The Colorado State Open Thread is designed to be enjoyed by people who might be in a state of mind that’s equal to our home state — beautiful, generally peaceful, full of grace and joy… Our state is trending blue and I believe we approve and appreciate this fact. Please feel free to comment on anything that might be on your mind in the comments, or, if you’d like to contribute a diary, please contact me and we’ll work it out.
The last three weeks have seen the Mrs. and I get some of our pent-up travel anxiety released with trips to the US Virgin Islands over the Memorial Day holiday and then the last two weeks taking a train trip from Denver to Seattle via Amtrak. I’ll have some separate diaries on those, with photos, because they’re not so much concerned with Colorado, but we were very happy to get those trips in. The first one had been delayed a year due to Covid and the Seattle trip was scheduled this Spring to get to see a new great-grandson (no, I’m not old; I don’t think).
We managed to return home just after midnight Friday night and I re-acquainted myself with our fur-kid Ginger. We managed to miss the heat in Seattle and Tacoma, but we did get rain back here in Colorado. Ginger came out with me onto the driveway and she immediately went to check out something unusual. I had seen one of these in the wild a couple of years ago, but didn’t get a photo of it next to our house. Here, though, I remembered to take a photo.
They apparently have a number of looks as they grow up. To find more about them, you can check them out at www.estesparknews.com/… and the photos there are the younger, “larval” stage. The adults, like the one seen here, can be learned about at en.wikipedia.org/…. I put this out because I have not seen them in the wild until I moved up here to Estes and apparently they’re able to survive in the mountains, even when there isn’t necessarily a stream nearby (I don’t have one within a half-mile, at least). An additional fun fact about our state amphibian— Attorney and now US House Representative Jason Crow represented the group that lobbied the legislature to get this designated as the state amphibian.
We were very happy to arrive home and for the rest of the summer, we only plan to host visitors and the farthest we’re likely to travel is down to the Denver metro area or perhaps north towards the Poudre Canyon to see the fire damage from last year. That is, of course, unless Kossack Leftcandid wants to go chase tornadoes sometime, which I am totally down for. The two times I’ve gone, we’ve wound up in Nebraska.
I have been very happy that we’ve received a good amount of rain up here in the mountains on the east side of the Divide, but I did get to see just how dry and dusty the western slope is. It’s easy to believe all of Colorado is as wet and green as we are and just forget about the extreme drought to the west. My hopes to you that you get rain and that you don’t get fires this year.
I do encourage you to pay attention to the new map for the extra district that Colorado will gain as part of the redistricting process and the US Census. I don’t know how many of you might lose your current rep and have to deal with campaigns in 2022 for a brand new representative. I get to keep Joe Neguse. The federal district boundary proposal can be found on Colorado’s Independent Redistricting Committee website redistricting.colorado.gov/… where they will also be releasing the new state districts on 6/29 (Tuesday). I was kinda hoping that they might draw out Lauren Boebert’s district, but apparently she will get the chance to run as an incumbent. For more on Colorado and voting trends here, check out www.dailykos.com/….
I also wish to express my sympathy and condolences to the family of Johnny Hurley, the “Good Guy With a Gun” who stopped the Arvada cop-killer with his own gun, before getting killed by police when he briefly held up the AR-15 that was being wielded by the criminal gunman. He didn’t deserve to die from saving the lives of his fellow citizens, but I hope his sacrificial lesson is remembered in future situations where a gunman is shooting and people face a choice of trying to shoot the gunman or hiding and not becoming a target when the police or other authorities respond.
Another bill signed into law by Governor Polis seems to have been missed by folks — www.dailykos.com/… is to help undocumented agricultural workers.
Please let us know what’s in your thoughts down below in the comments. The floor is yours.