Today I want to show you some of the heavy industry that surrounds and permeates these neighborhoods. I’m sorry I haven’t provided a map for any of these posts: it took me a long time to figure out the route of most of the tour. I’ve included cross streets in the discussion below, so if you’re motivated, you can go to Google Maps, search for “Globeville, Denver,” and find the places I’m talking about.

I’ll begin with Valu Tires, at 40th and Steele, which turns into Vasquez north of I-70. Michael Maes, the tour guide, said that a number of junkyards have moved into these three neighborhoods but have avoided the ban on junkyards by calling themselves “recycling centers.” Now, there is a Discount Tire Company a few blocks from our house in Broomfield, but there isn’t a big pile of tires right next to it. Discount Tire either stores them inside the building or orders them as needed. The tour continued up Steele to Vasquez, where I snapped this long-distance picture of Xcel’s Cherokee Station (the red-and-white smokestack with the plume on the center-left) and the Suncor refinery to the right.We continued up Vasquez to 56th and down Brighton Boulevard to York, in the process going by this Suncor building, which is across the street (more or less) from Riverside Cemetery.As far as I can tell, we then took York to 58th and headed west to Franklin, where I took a picture of the last farmhouse in Globeville featured in Monday’s post. But from the map in Google, I get the impression that we drove up to 64th because we got so close to the red-and-white smokestack of Xcel’s Cherokee Station (part of the bus window is in this picture), and to the trains hauling coal.We went south, past the Purina Puppy Chow plant at York and I-70 (built in 1930, so I guess they routed I-70 around it when they built it in the 1960s),and then drove east and north to reach the northern part of Swansea, where I took the picture of the house without sewers featured in Wednesday’s post. Then we ended the tour back at the Cross Community Coalition offices,which are just across the railroad tracks from the Eaton Metals building (I’m not sure if that building is being used right now)and only a couple of blocks from the Growhaus at 48th and York.

Garbanzo Mediterranean Grill has locations all over Denver, including the University of Denver area, where we went, and Aurora, but nothing north of I-70. And D Bar Desserts, on 17th Avenue west of Park, sits in the midst of gentrification.

The only gentrification I saw on the tour was Globeville Townhomes, and since gentrification moves low-income people out of neighborhoods, and the people in these neighborhoods want to stay (at least, according to Michael Maes of Cross Community Coalition and Tom Anthony of the Elyria Neighborhood Association), I can’t say I’m in favor of it. I would recommend that the Denver City Council stop forcing industrial development down the throats of people who don’t want to live among it.

And, yes, the lady is protesting too much.

Last Friday Todd and I went to Garbanzo on University near Evans for dinner before Amiri Baraka’s reading at DU. Garbanzo is a fast casual joint that claims to place an emphasis on freshness. However, as Todd said, the tomato and cucumber salad on the right in the picture below had been sitting out all day, and the minty tabbouleh, made with couscous instead of bulgur wheat, had an odd sticky texture that might have been more palatable if it hadn’t also been cold.

We didn’t see a rotisserie there; the pictures on the wall indicated that the shwarma comes in chunks rather than being shaved off a large piece of meat.

The falafels, however, were hot out of the fryer and crispy. The tahini made a nice contrast, but the cilantro sauce didn’t have much oomph. One other thing I liked about the falafels was the liberal use of green herbs in the dough, which lent them a bright appearance and a fresh flavor.

Dinner lasted about 20 minutes, so we had time to kill and nowhere to do so before Baraka’s reading. Amiri Baraka is certainly an accomplished poet and critic (e.g., Blues People), and it may be that he is committed to social justice like no other American writer, as his website says, but he is also an anti-Semite, recycling hateful 9/11 conspiracy theories that were debunked years ago. ‘Nuff said.

All in all, it was a relief to get to D Bar, which was packed as always on a weekend night, and stand around until seats opened up at the communal table. The place is a haven for me. We would have preferred to sit at the bar and talk to the chefs, but instead we talked to the mother and daughter, the couple, and the man with his novel also sitting at our table. Todd got the dressed avocado, which isn’t on the menu anymore (pictured here from an earlier visit), and then the ice cream sandwich.

I got the palmond³, and I’m still trying to locate the 3 uses of pear and 3 uses of almond. The menu describes it this way: palmond³—pear I will actually eat—pear³ almond³ caramelized white chocolate ·pom ·almond ice milk.

Some are easy, of course, like the pear halves and the ball of almond ice milk. I assume the cake on the bottom has almonds and pears in it, and the caramelized white chocolate is the custardy thing between the cake and the pears. But then I thought, What if the sugary crumbs underneath the pears are the caramelized white chocolate and the custard is made with almond and pear? And what about the “pom,” which usually means passionfruit, orange, and mango juice but in this case refers to pear.

I started this post with gentrification and ended it with puzzlement over dessert. Must be nice, eh?

Some of the houses we saw on the tour date to the 1880s. Along with Highland(s) and Five Points, the neighborhoods of Globeville, Elyria, and Swansea (moving east from the intersection of I-25 and I-70) have some of the oldest housing stock in Denver. The latter three neighborhoods used to be home to 3 smelters; the only one that persisted long into the twentieth century was Asarco. In the 1990s, the Cross Community Coalition pursued a class action suit against Asarco for heavy metal pollution and won monetary damages and an agreement to replace the top 12 inches of soil in any house in Globeville. (I think it was any and all houses, but I may be using too broad a brush here; I know that Elyria and Swansea had some soil cleaned up around houses, but it wasn’t done as extensively in the latter 2 neighborhoods. Those 2 neighborhoods are a Superfund site, VB I-70. VB stands for “Vasquez Boulevard.”)

I asked Michael if there was a scientific basis for replacing only 12 inches of soil, and he said that it was an economic decision. If you clean down to 2 feet, say, you can’t afford to clean up as many yards.

I saw this house early on; it reminded me of houses in Broomfield’s First Filing neighborhood. (Please note all photographs were taken through a bus window. Some are clearer than others.) At the other end of the spectrum are the Globeville Townhomes at 51st and Logan, which were built on remediated land. Most of the townhomes are Section 8 rentals, but 12 units are on sale for up to $193,000. These new townhouses are a few blocks east of I-25, a few blocks north of I-70, and have a rail line running along their eastern edge. Xcel Energy’s Cherokee Station, a coal-fired power plant with the red-and-white smokestack visible from I-25, is located west of York between 58th and 64th.

A woman who works for Habitat for Humanity was on the tour, and she said Habitat had done blower-door tests on a townhouse and found that it wasn’t very energy-efficient. So let’s see: we have townhomes that are built on a brownfield, priced beyond what people in the neighborhood can pay, and not that eco-friendly. It’s not surprising that only 1 unit has sold.

Across the street are the old headquarters for Asarco (the red buildings) and the rail line beyond the 2 fences.

We drove all over north Denver on this tour, and I couldn’t always keep track of where we were going, but this house is located at the corner of St. Paul and 52nd in north Swansea. I’m not sure if it’s a new house or has just been renovated, but it looks pretty nice. Take a look, though, at the bottom left corner: there are no sewers.

Michael Maes stressed that family life was important to people who lived in these neighborhoods and that the neighborhoods are important to the families who live there. Despite the enterprise zone, there’s still lots of housing, and Maes definitely thinks there could be a lot more. Certainly people in Elyria, who are fighting a proposed realignment of I-70 right by Elyria Park (on 48th, between High and Race Streets), would like their housing values to increase (they’ve declined since the plans to realign I-70 were announced).

