Travel Diary, August 2007

the sunflower seems to be Colorado's state flower - there are certainly a lot of them around!

Sep 8, 2007

This trip has given me plenty to think about (but, then, all my journeys do). And there's been plenty going on, so it's time for another travelogue.

Aug 3 - Arrived in Denver, about three hours late (having spent still more time in Heathrow, during a week in which I'd already seen far too much of that particular airport). Tin Tin and her son picked me up at the airport (bless them!) and we drove back to her house, to be greeted by four dogs - two are Tin Tin's, two she's looking after for her daughter. Tin Tin's two remembered me from my earlier visit, but the two little yappers (one Chihuahua, one miniature Doberman who would have torn my throat out, if only he could reach it) remained annoying for quite some time. We finally came to an understanding after about a week - now they greet me like a long-lost family member every time I appear.

daily activity: dog walking!

We spent that weekend quietly. Tin Tin wanted me to watch the first two Bourne movies because she was anxious to see the third one, which we did on the Sunday after I'd caught up. Not bad in their genre, certainly better than the last James Bond.

Aug 6th, Monday - Tin Tin drove me to Sun's campus in Broomfield. During the course of that day I met with people about the training I'd be attending and filming for the next three days, and I went out and rented a car.

This was a bigger deal than you might think. Having never driven in Italy (never needed to, when we lived in Milan), I finally got my Italian driver's license a few years ago. Then I developed a phobia about driving. There are many reasons for this (though no specific, recent accident), that's a story for some other time. Suffice to say that driving is very scary for me, even in the US where the roads are wide, parking is easy, and most drivers are relatively sane. Driving is a skill that most people take for granted (more than they should, sometimes); I can't.

But I rented a car and started driving it, and managed not to kill anybody. Fortunately, Tin Tin's home in Boulder is only a short hop to Sun in Broomfield.

I spent three days as second-unit camera on some highly technical training about the Leadville stack (part of Sun's Solaris storage software). Now I have 18+ hours of footage to beat into some sort of presentable shape.

That Friday I went for a fitness interview at the gym at Sun, preparatory to a fitness assessment (walk on a treadmill then have your pulse taken, etc.) the following Monday, in anticipation of the nice man setting up a gym routine for me. I figured I could go three times a week while in Broomfield, then, if I could really stand it, might contemplate joining a gym in Lecco.

That afternoon I was completely brain-dead, so I went to the mall and had my nails done - blue, because exactly one year ago I was in New York with Ross, we had our nails done, and mine were blue. I was thinking about the fact that the next day she'd be celebrating her 18th birthday, up in Mussoorie.

At the Apple store in the mall, I looked at Macintoshes. Dan had offered to buy me a newer, faster laptop to speed up video processing, and I was trying to decide whether to switch to a Mac. I had heard that they are faster and easier for video work, but they're far more expensive than comparable Windows machines.

In the evening I met Tin Tin back home and we went for dinner with a physicist and three biologists, plus a four-year-old who was about to be a big brother. Very good Mexican food at a restaurant part-owned by a CU biology professor who is finally enjoying the profits from a medical patent he took out 20 years ago, now being used in medications for macular degeneration.

Aug 11, Saturday - We went to the second-hand store to buy some t-shirts for me to work out in, a mug to use in the office, plus Tin Tin bought a pair of barely-used sneakers and four nice coffee mugs. I had already bought a perfectly serviceable hair dryer there for $2.99. Second-hand and resale shops almost don't exist in Italy, though some for childrens' clothing and equipment seem to be doing all right. Most Italians wouldn't be caught dead buying or wearing used clothing, but kids' clothes are so ridiculously overpriced here that, in today's economy, some people are apparently willing to swallow their pride.

In the early evening we went to a potluck dinner for CU professors who had been together in a workshop on how to become a full professor after you've got tenure. CU take unusually good care of their faculty, actively supporting them in their ongoing careers with initiatives like this. It was an interesting group of people from across many different departments - this kind of faculty mixing has its own value, I should think.

One of the professors present, who teaches acting and had interviewed Tin Tin for a documentary on mothers in the sciences, gave us tickets to a local Shakespeare festival that evening, "All's Well That Ends Well." Neither of us could understand it very well, so we left at intermission. I watched part of "A Prairie Home Companion" on DVD, but was too tired to finish it.

Aug 12, Sunday - As already recounted in text and photos, we went to Rocky Mountain National Park.

Colorado & New Mexico 2007 - 1, 2, 3