16th Street Mall’s new Wi-Fi finds many fans
It didn’t take long for the free wireless network along the 16th Street Mall to become a hit.
Exactly one month after the Downtown Denver Partnership began offering the service for free Wi-Fi, or wireless fidelity, connections along the 16th Street Mall, the number of website hits and log-ons has soared.
Some 226,783 hits have been recorded on the network’s informational home page, www.downtowndenverwifi.com, and about 350 people are logging on to use the service daily, the partnership reported in its Skylines newsletter.
PUC’s resident cichlid gets cash for new tank
Looks like Killer, the Jack Dempsey cichlid who resides at the state Public Utilities Commission office, will be getting a housing upgrade.
Just in time too. The 10-inch- long speckled fish has more than outgrown his 10-gallon tank that sits on a countertop near the front desk.
Cheryl Fisher, the office manager and Killer’s owner, undertook a fundraising effort about two weeks ago. She placed a jar near the tank that said: “To the merciful. Please release me from the (picture of a pair of handcuffs) of my present lodging. Please donate for my new digs. Sincerely, Killer.”
It worked. Fish-lovers started kicking in cash, and last week a couple of guys said they would pay for the existing tank. That will give Fisher the necessary $100 to buy a new 29-gallon tank.
“People love this fish,” she said. “They like to watch him spit his rocks. He just has his own winning personality.”
New clubs make city little bit more country
For all those eager to see Denver shed its cowtown image, there are just as many who embrace the city’s Western heritage.
Case in point: Two of the newest nightspots to debut in downtown Denver are Western- themed.
The Buck Wild Saloon opened this weekend in the former Beyond space on the second floor of the Denver Pavilions. It will play country music and feature an 18-wheeler Big Rig Bar with sawdust and peanuts on the floor.
The saloon follows on the boot heels of the Cowboy Lounge, which has taken over the former Market 41 space in LoDo. The venue promises a mix of classic and modern country music with a little bit of rock on the side.
Partyers get a lift in limo
A 22-1/2-foot-long luxury truck/ bus chauffeured customers from an EchoStar Communications party in downtown Denver to WildBlue Communications in Greenwood Village this week.
Yes, you heard that right – the “largest limo in Colorado” is 22-1-2 feet long.
The Mammoth F650, built from a Ford F-650 body, is so big, 30 people can fit inside.
It’s so tall, you have to walk up four steps just to get in the door.
It’s so wide … well, you get the picture.
EchoStar played host to an estimated 1,900 Dish Network retailers at the Colorado Convention Center. WildBlue hired the limo to welcome them in style, said Brad Greenwald, a company spokesman.
PR firm’s newcomer talks about highs
Paul Raab, 48, joined the Linhart McClain Finlon public-relations firm two months ago as a senior vice president, leaving A.T. Kearney in Chicago, where he was also president of the city’s chapter of the Public Relations Society of America. We asked him a couple questions:
Q: Cubs or Rockies, and why?
A: When we prepare our clients for media interviews, we advise them to watch out for the either/or question. How about the world champion White Sox?
Q: What can you do at altitude that you couldn’t at lake level?
A: Snowboard, ice-climb and heli-ski. Of course, I don’t actually do any of those things, but I’m told they go better higher up. I’m hoping to make it up an easy fourteener over the summer without Sherpas and bottled oxygen.
FROM STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS
This story has been corrected in this online archive. Originally, due to a reporting error, the size of the luxury truck/bus being used by WildBlue Communications to transport customers from an EchoStar Commmunications party downtown to WildBlue’s headquarters in Greenwood Village was overstated. The limo’s length is 22-1/2 feet.
