Echoes

We WON! On April 19, 2021 KFFR was granted an "Award of Excellence" from the Colorado Broadcasting Association for "Best Podcast" for small markets in 2020. Our daily program was called the "KFFR Coronacast," and was hosted by Steve Skinner and Stacy Stein. It would have never happened without support from station founder and producer, Denis Moynihan.   We were up against some very well-funded radio stations. I have always believed that the audio canvas provides everyone the same opportunities to create valuable, quality programming.   The podcast went for months. This podcast is our half-hour edit entry.

Martin J. Smith is a veteran journalist and magazine editor. He has won more than fifty newspaper and magazine writing awards, and his crime novels have been nominated for three of the publishing industry’s most prestigious honors, including the Edgar Award, the Anthony Award, and the Barry Award. In addition to his five novels, Smith has finished his fifth nonfiction book. “Going to Trinidad: A Doctor, a Colorado Town, and Stories from an Unlikely Gender Crossroads” will be published in hardcover by Bower House and as an audio book by Tantor Media on April 15, 2021.

We are all obsessed with the human body. And nowhere do you find the body more on display than at the beach. If you really want to go all the way, you have to go to a nude beach. In our parents’ days, we heard of nudist colonies, places where young and beautiful beatniks smoked weed and drank wine and frolicked in mud baths in the altogether, all together. We all saw the compelling posters. I don’t know about you but I spent a long winter building up body fats and dry skin, including an occasional itchy rash. My doctor said my skin looked “dry” and urged me to use skin moisturizer, something we tough guys often forget as we are putting on the Carharts. Like many of us mountain people, I split for tropical climes this off-season, seeking moist air, beaches and a chance to air out the wrinkles and folds that had been under many layers of protective clothing. Maybe it’s because the islands are blowing up, but I found shockingly cheap airfare to Maui and got on that plane. When we touched down and they opened the cabin doors for arrival, the plumeria-scented breeze was like an instant balm. The lips felt moist. The red spots vanished, and the air was full of oxygen and deeply nuanced scents. After a couple of days chasing turtles in the tourist hotspots, we decided to attend a locals’ traditional party on a not-so-secret beach on the far end of the island. A quick stumble over a lava hill led us to a strip of sand with gentle waves and scattered with locals. A closer look revealed that many were “pants down.” You know what they say, “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.” So I went pants down and headed straight for the water, where other like-minded nudists were bobbing about. Swimming naked is liberating, to say the least. Without too much graphic detail, salt water beats the pants off of synthetic fabrics every day. The ocean is the wetsuit. And the wetsuit suits me. After the bobbing, it was time for a dash back to the beach chair. Not too fast. Must avoid flapping about and drawing attention with quick movements. Not too slow. Don’t want to risk evocative strutting, either. No, the nude-beach cadence should be slow and carefree. I snuck a look around. I couldn’t understand why everyone was not staring at me. It was as though a rare species of albino sloth seal had emerged from the ocean and no one noticed. I made it to the chair, popped up the umbrella, plopped down and made a nonchalant gaze directly in front of me into the endless ocean. Glancing around, I saw other ghastly species mingling among the beautiful people. No one is perfect, and nowhere is this more obvious than a nude beach. Most of the people you wouldn’t mind seeing naked were clothed, and most of the people you’d prefer to see clothed were naked. The hairless apes were at this particular beach for a weekly gathering of the tribe. There were many old hippies, smoking joints in their wrinkled leather suits. I saw a lot of lonely looking guys but some had their gals with them. It made me wonder, where did these old hippies come from? How did they get here and how did they live? Maui is expensive, and these retirees did not look like the working type. Late in the afternoon there was a steady stream of new recruits arriving, bringing drums and drinks. A small group started the drum circle with a bleached, mistimed pulse that went nowhere but somehow changed the atmosphere to something more electric. More and more drummers showed, and before long an exotic African couple were leading the ensemble with a simpler, more compelling tribal beat and simple commands that really got things going in the right direction. I almost forgot I was naked and started moving my hips. As the light lengthened there was a higher ratio of clothed to non-clothed partygoers. I slipped on my shorts and walked closer to the circle. Having my eyes suddenly behold a nude man when I forgot where I was because of the music is unsettling and startling. I would have to get used to it. There were still more fissures on display than on the Big Island. This scene was going off and it was time to split, time to weave our way through the naked crop, some sitting, some prone, some up, some down, some sideways. Some sitting on a towel, staring into a cell phone as if to say, “I feel naked without my device.” I saw a lot of cell phones out there on Maui, mostly on the popular public beaches where waves, wildlife, sand and sunsets were right there, front and center. All you had to do was look up. But some couldn’t, and it made me a little sad. Because to be human means we all share the same flesh, the same habits and the same lameness. Some are better than others at covering it up, but everyone eventually sags and the grim reaper comes for us all. Steve Skinner thinks we should bring back streaking. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.  

Patrick F. Brower is the author of “Killdozer. The True Story of the Colorado Bulldozer Rampage.”He is the former editor and publisher of the Sky-Hi News, and a group of weekly and daily newspapers, in Granby, Colorado. He was published extensively for 28 years, as a reporter, editor and columnist and has received numerous statewide and regional awards for his writing. He’s also had short fiction published in the Redneck Review of Literature. His news articles have also been published in the Denver Post and the Rocky Mountain News.Brower personally covered almost all of the hearings and interactions relating to the Killdozer rampage before it took place. Brower was also a victim of the rampage and extensively covered the event itself as well as its aftermath. After the newspapers were sold in 2007, Brower owned and operated his own public affairs consulting firm before working in grassroots economic development with the Grand Enterprise Initiative in Grand County. He continues to write.Brower graduated from the University of Virginia with a B.A. in American Studies.He is an accomplished jazz drummer, an avid cross-country skier, runner and a masters level national champion biathlete. He has three children and continues to live in Granby, Colorado.

In this edition I sit down with Ven. Thubten Semkye, a Buddhist nun at the Sravasti Abbey in Northwest Washington State. Ven. Semkye was the Abbey’s first lay resident. She met Venerable Chodron, founder of the abbey at the Dharma Friendship Foundation in Seattle in 1996 and took refuge with her in 1999. A founder of Friends of Sravasti Abbey, she accepted the position of chairperson to provide the four requisites for the monastic community, which we discuss in our conversation. She moved to the Abbey in spring of 2004.Although she didn’t originally see ordination in her future, after the 2006 Chenrezig retreat when she spent half of her meditation time reflecting on death and impermanence, Ven. Semkye realized that ordaining would be the wisest, most compassionate use of her life. She became the Abbey’s third nun in 2007. In 2010 she received bhikshuni ordination at Miao Fa Chan Temple in Taiwan. Ven. Semkye draws on her extensive experience in landscaping and horticulture to manage the Abbey’s forests and gardens. We talked in Carbondale where she was leading a retreat for the Way of Compassion Dharma Center.

