You Won't Believe This

***Text in this color authored by Shena***

Work & Play
So this is what vacation is all about, right? Running around like crazy and being busy. That we were today...just wait until you read the rest of this. You will be shaking your head at me saying "Cheeto, Cheeto, Cheeto. Are you serious?"

We got up and got ready for the day. The original plan was for Bart, Ryan, Mom and I to go to the Braves game, while Shena, Cherie, Dad and the boys went shopping. At the last minute, dad decided that he would rather go to the game...but Cherie didn't hear that part. As we are headed down the elevator (we all left together) Cherie goes "Chemo, I'm sure glad you are going with us and not with them. We are going to need you," (she was nervous about driving around in Atlanta traffic, and Shena couldn't drive because she wasn't on the rental car agreement. We all looked at her like "Huh?" Of course dad immediately started feeling guilty that he was ditching them...and Cherie felt bad for saying something, but the rest of us thought it was pretty funny. Anyway, we all went our seperate ways. We had to get dad a ticket...the rest of us had one. He wound up getting one about 3 seats down from us (they tried to get him as close as they could). Luckily the Braves fans don't show up for regular season games. All the winning they've done over the years has spoiled the fans and they just don't show up much. So dad was able to sit by us anyway. We got there pretty early...like an hour and a half before game time. We wandered around the park for a bit, looking around. Went in the store, looked at some of the displays, etc. The old folks said they wanted to go and sit down after a bit, so Ryan and I went and walked around some more. We went and hung out by the Braves' bullpen. At one point Leo Mazzone (pitching coach) walked through the bullpen, then walked back out with about 6 baseballs. He started tossing them into the people surrounding the bullpen. Unprovoked, unasked as far as I could tell. He tossed one up my direction (not directly at me) and I got one finger on the ball, but the dude next to me had a hat and he stuck it out so far I couldn't reach the ball and he got it instead. I almost punched him and took his ball AND his hat...but since Ryan just is coming off his mission I figured he wouldn't like that much. We watched Tim Hudson, who was the starting pitcher warm up a bit, then we headed to our seats. On the way we ran into mom, who was headed down to her seat with food. She gave us money to eat, and we both grabbed dogs. On the way to the game, mom and I were talking about Matt Price, a guy Lettie went to H.S. with, who worked for the Braves at one time. We didn't know if he still did, so we thought we might stop somebody who looked like they might know and ask them. Well, as Ryan and I were walking back towards our seats with our food, (which was quickly getting cold because we were in the middle of putting condiments on the dogs when the national anthem started...at it was like 10 minutes long, very nice, but very long) when Matt happens to walk by in the concourse. He's still with the Braves, working now in player development. We talked for several minutes (my food getting colder all the time), and I put in a word for Greensboro's new baseball stadium. I told him that he should hooks us up with a AA or AAA affiliate with the Braves. He said the rumor is floating about that they will be moving the AAA team from Richmond soon because their stadium is literally falling apart. So, you heard it hear first...if Greensboro winds up being an AA or AAA affiliate for the Braves, it was all because of Cheeto! The rest of the game went like this...we hung out, watched the game...cheered sometimes, booed sometimes, tried to get t-shirts from the girls dancing on the dugout, tried to get foul balls that were really no where near us, refused to participate in a "wave" that some guys in front of us were trying to start in the middle of a Braves rally, watched the Braves get beat 4-1. A funny thing happened during the game. During innings they have the cameras around the field putting people on the scoreboard (that's not the funny part)...once they put a heart around the border of the scoreboard and called it the "smooch cam" or something like that (that's not the funny part either). Everybody who they put on camera kissed the person of the opposite sex next to them with great delight...and the crowd even got all riled up when a girl leaned forward and kissed another girl on the cheek instead of kissing the guy who was sitting next to her (he seemed ok with it...maybe they were siblings?). The very last "couple" that they showed were two Pirates (whom the Braves were playing today)...oh, did I mention they were two MALE Pirates fans? One guy just kind of grinned, the other guy shakes his head, then raises his middle finger. For a full 3 or 4 seconds the guy is flipping everybody in the stadium off. We all got a kick out of that one...laughing, clapping. Hilarious.

The game was pretty short. Started at 1:00, was over by 4:00. We were back to the hotel by 4:25 or so. The girls and the boys arrived just about 10 minutes after us and we swapped stories for a bit. At this point, I'm not sure exactly what happened, but to make a long story short, we bought our Odyssey. WHAT!?!? Well.....we THINK we did. We don't know for sure until tomorrow night. How did that happen? Shena said something about "I'm going to call the dealerships down here and see if anybody has my van," (since we were having no luck in Greensboro, and Crown hadn't bothered to call me at all today like they said they would...not even to say "we're trying, but no luck...give us another day." So I 1/2 jokingly say, knock yourself out...you find the van, we'll go buy it. So she called about three dealerships. Two of them say "sorry, we don't have any EX Odyssey's with a gray cloth interior. But one says "I don't have any, but I can find one." Again, to make a long story short, after several phone calls between myself, Shena and the salesman, he says he can have one in their dealership tomorrow morning. At this point I was like "Whatever, the guy is full of crap, he can't find one. We've called two other dealers and they say they don't have any...where in the world does this guy think he is going to find one?" So I figure I'll give it a shot and just throw a number at the guy and see if he bites. I call him on the way to dinner, tell him that I want the van for $27,000, walking (in other words, with all fees, taxes, etc. included). That would beat the Crown dealership price by about $125. So he goes "Oh, I don't know. That's pretty tough. Let me see what I can do." I'm thinking, either this guy is just playing his salesman role and uses the same line for every single customer who makes an offer, or he really thinks I'm full of crap. We eat, come back to the hotel and I haven't heard from him in an hour and a half. I was about to go get in the shower and get ready for bed, when I thought I'd just give him a call and see what he says. He asked me the number again I was looking for, then said he'd call me right back. Five minutes later he goes "We can do it. How soon can you come down to the dealership?" Suddenly Shena and I are on our way to track down this Honda dealer in Atlanta at 8:30 at night...they close at 9:00. We find out the guy has the day off tomorrow, but is coming in to track down our van. He should be able to find SOMETHING. We essentially told him we would take ANY exterior color, as long as the interior was either gray or olive color. We just don't like the tan interior. That means he can bring us back a van that could be one of two different shades of green, one of two different shades of blue, or silver. Our first choice is silver (my last choice would be the dark green...Shena's the light blue), but after talking with all of these dealers, it is obvious that we can't be choosey right now. Otherwise we could wind up buying a 2006 that costs $500 or $1,000 more than the 2005's. We'll have to wait and see how it all turns out tomorrow. Shena said that if it doesn't go through, or they can't find a van by the end of the day tomorrow, she may be crying the whole way back home to Greensboro. I hope it doesn't come to that.

Llano Update (Cheeto's Brood)
You heard it all, already.

Arellano Update
Ditto

Christensen Update
Ditto

Daily Report
LAST NIGHT:
Sleep: 11:45 - 6:45 - but I was up several times during the night...I just can't seem to sleep in a strange bed

TODAY:
Breakfast: Thanks to the Fairfield Inn "Continental Breakfast": two mini-blueberry muffins, 1 bowl of raisin bran, strawberry yogurt and a glass of oj

Lunch: Brave's game: a "Jumbo" hot dog - with WAY too much mustard...the dang dispenser was broken and when I pushed down on the button to spit it out, it sprayed a lake onto my dog, sprite

Dinner: Hard Rock Cafe - cheeseburger, no tom, no onion, fries, water - everybody else liked their dinner, mine was unmemorable. I've had better cheeseburgers at Hardee's.