G's somewhat blah life

red wine and chocolate cake

2012-01-27T19:32:00.001-07:00

I have cycles of will power. This week has been a down cycle. The last three days have been drenched in chocolate. Chocolate cake for dessert Wednesday, thin mint girl scout cookies yesterday and today, and left over cake just now. I’m squinting through the sugary cake buzz to write this. The red wine helps.

In addition to these cookies and cakes, the candy dishes around the office are killing me. One woman has a four inch thick dish full of peanut butter M&Ms. She refills it to the brim every few days. My travel patterns through the office have been adjusted to swing by that dish several times a day. I have to go farther than I would normally walk to get to and from my desk and I justify the candy intake telling myself that I’m burning more calories.

The interwebs tells me that “will power” is both self discipline and an Australian racecar driver. The former is “the ability to overcome laziness and procrastination.” If I don’t develop this ability soon I’m going to look like this:

Masonic G

2012-01-15T19:52:00.000-07:00

While in a small Colorado town I passed a Masonic center that had this symbol over the door:

Having a “G” name, I often notice when there is a “G” sign. The person I was with asked what the G stood for and I assumed “God” but wasn’t 100% sure. So I Googled it!

I learned that it could mean God or it could mean Geometry or it could mean the “generative principle”…this is the definition I found:

The Blue Lodge Mason is taught that the "G" in the Masonic symbol represents God. Later on, he is told that it also represents "deity." Later still, he is told that it represents "geometry." In reality, this letter represents the "generative principle," the Sun-god and, thus, the worshipped phallus, the male "generative principle…" In its position (along with the Square and Compass) on the east wall over the chair (throne) of the Worshipful Master, it is the representation of the Sun, thus of the Sun-god, Osiris. Its earthly meaning, then, is of the sacred phallus; its cosmic meaning is of the Sun, worshipped since antiquity by pagans while facing the East.

The phallus eh? Who knew?

Brush your tongue?

2012-01-13T17:34:00.000-07:00

Lately I’ve been asked a number of random questions for which I have no answers. Similarly, I’ve started challenging myself on things that I think I know about. These are questions largely about the world around us and how things work. I’m realizing how little I know about a lot of these things.

This is the first in a series about researching the answers to these pressing questions.

Why Brush your tongue?

Usually I brush my tongue with my toothbrush at the end of a toothbrushing. I was about to recommend this to someone when I realized that I didn’t know if there actually are any benefits to this. Research has shown there are some benefits.

Basically, brushing your tongue can reduce bad breath. This is particularly true if you brush the back of the tongue as opposed to the front. It seems the front has more saliva and more of a “self cleaning” function, while the back doesn’t.

There is a danger of activating the gag reflex with cleaning the back part of the tongue. So a “tongue scraper” is recommended. What is a tongue scraper you ask? Good question. Here is what it looks like:

If you want to know how it works, google it. The photos aren’t going on this blog.

So if you are concerned with bad breath, try brushing (or scraping) your tongue.

Until next time…

Views of Valleys…

2012-01-11T18:57:00.001-07:00

It’s January in Colorado and I’m at an elevation of over 8,000' feet. It’s nighttime and dark but for the light of the stars. The moon has yet to rise. I exercised my clothing optional option and quickly dipped into a hot spring pond to cover myself in warm water. The “waterfall pond” is smallish and as I move further in, I’m startled to realize there’s a man in the water sitting at a distance but under the waterfall. I’m surprised because I made something of a racket arriving at the pond and I thought he would have announced himself. This was my first night at Valley View Hot Springs.

In addition to the option to go clothing-less, the setting was also very natural. There are several ponds and all are actual ponds complete with rocks and algae. The thin film of detritus stirs as you settle in to the mostly subtle rocks and pebbles of the pond bottom. It is fantastic!

The views are truly wonderful. It was possible to watch the sunset from the “soaking pond”:

And from one of the top ponds, you can gaze over the valley and the Sangre de Cristo mountains as you lay flat propped on your elbows with just your head sticking out of the water. Here is one of the top ponds:

A nighttime dip is a must – especially in the top pond, which is also the warmest natural pond. There are no lights. The night sky view stretches from the western horizon to just overhead and is so bright and clear. It’s magical to sit in the warm spring with the twinkling stars above and bubbles all around you from the water seeping up from the ground.

From the main Valley View lodging area there is a hiking trail to the bat cave or the Orient Mine town site. The hike to the bat cave has sweeping views of the valley and a cool cave system, which you can partially see but is separated from you by a chasm (and a fence). It’s worth the hike up.

On the hike up there was an interesting sight – the carcass of a deer. There were a few bits around the trail but this was the biggest part. It must have been recently taken down. Not exactly sure why it’s so fascinating to see stuff like this but I really can’t help looking. Not something you see everyday…

Speaking of dead things, the Orient Mine is sealed but there is this eerie sign nearby that reminds you that six people died in the mine and that their ghosts are in the tunnel.

After two nights and two days at the hot springs (and two stops at Amica’s in Salida!), I’ve returned home feeling relaxed and lucky to live in Colorado and be able to see stuff like this.

A pig in a santa hat

2011-12-23T17:48:00.001-07:00

I’ve noticed it’s December 23rd and thought I might do a holiday blog post. Luckily I’ve been taking holiday-oriented photos throughout the month!

While in Walgreens earlier in December I noticed their aisles of holiday stuff and the pig in the santa hat caught my eye:

Of course I promptly bought them for a friend and shipped them off.

Just outside of walgreens (or maybe a block up) I was offered the opportunity to purchase a wee reindeer made of little stumps. I didn’t.

Speaking of reindeer, the building I work in downtown had a “tenant holiday party” this year. Tables of cupcakes and a live a cappella group belting out seasonal songs filled the lobby. The tables were decorated with something everyone needs – gold glittering reindeer:

Holiday decorations are everywhere – even between the pure sugar and sweet and low packets at Einstein bagels, which is where I picked up this guy:

There was also the annual holiday potluck at work. Being a particular kind of eater, I refrained from taking part as I usually don’t like much of the fare. However, I did get some leftover cookies. These are the worst kind of cookies. King Sooper-made, whiter-than-white dough with bright green frosting and toxic sprinkles. I ate something like three or four cookies…

The work potluck did have a theme! Tacky. Seriously. Even coming in late I did get to have my picture taken with a cardboard cut out of a couple wearing silly holiday sweaters and loving their pet. Thankfully my friend Pat helped me out:

It wouldn’t be the holidays without ridiculous holiday cards, right? I wished my family and friends a “meowy” holiday with this festive snowball of a cat:

Meowy Holidays!

11

2011-12-19T21:59:00.001-07:00

It will pass

2011-12-17T20:44:00.001-07:00

So I’m making this manchego-jalapeno beer bread the other night. While cutting the jalapeno I absentmindedly licked my finger. Instantly there was a soft burning sensation throughout my mouth and nose and sinuses. The soft burning became more intense with every inhalation. My face was on fire. My tear ducts and mucus membranes leapt into action and I sat around the house with water pouring from my eyes and snot oozing out of my nose for about 90 minutes. It was torturous.

I kept telling myself something throughout the experience: this will pass. I had this happen in the past with my hand and knew that the pain would subside. While blowing my nose and trying to just sit with the throbbing face and deal with it, it occurred to me that “this will pass” is something I should keep in mind more often. How could I so rationally accept this while my face was on fire but I can’t get to that point when I’m feeling angry or sad or whatever?

Waiting room magazine

2011-12-02T17:23:00.001-07:00

I think I’ve mentioned that I get allergy shots pretty regularly. If you recall, I have to sit in the allergist’s waiting room for 30 minutes after each shot – to make sure I don’t have a reaction. I usually peruse email or the interwebs via my phone but sometimes I’ll look at the magazines. The magazine selection is scant.
I want to share with you some of the disturbing ads I found.
Ad #1: Sally Hansen Airbrush legs ®
This stuff is available over the counter!? there are women who use this product regularly? This just seems like a product that exists to waste resources. I guess I just don’t get the point…I mean it tells me that “Silky smooth, gorgeous legs are just a spray away!” but I have a hard time believing that this product wouldn’t look fake.

Ad #2: DiGiorno Pizza & Cookies

You know how much fat and calories are in a DiGiorno pizza?? Pairing it with buttery chocolate chip cookies is like inviting Americans to have a heart attack.

Ad #3: A Pill for Cellulite

Ironically, shortly after the DiGiorno pizza & cookies ad was an ad for a pill that would help relieve cellulite! How about no DiGiorno pizza & cookies? Advertising is evil.

This all makes me long to read an Adbusters magazine. They shine a strong light on our consumer culture:

Not that I don’t consume…

Where is 154W?

2011-11-30T20:48:00.001-07:00

Things are not always where you expect them to be.

Tonight I lost my locker at the gym.

After yoga I returned to the locker room and went to the area where I thought my locker was – locker #8 as I recalled. However, my key tag read “154W” and I assumed I’d picked up someone else’s key from the yoga studio floor. I thought “I know, I’ll just go over to 154W and wait for that person to show up with my key.”

I walked around the locker room twice and found no locker marked “154W.” I returned to the yoga studio imagining a woman standing there looking down in a befuddled state at a key reading “8W” – I found no such thing.

I went to the front desk and had a woman who worked at the gym go and look for 154W. She couldn’t find it…She fetched the master key and went to locker 8 and opened it. That wasn’t my locker. Right next to #8, sandwiched between 8 and 14 actually, was locker 154W!

This defies all sense of the order of things. Kind of like this “dog.”

This experience got me thinking about looking for things; we can look for something using rational thought and even a solid process in some instances and not find it. It seems plausible that some things can be found only once we abandon those rational thoughts and processes.