I talk with Martin J. Smith about his new book, "Mr. Las Vegas Has a Bad Knee and Other Tales of the People, Places and Peculiarities of the Modern American Southwest." I met Martin at his home in Granby, Colorado. The veteran journalist and magazine editor has won more than fifty newspaper and magazine writing awards, and his crime novels have been nominated for three of the publishing industry’s most prestigious honors, including the Edgar Award, the Anthony Award, and the Barry Award. Visit his website here.

  by Steve Skinner, Aspen Daily News Columnist   Tuesday, September 12, 2017   I’m feeling squashed again. And the feeling’s just begun. Proceed with this seedy column at your own risk. Hope you have a thick skin. The views and opinions expressed forthwith are my own and do not reflect the new and upstanding ownership of this newspaper. Anyone who goes to the store and purchases a zucchini right now is certifiably nuts. No offense but this is zucchini season, which is kind of like hurricane season, except that it’s raining zucchinis instead of water. What we have here is something of an emergency: a squash surge. I’m with you. I don’t particularly care to eat zucchini. Eating it straight up in a salad or steamed on the side brings me a borderline gag reflex. It must be good for me then, right? My daughter writes a blog (Moodystark). In “s--- you don’t need,” she writes that the No. 1 thing you don’t need in your life is zucchini. Coincidentally, the last thing on the list of things you don’t need in your life is “food that doesn’t taste good.” It’s not my fault. I tried and tried to get her to eat zucchini. To her credit, once a year, she always sampled whatever zuke incarnation I presented. But not even fresh-picked baby zucchini masterfully sautéed in butter and garlic could pass her yuck test. Zucchini bread? No. She knew it was in there. My eating habits have changed. If someone hands me a local zucchini, I’m going to find a way to ingest it. Local food is the healthiest, best-tasting and freshest. Whenever possible, I eat the locally sourced stuff. Even donuts. And yes, even zucchini. If you are going to eat it, eat the local stuff. Did you know that you can put a zucchini through a spiralizer? One of these hand-crank peelers cleverly turns zuke meat into long green noodles. Dress with carrot-top pesto and you are off to the races, yes? Stop! I am practically hurling just thinking about it. Noodles need to taste like noodles. Sorry. Disguising only works when you disguise the taste. It’s fine to disguise the look but more important to disguise the taste. If I have to deal with zucchini, I will often slice it, lube it, salt it and grill it. I know it sounds cruel but the babies are the tastiest. One of the most palatable ways to gag down zucchini is to grill the babies. The big monsters are woody and bitter. The longest zucchini courgette ever officially measured by the Guinness World Records was 8 feet, 3.3 inches and was grown in 2014 by the wonderful wizard Giovanni Batista Scozzafava in Niagara Falls, Canada. He claimed that he had used “no manure” on the plant, just lotsa Niagara water. I recently discovered that zucchinis can be poisonous. Zucchinis can and have killed! Maybe I have an inner sense that repels me from dangerous vegetables because I knew something was up. Perhaps I don’t like zucchini because they, like other cucubita pepe, including pumpkins, contain cucurbitacins. These toxic steroids help plants fend off predators. To add insult to injury, the toxin often adds bitterness to the squash. If you come across a particularly bitter zuke, you might want to skip it — you can thank me later. Wikipedia features a story of an elderly couple sickened by eating zucchini that the neighbor brought over. They noticed a bitter taste before they keeled over. The man died, and the wife barely made it. You guessed it: cucurbitacins. Still, you are probably more likely to choke to death on a squash than die from too many cucurbitacins in your fake noodles. Last Sunday night, I was presented with a zucchini casserole. The steaming concoction was layered with fresh mozzarella, basil and tomato sauce and topped with squash blossoms (yellow zuke blossoms are considered a delicacy in many countries, including Mexico). I must admit that it was pretty tasty considering that I knew what it was. Zucchini grows well in our climate. Keep the predators out, add sunshine and water and stand back. Never turn your back on a bed of zucchini as it can triple in size when you are not looking. Harvest those pepos early and often for best results. Look under the leaves because the big ones have a way of hiding under there. If you find yourself inundated by zucchini and your friends start locking their doors and pulling closed their shades when they see you coming, take heart. Get busy preserving, pickling and candying. Then you can give zucchini to your friends for Christmas. Steve Skinner nearly went out of his gourd when he heard that these fruits we treat like vegetables are actually swollen ovaries of the zucchini flower. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.  

The judge, jury and executioner made the decision. The sentence: Death. Death by car. Death head-on. Fast death. Famous killer.The judge decided that the members of the defense team were all the same. They deserved the same fate. If he could have wielded more power, he would have sentenced them all to death and then followed through.But the only power he had was the power that was handed to him, like so many other young American kids. This self-proclaimed judge had free access to fast cars, weapons, freedom of speech, freedom of movement and freedom to believe, believe, believe. Like so many of us, he ultimately had the freedom to do whatever he wanted, however bad that may be.Heather Heyer was one of the guilty party. Her crime was standing in the wrong place at the wrong time with the right message. She was walking a crowded street in Charlottesville, Va., peacefully saying “No Place for Hate” to a group of misguided, maniacal haters who felt umbrage, outrage, righteous anger and self-entitlement.“Alt-right” demonstrators were protesting the planned removal of a statue honoring Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee. Counter-demonstrators were protesting the message of the protesters.The judge saw his opportunity: a cluster of guilty, sanctimonious protesters with the gall to challenge his right to free speech and all that he held dear. He would make them understand.The seas parted in front of Heather, and the judge came roaring in with his 4,226-pound Dodge Challenger, pedal to the metal. The American muscle car can reach 60 mph in 4.4 seconds. The front end of the speeding car rammed Heather and 19 others before backing away and escaping in a hurry. Heather Heyer died.That could have been me standing there, my daughter or my friend. Maybe it could have been you, your daughter or your friend.Heather Heyer died for the rest of us. She died saying what so many of us think when confronted by racist hate. She said, “No way!”Saturday was a lovely day in Charlottesville. Temperatures got into the 80s. There were some passing clouds. A sprinkle of rain was reported in the area.Heather could have gone birdwatching in Shenandoah National Park. She could have been strolling the peaceful grounds of Monticello, home of Thomas Jefferson’s former living quarters.Instead, Heather Heyer and a crowd of her neighbors spent that day responding to an urgent situation in their neighborhood. A “Unite the Right” rally was in town and people were gathering to protest. They had guns, body armor, hate. They were united in the desire to do battle both ideological and physical.“If you knew Heather, you would know that she loves everyone, and all she wants is equality for everyone, no matter who you love, no matter what color you are,” her close friend Marissa Blair said in the aftermath.I’m with Heather.Frankly I was shocked seeing these hate groups all in one place. The Charlottesville Police Department was apparently expecting 2,000 to 6,000 attendees at the rally. Where were their mothers? Which country were they defending? Why were they carrying weapons and torches? And why in the world were they so angry?They already had everything in the world a racial supremacist could want.Our great country allows people the freedom to be righteous fools. That was on display Saturday on the streets of Charlottesville. Media images of the Unite the Righters makes them look larger than they are. The world watches in horror at this behavior. Our country was once the moral compass of the world and is now swiftly becoming the moral morass of the world.As common sense flies backward in a new political wind, we must once again fight for civil rights, women’s rights, environmental justice, peace and civility.We will all have to take up our “No Place for Hate” signs and stand on the street, vulnerable fodder for the loose cannons of free, angry young men. Going out there means that we, too, are ready to die. Because it really could happen, fast and furious.Thank you, Heather Heyer, for taking one for the team. Thank you to the 19 others who fell beneath the wheels of the judge on Saturday. Thanks to those who changed their plans that day, deciding to stand together with one voice against the fiercely senseless and shrill voices of hate.To say Heather Heyer was a professional and a caring active member of her community does not scratch the surface of who she was.“This is our city. We work here. We live here. And we didn’t want neo-Nazis and alt-right and racists to come into our city and think they could spread freely their hate and their bigotry and their racism. We wanted to let them know that we were about love, that we would overpower them … We were peacefully protesting and we were just standing up for what we believe in … And that’s what Heather stood for. That’s why she was out there, that’s why we were out there,” Blair said on CNN.On Sunday there were rallies and protests in Seattle, Wash. My daughter would likely be out there. I saw footage of violent anger. In the background on the corner of the street stood a man with his elementary school-aged daughter. They were standing there for you and me. They were sitting ducks.Steve Skinner sees that we must stand together. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.

