Stimulus Package

So the entire country knows that we need this and yet again there are those who are fighting our President in getting these funds out to our states. Some of our leaders still do not understand that history will look at what they accomplished not what they blocked and destroyed. Hopefully this will move forward quickly. As people lose their jobs and their confidence the downward spiral starts to look like a plane in a tailspin. Everyone I talk to has great confidence in President Obama's leadership in this difficult time. We of course have a few people who are still mad that he is in office and that they lost. Turning these bad sports around will likely take awhile if it can even be done. I heard a little girl say to her parents who were complaining about the economy. "The past is the past. I had a test yesterday and now I need to focus on the future." Well said

Skiing

The skiing in Breckenridge was great this weekend. On Saturday the powder snow was deep and soft. It snowed all morning and was a bit on the wet side. We end the day in the hot tub at the Village where I own a condo. Our cabin is six miles south of Breckenridge so we drive to the Village and valet park. The condo is a short walk to the Silver Queen lift. The snow on Sunday was packed powder. We left early as the roads were snowy in places and the traffic gets heavy later in the day. Denver was foggy, snowy and cold as it is today. The National Stock Show ended on Sunday which is when the Holiday lights officially turn off in Denver. So our lights are off and will come down when it is warm enough to get outside. Dinner tonight was a simple Ouef de la Tripe which is onions and hard boiled eggs in a cream sauce. Mark made orange pecan yellow carrots to go with the main dish. The meal was good although very yellow. We have the meals planned for our week in the mountains which starts on Friday. My nephew Zac is coming to ski with us early in the week and our friends Chris and Pat will join us at the end of the week. I talked with our First Lady Jeannie Ritter today about her experience in DC at the inauguration. She said it was so moving to see so many people at the mall. She said it was uplifting and cold.

President Obama Day 4

It has been spitting snow today. The temperature dropped dramatically this morning and the skies are overcast. I did ride my bike to work today partly because of the weather and partly because I had meetings in different places around town. I am heading home from work to water the plants before heading to Breckenridge this evening. Heading to the mountains always feels like a mini vacation and after this great week I am ready for the excitement of snowboarding. Percy our blue front Amazon Parrot misses us when we leave. Millie our Quaker Parrot seems like she could care less. At least they have each other for company when we are gone and Dwight or John feeds them and covers their cages at night. They like the comfort of a covered cage. Percy always says "night, night" when I cover his cage. Well off to the watering and packing.

President Barach Hussein Obama Day Three

Every quarter I take a group of MHCD employees out to breakfast at HotCakes. These are people who have been recognized by their peers and supervisors as going the extra mile. We call it the Way to Go program. Since the weather was still nice I rode my bike to the cafe and afterwards to my clinic. I generally do my clinic on Tuesday but for this week I changed it so I could see the inauguration of President Obama. The weather was great today. It is supposed to snow tomorrow which is fine since we need the moisture. Mark and I are rushing off to a play called Inana when he gets home. Costco is on his way home and he is very good about stopping to make sure our kitchen is well stocked. Hopefully it will snow a lot in the mountains this weekend as we are heading that way for some more skiing this weekend. Mark's Uncle Dick is a retired Priest and is skiing there this week. We hope to hook up with him for dinner on Saturday evening. Yesterday the temperature was 71 which melted a 59 year old record. We say the world premier of Inana tonight. It is about an Iraqi Museum Director's efforts to save the great art works of Iraq from pillage. It was simply great.

President Barach Hussein Obama Day Two

Another warn sunny day in Denver today with temps in the 70s. This just rarely happens this time of year. I love to us public transportation when my schedule allows. Today was such a day. After testifying at the Denver City Council Safety Committee on the proposed Crisis Triage System I took the light rail to work. It gives me time to read while others drive. Brain Rules by John Medina is my current book. He is a great writer and describes how the brain works. Great story teller and takes complex concepts and translates them into easily understood principles. Tonight is Top Chef our favorite reality show. I have such a great team at work. Today we were looking at options for expanding our services. We have more poor people who need our help than we can serve so we work hard to develop services for people who can pay. The profits from these services pay for indigent care. At end of our meeting I recalled that President Obama is asking all of us to work together to get our America back. I have the plan to think about this everyday and do what I can. I challenged my team to do the same.