What I’m applying this to is dating. I went full throttle into the online dating world. I was on three sites and had a lot of single dates (you go on only one date and realize that person isn’t your cup of tea). It made me learn a lot about myself, other people and dating in general. It was like a crash course in dating. I had a process, a spreadsheet, and a sense of adventure. There was some good luck; I found a few good guys.

It was while I wasn’t looking that I came across someone organically (i.e. not through a website). It defied my sense of order but it’s been amazing. I would have never looked between locker number 8 and 14 to find number 154…

Phoenix, Arizona

2011-11-16T21:17:00.001-07:00

Phoenix for me was a melancholy room at the historic Hotel San Carlos where I camped out with a cold. Well, that is what was going on with me when I wasn’t at the WTS Chapter Leadership training, which was being held in a different hotel about a half mile away. That’s right, I got to commute via foot through the desolate, dusty streets of “downtown” Phoenix for two mornings.

The first night in town I wandered fruitlessy through those empty streets in search of dinner and perhaps a beer. While I didn’t really find anywhere good to eat I did see some Phoenix sights. This is supposed to be an artistic interpretation of a desert flower on the ASU campus:

I also got to see the famous “Westward Ho” building. An old hotel-turned senior housing or something.

This little guy was a treat to come across – seriously. How often do you get to see a gecko on the sidewalk??

Of course, I took the light rail a bit. This is Phoenix’s relatively new light rail line:

On my last afternoon there I walked about a mile and a half from “downtown” and visited the Phoenix Art Museum. This was my first solo visit to an art museum (or museum of any kind). It’s different when it’s just you; it’s just your own thoughts and contemplation. I was ok with that. Here are some photos from my art museum experience.

There was a place on one floor with tall windows and big, black, leather chairs. I sat for some time in those chairs observing the sunny Phoenix afternoon through the glass.

I think this was saved from an old hotel sign (the hotel was destroyed in some tragic catastrophe of some kind).

This is just a frog I really liked.

Parting shot:

That was Phoenix for me.

slasher victim

2011-11-13T19:42:00.001-07:00

I find it excessively difficult to come up with a Halloween costume. Every year I want to do something clever, but that idea never seems to come to me. It has only been in the past few years that I’ve dressed up. So it’s a new topic to think about for me.

This year I was saved by Emily. Well, she saved me a few times this year, but also for halloween. She had the idea to be an 80’s slasher victim and we did it together. Brilliant idea – just the purchase of a good will prom dress and application of fake wounds and blood and you’re there!

Here’s us in costume being dead:

This is my self portrait with tiara:

See how good the wounds looked!

Now I should get thinking for next year…I could be a gorilla again.

MMMM

2011-11-12T16:20:00.001-07:00

Last night I went to see Martha Marcy May Marlene at the Esquire theater, a place I haven’t been in some time. It’s a disturbing story of a young woman (played by Olsen twins sister – Elizabeth Olsen) both during and after living with a cult. The cult included elements of sex/sharing each other, initiation and cleansing, gender roles, and manipulation. The cult is, of course, led by a man - the scrawny but commanding Patrick (John Hawkes of Winter’s Bone).

I can’t stop thinking about it.

The many women of the cult seem more like a harem for the group of men that live there. The men are clearly more important in this micro-society. The women make the men food, wait for the men to finish, clean up, and then eat dinner themselves. They seem to serve the needs of the men let’s say. Patrick, the quiet bull of the herd, has his needs met most of all.

The heroine – let’s use the Martha name – does get out of the cult and lands in the somewhat safe home of her sister and brother-in-law. Even though the world of her sister is starkly contrasted with the cult, there is a blurred line between memory, reality, dream, and paranoia. The movie jumps around in time and you don’t always know where you are or what’s really happening and neither does Martha. It was a little painful watching Martha struggle to decide which world is better, that of the structured and sexual cult or the clean, expansive, uncertainty of the real world of her sister’s home.

Watch it but make sure you are expecting to be unsettled.

whiskey and smoked gouda

2011-10-24T20:34:00.001-06:00

I relaxed with some of both last night.

Yesterday morning I ran the farthest I’ve ever run in my life – 10 kilometers (6.21 miles)! I ran The Stride 10k (benefit for Littleton public schools) with Lisa and she was an amazing running partner. We ran the entire length and didn’t stop. Now, I know to some this is no big deal but I typically run only about 3 miles at a time and have been doing that for 10 years off and on. Also, I only ran about 5 times in the past month. So I had serious doubts about my ability to run the full 10k without stopping.

But we did it! I’m so proud of us – here we are just after completing the run:

There were some hills on the damned thing too. See the profile below. Sure there’s some vertical exaggeration but still! I had no idea Littleton had so much elevation gain and loss…I know it’s no trail run.

10

2011-10-16T22:11:00.001-06:00

This bit of Exploding Dog art expresses so much about my life right now.

To do

2011-10-05T21:29:00.001-06:00

hardwood floor research
clean computer
repair sandals
mail Audrey’s t-shirt
orthopedist appointment
vacuum car
get camera cleaned
fix prairie dog photo frame
dust
find new sunglasses
buy camping water filter
Learn how to clean bike chain

This list is weighing on me*. What’s not on the list are the “regular” things like laundry, grocery shopping, give the cat her treats, and so on. I suppose I’m lucky that the list doesn’t have things like “don’t be late for chemo therapy” or “buy enema.” Nevertheless, making it to the frame shop, the shoe repair place and schlepping myself around town to glasses/sunglasses places (prescription sunglasses needed) is not exactly high on my list of things to do when I have a spare moment. I’m not going to list what I do in those spare moments because, well frankly, who cares? I’m not solving world peace so whatever.

* I realize that this is a massive first world problem…

SD-CB-Salida

2011-09-20T17:18:00.000-06:00

In August I took a road trip around Colorado and I went through the Great Sand Dunes, Crested Butte, and Salida. Colorado has so much beauty. I’m just going to throw in some photos here as opposed to much narrative. The trip was amazing – enough said.

Sand Dunes

Inspirational card kind of sky on the way to the Dunes:

Almost there!

The view from the campsite:

A few shots from a short hike that went around the dunes and allowed for some good photo opportunities:

The forest surrounding the Sand Dunes had experienced some fires in years past, thus the problem of hazardous falling trees:

Crested Butte

Crested Butte is a never ending photo opportunity.

Views from a hike:

This has got to be the most amazing rainbow I have EVER seen:

Views from town (Crested Butte):

Finally, sunset in Salida:

Microblogging

2011-09-19T22:01:00.001-06:00

Is Twitter dying? An article at tipping point labs indicates that it is and that Tumblr is well-positioned to be next. I’m not sure about the demise of Twitter, but I am Tumblr-curious.

Tumblr is another microblogging platform and is an interesting hybrid between a full blown blog and a spot where you can spew a few sentences (Twitter). What is “microblogging” you ask? Well, according to Wikipedia it’s:

a broadcast medium in the form of blogging. A microblog differs from a traditional blog in that its content is typically smaller in both actual and aggregate file size. Microblogs "allow users to exchange small elements of content such as short sentences, individual images, or video links.”

It feels more appropriate to post an interesting Oatmeal link and a sentence rather than a full-blown blog post on Tumblr. Here are a few examples of Tumblr pages:

The list goes on but these give you a sense of the brevity of a tumblr. I never got into Twitter and I already have a blog, but that didn’t stop me from starting something on Tumblr! I now have an additional spot from which to yell into the void.

And now for something completely different – I re-watched Rushmore recently and it has rekindled my love of Wes Anderson films. I was reminded of the Jason Schwartzman-Natalie Portman couple in the Hotel Chevalier short and thought I’d share a moment from that:

Blogger app

2011-09-19T00:16:00.001-06:00

There is an app for Blogger! I am testing it out...so this might not be a very worthwhile post. Basically, I can create blog posts from my iPhone.

I've tried to Insert some photos but I'm not sure how they will show up.

There's an app for this!

Almonds and string cheese

2011-09-12T23:45:00.001-06:00

It’s Monday night. Post-work in a rare spurt of energy, I’ve gone to yoga, done my laundry, hit the grocery store and made a beer-cheese bread (with manchego and jalapenos). As the title of the post suggests, dinner was almonds and string cheese (with some Zinfandel). I did have some hummus and pita earlier, so the dinner was my dynamic than you think!

Sometime between laundry runs and bread-making, I caught the cat (Yota) staring longingly at her catnip worm (see below). I was overwhelmed because the sight of her summed up how I feel lately: longing. A longing for…many things (not catnip or worms). Longing creates a void that is not easily filled.

I’ve recently come across these two quotes about longing that stuck:

If some longing goes unmet, don't be astonished. We call that Life. (Anna Freud)
People of this world are deluded. They're always longing for something - always, in a word, seeking. (Bodhidharma)

I can buy this, that I am seeking, deluded, and just experiencing life. Don’t we all long for something? For some it’s birthday cake or a new computer or a car stereo, for others it’s a child. Big and small, the sense of longing pervades life. Doesn’t it?

I long to know the wisdom of the Druid hamster…

Canadian street stuff

2011-09-11T00:08:00.001-06:00

I’m sitting in the Austin airport as I type this. In my travels around Austin I got a total of three photos of stickers or street art. Toronto on the other hand was rife with these street art things!

Not sure what this means but it was everywhere. I didn’t love it but thought I must include it because it was so pervasive.

This little heart was also pretty common (not quite as common as the black and white bird though). Here it’s in cardboard but it was also a sticker in some spots and just painted on in others.

