PSU Track Alum Outreach Travels to International Petting Zoo

An impromptu phone call from Rob Whiteside led to a meeting at my home for a little reunion yesterday. He was taken a little aback by my 8 dogs, 4 cats, 20 fish, 3 mice and 2 frogs, but soon warmed up for a walk and reunion dinner. Gary Black is here with two visitors from Austria, adding an international flare to the whole circus. Some of you may know that Rob was the Best Man at my wedding. The runs we took at PSU were always great, discussing all things important and not. Following that I kind of descended into a hole of hermithood (like the guy in Monty Python's Life of Brian.) It was good to rekindle the old dynamic yesterday. We walked along the Rail Trail in York for an hour or more, almost exactly like our three times weekly 10-milers at PSU, except slower. We again talked about all things important and not. The difference was Rob didn't have to "borrow" my soap afterwards for a Rec Hall shower while getting scalded each time someone flushed the toilet. And we didn't have to walk over to the West Halls Dining Room afterward to find out they were out of cheesesteaks and all they had was fried perch, again. We got to go to a Sports Bar downtown for a pub meal and a viewing of the PSU/USC debacle.

Rob is a fan of the blog and has offered substantial advice on different directions it can go. He thinks it can become a bigger vehicle to unite a substantial conglomeration of all PSU Track Alums. His vision isn't far away from Ken Cooper's current activities trying to establish a comprehensive listing/contact info. database. I'll say it again, we should have the largest and most dynamic Track and Field Alumni group in the entire world. The fact that Minnesota has a huge golf outing each year should shame us all. They are Gophers for Pete's sake! I could use help on story ideas, photos, videos from any of you. Comments to blog posts will open up a discussion many of us would find amusing and informative. Finding out about the rich history of PSU Track, meeting greats from the past, and finding out what grads are up to after school could prove interesting to scores. We have CEO's, Wall Street traders, Hedge Fund managers, doctors, lawyers, physicists, (and even important people besides!) in our numbers.

I hope everyone has had a good start to the new year, mine was great spending the day with a former PSU Track Alum.