a Krapfen for that here.

There are thousands and I have downloaded a few useful ones. One not so useful one is call Ski Jump and it’s a game where you send a tiny little man down a Ski Jump and see how far you can get him to jump.

It’s not as easy as it sounds as you have to manipulate him as he flies through the air. Most of the time (even on beginner level) my Ski Jumper ends up in a heap in the snow and has even landed on his bum – which I am sure is not possible in real life.

After some practice I achieved a jump of 130 Metres – which I thought was pretty good. So I thought I would upload it through the IPhone to see how this jump compared with others which are being conducted by thousands of wastrels out there.

Well, it wasn’t in the first 1,000. The longest jump on the day was 160 Metres set no doubt by a 12 year old in somewhere like Minsk. I was too depressed to look.

So I will continue to play Ski Jump but will not bother to look on line. I am planning on teaching Muffin how to play but will not tell her all the tricks or else she will certainly beat me.

2 comments:

  1. How can you teach Muffin to play Ski Jump if you ate frozen Muffin at a cafe? Non capisco, Cisco!

    I am disturbed by Cate's insistence that you ski. If she wants to ski, so be it, but she shouldn't force you into it. Learning to ski is best done at about age 5 or 6, when fearless. I tried in my late teens and hated it. Didn't even master the snow plough so had to fall over to stop - not recommended. And all the time, kids of 5, 6, 7 and 8 were whizzing past me.

    I guess apres ski is another matter. We always made day trips to the snow so I never experienced it. Some of my friends, however, can attest to apres ski stretching nearly all day, making it not worth buying a day ticket to the ski lift - another small fortune saved to spend over the bar! Why not try adopting this approach to 'going sking'.

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  2. Ah well...different Muffins!

    I need to indulge her and as she is so precious to me I will make this sacrifice.

    I reckon you and Jim would be sensational at apres ski. You are certainly sensational at apres dinner!

    I am trying to imagine Jim on skis.................hmmm.......not working!

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