I love the robot below but I was equally intrigued by the OperationMaple.com sticker (Take Canada Back!)…

College St was where the real action was though. I found this:

and my favorite – the two rabbits:

There were other little ones here and there:

I was pleased with the quantity and quality of finds in Toronto.

Toronto – various

2011-09-08T17:55:00.001-06:00

As opposed to taking photos of buildings or neighborhoods or historical things, I end up taking photos of random signs, public art and so on.

For example, these two larger than life monsters below were in the Distillery Historic District:

I found this “no trespassing” sign amusing because it looks like you aren’t supposed to lightly dance. I don’t think it’s very intuitive…

These turtle signs requesting motorists to drive slowly were all over. At first I thought it was just the work of one specific neighborhood, but they were everywhere.

This sign was slightly perplexing – was the kid looking for water or playing with a sling shot before he was zapped for touching something?

So, I did take a photo of one building. I walked through a neighborhood to get to an Indian area of Toronto. This neighborhood had lots of row houses and duplexes. The duplex below stood out because the two owners clearly did not agree on the design!

When walking on Spadina Ave, I passed a store that had this human model in the window (see below). Either the owner is really prudish or there is something really surprising beneath that square of paper towel!

I do have some evidence that I was there – even though there are no Toronto-specific things in the background…here’s me!

The public library had some interesting elements on the building – this owl was my favorite:

On my way to breakfast one morning I passed Wendy’s, which had this little mural on its external wall. I liked it not only because I know a Wendy (and she’s amazing), but also because it’s cool – it has such a laid back feeling.

Finally, this is what I saw on my way home somewhere over the midwest:

Stay tuned for the final installment – Toronto street art!

Toronto Tourist

2011-09-07T17:28:00.001-06:00

In Toronto I walked around fairly aimlessly. I picked a restaurant or a neighborhood and just set out. I didn’t do any of the touristy stuff like go up in the CN Tower or take the ferry to the islands. I just walked and ate basically.

On the way to the Distillery historic district I popped into the St. Lawrence Market – it was Sunday and it was the “Sunday antique market.” In perusing the items (see the three photos below), I didn’t find much that appealed to me but it was fun to look at everything.

This is the first time I saw a carving made out of deer antlers – I didn’t buy it.

One of my favorite parts of Toronto was the transit! They have streetcar and subway!

The streetcar was fun, extensive, and fascinating. As you can see from the photo below, there are shelters/stops but because the streetcar runs in the center of the street customers have to mosey out into the travel lane to get on it. I don’t know that such a “hazardous” boarding method would be allowed in the US.

Here’s what it looked like inside the streetcar:

Extensive! Below is a mix of subway and streetcar but, of the 15 lines shown below 11 are streetcar! It went almost everywhere I wanted to go.

Here’s a photo of the streetcar in traffic. You can also see that they have lots of the Vancouver-like glass house development in the background along the lake.

I did take the subway too and enjoyed their version of the “mind the gap” sign:

Toronto also has bike share! They have the Bixi system but it’s very similar to the Bcycle in Denver. I didn’t get a chance to ride it but was happy to see it there and saw quite a few people riding it.

Speaking of bikes, there were these bikes all over town that were locked to signs and completely painted (various colors). It turns out there is a story. Two artists did this to some abandoned bikes but were initially ticketed! The Mayor pardoned them and commissioned art in this form around the city.

Another thing I saw were these plants with imploring messages stationed on top of bike racks near Union Station.

To continue the non-motorized transit nerdiness, the pedestrian signal was a more laid back figure than we have in the states:

Oh, the Canadians…stay tuned for more on Toronto!

Brie and Beer

2011-09-02T19:41:00.001-06:00

It’s Friday night and I’m slicing wedges of brie, eating bits of them with strawberries and washing it down with a Great Divide Rumble. The night also includes laundry and who knows what other domestic endeavors.

I haven’t posted in a while. I’ve been wondering if I’ve fallen into a narcissistic pattern with this blogging and woe-is-me life. I find that narcissism is a little difficult to avoid as an only child. So, I’ve been thinking of discontinuing the blog. It is time consuming anyway…

What’s the point of blogging?

I’ve described it as yelling into the void since I know that even most of the people I know don’t read it. I’ve also described it as an opportunity to write and coalesce my thoughts into something other than a disjointed conversation I might have. Maybe it’s just satisfying for me and that satisfaction is on the wane.

I realize that blogs have purpose and if the blog is focused on a specific topic then there is a point. For example, Cake Wrecks exists to inform all who care to know about the various cake fuck ups in the world (to be fair they also showcase good work). The Overhead Wire exists to discuss transit-related news (a hot topic for so many!). The Malia and Sasha Fan Club blog exists to keep us all up to date on the going on of the President’s children. There is the Cliff Mass Weather Blog, which, of course, focuses on weather in a specific area. And there are plenty of other self-focused blogs.

Clearly I have not come to any conclusion as I’m actively blogging now.

BTW here’s something I photographed during my recent Toronto trip:

Bye.

Cherries and white wine

2011-08-04T20:15:00.000-06:00

In contrast to my last post, this post will feature items I’ve mined from the internet while enjoying cherries and white wine (post cheese, of course).

I’ve unwittingly devoted my evening to viewing random blogs and websites.

PetaPixel

This website is really for photographers and covers topics of particular concern to them. However, as you might imagine, there are some interesting photos on the site. Like the dogs shaking their heads:

The site also had humans shaking their heads but this was less interesting:

Speaking of dogs, I found a website for Martin Usborne that has a section entitled “MUTE: the silence of dogs in cars” and is worth checking out – if you are a dog lover that is. I have to warn you though, the photos are more melancholy than they are cute. Here are a couple to get you going:

This website had a page on tree planter graffiti, which was highly appealing to me (the project website is here):

I also came across “extreme sheep LED art”:

Not sure if you are familiar with decorator crabs but the video below gives you an idea of how they work. They will take whatever is around, tear it up and use their saliva to adhere it to their bodies. Fascinating creatures.

Ok, that’s enough for now. Over and out.

letting go

2011-08-03T18:24:00.001-06:00

I’ve recently begun to start letting things go. My fear of ground meat, my assumptions about life, my motivation to seriously get things done, my marriage. The photo above came from a blog that I recently ran across. It seems to be titled “a place to mend the hearts of everyone who feels alone.” It’s full of both profoundly sad and significantly inspirational photos and art (with a few ridiculous and irrelevant photos). The quote in the photo above is the most succinct thing that I have found that describes this phase in my life.

Mostly the change has been good. Discovered a lot about myself and those around me. My friends and co-workers are even better people than I thought. Anyway, all of this change and letting go leads to contemplative times – like this. Just sharing.

July Wrap-up

2011-08-02T17:14:00.000-06:00

July was packed with activity - July 4th weekend activities, happy hours, bike events, hiking, etc. However, I did not cover everything in previous posts and now that it’s August, it’s about time.

Notably missing is the Moonlight Classic and my participation with team Hell on Wheelz . The Moonlight Classic is a benefit bike ride that starts at 10:30 pm, has you ride 10 miles around Denver, and ends with a big party at the state capitol afterwards. The Hell on Wheelz team was well-organized and pubcrawling-centric. Good fun but it was late for me with the pre-party at El Diablo, the late start for the ride and leaving our second pub at 11:30 with 8 miles and two more pubs to go. I left early but had a fun time riding with the team of devils with blinking red horns.

This is a photo Jessica took while we were waiting to start riding:

This is Jessica at El Diablo, that devilish girl:

I hiked to Lake Isabelle near Nederland – this is the lake:

I hiked in Chacos (sandals) and was surprised to encounter so much snow!

I also did some hiking in Boulder with my friend and colleague Pat. Where we parked was spied on by a little white dog that stuck its head through a hole in the fence.

We hiked to Royal Arch, which is this:

It was a steep climb to the point that the trail had stairs (made of natural stone not concrete stairs). This is Patrick at the top.

This is one of many chipmunks that was not afraid of people:

In my walking life I tend to take alleys for some reason and I was treated to the sight of a raccoon mom and two of her babies this month. This is the mom:

These are the babies:

Other July activities are covered in previous posts but I wanted to share these too. This is G from the Blah Life reporting – over and out.

Denver County Fair!

2011-07-31T14:56:00.001-06:00

This weekend the National Western Complex here in Denver was full of roosters, belly dancers, tarot card readers, pie eating contests, art, and a wide cross-section of Denver (and Colorado) residents. We were all there to attend the Denver County fair, which Colorado Public Radio says is:

The first in Colorado’s largest city since the 1890s. Its founders say they’ll open up a can of yeehaw but with a twist. They want to bring a modern, urban flavor to what’s traditionally a celebration of all things rural.

After bike riding 3 miles and partially through an industrial area, I was displeased to find that there was no bike parking. There were a good number of bicycles locked to a gate and some signs near the entrance. But this is one of my only complaints.

While there were plenty of photo opportunities, I gravitated towards the art. There was an arts pavilion and an artists’ competition. These are some of the pieces I liked.

Yes! RTD Denver!!

This was a functioning bobble head chicken.

I was taken by the creativity of one artist who took old figurines and needle felted them together or needle felted hats or face masks on them.

While this isn’t really my cup of tea, I couldn’t resist taking a photo of this one – so county fair-esque.

This wouldn’t be a fair without animals! The animal pavilion had a large variety of chicken breeds, llamas, alpacas, sheep, goats, and guinea pigs!

I stayed to watch the Devo show but I have to say that the National Western Complex stadium has got to be one of the worst locations (sound-wise) for a concert. They put on a good show that bordered on performance art with multiple costume changes and masks and things, but were handicapped by the sound issue.

I had a good time at the fair and look forward to seeing what they put together this year.

