It's already August, can you believe that? Since it's the first of the month, it's also Theme Day for City Daily Photo Bloggers, and this time the theme is sweets. I'm not much of a candy person but I love orange slice candies! I think it must go all the way back to early childhood for me. Generally if you offer me candy I pass, but I never say no to these. Yum!
For more takes on sweet things from CDP bloggers all over the world, click HERE. Enjoy!
There's a small neighborhood called Old Farm a few blocks north of where I went to high school. For some reason people here tend to pronounce the it with emphasis on the first word: OLD Farm. Isn't that odd? I never knew how it got its name until last Saturday, when my friend JB and I did the annual city garden tour, and several of the stops were in Old Farm. I guess I never noticed the actual old farm before! Ha! Anyway, it's cute, quiet and originally sprung up probably in the late 1960s like the adjacent and much larger neighborhood, Village Seven, where I lived. We saw some great gardens on the tour and I'll share some pictures over the coming days.
After finishing with a photo shoot shoot up north yesterday, I stopped in the parking lot at UCCS for the purposes of taking my camera bag out of my car and depositing it in the trunk, where it would be secure while I ran some errands. I was only there for a minute or two, just long enough to take this picture. I went to college at UCCS but it was so long ago I can't remember if this is Dwire Hall or the science building (I think it's the latter). I must be getting old.
I came across this while walking Frodo in Shooks Run Park, and I can't exactly decipher it but it looks like it says Addie Buck 18. Perhaps Addie was involved with a park improvement project, or maybe she just decided to leave her mark, given an opportunity to do so. Wet cement is hard to resist. When we got a new driveway a couple of decades ago I naturally incised my initials and the year in it. You can still read it just fine.
If you read this blog regularly, you probably already know that I'm an avid sewist. That and knitting are really my only "crafts." I'm not handy with a glue gun and don't know how to pronounce Cricut. That kind of stuff was never my jam. But I do love to sew and knit! I can crochet, too. These skills were taught to me when I was a child in the Philippines, so maybe that's why they've stuck with me. At any rate, sewing makes me a fan of The Mill Outlet, which is a locally owned fabric store on Prospect Street just south of Fillmore. I've been a regular customer for many years. This is a large city, and people don't like to drive far outside their zone to get what they need, but with the nationwide closing of Joann's Fabrics and Crafts, The Mill Outlet has suddenly become a hot spot, even for those who rarely venture west of Academy Boulevard. I'm so glad of it! I went there a couple of weekends ago and it was actually hard to find a parking spot. The place was buzzing. When a big box store opens, it makes the mom and pop stores wither and die. But when a big box store closes, here's your proof that the opposite thing happens. Long live The Mill Outlet!
You could say that Academy Boulevard is the main drag here. It goes all the way from the very south end of town to the Air Force Academy. The middle section of Academy Boulevard, bounded by about Palmer Park Boulevard to the south and Constitution to the north, has been in a sort of depressing, half empty limbo for years now. Academy is six lanes wide, not including turn lanes, and this part of it has a large median separating the northbound and southbound lanes -- large enough for a strip mall, in fact, probably built sometime in the 1960s. Unfortunately the little strip mall has been almost entirely empty for some time now, although there was a watch repair shop and a hookah lounge that hung on for a few years even after the rest of it slowly became vacant. Up until about 10-12 years ago it was full and bustling, though. In the 1990s there was a place called Housing Helpers, where I worked for about a year. It was my first ever office job; before that I had only worked in retail and restaurants. There was also the aforementioned watch repair guy, a large chain record store where several of my friends worked over the years, the Yakitori restaurant where I ate lunch most days (it's long since been relocated to Austin Bluffs Parkway), a plus sized clothing consignment shop, and I think there was a least one insurance agent to round things out. But times change, and recently the little strip mall in the middle of Academy Boulevard was torn down. I believe yet another giant convenience store/gas station is going up in its place.
Not the sharpest picture, but another great example of senior citizen style nonetheless. I was leaving my surgeon's office last week and this woman (I'd say about 65+ years old) was sitting in the common area near the elevators. I couldn't help but notice her cool Dr. Martens brogues with a heart shaped cutout and animal print. Nice! She kindly let me snap a picture before I ran for the elevator. Like any self respecting Gen X punk, I've had a few pairs of Docs myself; my current ones are Chelsea boots and I love 'em. By the way, I too now qualify as a senior citizen and I'll be wearing Docs as long as they're still making them! I'm stubborn that way. 😉
Day four post surgery, and I'm still feeling terrible although I've barely even left the bed. But it was a nice day, so I thought maybe I could manage getting outside for a few minutes. Pat drove me to my studio, where I worked for about 30 minutes, then we drove to Tokyo Joe's to pick up some lunch to go. By the time we got there I was exhausted again -- so here's the view from the passenger seat, which is about all I could muster.
About ten or twelve years ago I had some fairly major abdominal surgery, something called a Nissen fundoplication, and for weeks afterward I was weak and miserable. In fact it was months before I felt even close to normal again. I figured that having my gallbladder removed wasn't as dire by comparison, but this post-op feeling sure feels much the same. I hope my convalescence goes much more quickly. I can't afford to be sidelined for much longer.
