Kim and I headed to Red Rocks last night for yet another sold out show. This was not your typical show though, everyone was there to watch Wedding Crashers on a screen that nearly filled up the stage. I was floored that Red Rocks could sell out just for a movie showing. There was a band on before the movie named Under A Blood Red Sky. Obviously they are a U2 cover band, but I don’t think many people were there actually to see them. In fact many people around us were annoyed by their performance. I didn’t think they were bad, but definitely no comparison to the real thing. As expected, the movie was a huge success and it was amazing to hear seven or eight thousand people all laughing at the same time.

While I was out of town over the weekend, Kim bought a bike. We’ve been wanting to get bikes to enjoy all of the lovely trails around Denver, and when she saw one at a garage sale she quickly bartered with the sellers and got it for $50. I don’t think it’s top of the line or anything, but it is better than what we had before, which was nothing. Now I just need to get one of my own.

Regardless, I just took the bike out for a spin over lunch. I ended up going almost 7.5 miles while out running a few errands too (route). Overall it was pretty enjoyable. The seat wasn’t the most comfortable thing ever, and the brakes squeaked a bunch, but at least it moved well. I’m not very knowledgeable when it comes to bikes, but I’m hoping to learn more as the time goes on. First thing would be to fix and/or replace the squeaky brakes.

I mentioned it a couple times before, but this past weekend was spent at Deer Creek, aka Verizon Wireless Music Center, in Indiana for two nights of the Dave Matthews Band. I left first thing on Friday morning and flew to Chicago where a couple of friends picked me up and we were quickly on our way to our campground. Despite a few traffic jams along the way, we made it in pretty good time and immediately began setting up our tents and other camping goods.

Before too long we were heading into the venue for the first night’s show. I enjoyed the second night’s setlist a little more than the first, but it was still a great show. Song highlights for the weekend included “What Would You Say”, “So Damn Lucky”, “Jimi Thing”, and “Tripping Billies”, to name just a few. Heck, I could list almost every song they played as a highlight for me, especially with so few repeats between nights.

Besides the shows, we had a blast hanging around camp, enjoying the surprisingly nice weather, playing cornhole, hanging around a campfire, etc. In fact I slept most of yesterday just to catch up from everything. That included the drive back to Chicago, a nap or two on my friends couch, and then sleeping through most of my entire flight back to Denver. Even still I slept like a baby last night. All in all it was well worth the trip and I always look forward to seeing future shows at Deer Creek.

Kim and I headed out to Red Rocks last night to see another one of my all time favorite bands, 311. I often forget about 311 when mentioning my favorite bands, but I still try to catch them anytime they play a show near me. I’m a big fan of their older music, and still know most of their newer material.

Last night started off a little rough with storms passing through the area as show time approached. Fortunately there were two opening bands, and we brought a cooler of beer, so we just sat in the parking lot and waited for the weather to clear up. And it did, just in time for 311 to play. We caught the end of Matisyahu’s set and even though I thought his show was great a couple of years ago, I think his moment of fame is up, at least for me.

311 played a great set full of tons of my favorites from back in the day. We watched this show from very close to the top of the amphitheater, and despite the strong winds it still sounded pretty good. Besides it was cool to see the show with a lightning storm going on in the distant background. I really enjoy the song “Creatures (For A While)” and was glad to hear it as the last song played of the night. Once the official setlist is posted I will update with a link to it.

After Sunday’s game, my men’s league hockey team went defeated for the season. That’s right, we didn’t win a single game! I guess the team usually plays in the B division, but during the summer there isn’t enough teams for separate A and B divisions. So every week we got waxed by teams that typically play in the A division. Our team definitely had it’s fair share of good players, including one guy who will be playing at DU next year, we just couldn’t put the puck in the net. My season started off really rough with lots of time off from the ice and my ankle injury that acted up for the first month or so. I finally started to get going toward the end of the season. I just hope the one goal I had was memorable enough to keep my spot on the team for next session. If not, it’s back to the minors, aka the C division.

Call off the search, we have found a great Mexican restaurant in Denver! With little going on this past Friday, Kim and I decided to head out for dinner after work. I consulted my 5280 magazine from July, which featured the Top Of The Town article, and decided to try the readers’ choice for best Mexican restaurant, Benny’s Restaurante y Tequila Bar (301 E 7th Ave).

I had a combination plate consisting of a cheese enchilada, smothered bean burrito, and a guacamole tostada. I think my favorite thing on the plate was the guacamole. I would highly recommend having their guacamole in some form or another. The rest of my food was delicious as well. Kim ordered a chicken rellenos, which she really seemed to enjoy. I did not try more than a little bite of it, since I had enough food of my own. We also split a liter of margaritas on the rocks, another thing that I would highly recommend. Overall, the food was great and we will definitely be back sometime in the near future.

