Airheads The symbol of a blow-up doll on your December 31 Year in Review issue was particularly appropriate, since Westword is so often full of hot air. Jayne Riley Denver It has been refreshing to move to a new city and discover original literary instincts in Westword. Just wanted to…
Bryan Scheferkort left behind a hundred bad memories on the streets of Denver, but he can’t shake one image that will always remind him of the year he spent without a home. One night last spring, at about 2 a.m., he and three friends were smoking pot under the 20th…
Colorado truly was an altered state in 1998. A Boulder manufacturer of Halloween “Dracula Fangs” sued a competitor for selling allegedly identical devices known as “Fangtastics.” A fourteen-year-old sexual assault suspect was arrested in Boulder after he crashed his bicycle while attempting to grab a passing woman cyclist’s breast. Police…
Since the moment Michael Kennedy made unfortunate contact with a tree on an Aspen ski slope on New Year’s Eve 1997, it’s all been downhill for Colorado. If 1997 had been a peak year for the state–which attracted international attention with its flawless handling of the two Oklahoma City bombing…
Pat and Annabel Bowlen Corporate Welfare King and Queen Years ago, when Canadian millionaire Pat Bowlen started angling for a new stadium, one with deep revenue streams and luxury boxes that he hadn’t already sold off, image consultants warned that he’d have to ditch the fur coat if he wanted…
It was the year of Hurricane Mitch and Typhoon Monica, of Governor Ventura and King Viagra. It was the year they finally played college football at Mile High Stadium (Colorado 42, Colorado State 14), the year Harry Caray and his “Holy Cow!” died. It was the year that boxer Bobby…
Green Acres I loved Stuart Steers’s December 17 article, “The Village People,” on the Greenwood Village annexation. Having taught at Cherry Creek High School for over 25 years, I have some experience with what Greenwood Village considers “solutions” to the constantly growing traffic problems. For instance, a favorite solution is…
The examiner tells you to sit down in an old, creaky chair with high, worn-down armrests. If the chair had straps to secure your legs, it would look like the one they use to fry people at the pen. Even though the examiner has gone over the questions with you…
As the singing Christmas tree next to the cash register slogs through its third rendition of “Jingle Bells,” Robbin O’Donley stops pouring coffee long enough to gleefully pull the plug. “That thing’s starting to drive me crazy,” she says, then pauses. “Oops, too late,” the 34-year-old cackles. “I’m already crazy!”…
Maverick Elbert County commissioner’s concern over thousands of tons of waste from Denver’s sewer system being used as fertilizer has spawned an unprecedented $1.4 million agreement to monitor soil and water on an eastern Colorado farm. Since taking office in 1996, John Dunn has butted heads with oil companies, developers…
No one can deny that America Online is the cheapest slut on the Internet. The company hands out start-up CDs faster than a hooker spreads the clap (so far, it’s managed to infect 14 million subscribers with its unique brand of easy Net access). But as Denver Web developer Kenton…
This time of year, you’d think a truckload of Christmas trees would be a welcome sight, a Hallmark moment to lift the holiday spirit. But that’s not the case if that truck is rolling through Boulder County with Tony Smith at the wheel and a load of local trees in…
Bear hug: Impeachment-happy Republicans thought the timing was a mite suspicious, but the air strikes on Iraq proved an unexpected boon for Dave Liniger, the Re/Max International founder who’s planning to sail around the world in a balloon shortly after Christmas, circumnavigating the southern hemisphere at an altitude of 130,000…
The people in the picture on this page are all Denver musicians with at least twenty years’ seniority. Every one of them played with guitarist Tom Butters, who died of an overdose last week at age 46. And they are just a handful of the players who show up for…
Mary Christmas Thank you for Harrison Fletcher’s “Virgin Rebirth,” in the December 10 issue. What a pleasure to read–and what a nice story this holiday season! Joy Friedel Denver The statue described and pictured in the article appears to be Our Lady of St. John of the Lake. Auraria library…
Giving birth to a new town is exciting, but running one can be far more challenging than city fathers and mothers ever imagined. Just ask the folks of Foxfield, a 1.3-square-mile town at the corner of Parker and Arapahoe roads. Foxfield is only four years old, created after 700 residents…
The weekly meeting of the Arapahoe County Republican Men’s Club is the ultimate power breakfast. Over scrambled eggs and ham, influential business and political leaders gossip and scheme in a usually well-behaved manner. The opulent Metropolitan Club setting on Orchard Road reflects the comfort and good fortune of the south…
Debbie Black goes flying over a bank of chairs. A whistle blows; time stands still while she’s airborne and then buried under a tangle of spectators. Her teammates are frozen, sweaty on the hardwood, their chests heaving as they catch their breath, waiting to see if she’s all right. Black…
The company that Velma Gilbert worked for was called Caring Hands, but it didn’t seem to care much about one very important thing. Last summer, Gilbert, a licensed practical nurse, quit her job with the Littleton home health-care company after her employers continually refused to pay her wages. When Gilbert…
Death is different,” fellow jurists told District Judge Frank Plaut as he prepared for his first capital murder case, the trial of Robert Riggan Jr. on charges of first-degree murder in Jefferson County. But how different, even they couldn’t have predicted. In mid-October, Riggan went on trial for the murder…
When two South High School journalism students attempted to cover a fight in a school parking lot last month, only to have their film seized by Denver police officers, the incident touched off a vigorous debate about the rights of student journalists. But many parents and students were less upset…
The rust is history: Currigan Hall doesn’t get much respect these days–not since Denver Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau bigwig Eugene “Big Is Better” Dilbeck became obsessed with tearing down the 1970 structure (which played the cloning lab in Woody Allen’s Sleeper) and expanding the Colorado Convention Center (also known…
