Discussing Baseball Over Lunch And Coffee With Stuart

I had a late lunch yesterday afternoon with my friend Stuart at the Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom in Lakewood, Colorado, a suburb just to the west of Denver that epitomizes everything that is wrong with suburbia today. But as I have said before, you can't actually see Lakewood from the bar at Old Chicago, and so no problem. And I am here to report that Stuart is actually very excited about his team, the Chicago Cubs, who are solidly in first place in the National League Central with the 3rd best record in baseball. Stuart was raised on the North Side of Chicago and has thus been indoctrinated into cheering for that team, sometimes referred to as "those loveable losers," who I am sure will once again snatch defeat from the jaws of victory at the very end of the season and once again break the hearts of Cubs fans everywhere. I myself am from the South Side Brainerd neighborhood of Chicago and have no worries about my playoffs hopes for the White Sox being dashed. We Sox fans always expect disaster, but happily, as of today, the Chicago White Sox are one game above .500 and one game out of first place in the American League Central. After several years of futility, this is great news. It means they are actually once again a fully functioning baseball team, playoffs or no playoffs. You can watch a game and reasonably assume they have a 50-50 chance of winning, which during a rebuilding process is a great thing. As for our adopted hometown team, the Colorado Rockies, they are 10 games under .500 and 3 and 7 over their last 10 games. The Rockies are also in a rebuilding mode and are now under the management of actual baseball people, but are still a long way from the playoffs, or for that matter, playing .500 baseball. And by the way, I took the photograph above of Stuart smiling happily in front of the Barnes and Noble, where we stopped for coffee after Old Chicago, no doubt with of visions of World Series victories dancing in his head.

Wearing Your Antlers Proudly, And Why Not?

When I was at the Denver Botanic Gardens this past weekend, I could not help but notice that one of the visitors walking around enjoying the ambiance had antlers on her head, as seen in the photograph on the left. Talk about an interesting family lineage. Of course, if those antlers are not natural, I suppose she could be a Druid, proudly showing off her dedication to that pagan religion, although the summer solstice is still over 5 weeks away. That is when those Druids gather in Denver's Washington Park and at midnight perform their ancient rituals, including human sacrifice. Is that covered by the First Amendment? I'll have to check. Just goes to show that Denver is now indeed a cosmopolitan city, not just the hick cowtown it was when I first moved here back in 1981. Progress, right?

The Denver Botanic Garden's Spring Plant Sale

My sister Susan and I attended the Spring Plant Sale this past Saturday afternoon at the Denver Botanic Gardens, a section of which can be seen in the above photograph of a pond with huge spooky faces hovering over it. This is an annual sale, the best part of which is that admission that day is always free. I myself just liked walking around the gardens and enjoying the day, although Susan pointed out that nothing was in bloom yet, and insisted we go back later this summer when we will have to pay actual money to get in. As you can probably tell, I am not a big plant person. Years ago, I did used to attend this sale religiously when it was the Denver Botanic Garden's Plant and Book Sale. Back then, they had thousands of used books on sale in the main building, all at very reasonable prices. Then, a number of years back, they stopped selling books, citing the cost of storing them between annual sales. My late friend Valarie, whom I worked with at the University of Denver Bookstore, put together a similar annual book sale for the Jefferson County Action Center's Beautiful Junk Sale, famous for its final hour, when you could fill an entire shopping bag with books for $10. However, that ended too for the same reason: storing the books before and after the sale. In any case, the Denver Botanic Gardens is a very pretty place, with ponds and waterfalls and wonderful landscaping. Just be sure to go there when those damn flowers are in bloom.

Watching Tottenham Play Leeds With Both The Tottenham AND Leeds Supporter Groups!

My friend Mark - seen in the photograph above - and I went to Ester's Pub here in Denver yesterday afternoon to watch a Premier League soccer match between the Tottenham Hotspurs and Leeds United with both the Colorado Spurs and Leeds United Colorado supporter groups. Tottenham is desperately trying to avoid relegation down to the Champions League (the AAA of English soccer) and every win is important. And I must say, it was a very exciting and hard-fought contest, ending in a 1-1 tie. It was really fun to have fans of both teams in the same room, voicing their opinions: "That was definitely a penalty," "No way was that a penalty," etc. Three teams will be relegated down to the Champions League, and with the tie, Tottenham is 2 points above that relegation zone. I do understand how this system motivates teams to win and owners to continuously strive to improve their teams, but I am very glad that it is not used in Major League Baseball. If it was, the Chicago White Sox and Colorado Rockies would never get back to the big leagues again. Thank heaven for small favors.

