Welcome to the Tuesday edition of the Coffee Hour at Street Prophets. This is an open thread where we can discuss what’s happening in our lives, what we’ve been working on, and our opinions on current events. Today’s topic is winter recreation.
I thought it would be interesting to start off by talking about skiing. First, a disclaimer: while I live in an area with some major ski resorts and an area in which cross-country skiing is a major sport during most of the year, I do not now, nor have I ever, participated in this form of recreation.
Skiing originated in Scandinavia with the first evidence for it dated to about 5000 BCE in what is today Norway and Sweden. The word “ski” comes from the Old Norse “skíð” which mean “split piece of wood or firewood.” Skiing first appears in North America among Norwegian immigrants in the Midwest about 1825. Initially skiing was seen as a Scandinavian pastime, a part of the winter culture. Most of the skiers made their own skis and the primarily focus was on cross-country trekking or, at times, ski jumping. Downhill skiing, which involves such things as ski lifts, resorts, and bars, would come much later.
Shown above: cross-country skiing in Glacier National Park.
Now there are lots of other interesting winter recreational activities—curling (okay, so my Canadian heritage shows sometimes eh), skating, hockey, falling down, eating, watching television, checking out Daily Kos, pushing cars out of snow banks, shoveling snow, snowshoeing, and finally, eating some more. What do you do for recreation and fun in the winter?
This is an open thread.