Monday 1 October 2012

'So, what do you do in the summer?'


Probably the most common question that I get asked during the winter season, be it in my capacity as a ski instructor or sometime transfer driver to the airport is, ‘So, what do you do in summer?’. 

life's a beach
This is normally the second or third question after the two other guaranteed questions, being ‘What’s the snow like?’ (cold, white, attached to the mountain) and ‘How long will it take to get to Chatel?’ (as long as it takes, depends on whether you want me to drive like I am supposed to or if I can drive like I’ve got a 74 number plate, which you really won’t like).
So I thought I’d write a blog about what I’ve done since the ski season ended and for something to write about since I haven’t written anything since April. 

Non-ski season, I am a football coach and my 8 month off season started with a week of Easter football camps and progressed into various after-school coaching programs and summer camps.  We are now into the after-school coaching autumn season, with added rain, cloud, cold and general crappy weather.
This year, after meeting another particularly good coach who has joined the company that I work for, I have changed my approach to coaching.  I have realised that much of the work that I did last year, although fun, wasn’t that constructive in making kids better at football.  Trying to put myself in the shoes of a parent, I figured if they are going to pay X to come and have me coach them, then they should be a lot better at the end than when they started.  Even the ones who don’t really want to be there.

I now work on a similar basis to skiing, with a lot of questioning/discovery led approaches and a gradual build-up of skills in a particular set order, which makes for development of individual football skills.  At the age group that we coach, 5-11 normally, individual skills are hugely important.  Team play etc comes after in development but if you can’t do what you want with the ball, you’ll never get anywhere in the game itself.
Apart from this, I’ve been on holiday twice.  Once on Danny’s stag do.  18 blokes go to Ibiza – can’t really tell you anymore about that but I had two amazing nights, one at Defected at Pacha and the usual Space on Sunday.  The highlight of the Space night (apart from the eternity that we spent ensuring that everyone was ‘ready’ to go to Space on Bora Bora sodding Beach – never again Dan) was seeing one of my favourite DJ's Deetron live and the other DJ who dropped a Dr Dre track into the middle of his set at about 4am.  Dan won't remember this though as he was having his face painted as a tiger at the time.

The second holiday was a very pleasant 3 days that I grabbed with Mrs Burrows to Italy.  We went back to the place that we went on honeymoon, Cesenatico on the Adriatic coast and spent a couple of days on the beach and 3 nights eating in lovely Italian restaurants.  It was great and it was driveable from Chatel in about 7-hours.  It’s close enough that we are considering renting an apartment there next summer for a month and just chilling by the beach.  Getting out of the Chatel goldfish bowl for a while.
In an effort to offset the epic drinking that counts for the summer here, I’ve been helping a mate out who has been landscaping on an amazing Chalet up at 2000m above Les Crosets.  It’s interesting trying to do a day’s work at that altitude because if you don’t keep yourself fed and watered properly, you start making silly mistakes due to the effects of the height.

Also, it’s tough trying to put a decent shift of work in at 2000m and fatigue certainly was setting in at 8 hours + a day.  Whether this was just me being 35 years old and not used to manual labour after my previous life in suits and offices or the work being genuinely hard, I am unsure.  Anyway, we’ve got a break now until November so I can rest up.
As an aside on the subject of epic drinking, I got so drunk the other day at a wedding,  I seem to have actually scared myself into soberness.  I haven’t had a beer for about a week and a half now and the worst bit about it (apart from the rather worrying fact that this is about the longest it’s been since I started drinking at 15) is that I’m starting to feel quite good.  I am even considering seeing how long into October I can go for without.  The next thing you know I’ll be finding god.

I’m not missing the hangovers though..