Happy Halloween!

Today is Halloween, a holiday very popular not only with kids, but these days, with adults, too. Here in Denver the big thing seems to be haunted houses, where the object is to scare the living hell out of you. For a price, of course. Looking on the internet, there seems to be dozens of these places around town. And, in addition to a lot of guided ghost tours, this being Denver and all, there are also several "Boos and Brews Haunted Pub Crawls," too. To me, it all seems pretty tiring, not to mention cold out there (I am, after all, feeling damn old these days). In my opinion, it would be best to do all your trick or treating down in Florida, where I took the photograph above years ago of my sister Susan and mother Mary at an arts and crafts show at Riverside Park, in Vero Beach. And no, we did not buy those two ghosts seen in the photograph. They actually wanted money for them. Go figure.

Boulder In The Fall

Boulder is definitely a fun place to be in the fall. Of course, as usual, much of the action takes place on the Pearl Street Mall, as seen in the photograph on the left that I took this past Sunday afternoon. There was a nice mix of University of Colorado students, retired couples walking hand-in-hand, as well as families out and about enjoying the laid-back day. And as can be expected, there were some people in their Halloween costumes, but not too many. Years ago, Boulder was the epicenter for Halloween in Colorado, with the Boulder Mall Crawl taking place each year the Saturday night before Halloween. When the crowd swelled to 300,000 one year, resulting in damage to stores, drunken brawls, and other mischief, Boulderites decided they had had enough. The following Halloween it was announced there would be no official mall crawl, and police established roadblocks to keep everyone not a resident from entering the city. It took a few years, but they eventually were able to stop that annual tradition. When a group wanted to revive the mall crawl a few years ago, the idea was quickly squashed.

Boulder was founded in 1858, when miners arrived at the mouth of Boulder Canyon. When gold was discovered in Boulder Creek the following year, more miners and merchants began to show up, and the city grew from there. Much of Boulder, located beneath the Flatirons, is filled with old, tree-covered Victorian neighborhoods, and the Pearl Street Mall is filled with late 19th Century era commercial buildings. All that, combined with the University of Colorado campus just a few miles away, makes the place a perfect spot to hang out. As my sister Susan and I walked the mall this past Sunday, the patios were filled with people lingering over a late lunch, enjoying the view of the Flatirons. A great place to visit, a mere 45 minutes from Denver, and an even greater place to live, if you've got big bucks. Of course, if you are a college student at CU, you get to live like a native for 4 years, or even longer if you decide to go to graduate school. With a bit of determination, you might even manage to stay in school through late middle age. Worth a try, right?

The Buchtel Bungalow Is For Sale? Say It Ain't So, Joe!

I was driving down East Evans Avenue here in Denver the other day and noticed a "for sale" sign in front of the Buchtel Bungalow, which has been part of the University of Denver since 1927. Yesterday, I made a point to stop and take some photos of it, and in the process met someone waiting to do an inspection of the place for a potential buyer. The home was owned by Henry Buchtel, DU's 3rd chancellor, and built in 1906. As chancellor, Buchtel oversaw the funding of 5 new buildings, saw enrollment double under his tenure, and set DU on the path to becoming a major university. He was also the 13th governor of Colorado and a Methodist minister. His daughter gave the house to DU in 1927, and it has served a number of purposes over the years, including as an event space. When I was the Finance Manager for the DU Bookstore, we once had our holiday party there, and I saw that it was a very nice place indeed.

Back in 2007, Buchtel Bungalow underwent a major renovation and became the official residence of the chancellor. Robert Coombe, the chancellor at the time (and who also, by the way, approved the outsourcing of the DU Bookstore to Follett Higher Education Group in 2012, resulting in the layoff of the entire staff) waxed poetic about how historical the place was, and how now it would be preserved instead of being sold and torn down to make way for a new structure. Buchtel House is located in the University Park neighborhood, just to the east of DU, parts of which were recently made into an historic district by the City of Denver over DU's strong objection. Evidently, due to declining enrollment, DU wanted to sell the house, and it would not bring top dollar if a buyer couldn't level it and build a suitable mansion on the property. And if it is in an historic district, the chances of demolition are slim. So much for caring about its historic past. DU did the same thing years ago when they sold the Phipps Mansion, built in 1933 and located in the Belcaro neighborhood of Denver. It was given to DU in 1964 and became the Phipps Memorial Conference Center. That is where the Summit of the Eight Conference took place back in 1997. Every year, a holiday party would be thrown for DU staff and faculty in the mansion's Tennis Pavilion, and afterwards, everyone who wanted to could walk up to the mansion and take a self-guided tour. The chairs in the conference room, I noted at the time, were marked with plaques telling who sat where at that summit (Bill Clinton, Boris Yeltsin, Tony Blair, etc.) DU sold the place in 2010, no doubt for big bucks. And there is also no doubt what DU's priorities are, if there ever was.

