Hi 5

Whew, it's been barking cold here lately.  The temps are finally starting to rise a bit today, but for the past several days I don't think we broke 5.  As in FIVE degrees Fahrenheit.  And that's the high kids, the low has been minus 20ish.  When the paper has the article  Sure it's cold - but cold enough to kill pine beetles?, you know its been chilly (it hasn't been cold enough by the way, those beetles basically hibernate inside the trees).  Most people I know are dealing with some sort of pipe freezing scenario while shleps like me are wearing four shirts at work.  Great fun.

Just couldn't close it

When things get this cold I think of how the Ute Indians who lived here some time ago would've dealt with it.  I can only imagine that those tepees were quite cozy.  And that nine months later there were lots of newborn babies.

-In true, crazy Aspen spirit, I still rode my bike to work everyday.  As I've mentioned before, it's my small contribution to mankind.  You're welcome.  As you can see in the pic though, I wasn't able to get my lock all the way closed at work because I couldn't stretch the thing out far enough.  I'm a fairly strong guy, but I just couldn't move it that little bit farther due to the temperature.  Honestly, I'm not even sure why I lock it up in the winter in the first place.  Also, I only have one gear to use at these temps ... the cables on the bike won't stretch enough to let me get into smaller gears.  Not the hugest deal, but annoying nonetheless as the roads here aren't exactly flat.

Who stole dat cream?

-Here's a pic of what can happen to some cream top yogurts after they pass their expiry date and before they hit the rubbish bin at my workplace.  Who could've done such a thing?  I sure hope that person washed all that arterycloggingsaturatedfat down with some broccoli juice or something!  (just in case my biting sense of humor is lost on some poor soul, it's my belly that was the beneficiary of the cream tops ... yum, yum)

-In mildly interesting other news, I've stopped eating veggies for the past few months and haven't keeled over dead or anything.  I had lots of them over the summer as I would grab all different kinds at the Farmers Market each Saturday, but since then, my laziness combined with my increasingly doubtful view that they actually provide some nutritional benefit, have made them sparse in my current diet.  I'm not hating on veggies here, I think they can provide great texture and taste to meals, and in moderation are probably fine, but a golden child they are not (IMO).  I recently put up a new link on my Blogroll to Dr. Georgia Edes blog where she dives quite deeply into the pros and cons of veggies in general, and certain 'families' of them in particular.  She's also not hating on veggies, just putting together some great information for us nutrition geeks to make informed decisions with.  A big shout out to her and her work, you should definitely check her stuff out.  Oh, she has articles there about all kinds of stuff, not just about veggies.

-As you've probably heard, we here in Colorado voted to make marijuana legal at the state level.  Your personal thoughts on it notwithstanding, you have to admit to having some sort of visual image of a giant pot cloud hanging over Buttermilk next week when the X games arrive.  In an attempt to try to curb such shenanigans, a headline in the paper last week read: 'Superpipe ... Yes, Marijuana pipe ... No'  Yeah, good luck with that one.

-I'm headed out to Miami for a Disney cruise in 2 weeks.  A cruise wouldn't exactly be my first choice for a vacation, or in my top 10 for that matter, but the whole fam damily is going and it'll be fun to see my niece and nephew have a great time.  Me?  I'm just hoping to get a massage by Ariel or some other Disney princess.  Before that, we're suppose to hit the mid thirties here the next few days so I think I'll go outside with shorts and a tank top on to work on my tan