Back to Calgary
2011/09/28
Started the day with a visit to the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller. I was just there a few years ago, but it’s an excellent museum and worth revisiting, and as it turns out they did change a few exhibits since my last visit. A few pics:
Then a short drive to Calgary (via a favorite back way that has very little traffic).
Another new thing since last time: a large wind farm just south of the Drumheller canyon. This dash-cam photo only shows three out of at least twenty giant windmills dotting the hilltops along the road:
Highlight of the drive was catching sight of the mountain silhouettes before I had even reached the outskirts of Calgary:
Got my room, then went to pick up Frink from Mount Royal – where I started my Comp Sci undergrad (it was only a college back then). Wandered around the campus a bit taking pictures. Dropped in on the CS department – the only faculty member I knew who was present still remembered me 15 years later, which was a nice surprise.
The Mount Royal campus has changed slightly since I was there. Mainly in the addition of new buildings outside the sprawling central one. But also some internal changes. One of my favorite study areas is gone, replaced with more walled-in rooms.
This wall used to be all full-height window, and looked in on the tech services department that I worked in, repairing computers, when I was a student there:
Although this was actually before I was a student here, there used to be a small arcade beside these stairs in the phys ed wing. It’s the only place I’ve ever seen a Robby Roto machine, and got to play it after years of wondering about screenshots in Electronic Games magazines:
But my high scores are still up on the board – my President’s Honor Roll plaques from the two years I was there:
After that, went looking for the place I had planned to buy new tires for the Slaywagon, but it appears to have gone out of business. Did some book shopping, then met Sean and Bud for sushi downtown and had some good conversation for a few hours.
Drove Frink home after that, and nearly hit a deer on the road. For days now I’ve been internally grousing that I haven’t seen any moose on this trip (on previous trips we’ve had close encounters with meese in northern Ontario and in Riding Mountain Park), and here I nearly intersect a deer right in the big city.
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