funny stuff

I hope this post doesn't make me sound like too much of a crazy liberal tree-hugging maniac or anything, but the Union of Concerned Scientists is doing a contest for political cartoons, and a few of them are pretty funny. You can vote for which cartoon you like the best, and the winner of the contest gets some cool prizes.

The UCS was formed to protect the integrity of scientific research. In recent years, there have been many instances of the government censoring scientific research reports regarding things like global climate, endangered species, and drug safety (ie: prescription drugs). Anyways, the comic below totally made me laugh out loud. If you want to check out the others, and even vote, you can go to http://www.ucsusa.org/scientific_integrity/science_idol/

Fair warning, though, I think they might send you emails if you vote, but you can probably opt out of that. You don't have to give them any info to see the cartoons, though. Oh, and some of the cartoons seemed a little more sad than funny to me. That's all... end of warning and on to my favorite!

weekend part 2: wind blown fur

Also on the way up to the tundra, we passed some pretty little waterfalls that had formed along the side of trail ridge road from the snow melting. We got out to explore and take some pictures...

Brent decided to break the rules.


Dad liked the big road re-paving equipment across the street.

We decided to stop driving along Trail Ridge Road once we reached an altitude where the climate became an alpine tundra. A marmot decided to pose for us on some nearby rocks, so Brent took a video. For some reason, YouTube is having issues with my video file, so I'll add a picture of the marmot soon.

A view of the tundra.

After the alpine tundra, we turned around and headed towards Bear Lake. Just before reaching the lake, we pulled over at a trailhead to check things out. Brent and Taherah decided that a short hike to a waterfall was just what we needed, and Brent convinced me to walk it in my flip-flops. It wasn't exactly a comfortable walk, and my feet and shoes were dust-colored by the end, but the waterfall was gorgeous and totally worth it. Actually, my feet didn't really hurt all that much. But it was fun to complain anyways!

My poor feet.


Group picture with the waterfall.

It was really a beautiful, fun, and very tiring day. Hopefully we'll get to go back to the park again and explore even more of it. And we've hopefully convinced Dad and Taherah that Boulder is totally awesome and that they need to come back and visit again! It was such a great way to celebrate Father's Day weekend with my Dad, which is something I don't often get to do anymore. I think I'll try to make it a point to actually physically get to hang out with him for future Father's Days.

Oh and I'm sorry for such a cheesy post, but we really did have lots of fun, and I was really excited that family visited me yay! And I am really really REALLY tired tonight. However, I'm posting anyways because I said I would, and I am a good blogger.

fun weekend part 1!

This past weekend, Dad and Taherah drove up from Arlington to visit Brent and I! It was really, really great to get to hang out again after a long year, and we had a lot of fun. We also were very tired by the end of the weekend... we did so many activities! To keep things manageable, I'm going to divide the weekend into 2 posts, which means there are more pictures to come tomorrow!

They arrived on Friday afternoon and we went to lunch at my favorite local bagel place for sandwiches. After walking around and seeing where Brent and I will be moving at the end of July, we hung out until Brent came home from work. Then, we all headed out to Pearl Street for dinner at a yummy Italian place.


This is how Dad eats pizza. Can you tell he likes parmesan cheese?! I know it's sideways, but it doesn't want to be vertical, and who am I to argue?


Super cute picture of Dad and Taherah at the restaurant.

Saturday, we went to the farmer's market for lunch and then we headed out to Rocky Mountain National Park. It was so pretty, and the main road, Trail Ridge Road, was open much further than it was when Drew was here. As a result, we got to see a lot of new areas of the park. Below are pictures from the Many Peaks viewpoint, and some other fun pictures as we headed up the mountain, towards the alpine tundra. Tomorrow I'll add pictures from the tundra and from our hike to a waterfall near Bear Lake, woot!


Walking to look at the view from Many Peaks.


The view at Many Peaks... of many peaks!


Brent being serious at Many Peaks. It was before he drank some diet coke.

On the way up Trail Ridge Road, we pulled over at another viewpoint, and this squirrel decided to say hi.



SO CUTE. Like seriously, so cute.

an ode to my mechanics

I LOVE my mechanics. Seriously, I do. My mechanics are the best mechanics ever times ten. The first time I went to them, it was after visiting a different local auto shop that totally tried to charge me for things that didn't apply to me, and whose services turned out to be way more expensive than necessary. The first (bad) auto shop quoted me like $800 to change a head gasket on my blazer's engine about a year and a half ago, and they found this problem after my car was towed to their shop because it wouldn't jump, so the alternator was dead. The new, fantastic wonderful auto shop charged me like $500 for it. Seriously, I love them!!

They always tell me when something needs to be done immediately, versus when I should consider addressing something in the next year. They also treat me completely respectfully and are happy to explain what they do to my car, since I like technical stuff like that sometimes. As a small blonde female, I've definitely experienced not-so-good service that I don't think Brent would have experienced, at other shops (here's looking at you, bad first Boulder shop).

