2014 -- that was the year that was

A look back at this rapidly-fading year....

January

Wyoming Highway Patrol on the alert for legal Colorado pot crossing the border....The creeds and oaths of our youth....Medicaid expansion rally at Wyoming Capitol....Whale of a tale on a Florida beach....Artspace comes to Cheyenne....From beach boy to beach cowboy....Feeding your fiction-writing habit....Remembering Rep. Sue Wallis.

February

Cheyenne launches Artspace project....Unplanned winter off-roading in Wyoming....Halfway mark of painful legislative session....Colorado burger wranglers commute to Chey-town.

March

Courage v. Wyoming may force state to live up to Equality State brand....Irish or not?...Florida vs. Wyoming in retirement destination battle....Avoid politics in gardening discussions....Psychiatrists aren't crazy about living in Wyoming....Spring is lion time.

April

Welcome to the Magic City of the Plains....Cheyenne corners the market on Gov candidates.... Dumbing down state science standards....Wishing Colorado a happy 420 day....The future belongs to aggies and artists.... Revisiting the Great D&D Panic of the 1990s....Putting the community in community college.

May

Miss Atomic Bomb....Writers Speaking Out Loud....Wonky in Rock Springs....Famous for all of the wrong reasons....Cindy Hill's little red book.

June

Remembering my mother and the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps....Summertime in WYO....St. Michael in downtown Cheyenne....Visiting a sick friend....Lesson for politicians -- beware of poets....That was one super day.

July

How you gonna keep 'em down on the farm....Revisiting a 1970 pot protest in D.C....Welcome to the West's wet years....Old books live on....Music, melodrama and politics at CFD....Wyoming Democrats respond.

August

At the Music & Poetry Series in Casper....As I begin my tenth year of blogging liberally....Gov's science panel....Satire is in the eye of the beholder.

September

Hemingway found a clean, well-lighted place in Wyoming's Big Horn Mountains....Day one of touristing on the high plains.,..Day two of touristing on the high plains....The rich are different -- they want to destroy Wyoming's public pension plan....Americanism trumps conservatism in Colorado schools.

October

Envisioning the future of Cheyenne's downtown....Final words on Mental Health Awareness Week....Wyoming Liberty Group threatens state retirement plans....VOTE!....Book preview for "Living Behind the Carbon Curtain."

November

Lifting of Wyoming's same-sex marriage ban a big surprise....Might be time to change that obnoxious county name....New generation of book censors....If we're going to keep our young people in the state....No Black Friday for me....Yummy Gore-Tex for seniors.

December

This progressive wants to go to Mars...What happens when Wyoming tourists no longer want to drive?....Gubment-hating righties invade Wyoming.

So much to write about. So little time. Happy New Year!

Dems hold a cakewalk fund-raiser today in Cheyenne

When is the last time you participated in a cakewalk? Not the metaphorical kind, such as "Iraq will be a cakewalk," but the actual kind, in which you walk around in a circle while music plays and when the music stops and you land on the right number, you win a cake. Today's cakewalk is a fund-raiser for the Laramie County Democrats Grassroots Coalition. It will be held amongst all the beautiful growing things in Joe's Amazing Garden at 3626 Dover Road in Cheyenne. Be there between 2-4 p.m. this afternoon and wear your cakewalking shoes. The event also features a 50/50 raffle. 

As new year dawns in Colorado, authorities on the lookout for stoned Wyoming Boomers

An Iraq War veteran with PTSD was the first in line to purchase pot this morning in Colorado, according to a story on NBC News Online.

"I feel amazing. This is a huge step forward for veterans," said Sean Azzariti of Denver, who helped campaign for Amendment 64. "Now I get to use recreational cannabis to alleviate my PTSD."

Meanwhile, the state's “potrepreneurs” are preparing for an onslaught of Cannabis tourists.

From the Colorado Highlife Facebook page

Colorado Highlife Tours promises “fun, affordable and discreet” cannabis-centered excursions on its bus and limo tours. From NBC:

“You’ll be able to buy a little pot here and there, see a commercial grow, visit iconic Colorado landmarks and take lots of pictures,” said company owner Timothy Vee. “It will be like a Napa Valley wine tour.”

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Unlike Napa Valley wine tours, however, out-of-states tourists to Colorado’s pot retail stores won’t be able to take home most products they purchase. “It remains illegal to take marijuana out of the state,” said Michael Elliott of the Medical Marijuana Industry Group. And because marijuana also remains on the Transportation Security Administration's list of prohibited items, Denver International Airport will enforce a new policy that bans pot throughout the airport.

Prior to Jan. 1, Colorado Highlife Tours has mixed sightseeing with stops at glass-blowing shops, marijuana grow centers and has offered customers “free samples” — because buying pot was not yet legal.

“You live and learn,” said Vee. “On our tours, we’re getting a lot of empty nesters that haven’t smoked pot in 20 years. We’ve also had people who have never smoked pot take our tours and had one couple get high and so paranoid that we had to interrupt the tour and take them back to their hotel.” 

Stoned empty nesters. Baby Boomers, high on Bubba Kush, reeling around downtown Denver is search of organic munchies. Busloads of Wyoming retirees rolling down the highway, sweet smoke and Doobie Brothers tunes wafting out the windows.

All hell is breaking loose in my home state of Colorado. Across the border in Cheyenne, we are sober as judges -- most judges, anyway. No legal pot here.

But Wyoming NORML is working on it. It will sponsor a "Walk for Weed" Feb. 10 in Cheyenne. At least two Republican legislators have been discussing marijuana publicly. Sen. Bruce Burns (R-Sheridan) made the news recently when he revealed that 30 years ago he transported illegal ganja to his cancer-stricken uncle (a priest!) back in New York. His momma asked him to do it and he delivered. His uncle started eating better and gained 15 pounds. Burns knows first-hand the benefits of medicinal weed, which is where Wyoming may start. Rep. Sue Wallis (R-Recluse), she of the strong Libertarian streak, has already talked about promoting medicinal marijuana legislation. On most issues, Rep. Wallis is as conservative as most of her neighbors in rural Campbell County. But she is a big promoter of the local food movement, spoke out last year in favor of a civil unions bill and has been very vocal in opposition to anti-women legislation promulgated by the wackos in her own party.

So who knows? Will Legislature focus on pot amongst all of the budgetary items? On day one, 2014 already looks interesting. Don't know about you, but I'm glad to be here.