Photo Blog: Colorado Dragon Boat Festival

We took the kids to the Colorado Dragon Boat Festival today. It was the first time there for all of us -- the free admission and chance to experience some different culture seemed like a nice combination.

We made it in time to see the 75-foot dragon, which Zak and Taryn felt we needed to follow around for a while.

Kudos to anyone who volunteers to carry around a 75-foot dragon in 90-degree weather.

Young people in traditional costumes made for a colorful sight.

And I wasn't the only one with a camera who thought they were good photo subjects.

What would a festival be without face painting? Taryn decided to get the character for "dragon."

Zak was much more interested in getting a snow cone.

Spending the day on a kayak occasionally resetting finish line flags didn't look like a bad gig.

We only watched one actual race, but it was pretty obvious that the crew who was more in sync had a huge advantage.

If I'd known that the end of the race was marked by somebody crawling out onto the prow of the boat and stretching to grab a flag, my timing and position for this photo would have been MUCH better.

Not a bad way to spend a couple of hours on a summer Saturday. Pretty well-organized, active but not overly crowded. And it inspired us to order Chinese food for dinner tonight. We'll probably come again next year, but earlier so we can avoid some of the heat and catch some more races.

Sort Of Like Claiming The Dog Ate My Homework, College-Style

Saturday mornings are great. The work week is (typically) over, and you get to relax, have fun and do stuff with your friends and family.

First semester of freshman year of college my Saturday mornings almost weren't so great. I was scheduled to have biology lab then. That completely obliterated the excitement of learning that classes during the week didn't start until 8:00. I was used to getting to high school by 7:30 -- an extra half-hour of sleep sounded GREAT! Of course, I soon learned that getting up for an 8:00 class only provided extra rest if I went to sleep at the same time I did in high school. But I digress.

I was understandably pretty down about the whole Saturday morning bio lab thing. As I was complaining about it back in the dorm, an Orthodox Jewish kid named Paul laughed and said getting it switched would be a piece of cake -- I just needed to say I couldn't do it because I was "Shomer Shabbos."

Of course I had absolutely no idea what that meant, so he explained to me that it was Hebrew for someone who observes the Sabbath. That included not doing certain forms of work, in which dissecting frogs was most definitely included.

I was dubious, but I couldn't think of any other options. So I went to course exchange and despite undoubtedly butchering the pronunciation, it worked. My lab was switched to Tuesday afternoons.

Sure, it was dishonest. Looking back probably not one of my prouder moments. If you've never told a fib to get out of something you didn't want to do or made nothing but good decisions when you were 18, you may not even find it funny. It's a little strange that back then I felt the need to save my Saturday mornings for things like going to football games, and 20 years later I gave up going to football games to save my Sunday mornings for spending more time with my family.

At least in those 20 years, I grew up enough to be honest about it.

I'll Bet the Rose Still Doesn't Want to Be Called "Fred," No Matter How It Smells

I had a phone interview with a recruiter recently. Even though we'd had an e-mail dialogue beforehand, I still called her the wrong name. You'd think this would have been the kiss of death for my employment chances. But I quickly apologized and joked about what bad form it was and we moved on, and I'm fortunately scheduled to have an in-person interview with the organization next week.

I was quick to handle the gaffe because this sadly wasn't an isolated incident for me; I've had a lot of practice. For whatever reason, I'm just really bad with names. I even called Danelle by the wrong name on our first date, but somehow managed to overcome that faux pas, too.

It's sort of a weird flaw, because I otherwise have a pretty solid memory. I tend to waste the ability on stuff like sports trivia, '80s songs and movie casts, but it sometimes has more tangible benefits. Like helping the Colonie Central High School team retire as three-time undefeated champs on Answers Please. I was disappointed not to see that sweet trophy not still proudly displayed in the lobby when I went back for my 20th reunion, but that's another issue all together.

Back to the name thing -- I do fess up most of the time and try not to fall back on calling people things like "big guy" or "hey...you." I think for the most part people can tell when you have absolutely zero recollection of their name. They then get some perverse pleasure out of using yours repeatedly, just to twist the knife a bit. So I try to be up front as often as I can and just come clean with a simple, "I'm really sorry, but I can't remember your name." I've managed to convince myself that candor is better in that sort of already-awkward situation.

That card has no more than one use, though. And yes, there have been times when I've played it and then run into the person later and AGAIN blanked on their name. Then you really have no choice but to fake it and hope for the best. You can't go back to that well twice without looking like a completely insensitive jerk.

Similarly, there are the times when you've known a person too long or had too many interactions with them to confess to not knowing their name. It's not quite the same as having already admitted to them that you don't know it, because it never even crosses their minds that you might not. There was an executive at CBS4 who fell into this category for me. We worked on projects together for years, but enough time passed between each of our interactions that I could never remember her name the next time we saw each other.

