No new sled

K came over for an overnighter with T, and I went out with them for a couple of hours of sledding, including I opened up one of the long slopes that people don't tend to hit because it's a quarter-mile walk. I also, from the looks of the tracks, hit a new distance record on the long/fast/bumpy slope back in the woods, and had the interesting sensation of breathing snow powder as I hit the fluff at the end going headfirst. Very fun.

I never remember until about this time of year that we really need some new sleds. We have ONE decent sled, and also a junky $3 plastic thing that we bought at K-mart about 20 years ago, and that's it. There are some runner sleds in the attic of the garage, but I've never had any luck with runner sleds, and besides I don't think they'd like it if I hit the Waterloo slopes; a 180 pound guy catching 5 feet of air on 3 successive moguls and coming down sideways on the last one would be the final run for them, I'm pretty darn sure.

A trip to Meijers and checking the toy department reminded me that in US retailing today, you have to buy things 2 months before you need them. The only sledding device of any sort they had left was one cheap snowboard and a half dozen toddler sleds. The guy I was talking to at the store said "Yeah, sorry, that's the way it is. It's about time to go buy a swim suit, BTW."

I'm going to check some lesser-volume places like hardware stores, or maybe Pamida.

I'm going to set a calendar reminder to buy a new sled next Thanksgiving.