When we went to Big Bear this week, we stayed in a cabin owned by my friend, James. He uses it as an investment property and rents it out through an agency up there. He's constantly amazed at the things that get left behind - he has a whole box of games people have forgotten, a baby crib, and as we discovered in a closet this weekend, a snowboard bag. He also has two couches in his living room, one of which is a sleeper sofa. Apparently, everyone kept thinking the one with the sofa cover on it was the sleeper. They'd take the slip cover off (and those are a bitch to put back on), discover it wasn't the sleeper, and then just hide the evidence of the cover by putting it in a closet. He said for the longest time, every time he would visit his cabin, it would turn into a game of "let's find the slip cover." Finally, he put a label near the couch that reads "This is not the sleeper sofa" and then used a staple gun to permanently affix the cover. Problem solved.

He also has a bear motif throughout the cabin, which started when his mom bought him this gigantic stuffed teddy bear. It made its way to the cabin where it's been sitting in the corner of the living room. I thought when I was up there that the bear seemed smaller than it had been before and when James showed up, I realized why. It wasn't the big giant bear that had been there before, but another one that had been somewhere else in the house. As James reported, "Someone stole my fucking teddy bear!" I can't imagine what they would have done with it - it really was huge. James determined maybe someone had a dog or something had happened to the bear, and the tenants had gotten rid of it to hide the evidence. It's funny what people will do to avoid taking responsibility.

Off topic, my friend, Mark, who went riding with me shot this short video clip of me coming down a small black diamond run. I couldn't have ended the video better if I'd planned it.