President Barach Hussein Obama Day One

What a great joy it was to watch President Barach sworn into office today. My staff and I all watched together as this historic event occurred. We all had tears and joy. I am more hopeful now than I have been in a long time. It was so good to watch ex-President Bush fly away. President Obama was deft in his criticism of the former President while focusing on the future of our county. We are blessed to have such a great orator and visionary leading us to our new future. We have great burdens to address as a nation. As a gay man I feel such a sense of hope that a man from humble beginnings can achieve such a great station in life in our country. I believe this puts our leadership back on the map of the world. For this I am thankful. The people I work with are simply the best and I feel such a great sense of wonderment that I get to work with such talented people. On a different note I rode my bike to and from work today. We had temperatures in the high 60s, which is so rare this time of year. I love the good things that happen around me each day.

Warm Winter Weather

It was 65 degrees and sunny in Denver today. Great for getting things done outside. Mark and I did a simple meal this evening, Broiled Tuna, fennel salad and a mixed veggie salad with a simple Hawaiian dressing. Our investment club met at our house tonight and they all loved the kitchen. It is beautiful. Mark arranged the cookbooks in the book case and amazingly we have room for some more books if we like. Just how many cookbooks does one need. We are already in the triple digits. I plan to ride my bike to work tomorrow. My car is still in the shop and the weather is supposed to be good again. I love cycling to work when I can. My office is watching the inauguration together in the morning. We are all excited about our new President.

Skiing in Breckenridge

Mark and I got home this evening after two sunny days of skiing in Breckenridge. January is usually the coldest time to ski. This weekend was like Spring Skiing with the sun, warmer weather and lots of people. Of course it is the Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday weekend. We are excited that President Elect Obama will we sworn in right after then Martin Luther King's Holiday. Seems most fitting. Mark and I love cooking after a day of skiing and last night we had lemon-chile mushrooms, eggplant and broiled lamb. It was good, especially after a day on the slopes. The traffic was heavy on the way home. We watched the first episode of the new season of Big Love. This is an HBO series about a polygamous family in Salt Lake City, Utah written by a gay couple. It is intriguing and very clever. Mark is doing physicals at Manuel High School tomorrow pro bono and Dwight and John are in Pocatello Idaho celebrating John's mother's 80 birthday. I will be here alone for the day. That will be nice.

Beautiful Day by the Confluence

Colorado can surprise you with warm days in the middle of winter and today was blue skies with temperatures in the high 50s. I dropped my car at the garage since the engine light was on and took the bus to the REI Flagship store at the confluence of the Platte River and Cherry Creek. This is were Denver began 150 years ago. Jamiee Van Leeuwen who is the head of Denver's Road Home was going to meet me at the Starbucks there but he had car trouble. My next meeting was a conference call with folks around the country that I made while sitting by the river. Most of the others on the call were in the deep freeze that is covering most of the US. Wen chocolatier is nearby so I could not resist their hand made truffles. I will surprise Mark with them tonight. We are heading to the mountains to ski as soon as he gets home and we eat a bite. His clinic is running late so it gave me time to water the orchids and the poinsettias. I have all the gear and food ready to load in the car when he gets here. My last meeting of the day was with Dorothy Horrell the head of the Bonfils Stanton Foundation to talk about the future structure of the Livingston Fellowship. She is a gem and always such a great person to talk with. Tom Downey from the Children's Museum who is another Fellow joined us. I took them some of the chocolates too. Their office is in the old May D&F Tower. Every floor is a different office and the elevator opens right into the office. It reminds me of Dynasty or as they called the show in Germany, DenverKlan.