Cherries and Cheddar Chex Mix

2011-07-26T17:09:00.001-06:00

This past weekend I hiked the Fancy Pass/Missouri Lakes Loop for the third time. It never disappoints. As one of my hiking partners, Erika, put it, “ it’s stunning but it’s not a cake walk!” Going over two passes and hiking about 8 miles in a day took us roughly 6 hours. It was so worth it though.

We started at the Fancy Pass trail head and did the loop counter clockwise. The hike starts at around 10,000 feet and has a rolling ascent through a beautiful, green forest with patches of wildflowers all around. Just before tree line we came to this beautiful little lake:

The beauty really is hard to capture but just take my word for it – beautiful!

Since we’ve had crazy amounts of snow late in the season this year here in Colorado, there were a few snowfields to pass on the way to Fancy Pass. This is one of them we had to traverse (Trisha in foreground).

After the traverse you take a left and go straight up to the pass – a somewhat slipper and frustrating effort. This is Trisha and Erika on the way up:

At the top I turned around and this is the view looking back on what we’d just ascended:

After coming over Fancy Pass you are treated to an ample patch of alpine tundra before going up and over Missouri Pass. This is the view from the top of Fancy Pass looking down on the patch of alpine tundra:

The tundra was full of treats. Here’s a pika:

This is a view from the tundra – on the trail with Trisha and Erika:

Some wildflowers!

There was this old, rusted metal thing on the tundra, we couldn’t figure out quite what it was. At any rate, here’s Trisha with the thing:

We also saw plenty of marmots – here’s one that posed for us:

There were some interesting rocks also – I liked the light green lichen on the white (quartz?) rock:

We made it up Missouri Pass and were treated to yet another spectacular view on the other side. Here’s Trisha on the snow field at the top of Missouri Pass:

Just another shot of the hike down through the Missouri Lakes area:

On this side of the loop you follow the creek more and it turns into an amazing little canyon near the bottom.

We retired to Minturn after for a refreshing glass of white wine and then a coffee for the drive home. A truly lovely day with some great hiking partners. Oh – I didn’t have time to shop properly for the trip so ended up with some left over cherries and cheddar chex mix from walgreens…

9

2011-07-21T16:43:00.001-06:00

Outside

2011-07-11T17:35:00.000-06:00

More skies…but these are not from Denver! All photos were taken with the iPhone by the way.

These first couple of photos are from Boulder a few weeks ago. A storm moved across the County but never touched me. I did get the fruit of it though:

A faint rainbow:

One of the good things about Boulder is that there are trails literally within walking distance of an excellent restaurant on the Pearl Street Mall. Here’s a shot from one of those trails:

I also got outside with my friend Lisa recently. We went to the Mt. Evans Wilderness area and hiked the Hells Hole Trail, which, interestingly, doesn’t take you to Hells Hole…It did take us to a small lake above (or at) tree line. The Mt. Evans Wilderness was beautiful – lush green and with a good amount of wildflowers. Here are some photos from the excursion:

Here’s Lisa trying to get a close up of some of the wildflowers:

Once again, I feel lucky to live in Colorado.

Western

2011-07-10T12:31:00.000-06:00

This is the final post/final artist in the series of artists that I picked out from the 2011 Cherry Creek Arts Festival.

This artist – Gabe Leonard – has a wild west theme as well as a pirate theme and so on. The western art appealed to me the most. The pieces have a kind of kick ass attitude but they are also slightly funny. These were my two favorites from his website (I especially like the woman!):

That is all.

Trains and Openness

2011-07-09T11:51:00.000-06:00

In my last post I featured two artists that I dug from the Cherry Creek Arts Festival. Well, you’re in luck! I have two more to share.

Kendra Baird is an artist after my own heart – she has a streetcar painting! I love everything about this – the detail, the warm color, the transit…

In this one there is also a train (obviously) but what I like here is the quiet emptiness that I feel when I look at it.

There are also trees!

And an owl in comforting shades of green:

There was also a photographer that caught my eye – Mark MacKinnon. The openness and simplicity of these two drew me in.

And yet still more to come – stay tuned!

Robots and Sky

2011-07-08T11:46:00.001-06:00

I attended the Cherry Creek Arts Festival this weekend and was exposed to some new artists!

One is Mr. Hooper. Mr. Hooper has much more in his repertoire than just robots, but the robots are the ones I liked the most. Here are two examples:

I also liked Michael Bryant. He does less silly but more contemplative art:

More to come!

Independence Day

2011-07-06T14:15:00.000-06:00

This year Independence Day has another meaning for me. Since the end of my marriage earlier this year, I have had a growing sense of independence as I do things more on my own. It lends itself to a large amount of self-discovery – some of which is a little frightening. I am also learning to ask for help – harder than it sounds. Similarly, I am having to seek out activities with others, which I hadn’t had to really do while in a long-term, committed relationship. So, I invited Altan to spend the weekend with me. We did mellow stuff around town – starting with the Mile High Flea Market!

The Mile High Flea Market is a huge place populated by all kinds of vendors. It has everything from used baby dolls to tires to antiques to turkey legs and mangos to jeans. Here is Altan offering a welcome to the merchandise fiesta.

These photos offer a sample of some items for sale.

Antique dog figurine:

Chinese character statue (also in the antique store):

Random stuff and sad-looking panda in a random stuff stall:

Used tools:

Striking shirts:

Butt-hugging jeans. This particular methods of jeans display was pretty pervasive and it fascinated me.

Altan made a friend:

Some evidence I was there:

Later, after lunch, we journeyed via bicycle to get some sweet action at Sweet Action Ice Cream. They’ve got vegan options, Stranahan’s Brickle, red velvet ice cream, baklava ice cream, and all kinds of other amazing flavors. Altan pointed out this bit of street art on the way there and I fell in love with it immediately.

Here’s the part where I accept help. My commuter bike has been out of commission for some months as I procrastinated on fixing the flat tire it had. I tried to get it started but had serious problems getting the tire off the rim. Altan lent a hand and ended up working diligently to finish the project (as you can see below), which was fine with me since I had a hand injury anyway (sliced a finger pretty good while preparing lunch the day before).

The weekend wasn’t totally candy and puppies (what really is in life?) but it was generally fun and relaxing.

June wrap-up

2011-07-02T12:05:00.001-06:00

This post is just a mishmash of things that happened and that I saw in the latter half of June 2011.

I didn’t get to see Emily and Archer as much as I would have liked but did get over for brunch and a hang out. Here is some evidence:

Archer is the cutest baby ever.

I know there are plenty of photography apps for the iPhone but I got a free one – Instagram. It doesn’t do a whole lot but does let you apply filters to photos and make them look more interesting and, in some cases, better. Here are some examples (the first photo is the original and the second is the one adjusted via Instagram).

Denver’s City and County Building

Archer:

Me:

In June, I saw lot of beautiful skies. I know I did a whole post on this previously but I had to share these new shots. By the way, I realize that most of these photos could be religious or inspirational greeting cards, but whatever.

That is all.

First World Problems

2011-06-22T16:24:00.026-06:00

A while back I posted on “yuppie problems,” which is a bit narrowly defined to a specific socio-economic and age range since a “yuppie” is a young, urban professional. I recently discovered that a certain website has a feed devoted to “first world problems.” This is far more encompassing of the kinds of issues that come up in the lives of a variety of Americans. The website on which you can find this feed is Reddit. More on Reddit in a future post. There is a subsection of the site called "First World Problems". Some selections from this section include:

I can't find a Gmail theme I like
I live in the New York City and I cannot find a Chik-fil-A anywhere
The touch screen on my phone makes it hard for me to text while I drive
reflection of palm trees on my laptop interferes with my work

I am finding that I have so many first world problems…that is to say, any type of complaint or observation that exits my mouth seems to be one of these. For example, yesterday I made the following comments in the span of one 15-minute conversation.

I’m so sleepy; I left my chai latte at the allergist’s office
I was annoyed on Sunday because my gym class ran 45 minutes over
I had the hardest time getting into a bottle of moscato wine on Saturday night

In this conversation we went on to talk about how I should document these regularly on my blog, which led to a first world problem about first world problems: how to effectively add the first world problems to my blog – just a tag or a sidebar or what?? I think I’m going with a tag, so I can just post my yuppie/first world problems at random.

Beef

2011-06-21T16:14:00.000-06:00

I’ve started eating a variety of beef products again. I’ve always cheated with beef jerky for hiking but have avoided steaks and burgers and so on.

I stopped many years ago during a 5 year vegetarian stint between 1995 and 2000. After falling off the vegetarian wagon I resumed chicken and turkey consumption but not beef (or pork actually). Not only had beef products become difficult for my body to process (I did try a steak early on at a fancy company dinner), but I knew that beef is environmentally unsound. The amount of water and grain that goes into one pound of beef could feed families. In addition, the waste from factory farms is toxic.

So why resume eating beef you ask? I’m a pretty particular eater and at some restaurants beef is the only appetizing option. Case in point – last Thursday night my friend and colleague, Pat, and I tried out the new restaurant Linger, which is a well-designed, hip place that is brilliantly reusing the old Olinger Mortuary building. Here’s a photo from the back side of the restaurant.

As an aside, there was another beautiful sky as it briefly rained and clouds were moving through the windy evening:

Here’s Pat looking regal while we were waiting for our table:

Anyway, at Linger not only did we get the beef tacos but I got an amazing burger slider with some yellow sauce (not mustard) on a surprisingly tasty bun. For some reason I look overly happy, but here I am below with said slider:

More beef ingestion: after my Memorial Day backpacking trip we decided to stop at Coney Island. For the first time in 20 years I got a hot dog! After two days of backpacking and eating snacks and ramen and so on, the hot dog was truly satisfying. Here is evidence of my hot dog eating:

Sign spotting

2011-06-19T17:10:00.000-06:00

Whereas in previous posts I was referring to sign spotting in the sense of keeping open to signs in a philosophical sense, this post is more about watching for signs in a literal sense. I post most of these on Facebook, but here are some of the signs that I’ve captured in the past few months.

