Another fun filled day! And I had lots of pictures I wanted to post but I figured just one. We went to a gold mine and panned for gold. The old mill part was still there and that was pretty creepy, like the Silent Hill movie. I kept waiting for the air raid siren to go off. After the gold mine we just drove around for a while, up a scenic road through the mountains. Sometimes we would come over these peaks into falling snow! Lots of snow but none of it was sticking. It was beautiful! Then we went to a state park near Boulder that is a big rock climbing place. Really cool watching the climbers and more beautiful scenery. Also saw a mountain goat! This picture is from the drive up the scenic road. You can see the aspen trees glowing gold in their fall colors on the ridge. So pretty!
Saturday

One of the most amazing rainbows I've ever seen! It brought immediate shouts of "They're after me lucky charms!" in our worst Irish accents from Mary, Ken, Willow and I. We went to Estes Park, CO to take the ghost tour of the Stanley Hotel. We didn't see any ghosts but it was loads of fun anyway. The hotel itself is lovely, I would love to stay there! And the town, Estes Park, I fell in love with the first time I went there back in May. I totally could see living there!
Rainbow

Alright! Denver, Colorado. Here is to a busy and good first day. Got up about 8am after forcing myself to sleep that late. I actually woke up at 5:30am but I said hell no! Go back to sleep! After a crazy phone call with a man that barely spoke English, my rental car arrived about 8:30am. Woo hoo for the Jeep! I love it and they knocked off about $130 bucks off the cost. Shit yeah. Willow and I headed straight out for coffee and tea. Who ever heard of dry or wet cappuchino? Craziest damn question I ever heard. Then showers all around. Next, Willow decided that he was buying Mary and Ken a big tv for their wedding present. Guess he was tired of watching on a smaller tv. So off to Best Buy, then Walmart. At Walmart we got a 32 inch tv, 4 pumpkins, 3 coffee mugs and a loaf of bread. Where else could you buy such random stuff in one stop? Next stop, my first meal at Sonic. Yay watermelon slushie! Back to the house, unload and set up the tv. Ken decided he wanted a tv stand so back out we went. We decided to do it up college style and headed for the home depot. Got cinder blocks and particle board-hell yeah. Spent the next hour or so making sure the tv and stand were all set up good. A nice little thunderstorm blew up about then. It was awesome being able to see the whole storm so well because the land is so flat with no trees. From the second floor of the house I could see the downdraft from the storm blowing up dust from a couple of miles away. That was cool. Almost 3pm by then, Ken was having band practice so Willow and I headed out to Red Rocks. That place is awesome! I have to see a concert there, it was amazing. Built into the side of the mountain with those famous huge red rocks along the sides. We started at the bottom and walked up the mountain side ampitheater steps. Bad idea. Altitude anyone? Holy shit, I was so out of breath at the top it was unreal. Willow almost passed out, his 2 pack a day smoking self. There was a neat hall of fame with lots of pictures of people that performed there inside the visitors center. Then it started raining so we hurried back down to the jeep. Of course as soon as we got to the car it stopped raining. So we drove around the park, took lots of pictures and just generally got swept away by the scenery. Great views of the plains. Oh yeah, and a rainbow! I haven't seen a rainbow in ages. Beautiful. Then as we were leaving we noticed a place across the street on a smaller foothill that had fossils and stuff. Dinosaur fossils and tracks. That was pretty damn cool too. I haven't seen stuff like that outside of museums. Back home again by 7pm and ordered pizza for dinner. Mary should get home about 10pm tonight. Yay Mary!

Red Rocks

Today was a traveling day. I was a ramblin' man, so to speak. Even more important, it was the first day of vacation! So got up about 8am and finished packing, showered, hung out with my dad, all that good stuff. Then off to pick up Willow by 10:30am. Back to my house, load up the car, say goodbye to the parents and off to the airport. No major problems at the airport. Willow's real name is a very common name so he couldn't get his boarding pass the night before on the computer, he had to get it that morning at the airport. Weird, I had no idea. Then he got picked for one of those random bag checks by the TSA. Not a problem though, he didn't have any liquids or anything. Then a 4 hour flight sitting in the middle seat. Sigh. All for my friend. He wanted the window, it was a crowded flight and he wanted me next to him instead of a stranger because it was the first time he had flown in 20 years. Sigh. I hate the middle. Especially on a long-ish flight. I survived, he survived, but I am going to do my best not to do that for the return flight. One of my favorite things happened, in regards to flying. It was heavy overcast, a little rain, when we took off. I love when you finally break through the clouds and into the bright blue sky above with the sun shining. We arrived in Denver, Ken met us at the gate because he works in the airport so he can do that. Then our other snag. The car rental place was out of cars. Nuts. But I did my best to stay cool and not yell at the poor guy at the counter. It wasn't his fault, you know? Doesn't do any good to bitch at him. So I was nice and in return he was so grateful that I didn't yell at him or anything, so then I felt good. Not a big deal really, not having a car right away since Ken was there. He took us to the house then out to this great chinese restaurant. Then a little bit of grocery shopping and home again. The three of us stayed up for a little while, just hanging out and bullshitting. But I was so tired by 10pm here, 12 midnite back home, that I had to go to bed!

