4th of July and Travel

(One of my more successful firework pics)

I am writing to you live from San Francisco, where I have to returned to work on another planetarium. The weather here is not what I was expecting. In fact, the city itself is not what I was expecting. 'Frisco has a certain grime and dirtiness I wasn't prepared for. I guess that comes from basing all of my assumptions its various depictions in movies. It's not a bad place. There are many good restaurants and cool shops to check out, don't get me wrong. But what justifies it being one of the most expensive places in the United States to live? Is really that cool?

The visit to the homeland of Grand Rapids was wonderful. Mandy ran the Buck Creek 5K, we had a great 4th of July party (complete with a fireworks-prompted visit by the law--link to pics), a well-executed surprise party for Jess (link to pics), and many other tales of fanciful whimsy. I will try to migrate these pics over to Flickr, once it stops acting like a bitch and lets me upload again.

I left on Wednesday last week (the 9th of July) for San Fran. Mandy has stayed on a few additional days and will be leaving tomorrow with her mom and Nikki to drive back to Denver. Her mom is then flying back out to Grand Rapids at some point early next week. I will be returning home on the 23rd or 24th of July, returning just in time for a visit from Chad. Wish Mandy and family good luck on their travels.

It's been a crazy summer so far. It's been great to have so many visitors come out to Denver. It's also been equally amazing that I have found ways to be there at the same time they've come to visit. By the time I get back home, I will have been gone for over a month... a long time to be away from home. I'm looking forward to being back there for a little while before heading out again. Maybe I'll get some time to ride our new moped, an amazing 150CC monster. I will take pictures of it when I get back and write a little post on the guy who sold it to us, and why we think it's a good investment.

That's it from San Fran. Peace n' love!