by Steve Skinner, Aspen Daily News Columnist   Friday, August 4, 2017     These days I’m into a mix of local trails. Call it a trail mix. Someone has to get out there and mix it up with the bushes, grasses and moose. Why not me?   The best part about the local woods at this time of year is that there are edibles everywhere. While a lot of the state is looking for edibles in marijuana dispensaries, some of us have been finding them along the trails.   Causes and conditions of weather, soil, luck and sunshine have conspired to provide us with a bumper crop of serviceberries this season. This purple bush fruit has been slowing down my walks as I pause to peruse, pick and plant plump berries onto my willing taste buds.   Sweet. Juicy.   The serviceberries are the star of the show. There are enough of the plentiful, purple juice sacks along the trail to share with humans and bears or I wouldn’t be writing about them. I’d keep a silly gooseberry secret.   There are tons of fruits on the vine, and we can’t possibly eat them all.   Gooseberry health benefits? Of course.   According to reliable internet sources gooseberries are low in calories. A 100-gram bowl of berries adds only 44 calories to your body, which you will burn off picking the darkest and best berries … always found on the highest branches of the shrub, just out of reach. The caloric intake of that bowl of berries represents just 2.7 percent of a human’s recommended daily donuts allowance.   That same 100 grams of nectar include 46 percent of our recommended daily intake of vitamin C. Most would agree that this is much better than getting C from a tart, chewable vitamin disc, prepared in a factory using chemically synthesized vitamin powder. (They do taste good, though, yes?)   Serviceberries are moderately packed with scientific stuff like flavones and anthocyanins, compounds which help with the little stuff like inflammation, neurological disease, cancer and getting old. They are pretty good antioxidants as well.   It’s easy to put them down. You can miss the tall bushes right along the trail but don’t walk past the serviceberries. Bring a baggie and pack some out. If you are going to make them into a pie, some say you should pick the green fruits. Some recipes call for skinning the little devils but that hardly seems necessary — it’s all delish. Experiment!   Warning: There are poisonous berries out on the trail, too. Please don’t blame me if you mistake Death Camas for gooseberry. By the same token I cannot be held responsible for people downing a handful of delicious-looking but poisonous red honeysuckle berries instead of mild and juicy gooseberries. You have to know what to look for!   Alongside the serviceberries on the trail today you will find a few currants (related to gooseberries) and some little tiny raspberries and strawberries that are packed with more flavor than a Jolly Rancher. Many of these nectar pods are growing close to the ground. The true hunter will sometimes bend down low to spy the micro-strawberries hiding shyly in the shade of the foliage. They may appear too small to pick, but there’s more natural flavor in one of these than you will find in a whole plastic container full of massive, wooden strawberries grown on factory farms. Once you go natural you won’t want to go back.   Another low-hanging fruit you can forage for now is the too-good-to-be-true thimbleberry. Unless people are sure of what they are getting, they may avoid the thimbleberry. In all honesty the plant and fruit looks so good that it must be poisonous. Maybe this fear explains why there are so many of them within arm’s reach on many local trails.   Thimbleberries look kind of like raspberries, but they stand up on tall vine bushes that have no thorns. The juicy fruits are fragile and often fall apart on red-stained fingers. They don’t travel well so it’s best to eat them on the trail.   According to womenfitness.com thimbleberries are beneficial to digestion. According to folk medicine, baby thimbleberry shoots can be dried and used to help stop diarrhea (although nothing works for that better than Immodium A-D).   These occasional rains we are getting now makes it almost certain that berry season will linger on. Some stuff is just getting going. Putting a little trail mix into your daily diet may have health benefits beyond just walking. Watch for bears and berries, and enjoy happy picking, pecking, perusing and popping!   Steve Skinner hopes to see you out there having a berry good time. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.   Published in the Aspen Daily News July 25, 2017

What's up with David Aguilar? (Featuring "Justice Day," and "Secret Rendexvous," performed by David Aguilar and Chocolate Watchband) Author, Artist, musician and enrichment lecturer, David A. Aguilar. AGUILAR is the past Director of Science Information and Public Outreach at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts as well as a naturalist, astronomer, author and space artist. He was member of the Hubble Space Telescope repair team; & past Marketing Director for PBS’s Emmy-winning 7-part NOVA series, Evolution. While at Harvard he hosted the popular Observatory Nights’ series, “Everything I Know About Science – I Learned At The Movies!”.  In 2015, he directed NASA’s New Horizons Mission special media team on the historic Pluto Flyby Mission.   He is author and illustrator of seven National Geographic and three Random House books on astronomy including this year's smash:  "Cosmic Catastrophes- 7 Ways to Destroy a Planet Like Earth". His new book called, "7 Wonders of the Solar System"  - details a wondrous celestial journey through our own solar system. David is also a member of the San Francisco psychedelic garage rock band, the Chocolate Watchband. The band formed in Los Altos, California in 1965 and continues to play live and release albums.    

What the hell is going on? Why do people say, “what?” all the time now. I used to think it was cute. But not any more. It's what's driving me crazy.   I just spent a week with my mom, who I love very much. But she has a horrible habit of saying “what?” every time I say something. She has an excuse. She's 83. But half the time she just says it out of habit. If I wait for what I said to sink in before I repeat it, she often responds as though she heard me, even though she already said, “what?”   I just spent a week in close proximity with a pal of mine and I'll be damned if he doesn't do the exact same thing as my mom. My sentence isn't even halfway out of my mouth and he's already drooling, “whaaaat?” like he's in a trance. He has NO EXCUSE. He's in his '40s and can hear just fine. It may be passive aggressive behavior or maybe he doesn't realize it. On day seven I finally looked him firmly in the eye and asked him, “Can you not hear me?”   Asking “what?” is either meant to annoy or a sure sign that someone is not listening to your words.   I used to use “what?” a lot to exclaim incredulity. For instance when a friend gets a particularly good hand at cribbage, I might exclaim, “”what?!” Or when I see a dazzling sunset out of the corner of my eye or a particularly round and magnificent afro I might say it under my breath.   Now everyone is doing it for this purpose so naturally I'm trying to avoid it. “What?,” has become the new “right?” which was very popular right up until, “what?” took over. If you listen closely you will still hear plenty of “right?s” but I hardly notice them any more.   People have been using “right?” for years now to let you know that they agree with you and to pretend that they are actually listening when they are really not. It happens when someone is half listening while checking a text or checking to see if anyone liked their latest Facebook post. OMG we are so lame.   But “what?” is hot right now. You will see it on TV game shows and competitive cooking shows.   Of course teenagers own it now but even the youngest kids have learned it and now four-year-olds are repeating it back to their parents, delightfully driving them crazy.   “Buttercup, eat your organic, kale cumin potato salad or you won't be able to have a non-dairy, gluten-free, sugar-free, homemade bran muffin.”   “What?”   Back when I was a kid my dad would read the paper at the breakfast table before going to work. My mom would often interrupt his reading with some comment about a neighbor or a bit of gossip.   His consistent response was a distracted, “Is that right?,” which I still use to this day. Mom never seemed to notice but I did and remain sensitive to such communication styles.   Just before writing this I was talking to a long lost friend on the cell phone. We hadn't talked in a while. He sounds very distracted every time we talk on the phone and the smart smart phone just invites a distracted participant to say, “what?” all the fucking time. I was already very sensitive to this nonsense so in this instance I blamed it on the reception and said we would have to catch up in person. I find that I'm wasting my life repeating myself all the time and I'm a professional communicator.   With “what?” we have certainly reached a new low. And you thought that “WTF” was bad. It is but “what?” is worse.   Now that I think of it, the original television series, “24” made “what?” the centerpiece of their program. The leading protagonist, Jack Bauer, played by actor Kiefer Sutherland used “what?” artfully. He'd be in a quiet hallway with the bad guys storming up right behind, whispering instructions into his smart phone back to headquarters ...   “I need the schematics for the LAPD station downtown. I have thirty seconds to defuse the bomb before LA is nuked.”   You already guessed it. The alert agent on the other end of the phone whose only job is to listen and to respond to this emergency only has one thing to say ... “What?”   This was a maddening thing to watch but it sure built suspense and tension and the show was a big hit.   Steve Skinner wants a dollar for every non-essential “what?” that he has had to endure. He thinks listening is a lost art. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.        

