dumped dumped like a kid-brother who thought he had something going with a popular senior  That’s what happens when you get too happy and your attitude gets in the way. In this situation, it was a case of too much snow:[image](photo of my phone: Text message from a friend who used to live here but is now in flatland Pennsylvania. He was bragging that his NHL team beat mine, as if I was paying attention while Tahoe got 15 feet of snow)  Here’s the deal: It’s been raining for 24 hours and is predicted to continue for another whole day. This is the price we pay for all the bonii of living in a ski town that’s only an hour away from real palm trees (at the In’N’Out Burger in Auburn). But let’s not race to conclusions. We’ll leave the outcome of this rain for next week’s update. No need to enter into the possibility of that headline: “First to Worst….” So the storm system that started on Feb 6 continued through this past Tuesday. We had awesome storm days at the beginning of the week (photo: all's quiet except the wind on KT-22).[image]Wednesday and Thursday were predicted to be partly or mostly sunny. This break from a long cycle was the talk of the town and photographers busied themselves shining lenses while 9-to-5-ers rehearsed their scripts for “calling in SICK!” The sun rose on Wed. morning unable to find a single cloud over the Lake and we had diamonds on the snow surface. The big news at Squaw was the much-anticipated opening of Silverado which happened mid-morning.If you’re not familiar, this chair is a desperado among its peers throughout the West. There are big, open swaths of terrain which make western resorts great. Squaw has a couple chairs that could be entire ski areas in themselves. Where KT-22 is long-legged, well-rounded, good-for-quickies and perfectly framed at the base of the entire mountain, Silverado is an easily-overlooked, buck-toothed, knee-knocked b*tch with dip in her teeth and a pension for slapping people upside the face. Anyway, for a lot of us she’s the favorite and always opens last because she needs so much snow to fill in the evacuation routes, heli landing pad, and the lower lift shack which is perched on a granite knoll. While I was hoping to be with everyone who was scattered at the eight control gates when the ropes dropped, I ended up getting ‘lasties’ at 3:30 when a generous patroller let me pass by his freshly-turned ‘Closed’ sign and duck the rope he had just strung across the gate.[image](photo: view from Silverado chair at about 3:40 on its 2009 debut) Thursday was a busy one at the resorts because word of the day before had spread plus the impending doom of rain in the forecast made people realize it was becoming now or never to get some under blue skies There was nice wintery snow on all north-facing slopes and some of the steeper terrain at Alpine (Keyhole in particular) still had nice deep pillows but lower mountain faces were all pretty cooked from temps in the mid-40’s for two days. Friday was a solid groomer day. Saturday was more of the same although nooks like the Broken Arrow trees and Corkscrew still had nice wintery sections.[image](photo: Jon Bowden lining one up in Keyhole) EVENTS: The Helly Hanson Big Mountain Challenge at Squaw was a hit on Saturday with teams sweating all over the mountain to make their way to various hikes and chairs with GPS tracking their every move. This coming Saturday the big events are the Nissan Tram Face contest at Squaw and the Tahoe premier of The Full Picture, Jon Bowden’s award-winning dramatic comedy being played at Sugar Bowl at 6pm at the Mount Judah Lodge (free show). Also kicking off this weekend is the annual Snowfest celebration with huge fireworks and a torchlight parade at Squaw.