One Day Trip to Richmond for John’s Birthday

Pictures and videos below

Got a strange call the other day from Sara Erikson  not only is she a Famous Hollywood Actress, she is the daughter of a good friend of mine John Erikson. You may remember last fall I had visited John the world renowned soy candle maker based in Richmond Virginia.

Sara was calling me to let me know she was having a surprise birthday party for her dad's 60th birthday and she expected me to be there. He lives in Richmond, Virginia.

I said no problem I would not miss it, when is it? Her response, “Next Week! After a few seconds of silence I said why the short notice. Sara came back with a very quick "You know how long it takes to find a person that lives in some tiny village in Botswana”. I said, “I will be there, some how”.

I had not planed on going back to the United States I had a lot of work to do on the wind generator project and had just been to the United States for the Idaho Trip. So I had an issue of time and money. I would only be able to go for the day and I needed to find a low cost way to get there.

I had heard that there were some World War II B17 bombers that had been sitting in Botswana since about the mid 1940's heading back to the United States to join a museum. So for 50 U.S. Dollars I could hitch a ride. Perfect. Then I found out a United States diplomat would be heading to Uganda on one of the air force corporate jets, and they would give me a ride to Uganda, from there I could hitch a ride back to my village in Botswana. I think Margarite’s family pulled some strings to get me the ride back.

The flight over was like flying in a steal trash can noisy, bumpy, and cold, (see video) but very cheap. We took off in the evening then flew east banking back west directly to the east coast of Florida, then straight up the east coast of the United States. We had to refuel three times in mid-air. The flight was a total of 30 hours flying time. Most of the video was shot on the east coast of the United States since it was dark for the ride over until we hit the United States.

Cliff picked me up at the Air Nation Guard terminal in Richmond, Virginia and took me to his house which is where John’s party would be.

Everybody would be joining at 6:00 pm and John would show up at 6:30 it was Saturday night and John already had a few surprises this week. The first a very sad event Brando John’s great dame and long time companion passed away on Tuesday this was a sad day and low point of the week. Then on Wednesday Sara showed up along with her mom to surprised John coming all the way from Hollywood and spent a day and a half cleaning John’s house. On Friday Andy and Pam showed up at John's. Andy and Pam are John's brother and sister in law. Boosting John's spirits even higher, a few hours later John's son Prentise showed up from Memphis. This surprise almost put John over the edge. From what I heard watching a 60 year old man cry not once but three time can be heart wrenching and emotional.

So now it is Saturday and John thinks he is coming to Cliff’s for a barbeque unknown to John, Sara has gotten about 20 of John’s closest friends together for surprise number 4. Also another famous actor Peter Oldring  Sara’s fiancé  has flown in from location for John’s party.

John was very surprised and started crying again a very sad week had improved quite a bit for John. The party was fun the highlight was John and Cliff performing their magic tricks. See videos.

The travel over was tough I am glad I attended you only get so many friends and so many days in your life so when you can maximize both, it is a great feeling.

Travel to Richmond worth watching


Intro and Magic Tricks I


Magic Tricks II


Magic Tricks III


Magic Tricks IV and some fun stuff


Pictures


Cheers,

DUG

Beach Week 2009 Zanzibar, Tanzania

Margarite’s Family gets together every other year for a family reunion. This year the trip was a Beach Week at Jambiani Beach in Zanzibar, Tanzania. We had a special guest Walter Sullivan, Margarite’s 3rd cousin who is also the retired Bishop of Richmond, Virginia. In fact he gave us a Private Mass on the first Sunday we were there.

The week was mostly R&R the only exciting event was one day there were huge schools of fish just a few yards off the beach, this brought some Great White Sharks in very close. If you watch the video you should be able to see their fins on the top of the water look closely. I did not want to get to close, though Great Whites are very docile off the coast of Zanzibar it did not make sense to push my luck. The first section of the video is the schools of fish then you see the sharks. Enjoy the pictures and video.

Shark Video


Beach Week Pictures


Beach Week Video


Cheers,

DUG

Poker Results for July

I continue to play mostly $.25/$.50 Texas Holdem while I rebuild my bank roll. I did play some $.50/$1.00 when it made sense. Overall I did very well with total winnings of $370.90 for the month. I played 31.23 hours for a total hourly rate of $11.88. I played 2,453 hands for a hand value of $.15 per hand.

Below are some fun hands from the month

Ace Rag Suited


Pocket 2’s


8 9 off suit Big Blind Special


Pocket K’s slow played after the flop


8 5 suited Playing Position and getting Lucky


Cheers,

DUG