News from here -

We started off the week with a lovely day, bright with sunshine. The wind was cold, but in the sunshine you could really feel the heat of the sun. That's always encouraging to realize the earth is finally tipping towards spring and summer.

We noticed in Saturday's Caledonian Record that Jason Larrabee has purchased Larrabee's Building Supply from Steve Larrabee. Lots of you know Steve and Jason are cousins. Steve is also our state representative. Jason said not much will change, and Steve will still be on hand part time. This agreement has been in the works for quite a while, apparently, and details have now been finalized so the changeover is official.

I suppose lots of you get forwards in your e-mail, some of which strike you as being important if warning about something or disclosing some little-known trick to avoid something-or-other or prevent mail fraud or whatever. Some of you know that I've been taken to task a few times for posting one of those messages here when I thought it was a valid warning. It took a couple of those embarrassing errors, but now I take time to investigate by going to factorfiction.com, urbanlegends.com, snopes.com or hoax-slayer.com to find out if the message is real or not. Today I got something a little different. Someone sent a picture of the moon as seen at the North Pole - lovely shot with amazing reflections and details - but, guess what? It was a completely fake digitalized made-up picture. Geeze, you can't trust anything these days.

Here's one that is real. My sister-in-law, Ellie, sent this from Colorado recently. I asked about it because I'm partial to railroads and think there should be more of them. Here's her reply:

The picture of the RR track sign does not indicate a functioning track! It was probably used before we were even born. It is amazing to see the trains, loaded with coal, pass through the valley, though, and especially through the Glenwood Canyon. The tunnels carve into the mountains and the trains are swallowed up for awhile. Sometimes the trains have to wait until one comes from the opposite direction and then the switch to the tunnel track can be made.
In Colorado, the DOT [Department of Transportation] and the legislators are considering the possibility of constructing a rail system connecting the Denver area with the mountain area, along the I-70 corridor, to alleviate the congestion of traffic. This (congestion) is terrible during winter storms and especially during the weekends and vacations. And so many times, it is impossible to get through because of accidents, avalanche dangers, etc. A lot of gas would be saved if most of cars could be "removed" from the travel from city to mountain.


Coincidentally, I heard about a proposal by a senator in Colorado that seems to address the traffic problems Ellie mentioned. Here's a link to an article dated today: Traffic

Ellie and Tom are at Beaver Creek, Colorado. Tom is a ski instructor there, so Ellie is often left to ski on her own. She wrote to me about a typical day for her:

The sun was shining and it was pleasant. It was early, around 11:30 am, and the warmth of the sun was very nice. I was even convinced that I should ski, since it was so warm. So, I came home, walked Rascal [their dog], and put on my ski duds. I walked to the bus shuttle for the mountain and did about 6 runs. It was sunny but it was only 20 degrees F. Thankfully there was not much wind. I explored the ski areas known as Bachelor's Gulch and Arrowhead. Tom was in training all day. Anyway, after 6 runs, I decided that I had gotten enough exercise for the day and took a long trail called "Leave The Beav" to end up at a bus stop where I could catch a parking lot bus and walk home from there. It is only about a 5 minute walk from the bus shuttle station. Going skiing is convenient here.

She sure makes it sound (and look) easy. This is a picture of Ellie on the mountain.