Rain Delay...,

There was a rain delay today. It rained all day. Tennis was delayed until tomorrow. So I spent the day shopping in Manhattan. It was fun to walk around and visit some stores and places to eat and get a drink. So a good day. I am in my hotel room now. I think the rain is over. So tomorrow should be a good day. I will be watching tennis all day tomorrow....

It seems like New York is becoming a cleaner more friendly city. I am not sure why. I was thinking today that San Francisco is more dirty and feels more unsafe than New York these days... But as the song goes... I left my heart in San Francisco.... I am anxious to move back.

More to come.....

U.S. Open 2006,

I am in New York now. I got here last night. Today I went to the U.S. Open. The tournament doesn't start until Monday. But today I had a pass to go see some players practice. I was able to watch most of the top mens players practice today which was awesome!

Some of the players I watched today were Andre Agassi, Andy Roddick, James Blake, Rafeal Nadal, Fernando Gonzalez, and Michael Berrer. It was really exciting to watch them and it made me feel like I am really terrible at tennis. They make the sport look so easy and the power in their game is incredible!!

I also had a chance to see the ledgend Martina Navratilova practice. She is playing doubles and this is her last year to complete. I think she must be close to 50 by now. But she still plays young and looks good. I also watched Steffi Graf. She is retired and married to Andre but she was out on the court hitting balls. It was fun to see her.

So it was a great day and made me want to go practice harder. So when I return I have new fire to play... It will be a great week here I am looking forward to watching the tournament...

live from sapporo...

I am sitting here tonight watching the world basketball championships. The United States is playing Italy in Sapporo. I was surprised to hear some of the games are being played there. The United States is losing by only 1 point. But I know they will win this game so I am not worried. In fact I think they will win by about 20 or 30 points when it is finished. But its nice to see some live shots of Sapporo.

Tomorrow is Thursday but its my Friday. I am flying to New York on Friday to take a week vacation and go to the US Open Tennis Championship. So I am excited to get away from work for a week. But the vacation will end too soon and I will be back in the office trying to catch up... But thats life...hehe.

Go USA and hurry and win!!!

Monday's over.....

My Monday is over... its always a good feeling to have it over. I really hate Monday's. But I bitch about that a little too much...

I wasn't able to play tennis today. This is the first day in almost 2 weeks that I did not play. So I feel like I am really lazy today or something. But there is always tomorrow. I stayed up too late last night watching the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox baseball game so I was too tired tonight to go play. But the game last night was awsome. The Yankees won. (Actually I am a Boston and New York fan but I wanted the Red Sox to win.) Stil it was a great game to watch. Matsui is still hurt so he didn't play. It will be nice to have him back next month. The Yankees need him....

Well I guess I will go read a book and go to bed....

Yellowstone,

I drove up to Yellowstone a couple weeks ago and took some pictures. I have been there a few times but this is the first time I have seen hidden falls. It was absolutely beautiful!! So I took a few pictues.

Its Wednesday night now. I am a little tired. I just got back from playing some tennis . I am glad the week is more than half over now. Well the fall fashions are hitting the stores and football season is about ready to start. That means summer is winding down. Fall is getting close.... my favorite time of year!!! But it still feels like summer outside. I am heading back to New York next week. I hear its starting to feel like fall now there. So I am a little happy to be in some cooler weather hopefully. I am headed to the US Open for a week. So lots of tennis, sun, and excellent food!!!

My friend sent me this. I have tried to be a good dad in my own situation but this makes me really feel like a terrible father!!! I don't think there are many fathers like Dick Hoyt.... Actually this makes me feel like I really suck as a dad compared to him.

85 times he has pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a small boat while swimming and pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day. Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike.

What has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life. This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs.``He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. ``Put him in an institution.''But the Hoyts would not believe the doctors. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. ``No way,'' Dick says he was told. ``There's nothing going on in his brain.''"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.

They hooked Rick up to a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. When he was hooked up he actually started to communicate. He told his dad he wanted to run. He wanted to race with his dad. How was Dick who was out or shape and never ran' more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles in a local charity race? Still, he tried. ``Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ``I was sore for two weeks.''That day changed Rick's life. ``Dad,'' he typed, ``when we were running, it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!''And that sentence changed Dick's life.

