But while waiting for the faded, chipped red facing to be replaced, customers found themselves once again with parking difficulties.

It already was difficult, with mall owners threatening Starbucks and Quizno's customers with towing if they dared park in the precious spots.

But then the big trucks came in for the re-do and for over a week, places such as Edisto Gallery and Tea Room, Tailwaggers, Mammoth Art Supply, et. al. lost all the parking in front of their joints.

Mary Siceloff, whose internet-connected tea room often is packed at lunch, said she had a couple of days last week with just one customer sitting in the dining area at any given time.

Nov. 21 was a breakthrough day, however.

Workers finished the siding on the main part of the L-shaped building and began work on the Mammoth Sporting Goods side, leaving Siceloff and her other, beleaguered shop owners with at least a few parking spots out front.

It is the ice skating season—the season in late fall when the lakes freeze but snow has not accumulated on them.

It's happening now. Ice is all over the place from about 9,000 feet up, although it's not thick enough to skate on yet. I was up at Ellery Lake and Tioga Lake on the Yosemite road this afternoon, and ice already was forming in large chucks.

Conditions have to be just right for the skating season around here. The freeze optimally happens in the absence of wind, so the ice isn’t bumpy. The freeze should be sudden, and last at least several nights.

The result is thick, smooth ice.

The best lake for skating? It depends on how hard you want to work to get there.

Aficionados are particularly fond of Ruby Lake, one mile up the Mono Pass Trail from Little Lakes Valley, south of Mammoth in the Rock Creek drainage. Ruby Lake lies at the bottom of a north-facing slope (Lookout Peak). It is remote and, at 11,040 feet, is about as high as a skater could want to be.

Nobody wanted this.

Not surprisingly, some worshippers at Sunday services will give casino chips rather than cash when the basket is passed. Since they get chips from so many different casinos, the churches have devised a method to collect the offerings.

The churches send all their collected chips to a nearby Franciscan Monastery for sorting and then the chips are taken to the casinos of origin and cashed in.

This is done by the chip monks.

With very little snow at lower elevations and no man-made snow at all up top, Mammoth Mountain Ski Area opened the lifts to the top of the hill on Nov. 12, providing skiers and boarders with an altogether different kind of experience.

"It's like a bowling alley up there!" said one skier, hours after coming down off the hill.

That's not an entirely bad thing, mind you.

Just keep this in mind:

If you have older skis or boards, you might want to use them until there's a leetle more fluff on the ground.

2. You haven't played solitaire with real cards in years.

3. You have a list of 15 phone numbers to reach your family of 3.

4. You email the person who works at the desk next to you.

5. Your reason for not staying in touch with friends and family is that they don't have email addresses.

6. You go home after a long day at work and still answer the phone in a business manner.

7. You make phone calls from home and accidentally dial "9" to get an outside line.

8. You've sat at the same desk for four years and worked for three different companies!!!

10. You learn about your redundancy on the 10:00 news.

11. Your boss doesn't have the ability to do your job.

12. You pull up in your own driveway and use your cell phone to see if anyone is home to help you carry in the groceries.

13. Every commercial on television has a web site at the bottom of the screen.

14. Leaving the house without your cell phone, which you didn't have the first 20 or 30 (or 60) years of your life, is now a cause for panic and you turn around and go get it.

15. You get up in the morning and go on line before getting your coffee.

16. You start tilting your head sideways to smile. :)

17. You're reading this and nodding and laughing.

18. Even worse, you know exactly to whom you are going to forward this message.

19. You are too busy to notice there was no #9 on this list.

20. You actually scrolled back up to check to see that there wasn't a #9 on this list.

And Now You Are Laughing At Yourself.

    A guy gets used to the shoulder season around here—no traffic, no lines anywhere for anything and, in fact, no people except local people who know each other.
    That all changes this week, according to Laurie Medov of the Visitors Bureau.  Laurie says the hotel and lodging folks are projecting 40 percent occupancy in the town this weekend, no doubt owing to the fact that the Mammoth Mountain Ski Area is open as of today.
    Of course, there are other things going on, too, and they're all listed below:

    Friday night 11/11/05 - Saturday night 11/12/05 = 40%
    Sunday night 11/13/05 - Thursday night 11/17/05 = 17%