Now I’ve been there twice, both times with company, and I can confidently say that I wouldn’t mind going there by myself and taking a seat at the bar. Though I’m not sure how long I would stay, because the round-back chairs are nowhere near as comfortable as the atmosphere.

My Brother’s Bar, at 15th and Platte Street, just northwest of the South Platte River, is known for being “Denver’s oldest saloon still serving booze on the original site,” according to Tom Noel. An establishment called “Highland House” opened there in 1873 and served Denver’s Italian immigrant community. In the late 1800s, the neighborhood sometimes called Lower Highlands and sometimes called the Central Platte Valley (even though the river is named the South Platte) was sparsely settled. Since then, several different bars have come and gone in that corner building, and the neighborhood is one of Denver’s trendiest.

The bar has a reputation for making good burgers, so when Todd and I went there one Saturday, that’s what we ordered. I chose the jalapeno cream cheese burger, and Todd negotiated with the waitress over a chili cheeseburger. She said she could bring him a cheeseburger and a cup of chili, but not the two together. When she brought our order, we understood why: the burgers are served wrapped in paper rather than on a plate. Saves washing dishes, I guess.

Todd and I liked our burgers well enough, but many of the ingredients seemed to have come out of a can or a box: definitely the chili, and possibly the jalapenos in this cream cheese.

Although the onion rings and fries looked good, the rings were too crispy.

I got a kick out of this condiments caddy, which has 2 sides so you can put it in the middle of a table and let people dress their burgers without fighting over the onions and relish.

If you want a great burger, I recommend Larkburger (there are locations in Boulder and Greenwood Village). If you want atmosphere, go to My Brother’s Bar, where the host says, “Have fun!” and the servers are mellow and Girl Scout Thin Mints are stacked along the front wall and up the stairs. The menu offers a variety of bar food, including vegetarian items. You can drink a glass from a small but quirky wine list or a craft beer such as Twisted Pine or Samurai or order from the full bar.

My Brother’s Bar is on the Beat Poetry Driving Tour of Denver.

The tour guide, Michael Maes, said Globeville (located around the intersection of I-25 and I-70; Elyria and Swansea are to the east, with York as their dividing line), used to be the “garden” area of Denver, with lots of small gardens and truck farms. People could drive there and buy produce from the farmers’ trucks. But the last farm in the area sold out five years ago. It’s located on Franklin, but unfortunately I didn’t write down the cross-street (58th, perhaps?). It’s the dark house on the right in the photo. The beige building on Franklin was built in the past five years.Maes said there are 6 Superfund sites within a 2-mile radius of these neighborhoods (and that Swansea and Elyria are one of those Superfund sites). There is an oil refinery in this area, at least 1 coal-burning plant, and a water management plant.

Michael grew up in the area and has lived there all his life. He was there when Denver decided to approve an enterprise zone in the city, which allows business and industry to move in. On the tour, I saw streets where businesses had bought a couple of lots and torn down the houses and put some kind of business in its place. How would you feel if someone bought the 2 houses next to you and turned those lots into industry?

If you want more information about Growhaus, I suggest contacting Wild Green Yonder, a site focused on sustainability and the grow local movement.

I almost drove off Highway 50 when I saw the sign below. Cheney Highway! No way the VP deserves to have a highway named after him. But after a few days driving around Titusville, I noticed Old Cheney Highway as well. So I think the name dates to an earlier time.I love the juxtaposition of signs here, especially “No Outlet.”

Speaking of strange combinations, this sign at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge really makes you think Florida officials have no sense of humor…or fun. Why can’t I walk nude on the beach with a dog leash in one hand and a metal detector in the other?

Here’s another view of the same bird. Keep in mind these pictures were taken with an 18-55 mm kit lens and are heavily cropped. I wish I could get them a little sharper, but really the only way to fix this problem is to use a telephoto lens.

From the outside (which I didn’t photograph because it would have required standing in the highway), it’s not much: just a large restaurant along Garden Street in downtown Titusville (Highway 406) with a big orange sign spelling out its name.

We began our first visit in the “gazebo,” otherwise known as the bar, which had just opened for the season that February night. Our waitress busied herself cleaning, but we managed to chat about snow in the South before we were summoned to our table.

The restaurant was full that Friday, so the hostess tucked us into a little room in the back with a waitress named Patti. She brought us beer, a Villa Maria chardonnay from New Zealand, which was soft and medium-bodied, and corn fritters. I ate far too many of those sweet little devils.

I loved this square, substantial, paper napkin (it’s on top of the menu). Both menus were made from paper (online, the entrees are divided into “seafood” and “not seafood”). The waitress, who definitely knew her stuff, suggested the large Royal Red shrimp, which live 1,200 feet down and are fished by only a few intrepid captains. I ordered the Royal Red dinner, broiled, and Todd ordered the “Shellfish”: breaded rock shrimp, scallops, and more shrimp of a variety I can’t recall.

We could have ordered the Best of the Cape [Canaveral] Shrimp Special, featuring 1 dozen each of rock, Royal Red, brown, and white shrimp. Never having encountered “brown” or “white” shrimp before, we were intrigued but didn’t think we could eat 25 shrimp each.

I’ve had a lot of shrimp in my life, but never before have I bitten into one and said, “That is beautiful.” The Royal Red were the most tender, flavorful shrimp I’ve ever had.

Todd’s rock shrimp were decent, but the scallops (on the right) were small. I much preferred the meal he had on our second visit: shrimp and grits flavored with bacon. I had Royal Red and Villa Maria chardonnay both times (as well as a much drier Placido pinot grigio), and finished my 5-day visit to Florida with key lime pie, which, frankly, didn’t taste any better than key lime pie I’ve had in the Denver area. Of course, the limes weren’t in season.

If you visit Titusville, you might as well go to Dixie Crossroads and try the Best of the Cape Special. Let me know how it was, OK?

***

On February 20 (Saturday), Denver Restaurant Week begins. It lasts until March 5 (that is, two weeks).

Denver Artopia, sponsored by Westword, is Saturday from 7 pm to 2 am.

Todd and I ordered mojitos, which were sweeter than he would have made them, and a tad watery. The old-school waiter brought black bean soup as an appetizer. I misunderstood him when he asked if I wanted onion and cheese on it; I thought he was suggesting it for the picadillo. He spoke softly and not very clearly.

Of the 8 Cuban dishes on the menu, I ordered picadillo, which like shepherd’s pie features ground beef and potatoes but adds raisins and a sofrito base (onion, garlic, tomato, peppers). Unlike the salty picadillo I had at Cuba Cuba in Denver, this dish was warm and spicy and made me want to keep eating it. And I didn’t need to hunt for the raisins.

Todd ordered palomilla, or top sirloin served Old Havana style (half an inch thick). It was a bit tough and not as flavorful as the picadillo.

El Leoncito also lists churrasco under the Cuban dishes; it is an Argentinian-style steak marinated in mojo de ajo, topped with chimichurri paste, and served on a sizzling pan.

The plantains were dark and moist, the best I’ve ever had. The Cuban bread looked like smashed bread-biscuits. I didn’t care for it.

