yum! bacon-wrapped sea scallops

engaged!

table for two

Snapped a picture of this guy from the car while driving by Duffy Roll.

It looked like he was waiting for his girlfriend to meet him for lunch, but sadly, she had stood him up.

sarah gets a new job

Kidding. I'm in Parker, AZ for an exercise this week.

Anna and I got to take a spin in the fire engine the day before the exercise.

you are feeling very sleepy

spring blossoms

We got back to CO late last night and look what greeted us this morning.

bowman hill wildflower preserve

I didn't take any pictures yesterday so I can't do a blog post about it but it's still worth mentioning. The four of us headed into Philadelphia and checked out a street festival in a really nice, old neighborhood. We had sushi on the street and Sean drank some street beers which made him happy, and we walked up and down checking out the different tents/booths of wares. Abby and I both bought the same green scarf and she also got a gorgeous necklace that looks a lot like one that I got in Kauai. Brad wasn't as happy as the rest of us because he had forgotten to put sun screen on and was frantically searching for it and not finding it at any of the stores. He finally found some and applied it minutes before we left. Next Brad took us on a fabulous driving tour of the city and showed us all his old vet school haunts and different historic sites and neighborhoods of the city. Then we drove home and cooked up some Mexican food for dinner and some chocolate covered strawberries and pretzels for dessert. YUM!

But that was yesterday. On to today! Abby took the day off work and the three of us went to the Bowman Hill Wildflower Preserve and took a guided tour.

Sean and I both love guided tours of any kind so it was a good day for us. It was a lot of fun to learn to identify some of the wildflowers. Sean actually said that this was his favorite activity of the entire Doylestown trip.

This little yellow flower is a wild orchid aka: lady slipper.

There were lots of frogs croaking in this little pond, but they were pretty hard to spot in all the duckweed.

After the tour we went to New Hope, PA for lunch.

All the little towns along the Delaware river in this part of PA and across the river in NJ are really charming. It's too bad they're so expensive!

doylestown dog show

Mark was kind enough to drive Sean and I up to Doylestown Thursday night so that we could visit Abby and Brad for a few days. We were really excited to see them again and to witness first hand all the progress they'd made on their new house. It looks great! Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of their renovations, but I do have a picture of me and Lex the mastiff at the Doylestown dog show.

The dog show was a lot of fun, especially checking out all the different breeds running around.

We talked to the owner of this afghan hound who said that they wrap their hair in head scarves so it doesn't get tangled between judging rounds. It made her look like an old-style movie star.

rutherford park

Before Lindsay and Sara flew out of town today, we took a walk to Rutherford Park with Charlie, my mom, and Lindsay's mom. I hadn't been to this park in such a long time so it was good to go back. Lindsay and I spent many hours playing softball here. In fact, this is where it all started for me because my very first team practiced here when I was 10 and then subsequent teams I played for held games here until I started playing in high school. And then Sara and I also spent time here as kids catching minnows in the creek with colanders, and then releasing them at the end of the day.

Charlie took a ride on the little horsie...

And of course I couldn't resist taking a ride myself! As you can see, I definitely couldn't help reverting back to childhood in this park where I used to play growing up.

new nationals stadium

After work today I met Lindsay (one of my oldest friends - we met in kindergarten) downtown at the brand new baseball stadium built for the Nationals in DC. Sara and Rachel were supposed to join us too but Rachel got some last minute premium tickets to see her cousin, Emmy Lou Harris, get inducted into the County Music Hall of Fame. I'd say that was a pretty good excuse. Poor Sara was too slammed at work to be able to leave in time for the game so it was just Lindsay and me.

The new stadium was beautiful. I loved the way they gave it an old fashioned feel. I saw a Modern Marvels episode about the stadium when it was being built that said it was designed so that there was not a bad seat in the house. And true to that statement, even though we only paid $12 for our tickets, the view was excellent.

Between one of the innings, they had four guys dress up like Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Roosevelt including big foam heads and race around the perimeter of the entire field. It was hilarious and Lindsay managed to capture a shot of it. Good ol' TJ won!

hiking at great falls

After spending Friday night at Mark's in Baltimore, we got up Saturday morning and headed over to Frederick to spend some time with Sean's family. Then that evening, Sean drove me to my parents' house where we all (Sean included) had a really good dinner. It was a lot of fun with maybe a little too much wine drinking and a lot of laughing. Sean really liked Elizabeth's boyfriend Andy, who was also there.

This morning Andy, Biz, and I headed to the MD side of Great Falls to go hiking. They had this great old fashioned boat in the canal that was modeled after ones that used to run up and down when the canal was still regularly operating.