My friend (and Archer-daddy), Josh, very appropriately commented that Darth Vader was finally killed by the gate in the sign below:

This one just made me chuckle.

Snapped this little puppy (below) at National Airport in DC – snow globes are a serious threat to national safety:

This one was posted on the fence outside my condo building, and not by the HOA:

This one was supplied by Altan and tipped me off to an actual website that collects signs of all kinds – Sign Spotting!

The Sign Spotting site devotes itself to displaying signage of a humorous nature. Here are some examples from the site:

If you love ridiculous signs the way I do, check out Sign Spotting.

Would I go on a date with you?

2011-06-18T11:40:00.000-06:00

On of the dating sites I was on sent me an email a few weeks ago with a flowchart attached. The flowchart indicates if I would date you based on 20 of the questions I answered on the site. See below.

I’m not sure why they sent it to me. I asked a few others I know on the site if they received something like this. The answer was “no.” Perhaps they sent it to point out how particular and selective I am? I am also a bit insulted by the bottom left bit – I would date someone I wasn’t quite 100% on if they paid! That’s not the way it works for me.

Yurt weekend

2011-06-17T12:55:00.000-06:00

My love affair with Colorado lives on and the flame isn’t close to going out. A few weekends ago a friend and I ditched our thoughts of camping for a much more leisurely weekend – at Joyful Journey hot springs!
The weather was AMAZING. Blue skies and pleasant clouds the entire drive down:

Although Joyful Journey has actual rooms, we opted for a yurt! You can see more beautiful weather and a yurt (far left) below. This was the view from the doorway of the yurt. A yurt is like a hotel room but with no bathroom and no climate control (other than fans). There is a skylight and a wood floor and a queen-sized bed and other hotel room amenities. Some nicer yurts actually have little kitchens but not here, which was fine.

Happily, there was nothing to do but eat, drink, sleep, read, and soak. Here’s me, post-soak.

It wasn’t all candy and puppies though, there were little biting gnats that ate me up. I got one (or more) trapped under my hair on the back of my neck and had a patch of red, itchy bites. That didn’t deter us from an outdoor breakfast though.

Here’s my breakfast mate, Altan.

This is me, excited for breakfast:

Here’s the hazy sunrise from the door of our yurt:

Sunday we slowly made our way back north to Denver. Stopped in Salida for breakfast and in South Park to check out its little old town area.
One of Salida’s many art galleries had a flock of needle-felted sheep in its window, which was so cute I had to document and, of course, share:

That is all.

Denver skies

2011-06-16T10:32:00.001-06:00

In my movement about Denver lately, I've been treated to some beautiful sun and sky. Denver has a lot of that and I'm struck by it time and time again.

Cloudy sunset photo taken from City Park:

Denver’s Millennium Bridge Friday at sunset:

Payne Creek

2011-06-02T21:37:00.001-06:00

Just under an hour from my home in Denver is a trail leading into Pike National Forest and then the Lost Creek Wilderness. That trail is the Payne Creek Trail. This was my backpacking destination for Memorial Day weekend.

This was not only close to town but one place where I was fairly confident there would be no snow. Yes, that’s right – snow. This Memorial Day weekend snow conditions in the mountains were like March not May. To make this point more clearly, let me tell you that some ski areas actually re-opened!

The Payne Creek Trail was joyfully free of snow. The weather was pretty much perfect save a small bit of early evening rain on Saturday and some seriously strong winds on Sunday night. Here’s a shot of a budding Aspen Tree in the mid-morning light Saturday.

Me in the tent during the Saturday evening rain.

I was accompanied by two friends: Charlie and Dylan. Charlie is a super cute terrier (pictured immediately below) and Dylan is Charlie’s person (pictured below the picture immediately below).

We didn’t see much wildlife save for this mouse that tried to make a new home in Dylan’s shoes:

The weekend was goal-less and relaxing. Just naps, yahtzee, reading, eating, naps, uno, and reading. A perfect antidote to my current busy life.

Messages from SF?

2011-05-23T17:03:00.000-06:00

Lately I’ve been struggling with some bigger questions in life. One friend suggested that I keep my mind open to “signs.” In my walking through San Francisco I found two bits of street art that might be signs. I almost missed both of them. These seem to be positive messages but possibly having various interpretations…

Of course I also found a few other bits of street art from which I derived no meaning but still liked.

Solo Day in San Francisco

2011-05-21T17:51:00.000-06:00

My feet are tired and parts of them are swollen. I must have walked at least six miles on Friday. The 2011 WTS International Conference in San Francisco was wrapping up and I had several hours before my flight back to Denver. From the Embarcadero, I walked to Union Square then up to Nob Hill then through Chinatown to Coit Tower then back through Chinatown to the Hayes Valley district then up Market Street back to the hotel and my luggage.

It was a solo travel day for me. I’m still getting used to going to some famous sight or another and just enjoying it with myself. As a person just out of a looooong-term relationship (that I was in from quite a young age), I’ve always had someone to turn to and say, “wow, isn’t this amazing?” (or whatever the case may be). Now I just look and take in and move on. I’m doing ok with this solitary enjoyment of things. It’s peaceful.

One thing that you may notice, this singlehood travel deal means there are almost no pictures of me – just pictures of what I see. I haven’t quite gotten the hang of asking random people to photograph me…

Ok, a tiny bit of nerdy transit stuff - streetcars!

While at the WTS Conference, I took the F-line streetcar mobile tour. As you may or may not know, San Francisco purchased vintage streetcars from around the world, restored them, and have them in service on their streets. They are beautiful and are an excellent complement to historic San Francisco. The is the streetcar vehicle in which we toured:

The interiors are even restored:

The rest of the WTS Conference was filled with technical and professional development sessions, an awards banquet, an opening reception, and so on. All of these events were made especially fun by the company of my fellow WTS Colorado ladies.

I did have one non-WTS night out! My friend and co-worker, Pat, put me in touch with two of his friends – Evan and Hassan. They did an excellent job of entertaining me and took me out in the Mission to do something we all enjoy – beer drinking (and good beer too!). We went to the Monk’s Kettle and Zeitgeist (self-proclaimed as San Francisco’s #1 beer garden), both cool places. A sample of the fantastic beer menu at the Monk’s Kettle is below.

We also went to an historic building/bar at the end of the evening but that place is a bit fuzzy in my memory. We did, however, get a group photo taken there:

Here are a few of my views from my solo city touring day:

As you can tell from these photos, I was lucky to have nearly perfect weather in San Francisco.

Hot Springs with Buena Vista

2011-05-20T19:15:00.001-06:00

My legs are resting on the edge of the pool, I’ve got two pool noodles supporting my back and arms, the sunlight is getting stronger as it comes over the San Juans, all I can hear are birds making their morning calls, and I’m just floating. This was me at Joyful Journey hot springs for two and a half days.

Sometimes that serene moment was punctuated by the conversation of couples. Being alone on vacation you get to overhear lots of (mostly boring) conversation between couples. At night, however, the couples conversations can be silly and giggly. Given that I’m steeped in thoughts about human relationships, these conversations were fascinating – even the boring ones.

I mean, what did/do I talk about as a couple? Outside of the occasional discussion about current political activity or random zombie conversations, couple conversations can be pretty mundane – what we are doing later, when should we take the cat to the vet or take the car in to have the oil changed, we should try this or that restaurant, and on and on.

Anyway, other than eavesdropping while soaking in the hot springs, I mostly read and slept, which was heavenly. Here’s a typical shot of those days:

After emerging from the hot springs experience, I met Trisha in Buena Vista. She ran a 25-mile trail run! I know there are lots of people who do this, but I’m still in awe.

In the afternoon after the run, we made it a goal to visit as many patios in Buena Vista as possible. The first of these was Mother’s Bistro. This is Trisha on the patio:

The patio was complete with a cat named Simba that circled my chair and let me pet it:

We both had glasses of white wine and shared a piece of caramel apple pie. It was soooo nice.

When the sun started to set we made our way back to the Topaz Lodge and got to watch the sunset as we walked.

It was a lovely weekend and a good first solo trip for me. I’ll definitely do it again.

Data on my attractiveness

2011-05-06T14:48:00.001-06:00

As is fairly well known at this point, I am doing the online dating thing. One of the sites I’m on sent me an email a few weeks ago that I found hilarious. It was from the site’s “interns.” I’ve copied out most of the email and pasted it below:

“= good-looking

We are very pleased to report that you are in the top half of [the site’s] most attractive users. The scales recently tipped in your favor, and we thought you'd like to know.

How can we say this with confidence? We've tracked click-thrus on your photo and analyzed other people's reactions to you in [the site’s matching service].

Your new elite status comes with one important privilege: You will now see more attractive people in your match results. The people we recommend will be more attractive. Also! You'll be shown to more attractive people in their match results.”

What great news…I haven’t noticed a sincere uptick in “attractive” people coming my way via email from the dating site, but then, they don’t really define “attractive.” I’m also wondering how “the scales recently tipped in [my] favor.”

What I wouldn’t do to get my hands on all the data to which these dating sites have access. It’s all self-reported though, which pretty well skews any statistical validity but it sure would be fun to look at!

Not sure how much if anything I’ll actually share about dating here but stay tuned.