By the end of the meal I was annoyed with our waiter. A young man, he was courtly to me but handed the check to Todd and was always calling him “senor.” These days he could at least put the check in the middle of the table and let us decide.

El Leoncito had quite the hall of celebrities by the bathrooms, including signed pictures by Andy Garcia and Tiger Woods.

At first it wasn’t easy to find. During our fabulous shrimp dinner Friday night at Dixie Crossroads, I was yearning for a chocolate shop I’d never even visited, and when we finally found it after driving up and down Washington and Hopkins, I was unhappy to learn that it wasn’t open until 10 pm after all.

On Saturday, Todd thought I was going to have a fit when the first door I tried was locked. The store was open; I just had to find the entrance. And once I did, I ordered a caramel latte and 8 chocolates (from left to right, caramel, rum meltaway, key lime, and champagne in the lower-left corner). I was planning to share those chocolates with a friend from college and his family, but by the time we met up with them at 5 pm in Cocoa Beach, I had eaten them all, with a little help from Todd.

I’ll bet this gull would have helped too, but that’s another story.

We didn’t get back to Caffe Chocolat until Monday, after we had watched the space shuttle launch and slept through morning and lunchtime. Luckily, they are open until 7. We arrived about 2 pm for a late lunch.

Of the gyro and Greek salad I ordered, the salad with its tangy Aegean dressing was my favorite. The gyro was fine, but I prefer the ingredients in a crisp pita that’s been slit open, rather than a soft pita wrapped around them.

Todd had a roast beef sandwich, which he liked because it was “basic and had fresh stuff on top.” I liked his creamy potato salad but wasn’t as excited about the French onion soup—the broth tasted thin.

That afternoon, I returned Todd to the hotel and went to the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge for a little birding. It was a good thing I did, because his lunch haunted him all afternoon.

And then, after the painted bunting and the wood stork hunting along Black Point Wildlife Drive (2 new life birds for me), I had to visit Caffe Chocolat again. Their dark chocolate truffles are the best of the 5 truffles I tried. The wafer-thin sugar-free peppermint patties aren’t bad either; they have a slight aftertaste.

Caffe Chocolat, which has been in business for 6 or 7 years, is one of three coffeeshops within a few blocks. This interior shot shows the main room; there are large rooms on either side. Sunrise Bread Company, across the parking lot on the Hopkins side of Highway 1, offers coffee and smoothies and bagels and bread, but no sandwiches. (I was turned off by Sunrise’s notice about 24-hour video surveillance, but my smoothie was good.) The Coffee Shoppe is located up the road on Washington. I didn’t go there.

There’s an establishment called Medical Weight Loss Solutions across Washington from Caffe Chocolat. I’m glad to see downtown Titusville has all its bases covered.

Bruriah is a story within a story, in which modern-day Bruriah is obsessed with the tale of second-century Bruriah, a learned woman who questioned the rabbinic claim that women are “light-minded.” In response, her husband sent one of his students to seduce her.

The only thing that bothered me about this film was that it never questioned the right of men to mess with women in this way. It reminded me of Atanarjuat in that respect.

The Fire Within explores the history of the Jews who settled in the town of Iquitos, Peru, and made a living in the rubber trade at the turn of the twentieth century. Many of them had children with indigenous women, and after a generation or two they stopped practicing Judaism. The movie chronicles how modern residents of Iquitos reconnected with their Jewish roots and eventually migrated to Israel.

The festival runs through February 20 and shows films you won’t see anywhere else. Check it out.

We noticed Dogs R Us Friday night, after eating at Dixie Crossroads on Garden Street. It’s located next to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals thrift store, which we thought was pretty twisted.

From the inside, Dogs R Us resembles a large house. Otherwise, it might as well be a Hooters: the waitresses are all pretty and skinny and dressed in black short-shorts and pantyhose and low-cut referee tops. Even so, the place was packed with families and was surprisingly quiet. Georgetown was playing Villanova on one of the big screens. The service was slow but good; when we asked our waitress for something, she calmly said, “Just give me a second; I’ve got to catch up a second.”

Todd didn’t like his dogs much, though. He said the Coney Island dog (mustard, onions, chili) was good, but the other was only “reminiscent of a Chicago dog.” It needed real sports peppers and “nuclear relish.”

I ordered the Fresh Catch meal, which surprisingly for Florida, turned out to be mahi-mahi, a Pacific fish. I took a few bites of the sandwich and then just ate the fish, which had so little Cajun seasoning I could hardly taste it. The fish was cooked properly, though.

If you go to Dogs R Us, go because you like sports bars, not for the food. Steve’s Snappin’ Dogs in Denver has nothing to worry about, that’s for sure.

I had researched what exposure I needed for the launch itself: ISO 400, shuttle speed 1/125 of a second, and aperture of f8. The problem was, to get a picture of the shuttle before it launched, I needed a much longer exposure (5 seconds). And even with a tripod, the image was blurry (this is a tiny detail of the entire photograph, taken from 7 miles away with a 18-55 mm lens).If you squint, you can make out a shuttle shape. The problems began as the rocket boosters started up. If I had bothered to check my exposure then, I could have reset the shutter speed to 1/125 of a second. But at a 5-second exposure, this is what I got: a very bright light and shadows.It was lit, all right. And I just kept clicking away at those 5-second exposures.The clouds of steam are produced by the water involved in the noise suppression system. Eventually the shuttle got far enough away that my camera could record its shape again.Todd was happy afterward. He posted a detailed description of the launch and lots of links about STS-130 Endeavor.And we were both happier after breakfast at IHOP at the Days Inn in Titusville.

In fact, you could live in the museum residences above Mad Greens, and find salad and coffee and dessert and wine and cheese at the restaurant, and go see art. You’d hardly ever have to leave that one block.

Here’s the cheese plate we ordered for $15. (The two glasses of wine we ordered cost nearly $20.)

From left to right, the cheeses are Manchego (Spain), Roomano (a 4-year-old Gouda from southern Holland), and Barely Buzzed, from Beehive in Utah. The latter is rubbed with coffee grounds. The dark stuff in the spoon is a tart plum spread. I liked all three cheeses, but my favorite was the Roomano.

The DAM solicited a bunch of artists to create the Embrace! exhibits using the strange geometry of the Hamilton Building.

The first exhibit, on the ground floor, uses the walls but doesn’t take quite as much advantage of the corners as some of the others. Rupprecht Matthies asked immigrants to Denver to give him words (in any language) describing their initial experiences here and then carved the words in wood, plexiglass, and foam. The words were finished with help from volunteers, staff, and visitors. For example, the words on the walls themselves were supplied by visitors to the museum, who can add a favorite word to a card. The word is then cut out and put on the wall.

Kids can pick up the foam words and read them or, if they’re not familiar with the language or alphabet, read the translation.

My favorite exhibit was “Chamber” by Charles Sandison. Using projectors and computer-generated words, numbers, letters, and symbols, he created the effect of a room lit by firelight. We had fun playing with our shadows and trying not to let the lights “get us.” This man had the right idea: lie down and watch the patterns.

My friend’s children were fascinated by this exhibit, “Mirage,” by Zhong Biao, especially the funhouse mirrors. Here’s a small section in closeup.

Possibly the kids’ favorite exhibit was this one by Tobias Rehberger. Several of the Embrace! exhibits encourage visitors to touch, but Rehberger’s installation lets you walk (or, more accurately, struggle) through the bungee cords. If you look closely, you’ll see a child in the back. You’ll also see a window on the left with bright colors peeking through it. That installation takes up several floors.