It had been raining so much during the month of April that the falls were really booming. In the past, I've usually seen kayakers out on the Potomac, but not today; it was way too rough.

It was a perfect time to be out hiking because everything was so green! Especially coming from CO.

Lots of little wildflowers were blooming.

We decided to hike the Billy Goat trail which I had never actually hiked before.

During the hike, Andy somehow ripped his pants. And with each big step he took to climb over rocks, he would rip them a little more and a little more.

He was so funny about it. He would say after a particularly steep scramble, "Man! That was a real pants ripper!" Elizabeth and I were dying.

I definitely recommend the Billy Goat trail. I think it was about 3 or 3.5 miles and it was a really pretty hike. We even came across a swampy pond where we found lots of tadpoles.

the big apple

Got up bright and early this morning to fly east for a trip to visit family and friends. We were flying into NYC to visit the Belgians for the first leg of our trip, but it turned out that Sandrine was accepted into Stanford business school so they had to fly to Palo Alto for admit weekend instead. So upon arriving at JFK, Sean and I took a train, then a subway to get to Union Station. There, we caught the Chinatown bus down to Baltimore.

Believe it or not, the bus was actually really comfortable. We found it more comfortable than a plane because there were foot rests. And even though it was a Friday and our bus left at 5 pm, we didn't actually sit in that much traffic! We arrived in Baltimore at 10 pm where Mark picked us up. It took us thirteen total hours of traveling via car, bus, train, subway, and plane to get home. If only we had ridden on a submarine and a helicopter too, we could have covered all our travel bases.

palm springs

My flight home got delayed this morning so I had a couple hours to kill and decided to check out Palm Springs. I got breakfast at a little street cafe and then found this great courtyard in back of the restaurant to sit and eat in. I swear, every man I saw in Palm Springs was wearing white deck shoes and walking a Pekingese. The Pekingese must be the popular breed to have in Palm Springs just as the Burmese Mountain dog is the popular breed of Denver.

After breakfast, I just walked around and checked out the town for about an hour. Saw Liz Taylor's Palm Springs star and many others on the sidewalks.

I loved all the fuscia flowers growing on many of the stuccoed building walls.


I didn't get to spend very much time here, only about an hour and a half, but it was definitely interesting to check it out. The biggest thing I noticed was the amount of irrigation the city must do to keep it so green. I'm not kidding you when I say that this place is in the middle of the desert. As soon as you cross the city limits after leaving town, everything is brown brown brown. No natural vegetation anywhere to be seen except scrubby weeds.

morongo casino resort and spa

This morning before heading out to my meeting, I had to snap a shot of the entrance to the Morongo Casino. They have this elaborate metal structure that upon first glance seems pretty ugly. How'd you like that oxymoron?

But after considering it for a moment, I realized that not only does it provide much needed shade but it also seems to fit in well with the landscape.

My meeting went pretty well today. I survived, at least. I hate speaking in front of a crowd so I was pretty nervous. Also, I'm leading this exercise so I want to make a good impression and do a really good job.

After the meeting, I came back to the casino and had probably the best Chinese dinner I've ever had. It was early and there weren't that many people in the restaurant, so I decided to sit up at the bar so I could watch the chef make his dishes.

I ordered Mu Shu chicken, my usual Chinese dish and the reason I can confidently gauge the quality of one Chinese restaurant over another. LOVE those pancakes spread with plum sauce, rolled up like tacos! The restaurant really delivered and it was easily the best Chinese food I've ever had. It was so good because they didn't over-sauce the Mu Shu chicken, which is so typical of most Chinese restaurants.

After dinner, I wandered through the casino and took this picture before learning that you can't take pictures in the casino. Oh well - looks like I got off one illegal shot. I didn't gamble because I hate to waste my hard-earned money. Maybe next time I'll take a chance and see where it takes me. Or should I say, what it makes me.

banning, ca

Headed out to Southern California today for a work trip to the Morongo Band of Mission Indians Reservation. The Morongo Reservation is located in Banning, CA which is about 80 miles east of LA and 20 miles west of Palm Springs.

Snapped some quick shots from the car to show what the typical scenery looks like in this area.

Here's the view from my hotel room at the Morongo Casino Resort and Spa. I originally wanted to stay in Palm Springs but felt like I valued sleep too much to make the 20-some mile drive for my meeting the next morning. I'm actually glad I stayed here because the rooms are cheaper than Palm Springs and they are NICE. It's definitely one of the nicer hotels I've stayed in.

rockies vs. dodgers

This evening we took Matt to Coors Field for our first baseball game of the season.

Once in the gates, we ran into a filming set-up where they were soliciting volunteers to do a "Don't Drink and Drive" commercial. Both Matt and I did the commercial. Supposedly if it's chosen (fat chance) they will air it on TV.

