Other stuff that went on and can't think of a witty title

At long last, 2 tickets to the Van Show

This week we had Vicki tattoo and Becca waterfront come out to visit which was awesome! They had some decent nights in Scottys and sampled life chez la Plagne, woo! I am so far managing (for a week) not to go into Scotty's unless I am working, so I am avoiding the place like the plague because I'm a bit fed up with it! Lots of people are either leaving or transferring which sucks so badly and is getting everyone down. Our assistant manager, Troy has been replaced with her clone, Hannah, who has so far been a bit of a pain in the backside. Hannah chalet has now been promoted to Housekeeper, so we are waiting to see how long it takes for Roz to get her fired. Will from Chalet (I can't believe I have never mentioned this guy but he is a complete dumbass and I'm sure he will now feature heavily) has been moved to work in Scottys for 6 weeks, AH! Van Show Part Deux has been achieved my friends. I didn't even understand what Stu Pool meant this time. I mean 'Caffe Oly'. What do you do with that?!?! Supposedly that is what they call a Cafe au lait in Blackpool. Oh and I'm going to play Ollie at tennis this week which is awesome, and I'm going to beat him, woo!

The crying game

Snowboarding is hard for Kat, really hard. However, I persevered and thought I was getting somewhere (slowly and 10 miles behind everyone else). I've been out quite a few times with numerous teachers who claim to have invented the snowboard with their own bare hands, and I started out well the other day, for the first time ever I hadn't forgotten everything I had learnt which was a nice change! I have been assured that boarding follows the '3 day principle', in that you want to hurl your board down the bottom of the slope, burn it and bury the evidence, until that magical 3rd day when it all just, 'clicks'. Whoever invented this principle was clearly smoking something because I've been out about 6 times and of course things went rapidly downhill soon after on the 6th day and the kneepads were tested to the extreme. Damn Corinne tried making me do something horrendous (ie turning both ways) and next thing I know, BAM! Smack down on the piste. I screamed so loud a few lads thought I had broken something, but that concern was extinguished when Corinne just shouted at them 'she's fine leave her alone!'. Cheers. I swear my knees have never known such pain and due to my pathetic skills, the tears started. I didn't just sob though, oh no, I believe I screamed at Corinne 'I HAVE ENOUGH TEARS TO GIVE THE WHOLE OF THE 3RD WORLD WATER FOR A YEAR!', and then struggled on to her on my board, I couldn't even bleedin see for all the tears. Safe to say I'm giving it a break for the moment and then I'm having a lesson from some lad from Airtours, so we shall see if I cry at him or if I blossom into a snowboardess!

The blind leading the blind

I ate these bad boys, before they could crawl away
The assassin and the victim

Paul is now back from Moutiers hospital and has the ulitimate luxury of being in a guest room and being waited on hand and foot! Ok, his leg still hurts a LOT and has 2 pins in it and hobbles around the hotel on his crutches and generally looks like a scary guy uttering words to kids such as 'aha, you must be children' (kinda had to be there!). He is going to go home soon and then come back in 6 weeks hopefully and carry on working. In the mean time, Chris from Scotty's (who we have decided looks like he would fit in rather too well into Westlife) has been made bar supervisor, so we have been taking the mick out of any authority he tries to assert over us, ha! We all went out for a meal for Paul's leaving 'do' and went to a place called 'le refuge', which was awesome. I had tartifilette, and lots of other people had a raclette, for those of you not aware, its a massive slab of cheese put in front of a heater and then you scoop off the cheese into a massive yellow fatty mess and struggle though it in a cheese related nightmare. I was on the receiving end of this bad boy raclette and I swear I got a suntan. This is also a landmark moment because I only bloody had snails! They tasted, hmm, meaty. For some reason a lot of the booze was free and we did abuse it to the max, and safe to say we had a lot of sick people on our hands, I mean there was a dangerous amount of cheese on that table. Getting a drunken and cheese filled Paul home was a task. Rob, the assassin, and Mick head chef had to carry him back, and I had the best job in the world, chief crutch carrier. Never will the novelty of crutches wear off. It took forever to get him home and Mick was rewarded at the end of this trip by Paul puking into his ash tray, and then Mick failed to control the cheese and of course hurled as well. Honestly! I was then chief mopper upper and apple blossom sprayer. I forgot to warn you that this story was rank, sorry!

Protection is paramount!

Check out THEM knees!

Although I have clearly dropped lots of hammers and I'm suitably gnarly, a girl needs to look after herself. Another flirting attempt in the snowboard shop with Mr Smelly French Man and I was protected with knee pads and wrist guards. Now I can fall over all day long and not moan (as much). And for all of you that were curious, I look HOT!

Unblock THIS!

I am Mrs Muscle, I am ready to unblock

I'd just like to make a brief plug (excuse the pun, but God I'm good) for Spar supermarkets. If you ever have a 'friend' who is stupid enough to throw up in a sink and it won't drain away, Spar drain unblocker is the answer to all your problems. At merely 1 Euro per bottle, this formula is bloody priceless. I can't believe it ACTUALLY worked, such was my excitement that I went round and unblocked our bath and now our feet don't have a little bath everytime you want a shower! Sorry but I thought I would have to get Mr Muscle on the case, and I had to share it with someone!

Mr cautious skiier 2007

Even that kid looks disgusted with Rob's 'skills'

I can't believe it has taken me this long to shame Rob on the blog, but the time is now. Like myself, skiing doesn't rank top on the list of favourite pasttimes for Rob, and his first trip out on skis was testament to this. To cut a long story short he comes home with broken bindings, and 2 poles chopped into 4. How is this possible??? Well I can guarantee anything is possible when you forget to raise the bar at the end of a chair lift ('I thought it was like the rides at Alton Towers'...give me strength!). So Rob and chairlifts are no longer friends, but myself, Roz and Jenny CS tried to remedy that by going out on a little skiing jaunt the other day. Seeing Rob ski is a fantastic thing, it is like seeing Bambi learning to walk. Its an awesome mix of excitement, wonder, and trying not to soil yourself. Saying that I am still rubbish at skiing, and so I have nothing over him, YET I can turn both ways on a snowboard, woop woop!

Space cadet

Moi, Hannah, and da big boss Ollie (and some drunk guy about to hurl)

I thought Marge and Pete would like this one, myself and Henry in Corsica mode

You all know one. The kind of person where you wonder what is going through their heads exactly and they ask questions like 'why is the sky blue?'. The official space cadet for la Plagne is Hannah from Scottys, and as it was her birthday this week what better fancy dress than dressing up as aliens?!? In fairness everyone made a good effort, for some reason the kitchen boys came as the teletubbys, complete with body paint, but Hannah and myself simply went straight for the winning formula..the moon boot. Add some goggles and some appropriately 'out there' make up and there you have it, space cadet. The night was pretty messy of course, starting off proceedings with 'Pelule d'Oignon' (thats right, 'Onion wine', you heard me) and then it got much much more horrendous, I thought my all white outfit and a bottle of red wine would be a successful formula. NB: it is not. In fact for future reference, any red wine stain can be removed with white wine! Barry Scott of Cilit Bang fame would be proud of me! The best bit of the night was getting Hannah up on stage with the live band and having to sing herself happy birthday, and she hated every second of it, ha! We then danced on the stage, head height above everyone else, ruling that dance floor. Like most nights, after Scottys we had a very hazardous walk into town, slipping over in fantastic style on the ice and eventually making it to another bar. After a ridiculously overpriced drink it was time for bed and watching some of the Aussie open on tv! Oh yeah Henry CS Manager from Corsica was there. Wasted. As usual.

Wanna join the pole club?

You know when you just know you're the hottest person in the room
Chubby, Chris and Jack, proving that men too can practice the art of seduction

La Plagne isn't exactly famous for its nightlife. More like quiet nights in and an average age of 65. Ok thats an exaggeration, but its the seasonnaires opinion that Scottys is where its at. It is my soul intention to prove them wrong, every last one I tell thee! I don't know about you but where better to start than a place called 'Monica's pub'? A free bus ride up to Plagne Soleil and you are welcomed into a room, about the size of my bedroom, with weird French guys, and of course obligatory football on tv, complete with necessarily loud commentary. I struggled on though with some of the lads from the hotel and after a few leffe's everything was a hazy blur. Ha ha, 1-0 to Monica's. Before I knew it, I was in some weird minibus on our way to some club called 'le Saloon' (like everything round here, simply adding 'le' or 'la' to any English word magically makes it Francais. 'Le Tex Mex' and 'le Far West' are two shining examples in Plagne Centre). Essentially it was a glorified gay bar but it meant I could dance and dance and dance. Then there was the pole. Mick the head chef spotted this ingenious yet essential piece of interior design, and I swear we danced around that pole for about 3 hours, only stopping when someone else tried to use it, and even then we would send daggers their way and they would know that we owned the pole. Being the token female of the group, I was leaps and bounds above the rest of them, although I must give credit to Chris (my robot foe) who spun around the pole not once, not twice, but three times!!! I suppose he is helped by the fact that he is an Irish leprechaun, coming in at a massive 1.5 feet high. So, auditions for the pole club will be taking place soon, coming to the ONLY club in la Plagne!

