THE GOOD LIFE

What I am listening to: Andrew Bird “Noble Beast”. Released January 20, 2009

OK, so I though I would start posting the music that I am listening to while I am writing my blog! That way, you can see what I like, and perhaps discover a new artist or song that you might like! If you haven’t heard of this artist of CD, then you must find it and listen to it because it is fantastic!

I have been at a loss of topics to write about recently and so I haven’t published much of anything lately, at least nothing of substance. This post isn’t going to be much of anything this time either. However, I did want to just express how excited I am for summer because along with summer comes summer activities! Here is what I am planning on doing this summer. Please let me know if you want to join me because I would be happy to have you!

1. Off-Roading! This has to be one of my most favorite things to do in Colorado. I have seen more beautiful parts of Colorado this way since joining with my friends in this wonderful outdoor activity. My friend Austin has a Jeep Wrangler Rubicon, and we usually take off the doors, put down the top, and explore the wonderful scenery of Colorado with friends! There is nothing like it! Once you go, you get hooked. I now want, and will get a Jeep Wrangler Rubicon because of it!

2. Camping! This of course is a given. Colorado is perhaps the most beautiful place to camp. This of course is something that I do frequently when off-roading. We are currently planning a multiple night trip to Webster’s Pass for off-roading and camping which should be phenomenal.

3. Backpacking! I have not done this yet, but I want to. The problem is that I don’t have the property backpacking gear yet. I am planning on getting a backpacking backpack and tent among other things like trekking poles and a backpacking sleeping bag and pad. Hopefully in the next few weeks I can invest in that and have some gear in time for summer!

4. Rock Climbing! If you haven’t been rock climbing at all, you need to try it. I have done the rock gym before, and last year, when on vacation in Ouray with my friends, we did some actual rock climbing. I have to say that it is much more difficult than the rock gym, but so much more fun! I will be doing this again for sure, and will eventually be investing in rock climbing gear in the next few years…once I get the basic camping and outdoor gear and clothing purchased!

5. White Water Rafting! I have not done this before, and have been previously afraid to do this. However, I really want to do this now, and have a few friends who are interested in doing it! Hopefully we can get a trip planned before the summer is out!

6. Spelunking! I have always though that cave diving and exploration would be a blast! There are a lot of caves and mines here in Colorado that I have wanted to explore, but of course my better judgement has prevented me from going into the abandoned mines! I did find a society called the National Speleological Society. You can become a member in a local chapter, and they have planned events with guides who take you on cave explorations! It is great too because they are all about cave conservation, and ensuring that the caves are taken care of and preserved not only as a habitat, but also so that future generations can enjoy them. I think I am going to become a member and begin exploring with these groups!

7. 14ers! Of course, you cant live in Colorado without attempting one of these! If you do not live in Colorado, you may not know that we are home to 58 peaks that top 14,000+ feet in elevation. Each of these mountains can be climbed and you can summit each of them. I tried to climb one last year, Mount Huron. I wrote a blog post about it and posted some pictures. Check it out if you haven’t seen it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t well prepared for the hike and only made it to 13,200 feet in elevation. I still think that is pretty good for my first time out. This year however, my goal is to climb and summit 2 14ers! We’ll see how I do! If you are interested, check out www.14ers.com. It has a whole lot of information and pictures on Colorado’s 14ers!

8. Fishing! Colorado has excellent fishing locations. We fishing during last years vacation to Ouray and caught several beautiful trouts and bass! I will most definitely be doing this again this year!

OK, so that is some of the outdoor activity that I plan to do this year! I am working on trying to get into shape right now so that it will be easier to do some of them like rock climb and hiking. You have to really work out your stamina and cardio for that type of hiking and backpacking!

