Weekend in Colorado

Sometimes you just need an excuse for a holiday and since a family friend was having her wedding reception in Colorado this weekend, my cousins and I decided it was a good excuse to drive over to see family. We drove all night on Thursday for the reception on Friday and ended up getting in at three in the morning. It's not that I can't stay up that late anymore but it feels like I got kicked in the head the next day. Of course I forgot to turn my alarm off for work which didn't help but the supposedly "sixteen" naps I took before the reception did.

I took zero pictures of the wedding (or anything else) but know that it was pretty and the food was good.

The coolest part of the reception was a photobooth service. They would take your pictures (in an actual photobooth) and give you one strip and the other one was taped into a guestbook for you to sign.

Black and White framing? Not worth fixing.

I've heard of the idea before but this was the first time I've seen it in action and I'm a fan. Of course it's not quite as cool as the hand drawn photobooh I found last year but really, what is?

Allison and I in SLC

Naturally there was dancing at the party... well there was music which meant I started dancing and eventually people joined. I'm sure they meant for dancing though, I mean who wouldn't have dancing at a wedding?

On Saturday we had a massive family Thanksgiving dinner--the best holiday should happen twice a year anyways.

Beard is coming a long nicely--at a month now. I am anti-selfies though so you have to use your imagination.

UMOCA and Frontrunner

My friend Jean had an art show in Salt Lake this past weekend so I went up there with some ward-friends and my little-cousin Kemarie. Once upon a time when you wanted to go to Salt Lake you had to drive your car, but thankfully we are not that barbaric anymore and now can take the pinnacle of transportation--a train.

Tables, WiFi, and Electricity. The only way to travel.

The opening itself had a lot of great peices and, while I tried to engage my eight-year-old cousin in the art, some of it was just weird. Jon McNaughton (Obama burning the constitution) had a few of his pieces there which were hard to explain and then there was some very modern art which is a bit more inaccessible. The two most memorable works were a collection of Jesus portraits done by a large variety of amateur artists and also a series of painted wasp nests (Jean's).

So many paintings of Jesus!

By chance Kemarie ran into one of her best friends from Provo and I had the pleasure of watching Kemarie go around and explain each artwork to her pal. She is still struggling to go beyond the narrative of the work but I can see a glimmer of understanding starting to unfold as she continues to partake in art.

Snacking and Observing

Flaunting the glasses and sticker.

One part of the exhibit had several tables of different activist pamphlets including such groups. One of the tables was offering free sunglasses which I gladly accepted and put a pair in my jacket pocket. It wasn't until we got on the train to leave when I took them out and noticed that they had a big sticker on them saying "DO NOT REMOVE, TABLE PAIR." I'm an anarchist at heart.

Since it was late when we headed back and the windows held no interest for us we decided to explore the rest of the train. We went head to tail and found the most beautifully vintage (train) car. The conductor informed us that it was built in 1976 and was named the "Comet Car." Luckily I had my blazer and glasses on for some real vintage shots.

Thanks to Mirielle Sanford for all the photos in this post. She was the only other person in our group who was wise enough to take the train up.

Bus Rodeo

This is a week old but oh well, last Saturday I was an official judge at a bus rodeo. I had no idea there was such a thing until I was asked to help out by a family friend (can I have family friends when my family is one person?) but I did it nonetheless.

My co-judge and I. The green vest indicated that I was the score-keeper.

The jist of the event was that the drivers were required to go through several obstacles designed to test their expertise at controlling the vehicle. My specific event was the Right-Hand Reverse parking in which the drivers were required to reverse into a parking stall on their blind side. Mostly everyone did fine but there were two highlights.

Some of the drivers decided it would be worth it to plow directly through a cone so they could directly back up into the stall. It was a valid strategy but caused an issue with one bus as the cone started going up into the engine block. Fear not though, I bravely dove under the automobile to save the poor thing.

I ended up scraping my knuckle pretty bad but they invited me back to judge the state competition so it was worth it. However, my favorite driver and moment was a woman who started backing up a good twenty feet before she was supposed to, started to turn completely around, and then gave up and drove away.

It wasn't paid but they did pay for us to eat at Chuck-O-Rama and as gross as that might be I couldn't turn away from a free meal. I just ate a bunch of scones with honey butter and felt sick afterwards.