The Big Apple

My first 24 hours in New York... This is a big place, I mean in most downtowns you have a handful of buildings taller than 20 stories but here you can walk for 50 blocks and every single block has enormous skyscrapers.

We had dinner at a cozy little Italian place on Wednesday night near Rafi's apartment. He actually has a pretty nice place on the Upper West Side. I was expecting smaller, it's not HUGE but it's comfy. After dinner we had drinks at a bar across the street and an old high school friend from Louisiana School showed up to say hi. Linda Okereke, who was moving to Cleveland today, came across town to have a beer with Rafi and I. I hadn't seen Linda in probably 11 years since her graduation in 1995. We hung out for a few hours and then we were off.
I slept in a bit this morning and finally made it outside by 10am. I took a stroll through Central Park, the place is completely different than I thought it would be. You could get lost on the walking trails through there. They had a few playgrounds filled with kids and moms and on trail the entire side was lined with people reading or napping on blankets as if they were waiting for tickets to go on sale to a rock concert.

I had lunch with Rafi in Bryant Park. Snapple was doing a promotion on their light teas so they had 3 hot air balloons. They were more like round spheres of light gas with a harness and two guys on the ground holding ropes. People would strap in and be lifted to what seemed to be about 50 or 60 feet up. After my sandwich I tried to get in line to take a turn on the balloons but they were closed. Rafi went back to work and I walked around a bit more. I made my way back up to his apartment and crashed on the couch.

I got dressed to head out to the theatre. It was drizzling a bit when I got outside and i walked about 3 blocks to the subway. 4 stops towards downtown and I came back above ground at 50th and Broadway. By now it was storming! The homeless guy selling newspapers automatically turned into a homeless guy selling umbrellas! I waited for about 10 minutes as it stormed. People's umbrellas were being blown inside out by the swirling winds and everyone was getting soaked. I was wishing I hadn't worn my nice leather shoes but I wasn't gonna go back and change. The rain finally slowed and I went up to the street level and crossed to get to Ellen's Stardust Cafe. A touristy place where the waiters/waitresses sing show tunes. The food was fine and we made it over to the John Golden Theatre at West 45th to see Avenue Q.

The show was hilarious! The main members of the cast each played 2 different puppets. It's about finding your purpose in life and when you finally do how happy that makes you. Of course there was a puppet sex scene as well. The soundtrack was really funny including songs like "It Sucks To Be Me" where a Gary Coleman look a like who plays Gary Coleman makes fun of his life for having peaked before 15. A short subway trip home and I'm off to bed to get rested for tomorrow. I'm gonna try to go see a few things around town like Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, Museum of Modern Art, etc.

Good Night!

California sans humidity

I found my way out of LAX and onto the 405 South. I was headed towards Long Beach and down to Ocean Blvd to the Hilton there. The hotel was really nice and had a massive lobby area. If you like sitting on stylish furniture in rooms with 30 foot ceilings then you would've liked this place. I had a room on the top floor, #15 with a good view, although this area is mostly industrial with lots of cranes and shipping containers.By the time I got ready for dinner all the restaurants were closing and it was only 9:30. I found a Sports Bar and Grill and had some Mac 'n' Chicken, it was OK.Sunday morning I woke up at 7:30 CST which was 5:30am in my room and couldn't get back to bed. I watched some TV and killed time until 11 and headed out for lunch and the beach. When I walked out to the valet stand there was a rolling luggage bag on the ground alone. I handed my ticket to the valet and he retrieved my car. I placed the bags I needed in the car and some towels and such in the trunk. After lunch, I got down to the beach and opened the trunk. I noticed a strange bag in there but for some reason it wasn't strange enough for me to investigate. I grabbed the towels and went to get me a strip of beach going. (Travis, that's for you!) The sunshine on the west coast in southern California is warm but it is countered by the wind which averages out the temp to about 75 degrees. It's fantastic weather until about 6pm when the sun gets lower in the sky and the temp drops into the 60s. About an hour of being lazy on Long Beach and I was ready for a change. I drove up the 405 towards L.A. and then headed down to Redondo Beach. Walking along the boardwalk, I found enough ice cream stands to satisfy a thousand kindergarten classes and for some reason people here really like chocolate covered frozen bananas! Picture this, you're standing in an open area surrounded by people you don't know and 1 out of 10 are eating a chocolate covered frozen banana. For me, California is the only place I've witnessed this.

