Hogbacks (Raton, New Mexico)
July 29, 2006
| Hogbacks in New Mexico “Interstate 25 cuts through dipping strata that form hogback ridges between the Great Plains and the south end of the Rocky Mountains. The Santa Fe Trail from here to Santa Fe followed a natural valley eroded in less resistant strata between the mountains to the north and Glorieta Mesa to the south. Elevation: 6,200 feet.” ~ roadside marker, Raton, New Mexico
 hillsides along Hwy 54 south |
 Historical Marker |
Geography Lesson
July 29, 2006
The other day I was doing a unit on countries and nationalities with my Korean students. We’re using a British book about Pierre from France, Carlos from Spain, Petra from Germany and so forth. I realized it wasn’t too appropriate for them, so I added Midori from Japan, Lakshmi from India and Kim from Korea.
I’d barely finished writing “Korea” on the board, when Joh, one of my students, stopped me.
“No Korean in English class! You know that!” I told him. I love when I can actually see my students thinking, and I could see the wheels turning in Joh’s head. He’s in a beginning class so I didn’t expect too much from him.
“Japan tell Korea make K!” he shouted.
Now, I remember reading in Richard Kim’s Lost Names that the spelling was changed when Japan occupied Korea but that was before Joh was even born! I assumed Koreans would look at the Corea-Korea thing as a sidenote, the way a lot of Americans look at their Ellis Island misspellings. But Joh was struggling so hard with such a small vocabulary that it was clearly vitally important to him.
“Ok,” I said, and changed it to Corea.
Then I started to ask them where different people live, and what their nationalities are.
“Where does Midori live?” I asked.
“She lives in Japan!!!” my students all chorused.
“What is her nationality?”
“She is Japanese!!!”
One of my students was staying quiet. “Where does Carlos live?” I asked him.
Once again, I could see the wheels turning in his head.
“Carlos… lives… in…” He paused for a moment. “…in the book!”
Remember that time?
July 28, 2006
Remember that time?
The thing is, everything in China relies on context.
It’s kind of like when you meet your boyfriend’s friends and they’re all “Remember that time? Hahahaha!” while you’re all “Hi, I’m Meg”. They use these half sentences and references to other things, and even an awesome girlfriend just can’t keep up.
In Norse mythology, each line of a story is a kenning, a reference to another story. If you’re well versed in the exploits of Thor and Freyja, the kennings are funny and clever. If you’re not, it’s an epic brainteaser.
There’s actually a Star Trek episode where the Next Gen crew runs into this race that only speaks in references to their history. I’m ok with something like “Caesar and Brutus in the forum,” but it’s hard when it’s “Bob and Joe last Thursday.”
China is an entire country like that. They’re this clique that’s been exclusive for 5,000 years and I just can’t fit in. There’s no need to explain things in China because there’s this cultural hivemind that’s able to understand everything from super-secret contextual clues.
Chinese is all about context. There are so many homonymns in the language, so you need a complete sentence to make sense. In fact, most Chinese jokes are puns that get huge laughs in Chinese but don’t translate particularly well. And there are also many words that aren’t really pronounced the same but I kind of pronounce them the same way. You need to use a complete sentence or a complete phrase because a couple syllables can be easily misunderstood. It doesn’t make sense unless you put into context.
When Zorro was helping me with my Chinese yesterday, he said I should try to speak faster and not draw out each syllable. He also said I’m using a Beijing accent. (Can you believe that? I know about 3 words and he’s criticizing my accent!)
So I try to speed up when I use Chinese. It’s another example of how Chinese is the opposite of English, because when my teenage girls mumble and speed though their answers, I make them stand up and shout each word.
“Shout it like Alice’s mean math teacher!” I tell them. Hey, it’s an inside joke. They understand.
