S'Wonderful

I drove down to Denver today to have lunch with my sister at the Punchbowl Social in the old air traffic control tower at Stapleton. (Tip- if you are a grown up without any children, eat in the bar on the second level.)  After that we went to Rare Finds Warehouse which has furniture and an eclectic bunch of stuff.  We spend almost a couple of hours wandering around looking at everything. And then I saw this:

So now I am a proud owner of my own piece of Denver history.  This five-loaf pan still has bits of crust attached around the top edges.  The darn thing weighs about 10 pounds.

Okay, Venus? Okay, Steve. Right, Let's Go!

-Opening lines of Fireball XL5

Why does this supposed high tech spy device that Homeland Security says is being used by bad guys to track phones in Washington DC look like something built by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson for one of their Supermarionation puppet series?

Drum Roll, Please

I went down to the basement and found Belle's lobster doing a handstand.  Now, is he showing off or is Belle punishing him?

Hola Amigos!

Estoy aprendiendo español. No hay tiempo para bloguear hoy.
(I am learning Spanish.  No time for blogging today.)

First Full Day Of Summer, People! Yeaaa!

(Sigh) I can only dream of the beach.

It's National Go Barefoot Day!

From L. Frank Baum's "Ozma of Oz," illustrated by John R. Neill.

National Go Barefoot Day is observed on June 1.  This day is an opportunity to kick off your shoes and run barefoot through the cool grass! More importantly, it is a day to help support a charity that provides millions of underprivileged children all around the world with shoes.
-National Go Barefoot Day website.

Global Warming Brings February Flowers

Outside the Loveland, CO main library today.

At Heart I Am A Librarian

-Juliana Hatfield (American musician and singer-songwriter)

University of New Hampshire librarian, Robert Morin

"We are New Hampshire's public research university, providing comprehensive, high-quality undergraduate programs and graduate programs of distinction. Our primary purpose is learning..."
-Beginning of UNH mission statement

Well, that's a lie. After working for the University of New Hampshire in its library for almost 50 years, Robert Morin left the university 4 million dollars in his will. The school is planning to use 1 million of the donation to buy a new video scoreboard for its football stadium.

Lesson Unlearned

"If you look at the women’s national team, what do you want [people] to see? What do you want them to hear? And that’s where we do have a choice, as players, coaches, staff, the way we respond to certain things.”
-Former US Women's Soccer Team Head Coach Pia Sundhage to Hope Solo in 2012

“We played a bunch of cowards. The best team did not win today. I strongly, firmly believe that.”

"To call them cowards for playing a tactically smart game is ridiculous and classless, and it really doesn’t represent the house that we built with the U.S. team.”
-Former Gold Medal  US Women's Soccer Team member Julie Foudy

And the US fans calling for a boycott of IKEA are just as childish as Hope Solo.


Washington Post article.

Everything Old Is New Again

A whole bunch of these were inside a shipping box instead of Styrofoam peanuts.  There is hope for the world.

Old Postcard From Loveland, Colorado

Give me your beach lovers, your sun-baked,
Your boaters yearning to water ski,
The happy children on your teeming shore.
Send these, the families, the sun bathers to me:
I lift my lamp beside the blue water.

Happy Birthday Frida Kahlo

"Self-Portrait with Cropped Hair" (1940)

 

 

The song lyrics at the top of the frame are from an Mexican folk song and translated say, “Look, if I loved you it was because of your hair. Now that you are without hair, I don’t love you anymore.”

Crime Blotters

Blotter: a book used in a police station for writing down information about people or events
- Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary

I've just discovered that The Denver Post publishes crime blotters for Denver and its surrounding counties.   Let's see what small crimes have been happening in the area.

1. Adams County: Man wakes up the whole neighborhood

2. Arapahoe County: Drunken man's pants abandoned him

3. Aurora County: Road rage suspect breaks out baseball bat 

4. Denver County: Angry defendant breaks door handle

5. Douglas County: Teenagers follow, harass woman at home improvement store

6. South Jeffco (Jefferson County): Thieves fail to steal camper

 After reading them all, I see Arapahoe and Douglas Counties have the most creative one sentence descriptions of each reported incident. My favorites are "Suspicious man turns out to be extra shady" and "Creepy kids in Lowe's."

