A DAM Sad Sight To See

Since the last time I have visited, the Denver Art Museum has leveled the building that connects the north wing (the Ponte Building) with the south wing (the Hamilton Building), as the museum begins a two year renovation, as seen in the before and after photographs above. Excuse me if I shed a tear, but the part of the building which is now rubble is where the free buffet table was located during Final Friday events at the museum, not to mention the location of the restaurant that provided the food.  Call me a traditionalist, but I have found my interest in art waning considerably since the elimination of that free buffet table.  This waning interest might also have to do with the fact that the exhibits have not changed one iota since my last few visits: Linking Asia: Art, Trade and Devotion, Stampede (Animals in Art), and Degas, A Passion For Perfection are all still there. With the exception of Degas, these exhibits are simply art work that was previously on display in the now closed Ponte Building.  Last night I decided to walk through the Linking Asia exhibit again, which is really very good, but how many more times can you look at it before you say enough?  The Degas exhibit will of course be wonderful to see, but they charge actual money for that one, and I am waiting to see that exhibit when my sister Susan and brother-in-law George are well enough to attend.  And as for the food issue, one more thing.  The museum arranged for a food truck to park outside, and provided runners to bring the tacos to the lobby for you.  You would actually have to pay money for that, and tip, too. Not quite the same, Denver Art Museum, not quite the same.

Experiencing The Start Of Baseball At Old Chicago

My friend Stuart (seen in the photo on the left) and I had dinner at the Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom in beautiful, exotic Lakewood, Colorado last night to watch the start of the 2018 baseball season. Unfortunately, since Arizona does not observe Daylight Savings Time - heathens! - Colorado is now an hour ahead of that state, and so we missed even the opening pitch of the Colorado Rockies/Arizona Diamondbacks game.  However, it really doesn't matter.  It is just the idea that baseball has finally begun.  And not only that, both the Chicago Cubs and Chicago White Sox won big in their first games of the new season.  Can a subway series be far behind?  Let's play ball!

C.J. Box Appears At The Tattered Cover Bookstore!

My fellow University of Denver alumni C.J. Box appeared at the Tattered Cover Bookstore on East Colfax Avenue Tuesday night to promote his new book The Disappeared.  This newest mystery in the Joe Pickett series finds Wyoming game warden Pickett investigating the disappearance of a wealthy Brutish woman who was vacationing at an exclusive dude ranch in Saratoga, Wyoming.  Box read a few excerpts from the book, and it sounds really good.  And by the way, not only is Saratoga, Wyoming where Box got his first newspaper job, it is also the location of authot Annie Proulx's famous summer home Bird Cloud, often referred to as Bird Cage (at least by me, anyway).  In any case, I am definitely going to put my name on the waiting list at the library for The Disappeared.  You should too.

Dining With Mark At Pepper

I had dinner last night with my friend Mark at Pepper Asian Bistro, located just a block or so from the bookstore where I work on East Colfax Avenue.  Mark participated in the March for Our Lives here in Denver this past Saturday, joining a number of his fellow Columbine High School alumni at that event.  Being the cynic that I am, I doubt it will have much impact in countering the NRA's stand on assault weapons, but I have been wrong before.  Really!  In any case, Mark is excited about his upcoming trip to Leeds, England next week.  He will be visiting friends there and taking in a few soccer games, too.  Surprise!  Mark tells me that Leeds was named one of the top destinations in the world to visit in 2017 by Lonely Planet Magazine.  I wonder how much Leeds had to pay them to say that?  Just kidding.  Kind of.  And by the way, the food at Pepper is wonderful, and I recommend it highly.  Have a great time in the U.K. Mark!

The Blue Bear

Denver has a lot of public art, and much of it, if I say so myself, is pretty stupid.  I have to wonder how much the city paid for that big pile of red beans sitting by the bike path? However, The Blue Bear by the late Lawrence Argent, a former University of Denver professor, is an exception.  It's official title is "I see what you mean," and features a huge blue bear peering into the Denver Convention Center.  It is fun, playful, and a favorite with the kids.  I was reminded of this as I walked out of the Denver Travel and Adventure Show last Sunday, and I took the photograph on the left.

