• Tag Archives Colorado
  • Happy Grandpa

    Winter                                             Waxing Moon of the ColdMonth

    When Kate and I arrived down south here in Denver, we got a 40 degree temperature swing.  At 8 am this morning, my weatherstation recorded -14.  When we got to Denver, it was 26.  If we’d left Minnesota at 50 degrees amd gotten a similar bump, it would be 90 here.

    Now, there are school closings here with a snow that would only bring out the sanding trucks in Minnesota.  Strange.

    After a nap, the grumpy traveler became a happy grandpa, taken upstairs by granddaughter Ruth to see her princess walkie talkies and her changeable Cinderalla doll.  Back downstairs grandson Gabe carried his toy train, Thomas, and came to me, “Up.”  So we did.

    Gabe and I looked at the Dreidel lights Jen had strung over the window sill.

    After a Mexican meal at the restaurant next to our hotel, the kids went home and the grandparents walked through the snow a short way to the hotel.  This snow is finer than most of them we get in Minnesota, light, but not fluffy.

    Bedtime here in the Mile High City.  With snow.


  • Hard Rock Mining and Minnesota

    Lughnasa                            Waning Harvest Moon

    Up for a bit then out of the house to chase down the wandering puppies.  Again.  Sigh.  This is a problem still in search of a solution.  Harnesses help but the one who needs them most, Rigel, slips out of hers with the ease of a banana escaping its peel.  We have other solutions on tap:  fence, microchip, tags, better harnesses, conversations with our vet and the breeder, but until we come up with something that works we have to alternate them inside and out.  That’s a pain and still requires surveillance.  Oh, well.  We wanted puppies.

    Today is a forum on non-ferrous mining in Minnesota.  In other parts of the country like Colorado, Montana and Nevada for example it’s called hard-rock mining.  The degradation caused by this mining includes sulfuric acid drainage into the watershed along with heavy metals.  There is no need to wonder about the devastation caused by this kind of mining.  All you have to do is visit sites in Colorado and Montana.  The question now is whether this kind of mining can be made safe and is the risk to Minnesota waters worth testing such a claim.

    This issue has a lot of complicated vectors:  geological, industrial, metallurgical, chemical, hydrological, environmental, political and economic.  My learning curve about it is still pretty steep so I’m looking forward to this forum as a place to advance my knowledge.


  • Crash Under the Blood Moon

    46 bar falls 30.22  6mph  ENE  windchill 43  Autumn

    Last Quarter of the Blood Moon

    It looks like the most violent moments of the credit crisis, stock market crash will have come under the aegis of the Blood Moon.  Coincidence?  I think so, but it’s still metaphorically powerful.

    All the trimmed hemerocallis in the back have been tucked away in piles to decompose for the good of the land.  The umbrella for the patio table has been deconstructed; it broke during a powerful windstorm in August.  We will use the skeleton of the umbrella as a tutor for some climbing vegetable next spring, probably beans.

    There are no more major fall clean-up tasks.  The orchard has fall tasks, but I’ve only begun to learn about them, so I won’t do any of them until we come back from Colorado.

    I also need to clear a fifteen foot edge on the woods, then cover it with black plastic and  hay.  That one I’m going to let nature start by killing back the existing plants.  Once we have some snow on the ground I plan to burn two large brush piles in the way.  A couple of other areas need black plastic or newspaper and hay, that I may start tomorrow.

    Kate and I have our business meeting now.  Tomorrow we have to get packed, finish up the usual pre-trip stuff.  Later.