How To Snowboard (from someone who can't do it too)

If you squint really hard in Calgary, you can just about not see mountains. It's that difficult to miss the damn things, they're bloody everywhere. As such, mountains magically attract snow,and thus, idiots who enjoy it. 

What could be a more leisurely pursuit of a Sunday afternoon than rushing headlong down a mountain on what is essentialy a Popsicle stick or two. 

"Oh, but it's marvelous and fun and energetic and it makes you feel close to nature" they cry.

"I have a taser" i cry. Then they cry.

Snowboarding is the younger and slightly more stupid cousin of skiing, having been invented when long haired surfer people learned about how water freezes in first grade and wondered if their summer passion could extend to colder times. Snowboarding is actually incredibly simple. Skiing has a variety of different disciplines, styles, variations on equipment and other funny names and technical jargon designed to scare off the peasants who greedily feed on the scraps left from the Aspen banquets. Snowboarding has one fundamental rule, and no alterations to that rule.

Don't fall off.

"Oh, but skiing surely has the same rule!" They cry

"I still have a taser, and I'm talking." i state patiently.

Skiing is a complicated beast. Not only do you have to wear the most uncomfortable footwear known to man (you can't tell me that's the finished design, a boot that practically snaps your ankles when you wear it. Seems a bit counter intuitive to me, like designing a car airbag that stabs you or a reclining chair that punches your groin repeatedly) but you have sticks. Poles, sticks, kebab rods, whatever, they're there sometimes for show, sometimes for purpose. Another prerequisite is to look like a smug git while you do it, if only to mask the pain shooting from your ankles with gay abandon.

Snowboarding is blissfully uncomplicated. But there in lies the problem. Skiing, it's older, more affable brother, is very complicated, so some fools decided that snowboarding had to catch up somewhat. Of course, it would be ridiculous to suggest that Snowboarding has any real rules.

Here are the rules of Snowboarding.

1: You must not fall off.

2: You must wear winter clothing designed by a colourblind chimp. Nothing is allowed to match, and none of it can be deemed to be of good taste. Instead of your usual choice in attire, you must now look like a neon takeaway sign threw up on you.

3: You must talk as if you have suffered a serious head injury and cannot remember the basics of English. Instead of "I fell over" you must now say "I did a sick bail"

4: Sick now means a variety of things, none of which actually have anything to do with illness.

5: you must scream as if you have a colony of termites burrowing through your flesh at every small achievement or trick you accomplish. The less significant, the louder you scream to make up for it. Always describe it as Sick

6: Look down your nose at skiers. Sneer if necessary

7: Get offended when skiers look down their nose at you.

8: High Five. All the time. High five!

9: Don't complain that the lodge charges you as much for a small can of beer as a liquor store does for a six pack. Supply and demand buddy.

10: Don't fall off.

There you have it. I may not be a big fan of snowboarding, but armed with these rules, you may emerge better looking and slightly more talented at it than me. But only at snowboarding. I still rock at everything else.

Don't like it?

I have a taser.