When I got outside, I decided what the heck, and took another photograph out there of the bear. Like I said before, the bear is a big hit with kids, and all the children on the light rail train were very excited to see it as we approached the convention center that morning. Sadly, the artist, Lawrence Argent, died this past November due to complications following a liposuction procedure.  And although I know it has nothing to do with art, I have to say I am not a big fan of elective surgery.  My sister's best friend when she worked in admissions at the University of Illinois Medical School decided to get a free nose job, and died from an aneurysm on the operating table.  A friend in Vermont went up to Montreal for Lasik surgery, and has never seen quite right again.  And the woman down the hall from me at my condo went in for a routine colonoscopy, something was punctured, and she died. But enough horror stories.  At least Argent was able to leave a legacy for people to remember him by.  All I hope is that I don't meet one of those things in the mountains one day.

The Denver Travel Show

As I mentioned in yesterday's blog, I spent the entire day this past Saturday at the Denver Travel Show.  In addition to speakers like Rick Steves and Peter Greenberg, there were booths throughout the convention floor promoting various countries, cities, resorts, and cruise lines.  It reminded me a lot of the National Association of College Stores annual conventions, which I attended when I was the general book buyer for the University of Denver Bookstore.  In other words, walking around there was just as tiring, and I needed to sit down. I wound up sitting in front of the Global Beats Stage, where the Flamenco Underground were performing, as seen in the photograph on the left.  The act opened with the Spanish guitar player and singer/ moderator performing a Spanish tune.  He asked if that made the crowd want to visit Spain.  They responded in the positive, and he said it did for him, too - it has been a long time.

Flamingo Underground, he said, performs up and down the I-25 corridor throughout Colorado and New Mexico.  The flamingo dancers performed a number of dances, and after each one three little children would run up to a statuesque Spanish beauty and to the head of the troupe, an older woman, before being shooed off back behind the curtain.  I wondered if they were the mother and grandmother, and if one of the men in the troupe was the father.  If so, what a hard life it must be, performing up and down the I-25 corridor, especially with three kids.  I bet they don't do much traveling, which is ironic, since they were performing at a travel show in order to get people in the mood for traveling.   The next dancer (in the photograph on the right) comes from India, and has taught in the U.S. for the past 20 years.  Considering how expensive it is to travel to India these days, I'll bet she doesn't back home much either.  I'll bet life might be a grind for here, too.

Speaking of grinding routines, there was a camel inside the exhibition hall, giving free rides to all the visitors.  It was just a short circular loop, past the men's and women's restrooms and back again, so it wasn't really too hard on the camel.  Considering that camels are often sold for meat, and often forced to carry both people and supplies through the desert, this gig must have been pretty easy for it. Which is probably why it was smiling at me when I took his picture.  It has actually found the good life here in the U.S.A.   I understand, completely, bro.

Rick Steves - Superstar?

I took the light rail train down to the Denver Convention Center yesterday morning to hear Rick Steves give a talk about European travel.  I arrived 15 minutes before the doors opened, and still the line waiting to get in was huge.  Once 10 o'clock arrived, the crowd rushed to where his presentation would be, and I was lucky to find a seat  Most of the audience was my age or older, and so I guess my friend and former DU Bookstore co-worker Doug was right when he said that Rick Steves was the Lawrence Welk of travel.  In any case, after his very informative talk, I tried to get a photograph, but the crowd around him was so big that I couldn't get near him.  I did attend his second talk on taking cruises and tour buses, and took a photo of him afterwards, but he kept looking down as he signing autographs, and so it didn't turn out the way I wanted.  Peter, my friend and office-mate at the bookstore where I work, thinks I am a Rick Steves groupie, and was sure I would be arrested for hassling him.  Pete will be happy to know that I encountered Rick going into the men's room after his talk and didn't even try to engage him in conversation at the urinal.  You're welcome, Rick!

Dinner With The Bonnie Brae Gang

I had dinner at the Bonnie Brae Tavern last night with the "Bonnie Brae Gang," as I tend to think of them.  In the photograph above (from left to right) are Kay, her husband Dale, their son Mark - who works at the University of Denver's Anderson Academic Commons (the library), Bill, the former Operations Coordinator at the University of Denver Bookstore, and his wife Renee.  Both the food and the conversation was very good.  Much of the talk centered around travel.  Bill and Renee recently returned from a mid-winter trip to Norway, which they said was fantastic, while Mark will be traveling to Leeds (Leeds?), England in a couple of weeks to visit friends and take in a few soccer games.  Kay and Dale took a cruise down the Danube not too long ago, while I myself have taken quite a few trips up to beautiful, exotic Fort Collins, Colorado.  And just what is wrong with this picture?  In any case, good to see you all again, guys!

