So when a friend of yours gets ahold of your camera (maybe you forgot it in their van or something), you never know what you’re going to get back. Let me give you a hint: it looks something like this.

Wedding pictures to follow soon!

We are giving away 2 pairs of tickets to The Unusual Suspects, thanks to the most excellent JayMar.  Find out how at www.unusualsuspectsthemusical.com.

Or, you can play it safe and order early!  Tickets are going fast!

Thanks guys.

I was looking at a girl’s page on OkCupid out of morbid curiosity (it is quite clearly a troll or spammer account, based simply on the size and prominence of her boobs.)  Usually on those, they don’t bother filling out all the topics.  This one did.  http://www.okcupid.com/profile?u=amortazo

Why am I so fascinated by this?  Under the category “My favorite books, movies, music, and food”, this was her response: “shakespears novels…actualy all of his masterpies”

Who knew Willie could make pies?  And MASTER pies at that!!!  Way to go, ex-Bard.

Actually, it reminds me of a similar older post I commented on months ago.  Here’s the other post I responded with.

“In general, I think the caliber of women on OkCupid is significantly better than anywhere else in terms of wit, intelligence, and general compatibility with me. Yet I just saw this one profile from a girl that the average guy would call ‘hot’ that was inscrutably illiterate and outright giggle-inducing. Case in point:

“I Spend a Lot of Time Thinking About
hello…..s..e….x…lolool”

I learned a lot from this telling answer:
1) She is a fan of formality, starting with a formal greeting before answering every question.
2) She is not handy with the ellipses.
3) She likes certain letters of the alphabet surrounded by periods of stasis.
4) (another interpretation) She likes sex that slows down and kinda just peters out.
5) I learned the new online acronym “Laughing out loud out out loud”
6) Perhaps the entire answer was written as a diary entry, with a substition of ‘hello’ for ‘Dear Diary,’ and even signed it with her cute foreign name, Lolool.

There is so much to learn about ‘pretty’ women.”

Greater Hartford Disc Golf Open - Wickham Park is one of my favorite courses to play, though I routinely don’t do very well there.  Last year, I threw a 998 rated round at this tournament, putting myself on the lead card, only to detonate the second round.  And having played like ass all year, I wasn’t expecting much.  The TD, Mr. Mourad, is an eccentric and always tries new things: he again implemented the Choose-Your-Own-Hole method, allowing you to pick your grouping and hole round one.  I was fortunate to play with Cromwell (it helps that he practically lives at Wickham), BOB, Scot, and Bill Newman (one of those guys whose full name has to be said)

I started off on the unassuming hole twelve, a very easy par hole, though extremely tough to birdie.  What do I do?  I throw OB (didn’t know THAT was even there) and take a five.  Not the start I wanted.  From there, I actually did okay, with every part of my game being about average.  I took a couple of birdies here and there, and after a little slide downwards at the end of the round, carded a 59 (which is about my average).  I wasn’t happy, nor was I really miserable.  It put me 3 strokes away from the cash bubble, but also 3 strokes away from 2nd-to-last in a field of 25.

Second round, I snuck into the trickle start, so I began on a longer, tougher hole 1 (three of the holes were tougher the second round).  I do a “safe” throw to avoid OB on the hole, a pretty crappy up, and then three-put to start with another 5 (my fourth of the day on a course where I *rarely* throw 5′s)  Wonderful.  But after that, I really put the tourniquet on and played VERY solidly.  I parred the very tough stretch of holes 6-8, and would have done so on 9 if not for another terrible upshot and a putt that I still am scratching my head as to how it missed.  A few more holes, and a few more missed up shots.  I ended on a few birdie holes, getting two of three (missing the third by missing a 15 foot putt!  D’oh!) and carded a respectable 57.  Only three people had better scores.  It JUST snuck me into the last-cash spot.  So it was my third PDGA cash.

Also, I won a CTP contest for a $20 gift certificate to Marshall Street (to buy discs).