Black Thursday

A lot of good things happen on seasons, and so of course a lot of pretty damn right rubbish things also happen. Unfortunately in la Plagne this happened all in the same day, and I don't just mean the death of Josephina (God rest her soul). First off was a completely pointless thing which just refelected how much of an idiot out manager is. One of the KPs (Adam) got a little bit fruity in Scotty's one night and after a few too many Mutzigs, decided to brandish his backside. Now Scottys is a public bar where you can do what you like, the guests don't get preference and is completely different to the hotel. Unfotunately for Adz, our manager was in there at the time and decided to sack him. It was pretty uncalled for and then practically everyone jumped on the band wagon and decided that quitting was the way forward. Of course no one actually followed up on that and Adz is so far the only one to go home, err, this week! Then later that night when everyone was pretty blue, our general manager took out all the God-like heads of department out on skidos for his birthday (so as not to make the rest of us feel excluded). From what I understand these bad boys are death traps and it did not fail to deliver! A bit of a misjudgement by someone who will remain nameless (Rob!) and next thing you know, Paul from Scottys has his ankle smashed in between 2 skidos and all of a sudden there is a skido sliding off down the mountain, driver-less! The outcome is Paul had his ankle broken in 3 places and he has had to have an operation to put pins in it, talk about nightmare! Noone is really sure whether he is going home or not because he is stuck in some hospital in Moutiers, but now we are 2 people down (Stu Pool was an idiot on his snowboard and got a week off work, clearly I failed to mention that due to lack of concern!) and so we've had nannys and chalet members working in Scottys this week!

RIP Josephina

Forgive me, I am a little choked

It is always a sad day when you have to bid farewell to a loved one, and unfortunately Roz had to cope with the loss of someone very close to her this week. Last week Roz got the call from Momma Cameron and she had some bad news. Unfortunately Josephina had passed during the night. I hope everyone can give some support to poor Roslyn, as losing a goldfish is always a tough stage for any ahem, 23 year old. Strangely enough Roz's Mum spotted that the poor golden mite was looking a little green, and so dropped a wee dram of whiskey into the tank. Despite promising signs at the start, it was lights out for Josephina. Roz was inconsolable for the whole evening, so I made her a memorial plaque to say a proper goodbye to her gilled mate.

Roz gets her boss FFFFFFFFFFIRED!!!

Ha ha! Sadly Roz's housekeeper boss joined us a couple of weeks ago and even though she shares the same name as me, she is an absolute bitch (no comments!). She basically caused all manner of outrage and bossed people about and didn't actually do any work herself. The worst was one situation that I actually witnessed, where Catherine shouted at Roz telling her to 'DO IT, JUST DO IT!'. No it wasn't a Nike advert, it was a horrendous slanging match, relating to a mug apparently of all things. Talk about petty! Don't get me wrong, ALL the chalet staff hate her, its not just Roz. Anyway at one point she said to Roz 'I'm your f****ing boss, I'll do what I f***ing want, now f***ing do your f***ing job!'. She has quite an eloquent way with words, you might be able to tell. Anyway about 4 statements from staff and 1 from a guest and today Catherine walks in Scotty's in tears and she sobs....'I've just been sacked'! Ha ha gutted love! I'm quite jealous that I couldn't get James fired from Corsica like Roz did here, but they are now free from Catherine's reign of terror! Woop woop!

SICK!

Staff food is rancid at the best of times, and it was certain it wouldn't take long before I was affected. Im pretty certain that the culprit was eggy bread, but straight away it had me wincing in pain and grabbing my stomach to gain the sympathy vote. After work I went to bed and thought I'd sleep it off, but then a text at midnight woke me up and for some reason I had my captain chunder hat on. I'm not sure at what point I thought that the Dark Corner's draining system would be good enough to take sick down a sink, but of course I did it anyway. It was a proper flashback to San Francisco I tell thee. So of course it didn't drain, I searched the whole hotel in my gorgeous tartan red pj bottoms complete with mouse on made by my mamma, for a plunger and to no avail, but I did have the pleasure of seeing my boss and confusing him greatly and wondering why I had an ice cube on my head (I was burning up ok!)! Before I knew it I was fishing out sick with a plastic bag acting as a rubber glove, and a used toilet roll, oh and a coat hanger for extra effect. After a while, Roz came in with Gaz (of Corsica action) and in his drunken stupor he threatened to 'TAKE OUT THE U BEND!'. He then threw a lot of crap out of the window and nothing really got fixed. Anyway enough of the rank stuff, safe to say I was sick as a dog in Morocco, and I missed out on the staff 'Christmas' party and all kinds of frolics! Oh well, I'm sure I'll live but Kat was not a well puppy!