As we were taping the commercial, you could watch what it would look like on a TV screen.

The Rockies were winning the entire game until they lost it in the ninth inning.

Despite how freezing it was, we actually stayed until part way through the 9th when they fell apart. If Sean had had his way, we probably would have left after the 7th!

ward

Sean's childhood friend Matt Lynch flew out for the weekend to visit us here in CO. We started out yesterday by driving out to Rollinsville, CO to visit his cousin Scott and his wife Mary. We had a really great time hanging out with them and even got to see a video of Scott's little brother playing on a Japanese game show where they shock you when you get the answer wrong! We spent the night there and then did a little driving tour of Ward, CO this morning on our way back to Denver. Usually Sean and I just do a drive by of Ward because it's definitely the type of little town where your car goes to die. There are rusted out cars everywhere and it feels as if everyone who lives there was just driving through town once themselves when their car gave out and they were forced to take up permanent residency here. There's a 3 legged shaggy brown dog right at the entrance to town and you will always see dogs and barefooted children running loose. Anyway, Matt wanted to get out and walk around! He wanted to go into what we thought was a general store based on the sign in the picture above.

But once we went in and after the owner had offered Matt a cup of coffee, we learned that it wasn't a general store, but someone's home!

The guy was really nice though and didn't seem to mind at all that we were walking around in it picking things up.

Then the local drunk stumbled in and took a seat on the couch in the back room.

Here are a few more local characters that were sitting on a bench outside the so-called general store.

Here's the owner selling Matt a bag of coffee beans. He claimed that he had the highest elevation coffee bean roaster in the country. Another typical trip to the town of Ward. We drove Sara Mullins through here when she was visiting us last November and she took a bunch of pictures of all the rusted out vehicles. She would have loved the rusted out CONESTOGA WAGON we saw this past trip. I wouldn't be surprised if that wagon died on its way through town two centuries ago.

old man in the sun part 4

hiking in helena

After a productive meeting yesterday, Trista and I had a few hours to kill this morning before our flight home.

We decided to go hiking on a trail up a mountain right outside Helena.

The trail had us huffing and puffing, but the view of the city was great from the top.

And we even got to check out some wildlife on the way back down.

Our flight home had a connection in Salt Lake City. It was interesting to fly in there and see the big lake and the huge mountains surrounding the city because I'd never been there before. Who knows...maybe I'll have a work trip there someday too.

helena, mt

Cross another state of my list baby, because I'm going to Montana today! I had to snap this shot of the CO mountains during my flight because I never get tired of seeing them when I fly.

You may wonder why this picture is here but for those of you readers that are close friends from UVa, doesn't this look like Jen R. from behind?

old man in the sun part 3

biking in the park

Today we broke out our bikes from the utility room for a spin around the city. That is after we drove to the bike store twice - once for a new inner tube for my tire, and again for a new chain for my bike. After a few technical difficulties, we were off. It was a really pretty day, one of the first warm days this spring so far. We headed north through some really gorgeous neighborhoods and ended up at Cheesman Park, which we cycled around. Then we headed back down south through some more neighborhoods and rode around Wash Park. We paused in the park to check out all the people enjoying the great weather, playing sports, and walking their dogs. We smelled all the grills cooking dogs and burgers and decided to ride straight to the grocery store to pick up our own burgers for dinner.

where did spring go?

old man in the sun part 2

old man in the sun part 1

breakfast for dinner

a treat for my sweet

mr. happy man

couscous with tomatoes and asparagus

Today I made some couscous and decided to jazz it up by including some tomatoes and asparagus and adding vegetable broth instead of water and it was SO GOOD. I highly recommend it!

caribou

Today we decided to check out another one of the scenic destinations in our John Fielder's Colorado book: Caribou, CO. John is one of the best known CO photographers so the scenic destinations he highlights in his book are usually breathtaking. I love that he explains exactly where to capture the image he has captured. He also details places to stay, hiking, camping, biking, etc. so if you live in CO, I highly recommend you get it.

We found this beautiful little road on our way to Caribou and had to jump out to snap some pictures because the bushes in the field were reddish/yellow which highlighted the green pines in the background. Plus it started to snow which made the whole scene even more beautiful.

At the end of the road we found Caribou, which at one time was a thriving town but has since been completely reclaimed by nature except for the occasional stone shells of a few buildings.

By this time the snow was really coming down and Sean and I were lucky that we even had light jackets and hats. It was pretty warm in Denver so it was shocking how much it was snowing in the mountains.

We just walked down the road a ways before getting back in the car to go home. Maybe we would have done a little hiking had it not been snowing, but the beautiful drive in and of itself made the whole trip worthwhile.