Why not come to Colorado?

Over the last few years Dana and I have talked a lot about where we want to live. There are a handful of places that I think we would feel truly at home; the Bay Area, the Pacific Northwest, and Northern Colorado top that list, followed by a handful of familial hold-outs - San Diego, Washington, DC, and New York among them.

We continue to come to the same conclusion: Colorado is a really nice place to live. I think it's safe to say we love it. We have the Rocky Mountains on one side, and the Great Plains on the other. We have big cities and small towns fighting it out for the crown of "best place to live." We have beautiful weather -- beautiful in both its variety and its moderation. We have a thoughtful cross-section of American politics, culture and quirkiness. We have an acceptable balance between being well connected to the world, and being just a tiny bit removed from its most tumultuous extremes. We have the luxury of being "about two hours" from anywhere else in the lower 48.

We try hard to find opportunities to visit our friends and family elsewhere, and we enjoy every trip. But why not come to Colorado?

Come and stay with us. Let us treat you to long hikes in Rocky Mountain National Park. Let us take you to our favorite Indian restaurant. Let us revel in drinking a couple of pitchers of cheap beer and singing karaoke at the corner pub. Let us spend the day at Denver's museums and zoo. Let us "hand you the keys" to Alex for the day and watch him delight in the simplest pleasures at the park up the street. Let us take you to the abandoned parking lot up the freeway after a big snow storm for a physics lesson in how to drive in the snow (and have a ball doing it). Let us learn how to make money in investment property in a place where you can actually afford to do it. Let us sit around a huge, roaring campfire telling stories and warming up after paddling a canoe all day.

Someday, we want to have a big homestead, or estate, where we can gather all of our loved ones in one place. Maybe not to live and stay forever, but at least anytime they so choose. We can come together and play and share and enjoy each others' company. I think Colorado would be a fine place to build that dream.

San Diego

The weekend before last we took a last-minute trip out to San Diego to visit Dana's Mom. Our once-favorite airline, Frontier, made a dramatic change to their frequent-flier program which would render about 25% of our miles useless, so we decided to put them to good use instead.
We had a delightful time with Susan and Herb, including walks on the beach, visiting with Dana's Aunt Leslie and Uncle Shimshon, an afternoon at the pool with Dana's friends Martha & Jeff and their delightful daughter Veronica, outstanding food, and even a rare "date night" thanks to Susan and Herb's generous babysitting.


Alex had a mysterious and inexplicable fever throughout most of our trip, one night, much to our alarm, topping out above 104F. He had no other symptoms, and as long as we kept him on Tylenol or Motrin, he had no fever at all, and was happy as a clam. By the time we got back to Denver he was feeling fine.

Since we returned from the coast, it has been a busy few weeks -- hence the rather infrequent blog postings here. Dana has a full class schedule, taking both day and evening classes Monday-Thursday, working about 15 hours a week at a reputable Denver Intellectual Property firm, and then one more class Saturday mornings, just for good measure.

Meanwhile Ryanne is taking a biology class in the evenings, and Dan is taking a "Citizen's Academy" class from the Larimer County Sherrif's Office. We had to sit down with a piece of graph paper and work out a weekly schedule so we could figure out when Dan, Dana and Ryanne could each watch Alex. It is rather complex.

Now for some more cute photos -- Alex eating big macaroni pasta for dinner this week: