ACL in tact. Back not broken. Birthday celebrated. Great success.

Last weekend I woke up and asked Mack if he wanted to go skiing. Although his vocabulary was a little more colorful, his answer was essentially NO. I hadn't been skiing in more than a decade, I have no health insurance, and skiing is a generally a bad idea under those circumstances.

But then my dad walked in with free passes and, hello, DEAL. You can't say NO to a DEAL or the universe stops giving them to you.

One of my favorite people to make bad physical decisions with is Heather. She's conned me into jumping off balconies and walking through drainage tubes and watching tornadoes and doing mud runs. I asked her if she wanted to go skiing and celebrate her birthday, for free thanks to the magic of my dad, and after saying, "I hate skiing, I am constantly terrified by it, I will probably die and leave my children without a mother," she said, "Okay, I'll go." She also can't resist a deal.

Saturday we geared up, including some ibuprofen that we planned to take prophylactically, and headed to Paoli Peaks. We agreed that our goals for the day were to keep our ACLs in tact and not break our backs. I'm proud to report we're both in one piece and have no new medical bills.

I had a great day celebrating Heather's birthday on the slopes, acting half our age and laughing so hard I almost peed my pants on a few occasions. I was also super proud of her for overcoming so many fears, from heading down steep hills to getting off the ski lift to actually going a few feet without the brakes on. We started on the bunny slopes and ended the day, 8 hours and two cocktails later, on a blue slope for moderate skiers.