Hello, Mountain Time

I've never been to Denver, Colorado before. I should have thought about the high altitude before I worked out as hard as usual this morning! Before I realized it was the altitude, I was very concerned that I had gotten out of shape after two 12 hour bus rides! According to the desk clerk at the airport Comfort Suites, the seats at Mile High Stadium that are actually mile high are painted purple. Purple! A truly fortuitous color.

OK, so I'm a little crazy today. I got up at 6 am and worked out. I think the think air is making me giddy. And maybe the two cups of coffee. But definitely the bunnies.

Didn't I mention the bunnies? I opened the curtains to enjoy the mountain view (snow -capped Rockies!), and noticed movement out of the corner of my eye. There was a drainage ditch off the highway, filled with big gravel -- 2-foot wide glittery gunmetal gray slabs of rock -- and jumping, chasing, and foraging in this ditch were easily a dozen bunnies! They were sandy brown, all the better for camouflage in the short bleached grasses, with fluffy white cotton-ball tails. Oh, it was too cute. I sneaked downstairs to see them up close. Nibble a little grass, chase a friend, run full speed over the rocks, sit completely still for a minute, run again. It was hoppingly fantastic! The sky was blue with streaky white clouds, giving me a great view of the truly majestic Rockies in the distance. How could you not be giddy looking at that?

I guess it's a good thing to psyche yourself up for a nineteen hour bus ride. We got so far behind schedule because of the storms in the Dakotas (you may have heard about them), that we had to fly in another driver and skip a hotel stay to make it to Moses Lake, WA in time for our Thursday evening show. We're three hours in now, and mimosas are being passed around (I'm abstaining -- such the Mom) in preparation for a viewing of The Descent, one of the scariest movies I've ever seen.

The movie may be delayed, however, because we are seeing the most beautiful scenery this side of a spaghetti western. Mesas, snow, plains, brush trees, and the biggest sky in all of creation. Dark clouds are looming on the horizon, as we are driving straight into a big storm, but I have hopes we'll outrun them all.