Remembering Willie...

I took the above photograph of my brother-in-law George's brother Willie and his family many years ago in front of their home in South Miami.  My sister Susan (seen above on the left) and I were visiting my mother Mary in Stuart, Florida, and we drove down to Miami to visit them one weekend.  Willie and his wife Nancy were very gracious, and we got to visit with their 3 children, too.  Not too long after this, Hurricane Andrew came along and destroyed the entire neighborhood, including their house.  They lived in a trailer in their driveway for several years while the house was being rebuilt.  Sadly, Willie did not take care of his health, and did not visit a doctor when he developed some scary symptoms.  He passed away from cancer not too many years after their house was rebuilt, leaving a young family on their own.  The moral - see your doctor on a regular basis.

Remembering The Lowenstein

I have been working late a lot lately, and when I come up the stairs from my office at the local Denver bookstore where I work, the lights are on and the room resembles the theater lobby it used to be, as seen in the photograph on the left..  The building started out as the Bonfils Theater, later became the Lowenstein, and after standing vacant for a long while, was turned into the bookstore where I now work.

As a matter of fact, back in 1981 my fiancee Lisa was one of the "three little maids" in a production of Gilbert and Sullivan's Mikado that took place in the Lowenstein Theater.  I attended every rehearsal of that production, as well as attending opening night.  And as I recall, I was NOT invited to the cast party.  Despite this show of devotion, Lisa still left me after 5 years. Go figure.  I even took many photographs of the production, such as the one on the right (Lisa is in the middle, and Yum Yum, the star of the show, is on the left).  The production made quite an impact on me, especially the Mikado himself.  I have always remembered his famous line:  Let the punishment fit the crime.   Which always seemed to be a beheading. That line has come back into my mind through the years during many situations.  And no - I am not a bitter man.

Spring Is Here!

I took the above photograph Monday morning on my way to work as the bookkeeper at a local Denver bookstore.  It snowed a bit Sunday night, and snow still covered the ground and trees in the morning, but yesterday, on the first day of spring,  it was warm and sunny.  I am glad to see that Mother Nature is finally respecting the seasons.  Tomorrow the temperature will hit 75 degrees.  Of course, March and April are supposed to be our snowiest months, but in recent years the spring snowfalls have been few and far between, and season to date Denver has had less that half it's normal snowfall.  Could this be a sign of global warming?  On the other hand, they have had snow up the wazoo back east, so it is probably just La Nina or El Nino or one of those damn Ninos just playing tricks on us again.

The Goods In Winter

As I have mentioned before, there is a restaurant next door to the local Denver bookstore where I work called The Goods, and in addition to the front entrance, there is also a connecting door from the bookstore to the restaurant.  The place has a large patio, which is is popular during the summer, but not so much in the winter.  I took the above photograph one morning before they opened, and as as you can see, it did not look very promising for a patio crowd that day, what with snow on the ground and all. In any case, the restaurant does a good business when there are big events going on in the complex, such as the Denver International Film Festival.  And on St. Patrick's Day I was working in my office, which is located in the basement directly below the restaurant, and could here all kinds of whooping, cheers, and laughter, and so I definitely think they made their rent that afternoon.  Keep on keeping on, guys.

An Opening Day Colorado Rockies Ripoff

The major league baseball season starts in just 10 days, but the big event will be Opening Day.  Since Opening Day has become such a popular event here in Denver, the Colorado Rockies have decided to raise the price of the seats to unconscionable levels.  The cheapest seat is now $110, and is in the Rockpile, the worst seat in the house.  Watching a game from there is like watching it from another time zone.  Any other game, the seat would cost you $5.00, but in the spirit of true greed, the Rockies have raised it by 2200%. What a crock.  And by the way, the photograph above was taken on an Opening Day when the price of a ticket was reasonable. Photo-shopped into it (from left to right) are former Rockies great Eric Young and current Rockies players Carlos Gonzales and Charlie Blackmon, taken during a salute to the fans on the last day of that season. I also want to add that to attend the Chicago Cubs Opening Day it would cost you $64.00, still pricey but doable, and to attend the Chicago Whate Sox Opening Day, you can buy an upper deck seat behind home plate for $46.  God bless those Chicago White Sox.  Oh to be back in Chicago.

