The Final Days

To Anyone Out There Still Reading,

So I'm back in North Olmsted, Ohio and I've had a few days to rest and recoup - if you don't count Mike's bachelor party on Saturday. I'm going to be quick and to the point while explaining the last four days of our trip. After a few more days of rest and contemplation, I'll come back and try to write something profound to sum it all up...but for now, let's just keep it simple.

I left off on the morning of the White Sox game. We relaxed for the better part of the day, and then my parents and I drove into downtown Chicago and visited Navy Pier. We ate dinner there and took the train to the South Side for the White Sox game. I was very surprised at the high energy the crowd at U.S. Cellular Field displayed. I thought most people in Chicago were Cubs fans, but in all honesty, the Sox fans were intense. We endured another rain delay, but only for an hour this time. We watched the game for a while, then my parents left early and Sam, Sloan (OU friend living in Chicago), and I stayed for the rest of the game. Two things stick out in my mind. One, the Sox fans executed the best wave I have every seen. Two, we met Sam's friend Brandon at his seats for the last two innings. He got tickets from work and was sitting in the third row behind the visitors dugout...so that was a pretty nice view to catch the end of the game from! I thought the whole experience was pretty cool, and I really would have enjoyed it if I didn't DESPISE the White Sox.

I stayed at Sloan's apartment after the game, and then the next day I walked to Sam's aunt's house nearby and hung out with her and her cousins Morgan (7) and Keagan (2). I took the train out to Mike's house and had dinner with him for his birthday. I know, I know, I should have been cooking for Mike on his birthday...butttt he cooked me an incredible pasta dinner with homemade sauce and meatballs and sausage and the whole deal! We watched the new show "Shaq Vs." - really cheesy but kinda cool - and then I drove back into the city to spend our last night in Chi-town at Sam's Aunt Steph's place. 

On Wednesday we headed to Detroit for the Tigers game. We stopped just East of Ann Arbor to spend time with my sister's high school friend Corrin and her husband Tim. We drank a few beers and bullshitted, then drove to Sam's Dad's hotel (he was in town on business for the day.) We had a few more beverages, then the three of us drove downtown to Comerica Park for the game. I'll describe what it looks like for you since this is the ONLY game I forgot to bring my camera to. In a nutshell, it looks like someone puked up a  plethora of HUGE tiger statues. THEY'RE EVERYWHERE around the stadium. That's the only important thing to note. After the game Sam went back to the hotel with her dad and I went back to Corrin and Tim's house to catch up and hang out a little more. 

THE LAST DAY!

We drove to Toronto in the morning and had a little setback crossing the border. I've been to Canada three times before with no problems, but since Sam had a guilty look on her face, we had our whole car searched and were detained for a short while. After they found nothing but food, clothes, and baseball junk in the car, they let us go. We walked around the streets of Toronto for a while when we arrived and just wandered aimlessly into stores and the like. We made our way into the Rogers Centre (formerly the Skydome) for the game a little early and found our seats. The Blue Jays were playing the Red Sox, and once again their jackass fans were in full force. We only stayed for the first five innings for three reasons. One, we were driving back to Cleveland right after the game and didn't want to roll in around 4AM. Two, it started raining RIGHT AFTER they opened the retractable roof and we were getting wet. Three, I can only take so much cheering from Red Sox fans before I puke. 

So that puts me where I am now. We arrived back at my parents' house around 2:30AM last Friday morning. I'm still letting everything marinate for a few more days before I lay down some great insights about the whole summer and traveling in general...so keep reading! (If anyone besides my mom and Rachel still are!)

Peace,

Matt

Milwaukee and Chicago I

Hello Friends,

On Friday, we left Minneapolis in the afternoon and headed for Milwaukee to catch the Brewers game against the Houston Astros. Very quickly, I realized I was going to like Miller Park. It definitely ended up being one of my top five or top three favorite parks. Some of the highlights were the mascot sliding down the big yellow slide every time a Brewers player hit a homerun and, of course, the famous sausage race. During the sixth inning of every game the stadium has a race between five "sausage mascots." The best part about this time was that the Italian sausage won! The game itself was exciting yet anticlimactic. The Brewers scored eight runs in the first inning and the outcome of the game was never in doubt. They ended up winning 11-2, but we didn't stick around to see the ending. We left early to drive down to Chicago for the night, and I dropped off Sam and Elle at Sam's aunt's house then drove out to my brother Mike's house in the suburbs. After three cities in one day, I was pretty exhausted so I relaxed and watched last week's episode of Entourage before calling it a night.

