COLORADO -- Columnist Philip Potempa is reporting from Vail this week.

Famous with forks

If you read my From the Farm column on the cover of today's Food section, you know I detailed the experience and interesting history of dining at Beano's Cabin at Beaver Creek Resort near Vail. At dinner, I made sure to ask about some of the famous diners who have enjoyed a secluded dinner among the treetops in the past two decades.

In addition to late President Gerald Ford (who is going to have the Vail Post Office renamed after him) and Betty Ford, Ross Perot, Bill Clinton (minus Hillary Rodham Clinton), President George Bush and Barbara Bush and Dan and Marilyn Quayle have all enjoyed duck, buffalo, elk, boar, salmon and other wild game specialties.

Porcupine population

I'm amazed at how many porcupines there are in Colorado. I'd describe them here as being as common as raccoons and opossums back in Indiana. However, when it comes to damage control, it's not the prickly quills people here worry about. Instead, it's the sharp claws the porcupines have and use to pull away the bark from pine trees searching for the destructive pine beetles underneath.

When it comes to deciding which is worse -- porcupines peeling away the pine bark or the beetles eating away underneath -- it seems an even call. The end result is still the same: lots of orange, dried-up pine trees lining ski slopes and landscapes.

Ski scene

Who are some of the famous folks spotted skiing the slopes of Vail this season? Actress Rebecca De Mornay (who dated Tom Cruise after they filmed the 1983 movie "Risky Business" together), Kelsey Grammer, who has a winter home at Beaver Creek Resort, actress Minnie Driver and a messy-haired Richard Dean Anderson of "MacGyver" fame.

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer. He can be reached at ppotempa@nwitimes.com or 219.852.4327.

celebBirthdays

Comedian Alan Sues ("Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In") is 81. Photographer Lord Snowdon (husband of the late Princess Margaret) is 77. TV personality Willard Scott is 73. Actor Daniel J. Travanti is 67. TV evangelist Tammy Faye Bakker-Messner is 65. Bassist Chris White of The Zombies is 64. Singer Peter Wolf of The J. Geils Band is 61. Actor John Heard is 61. Keyboardist Matthew Fisher of Procol Harum is 61. Football great Franco Harris is 57. Guitarist Ernie Isley of the Isley Brothers and football-star-turned-TV-personality Lynn Swan are 55. Actor Bryan Cranston ("Malcolm In The Middle") is 51. Actor Bill Brochtrup ("NYPD Blue") is 44. Comedian Wanda Sykes is 43. Singer Taylor Dayne is 42. Drummer Randy Guss of Toad the Wet Sprocket is 40. Actress Rachel Weisz ("Constantine," "The Mummy") is 36. Singer Sebastien Izambard of Il Divo is 34. Singer

Hugo Ferreira of Tantric is 34. Actress Laura Prepon ("That 70's Show") is 27.