Here in SW Montana, winter is off to a great start.  Ski areas are opening with good snow (Big Sky opened Saturday 11/24 with the second most skiable terrain in the entire Rocky Mts) and ice is forming well in Hyalite.  My plans for this past weekend included getting some of both - climbing Saturday, skiing Sunday.  So much for the best laid plans...
 
Some friends & I drove up to Hyalite on Saturday - home of MADiDEA 2007 - to climb Genesis 2, a great top-rope area.  The climbing was great and we all got 4 or more pitches in.  Unfortunately, between my 3rd and 4th climb, while not belaying but still standing around the base of the waterfall, a huge chunk of ice was dislodged by another climber 100' above.  It nailed me on the toe of my boot.  Considering that I was wearing double-plastic mountaineering boots, not the softer, lighter climbing boots most people wear, I was pretty lucky.  Nevertheless, it smashed hard enough to break a bone in my big toe.  Apparently the force of the (30 lb?) chunk of ice falling that far compressed the rigid hard plastic shell of my boot enough to do the damage.  Without that boot, my foot would have been shattered.  That same impact anywhere else on my body (head, shoulders...) would have been much uglier.  I'm a lucky guy, despite my toe now looking more like a plum.  Obviously I didn't get to ski Sunday.
 
Lesson learned - don't stand anywhere in the potential impact zone if you're not paying close attention!  I still made one more climb on the broken toe which went surprisingly well.  I didn't get a good look at it until I was back at the car.  Despite now being grounded for (hopefully) a short while, things could have gone much worse.  I'm grateful for my good luck.  I also had my first chance to test out the new Medtronic 722 pump in cold weather.  Despite the temps not getting above 30 F, the pump performed extremely well while stashed in my IDEA bag.
 
Follow up - my friend Phil who climbed with us did get to ski Big Sky on Sunday.  But his luck wasn't so great either.  He hit a tree and banged himself up a bit.  Hopefully nothing too serious...  It clearly was a weekend to pay attention!