Today, my car wouldn't start, but the lights and power locks and typical your key is in the ignition sound all happened. After opening and shutting the door, it started, so I called my trusty awesome mechanics (after calling my trusty awesome Brent) and headed straight over. They checked it out, and the starter was fine, so they feared it could be the wiring. It was lunchtime, so they took me back home before heading out to lunch, and then later found that the starter's fuse had corroded. They put in one of my extra fuses, kept checking on the car for the rest of the afternoon to confirm that the problem was fixed, and then let me pick it up. The charge for their work? Nada! It was totally free! Plus I got to hang out with a bunch of super cool mechanics, who are all really nice and really respectful, and didn't treat me any differently just because I was a girl. How cool.

learning to put myself first... ack!

So not much has happened lately around here, until today. Tuesday, I asked some trainers at our gym (24hr fitness) a question about running, since I'm trying this program I found online to work up to running 3 miles in 30 mins in 9 weeks. So far, so good, I just had a pacing question. Anyways, a few minutes later, one of the trainers offered to give me a free personal training session and running assessment, to check my running form. It sounded like a hot deal, so I agreed and met with her today... bad idea! She just had me run for a minute, told me that my form is bad, and told me that I need to start doing exercises to strengthen some leg muscles so that I have good form and don't cause injury down the line. She did not, however, tell me what these exercises were.

Instead, I got a 30 minute sales pitch, and she lowered the price for 5 sessions to $250 for me... I don't have $250 laying around to spend on a trainer!! I'm a grad student for goodness sakes. If I spend money like that, it's usually on a trip or something. Instead of cutting her off then and there, I felt really conflicted, and I also didn't want to make her angry, so I said I'd think about it. She offered to help me learn some exercises tomorrow if I'd buy vitamins or something that would give her a commission and I agreed but then totally called back and cancelled. I need to just say no!! When I cancelled, I said maybe I'd reschedule, but I can't and I know it. Sometimes I need to not worry about what others think, seriously!

Update: I totally just called and told the trainer that I wont be rescheduling for an extra session because if I do, I'll be tempted to buy the package and I can't afford it. It was the truth and she was so nice about it! Go me!! Besides, I don't really want to deal with someone telling me what I should eat, etc. I just want to learn some cool new exercises, and I'm sure there are plenty online. Woot!

scary night

Boulder, and a lot of Colorado, is under a high wind warning tonight. What does that mean? Well, wind gusts in Boulder could get up to 90-100mph, especially after midnight. It is so scary! I keep instinctively crouching down during the big gusts, even though we are safe (I hope) in our home. So far, the most recent wind gust recorded was at 10:05pm, and it was 61mph. Once the wind really started to pick up this evening, we found 2 flashlights that we're each carrying around with us, since with such high winds, the power could go out any time. The lights were even flickering about an hour ago. Here's an image of the first headline on the local ABC news station's website. The winds are supposed to continue into tomorrow, and taper off by the evening. Wish us luck!

around here

Things that have happened lately:

Brent got a big box of belated bday goodies from my Mom, and he was very very excited. It was full of nuts and stuff, plus bonus Bad Boys Bail Bonds lanyards, because, as Mom put it, "your Momma wants you home." (The county office building where she works is near the county courthouse and jail, so the Bad Boys Bail Bonds guys are always around, and that's their slogan. I think it's so funny.). Here's the excited belated bday boy:

This picture was being a pain and wouldn't go upright. But it looks kind of silly like this, and you get the idea.


Lots and lots of goodies!

This week, Brent is taking a class as part of the requirements to be certified in the 2nd Oracle level... it's one below Master, which just sounds cool. To prepare, he's been doing a lot of reading about Oracle database administration, so this is how he feels (but not really, because he always seems to want to read, so I think he's pretending not to like it so he'll seem less like a computer maniac, and more like a cool dude. Which of course he already is.):


We went for our weekly ride to the farmer's market on Saturday, but I had forgotten to take my allergy meds. My allergies haven't been too bad since we moved here, so I figured it wouldn't be a big deal. Boy was I wrong!! My eye watered so much that tears ran down my cheek during the entire ride, and by the time we got back, I was having to stop every so often to blow my leaky nose. I think the culprit was cottonwood, which is blooming ALL over, and sending cottonball looking balls blowing everywhere. It started doing its thing this weekend, which conveniently corresponded with the worst allergy attack I've had in years. A picture of the (alleged) culprit is below:


And finally, my patio plants are doing great! The tomatillo has produced tons of flowers that we picked off to hopefully help the plant to continue to grow big and strong, so that in the longrun we have lots of tomatillos. The bell pepper is bigger than it was, and I'm hoping that it will have a growth spurt soon. It's now bigger than a bell pepper, but it needs to be much bigger! My lettuce has gone crazy, and it's almost ready for me to start to pick and eat. There's enough for like 2 salads now, but I don't want to pick it too early, and I have plenty of farmer's market lettuce in the fridge. The cilantro and chives are also doing well in the lettuce bowl, though I may have to keep my eye out for the lettuce to keep it from taking over.

Bell pepper.


Tomatillo. Note the cottonwood pollen stuff in the pot with it. That stuff is everywhere!


Lettuce madness!