Aside from outdoor activities, summer is the time for movies to be released! I recently got in the mood to look at upcoming movies that are going to be released this month through the summer time. These are all movies that I want to see and I wanted to share the list with you. They are listed in order of release date:

1. Monsters vs. Aliens – March 2009
2. Sunshine Cleaning – March 13, 2009

3. Gigantic – April 3, 2009

4. Paris 36 – April 3, 2009
5. Star Trek – May 5, 2009
6. My Life in Ruins – May 8, 2009
7. Angels & Demons – May 15, 2009

8. Land of the Lost – June 5, 2009
9. The Proposal – June 12, 2009
10. Year 1 – June 19, 2009

11. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen – June 24, 2009
12. Public Enemies – July 1

13. 500 Days of Summer – July 17, 2009

14. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince – July 17, 2009
15. GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra – August 7, 2009
16. Inglorious Bastards – August 21, 2009

To see all of the trailers for these videos, you can find them in YouTube, or go to Apple’s website and view all of them there. http://www.apple.com/trailers/

So I guess this post is more than I thought it would be! I am just really excited for summer time as you can tell!

I have two parts to my post today. The first is about my first 14er and the second is about my future educational plans which have changed yet again! Read on!

HURON PEAK: MY FIRST 14ER!

Yesterday I took a trip to tackle my first Colorado 14er: Huron Peak. For those of you who do not know, a 14er is one of Colorado’s 54 mountains that have a summit elevation of 14,000 feet or more. Huron Peak is, out of a class scale of 1-4, where 4 is the most difficult and can require rock climbing gear, a class 2. I didn’t think that it was going to be all that difficult to climb. I was wrong! It was exhausting!

First off, a group of friends, five of us total, went up to a campsite, just North of Leadville, and found a spot. It was about 9PM when we finally got our tents set up and got to bed. It was chilly that night at about 10,000 feet, but not too bad…until we got further into the evening. I don’t think I slept but a total of 1-2 hours. It was obviously cold because when we woke up in the morning, there was frost all over our tents, the car, the ground…everything! I was frozen to the core! 

We started up the mountain at about 7AM, and it was not long before we were taking a break. My heart was racing, my lungs were moving fast trying to catch my breath, and it was still cold! We camped at around or just above 10,000 feet and Huron Peak is just barley a 14er by 3 feet. Yes, it is 14,003 feet above sea level. The trail is about 5.5 miles round trip with a 3,500 foot elevation gain from where we were camping. That is an elevation gain of, on average, 8.3 feet per foot! Essentially, it is pretty much uphill the entire way to the top! 

The forest was beautiful, and when we got to the tree line at about 12,000 feet, the views just expanded to include several other 14ers and wide open spaces. The tundra was nice and quiet, Marmots and other little critters were everywhere. We reached 13,000 feet at around 1030AM. My friend and I were looking at the last 1,000 feet in elevation, and determined that we just cannot muster enough strength and stamina to continue and summit the mountain. We decided to stop at 13,000 feet and head back down a little ways and have lunch. The others pressed on, summated and returned in just over an hour. I was impressed with their stamina and their ability to have a conversation while they were hiking! Then again, two of my friends have hiked 11 other 14ers previously, and my other friend had hiked 17! They are native Coloradans so they have the lung capacity!

The way down was no pick-nick either. Without much flat spots on the trail, we practically ran down the mountain. Let me be the first to tell you that going downhill, 3500 feet in elevation without having a flat spot to rest the legs is very unpleasant. As if your legs were not tired enough from climbing up, now you have to support your whole body going down, and it was hard! Well, we finally made it down, packed up our gear and headed back home. I tell you, I slept for 12 hours last night without waking once! I was exhausted!

While I didn’t summit Huron Peak, I am happy that I got to 13,000 feet. That is a lot of hiking and elevation to hike for a kid from Arizona who has been in Colorado for only a year! Next time, I am going to climb a class 1, in the summer, and I am going to make it to the top! I am going to train and get my body into shape for that climb because it is the most taxing, hard, physically demanding activity I have done since living here. At the same time, it was beautiful and exhilarating at the same time!

MY FUTURE EDUCATIONAL PLANS

So ever since high school, I have entertained the though of being in education, both as a teacher and in an administrative capacity (principal or dean, etc.). All of the many career “tests” I have taken have placed my first or second career in education, mainly in a teaching role. For the most part I have largely ignored that though and skill until now.

