Quotes
"The best thing one can do when it’s raining is to let it rain." – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

"If you want the Rainbow you have to deal with the rain". – Augustus

"Life Is Like Riding A Bicycle To Keep Your Balance You Must Keep Moving". – Albert Einstein

“Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get.” – Mark Twain

“It was one of those perfect summer days – the sun was shining, a gentle breeze was blowing, the birds were singing and the lawnmower was broken.” – James Dent

"For those who may care: Our lawnmower went to the lawnmower hospital yesterday." - G. Eldon Smith


Weather Or Not
Rain and snow melt combined adds up to the amount of precipitation an area gets in a time period. Snow melt depends on how wet the snow is. On the average general snow melt averages six inches of snow which equals about one inch of rain.

Since January 1, Denver has received 8.4 inches of precipitation (rain and snow melt.) In the same period of time Miami has received 7.3 inches of precipitation (rain and obviously no snow melt). Considering cloudy or partly cloudy days, Seattle had 63 days, Portland 57 days and Denver had 65 cloudy days. Makes Denver appear to be wet and dismal.

The western part of Colorado that lies west of the Rocky Mountains is known as the western slope. The western slope has been in moderate to extreme drought conditions for a number of years. Going from north to south on the western slope,Yampa watershed is at 55 percent of average snow pack. The extreme southwest corner of the state has only 28 percent of average snow pack. Of course snowpack becomes water during warm weather.

"Hot Dogs (Not What You Think)
For me, a house or apartment becomes a home when you add a set of four legs,a happy tail, and an indescribable measurable of love we call a dog." -Roger Caras

"Don't accept your dogs admiration as conclusive evidence that you are  wonderful". -Ann Landers

"My goal in life is be as good a person as my dog already thinks I am" -Anonymous

Good reads are good any time of the year. Here is where to get them.

Murder in the Rockies
www.amazon.com/Murder-Rockies-Andrew-Coyle-Eldon/dp/1938467701


Two Miles High and Six Feet Under
www.amazon.com/s?k=Two+Miles+High+and+Six+Feet+Under&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss

Quote
There is certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse! As I have often found in traveling in a stagecoach, that it is often a comfort to shift one's position, and be bruised in a new place.
   ~Washington Irving

Stagecoach Transportation
Concord stagecoaches were built in Concord, New Hampshire. The interior featured three upholstered bench seats. Passengers were allowed 21 pounds of luggage. The passenger compartment was suspended on   multi-layered ox-hide straps that smoothed the ride over rough roads. In 1861, entrepreneur Ben Holladay (October 14, 1819 – July 8, 1887) won the U.S. Postal Service’s Missouri to Salt Lake City mail-hauling contract and launched the Overland Stage Line,

The Overland Mail and Express Co.’s 600-mile Denver to Salt Lake City Division was composed of 46 stage stations spaced every 10 to 15 miles. Station operators grew and cut hay and stored grain for Ben Holladay’s 1,700 stagecoach horses and mules. The stage would pull into the station and the operator would swap the worn out horses for fresh ones. Horses and mules were swapped every 10 to 15 miles depending on terrain and weather conditions. Stagecoaches averaged 60 to 100 miles a day

A Denver city ordinance came into effect on June 1, 1866 renaming McGaa Street to Holladay to honor the tycoon. At the heart of Holladay Street was Denver's red light district. Two years after Benjamen's death,   Halladay's widow, Lydia, and the family, concerned with the relationship, petitioned the city to strip Holladay's name from the street, which had become widely known as 'the most sinful street in the West.' The city passed an ordinance on June 1, 1889 renaming Holladay Street to Market Street, a tongue in cheek reference to the activities that took place there.

Tesoro Cultural Center
The Tesoro Cultural Center (Tesoro means “Treasure” in Spanish) is committed to protecting and making available to the community the artistic treasures of our American past. All Tesoro events are inspired by Colorado’s rich history.

June 5 and 6, at the Fort, a restaurant built as a replica of early western forts, Tesoro presents the 20th Annual Indian Market and ceremonial dance. Award-winning American Indians will sell and demonstrate their art. Stories, wildlife lectures, and Indian dancing will contribute to the family fun.



. .

For more information email:  www.TesoroCulturalCenter.org
telephone 303-839-1671  

Monarch Butterfly Navigation
"We still don't understand how they how they find their way to the overwintering sites," says Steven Reppert, a retired neurobiologist. Only in the last twenty years or so have scientists been working on solving the mystery of this astonishing migration ending with the monarchs finding their way to the sanctuary forest of Michlacan, Mexico.