I’ve shown you only 4 of the Embrace! exhibits, though we saw about twice that many, and there are at least 3 that I missed, even in 2 visits. As my friend’s daughter said late that afternoon, “But we haven’t seen all of it.”

We did, however, get some good cheese at Mad Greens and Wine.

***

Todd and I will be in Florida next week. I’ll be posting about that trip as well as a visit to the Denver Art Museum.

***

Oh, tragedy! Wen Chocolates is closing. I’d probably pine away and die, but I think it will still be possible to order William Poole’s chocolates online.

My only photographs come from the approach to the exhibit, which was on the third floor. Going upstairs in the DMNS always activates my fear of heights; on Sunday I told Todd it felt as if my whole body was fizzing, starting in my belly and going out from there.

This fin whale hangs in the back of the museum: its head points toward the front of the museum, and its tail reaches out to Genghis Khan on his throne, right next to the group of red hat ladies who came to visit.

And here’s a closer view of the entrance to the Phipps Special Exhibits Gallery, which was rebuilt in 2009. Genghis Khan is the first exhibit in the remodeled gallery.

The Museum is seeking LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification for the Phipps Gallery project. Construction crews used low-emitting materials in construction, and the gallery is designed to consume less power overall. In addition, 17,254 pounds of materials from the old gallery were reused in the new gallery, saving tons of trash from the landfill. The terrazzo floor covering outside the gallery includes 4,000 pounds of recycled crushed beer bottles.

Getting into the exhibit was a slow process. First we waited outside for the vestibule to clear, and then we waited inside the vestibule. Even so, there were people 2 and 3 deep around each exhibit.

In the vestibule, we received cards printed with a name: mine was Börte, the first wife of Genghis Khan (then called Temüjin). As the mother of his four heirs, she became a powerful woman in her own right, as did her daughters.

Kiosks throughout the exhibit gave snippets of information about each character. Todd complained that his character was just some guy and that the same thing had happened at the Titanic exhibit as well: he was a third-class passenger who drowned, whereas I was rich enough to get a seat on one of the boats.

Whoever designed the exhibit had taken care to promote the contributions of women. Höelün, Temüjin’s mother, survived ejection from her husband’s clan after his murder and kept her 7 children alive on the steppes until Temüjin could begin his ascent.

And one of Genghis Khan’s daughters led an attack in Central Asia.

I had mixed feelings, however, about the note that women played an important role in battles: they killed the wounded and collected the arrows.

Hmm, killing the wounded. Now there’s a noble profession. Yanking arrows out of dead (or dying) bodies is right up there too.

This exhibit rekindled my ambivalence about force. I had a great time taking Krav Maga self-defense classes for 2 years. I still dream of being a modern-day freelance warrior, but then reality, in the form of my inability to do even 1 pull-up, does intrude.

The larger the scale of force, the more it bothers me.

I admire Temüjin for uniting clans who were continually attacking each other; they repaid the favor (which involved killing the clan leaders and promoting their subordinates) by declaring him Genghis Khan, or sovereign ruler. But why should I admire Kublai Khan, his grandson, for uniting China? Why does China need to be united? Why must empires expand? No matter how far we push out the borders, there will always be an enemy on them. Why not just live with it?

I also admire Genghis Khan for supporting all religions and encouraging the arts and sciences.

All that conquest, though, past the point of uniting the Mongols? Pure ego.

***

The exhibit ends by showing us modern-day Mongolians. The population in Denver, 2,500 to 3,000, is the largest in the United States; Mongolians like Denver’s climate. Denver has been Ulaanbator’s sister-city since 2002, and there is a City of Ulaanbaatar park near Lowry.

We had an hour to amuse ourselves before we could get into the Genghis Khan exhibit, so we wandered around until we found my favorite exhibit at the museum: Vasily Konovalenko’s gem carvings. As you may or may not be able to tell from this sign, the guy was self-taught. He became famous for his carvings in Russia, and then he emigrated to the United States in 1981. The DMNS has the largest collection of his carvings outside Moscow.

Almost everything about this servant is carved from gems, except the tray.

It was a bit of a challenge to photograph the figures, between the low light and the reflective cases. This detail from a strolling couple has eye-popping colors. The bodies are carved from quartz. My favorite carving is this one, of three singers, one with a balalaika (on the left) and one with a horn. DMNS uploaded a few pictures of other carvings to Flickr.

Both the Boone biscuit (avocado, lettuce, tomato, mayo) and the Charlotte (bacon instead of avocado) tempted me, but I settled on a biscuit with jam. This biscuit was densely layered and crisp on top from all the butter in the recipe. It tasted the way a biscuit should.

Rise and Shine is a small place, with seating for 5 or 6 people. Therefore I was impressed that the staff brought our food and drinks (a mocha and a hot chocolate) to our seats, rather than handing them over the counter.

My second choice, the biscuit cinnamon roll, was a rather odd amalgam of the two: it had the cinnamon roll’s flavor and shape but the biscuit’s texture. The frosting was perfect—not too sweet.

I’m still partial to Lucille’s biscuits, which are, as Rise and Shine proprietor Seth Rubin told Denveater, cake-like and sheet-cut. I like the way they crumble, which I suppose no self-respecting biscuit should do.

Todd had an egg biscuit and then a cheese and sausage biscuit, which I enjoyed most for its flavorful sausage. I have to confess that when I eat a biscuit topped with eggs or cheese or sausage, I forget about the details of that particular biscuit and start thinking of fast food breakfast sandwiches. It seems hardly fair, so I’ll have to go back someday and try the Boone. Or the biscuit of the day, which on Sunday was dill and cheddar. Or the Pablo’s coffee.

Note: If you stop in at Rise and Shine before closing time at 2 and you’re craving pizza, you can get a slice or two from the pie Basil Docs left the day before. Or, you can wait until 4:30, when Basil Docs starts taking orders for whole pies.

I was able to take pictures of other parts of the museum, however. Here is the first, and probably the plainest, of my photographs: a side gallery at the DMNS. It’s probably used for parties. My favorite part is the palm trees.

Do you like the extra saturation, or not?

Here’s a bit of news from 5280 magazine that I find disturbing. William Dean Singleton, chairman and publisher of the Denver Post, will be making more than $1 million after the restructuring of Affiliated Media of Denver, which owns the Post and more than 50 other newspapers. Apparently, the restructuring was done in such a way as to give Bank of America an 88% share in Affiliated Media. That doesn’t give me confidence in the news. What do you think?

Here’s the 5280 blog post.

Also this weekend: my husband is showing Birthday Girl, the test shoot for his film Kung Fu Sushi Chefs, at the Bug Theater at 37th and Navajo. Here is the trailer on YouTube.

The Denver Jewish Film Festival has a launch party February 2. The festival opens February 11.

Luckily, there is a shop in Denver called Sanctuary, on Platte Street near 16th Street. It’s next door to Salvagetti Bike Workshop and half a block down Platte from Colt and Gray.

Sanctuary is the jumping-off point for Wade Richards’s interior design business. One thing he likes to do is to take old furniture and make it lovely and new again. When I visited Sanctuary last Sunday, I saw, kittycorner to the greeting cards, half a wall of fabric swatches and a table holding design books.