Archer

2011-05-04T09:15:00.001-06:00

Ok, as some of you may know, I don’t always get excited about babies but I’m excited about this one. My friends Emily and Josh, who are amazing people, joined forces to bring another amazing person to this world. Archer Gray Silverman was born on April 23, 2011 at 11:20 AM and weighed 5 pounds 7 ounces!

He is tiny and fantastically cute. Here, see for yourself!

I think this one is the best of the series – Archer says hello to his fans.

Here is the new mom out for the maiden voyage of the stroller.

And the new dad!

I can’t wait to see how this little guy grows! Stay tuned.

9

2011-04-30T12:51:00.001-06:00

Moab Safari

2011-04-21T10:57:00.001-06:00

I didn’t know there was such a thing as the “Easter Jeep Safari” in Moab. Well, turns out there is and it kicked off last weekend, which coincided with a trip to Moab to celebrate Hillary’s birthday.

Friday: Driving and Drinking (not together)

Hillary’s sister, Shaina, and I traveled about six hours from Denver and Hillary drove down with her dog, Driggs, from Salt Lake City. We converged in Moab on Friday . The intent was to camp, but all camp sites within about 45 min of Moab (even disbursed camping) were taken. There were, however, a few hotel rooms left. So Friday night we stayed at the Apache Inn and managed to snag the “John Wayne Suite.” It turns out that Mr. Wayne actually stayed in this hotel and frequented this particular room.

Staying in a hotel in town offered the possibility of nightlife! We started with margaritas and dinner at Juan’s. There was a wait for a table and because it’s Utah and ridiculously strict when it comes to alcohol, it is not permitted to have drinks while waiting. Whatever. We were seated pretty quickly.

After dinner we ended up at Woody’s (a bar). Inside we found a good amount of people our age as well as a pretty good live band and a solitary Jagermeister girl. She was dressed like a stripper and sprinkling Jagermeister lanyards, hats, blinky lights, and so on. We had way too good of a time…there was dancing, chatting with local river guides, and receipt of Jagermeister schwag. All three of us received Jagermeister hats:

The night ended about an hour after the bar closed with the three of us walking around the hotel trying to get Driggs to pee. That dog never pees, but when he does (especially at two in the morning) Hillary get’s pretty excited:

Saturday: Canoeing and not canoeing

We were supposed to be at the canoeing place (we rented canoes) at 9:30. At 8:30 I woke up in a state of confusion since I was in a king-sized bed with Shaina and Hillary was on the floor with Driggs. We scrambled to get ourselves and our stuff together in time to get caffeine before canoeing.

Canoeing was an adventure. With Shaina and I in a tandem canoe and Hillary with Driggs in a single canoe, we launched the first time around 10:45 am. We had 11 miles to cover and were being picked up at 3:00 pm. Below is Hillary (top) and Shaina (bottom) pre-first launch.

Driggs immediately jumped out of the canoe and took off in a sprint towards the road. Not a good sign. This was the first time Driggs was in a canoe…Hillary did get him back in the canoe and we set off again around 11:00 am.

Driggs looks ok in the photo above but he was extremely difficult to control and we made the executive decision to bail on the trip. We pulled off on a small strip of eroding shore closed in by thickets of tamarisk. We called the canoe rental place to come and get us and they were out to lunch! We hemmed and hawed for about an hour then we decided that Hillary would pull her canoe up to the road and Shaina and I would continue with the trip to the pick up site.

Here is Hillary making her way through the tamarisk thicket:

Shaina and Hillary pulling the canoe from the water:

We got going at around 1:30 pm and had about 90 min to make it 10 miles. The canoe trip was hurried a bit but really quite lovely. Here are some views from the canoe:

We lounged around our hotel room at the Sleep Inn after all of this. We were a bit pooped and even Driggs was relaxed:

I’m a hotel artwork aficionado and here is what I saw at the Sleep Inn:

Saturday night was a full moon. Here is a shot of that and some additional evidence that I was there:

Sunday: Snake hike and the journey home

Sunday was pretty mellow. We did a short hike on the way out of town and saw a snake! Exciting. Below is the snake and a picture two awesome sisters.

That was Moab last weekend. It turns out there was another “redneck convention” (I’m quoting a Moab local) going on that weekend which kept the number of “jeepers” to a tolerable amount. So, the Easter Jeep Safari didn’t really negatively impact the trip.

For me the trip was therapeutic. Not only did I get out of town and spend time with fun women, but I was reminded by Hillary that life isn’t about the destination but rather the journey. I know this, but like anything else useful to remember, my impatient nature tends to take over and I get focused on the end game, whatever that is at the moment. But Hillary is so right, I need to enjoy where I am more often.

Warning Signs

2011-04-12T16:39:00.000-06:00

Warning signs are all around us, especially in America. We are reminded that the moving sidewalk is ending at airports. We have tags on appliances warning us not to stick our hands in the blender while it’s on. We have messages on cleaning products warning us not spray the product directly into our eyes…Of course, there are more meaningful but elusive warning signs that we all miss, sometimes until it’s too late.

Think about it, when you’re 40 pounds overweight you probably can think back to a time when the muffin top started to peek over the waistband and your pants got a little snug. That was the moment to seize and change course. I think about this more often these days, not because I’m overweight, but because my marriage is ending. I feel like it was in the mail for several years. Was there a moment that things started to tip this way? What was it? How do I recognize it if it appears in future relationships? Maybe there’s nothing to be done without over-examining everything, every strange look, every sigh.

If only there were some sign like the ones below that would pop up at that moment, but what would it look like?

Record 84 degrees

2011-04-03T10:22:00.001-06:00

Yesterday in Denver it hit 84 degrees! I took full advantage. I put on a sun dress, met a friend, and walked to lunch at a super cute and tasty sandwich shop in the Golden Triangle – Parsley. This place should really be in Boulder – organic everything, vegetable juice, etc. – but I’m glad it’s here.

On the way I got a shot of some street art around 1st Ave and Lincoln:

After lunch it was time for going to the Botanic Gardens with another friend. It is still early for the gardens but things are starting to bloom. Here are some springtime shots for your viewing pleasure:

At first I thought this was a snail on the plant below but on further inspection I decided it was not. Not sure what it is though…

This was one of those days where it’s just nice to sit on a bench and watch the budding trees sway in the wind.

It was also the perfect night for a rooftop happy hour at Vita. There was a slight breeze, we were in the shade, sitting at the bar, sipping on bubbly, and watching the light of the setting sun on the buildings of downtown Denver. I tried to get a photo of me and the skyline in the background but my aim was a little off:

All of these venues were reached via bike. I had forgotten how incredibly fun it is to ride from one side of downtown Denver to another on a bike in sandals. Can’t wait for summer after this teaser of a day.

Walking and the Sights

2011-03-26T12:31:00.001-06:00

Other than watching Lost, flailing at work, and doing yoga obsessively, the one thing I have been doing is walking in my neighborhood – Capitol Hill. The neighborhood has a good diversity of ages, incomes, etc. It is, however, populated with a good number of 20 and 30 somethings and some of them are slightly deviant and artistic. I know because I see the fruits of their labor everywhere and enjoy them and document them. For those of you who are “friends” on Facebook, some of these photos will be familiar. There are a few new ones in here though.

These photos are examples of the art/graffiti to be seen around Capitol Hill if you are observant. I hope you enjoy them.

Jean-Pierre Jeunet

2011-03-22T11:33:00.001-06:00

Jean-Pierre Jeunet is a French writer/director that makes amazingly visually-appealing, dream-like films. He has an eye for the fantastical. A couple of his films are mainstream: Alien: Resurrection and Amelie. But his best work is a little under the radar. Below are descriptions of two of the most visually delightful films I have seen. They are dark and quirkily funny.

Delicatessen (1991) – written and directed by Jeunet (with Marc Caro)

Post-apocalyptic surrealist black comedy about the landlord of an apartment building who occasional prepares a delicacy for his odd tenants.

The City of Lost Children (1995) – written and directed by Jeunet (with others)

With a mad scientist kidnapping children to steal their dreams, only brave young Miette and a kindhearted circus strongman (Ron Perlman) can save them. Part fantasy, part nightmare…

This one is a bit more disturbing than Delicatessen. The mad scientist is creepy.

Dominique Pinon is the guy in the photo below (multiplied by four). Jeunet employs Pinon in all of his films and this guy, with his distinctive face, is exuberant and perfectly suited for surrealist films of this kind.

Last night I watched Micmacs (2009)

Jeunet takes a satirical look at the global arms trade with this foreign-language comedy starring Dany Boon as Bazil, who rallies his friends to take down weapons manufacturers responsible for his father's death. Bazil also discovers a dump into an underground haven for cool tools and sculptures crafted from discarded junk.

Since this post is going a bit long, I’ll just say that this French-subtitled film is worth watching. However, the Onion review sums up my overall feelings towards the film, “Longtime Jeunet fans may be a little disappointed at the film’s feather-lightness, which admits almost none of the grimness of his Delicatessen or Lost Children…”

Dusty and Lost

2011-03-17T10:14:00.000-06:00

I've been checked out lately - still watching Lost. I'm almost done with season two and am watching (on average) two episodes per night. I can't stop thinking about how bad they all must smell and where the women get their mascara. Similarly the men never grow beards but are never clean shaven either. Whatever, it's not as if any other part of the show is believable.

I'm not here to talk about lost. I want to make you all aware of an important event coming up: the 2011 Road Dust Best Management Practices Conference. That's right in November of this year road dust afficionados will descend on "dusty" Las Vegas. Conference goers can look forward to a special treat:

To better serve our road dust community, we will also have a Specification Showcase as well as offer a training session on (1) How to Put Down Product and/or (2) Understanding Dust Plume Opacity. Vendor displays and the unveiling of the Road Dust and Fines Management Institute will round out this highly anticipated 2nd event!

