April 2009

And Away They Go

Is what the announcer says at the beginning of each horse race at the Del Mar Racetrack.  I first went to the races when I was in my early twenties.  It was an adult activity to do after high school and college.  Horse racing is another world that comes to visit every summer for six weeks.  There is nothing like going to the track on opening day.  It’s usually sunny and warm with a lot of great looking ladies in dresses and hats.  Oh yeah, and then there is the racing.  The first thing you need to do is get yourself a racing form and a pen.  Next, head out to the infield, that’s the center of the track, and set up your lounge chair and cooler.  Once you’re situated, it’s time to pick your winners. 

This is where it gets really confusing.  Which horse do I pick?  To win, place or show?  What about her record?  the jockey’s record?  the trainer’s record?  Did she take lasick?  Has she run on turf before?  It always seems to be one extreme or the other, a little too timid on the betting or a little too aggressive.  I’m a little confused so I’ll start on the timid side.  “Two dollars on number three to win.”  In the infield you can get right up to the finish line and watch the horses thunder across the tape.  Woo hoo, my horse won.  I head over to collect my winnings and get a lousy $2.25 because the odds were 6/5 or some number you just can’t seem to divide after a couple of beers.  Let’s get a little aggressive.  “Ten dollars on number seven to win!”  Yeah, at 60/1 odds, I’m gonna make some cash to pay for this afternoon.  Look, seven is in the lead….now second…now third…she’s way back.

This Saturday I get to have another first 20 years later.  I’m attending a Kentucky Derby party for the first time.  I need to wear southern daytime formal, so I’ve gone out and purchased myself a seersucker suit and a hat.  I will probably have a mint julep even though it sounds gross.  I even hear they’re going to have a betting parlor.  Maybe with all those years of losing at Del Mar my luck will finally change.

Hopefully, I’ll see you at Del Mar on opening day and get my money’s worth out of this seersucker.  Have a great weekend.

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Crazy Day

I blog about the adventures of man, husband, father in a post modern world because there is a never ending supply of topics for me to ponder, mull and eventually write about.  Some ideas I have had in my head for years and some ideas are hard to come by, but some days they fall right into your lap.  Yesterday was that day.

It all started with my trip out of the county to go look at a project.  I was supposed to do a job walk with someone for some air conditioning work my company was going to perform, but they didn’t show up.  I wasn’t sure what to look at or what to do, so I had to turn around and head back to San Diego.  Not a good start, when you have a lot to do.  Next, an emergency at the office.  I wasn’t planning on being in the office today.  By the time I got to the office and put the fire out, four hours had transpired.  Half a day and nothing done.  Oh well, I settled into my desk and started down my to do list.

I was going to leave the office at 3:00pm to head to my son’s high school swim meet.  However, he called me at 1:30pm to tell me it had been cancelled.  The other team was not going to show up.  This is good.  I can get something accomplished today.  Phone rings again.  The swim meet is back on, but an hour later.  Now things get confusing.  The kids are supposed to warm up a one pool and then the meet is at another pool.  What?  Phone rings.  “Dad, can you drive us from VMMS to the Wave at 4:00pm?”

“Why do I have to do this?  It’s only two blocks.”  He can deal with it.  I’ll just see him at the meet.

Phone rings.  It’s the wife.  She’s going to take the girls to dance and then go play tennis, but I need to give the boys a ride home from the swim meet.  No problem, I got it.  Phone rings.  The swim meet is cancelled.  Now, there’s swim practice instead of a meet.  I’ve been on the phone so many times I can’t remember what I was doing.  Okay, I got it.  Pick the boys up from swim practice at 5:30pm.  Got it.

I decide to pack it up at the office and hit the grocery store before I pick the boys up.  We’re running low on some things.  On my way to the store, I get a text message from another mom saying I don’t have to drive the boys home.  She’s got it.  Okay, there’s no rush now as I saunter up and down the aisles.  I’m having fun in Frazier Farms.  They have rabbit, hens, ducks, goose, capons, pheasant, buffalo and other odd ball stuff.  Phone rings.  It’s my daughter’s friend, “Hi Frank, dance was cancelled.  I can’t get a hold of Karen.”  That’s right she’s playing tennis.  I tell her to give me a half hour and I’ll pick them up.  Click.  What’s with all the cancellations?  I hurry in the check out lane.  I race over to the dance studio.

I walk into the dance studio and my daughter and her friend are nowhere to be found.  I wave to the dance instructor and she waves and keeps going.  I say, “Where are the girls?”  She can’t hear me.

She stops class and walks over to the music to turn if off.  “I’m sorry, the ballet instructor had a work emergencey and there is no ballet today.”

“I know that.  Where are the girls?  I’m supposed to pick them up.”  Today is weird.

“Frank, they’ve never been here today.”  It is now that I realize dance starts in one hour and I am all twisted around.  Her friend was calling to inform me that dance was cancelled and for my wife not to pick her up because my wife was driving to dance.  Heavens sake.  I immediatlely call Karen, but there is no answer.  She has Jennifer in the car sitting in front of her friends house wondering why she isn’t coming out.  It is at this point that she sees a voice mail from me telling her that dance is cancelled.  It’s all very confusing.  Karen then races Jennifer home and is late for tennis.  I went home and didn’t leave the house or answer the phone until the next day.

We all had a good laugh later on that night.  I’m glad days like that don’t come around often, otherwise I woud go nuts.

