I knew we lived pretty close to some really neat things, but I just found out yesterday that we live about 10 miles from a SKI LODGE! Neither Richard nor I have ever been skiing, so come winter, we are definitely going to take a lesson. It's actually way more affordable than I ever would have expected.

We've been planning to hike to the top of the mountain (Mt. Baldy) for the past two weekends, but we've found reasons not to every week. Two weekends ago, it was too cold (in August, people!), and it would have been freezing (literally) at 10,000 ft elevation. Last weekend was exceptionally hazy, and why hike to the top of a mountain if you won't be able to see anything anyway? (The smog here is unbelievable some days.) And now, I found out this hike is not just a fun morning hike where you can get home and take a nap by the afternoon. No, this is a minimum of a 7 hour hike- and pretty arduous from what I've read. So, I think we're going to put it off even longer until I'm in better shape so neither of us dies on the way up.

In other news, Richard's German test is on Monday. I quizzed him last night, and he passed with flying colors. The three sentences I gave him to translate were, "I like the New Testament," "The gospels are interesting," and "Jesus is similar to Cinderella." (Cinderella ("Ashenputel") was one of his vocab words the other day- should be useful on an exam over passages from the field of BIBLICAL STUDIES.) He translated them all correctly (according to him- I have no idea), so I've deemed that he is well prepared.