I recommend going to the drive-in on a beautiful night with great company. Hearing laughs all around and watching men and boys toss footballs as the sun set, it seemed most of us were in the mood to take in a good show. Some of us saw Shrek the Third; others saw Hulking Hatchback or Super-High Ski Rack.

Bear and I arrived at the Cinderella Twin in Sheridan an hour and 15 minutes before showtime Friday and found that dozens of other drivers had the same plan. When it's not football season, where else are you going to tailgate, right?

After watching Shrek 2 at the same drive-in on our second date three years ago, Bear and I had sandwiches, Shrek M&Ms, cherries, sodas and a couple games in tow for our anniversary picnic. With our $18 paid, Bear parked his Xterra in a high-clearance row. I took some photos of other folks waiting for the movie to start and launched into a game of Battleship with Bear.

Soon a Jeep moved into the low-clearance lane in front of us. Other SUVs, minivans and various trucks soon filled that row and others.

Pausing our game, Bear and I politely asked the Jeep driver to pull in a few feet closer and lower so we could see the screen. He obliged, but the move only helped so much.

Sedan-drivers, beware. Denver's two drive-in theaters -- the other is 88 Drive-In Theatre in Commerce City -- try to accommodate all of us by sending big vehicles to certain lanes and shorter ones to the other lanes. But with these spaces apparently split evenly, the monster rides will be taking your spots. It's not always out of selfishness. There are a lot of SUV drivers in town, and when the big-rig spaces are full, SUVs and trucks start filling the short-car spaces.

The good news is that no SUV made it onto the 2006 national bestsellers list. The bad news is that three big trucks did and that Colorado SUV sales shot up last winter amid the back-to-back-to-many-more-backs snowstorms.