Remembering Rocky Mountain National Park In The Fall

The trees are changing color here in Denver, but up in the mountains they are now past their peak. I had hoped to get up to Rocky Mountain National Park this fall, but never did. I remember years ago my sister Susan, her late husband George, and I would go hiking up there every Autumn. I am pretty sure that I took the photograph above of Susan and George when we were hiking the Glacier Gorge Trail, which starts just before you reach Bear Lake, one of the most popular spots in the park. But as you can see from the photo, the Glacier Gorge Trail is a pretty damned impressive place to hike, too. And by the way, in the photo George is wearing his News Cafe T-shirt, which Susan bought for him when she, our mother Mary, and I drove from Stuart, Florida down to South Beach on one of our visits there. I also bought a News Cafe T-shirt for myself, but after Susan moved in with me after she sold her townhouse in Fort Collins and saw it, she quickly appropriated it for herself. But I am not bitter, because after closing during the pandemic, the News Cafe, a Miami Beach institution, has once again reopened, and so I can pick up another one when we head back there one of these days. Hopefully with Susan paying for it. In any case, I definitely intend to hike the Glacier Gorge Trail next year, without fail. You should too.

Dinner With The DU Bookstore Gang, And Other Friends, Too!

Darrel, my friend and former University of Denver Bookstore Accounts Payable Manager and his wife Linda hosted a dinner for some of us DU Bookstore retirees, along with some other friends, too. The dinner was excellent, and it was fun to get together and hear what everyone has been up to lately. In the photograph above, starting on the bottom left, are my sister Susan, and next to her Fifi and her husband Moise, who are visiting here from Peru and staying with Jake, whose late wife Valarie was the DU Bookstore's Operations Manager back in the day. At the head of the table is Darrel. He and Linda are planning a trip to Germany next year, where their grandson is now living in Berlin. Talk about a fun place to visit! Next to Darrel is Jake, who has been spending time working on his cabin outside Walsenburg, Colorado. Next to Jake is Linda, who cooked a wonderful dinner for us all, and next to her are Chris, the former DU Bookstore Accounts Payable Assistant, and her husband Jim, who are spending a lot of time down in Pueblo helping out Chris' father. Chris brought a huge tray of hors d'oeuvres to the party, which we eagerly devoured while chatting in the living room. A very nice evening with great friends. What could be better?

Monkey Business

As I mentioned in yesterday's blog post, I went to the Denver Zoo Thursday afternoon to take a few photographs, but unfortunately, very few of the animals were willing to pose for a portrait. It appears they were all doing their own thing. The monkey in the photograph on the left was obviously absorbed in its own thoughts, no doubt pondering the meaning of life, why it was imprisoned, and when dinner would be served. Too absorbed to look up and let me take a damned photograph of it. Next time I suppose I could bring some tomatoes to throw and make it look up, but I suspect that might be against zoo regulations.

The orangutan in the photograph on the right was all about nurturing its one-year-old baby. Over-mothering, if you ask my opinion, but what do I know? If you left it to its own devices, it would probably get into all kinds of trouble and wind up becoming a delinquent, and sent to orangutan reform school, which I am sure would be supervised by unpaid Denver Zoo interns. But no problem - they wanted to work at the zoo and were willing to do it for free, so they have to take what they get. And I understand that if interns complain about their assignments, it will be back to cleaning the cages for them. Not a very pretty thought at all.

A Tale Of Two Cats

I went to the Denver Zoo yesterday afternoon to take a few photographs, and I am afraid it was slim pickings. The weather was sunny and mild, but virtually none of the animals would look into my camera lens for a portrait. The exception was one of the tigers, who was pacing his or her cage the entire time I was there. It finally went up onto the ledge lining the cage and on one of its trips back and forth looked down at me as it passed, as seen in the photograph on the left. I even think it was smiling at me. Talk about a positive attitude. Thanks guy!

Contrast that tiger's attitude with the lions in the Predatory Ridge compound. All but one were turned around and sleeping with their backsides to zoo visitors. The one exception was asleep, but suddenly raised its head. I took a photograph hoping to capture it looking me right in the eye, but I'll be damned if it didn't even open its eyes, and immediately went back to sleep. On average, lions sleep 15-20 hours a day, and I definitely can believe it. I still say the zoo should hire interns to go into the lion compound and poke each of them with a big stick, which I am sure would liven things up.