Minor setback

While I was living the excitement of CPR recertification today, Piper went for a walk with Spouse and somehow opened a couple of inches of incision. While I faux-shocked dummies, Spouse took her to the vet where she received additional staples and antibiotics.

Rather than the staples coming out next week, she gets to be FrankenDog for an additional 7 days.

In unrelated news, there is a trip to DC afoot! I am very excited as this is our first real travel since the NOLA conference *and* it’s to another awesome city where I *also* know awesome internet peoples. I love the web, y’all. It is no lie.

There’s also this weird thing where, when explaining internet friends to people who do not have internet friends, it feels like it devolves into a history of how I am an internet nerd. Probably these days I should just say I met people on Facebook?

Vacation

I can’t BELIEVE I haven’t posted since the end of July. In my defense, there was vacation and book reading and PLENTY of twitter and G+ posts. So while this is not a real post, there is soon to be a long post about vacation book reading and how I recently bought (*gasp*) two actual PHYSICAL books. Shocking!

Bears shit in the woods, and so do I

Last weekend, Spouse and I made a trip to Colorado Springs. The drive includes Wilkerson Pass, where there are incredible views from a visitor station. Given the dearth of nearly anything from Buena Vista to just outside the Springs, odds are if you’re making that drive you’re ALSO making that stop.

The visitor station has bathrooms of the enclosed fancy port-a-john type. I loathe these things. I actually detest port-a-johns as a whole but I hate these things especially because the tanks are so large and frankly just about any damn thing could be swimming around down there and ohmygod I don’t talk about this because it gives me the screaming heebie jeebies.

This is all apropos of 1. Having stopped at the Wilkerson Pass visitor center, having to use the john and being skeeved out about it. 2. Thinking I would maybe post about the inherent ick factor of those facilities. 3. Reading THIS STORY in the local paper TWO DAYS after this adventure.

I’m not sure that I can convey exactly HOW MUCH that story freaks me out except to tell you that there are now two emergency TP rolls in my car.

Quick and dirty NOLA

Denver’s Day of Rock was nice but this post is full of NOLA updates for my friend who is about to make a trip.

One of the best things I put in my mouth the entire time we were in New Orleans is the Shrimp and Grits from the Desire Oyster Bar. PHENOMENAL.

Beignets are a must; Cafe du Monde or Cafe Beignet, makes no difference.

Cochon is the other place you need to visit – not far from the convention center and while the food is upscale, the prices aren’t. One of the best drinks I had was there (the Swinekiller) and their drink menu was nearly as incredible as the food.

Before you leave, hit up the Central Grocery for an original muffaletta. Plan on splitting it because they’re massive.

Crescent City Brewhouse has two floors and an excellent courtyard. The beer’s a little pricey but you’ll be glad you ordered a Red and Black half and half. SO GOOD. I ordered the duck and it was EXCELLENT.

Visit a Hemingway haunt at the Carousel bar inside the Hotel Monteleone. The Ramos Gin fizz is fantastic.

For music and drinks, we spent a lot of time at Maison on Frenchmen Street. Their fruit punch was on special and FANTASTIC, as were the bands. Make sure to catch dinner at the Praline Connection just up the street; it was one of our favorites.

Bourbon House has great food and impeccable service.

You’ll need strong drinks to tackle Bourbon Street and luckily they are available everywhere. I like loud music but Rue Bourbon is MOTHERFCKINGLOUD.

If you need a lunch break during your conference, hit up Mulate’s just across the street. Best sweet tea in town (among other things).

Take the St. Charles streetcar out to Tulane and see what a real university looks like.

The Haunted History tour was interesting. The Voodoo Museum is wicked cheap and takes all of about 10 minutes to get through.

It takes a bit of legwork to get to, but the Metairie Cemetery is worth a visit. Make sure you take something to drink.

NOLA

The first thing people ask about when I mention NOLA are beignets. Weird, right?

