When Boulder is Bolder
In late May, a few beautiful things happen to Boulder, Colorado. First, most of the students move out, reducing the city’s population by nearly 20,000 and leaving the bars and restaurants less crowded and accessible for the exclusive enjoyment of residents and visitors. Second, regardless of how many late spring snow storms have surprised the city in the last couple months, the weather is invariably leaning toward the sunny and warm. Most importantly, however, the city prepares for its biggest annual celebrations: the Bolder Boulder 10k race and Boulder Creek Festival.
I recently returned from another Memorial Day weekend spent in Boulder, and was pleasantly reminded of what I have pretty much always known: this is the best time to see Boulder. On this trip, you see, I had the unique need of impressing a special certain “someone” that my hometown was indeed a beautiful and pleasant place to live and visit, and that those epic snowstorms that shutdown the airports and trapped us in Boulder two years ago were indeed an exception, and not the rule.
Let me also say that although I am a “Colorado Native” and lived in Boulder for nine years before leaving for college on the East Coast, returning to visit is in many ways an act of re-discovering a city I once thought I knew very well. After all, a city is a very different place for a teenager than for a twenty-something.
While our visit to Boulder was wonderful on numerous levels, I want to focus on the two real attractions that make Memorial Day weekend uniquely well-suited for a visit: the Bolder Boulder and the Boulder Creek Festival.
The Boulder Creek Festival
The Creek Fest is an annual rite of summer. For three days, the public park space along the Boulder Creek, the library parking lot, and the surrounding downtown streets are taken over for carnival games, local food, art displays, and a healthy dose of Boulder Hippie-ness. Most things are organic, will help you purge your body of toxins, boost your energy, and help you come into balance with your inner chi.
It’s also just a lot of fun. Bands play, people sponsor rubber duckies in an annual race (dumped in the Boulder Creek, with prizes for the first 50 finishers a few blocks downstream), and free samples are handed out in abundance.
Oh, and it’s free.
This year we enjoyed free samples of a number of different energy bars, sampled locally produced kombucha tea, sipped on the latest brews from Boulder Beer, and even test drove the hybrid Toyota Highlander, to see if it drove any different than Ellaine’s own Scottish SUV (it did – but it was also five years newer).
The Bolder Boulder
This massive event is one of the largest 10k races in the country, and attracts both truly talented athletes from around the world (who enjoy the challenge of racing at high altitude and the large prize-purse) and local runners/joggers/walkers alike. This year, 53,000 people participated, making it the largest Memorial Day event in the country.
It’s a good race, with a lot of happy spirits all around. Local schools send volunteers in abundance to hand out water, locals along the route camp out with music and cheers aplenty for those passing, and more than a handful of runners make sure to try and outdo each other in the absurdity of their costumes (ourselves included).
We decked ourselves out in full-body pink spandex we had left over from the Bay to Breakers in San Francisco the week before, and ran with Smurfs, Crayola Crayons, Pirates, and even a guy who managed to juggle while jogging for all 6.2 miles.
What Else to Do:
While the festival and race will keep you busy for a good amount of time, there is also plenty to see and do during the rest of the three-day weekend. Below I offer a few personal recommendations, but nothing close to a comprehensive list:
Nature:
- Chautauqua Park
- NCAR
- Eldorado Springs
- Views from Flagstaff Mountain
Local Attractions:
What to Eat:
Breakfast:
Lunch:
Dinner:
Building the Zecco Bay to Breakers Float
Over the last week, I designed and helped build the Zecco.com float to be used in the Bay to Breakers race on May 18. It was fun to break out the skills I learned as a set designer and builder in high school and college theatre for an immensely more practical purpose: creating a mobile beer-keg-toting “Z” to push seven miles up and down San Francisco’s hills.
The most important step was finding a wagon to transport the whole device, because I knew building our own axle and wheel system would be far more trouble than it was worth. Ace Hardware in San Jose had just the vehicle for us: a large green wagon with pneumatic tires and a base just long enough to fit my planned 4-foot-long Zs and wide enough to fit a keg in between.
The sides of the Z were cut from 3/4 inch particle board, and provide the primary structural support. The Zs were then framed with square 1×1s, and joined together with lateral supports from the same material. We cut sheets of 5mm luan plywood to cover the Zs, and taped the seams for optimal painting. The bottom piece of plywood was cut out to allow space for the keg to rest directly on the bottom of the cart, with enough room for a bucket of ice around it to keep our beer nice and chilled.
We first sealed the whole vehicle with white latex primer, then covered the Z in bright pink, traced out the remaining letters of Zecco, and filled them in with the last of the pink paint.
The final result is a beautiful creation - I can’t wait to get a keg inside. Thanks so much to Zecco for the inspiration and funding, to Tony and Ellaine for helping build it, and to my family for lending a driveway, beer, and pizza for our construction efforts.
Tony has posted a whole series of photos on Flickr , and written about the float on his blog, Philotech .
Reactions from the Newseum
I visited the Newseum (museum of news in Washington, DC) this morning, four days after its inaugural opening. I was impressed, educated, and intrigued, and am in the midst of rearranging my day’s schedule so I can return for more.
