Unfortunately, sometimes the news most fit to print doesn’t get the attention it deserves. Amend that by catching up on a year’s worth of colorful Colorado stories that went under the radar.
JANUARY
RUI:
A 20-year-old Aspen snowboarder got a formidable head start on his apres ski drinking. Two Pitkin County sheriff’s deputies showed up at the gondola plaza, where a lift operator identified the tipsy rider, who received a summons to go with his hangover. Riding in a gondola or on a lift while drunk is a violation of the state’s safe skier act.
FEBRUARY
That voodoo:
Some of Bernie Madoff’s former clients insist they’re not “victims” of this $50 billion Ponzi scheme artist. For everyone else, there’s Colorado artist Rosemary Ranck’s Bernie Madoff voodoo dolls.
MARCH
Weeds:
John Rose fights through prickly clouds of tumbleweeds to get to his front door at 249 60th Ave. in Greeley. High winds often cover his neighborhood with tumbleweeds, although the pile-up isn’t usually so dramatic.
Whipped cream is extra:
At Steamboat Springs’ Slopeside Grill, the clientele was treated, briefly, to free brown moose.
Video.
APRIL
Tails of woe:
Those no-good, dirty rotten horse tail thieves are back. Following earlier incidents in Parker, where horse owners discovered at least eight horses with missing tails, a Boulder man reports that Vinnie, a handsome black mustang, is the latest victim. Without leads, the law officers are pessimistic about an arrest, and cloudy on the exact charges.
“You could go with theft, but you’d have to prove some kind of value,” said Boulder County Sheriff Cmdr. Rick Brough.
MAY
Pooped:
The U.S. Forest Service installed a plastic fecal-waste bag dispenser, its contents intended for human use, at the Conundrum Hot Springs trailhead. At least 2,000 hikers visit the popular hot springs every year, leaving the springs, Conundrum Creek and Castle Creek tainted with bacteria from human waste.
JUNE
Parting thought:
When Carbondale iconoclast John Palmer died after a long struggle against cancer, his final words were: “I can’t believe Keith Richards outlived me.” He was 62.
JULY
Firewater:
After Fort Lupton residents Amee Ellsworth and Renee McClure demonstrate that a flame can light their gas-contaminated water as it emerges from the tap, officials at the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission vow to investigate. The Fort Lupton women suspect one of the eight natural gas wells near the water well. The commission eventually announces that methane gas has been ruled out as a culprit, and says its investigation has “partially solve(d)” the mystery.
AUGUST
Exit strategy:
A hipster bear in Snowmass found itself trapped by the smooth, sloping walls of the local skate park. After deliberation, animal control officers slid a ladder to the park floor and backed away, watching the bear teach itself to climb out.
SEPTEMBER
Cheesed off:
Pitkin County Judge Erin Fernandez-Ely ordered John Douglas Williams to pay a $100 fine, and be on probation for a year, a pretty good deal for a guy charged with separate, class-five felony charges of false imprisonment and menacing his roommate after a dispute involving havarti and provolone cheese. Why bother? On the other hand, if it’d been a cave-aged Gruyere or a nice Piave . . .
OCTOBER
Eroding civil liberties:
Four Grand Junction High School students are suspended after their prank at the Sept. 26 football game against Fruita Monument High School. The students sprayed a foul-smelling oil on the ground and in the trash cans of the stadium’s visiting student area. Word spread that the foul smell was elk urine. In an apology letter, the students identified the substance as skunk oil, commonly used by hunters to disguise their scent.
NOVEMBER
Political games:
Some tied elections are settled by drawing straws. In Crested Butte, Roland Mason and Phoebe Wilson played “Ninja-Bear-Cowboy” to determine who got the town council seat. The town clerk compared it to “extreme Rock-Paper-Scissors”: Ninja disarms Cowboy. Bear mauls Ninja. Cowboy shoots Bear. Mason beat Wilson in two of three rounds.
DECEMBER
Paging space cadets:
A Woody Creek travel agent is one of 80 “accredited space agents” booking 2011 flights on Virgin Galactic’s VSS Enterprise. Passengers will “experience weightlessness for about five minutes” and see the curvature of the Earth.” Price per flight: $200,000, with a $20,000 deposit required.
In addition to Denver Post archives, sources include The Aspen Daily News, the Aspen Times, the Boulder Daily Camera, the Carbondale Valley Journal, the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel, the Grand Junction Free Press, the Steamboat Springs Pilot, the Greeley Tribune, the Vail Daily.