Saturday was spent soaking up some serious family time. My parents are in Chicago for the weekend staying with Mike and Christie, so we hung out together all day Saturday. We woke up early (relatively speaking) and went to brunch before getting ready for a cookout at Mike's house. Mike's college roommate Adam, his wife Bree, and Bree's cousin Meaghan (see St. Louis) joined us as well. We all started drinking and catching up, then eventually we played some cornhole and ate dinner. Another old roommate of Mike's, Grove, came later and we ended up getting a pretty good crowd to go to the bar near Mike's house.

Since Grove tends to enjoy liquor, the bars were interesting. He was buying us shots and drinks all night, and here are some of the results...
Adam tapped the top of Mike's beer bottle with his bottle, expecting Mike's beer to foam up and overflow. The only problem was that Adam was drunk and hit it too hard, resulting in the bottom of Mike's bottle dropping out and beer and glass going everywhere.
Grove was teaching Christie to salsa dance, then her balance betrayed her and she got to know the floor a little better.
As we're catching a cab home, Adam and Bree were leaning on each other, only neither one was in any shape to help the other one out. So they basically tackled each other on the sidewalk.
Finally, after a long night of shit-talking between Mike and me, we got home, cleared out the living room, and had a Pavia battle-royal. It went something like this: Mike was drunk as a skunk so I took advantage of that fact and threw him around the room most of the time. He resisted a bit, then stopped, and I threw him around a little more until I wasted all of my energy and we both laid on the ground drunk and trying to catch our breaths. Good thing we didn't break anything in the living room or Christie would have kicked both of our asses. Oh yeah, after churning all the alcohol up in my stomach, it decided it was time to let it all out...so I had a date with the porcelain.

Sunday: Game Day
We woke up in a frenzy (thanks to Bree's early burst of energy) trying to pull ourselves together and catch the Metra train into downtown Chicago. On the ride in, my dad asks me if I know that the game starts at noon, not one. I said, "No. I'm sure the game is at one." He tells me to check my ticket, and I do, and it says the game is at 1:20PM. The tickets that Mike, Christie and my parents got from friends say the game is at noon, only on Saturday! So Mike and Christie scrambled to get tickets from Craigslist as the rest of us relaxed and recouped on the train. We took the red line subway into Wrigleyville and finally made it to Cubby Bear Tavern to get ready for the Cubs game. I took advantage of the free beer still sitting in my body from the night before, and after a couple morning beverages the shampoo effect started setting in. So eventually Mike, Christie and my parents scalped tickets to get into SUNDAY'S game and we headed into Wrigley Field. Sam and I had tickets we bought online the day they went on sale and Adam, Bree, and Meaghan had tickets in our same row!

Here's how the game went:
After EIGHT first pitches, the game was ready to start, but not before it started downpouring. The rain was on and off for a while, but they wouldn't start the game until it cleared up. Around 1:45 or 2, the weather really started clearing up and we thought the game would start back up. Unfortunately, whoever is making decisions at Wrigley Field is a complete moron. The weather cleared up and an announcement was made saying that thunderstorms were on the way and would be there in an hour. They decided to wait it out and try to start the game AFTER the rain came. Here's the problem...what if the rain never comes?! These people are complete idiots because two hours later the rain finally did come, but they could have played four, five or even six innings by then! What an ass-backwards way of thinking. So thanks to the intelligent people at Wrigley Field, we didn't actually see any baseball yesterday.

We woke up early, took the train into downtown, took the red line to Wrigley, drank at the Cubby Bear, and sat in Wrigley for almost four hours. I'd say we got the whole experience, minus the baseball, so I think it counts towards the whole seeing 30 games in 30 stadiums thing. After the "game," we hustled to catch the train back to the suburbs and picked up some Chicago style deep dish pizza on our way home for dinner. At night, we watched UFC and Entourage, the only two things REALLY worth watching on TV these days. Finally, before crashing for the night my mom, Meaghan, and I watched the worst movie I've seen in a while, The Cutting Edge (even though I've seen it before...shhhh). To my mom's credit, she was so into the movie that she stayed up and watched the whole thing without even dozing off on the couch (a normal occurrence around 9PM).

I had a great weekend spending time with my family and it was especially great to see MY MOM! Today we'll be heading to the White Sox game, and I'm hoping we actually get to see some baseball! Hard to believe it, but we only have three more games and four more days. Almost there...

