Old Man Gloom is hanging heavy over the offices of TransWorld. The ranks are preparing for the hard dark days ahead. Black rain pounds down in sheets, and we turn our backs to the icy winds of fate. We are sinking headlong into the abyss of the so-called "new millennium," and faint hope is giving way to nervous paranoia. A new social plague is festering in the hearts and minds of the world’s political henchmen. Severe orders are handed down from above, with greed as a virtue, and still, our planet Earth drifts ever nearer to the sun. The vultures are circling, the snakes are stirring in the pit. A static fear paralyzes our minds because we sense beyond reason that the end is nigh–that is, if you’re one of the few, the pissed, The Angry Interns™. Send your diatribes and junk mail to: The Angry Interns™ 353 Airport Road, Oceanside, CA 92054. If you haven’t yet given up on the Internet, try: [email protected]

Carpetbagger

About two months ago I was looking through a snowboard mag. I saw an advertisement that I haven’t forgotten. There was a guy doing a boardslide on something that looked like a man-made hill with a thick carpet covering it. Is there a certain kind of carpet that you can ride on?

Andrew Pikop

Exeter, California

We’ll forgo the cheap and easy response to this question, Andrew. What you saw is called "dry slope." It’s a type of Astro Turf or carpet material originally used for freestyle and ski-jump training in the summer. Currently it’s popular in Britain and other places where it doesn’t snow. Soon it will be all we ride, as the global temperature continues to rise. Huge mega-resorts, like those here in the States, will all be barren–the lifts decaying reminders of a time since lost. Carbon-dioxide levels are soaring, and you are part of the problem. So, forget about snowboarding in the off-season, and please stop breathing.

The Big Lie

I’ve got the blues. I’m training in the army in Missouri, wishing I were atop a run with some pals …

Cris Murry

FLTW, Missouri

To spare our readers the chore of trying to read the torturous grammar of this dimwit, we chose to trim his letter down. Private Murry, you are a fool, but it’s not your fault. The military branch that you’ve chosen to serve is a mere tentacle of a broader system of social control. You’re unaware that you are being programmed to deny your individuality, creativity, and spirit. Patriotism, nationalism, and honor are illusions, carefully fed to you by the boys in charge. Stuffed down in the depths of miserable Missouri, it makes sense that you have "the blues," but the military machine isn’t done with you yet. So stand up straight, son, and forget your emotions–there are boots to shine and people to kill.

Gaylord Dynamo

I am 21 years old and have been riding for eleven years. I’ve been reading your mag for even longer. I’m pissed because I open the mag and see all these badass spots out west and east, and I am stuck here in a shitty little town in Michigan called Gaylord …

A.J. Wix

Gaylord, Michigan

Leave Michigan, or live out your legacy: a mess of deadening chemicals and waking up alone on another rainy day, listing excuses to yourself as to why you’re not skipping work and drinking yourself numb somewhere–knowing that the only person who really gives a shit is you. Self-serving? Yes, but relish it–cry for crying’s sake, for all the times you should have, and for all the times to come. But these self-serving depressive fits will grow dull. It’s a painful dichotomy–to see beauty and decay everywhere you look. The vengeful and nihilistic self you’ll become has its roots in a

childish want–your desire to be content and to see your

life reflected in another’s approval. Do nothing, just wait

for time and the future to validate you. For now, delve into the

horror of nakedness. Or move out west. You are a skipping record, a skipping record, a skipping record.

Morphine Drip

A couple of my buddies and I were enjoying fresh powder at Brighton ski resort. It was the first run of the day. I came around a corner going Mach 10 and collided with a tree in the middle of my turn. I bounced back, ending up in a position that made my leg look like it had two knees. I snapped my femur right in half. Every move I made caused the two broken ends to rub together. The pain was unbearable …

Quinn Bell

Murray, Utah

Let’s face it, things could have been a lot worse. A few pins, a metal plate, and hours of painful suffering are practically irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. At least you’re still here, and the small comfort that offers you and your loved ones is enough to keep you all in a normal state of mind. Hoping for much more is a waste. Close your eyes and envision a degrading journey down your own numinous river Styx: the boatman with his bottle of poison, and

the cacophony of screeching demons clawing at themselves and everything else in a ruinous symphony of self-loathing and senselessness. But you are alive!

We take the time to sit and ponder, and the object of our pondering has become something else. Concerned with beauty, all we see is despair. Wanting peace, all we have is fear. Looking for contentment gives us hope, and in hope there’s the element of future, of time, of death–of nothing.