Mountains and Bonus Tacos

 

This morning my aunt and uncle picked us up and brought us to their house, and we took a walk around the pond in their neighborhood with my uncle and one of my cousins. Travalon took some photos. There was one cool bird he was about to take a photo of, but a guy walking a pair of dogs headed straight toward it, so it took off. My cousin thought it was a flicker, and we do have those back home.

You can see the mountains from their backyard.

My cousins didn't want to go to Boulder, so only my aunt and uncle drove Travalon and me to this lovely mountain town, where we went to Chautauqua Park. It was incredibly windy, so we only walked around a little bit. The views of the Flatiron foothills were beautiful. Travalon took photos.

We had lunch at a brewpub called Boulder Social Club; my spicy poke bowl was delicious, and I also tried a sample size of their Mexican lager. Then we stopped at Boulder Creek Trail for another short walk, and Travalon took more photos.

This ancient volcanic cone is called Green Mountain. My aunt, who is a geologist, says they have discovered these volcanic cones contain diamonds, so now there is a lot of diamond mining in Colorado.

We went back to their house, and my uncle and I jammed in the plant room - it was like I was in Paradise! We did our three songs from yesterday, and they went pretty well, then we did some others, like Travalon requested "Thick as a Brick," and we did a song by Michael Frenti that I'm not sure what it's called, and my uncle put on "Don't Speak" by No Doubt but the chords were too weird for me so I just sang it. I feel like there were some others in there too. It didn't feel like we had been jamming that long, but suddenly my cousin said, "It's seven, and the Mexican place closes at eight, so we'd better get going." First we went to the Odd 13 Brewery where we were going to eat, since the Mexican place was takeout. My aunt and two cousins held a table for us while my uncle, Travalon, and I went to get the food. The guy taking our order mistook my Third Eye toque for a Kansas City Chiefs hat, and he said, "You can't wear that in here, not after what they did to our Broncos." I was puzzled, since a bright pink hat with a single eye doesn't resemble anything having to do with the red and yellow of Kansas City. Then he said, "Oh, never mind - I thought you were wearing a Kansas City Chiefs hat." I told him I'm a Packer Backer and don't particularly care about any AFC team, and maybe that's why he screwed up my order, giving me a pork sopapilla instead of a chicken one. By the time we discovered this, the Mexican place was already closed, so I just had to eat it... and it was also spicier than what I'd ordered. Then we discovered they had given us two bonus tacos, so there may be someone else out there who was furious too, wondering why they got a chicken sopapilla instead of a pork one, and it wasn't nearly spicy enough, and where were their tacos? Everyone else in our group got their correct order. However, after the endorphins brought on by the spice hit me, and I had a key lime sour beer, I was so happy I couldn't have cared less. Then we went back to my aunt and uncle's house and ate too many Christmas cookies. They have so many that there are even containers of cookies out in the garage. I am definitely not losing weight on this trip!

Famous Hat