Matt

Minnesota Pictures

Yellowstone to Denver PIctures

Denver and Minnesota

Hello Friends,

I have some catching up to do, so let’s get right to it. We left Seattle on Saturday morning at 5:30AM on our way to Yellowstone National Park. We left so early because we expected to get to YNP in time to set up our tent and explore a little. That didn’t happen. Between the longer than expected drive and the time change, we arrived at the visitors center of the park around 7PM, only to find out that we had another two hour drive to our campsite. We started setting up the tent – in the pitch black and rain – and found out there weren’t any stakes with it. By the time we got it set up, I was ready to go to sleep; only it isn’t easy to sleep when you are freeeeezing cold. We had two sleeping bags, two pillows, and a blanket…and THREE people. Oh yeah, did I mention that the temperature was hovering just above freezing? In August. Sleeping on a tree root didn’t help either.

Needless to say, I didn’t get the best night of sleep I’ve ever had. This is a great lesson in Murphy’s Law. Here’s the silver lining: The drive to and through Yellowstone was the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen. The Pacific Northwest and Wyoming are by far the best places to drive in the country.

On Sunday we headed for Denver and were pleasantly surprised to find that the drive wasn’t nearly as long as we thought it was going to be. We arrived at Ken’s apartment around 6PM. Ken used to work with my brother in Kansas City before he was transferred to Denver. He also graduated from Elder; so unfortunately, he bleeds purple like the rest of you Cincinnati fools. I was staying with Ken while Sam and Elle stayed with Elle’s cousin Erin and her husband Nick.

Here’s the fun part: It is an incredibly small world, as we’ve been finding out all along this trip. Ken and I were having a drink and talking, then one conversation leads to another, and this is what we came up with: Ken graduated Elder the same year as Joe, Elle’s boyfriend. He knows Elle, and Elle graduated high school with Ken’s sister. Then, Ken and are were talking about getting a bite to eat, and he asked what the girls were doing for dinner. I said they were at Elle’s cousin’s for a cookout. Ken asked what Elle’s cousin’s name was, because of course, he knows Erin and Nick! They invited him to the cookout, but he said he couldn’t go because he had a visitor from out of town coming (me)! Damn Cincinnatians all know each other.

Anyways, Ken and I headed over to join the girls and friends for a fun cookout. After some good food and a few drinks, Ken, Elle, Sam, and I headed to a local watering hole to shoot the shit a little more. The bar we went to had tons of board games, so we drank and played Mad Gab…just another typical Sunday night. The best part was that Sully was in town visiting his grandparents and he met us at the bar. It’s always great to see friends from home…and to have some Cleveland blood around all the Cincinnatians (trust me, it helps).

On my second day in Denver I was the world’s biggest bum. While Ken was working, I was watching about five or six hours of The Office on DVD. Later on in the afternoon, Sully came over to his apartment and we watched some more The Office and started drinking a little. Ken got home and decided the best thing for us would be to take a couple shots of Tequila. He was wrong. I was decent drunk before we even left for the Rockies game.

We had a good crowd for the game. It was Erin, Nick, Elle, Sam, Ken, Sully, and me. The thing that sticks out most in my mind from the game is the food. Somewhere along the way on this trip, we met someone who told us we need to try Rocky Mountain Oysters while at the Rockies game. Luckily, he was nice enough to actually tell us what they are and not let us be surprised. They’re fried bull testicles. Well, as I’ve been saying all along, when in Rome…

In all honesty, they really weren’t too bad. They were kind of tasty, considering I was eating balls. Maybe the alcohol had something to do with it as well. However, I wouldn’t recommend trying more than a few because I had one too many. I felt like shit the rest of the night, and when we went out for a few drinks after the game, I was not feeling so hot (understatement of the year).

The game itself was awesome, but I missed a lot of the most important parts. The Rockies shortstop, Troy Tulowitzki, hit for the cycle and turned an unassisted triple play. These are two things that RARELY happen in baseball and they were somewhat of a blur for me. As we were leaving, I noticed Tulo being interviewed on the jumbotron and hearing that he hit for the cycle. I was thinking, “Did that happen in this game???” Someone said, “I wish they would have made it more obvious,” to which a woman replied, “They couldn’t have made it more obvious. The screen was flashing CYCLE! CYCLE! CYCLE!” The one thing that does stick in my mind is a catch that the Rockies’ centerfielder made in the ninth inning. He slammed into the wall full-speed and robbed a possible homerun.

