Visiting Doug At The Wizard's Chest

I stopped by the Wizard's Chest, a well known costume and magic store here in Denver, to visit my friend and former University of Denver Bookstore co-worker Doug.  Doug was the textbook buyer at the DU Bookstore.  After Follett Higher Education Group took over the store, he soon found himself doing the work of three people, and decided to take a hiatus from the corporate world to find a little time for himself.  Doug is also a magician, now works at the Wizard's Chest three days a week, and enjoys the job thoroughly.  A lot of former DU Bookstore employees often stop by to see him.  Doug mentioned that Dave B., the marketing coordinator at the store before the Follett takeover and a fellow juggler, stopped by the Wizard's Chest and says he is still running his own little wholesale confections business.  Good to hear!  The photograph above shows Doug (on the left) and Dave B. (on the right) " taking a juggling break at the old DU Bookstore.  Always remember - practice makes perfect!

The Annual (Or So) Sky Sox Game

My friend Mark and I drove down to Colorado Springs last night to see the Colorado Springs AAA baseball team play the New Orleans Baby Cakes (Yes!  The Baby Cakes!).  The Baby Cakes used to be the Denver Zephyrs before the major league Colorado Rockies came to town and forced them to move, so I thought it would be a good game to see.  Minor league baseball is a lot of fun - the players all want to get to the major leagues, and therefore give it their all, and they have lots of fun promotions every half inning.  Plus, you can usually sit in the front few rows at a fraction of the price of major league baseball.  However, last night was Harry Potter Fireworks Night, and so we had to sit in the last row of the infield, but they were still good seats.  It poured like crazy on the drive down from Denver, and I was worried it would be a washout like last year, when we spent the evening at the local On The Border Mexican restaurant instead.  However, the skies cleared by the time we arrived, and it turned out to be a really nice evening.  In the collage above, going clockwise, are myself and Mark at the park, a photograph of a wizard (many of them seemed to be wandering the stands that night), a view of the baseball action, and some kids interacting with the mascot, the Sky Sox Fox.  Sadly, the Sky Sox will be moving to San Antonio in a couple of years, a city of over 2 million people, which is building them a new stadium.  The current stadium seems pretty good to me, but I guess with a larger population base the Sky Sox can probably draw larger crowds.  The organization plans to move one of their Single A teams to Colorado Springs to replace the Sox, and so hopefully things won't change too much.  We'll still always have the Sky Sox Fox and those crazy wizards who seem to infest Colorado Springs.  When are they going to do something about that?

Bourbon Chicken Is Gone - But Not Far...

I took the photograph on the left of the bourbon chicken place as I was driving down Colfax Avenue the other night. Usually, the sidewalk is packed with people waiting for their order, but not that day.  As I looked closer, I saw that the place was closed for good, which was strange, since it was so popular.  You actually had to walk in the street to get around the people there.  It wasn't until yesterday that I spotted their new location further down Colfax Avenue, in a brand new building.  Denver's Bourbon Grill has gone upscale.  Will it ever be the same?  As for their old location, the photograph on the right shows how years ago in Denver, when a residential neighborhood goes commercial and people move to different neighborhoods, ambitious entrepreneurs would build shops in front of the house and open up a store.  There are a number of these structures on Colfax, as well as South Broadway. Looking at the photograph, I have to wonder who lives in those houses?  I assume it was once the owner of the shop, but these days I suspect they are divided up into apartments.  But who knows?

I remember one time walking around the area with my friend Darrel, checking out some of the local color on Colfax, and being offered free samples when we passed by the Bourbon Grill. I must say, it was damn good. In any case, as long as I was doing the bourbon chicken photo, I decided to include a photograph of Darrel that I took the day we got  free samples.  I scanned it from a copy of a Blurb book called Denver People and Places that I made for a photography class I was taking at the time.  In it, Darrel is standing in front of a local Colfax icon called Pete's Kitchen, where we had breakfast that morning.  Darrel at the time was sporting a short-lived beard, but rest assured that it is the same Darrel that appears on other pages of this Blog.

Vicious Circle

I just finished reading Vicious Circle, the latest Joe Pickett novel by Wyoming author C.J. Box.  Box always writes a good story, and this one was especially exciting.  A man with a grudge against Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett targets Joe and his family, and the action never lets up until the final page.  I requested the book from the Denver Public Library, and it took so long to get that I had forgotten I ordered it.  I'm glad I did, and I strongly recommend it.  Pick up a copy at your local bookstore or request it from your library.  Now!

Summer At The Zoo - Part II

Summer at the Denver Zoo can be pretty disappointing to visitors - all the animals seem to want to do is eat and sleep, and the lions in the photograph on the left seem to be deep into the sleeping part of their day.  I took the photo when I first got to the zoo.  I came back later to try and get an "action shot," but they were still sleeping, this time with their backs (by which I mean their rear ends) to us.  The child in the photograph on the left didn't seem to mind, however.  As far as he was concerned, a lion is a lion, asleep or not.  Hey kid - if you were trying to take an interesting photograph you would think differently.

I was glad to see that the orangutan still felt lively, putting on a show for the trio of young boys in the photograph on the right.  I have found that the orangutans are pretty friendly animals, often coming right up to the window of their cage to interact with zoo patrons.  I bet they would make great pets, too, although I am sure the City of Denver probably has some sort of ordinance banning you from keeping them in your apartment.  Rules - got to hate 'em.

Summer At The Zoo

I went to the Denver Zoo Sunday afternoon to take a few Blog photographs, but had to work for a few hours first, and so did not get there until late afternoon.  The weather seemed pretty threatening, and so I hurried to take the photographs before the rains started.  In any case, most of the animals were either inside or sleeping, and  so it was tough to get any good photographs.  The animals I did photograph  seemed pretty depressed, like the monkey in the photo on the left.  Being in prison for life is indeed depressing, and the poor thing in the photo seems to know it.  Sorry about that, guy.

By the time I got to the giraffe compound, all the animals were inside, and I snapped the photo on the right of the baby giraffe looking bereft.  He is just a baby, but seems to realize that he is in jail for life.  I would love to spring him, and the monkey in the photograph above, but would need to put together a team to do it, kind of like Frank Sinatra in the movie Oceans 11.  Since most of the people I know are retired or close to it, it would be a complete geezer operation.  On second thought...

Catching A Live Soccer Game With Mark!

I went to the Colorado Rapids - Vancouver Whitecaps soccer game Saturday night with my friend Mark, who works at the University of Denver's Anderson Academic Commons (the library).  Mark called me up the other day and said he had free tickets to the game, which is my favorite price, and so I readily said yes. When I got to his house to pick him up for the game, he said the free ticket deal fell through, but he was able to buy two tickets for $52 each.  I don't. think I fainted, but certainly felt a little comatose for a while.  However, after a dinner at Chick-fil-A I felt much better.

The price aside, I really did enjoy the soccer game.  It was fast paced and exciting, and the fans were really into the game.  In the seats in front of us was a large group of grade school girls, no doubt members of a youth soccer league.  And behind us were a bunch of teenage girls who were members of the Las Vegas Soccer Club.  One of them seemed to have a crush on the Rapids Irish soccer player Kevin Doyle, and when he scored a goal, she went wild, to the dismay of us sitting directly in front of her.  Mark could have bought $42 seats in the end zone, but since it rained much of the game and those seats were uncovered, I am glad he didn't - we would have been soaked to the core.  It was worth the extra $10 bucks to be dry all night.  In any case, I will be happy to go to another game, as long as the price is a little bit more reasonable.  Do they have bleacher seats in this place?