Scientists have estimated that it takes three or four generations of monarchs to travel from Mexico to southern Canada and a completely different generation returning to the overwintering site. Monarchs don't migrate at night because they use the sun to orient themselves.

Warming temperatures from climate change could be affecting the Monarchs cues to start the autumn and spring migrations. The number of butterflies have been increasing in a fluctuating upward cycle which gives  some scientists hope. On the other hand American farmers are tearing out milkweed or using more pesticides and in Mexico illegal loggers are encroaching on the sanctuary forests.

The monarchs are not just a pretty face. They are valuable pollinators.    

Hunting a Sport?
Wolf pups are being corralled into their dens and dynamited to death by trophy hunters -- and it's all completely legal. Hunters now have the right to snare, shoot, and even dynamite wolf pups in their dens. It’s appalling, it’s barbaric, and it’s wrong. 

Wolves help keep deer and elk populations in check, which in turn benefits many other species. For example, with less browsing from elk, water-side vegetation returns, which brings different birds to the ecosystem and helps mammals like beavers.Year after year, scientists discover more and more ways that wolves are positively affecting ecosystems.

We know what happens when wolves aren’t protected by the EPA and the Endangered Species Act   In the last ten Years, more than 3,200 wolves have been killed. That’s more than half as many wolves as are alive in the lower 48 states. . Currently, around 6,000 wolves remain, occupying less than 10% of their historic range. 

A sport is when both sides have an equal chance. Is hunting a sport?


Motherhood
"Motherhood: Because going to the bathroom in private is over-rated."

"Mom, what's it like to have the greatest daughter in the world?" "I don't know, ask your grandma!"

When your children are teenagers, it's important to have a dog so that someone in the house is happy to see you. - Nora Ephron

Wild West Gunfighters
Colorado saw their share of them. Wyatt Earp played poker in Gunnison. Doc Holiday tried to treat his tuberculosis in the warm water of Glenwood Springs. Bat Masterson was a professional gambler in Denver. Tom Horn was an agent for Pinkerton Detectives.

                                                                            


    Wyatt Earp

“For my handling of the situation at Tombstone, I have no regrets. Were it to be done again, I would do it exactly as I did it at the time.”  --Wyatt Earp, lawman

“You damn dirty cow thief, if you’re anxious to fight, I’ll meet you!”  — Wyatt Earp to Ike Clanton before the fight at the O.K. Corral.


“Leave me alone and let me go to hell by my own route.” – Calamity Jane shortly before her death in Deadwood, South Dakota, in 1903.

“You’re the sickest looking lot of sheriffs I ever seen.” – Tom Horn’s comments as he mounted the gallows

“Conflict follows wrongdoing as surely as flies follow the herd.” — Doc Holliday, 1883

'I'm not afraid to die like a man fighting, but I would not like to be killed like a dog unarmed.''
---Billy the Kid in a letter to Gov. Lew Wallace, March 1879

“There are many in this old world of ours who hold that things break about even for all of us. I have observed, for example, that we all get the same amount of ice. The rich get it in the summertime and the poor get it in the winter.”— Bat Masterson
                                                                                                





The gun fights have been glamorized by western movies, and the old west where everyone was armed never really existed. We don't want to return to the those bad old days.

The COVID-19 pandemic has provided more proof of what we have known for a long time which is that wildlife trade is not only a threat to biodiversity but also a threat to global public heath. The Center for Biological Diversity calls for a swift end to that trade. The U.S. imports 22.4 million live animals every year. We need to enforce wildlife trade bans.

Mothers in Verse

Tintype on the Pond, 1925
By J. Lorraine Brown

Believe it or not,
the old woman said,
and I tried to picture it:
a girl,
the polished white ribs of a roast
tied to her boots with twine,
the twine coated with candle wax
so she could glide
uninterrupted
across the ice--
my mother,
skating on bones.

                                                                            
      There Was An Old Woman
      There was an old woman
      Who lived in a shoe,
       She had so many children,
       And loved them all, too.
       She said, "Thank you Lord Jesus,
       For sending them bread."
       Then kissed them all gladly
        and sent them bed.                               
                                                                         

First Day of Kindergarten
By Margaret Hasse
The bus steps are high, but William clambers up gamely.
Doors shut. He peers out a print-marked window.
From the street corner, I wave, wistful as a soldier’s bride
as his bus pulls away and turns a corner
At noon the yellow bus returns him
to the same place where I’m standing again.
He thinks I stood there all day, waiting in his absence.
When he finds out I left to play tennis,
his forehead crumples like paper in a wastebasket.
Now he knows I can move on my own without him.
Tears drawn from the well of desertion form in his eyes
I’m his first love and his greatest disappointment.