The Woman In The Woods

I just finished an advanced reading copy of John Connolly's new thriller, The Woman in the Woods, and was very impressed with it.  The story follows Portland, Maine private investigator Charlie Parker as he tries to find out what happened to the infant child of a woman whose body was discovered buried in a shallow grave deep in the Maine woods.  The book started out as a straight mystery, but then supernatural elements began to appear.  This combination of the mystery genre and the supernatural actually works, and Connolly delivers an engrossing and fast paced story.  The book is not scheduled to be released until June, but the book lists 16 previous Charlie Parker novels (I am amazed I never read one before), so I strongly suggest you start with them.  I know I am. And write down The Woman in the Woods so you can remember to pick up a copy in June.

St. Patrick's Day Nostalgia

Today is St. Patrick's Day, and every year on this occasion I think of my Uncle Jack (my mother Mary's brother) and his wife Helen, seen on their wedding day in the photograph on the left.  St. Patrick's Day was their favorite holiday, especially Helen.  She was very proud to be Irish.  I remember one time, after my Uncle Jack had passed away, she and her nieces and nephews drove from Chicago to Miami to see Notre Dame play in the Orange Bowl.  They stopped only once - to visit my mother in Stuart, Florida - and then drove back non-stop after the game.  Talk about proud to be Irish. And by the way, Jack and Helen got married here in Denver. During WWII, Jack was in training at Lowry Air Force Base (now an upscale Denver neighborhood with the Wings Over the Rockies Musueum in the middle of it) before being shipped off to the Pacific, and Helen traveled out here from Chicago so they could marry before he left.  That has nothing to do with being Irish of course, just a fact.

Speaking Of Zoo Babies...

As I mentioned in yesterday's blog, I visited the Denver Zoo Sunday afternoon and photographed Dobby the baby giraffe, who recently celebrated his first birthday. However, I would be remiss if I didn't also photograph the baby gorilla Whimsie Adepa, which was born in February of 2016.  That makes it 2 years old, but to me it looks much younger (see photograph on left).  I wonder if the zoo is feeding it enough?  Perhaps a daily milkshake might help.  And who named it Whimsie Adepa, I wonder?  What is wrong with naming it Bob, or Al, or something like that?

And just across the room from the gorillas is the Orangutan cage.  Unlike most of the other animals, the orangutans, especially the one in the photograph on the right, are very interested in zoo visitors.  The orangutan in the photo on the right likes to go up to the window to interact with everyone, then leap back and cover itself with a blanket, peaking out from under it.  Now that would make a great pet, although if if kept it in my condo, I would probably have to clean more often.  Maybe.

Spoiling The Giraffe

Dobby, the Denver Zoo's baby giraffe, turned one year old last week, and was given a big birthday party, complete with presents and special treats.  Everyone is crazy about Dobby, but is he being brought up right? Will he become a spoiled brat?  It was a very pleasant, late winter Sunday, and so I was surprised to see that the giraffes were not outside in their compound, but inside, munching away at their food.  Was 49 degrees too cold for them, even with the sun warming things up?  Even I thought it was very pleasant out. And as you can see in the above photograph, Dobby was being hand fed by zoo visitors.  Spoiled, spoiled spoiled, I say.

A Secret Fort Collins Greenspace

As regular blog readers know, I have been driving up to Fort Collins a lot lately, since both my brother-in-law George and sister Susan have been experiencing health issues. Since neither has much energy these days, as soon as I arrive I am given the task of walking their dog Blackberry (the other dog - Tutu - stays inside and uses a "wee" pad.  Don't ask me why).  And so the other day I took Blackberry to the open space just to the north of their townhouse, which used to be a farm. It is a fairly large piece of land, with a high fence on the west side shielding it from Shields Avenue (no pun intended), and a split-rail fence separating it from the backyards of the homes on the east.  It evidently belongs to an older couple that used to farm the land and are now retired, but still want to hold onto the property.  It remains a kind of secret park, known only to the neighbors and a hell of a lot of geese.  In any case, Blackberry liked it too, frequently rolling around on the ground and then running about.  It wasn't until I got back to Susan and George's townhouse that I found out that Blackberry had been rolling around in manure.  And you ask why I don't own a dog?

