List 2 - things that confuse me about skiing

Here in Ye Olde Inland Northweste winter lasts for a long time.  Last year I learned that while skiing with kids means hauling a whole lot of relatively expensive crap in and out of a whole lot of places that sell only bad and expensive food and dealing with a whole lot of whining, it also (usually) means getting to see the sun and spend the day outside.  So we as a family are in.  I am the slowest.  Jeremy knows no fear and last year launched himself off a jump, 20 feet into the air, did several flips and spins, landed in a huge, like, blown up air pad and called it fun.  He's good.  The kids will soon be as good as he is.  I am happy to curve my way down the hill, feeling the sun on my face and the wind on my cheecks.
While sking as a family is moving from tolerable/worth it to fun/worth looking forward to as the kids improve, skiing with just Jeremy is a treat not to be missed.  Enter ski school.  At the lovely little unpretentious mountain closest to us the kids are going, every Sunday (no church!  Whoohoo!) to ski school where they are on the slopes with adults who are not their parents from 10:00 - 2:00.

This leaves me with time to wonder the following:

1.  The rules clearly state that the uphill person must look out for the downhill person.  This is printed on the list of things to do and not to do that is available to read as you wait to get on the chairlift. There is no quiz (which I would ace, by the way). There is no box to check to certify that you know the rules.  They just kind of assume.  I am a control freak (didn't you know?) and the sound of someone zooming up behind me makes me tense up and prepare to be taken out and this is WAY exacerbated by the fact that I do not know if the zoomer knows they are supposed to be watching out for me which leaves me in a constantly frantic state of watching out for everyone.  

2.  Why are all snowboarders assholes?  How can they ski with their pants around their ankles and headphones in?  I flip them off every time they zoom by me in a loud, smokey cloud of ice chips.  No, I didn't just celebrate my 85th birthday, why do you ask?

3.  How do you identify anyone on the ski slopes?  People will wave and say hi, which is lovely, but to me everyone kind of looks like the peons on Spaceball One- all helmet, fully covered in nondescript snow suits, impossible to identify. 

4.  Why does all the food taste the same?  I get why it's expensive, what with the marketed cornered at the top of the hill and all, but when the chili is discernible from the turkey wrap by texture alone that is a problem.

5.  How many people fall off the ski lift each year?  Why have I never seen it happen?  Since I have never seen it happen why do I spend so much time worrying that it is going to happen to my children?

And last but not least,

6.  Why when I am unloading the car and yelling at the kids to 

getonyourboots

quitkickingeachother

wherearethedamngloves

whyisitsofuckingwindy

whereismypass

didIforgettoputontheemergencybreakoristhatcarabouttoslideintome

HOLYGODPUTONYOURBOOTS

Am I surrounded by families in Lexi SUVs who seem to be gliding out of the car and arranging their things to carry up to the lodge in a calm and orderly manner while their children, with boots already on, are asking what they can carry?