Upcoming Events:
11/1-15/05 - Convict Lake Fall Trout Derby.  Call Convict Lake Resort at 934-3800 for details.
11/9-12/05 - MHS Drama Club presents the play "Harvey".  Call Mammoth High School at 934-8541 for details.
11/10/05 - Mammoth Mountain Ski Area Opening Day.  Call Mammoth Mountain Ski Area at 934-2571 for details.
11/12/05 - Forum Youngblood Contest Series.  Call Mammoth Mountain Ski Area at 934-2571 for details.
11/12/05 - On Foot: Lost Worlds-Artist Reception & Show Opening.  Call Edisto Gallery at 934-3001 for details.
11/12/05 - Mammoth Mountain Opening Day Celebration.  Call Mammoth Mountain Ski Area at 934-2571 for details.
11/12/05 - Telemarkstips Opening Weekend Party & Powderwhores PW05 Premier.  Call Sherwin's at 924-7222 for details.
11/15/05 - End of Mono County Fishing Season.  Call Dept. of Fish & Game at 934-2664 for details.
11/16/05 - Murder Mystery Dinner Fundraiser "Hauntington Inn".  Call Sierra Classic Theatre at 934-0190 for details.
11/16/05 - Annual Womens Club Holiday Auction.  Call the Womens Club at 934-3328 for details.

    Now *that's* an alarm clock, Ché.
    Just after 6:30 this morning, Bobby Hoyt's Ski Patrol began testing the avalanche guns on Mammoth Mountain.  The target was over by Chair 9, so everybody over on that side of town sure got an earful from the howitzer cannons.
    "I couldn't believe it," said my pal Laura.
    "I thought maybe they were blowing up the Village or something."
    Now there's an idea, I thought, but then shook myself back into time and space and called Mammoth Mountain Ski Area, where the P.R. wonks confirmed that it was the Patrol out doing its thing.
    Last season they never got a chance to practice, hardly, because early October snows forced the guns into action for really real.

    Just got back in, and is the wind picking up out there or what?
    The temperature is starting to drop, too. The dog says she can smell snow coming our way.
    Meanwhile, across the street, we ran into a really friendly guy named Chuck. Maybe too friendly. Anyway, this man Chuck was walking up the sidewalk, flanked on both sides by bright yellow aspen. The sun was warm on our backs and, like I said, the wind was still more of a breeze than anything else.
    "This is just great!" he said, meaning what, I did not know. "I've never been here except in the winter! There isn't anybody here!"
    I wanted to say that was partly the season, but there were some other reasons why people weren't here this weekend, such as the HIGH WIND WARNING for tonight and the SNOW ABOVE 7,000 FEET for tomorrow and tomorrow night.
    Who'd want to come up here? Actually, Nook Logan says yet another team has forfeited to the University of Mammoth (Team Cheer: "Ummmmm.") this weekend, unwilling to get hit by crosswinds that, on the ridges, are going to hit 100 miles an hour.
    For the record, the National Weather Service moved this urgent message over the wire late this morning, and pardon the capital letters. the Weather Service seems to be locked in to 1942 Western Union telegraph style.

    SOUTHWEST WINDS FROM 20 TO 40 MPH WITH STRONGER GUSTS WILL DEVELOP EARLY THIS EVENING AHEAD OF AN APPROACHING COLD FRONT. AS THE FRONT PASSES THROUGH THE REGION...LOCAL GUSTS TO 60 MPH WILL OCCUR. EVEN STRONGER GUSTS ARE POSSIBLE IN WINDPRONE AREAS ALONG U.S. HIGHWAY 395. RIDGE WINDS OVER 100 MPH ARE EXPECTED ALONG THE SIERRA CREST OVERNIGHT. PATIO FURNITURE AND OTHER LOOSE OBJECTS SHOULD BE SECURED FROM THE STRONG WINDS. BOATERS ON AREA LAKES SHOULD BE PREPARED FOR ROUGH
WATERS AS WINDS INCREASE THIS EVENING. A HIGH WIND WARNING MEANS A HAZARDOUS HIGH WIND EVENT IS EXPECTED OR OCCURRING. SUSTAINED WIND SPEEDS OF AT LEAST 40 MPH OR GUSTS OF 58 MPH OR MORE CAN LEAD TO PROPERTY DAMAGE AND VERY DIFFICULT DRIVING CONDITIONS FOR HIGH-PROFILE VEHICLES.

