Portland to Petco, Day Two

This morning while Robert and Phil slept in I went down to the restaurant at the Red Lion in Eureka and availed myself of the buffett. I had eggs, french toast, potatoes and fruit. After the guys got up we went and checked out and then headed into Fortuna to go to church.  We were going to check out the church our family had gone to when we lived here between 1962-1965.  We were a little early for church so we drove into Ferndale, a real small town, but the home of Food Network star Guy Fieri.   We drove most of the way out to the base where Dad had been stationed, the road didn’t look like much had been done to it since we left in 1964.  We got out to the last big turn before the base and that was when I realized how much had changed.  There used to be a big house right there and a statue of the Virgin Mary in the hillside and that was all gone.  We then turned around and I took a road back to Main Street and there it was the building I started my formal education in.  Ferndale Elementary School, I don’t remember anyone from there at all or any teachers.  After snapping a couple of pictures we headed back to Fortuna to go to church, we used the navigation from our phone to get to the church which looked vaguely familiar.  We went in and talked to the Pastor for a little while, he was from Dallas, OR, had gone to seminary in Portland, had attended Trinity Baptist and had work with Cadence in Germany. So to get to the point he knew of , or knew people that Robert and I knew.  His name was Mike Schellenberg, and then he conducted the entire service by himself.  It was like attending a church service from the 80′s or 90′s.

After church we got on Highway 101 and headed south, we stopped in Rio Dell to get gas, stopped for lunch in Willits at Subway (Robert really likes Subway), as we headed south along the highway I kept looking for my oldest son.  He is working in California for the summer and had mentioned that he might be along the 101 went we went past.  But didn’t see him even when we went past the road to where he is working.  We got to Petaluma and kept hitting construction projects and so traffic slowed to a crawl for many miles.  We got off 101 so that we could cross the Golden Gate, traffic was pretty heavy there also.  The fog was too thick to go up to the viewpoint so we went across, we were scrambling to find money to pay the toll, but all the signs said don’t stop and pay by plate, so we have no idea if we paid the toll or not.  We then rolled through town listening to Tony Bennett sing I Left My Heart in San Francisco.  After we left San Francisco we rolled on down the Pacific Coast Highway to Santa Cruz, talking about Mavericks as we went past Half Moon Bay and Robert reading the Mavericks entry in wikipedia as we rolled by.  We got to Santa Cruz and checked into our room at the Comfort Inn, two blocks from the  Boardwalk.  We got to the Boardwalk at 8 PM just as they were closing down.  We walked up and down the boardwalk and I talked about coming to Santa Cruz with the youth group from Lakeside Baptist in Oakland, CA and with Rick Lindholm.   We found a little Mexican restaurant just across the street from the Boardwalk, it was pretty good.  Then we came back and tried to find the Beavers game but they had finished blowing out K-State.  Robert blew up his air mattress and the only way to fight it in and move stuff around so that we were barricaded into the room.

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Portland to Petco, Day One and Night Owl gets a mention

