A Transitional Period

Today I am sitting in an empty house. Shannon and the cats are gone, as are most of the furniture and things. It's sort of depressing. We have lived in this house for over three years, and we are sad to be leaving.
My life has gone through some big changes recently. I quit my job at Towne Park (formerly Avascend and before that formerly AVP) after working there for well over four years, and it still feels weird not to park cars for elderly patients everyday. Now I am student teaching at Westside Middle School, and, while I thoroughly enjoy it, am still trying to adjust to new the schedule.
The biggest and most difficult change in my life is the fact that I will be away from Shannon for over four months while I am student teaching in Omaha and she is living next door to her parents down in Bonner Springs. She is just three hours away, but we only get to see each other on the weekends and it will certainly be hard. My hope is that we both stay busy enough during the week that we won't miss each other as much.
So this weekend we moved out of our house. Next weekend, I will be moving in with a friend and fellow student teacher, and because I only get one room there I had to ship most of my stuff with Shannon's parents to store in their basement.
I graduate in December and then will most likely have a difficult time finding a teaching job, because apparently everyone in the world wants to teach social studies. That's okay, I can substitute in the mean time, and at least then I will be with Shannon everyday. Oh, and the cats! Man it's quiet without them here.

New indie pop 4-track EP available from Bubblegum Records

Pop! Vol. 1. 4 track e.p. now available from Bubblegum Records

Featuring...
1. snye - Goodbye Polar Boy
2. Electric Needle Room - Oleaver’s Pub Won’t Let Us Play There Anymore
3. Your Elders - Your Elders
4. Mammoth Life - Bicycle Rider

Now available here

Our Colorado Trip

I hadn't been to Colorado in 11 years, so I was pretty excited to get back there. Shannon and I left early last Sunday, and drove for 10 hours over some extremely boring landscape in central and western Nebraska. Occasionally there would be random hills, but mostly it was just a long drive.
One thing I loved about driving to Colorado as a kid was the fact that you would see an endless, barren, and flat landscape for miles, and then all of a sudden these mountains would pop out in the distance. Well, that didn't happen for us this time because it was raining as we approached Denver. We didn't see the mountains, in fact, until we arrived in the city.
Shannon and I determined on this trip that we loved Colorado Springs and Estes Park the most of all the cities we visited. Among the additional cities we hung out in (not just drove through) were Fort Collins, Denver, Woodland Park, Cripple Creek, Manitou Springs, Divide (where our cabin was), and Boulder. We were both disappointed how you couldn't see mountains very well in Fort Collins and Denver, but other than that they were nice cities.
The reason for the trip was my mom's 50th birthday, which we celebrated by renting a cabin in the mountains (elevation 9,500 feet) for a few days. The cabin had a great view, but it was kind of smelly and dirty. Overall, we enjoyed it- it even had a hot tub which we used the last night of our stay there.
One day we went hiking in nearby Mueller State Park. The views were spectacular, but wildlife was scarce. We didn't see one bear, not one elk, not one moose. We did see some foxes and mule deer, in town.
Other highlights include taking a cog rail up to the top of Pikes Peak...

Visiting the cliff dwellings of the Anasazi Indians...

Losing all our money in Cripple Creek...

Getting family portraits at Garden of the Gods...

Visiting the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park...

Surprising my mom with a 50th birthday party at the cabin...

Seven Falls...




We had a great time and ultimately decided that we want to live in Colorado someday (somehow, some way). I miss the mountains already.