Anyways, our last day in Denver was spent checking out a few sites around the city. Ken took off work for the day and took us out to Red Rocks Amphitheatre and Park. Then we saw a little of downtown and the 16^th St. Mall before we saw Funny People at the movie theatre (It was just as funny the second time around). We had a nice dinner at a kick-ass pizza place with all seven of us for our last night in Denver. Afterwards, we went back to Erin and Nick’s and relaxed for a little while before our long drive to Minnesota.

We left in the middle of the night and got to Minneapolis around 4 or 5PM on Wednesday. We met up with a friend of mine from OU, Ashton, at her apartment before the Twins game. She’s living in apartments near U of Minnesota’s campus, subleasing with some students, and they’re all nice enough to let us crash for a few days. Ashton came to the Twins game with us last night. It was the best deal we’ve had yet (besides the free tickets). It was $16 total for four seats in the upper deck…a special student four-pack. Plus, it was dollar dog night. This reminds me, recent grads don’t ever get rid of your student IDs. They’re priceless.

Finally, today we saw a few more things on our last day in Minnesota. First, we went to Summit Brewing Company in St. Paul for a free tour and beer tasting. The best entertainment possible is a brewery tour because they’re almost always free and you get to learn about and drink beer. Did I mention it’s free? After that, we went to the Mall of America just to check it out. It was impressive and dull all at once. Impressive because it was so huge and had every store you could ever imagine. Dull because it’s just another mall, only bigger. The only special part about it was the mini theme park and roller coasters in the middle of it.

Tonight for dinner Ashton, Sam, Elle, and I met my friend Margaret (another Bobcat) at a place in the “trendy” part of town. It was cool to have another OU reunion and shoot the shit over some drinks and dinner. Anywhere we go, it’s great to see Bobcats and reminisce about the good ole days in Athens.

It seems that I’m always tired every day now, and today is no different. So I’m going to call it a night. Next, we’re moving on to Milwaukee and Chicago. Talk to you all sometime soon. I’ll try to put up some more pictures soon.

Peace,

Matt

Seattle Pictures

Bay Area Pictures

Most of these pictures speak for themselves.

Anaheim and San Diego Pictures

Seattle

Most people who know me well will tell you that I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. I generally believe that people are inherently good, and I think the majority of people are more likely to help you than hurt you. Our experiences in Seattle have reaffirmed my thoughts and taught me that regardless of your expectations, people will always find some way to surprise you.

With that said, let me explain our relationship to our hosts in Seattle. Sam’s mom set us up with a place to stay at her ex-coworker’s cousin’s house. Jaime is the cousin, and we stayed with her, her husband Mark, and their two adorable girls Peyton and Katherine (9 and 6?). So this family took in three recent college grads without knowing any of us, knowing Sam’s mom, or having any idea what to expect or who would should up on their doorstep.

As you can probably tell by now, they welcomed us with open arms and treated us far better than we deserved (this has definitely been a theme on our trip). When we arrived Thursday night we sat around and chatted for a little while and got to know each other, and then they all went to bed and left us to “help ourselves and make ourselves at home.” Mark left us with an email address and contact info for a friend of his who works at Safeco Field (Mariners’ stadium). So Sam emailed Mark’s friend to set up a tour for us the next day!

Before we get to that, let me tell you what we did to entertain ourselves on Friday afternoon. We drove into downtown Seattle to see the Pike Place Market. It is a world famous open/outdoor market and one of the largest farmers/artisans markets in the country. You may recognize it from seeing clips of Pike Place Fish Co. employees throwing huge raw fish across the market when customers place an order. You may also recognize the giant pig/piggy bank that sits out front. Anyways, we spent most of the day walking around and exploring the market. We checked out different artists’ work – and realized we couldn’t afford most of it – and also browsed through all the fresh produce farmers were selling. We also got to see the world’s first Starbucks, which is right in the heart of Pike Place Market where it all began…before they started trying to take over the world. It’s such a cool atmosphere there and I think if I lived in the area I would probably be there three or four times a week (I’ll get back to that later).

From the market we walked to the game and got there incredibly early. Why, you might ask, would we be at a 7:05 game before 5 o’clock? Well, because it was Ken Griffey Jr. bobblehead night of course! There were only 20,000 bobbleheads available for giveaway, and I swear at least 10-15,000 people were standing outside the stadium in line waiting to get in and grab their piece of history. The other reason we arrived early was to meet up with Mark’s friend for an all access tour of Safeco Field! In a word, it was phenomenal! She took us to the press box, owner’s suite, diamond seats, etc. We got to see all the ins and outs of the stadium, which coincidentally really makes you fall in love with it.

