Tea at the Brown Palace Hotel

I met up with Megan and her sister Katie for Tea at the Brown Palace Hotel. The hotel opened in 1892 and has a 8 story atrium. The tea takes place in the atrium accompanied by a harpist.

CSO Concert in Cheesman Park

It has become a tradition to attend the free Colorado Symphony Orchestra concert in the park and again Megan made one of her fantastic picnics. This year her sister, Katie, was visiting and joined us (see pic). Last year's concert rained out near the end and this year looked like it might also, but it held out and the symphony was able to play three selections:
Puts - Two Mountain Scenes
Copland - Suite from The Tender Land
Beethoven - Symphony No. 7
This year there was a man with an easel set up. He painted throughout the concert then held up the final product after the last piece. We walked up to take a closer look - not bad for less than 2 hrs of painting. It sort of had a Van Gogh feel to it.

Lyle Lovett @ Red Rocks

I went to see Lyle Lovett at Red Rocks with Ellen, Joan and Dave. This was a song that isn't on any of his albums with very creative lyrics (poor video quality, but decent audio). For the song, he used a smaller group of performers and the mandolin player was from Duncanville, Texas.

Highlands Garden Cafe

Megan and I tried a restaurant in the Highlands area of Denver. It's similar to the Highlands area of Atlanta. The Highlands Garden Cafe is a home turned into a restaurant. In my Gabby Gourmet book it is ranked as "to die for" which is one below the top ranking of "flawless". We had the goat cheese quesadilla with lobster/mango topping as an appetizer. It was a fun, interesting combo. My entree was tuna. Compared to other 'to die for' rankings Megan and I have tried, I'm not sure I would rank this one in the same category. I think it may be up there due to the ambiance since most of the seating is outside in pretty gardens.

Cherry Creek Arts Festival

Every July 4th weekend Denver hosts an arts festival. I last made a blog entry regarding it in July 2005. I picked 2 new favorite artists this time:

1. This Into That - Jim Rosenau uses old hardback books to make bookshelves and bookcases. A very creative idea.

2. Click on picture below to go to artist's website.

Blocking the sunlight

I planted flowers again this year. Although the 4 floor monstrosity across the street is up now, and I believe it's blocking a lot of my sunlight. We'll see how the plants fair this year.

Seinfeld

I went and saw Jerry Seinfeld at the Buell Theatre. He performed for a little over an hour. It was entertaining. It's hard to believe he's 54. He was asked by the audience if he was going to do any more shows, etc. He said something to the effect of being old, tired and rich, so no.

Nixon in China

Megan and I met up at Alto for another opera short event. This opera was "Nixon in China". The assistant director explained a little about the opera after the mini-performance. It is in a minimalist style, definitely different then anything I've heard before.

Post-Graduation Trip

After graduation, I flew back to Atlanta and then drove with Eileen to Charlotte.

I had an interesting flight to Atlanta. The flight attendents were serving the drinks when several passengers noticed a burning smell. They put the cart away then started asking if the floor felt hot under anyones' feet. They also opened all the overhead bins and starting feeling the bags. They wanted to know if anyone had brought a curling iron or butane on board... Yeah, so we diverted to Kansas City. I spent the next 4 hrs there until they discovered the short circuit in the coffee hot plate.

In Charlotte, I met Shawn's parents. We went out on the lake in Shawn's parent's boat. I had not been wakeboarding since 2000. It took me 4 times to be able to get up on it. Apparently it's not like riding a bike and it does not come right back to you. See Eileen's blog - she captured a video on her new camera. I also tried kneeboarding which was a little easier.

It's Official - Graduation

Today I graduated from the MBA in Health Administration program at CU Denver. I attended a dinner and awards banquet for the program. I was surprised to receive the Director's Award. Our program director said something to the effect that it goes to a student with a high GPA. I had no idea how my grades compared to my peers - thus the surprise. I was even more surprised when I got home and realized there was an envelope taped to the back of the plague, and the award included a monetary gift.


My aunts Ellen and Joan attended the event with me. We celebrated by opening some champagne at Joan's house. They also gave me some gorgeous earrings by the jewelry designer John Atencio.