I couldn’t help but notice this chair, reupholstered with Argentinian cowhides that have been stenciled to look like wild animal skins. It sits in front of a display of framed sayings and another of barware. To the right, on the shelves on the wall, you’ll find some R&Y Augousti accessories and a small card that reads: “It is a privilege for us to carry this unique French line of handmade accessories.”

Everything about the store, including the clerk, was gracious like that.

(Though I’m not sure I approve entirely of R&Y Augousti, since they use materials like python and stingray skin and exotic shells. I would need to learn more about where they get their materials. Also, their website requested my address before it would allow me to look at their collections. I guess the website wasn’t kidding when it called the husband-and-wife team “self-confessed control freaks.”)

Sanctuary also carries Zents body care products, made in Denver of natural ingredients and, apparently, beloved of celebrities.

It was the little touches that I liked most about Sanctuary: the frogs everywhere, black glass skull candleholders by Two’s Company, these candelabra, wire bowls, fair trade scarves in bright patterns, Vita Moda Italian purses, and Table Topics games, which pose questions to start conversations to relieve that awkward silence at your very first dinner party. And this piggy bank.

My favorite item was the book 365 Ways to Save the Earth by Philippe Bourseiller, an outsize coffee table book with stunning photographs. At $30, it’s cheaper than most of the items at the store, but if you check the website, you’ll notice tabs for “under $30” and “under $70.”

Sanctuary reminded me of Bouquets on 15th Street in LoDo, but I think I am more likely to buy something at Sanctuary. Not because one store is better than the other; it’s just a matter of personal taste.

The website for Rocky Mountain Barrel has a different email address than the card he gave me. So if you try to reach the company, I suggest trying sweekes at rockymountainbarrelcompany or skyweekes at gmail.

One thing they had in common: I didn’t recognize most of the wines at either store. It’s amazing how many wineries there are. Learning wine is like exploring the universe—it’s always expanding around you.

The main difference: Just about everything else.

Little Raven Vineyards (LRV), which is, according to Glenn Ehrlich of Corks, the second wine store in that location, is an elegant place. The wines are arranged by country (except for the North American and Colorado wines), and when you walk in this display of discounted bottles greets you.

LRV’s motto is “A Collection of Undiscovered Wines,” which the owner collects from vineyards around the world. I wrote down quite the list, which I’ve shortened here for you: Double Dog Dare, Mirth, Cupcake (I liked the citrusy chardonnay), Queen of Hearts, Fire Station Red, Sultry, Sinister Hand, Spellbound, Patriarca Chianti Classico, Out Riesling, and the one that appealed most to me because of the label and the blend: the Offering, with 49% grenache, 37% syrah, 13% mourvedre, and 1% viognier.

And those were mostly North American wines plus one Italian. Little Raven has more North American, French, and Italian wines than anything else. I found one Torrontés, Elsa Bianchi from Argentina, which I bought; the store was mostly out of Chilean wines.

Skyler Weekes presided over the store while I was there; as I walked around, I could hear the fan as well as jazz playing softly. The owner is Peter K (What is this, a nineteenth-century novel?).

The atmosphere at Corks, which opened 10 years ago before Platte Street was a destination, was altogether different. I crossed the threshold and nearly ran into a display of sparkling wines, including a Prosecco, Toad Hollow Risqué, and Barefoot Bubbly. I noticed Patron coffee liqueur, which I never knew existed, Cachaça 51, and Foxglove wines. The store carries several of the latter, although its policy is to sell only 1 or 2 wines from smaller vineyards, priced at $15 or under.

(Corks resembles Little Raven in its focus on less well known vineyards. Glenn also pointed out that larger liquor stores can buy the better known brands in quantity and sell them for less than what Corks would pay its distributor.)

Wines aren’t arranged on racks; instead, they’re clustered in crates under signs such as “Crisp—light-bodied” and “Voluptuous—full-bodied.” Unlike Little Raven, where you could walk quickly to a particular wine if you wanted, Corks arranges its wines so that you have to step carefully and, in the process, stop to read the tasting notes provided for every wine.

As I was taking notes on the wineries (Corks carries the Mirth label, as well as Crios wines, a South American vineyard owned by Susan Balbo), I noted Snoqualmie and Geode chardonnays, a No Time Viura-Chardonnay blend, and Bitch wines with a pink label.

Glenn asked me what I was doing, and when I told him about this blog, he mentioned that once a man from a competing store had visited Corks to write down wines his store should be carrying. Glenn thought that was a bit cheeky. We had a long discussion about Colorado liquor laws; I looked them up online and found this under Definitions in the Liquor Code:

(31) “Retail liquor store” means an establishment engaged only in the sale of malt, vinous, and spirituous liquors and soft drinks and mixers, all in sealed containers for consumption off the premises; tobaccos, tobacco products, smokers’ supplies, and nonfood items related to the consumption of such beverages; and liquor-filled candy and food items approved by the state licensing authority, which are prepackaged, labeled, and directly related to the consumption of such beverages and are sold solely for the purpose of cocktail garnish in containers up to sixteen ounces. Nothing in this section shall be construed to authorize the sale of food items that could constitute a snack, a meal, or portion of a meal.

Note that restriction at the end? Liquor stores are not allowed to sell food unless it can be used as part of a drink.

Why is that important? Because grocery stores want to sell regular beer and wine. Ever since the Colorado blue laws were repealed, they claim they’ve been losing money on alcohol sales.

Not so, counters Glenn. It’s true that grocery store liquor sales are down, but all sales are down in this economy. And he said most liquor store owners didn’t want to open on Sunday in the first place.

If McFayden and Veiga of the Colorado state legislature manage to get their bill passed in the current session, grocery stores will be allowed to sell liquor, but liquor stores will not be able to sell food. Glenn says if that law passes, Colorado liquor stores won’t be able to compete.

When I was in Louisiana for Todd’s surgery to correct superior canal dehiscence syndrome, I bought wine at Rouse’s grocery store. I don’t recall seeing a lot of liquor stores on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain (except for daiquiri drive-throughs), but I didn’t really pay attention. It was convenient to buy a bottle of wine with groceries, I have to admit, but there wasn’t anyone there to discuss wines with me. That is more important to me than convenience.

Colorado, unlike Louisiana, has set up its liquor laws in a way that favors smaller stores, and in this economy, I would like to see those stores stay in business. They return a larger percentage of their revenues to the community than do grocery store chains, which would be the main beneficiary of the proposed changes in liquor laws.

I was a little startled when this pitcher appeared, but the waitress assured me it was the smallest size (16 ounces). I drank all 3 or 4 cups, loving the taste of tea plus steamed milk plus cinnamon, even though I knew the entire time that I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep that night. Why is it that tea keeps me up but coffee doesn’t?

For lunch I ordered Zorba the Greek, which was better than the house salad I had on my last visit. To be honest, the two salads are built on the same foundation of romaine lettuce; in this case, cucumbers, feta, olives, red onions and a balsamic vinaigrette made it “Greek.” The salad wasn’t gasping for air under gobs of feta, and the dressing was just a little sweet.

I find lately that I like eating olives a lot more than I did in the past. Must be the change of life.

There was a suspicious incident at the end, when the bill came with a charge for a small pitcher. The waitress corrected the amount, and I paid.

Now I’m curious to see what the small pitcher looks like. It would probably keep me up for a week.