Needless to say, after seeing all the different great views in the stadium, it was really tough to take our actual seats and watch from the nosebleeds. But, we managed to get by of course. The game was really exciting too. The Mariners were losing the entire game until the 7th inning when they scored four runs to tie the score at 5 a piece. The game went to 11 innings when the Mariners finally won 6-5. Unfortunately, we weren’t there to see the ending because we had to leave the game early to get the car, which was parked in a lot with a time limit! Seems like bad luck, but after the stadium tour and our incredible hosts, nothing could have gone wrong in Seattle.

After the game we drove back to Mark and Jaime’s to find that they had baked cookies for us to take on the road! How unbelievably nice are these people??? But wait, it gets better. This morning at 5:30am we were just about to take off for Yellowstone National Park to camp for the night. Jaime wakes up to say goodbye to us and GIVES us one of their sleeping bags because we only have one and she wants our night of camping to be comfortable! If you ever have doubts about the inherent goodness of people, please remember our wonderful Seattle hosts.

Now, back my comment before about visiting the Pike Place Market all the time if I lived in Seattle. Seattle is an amazing city and I would love to live there someday. However, it is the one place that I really want to live, but I KNOW I never would. Why? Because in our two day stay there I didn’t see a single ray of sunlight. It is perpetually overcast in Seattle, and although it didn’t rain at all (which I thought it would), it was constantly gloomy and somewhat depressing. STILL A GREAT PLACE TO VISIT THOUGH!

So like I said, we’re on our way to Yellowstone National Park to camp for the evening. We’ll be in Denver on Sunday, which is when I’ll end up posting this entry…and probably another since I’ll have lots to say about YNP. Until Denver…

Slacker.

It's been over 2 weeks since my last blog and I'm well aware I've been slacking.  

The Anaheim game started our last leg off with a bang.  Some heaven-sent man handed us 2 tickets to sit behind home plate with him- for free- again upping my drinking budget (thank you, Angel wearing jeans).  The game was next to amazing and the reasons are 3 fold: 1) we saw 2 fights break out in the stands which stalled the game and involved no Indians fans 2) the Indians resembled an actual baseball team to pull out an 8-6 win and 3) when Francisco made a hell of a save, Anaheim cheered.  Classy.

I spent some quality time the next day with Brittany Burke- a dear friend from OU who has made quite a life for herself in LA.  We caught up over bottomless Bloody Marys and a celebrity sighting (Maggie Grace) then I headed to UCLA to meet up with Rachel & Matt.  We went around campus (Rachel just moved in for Law School- hello future sugar mama) & ended up at a Mexican restaurant-obvi- where we each had a 32oz margarita.  It was here that I realized Rachel's love for Ritas, -and a potential drinking problem- because she finished hers by the time I was nearing the halfway point on mine.  I spent Wednesday exploring the college town that is UCLA while Matt & Rachel spent the day at the beach.  They got back & we got ready for the big two-three celebration in Santa Monica.  Rachel, Matt, Mckenzie, Ashley, Brittany, Stile & I (all Bobcats) went to Cabo Cantina- a place with happy hour til midnight with 2-for-1 deals.  When Matt got a beer, I was given a beer.  When Stile got a shot, I was given a shot.  It rapidly turned into a give-Sam-your-other-happy-hour-drink.  Once midnight hit & my friends decided to sing- which made the people sitting next to us shell out their 2-for-1 margaritas, adding to the birthday frenzy.  Thanks guys, wherever you are.  Onward to a bar where Ashely informed the bouncer that it was my birthday.  The info trickled down the line to 3 guys behind us who wanted to buy me a birthday drink.  As Matt wrote earlier, these guys seemed eager to hear about our trip.  I have to throw in that I have a slight recollection of taking a shot of American Honey, and by shot, I mean half of a pint.  Great Birthday.  It's the most amazing thing to know that wherever I spend my birthday, I've got great friends to share with me.

On my birthday we drove (actually, Matt drove) to San Diego.  It was on our way out of town that I had my second, and best celebrity sighting (Jamie Kaler).  He walked right past me, rocking out to his iPod.  I spent the day with my friend from high school, Evan.  We went to Pacific Beach to a bar to catch up- a common theme in this blog- over Bloody Marys- another common theme- and after, we went to a beach party with Evan's girlfriend Katrina to meet her friends.  Low & behold it was the Metz family (Natalie & Drew) in town for a family wedding.  I finally got to meet Natalie's perfect bundle of joy as well as the rest of the Metz family, before picking up our newest companion, Elle.  The cherry on top of a great birthday was sitting on Evan's patio with his roommate and Elle, drinking and catching up.