These were at Café Beignet. While we did visit Café du Monde a couple of times, I actually preferred the beignets here. They were a bit lighter and fluffier but don’t get me wrong – beignets in any incarnation are delicious. This was the spot on Bourbon Street which wasn’t actually on Bourbon – a little courtyard just off the sidewalk, with the tables and counters deep in the lot. The live music which was always playing distracts from the strip clubs and pounding dance beats that make up the majority of this part of Rue Bourbon, such that it’s kind of a shock to get back to the sidewalk and the noise after your interlude and treats.

Our first two days though, were all about French Quarter Fest. I wish I had a single picture that captured what it was like, but this is the best of the bunch.

We arrived to hotter than usual weather, which was LOVELY. I, who hate extreme heat and humidity, was thrilled by the change in latitude. I believe my exact words were, “It’s as hot and moist outside as it is on my insides!” This was said with an inordinate amount of joy. We walked from the CBD to Bourbon a couple of times the first day, checking out the Fest and Rue Bourbon. While it’s no Red Light District, I’ll say Bourbon Street lives up to its hype.

The French Quarter Fest comprised of some major stages right on the Mississippi which – if you haven’t seen it from NOLA – looks like a completely different body of water when compared to the crossing at St. Louis, as well as a bunch of smaller stages throughout the quarter. In addition, there were a boatload of buskers and bands playing virtually anywhere they found free sidewalk or streetspace. The end result was the loveliest, largest street party you’ve ever seen and the best food I’ve ever put in my mouth.

The band in this picture was a Dixieland Jazz band from Belgium.

The balconies and galleries everywhere were lush with greenery as well as chock full of decoration. They made walking an especially interesting adventure.

We were lucky and had Marlene to show us around on Sunday. I think we must have walked the entirety of the Quarter (she was a champ) and gave us the lowdown on local favorites and history, not to mention all the dirt on local film shoots. In keeping with my experiences thus far, meeting an old internet friend (8 years? A bit more?) for the first time in person was wonderful. She also went above and beyond the call of duty with an amazing gift baskets of snacks and goodies, of which we made SERIOUS use.

One of my favorite buskers during the Festival:

We spent a fair amount of evenings during the week on Frenchmen Street listening to local music. This was one of my favorite doorways:

Food and drink will likely have to be another post, but this picture really captures the mood during our vacation. The best part was that this sign was off Bourbon Street at a small, out of the way neighborhood bar.

potentially bad decisions

Watching MacGruber while on Ambien. A musical cameo of Rosanna means my dreams this evening are bound to be epic.

I’m having a kind of bad ass week. I know it’s only Tuesday but it’s worth saying. It’s nice having work buddies to chill and bitch with.

I’ve been reading and watching some Netflix, which I may update next week because I’m already a little Ambien woozy and losing track of my qwerty.

I’m very excited about our upcoming trek to the Big Easy. So far my biggest challenge is 1. finding places to do yoga in new orleans while spouse is otherwise occupied and 2. convincing spouse that we need to take a guided swamp tour.

Anyone with suggestions/recommendations/ can’t miss things to check out, please let me know!

End of the week roundup

The inside upstairs paint projects are DONE. That includes touch ups where we changed lighting fixtures. There’s a guy outside right now hanging a gutter on the back of the house because they old owners didn’t have one. Gutters are the last home improvement for (at a minimum) the next year, if not more.

In terms of current home improvements, I painted the front deck post and have started painting the front deck bench. The benches were a gift from my in-laws for our wedding. When they’re pushed together and the backs are flattened, they become a picnic table. Very cool, but also makes restaining a challenge. I’m going to do it in two parts.

All that remains is the railing on the back deck and the back deck bench. I’m very happy at the prospect of being DONE for a while.

In related news, I got an 83 on my exam which I’m pretty happy about. First exams suck because you’re never quite sure what the test is going to look like. I’m excited about class time in July.

With any luck, our plans today will include a trip to Frisco for BBQ and maybe seeing The Proposal.

Mission accomplished!