I was so busy taking a picture, I didn’t think to feed the meter. I hope to do better next time, and if any of you see one of these meters, I hope you’ll completely outclass me.

I was jonesing for Wen Chocolates until Sunday. I went by on January 11, and the store was closed for a long vacation that chef William Poole later explained was no vacation at all because he was rushing from one place to another attending tastings and such.

I think all the employees of Wen deserve a long vacation/trip/whatever. But then I went to the website, and it was down. I started to panic. I started to think I was a jinx. I told myself Wen couldn’t fail because the entire retail outlet is only as big as my kitchen (read: affordable rent) and people are always going in and buying sweets.

So I was relieved during my visit to Denver’s Savory Spice Shop in the South Platte River Valley neighborhood on Sunday to find Wen doing a brisk business. The website is still down as I write this post, for a redesign, and Poole has changed his approach a little bit.

Instead of offering a large selection of truffles, he’s downsized to 8 bestsellers plus 4 others per month plus 1 truffle of the month. (I can’t remember why the 4 additional truffles were selected.)

For example, when I asked about the Milan (on the left), which is a coffee-and-chicory truffle, he said it didn’t do well. I had thought coffee truffles always sold, but what do I know? That one, and others like it, will be coming back sporadically, if at all.

Poole and I also discussed his efforts to make the store eco-friendly. When I first visited Wen in the fall of 2008, employees put the truffles in a plastic bag and then in a cute pink bag with polka dots. (I still have 1 or 2 of those.) I believe there was also a bow involved.

Poole has found plastic bags made of cellulose, which are more expensive than the old ones, but he said he’s willing to eat the cost. He’s not putting shiny stickers on boxes anymore because they don’t decompose, and he’s doing his best to find boxes made of recycled materials. (There are plenty of boxes made from recycled or compostable materials in the world today, but they don’t always come in candy-friendly shapes and sizes.)

I walked out with 2 truffles I bought (Pagan Bunny and Rue Royale), plus another Pagan Bunny and a caramel he gave me for free. To make the Pagan Bunny, on the left, Poole poured chocolate into an antique mold imprinted with a bunny.

I bought the Rue Royale because it involved absinthe, rye whiskey, lemon, and bitters—all that sounded different and cool. I bought the “bunny” because of the name, and butter rum caramel needs no explanation.

The picture, unfortunately, doesn’t do them justice. I would have had better luck photographing them separately outside, but instead I took the picture inside Paris on the Platte, using a flash.

The Rue Royale tasted delicately of absinthe and lemon more than anything else. Absinthe is an anise-flavored spirit that at one time was banned for its supposedly addictive qualities, and I tasted more in the last bite. The Pagan Bunny, according to Poole, contains chocolate from 3 continents and 7 plantations, and he implied it would rock my chocolate world.

I’m not sure I agree, but it did taste dark and earthy, especially after the other candies and an Italian soda.

It would be interesting someday to do a tasting that involved eating 1 food (say, basil) and then tasting a chocolate. And then eating something else salty, or sweet, and tasting the same chocolate. The flavors would fight each other, or blend, or build. And perhaps one of the foods would bring out a flavor in the chocolate that I hadn’t noticed before.

According to one conversation I overheard, Colt & Gray has the best burgers in Denver. Not to mention pig’s feet. And now I notice they have a twist on the “Vesper” cocktail—and here I am watching Casino Royale: The Remake—and the Riviera is just one of their original cocktails.

Perhaps I should assemble a group, so I won’t feel so intimidated by gangs of servers.

Here is what I saw when I looked to my right.

***

The Colorado Indian Market and Southwest Showcase is happening this weekend at the Merchandise Mart.

and these two (comparison and contrast-ion are necessary to achieve perfection)

and some of these chiles.

And you might want to read all these books first (except the one on Colorado place-names). And after that, try the salad dressing mixes and the stocks and the lobster mushrooms and the curries and the BBQ powders. And the “Italian herbs” containing French thyme, Greek oregano, and California basil. (I got a kick out of that.)

What usually happens in stores like these is that I buy far too many herbs and spices (this picture was taken from the cash register), and they sit in my spice drawer and lose flavor. For example, the main reason I went to the Savory Spice Store in the first place was that I checked the date on my dried onions, and it was 2006. The date on the mustard was 1991.

On Sunday, however, I restrained myself for once. I bought the “Toasted Onion, Sliced,” because the clerk said it would add brightness to chicken stock (and I actually have a chicken in my fridge waiting to be cooked in the crock-pot and then turned into stock), and the Summer Savory (also called “Bohnenkraut, or the “bean herb”) because I have never used it before.

Check out the recipes on the Savory Spice Shop website. The sweet potato bisque sounds decadent.

Speaking of decadent, one of the best things about this store is the fact it wraps around the back of Wen Chocolates, which you peek into through that window.

In this picture you can see Wen’s taupe awnings just next door. Of course, I couldn’t resist Wen, but more about that on Thursday.

For those of you unfamiliar with Denver, Cherry Creek is on the left, and the South Platte River is on the right.

Last Saturday I found beauty in 2 trees, 1 in Lower Highlands and 1 in South Platte.

Across the street from the Smithson Clinic, on Vallejo between 28th and 29th Avenues, I turned to see this gnarly old cottonwood. You don’t see too many of these big cottonwoods in cities anymore. Their spreading roots wreak havoc on plumbing systems and crack driveways and patios. Their branches are weak and often break in storms.Nevertheless I love them and hope more of them grow in the Denver Metro area. Last year Boulder cut down the huge cottonwoods at 75th and Arapahoe so as to add a lane. It would have taken at least 2 people to circle one of those cottonwood trunks; their branches extended out over Arapahoe. I still get mad when I drive by that intersection.

But this post was supposed to be about trees making me happy. Let me try again.

At the end of last Saturday’s walkabout, I took 29th Avenue to 16th Street to the bridge over I-25 that ends at this example of Denver public art.I wrote about it last fall; that post begins and ends with a picture of the bridge. In the courtyard surrounding National Velvet, someone pasted a beautifully detailed paper tree. If you zoom in close enough on the left side of the tree’s canopy, you can almost read the signature: Barney, perhaps.Last Saturday, I visited the tree again. It’s had a difficult winter.There’s more snow now than tree.

How do the CEC/North Middle Colleges work? Enrollment in CEC/North Middle College of Denver creates a smooth transition from high school to college. Freshmen and sophomores spend half a day in academics and half a day in career class. As juniors and seniors, students take their academic classes on the CCD campus. If they qualify, they can take up to four college classes per year, allowing them the opportunity to earn up to a year’s worth of college credit toward their college degree by the end of senior year.

Sounds like a much, much better version of the Vo-Tech stuff we had in high school in the 1970s. In fact, the CEC was founded in 1976 and has been educating students ever since.

Hanging a right at Federal, I noticed Denver Fire Station 12 on the corner. I turned right again at 29th Avenue and was rewarded with a honk. Some man was waving at me, though I’m certain I’ve never seen him before. Going east, I passed José Valdez one more time and Three Tomatoes on my right. Three Tomatoes used to cater restaurants at the Botanic Gardens. I interviewed Three Tomatoes as a possible caterer for my wedding and was impressed, though I finally chose Spice of Life in Boulder.

As I stopped at the corner of 29th Avenue and Zuni to take a picture of a Coke sign, a dark-haired man in a truck shouted, “Take a picture of this ugly mug!”

