Rocky Mountain Hi!

Friday, March 11th, 2011 – aaaaaaaaaaaaagh

So are we all ready to learn something outstanding about Colorado?  I’m sure you’ve been camped out here since Monday, trembling with excitement.  Who can blame you?  

Let’s get on with the titillating subject of Colorado’s claims to fame.  To sum it up succinctly, it has snow and mountains and old people, the Columbine massacre and Hunter S. Thompson.  The end.

I’m kidding. Mostly.  It also had John Denver, who named himself after its capital city.  Mr. Denver had a great love for Colorado, a penchant for flying (and crashing), and the haircut of a 1970s’ Bavarian milk maid.

You’d have to be Rocky Mountain High to sport that hairstyle
I’m not even going to mention the shirt.  Oops.  Just did.

Okay. Here’s some pseudo geography for you.  Colorado forms the north eastern corner of the “four corner” states and is stock full of every kind of scenery imaginable – forest, sand dunes, mountains, plains, desert, mesas, canyons, rainforests, jungles, black holes and quicksand.    At least some of those are true, which ones, are entirely up to you.

Colorado is obviously famous for its snow sports and mountain resorts like Aspen and Vail, due to its hosting the state’s most famous residents, the Rocky Mountains, which take up most of the western half of the state, while plains and forest land occupy the eastern side. The Continental Divide also runs through the Rockies. I’m not sure what continents it divides exactly, but I like to imagine they’re the continents of “batshit insane” to the east and “bat-Sheen insane” to the west.  See what I did there? Now who’s winning?  I am. 

Most of Colorado’s population lies east of the mountains – in cities like the state capital, Denver and its close northern neighbour, Boulder.  Now if we can talk about Boulder for a second here.  I always imagine Boulder was named by idiots.  They reached the foothills of the mountains, surrounded by giant stones, started a settlement there and then thought, “Hmmm.  What to name this rocky outpost… Oh I KNOW!”
  
Nowadays, Boulder is a liberal city, known for its generous sprinkling of patchouli scented hippies, who arrived in the 1960s and never left, the illegal substances that come with hippies and a bunch of university students, who possibly also come with illegal substances and who smell even worse than hippies.   Screw all that though.  Who else when they hear about Boulder, immediately thinks of Mork and Mindy?

I used to love “Mork and Mindy”.  What was I thinking?  Any dude that hairy who was as annoying  as Mork in real life would get his ass handed to him in ten seconds. 

Also a popular destination in Colorado is its second largest city, Colorado Springs. Now I COULD go and look it up on the Information Super Highway and tell you all sorts of interesting true facts about it, but I prefer to think that it was named after some very special hot springs that contain the fountain of youth, which might explain why these little Colorado residents have been nine for about fourteen years.

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Lastly, you’ll be thrilled as I was to find out that a whopping 25% of Coloradans are delightfully dirty heathens, making it the highest percentage of any state we’ve covered so far. Hooray! I also like to think that fine statistic is due to the above young gentlemen and their potty mouths. Who doesn’t love South Park?  A moron, that’s who.

And that about does it for Colorado.  I know it’s a little thin, but goddamn it, I’m tired.   You all have a fine weekend, okay?