  There's power in that flower  - End song, "Shimmer," by Riley Mae Skinner   You'd have to be living under a rock not to have noticed. Things are popping out all over! Even if you are living under a rock you'd probably notice the green shoots and colorful blooms chorusing right outside your stone. Spring is the right name for it.   I definitely like going out into the local woods looking for berries, mushrooms and any edible plants that present themselves.   Right now it's dandelion season. There are several varieties of these wonderful taraxacum officinale from the asteraceae family. There's the common American lawn dandelion to the more exotic Norwegian dandelion.   Dandelions spring up on every continent on earth. When we get to mars, it would not shock me if the red planet was covered in dandelions.   Dandelions are like wolves. They get a bad rap from humans. People love to hate them even though they are wild, beneficial, beautiful, and in the case of the dandelion, bountiful.   Everybody knows that dandelions are fun to play with. You can put them in your hair or your lapel. You can make the stem into a flute. You can give them to a friend. You can hunt them early and make daisy chains or you can look for the mature white puffballs containing hundreds of dandy little seed umbrellas that catch the wind and soar or snag on the coat of a meerkat and get dropped in a distant meadow. Sometimes critters even poop out the seeds.   And just like the common grey wolf we Americans have done our best to eradicate one of nature's most profoundly wonderful creations, in this case the humble dandelion.   You can eat dandelions. I hear you. You are saying right now, “yeah, but why would I?”   Health benefits, that's why.   Apparently dandelions are strong medicine. The Latin roots to the flower's name means something like “the official remedy for all that ails ya.” What if someone develops a dandelion addiction? There's good news for those of us who exhibit addictive personality traits. Even though they are potent, you can't really OD.   The leaves are really good for your kidneys and the roots work magic on your liver. Need to cleanse and clean and clear your accumulated toxins? You know you want to. Try some dandelion leaves in your salad and make a tea out of the roots. This will cleanse you without all those side effects you hear about on TV.   I'll be the first to admit that taraxacum officinale tastes a little bitter. So if you just pop one in your mouth on the trail you might not like it. But you won't get sick. Experts say that you can eat any part but the young leaves and the roots are where the nectar is.   The bitterness is just the kind of thing that some people like. I'm not a huge fan of arugula but if it gets the right treatment the bitterness is a benefit. Everyone knows that ranch dressing makes pretty much anything taste great. But the pickers, picklers and planters that I know would never stoop to smothering their dandelions in ranch. It's not done. Try a nice vinegar and oil.   Last year at Dandelion Day in Carbondale someone was serving dandelion fritters. She dipped the flowers in some savory pancake batter and fried them on an iron skillet until brown. Now we're eating them like this at home. Serve warm. Kind of like sushi, you want to put the whole golden browned head in your mouth at once so you don't make a mess.   There's a retired doctor in Carbondale who makes a kick ass beer from using dandelions. They call him “Doctor Dandelion.” I am probably not the best judge of microbrews but his stew tastes pretty good to me. I am don't know if drinking dandelion brew has health benefits but it would not surprise me if you lost weight from drinking buckets of this very effective diuretic.   History tells us that dandelions were brought over intentionally on the Mayflower for making medicine and wine. The founding mothers and fathers knew that dandelions were good for their constitutions.   Dandelions are a good thing to add to a salad. Mix them up with some other wild greens and add some sweet flowers and berries to counter the bitterness. Bacon bits will add that savory richness if you really need it.   Dandelions can be included in pesto. You can find enough ingredients right here to do the whole deal. Pine nuts, dandelion greens and mint make a solid base—then get creative.   Whatever you do, don't dismiss the dandelion. Look at things from worm level and you will see some beautiful flowers and big bumblebees.   Steve Skinner want to plant one on you. He thanks author Laurel Dewey for her magnificent books, which provided some of the source material for this article. Reach Steve at nigel@soipris.net.          

  Today I'm talking with John Bruna, a counselor, educator, mindfulness and dharma teacher. In 1984 John had an experience that transformed his life and motivated him to live a life of service. John has had careers in counseling, primarily as a substance abuse counselor, and in education as a teacher in a low-income, urban high school.   In 2001 John found his spiritual teacher, Venerable Geshe Tsultim Gyeltsen, and, in 2005, traveled to India to be ordained as a Buddhist monk in the Tibetan Geluk tradition. After more than six years of monastic life, John returned to life as a layperson. Drawing upon his education, training, diverse life experience and his humor, John has dedicated his life to helping others overcome their personal obstacles and challenges. He facilitates a variety of workshops and public talks.   Find out more at wocompassion.org. Reach Steve Skinner at nigel@sopris.net.  

I talk weed with Parks Thomson from Fraser, Colorado. I met Parks the first day I hit Winter Park. He owns Rocky Mountain Roastery, a coffee shop right under radio station KFFR where I have been doing some work lately. He is a marijuana enthusiast and former pro skier. His friend and professional mariuana extractor, Matt Errico joins us halfway through the program. I recorded this interview at KFFR on Sunday, May 7, 2017.  

Frank Martin is a quadruple threat. He sings. He plays guitars and mandolins. He writes songs. He is an octopus with fingers flyings in all directions.   Frank's four-way skill set empowers him to be one of the best musicians in the valley.   Right here, right now, in this Roaring Fork Valley, as consumers of great music, our cup runneth over. Frank Martin has just refilled it with a new recording called, “Blue on Blue on Blue.”   I've taken a few slugs from Frank Martin's spanking new album, It's Americana, gospel, blues, folk and rock, stories and soul. I'm still standing but the music is strong. I find it quite tasty and mildly intoxicating. When I mentioned to him that I found his sound firmly planted in Americana he seemed surprised.   “It is?”   The visuals that Frank plants in his music with lyric and melody add a deep dimension to the listening experience. He takes you places. Each of the nine tracks on the record fit together like layers of cake. What holds things together is Martin's plaintive singing and colorful lyrics.   “The wake peels off of the back of the ferry shot pure white like a waterfall Shallow waves curl into the glimmer and disappear from view Layers of mountains rim the sea receding into salt air and sky We stand together in the wind and take it in Blue on blue on blue”   Words like these served over a bed of urgent acoustic guitar strumming takes you to the moment on the water with sun slanting and shimmering. You can feel the wind and hear the lonely mystery of the distant mountains.   Lyrically, the tunes on the new album cover quite a bit of geographic territory from Alaska to Montana to Wyoming to Glenwood Springs and places in between, beyond and before.   And here comes Frank Martin's guitar and he's better than ever. He is a master of the volume knob making the Stratocaster weep and cry like a lap steel. His mandolin is crisp and the acoustic guitars are bright and snappy.   How does someone like Frank Martin know when he's in the zone?   “I know I'm in the zone as a guitar player when I'm watching my hands and I have no idea what they're doing. I'm like, 'Go Ahead!'”   “I'm almost hitting my prime. And I just totally feel that way about where I'm at as a player these days and as a singer,” he told me.   That's not bragging it's just the way it is.   Frank Martin comes from a musical family. His sisters played cello and piano. His mom played violin for the Colorado Springs symphony and his dad sang in a choir. The family musical inspiration and influence is steeped into in this new album.   This recording was locally hatched at Cool Brick Studios in Carbondale. Frank handed some creative control over to owner/chef Dave Taylor who produced, engineered and mixed the new recording.   Frank brought in some great local players to help him fill things up to the brim. The cast includes Aaron Taylor, William Brown, Vid Weatherwax, Ross Kribbs, Sophia Clark, Olivia Pevcc and Dale Loper. This project is a local collaboration and a labor of love.   Martin has some new material and a bag of country songs he wants to open in the near future.   I sat in Frank's kitchen and he played me a couple of tunes including a new one about dry land farming.   The chorus sticks in my head.   “Thunderstorms roll like dice Over parcels and the range Dry land farming Waiting on the rain”   Frank Martin is not resting on his laurels. He has been entertaining and writing and performing in the valley since the early 1980s. He will be out this summer supporting his new album and performing with Dan Rosenthal on drums and Dan Whitney on bass. It's a quadruple threat in a three-piece band.   You can catch him at the Carbondale Mountain Fair and at various venues including the Glenwood Farmer's Market.   Find Frank Martin's music and schedule at frankmartinmusic.com.   To hear an interview and live music from Frank Martin go to steveskinner.podbean.com.   Reach Steve Skinner at nigel@sopris.net.  

