Welcome back to the Backstage series on science communication! If seeing the Science Riot show last week (which I assume you did!) got your nerd juices flowing and you just want more, you’re still in luck! Nerd Nite is the next Denver science communication specialty on offer. If you like science, trivia, esoterica of all sorts, Nerd Nite is for you. If you like all of the preceding items AND have trained your liver to tolerate large quantities of alcohol, Nerd Nite is so very definitely for you. Nerd Nite is not endemic to Denver—in fact, it started in Seattle and spread here like a virus,... Read More

This is my seventh year in Denver. In the Biblical tale of Creation, God took six days to build the world and then, seeing that it was good, on the seventh day He rested. Fitting, then, that this is my seventh year in Denver and I see that it is good, indeed. Yes, I may have just compared myself to the Almighty. Contemplating the Rockies makes one feel a bit divine, especially if one is currently at altitude and may or may not have taken a hit off one’s buddy’s recreational spliff, which is itself a Denver religious experience. After seven years, what would I say gives this rowdy, ethereal,... Read More

One of my idols is Julia Child. Brilliant cook and charismatic personality, of course she was. She was also tall and gawky and quite homely. She bloomed late in life, doing nothing of public note for the first fifty of her many years and not exploring romance until her mid-thirties. She stumbled onto the passion of her professional life, French cooking, as the stumbled toward her 40th birthday. I relate to all of this late-blooming and awkwardness. Especially the bits about being tall and gawky. *insert self-deprecating eyeroll here* I love cooking and could write another column about that (hint,... Read More

I, like everyone who is currently, or has ever been, an adolescent, am convinced that the world just doesn’t UNDERSTAND me. One of my main points of pique is that I am convinced that I have a reputation for being a rabid man-hater. The hurtful-truth part of this conviction is that it is not without merit and neither is the reputation. I will claim a nuance, though. I don’t hate *men.* Men are fun. They’re fun to talk to and flirt with, sometimes date and sleep with. I love the give-no-f***s boldness that men often display in greater portions than women. (Don’t get me started, though, on... Read More