Dance Extroadinaire: Richard Durnford (Colorado Springs, Colorado)
July 20, 2006
Sunday, 9 July 2006 - Part II
Dance Extroadinaire - Colorado Springs, Colorado
| Colorado College Summer Programs: Extroadinary Dance - Faculty Performance Gala, 2006 Summer Festival of the Arts 7:30 PM - Armstrong TheaterRichard Durnford Solo Extremity The first opening performance was Richard Durnford doing extremity dance on a pole that leans towards the audience reaching almost to the ceiling of the theater. Richard Durnford is a well known performer and teacher of Circus Arts (he has been teaching since 1988) and is part of the internationally renowned Bongo Bolero. He trained at the French National Circus School, the San Francisco School of Circus Arts, and the Circus Space in London. He currently teaches Ashtanga Yoga at the Colorado College Extraodinary Dance Festival. bongobolero.com. Incredible performance: 4.5 stars out of 5.
 Richard Durnford |
 Richard Durnford  |
Boulder Falls (Boulder, Colorado)
July 19, 2006
Boulder Falls (Boulder, Colorado - Boulder Falls)
http://www.bouldercolorado.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2875&Itemid=1016#Boulder%20Falls
| “The Yosemite of Boulder Canyon” - Boulder Falls is a torrent of icy cold water that falls from the rock cliffs above dropping 66 feet, with a little ledge cave behind it. A spot famous with rock climbers this falls takes many climber and sightseer lives … and doubles for one of the most romantic viewpoints in the Boulder area. Located just off Hwy CO-119, 11 miles west of the city of Boulder. Open dawn to dusk, Free. Rating: 4 stars out of 5. |  Simulana at Boulder Falls, Boulder, Colorado © 2006 technogypsie.com |
Tubing at Boulder Creek (Boulder, Colorado)
July 19, 2006
Tubing at Boulder Creek (Boulder, Colorado - Boulder Creek)
| One of the more entertaining activities in Boulder during the summer … is tubing down Boulder Creek. Boulder creek runs right through the city of Boulder, and pretty much anywhere along its course you can enjoy the river and do activities like whitewater tubing. Enjoy picnicking, fishing, kayaking, tubing, rafting, wading, or swimming … alongside the creek is a 7 mile long Boulder Creek Path - great for walking, jogging, biking, and rollerblading. The path goes from the mountains of Boulder Canyon, through downtown Boulder, and out into the plains, with many scenic spots for hiking, gazing, sightseeing, picnicking, and other outdoor activities. Rating: 4 stars out of 5. |  Boulder Creek, Boulder, Colorado © 2006 technogypsie.com |
Tokyo Joe’s (Denver, CO)
July 16, 2006
Tokyo Joe’s
1116 W Dillon, Louisville, CO 80027 303.926.7100
http://www.tokyojoes.com/
1996 Colorado born, raised, and owned; Tokyo Joe is a fast - health food, sushi oriented option of dining in the Boulder area … a unique artsy deco hip place to feed, they are committed to great nutritional integrity, pushing positive eating is positive living. They prepare their food by grilling and steaming, they offer affordable and healthy sushi and Japanese cuisine. All over the Denver and Boulder area … its a place to visit when in this part of Colorado. Delicious food at good prices. A must for any Japanese food lovers who wants something healthy fast. Rating 5 stars out of 5.
Best of Niner Niner July 06
July 13, 2006
Niner Niner, a collaborative weblog network, has over 25 great blogs and this “Best Of” highlights just a few of the posts that were written by some of the Niner authors, in topics that range from High Heels, Ajax, HIPAA Privacy Regulation to gadgets, books and health.
In Ajax Blog, Sreejith introduces us to a few new things. First is Vox a new blogging service from Six Apart that uses WYSIWYG with a taste of web 2.0. After that we learn about Krun.ch and Wishlistr.
Blogging Naked: Scarification and lip plates are shown to be some of the newest and more popular form of “self-expression” in recent years.
Bookadoodle: Nancy Callahan posted more in her series “Getting Published” and this latest edition was part 5.
Boomer 2.0 had posts that pointed out that boomers can still have that second career and another that shows many are not even planning retirement anytime soon.
In Class Action Questions find out about lawsuits involving pyramid scams, hair raising beauty product claims and why State Farm was penalized.