Roddy MacInnes Appears At The Tattered Cover!

My old University of Denver photography professor, Roddy MacInnes, appeared at the Tattered Cover Bookstore last night to speak about his new book, Family Album.  It is a photo essay about both his own life and the life of a North Dakota native whose family photo album he found for sale in an antique store back in 1993, and which became one his major photo projects.  Roddy gave a great talk, and it was fun seeing him again after several years.  I must say, however, that the next time he goes to the barber, he should tell him or her not to cut his hair quite so short.  Good to see you again, Roddy!

My Father's Birthday

Today is March 12th, which would have been my father Nelson's 109th birthday if he were alive today.  The photograph above shows him posing along the boat basin of Circle Bay, the condominium complex next door to the Stuart, Florida condo my parents moved to back in 1976.  My father was a dentist in the South Side Brainerd neighborhood of Chicago all his life, and just hated it.  He was finally able to retire in 1975, right after I finished college, and the following year he and my mother Mary moved to Stuart.  They both just loved it there, and although my father lived only another 7 years before he passed away, it was a very happy 7 years. My mother continued to live in Stuart for almost 30 years.  My sister Susan and I still own the condo, and have rented it out until I can start receiving social security and start living the good life, commuting back and forth between Denver and Stuart.  But I digress - Happy Birthday Dad!

Speaking Of Victorians...

I pass the Victorian house in the photograph on the left every day on my way to work at a local Denver bookstore chain.  It looks especially appealing in the morning, with the sunlight shining on it, but since I am always behind schedule, I have never had the time to stop and take a photograph.  However, yesterday was Saturday, and I did have a few minutes to spare before a meeting with my boss at 10 A.M., and so took the photo.  It would have looked even better in the 8:00 A.M. sunlight, but life would be better if I won the lottery, too.  Ain't gonna happen.  In any case, I think the owners have done a great job restoring the place, which is just a block south of the Victorian on Josephine Street that I featured on yesterday's blog.  As I have said before - I think - I love to look at and tour Victorian homes, but would never like to live in one.  Back when I was married, my then wife Lisa house-sat for her friend Mary Ellen, a fellow member of the Opera Colorado chorus.  The house was a Victorian located just a few blocks north of Denver's Washington Park - no doubt worth a fortune now - and we stayed there overnight.  Talk about cold - no matter where you set the thermostat, the place was freezing.  And to take a shower, you pulled a curtain around a semi-circular rod and had to hold on to a hose to take that shower.  Give me modern, "Soviet style" buildings like the condo I live in any day.

A Change In Ownership At Bosworth House

I took a short walk on my lunch break yesterday afternoon and noticed that a lot of work was being done on what once called the Bosworth House, a Victorian Mansion at the corner of 14th and Josephine Streets here in Denver (and seen in the photograph above).  For years the place was owned by the Assistance League of Denver and used as their headquarters.  I toured the place once during one of the annual Open Doors Denver weekends (an open house event for the city's notable buildings) and was very impressed with the place.  About a year ago I noticed a "For Sale" sign in front of it, and seeing all that activity yesterday, I guessed the place had been sold.  A little research on the internet found that this was indeed true.  Bosworth House, built in 1896, has been purchased for $1,800,000 by Unbridled Holdings, a company that has bought other Denver mansions and carved them into office suites.  I have no doubt that is exactly what will happen to this place, too.  What a shame I didn't investigate earlier and make a counter offer - it would have been just a block away from work, perfect for me and my staff of servants.  Be sure to check out the details of the mansion at http://www.fullerre.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/1400-Josephine-St.-Brochure1.pdf?KeepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&width=800.

Denver Traffic

The traffic here in Denver is not pretty.  When I was driving up to Fort Collins almost every day last month, an hour and ten minute drive in normal times often took almost two hours during rush hour.  And on the weekends, traffic seems bad all the time.  Fortunately, I live in a condo in south central Denver - close to both work and downtown - and very seldom have to deal with this kind of traffic.  However, now I know what everybody else is complaining about.  Living in the heart of Denver is very desirable these days, and more and more apartments and townhouses are being constructed, all of it very pricey.  The place next door was recently renovated, and they have a sign out in front advertising studio apartments for "only $1,000."  Give me a break.  No wonder people are starting to move out of Denver, hoping to find higher salaries and a lower cost of living.  It looks like trouble in paradise.

