A peaceful scene at City Park this morning. The blue of the sky just before sunrise is now giving way to some bright pinks. The lights around the lake are still reflected in its glassy surface, part water, part ice. Tho all of the beautiful snow that was captured by the trees Saturday nite into Sunday morning melted yesterday, there is still snow on most of the grassy areas, reminding us that even tho we are getting close to 60 degrees today, it is, technically, still the winter season.
I miss the beach at Ogden Dunes and the mountains in Longmont most poignantly during the Full Moon. Like last nite, this morning, and tonite.
I think I will plan a stay in the mountains during a Full Moon once winter's icy grip finally lets go of the Rockies. I am sure the scene is a winter wonderland right now with all the recently fallen powder (and more coming down there as I write), but I am afraid of the terrain to drive up there. It instills a great deal of fear in me when we have driven them with not a speck of precip on the roads...there are so many twists and turns and steep declines. If someone else, in a very reliable car and a very safe driver, were to offer to take us up to one of the ski resorts, I would strongly consider going. I would still be uncomfortable during the ride, there's no doubt!
I MIGHT feel better when we have an AWD vehicle, but don't be so sure about that!
Here we are already into February. January almost a blur. Ringing in the new year seems so long ago. During those 31 days of January, we enjoyed brunch with our new friends, Ted & Dan, to usher in 2015. We have also enjoyed dinner & a movie with them (tho, I wouldn't recommend paying money to see Into the Woods in the theatre...wait for Redbox!!). We tried a couple new restaurants and can highly recommend both: Hopdoddy Burger Bar, just outside Union Station, where we ate the Buffalo Bill bison burger (mine without Frank's hot sauce b/c I won't be putting "that shit" on anything!!). The service was very attentive and, being winter, they have hot tea on the bar to serve yourself!! Nice touch! We also hit The Abbey Tavern on Colfax for Happy Hour. We enjoyed $3 Breckenridge Brewery Avalanche Ale draughts, $7 appetizers and shared a $13 Shepard's Pie entrée. It was a fairly light crowd when we arrived, but, boy, did it pick up! The place is small (bigger when the outdoor seating can be utilized), so the chatter can get pretty loud. The lighting is low and the place has an almost secretive feel, probably more so if you sit in one of the booths over the high tops.
We visited the Denver Museum of Nature and Science on one of its free days. Pretty crowded, of course, but we made our way. It was a lot bigger than I thought. The displays and exhibits, to include one on whales, were very well done. It reminds me of a small version of a cross between Chicago's Field Museum and Museum of Science & Industry. There was a more educational area, the science part, which we didn't visit. It seemed geared more to kids and we were around enough of them in the nature aspect!!!
We had our first laser hair removal appointments! Yep! I scored us an awesome Living Social deal last year! We have a year's worth of treatments, each taking place every 6 weeks. I definitely believe the hair on my legs and underarms is significantly less! But it is killing me (and Chris, more so) to not be able to do some very strategic plucking! It is of great importance to let the hairs grow in order that the laser can kill the follicle, which must contain hair for the treatment to work! I look forward to the changes and not having to use a razor every single day!! I will have to run it over my ankle tattoo, as you do NOT get the laser over that! One, it would hurt like hell b/c the laser is seeking out darker shades of skin and, two, it would begin to fade my tattoo, which I don't want!
I had hoped to pick up a second training job at a beast mode gym, but it didn't work out. Not because they wouldn't have loved me, but because it required a $200 in-house certification. I have already spent several hundred on my Group Fitness cert and another couple hundred on my TRX cert, both of which already have me employed and make me employable to any gym/fitness setting. While I can appreciate the training protocol to keep all of the trainers on the same page, I can not get with paying $200 for a certification that means absolutely nothing anywhere else on the planet. I was pretty bummed b/c I had taken one of the group training classes and it kicked my ass! I hadn't worked that hard since LAB /UFC and I LOVED it! It was a leg-specific day and I was sore for many days thereafter!!! However, the class didn't go to waste as I used it as a basis for my Group Training that same week!
Live and learn...and apply that knowledge!!
I almost forgot...there is an annual Stock Show, which begins with a parade downtown. Chris took a long lunch so we could go watch it together! Long-horn cattle start the procession!!! It was surreal ~ 20 or so long-horn cattle coming by us on 17th Street in downtown Denver!!!
Which brings us back to the beginning of February:
We started the month by getting new tattoos! We met a female tattoo artist, Sam, at a holiday party we attended at the home of some new friends, Markie & Beth. I got a siren/mermaid on my left side/ribcage (to bookend with the seahorse on my right side) and Chris got a raven on his left forearm.
This Friday, we will see Danny Elfman in concert at the Colorado Symphony doing the music from Tim Burton's films! A gift we bought ourselves around Christmas. VERY excited! It is how we are going to celebrate Valentine's Day and Chris's birthday (early). We are going to hit another new spot for Happy Hour: Russell's Smokehouse, an underground spot a la Prohibition speakeasy.
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