Getting ready for the Mountains

Mark and I are heading to the mountains tomorrow evening after work. It might be unusually warm this weekend. Generally January is a cold time to ski. They are predicting temperatures as high as 40 F. That's warm. I hope the snow will be good. We are taking Nip Tuck to watch and of course will be making something good to eat. We are going to the Curious Theatre tonight. This venue shows very edgy plays that are usually quite good. Plays on a "school night" usually means we eat simple dinners. Tonight we had apple chicken sausages with a fennel, blood orange and pomegranate salad. Tasty.

The Color Purple

Mark and I went to see The Color Purple last night at the Buell Theatre. It is a musical adaptation of the book/movie. I could not imagine how they would pull this off, yet it was quite well done and moving. The cast is all black as it should be and it was underwritten by Oprah Winfrey. The cruelty is unbearable. Cilie finding herself is inspiring. We got the copper vent covers for the ventahood installed today. The air still leaks a bit so we will talk with Tarl the contractor when he returns from visiting his in-laws in Mexico. I am working with a group to change the laws on requiring sex offenders to register. Right now the requirement is too broad and harms a lot of people. For example if college students streak and get arrested they are required to register as sex offenders. Personally I do not find anything about college students streaking as offensive. Young naked people having fun is something we should encourage.

Snow

We awoke to 5 inches of snow this morning. Quite the surprize after a day of sun and temps in the 40s yesterday. I had not listened to the weather report so I was a bit stunned. I love that we are in the single digit days until President Obama takes office. What hope he is giving all of us.

Installing the Windows

Mark had a dinner party for the people that work on the online medical record team, Health Connect. The leg of lamb with roasted veggies was great. Most of the folks had not seen the house before and loved it. They especially loved the new kitchen. We still have the Holiday decorations up and it looks festive. Tim caulked in the windows yesterday so we will be able to put them up this afternoon. We will have sushi with friends this evening at Osaka Sushi, Kate and Scott's favorite sushi place. We only have one orchid blooming at the moment. It is easier to keep them watered in the summer because I can just hose them down on the balcony. The hand watering in the winter takes a lot more time.

Getting the Leaded Glass Windows

Our good friend Tim Charney is coming over today to install the leaded glass windows in our kitchen cabinets. Tim is a retired school teacher who taught Spanish. He started making stained glass windows and has created many beautiful ones both for the homes that Tim and Rich own and for others. Tim was at the top of our list hoping he would have the time to create these for us. Not only does he have a great eye for design he creates this windows quickly. I will post some pictures when they are installed. We had our MHCD winter party last night at the cable center on the University of Denver Campus. It is a beautiful space with lots of TV monitors so we had displays of our staff rotating on the screens during our event. We hired an improve comedy group "MAD CAP" to perform and they were hilarious. Three Tomatoes catered the food and it was great. Tasty dishes replaced your typical buffet bland choices. The house is still decorated as we leave the Holiday decorations up until after the National Stock Show ends. This is a Denver tradition. The mountains are getting some good snow. Mark's computer team at Kaiser is coming over tonight for a dinner party so we will ski next weekend. Staying home gives us a chance to catch up on 'cositas".

Happy New Year

Well 2009 is here and we are ready for a good one. Mark, Dwight, John, Bill, Robert and I did the annual raku firing for the new year. We make totems that represent what we want in the new year and do the glazing and firing on New Years Eve. The pieces came out great this year. Mark and I got back yesterday from three days of riding(snowboard, me) and skiing(telemark, Mark). My body has been praising me for getting it in shape with a strong dose of soreness! The powder snow was great in Breckenridge on Saturday. By Monday the snow was packed and crusty with strong winds so we stopped in the early afternoon.
Our new kitchen is beautiful. There are still a few things to be completed. This has not stopped our being able to use it. The design was done by our contractor Tarl's mother Mary. She did a great job working with us to create a kitchen that really works well. We are looking forward to starting our dinner parties again.