And that, my friends, was the walkabout. I hope you enjoyed it.

I cut around the corner at Zuni and realized the area looked familiar. Two years ago I participated in a walking tour of the Highlands neighborhood with Phil Goodstein, a local historian and author. On my left between 29th Avenue and Dunkeld stood Emerson Street School, which I assumed was an elementary school. On my right, Ashland Recreation Center. Remember that crazy intersection I talked about yesterday, where 15th meets 29th and there may or may not be a vortex? Well, it’s just 4 or 5 blocks from a rec center.

According to the Denver Recreation Center Task Force report of April 2009, Ashland is designated as a neighborhood center and also as a local center (1 step up) because of its indoor pool. In the winter it offers swimming classes, basketball, volleyball, football, and oil painting, among other things.

Ashland is not open on Sundays (I wonder if that’s a budget-cutting measure?), so I was left to photograph the entrance, which impressed me. Here is the right-hand building of the rec center complex.

Obviously, swimming is important to the people who designed this entrance. I moved the camera to my left to get the main entranceand kept going to find the male swimmer backlit against the afternoon sky.And now I’ve come full circle, back to her.I crossed West Dunkeld Place to inspect this mural painted on the fence that bordered the elementary school. I saturated the colors a bit, but what you see is pretty true to the section closest to Zuni.

Here’s another section of the mural. I’m doing a liquid diet today, so Loncheria La Mexicana (in the center-bottom) sounds pretty good.

I walked around to 29th Avenue and discovered the school is called José Valdez Elementary School. As of this year, it’s an early childhood education (ECE) 7 school, teaching children from preschoolers (Montessori, ages 3 to 5) to seventh graders. According to the Principal’s Message on the website, however, in 2010-2011, Jose Valdez will become an ECE5 school until it figures out how to better serve middle school students. Its main goal is to graduate students who are fluent in English and Spanish and comfortable in a multicultural setting. Here’s a final section of the mural.

Emerson Street School nearby is very small, with about 40 students and 10 teachers; it educates students who have been expelled or are on parole.

North High School is located northwest of José Valdez. Does it strike anyone else as funny that North High School (located at 29th and Speer) is west of West High School (located on Speer between 9th and 11th)?

Earlier I had spotted a white cat prowling, and the snow in this picture reminds me of a cat investigating the flowers.

Soon tulips will be peeking out of snow and mulch. They’re my favorite flowers. I can’t wait.

Right after Christmas, when we visited, the featured artist was Daniel Berv. This bejeweled painting hung over our booth, but my favorite was the atmospheric purplish one in the back room. (I know that’s not a sophisticated description, but it’s what I remember. I assumed it was Berv’s painting, although it had no price tag.)

I don’t recommend going to Vita while you’re on a diet; almost everything on the lunch menu is substantial. I was tempted by the panzanella after reading about Denveater’s struggle to find a good Italian bread salad in Denver; I was also tempted by Shrimp Two Ways (tempura and tequila-poached). I chose the Caprese sandwich, with slabs of portobella and mozzarella, tomatoes, pesto, and watercress on focaccia. The mushroom and cheese were both sturdier than the bread, which crumbled in my hands. I mentioned it to the waiter, and he responded, “Yeah, but it tastes good, doesn’t it?” It did (mushroom and olive oil and mozzarella, oh my!), but I really do prefer not to drop crumbs and watercress all over the table. That complaint aside, I ate the whole damn thing, as well as the butternut squash soup. It tasted of cardamon, and the pepitas on top added a crunchy finish.

Todd ordered the Cubano, with braised pork, ham, Swiss cheese, mustard, and pickles on a Amoroso roll, and he did indeed seem to love the sandwich. It’s hard not to love such a meat-fest, with brown pork and pink shaved ham hanging out everywhere.

All the food was beautifully presented. In fact, the presentation reminded me of the finesse demonstrated at Encore over on Colfax.

Vita opened 3 years ago and was a 5280 favorite early on. Its rooftop offers a wide view of Denver in the summer.

On that cold day, a warm summer night on the roof sounded like a dream. Is it just me, or did winter linger too long before it officially began?

***

I just discovered Indulgences, Etc. (Belvedere Belgian Chocolate) on Colfax has closed. That leaves 2 locations along the Front Range: the one in Boulder on 14th Street and the factory in Castle Rock.

Bixa has also closed its location on Colfax at Vine. It is now a medical marijuana dispensary, which somehow seems appropriate.

Coffee, that is. I was actually looking for Red Trolley, the ice cream and cereal place. Then I checked the map in my Lower Highlands Local Flavor Guide and realized it was farther away than I wanted to walk.

So I went to Shangri-La (the green building on the right). How many people can say that?

Not that many in Denver, anyway. It’s a tiny little place with lots of exposed brick. (For an amusing rant about exposed brick, check out Brownstoner: Brooklyn Inside and Out.)

(By the way, is there some connection between winter and “tiny little places”? Tomte Modern Craft, Unity … I’ve been finding them, or they’ve been calling me. )

The gray-haired man at the counter inquired if my camera was a Christmas gift. I guess he thought I couldn’t bear to part with it, so I hung it around my neck and walked it around Denver. He also informed me the current owners have run Shangri-La for 2 years, before which it was Carmen’s vegan cafe and coffeehouse. So this space next to Vita has been serving coffee to seekers of truth for years.

I sat in a black leather chair by the door to the inside hallway and drank my hot chocolate with extra mocha (not the best I’ve ever had). The “second room,” with its high ceilings decorated for Christmas, had 4 tables and a few chairs. The floor was painted concrete covered with wood covered with that hexagonal tile you see in bathrooms. Layers upon layers upon layers… Light streamed in through the large window, and several couples chatted happily next to me. It had a completely different atmosphere than the new Hooked on Colfax (2 doors down from the old location, with no sign the last time I checked), which is much more serious and much larger.

As I left, the man who fixed my chocolate sprayed the chairs with cleaner and wiped them off. I hope he did the same to the chair where I sat, since at that point I was still infectious.

Todd and I went next door to Vita to have lunch and then came back to get Todd a drink. It was then I noticed the selection of Numi tea, not to mention Bhakti chai.

I took this picture of a blue-topped tree in the Japanese Garden at the Denver Botanic Gardens. I’m not including the “master” here; the first “version” has shadows turned all the way up. Now you can see the house in the background.In this version, I left shadows alone and increase the tint and vibrancy settings. I also played with the black point setting. As far as I can tell, upping the black point setting has the same effect as upping the contrast.And in this one, I turned hue and saturation down and luminance up.I liked turning the top of the tree white without having to do any spot editing (which I don’t know how to do yet).

None of these pictures seems really sharp, despite my use of a tripod. Right now I don’t have a way to take pictures without touching the camera, so I think I was moving it just a little.

For more photographs from this visit to Blossoms of Light, check out Girls Trek Too.

I’ve been to Mona’s twice now, once for lunch when I had a salad, and once for brunch with Todd. The first time they sat me in the back, near the bar and a mother and child who were waiting for Dad to come out of the kitchen, in his chef’s whites and a NY cap. My table was dotted with glass and illuminated by the window to its left. Mona’s is full of light and talk. I could hear the voices of diners around the corner, including the distinct voice of one man.