Friday was the Padres game & Evan bough me awesome tickets on the 3rd base line.  For those of you who know Evan and actually like him, you know it can be a love/hate relationship.  Today was love.  Thanks Ev!  I sat next to some obnoxiously loud Jehovah's witness who was heckling the 3rd baseman and for those of you who fall into the above category, you also know I'm talking about Evan.  He had people laughing, yelling at him, and 2 adorable 6-year-olds mimicking him.  We went out with Elle's cousins after dropping Matt off at his cousin's and take a guess- I knew them from OU too.  The more expanding west we do, the smaller the world gets.  Not a day into the trip & Elle gets us kicked out of the bar.  In fact the bouncer could be quoted as saying to me "girl, you've got some great moves- but you've got to get your friend out of here."  Elle & I stayed up partying with her family  friends & I ended up watching the sun come up.  

Onward to San Jose/San Francisco the next morning.  We arrived 10 hours & 1 killer PCH drive later to Bob Fenner's house.  He immediately had dinner grilling for us and one hell of a great plan for the night.  I'm going to explain this night and the next morning on the way to the Giants game to you with some quotes from Bob, which should sum it up for those of you who know him:

"Tonight's gonna be one of those nights the Black Eyed Peas write songs about"

"The best part of waking up drunk is that it's like free beer"

and

"I'm glad I have my sunglasses on because I'm fucking hammered"

The game consisted of the 4 of us shampoo effecting our way through the day.  It's all pretty much a blur, except I remember not being able to get on the same drunken level as the rest of the clowns I was with, and oh yeah, the next morning was Bob's first day at his new job.

That Monday, while Bob was fighting back yaking during his first meeting with a new company, Elle, Matt & I went biking along the San Fran Bay.  It was breathtaking in every sense of the word.  The scenery was beautiful and the hills made me remember that I'm horrible shape.  The only other way to describe it is with pictures- which are posted somewhere on this site.  

I'm going to break up these blogs for you so to keep you from trailing off and actually doing something productive.  Stay tuned for Slacker 2.0 to hear about our trip to Tahoe, Sacramento, Seattle & Bull Testicles.  

Los Angeles Pictures

Arizona Pictures

That's all I've got for tonight...I'm tired. I'll try to put more up tomorrow morning or later on this week. Enjoy.

Colorado Springs Pictures

Mostly pictures from Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs. I forget most of the names of the rock formations...but everything was beautiful!

Kansas City Pictures

St. Louis Pictures

Uno Mas de California

Hello Friends,

We’re on our way to Seattle right now, in the middle of a wonderful 12 hour drive. It shouldn’t be too bad now that we have three drivers (I guess it’s not so bad having Smelly Elle around after all), and also because I’m really excited to get to Seattle. I’ve been looking forward to it for a while now. 

There isn’t much battery left in the computer, so I’ll briefly recap the past couple of days for you all. On Tuesday, Elle and Sam took the car and headed to Lake Tahoe and then eventually to Sacramento. I stayed in Santa Clara with Bob for one more night and some much needed “man time.” It isn’t that I can’t handle being around women all the time, I mean I lived with four gals for a year. But when you spend so much time without any male bonding, things start to get a little feminine all the time. 

Anyways, on Tuesday I slept in, caught up on emails, and eventually made my way outside. I walked around Santa Clara’s campus, downtown San Jose, and eventually settled at Panera for lunch. When Bob got home from his second day of work (much better than his first according to him), we had left-over fajitas – which were still delicious. Then, we went to the movie theatre and saw Funny People. It was a pretty kick-ass movie, and I usually hate Seth Rogan. But I have to say he did a good job and even made me laugh a little. As a whole, the movie was a mix of funny, sad, and inspiring. 

Moving on, I spent much of Wednesday on various trains. In the morning I took the Caltrain (like a commuter train) near Bob’s house to just south of SF. From there, I took BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit – more like a subway system) to Berkeley. I spent the day in Berkeley just walking around and exploring. The campus there (Cal) is beautiful and felt like a small town even though the campus is so big. It was cool to see Bancroft Way – named for Ann Bancroft from The Graduate of course. Now I need to go back and watch The Graduate for the umpteenth time and see if I recognize any of the places. All-in-all, Berkeley is a really cool and interesting place. 

