Mail is fun!

So, I spent a little bit of my tax refund thing. I mostly put it into the savings account, but I did have a little splurge. Basically, I'm always cold. The perfect temp for me is literally between 85 and 95 degrees. I think that feels wonderful! Not a huge fan of humidity though. Anyways, Jason and I have done some climbing and bouldering as you all know and by the time 4 or 5 o'clock hits I'm freezing! I decided that I needed something that I could climb in that would keep me warm. Being that we live in Cali. and our winters are pretty mild...the last real thing that I've bought that was made to keep me warm was probably my snowboarding jacket. I have some Old Navy fleece that keep me fairly warm and a couple of little hoodies from Old Navy. That's about it.

Last Fri. I went into Mountain Air to see what they had. Everything was of course super expensive. I tried on one thing though that I really liked. It was an Arc'teryx zip up. Mmmm. Here's the thing. Like everything else, the "mountain clothing world" also has "levels" of clothing. You have North Face which is probably one of the cheaper brands, then you have Mountain Hardwear, then there's Marmot and Patagonia which is sort of an upper middle ground, and then you have Arc'teryx. :-) It's the rich man's mountain gear. I'm not a rich man...or woman. The jacket though was perfect. It wicked the sweat away. It was warm, but not too warm. It would stand up to being rubbed against rock...and it has a lifetime warranty if anything falls apart. The price though...$175 (and that's low for the brand). hmmm. I also wasn't sold on the color that they had. They had the full zip-up in this burgundy color. Then they had a pull-over that was in this nice brown color. Basically I wanted the full-zip in the brown. So, I left with a mission...find what I want online, but for cheaper! :-)

So, here is my plug-in for an online outdoor store. Backcountryoutlet.com is the place to go! First, I went on to the Artc'teryx site to see if they even made the jacket I wanted in brown...nope. Bummer. So, I typed in the exact name of the jacket into Google and came up with a whole list of things. Some how I ended up at Backcountryoutlet.com because I remembered it being recommended to me a while ago. I managed to find exactly what I wanted, in brown, and for only $100 w/ free shipping. I saved $75 and got what I actually wanted (not sure why they had it but the site said they didn't make it)! Hey now! I was very excited. So, it came yesterday and I really love it. I can wear it around town but also climb and hike in it. Yay!!! Thank you government, and thank you Backcountryoutlet.com. Another cool thing...backcountry just sent me a 50% off coupon...for my WHOLE next order. So, the Patagonia hiking boots that I've been eyeing at Mountain Air...the one's that are $140. I can get the same one's online for $70. (That's an incredible deal for hiking boots!) Ok, enough on this. If you need camping stuff, backpacking stuff, outdoor clothing, etc. Take a peak at that place!!! So, here's my sweet find...

This is the style that I got but the one below is the color. Except the zippers aren't an ugly light brown, they are a dark brown that blends with the color of the jacket. Also the gray along the sleeves and neck is not that bright...it's really dark and blends too. Ok, so actually the brown looks ugly in this pic. You get the idea though. The material is a really tight weave...it sort of has a "sweater look" and the inside it a thick warm fleece. It has sealed zippers and all that jazz! :-)