This weekend was interesting.  (Pay attention since there are questions to be answered!) The weekend started early when L came in Thursday evening while I was still at the county fair manning the EMS authority information booth.

To be truthful, I should have said I was helping pick up what was left of the EMS booth. After a day with temperatures in the 100+ range, the evening storms really built up and about 6:30 it started to rain. We weren’t worried. But then the wind started to whip and we were struggling like mad to keep our tent on the ground. Stakes and counter-weights didn’t seem to do much good in the face of the severe wind. The Army tent/booth next to us was utterly destroyed in no time. So were all the others we could spot through the sheets of water and the wind.  We managed to keep our tent on the ground, but the chairs and literature and even tables took to the air, some never to be found. About the time steel picnic tables started flying past us in mid-air, we called it a day. We cut the canvas anchor ropes so the frame wouldn’t fly off and bean someone, and then sprinted to shelter under the grandstand. We found out later that the wind was measured at 80-85 mph. The sheriff and his crew was busy evacuating the people in the grandstand seats for the rodeo, moving them to the shelter under the grandstand. It was the first time in anyone’s memory that the grandstand had to be evacuated (the grandstand holds ~15,000 people when full). An hour later it all was clear, but the carnival rides and the outdoor booths were down for the count until they could be checked and re-erected. Needless to say, we packed up what we could gather and called it a day at the booth. The wind and rain had built up coming down from Denver and then got really feisty when they heat fueled out here on the plains. A lot of tree limbs and trees were down along with numerous power line breaks throughout town. That coupled with flooding made for an interesting evening for the emergency crews. But it did drop the temperature into the 60s. A lot of hard work by everyone and the fair continued on and most of the trees are cleaned up. Just another blowy day on the plains.

Friday when I was at the grocery store, I ran into the brother of a high school classmate. He said his brother was coming down for the western show Saturday and he was having a “small” party for a hundred people before the concert. His brother is a high school classmate of both L and I that we hadn’t seen in a few years, so we said we’d drop by. When I told L of the party and where it was at, she made the remark that this was the only place she knew of where people built garages specifically with holding parties in mind. I disagreed. Understand that these are not run of the mill garages. They typically have running water and tiled floors and big screen tvs and … They might work on a car or truck in them, but they are more used to hold parties (and they are not small – 4-7 car size). So my questions to you are: 1) Have you ever attended a party held in a garage? and if so 2) Was it a fancy garage of a plain old shop type garage?

Saturday morning we did yard work to clean up and I got to mow the lawn. L and her mother headed off to watch the fair parade while I battled a broken cable on the lawn mower. They then went out to the fair and got a hamburger (why do hamburgers grilled in the open at the fair taste so good?). We spent the afternoon doing miscellaneous tasks, napping, and then getting ready for the party.

We had a good time and some excellent margaritas Saturday evening at the party along with good conversations. The classmate who was down from Boulder and I go back to grade school. We were the iron horse champions of 4th and 5th grade and were on the same wrestling team in high school. I can remember writing his book reports in grade school in return for being invited over to his house to watch the original campy Batman series on their {*gasp*} color tv (one of the few I knew of at that time). He hit a bad patch after high school and ended up serving a few years in prison. He was one of those people where prison was the wake up call they needed and it really turned him around. He’s been a real straight arrow for the last 30 years since then. It was good to talk to him again.

When the revelers left for the concert on the tour bus (the classmate runs a tour bus on the side to take people to tailgate at the Broncos games and to squire around celebrities – it is all fitted out with leather couches and signed autograph galleries of all the country western stars he has transported) so that there were no drunk driving issues, we took our leave and headed to mom’s house. We had been invited to come rejoin the party after the concert, but demurred – we’re getting too old for that 4am partying! Spent a bit of time visiting with mom and then headed back home.

Today L had to head back early to the mountains since she had a social function to attend. She was going to pick the Son up from a concert he had bicycled to and then proceed to the function. The party featured a local singer/guitarist (as both performer and honoree) that they both wanted to hear, so I suspect they were happy. Molly moped and I watched a bit of the inagural pre-season football game to pass the evening. Yea Football!!!!!

So what did you do for the weekend? And don’t forget to answer the garage questions!