Back in February my friend Robert Jones, founder and CEO of Tren*, told me that he had an event to attend in San Diego, CA on June 12.  He wanted to know if I would drive down with him, as he didn't want to drive the whole way by himself.  His son, Philip, would accompany us but he doesn't drive.  I began to make arrangements to take time off from work, which was fun (not).  I had to make arrangements for someone to cover for me, which involves moving people around a bit since I am the only paid employee at the bookstore.  I took Friday off to do laundry, pick up a few things I still needed for the trip and pick up some things for Ruth Ann.  We had run out of dog food for Sith and I filled up the car.  I took my change that I had been accumulating since I returned from my reading vacation** last year.  I am not accumulating as much change since I stopped drinking Coca-Cola on April 25+. I took it in to the local US Bank and had them count it and deposit in my account, $142.62. Robert and I went out to Tigard Friday afternoon to pick up the Chevy Captiva we would be driving.  We live in Northeast Portland and I asked Robert why we were going all the way to Tigard to pick up the car.  We saved $100 in taxes by going outside of Multnomah County, the trip was worth in my estimation.  I got almost everything packed and ready to go by the front door, left the computer out till this morning and didn't load up the cooler until this morning.  Robert and Phil showed up right at 8AM and we loaded up the Captiva, we were on the road by 8:30 and didn't stop until Eugene, we went to the Best Buy, because we needed to pick up a memory card.  Then we got on the road and I gave Robert a history lesson on World War, interspersed with other bits of trivia.  Like as we crossed the Willamette River in Eugene on I5 I pointed to the hill where Steve Prefontaine met his end.  We drove on to Grants Pass where we stopped to gas up and have lunch.  We ate at the Subway in downtown Grants Pass in the shadow of the Caveman Statue.   From Grants Pass we continued south on the Redwood Highway, just before crossing into California we passed the Great Cats World Park and the Tiger Preservation Center outside of Cave Junction.  We crossed over into California just before two pm.  We came down 101 and saw two herds of elk just along the road, more elk in one day than Richard Smouse has seen in all the times he has been hunting.  Drove through Crescent City looking for the anchor that had been tossed into town in the 1964 tsunami, but didn't see it.  I noticed that the ocean seemed to have a  saltier smell than the water off the Oregon Coast.  We crossed the Klamath River bridge which has two golden bears at each end.  We stopped at Trees of Mystery, I remember going past the giant statues of Paul Bunyan and Babe when we would drive up 101 from California to Medford to visit Grandparents, Aunts, Uncle and Cousins.  It was a beautiful drive through some awesome redwoods, some so close to the road that it was if the repeated passage of vehicles had shaved it to the side of the road.  One of the both entertaining was as we went over the Little River we were listening to Little River Band sing Night Owl.  We arrived in Eureka about 4:30 and checked into our room and then went to dinner at Applebees and watched the OSU Beavers and K State Super Regional College World Series game.  When left the restaurant the score was 2-1 OSU.  We came back to the room and watched K State score something like 5 straight runs and win in 10 innings.  We then proceeded to utilize almost every outlet in the room to charge two computers, three phones, a camera, an ipad and an ipod.  I read the story of Barrington Bunny to Robert and Phil, Robert read a poem about Mt. Tamalpais to us.  Phil is watching youtube, Robert is sleeping and I am finishing this up.  I will read a little of Robopocalypse and go to sleep.

*Theological Research Network/**I go to my cousin Johns' place every year and spend a week reading/+My friend Diana challenged me to drink less soda, so I stopped drinking soda on April 25, it hasn't been as hard as I thought.

State of the Blog, May 13, 2013

I am still here and reading all your blogs.  My time is being consumed with work and putting stuff on ebay to finance my trip to San Diego next month.  I will be driving down the California and Oregon coasts with some friends.  We  will taking Hiway 1 from the Southern Oregon coast to San Diego.  I am going to get to see two Padres games against the Braves.  This will be the  first time I have been to Petco Park, I am looking forward to it.  I also plan on spending some time going to card shops and Goodwilling.  I am going to spend a night with Travis of Punk Rock Paint fame, and his wife.  See the latest issue of Becketts Sports Card Monthly for more information on what Travis has been doing.  Those of you who live or have lived in San Diego, what local card shops should I make sure to visit.

I have been picking up a few cards here and there and have gotten a few spring training TTM request back, including one from Spring Training 2012.  I will packages going out to several of you when I get back from my trip in mid June.

I am going to try and blog here and on my other blog readerman.us during the whole trip, we will visiting several places that I used to live along the California coast.  If you don't know of my other blog, readerman.us, I review everything I read.  Stop by and visit me there also.

Game 2, 0-2

In game  2 my favorite current Padre came up with the loss, although this time the Padre hitters did a little better than Monday.  Gyorko and Hundley both had hits and Evereth Cabrera had two hits, put got picked off at first attempting to steal.  If the bats continue to increase their productivity, things may turn around.  I would like to see the team salvage one on Wednesday.
I had big dreams the way the team finished the season last year.  I had not envisioned the Padres starting out with two losses to the Mets, who many people had thought would be terrible.  As one friend of mine constantly reminds me, wait at least until one third of the season is over before starting to panic.

Game One-0-1

I had high hopes for this year, but this is not the way I saw things beginning.  Edinson Volquez only went three innings and gave up something like six runs in three innings and the Padres only had 4 hits in the whole game.  Hopefully things will get better for the team and they will come together as a team.  I am not yet ready to give up on the team yet.

