Aftermath
It seems crass to talk about my gifts. Plus the folks who would be interested have already been told in person.

Christmas dinner was pleasant. Either the brothers are getting used to me or actually like me because they were a bit more talkative than usual so I'm pleased by the development.

After dinner I was not feeling very good. I was having a hard time catching my breath and felt something that caused me some concern. Most likely it was hypochondria. Anyway I went into raddidge's room and took a long winter's nap. When I woke up I felt like I had been a poor and ungrateful guest for taking the nap.

Since I had to work on Tuesday, I had to part ways at a decent hour. raddidge gave me leftovers, carried stuff out to the car and had a long talk where I expressed my deep and sincere love for her, how I want her in my life, explaining how getting her good, new tires for her car for Christmas is part of my love vocabulary. Actually a major part and I get it from my father.

Anyone who is anyone in Colorado and has had the pleasure of driving the Route 25 corridor between Denver and Colorado Springs know that there's a big, electric star atop a mesa near Castle Rock. I discovered something astonishing that caused some confusion with raddidge.

Or maybe she was just busting my balls that is her way.

When I reached exit 163 I saw that there was a river of red brake lights in front of me. I always like to keep moving even if it means going out of my way taking the scenic route. Traffic sucks. So I took exit 161 to head east to 83, also known as Academy Boulevard, and home. Once I got onto the street that went over Route 25 I saw there was a lighted star in the distance. There were cars behind me and no real way that I could stop and take pictures. Eventually I found a side street and took some bad pictures with trees blocking the view. One or two were satisfactory and I decided to continue my journey home.

Now I was in the sleepy burg of Palmer Lake and discovered I kept getting better views of this star. Eventually I got close enough to see that the star was something that was set up on the side of a mountain and appeared to be lit by street lights. So I took more pictures.

So I figured I was getting lost since I was facing the mountains, i.e. westward rather than eastward, and I stopped to ask for directions. Some kids at a bar said to keep heading down the road towards County Line Road and eventually I'd make it to 83. Well finding County Line Road was easy enough but I was in for a surprise.

First I saw signs for Route 25. When I got back on the highway I saw that I was at mile marker 163.

What?

Plus the river of traffic that began my side trip was gone. Just a wide, open road and it was only 20 minutes later!