Finally, there's an odd category of people who enter my life from time to time whose names I know, and I know I know them. But something inside me won't let me actually utter the name for fear of being wrong. We had an operations guy at the stadium like this. I'd see him, I'd know immediately what his name was, but I still had to sneak a peek at his security credential just to erase that little gnawing sliver of doubt.

I try to build a bank of karmic goodwill against this shortcoming by pre-emptively introducing other people. As in if I'm with Bill and Joe walks up, I'll quickly say something like, "Bill, you remember Joe, right?" Assuming everyone else shares the same affliction somehow makes mine more forgiveable.

I don't know if I'm going to get this position I'm interviewing for next week or not. But hopefully I won't skewer my chances by screwing up the hiring manager's name. I guess it's not like I'm going to ask her to marry me one day or anything, though...

Alderfer/Three Sisters Park

Hike day took us up to Evergreen for a visit to Alderfer/Three Sisters Park. Many thanks to Taryn for this week's intro photo.

I can't decide if this is a Colorado Alpine or Small Wood Nymph, but these guys were by far the most abundant butterfly here. And not much for sitting still to have their pictures taken.

UPDATE: Friend of the program Mike Fisher settles the issue -- "That is the Small Wood-nymph, Cercyonis oetus charon. A little higher up in elevation and you will find the Common Alpine, Erebia epipsodea in moist meadows, mostly above 8500 Ft. in the Front Range."

Taryn made it about 20 steps before deciding she already needed to eat her cereal bar.

The area is an interesting mix of meadows and forested rock formations.

The park is made up of a lot of small trails. Of course, I didn't look at the map closely enough to take any that actually brought us by The Three Sisters.

The view to the west, possibly with Goliath Peak in the distance.

I've been reading the Chronicles of Narnia to them at night, so they pretended they were King Peter and King Lucy and took turns leading. That's right -- KING Lucy. She was very insistent on this point.

The view to the east from the Homestead Trail.

A female Mountain Bluebird, I think. At least, that's what I'd expect to see on Bluebird Meadow Trail.

It looks like Zak's photography training last week paid off after all. Solid reproduction of his shot from Lookout Mountain.

A very light 1.6 miles done in about an hour and a half. I didn't want anything too long, but I could have put together about two miles worth from the other parking lot and gotten to The Three Sisters and The Brother. Hey, there's nothing that says we can't go back!

I Think The Pregame Brunch Had Some Guys Called "The Tumbling Rocks"

I read tonight that Earth, Wind & Fire is playing Red Rocks this September. That made me think of the moment when I realized how different working in the NFL was from any other job I'd ever had.

January 1998. Pat Bowlen was incredibly generous and paid to fly every team employee and a guest out to San Diego for Super Bowl XXXII, and Danelle and I were having a great time going to various events.

One night the NFL took over Sea World for a private party. Learning that was impressive, but not "the moment" -- I'd been to Six Flags Over Texas for something similar before through a conference Danelle's brother attended, so I already knew theme parks did that sort of stuff for organizations with deep pockets. Pretty clever alternate revenue stream, actually.

"The moment" came while we were waiting in a buffet line inside a ginormous hospitality tent. There was a band playing, and I commented to Danelle that they were doing a really good cover of "Boogie Wonderland."

We asked the 20-something server behind the table who the band was, and she mumbled disinterestedly, "I dunno. Dirt, Water & Air or something."

Yep, it was Earth, Wind & Fire. Just sort of playing in the background while people hit the carving station.

I don't know why that surprised me so much, but it did. It just never occurred to me that the National Football League simply doesn't DO cover bands. From that moment on, I understood that I was quite literally operating in a different league than I'd been used to.

I might just go catch Philip Bailey and the boys again in a couple of months, if I can confirm the presence of a pasta bar.

The Geek Shall Inherit

I'm a jumble of pride and shame today -- Zak and I played our first game of Pokémon.

He's been into the cards for a while, but had never tried to learn how to play the game. I'm proud that my 7-year-old quickly picked up the game mechanics, turn sequence, card abilities and all that. But there's also a twinge of guilt for leading him down the path to full-fledged geekdom I took.

I don't think I even started at such as tender age. My earliest memories of stereotypically dorky inclinations are from fourth grade when some of my school buddies introduced me to Dungeons & Dragons. We didn't fully grasp how the game was supposed to work, so we "played" as we went about our normal daily activities. No, we didn't beat on each other with toy swords. But I was a cleric, and when I sat down to lunch I'd announce that I was casting Purify Food and Drink on my meal. Without fail, one bite in Jason O'Toole would cackle that he had poisoned my PB&J AFTER I cast my spell and I was now dead.

Needless to say I didn't think this seemed like a very fun game. But for whatever reason I bought a basic rulebook and module B1: In Search of the Unknown and kept after it. And eventually, for whatever reason, something clicked.

