Aspen Cougars

[dantheman0177]

Classic.

I can't wait to see this movie.

[boarderboy]

I know you are smart. I know you are 'opportunistic'. I know you are a great boarder.

But what I truly want to know is, "How the hell do you really afford this lifestyle...!"

Signed, 'Jealous in Possum's Pouch'

BB

[Aisling]

just out of curiosity, since you run away from all these crazy cougars... how old are you?

on a side note, I do think the tan bulbs gag would be funny!

[Rob Stevens]

just out of curiosity, since you run away from all these crazy cougars... how old are you?

Old, I think, unless the grey ponytail is a dye job.

C'mon man... What's wrong with a little "age-appropriate" action?

If you're not down with the cougars, that only leaves geriatrics and teens from where you stand (in judgment). Both of these age groups can be bothersome or dangerous for a middle-aged fella (unsolicited mothering or mis-judged age resulting in jail time).

[John Gilmour]

I know you are smart. I know you are 'opportunistic'. I know you are a great boarder.

But what I truly want to know is, "How the hell do you really afford this lifestyle...!"

Signed, 'Jealous in Possum's Pouch'

BB

Oddly enough.... if you can stand eating shrimp cocktails, filet mignon, tiny pieces of sashimi on some weird bread, and drinking whatever promoted liquor product.... food costs in Aspen are pretty small.

for instance ... Friday was the Women's Health magazine party- burgers, bud lime, open bar, saturday was Mens health party with roasted smoked pork, and Brats and open bar- ..free knit hats- organic dog food giveaways (I have no dog but my turtles eat it) also same night Soup Skol where 25 restaurants compete with free soups- another open bar at a clothing shop that opened... free fireworks. Today Sunday was the Snow magazine fashion show at aspen highlands. Tonight is another fashion show at the Jerome Hotel. Yes you can understand why there is a extremely high alcoholism rate here amongst the locals- alcohol is free and far easier to come by than bottled water.

The skipass is expensive, $1500 for early season $2000 in season. But my pass the first year..well I tested to teach- was accepted ..and waited for them to call me..and they never called.., the next season I was a ski photographer, and my second check was for $9.97 for 6 days work..I said call me when you straighten that out.. and I will come back to work.. it took them 13 weeks to adjust that.. I worked perhaps 15 days..so those passes were free. This year.. I just bought it..

Lodging can be expensive $$$$3000+ for 2 bedroom... or ...not. employee housing a 4 bedroom house w/ 2 car garage in Aspen highlands is $170,000. Some rentals come with all utilities included.

Transportation is free with the bus system.

So no need for a car. or car insurance, gas, repairs.

Ski clothing is 75% off at pre season and end of season. I live in ski clothing all winter. so $300 buys you a wardrobe that works for 6 months. You hang dry ski clothing..and there are free washing machines. So no laundry bill.

and once in a while you can get a good gig. I was the DJ for the Aspen Snow Polo world championships. A couple of legacy carvers come out and ride with me....some I have taught for over 20 years.

and I do high end audio systems in $10,000,000 + homes... perhaps 2-3 a year...

So if you are multi skilled and very very very good at what you do it can work....and you have to be EXTREMELY good or no one will hire you.....at all..... and you must be polite, extremely polite- Aspen is financed by Texas Oil.

but doing the skibum/waiter thing here...well that's a ticket to misery. Staring at snow 5 days a week and being too tired to ride on your days off..or worse yet.... infected with flu from tourists...

Hot girls make incredible bank in Aspen... cute coat check girls make up to $200-$350 per night. Cocktail waitresses at upscale apres ski..they also kill it- cute girls can have their run of the place.... get the private jet rides, the heli skiing, free clothes given to them at fashion shows and product tosses etc... they can run this town.... effortlessly..

A few bartenders make good cash... but very very few. like maybe 5-10.

Real estate people are not making squat right now. time share sellers..also no cash.

