A Few Lazy Days

Monday and Penny is at work so I have a moochy day visiting Costco and some other shops not buying much at all. I have offered to make dinner so buy the necessities for that. Around 15:00 I meet Penny and we pick up the kids from school and go back to their place where I cook a steak and Pavlova dinner. Unfortunately Penny is on a strict diet so can only eat some prawns and green salad .

Hunter has a science test the next day and is very nervous about it so Penny sits there grilling him on the contents.

I head back to the hotel around 21:00 where I answer emails etc. finally going to bed at 01:00.

Next morning and I have lunch arrangements with John and Loreali Kerr with whom I became very friendly in Seattle and who, not uncommonly, spend six months of the year in Phoenix and six months (summer) in Seattle. I gravitate back to Chompies for lunch where it has been good to catch up as I missed them here last year.

Back to Penny’s place where she has been told that one of the kids hasn’t handed in two homework assignments so I pick up the kids and bring them home while she sees the teacher. Hunter has aced the science test with 91% but this is overshadowed by Riley getting an infraction for coming to the classroom 15 minutes late and not handing in the two homework assignments.

I help Riley with his homework and am really nervous about how I did as it was h-a-r-d – and he is only 9! Anyway I find out the next day he got 100% - phew.

Wednesday I get up late which is a good sign for relaxing holiday for me. I headed for the Musical Instrument Museum which is two minutes from the hotel where I spend a relaxing couple of hours.

It is a remarkable place which shows musical diversity from around the world. The setup is that each country has a display comprising an LCD TV surrounded by all the instruments and as you approach the audio tour device automatically switches over to the LCD TV where you can hear musicians playing the music of that country. It is so hard to understand how much diversity there is in music and musical instruments. I am told however that the Museum in Seattle, paid for by Paul Allan, was originally scheduled to cost $50m and ended up costing him $250m is unbelievable – a weird building that’s for sure http://huichun.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/800px-ariel_of_empsfm.jpg

I then head over to Nordstrom Rack and buy nada nothing – what a bust. I go to the Apple Store before meeting a bridge friend Haig Tamitsch across the road at Zinc Bistro for lunch. He makes his living giving bridge lessons and playing bridge professionally and at around 50 years old, single and no kids has a nice relaxing life travelling and pursuing his passion for photography.

Back to the hotel where I meet up with Penny and the kids for a few hours around the pool. Afterwards I head off to John and Loreali Kerr’s place for dinner and an extended chat. I do get a little jealous when I see a lovely large three bedroom townhouse with big rooms, double garage etc. selling for $A225k which in Sydney would buy you a 0 bedroom shoebox. Anyway back to the hotel for bed.

I must say I really like the desert vista and architecture. The cacti, rich red earth and the small mountains which surround the city. Phoenix isn't a tourist haven but if you stay at a resort it is a good place to relax and chill. This is evident by the number of resorts they have here.

Anyway a few relaxing days and not much to tell. Haig has told me to go to the botanical gardens and butterfly enclosure and may do that today.

Best to all
XD

First Few Days

Here we go again my annual pilgrimage to "Mecca" Phoenix for a week of chilling out and a week of bridge, sun and gaming in Las Vegas. Can life get any better.

Check in at the airport goes smoothly and my advance planning pays off when I manage four seats to myself albeit in the last row of the plane. I doze for moost of the trip The Bill in between getting off the plane feeling in remarkably good shape.

I check in to the hotel using their automated check-in to room 2062 which I imagined would be on the twentieth floor of this nine storey building. All became clear when I realised that there were 153 rooms on each floor and of course mine was about 500 metres from the lift - GRR!!

I meet a former business associate for a sandwich lunch at a nearby Salad/Soup cafe.

Back to the hotel for a relax after which I head off for dinner. I decide to save the $40 cab fare and get the free shuttle 3kms to the airport and the Rapid Transport system to downtown just four blocks from the restaurant - Foreign Cinema. It is my fourth visit here and again I am not disappointed. Three varieties of oysters, foi gras and a magnificent dessert. www.foreigncinema.com

OK if it was good enoiugh to get there it would be good enough to get back so on the tain to the aiport and shuttle to the hotel and a good nights sleep.

Up early next morning for my short flight to Phoenix. Easy check-in and very short security line compared to what I saw thirty minutes later As I am very early I download the morning paper to my Kindle and read the paper while having a coffee.

Interesting company on the plane - an attorney specialising in IP in his way to a family holiday in Hawaii. Now I know little about American geography but Hawaii via Phoenix would be leading me to a new travel agent.

Picked up at the airport and back to the Warring’s house to collect around 20 boxes of ‘stuff’ I had ordered in the past few months in anticipation of collection this visit. Nothing too startling except my birthday present from my kids www.handpresso.com which I subsequently tried and is excellent for coffee on the go.

Off the Marriott Canyon Villas and a lovely one bedroom apartment, beautifully appointed and which will be a comfortable home for the next seven days. We spend a few hours around the pool, I beat Penny at Chess on a life size board (my first chess win in 25 years I think) before I excuse myself with jetlag now setting in.

It’s dinner time so I head down to the local supermarket and buy some supplies ending up having Piroshkies for dinner and a relatively early night.

I wake up at 06:30 on Sunday morning and it is full daylight and luckily fall asleep until 08:30 which means I have to rush to get ready as I am going to watch a friend of the kids compete in an Arabian horse show. It was very good fun and she finishes second of her group of eight having won the previous five rounds of the competition. It is quite amazing how done up the horses and riders are, both immaculately groomed – both.

Back to the Marriott Hotel for a few hours and lunch around the pool and what they call the lazy river – a long circular pool with slow running water dragging lilos and other floats around the pool.
I then have a few hours back at the hotel before heading off to watch the kids take a two hour soccer training session which is REALLY interesting. A former Belgrade Red Star and Yugoslavian national soccer player, Peter Balsic runs a soccer training school at his home. Hi backyard is a beautifully manicured walled soccer field about 15 metres by 30 metres where today he has four groups for two hours each with eight students in a group. I probably had better career choices when I learn that he charges $50 per student earning $1,600 for a day’s work. That said I must say he was unbelievably good, tough but outstanding.

He taught the kids ball trapping skills using both legs, kicking skills including just how to turn and strike the ball and then for the last 40 minutes they played a 4 vs 4 game where he often froze and rewound the game explaining what the kids did wrong – really good to watch. He is also an accomplished artist.

Dinner at Sushi Bistro saw an end to quite a long but relaxing day. Off to bed and love to all
David