I love this guy. Of all my friends and associates Jim is one of the most exotic. He makes really big bucks and then he makes a really big difference in the local community and the world by giving it all away to the right causes. Generosity is one of the noblest and most satisfying pursuits for all of us as is evident in this conversation with Jim Calaway. He lives with his wife, Connie, his dog Lacey and his cat Jazzy in a modest house in Carbondale, Colorado. He is surrounded by friends and dignitaries that love and appreciate his company. I am happy to be in Jim's circle of friends. Photo of Jim and Connie and Lacy Calaway: CMC Foundation   Original theme by Steve Skinner. Performed by Steve Skinner. Louie Girardot plays bass.

Have another hit … of Avermectin residue   Welcome cannabis enthusiasts. Welcome to Aspen in the beautiful state of Colorado. We finally have some snow now ... and since 2012 ... legal recreational weed!   Welcome vaporizers, lollipop lickers, bongers and blunters. We have the drinks, the drops, the candy the buds, the kief and the bubble hash. It's all here for you. We have warehouses full of Mary Jane budding and blooming in the area right now. Get your “Sour Diesel,” “Strawberry Cough,” “Blue Dream” and “Chemdog.” No waiting.   Marijuana is a pervasive industry providing jobs, infrastructure investments, taxes and tourist dollars to the state. When you look past the bud counter you will see that it is raining money. Make sure that your umbrella is upside down.   In the old days, when Aspen had a lot of hippies and hipsters, local police took a laid back approach to weed, which was good. Now it's legal the police don't have to worry too much, unless your rental car is so fogged up with bong juice that the police can't see who's driving.   I supported legalization. I voted for it. If someone wants to grow some plants in the yard, let them. Let the sun come down and let the water drip in and let the photosynthesis happen. It's only natural.   Here in the valley, jars full of super strong nuggets are available in many casual retail environments. As you gawk at the products you might wonder how did those buds end up looking like that? They are beautiful! They are so big and hard and hairy and enticing and smelly. The nugs of chronic in every jar look like centerfolds from High Times magazine. Welcome.   The thing is, commercial growers have figured out how to grow wonderbud very quickly. Environmental conditions at large grows are strictly controlled. They know how much to fertilize, how much fungicide to use, which insect control chemicals work best and which minerals and other ingredients make the buds grow fat and sticky. If fat and sticky is what you want, there are many shelves for you here.   Don't get me wrong. I want everyone to have a good time.   I'm just surprised when I see the labels on dispensary pot canisters. The ingredient list on these labels is a mile long. The type on the list is so small that I have to use my strongest reading glasses just to see them. I see more than 35 ingredients. There's no way I could pronounce them all. It's chemical mumbo jumbo!   Some of the ingredients listed on these labels are product names, so you really have no idea what is in your whacky tabacci.   Agromineral 72? What the hell is that? Probably a mineral concentrate and biostimulant but I cannot find the listed ingredient anywhere in cyberspace as it is listed on the weed label I am looking at now.   I saw a label from a Denver dispensary listing stuff like Spiromesifin in its “ingredients used in production” label. Spiromesifin a mite killer. Might be a mighty strong might killer.   In June a marijuana cultivation business in Denver recalled all their products after discovering unsafe levels of pesticide residues in everything they make.   I'm not saying that the weed you buy locally has any such chemicals. I'm certain that the list that you see on that $15 doobie are as benign as a banana. Well, pretty sure.   Big money spoils everything.   In October of this year the appropriately named, “Tree of Wellness” store in Colorado Springs and Colorado cannabis provider recalled products statewide that, according to the Denver Health Department, contained Spiromesifin, Myclobutanil, Spinosun and Avermectin.   Nothing says, “Let's Party!” like vaporizing Myclobutanil residue.   Oh well, I can't hope to keep up with the times.   In the good old days the neighbor grew a few plants in the compost pile outside. You could take a puff and still ski down S-1. Even though his plants grew high and thick, I'm pretty sure Joe wasn't adding molybdenum.   I discovered that Sodium Molybdate is a good source of molybdenum and another ingredient you will see on some commercial bud labels. According to Wikipedia, the agriculture industry uses one million pounds of Sodium Molybdate per year as fertilizer. Everyone's doing it. Must be safe.   Commercial growers want stuff that grows as fast, fat and as finished as possible. They use ingredients and growing conditions that maximize the potential and potency. It's science.   Have these combinations been tested on lab rats? Or are they just par for the course like a lot of the commercial produce we consume?   Go to the grocery store. The biggest bell pepper is not always the best, right?   Thank the cannigods that recreational weed is now legal in California, Nevada, Maine and Massachusetts. The more the merrier. Now maybe everyone won't have move to Colorado just to smoke weed. I don't have anything against smoking weed. I'd just hate to see Colorado get too popular, or should I say “potular?”   I know. I know. “Everybody must get stoned.” I'm not complaining.   I just never knew that they could get that many ingredients into a bong hit.   Steve Skinner thinks you should pay extra for the organic stuff. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.   Photo of Dead Bob by Steve Skinner. Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com        

  Face the danger and pull away The simple act of rowing a boat is not that simple. Just like other life skills rowing starts off as something challenging but becomes easier the more you do it.   You'll need a boat, a pair of oars and a willing pilot.   I recommend the most simple rowing setup, which also happens to be the most efficient. Equipment should be of the highest quality with features for performance and durability. Don't skimp. You can't have things bending, popping or snapping when you are rounding the corner to “Crystal Rapid” in the Grand Canyon or approaching the fearsome “Satan's Seat” in Cataract Canyon.   You don't need the add ons, which can add on cost. Don't heed the salesman peddling oar rights and oar tethers, pins and clips. Straps and other entanglements can trip you up. No offense to folks utilizing these and other expensive appendages. They are designed to help us learn to row but can restrict the us from enjoying all the options.   You want to be able to ship the oars (pull them in easily) and feather the oars (turn them at any angle, freely). This way oarsmen may apply skill and nuance to their strokes. Can you stand and row? Can you jump to the other side of the rowing cage and row that way?   You can row forward and you can row backward. That's it. Of course you can row forward on one side and back on the other. Or you can row back on one side and not row at all on the other. You can row harder on the left than the right. There are countless variations of going backwards and forwards at the same time (or not). Understanding these variations and internalizing the moves is key to success.   (This may be my favorite rafting photo.) Sitting on the boat with Tiki Girl and Brian Burron. Not sure who is rowing and took the photo. Rowing back means putting your feet on the foot bar, tipping the oar blades out of the water, reaching forward, dipping the oar blades back in the water and then leaning and pulling back. Rowing forward is the opposite.   It's important to row in your power range. Use your whole body and keep it all in front of you. Oars should be close together, almost touching. You should have a foot bar for digging in on backstrokes. You should be able to row without bumping into anything.   Rowing forward is a good way to see where you are going while rowing backwards is a better way to get where you are going. So, if you look ahead and anticipate curves and hazards you can push forward most of the time. But move early using the angle and tracking of the boat to position yourself. Save the backstrokes for the more urgent situations.   The angle of the boat in the current is quite influential. This is called ferry angle. The more angle you have, the faster you can row across a river. Watch it! A sharp ferry angle in rapids is a good way to flip a boat or jam an oar. Ferry angles are helpful but hazardous.   You want to avoid using too much ferry angle, especially when approaching rocks at the last minute. Shouting expletives and whipping the oars about while trying to avoid a sleeper rock unsettles the crew. Wrapping is possible. Extreme maneuvers are good to know, but best avoided.   If you find yourself approaching danger faster than you'd like, face the danger and pull away. Pull. This may mean rowing against the current. Make it your rowing mantra: face the danger and pull away. Pull. Even if you have to spin the boat around to position it for pulling, do it. Pushing doesn't work.   Going to hit the bank? Coming up too fast on a kayak? About to go over the falls? Face the danger and pull, even if it means turning around. Just like life, it's almost never too late to realize you are going the wrong way and turn around.   You don't want to wear yourself out by rowing unnecessarily or by compensating for wrong rowing. Sudden course corrections can take a lot more effort than having your boat in the right position in the first place. Anticipation is the goal. If you have a lot of miles to cover, moving the raft into position early will pay off in the long run.   Wind can wreak havoc. For winds gusting over 30 miles per hour pull in umbrella and stow drinks and loose clothing, unless it is a downstream breeze, which it never is. In a fierce gale try to anchor on shore where you can tie off and enjoy a drink. Being blown helplessly upstream while your stuff is blowing into the river is disheartening.   On windy days look for a bubble line in the water: that's the current. You can also look for slick spaces in choppy wind blown water. That's the current. Follow the bubbles and the slicks. To proceed forward you may have keep your oars shallow and you may need to feather them as you pull them out of the water. And, if need be, you can turn your back to the wind and pull.   If your boat is set up right, you can add “power assist” adding a friend. Have them sit opposite you and grip inside the handles. They should push or pull gently. Your assistant shouldn't overpower your moves. There can be only one captain at a time.   A last resort in the wind is firing up a little four stroke motor, otherwise known as a “black oar.” A tiller extender lets you stay in your comfy seat and sip a beverage while steering and keeping a steady pace. Have some chapstick handy because you can dry out like a leather sack out there, especially while you are motoring past the others in a relentless headwind.   Reach Steve Skinner at nigel@sopris.net.   Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com    