I will graduate in December with a bachelors degree in Business Administration but want to get into education. I am looking at several different schools in my area and am finding some great programs that are offered that would allow me to obtain my M.Ed. or Master of Education. I would like to teach elementary school for a while, and then work my way into administration, including principal. Someday, I would love to teach or be an administrator at a university and I think the teaching experience would be helpful and play to my advantage. 

So, that is it. If I find a program that I like and can afford, I would like to start classes in August. Hopefully that would come to fruition. I would like to get into a career of some sort soon, and teaching would be awesome!

I love being an American! The sense of patriotism and love of country just overwhelms you sometimes and you then, at that point, remember what it means to be an American. We are so lucky to be living in a free country!

Today I attended a McCain-Palin “Victory Rally” in Colorado Springs with some friends. It was amazing to see the number of people who turned out to see the next President and Vice President. Now, I have never attended any sort of political rally before in my life so this was a first for me and I was really excited and proud to be there today, supporting my choice for President of the United States and his running mate!

When the motorcade pulled up, Sarah Palin and John McCain were in separate vehicles, but both were smiling as big as can be, waving to all of the people who were there to see them. It was a surreal sight to see. You may or may not know that I was born and raised in Arizona so having John as my nominee for President is very exciting, and there he was in real life!

Flags were passed out to the crowd which were apparently rescued from the trash after the DNC’s performance wrapped up an Invesco Field in Denver last week. Instead of throwing them away, these flags were brought here and passed out to supporters to take home.

Seeing those flags flying in the wind, several thousand of them it seemed like, and the patriotic music playing in the background was so inspiring and moving. There were a lot of little kids there like this little girl on the left who was holding a McCain-Palin sign and her flag. I kept thinking to myself that this is the American moment I see on television during the fourth of July while watching the fireworks in Washington D.C. This is that patriotic moment we see in magazines and published pictures of American Patriotism.  I then was reminded that we live in the best country in the history of the world!

Both McCain and Palin did their stump speech which was a condensed version of their acceptance speeches from the RNC last week which of course got lots of claps, whistles and hollering. There was quite a bit of booing too when Obama’s name was brought up and what he wanted to do with the country. I have to admit, I booed too!

Once the speeches finished, we migrated towards the Straight Talk Express airplanes where the candidates were to board and fly to New Mexico for another rally this evening. Mr. and Mrs. McCain exited their vehicles with Sarah and walked across the gates where people were standing and shook hands with every person along the line. Unfortunately I was about ten feet from the gate so I couldn’t shake their hands, but seeing them that close was just surreal.

The place was crawling with Secret Service, police, SWAT and more along with the media. One lady who shook John’s hand started heading for the exit and I heard her say “John McCain is wearing makeup”! I though that was funny to hear.

The whole event felt so official and Presidential. I felt so patriotic and free. I look at McCain and Palin and think to myself “I could do this”! To be the leader of the free world is such a privilege and honor, but how amazing to be able to have the support of the people, to be in a position where you can change the country for the better and lead in a way no one else can. McCain will be the president that the American people look at and think “he is the one that lead us to energy independence”, “he is the one that stopped the excess spending in Washington D.C. and paid off our 7 Trillion dollar deficit”! To have a legacy like Regan and others would be such an honor!

Who knows, perhaps someday I will be President of the United States! When you look at Sarah Palin and her rise to her current position, it makes you think that anyone can do it if she can. She is a wonderful breath of fresh air for politics and will do Washington D.C. some good. This team will grab Washington by the scruff of the neck and shake it around a bit which is exactly what this country needs.

I am sure this team will be back to Colorado before November 4 and hopefully I will be able to see them again. It was so exhilarating, fun and awesome to see them in person.

After they got onto the plane and we turned to walk away, I just felt so prideful in our country, like there was hope that we could fix the problems in Washington with McCain and Palin in the White House. I was so proud at that moment to be American, thankful to all of the soldiers who have fought to keep my freedom. It was so overwhelming that I almost cried. I know it sounds cheesy, but I did. I am just so proud to be a part of such an awesome event in history, to vote for John McCain and Sarah Palin!

As of today, we are 58 days away from November 4, 2008. This will be a historic event. I think we will see the largest voter turn out in the history of the country. We have two historic tickets which, will the a first for the county no matter which candidates are elected into office. I want to urge everyone to get involved, get educated on the issues, the people running and get ready to let your voice be heard on November 4, 2008!

