We are back in Denver after a week on the road, camping in Grand Teton and Yellowstone, seeing friends and getting close to the land. We had a Dodge Ram Pro-master Van that we rented through Outdoorsy.com. It is the perfect size for two people who get along. It was fabulous to sleep under the stars and respectfully share the forest with the wildlife. It … Continue reading Travels with Ca$hy
My father, Ed Collins, died when my son, Kyle, was just one year old. Perhaps he knew his time was short because on April 28, 1994, less than three months after Kyle was born, he wrote him this letter. On the envelope it said “To Kyle on his 18th birthday.” We gave it to Kyle this past February. We had waited for years to see … Continue reading On Father’s Day: A Gift from the Grave
Very early on the morning on May 5, 2007 I got a call from NBC News to hurry from Denver to Greensburg, Kansas. There had been a huge tornado and the town was devastated. Go! Go! When I pulled into the town six hours later I was stunned to see wreckage so complete that even the bark had been pulled off the trees. These skeleton … Continue reading The Greening of Greensburg
My friend, Niza Knoll, has an art gallery in the Santa Fe Arts District in Denver. Knoll Gallery is a fantastic array of creativity and is emerging as one of the best galleries in Denver (in my humble opinion.) Each year Niza does a juried exhibit featuring art on dogs. Gone to the Dogs 3 opens this Friday, August 19, and runs through September 17. … Continue reading Gone to the Dogs
The Sunday New York Times had a feature in its Travel Section today on how to spend 36 hours in Honolulu. It singled out some of my favorite places like Kapiolani Park, Chinatown and the drive from Hanauma Bay to Waimanalo with stops at Sandy Beach and Makapuu. With no disrespect to the author, Jocelyn Fujii, I would like to suggest my own itinerary based … Continue reading Facetime Instead of Facebook: 36 Hours in Honolulu
When I was a senior at St. Andrew’s Priory in Honolulu I was selected by my high school government class to spend a week at the Hawaii state capitol observing the legislature. My assignment was to select one bill under consideration, research it and follow it through the session. I chose the effort to legalize prostitution. At the time, Hawaii had a very active sex … Continue reading Prostitution in Perspective
Two years ago the Rocky Mountain News ended publication after 150 years. The Colorado newspaper was a casualty of a changing media environment which saw the bankruptcy of dailies across America. Recently former Rocky editor and publisher, John Temple, sent out a survey to his former staffers to see how they were faring in their careers. Ryan Warner of Colorado Public Radio sat down with … Continue reading Rocky Mountain News Retrospective
He told us his name was Ray Casados but on the street they called him Rah-Rah. He was a young tatted up heroin addict who was spending 90 days at the Hoy Recovery Program in Velarde, New Mexico, hoping he could finally kick the habit that had him by the balls, and move forward with a new life as a barber. He hailed from nearby … Continue reading My Week in Detox
My 12 year old son, Blair Ewalt, a budding filmmaker and 7th grade student at Denver School of the Arts, just produced his first professional film. It is a two and a half minute promotional piece for an exhibit called “The 4000 Year Road Trip: Gathering Sparks” at Denver’s Mizel Museum. The exhibit opens on February 2, 2011. It took Blair less than two weeks … Continue reading Blair’s First Filmmaking Job
The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health: The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow. Crunchy numbers A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 11,000 times in 2010. That’s about 26 full 747s. In 2010, there were 85 new posts, growing the total archive … Continue reading 2010 in review
Vicky Collins Online 