There is kickstarter and indiegogo, but I am using Ebay

I have funded several projects on Kickstarter, including a book about the intersection of dance and baseball and a movie about women playing baseball.  I have looked at indiegogo but am not a fan of that particular model.  I am taking a trip to San Diego in June so I am trying to fund that trip by selling items on ebay.  Dodger fans check out the True 1/1 Autograph of legendary Dodger outfielder and Hall of Famer Duke Snider, relic collectors and Tony Gwynn fans that are some awesome and unusual relics of Mr. Padre available.  There are Ozzie Smith, Dennis Eckersley and Trevor Hoffman relics, inserts from various sets and an autographed card of Marvel Comics editor Joe Quesada.  Thank you for your help.  Here is a link to the items  on sale

A picture that needs to be a card

A Pilgrimage Must be Funded

I will be heading south in June of this year.  A friend is going to a conference in San Diego and asked me to drive down with him.  I agreed so we are going to drive along the Oregon and California coast and end up in San Diego just in time to see the Padres whup the Braves for three games.  I also hope to visit with the proprietor of Punk Rock Paint and his talented wife, and maybe listen to the musical stylings of Rob Deez and Isaac Cheong.  I have to pay for the trip so I am putting several items up on ebay.  I am going to try and sell a bunch of stuff from every team, I even have a true 1/1 from a Dodger Hall of Famer that will be going up eventually.  If you are interested in helping out here is a list of the things that I currently have for sale on ebay. Thank you for your help.

The Padres year by year 1969

I have an autographed card from each year the Padres have been a major league franchise.  I have chosen a different player to represent each year.  I will showcase that card in this feature until we get to this year.

In 1968 four cities were awarded major league baseball expansion franchises.  Montreal, Kansas City, Seattle and San Diego started playing in the major leagues in 1969.  In 1968 an expansion draft was held to stock the teams from the current major league teams.  Montreal and San Diego went first, and with their first pick San Diego choose Ollie Brown from the San Francisco Giants.  Ollie went on to play in the majors until 1977, he played in San Diego from 1969 to 1972 when he was traded to the A's.  Ollie Brown also had a brother who played in the NFL, Willie Brown and a brother Oscar who played for the Braves.

In 1969 the Padres were managed by Preston Gomez and finished 52-110, sixth in the division.  It was just the first of six consecutive losing seasons in San Diego.  

1969 Hall of Fame

Stanley Coveleskie and Waite Hoyt were selected to be inducted into the Hall of the Fame by the Veterans Committe.  Roy Campanella and Stan Musial were elected by the Baseball Writers.  Stan Musial just passed away on Sunday and I was reminded of the one time I got to meet Mr. Musial.  He was doing a signing at a mall here in Portland, it's gone now.  I went to the show with my friend Craig Lockwood and after we shopped, me for Padres stuff and Craig for football, we got in line and were talking.  Craig stepped up and spoke to Mr. Musial and Stan told Craig that he had a great voice for radio.  Craig and I chuckled and moved on.  The thing is Craig was a disc jockey for a local country music station.

1968 Hall of Fame

Kiki Cuyler and Goose Goslin were elected by the Veterans Committe for induction in 1968 and Joe Medwick was elected by the Writers.
In 1968 Dad got transferred again this time to be the Executive Officer of the USS Excel in Long Beach.  This time we drove and camped along the southern route, with four kids between 11 and 4.

1967 Hall of Fame

Branch Rickey and Lloyd Waner were elected by the Veterans Committee and Red Ruffing was elected in a special runoff election by the Baseball Writers.

1966 Hall of Fame

One inductee was selected by the Baseball Writers and one by the Veterans Committee.  Casey Stengel managed all over the place but primarily the Yankees and Mets. Ted Williams was the first player to go into the Hall of Fame with ties to the Padres.  He played for the Padres in 1936 when he was scouted by the Red Sox.  He is one Padre that I always wished I could have gotten a signature of.  In 1966 my Dad got transferred from the Charles H. Roan in Newport to the Charles Dahlgren in Norfolk and so we moved again.

1965 Hall of Fame

In 1965 only one player was inducted into the Hall of Fame.  Pitcher Pud Galvin was selected by the Veterans' Committee.

1964 Hall of Fame Class

From here on out I will be presenting the Hall of Fame Classes with out too much editorial comment.  In 1964 Luke Appling was the only player elected by the BBWA, and that was in a special election.  There were six other players elected that year, during 1964 my younger brother was born in Ferndale, CA and then we moved to Newport, RI.  My parents drove from CA to RI camping along the way, with 4 children age 7 to newborn.
If you see a card you want or need, I will trade you for another card of the person.