I Love My Job!!!!!

There are some great benefits to working for my family's business.

1. I get to see my family often

2. I have a great boss

3. I get the opportunity to learn new things daily

4. I can ask for last minute time off

5.... Lot's more, but back to great reason #4:

On Sunday night I called my mom to see if we were still going to have a meeting in Denver on Monday morning (it had been discussed but was still up in the air).

She said that we were going to schedule it for a later date, but that I would still need to come down to pick up a server from their office. So I asked if I could take Monday morning off to go to the Colorado Avalanche training camp and then stop by to pick up the server. I didn't have anything else on my schedule so she said that would be fine and to have fun!

When I got off the phone, I asked James if he wanted to go to training camp in the morning; he looked vaguely interested. He had considered driving me to my meeting in Denver, and then heading over to watch training camp. I told him that my meeting was cancelled and that I was taking the morning off so we could both go! He seemed much more excited with this change of plans.

So we planned to leave around 7:15ish in the morning so we could get down for the start of camp at 9. Well, my alarm went off at 6:20 and I was not quite ready to wake up yet, at 6:35 James grumbled at the "stupid alarm clock" and rolled over, I finally got up at 6:45. It's hard to get motivated to get out of a nice comfortable bed when you really don't have to!

I made a pot of coffee and fed the monsters (our pets) and got ready to go, James got up sometime during this and got ready as well. Thankfully neither of us are too high maintenance so we get ready fairly quickly. We got in the car and realized we needed some markers for autographs. A quick stop by the store and we had 4 silver and 5 black permanent markers (we got the larger packs so we would have them for Las Vegas on the 25th).

We drove to Denver, thankfully traffic wasn't too bad. We got there a little after nine, and went into the pro-shop to get a hat and pennant for autographs. It is kind of a tradition to get a hat and pennant signed each year we go (we missed last year but went a couple times before).

Then we watched some hockey. Well, we watched some drills and then a scrimmage and some more drills. I am always amazed just to watch those guys skate! I wish I could skate like that, or even half as well!

The scrimmage was a lot of fun to watch. Weiman played great in net and I hope he gets his chance this year! Duschene play well also, initially he looked a little lost but went on to make some great passes and scored 2 of the 4 goals during the scrimmage; he also scored in the shootout that followed. He has a great shot and some good moves, we'll see where he goes from here. Stoa, Koci and Wolski looked great also, along with many others but those are ones that particularly stick out. Anderson play well in net, hopefully he can be solid in net this year for the Avs. By the way, Stastny, Foote, Budaj and several others were not a part of the scrimmage and we watched them run some drills on the other rink.

I was too focused on watching the scrimmage to take any pics, but I got some during the drills.

Budaj blocking shots during drills:

Foote shooting on Budaj during drills:

Stastny taking a shot (Sorry I cut off part of his foot, I need more practice and maybe a better camera):

My awesome photography skills! I managed to get a puck flying across the ice but missed including any players, oops:

One of the other cool things about training camp is that after it's over, many players stop on their way out to sign autographs!

Every time we have been there, Liles stops to sign and talk to fans and take pictures. There is only one time that he didn't (a couple years ago), but he stopped to apologize that he had some place he had to be and would have time the next day. A class-act in my book, plus a defenseman so that's bonus points!

James was pretty excited with how Koci played and he stopped to sign as well, seemed like a very cool guy. So we got a picture of James with him:

Duschene actually came out first, but I'll finish my post with him. He looked good from what we saw during and I hope he does well in his hockey career. He walked out to sign and talk with fans. We got a picture with him also:

We got 10 autographs in all and watched some great players, so it was a wonderful way to start the week! Now the countdown to Vegas begins: 10 days and counting....