Beating the Heat

Denver had a record high yesterday of 102. We ventured out in the morning to Golden's local farmer's market, but quickly bought our produce (and pastries, because there's a great pastry and bread tent at the market and let's face it, that's really why I go--vegetables aren't that compelling) and headed home to our air conditioning for the rest of the day.

The farmer's market is located by a large park in Golden next to Clear Creek, the same river that allows Coors to "tap the Rockies." Aside from being used to make kind of crappy beer, the creek also provides some great people-watching in downtown Golden, especially on hot days like yesterday. People turn out in droves to kayak, float, swim and splash in the super-cold water. The best people-watching, though, happens when all those people who floated down the rapids in tubes or rafts have to walk back upstream to their cars, sauntering right across mainstreet in their swimwear with their floatey toys in tow. If everyone looked good in their swimwear, the people-watching wouldn't be that entertaining, but of course, they don't, and nothing puts a smile on your face like seeing a large woman in a small bikini jiggle across the road as she hurries to get her and her gigantic inner-tube out of the traffic.

The best people-watching moment for me happened yesterday morning, though. A group of three skinny teenage boys was heading back upstream to run the rapids a second time. The first two boys were clearly carrying large, grey inflatable rafts, towering over their heads as they walked across the road. The last boy in the line, however, was carrying something tall and pointy, and kind of pinkish colored. As the first two disappeared over the riverbank I was able to get a good look at the third boy's "raft:" a large inflatable woman in a red polka-dot bikini, with breasts that had to have been separate inflatable chambers all their own and were big enough and upright enough to serve as handles during those wild moments in the rapids. The kid had found the best way for a teenage boy to beat the heat, and the giant grin on his face proved that he knew it.