The Fall of Alpine

It was my favorite kind of day - gray, cool, cloudy, rainy (yeah, I'm kind of a depressing person) - so I decided to go on a walk and take some pictures from our neighborhood.













I would have loved to have been able to go home afterward and take a nap and then maybe make a cup of hot chocolate and read a book... But, well, I had homework and work and those two things always seem to be conspiring against my happiness.

My Music

It's been a particularly stressful semester, and I've been listening to a lot of classical music as a way to relax. These are two of my favorite new discoveries, and I listen to them almost every day (I actually discovered both of them when they were used to memorable effect in two different movies.) No guarantee that anyone else will like them, but I find them very beautiful and evocative. Neither, unfortunately, has a particularly exciting video (though the first does show the movie where I first heard the piece.)



Does the second piece remind anyone else of "Beauty and the Beast" for some reason?

This could be amazing...

Denver

I went to downtown Denver to do some work, and ended up completely captivated by this strange and wondrous building near the place where I parked. So, before my big post about Rocky Mountain National Park, here's a smaller post with some pictures of some of the absolutely amazing sculptures (and an interesting building) located in that lovely little complex.

And, really, I just want to increase my post count on my blog - if I play my cards right, I'll be able to double my current post count just with pictures and stuff from this Colorado trip.The Denver Arts and Civics Center, from afar. The Center contains several museums, a library, and maybe some other stuff (maybe.)
The Denver Arts and Civics Center, from aclose.
A sculpture, located within the same complex as the above two pictures.
It's a horse. On top of a chair. Got it?
This pretty much speaks for itself.

Not quite an epic adventure

Over the weekend we drove up into the mountains west of Denver. It was truly a thrill and a joy, and probably the most exciting thing I've done all summer (yeah, that's the kind of summer that I've had.)


A fairly nice lake, though its reservoirness detracts from its niceness. Natural lakes are, quite simply, vastly superior to any manmade body of water.

Yeah.

It may not look it, but we're actually pretty high up here, elevation-wise. We spent most of the trip at elevations between 8000 and 11000 feet, and many of the mountains (including those in this picture) are over 14000 feet, placing them among the tallest in the continental United States. Wow!

Leadville is an old (emphasis on old - also, decrepit) silver mining town that is, officially, the highest incorporated city in the United States (thanks Wikipedia!) Along with being the one-time host of a gay and cultivated social life, it was once the birthplace of some truly fabulous fortunes. Nowadays, however...

It's also near the headwaters of the Arkansas river. Incredible!

The long and not-so-winding road - to the future!

Coming soon: My journey into the wild and wacky world of Denver architecture!

This post brought to you by Nutella, the original hazelnut spread.

So I like totally updated my blog! (Looking for traveling and time-passing ideas, yo.)

Finals are done - only three semesters (or so) to go! Let the boredom of summer ensue! And any ideas of what I can do to pass the time? Other than sitting in my room and watching movies on my totally cool TV?

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Also, I've decided that I want to take a few trips over the next year or so, and would like some suggestions from the four people who read this blog.

Firstly, I'd like to go on a sort of mini-trip sometime this summer - preferably one that wouldn't cost more than two or three hundred dollars. My initial thought was to fly out to New York, catch a few Broadway shows (I do desperately want to get to "Sondheim on Sondheim"), and then go down to VA for a few days... But, unfortunately, that's sort of out of my price range at the moment. So any ideas for that? It'd probably best be somewhere I can go in my car, possibly with a few friends. Somewhere cool, and maybe somewhere I've never been before (not a new state or country though, obviously.)

Secondly, the recent, uh, list that has been passed around (you know the one of which I speak) has inspired me to, well... It's made me feel more competitive than I have in a while, and I've decided that next year I'm going to go somewhere I haven't been before, country-wise. What I'm saying is that I really need to drive up my number - there are certainly individuals I can't beat, but I need to drive up my ranking a little bit... Right?

So any ideas? Australia/Asia, etc. are too expensive, but I think there are other places that are relatively cheap. I'd only ask that the place not be entirely dangerous (half-dangerous is all right.)

These would, of course, only be a warm-up for the Ultra-Awesome-Mega-Ultimate-Fantabulastical Trip that I'll be taking after a few of my friends and I graduate (so it'll be a while, since at least one of them probably has a good three years left - enough time to save up for it.)

So, yeah, any and all suggestions are welcome! You could even suggest that I don't worry about stuff like this just now and focus on saving for school and the future and wait until I get a good career before I start planning epic trips - but, well, you know... I've gotta get more little black X's on the list!