I've Been Coloring Again

A bit of the top feathers were cut off because I could not get the whole page into the scanner.  From Animal Kingdom:Color Me, Draw Me by Millie Marotta.

Happy Summer Solstice!

End of the spring and here she comes back
Hi, hi, hi, hi, there
Them summer days, those summer days

That's when I had most of my fun back
High, high, high, high there
Them summer days, those summer days

I cloud nine when I want to
Out of school, yeah
County fair in the country sun
And everything, it's true, ooh, yeah

Hot fun in the summertime
Hot fun in the summertime
Hot fun in the summertime
Hot fun in the summertime

First of the fall and then she goes back
Bye, bye, bye, bye there
Them summer days, those summer days

Boop, boop, ba, boop, boop when I want to
Out of school, yeah
County fair in the country sun
And everything it's cool, ooh yeah

Hot fun in the summertime
Hot fun in the summertime
Hot fun in the summertime

Normal Service Will Resume Shortly

January 29, 1845

 The New York Evening Mirror publishes Edgar Allan Poe's poem The Raven.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—

    While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,

As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—

            Only this and nothing more.”

    Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;

And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.

    Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow

    From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—

For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—

            Nameless here for evermore.

    And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain

Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;

    So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating

    “’Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—

Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—

            This it is and nothing more.”

    Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,

“Sir,” said I, “or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;

    But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,

    And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,

That I scarce was sure I heard you”—here I opened wide the door;—

            Darkness there and nothing more.

    Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;

    But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,

    And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore?”

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”—

            Merely this and nothing more.

    Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,

Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.

    “Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice;

      Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—

Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;—

            ’Tis the wind and nothing more!”

    Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,

In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore;

    Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;

    But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door—

Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—

            Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,

By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,

“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,

Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—

Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,

Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore;

    For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being

    Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door—

Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,

            With such name as “Nevermore.”

    But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only

That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.

    Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered—

    Till I scarcely more than muttered “Other friends have flown before—

On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.”

            Then the bird said “Nevermore.”

    Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,

“Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is its only stock and store

    Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster

    Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore—

Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore

            Of ‘Never—nevermore’.”

    But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,

Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door;

    Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking

    Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—

What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore

            Meant in croaking “Nevermore.”

    This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing

To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core;

    This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining

    On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o’er,

But whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o’er,

            She shall press, ah, nevermore!

    Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer

Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.

    “Wretch,” I cried, “thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee

    Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore;

Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    “Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—

Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,

    Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—

    On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—

Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    “Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!

By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore—

    Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,

    It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore—

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    “Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!” I shrieked, upstarting—

“Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore!

    Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!

    Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!”

            Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

    And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;

    And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming,

    And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

            Shall be lifted—nevermore!

Someday

From Stones 'n Bones:

In 1905 Skyline Drive was completed through the use of inmate labor. At the height of construction, the Skyline Drive project employed sixty prisoners. It was Senator Lewis of Florence who sponsored the legislation bill that allowed prisoners to work on this public road. Prisoners working on Skyline Drive received a reduction of ten days on their sentence for every thirty days they worked on the road.

According to articles in the Cañon City Record, a contest to name the road was held following its completion. S.A. Van Buskskirk recommended Skyline Boulevard and the name was incorporated into the deed, although, it is now referred to as Skyline Drive. The drive was originally built for biking, horses, and walking. Cars were prohibited because they scared the horses. However, popular demand to allow cars provided for their use on the drive after February 1907.

During the Best administration, the penitentiary repaired the road and built an arch at the entrance of Skyline Drive using a stone from every state in the union. When F.B. Rice, the gentleman in charge of procuring stones from individual states, contacted New York on April 12, 1932, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the governor. Roosevelt wrote back asking Rice to ask for information regarding the nature of the project, inquiring whether or not it was a public or private enterprise. Rice informed him that it was public, and Franklin agreed to send the stone.

I Want To Join The IORAM

Photo from Colorado State University, CSU Archives and Special Collections (name: nmhfm-689.jpg) taken in 1949 of members of the Denver Mining Club standing in front of the The Brown Palace Hotel in Denver, Co. 

Below is the caption the Archives wrote to explain the photo:

"Members of the Denver Mining Club pose before the Club's bus. The Denver Mining Club was established in 1891 as a local chapter of the International Order of Ragged Ass Miners."

Please Stand By