An Entry from Mark (alias Dad)

We got up early and despite mom needing to work on homework she helped me in the yard for an hour. She pulled weeds, cut the grass, and barked the front. The best thing is she let me run the hedge trimmer. I went and rented this kickin' big, mangle teeth, wicked sweet, mini chain saw like hedge trimmer. Protect the women and children of the neighborhood cause Mark's got a dangerous weapon and he's out to cut back the wildlife that has grown in the yard. It brought back memories of when Tracy and I lived together at the Hogan's before we were married. I was given the task of trimming the pear tree, and I went to town. So much so that there wasn't much left of the pear tree, but man were the three pears grown on the tree gigantic. It took three years for the tree to recover.

I had a blast trimming hedge and tree and bush and yard, thank goodness mom stopped me before I took down the back fence. She reminded me that I would have to clean up all the mess and that really took all the fun out of the path of destruction. It isn't fair that an hour and half of total fun turns into two hours of clean up. Something is backwards here. It will keep me from renting one of those machines next week to tackle the greenbelt.

After so much fun in the morning we did what every Saturday afternoon should be..we heeded the call of the sunshine and the mountains and packed a picnic lunch went off to the mountains. The internet is great because we found this sweet trail outside of Boulder that went to a bat cave and off we went. The hike was great with lots of majestic scenery, a cool breeze, and lots of shade. There was one small problem, the cave was closed off so the bats could mate in peace. For heavens sake I didn't want to disturb any of those rituals. I had misread the internet posting thinking that the cave was open April to Oct, but it actually said closed. I thought, "Why do people trust me with their money? If I can't tell the difference between open and closed." The highlight of the trip switched from the bat cave to the lunch mom had made. We sat in a small patch of shade on comfortable rocks (relative term), and were the envy of other hikers with bar-b-qued chicken, an incredible salad, and even no pudge, fudge brownies. There was even a museum at the bottom of the hike for me to enjoy, the only thing that would have been more perfect would be if there was also a fort to visit.

But the day wasn't over, we hit the Flatirons Mall on the way home. Mom has wanted to visit that mall for ages. It is a little bigger than Park Meadows but has this cool outdoor village, European style of shops where it was fun to sit and talk and people watch. We also gave in and saw Spiderman 3. After sitting through Pirates 3, Spidy was a treat. It was the end of a very fun summer Saturday. Life is good.