Dropping some hammers

Having received a letter from my bro along with the snowboard, he informed me that I needed to 'drop some hammers' for him. Not being entirely sure what this involved I set about my snowboard quest hoping it would all become clear. First task was to get boots and bindings, for which I had specific requirements from my bro. I went to literally the only board shop in la Plagne and had a little look about and realised that this was basically the best shot I had at getting what I needed. First thing was boots, and shamelessly this is where I had to start flirting en francais with a horrendously smelly and long haired frenchy who worked in the shop. All in pursuit of a good discount, I even smiled when he gave me the shop's one pair of demo socks, reaking from its one millionth customer, for trying on some boots. Thankfully I found some boots and they had the bindings I wanted, and they are both beautiful and white! Before I knew it I had the bindings fitted to my 'planche' (new word I learnt by the way!) and I was good to go (after asking them to come along to Scotty's hoping this would reduce the price even more but to no avail!). That afternoon I went out with Corrine, a chalet girl, snowboarder chick, and she taught me the wonder that is a 'falling leaf' and I learnt how to turn one way, but I think the other way was too much for me that day! Needless to say I did some massive wipe outs, possibly this is the definition of dropping some hammers...we shall see? The day afterwards I pleaded with some of the Scotty's boys to take me out and show me the way of the board, and Chris was the lucky contestant. I admit hands down that I failed to impress Chris with my boarding prowess at the beginning of the day, with an encounter with a drag lift. I want to defend myself first and say that drag lifts for snowboarders are like kryptonite for superman. Anyways before I knew it the stupid guy in charge of the lift decided to issue me with a ban from the drag lift. Not a good start. So Chris rather stupidly decided to take me up on a blue run via a chair lift, but here's where I started to kick a bit of ass (dropping hammers on the way???), I made it off the chair lift, without making them stop the lift, and without falling. I should have just stopped there to be honest. After that it took me about 1 hour to get down this blue run, and I properly nearly killed myself. I'm sure you've all been there, when you get a little cocky and you're doing a relatively 'easy' bit and then BAM! Wipe out city. I winded myself so badly I couldn't talk and Chris had to fetch my hat and googles from the arse end of nowhere. So I made my way down the hill a la my ass and then went in for some refuelling in the form of chocolat chaud! Man did it work a treat! I went up the same lift and I managed to make it down this blue, turning not just one, but both ways, my friends and falling over only about 20 times! Woo! Still not a clue what they are or how you do it, but I definitely dropped some big hammers.

Token females

Hannah and myself, clearly more drunk than we realised on New Year

MOON BOOT!

Random Christmas Day moon boot purchase, you got a problem with that?

Snow update, if you care!

White out city

For those of you that care, it snowed and snowed and snowed a lot this week. Awesome powder man, awesome.

Kat attracts freaks all over the world

Now being a bar maid, most of the time, you are everyone's best friend. This is even more the case when people have had a few and you are seen as the most important person in the room, ie purveyor of all things alcoholic. So it was inevitable that I would eventually get someone who takes this a bit further, and by 'someone' I of course mean, a freak. I'm not quite sure how I managed this one but there is a group of English lads who come in roughly 10 times a day to Scotty's and before long, the chief freak asked me out on a 'ski date'. Given that I couldn't quite get my head around how ridiculous and horrendously embarassing such a situation could be, I of course didn't turn up! Later in the day he comes in and asks why I didn't show! The only way I could get rid of him was to say I'd have a drink with him. By this I am purely intending on being in Scottys at the same time as him, acknowledging his presence, and thats it. The saga continues!

Proud owner of one snowboard

Let't hit some powder

Now I am officially 'gnarly' with this snowboard, compliments of Hungerpain and Jon Weaver (who I have been abusing as one of my connections here to make me sound cool), I can take up snowboarding. I do need bindings and boots though, both of which I have no idea about. This is probably one of the biggest blagging spectacles I have ever embarked upon. I may have my super polka dot boarding outfit, but Im not sure if I can fake chatting about 'edges', 'kickers' and all things 'gnarly'. Please post any snowboarder blagging tips my way.

Not hating skiing, quite so much!

Ok so I was forced to go out skiing with Roz and a few other people including all the ski hosts (most are annoying, but then again thats just Mossford and the others are actually quite nice!) and I admit I was a tad scared they would fling me down scary red runs! Well my friends, we went over to Les Arcs and can I just say that I actually went down a BLACK RUN! For all of 200 metres. It made me proud anyway. I survived the whole day without falling over, and I even managed to overtake some small kids at one point.