Finally, I took another BART train from Berkeley down to Oakland to meet the girls for the A’s game. I can honestly say there was nothing interesting about the Oakland Coliseum, except for the fact that it’s right next to Oracle Arena where the Golden State Warriors play. The game was all right, and kind of exciting because the A’s hit a lot of HRs. There was one that hit a sign about 10 to 20 feet away from me, just out of my reach! After the game, we drove back to Sam’s Aunt Sandy’s place in Sacramento, crashed for the night, and that brings us to where we are now…driving again! 

THANKS AGAIN MR. FENNER FOR SHOWING US THAT YOU’VE STILL GOT IT. WE HAD SUCH A GREAT TIME IN THE BAY AREA AND WE REALLY APPRECIATE YOU GIVING US A PLACE TO STAY AND TREATING US SO WELL (PAYING FOR DRINKS AND ALL THAT GOOD STUFF!). I’LL BE BACK TO VISIT SOMEDAY WHEN MY BODY FULLY RECOVERS FROM THE WEEKEND THAT DESTROYED IT. P.S. - I SAW A MEESE POSTER WHILE I WAS IN BERKELEY.

- Matt

Dallas (Texas Rangers) Pictures

More pictures will be coming soon. It took me forever to upload these because of a slow connection. When I have time and a better connection I'll be putting up more.

Yep, We're Still In California

I have a lot to talk about from the past few days. I'll make an attempt to be brief, but we all know that's probably not going to happen. When I last checked in, we had just celebrated Sam's birthday and spent a day in San Diego. Day two in SD was another great one. I slept in to catch up on sleep, and then Sam and Elle came and picked me up from Jess and Alex's place. The three of us, along with Sam's high school friend Evan, drove up to Encinitas to Stone Brewery. If you've had Stone I.P.A. or Arrogant Bastard Ale, then you know what I'm talking about. We hung out there and explored their gardens, took the brewery tour, and of course, indulged in some free taste testing. It was pretty cool, but not QUITE up to par with the Boulevard tour in KC. Clevelanders...if you have the chance to try Arrogant Bastard Ale, do it. It tastes similar to Great Lakes Christmas Ale, only slightly less delicious.

That night we went to the Padres game. There honestly wasn't anything too interesting that happened worth noting. I had already visited Petco Park last year, and it was definitely as cool as I remember. I guess all I remember is that the Padres won and Evan was drunk and yelling at/harassing the Brewers' third baseman. After the game I went back to Jess' and Sam, Elle, and Evan went out and apparently got hammered. There are pictures (and dance moves) to prove it. SO THANKS AGAIN JESS AND ALEX! I HAD A GREAT TIME IN OB AS USUAL AND HOPE THAT I'LL GET THE CHANCE TO VISIT AGAIN SOMETIME SOON!

Needless to say, Saturday morning I drove the early shift. We left about 10am and headed North towards San Jose to visit our good friend from OU, Bob Fenner. It took us longer than expected because we took the PCH (Pacific Coast Highway) for about half of the trip. There was more traffic and the route is longer, but the scenery is ABSOLUTELY worth it. Imagine driving hours with nothing but the Pacific on your left and mountains on your right. Gorgeous. We finally arrived in San Jose/Santa Clara at Bob's place around 8ish, and Mr. Bob Fenner Mr. Bob Bob Fenner had a delicious dinner waiting for us. I wouldn't have guessed that Bob is a chef, but now that I know, I'll call him a grill-master. He made beef and chicken fajitas, and the second best guacamole I've ever tasted (see the previous post in LA to read about the best guac ever).

We hung out around his apartment with a few of his buddies from work and shot the shit for a couple hours. We started drinking somewhat heavily and playing card games to prepare ourselves for a lovely evening in Santa Clara at an SCU bar. Bob's buddy Andy had already polished off a bottle of Jack by the time we were ready to hit the bar. The Hut, as Bob likes to describe it, is what came out when Pawpurr's screwed the CI. To paint a picture, it's a college dive bar (our favorite kind) where they have pop-a-shot basketball and everyone pins their business card and a dollar to the ceiling when they get their first job. Now, there's one of Bob's business cards with my name scribbled on it pinned to the ceiling with a dollar...even though I don't have a business card and haven't made my first dollar after college yet.

