I've given up on trying to find new friends to ride with. I come from a family of snowboarders so I mostly ride with my siblings or dad. Anytime I've branched out and tried someone new, they either overestimate their actual skill level and we spend our whole time on different runs or they show up with their brand new Burton everything trying to show me how it's done in the park. I love park, but I'm not trying to be Bode or Shaun. You came up with a new trick? Great, that doesn't mean I have to learn it. You think it's dumb to carve down the mountain without pulling tricks? Awesome, I'll meet you at the bottom.

I don't comment on other people's riding choices, so I'd like the same courtesy to be extended to me. Ever since snowboarding turned into a frat house sport, there's been a real change in the culture. I've been looked at like I'm crazy and told 'you must be new to riding' for declining a bowl on the chairlift. Um, no. Snowboarding has become affiliated with partying and living a crazy life in some of the public's eye and that shows in the newer batches of riders. It's highly amusing that these types are often the ones accusing others of not sticking to snowboarding's 'true roots'. Who cares? I'm here to have fun and do what I want.

The ski/snowboard feud, if you can even call it that, is crazy! The demographic lines between skiers and snowboarders have been blurred over the last twenty years. It is no longer the case that snowboarders are all teenage dirtbags with no respect for authority looking to tear up the slopes or that skiers are just their arrogant, privileged, white, middle-class parents who like throwing their money around in mountain restaurants. Snowboarders are growing up and getting older and there are lots of crazy youngsters exploring skiing. Skiers and snowboarders for the most part have come to understand each other and the old stereotypes no longer apply.