April 14, 2008
Birds, trees, pollen, sunshine
I love warm weather. No. Scratch that. Well, don't scratch it, just amend it: I like hot weather. I like the sort of weather that bakes the brain until all it can do is contemplate a cold glass of tamarindo soda.
It wasn't that hot yesterday, but it was very pleasant. Sitting on the porch with my neighbor, drinking beer and eating chips, watching Amalia fly a rubber-band powered balsa airplane...that strikes me as pretty close to a perfect Sunday.
The downside, of course, is the messy way that plants reproduce. I have no problem with them reproducing, but do they have to be so inefficient? It only takes that little bit of pollen...the rest of it serves no purpose but to irritate noses and eyes, to cover my dark green car with yellowish crud, to make a mustardy crust on the walkway and porch, and so forth. Fine, I'll forgive the pollen, but then there are the little spiked balls of foot torture that encase futile seeds: seeds that will fall on the sidewalk, get swept into the street, crushed into dust by the cars and eventually go to sea via the storm drain system. You step on one of these suckers barefoot and it is pure pain. You step on one with shoes and, if you don't hit it squarely, you risk twisting your ankle. Of course they do make good projectiles.
Anyway, spring is doing what it does to me every year (besides making me sneeze a bit): it is amazing me at how fast it all happens. One day the trees are still in their bare, bleak mid-winter skeletal state, and the next there is a little greenish tinge to the whole thing, and the next thing you know there are full-sized leaves. You think that if you just sit quietly out there you could see the foliage grow.
Posted by erik at April 14, 2008 9:06 AMIt's different, that's for sure. But you have to keep in mind that I grew up in frosty Minnesota until 8th grade when moved to Los Gatos. Talk about culture shock! I went from a Catholic grade school in a suburb of Saint Paul to a public junior high in California...what's a burrito? What language are those people speaking?
Honestly, I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand are things in Colorado that keep me, like significantly lower cost of living, a relatively sane state government (flat income tax, balanced budget written into the state constitution, etc), good public schools, very relaxed and family friendly pace of life, good political mix, and probably the best weather you can get for getting all four seasons. Lots of sun and any snow melts within a day or two. Plus, having snow during the winter holidays makes things very cozy. Overall it's an interesting mix of left coast weirdness and midwest values - everyone here is from either California, Texas, or the midwest. Denver is big enough to have an interesting, but not leading, cultural scene and it also has lots of good jobs. I tend to think of it as how the Bay Area was 30 years ago before the early 80s tech boom turned everything into a wealth status race. People here aren't so caught up in who makes how much or what car they drive.
But I miss things like the ocean, the long growing season, San Francisco, the crazy mixup of cultures and their foods, and the old Oaks and Redwoods.
Here's an interesting take on the beer scene here at 5280 feet:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1729699,00.html
Posted by: at April 16, 2008 10:33 AMThe funny thing is that I was just thinking about that a few days ago. I still have the score that I marked up for it.
Crocuses are long gone here - they popped up in late January. Now we are at the tail end of Tulips and the summer bloomers are advancing: rununculus and gladiola are getting in position.
How does a California boy from the Valley of Heart's Delight take uprooting and transplanting to the state whose map looks like a placemat?
Posted by: Erik at April 15, 2008 5:01 PMRemember our take on `Le Sacre du printemps` in the Porter quad?
Spring shows up a bit later for us here on the edge of plains - although today we're in the high 70s and sunny. The cherry trees are starting to blossom, the birds sound quite happy, and the crocus and narcissus are showing their colors. We spent Sunday cleaning up our flower beds. Yesterday the kids splashed around in the kiddie pool.
Of course, it's supposed to snow tomorrow with highs in the 40s, but then that's springtime in the Rockies!
Posted by: Chris at April 15, 2008 3:50 PM