And if you think you can find a girlfriend here and make under $250,000 a year... ... uh ...think again.

right now..the snow in Aspen is the worst I have ever seen in Colorado... I am not sure we are going to make it..Bare spots and rocks are everywhere. I had to put away my Kessler 185 PGS and go back to my trusty Madd 158 because the speckled base double sintered PTEX 5000 doesn't get rock damage nor do our super hardened rockwell steel edges.. But I look at the PGS and just pray for snow. But the Madd 158 well it is still one of the most fun decks and it is damn icy right now (down right east coast) ..and its trusty old faithful to the rescue.... this loyal little deck just won't die in my eyes- god it is fun..and with my new boot liners... and boots...it's like a whole new board all over again.

Oh...and if you wanted to date Bryce Kellogg... there are some of those here but it ain't going to be me.

[Guest]

yeah, we need some snow desperately. Did 1 run today on Snowmass and went home. Just plain terrible, and the flat light certainly did not help.

And I hate to agree, but these are the worst conditions I've seen in my 6 years in CO.

[DiveBomber]

SO Gilmour when are we going to see you on "secrets of aspen"??:lol:

should have looked you up when I was out there mid Dec.

[boarderboy]

my trusty Madd 158 because the speckled base double sintered PTEX 5000 doesn't get rock damage nor do our super hardened rockwell steel edges.. But I look at the PGS and just pray for snow. But the Madd 158 well it is still one of the most fun decks and it is damn icy right now (down right east coast) ..and its trusty old faithful to the rescue.... this loyal little deck just won't die in my eyes- god it is fun..and with my new boot liners... and boots...it's like a whole new board all over again.

Here's to Madd, and to free sashimi, and to open bar and to champagne powder. (This old freecarver hopes to ride one of your 170's, one day.)

And here's to living the life and being skilled enough to do it!

And who the hell is Bryce Kellogg?

BB

[JDB]

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Bryce+Kellogg

[Michael Pukas]

Yeah, Johhny - when are you gonna be on Secrets of Aspen? I can seen you strutting down the main street, snow falling, and a couple of catty bitches on each arm clawing at each other while you describing the finer points of the Madd 158.

A freind of mine is a fishing guide (And former owner of ZG Grill - he was the G) got to take one of the girls and her friend fishing on the upper Fork. Too funny. Poor bastard, I hope he got something good out of the deal. mpp

http://www.vh1.com/video/play.jhtml?id=1629320&vid=469525

[eajracing]

Oh...and if you wanted to date Bryce Kellogg... there are some of those here but it ain't going to be me.

Haaaaaaa..... that might be me.... but i've always had a thing for victoria courtesy of the section 8 guys....

[Guest]

Yeah, Johhny - when are you gonna be on Secrets of Aspen? I can seen you strutting down the main street, snow falling, and a couple of catty bitches on each arm clawing at each other while you describing the finer points of the Madd 158.

A freind of mine is a fishing guide (And former owner of ZG Grill - he was the G) got to take one of the girls and her friend fishing on the upper Fork. Too funny. Poor bastard, I hope he got something good out of the deal. mpp

http://www.vh1.com/video/play.jhtml?id=1629320&vid=469525

Heh, yeah Graham. I'll have to ask him when I see him next.

[John Gilmour]

Yeah, Johhny - when are you gonna be on Secrets of Aspen? I can seen you strutting down the main street, snow falling, and a couple of catty bitches on each arm clawing at each other while you describing the finer points of the Madd 158.

A freind of mine is a fishing guide (And former owner of ZG Grill - he was the G) got to take one of the girls and her friend fishing on the upper Fork. Too funny. Poor bastard, I hope he got something good out of the deal. mpp

http://www.vh1.com/video/play.jhtml?id=1629320&vid=469525

I knew one of the guys involved with ZG that also ran Dish restaurant. But he moved to Hawaii - cool guy...I brought some DJ gear for a New Year Party which "bombed" .....errr....

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jan/02/nation/na-aspen-evacuation2

actually...and so we had to call off the party... and were evacuated.

a lot more interesting of an episode

Unfortunately...Aspen has been "one run Done" almost every day for me...I will have racked up the least vertical footage this year.