    So. Everyone gets that.  What I still don't get is how the Weather Service pinpointed 58 miles an hour as the break point for property damage.  That will be for another day.
    As for the snow, read it and weep:

    Saturday: Partly cloudy with a chance of showers. Snow level 7500 feet. Highs 52 to 62. Southwest winds 15 to 30 mph shifting to the northwest in the afternoon. Gusts up to 40 mph in the afternoon.
    Saturday night: Mostly cloudy with a chance of showers. Snow level 7000 feet. Lows 24 to 34. North winds 15 to 20 mph becoming northeast 10 to 15 mph after midnight.

    This is the day all of Mammoth has been waiting for.
    No, not the Open House at Main Lodge.
    No, not a drop-dead gorgeous late October day.
    Rather, this is the day of the Vons Grand Re-Opening, capping a 13-week remodel that flummoxed most of us along the way.
    The verdict is in, too, and it's good.
    Vons is a much better store now.  Lots more booze and beer and stuff, and nice wide aisles.  Better produce and etc. etc.  There is nothing in the store that's not better than it was.
    On thing, though:
    The new motto is, "Experience the Unexpected."
    Well, if Vons wants a PR disaster, all they have too do is stick with that motto.
    Me myself, I was in the produce department the other day, looking for sprouts to top off my wowzer Pad Thai. Couldn't find fresh sprouts, and the produce guy shrugged and said they didn't come in on the truck, but there was some packaged "Spicy Sprouts" down by the ginger root.
    "Hey!" said I. "I am experiencing the unexpected!"
    Wait until the holiday weeks come around. If there's snow, like there usually is, all kinds of unexpected things can happen.  One year, Vons ran completely out of bread.  There was another time when the store ran short on grocery bags.  That was unexpected.  And there also was the day they ran out of tampons, which made many of women more than a little ornery around here.  Talk about unexpected!
    But anyway, I'm getting ready to head on down there in about a half hour.  Then off to enjoy the beautiful day before heading up to the hill for the Open House.

    Oh wow that was an ugly one.
    The University of Mammoth Mushers got whupped, 62-0, by the Wizards of Cal St. Polytechnic, Waverly — a school so small and obscure that most people have never heard of it and which doesn’t even appear in Internet search engines, such as Google.
    “Arrghhhh,” said Mushers coach Ronald “Bigs” LaBlash before, during and after the game. “And you can quote me on that!” he added.
    At least Cal St. Polytechnic, Waverly bothered to show up.  Word coming down the pike suggests that another string of forfeit victories for the dogsledders might be likely if Mammoth gets some really windy, cold or snowy weather.
    Yesterday was pretty windy, all right, and some of the Mushers players said they were distracted by the Cal Poly cheerleaders, whose signature yell drifted in and out on the gusts, interfering with MU signal callers.
    The yell is pretty simple:
    “Give me a ‘C’! Give me an ‘A’” and so on and so forth, except that the cheerleaders went through “California State Polytechnic Institute, Waverly.”
    That took about one full quarter, during which the Wizards took the Mushers out back and opened a big can of whoop-ass on them.
    Good old MU has never won a game that it actually had to play, but holds the all-time college record for forfeit victories.
    Yesterday, they actually played, and like I said, that was an ugly one.

    Hey look at that, will ya?
    That's a meat and fish counter, with an actual butcher, just like supermarkets in the rest of the world, right here at our very own Vons.
    Well, you coulda knocked us all over with a feather.
    They've got prepared marinades, too, and advice on what goes with what, so that the meat or fish can be wrapped and it'll sit in the marinade on the way home as you bounce bounce bounce along Minaret Rd.  (What the heck are they doing over there anyway? There are roads that are less torn up in Baghdad.)
    Anyway, back to Vons.
    I still couldn't find the Vons-Safeway pizza yesterday, but I did manage to score some chives, and that ain't ever easy.
    But the big thing was the meat and fish counter.
    Now, this doesn't mean that Mammoth's only supermarket is going to be able to handle to big crowds at Christmas, February and March, but we'll see. Nothing's a given over there.
    Oh, and by the way: workers repaved the sidewalk in front of the entrances, which knocked out one entrance, then the other, for a day or two.  And it knocked out all the handicapped parking spots, too.  But all that work is done now.
    It's still a bit of a load navigating the store, mostly because the headers on the aisles don't make any sense, even if the directories under the signs are OK. For example: Under "Natural Foods," we still have the magazines and paper products. 
    Oh well.
    Things are getting better.