Who we are

Josh is a machine in a plain gray hoodie. And plain gray pants. And plain gray shoes. There’s a lot of gray, okay? For him, a day out usually involves huge distances and huge elevations. He’ll like summit Gannett Peak in under 24 hours car to car and casually say, “It’s just walking.” Yeah, and Hell is just a sauna, Josh. Good job trying to relate to normal people, bud. His hobbies include alpine starts, hockey, wearing sunscreen and drinking roughly 37 cups of strong black coffee every day. He once won an award for the most patient person on the planet. When he was a kid he actually counted how many licks it took to get to the center of the Tootsie Roll Pop and in a move of pure audacious confidence, SENT IT IN TO THE COMPANY like, “Hey guys, I solved it.” That is an absolute lie-Laura was the one who actually did that, but honestly, it’s more believable to think it was Josh. He puts up with all of Laura’s harebrained ideas better than anyone else in the world and must find her clumsiness and general chaos endearing, because damn. But (!) he’s one of those really quiet but deep-down-wily guys. You know the type: they keep to themselves and never raise their voices but in secret they’re ornery as hell and cause all sorts of problems for reactive people (like Laura in particular). Then, when they’re caught out, no one ever believes that they’re capable of doing that stuff because they’re so nice and quiet. Yeah. He’s just like that. Don’t be fooled. He is a creature of habit and I swear to pancakes he’s eaten a toasted bagel with pepperjack cheese every single day at 10 am for the past twenty years without fail. You could set your watch by this. Crackers and cheese by 3 pm. Every day. For twenty years. As of this writing, that’s 7,305 days IN A ROW, taking leap years into account. That’s a lot of bagels, cheese, and crackers, you know? His appetite is incredible. You’d never know it to look at him, but he’s a secret beast. He absolutely hates board games but will destroy anyone at Pac-Man. He likes computers and programming and nerdy stuff like that. His computer background is a 3D Magic Eye puzzle of dinosaurs getting onto a UFO with Al Capone in the foreground manning a lemonade stand. He likes Jim Jarmusch films. Josh is the steady one of the group. He keeps us all in check and on task. Or at least he tries, which is more of an effort than the staff in general (and most especially Laura) ever makes.

Two things you should know about Laura: one: she absolutely hates mayonnaise, or as she calls it “sandwich lotion,” and two: she *will* fight you. Laura wears men’s deodorant because “No one trifles with a bitch who smells like gasoline and eagle fangs.” In a bizarre life twist, once upon a time she was named as one of the Wyoming Business Council’s 40 Under 40 top entrepreneurs in the state, which is hilarious because in real life she’s got this intense feral gremlin energy and is chaotic and spazzy and by far the clumsiest idiot in the building. When she comes thundering down the stairs *everyone* gets out of the way. But she does have a real knack for writing staff bios, so there’s that. She will make fun of you relentlessly. There’s a fine line between mean and funny and she struts her stuff along that line like she’s Johnny Fucking Cash, baby. Look out. Her love language is sarcasm and dark humor. She owns a shiny red cape. Usually she wears it when she vacuums, but she also has been known to wear it on mountain summits, when she’s lifting heavy in the weight room, or just on a Tuesday in the office. She never matches socks and has gotten her hair stuck in the paper shredder. TWICE. She’s basically the person that warning labels are there for. And she squeezes the toothpaste tube right in the middle, which is essentially proof that she’s a goblin. But she does always put her shopping cart away instead of leaving it in the parking lot, so she’s got that going for her. She takes the biggest steps in the world. Laura is not a hugger. For your own health and safety do not attempt to touch her. Like, why would you even want to?! Do you, dear reader, also try to pet rattlesnakes often? Or try to do-si-do with grizzly bears? Look, she *will* hit you, and she used to box-trust me, you do not want that. Another neat thing about Laura is that her facial expressions will tell you exactly what she’s thinking even before her mouth does. She doesn’t need a mood ring because she’s got a face. Laura is not the predictable one of the group-that’s Josh. Laura has been known to waltz in the door with a bucket of water balloons. Or suddenly engage in a pool noodle or nerf gun battle with whomever she comes across, whether it be staff or customer or random person on the street. She often engages the entire store in shop-wide dance parties or planking competitions. She says that Josh provides the rhythm and she provides the soul, and that’s pretty true.

Brandon moved back to Pinedale after spending several years in Seattle, because, duh, Pinedale is WAY better than Seattle, although both are a notch above Nebraska where he’s originally from. Brandon was drawn to the mountains here as a climber and hella good snowboarder. But, after spending approximately 934 hours jumping on the trampoline with Josh and Laura’s daughter, exploring the Winds and playing soccer with Travis Rice at a birthday party, he was hooked and has always felt home in Wyoming. Brandon is an incredible artist and graphic designer with a dry, forgiving sense of humor that somehow fits in well with Laura’s bludgeoning sarcasm, Josh’s quiet wit and the whole crew’s general shenanigans, so although he mostly works from home he fits right in. He has a neon safety vest he wears unironically while operating a drone. He takes all of Laura’s outrageous ideas for content in stride, and somehow puts it all together and makes magic happen. I mean, have you *seen* our videos?! He loves tacky romance novels, baggy spandex, really sharp pencils and coffee. Nothing makes him happier than finding perfectly symmetrical pine cones in the wild and buying Dalan caselots of Capri Sun. All of his major life choices have been influenced by utilizing a Magic 8 Ball, or, if driving, just following another car at random that seems like it knows where it’s going. Seems haphazard, but if you ask him he’ll challenge you to point out how such methods have failed. He taught his cat how to give high-fives. That says more about him than probably anything else in this bio does. Also, this is the only staff picture that is an actual depiction of the person…it is not a random internet glamour shot-that’s him. In real life.. Make of that what you will.

