Posts in the “colorado” category

I recently bought a 2013 Sticks calendar in Boulder, Colorado, and it got me interested in the artist. This is another work from shulock.blogspot.com, a variation on The Thinker, by Rodin.

I saw several fields of caribou/elk at Rocky Mountain National Park on July 31, 2019, a few only ~20 feet away from my car.

I went up to Rocky Mountain National Park yesterday, and there was still some snow in the mountains. This snow is near the Alpine Visitor’s Center at a little under 12,000 altitude.

I didn’t think about snakes at all when I lived in Alaska, but here in Colorado they cross my mind from time to time. Following up on my previous article, Can snakes see?, here’s some information on what snakes do in the winter, from snakeprotection.com:

“Snakes do not actually hibernate, rather they become less active during cold weather. It is called ‘brumation.’ Brumation is an extreme slowing down of their metabolism. Snakes are awake, but just very lethargic so you don’t see them moving around. In the fall, snakes move back to the previous year’s den. If a sudden cold snap catches them before they get there, they may die if not fortunate enough to find a suitable secondary den. A number of species may share the same den. For example, black rat snakes, timber rattlesnakes, and copperheads commonly den together. Sometimes there will be as many as 100 snakes in one cave. A group site is called a hibernaculum.”

If you ever need to drive from the Boulder/Denver, Colorado area to (or from) Santa Fe, New Mexico, the gray route on the left in this image is the most scenic, the one to take if you only get one shot at it. Lots of mountain views and ranches, and many small towns.

Once you get off of I-25, the blue road that goes through Taos is also very scenic, and is particularly pretty in the winter. I usually take the gray road back to Colorado, and the Taos road down to Santa Fe.

#MeepMeep

Since I’ve been in Colorado we seem to get anywhere from five to 25 hailstorms a year. Sometimes they have markdowns on cars, other times, flowers.

I’m not sure if this is just a Colorado thing, but there are also a lot of goats around here.

I don’t know what the exact numbers are, but Colorado is growing very rapidly, especially in this area where I live in the cities near Boulder. On a walk today I counted that 66 out of 220 license plates I saw were out-of-state license plates, meaning that a whopping 30% of my neighbors are from out of state and haven’t changed their license plates yet.

On June 26, 2012, there were several fires in the mountains near Boulder, Colorado.

While I’m going through some medical treatments I drive into Boulder, Colorado once or twice a week. This was today’s view (June 20, 2019) while driving into Boulder on Arapahoe Road. As you can see, the tallest mountains still have some snow on them.

The Rocky Mountains this morning (June 16, 2019) when I was out looking for a new place to live in Colorado.

Back on May 19, 2013, we had a little problem with goats at the apartment complex I lived at in Broomfield, Colorado.

Yesterday’s bad weather left a fresh coat of white on Mt. Whatsitsname.

Here’s a photo of the view in Los Alamos, New Mexico.

I post this image from this tweet in memory of Kendrick Castillo.

When will the violence against our school children stop?

I noticed on the drive to the hospital today that there’s still plenty of snow up in the Rocky Mountains.

Several times when I’ve told people in Colorado that I have mast cell disease, they’ve replied, “Have you tried marijuana for that?”

In what might be a related story, one time I went to the ER and a young man there was vomiting extremely loudly and repeatedly into a large bucket. I initially didn’t know what was going on and sat down near him, but once he started vomiting I got up and moved away from him, as everyone else had already done. I recall hearing someone say that he had been there before for the same problem.

I say that it might be related because a few days ago I read that consuming edible marijuana products can lead to “repeated and severe bouts of vomiting,” a condition known as cannabinoid hyperemesis. From what I know, people consume edible products, don’t feel anything immediately, so then they consume some more, etc. Apparently it takes time for consumables to kick in, so when they do, people find out the hard way that they’ve consumed too much. I was just reminded of all that when reading this UCHealth story.

March 24, 2013: After yesterday's snowstorm, about 5" locally, I woke up to completely white mountains. Twenty minutes later they looked like the top photo, and twenty minutes after that they looked like the bottom photo. Between the thin air (my apartment is at 5,800') and the sun, the snow disappears fast here, either by melting or ablation.

This is a view of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado on February 27, 2013. The top photo is from the previous day, when a storm rolled in in the morning. The bottom view is from the following morning when the skies were perfectly clear.

I found a little ice skating rink in downtown Louisville, Colorado recently. Looks like it would be fun at night. :)