Logan is Cameron, Cameron is Logan

 
Alan Ruck...

Alan is the guy who played Cameron in Ferris Bueller's Day Off

People fairly often point out that they think I look a lot like Cameron.

 

Nike+ Human Race, Austin, TX 8.31.2008

	Lance Armstrong at the start of the Nike+ Human Race 10K
Lance Armstrong cooling off as he runs past the Bob Bullock Museum	Sea of red shirts running through a cooling station on Congress Ave
Matthew McConaughey after the finish of the Nike+ Human Race 10K	Ben Harper playing after the race

Do I Look Like This Guy?

They say things always come in 3s but yesterday I had something happen twice. Maybe today it will happen again and round out my theory.

The first incident happened when my friend Randy relayed some information to me from his mom. She's been watching the Olympics like Billions of others have and apparently thinks that I look like Michael Phelps.

Now I'm a pretty good swimmer, heck I was even a lifeguard for 3 summers, but I have no gold medals to date for that.

A few hours later, while out at a customer site, a guy named Alan says, "you know who you look like? Michael Phelps" to which i proclaim, "that's the 2nd time today someone has said that"

For the past many years I typically get told that I look like Alan Ruck, the actor who played Cameron in Ferris Bueller's Day Off but this Phelps thing is new to me. Personally I think he has huge ears and a slight speech impediment but I'm guessing most girls would overlook that at a chance to hold his 10+ Gold Medals!

I did my best to imitate him below, tell me what you think... Long lost brothers or just bizarre random coincidental thoughts.

 

Ils Sont Partis!

I spent Saturday out in Manor at the Austin Polo Club. It was an awesome day with weather topping out around 80 degrees and a cool breeze blowing through the polo field. Although the Austin Polo Club team didn't win, it was a good match. The field has been newly renovated and has 12" boards lining both sides. The only other match that I've seen didn't have the high boards so the ball goes out of bounds a lot. This field allows a team to advance the ball down the sideline. With a final score of 7-2 the match ended after 4 chuckers.

The grounds were set up with a large tent and seating for about 50. There was a bar and a buffet line serving chicken and brisket. Under the tent they had two 50" flat panel TVs. After the match we sat around and waited for post time for the Kentucky Derby. I chose Eight Belles as my horse and she ran a great race with a strong finish but not strong enough to catch Big Brown.

End of an Era

On January 11th, 2008 I lost my job... I had been at Rush Enteprises for nearly 7 years and now it was time to go do something different.

The following day I hopped on a plane to Guadalajara, MX with a 1-way ticket and decided to go see some places that I had never seen. I stayed 2 days in Guadalajara at the Intercontinental Presidente as I planned out the next few days of my journey. I decided to rent a car and drive to Puerto Vallarta on the pacific coast. On a Monday morning, I set out for Puerto Vallarta and with one small detour to the Jose Cuervo plant in the town of Tequila, I made it to Pto Vallarta in 5 hours.

I found a room at the Sheraton Buganvillias on the south end of Pto Vallarta on Priceline and booked it for 2 nights. The hotel was great and the room was nice. I slept with the windows open listening to the sounds of the waves and enjoying the ocean breezes. On my 3rd day when I was due to check out, I decided to stay a little longer so I booked another 3 nights. I wasn't ready to leave.

During the day I would hang out at the pool, playing pool volleyball everyday at 1pm. There was a family there from Salta, Argentina and the father and son took the game really seriously. The dad didn't speak english so we kept score in spanish. Each morning I would wake up to a combination of water aerobics and spanish lessons. I could hear "Manos Arriba, Manos Abajo" (Hands Up, Hands Down), "Pierna Derecha Arriba, Abajo" (Right Leg Up, Down) being shouted by the activities coordinator. It was one of the more interesting alarm clocks that's woke me up.

They had a ping-pong tournament one morning and I came in 2nd. I hadn't played the game hardly ever but for some reason I was killing the ball. Only 1 guy stood in my way to winning the free drink but my backhand and the wind persisted in letting me hit the ball onto the table. The guy that beat me and his brother were from San Diego. I ended up hanging out with them for a few nights.

We'd start out at a place called Cheeky Monkey where Beer and Margaritas were $1 until 10pm. The margaritas were AWFUL but for $5 they got the job done. After that, we'd bounce around to the handful of clubs that line the "Malecon" (Boardwalk). It was a pretty quiet time of the year for tourists so not a whole lot of people were out. We met some locals one night who invited us back to a house party but our better judgement convinced us it probably was best not to go wandering too far from the main drag.

I met a lot of Canadians in Pto Vallarta. Playing volleyball one day in a 6 on 6 game i think all but 3 of us were Canadian. I guess when it's -40 degrees at your house, Mexico looks like a pretty great place to be.

Being that this is mainly a tourist destination, the food was pretty cheap. I had dinner one night at a nice Italian place, La Dulce Vida, for about $15 and my favorite of all was Los Tacos for the Tacos al Pastor at 8 Pesos each (around $.72).

After my 5th day in Pto Vallarta it was time to move on. I enjoyed being on the coast and listening to the ocean at night so I decided to head south instead of back inland. I was originally gonna travel to San Miguel de Allende but decided a 700km drive to Zihuatanejo/Ixtapa would be a better place to land.

I set out on a Saturday morning around 10am and thinking the drive would take me 7 hours at most, I would certainly get there before the sun went down. Well, I had no idea how the drive would go. The mountains alone held my average speed to under 25mph for almost 2 hours. Countless tiny towns with the biggest speed bumps ever and hundreds of small bridges and curvy roads stretched out my venture to right at 10 hours. Twice along the way, as I was going through a small town, some young girls would stretch out a string with a small rag tied to it so that I would stop. Then they'd approach the car and ask for some money. I gladly handed over a few pesos, the string was lowered and I was allowed to proceed. It was 8pm when I pulled into the front of the Las Brisas resort in Ixtapa.

Las Brisas was a beautiful resort. The room was perfect and the hammock on the balcony overlooked a nice crescent shaped private beach area. The first night in Ixtapa, I went down to Carlos and Charlie's and ran into a huge group of vacationers who were there for an annual volleyball trip. I befriended several of the people on the trip who were all confused why there would be a 6'5" guy in Ixtapa who was NOT on their trip. For the 4 days that I stayed there I had to continually tell people that I was NOT a part of their group. By the 3rd day, people would say... oh you're Logan... I've heard about you, aren't you the guy that lost your job and now you're travelling the world! I must admit, it was weird to be famous amongst a random group of americans while in Mexico.