This picture made me (Laura) laugh for 5 minutes straight. Take my word for it, it’s funny as shit. Kristin works remotely in a completely different state, which is good because I can guarantee you that if she had to be in this building with all of us every day she’d either burn the building down with all of us inside or literally go insane and start peeling paint chips off the wall to eat in an effort to numb her brain cells into submission and acceptance of the lunacy we create day in and day out. And she has 5 kids. That should tell you more about the disaster zone that is the personnel department of GOS than anything else possibly could. When Kristin was a child she competed in the under-appreciated art of ski ballet but an unfortunate incident involving dental floss, Necco wafers and an understaffed Taco John’s resulted in a career-ending injury on the slopes and a deep-seated fear of Potato Oles. But, Kristin is nothing if not tenacious-she switched gears and still to this day holds the Midwesterncentral Nebraska Statecounty title for Underwater Basket Weaving. Just when she planned on riding the UBW glory through and coasting on that victory for the rest of her life, a free AOL trial CD-ROM was delivered to her door with a sample of Tide laundry detergent and her life was irrevocably changed for a third time. Which brings us to today. Kristin maintains our e-commerce platform and listings, which is a lot of words for saying she runs our web store. It’s no small task, lots of steps, lots of inventory to maintain, lots of computer screen time, but she’s an incredibly smart, hard-working person who also does like 72 other jobs to boot. This woman could rule the world if the world wasn’t in such poor condition that no one actually wants that job to begin with. She’s also Josh’s big sister. She’s amazing. And unstoppable. And brilliant. And so, so appreciated.

Vinnie is Italian.

Yeah, I get that it’s confusing to have two very tall and willowy young fellas named Brandon on staff, but we can figure out who’s who quite easily, so you shouldn’t have any problems either. Quit whining. *This* Brandon sued Oakley in 1985 for stealing the concept of Frogskins but as his only defense was, “Bruh, look at me. Obviously, those were my idea.” he was ultimately unsuccessful, was fined for contempt and still holds a red-hot grudge against the brand to this very day. So visceral is his hatred, he will fly into a jealous rage at the mere mention of Shaun White, and by consequence, will only wear black-market Pugz brand sunglasses which he buys in bulk from that guy in a cape everyone in town is okay with calling “Lady Winona, Wielder of the Chaos Emeralds.” Brandon volunteers his lap at the local cat shelter and is known for bringing his own special brush and grooming the cats for hours on end. He keeps the fur he brushes out in a brown leather bowling bag and takes it home to make one-of-a-kind felted wall art depicting the Golden Girls, the Blanche Devereaux character in particular.

Emily got super into painting rocks when Covid hit and when she was telling us about it we were all like, “Aw, that’s cute” because she’s so sweet and nice and we were envisioning her like in a smock painting goldfish or flowers or whatever to cheer folks up…but no. Emily is *not* that kind of rock painting girl. Emily is the girl who finds rocks and paints them to look like severed fingers and toes, and then she scatters them behind her Hansel-and-Gretel style while she’s hiking in the backcountry just to spice things up for the other hikers. So…you know…that’s pretty weird. Emily has been living in Norway for the past few years, but she’s real shady about why or what she was doing there, so we’re *pretty sure* that she was on a quest to find giants like Hagrid in Harry Potter, but whether for our salvation or our doom is a lingering question remaining unanswered. *cue intense thematic music here* Of course, she also could just be hiding from the mafia in the witness protection program, which honestly would make the whole severed fingers and toes thing make a lot more sense. She’s a big fan of planks and also has perfected the same-arm-same-leg method of running. All of this is lies, except the Norway part. An honest-to-goodness true thing is that last week Emily said she’s never laughed so much at a job before, which is like the single greatest work compliment of all time. Don’t forget to have fun everyday, folks. None of this shit really matters.