The First Annual RiNo Street Fair!

This past Saturday the first ever RiNo Street Fair took place. The River North Art District, RiNo for short, is the ground zero neighborhood for hipsters here in Denver. It was originally a factory and warehouse district, and when Lower Downtown, just to the south, became too expensive, artists moved their studios and art galleries to the much cheaper RiNo neighborhood. And then, of course, hipsters discovered it and moved there in droves. The neighborhood is now filled with expensive new apartment buildings, brew pubs, upscale shops and hotels, and colorful street art wherever you look. The street fair was held on Larimer Street between 28th and 31st. Larimer still had many Victorian commercial buildings, and so is pretty vibrant and walkable. But just to the west, large new apartment buildings stand next to empty or still operating warehouses and factories, and there are still plenty of vacant lots waiting to be developed, which to me makes the area pretty unattractive. But hipsters seem to love it. As for all those artists, RiNo is now pretty pricey, and to me those galleries and studios seem to be few and far-between these days.

In any case, the street fair featured 100 artisan booths, food trucks, pickleball (why not?), and craft beer from Ratio Beerworks, Our Mutual Friend, Bierstadt Lagerhaus, and Odell's Brewing. And this event was very well attended. I enjoyed walking around and checking everything out, but have to say that RiNo doesn't really need an organized street fair, since the neighborhood is more or less a 24/7 street fair anyway. There are always food trucks and vendors selling merchandise on Larimer Street, and the brew pubs have patios that extend to the street, making patrons feel part of the action. And there is an alley, seen in the photograph on the right, located behind the Denver Central Food Hall, that is filled with bars, restaurants, and esoteric kinds of shops, with the walls on either side covered with murals. People are always walking up and down and hanging out in that alley, creating their own impromptu street fair. A fun neighborhood to visit, but as for living there? Having an apartment located next door to fenced-in former warehouses or huge vacant lots waiting to be redeveloped would be tough to get used to. Of course, real estate agents refer to that as local color. And seems to work.

Mother's Day 2026!

Today is Mother's Day, and my sister Susan and I were talking just yesterday about how much we both wished our mother Mary was still here with us. When our father Nelson retired back in 1976, they moved from the Chicago area to Stuart, Florida, and they both loved it there. We visited them in Florida as often as possible, and after my father passed away in 1983, our mother stayed on in Stuart, telling us she had more friends there than at any other time in her life. Although she can't be with us today, we still have great memories of our time with her, and for that we are grateful. And by the way, I took the photograph above of mother in front of the House of Refuge Museum on Hutchinson Island, just a few miles south of Stuart Beach, sometime in the early 2000s, a favorite place of ours to hang out and enjoy looking at the ocean. Happy Mother's Day, Everyone!

Friday Afternoon On The Boulder Mall

It was a perfect day up in Boulder, Colorado yesterday afternoon, sunny and warm after a few days of cold and snow, and so everyone was out and about on the Boulder Mall enjoying the day. The Boulder Bookstore, located at the west end of the mall and seen in the photograph on the left, was doing good business, and there were several musicians in front of it, entertaining the people walking past. And even though commencement took place last Saturday, there were still a couple of coeds in their graduation gowns walking down the mall having their photographs taken by relatives. Hopefully, they own those gowns and didn't just rent them. Otherwise, they will be looking at a visit from the rental gown police.

As usual, there were a fair number of people on the patio of the Bohemian Biergarten, no doubt having a beer and a late lunch, as seen in the photograph on the right. This place specializes in Central European cuisine, and most if not all of their draft beers are imported from Europe. I have walked past this place many times and really like that patio, but have never actually stopped there, mainly because they specialize in Central European cuisine and most if not all of their draft beers are imported from Europe. After all, right next door is The Post, which specializes in fried chicken. They also brew their own beer and have a happy hour from 2:00 until 6:00 featuring $5 pints. How can you top that? 

At the east end of the Boulder Mall is Postino, which also has a very nice and very popular outdoor patio, mainly because of a happy hour which features $6 glasses of wine between 3:00 and 5:00 every day. The rest of the time those glasses of wine sell anywhere from $11 to $15, and so I understand why those bar stools, seen in the photograph on the left, are always occupied. On the other hand, they only have 3 beers on tap, the snobs. What's the deal with that? In any case, it was a great day for a walk on the mall, not to mention a great day for people watching, too. It is Boulder, after all.