The Sickmiller Express

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So this isn't shaping up to be the best week of my life. Yesterday I came home from work and Rebecca, one of our goldfish, was dead. She had been struggling for awhile now and finally stopped breathing. It had been really hard to watch these last few days. RIP Rebecca.

Our vacation is now looking to be the best timed vacation ever.

Friday, Senator Salazar made a stop in Silverton to talk about healthcare. Adam and I attended along with around 20 other citizens. As is to be expected he is great in front of a crowd, very personable. He wanted to have a conversation and not lecture, what is with that? I don't understand why the lecture is so feared. If I wanted to have a conversation I'd head to the pub. I always hated those kinds of classes at university, where participation was a large percentage of the grade. It always led to people making unnecessary comments and asking questions they already knew the answer to. They didn't seem to help me out because I'm still pretty standoffish and don't have much to say (specifically around people that I'm not good good friends with). It makes more sense in this case because he wants to hear what 'the people' have to say and he DID give a mini presentation. Ok, back to the topic. Ironically I started this post wanting to comment on how people rant on other topics when asking a 'question'. Not only did the questions seem to be hidden behind a lot of opinion but they were off topic. Let's just talk about the issue at hand, don't come and waste all of our time. The senator is only going to divert or shallowly answer your 'question'. Write him a letter or something. Aside from all of that it was interesting and I really enjoyed meeting him. Also someone sang him a song while strongly hinting that he was a 'Caveman Democrat'. Fun times.

We had a great time with Dad Sickmiller and the Armbrusters. The weekend was pretty busy involving quite a long hike for little legs and didn't leave much time for altitude adjustment as it was the first day everyone was here. The pictures are amazingly beautiful. We had bright blue skies, everything was green and there was an abundance of wildflowers. Following the hike we grilled out and spent an evening catching up. The good weather continued for most of the weekend as we went to Animas Forks, watched Adam perform with the Brass Band, rode the train and went to the Bar-D Chuckwagon.

It was the first time for Adam and I to ride the train. We left from Silverton and got off short of Durango in Rockwood. We really enjoyed the ride and are looking forward to doing it again on locals day. It was overcast that day and I rather enjoyed it that way. It made for a nice moody train ride.

When our friends Mark and Jason were here in May we tried to go to this Bar-D Chuckwagon in Durango but they were closed for a private party on the night we planned to attend. Bummer. Adam made the suggestion that the gang of us go down after the train ride and I'm so glad he did. I wasn't necesarily sold on the idea but I loved it. The food was great for being a buffet capable of feeding 700 and the show was fun. Mark and Jason, you would've loved it! Next time.

The Armbrusters left Tuesday morning heading to Steamboat Springs then on to visit other family in Fort Collins. Dad stayed with us and we had a nice week together until he flew out of Denver on Saturday. I worked most of the time but he and Adam visited the museum and went hiking. We had heard the museum was interesting but we'd never been. Adam and his dad confirmed that it was a great museum, so I really need to go check it out. We left Friday to start heading towards the airport so as to not have to drive in the middle of the night the entire way. We stopped at the botanical gardens in Grand Junction just 45 minutes before they closed and probably could have spent a BIT more time but we were able to see everything they had. It's a pretty nice garden, if a bit small, but they have plenty of room to expand and have lots of plans for the future. They had a most interesting tree that I had never seen the likes of before and I asked the one guy who was working there what it was but he didn't know. He said I was the second person to ask that day so he would have to find out. Most of the plants were marked but not that one. It had pink fluffies all over it. They also had a really nice succulent garden.

Anyway, we stayed in Eagle along I-70 Friday night and then leisurely got up and went to the airport in the morning. Adam and I did some shopping at the mall afterwards and then headed to REI. We tried to eat fast food as we left Denver and ended up having a problem that we've had before. All of the sudden it's as if we're leaving Denver and we haven't see any fast food places. So we get off at what seems like the last exit before heading into the hills and it took us an hour to find and eat at Burger King. We get back on the highway (after backtracking three exits on side roads) and then about twenty minutes later there is a Wendy's in some po-dunk town in the foothills right off the highway. Strange. I was really grumpy after shopping on an empty stomach and I was not going to eat from a gas station (I had an irrational fear that Colorado gas stations don't serve warm food and I wanted a warm meal not a cold refrigerator sandwich) so I was glad to put up with the hunt for BK. Continuing on... we camped that night and then headed back home to Silverton in time for Adam to play with the band. The end.

I just looked back at my posts over the summer and realized I never posted about my parents' trip out here the first week in June. My mom will probably give me a hard time about that. LOVE YOU MOM