Jake joined the team in April after being legally removed from a Bass Pro Shops aquarium for “trying to unionize the trout.” Prior to working here, Jake spent several years living in a decommissioned Pizza Hut where he claims to have invented both flavored gravel and a functioning emotional-support trebuchet. His professional certifications include Advanced Screaming, Forklift Divination, and a black belt in what a handful witnesses could only describe as “parking lot wizardry.” When asked about his greatest strength, Jake simply released a handful of moths into the HR office and whispered, “adaptability.” Just kidding. We don’t even have an HR office. Outside of work, Jake enjoys competitive soup, eating Maverik sushi rolls which he calls “raccoon ankles” for reasons yet to be explained and training crows to steal loose batteries from unsuspecting tourists. He once survived for three weeks on nothing but gas station mozzarella sticks and Fun Dip (he even ate the weird chalky dipstick thing, which is gross). The rest of the staff describe him as “surprisingly fast,” “legally difficult to classify,” and “the reason we now have a laminated safety policy regarding salamanders.” Jake is committed to excellence, innovation, and he’s absolutely, positively, one hundred percent for sure not responsible for whatever exactly happened in the back room last Saturday that left that big stain on the floor. His interview lasted 7 seconds because as soon as Laura saw the Batman tee she told him he was hired.

Alex came to Pinedale after allegedly being asked to leave a government archive for becoming too powerful. Armed with seventeen label makers, a color-coded planner system visible from space, and what can only be described as a threatening amount of zip ties, she quickly established herself as the shop’s undisputed High Priestess of All Things Organization. Rumor has it Alex can sense when an item is out of place from over three counties away. Several employees claim she once stopped mid-conversation, slowly turned her head 180 degrees like a hunting owl or that possessed chic from the Exorcist, and whispered, “Someone put the medium shirts in the large section,” before vanishing into the back room at a dead sprint. She returned twenty minutes later covered in dust, pupils fully dilated, holding a single rogue Titcomb Basin tee and breathing heavily like she’d just completed a hostage extraction. She asks customers if they need a bag or if they’re gonna use “nature’s handles” while giving them jazz hands, and she’s so charming that remarkably, people don’t even hate it. Outside of work, Alex enjoys alphabetizing her spice cabinet for emotional stability, painting her dogs’ toenails while listening to true crime podcasts with the intensity of an FBI profiler, and making deeply concerning jokes about retired people in an unnervingly calm tone. Coworkers describe her as the human embodiment of a clipboard, and Laura has said that Alex is the only person on the planet who could survive a zombie apocalypse entirely through passive aggression and proper labeling. Whenever a customer pulls out a freshly folded shirt and doesn’t put it back properly Alex ominously mutters the phrase, “Well, this is how documentaries start.”

Matt first arrived at the store during what witnesses described as “an electrical event.” The lights flickered, every Bluetooth speaker in the building simultaneously began playing whale sounds at double speed, and a bag of Mountain House Beef Stroganoff somehow spontaneously caught fire on the shelf. Out of the smoke emerged Matt: wearing mirrored sunglasses indoors, carrying a half-eaten rotisserie chicken under one arm and a live philodendron tucked into the hood of his sweatshirt “for emotional support.” Nobody knows where he came from. Some say he wandered out of the desert after surviving exclusively on expired Funyuns and moonlight. Others believe he was manifested accidentally when a Brandon (not that one, the other one) scanned the same Clif bar seven times in a row. Matt himself refuses to clarify, once stating only, “Time is a cube, brother,” before skateboarding directly into the back room wall without slowing down. Since joining the team, Matt has become less of an employee and more of a recurring phenomenon. Customers report strange side effects after interacting with him, including temporary enlightenment, smelling colors, and an overwhelming urge to purchase decorative throw pillows for cat rescue houses. He communicates primarily through cryptic one-liners, prolonged eye contact, and occasionally by slapping the top of nearby objects and whispering, “This baby can hold so many dimensions.” Alex describes him as “a sentient gas station hallucination,” Jake says he’s “the physical embodiment of a 3 a.m. Taco Bell run,” and Laura posits he is “either the most banjo-loving man alive or an interdimensional prophet. He cannot be both.” Josh once asked Matt to complete a routine online training, but he somehow uploaded a 47-minute video of a raccoon eating spaghetti under a strobe light instead. We have stopped asking questions. The raccoon, unfortunately, was promoted.

Gerald “The Noodle Goblin” McScraps has officially been promoted to VP of Catastrophes, and as a result feral morale is at an all-time high. His core philosophy remains simple: “Life is temporary. Parmesan is forever.”

Eric came to Pinedale after accidentally walking here from Oregon because he missed a turn on a hiking trail in 2019. Eric communicates primarily through meaningful nods, weather predictions that are somehow always correct, and occasionally emerging from the back room to say something deeply profound like, “Squirrels know more than they let on,” before chuckling knowingly and walking away without waiting for a response. Nobody knows exactly where he lives. There are rumors of a hammock hidden somewhere near the garden center at Ridley’s, though Eric neither confirms nor denies this. He carries enough survival gear in his backpack to survive either a mild inconvenience or the collapse of modern civilization. Outside of work, Eric spends most of his time wandering enormous distances for reasons no one fully understands. Emily once asked what he does on these hikes and he reportedly stared out the window for a full minute before quietly replying, “Mostly rocks.” One conversation with Eric and you’ll know that he’s basically a retired forest wizard and a man who has definitely fought a bear emotionally. Despite his quiet nature, Eric remains one of the most efficient employees in the building, possibly because years of surviving off beef jerky and untreated creek water have eliminated all nonessential thoughts from his brain. Last time we saw Eric it was right after he vanished into the foothills for eleven days and returned with nothing but a really cool stick.