I head to Arizona to hang out with notorious river runner, Katie Lee. Katie remembers her first run of the Grand Canyon in 1953 and so much more. This is a rare opportunity to reminisce with the one and only Katie Lee. Recorded March 21, 2017 in Jerome, Arizona.  Katie protests at the Glen Canyon Dam in 2000 - Steve Skinner photo. Driftwood for real - Courtesy Katie Lee   Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com

If I were younger I'd tell you now that I am being raised by coyotes. I guess, now that I'm so much older, I am living with coyotes, but still learning, nonetheless.   Native Americans, all the way back to the Myth Age, spoke of the trickster coyote, who knew human nature and invented copulation. Coyote apparently told the first lie when he told God that he was not laughing. Clearly he was laughing.   Coyote was always portrayed as a “he” and he could appear as a human if he wanted. From the descriptions I've read he could pass for a winter tourist in a fur coat in Aspen. Navajo legend says that coyote looked like a man in a “hairy coat, lined with white fur that fell to his knees and was belted at the waist.” We've all seen that guy in town.   The Atka Lakota Museum and Cultural Center warns kids and adults not to behave like the coyotes behave in the stories.   Think coyotes look like wolves? You are right about that. Their closest relative is the grey wolf and yes, coyotes have been known to copulate with grey wolves offspringing the feared “coywolves.”   I think the coyotes in my neighborhood have been copulating lately because they seem to be wherever they want, whenever they want, all over the place, all the time. They set up a pack and they don't care who knows it.   I figure that since we are neighbors I should get to know them.   When I walk out the front door in the morning, they are out there yipping in the meadow across the river. I close my eyes at night and awake to one giggling from right outside the window, seemingly communicating directly with my dog.   Chooch used to bark and whine when he heard the coyotes but now he listens in silence. I think he's downloading secret instructions for the takeover of humans. Yes, I mean that. Have you seen people with their dogs lately? We are being brainwashed!   On a recent trip to Arizona I saw a coyote that had chased a bobcat up a cottonwood tree. A raven wheeled down to the opposite limb and start croaking and harassing the cat. If the bobcat had fallen 40 feet to the ground the coyote would have pounced on it and the bird would get a free meal. I watched this teamwork unfold for about fifteen minutes then had to pull myself away.   I wonder what happened. Did the cat (she) wait long enough for the tricky coyote to get bored and leave? Did she land a swipe on the raven? Or did the raven manage to throw the big cat off balance and into the waiting jaws of the coyote? This is the stuff of modern legend.   Most likely, the coyote ended up giving the bite-and-shake treatment to the bobcat. This is the same treatment that our domesticated dogs give to various toys, shoes and pillows. Even though coyotes and bobcats weigh about the same, they rarely go mano y mano. Research indicates that where coyote and bobcat territories overlap, bobcat populations decline. Bite-and-shake. Coyote: one. Bobcat: zero.   I've been trying to tell my 20 pound shelter mutt that he is not a coyote and that he needs to stay back. Hopefully he's listening to me and not to them.   The coyote diet is 90 percent meat. This includes everything from deer to rattlesnakes. Yes, rattlesnakes. Coyote teases the snake. When the snake stretches out, tricky coyote bites the head and, you guessed it, snaps and shakes it to death. Then coyote eats the snake.   Wow, coyotes really are like people.   In the book “Mammals in Kansas,” by Bee James, coyotes are described as the most vocal of all North American mammals. We've all heard them. Sometimes spooky, sometimes funny and sometimes, oddly comforting. At least for me. Coyotes sound alarms, greet friends and lovers and make noisy contact.   They use one of their their yips for a kind of elaborate greeting ceremony and for when pups are playing. When I hear the happy yips I like to think they are having a good time over there, being left alone and doing coyote things.   Folks in the big city don't always notice coyotes. I have been seeing and hearing them for years around here and am glad they are part of the mix of people and wild things. They tolerate us and keep themselves under the radar. They are not prying open bear proof trash cans and breaking into kitchens at night. They do however sometimes take down household pets so be wary of that trickster coyote.   The Navajos say that the coyote taught humans how to protect themselves from physical danger. How did he do it? He would hide his vital parts in the tip of his tail. Tricky!   “Human kind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it! Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect!”-Chief Seattle   Steve Skinner feels bound to the coyote. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.   Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com      

    I'm lucky to be here right now. I probably shouldn't be. I should probably be dead.   Dead from so many potential things. Yet I stand on a new day.   I suspect the same goes for you, dear reader. We've all had close calls. We've all run the gamut in one form or another.   Sure we've come a long way since swinging around in the treetops. Our life expectancy has gone from about 18 years in 2000 BC to around 78.74 now. But even in our highly evolved state our fragility makes us vulnerable to the smallest and biggest things.   Yes, consuming today's modern diet has pickled us and held off the diseases a bit but even an act as innocent as eating can take us down. Just last weekend I almost bit off more than I could chew and was wondering who at the party I should start gesticulating to, desperately needing the Heimlich maneuver pronto. But I swallowed and got away with it.   Aspen should certainly have gotten me by now but I have dodged all those bullets … the avalanches, the slips on the ice, the near misses on the highway, the overindulgences, the flights out of Sardy Field, etc.   In Buddhism they constantly remind us that we are all going to die. No one knows how or when but it's something we all share. This reminder is designed to scare us into appreciating this very moment that we have right now because every thing else is uncertain at best and potentially perilous at worst. Breathe.   So, if I had to come up with a New Year's resolution it would be to notice and appreciate that my fragile water sac continues to function at a fairly high level, despite my best efforts to extinguish it. Forget the nagging psoas major muscle. I'm alive. That very muscle nearly dragged me into the grave almost a year ago but now it's there to remind me to stretch, get to work, breathe and appreciate.   Even in the bosom of Aspen, danger lurks.   Back in the day I went out of bounds with a gang of gung-ho Japanese sushi chefs. These guys partied hard every night and skied even harder almost every day. Only one of our group of about seven was a really solid expert skier. The rest of them made up for their lack of skill with a determination to float powder turns that you don't find in most foreign relations.   That day I led the pack in hotdogging down the out of bounds terrain below Steeplechase on Aspen Highlands. I greedily sprang from the trees onto a lovely unblemished stretch of steep and deep, keeping my head quiet and my shoulders straight down the fall line, making constant sweeping turns. The 207 cm giant slalom skis dug in and then floated out in a familiar and wonderful rhythm.   Then I heard and felt a low rumbling. Avalanche! I dove into a tight patch of Aspens and blasted chest first into an stiff pillar of wood and bark, safe from the slide but hurt in the unforgiving embrace of a tree. My wind was gone. My ribs were cracked. But my friends were safely above the path of the chute. Snow boulders the size of Volkswagen Beetles and as hard as concrete slabs littered the slope. I could have been killed!   My chefs did not really grasp the gravity of the situation and continued cutting up any open slope they could find, down to the road. I think they call it blissful unawareness. I was limping out and counting my blessings.   Last year we only had five deaths from avalanches here in Colorado. Recent history shows that we had 12 deaths in 1993 and 11 in 2013, so five is kind of a low number, unless you are one of the five. It's rare to have a season in Colorado with no avalanche deaths. We are all pretty safe in bounds but these are days of extreme sport. Staying in bounds is like a bunny hill experience to some of today's extreme skiers and riders.   Most of us have a pretty cavalier attitude about getting in a motor vehicle, either as a passenger or pilot. Some of us even do it after a few drinks or a few hits of wonderful, legal ganja. Sometimes we add to it a bit of texting or eating a big, dripping burger.   But it's a jungle out there. Statistically we are more likely to be killed on these rural roads than the pavement the city slickers drive. Statewide, in 2016 there were 3,705 highway traffic fatalities. Even when we do everything right … stow the phone … buckle the seat belt … stay sober and drive within the legal limits … there are no guarantees that the other guy or gal is doing the same. You have to watch out for the other guy.   Don't think you are any safer under the covers. People die from house fires, electrocution, TVs falling off the wall and slips in the shower. Living is dangerous.   Just the fact that the stars aligned to put us in this sweet spot in the first place is cause for celebration and appreciation. We are the fortunate ones. But that doesn't make us immune.   Steve Skinner wishes you all the best in 2017. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.   Published 1.3.17 in the Aspen Daily News.   Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com      

