You’re not imagining things. I have missed the last couple weeks. For that, I apologize, but I do have reasons. Just as I’m not in Colorado today, I have been very busy the last couple of weeks working on seeing new horizons. The first weekend in October, I went with a friend back to one of my alma maters, the University of Michigan, for Homecoming weekend. It had been over 25 years since my last trip to Ann Arbor and I needed to see the changes.
The U-M actually has a pretty good-sized alumni body in the Denver and Boulder metroplex and my school in particular has sent the Dean and various professors and academic leaders to speak with our alumni, educate us on how the school is growing and changing (they’ve changed their name twice since I graduated, for instance, and they’ve changed so they no longer offer undergraduate majors anymore). There have been extensive building programs all over the U-M campus, like there have been at many institutions, and I was very impressed with the updating that had been done all over the campus. Many buildings hadn’t existed when I was there and I see so many more opportunities for students these days as compared to my pre-personal computer days. When I was there, I took a Fortran programming course and we used punch cards for the first two programs we wrote, just to give you an example.
I also needed to update my mental image of the school and University. I occasionally have dreams where I’m walking the streets around campus, going into businesses that were there when I was a student and going into classrooms, now as a graduate student needing to work out my course of study, find out where the classes are being held and how things have been updated. My mind has tried updating the setting, but it really didn’t know how to fill things in. Now that I’ve seen the campus, its changes as well as what is still familiar, I’m curious to see what my mind will entertain me with.
The second reason I missed the last two weeks has to do with the trip I’m currently on. My wife and I are exploring the New England states to visit relatives, meet Kossacks and see Fall colors. We started in New York City for three days and since have driven up to Massachusetts to stay with some cousins, yesterday we were in Portland, Maine, meeting a wonderful group of Kossacks at a party organized by nhox42 and BillInPortlandMaine. We met on the waterfront in Portland and had a late lunch at DiMillo’s on the Water (well, actually inside a ferry boat). There wound up being about 18 of us, plus two woozles, all told. Yours truly has the sun-splashed face in the middle on the left.
Portland, Maine’s finest (with a few from the surrounding area)This trip involved a bunch of planning and so I had only last Monday in Denver (between Michigan and this trip). That day, what with working my 10 hour shift and packing, was just too busy for the Open Thread.
The third reason I was not able to write the Open Thread was due to the fast pace of finding the house we’re going to move to in Estes Park, getting the inspection conducted, getting paperwork done, arranging the financing and starting the process of packing up years worth of material for either keeping or (my wife’s preferred solution) jettisoning years of rarely, if ever, referenced materials, letters, papers, books, etc, etc. I can see her logic, but while I’m not necessarily a hopeless hoarder, I do have intentions on looking at things again. It ain’t easy for me, folks. If all goes to plan, we will be able to take possession of the house November 5th, but since it’s already snowed in Estes Park and the temperature is supposed to go down to NEGATIVE FIVE DEGREES!!!!!!!!!!!! tonight there, the ground may be too hard for us to get some things done there, like constructing a dog run so our two woozles have protection when they go out to do their business. We do NOT want them to be food for mountain lions, bears (if they haven’t gone into hibernation yet), bobcats (our dogs are small), coyotes or other predators in the wild. Our house literally borders on Rocky Mountain National Park, so the full range of critters can walk through our yard looking for something to eat. We’re fine with elk, deer, moose, or other vegetarians. We just don’t want omnivores or carnivores to make life difficult.
The work for the house is going to take time — we’ll hire movers once we have most things boxed up and we’re ready to have them move around furniture, exercise equipment, etc. When we have our house mostly or completely vacated, we’ll be putting it on the market. The winter isn’t the best time to show it off, but hopefully we can still find the right buyers and get the right price.
I’m also looking to meet any Kossacks up in Estes Park and the surrounding area. Please have any of them Kosmail me and I’ll invite them for coffee or something (or just communicate through Kosmail if that’s what they prefer). I have many things to discover in that town.
I will now repeat my request from several of these open threads — if there is anyone who would like to write an open thread (and this is a long one, and not having much to do with Colorado politics, so it may not be of much interest to many), please let me know of your interest and I’ll work with you to integrate you into the schedule. We’ve got people helping candidates, we have people who have opinions on candidates and believe me, there are Kossacks all over the state and even Colorado-curious people in the rest of the world who would like to know what’s going on in Colorado — politically, personally and inspirationally. It’s very easy to write a couple of sentences and ask for people to write what’s on their minds. It shouldn’t be just me writing these. We have an interesting, diverse set of writers here.
And now, the floor is yours. What’s on your minds this week? Have you voted yet?
The Open Thread list:
Colorado: Mondays, 7:00 PM Mountain Michigan: Wednesdays, 6:00 PM Eastern North Carolina: Sundays, 1:00 PM Eastern Missouri: Wednesday Evenings Kansas: Monday Evenings