Almost to graduation

Colorado GT Alumni Spring Meeting

Tonight I attended the Colorado GT Club spring meeting. The speaker was Robert Cohen who founded the Metro Denver Sports Commission. The commission bids on different sports events to be held in Denver. The committee is also aiming to get the 2018 winter games. He's a clever guy and got the SportAccord 2009 conference to be held in Denver; it's an international sports convention that members of the International Olympic Committee attend. There is a rule when bidding on the Olympics you cannot have members of the committee visit the city up to a certain time. So getting the conference in Denver was a smart way to get the IOC members to see Denver. Now other Olympic bid cities are trying to get the next conference in their cities. They always have very interesting speakers at the GT alum events. Plus, since I was the youngest alum there - I won a door prize.

The View is Changing

The pretty view I have enjoyed from my porch for the past couple of years is nearly gone. They have been building a new apartment complex for the past year. They poured the concrete for the final building today. Too bad they didn't use the plot of land for a park instead.

The Real "Winning" Egg

Michelle's Winning Egg '07 (left). Eileen's egg '08 (right).

In the last several years Eileen has liked to challenge me in a little Easter egg decorating contest. Unfortunately for her...it is no contest. This year she was going to win by my forfeit because I did not believe I would be partaking in any decorating. Eileen boldly sent me an picture of the susposed "winning egg", pictured here, which she calls "Easter Egg Hunt Among the Gardens in March" (which does remind me a little of my egg from last year...)

However, in an unexpected twist - there is no forfeit...may I present 2 eggs for the this year's title.
Egg #1 titled "Bunny" and Egg #2 titled "There are so many colors on that egg how did she do it?"

The answer to the number of colors on the second egg is that in a hurry Joan grabbed a different kind of decorating kit - you put the egg in a tiny plastic bag and put a couple of drops of color in then swosh it around till it looks like tie-die. Our eggs didn't quite turn out like the pictures on the package, but this was one of the best. I still think my egg from last year beats them all. Here are all of Joan's, Ellen's and my eggs for this year. Happy Easter!

Copper Mountain and Frisco

Uncle Fred and Aunt Vicki took their annual trip to Copper Mountain. My aunt Ellen and I joined them for a few days. At Copper I snowboarded on Friday and Saturday; unbelievably it was the first time I had been up this season. I was curious how bad I might have been since it had been a year, but I hadn't forgotten anything and didn't fall down once. I still was wearing my volleyball kneepads though just in case. Joan drove up on Saturday and joined us for dinner at the Blue Spruce Inn.

On Sunday, we tried classic cross-country skiing at the Nordic Center in Frisco. I really enjoyed the cross-country skiing and would definitely do it again. The boots are comfortable compared to ski boots (they lace up and only come to your ankles). And the skis are smaller and light-weight compared to downhills skis. It's an excellent workout; you pretty much can follow the tracks (see the tracks in right-hand corner of the picture with Ellen and Vicki ahead of me). There is also something called 'skating' that looks like someone on rollerblades.You can also see the skating tracks on the main center part of the trail.

Vicki, Ellen and I then had lunch at the Butterhorn Bakery in Frisco.

Opera Shorts!

Megan and I went to an Opera Shorts event. It was put on by the Central City Opera. It's wine, appetizers, and bits from the operas that they are putting on this summer. It was a quick, fun event to fit in right before my law class.

Birthday

I went to my friend Mythili's daughter's 5th birthday. She also has a 3mo old. In this pic, I'm in the background, and Mythili's friend to her left is holding the baby.

Mythili's daughter, Ananya, is the one on the left smiling.

27 Dresses

Megan and I met for a quick dinner after my class and then saw 27 Dresses. It was a nice break in the middle of the week. It was an entertaining movie too.

Where are they now? (Vol 3)

Billy, who I've known since the 6th grade, is now married and - as of Friday - a daddy living in Hong Kong. He is a pilot for Cathay Pacific Airways. In my previous "Where are they now?" blogs I've included a picture from the past. For those of you who don't know Billy, you can at least be amused by the picture from 1989. My friend Mandy on the front row had very nice tight-rolled jeans as well as a New Kids on the Block t-shirt (I heard they were getting back together?!?). I am in there somewhere but have neglected to point myself out. I did however circle Billy. (click on pic for larger image)

Here are recent pics of Billy and his wife Megan as well as William Franklin the IV.

Eileen & Shawn's Quick Visit

Eileen and Shawn were on their way to Montana for a medical conference (aka ski trip) and the layover flight in Denver was overbooked. They volunteered to take the morning flight in exchange for free tickets. Megan, Stephen, Joan and I all went together with them to dinner at Tomayo.