Day 4 ...

(Thursday, July 12; Captain's log ... I have fallen a little behind on blogs and am struggling to catch up)

(517 miles; Wahsatch, Utah to Denver, Colo.)

Denver -- There were no trees in southern Wyoming. Or at least there were no trees in southern Wyoming that weren't inside city limits. Many times you would see a town ahead in the distance, in a valley, and it looked like a mirage. A circle of trees and houses. A lot like a movie set that had been constructed in the desert.

As I was driving, I kept looking for bandits up in the hills resting their rifles over the top of rocks. It had that feel. Many rocks with small, green bushes.

Also, I-80 has train tracks running alongside it throughout Wyoming, which only adds to the Old West feel. I kept trying to take pictures of passing trains, but there always seemed to be a semi truck behind me and no place to turn off whenever I saw one coming. If you look carefully in the picture above, you can see the end of a train off in the distance.

If you read the previous post, you know the drive through Wyoming was a last-minute decision. I thought it might be fun to swing through Laramie, Wyo., and talk to former Fresno State basketball assistants, Fred Langley and Heath Schroyer, who are the associate and head coach at the University of Wyoming now. I was curious how two guys who seem so "big-city" were doing in a small-town environment.

Friday's column was about that meeting, which technically didn't happen. Schroyer and Langley were both in Tulsa, Okla., recruiting. So yeah, I drove all the way to Laramie, Wyo., to do phone interviews with two guys who weren't in Laramie. Great planning.

I did go to the Wyoming athletic department and poked around Schroyer's office, though. Not too shabby.

You can see his golf clubs agains the wall there, which he uses to play golf outings around the state.

The thing about a job like Wyoming -- and I hope this came across in the column -- is that pretty much everyone in the state is cheering for you. There is no other four-year school in Wyoming. There are season ticket holders who live two or three hours from Laramie. The loyalty is amazing, and Schoyer says he feels an obligation to be out in public and meet as many people as he can.

A couple other quick notes from Wyoming. Saw four different billboards featuring steaks. Crossed the Continental Divide at 6,930 feet above sea level. Heard two things on the radio ... "fed steer prices are up to $90," and 8th-row tickets to ZZ Top are $200 face value. (Sixth grade flashback: A good word problem here might be to figure out how many steers you'd have to sell to take a family of five to ZZ Top. Or better yet, how many steers it would take to trample the members of ZZ Top for gouging loyal fans.)

Also, I bought some Hubba Bubba bubble gum and without even thinking about it, started blowing huge bubbles. I forgot how much fun that used to be. The flavor wears out too fast and my jaw is not in Hubba-Bubba shape, but seriously, how much do you want some gum right now?

Bloggers note: Two days after I left Laramie, I got an email from Bob Schaller, the co-author of Rulon Gardner's book, who lives in Lubbock, Texas, and sent me a dozen different cool things to see in the Laramie area. If I'd have known all that, I would probably still be in Laramie checking it all out. Instead, I drove south that evening to Denver, where I planned to interview WAC commissioner Karl Benson. (As I'm typing this, I have already interviewed Benson, left Denver and written the column about Benson, which is making the tense of these blogs confusing. I'll catch up and take care of this. Don't worry.)

Scariest Driving Moment of the Day: Slight change, since there were no really scary driving moments, besides taking pictures from the side of an interstate. Scary moment, though. I nearly choked to death in Coe Library. The main library at the University of Wyoming has a nice little deli in it, with sandwiches and coffee and sodas and candy bars. So I bought a ham and swiss and sat down to do some research in the Wyoming Almanac and write my column. And on about the fourth bite of sandwich, a big piece lodged in my throat. I could breathe just a little, but the piece of sandwich was making me gag, which was making me swallow, which was only wedging it worse. At some point, I started to panic and it got serious, a little like struggling in deep water. Just before I was about to make the biggest spectacle Coe Library has ever seen, it came loose.

Memorable Radio Songs of the Day: "Smokey Mountain Range," by Ronnie Milsap; and "My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys," by Willie Nelson.

Apparently, the official state music of Wyoming is country. Shocker.