I won't bore you with all the details of afternoons spent drawing up castle plans for my mage, Thorgul the Mystic. Or how I had a map of the World of Greyhawk on my bedroom wall. Or even how I created my own science fiction role-playing game just for fun that for some reason I was able to turn in for an 8th grade English project. Mr. Butterfield gave me an A+ on it, probably in large part because it made absolutely no sense to him. Let's just say that I continued to play D&D until after I graduated college, and that if someone called me today and said they were playing this weekend and would I be interested in joining them I'd give it serious consideration.

I enjoyed a couple of relatively non-nerdish years, then in 1994 Danelle's dad bought a bunch of us all cards for this game called Magic: The Gathering for Christmas. Like Michael Corleone, I'd been pulled back in.

We tried it a few times over the holidays, but eventually everyone else in the family stopped playing but me. So I started going to play at comic shops and fell in with a group of other guys who became my primary social circle. We used to play for fun at one shop while a guy named George Baxter (who was quite well known internationally in the Magic community) gave presentations on how to succeed in tournaments. We called his young sycophants "Baxterheads" and snickered at their folly.

Then we moved to Denver in 1997, and I got sucked into the tournament scene myself. Somewhat ironically, my transition to the dark side happened at a store called The Light Side. I was never a great tournament player, but I won a few and was ranked in the top 20 in the state in my favorite format. I joined a team, went to play-testing sessions, participated in a local Magic e-mail list. I was in as deep as you can get.

Just how geeky is Magic? When I told someone I befriended through a text-based online role-playing game based on Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series that I played Magic, her only reply was, "Wow -- you ARE a geek." Ouch.

Anyway, around 2004 I decided I couldn't devote enough time to Magic to stay as competitive as I wanted to be. So I gradually drifted away, and now I probably haven't played at all in about a year.

That text-based game kept my geek flame burning for a while, then last year I took up World of Warcraft which Danelle had already been playing for about a year. I think it's safe to say my geek cred is beyond reproach without even getting into things like my collections of comic books and Star Wars action figures.

So this afternoon there I was at the kitchen table with Zak, listening to him crow with glee as his Lucario attacked my Piplup with Aura Sphere. Sure, he and I hike together, go to baseball games together and "cool" stuff like that. But I'm excited about this new activity we can share.

And I officially apologize here in writing in advance for all the dates he won't get and wedgies he WILL get because of this. But hey, I still ended up with two Super Bowl rings and a hot wife despite my own geekular leanings. And I didn't even roll a 20-sided die to get them.

Memorable Concert Moments: The Killers/Tegan & Sara 2005

By the early part of this decade I'd lost interest in music. The whole nu metal stuff of the late '90s just never resonated with me, and I thought maybe I'd just finally gotten old and things had passed me by. I figured I was just a few short months away from wearing plaid pants pulled up past my navel and yelling at the neighbor kids to turn that noise down.

But then something strange and wonderful happened in 2004 -- new bands with very '80s-sounding styles started emerging. And riding the crest of the wave were The Killers.

Hot Fuss woke me up from my four years of musical slumber. Was that actually a SYNTHESIZER I could hear on those songs? The Geritol went back in the closet, and I was back in the game!

In May of 2005 The Killers came to the Paramount Theatre in downtown Denver with the Canadian sister team of Tegan & Sara. My buddy Nerf at KTCL helped me get a couple of tickets, and I invited my former neighbor Rick Fisher. I figured as a musician he'd enjoy hearing what was new and as a father of two musically talented girls he'd appreciate the opening act.

Tegan & Sara were all right. Rick not surprisingly bought their CD there, and then embarrassed me by telling them at their little merchandise booth after the show that he thought they were better than The Killers. Seriously, isn't that like telling the JV they were better than the varsity? I think I slapped him on the arm for it like we were an old married couple.

Our seats were clearly part of the Clear Channel promtional allotment. Right in front of us were former Bronco Harald Hasselbach and his wife Aundrea, and right behind us was KBPI DJ Uncle Nasty, I think with his teenage daughter. I hope I didn't destroy his hard rock cred by outting him having been there like that. Regardless, one of the more surreal moments of my life was doing a tequila shot with that group (minus the teenage daughter) in between acts.

The Killers' set was absolutely phenomenal, if a little short at just 10 songs. One of the things that really struck me was how into them the entire audience was. The place was full, and I very much got the impression that people were definitely there specifically to see The Killers -- not just to go to any old concert or because they couldn't find something better to do. There was a definite energy in the venue that I can't say I've ever felt at another show -- the band and the crowd just fed off each other.

I caught them again at Red Rocks about four months later and it was a complete letdown. They did the exact same set, and they just didn't seem to have figured out how to fill a venue like that yet with their presence. But for that one night in May, they gave 1,870 folks at the Paramount a show I don't think any of us will forget.

Except maybe Rick. He's probably not sure who that band was that made Tegan & Sara cut their set short.