Thursday, March 3, 2011

going home

Just back to California after two weeks going to see family in Oklahoma and Texas. Good to see everybody but also good to be back! I feel like its kinda chapter two in LA. Pretty wild first one so we'll see how this next one goes. When I left I picked up two of my managers who live together and took them to breakfast since I was going to be leaving my car in their parking spot. Breakfast consisted of pancakes, eggs, bacon, coffee...and this pretty much started two weeks of good eats! At the Dallas airport a BBQ joint called Dickey's greeted me to Texas-which was nice because California, as far as I can tell, does not have the best BBQ....something with a limited ability to smoke things. Anyway, the rest of the time was full of chicken fried steak, chicken fried venison, t-bones, backstrap venison, tacos, pumpkin bread, poppy seed cake, home made biscuits, waffles...and plenty of gravy. Apparently everyone got my memo to fatten me up when I came home. Well done!
An unexpected highlight in the trip came from a one club golfing venture to the quartz mountains in Altus, Oklahoma. It was the first full day at my grandparents house and my uncle jeff and aunt kay and I were going to be waiting on the rest of the family to come hang out for the weekend. And seeing as the California weather followed me to Oklahoma we thought we'd take advantage with a golf trip....now in the past I have not exactly been an enormous fan of golf. I seem to always end up with an overwhelming desire to throw metal sticks as far as I can into the nearest woods or ponds. I really just went to walk off the pound of pumpkin bread, eggs and sausage that had just been consumed. And like I said it was a great day and its in the mountains...so-count me in! I think I was playing with a borrowed 4 iron from my granddad's golf bag. One club golf is sorta self explanatory...you just take one club, which makes putting and your short game a little more interesting but it does speed up the walking. I think Mark Twain said that “golf is a good walk spoiled” I used to think he meant it made the walk spoiled rotten-like it made a good walk just awful...not spoiled like grandparents spoiling their grand kids. I still don't know which way he meant it but I agree with the later on this particular trip. Needless to say I had a good time! I hit the ball well and I only lost two balls-but in the process of looking for those balls I found three totally different ones...so in my book I shot a -1 YES!! Other highlights were sitting on the front porch on our farm in Nacogdoches, Texas watching a thunderstorm roll in, walking through a soon to be vineyard on the same farm, getting to participate in my dad's wine club, seeing my cousins and cousins kids growing up and especially seeing my new niece! She couldn't crawl yet when I left but was running all through the house and even barking like a dog when she ever saw one or was asked to do so! She's a bit of a ham and would put her whole body into the barks! She could also give a sign for “more” which was funny when I gave her a bite of pumpkin bread....more, more! Don't blame ya Darby! That stuff's good! Well the trip was definitely full of lots of love and laughter, family and friends!! If y'all are reading this I LOVE YOU! Hey, I love you even if you're not reading this!!