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Why Don’t Kids Walk To School Anymore?

I am not embellishing or exaggerating when I say that my mom and dad never gave me a ride to school my entire life unless it was raining or snowing.  This is a fact.  When I was in the first grade, in Texas, I used to walk to school by myself.  I had to cross a creek and then a big clearing of tall grass.  By the time I got to school, my pants were usually damp up to my knees.  In third grade, in Ohio, the school was too far away and I had to walk to the bus stop and ride the yellow school bus to school.  Here in San Diego, I would walk to school with several friends every morning.  By this time my sister was old enough to go to school and it was my job to keep an eye on her.  I used to make her walk ten steps behind me so nobody would know she was with me.  How’s that for older brother harassment?

High school was the same story, but there was another option.  Walk, ride your bike, or get a ride.  In tenth grade, I rode my bike to school for the first half of the year, until I got tired of that.  I joined a car pool and my friend Ken would pick me up every morning.  He drove a Ford Maverick and the only cassette he had was Bruce Sprinsteen’s Born in the USA.  I think I still know most of those songs by heart.  Of course the ultimate is getting your driver’s license and never having to rely on other people to get from one place to another.

Fast forward to present day.  Parent’s have become the limousine service for the pampered generation.  It makes me want to puke.  The local elementary, middle and high schools are one mile from my house.  Most people around here don’t live too much farther away than that.  What do you see every morning and afternoon?  A big traffic jam is what you see.  There is a line one hundred cars long at the entrance  to the school.  It’s not any better in the afternoon.  The kids’ are so pampered they don’t seem to walk or ride there bikes anywhere these days.

I have been told that I am a dinosaur and just don’t understand present day.  It’s much too dangerous today to walk to school.  Really?  Is there is a pedophile on every corner?  Are these the streets of Tijuana?  Your personal safety is at stake walking down the sidewalk?  I am not going to look up crime figures for the last thirty years, but I would have to think that the percentage of violent crime isn’t any different today than it was thirty years ago.  The internet is an amazing tool, but one of the downfalls is that it has us living in fear.  If a violent crime happens in San Diego, then people in Florida can know about it within minutes.  I don’t think there is any more crime than in the past;  you hear about more crime due to the instant availability of the information.

Whatever happened to the buddy system?  Don’t talk to strangers and all that good stuff.   Stick together.  I’m not saying five year old kindergarteners be cut loose on the street or kids walk home alone.   Be sensible.  Let the kids gain some confidence.  Let them enjoy the fresh air and get some exercise and hang with their friends.

I’m done with my rant.

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Baseball on the Brain

The last time my son played little league was three years ago.  I was the manager of his team that season.  I remember we started out in January with the draft.  The season started the second week of February.  I think it was thirty one games later the season ended in the middle of June.  I was tired of baseball when it was over and it was good to take a break.  The next year my son didn’t want to move onto Pony baseball and that was okay.  I knew my son was not passionate about the game and I didn’t want him to feel like he had to play because I loved it.  Not being part of baseball for the past two years has been fine, I really haven’t thought about it, until now.

So thanks for letting me get my baseball fix by blogging.  See you at the ballpark.

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A Book Review: Twilight

My daughter Jennifer is thirteen years old.  She has read all four of the Twilight books.  For the past year or so, these books have been the “in thing” with female teenagers of this generation.  I would hear her talk about how Edward was a good vampire and in love with Bella and he would never hurt her.  I would just say to her there’s no such thing as a good vampire.  The movie came out and she went to see it with her girlfriends.  Then, the movie came out on dvd and she bought it.  We all sat on the couch and had popcorn and watched Twilight the movie.  It was a decent movie.  Jennifer had been begging me to read the book.  Her mom had already read three of the four novels.  I told her I would read it.

I guess you would have to say I’m a vampire traditionalist.  Bram Stoker’s Dracula is a great short novel that spawned our popular culture’s fascination with vampires for the next hundred years and counting.  You know the traditional stuff like they will shrink away from crosses and sunlight will kill them and you need to wear garlic around your neck for protection.  To my surprise and delight, the author has dismissed these attributes and added some new ones of her own.  They are still  immortal and they don’t have a beating heart.  However, the can be “good” and not prey on humans.  They can sustain themselves on animals just as well.

If you continue reading into the second, third and fourth books, there are also werewolves that are introduced.  I know it sounds corny with werewolves and vampires together, but if you just let yourself go with it, then it can be quite entertaining.  Better than anything you can watch on tv, for sure.  I was never really intrigued or interested in werewolf legends myself.  I have always found the idea of a vampire more fascinating.  By the popularity of the novels, there must be great interest in werewolf lore.  I just can’t get Lon Chaney running around in black and white with fake hair all over his face out of my head.  However, the novelist does a good job of giving werewolves a new twist, also.

It’s really not the vampire lore and story that makes these books so appealing to young women.  The books are really a love story.  A love story from the perspective of a seventeen year old young woman.  The dialogue is detailed and you see the development of a relationship through the eyes of the woman.  I found it fascinating.  Do women really think this way?  Can they really be this fragile inside and yet so strong at other times?  According to my wife, yes.  Its boy meets girl with a vampire twist, but very well done.

The really interesting thing is to see the hope and wonder for true love in my daughter’s eyes.  As a father, I am and I am not looking forward to witnessing all her experiences over the next few years, but I’ll get over it.

Got to go, to see if I can steal the fourth book off my wife’s nightstand.

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