Credit Cardenza: Unfortunately, millions of people are drowning in credit card debt, have to worry about credit scams and fraud, and let’s not even talk about the international fees.
Dealsneak managed to sneak more than a few deals pass us this summer including, the Samsonite laptop case, a gorgeous leather bench, and a sweet looking Thermaltake Tsunami computer case.
Feed Money discusses the fact the Ebay has jumped on the contextual ad bandwagon as well as blog feeds and a program called RSS To Blog.
If you need to Fix Your Finances one of the first steps is learning how to save your money. After that you can check out Mvelopes to learn all about budgets.
At Games For Money you can find places to play free online gambling games and also learn some card counting tricks and tips.
The High Heels Blogs show us which killer heels are on sale including boots, sandals, slides and mules. Also take a look at some killer wedding heels for this summers nuptials.
A few notable gadgets that were blogged in the HyperGadget blog were the Kurzweil-National Federation of the Blind Reader, and the jumbled and messy looking organizer.
Over at the Medcare Forum, Kathleen Milazzo tells us more about that scary mad cow disease and our medical privacy laws.
Find out just how much house you can afford before you go running off to get that mortgage. And is the housing bubble really ready to blow? All this and more in Mortgage Updates.
At My Secret Side Biz learn how to make a profit, how to get your own powerwash, and simple business and Ebay tips.
On Healthy Living: Sarah White tells us all about a new study that could help with asthma reduction when it comes to do light exercise that involves stead breathing like yoga.
On Movies has a decade of super heroes list that includes recent and unreleased movies. Leafworks reviewed The Omen and we got to see the trailer for the new Ghost Rider movie.
Powersellers Blog: Ebay has done it. They finally reached 200 million members and they are also expanding into new ideas. Also people are fed up with Paypal while crooks are finding more ways to defraud your account.
Seo Updates: Yahoo one of the biggest email services was hit with a worm and Google expanded into real estate but won’t be making a browser, at least not anytime soon.
Get some free exercise tips from The Diet Logs. You will certainly need them if you plan to take a bite of this $100 burger.
Living the Single life? Well take a look at some great break up lines and if your looking to meet people Leafworks posted a great review of club La Rumba.
Thumb Gods: Nintendo is no, no to the name Wii for their new console a game system that is at the end of this long list containing The Evolution of Video Game Consoles.
Las Vegas Revealed that it was ill prepared for a massive disaster, but til then you can still get married and get comp’d in Vegas.
Wander the World, well the State of Colorado with Leafworks. He takes us to the Cherry Blossom Festival, Gothnic in Denver, Old Colorado City, Plaza del Arte Festival in Downtown Denver and Garden of the Gods.
GTA: Yantai
July 10, 2006
Driving in China is like playing Grand Theft Auto, only with more bicycles, pedicabs and carts full of watermelon. Now, I’m not exactly a great driver myself, but because privately owned cars are so new in China, most drivers have had their license for much less time than I have. Here, traffic lights are more of a suggestion than a rule. You can make a right on red, as well as a left on red, and even go striaght through on red if you want. If you miss your turn, you can just back up down the street. There isn’t really any right of way, and horns can be used to signal anything from “Look out for the cart full of watermelon!” to “Hey, there’s my second cousin!”
If driving in China is like GTA: Yantai, then crossing the street in China is like playing Frogger, if all the cars in Frogger slowed down to shout “Hello! Look, it’s a real frog! Hello!”
Swing Thai (Denver, Colorado)
July 3, 2006
| Swing Thai 845 Colorado Blvd, Denver, 80206 - (303) 333-0444 An artsy trendy Thai restaurant on the edge of Denver’s downtown. Service was good, friendly, and fast … the ambience good … and the thai ice tea, green curry, and pad thai to die for. It’s an amazing find since we’ve spent a couple of days driving around for a Thai restaurant, and this oasis in the desert will fix your thai addictions efficiently with spice. Well recommended. Good food. Rating 4.5 stars out of 5. Visited 7/1/06.  |
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