I have this friend Anthony Webster who loves Dutch Ovens. Every time he talks about it all that I think of is this nasty game of farting on my wife, but really Dutch Ovens are all about delicious cooking. In fact, Trace (Anthony's nickname) likes the Dutch Ovens so much that he is a member of the Denver Dutch Oven Group (also known as a DOG) and he gets together with other folks who love cooking in their Dutch Ovens and they all cook delicious food together.

My friend Michael Hawley started doing Real Estate in Salida, Colorado a little while ago. If you don't know, Salida is located at the exit (Salida means exit in Spanish) of a high mountain plain in Colorado that includes Buena Vista, Poncha Springs, and several other cities. It's the "banana belt" of Colorado meaning that temperatures in Salida remain pretty moderate all winter long.

Our good friends Kaycie Rosen and her fiancee Steve Grigel just moved down to Colorado after spending a few years living in Anchorage. We're really excited to have them around again and, perhaps even more exciting, is that Kaycie is a Naturopathic Doctor and just opened the doors of her own Holistic Medicine Clinic in Golden, Colorado.

Note: "sucks" is a pretty strong and immature word, but it's the word to use online when you think someone has a bad idea. So, if that's off-putting, get over it. Or start a "sucks sucks" site.

Recently I was asked what I thought of Angie's List. Frankly, I had no idea. I was told it was a pretty neat list that has good ratings of local retailers. The idea is that you are looking for advice on a company to hire for a service (e.g. car repair) so you check Angie's List and see the advice and ideas of other users who have used the site. It's basically like Better Business Bureau, City Search, or one of thousands of other local directories. Many of these directories are broken: biased reviews, paid inclusion, incomplete information, etc. This is where Angie's List claims to be different. They use "only" consumer generated content and require a "small fee" to keep the reviews unbiased.

Inspiration: Your tired, Your poor

In Emma Lazarus famous poem The New Colossus she describes her personal interpretation of the Statue of Liberty. Lazarus' brief poem captures many of the concepts and ideals that people have for America as a land of opportunity, a shining city on the hill where poor exiles from around the world can seek freedom:

Living in Denver's Baker Neighborhood is interesting for me - there are many many artistic people who choose this neighborhood which makes the landscaping, home painting, home architecture really neat. The other benefit is that lots of my neighbors are artists and grahpic designers - handy when I do web development.

Today I mentioned my fascination with IKEA stores opening in Denver. A friend was talking about how she wanted some new office furniture - Room and Board felt too expensive for what she needs and Scandinavian Design was her best choice. What should she do? I recommended IKEA and lamented the fact that we didn't have one...