The snow is far far far better on the East Coast right now. Sugarloaf is getting a foot... I don't think we got even a single foot for the entire month of January. According to an Email reply I got from Aspen management they have ZERO intentions of making any manmade snow to cover the rocks and bare spots for the rest of the year. I may have to try and convince them to turn the snow guns back on.

[Michael Pukas]

I knew one of the guys involved with ZG that also ran Dish restaurant. But he moved to Hawaii - cool guy...

Hey John - Matt Z is a good friend of mine. We've had lots of dinner parties together - he's a good guy and a good chef. He was a sous chef for a chef friend of his f/ Aspen that was on Iron Chef America. He's who sent me the vid of Graham Cracker. Looking forward to caching up w/ you at the SES, if there's snow... hepefully this week will change things.

[photodad2001]

.....go sick,girl.......

:

Willywhit banned? What happened?

[John Gilmour]

So I left Aspen, for 17 months. I decide to come back after putting on 25 pounds. I have 7 lbs left to go ...to be back to normal. Within a minute of returning I am at a party for Aspen Snow polo. I meet 2 cute barttenders and their manager friend , all 23-24.

Later that night I meet a stunning german blonde girl who is taking care of the horses, 24 who rips on a snowboard , and rides an Oxcess boardercross deck. She is coming back in February. No relation to the other 3. Tough too , broke her back, was paralyzed, and made. A 100% recovery. We danced and she tore up the dance floor.

12 hours after I return I am DJ'ing the 2011 Snow Polo World Chamionships ( I DJ'ed it in 2009 too.

I finally get to talk with Nacho Figueras. Nice guy. I played polo for a summer before leaving to coach at Camp Woodward.

One bartender and manager girl have me teach them snowboarding ( conditions were the worst ever) I got them complete set ups for $200 and tossed in a lesson.

We all had fun snowboarding in our 3 matching snow polo jackets. My ankles appear to be healed along with my torn calf.

These girls just graduated from Alabama University. Very polite and also determined snowboarders.

Everyone welcomed me back to Aspen. My best friend has 6 weeks to go for her pregnancy and was the fastest girl snowboarder but can't ride until after the birth ( she is going to get 60 days in). So I'll have to make these other girls good riders quickly. The funniest thing will be our team jackets.

[boarderboy]

12 hours after I return I am DJ'ing the 2011 Snow Polo World Chamionships ( I DJ'ed it in 2009 too.

One bartender and manager girl have me teach them snowboarding ( conditions were the worst ever) I got them complete set ups for $200 and tossed in a lesson.

I took them out for après ski and they are my new cougar deflectors. I looks like the 3 of us will be roommates along with the other bartender. The manager got a marketing job with KIG ( one of the polo teams that had Nacho F. On it, her job starts in Feb. in DC. ) and the German girl will return in Feb. hopefully to take her place.

Another snowless, out-of-shape winter in Possum Pouch, vicariously surviving on the exploits of the legendary big-gamer, John Gilmour.

Do all us hapless Old Farts a favor, J.G., and turn your rekindled energies to board building, lest we less fortunate fossils descend into terminal, envious Mad(d)ness.

BB

[BlueB]

Gilmour caught poaching :D

(Photoshop, of course)

[DiveBomber]

So I left Aspen, for 17 months. I decide to come back after putting on 25 pounds. I have 7 lbs left to go ...to be back to normal. Within a minute of returning I am at a party for Aspen Snow polo. I meet 2 cute barttenders and there manager friend , all 23-24.

Later that night I meet a stunning german blonde girl who is taking care of the horses, 24 who rips on a snowboard , and rides an Oxcess boardercross deck. She is coming back in February. No relation to the other 3. Tough to , broke her back, was paralyzed, and made. A 100% recovery. We danced and she tore up the dance floor.

12 hours after I return I am DJ'ing the 2011 Snow Polo World Chamionships ( I DJ'ed it in 2009 too.

I finally get to talk with Nacho Figueras. Nice guy. I played polo for a summer before leaving to coach at Camp Woodward.