Back to the part about the strange luggage. I finally get back to the hotel around 6pm and as soon as I walk in the room the phone is ringing. No one knows which hotel I'm staying at so I can't imagine who is calling me. I answer and its the front desk. They ask if I noticed a strange bag that may have been placed in my trunk. I laughed and said yes and told them that I had just given the car to the valet and they could retrieve the bag. Poor guy, I had his laptop and briefcase for over 6 hours. I'm sure he wasn't happy with the valet dude!

Monday morning I was up and off to Pico Rivera, a town just east of L.A. where one of our Peterbilt dealerships is located. I got there about 8:30 and found the crew of guys who were out replacing PCs. I met the GM for that store as well as the Regional GM and spent some time with them to make sure any issues that may currently have were being handled. I was able to round up a golf game and later that afternoon we headed back down to Long Beach to play at a nice city course there. At $25, it was quite a bargain, the carpet like greens were so plush, something I'm not used to in the blazing heat of Texas. I placed my clubs on the cart next to Pete Davis' and ironically my LSU Tiger head cover sat starting at his stuff USC Trojan head cover. We didn't talk about the season at all nor did we fight over who REALLY won that year. I drove the ball extremely well, finding the middle of the fairway on about 9 of the 14 driving holes. Putting was a different story as the soft greens were hard to read and hard to adjust to. I missed more 3 footers than I normally do but I walked away with an 85.

Tuesday morning I was off to LAX by 7:30 for a 9:25 flight. I filled up the tank of the rental car with $3.19 87 octane regular unleaded. Since I had changed my flight to return to San Antonio instead of Austin I wasn't able to Check In online and therefore ended up with a C boarding pass. (Southwest uses A, B and C groups for boarding, A is good, B is ok, C sucks!) I ended up sitting next to a mother and daughter who were both of reasonably small size so I was able to use my own armrests and not feel crowded. I'll land around 2pm in San Antonio and head into the office for a short afternoon of work. Back to the real world in the morning. It was a fun, golf-filled vacation. I made some new friends, have a standing invite to a USC game and got to play golf in California.
I'm off to NYC in 15 days.

36 Holes

As a young teenager, I would often play 36 holes of golf in a day and they would be separated by a cheeseburger served to me by Simon. Those days were half my lifetime ago, the course was Indian Hills CC in Opelousas, LA and Simon was our favorite bartender.

This day of 36 holes was different, we tee'd off on the first 18 at the Milwaukee Country Club at 8am sharp, after a good breakfast. I had blueberry pancakes, a favorite of mine, along with some toast (pre-trimmed edges!) and jelly. The course was tough but fun, the place is barely played as the 225 members are only allowed 9 guests a year and it's located in a state that only has 5.5 months of golfing weather. The greens had almost no ball marks and the visible ones had been repaired and rolled as flat as any part of the green. The fairway lies were like carpet in your hallway, flat, not fluffy, but comfortable and springy to walk on. I shot 44 on the front with 8 fives and 1 four. At the turn i grabbed a water and a couple of Ritz crackers with fresh peanut butter to spread between them. Much better than those prewrapped peanut butter cracker packs. I was still playing with the same ball when I tee'd off on the 10th. I try not to think about that much b/c it's a sure way to SHANK the next shot into the drink and then be digging in your bag for another Titleist. Another 9 holes of fast paced golf filled with some great views and we were done. 42 more strokes for me on the back to round out at 86. I had to par the 18th to finish with 85 but a duffed SW shot after a great drive kept me out of the money. We packed up our bags and were off in the limo to the Milwaukee airport. There we would grab a rental, say bye to Bill Hooper from Qwest and Scott and I were off to our next tee time.

