Riding the chairlift with strangers is an unavoidable factor in skiing. Unless you have the perfect amount of friends with you or you avoid lifts completely, chances are, you will have to spend several minutes with some rando (or several randos) while waiting to shred the slopes (if you’re the kind of person who purposefully pushes singles out, or waits to get on the lift so it’s just you and your buddies, you’re an a-hole).
There are many different kinds of randos who you might run into on the chairlift. There are the silent types, who ignore you the whole ride, and there are the talkative types, who might give you some tidbit of information about the best places to find deep snow or might just tell you their entire lift story (personally, I’m totally fine with either, and love meeting new people on the lift). Then there are the less pleasant randos, like the person who just sings the entire lift ride (I promise you your voice isn’t that good) and the dude who sparks up a joint despite there being ten-year-olds on the lift with you (save it for that little clearing in the trees, please).
Worst of all, and probably the most rare, is the straight up scary person. They might seem a bit off, maybe they threaten you, maybe they admit to some sort of hardcore crime, or maybe they just straight up push you off the lift. The scary ski lift, as depicted by Saturday Night Live back in 1994, is one of the skier’s greatest fears, and man does SNL portray it well!