I'm bacckkkk

Mary and I got back from Boulder last night at about midnight. It is not the magic time of day when blog ideas drift gently through my brain freely, but I'd better end the drought quickly. A few reflections.

• Here it is humid, there it was dry, but the sun was intense.
• Elevation is no joke. Mom and I had gotten a little altitude sickness our first day in Mexico City, which is about 7,000 feet above sea level. Boulder is about 5,200 square feet, which we adjusted to pretty quickly. But when Mary and I went up to Rocky Mountain National Park, all of a sudden we were at 8,400 square feet at the start of our hike, and I could definitely feel it in terms of getting tired coming up hills, and I think I even saw it reflected in slightly elevated anxiety regarding storms blowing in. And the weather was mighty fickle up there. The sky would darken, the wind would blow, maybe a little rain would come, and then it was sunny.
• It's interesting to see NIMBYism in its many manifestations around this great land of ours. In Boulder, there is apparently pretty strict code about adding height to any structure, anything that would cast a shadow and/or impede a neighbor's view of the cliffs. So housing prices are way jacked up. Plain-looking, unreconstructed ranches 4 miles out of town go for $900k. You see things like the below, a Tesla charging in the driveway of a house in need of a little TLC.

To be clear, however, any snarky remarks the Grouse may have offered on Boulder by no means offset its many many positives. It's a beautiful place with tremendous municipal amenities, first and foremost an incredible and convenient set of public hiking paths (also bike paths). We only bothered to leave town once. There are great used book stores, good coffee, pretty solid if not exceptional food. I had the best Vietnamese dish I've ever had (steamed fish with eggplant and heaps of basil). All the things that the Grouse thrives upon. We will be going back.