Spring Training Update

Spring training baseball games were in full swing this past weekend, and I decided to take full advantage by watching as many games as I could.  I was automatically charged $115 by mlb.com to renew my subscription, but unlike last year, decided to not cancel the subscription.  Since I had originally planned to retire at the end of this month, I figured I would get a lot more use out of the subscription, but even after having to delay my retirement to the end of August, I decided it was worth it.  Just watching those spring games brought back memories of how laid back, enjoyable, and hopeful those spring games are.  Now I will be able to follow the Chicago White Sox and Chicago Cubs throughout the season.  I even intend to follow the San Francisco Giants this year. After all, San Francisco is my favorite city after Chicago (sorry Miami), and my ex-wife Lisa lives there.  She even tells me she attends Giants games, no doubt due to my corrupting influence so many years ago.  And so what the hell, as I often says these days.  Let's play two, as Ernie Banks used to say.

Dark Night Of The Soul

I just finished Dark Night of the Soul, another "Murph the cab driver" novel by the late Denver author Gary Reilly.  This time Murf is suspected not only of bank robbery, but assaulting an elderly woman who tried to pay her cab fare with $8.00 worth of pennies.  Once again, the book features a lot of local Denver color, and is written in a breezy, lighthearted style. I strongly recommend these stories to anyone looking for a quick, humorous read, especially if you live in the Mile High City.  The only downside to these novels is that Reilly never saw any of his books in print before he passed away.  Still another example of life's little ironies.

Equal Time Nostalgia

Since I featured my maternal grandparents yesterday, I guess it is only fair to feature my paternal grandparents Claire and Fleta today. My sister Susan really got to know them well, although by the time I came along, my Grandfather Hoyt was retired and they were spending the winter in California each year.  The photograph on the left show them at an anniversary celebration, superimposed upon a photograph I took of their house in the South Side Brainerd neighborhood of Chicago on my trip back there a few years ago.  The place looks a little worse for wear these days, but when my grandparents lived there the front and backyards were filled with flowers - my grandfather was a great gardener.  My father Nelson had his dental office in what was once the front bedroom of the house, and the front porch was his waiting room.  After work each day he was able to visit with them before coming home, which I think was a really nice thing.

Grandfather Hoyt worked for the Rock Island Railroad at their offices on the South Side, and when he retired was able to spend the winters in Newport Beach, California.  In the photograph on the right, my grandparents are posing on the rooftop of what I assume is the place they rented there.  This was before Newport Beach became the haunt of the rich.  When they decided to move to California full-time, they found a very pleasant trailer park in nearby Costa Mesa to live in, and my grandfather continued his gardening there, too.  They both spent many happy years there, but I have never considered them to be "Californians, just transplants..

The Nostalgia Corner

I went up to Fort Collins a number of times over the past few weeks to visit my sister Susan, who has been laid low by a combination of the flu and a low sodium condition.  We have done a lot of reminiscing during these visits, especially about our grandparents.  On our mother's side, our grandparents were Louise and Bill Spillard, seen in the photograph on the left on the occasion of their 50th wedding anniversary back on October 5th, 1958. I wrote about my Grandmother Spillard's family about a week or so ago.  My Grandfather Spillard was the black sheep of his family, a very proper clan who lived in Elgin, Illinois. He left home early and became a song plugger in Chicago. Later he worked as a narcotic agent for the government, for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II, and finally as an arson investigator in Chicago.

Grandfather Spillard just loved to schmooze with politicians, and was quite the raconteur. My sister tells me he did a lot of work raising money for what were then called the poor houses. He even wrote a book about his adventures as a narcotic agent called Needle in a Haystack, which I am ashamed to say I have yet to read.  But I definitely will - after all, it has only been 65 years.  Give me some time. And by he way, the photograph on the right was taken at my grandparents 60th anniversary party, held at our house in South Suburban Country Club Hills, Illinois back in 1968.

