Forgot to mention that yesterday was heptapod.org's 9th anniversary.
Also if you don't see a 
commute icon in the archives after June or July 2008, I forgot when I started that, it doesn't mean that I was driving all over creation. Just means I walked or stayed home.
It's a delight to watch the stars slowly fade from sight, their colors fading to match the sky while others like Sirius struggle not to be overwhelmed by the glare of day. Sunrise is a sight to see as the mountains assume their various moods of deep purple, dusky orange and finally eschewing strange and garish colors for the normal daylight palette. Let's not forget the arrangement of lights which is significantly more noticeable at night upon the mountains. Even after seven years in Colorado I still see civilization as a mirror to the night sky, a vain attempt to declare that humanity deserves to step among the stars but physics makes such an endeavor nigh impossible. As above, so below. I can pick out hidden roads near Cheyenne Mountain along with the few but increasing homes which are creeping up the slopes like cancer. This aspect isn't entirely bad because their windows gloriously catch the sunrise for a few moments.
Lately I've been wanting to find a good unobstructed view of the eastern horizon. I don't care if staring at the sun is not good for my eyes but I'd be overjoyed watching Sol rising up over the plains as it steadily grows brighter with each minute. Maybe I'd catch a green flash but as far as I know this phenomenon is easier to find when the sun is setting and near the ocean. Ain't been no shoreline 'round these here parts for sixty million years.
Maybe I'll keep a pair of binoculars at work along with my jeans and hoodie so I can do some stargazing instead of laying on the front lawn, hood pulled tightly over my face and oblivious to my surroundings hoping to catch a few winks before submitting myself to toil for money.
Already I have issues when it comes to the laughter of other people. The lizard part of my brain always goes on the defensive while the crazy half says "They're laughing because they're going to make you look like an ass" or sometimes threatening far worse outcomes. What it all boils down to is that they're laughing at me. When I looked over my shoulder I saw they were three wiggers.
So I grabbed my personal hydration system and brought stuff closer to me in anticipation of being assaulted or just having them grab my bag and run away to loot it at a safer location. Never happened nor do I believe I was even a blip on their radar.
Moments later I relaxed and returned to reading my funnybook and immediately felt old and ashamed of myself. Frank Castle wouldn't have been afraid in that situation. My shame was magnified when I caught my reflection in the front windows which shattered my delusion that I was losing weight and somehow becoming stronger. For the rest of the week I was exceedingly aware of how I rode my bike. I kept forcing myself to keep pedalling even though I have a habit of coasting while going downhill. Now if I ever happen to ride long distance surely this will be a halting affair going two to four miles, resting for five or ten minutes then continuing onward until I really do catch my breath. My attempt to ride through Garden of the Gods diminished my enthusiasm for cycling.
On the bright side, I still rode to and from work rather than driving. Trust me, the urge to drive was stronger than my urge to ride. Part of the reason behind going to bed at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday was to recover my energy in anticipation of Friday's commute.
Also supposedly a MOOer was going to be coming to Colorado Springs to meet up with the Birds and myself but they cancelled out. Considering their history of being institutionalized among other nutty things I took it as being flakey so I didn't take it personally while completely avoiding the fact that something came up which superceded any travels through Colorado. Let's not forget the whole uncomfortable thing of hhsb coming to Colorado because it's kept quiet and it appears that great lengths are taken to avoid having spivak around when hhsb is around because a certain person who is unhappy with her first name is supposedly tight with the aforementioned acronymed associate.
Three guys and a woman landed but declined being photographed so I settled for taking a picture of their parachutes and cords hanging from a tree. "Didn't you see me waving at your planes?" They shrugged in unison. "Let's go get something to eat. My treat."
We headed out to a hole-in-the-wall restaurant in a neighborhood which reminded me of Newark, NJ. It was an old brick building from the turn of the century, not millennium, surrounded by a twenty foot chain link fence topped with razor wire and none of the streetlights were lit. Inside was pretty dark and smelled damp. Along the walls were numerous laundry chutes which I figured out were food delivery systems which triggered a memory of my little sister tripping and plummeting through many decades ago.
Dinner went fast and I don't recall what I ate or what my guests ate nor do I recall if we ate anything at all. The bartender was walking through the dining room announcing the sun was shining at midnight. Over the crush of diners who were pressed against the windows and crowding the doors to look out over the alleyway. Diffuse gray light like the kind one expects on gray late October mornings. People were muttering about eschaton, others were rationalizing that it's after midnight the sun is that much closer to the horizon and the clouds were simply carrying light like fiber optic cable. I heard Brian's voice in the back of my head repeating "always one wing dipped in blood".
That annoyance kept me from being caught up in the fervor. One of the parachutists ran up to me saying he's going to tip 13%, grabbing my shoulders and shouting it in my face like someone just raped and killed then raped his baby. I meandered over to the bar and waited quietly to be acknowledged so I could pay our tab. Bartender wasn't interested in my money and told me how the Sunday papers had arrived early in case I was interested in checking out the comics.
When I woke up I thought it was Sunday.