Indepth and I share the pain of New Year in the Christina!

New Years Eve Nightmare

Much like Christmas Eve, I worked all day long and it was an absolute nightmare. A 40 minute wait for soup, SOUP I tell thee! If you wanted a panini, we don't have a panini machine, despite the fact that it is on the menu, if you want a coffee, the machine is broken. If you want to, heaven forbid, pay by credit card, that machine is also broken. Add to that there simply isn't enough people working. Its a nightmare trying to explain how truly crap you are in both English and French. So much like last week I finished at about 5pm and then went off for a sneaky one or three, and then went back to work at 10pm. I get there, and straight away I'm asked to work on the hotel bar upstairs instead of Scotty's. Fortunately I was with the lovely Mr Jon Indepth, but it was all kinds of horrendous. For those who went to Corsica, its like Chez Nous, for those who didn't, its like the crappest bar you have ever been to where the only custom you might be fortunate to have is from little kids asking for change for the pool table. If you are really lucky, like I was the other night, there might be a bit of excitement in the form of a bar brawl over the potted black ball, between four 6 year olds. Jon and I weren't even lucky enough for that. All we had was Jon the hotel manager, his fiancee Debs, Troy the assistant manager, and I think that was about it. We did get to give out champagne just before midnight, which I proceeded to spill all over 4 guests, I guess I still haven't perfected the tray technique. At the countdown to midnight I'm pretty certain I saw some tumble weed stroll through the bar, then make a hasty exit sensing how dead the party was. After that we closed the bar and headed down to Scotty's and immediately became drenched in sweat, and we found out the only thing we had left to sell was Desperados and Strongbow. Awesome. Fortunately a fight ended the party atmosphere and we shut about 2.30am. Then we just sat about and drank our 'first' drinks of the evening and when Stu had reached his quota for talking crap it was time to leave at about 4.15. Hannah, Paul and myself decided there was more partying to do so we headed into town to a place called 'No Blm' (not a clue) and had some strange shots and sat down next to a guy who had passed out with his hand down his trousers. We got back about 6am, shattered as you like! Happy new year, WHATEVER!

2 tickets to the Van Show

Like all respectable food and drink outlets in ski resorts, we proudly sell Vin Chaud. Call it whatever you want, Gluwein, mulled wine, it warms your cockles and for those with lacking french dispositions, its HOT WINE! Sounds fancy in French at least. Given that this isn't something you'd pick up in your local Wetherspoons, it took a while for some of the lads in Scotty's to get their heads round it. Now imagine if you're from Blackpool and your head has suffered from years of hair straightening, chatting up girls and wearing 'bling' and I'm sure taking in new things besides the latest H Samuel range is tough. Your name is Stu Pool. Last week I was working on the bar during lunch and putting all the cheques that Stu had written down whilst he was waiting, in the till. I was putting in every thing that he had written, but I have to say I struggled to find a button that said 'VAN SHOW'. Safe to say I got the cheque and showed it to everyone much to their amusement, with his argument being 'well you knew what I meant hun' (I must stress that quote must be read back in strong Blackpoolianishblingishchavish accent). Now this is the joke of Scotty's and Jon had the corker of an idea of making a poster that says 'DO YOU WANT 2 TICKETS TO THE VAN SHOW? PLEASE ASK STU'. Pure gold.

Disciplinary action...where have I heard this before?

Working for Mark Warner is essentially a glorified form of being in school. Just last night we had a lecture on how if they find any pens in our rooms, sorry, 'company property' is I believe what they called it, then we would be disciplined with a stint in the kitchen chopping 150kg of onions. On Christmas Day a lot of people were late for work and they suffered the same fate, talk about bah humbug baby! New Years Day was bound to be a tough one as well on the people starting early, with Rob being one of them. Despite the fact that he has worked on pretty much every day off that he has had, and transfer days mount up to about 14hr days, oh and he is chief post picker upper and rubbish dropper offer when he has been employed as an accountant (apparently rubbish removal counts as one module in your accountancy exams), he was 10 minutes late for work and he gets a disciplinary hearing. During the hearing he didn't apologise (go Rob) and so next thing you know he is given a verbal warning! Words can't really describe how pathetic this is! The only thing that made me laugh in this situation was that even though pretty much everyone was late for work, Roz was 2 hours EARLY for work, as in she turned up for breakfast when she wasn't even due to work. Clearly in her Scottish capabilities, she is still having trouble understanding the English language.