“You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children (America), the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done.” — Ronald Reagan

Tomorrow I will be attending the McCain-Palin Victory Rally in Colorado Springs! Ill post pictures and analysis tomorrow!

McCain-Palin 2008!

I think that most everyone knows that I am a Republican and am so excited to vote for the second time on a presidential election this year! I am so excited to be a part of history! There are two tickets that, which ever way this election turns out, will be a first in the nations history, and I will have been a part of it! Who would have thought that we would have a ticket with the first black presidential nominee, and a ticket with the first republican woman VP? Does this excite anyone else?

With that said, I have some frustrations that I want to vent. Since John McCain has announced Sarah Palin as his Veep choice, the liberal media has made her into an incompetent, stupid woman who cannot lead. Now I know that we have not heard much about her and she has never been in the public eye to this extent, but how refreshing to have a candidate who has not been in the public eye and who has not been in Washington politics!

How dare the media think that Sarah cannot lead a country because her daughter made a mistake. Since when did the parents take full responsibility for their adult children’s actions? Since when did a pregnant daughter mean that you were incapable of leading? The media just cannot find anything wrong with the Palin family so they dig up trash and carry it around until their clothes are permeated and the smell oozes into their pores! This is such a double standard! I have two points to make here before I continue.

1. If fathers are so important in the family, why is it that we are not criticizing our former presidents for not spending more time with their children? America knows that a household without a father is on the rise today and is the cause for many family issues. Well, perhaps it is because this has been the standard? Ill take it one further and say that women are though to be incapable, compared to men especially, of helping to lead a country and run a family.

2. What would have happened if Hillary Clinton was elected the Democrat Nominee or Veep choice for Obama? There would have been praise for her selection from the media, and I am sure there would not have been as much media attention shed on that as with Sarah Palin and her family.

I was feeling quite upset about this all week long. I have to admit, while I am a conservative, I do listen to and watch liberal media (what other choice do I have for the most part?) NPR and CNN are my source of news most days. This last week, I turned off even FOX on a few occasions because of the evil, disgusting slime the network news was throwing out there, and the ridiculous ridicules they were offering. Our very own local news anchor Cyle Dire made a comment that she uses too much hairspray! Just leave your petty comments to yourself! But tonight was the night she, and others, were able to strike back! I love what Mike Huckabee said about the coverage of Bristol’s pregnancy tonight “The reporting of the past few days have proven tackier than a costume change at a Madonna concert”.

Sarah Palin offered the most awesome acceptance speech at the RNC tonight! I am so happy for her and am actually not as mad as I was when I started writing this. (Yes, I watched the speech in between this post). Sarah had so many great rebuttals aimed at Barack Obama and the media that I actually clapped a few times in my living room! Did you also notice she is quick on her feet? She made the joke about hockey mom’s off the cuff. Impressive! She is a wonderful speaker, an awesome presenter, a true reformer, and one heck of a leader. After tonight, I know she can hold her own, and her family will be a great help and inspiration to her in the White House!

OK, I am glad to have gotten that off my chest! The media sucks and the left is afraid of a McCain/Palin ticket so they are trying to find as many faults as possible. I am sure more will fall out as time progresses, but until then, I will revel in the amazing speech she delivered tonight, and I will look froward to John McCain’s acceptance speech tomorrow evening!

I want to urge everyone: VOTE, VOTE, VOTE, VOTE. In all honesty, I would love everyone to vote for John McCain in November, but I know that this may not be the case. Because of that, I want to encourage everyone to vote for who you want to run this country, who you think can do it better, and who will lead us back to prosperity. But let me say this as well. If you are going to vote, you had better know where you stand on the issues that matter most to you, and you are voting for the person that best reflects those important issues. Be an informed voter. Don’t vote for John McCain because I said so. Vote for him because I said so and because of that, you decided to check him out and realized that compared to Barack Obama, he would be a better leader, and reflects more of your views that Obama. You need to be informed, and you need to exercise your right to vote. If you are voting because you can, you are not doing yourself of anyone else justice or any good. Get involved and be informed.