I’ve successfully made reservations for our anniversary dinner. It’s going to require a trip over to Vail, but 40 minutes isn’t a bad drive for good food. Not only that, but we’re in the off-season so we’ll be able to take advantage of some pretty sweet deals.

I’m waiting for Spouse’s new phone to arrive and then running some errands before he’s done wth work.

Have pretty much finalized house painting colors and a decorating plan for the basement. We’ll need an area rug for the kitchen but all in all we’re in good shape. The new sliding door arrives this weekend and I’ve just got to contact my guy to put it in. We’re inordinately excited about it for reasons I’ll elaborate later.

Our anniversary gifts are working out fantatsically and I’m going to update with some more Santa Fe details later.

Wide awake for no discernable reason

I hate that. But it’s why pharmaceutical companies make things like Ambien. Just waiting for it to kick in.

Today I picked up a tomato plant and a Topsy Turvy. I’m going to give it a go though Spouse is not confident. I generally forget to water things, so we’ll see how it goes.

I’ve got an unexpected trip to Avon later today. We also picked up a much-needed bookshelf for the living room. And it’s entirely possible that I’ve finalized the paint colors for the house. Not looking to start the paint project SOON but having the colors mapped out makes the project about half-done (in my head, anyhow). Not realistic but it FEELS good and that’s what counts.

Now I just have to determine if it’s better to edge the room before rolling paint on or vice versa. Also if I can freehand the top edges or maybe should use a piece of cardboard as a guide. Decisions!

Mom’s coming to visit over the 4th of July weekend! She’ll get to see Leadville sans snow! Probably not as fun as Boom Days (1st weekend in August) but I think something can be arranged. Possibly a little hiking.

I’ve got an extra lengthy work week this week (contrary to that of most) and while it should be busy, I also predict exhausting.

The short version

My lack of posting began shortly after we got an offer on our house back in Michigan, mostly because nearly all my free time was spent on the phone with either the mortgage company or Fannie Mae or the retirement people (we also had houseguests in there somewhere). The counteroffer which was accepted was considerably lower than what we’d paid for the house and we were pretty upside down on the mortgage. We applied for a short sale – where the bank accepts the offer and we all walk away clean – and it was mostly a nightmare. This experience has convinced me that we will never have functional health care.

I was told in not so many words by the folks at Fannie Mae that because our house wasn’t already in foreclosure, we weren’t a priority for help. This was, of course, ONLY after I had submitted my paperwork no less than three times in two weeks- because they kept saying they didn’t have it, even after a confirmation email from a specific employee on the 2nd occasion telling me he’d gotten it all. I’d made several phone calls and found exactly one helpful employee (the aforementioned dude). I DID have a spectacular runaround, including ONE employee who began to argue with me when I requested to speak to a supervisor. She was telling me why I wanted to speak to one and that they couldn’t help me. The third time, I finally said “I don’t CARE what you think, put a fucking SUPERVISOR on the phone.” Having done a shit phone job, I generally do not lose my temper with those folks. On the other hand, they don’t generally ARGUE.

Oddly, the supervisor was able to answer some questions. Which is when I found out that because we’d been responsible and kept paying our mortgage, we were going to take the entire shaft, sans lube, right in the ass. Thanks so much. If Fannie Mae can’t keep track of THEIR paperwork, we have NO HOPE of having a functional national healthcare system which – by definition – will require a much larger amount of paper and customer service.

We gave up on Fannie Mae after that and set about scraping together the funds needed to get the hell out from under the place. Paying two mortgages has NOT been fun. But someone bought it, I flew home to sign the paperwork and hand over the last of the keys, and we are now and forever shut of Saginaw, Michigan. We couldn’t be happier.

While in Michigan I seem to have developed something of an earache which is, apparently, not an infection. I pick up medication tomorrow.

I got to see some of the family back in MI, which was nice. Everyone seems to be doing well. I’d forgotten that mosquitos can be as big as my thumbnail though. We haven’t seen any up here yet, which is perfectly fine by me. The weather has been great, as usual. The last couple of days have had a bit of rain which is interesting because it doesn’t LAST, including the water on the ground.

