Three Fun Photographs

Here's a few fun photographs for your viewing pleasure today.

Isn't this cute?  Of course it's Paul and that's his friend and new roommate Jessie.  Paul's current lease ends July 31 and his two roommates are heading out of town to return to college, leaving Paul to find both new digs and a new roomie.  Luckily, his friend from high school (and the daughter of our neighbors) was also needing a new place so they teamed up.  

In a blink of an eye they found a newly remodeled two-bedroom-two-bath apartment in great location with nice amenities such as a pool, a dog park (yes, we love our dogs here in Boulder!), and a gym.   The complex offered two weeks free rent if they moved in this week, as the management wanted to get folks in well before the "back-to-school" rush of students in August.  Jessie moved in yesterday and Paul will gradually move in over the next few weeks with the goal of being out of his old place by mid-July, when the other two roomies leave.   Smiles all around!

I finally got a great photo of Turbo playing with his friend Rachel.  They are half siblings, sharing the same mother, and are about a year apart in age.  Turbo turns two on July 11--can you believe it? -- and Rachel turns one sometime soon.  They've known each other much of this past year but Turbo wasn't much interested in the young pup until she got big enough for the two of them to wrestle and roughhouse together.  Now she weighs as much as he does and suddenly they are racing around and tussling together.  Such fun to see!   

See anything interesting in this tree? Hint:  Look for a bird with a long beak and a white throat.  It's a hummingbird sitting on a nest!  How cool is that?  If you don't see it, don't worry, there's a close up below.

I came across this little bird while I was watching Ben rock climb the other day in Eldorado Canyon.  I was up on the Fowler Trail looking down on Ben and his partners as they got ready to climb.  That took a long time.  Finally they started climbing, but not Ben; no first it was Sandy who led and  then Gina followed.  That all took about 90 minutes.  Good grief, I'd forgotten how boring it can be to hang around waiting for a climb to get underway and waiting for "your" climber to get his/her turn.  So while Gina was making her way up Turbo and I stretched our legs by walking back and forth along the Fowler Trail.  At some point I just happened to look up and saw an unusual flash of white up in a tree.  So I stopped and waited and looked and looked and I saw the white patch again and looked even more closely and saw a long black beak and then I knew what it was.  I'd never seen a hummingbird sitting on a nest and I was quite thrilled!  

Eventually I tore myself away from the bird and her nest and headed back down the path and saw that Ben was actually climbing.   Here's one of his first moves...

..moving on up...

...and gets to a corner which he climbs around and up and out of sight. 

To watch further I had to leave the Fowler Trail and walk back down into the canyon.  I got this nice closeup up as I left.  Goodbye and goodluck, little one! 

When I was back on the canyon floor I looked up to see how Ben was doing.  He was just beginning to climb up the 100' long crack that would take him up to the top.  It made me nervous to see him there like a spider and I knew all three climbers would still have to get themselves back down.  I'd already spent three hours in the canyon and Turbo was getting pretty hot so we went home, having cleverly come in a second car.  It's been a long time since I've seen Ben climb in Eldorado and I think it will hold me for a while!