He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon.``No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. But in 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year. Then somebody said, ``Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon? ''How's a guy who never learned to swim and hadn't ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried. Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii.

Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? ``No way,'' he says. Dick does it purely for "the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together. This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time'? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time. "No question about it,'' Rick types. "My dad is the Father of the Century". Dick got something else out of all this too.

Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. "If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told him, "you probably would've died 15 years ago." 'So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.

On Father's day rick buys his dad dinner. But the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy. "The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, "is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.''
(Thanks ESPN for the heart warming story)

This video just really explains how the relationship between father and son should be!!! I guess as parents we need to evaluate our relationships with our children every once in a while. It doesn't matter if you live with your children or not. A parent is a parent.

jetlag........

Well I got back late Saturday night to my home. It was a smooth flight back with no problems. (But I hate going to LA Airport). I couldn't sleep Saturday night and slept a couple hours yesterday (Sunday). But last night I couldn't sleep again and now its Monday morning and I am ready to go to bed. One one problem its time to go to work... HA! So I guess I will chew some black-black gum and drink lots of coke today...

Anyway glad that trip is over.... But had some good experiences.

Driving the boss's car....

I had a funny experience today. We got a phone call from an executive we work with. He went drinking last night and left his car in the parking lot of our company. He doesn't work at our company. He is actually a customer. But a very important and powerful customer. He asked us to pick up his car at our company and take it to him.

Well..... he car is a brand new Lexus GS. Very nice!!! Very expensive!! We were happy to pick it up for him. We took it on the highway and testing the power and control of the car. We drove it around and had a good time. We basically drove on the kosoku as fast as we could which was exciting. So we finally took the car back to him and told him we went for a joy ride. He didn't seem to care and told us thats why he bought this car. So it was a funny experience to be driving his brand new expensive car. I took a quick picture of it.

My meetings are all over and now I am going to start packing. Tomorrow I finally get to go home but it looks like I will be back at the end of next month. So thats ok. I said before this has been the hardest business trip I have ever had. I can't believe how many meetings I had here this time. Crazy crazy!!

It will be nice to sleep in my own bed tomorrow night.

Friday Morning....

Wow the time flew... Its Friday morning. I have spent the last 3 days in meetings, on trains, in more meetings, on more trains and going out with colleagues and customers to dinner and drink. This has been the hardest business trip I have ever had. I have been so busy..... its been crazy. But so far its been a very successful trip which is good.

I really wanted to make some time to hopefully meet a few people I have taught English to. But I guess I will have to wait until next time. So I am disappointed about that. Also I wanted to go to Sapporo for a couple days but my schedule is just really too hard this time. But I will be back I guess in a couple months maybe even sooner. I am thinking about spending Christmas and New Years in Sapporo this year. So I will see if I can do that also.... But I will be back before then.

The weather in Nagoya isn't as hot this year. I keep waiting for some really hot and wet weather but it feels just really warm. Utah is sooooo hot this year it actually almost feels good here. But I don't like the humidity.

Well time to go to work.

Back to Nagoya....

Well I am in Nagoya now. I got here late late Monday night. Since then I have been so busy and have only a few hours of sleep. The weather is a little cooler than I thought it would be. But Utah has been so hot this year that I guess it may just feel cool I don't know.

One thing I am learning is that I must be getting older. Last night I had to go drinking with the company. Maybe I was just tired but I just didn't have energy. While I sat there last night I kept thinking to myself how much I really hate this custom now. I used to actually like it and look forward to it. But last night for some reason I thought it was a stupid way to waste 5 hours. I just wanted to get back to my room and sleep. It was kind of funny to walk down the street to the Subway with 25 drunk people. I myself didn't even drink. Maybe thats why I hated it....hehe. But really I just thought to myself that I would rather do so many things with my time than just drink and waste it away.

So I finally get back to my room and go to bed. Then I wake up and its 5:00am and I am not even tired. I only got a few hours sleep but feel ok. Its jet lag.... But tonight will be the same thing only with customers. So another late night.... But I guess its a part of the job. I often wonder if most people here in Japan look forward to this custom... The guys at my company sure seem to.

Tomorrow its off to Yokohama and then Tsukuba.

If I can just hang in there today and tonight.....

I need a coke.