The bigger story was my buddy Cromwell, a player who, by ratings, is a little worse than me.  I usually end up beating him in PDGA events, but for the second consecutive year, he’s gotten me at the GHDGO.  But he did it by shooting LIGHTS OUT the first round, besting me by 6 (and shooting his first ever 1000-rated round)  He faltered a bit the second round, but still beat me overall by three, good for his first pro cash.  Good job Cromwell!

Poker Tournament - I can’t remember the last time I played a poker tournament where I could just NEVER get any chips.  The cards were tough, and most of my pots early on were bluffs.  I managed to gasp my way onto the final table as the short stack.  Raul, a buddy of mine at work, was the DOMINANT chip leader.  In fact, as the story goes, with 6 people left (they were paying top 4), he busted two people in a row with the same hand: 6 7.  That’s right, he took out two over cards with 6 7 suited, and then busted pocked As with 6 7 offsuit.  In consecutive hands.  The mathematical odds of that are infinitessimal.

So I crept into the cash.  At that point, I had 1800 chips, one guy had 1700 after losing a HUGE hand to Raul, and the other dude had 1600.  Raul had over 15,000.  I managed to double up on Raul, then take out the other two guys.  Going heads-up, Raul had me by about 2.5 times.  I won an early hand by beating his Ks with an A on the turn, so the tide was turning, but then he SNEAKED my aces later by pulling a gutshot straight (???)  It was surreal, how many heads-up matches were screwed at the turn and the river.

Anyway, I finally got most of the chips and pushed him all in.  What were my cards?  6 7 suited to his 8 3.   A guy watching said “hope for the flush”.  I said “screw the flush, I want 6′s and 7′s”.  The river comes up with a 6 and a 7 and a 4.  I have my two pair, beating him, but he had a straight draw.  A dud card on the turn.  The river?  Another 6.  FULL BOAT!  I win!

Now I just have that pesky musical thing to worry about.

This relationship is getting pricey and ludicrous, yet we’re both still smiling.  I talked to Ash for 55 minutes ON THE TELEPHONE last night.  Most of you who know me know that’s 45 minutes more than I like being on the phone.  She’s my kryptonite.

This was a good trip for a number of reasons.  First and foremost, it was a bad trip, by all accounts.  That’s why it’s good.  Make sense?  We were both in ill health of sorts, she was in a crabby mood for a couple of days, and I was certainly uninteresting and bland.  This was the worst we’ve been since knowing each other.  And guess what?  We won’t get many second-chances in this 2500 mile relationship.  So I need to know what I can expect from her bad days, and she needs to know what to expect when I’m not my normal jovial self.  I still woke up next to her in the tent, despite feeling like crap, beaming at her.  It was nice to be with her, even if it sucked. 

Tahoe was beautiful, even on fire.  The shores were tiny but nice, and seeing mountains directly behind a shoreline is surreal and surely not-to-be-missed.  Camping in a campsite setting was perfect: not completely roughing it, but still being a bit rough.  I don’t know that I could have done a full woods-experience with how I was feeling.  The two disc golf courses we played were fun, and I adore that Ash gives disc golf a chance and genuinely seems to enjoy it.   Who knows if she’ll ever play it on her own, but I’m glad she tries it for me (and she does it VERY well for a newbie).

Her family seems to have accepted me a bit more.  Well, truthfully, it would have been hard NOT to given my first reception, but they are exceptionally down-to-Earth and realistic, and I like them for that.  Lexi in particular seems to like me, but I had conversations with each of her family members, including the illusive brother Brandon.  I have no doubt that my family will like her too.

What’s in store for us?  No idea.  She’s coming for 20 days in August (super woo hoo!) and hopefully that will be the antithesis of this visit on some levels, yet continue it on other.  I’m just as happy as before, but this trip was a reality check I think we both needed.

Oh, and Nevadans still can’t pronounce anything.  Aaron and Erin shouldn’t be homonyms. 