At my house, we have this awesome bush in the backyard called a butterfly bush-because of all the butterflys it attracts. And man does it ever! Mostly in the late summer, like now, the butterflys will just be swarming all over it. And they are so beautiful. I just love the blue on this one. There were about 4 other butterflys today that I got pictures of but I think this picture turned out the best. Just lovely.
Butterfly

This is a couple days late, should have been for Monday. Oh well. Willow did the most wonderful thing, he made me a halloween quilt! It is filled with the spooktacular goodness! This is his first quilt and he did it for me! :) Yay! I love it! The witch in front of the moon is so cool! Good job Willow!
My Halloweeen Quilt

Why am I irritated? I should be relieved, right? Now I wish I could talk plainly on here. Now I wish I had not given this out to everyone. Moving on, trying to stay on track with this blog.
My dad came home on Tuesday. Which is amazingly good news, since he has not been home since April 11th, the morning that he fell at work and broke his ankle. He is weak and not the same as he used to be. Too much has happened for that. But he is home and he is better than he was. He is happy to be here and not in the hospital and we are happy to have him here! He will get stronger now and adapt to his new life and everything is going to be good, I just know it. We had to put up this ramp to the back door because my dad can't walk up steps yet and the ramp is just amusing me to no end. It is long, really long. Like 30-40 feet long. Metal grate like thing that goes from the driveway across the length of the backyard, over the steps to the back door. Every morning I leave to go to work and I just want to race down it. Until this morning when I realized all the spiders have spread their webs across it. Ugh, I hate walking through webs! But about the ramp, it just makes me wish I was a kid because I would have had endless entertainment as a child with this big old metal ramp in the backyard playing with my friends. The boys are going to love it when they come up, if my mom lets them anywhere near it!

Your Birthdate: January 10

Independent and dominant, you tend to be the alpha dog in most situations.You're very confident, and hardly anything ever shakes you.Mundane tasks tend to drain you - you prefer to be making great plans.You are quite original. When people don't "get" you, it bothers you a lot. Your strength: Your ability to gain respect Your weakness: Caring too much what others think Your power color: Orange-red Your power symbol: Letter X Your power month: October

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

Ah glorious Saturday! I was supposed to work this morning but the remnants of tropical storm Ernesto knocked out the power at the branch so no work! How awesome is that? So I have a three day weekend! No work! Not at the wheel on Sunday either! Holy cow, if I had known, I would have went somewhere. So an unexpected morning to sleep in did a lot for my spirits today. Then Shawn and I went to the movies and saw Talladega Nights. Shit, did I spell that right? Whatever. It was funny. The beginning very funny, the middle ok, the end satisfying. Now the closing credits with the outtakes were great! After the movie, we went to Rocky Run and got some food. Then home. A nice night with good conversation and a funny movie. Of course since I slept in like mad this morning I couldn't fall asleep until after 2am. I got into one of those creative headspaces where I want one of three things. Hmm, dilemma. To mention those three things on a blog where my friends might read it. I guess not. But I know what I am talking about so that is all that matters, I know what mood I am referring to. So I wrote for a while and that always seems to help. I wonder which chakra that is? 1st, 2nd or 3rd? I used to know. Actually I think it is a little bit of all three. I am rambling now and I bet only Mary might know what I am talking about. Hi Mary! And of course as much as I thought about it, I couldn't get myself to open my mouth and say those words. Grr. Maybe one day I will work past that fear. I did email Mike and say something that I am sure he never thought would come out of my mouth. I told him I thought he and KC should get married--because when you get married you get alot of money! Sigh...Alright, this blog no longer makes much sense. Did I mention that I have been sleeping upside down in my bed?