This innovative museum tells the story of American history through a far more approachable medium than the typical museum exhibit: through the front pages of newspapers, television snippets, and even internal emails from the New York Times to its reporters on the morning of September 11th. It also tells of the important role of the media in our country, and in a democracy.
The first exhibit I approached was a collection of every Pulitzer Prize winning photograph since that prize was first awarded in the 1950s. It’s a stunning visual walk through history, from Vietnam and civil rights to Oklahoma City and Kosovo. It reminded me of the power of a photograph to deeply impact emotion: seeing a photo of the World Trade Center still shakes me to the core; an image of white students using an american flag pole to beat a black man fills me with disgust.
The exhibit made me ponder that career path I never really considered seriously, yet briefly pursued: photojournalism. The museum pays their tribute as well as that of their pen-wielding compatriots.
A video on the Sedition Acts, President Adams, and the creation of the freedom of the press made me consider the act of history repeating that occured in our own generation with the passage of the Patriot Act. It told the story of a part of our history I never knew, or at least never appreciated.
If you get a chance to stop through DC, I strongly suggest passing through the Newseum. My next visit will likely be a matter of hours away.
Mitchapalooza - Good Times with Good Friends
In just two days, I am heading back to San Francisco after more than three months living abroad. I return home having spent time in both in the dangerous, terror-stricken London, and the sunny-skied Riyadh. The occasion of this triumphant return? Mitchapalooza 2007.
The weekend involves relaxing, wine tasting, having fun in the sun, and eating great food up at the Russian River in Northern California. My friends and I take over my extended family’s cabin for two nights and take full advantage of Sonoma County and the ability to truly “escape” the city. Last year even included some great canoing and rope swinging into the river - hopefully a dry summer won’t mean water levels are so low that these are outside the realm of possibility.
Mitchapalooza 2006 was one of those great weekends when you can say for certain that you’ve had one of the best times of your life because you’ve spent the time with some of your best friends. Receiving a link to the t-shirt from ‘06 today made me remember just how great it was. A friend surprised me with the gift of 15 of these shirts for my friends and I to wear all weekend long.
Here’s to looking forward to Mitchapalooza 2007. Goofy Mitch-grin and all.
My Dream Machine: The Canon 40D
Canon announced yesterday the release of their new digital SLR, the 40D, which is the successor to the dated 20D and 30D models. It’s about time, since Nikon has had a far stronger model in the D80 for quite some time now. The 40D represents significant improvements in terms of LCD size, image density (megapixels), and quality.
Looks like I’ll be blowing a big chunk of change on a new camera - better start saving now! Given that my last vacation to Scotland generated over $200 worth of film development expenses, however, it will end up paying itself off in a couple years.
From Digital Photography Review:
Canon today introduces its latest digital SLR for advanced amateurs and semi-professionals: the EOS 40D. With a 10.1 Megapixel CMOS sensor, 6.5 frames per second burst performance, a newly developed AF system and 3.0” LCD with Live View mode, the EOS 40D makes significant advances in both performance and versatility.
Many thanks to Indranil on sending me this great news!
For Your Reading List: Why Smart People Make Big Money Mistakes
I had a fabulous lunch today with my former coworker and friend, Andre Medeiros. Our conversation turned to investing and he recommended a book, Why Smart People Make Big Money Mistakes — And How to Correct Them by Gary Belsky and Thomas Gilarch. Both he and his wife Christine vouch for the book’s readability, so I think I might just pick up a copy next time I find myself in a bookstore.
Editorial Review from Amazon.com:
Why do so many otherwise rational individuals make irrational decisions when it comes to money? Financial journalist Gary Belsky and Cornell University psychology professor Thomas Gilovich contend the answers can be found–and the deficiencies remedied–with help from a relatively new science called behavioral economics. Still largely unknown outside academic circles, the field can be traced to research on the impact of rewards and punishments on human judgment and decision- making that first were undertaken at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University some 30 years ago. In Why Smart People Make Big Money Mistakes , Belsky and Gilovich update this pioneering work and show readers how to understand exactly why they invest, spend, and save as they do. More importantly, using examples that everyone can identify with and language that anyone can understand, the authors offer dozens of workable suggestions that can help readers manage their money better. “We believe that by identifying the psychological causes behind many types of financial decisions,” they write, “you can effectively change your behavior in ways that will ultimately put more money in your pocket and help you keep more of what you already have.”
Dans Le Noir: Eating Blind
I had dinner yesterday with five friends at Dans Le Noir here in London. What a phenomenal dinner concept. Diners are led into a pitch black room and experience dining in total, utter darkness while being served by blind waiters and waitresses.
The French cuisine was good, but probably only worth about half the cost of dinner, which came out to a pricey £40 per head. The experience, however, was so unique that I was happy to pay the premium.
See a review of the restaurant at London Eating.
- Welcome to The Intrepid Mr. Fox
Welcome to the personal weblog of Mitchell W. Fox, a management strategy consultant in Sydney, Australia.The Intrepid Mr. Fox is about my personal life and adventures. It focuses on three main topics: The Good Life (things I enjoy in my leisure time), Travel, and my thoughts and ideas about the world around us.