One bartender and manager girl have me teach them snowboarding ( conditions were the worst ever) I got them complete set ups for $200 and tossed in a lesson.

I took them out for après ski and they are my new cougar deflectors. I looks like the 3 of us will be roommates along with the other bartender. The manager got a marketing job with KIG ( one of the polo teams that had Nacho F. On it, her job starts in Feb. in DC. ) and the German girl will return in Feb. hopefully to take her place.

We all had fun snowboarding in our 3 matching snow polo jackets. My ankles appear to be healed along with my torn calf.

Very relived now to have body guards again. The cougars here are aggressive. I explained their body guard responsibilities would be the same as the other 2 South African girls and they are cool with it. These girls just graduated from Alabama University. Very polite and also determined snowboarders.

Everyone welcomed me back to Aspen. My best friend has 6 weeks to go for her pregnancy and was the fastest girl snowboarder but can't ride until after the birth ( she is going to get 60 days in). So I'll have to make these other girls good riders quickly. The funniest thing will be our team jackets.

sorry John, but I cant help but be skeptical, Im going to need to video/pics, proof, all this just sounds to fantastic to be true.

(or maybe it is all one big joke and it not obvious to me? )

[John Gilmour]

The best part of returning to Aspen was the drive. The first part was done fairly slowly at about 80-90mph from Los Angeles to Vegas- I got stuck ...well..... mired in L.A. traffic. I ended up getting too tired after 5 hours and staying in some Casino hotel about 20 minutes before hitting Vegas. 5 hours is about my limit for feeling alert behind the wheel. I hate driving. I hate having to sit nearly motionless for hours while my metabolism drops through the floor and I get drowsy... Why do i drive the car I drive???.....- so I have to sit in it for less time. My friends call it ............."The Time Machine".

So the next morning I awoke- got in the car and found after about 20 miles that cops weren't around. In fact there were no services, even very few gas stations (ie no bathrooms for cops...what self respecting coffee drinking, donut eating cop wants to take a crap in the middle of a windy cold field with no toilet paper- while passing cars honk their horns ...laughing , pointing, flashing their lights..etc..???) I thought to myself??? What cop would patrol this area? Besides the posted speed limit is 80 mph. It's a few days before Christmas...I bet they wrote their tickets for the month and are being dragged to endless Walmart Christmas shopping by their wives.

I thought about the 10 hour 20 minute drive ahead (likely AT LEAST 12 hours with food 3 times + nap + gas fillups- err...maybe a 2 day trip ..ugh another $$$hitty hotel) ...realized I would be SOOO sleepy after 5 hours or more with food breaks with much of the drive happening at night ...likely many long dreary hours perhaps with traffic ... on unlit roads...and thought...I really want to get rid of that UNSAFE NIGHT TIME DRIVING. I had better be responsible. SAFETY CONSCIOUS, today was clear I had no snow tires (would not be able to see black ice at night) - a storm could come..that would be UNSAFE. My car was built for Autobahn speeds and even gets good mileage at high speeds....better than at 65mph. I should help save gas....be responsible ..eco-conscious.... I thought about it......carefully and prudently. I could cut my night driving to about 2 hours instead of 8 hours. Be SAFE and AWAKE, It's proven that sleepy drivers can be more deadly than drunk ones. In the interest of SAFETY....

I let 'er rip. The Rosse Bau Porsche factory hand built on pallets- made on the venerable Porsche 959 production line 1994 E500 Mercedes just got new Strut tower grommets, a new Exhaust , new transmission, new radiator, new sensors...and I discovered this trip that the previous owner had removed the governor (most Mercedes and BMW's of that era were governed to 155mph) likely when he put the traction defeat switch in. The speedo eased past 160mph and continued to accelerate. My guess is about 170mph was the fastest I went. I did about 120-140 over the some stretches with lesser quality roads- but for the most part... the roads were perfect. A lot of them straight (great lines of sight- my vison was LASIK corrected to 20/15 a few months ago) - a few narrow carving canyon roads with no where to pull anyone over. There were very few cars on the road. I passed perhaps 400 - 600 cars the entire way. The car was anchored to the ground with the new strut tower grommets.