Be sure to listen through to the end for one of Katie's great river songs. Read her and weep by Steve Skinner, Aspen Daily News Columnist   I admit it. I am a little bit nervous. Imagine getting a chance to spend some time with a really big rock star and you’d probably be nervous, too. I’m not bragging here. Just because I know a couple of really big rock stars, they can still make me nervous.   I know you are wondering … who is it? Jimmy Page? Mick Jagger? Joan Jett? Meatloaf? Beyonce?   Not that kind of rock, silly. I’m talking Navaho sandstone, Wingate sandstone, bluffs, buttes and beaches. Canyons, seeps, silts and serenity. I am of course talking about the one and only river goddess, Katie Lee.   Yes, she is a rock star, a river pioneer of the first order. Katie is a living legend, a sage, bard and beauty. She sings and speaks with a spirit that runs deeper that the Grand Canyon.   Although I’ve known Katie for more than 20 years I want to make sure that when I land in her living room this week that I am at my best, alert to her every utterance and nuance, keen on hearing her stories and capturing them for us all. Katie is into her 90s now and still as sharp as a tumbleweed thorn hidden on a secluded beach in Cataract Canyon.   Katie was an icebreaker. In 1953 she was one of the very first women to boat down the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon. That’s an accomplishment in itself but what is truly remarkable is that she wrote it all down in a stunning journal, capturing the essence and beauty of canyon rivers and the environment from a perspective that none of the men who went before her were able to do.   When I started running rivers in the mid-1990s I fell hard. I was gripped by the silence, the sunshine, the rushing water, the hot sun and the ever changing face of the mysterious river. I’d go out for weeks at a time, sometimes alone. On those solo trips I’d find myself weeping, raw emotion pouring from a well I never knew I had. I could just go outside and be a speck of dust in an ancient landscape that held so many secrets and wonders that they were untouchable.   I read all the river and nature books I could find, sometimes twice. I’d have river maps and whitewater books and nature journals by my bedside. These were my salve, holding closed the wounds of river experience that would never heal over the course of a dark winter. Winter was for surviving and preparing. The rest of the year was for bobbing along.   I became so obsessed that I had to get out on a river every month of the year. I had a few friends that would sometimes go out there with me in the snow and ice but that did not really matter. It was a personal relationship that I had developed with moving water, especially in the bleak embrace of the desert. Going solo gave me the opportunity to let my hair down and I used to have a lot of it. Nothing feels like standing on your cooler with a hot wind blowing through long blonde locks and no one to see you but your maker, who would not judge.   Katie Lee had connections with some of the old school Aspenites, many of whom I got to know through my mother in law, Su Lum. They were artists and writers and adventurers. I took it for granted that I would always have company like this. Of course, many of those fantastic people have passed on now and I have memories that flicker and falter and can sometimes make me sad and forlorn. I can go back and read the words of Hunter S. Thompson but that is a weak substitute for sharing a pipe with him in his kitchen, reading his letters and notes.   But Katie Lee is very much alive and I am bent on hitting the road to Jerome, Arizona to interview her and capture as much of her essence as I can, in her own habitat.   Katie came into a man’s world and utterly exploded the genre of nature and river writing that had been dominated by men, men, men. Like Major Wesley Powell and Wallace Stegner, she wrote about the same stuff that the rest had like history, sandstone, strata, bushes, animals, currents, stars and wind but her heart was smitten and she was very good at understanding and expressing the experience on an emotional level. She was a poet.   Katie was lucky. She found a couple of gentlemen that were seasoned river runners who were willing to escort this lovely television starlet, folksinger and free spirit into places that no one knew. It didn’t take long before Katie had changed the way the boys did their river trips. Katie stopped at every side canyon and explored the mystery of what was around the next curve. She spent more time in the water than out and was not shy about shedding her clothes and sitting in a pothole with a marvelous laugh on her lips.   And, starting with that first trip in 1953, she wrote it all down and took photographs. Otherwise you just wouldn’t be able to believe what she experienced. Causes and conditions led Katie and her friends to explore and understand the magical play land of Glen Canyon like no one else had. They explored and even named many of the side canyons that are now drowned under the still waters of Lake Powell.   She was just getting to know and appreciate the nearly 200 river miles of Indian artifacts, natural wonders and geologic history when she learned that the “Bureau of Wreck the Nation” was getting ready to dam and destroy her natural habitat. This of course broke her heart and transformed her from free spirit to free radical, a diehard opponent of that concrete plug and all it destroyed. I honestly believe that she felt the loss of Glen Canyon the most, because of all that knew the place, she knew it best.   Katie says that when she looks back at that first river journal she was at a loss for words — what a joke! Here’s an except from her June 18, 1953 journal on her second day down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon:   “We talk halfway through the night about life, the river, the canyon, the beautiful places—Toroweap, Nankoweep, Havasu, Shinumo, Thunder River, Matkatamiba, Vishnu, Kwagunt, Deer Creek Falls, the river, geology, star bright sky, the river, people, history, moonlit water, shadow play, riveriveriver … There’s an art gallery in the lower Granite Gorge where the river brings his finest tools of sand and silt to sculpt and polish quixotic, not to mention erotic forms in the granite cliffs—configurations that would make the greatest artist envious.”   That’s from her book, “All My Rivers Are Gone,” a corker of a tale published in 1998. Every word is like a perfect drop of nectar spilling from a spring where you don’t want to miss a drop. Reading it will make you want to drop what you are doing and go cry into the receding waters of Lake Powell.   Soiled appears Tuesdays in the Aspen Daily News. Reach Steve at nigel@sopris.net. Published Tuesday, March 21, 2017   Original theme written by Steve Skinner.   Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com  