We pulled up to Thunderhawk Golf Course in Beach Park, Il and were greeted by Scott's cousin Craig and his wife Cathy. Both are very good golfers. It was about 2:15 in the afternoon and we were up on the 1st tee about to start our 2nd round of the day. I hit the fairway on the first hole with a 270yd drive and I was feeling tired but good. At the turn I was sitting at 39, I'm usually in the low to mid 40's on each side so a 39 was good for me. The course wasn't easy but I just kept the ball in play and made a few putts. Still playing with the same ball from the morning that had encountered NO hazards and hence NO penalty strokes in the last 27 holes. I was thinking now about the possibility of shooting a sub 80 round. The temperature was dropping and was in the mid 50s with wind gusts approaching 20mph. Club selection was difficult, especially on the Par 3s. 1 double bogey on the back and I ended up with a 41 to shoot an 80. I missed my 70s round but was very happy with my score. 36 holes with no penalty strokes and no lost balls isn't something I do often. The highlight of the round for me was when I holed out with my lob wedge from about 25 yards. It was the first time I had ever done that on a fly. The ball came off my face with good loft and landed perfectly into the hole. It never even touched the edge of the cup as it banged into the flagstick and dropped to the bottom. Unfortunately it was to save Par as I had to punch out of the sand on the previous shot.

Craig and Cathy joined Scott and I at Outback steakhouse just up the road from the course for dinner. I had the chicken and shrimp fettuccine which was very good, I was also quite hungry so my stomach isn't as picky then.

After dinner we drove down to the O'Hare airport area and found our Westin hotel. Nearly 10pm we checked in and found our rooms. the Westin is always nice, i had a huge king bed with about 8 pillows, a shower with DUAL shower heads (soon to be my next purchase) and a comfy chair. I showered and changed and went down to the bar to get a drink. We found a sports bar around the corner but I learned a good lesson. If you want to have fun in Chicago, you gotta be downtown. There was NOTHING going on in the O'Hare area that we could find.

We decided to cancel our Saturday morning golf round due to cold/rainy weather. Good choice since I didn't rise out of bed ‘til almost 9:30. We got up and drove over to Hoffman Estates, Scott's old neighborhood. We drove around a few places, Scott's home that he grew up in, his grade school and high school and had lunch at Barnaby's A Family Inn. Pepperoni and Pineapple pizza for me which went well with my semi-hangover. Feeling all better now, I found my way to Midway Airport and am now waiting for my flight.
More to come from Los Angeles :)

Milwaukee in June

There are times in life when you're surrounded by a handful of good friends and everyone's having a good time and you'll remember the evening for a very long time, and then there are the experiences you have with people you'll probably only meet once. This weekend would be defined by the latter.

I'm sitting in my nice room at the Milwaukee Country Club on a Thursday evening. I had a great dinner of steak, potatoes, and chocolate cake tonight topped off with some Bacardi and coke and a little red wine. I flew up today with my boss, Scott to meet with Barry Allen, an Executive V.P. of Qwest Communications and basically the #2 guy in the company. I can't say that I have dinner often with the millionaire type but Barry was very engaging and a great listener. Qwest currently provides my company Rush Enterprises with a data and voice network that services about 60 locations across 9 states.

After dinner we took a quick walk around the club house and a few of the tee boxes and greens that we'd be playing on in the morning. The course looks tough but it's the kind of layout that looks like it's been manicured with a set of tiny shears. Every tree has a perfect circular edge traced around it as well as every sidewalk. The edges of the fairways have a perfectly even 4 foot wide strip of slightly longer, darker grass before becoming rough. I stood on the 10th tee box and looked down at a dog leg right par 5. I scoped at the sand traps on the left side of the fairway that sat about 275 yards from the white tees. The tips play about 7400 yards so we'll probably play one tee in front of that. We should have caddies in the morning, but the caddies are high school students and this being the last week of school in Wisconsin, we're not sure how many will be available.

After the 18 tomorrow, we're going to pick up a rental car and head towards Chicago. We're gonna play another round in the afternoon and then go at it again on Saturday morning. Then it's off to Los Angeles and finally back to Austin on Tuesday. I hope to keep a lot of mental images from tomorrow in my mind for a long time, but I'll also take some pics just in case I forget.