So on Friday afternoon we pack up the rental car (it’s the only vehicle less manly than my Saturn SL1) and head off to Lake Tahoe. Tahoe is an Indian word meaning: “on fire”. Who doesn’t love the smell of burning wood in the morning? Or evening? Or, in fact, always?

We find our campsite and set up the tent. After that, we walk (walk!) to the beach which features 14 square feet of beach, and water cold enough to make a Polar Bear Club member hesitate. But it was needed to thwart the thousand degree heat. We did see some fantastic sites on the way.

Somewhere in this blog is this picture but snow-covered

Awesome, and not in the hot-dog way

After the shore, we hit Bijou Community Park Disc Golf Course in South Lake Tahoe, site of the Tahoe Open this weekend. I unfortunately did not want to give up two days of Ashley time to compete, so this would be my chance to play it. VERY fun course with great (but fair) fairways. It was set entirely in the longs, and I think I would not like it as much if it were in its shorter positions. I shot a +3 on the 27 hole layout (several of the holes I threw before knowing sorta where the basket was, but I played the best round of the year otherwise)

Ash did extremely well on her second round ever, throwing a few shots over 150′ and, by the end, not hucking them into the toposphere. Here is an awe-inspiring shot of her on the course.

Toto, I don’t think we’re at Buzzy’s anymore

After that, it was off to the casino for a little while (ended up +35 on the night) and off to bed.

Saturday, we drove out to California. Why? Like all good road trips, no real reason. Of course I wanted to see a few areas for possible research purposes, but more importantly, we had to stop HERE:

This is for you, J-Mar

Umm, I guess so is this

Ash snapped a photo of the Cool Gospel Church and the Cool Youth Group (or something like that), and I unfortunately missed out on the Cool Volunteer Fire Department, but a good time was had. We stopped by Auburn CA. Very nice place, that.  It had a great disc golf course in Auburn Regional Park.  So odd how it had three different settings in 18 holes: wide open holes, tight wooded holes, and jungle-like holes.  I don’t think I’ve had a course that had all three.

On our drive, we spotted this beautiful waterfall. My skills of out-the-window-while-driving-photography are not as good with a cell phone as they are with a camera.

Manhattan NY

Finally, we ended up on the eastern shore after another stop at the casino (+$4, yes literally) and a few foodstops. Here, we hung out with the family at the shore, with Ash’s mother, sister, and niece. Her niece Lexi is legally as cute as one can be without being hazardous. She held the quote of the weekend (note: she calls me MonkeyDude)

Lexi: “Sara (oh yeah, she calls Ash Sara), your MonkeyDude is here. And he has ears!”

She also called me cute to my face. It’s been a good week. Anyway, here’s a few more shots of Tahoe.

Alcatraz Jr.

Yes, she’s really that tall

So, a few things about the northern Nevada area (note: all pics were taken with my cell phone, so that’s why they look like crap).

1) They are the only people, aside from residents of Newark, who pronounce their own place wrong. They say /Nuh-vaa-duh/ as opposed to the rest of civilization who says /Nuh-vah-duh/. Also, with Ash, there is no difference in pronounciation between Aaron and Erin.

2) There are many forest fires here. I doubt this is typical, but seriously, you can’t swing a cat without hitting a forest fire. This has created a murky haze over their otherwise crystal blue skies. Residents here are very put off by this. It actually reminds me of the smoggy haze that is a NJ sunset. I didn’t take a photo of one of those sunsets, but I did take these of a NICE sunset.

God forgot to pay the electric bill

Ash realizes the same thing

Artist sunset hoo-hah

3) They have many more rustic celebrations than we have out east. First, there was this celebration which, no matter how many times she told me the name, it just seemed like a long series of syllables that were accidentally put together. This festival featured a band, people selling things on sticks, and 100 degrees of funn. Then there was the Farmer’s Market, seen here:

Get a load of THOSE berries

4) You can make U-Turns anywhere. Literally, anywhere. Local roads, highways, church parking lots, narthexes… anywhere. It’s awesome.