  Frank Eriksen was a radio star     by Steve Skinner, Aspen Daily News Columnist.     No one forgets the first time they see Aspen.   When I first saw Aspen it was summer, 1982. I was free as a bird, having just graduated from college. I had “half the car” and about $500 in my pocket. My college roommate and I were driving around the West looking for a place to live, work and ski.   When you are in that state of mind, Aspen pretty much knocks you over. The ski area comes right into town. The Roaring Fork River snakes downvalley. The aspen trees quake in the breeze. Independence Pass is in the back yard.   A scratch deeper showed so much more. The music festival, the live local music scene, the local newspapers, casual celebrities and rock stars, great food and always a party.   Having gotten hooked on radio in college, imagine my delight at discovering an epic radio station in Aspen right in the middle of the dial at 97.7 FM. I say KSPN was epic because it fit my idea of the ideal commercial radio station: Local DJs, local news and sports, live broadcasts, humor, witty talk and really good music. I was naive enough to think that this was how commercial radio was and would always be.   KSPN buzzed. There was a receptionist, several sales people, news reporters, a sports reporter, a music director, a manager, a program director, a production director, live announcers day and night, etc.   I had to work there. And I did. I discovered that it wasn’t hard to get an overnight shift, even five overnights shifts a week. KSPN was my broadcasting school.   Among the formidable talent, one guy really stood out.   Frank Eriksen was a DJ who was fully able to take advantage of the fun, freedom and flexibility of the place. He was funny, fast, professional, unprofessional, irreverent and spontaneous. He drove it like it was stolen, getting away with it all because he had a voice that made you listen. Frank made you listen. There was no not listening to Frank. He had the voice.   Frank passed away in January of this year. Aspen lost an icon.   He was on the air for about 10 years in the ’80s, and he made Aspen a much better place. Frank was a master broadcaster with a sparkling personality.   I started hosting the jazz show on Sundays at 9 p.m. on KSPN. That was my opening. Jazz followed the show “Static,” KSPN’s weekly hour-long talk show. Frank was the host with program director Lee Duncan, local Judge J.E. DeVilbiss and sometimes other local authorities and personalities. They took phone calls from locals. They partied. They laughed.   Frank often made phone calls and took phone calls on the air during his regular show. He would jump on an issue of the day and make it part of the program. He was brilliant and unstoppable.   It was often thrilling to be at KSPN, often because of Frank’s spark. In those days, we broadcast live from the World Cup, the Coors Bicycle Classic, parades and lots of local events. I thought this was normal.   KSPN was led by smart and talented people who had the humility and common sense to realize that the best thing you could do in a live broadcast situation was hand the microphone over to Frank Eriksen. For all intents and purposes, at the time KSPN was the only game in town. Almost everyone in town listened, and we DJs could not go into a club or restaurant without being treated like royalty.   Frank set the bar high, and people in town were lucky and spoiled to have him at their ear-tips. The station suffered a huge blow when it was sold the first time in the mid-80s, but when the station sold again, around 1989, the hammer fell, and the experts from out of town thought they could do better than Frank Eriksen. They let him go, and the townspeople let out a collective groan.   As the voices of anguish rose around his ears, the new morning show host and program director asked me what he should do about the uproar (I think he was from Nebraska).   “Put Frank back” was the only possible answer. But it was too late for that. Everything in town had already changed so much. It was a sad day when Frank packed up his belongings and moved out of Aspen. That was the silent end to a very festive era.   Frank ended up on the Front Range and started his own voice-over company. I would still catch him on various commercials as I scanned the dial on visits to Denver and Boulder. You could not mistake his voice and delivery. Like I said, he made you listen. No matter what the subject, he was smart and you felt smart listening.   I called some of the KSPN posse from the glory days to reminisce about Frank and the station. Duncan was the program director, the morning show host and the guy who hired Frank and, eventually, me. He and Frank were roommates and partners in crime.   Duncan told me a story about doing the morning show with a raging hangover. He opened the window for a little fresh air, put on a long tune and headed to the couch in the hallway. While he was sleeping the record ended. A local cop walked up to the window and put the record on again from the beginning. We were all in town to have a good time, and we helped each other out. That was the culture.   Duncan and Eriksen had their disagreements, but they always made up and stayed friends.   “Humor. His humor was amazing. He was quick. He was really good and he was funny,” Duncan told me.”   Fellow DJ Leigh Anne Lindsey remembers Frank’s power.   “He was completely at ease with people. He was a mountain and you couldn’t rock him,” she said.   “I always wished I could be a fraction as talented as him,” she added.   Thanks to Facebook, Lindsey reconnected and got closer to Eriksen. They toured wine country in California and talked about the challenges and opportunities in each other’s lives.   “He was magical. Mystical. Mysterious. Deep. Thoughtful. Hilarious. He could whip out those quips with that deadpan, straight-faced, hooded-eyes look. Then chuckle with his whole body and soul when he either saw you laugh, or take him too seriously. You’d see that slim grin appear. You had to be careful around Frank because you never really knew when he was serious. Or not. (It wasn’t easy for me because he had the knack for catching me off-guard because I’d think he was telling me the truth when — nah. Just jokin ;-) .”   That pretty much says it. That was Frank.   I know I speak for a lot of us when I say that the legendary Frank Eriksen lives on in our fondest memories of Aspen. For a while he was the absolute star of a vibrant and vital local radio station. He should be in the Aspen Hall of Fame. His voice echoes on in our hearts.   Steve Skinner didn’t realize at the time that those were going to be the good old days. Reach him at nigel@sopris.net.   Original theme by Steve Skinner.   Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com

Generally speaking - Aspen Daily News 3.28.17   Generally speaking it would be nice to see some forward progress around here.   It seems like we are back in the the era of “I got mine, Y'all get Yallzes.”   For example, in general, the USA should err on the side of caution when it comes to the environment.   Leave it in the ground? Why yes, as much as possible, thank you. At least until we know what's going on, right?   If I was boss I'd call for a “total and complete shutdown of fossil fuels exiting the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on.”   From my perspective it's bad enough that our country is burning fossil fuels at such an alarming rate. To extract extra for sale to other counties adds to the problem of climate change. Businesses are benefitting from climate change. Often the companies that are commodifying our resources for profits are companies from other countries. What?   Scott Pruitt is the new boss of the Environmental Protection Agency. He calls human involvement in climate change a “religious belief.” Oh my God are you kidding me?   The Clean Power Plan, our nation's plan to address climate change is being swept away in a blaze of orange and Pruitt is here to let us know that Obama's “efforts to kill jobs across this country through the clean power plan,” are over. Yikes!   In my view we gotta go slow until the new renewable technology takes over. Let's make it official: Sip it.   In the general scheme of things I think it makes sense for everyone in our country to have health care, even if it's administered on our behalf by the government. Maybe it's necessary. In who's best interest is it to orchestrate the implosion of the Affordable Care Act?   Why not fix the Affordable Care Act so that everyone is covered and we can get back to the rest of the business at hand?   I would probably be a millionaire right now if I had only saved the money that I paid to insurance companies for decades for coverage I never used. Generally, I have been healthy and my money just went to accrue profits for an impersonal and clunky corporation and their suits.   Now I finally qualify for some health care assistance and my well-insured elected officials want to take my coverage away in favor of horrid, but myriad options. What?   Commodifying health care has never worked. The insurance companies are in business to make profit, not to get us to the doctor when we need help. Profiting from administering our health care seems unnecessary. A process where everyone can get the care they need is possible and humane. Why not try it?   We have to take care of our veterans. They should all get the same level of care as our elected officials, if not better care. Once leadership figures out how to cover everyone they could work on getting us into fewer world conflicts so that we have fewer injured warriors. Save those guys for when we really need them.   It would be interesting to see what happens if we invest in the healthcare system first and then cut back on the warring. That would be putting America first.   I get the general idea that cutting back right now on foreign aid and stopping grants for national food assistance programs like “Meals on Wheels,” is immoral and unnecessary.   There is a major famine descending on, Somalia, South Sudan, Nigeria and Yemen. Reducing aid before we assist with this imminent threat to humanity would be a shame. I think America should put Africa first and share what we have right now. There are up to 20 million lives at stake. We could use our amazing military to help with the project.   Cutting funds for food assistance programs to seniors in need like Meals on Wheels might not be the most compassionate idea. Some seniors really need good food ... delivered. Besides, someone is checking up on someone who might need checking up on at the same time.   So, yes, it's all fake news. He's right again, generally speaking.   The media reports on tweets and trivia while the whole shooting match is falling down around our ears. The real news is happening behind the curtain, in the background. Because officials are distracting us by legislating where people go to the bathroom we are missing out on the world scene. The press and the FBI is looking in mattresses and under the telephones in the Trump Towers.   Golf is being played.   We are missing out.   Soiled appears Tuesdays in the Aspen Daily News. Reach Steve at nigel@sopris.net.   Original theme by Steve Skinner.   Steve Skinner's music is at steveskinner.bandcamp.com