This post is the second in a series to spread the word about important and cutting edge transportation research. Enjoy.

8

2011-03-10T20:25:00.001-07:00

Creatures

2011-03-06T14:20:00.001-07:00

Reflecting on this weekend I’m discovering how unproductive I was. I had goals! but only met two: do the laundry and go to yoga. Although, I can’t complain because I did get out of the house and enjoy myself with some wonderful friends.

This is my weekend in pictures.

Friday: Inanimate creature found at a restaurant.

Saturday: Animate creatures - Athena and Emily.

Sunday: Inanimate creature on the trail. An omen?

Lost

2011-02-28T14:53:00.001-07:00

Lost. I’ve just begun watching the TV show this week. The word has something of a double meaning for me at the moment though. In my current situation and harboring feelings of being lost, I was naturally drawn to the title.

I’ve only watched four TV shows since 1994:

Sex and the City
Alias
Six Feet Under
The Wire

The reason I steer clear of TV shows is that, if the show is good, I get completely sucked in. To illustrate my level of addiction, I started watching the first pilot episode of Lost (there are two pilots) on Wednesday of last week – five days ago. Right now, I am watching episode 18. Including the two pilot episodes, that’s 20 episodes in five days.

My progress is now impeded due to some technical problem with the Netflix server or something. I’m watching in 30 second – 1 minute intervals. Addiction.

7

2011-02-23T20:15:00.001-07:00

6

2011-02-22T22:49:00.001-07:00

Valentine’s Day

2011-02-21T20:20:00.001-07:00

It’s February 14th, the sun is shining, I’m walking through my neighborhood wearing sandals, and the temperature is 67. Sounds beautiful right? Well, not really.

In reality, I’m stressfully darting around Capitol Hill from apartment viewing to apartment viewing trying to find a reasonably priced rental abode that isn’t gross. In an annoying twist of fate, it turns out that the rental market is totally saturated. Mortgage interest rates are up, there’s no extra tax credit for home buying this year, and there are very few places available for rent.

The apartment hunt was a diversion, a task I could embrace and throw myself into - even though it was depressing to look for apartments for just you on Valentine’s day. My spouse and I had recently decided to stop cohabitating. There was a considerable amount of anguish hitting me repeatedly, but when you have to focus on closet space and pet rents – one’s mind is distracted from that. Temporarily.

One week later...I probably shouldn’t be putting this out there but I can’t find an image that appropriately sums up my situation today. Back to work. Moving forward clumsily.

5

2011-02-20T21:02:00.001-07:00

Here

You all are fabulous

2011-02-19T18:56:00.001-07:00

4

2011-02-19T08:21:00.001-07:00

3

2011-02-18T09:04:00.001-07:00

2011-02-17T20:43:00.001-07:00

2011-02-17T09:31:00.001-07:00

The American

2011-02-12T19:02:00.001-07:00

The American (2010)

On the heels of a rough assignment, assassin Jack (George Clooney) declares that his next job will be his last. Dispatched to a small Italian town to await further orders, Jack embarks on a double life that may be more relaxing than is good for him. Although duty will surely call, Jack becomes friends with Father Benedetto and falls for villager Clara in this suspense thriller.

The words to describe this film are hard to find…ridiculously in love with itself come to mind. Among the reviews there are basically two opinions that surface, either the reviewer found the movie boring or zen-like. Roger Ebert goes so far as to liken Clooney to a Samurai. I found it hard to care about Clooney’s character. I mean you find out almost nothing about him and you’re never quite sure what the hell he’s doing.

I also found myself comparing it to the Jim Jarmusch film The Limits of Control. The comparison was in the slowness and the silence. The difference is that in Limits of Control there is something actually palpable in the silence. It has fantastic shots and crazy characters. The American’s silence was just flat.

There were some reviews that agreed with me. Time magazine’s review referred to The American as “surely the dreariest thriller of the year.” The New York Post review was hands down my favorite – I love the writer’s style. The reviewer called it “a pretentious Euro-snore that should occasion a fraud prosecution for any marketer who calls it a thriller.”

My thoughts exactly.

Silliness

2011-02-07T16:24:00.000-07:00

Ever since that Scream Scram 5k around Halloween last year I’ve had an awareness of my enjoyment of silly monster drawings/art. Over the past few months I’ve been collecting some examples as I’ve stumbled upon them. The time has come to share.

This one may be familiar to some of you, it’s “Talking Carl” who I think is a charming little character. He’s available via an iPhone app – he will repeat whatever you say in a silly Talking Carl voice. Absolutely indispensible app…

I found Carl and the family below on the same web site, which also has a number of other strange characters.

Here are some others I liked. I found most of them at one of two web sites.

That is all.

Blue Valentine

2011-02-06T18:00:00.001-07:00

Wow.

Blue Valentine (2010)

Once crazy about each other, Cindy (Michelle Williams) and Dean (Ryan Gosling) have now grown apart. Cindy is bored and disenchanted with her life while Dean languishes in the emotional emptiness of their sexless, routine life in rural Pennsylvania. As they muddle through their marriage, they hearken back to the golden days when life was filled with possibility and romance.

You might be thinking to yourself, “jesus that sounds depressing.” Well, sure, the subject matter was not exactly joyful and, I have to admit, at times I did feel the heaviness of the dissolving relationship. But the story was so emotionally complex and the film had this really visceral quality to it.

The way the story rolled out reminded me of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind in that it started with the stale relationship in the present, but jumped back and forth between that time and the beginning of the relationship several years earlier. This lent the film a bittersweet quality that gave the audience ample respite from the tragedy of the present relationship.

Michelle Williams gave a fantastic performance, but I have to say that Ryan Gosling was absolutely snubbed by the Academy – he was amazing. They truly are two talented (and hot) actors.

SEE. IT.

ten below

2011-02-01T22:13:00.001-07:00

I watched the weather intermittently throughout the day and my data collection indicates that the high was about zero. It didn’t stay that warm for very long though. Tomorrow the high is supposed to be 13 degrees. I’ll be honest with you, Denver doesn’t get this kind of weather very often. Heck, it was nearly 60 on Saturday!

I’m lucky or I’ve happened to make the right choices in life so far or whatever. My heat is working. I have warm smoked gouda macaroni and cheese in my stomach. I have leisure time to goof around with my iTunes settings, read magazine articles, write blog posts, and so on.

Realizing that I have little to actually complain about, I will give a few examples of how the sub-zero temperatures in Denver today affected me.

My cheeks are permanently red – it looks as if I have a triangle of blush directly below my eye areas.
I have vertical sock impressions on my shins and calves from the knee-high wool socks I wore all day in an attempt to insulate every part of my body. Unfortunately I don’t have any wool panties, but they do exist!
My body freaked out a bit in warm yoga also. I think it was calibrated to the super cold temperature and just didn’t know what to do with the extreme temperature change. I was sweating much more than usual and my heart was pounding.
Sweaty from the warm yoga effort, nearly all of my hair froze while waiting for the bus – even with a hat on!
Every time I enter or exit somewhere my glasses fogged up, which looks really sexy.

Here are some of the things I found myself thinking about today, while reminiscing with myself about the past summer:

Scary movies

2011-02-01T15:36:00.000-07:00

Well, kind of scary, but also kind of stupid.

Devil (2010)

In this edgy thriller, Det. Bowden (Chris Messina) must not only save 5 people trapped in an elevator -- a mechanic, a young woman, an old woman, a guard, and a salesman -- but he must act fast because the devil is among them.

Yes, this is an M. Night Shyamalan movie, which immediately puts it into a certain category – for most not a good one. I have to admit that I enjoy the concepts in Shyamalan’s movies, if not the delivery. This one was only about 80 minutes long, which makes it more palatable, but I actually don’t recommend it. The concept wasn’t that interesting and the characters were pretty flimsy.

Case 39 (2009)

To save 10-year-old Lillith Sullivan from her abusive parents, idealistic social worker Emily Jenkins (Renée Zellweger) welcomes the girl into her own home -- only to discover that Lillith isn't quite the innocent victim that she claims to be. As Lillith's mysterious past comes to light, Emily finds herself in a world of danger.

Modern devil child movie with annoying child actor. Bleh. Poorly acted and a tired tale. Please, for me, skip it.

Buried (2010)

While on a job in Iraq, civilian contractor Paul Conroy (Ryan Reynolds) is attacked and kidnapped, then awakens to find himself buried alive in the middle of the desert with nothing but a lighter, a candle, a cell phone and a knife. Does Paul have the instincts he'll need to save himself?

Boring. You wouldn’t expect a movie with a description like that to be boring, right? Well, you’d be wrong. For all the suspense and terror the movie tried to convey, I just didn’t feel it. I did chuckle a few times. The guy has a cell phone and gets transferred, put on hold, and leaves voicemail messages. I chuckled and I do think it was meant to evoke a sense of the ridiculous of modern communication especially in a situation like that.

Ryan Reynolds, the lead (and only role), doesn’t really deliver the performance required to carry a one-man show.

That Facebook Movie

2011-01-30T15:35:00.000-07:00

The Social Network (2010)

Director David Fincher's biographical drama chronicles the meteoric rise of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg) from Harvard sophomore to Internet superstar, examining his relationships with co-founder Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield) and Napster founder Sean Parker (Justin Timberlake).

Jeez, what to say about this movie…it’s gotten so much praise. I can say that I absolutely agree with all that praise.