A Morning With The Mile High Magpies

My friend Mark - who works at the University of Denver's Anderson Academic Commons (the library) - and I went to watch the Newcastle - Liverpool soccer match yesterday morning at the Hogshead Brewery on West 29th Street, on the border of Denver's Highlands and Sloans Lake communities.  This is the hangout of the Mile High Magpies (seen in the photograph on the right), which follow the Newcastle Magpies soccer club. The game started at 10:30 A.M. (5:30 P.M. Newcastle time).  I asked for coffee, but all they had was a coffee style beer - a morning beer?  What the hell, I thought - it was 5:30 P.M. in Newcastle, after all.  The group was a very genial collection of Americans and British ex-pats.  Hogshead advertises that it brews a collection of traditional English craft ales, and judging by the accent of the bartender, I must assume that is correct.  It was a very pleasant space, with enthusiastic people, and was an enjoyable way to spend the morning.

Newcastle lost the game to Liverpool 2 to nil, as they say.  Mark tells me that while Liverpool is in second place in the Premier League, Newcastle is in 17th place, and so the outcome was not a surprise.  However, judging by the enthusiasm of the crowd in attendance, I suspect these are the Chicago White Sox fans of the Premium League.  They are used to hopeless situations.  In any case, after the game, Mark and I drove the 2 blocks south to Sloans Lake and then headed for Chick-fil-A for lunch, where Mark told me about his plans for his upcoming trip to Leeds in less than a month.  Why Leeds you may ask?  Mark has a number of friends there, and a few more not too far away, and hopes to do a lot of visiting with them while there.  Much of his plans revolve around attending soccer matches in both Leeds and Newcastle (surprise!).  I took the photograph on the left of Mark while he was articulating his soccer plans.  Mark, as you can tell, is obsessed with soccer, but he actually did NOT attend the Colorado Rapids - Toronto Raptors game last month, which started at 8:00 P.M Denver time with a temperature at kickoff of 19 degrees Fahrenheit.  So there is still hope for him.

Another First Friday

Last night I attended the monthly art walk on Santa Fe Drive here in Denver, and was disappointed to see that most of the art on exhibit was the same as last month, and the art that was new was not very good.  It wasn't very crowded this month, either, as can be seen in the photograph on the left. On the other hand, the last several months I have been arriving pretty early, so maybe I am just missing the crowd.  On the other hand, the patio of the Renegade Brew Pub was packed, and so perhaps the art lovers are just shifting their priorities this month.  Can't blame them there.

The most interesting sight of the evening was the guy who has turned his Volkswagen Beetle into a coffee bar. In the photograph on the right he is fixing up a coffee drink for a customer. It is definitely tight quarters in there, but he seems to be making it work.  But does this mean that the chains will be getting into the act, too?  Will Starbucks be unleashing a fleet of Smart Cars throughout the city, pulling over to the curb to serve customers who hail them, just like the ice cream trucks of my youth?  All I know is that suddenly I have a craving for a Good Humor chocolate bar, but I haven't seen one of those trucks in years. Bummer.

Back At Old Chicago With Stuart

I had dinner with my friend Stuart (seen in the photograph above) at the Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom on South Colorado Boulevard here in Denver last night.  As usual, the conversation revolved around Donald Trump and his reality TV style administration. Neither Stuart nor I are Trump fans, of course, although we both have family who are avid Trump supporters - a very divisive time for both families and America as a whole these days.  But more importantly, I must say that I really like the tavern thin sausage pizza that Old Chicago has started serving.  It is the closest thing to Aurelio's pizza that I have tasted here in Denver since that Chicago icon closed it's outlet here.  I recommend it heartily, especially to ex-Chicagoans looking for a decent pizza here in Denver.  You could do much worse, let me tell you.  And I have, but let's not go there.

Retirement? Not Quite Yet...

Today is March 1st.  For a few years now I have been trying to figure out how soon I could retire from the local Denver bookstore where I work - the entrance of which can be seen in the above photograph - and start living the good life.  I finally decided on the last Friday of March, 2018, which would have made this the month I retire. However, December was so hectic that I was not able to discuss this with my boss.  By the time I did, she felt it would take until August or September to train someone else to take over my job, and asked me to stay until then. What can I say?  I agreed.  After all, the condo in Florida is rented, so I can't go down there, and I will now receive a few more dollars in social security money when I do file.  Plus, I will get to spend one more summer walking from work to downtown to catch the light rail train home.  It will be like a farewell tour. One day I can walk down Colfax (15th Street) and say farewell to all the homeless there, and the next day walk down 17th Street and say farewell to all the hipsters (the two groups hang out within two blocks of each other but are, of course, world's apart). Sounds like a plan to me.