So maybe my luck is changing.  I have long-chronicled my luck as being, well, rather poor.  Specifically with travel.  My first time to see Ash, it *snowed* in Las Vegas.  Not to mention the blizzards they were getting up in Reno.  When she came out to Virginia, it was 95 and extremely humid.  Plus there were delays, etc.  Now, before even coming out to Reno, two things were happening.  1)  Tahoe was on fire.  2)  The day I arrive, the temperature was set to jump over 100.  Well, it did set a record yesterday at 106, and it’s supposed to be hotter today.

Not only this, but I had my flight change a few times, and it ended up with me having a 27-minute layover in Tennessee, which I was NOT looking forward to.

So how is my luck changing?  Fenk let me crash with him, a nice gesture.  Some wine later, we all crashed around 2:45am.  My flight was at 6:29am, so I set my alarm for 4:02am.  This would allow plenty of buffer time, what with London blowing up and so forth.  So I crash for my hour and a half of sleep.  I wake up, not to my alarm, but just because I woke up, and the clock read 5:50.  As in 39 minutes before my flight LEAVES!

I pee and, having not changed, literally run out of the house down the street.  I was planning on calling a car service, but there wouldn’t be time.  I tried to flag a taxi, but he was full.  Suddenly, a service car (not a taxi) pulls up and tells me to get in.  Surreal.  I tell him to get me to the airport as fast as he feasibly can, please speed.  He gets me there in about 8 minutes (Laguardia, and Fenk lives in Queens).  I run inside and there is no line (thankfully).  The NWA representative (no, not Ice Cube) very slowly calls the desk to see if it’s even worth me running to get the plane.  She tries THREE times.  I’m thinking, “Just let me run and hope!” She checks me in and says they’ll have my bording passes there, but I need to run.  So I run, very tired and with two super-heavy bags.

As I am boarding (the last person to board), some woman runs up to me, “Is this yours?”  My license had fallen out of my hands.  Thankfully, she brought it back.  Good karma to her.

So I hit the plane as the last person, and they take off.  Now I have two hours before I have to worry about my 27 minute layover.  To cut this exposition short, that was NO problem.  I actually was in my plane 15 minutes before it took off.  No issue there.

I get into LAX with almost two hours’ layover.  So I re-go through security, get some lunch (mmmm, double bacon cheeseburger) and change my clothes.  I have time to kill.  I read some books, text some people.  At a half hour until my flight leaves, I go for my boarding pass.  Gone.  Same with my license (again).  I mentally retrace my steps and remember I left it at security while I was putting on my shoes.  I go back, and a very aged man delicately (read: slowly) goes over to a room to get a key.  He can’t get the lock open.  They both ARE in there (thankfully again), and he methodically writes my drivers license and has me sign for them.  I go back to my gate, and they’re announcing my name over the loud-speaker.  That can’t be good.

They are on final boarding there!  D’oh!  I get on (again, last person) and find my seat next to this lovely young college girl with a thoroughly unpronounceable name.  We chatted the whole time until I landed, seeing Gene Simmons get up and unboard the plane.  If I wasn’t so rushed, I might have noticed him as soon as I boarded, as he was the first one on.

Anyway, I’m in Reno, sweating off my increasing body fat.  We went to a large outdoor festival type thing, which was characterized by not having real food and a poor turnout.  But it’s all good.  I’m with Ashley, and that’s why I’m here.

For those of you clicking on something called “Lickathon” and being sorely disappointed by my lack of pictures and my insistence on talking about disc golf, I apologize.  But on we go:

LiCkAtHoN was cancelled this year back in January, due to numerous reasons.  I was sadder than a maimed seal, but I soldiered on, because I understood why it was cancelled.  So when Lick posted that the tournament was going to happen, and he only gave us 1 1/2 days notice, I had to get my butt up there, shirking my very pressing professional deadlines.  It’s LiCkAtHoN, and Mitch wouldn’t be there.  I had a chance for glory.