The director, David Fincher, took a movie essentially about court depositions and computer programming and made something dynamic and fascinating. But then, Fincher was the director that brought us films like Fight Club (a favorite of mine) and Zodiac, so we, as viewers, were in good hands.

While I have enjoyed Jesse Eisenberg in films like The Squid and The Whale and I think he was excellent in his portrayal of Mark Zuckerberg, he didn’t seem to give the audience a performance out of the range we’ve seen in other efforts.

Oh, one interesting thing I learned about the movie is that the Winklevoss twins were played by one guy (named Armie Hammer). That’s right, one guy played the part of both twins (I hope he got paid double).

Way behind

2011-01-29T15:05:00.001-07:00

I’m eight movies behind. That is to say, I’ve seen eight movies, about which I haven’t posted. So, I’m going to do a series of posts to try to catch up. This is the first.

Serpico (1973)

Based on the real-life story of NYC undercover cop Frank Serpico (an honest man who was grievously wounded for refusing to take part in the corruption forced upon him by his peers). Serpico is at once an indictment of corrupted authority and a shining testament to one man's effort to reform the NYC Police Department.

A Pacino movie that is nearly 40 years old. In addition to taking in the acting, the plot, and so on, I was enthralled with the actual 70s cars, clothes, and norms – New York City in the 70s! There are so many movies that try to re-create the 70s in film that it was interesting to actually see it as it really was.

I had no real expectations going in and watched it on a whim, but found it surprisingly compelling. I say “surprising” because I don’t find modern cop films to be my cup of tea usually and expected something similar from this. Serpico beats the pants off of most modern cop films.

PSA

2011-01-26T17:26:00.000-07:00

Yep, this is a public service announcement. Specifically, this post is bringing to your attention the power of a compliment.

When someone pays you a compliment, it’s not so much just that you have some satisfaction of knowing that you are doing something well (or whatever the case may be), but it’s even more that someone noticed you. In our very distracted world, having someone actually see you, let alone appreciate something about you, feels rare.

I received a surprising but pleasant compliment tonight and I’ve been feeling good for a few hours from that. It makes me think that we all (including myself) need to notice people more often and let them know. Ok so this is coming post-yoga, which may explain some of the “love everyone” vibe.

Anyway, if you need help coming up with compliments, I found The Surrealist Compliment Generator. So feel reassured that you can turn to this tool the next time you are staring longingly into the eyes of someone you adore. You can tell them something like this (from the Generator):

I find your eye sockets to be a wondrous amusement park of neo-plastic pleasures and oncogenic delights.

Also, if you want to take care of complementing several people at once, you might think about something like this:

That concludes this Public Service Announcement. Oh, by the way, you are special and I like you.

Oscar 2011

2011-01-25T22:27:00.001-07:00

The nominees for the 83rd Academy Awards were announced today. Overall I feel that the nominees this year are populated by very deserving candidates – perhaps more than in past years. Last year I wasn’t too excited about the nominations and last year was the first year the Academy allowed ten movies to compete for best picture.

Best Picture – I’ve seen them all this year!

Black Swan – good but not going to win
The Fighter – excellent, has a chance!
Inception – I enjoyed it but not going to win
The Kids Are All Right – I thoroughly enjoyed it but not going to win
The King's Speech – excellent, this will probably be neck and neck with a one or two others.
127 Hours – amazing but not sure that it’ll win best picture
The Social Network – the perfect representation of our times – this won the Golden Globes this year…just sayin’
Toy Story 3 – definitely an animated film deserving of accolades, but not going to win.
True Grit – ugh, this will probably be a contender.
Winter's Bone – loved this one and it’s an underdog, great acting, etc, but not going to win.

Despite my feelings about the various films, my money is split between The King’s Speech (12 nominations overall) and The Social Network (8 nominations). If one of those two don’t get it, The Fighter probably will.

Directing – Yikes, I’d be ok with any but True Grit winning. David Fincher won the Golden Globe.

“Black Swan” Darren Aronofsky
“The Fighter” David O. Russell
“The King's Speech” Tom Hooper
“The Social Network” David Fincher
“True Grit” Joel Coen and Ethan Coen

Actress in a Leading Role – I can’t comment because I haven’t seen Rabbit Hole or Blue Valentine. Natalie Portman won at the Golden Globe (for a drama).

Annette Bening in “The Kids Are All Right”
Nicole Kidman in “Rabbit Hole”
Jennifer Lawrence in “Winter's Bone”
Natalie Portman in “Black Swan”
Michelle Williams in “Blue Valentine”

Actor in a Leading Role – I’ve seen all but Biutiful. The one I want to win is James Franco, but I suspect Colin Firth has this one in the bag (he won the Golden Globe for a drama).

Javier Bardem in “Biutiful”
Jeff Bridges in “True Grit”
Jesse Eisenberg in “The Social Network”
Colin Firth in “The King's Speech”
James Franco in “127 Hours”

I’m not going to go through every category. You get the idea.

Iron Man 2 Splice

2011-01-19T20:35:00.001-07:00

Bad, bad movies. I’m not going to go on too long about these.

Iron Man 2 (2010)

The first Iron Man was surprisingly enjoyable. They really nailed the elements of an American summer movie – action, sexuality, technology, charisma, witty banter, etc. Iron Man 2 is clearly riding on the coattails of the first movie.

The characters were annoyingly magnified; all of their worst traits were played up and spotlighted. There were new ridiculous elements like Samuel L. Jackson and Scarlett Johansen playing agents of some super secret US Army unit. The plot was predictably reminiscent of the first Iron Man. And it went on toooooo long – two full hours.

Splice (2009)

With Sarah Polley and Adrien Brody starring, I thought there was a chance for this movie. Nope.

Netflix description:

Ignoring instructions from the pharmaceutical company that funds their research, groundbreaking genetic scientists Elsa (Polley) and Clive (Brody) continue with an unorthodox experiment to create a human-animal hybrid, a new life form they dub "Dren". When they see their fantastical creation, Clive warns that it should be destroyed, but Elsa refuses -- a decision she'll regret when Dren makes deadly plans of her own.

While the concept was compelling and did raise the interesting questions about genetics and the pandora’s box of tinkering with nature, I ultimately didn’t handle the strange sexual twists that well. I think I’ll leave it there.

Highlands Saturday

2011-01-16T16:34:00.001-07:00

Because there was a film festival to attend and a new restaurant to try, the bulk of Saturday was spent in the Highlands neighborhood of Denver.

I attended two separate film sessions at the Festivus Film Festival. Both were at the Oriental Theater, which is a cool, old theater that I had never been inside.

Session 1: 2:00 pm “Doc Double” – two documentaries back to back. These were supposed to be inspiring documentaries about the triumph of the human spirit and so on. The first one was about surfing and helping kids on Bali surf and get money for school. It was mostly surfing. If you’re not a surfer and/or don’t know anything about surfing, all the surfing shots look the same. It was chilly in the theater so I wrapped myself in the tee shirt I won and nodded off.

The second documentary was the draw for this session – “Conquest of High Passes.” Disabled cyclist traveling through the Himalayas and persevering. It turned out to be a little dour. The whole thing felt like rainy day wrapped in a wet blanket. I blame this on the cyclist on which the film focused. He was alternately talking about what an inspiration he was and talking about how horrible everything was.

The next session wasn’t until 6:00 pm, meaning there was time to check out the area. Lots of house-shops (i.e. little local shops in converted houses), art galleries, and coffee shops. In one gallery/framing shop (metro frame works) there were to shop dogs – Greyhounds!

They also had some art by artist Chris Vance that appealed to me. This is just one example:

Since the break between sessions was so long, there was time to shoot over to the 32nd/Lowell area for a stroll. More cute shops. I love this octopus mural.

Dinner was at Hops & Pie (specializing in craft brew and artisan pizza). The pizza was pleasantly tasty but the beer on tap was really special. Here’s a bit of the draft beer menu:

I had the Oaked Arrogant Bastard (you don’t get that on tap too often!):

After dinner it was back to the film festival for Session 2: Laugh Track Short Films. These were much more satisfying than session one’s documentaries. Many of them were witty and at least half had me actually laughing out loud! “Chump and Clump” was my favorite – two animated dudes and their adventures at a bus stop!

Afterwards was the last stop of the evening – Forest Room 5 – for a final beer. This is somewhere I don’t get to very often because it’s in the Highlands but it’s an eclectic place that has various sized logs for bar stools and old farming and mining films playing silently behind the bar. It is always pretty crowded.

That was my Saturday!

Borg

2011-01-11T21:18:00.001-07:00

Ok people, if every there was a blah time in the blah life – January is it! The office seems unnaturally quiet and even outside is somewhat muted with people avoiding the single digit temperatures out there. My antidote is warm (not hot!) yoga and movie viewing. I have seen five movies in the past 15 days. I’m not going to tell you about them right now.

This blah time provides the opportunity to get to know my old friend interwebs again. I would like to share some of my useless findings.

Beardo – something no one should go without on a frosty winter day (or night!), a hat with a beard attached! Heck with the balaclava on your next snow sports outing – get one of these.

Cushzilla: “Ultra Comfy Leisure Lifestyle Costume PJs for Men and Women. With a pocket.” These are actually just bizarre pajamas, but their web site does a good sell. For example, they make a pitch for wearing this at the office, perhaps for casual Friday.

Here is just a model of the pajamas:

I adore pajamas but I don’t think I’ll be getting these flattering duds anytime soon.

Google street view: I was helping with the design of a different blog (not mine) and was searching for some street view shots of Colfax here in Denver. I came across one taken at Colfax and Marion St that was odd. Again, I found this on Google maps street view. There’s a dude passed out or something on the corner and another dude just casually hanging out…that’s kinda Colfax though.

That is all.