My very first competition was at the end of 2005. Honestly, I just looked it up online and tried to find something local, because I had no idea how to do it or where to start. I did Denver's Strongest Man here in Colorado, and I won.

After I started singing, I'd go to my dad's records I grew up with in his house listening to: Gordon Lightfoot, John Denver, the Carpenters, Bob Seger, Neil Diamond, voices that resonate with you, that you know who they are right away.

I had a group of Hispanic Americans come into my office in 1976 who worked in a Denver packing plant. They had just been fired by their employer who turned around and hired illegal aliens for a lot less money. That had a big impact on me.

There's always someone out there training for your spot. For my scholarship at the University of Florida, for my job with the Denver Broncos, for my position with the New York Jets. And that's the reason to get up earlier or stay up later.

You know people probably don't realize this but I lived in Denver for 10 years as a kid. I was familiar with the city and what it had to offer. You know like any place it's changed a lot over the years. But that familiarity hit home for me.

In August 1994, I was invited to have dinner with House Minority Whip Newt Gingrich. At that time, I was a senior engineer working for Martin Marietta Astronautics in Denver, where I had been responsible for inventing a new plan called 'Mars Direct.'

When I was in high school, I was doing all the plays. My drama teacher, Melody Duggan, was the one one who first made me do stand-up. She's the origin of the whole thing; it's all her. In high school in Denver, that was kind of the beginning of it all.

In Denver, I was a homebody, and that's a life I'd chosen with great happiness. I wanted that break from the arc lights and focus on building a lovely home, have some fun, look after my kids and do things that I had missed out on while pursuing my dream.

In Denver, all we really had was pop radio, so I grew up on all that late '70s pop stuff - Billy Joel, James Taylor, Lionel Richie, Elton John, Steve Miller and Toto. Great love songs and really hooky and melodic music - I have all of that stuff in my heart.

My lone concussion occurred in 2003 against Denver. I was spinning off block and right when I spun, I hit Clinton Portis with my head turned sideways. I hit him and I hit the ground. That was first big one where I was like 'Whoa.' Back then, it was no big deal.

Growing up, as much as country was a big influence in my life, the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and Led Zeppelin were such a close second. My first concert ever was the Rolling Stones in Denver. I snuck a camera backstage and filmed Mick Jagger during sound-check.

I loved the time I got to spend in Denver. My boys, Arin and Ryan, were growing up. I got to spend time with them without being pried upon. There was no public scrutiny. I was free and could take them to the supermarket or to the park without being noticed or looked at.

Maybe we should have known that night in Denver that things that begin with plywood Greek columns and artificial smoke typically don't end well. Maybe the Hollywood stars and the glamour blinded us a little: you thought it was the glare, some of us thought it was a halo.

I first moved to Denver to work with a group called YWAM, 'Youth With a Mission.' I was a kid - I was 18 - and did some work with homeless people. Really, trying to convert people is sort of an awful position to find yourself in, so I quickly, on my own, grew out of religious ideas.

When I was superintendent of Denver Public Schools, I saw the potential of some of our best and brightest students cut short, punished for the actions of others - kids who had grown up and done well in our school system, and kids who know no other home but America. This is unacceptable.

I'm too busy with entertainment to think about anything else. No one knows this sport better than I do. I've been a fan of this sport since UFC 1 in Denver. I've followed this sport, I've been obsessed with this sport, I've trained with the best of the best, and I've fought the best of the best.

I've always approached the game, going back to when I got drafted in 2012 to Denver, like I was going to be the starter. That's how you have to prepare, whether you are first string, second string or third string, because you never know when something is going to happen to the guy in front of you.

Sprawl is the American ideal way to develop. I believe that what we're developing in Denver is in no appreciable way different than what we're doing in Los Angeles - did in Los Angeles and are still doing. But I think we have developed the Los Angeles model of city-building, and I think it is unfortunate.

The main thing is that everything is taped at Full Sail. It is kind of like competing on home turf every time in terms of the tapings and specials. The main roster travels, I am in Hartford for live Smackdown, then head to Edmonton and Calgary and Denver. It is travel travel travel. NXT is more stationary.

My district is centered around the progressive college town of Boulder, Colorado, and the high-tech U.S. 36 corridor. It goes from the well-established suburbs of northwest Denver in Adams County to the beautiful mountain towns of Vail and Breckenridge and the majestic Western Slope of the Rocky Mountains.

When I told my friends and family that I was leaving Stars to open a burrito shop in Denver, they thought I was crazy, but not long after the success of the first Chipotle, I knew I had to open just one more, so I opened a second one on Colorado Boulevard, which turned out to be even busier than the first.

It is not unimaginable to have military options to respond to North Korean nuclear capability. What's unimaginable to me is allowing a capability that would allow a nuclear weapon to land in Denver, Colorado. That's unimaginable to me. So my job will be to develop military options to make sure that doesn't happen.

The first thing I did after getting a Master's degree - and the Air Force was very kind; they let me stay on at school to get a Master's - I went to Denver for the Armed Forces Air Intelligence School, six months. Fundamentally, we had a major effort on in Southeast Asia, and this was training folks to support that effort.

I may have gotten my first job from 'Backstage.' I remember going to the Equity offices, and I signed up for an audition. I left. I was grabbing a coffee somewhere and looking at 'Backstage' and saw that there was an audition for another project going on at the same time. It was called 'Almost Heaven: The Songs of John Denver.'

At 11, I went to Misha's school for two summers. So when I wasn't in that school, I was taking classes at David Howard or Robert Denver's studios - kind of legendary places - and there was one summer where Alexander Godunov sort of took me under his wing; the memory's a little murky, but I felt as if I was his project for those weeks.

I'm from Denver, and basketball there isn't near what it is out in Chicago or Detroit or L.A. There weren't that many great players to come out of the area; I was the best player in high school. I was Player of the Year four straight years for the state. As a freshman, I was State Player of the Year; I was Mr. Everything, so I was a phenom.

Is It Unloving to Speak of Hell? If you were giving some friends directions to Denver and you knew that one road led there but a second road ended at a sharp cliff around a blind corner, would you talk only about the safe road? No. You would tell them about both, especially if you knew that the road to destruction was wider and more traveled. In fact, it would be terribly unloving not to warn them about that other road.

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