I drive up with the Disc Devils, and after putting us in Massachusetts (oops), we show up 4 minutes before teetime.  We started at Wickham, a course I traditionally don’t shoot less than 59 on (but shot 55 last year during a major tournament).  With NO warm up, we start on the three longest holes on the course, hole 18 and two temp holes (one of which was 1200′ and had a fairway of less than 30′ by the end).  Needless to say, I started with some ugly holes, including a horrific double-circle (out of bounds) 10 on the aforementioned long hole.  And that was with two great drives.  I just decided after those two good drives to start hucking my disc indiscriminately out of bounds.  I was playing with good friend and perennial dollar-better Cromwell (who I had beat in the two previous LiCkAtHoNs), who took a 7.  Already, I was down three strokes.

Over the next series of holes, we battled back and forth, not really changing score.  By the end of the round, we bad both amassed a pretty poor score, but I managed to put a few birdies together at the end, and I ended up beating him in the round by two strokes, even with the ten.  (I shot a 60 on the actual Wickham course, while Cromwell shot a numbing 66)

Scarily, I realized I left my expensive digital camera on the course, and I didn’t realize this for about 9 holes.  I was very bummed, assuming I’d just lost a hefty chunk of change.  On the last hole, while waiting, I asked the group behind us if they’d seen it, AND THEY DID.  They had it on them.  Good karma.

From there, we headed over to Panthorn, a course I have only played during other LiCkAtHoNs, and one I have never broken 30 on.  I start out taking a three on a very tough hole, and proceed to birdie a very simple hole that I have never, for some reason, birdied.  I’m feeling good.  I did take an unfortunate 5 pretty early on (most of my shots on the hole were good, but I hit blind trees that I couldn’t see from where I was shooting), but battled back with a few smart deuces.  Overall, I took a 29, my best score there.   Only three people (including me) shot below 30.  The problem was one of them was Cromwell, who came in at a very good 27.  So we were tied, going into LICK’S LINKS!

Now Lick’s is usually the highlight of the tournament, with 10 holes, pools, jello-shots, rooftops (heh heh)… but since this year is the aBbReViAtIo, it was going to be VERY different.  We only had two baskets, and three tees.  In groups of 8 or 9, we would throw from one of the tees at one of the baskets (hoping to avoid totally arbitrary “fake lava ponds” that I strung up.)  So LiCk’s Links was only 6 “holes”, all of which were two-able (actually… aceable).  In fact, on Cromwell’s first throw, he hit chains.

Anyway, I started with a deuce, as did he.  Second hole, he deuced and I just missed my 30 foot putt.  Third hole, it all came undone.  He took another deuce, and I threw about 40 feet away.  I threw a very good putt which hit the top of the cage and bounced up.  It caught an edge and (somehow, in thick grass) started to roll towards the OB.  It looked like it was gonna be saved by the thick grass, but it rolled OVER a disc that was on the edge and out of bounds.  So not only did I take a penalty stroke, but I had to putt from the OPPOSITE side of the lava.  I made the putt, but the damage was done.  Down three strokes with only three holes left?  I birdied the next hole to Cromwell’s three.  Second to last hole, Cromwell throws a decent drive, but still a longish putt.  I was gonna play “safe” (over the house), but I decided to gun my Buzzz straight at it.  CHING!  Nicks some chain, but it flies 50′ past.  We both three.  An ace would have tied me.  Instead, I was down two still.  Final hole, I birdie, but Cromwell’s par puts him ahead by 1, and our overall bets resulted in me owing him $2 (though we thought it was $1 – I owe ya a buck, buddy)

I ended up coming in 6th place (my first cash at LiCkAtHoN), and had a good time.   It was something of an “eh” feeling, as it didn’t really seem like LiCkAtHoN aside from the shenanigans and Lick himself.  Not that it was bad, it just wasn’t the drunken revelry and stupidity of years past.  But I already have a ticket stub for 2008′s LiCkAtHoN, and I am already counting down the days.

Oh, and why are there no pictures?  I left my camera either at Lick’s or in the van that drove me there.  Karma shmarma.