Either one or both makes a great Mother's Day Gift. Safer and healthier than going out for dinner!

Quotes
"If having a soul means being able to feel love and loyalty and gratitude, then animals are better off than a lot of humans."―James Herriot

"You think those dogs will not be in heaven! I tell you they will be there long before any of us."
― Robert Louis Stevenson

"Animals are such agreeable friends―they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms." ― George Eliot

"Clearly, animals know more than we think, and think a great deal more than we know."
― Irene M. Pepperberg


And We Call Them Animals

                            








A Little Love Goes A Long Way

                   

Progress
Iceland has canceled its whaling season for the second year in a row. Some see this as an indication that the whaling industry is losing buyers.

Good reads are good any time of the year. Here is where to get them.

Murder in the Rockies
www.amazon.com/Murder-Rockies-Andrew-Coyle-Eldon/dp/1938467701


Two Miles High and Six Feet Under
www.amazon.com/s?k=Two+Miles+High+and+Six+Feet+Under&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss


May 29th, 20215/29/2021
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0 Comments My Colorado Thoughts5/23/2021
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Quotes
"The best thing one can do when it’s raining is to let it rain." – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

"If you want the Rainbow you have to deal with the rain". – Augustus

"Life Is Like Riding A Bicycle To Keep Your Balance You Must Keep Moving". – Albert Einstein

“Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get.” – Mark Twain

“It was one of those perfect summer days – the sun was shining, a gentle breeze was blowing, the birds were singing and the lawnmower was broken.” – James Dent

"For those who may care: Our lawnmower went to the lawnmower hospital yesterday." - G. Eldon Smith


Weather Or Not
Rain and snow melt combined adds up to the amount of precipitation an area gets in a time period. Snow melt depends on how wet the snow is. On the average general snow melt averages six inches of snow which equals about one inch of rain.

Since January 1, Denver has received 8.4 inches of precipitation (rain and snow melt.) In the same period of time Miami has received 7.3 inches of precipitation (rain and obviously no snow melt). Considering cloudy or partly cloudy days, Seattle had 63 days, Portland 57 days and Denver had 65 cloudy days. Makes Denver appear to be wet and dismal.

The western part of Colorado that lies west of the Rocky Mountains is known as the western slope. The western slope has been in moderate to extreme drought conditions for a number of years. Going from north to south on the western slope,Yampa watershed is at 55 percent of average snow pack. The extreme southwest corner of the state has only 28 percent of average snow pack. Of course snowpack becomes water during warm weather.



"Hot Dogs (Not What You Think)
For me, a house or apartment becomes a home when you add a set of four legs,a happy tail, and an indescribable measurable of love we call a dog." -Roger Caras

"Don't accept your dogs admiration as conclusive evidence that you are  wonderful". -Ann Landers

"My goal in life is be as good a person as my dog already thinks I am" -Anonymous





Good reads are good any time of the year. Here is where to get them.

Murder in the Rockies
www.amazon.com/Murder-Rockies-Andrew-Coyle-Eldon/dp/1938467701


Two Miles High and Six Feet Under
www.amazon.com/s?k=Two+Miles+High+and+Six+Feet+Under&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss

Longmont Colorado
Named after nearby Long's Peak, Longmont is celebrating its 150th anniversary of its foundling with a year-long schedule of events. My Great-gandparents, the Herthas, were among the founders. The house where my Grandmother was born is designated as a Historic Home." They raised five daughters, including my Grandmother, in that house.

The population in 2020 was 95,000. The population when I lived there, school years1-12, was 10,000.

Quotes
"Somebody's good quote merely puts into clever words what you knew all along"
~G. Eldon Smith

Here are popular quotes about life that most people have heard  but the words still  ring true and make us think: If I was famous I could have said that...or... If  I said that I could have been famous.

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.”
— Albert Einstein

"My Mama said life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get.
~F. Gump                                                                                                                          

“Life is like a coin. You can spend it any way you wish, but you only spend it once.” — Lillian Dickson

“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: It goes on.”
― Robert Frost

“Life imposes things on you that you can’t control, but you still have the choice of how you’re going to live through this.” — Celine Dion

“In order to write about life, first you must live it.”– Ernest Hemingway

      Antelope

                                                                      

                                     Buffalo

                        Fox                                                                          Coyote

Wildlife in the mountains,deer, elk,  moose, most often get the publicity and attention, but there are many species that live at lower elevations. In addition to the four shown above, there are sage grouse  and pheasants as well as rabbits, prairie dogs, and skunks.  

