Friday Five

So is it Fridays Five or Friday Fives?

The Excuse

Well, huh. I really wasn’t planning on getting this far behind. But next thing I knew 3 weeks has flown by and I had yet to do up a Friday Five. So I guess I owe you three weeks of updates. I thought about doing 3 weeks of Fives as well, but I don’t want to hold up production while I try to come up with 15 new things about myself.

The Weeks

Well, these past three weeks were big ones.

The first week (9Mar^[1]) was extremely cool. It started with a trip to Vegas, where Abram joined. It was just Abram and I for the first two nights, until Liam and Baron joined on the last night to celebrate Liam’s departure from the Navy. While most of the trip certainly falls under the category of “Stays in Vegas”, I do need to mention Abram’s 30 minute roll at craps. There are two things that clear out a craps table – a great roll or something happening to kill the mojo. Abram’s was of the great roll variety. He’ll likely never do that again, but when it happened it was amazing. The second part of that week saw Abram visiting San Diego and getting into his normal trouble.

Last week (the second week (16Mar)) I found myself heading to Tampa. Unfortunately work had me, well, working, and I really didn’t get to go out and experience all that much. But what did make the week was Karin visiting over the weekend. The company I was working for prefers Saturday departures (over the normal Friday), and they weren’t big on me heading home over the weekend. Ok fine – we’ll take advantage of the situation and have Karin come visit. It was cooler than I thought having Karin come out to where I was to visit.

While we had intended to see a ballgame while we were out here, the only day that would have worked was Sunday, and the only game available was Yankees/Rays – sold out needless to say. But we did manage to have dinner with Bill & Amy. And we went out to the Big Cat Rescue for their feeding tour. (I don’t know if you’ve noticed this about me, but I have a small thing for tigers.) The tour’s about an hour long with one of the staffers leading you around the place, talking about the cats, and tossing huge pieces of meat at them. It was beyond cool, and something we fully intend upon doing again when we have the chance.

What was amazing was the couple of smaller cats that they had. Little bigger than housecats, they still had the same instincts as their bigger cats, and according to our guide had a bigger attitude. The birds were also funny. The small parade in front of the tiger was great (apparently one of the tigers caught a bird one time – wouldn’t eat it (they’re spoiled), but strutted around with the carcass for weeks). You can see the rest of the pictures here.

This week was a back to the grindstone week. Mostly just work, but I did manage a little fun for myself – I went out to play poker on Thursday night. Unfortunately I didn’t get to play as long as I had wanted (not much to do when your QQ gets beat by JJ when he turns a set), but it was still great to get out and sit at a table for a little while.

The Restaurant

For lunch on Sunday Karin and I went to this place called The Press Box. It’s really just a hole in the wall sports bar, but it’s a great hole in the wall sports bar. It had hole in the wall sports bar food, hold in the wall sports bar waitresses, and tons of TV’s. It was fantastic. I had the sloppy joe (it wasn’t as good as Karin’s (it was actually better, but don’t tell her that)) and Karin had the Philly which was also tasty.

The Exercise

Well – I actually started back up again. Well, twice, but still – that’s better than zero. It’s that first step that gets us started, right?

What I really need is a goal to build towards. Suggestions?

The Travel Note

Abram has a reputation for being singled out. At some point I’ll have to blog the peach story, but for right now I have to note two travel items about Abram’s trip.

I’ve been on a small number of plane trips. In all my time, I have never, not once, see someone get carded on a plane. While I’ve still never witnessed this, Abram did inform me upon landing in San Diego (before we left for Vegas) that he was carded from DC to Houston.

To add insult to injury, TSA started doing random secondary security screenings on the other side of security. Sure enough, Abram got selected for a second pat down.

Fortunately for him, his friends and family show him more respect than the rest of the world.

The Five

1. What I appreciate most about Vegas is that it’s a different experience every trip. Depending on the people you’re with, the circumstances, the time of year, etc, it’s always a different experience. And each time it’s a blast. Well, that, and the open container law.
2. Penn & Teller is still my favorite show in Vegas. Blue Man Group and Avenue Q (despite it being an abbreviated version) are a close second and third (in some order).
3. For the longest time I couldn’t get into March Madness. Then I got a job working for the CBS affiliate in Duluth. During the first two Thursday/Friday nights of March Madness we had to wait to go on the air until the games were over. Sitting in a CBS affiliate there’s not much else to do except watch March Madness. After the first couple of nights I was hooked.
4. As we approach baseball season, I have to say I much prefer watching defensive highlights over offensive highlights. Watching a baseball fly out of a small ballpark is not overly exciting. Watching a diving grab is.
5. In the only season I ever played organized basketball (it was a 7-9th grade league) we won a collective 0 games – including the game against our fathers. The first time through playing the opposing teams we’d lose 100+ to mid-teens. The second time around the coaches would hold them back to around 50.

^[1] I mark weeks by the Monday, as that’s how I email it out to potential clients.