Back at it

Hello again. Just a quick diddy about my trip this past week. As some and most of you may know I was over in the Colorado Springs (Front Range as it is called here) the past week for recruiting purposes at the college. Normally, a person such as myself does not attend such college fairs for highschool recruitment, but being that we are a larger department, I convinced my bosses to let me go. They paid the meals for the week and travel and living accommodations were courtesy of my friend Ben's admission travel budget. As you can see from the pictures (http://picasaweb.google.com/aldsmith3) we had a lot of free time between fairs to get into the outdoors! Most other admission counselors and recruiters at the fairs from other colleges opted to eat, drink, and be merry but Ben and I had other intentions. It was great to experience a handful of new areas in Colorado. Definitely hard to judge places until you try them. Found some beauty and so forth I wasn't expecting in the Colorado Springs area.

In other news, for those of you wondering how my "W" Mountain Race finished 2 Saturdays ago, I took 35th out of 90 or so racers. 23:50 was my final time. The course was 2.6 miles and gained about 1,000 feet over that 2.6 miles. Ben and I followed up the race morning with an epic mountain bike ride at Hartman's Rocks for the better part of 3 hours on a sunny, mildly warm, and beautiful afternoon.

It snowed here in Gunnison today! It was so exciting to see snow again. I know some of you are dreading it but the snow really adds another layer of beauty to the scenery out here-crested mountain tops, dusted sage brush, etc. Also, the presence of snow excites me for the ice hockey season, which started yesterday (Monday), though I didn't sign up till today because of monetary issues. My first game is tomorrow night. I am excited! Glad to get back on the ice and have some competitive fun.

Not too much else going on...looking forward to coming home for Thanksgiving and time with family (especially the Baker clan) and friends. Hope ya'll are doing well. Keep in touch if I don't hear from you or see you as this holiday season approaches.

Later ya'll

Al

As always, check out the photos online (link is above) if you haven't already seen them on facebook.