The rest of the evening can be accurately described in one sentence. "Party like a lobster, party like a lobster." Now those of you who know Bob Fenner know that he's about as generous a man as you'll find anywhere. You also know that he loves the phrase, "Lemme get a whole mess of shots over here." What I didn't expect was for him to open a tab and take care of us for the evening. Bob truly is THE MAN, and he knows how to have a great time and how to show anyone and everyone a great time. Then again, those who know him already know this. What happened the rest of the night gets a little blurry from here. Here are some highlights from the Hut. Bob was on top of a table on the back patio "dancing" with an umbrella. Elle was awkwardly staring at what she called a midget but what most people who don't completely disregard political correctness would call a little person. We took more shots of Jager than I wanted to. Andy passed out on a bench on the patio. The next thing I know, we're walking back to Bob's. On the walk home, Elle asked me to hold her purse. I proceeded to wear it the rest of the walk home and scream, "It's a satchel" every two minutes (hope you've seen The Hangover). People were falling in bushes and tackling each other. I ripped a spider-plant out of the ground and carried it home because Elle wanted to get Bob a housewarming gift. I aggressively challenged Bob's friend Mark to a foot race, but we never did because he wouldn't take off his shoes and race me barefoot. We got back to Bob's apartment and I started challenging people to wrestling matches, and luckily Bob did not take me up on that offer because he would have kicked my ass. When it was time to go to bed, Sam and Elle were apparently invading my personal space because I kept yelling "Give me some effing privacy!" at them. I even climbed into one of Bob's kitchen cupboards to get that "much-needed" privacy. Now Elle has a bunch of pictures on her camera from the walk home that explain a lot of unanswered questions, but I hope those pictures never make it to the public.

The next thing I know, Bob is waking us up at 10:30 to get ready to catch a train at 11 for the Giants game. Coincidentally, it felt like I got hit by a train. We barely made it to the train, rode it an hour and a half into San Francisco, and started drinking about 10 minutes into the ride. I needed one, maybe two beers to activate the shampoo effect (see Sam's previous post for a description). We hit Pete's Sports Bar before the game, drank some PBRs, and got into the Giants game to enjoy our standing room only tickets. I got lost/separated from everyone in the first inning. We met back up, stole some people's seats in the upper deck, and enjoyed (kinda) a great afternoon baseball game. Day games kick ass by the way. The Giants beat Cole Hamels and the Phillies 7-3, and the crowd was way into the game the entire time. I think it was even a sell-out. The coolest part of AT&T Park was looking out at the Bay Bridge and into McCovey Cove where Barry Bonds used to hit HRs. There aren't hundreds of kayaks waiting out there anymore, but there are still a few.

After the game we took a cab down to Fisherman's Warf, what Bob calls the most touristy place in the city. The cab ride was outrageous, complete with a dance party and the best sing-along to Queen's "Somebody to Love" that there has ever been. At the Warf, we saw a bunch of sea lions, walked around, and settled at a restaurant for appetizers and...wait for it...a few more beers. After a long, long, longgg day we caught the train back to Santa Clara. Bob caught up on his sleep (or passed out...depending on how you look at it) on the ride home considering the next day (today) was his first day at his new job. Drinking on a school night is always fun but not always recommended. If anyone can do it gracefully, it's Mr. Bob Fenner. Back at Bob's, we watched a few new episodes of Entourage and crashed early, obviously.

While Bob was rotting away at work and impressing his new co-workers, Elle, Sam and I drove into SF and rented bikes for a couple hours. We toured some of the city and rode out to and across the Golden Gate Bridge. It was a good ride and there were some pretty amazing views of the bridge, the city, and Alcatraz. Eventually, we made it to an In-and-Out Burger to see what all the California hype is about. I would say it was good, but not great. Good fast-food burger (better than McD's, BK, and Wendy's for sure), but the fries were nothing to write home about. I'm glad I got to try it, but I wouldn't go crazy about it or probably even ever get it again. All-in-all I'm very impressed by SF and I think it's a really cool city with a lot to see and do. It seems very touristy, but we had a great time hanging around the downtown areas. So we're back at Bob's now, relaxing of course, and re-fueling the batteries for our upcoming adventures in the next few days.

If you've made it this far, thanks for reading through this novel. I enjoyed writing it and trying to recap what has happened to us in the past couple of days, so I hope you enjoyed reading it. Once again, I'll try to keep you posted more frequently, but we're still in CA so it's tough to get away from all the fun. And I promise tomorrow I'll put up some more pictures, finally. Talk to you all sometime soon.

Peace,
Matt