I, however, would be terrified. If I were some average "Joe Plumber" from the area tooling along text messaging my scorned wife who was worried about me cheating again on her fat lazy ass, while on a refurbished flip phone in a 1980's minivan - wondering about where my next hot pocket was coming from... while my illegitimate child from a previous alcoholic girlfriend was playing angry birds on a -open box return- best buy discount touch tablet behind me in a vomit and ketchup stained 1990's child seat when some adrenaline fueled snowboard company owner blasted by me at 170mph in an uber car and almost blew my minivan off the road.

So my firm safety based decision was to overtake people with no more than 10-15 mph over their speed....ie pass like a normal person. Then pedal to the metal between car gaps (an after determining who I passed was not an undercover cop) I come up so fast on people at 155-160 mph they won't even see me coming if they look away from their rear view mirror for a few seconds.

The Valentine 1 went off about 5 times total during the 10 hour drive. (Checking all on ramps visually too- and aircraft- and opposing lane vechiles (undercover are white pickups and SUV's that are governed to 100mph...no idea what the "non-pursuit speeds" are in AZ, UT and CO) - slowing as I past "turn around medians") I determined roughly when the police barracks shift change was- and used that time to my advantage. When I got about 45 minutes past Grand Junction CO I slowed to about 85 mph the rest of the way - that was about 1.2- 1.4 hours of "regular driving"- which impacted my overall time. No speeding in more densely populated areas... SAFETY first. I have to live to tell Aspen Cougar dodging stories after all...it's the point of this thread.... Good mileage about 55-70 gallons of fuel.

Ripping through the twisty winding up and down canyons at 120-135mph was thrilling- my car has 354 ft/lbs of torque and downshifting to 3rd and racing uphill at 110mph and upshifting was killer.... right out of Playstation but soooooooooooooooo much better.

The "Time Machine" got me there in 6.5 hours total... just in time for the Snow Polo party my friend told me in the morning I was going to definitely miss because of the long drive as well as losing an hour to the time zones.

The only casualty.. (don't worry....no animals were killed)... at about 150 mph on a stretch through Utah, the wind force was so great (I had a head wind too) I heard a thump... from the sound...I thought for sure I had hit a small sparrow I had somehow missed seeing. But the Mercedes dealer has recently installed a new side marker light and the wind had somehow gotten under it and blew it off the car and made the noise. I'll have to replace that.... car ran like a top ...so smooth- effortless and none fatiguing at speeds over 130mph. I would have been exhausted driving a 911 for 1.5 hours at those speeds..I doubt I could have done it in anything but my car.

At 135mph it's pretty quiet and smooth. Just enough to keep you alert. Like being laid over at 40mph on a snowboard on perfect groom...you can do it all day long. I love quality german engineering. Some of the best things come out of the mid 1990's when engineers made quality decisions.

At over 160mph the wind sucks at my door seals.... it's like driving into a hurricane.

[John Gilmour]

pics? really? doubters????Anyone else want to see pics of the new Aspen Cougar deflecting team?

[trailertrash]

John, You are so full of yourself it is amazing. Anybody with half a brain knows you are full of sh!t.

[John Gilmour]

TT. I think you just got yourself banned .....again... according to Bombers posting guidelines..

[lowrider]

Hey watch who you slam i happen to like my 2.5 turbo 5 speed 89 Chrysler 4 cyl. mini van and how did you know i got a refurbished flip phone fo Christmas. You seem to know too much !

Love your posts. Hope the cop or cougar ( they are sort of the same thing aren't they?) that finally nails you has a sence of humour !

[John Gilmour]

Hey watch who you slam i happen to like my 2.5 turbo 5 speed 89 Chrysler 4 cyl. mini van and how did you know i got a refurbished flip phone fo Christmas. You seem to know too much !

Love your posts. Hope the cop or cougar ( they are sort of the same thing aren't they?) that finally nails you has a sence of humour !

Not the same guy... the turbo options were never offered in his area....they just didn't sell.