The first time I was tempted by the French onion soup but chose the spinach salad, with raspberry onions and Danish blue cheese and Granny Smith apples and walnuts (which should have been candied). The vinaigrette was just a little sweet. The English muffin I ordered to bulk things up was white bread, naked, lightly toasted, and hot—a perfect combination.

On my second visit, I ordered pancakes instead of the scramble and then regretted getting yet another sweet in a season of sweets. At least I had the sense to leave some of the 3 generously sized blueberry flapjacks on the plate; I did finish the lovely lemon whipped cream and most of the pure maple sugar, for which I paid $1.50 extra.

It was Todd’s choice that really stood out: the huevos rancheros that resembled nothing so much as a huevos salad. Even so, I would have taken it as it was, taco salad bowl and all, but for the romaine strips scattered all over it. That was a little too much new American cuisine. The green chile was spicy enough for me (translation: not too much), the eggs were perfectly scrambled, and the taco bowl, broken up, made great thick chips. But it just didn’t come together into the squishy layered thing.

As I was watching the blond busboy with a camouflage headband clean off this table, Todd commented on how thin all the waitstaff were. “Do they not feed them?” he wanted to know.

So I trudged across the 15th Street bridge over I-25 to Lower Highlands, which I suppose is elevated enough above the South Platte River to deserve its own moniker (though it’s still quite a ways from 32nd and Lowell, the heart of the Highlands neighborhood) and found Forest Room 5 to be just right.

You can’t tell from the picture of the exterior above, but it was quite dark inside, so dim that the helpful bartender gave me this big candle so I could read the menu (that blurry thing in the foreground). The blue patch on the right is part of a movie that was showing above the bar. I had to rest my camera on the bar itself in order to get any semblance of focus, and that was at ISO 1600.

The 5 or 6 other patrons at the bar (the tables along the wall were empty) looked askance at my gyrations, but they didn’t say anything.

The ostensible reason for the lack of light on the winter solstice: Forest Room 5 is renovating its back room (where Lighthouse Writers often held readings) to be a “venue”: in other words, a real stage. Somehow that affects the amount of light in the long front room, which was never very well lit on my previous visits.

After the bartender figured out that I wanted to order food instead of sit at the bar and eat my own food as some patrons have requested, he took my order for the risotto with eggplant and butternut squash and a Woodchuck cider. Unlike the risotto-soup I had at Brio Tuscan Grille in Kansas City, Forest Room 5’s dish was the real thing: thick with a cheesiness to some of the bites that couldn’t be explained simply by the parmesan shavings on top.

Having not had that many risottos in my life, I did wonder, are they all so pale? Is that traditional?

I was certain that the squash was zucchini, not butternut, and the chef confirmed it. (No doubt you’re thinking, “Of course that’s zucchini there in the lower left-hand corner,” but please keep in mind that I used a flash for this picture. I really couldn’t see what was in the food.) Where the eggplant was, I’ll never know. I could have eaten one-quarter of the dish and had enough, but I didn’t stop until all the rice pearls were gone.

Forest Room 5 is one of my favorite places in Denver, partly because I associate it with poetry (Lighthouse) and activism (I’ve been to meetings there) and partly because I once ordered the hot chocolate, which involved a massive mug of cocoa and peppermint schnapps and a selection of cookies. That is no longer on the menu, but the memory of it keeps drawing me back for more good things.

But the legacy remains in a certain ascetic streak exacerbated by my current life and the holiday season. Sometimes I just can’t stand how much stuff I buy, and yet I don’t want to stop. I know I’m not cut out for the pure subsistence lifestyle, but I can’t see my way out of consumerism either.

It was in this mood that I continued my shopping on Monday after buying a fish pillow at Tomte Modern Craft. First I visited Unity, whose store on South Pearl I covered last December, and then Common Era (on the right below), which also has a store in Boulder just east of the Pearl Street Mall.

Don’t know what it is about these stores grounding themselves on Pearl and Platte streets, no matter what the city. I do know that both increase my shopping ambivalence, probably because they’re designed for teens and twenty-somethings, not 47-year-old women with a BMI of 25. Having said that, I was seriously tempted by Unity’s DVLP hoodie at $100. The fact that DVLP hails from Denver and is committed to building an international fashion scene in my city doesn’t hurt.

Neither did these storm trooper cufflinks. I can think of quite a few people who would like them, but they’re not on my gift list. Too bad for them.

Unity’s tiny shop on Platte Street (right next to Sous le Lit) has been open 3 months and features women’s clothes; the South Pearl store had more of a men’s selection. Brands include Lento (“slow” in Spanish), which makes biodegradable hats (now that’s a niche); Livity Outernational; Tom’s Shoes, which donates one pair to a child for every pair bought; and Threads 4 Thought, which makes delicate patterned T-shirts for slender women.

It was only a few steps across Platte to Common Era, which is in between Paris on the Platte and Wen Chocolates. Luckily for my BMI, Wen is not open on Mondays, but that didn’t ease my craving for a Milan truffle.

After checking out a few of the “cutest clothes you’ll ever own,” I decided that everything in Common Era was made in China, but then I found (and tried on) 3 pairs of Closet pants made in the USA and priced around $30. How is that possible? I don’t know. I’m not sure I would have gone for the wide legs even if they had fit. Still, Common Era does know how to display the goods.

Which is my problem.

Opened in October by husband-and-wife team Brett and Crystal from Vital Industries, Tomte sells their screenprinted clothing and glassware (such as these scarves; the bicycle is one of their dominant motifs) as well as handmade items by other artists they met at craft fairs.

The emphasis here is on handmade, which generally means made in the USA, though I did notice one sweater made in China. The T-shirts they purchase for screenprinting are domestic.

I bought a long, narrow, cream-colored pillow made by Chakra Pennywhistle and printed with a swordfish. It’s just what every suburban living room needs. You can find a list of the artists whose works they sell (such as Berkley Illustration cards and Sophia Masri jewelry) on the Tomte website.

Tomte Modern Craft itself is tiny, and several times the owners slipped behind the gold curtain in the picture above and ran upstairs to get something from the “stockroom,” which I suspect is also their home. They’ve definitely made the most of the space they have. The store is two blocks from the corner of Platte and 15th and is right next door to The Other Side Arts.

If you turn your back on the tree, cross the bike ramp, and peer over the fence, you can find this little haven under the bridge.

Do you ever feel anxiety when you’re coming home? Do you ever worry that today you’ll walk in and find your home has been robbed? Well, imagine leaving your belongings under a bridge.

There were about 10,000 homeless people in the Metro Denver area as of 2006 (I’m sure that number has grown in the past year). To help get them off the streets, try giving to one of the organizations listed below.

Boulder Shelter for the Homeless is my favorite organization. It helps people without imposing religion on them.

I’ve also given money to the Denver Rescue Mission, but I stopped because it spends so much money on marketing and also because it does mix religion with charity. Then again, if it didn’t exist, many more people would be spending nights on the streets.

Catholic Charities runs Samaritan House, located across Park Avenue from the Denver Rescue Mission.

If you’re interested in statewide outreach, try the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless.

You can also help those who still have homes but can’t pay all their bills by contributing to Energy Outreach Colorado.

And if you’re struggling too much this holiday season to mail in a check, try putting a few dollars in the Salvation Army bucket. At least in Broomfield and Boulder Counties, the Salvation Army is in need of donations this year, and every little bit helps.