Our anniversary is coming up next week (9 years!) and we got each other a sweet anniversary gift to help take the sting out of the house fuckery. Details on that later.

I start classes in a couple of weeks and it sounds like Spouse is planning a House Project. We’ll see how far that gets.

We have returned from Santa Fe

One more way in which Leadville is superior to Saginaw: when we got home, one of our neighbors had plowed our driveway for us. Out of the goodness of their heart, without being asked. In the entire 8 years we lived in Saginaw, nobody ever even OFFERED – including when Spouse threw his back out and I was stuck outside shoveling 12 inches of snow off our entire driveway. I love this place.

Santa Fe was very nice and very relaxing. While I’m in the process of uploading pictures, I will leave you with this hilarious dog story.

Downshifting

There has definitely been an adjustment to living out here that extends beyond the change in altitude.

A couple of weeks ago, it was snowing and there was a fair amount of traffic to Vail. I made it over and back the Battle Mountain Pass without ever having to touch a brake – unlike the two drivers in front of me. I was inordinately proud of myself.

The other notable difference from home  is the dress code. I’d heard jokes about the Colorado Tuxedo (jeans) but there’s more than a little truth to it. For example, we’re attending a dinner tonight. At home, I’d have worn a dress – not an especially fancy one. Out here, that’s still way too formal. I’ve tentatively settled on a sweater and skirt and am still running the risk of being ‘too’ dressed up. Spouse suggested I wear a pair of “good jeans.” Alas, I own only regular jeans. Possibly I will have to consult someone to find out what “good jeans” consists of. I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around this.

I was hoping to find a book club in town, but haven’t had much luck. It seems I’ll have to drive to Avon or Vail but at least there are a couple and they’re not so far that I’ll mind the drive. The social interaction will be nice, for sure.

The job hunting continues, without much success. Right now I’m working three days a week which leaves me with just a little too much free time.

I’ve started running with the dog again, intervals in a 1.8 mile route for the time being. I’m hoping to work up to a 3.5 mile route. Running is a DEFINITE challenge. For the first time in my life, I find that heart rate charts might apply to me.

Next week I’ve got an appointment to get contact lenses. I haven’t worn glasses this much since I was 13 and I’m not really loving it. The nice thing is that the new eye doctor just needs me to fax my old prescription – rather than needing all my records.

For now, I’m off to run errands and get things around for our overnight trip.

More photos

My trip to Salida on the 26th. When I left Leadville it was snowing but in the pics you can see it clears off before Buena Vista. Leaving Salida, I took an inadvertant detour to Monarch before realizing and coming back. 

Photos here.

My car gets better gas mileage than I thought.

Our guests are gone. I have returned from Glenwood Springs. I have to work this afternoon but I totally promise that blogging returns to normal tomorrow. Probably I’ll link to photosets rather than posting a lot of pictures (because I’ve taken a lot) but I’m going to try and catch up the Daily Leadville and 52 weeks.

Piper fantastically spilled a mini-bag of dog food ALL OVER the back end of my CR-V. My car will smell like dog food forever.

In the meantime, I’m contemplating a nap before work.

Home, sweet home.

I’ve been back in town for about 24 hours. Guest rooms are made up and I have removed the ugly shelves and hung more photos  and a couple of frames that don’t have photos in them yet. Not 100% finished with the Photo Project, but I’m pretty close.

I have photos but have been slacking, so I’ll post them tomorrow when I’m at work. Since we’re post-Super Bowl I’m predicting above-average slowness.

Spouse and I are drinking beer and watching Supertroopers. It’s one of those movies that should stop being so funny once you’ve gotten to the point where you can quote absurd amounts of dialogue and yet somehow it hasn’t. We still laugh our asses off  through the entire film.

Our bar is the next project – mirrors and shelves for the back bar and grass skirts to decorate the front of the bar. Tiki motif, here we come! We’ve already got the talking parrot so there’s no turning back. Next big investment? Tropical wall mural. Oh yes.