On Wednesday, I ate lunch with Nate, Kirby, Trista and Courtney. They decided to go sledding, and Kirby joined me to go along. So Nate and I grabbed our gear and met them behind the Alumni Dorm, where we went down the huge hill (covered with a fresh layer of ice, making for a speed-of-sound descent and an interesting ascent) on broken plastic sleds and a mattress stolen from the dorm. Everything was going fantastic until, sadly, we all decided to go down on the mattress together. Courtney and Trista bailed at the beginning, Nate's foot got stuck in the snow and he flipped off the sled, and Kirby and I hit the bottom of the hill and flipped forward: and Kirby's ankle had snapped in half! She was rushed to the emergency room, and she is doing okay now after a good deal of surgery.

This could accurately be called the "hill of death". It doesn't seem too steep until you realize that there's actually a climatic drop-off that the camera doesn't catch.

I slipped on the ice as I tried to climb up the hill, and this is one of Trista's pictures right before I plunged down the hill. So slippery was the ice that sometimes one had to go up one hands and legs to keep from sliding (and that in itself proved to be a challenge!).

Nate and I beginning our descent down the hill. It would prove to be a risky descent: we almost hit multiple trees and a concrete barrier, and eventually I slid off the mattress and hit a tree (as Trista so eloquently captures with her camera):

A snapshot taken milliseconds before I made sweet love to the ice-draped tree.

Nate and I carrying the mattress back up. I carried it halfway up the steps (which were drenched in ice; notice Nate grasping the handrail), and then Nate took over for me.

A bittersweet ending: here is Kirby in the hospital, embracing Nate. She may have broken her ankle, but at least she and Nate grew closer together through this unfortunate climax to a day spent sledding in the snow!