Do you see those vehicles parked on the upper right side of this photo? Just to the right of them (outside the frame) is the building that housed my photography studio on Weber Street for a full decade. The large edifice on the left is a Safeway grocery store. Suffice it to say that over the course of that decade, I traversed this sidewalk countless times, from my studio to Safeway and back, and yet I never once noticed this big flat circle. I apparently quite literally walked right past it at least once a week for 10 years, and yet it never registered in my brain as a large circle shape until last month, when I was walking Frodo along this path. Isn't that hilarious? It's clearly been there for years but was invisible to me. And they say artists are highly visual people. Ha!
And now, for your listening pleasure...
I like finding new murals around town and am usually impressed by them, but this one's kind of meh in my opinion. It's not bad, just not the same level we're used to seeing around here. By the way this is on the building just north of where my studio was on Weber -- I relocated in 2018 but was next door to this building for 10 years. Ever since I moved, it seems like this little section of Weber Street has changed a lot. This side of the building used to house Bon Shoe Repair, but Wes retired a few years ago it seems. (Honestly I don't know if he's still alive, I hope he is but he was pretty old.) There was another cobbler in there after Wes, a Russian guy, but now it seems there's a tattoo artist in that space and presumably they're the one who painted this mural. Meh.
It snowed about six inches on Tuesday. These photos were taken on Wednesday, and that night it snowed yet again. Yesterday (Thursday) brought even more snow, and today it came down heavily starting in the morning and not letting up until nightfall. It's very unusual for us to get more than a dusting of the white stuff so early in the season, let alone 14"-20" of it over four days straight. In fact I don't recall this ever happening in the 40+ years I've lived here. The ground isn't frozen yet, so I suspect that as soon as the precipitation finally peters out, things will melt fairly quickly.
This was taken in my backyard and I just have to brag on these flowers for a minute. I couple of years ago I went to Camp John Waters in Kent, Connecticut, and all around that little village I saw Queen Anne's lace that had gone to seed. They were everywhere, so I grabbed a few dead heads and brought them home with me. Last spring I germinated a few, and at the end of last summer I put them in the ground. Look at them now! These flowers remind me so much of Ohio, where we lived not once but twice when I was a kid -- Queen Anne's lace was all over the place. I'm so happy that these plants are thriving for me here, so far away from where they started.
Have you gotten sucked in to the pickleball craze? I have not, although I have friends who've become pickleball addicts. It seems like almost every municipal tennis court around here, like this one in Monument Valley Park, has been converted for pickleball usage. This makes me feel a little sorry for the local tennis enthusiasts, since pickleball courts seem to outnumber tennis courts at this point. I will say this: these courts get used! There always seems to be a game on. I've heard that pickleball is fun because it's easier to play than tennis, and gentler on your joints. I guess I'll try it for myself one of these days. I used to like playing tennis but it's been years since I've picked up a racquet.
A new pool hall opened recently on Bijou Street, and they put a fun mural on the side of their building depicting "pool sharks." The place is called Bijou Billiards. It occupies a space that, long ago in a galaxy far, far away, was once the Deluxe Tavern. The Deluxe was owned by one of my former college art professors, a guy named Gael Bennett -- a true curmudgeon at heart -- and it was a favorite hangout for my large, extended group of friends. A great place for live music! Since Gael closed it down years ago, it has been the home of many a watering hole. A lesbian bar occupied the space the longest, then it became a bit of a revolving door with many drinking establishments trying and failing to gain a foothold there, most notably a bikini bar, for better or worse. You'd drive by and see very scantily clad women sneaking cigarettes outside the front door. It must absolutely suck to wait on tables in a bikini, especially in winter! Thankfully that place didn't last long, but hopefully Bijou Billiards will. I love the idea of a pool hall in my neighborhood, it's old school, just like Knob Hill.
February 15, 2024 edit: I heard that Gael passed away from esophageal cancer today. It's the end of an era for sure. Many of us mourn and are eulogizing him on social media. He was one of a kind.
Today wasn't a good day. In the morning I had a chance interaction with a stranger who was excessively rude to me for no reason, and though I'm usually able to shrug these things off, it stuck with me, mushroomed a little out of control in my head, and made me cry. It was such a small thing, really, but if you have ever done battle with anxiety and/or depression as I have and still do, you understand how something like that can destroy your emotional equilibrium and put you into a tailspin. Not long after this unpleasant encounter, I found myself waiting at a traffic signal behind this car that had a message just for me. I was so grateful for this little bumper sticker, I took a picture of it.
Never forget that little things you say and do, good things or bad, can have a huge impact on the recipient. Thank you, Lexus driver, for this uplifting message. It helped a lot in that moment.
A peek at the interior of Poor Richard's Feed and Read, a favorite haunt of mine since my college days. I like the cheery yellow mural they've been sporting lately.
And now, for your listening pleasure...
The holidays always seem to make me nostalgic for the Golden Bee. I think it must be because when friends who've moved away come back to visit for Thanksgiving or Christmas, one of the things they like to do is hit up the Bee. This place is classic Colorado Springs -- a true piano bar where you drink yards of beer and enthusiastically sing along with show tunes and old standards. It's a blast! If you're an old time Colorado Springsian like me, you have fond memories of the Golden Bee. I took this picture on Christmas Eve of 2014 and I can't remember the last time I actually entered the portals of this sacred drinking establishment. I must put it on my list to go there soon!
Last night my friend Jenn and I drove to Denver to see Depeche Mode at Ball Arena. It was fantastic! I think this is my ninth DM show since 1986, possibly tenth. Jenn has seen them 14 or 15 times now! I will jump on any chance I get to see Depeche Mode. They always put on an amazing show.
