Like a kid in a candy store...

Like a kid in a candy store. Literally.

Sometimes on the road that beckons the best things are actually quite close to home. No need to travel thousands of miles to get to one of the sweetest places on earth. I’ll bet a lot of folks who read this blog have made the jaunt up to the Republic of Boulder to visit the Celestial Seasonings Tea Factory. Even more have made the pilgrimage out to Golden (“Where the West Lives!”) to partake in the serious business of brewery (as in Coors) visitation. Now, I’m as big a fan of Sleepytime Tea and Silver Bullets as the next person but if you haven’t been to a certain other factory, right here in Denver, then your Colorado must-sees education is sadly lacking.

Sad to say I didn't qualify as a "candymaker" so I guess

I'll have to just settle for 'candyeater"!

I’ve lived in Denver since 1971 and until last Saturday I too had never made the effort to go see where one of Colorado’s finest chocolatiers and candy makers produces their delicious wares. I speak of the  Hammond’s Candy Factory just off of I-25 and 58th. Since 1920 when Carl Hammond first set up shop they’ve been turning out handmade confections to delight the sweet tooth of folks young and old. And they offer free tours at the end of which they hand out free samples! As my friend Larry would say, “Good times!”. Being a Saturday when we visited there were lots of kids oohing and aahing as the cooks poured tubs of chocolate and molded giant gobs of candy into Candy Canes (‘‘tis the season) of mind-boggling assortments. One of those giant gobs weighs about 70 lbs. and produces  nearly 1,000 Candy Canes. And yes, that curve of the Candy Cane is really done by hand, one at a time.

Did I mention the free samples at the end of the tour? Well, there’s more! They have a really nice, and impressively-stocked gift shop that’s fun to wander around. Seems lots of folks were doing more than just wanderin’ as the lines at the checkouts attested. But who can complain about waiting in line at a candy factory? Not me, and for good reason. I couldn’t have spoken up to complain if I had wanted to as my mouth was kinda full of the aforementioned samples. In today’s world that seems like its fraying at the edges it was very nice to indulge in a little (o.k., a lot) of sweetness made the same way it was almost a century ago.

So, if you and yours are looking for a fun escape from teas and brews, I recommend visiting the Candy Factory hiding in plain site in our own backyard. Who knew?!? Here's a short snapshot of my visit...

 

Let me be the first to say... Ho, Ho, Ho!

So it’s the eleventh day of the eleventh month of the year and I’m here to wish you a Merry Christmas (“Ho, Ho, Ho!”). I’m truly sorry if I’m a little late in sharing Holiday Greetings with you and really have no good excuse other than it is, well, you know, only the eleventh day of the eleventh month.

My beloved wife (I think I can still refer to her as ‘wife’?) took me shoe shopping (for her, not me...) yesterday because her current multitude of footwear was hurting her feet. In fairness to her, she doesn’t really buy that many new shoes at least in part because more shoes might mean we’d need a bigger house but I digress.

The shoe store  she wanted to visit does not have a location within the poor confines of Jefferson County, Colorado so off we went to that wonder that bills itself as a ‘Retail Resort’ (really - the signage outside the men’s room told me so) - Park Meadows Mall. Now, I don’t frequent shopping malls as a regular habit and the only draw of the mall closest to me - Southwest Plaza - is that one of its anchor stores (Sears) is closing just in time for the holiday rush. So you can imagine how in, like, total awe I was when we entered the shopping behemoth that is PMM. I mean, I was, like, literally transported from the doldrums of pre-Thanksgiving November into a winter, and more importantly, Christmas shopping wonderland. The fireplace, that reaches to the sky in the food court, was blazing with gas-fueled fake Yule logs and everywhere there were decorations celebrating the not upcoming but apparently already here Holiday season. The requisite Holiday songs wafted in the background (hey, even I’m a sucker for eight tiny reindeer and elves making toys), the Christmas tree was glorious, and  Santa was already ensconced in his sleigh on the lower level awaiting the (thankfully) not-yet-there hordes of wide eyed youngsters all anxious to get their picture taken with the jolly old elf (picture packages - NO PERSONAL CAMERAS allowed according to the sign - can be yours starting at just $32.99!).

In such a festive environment how could I not have a glorious shopping adventure as I watched the love of my life (is LOML a thing?) try on every variation and every size of every variation of footwear known to man (whoops, strike that...) womankind.

So, you might ask, why this particular store? Well, to make a short story long, my wife attended a conference in the Spring in the Windy City of Chicago and she and a friend in some of their down time did what any self-respecting visitor to that fair city would do - they went shopping. They don’t call it the ‘Miracle Mile’ for nothing. And by chance my wife fell in love with a pair of shoes that, alas, were out of stock. But have no fear, that shoe store, yup you guessed it, has a location at PMM, thus explaining my standing around watching box after box magically appear from the back room. Candidly, I can rarely remember what I had for lunch yesterday, so for my wife to have remembered that Springtime shoe-shopping excursion 1,000 miles from home so many months ago and finally acted on it on the tenth day of the eleventh month truly impressed me.  What impressed my wife even more was that they had all the shoes she wanted in stock and just begging to be given a good home!

Even retail clerks have a sense of humor but the one helping my wife really outdid himself. I mean, I literally burst out laughing. Couldn’t help myself, so sorry to all the ladies who were there looking for the shoes of their dreams. Turns out our bill for this little shopping excursion was  almost $250. That part, at least to my poor, addled, male brain, wasn’t so funny but what was hilarious was when the clerk told my wife that she was almost a quarter of the way to earning a ‘free’ pair of shoes through the store’s loyalty program. Math has never been my strong suit, but I think we can all agree that if, and when, my wife has spent $1,000 on shoes there’d better be a limousine awaiting and bands playing for our next jaunt to PMM to pick up that ‘free’ pair of shoes.  Am I right honey? Honey? Honey dearest...?!?????

Oh, well.  I had a great time celebrating the holidays at PMM so “Ho, Ho, Ho” to you and yours. Now if I can just figure out what I’m going to do in... December....