AND...

   The legendary but seldom seen Jackalope                                                             

also available online at Smashwords and Thrift Books 

Quotes
"The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing." -Walt Disney

"If you look at what you have in life, you'll always have more. If you look at what you don't have in life, you'll never have enough." -Oprah Winfrey

"Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn." -Benjamin Franklin

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose." -Dr. Seuss

"Great quotes come from great thinkers who are inclined to share their wisdom." -G. Eldon Smith

Every Day Earth Day
The Earth is sick like the rest of us. We can't mask it or vaccinate it. People we need to make changes in our living habits. Small changes ...but significant. Each individual's efforts may not seem to make a difference, but if we work together...

Three Colorado Miss Americas
Three Miss Colorados were fortunate enough to be selected  as Miss Americas. Two in the 50s when the Miss America contest was very popular and of great interest. One in the 70s, early in the feminism movement.

Sharon Kay Ritchie was Miss America in 1956 (Miss Colorado 1955). After her reign she was an actress on Broadway and worked in TV series and game shows, married singer and golfer Don Cherry and had two children. In her life she was married three more times. She died in 2009 at age 72. 

  Sharon Kay Ritchie Miss Colorado 1955 and
                Miss America 1956

Marilyn Van Derbur, a Denver native, was crowned Miss America 1958. After serving in that capacity for a year, she returned to the University of Colorado and graduated with Phi Beta Kappa. Marilyn became synonymous with public speaking. After her graduation from CU, Van Derbur was hired by AT&T as the only spokeswoman for their television commercial on the “Bell Telephone Hour.” In addition to her honors she  stood tall and beautiful and possessed looks, wit, and intelligence. ... Marilyn is a nationally recognized motivational speaker. Marilyn Van Derbur Atler became one of the most popular women to hold the title of Miss America.

Marilyn is married to Larry Atler and has one daughter. She was inducted into the Colorado Women's Hall of Fame in 1996.

                                                   Marilyn Van Derbur, Former Miss America

Rebecca King, Miss America 1974
King was crowned Miss Colorado 1973 and later earned the title of Miss America 1974. King was a law student, who famously expressed feminist political views at the Miss America Pageant's morning-after breakfast following her coronation. She persuaded the Miss America Organization to award points for the interview section of the competition which formally was criticized as an exercise in dumb questions  and dumb answers. She has spoken in favor of female empowerment at many schools and organizations after her Miss America reign.

.She married banker George Dreman in 1992 and has since used the name Rebecca King Dreman. King received a law degree from the University of Denver School of Law and became a practicing domestic-relations attorney specializing in divorce.








  Rebecca King Miss America 1974












Skiing
Spring snow storms have extended ski season at several resorts and ski areas. Call before you go to be sure your destination is still open. Good Luck and Good Skiing and Boarding.

Good Books To Read
Murder in the Rockies
Two Miles High and Six Feet Under
www.amazon.com/s?k=Two+Miles+High+and+Six+Feet+Under&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss

www.amazon.com/Murder-Rockies-Andrew-Coyle-Eldon/dp/1938467701

Quotes
In the spring, I have counted 136 different kinds of weather inside of 24 hours. ~Mark Twain

“Spring will come and so will happiness. Hold on. Life will get warmer.” – Anita Krizzan

“I want to do to you what spring does with the cherry trees.” – Pablo Neruda


Class of 2000
The Class of 2000 inductees into the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame included: Dan Reeves, football player and coach; Greg Riddoch, baseball player and coach; John Adams, member of the NCAA Football Rules Committee; Nuggets’ trainer Robert “Chopper” Travaglini.

Twenty years after their induction, the member of the Class of 2000 best remembered by most people  is Dave Logan. Logan is perhaps one of Colorado’s finest all-around athletes. He is the first Coloradoan, and only the second person, to be drafted in the same year by the National Football League, the National Basketball League and Major League Baseball.

Logan decided to pursue a football career with the Cleveland Browns. He spent seven successful seasons in Cleveland before returning to Colorado to play one more season with the Denver Broncos. After his playing days, Logan took his talents to the broadcast booth as the radio voice of the Broncos and host of various sports talk programs and at the same time coaching various top high school football teams.

It could be verse
“I think that no matter how old or infirm I may become, I will always plant a large garden in the spring. Who can resist the feelings of hope and joy that one gets from participating in nature’s rebirth?” – Edward Giobbi