Kim and I went hiking again this past weekend, once again inside of Rocky Mountain National Park. Our mission this time was to climb to the top of Flattop Mountain. This 4.4 mile hike starts at 9,475 feet near Bear Lake and the summit is at 12,324 feet, an elevation gain of 2,849 feet. All around this is a bigger hike than the week prior when we hiked the Twin Sisters Peaks.

We started in the morning once again, around 10:30 I believe. When we reached the summit at around 1pm we ate some lunch and took in the wonderful sights. After a half hour or so, we decided to keep hiking and go to the top of Hallett Peak, which is another half mile or so from the top of Flattop Mountain. This peak rises to 12,713 feet, an additional 389 feet from where we ate lunch. It was well worth the extra distance, as we walked very close to four elk, and then had an amazing view from the top.

After some time at the top of Hallett Peak we began our five mile descent back to Bear Lake. As we neared the end we decided to take a side trail over to Bierstadt Lake, where our car was actually parked. The sign said that it was only another 1.7 miles away. Unfortunately once we hiked that 1.7 we realized that the car was another 1.3 miles from the actual lake. We eventually made it to the car, but much later than we were originally thinking. In the end we hiked over thirteen miles! Trust me, my body is still feeling it today.

The weather was much clearer for this hike, so I think our pictures came out much brighter this time. And as an added bonus, I finally got the gallery on my site working again. So the photos from this journey can be viewed here at edpaffjr.com.

I finally have the swamp cooler working again! For those of you who aren’t familiar, a swamp cooler, or evaporative cooler, is a device to cool the air that is common in low humidity climates. So you wouldn’t use one in Cincinnati or Kansas City, and therefore I had never heard of such a thing until moving into our house in Denver. Instead of central air, we have this monster machine up on the roof that magically cools the air.

Well it was cooling the air fine at the beginning of the summer, but over the last couple of weeks it suddenly stopped being effective. It was blowing air, but the air was not cool. So instead of hiring someone to come in and take a look at it, I do what I often do and consulted the web for any information I could find. After some research I was convinced that the filter pads needed to be replaced. The pads are continuously sprayed with water and the evaporation there is what cools the air as it comes into the cooler.

First, I had to get a bigger ladder so we could get up there and see what the problem was. So I am now the proud owner of a twenty foot extension ladder. The fourteen or sixteen footer that I bought first wasn’t tall enough to reach the roof. Once we were finally able to get up on the roof, we removed the huge pads from all three sides of the cooler and immediately went over to the local hardware store to get some new ones. We put the new pads in on two sides, but before putting the last one in, I wanted to test the system.

So I turned the water pump on, which should soak the pads, but instead nothing happened. Crap! I didn’t even think to check the water pump before replacing the pads. Anyway the motor in the pump must have died because all it was doing was producing a light hum and no water was flowing. I later took the pump into the store and asked if they had anything to replace it. Fortunately swamp coolers are very popular in this area, so they had just what I needed. And finally, $30 later, the swamp cooler is working again and probably better than ever with some brand new pads too!

After our long hikes on Saturday we headed into Boulder to catch the Marc Broussard Soul Review show later that night at the Fox Theatre. This is a special tour to coincide with the release of his latest album S.O.S.: Save Our Soul, which is mostly a collection of covers of old soul tunes. Therefore the performance included many more cover songs that one would normally expect from a Broussard performance. And while I’m not the biggest fan of this latest release, I felt that the concert showcased the songs better than I had originally thought.

The show started with a couple of songs from Broussard himself, followed up with a duet with Toby Lightman. Once their performance of “If I Could Build My Whole World Around You” (Marvin Gaye), Broussard left the stage for Lightman to perform her own songs, along with a couple of covers of her own, with Broussard’s band. After her short set, Broussard came back on for another duet, this time they sang “Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours” (Stevie Wonder), which I felt was the highlight of the show. From there Broussard continued his full set with many various covers and a few originals of his own. If you would like to hear this unique performance in it’s entirety, I have uploaded it to archive.org, where you can stream the whole thing online. Enjoy!

On Friday we had planned to play a round of golf, but the weather forced us to make other plans. Instead we hit a ton of balls at a covered driving range and followed it up with dinner. It never really poured on us, but it was comforting to be under the safety of a roof. In fact it didn’t really rain hard for too long, but if we had been out playing it definitely would have poured on us. Better safe than sorry, right?

For dinner we headed to The Hornet. I often forget about this restaurant, even though it is fairly close to our house, and I’m not sure why. They have a good selection of beer and a simple but unique food menu. I had one of the better buffalo chicken sandwiches I had in awhile and Kim had Cubano Melt, which she also really enjoyed. Not to mention their chips and fries were both delicious! Add in a few New Castles and you have yourself one heck of a meal.