The Great Hungry Lake Games Weekend

To kick off this weekend's adventure, I drove to Pittsburgh where I joined Bri and Drew to watch The Hunger Games followed by Panera dinner hangout. The movie was good and the company better. Afterwards I drove north to Pymatuning State Park where I parked at a pulloff a half a mile down the road from the closed campground. After hopping the fence, I picked my site:



The skies were clear and the constellations in view as I set up my mattress and sleeping bag. I did not bring a tent on purpose so I could sleep under the stars. This was totally awesome up until about 4 AM when it started pouring down rain instantly. I grabbed my stuff and quickly relocated to a picnic pavillion to sleep on top of a picnic table. In the morning I drove straight to Lakeshore Park in Ashtabula, OH to enjoy some disc and a lakeside picnic. The course is a very nice mostly open course with some vertical game, water hazards, and 3 levels of tees from rediculously easy to challenging. I played the easy tees.

The waterfowl pond fenced in area is a very annyoing hazard for me as this is the second time I had to climb the fence and get surrounded by geese, ducks, and other birds to get my disc back.

I ended the course with 3 birdies, 7 pars, 6 bogeys, and 1 double bogey. Not a bad game for me except you might notice I am one pin short. That's because the picture above is from the pin that killed me. On a birdy shot, I got a Dixey roll down that massive hill (much bigger than picture makes it look) that sent my disc further away than the tee. I finished this hole with a +7. Fuck you pin 14. I should also mention that the moment the disc started to roll down the hill, a fucking seagull started making laughing noises at me. No joke. I was pissed.

This is my favorite hole in the course. You can't tell by the picture, but there's a double valley on this hole so you can get some nice distance if your disc is still gliding past the first dip.

After disc I sat down on a bench by the lake to have some snacks. The sky was very foggy so the view was not as good as I hoped it would be. During this time a bunch of seagulls were flying all around me, sometimes withing inches of my head, all while making their stupid noises. If I had a gun, they would all be dead.

There was even this asshole seagull that just stood there staring me down the whole time.

 This park even had a bocce ball court. I am a little jealous of Ashtabula. Afterwards I drove to Cleveland, specifically to visit the zoo, as it had a few animals I wanted to see. The two animals that stole most of my time were the snow leopard, the most beautiful feline on the planet, and the chameleon, one of Earth's most fascinating creatures. Here are pictures from the zoo.

 After the zoo, I made my way down to Brandywine Falls in Cuyahoga Valley National Park, which is the retarded cousin of all the other national parks.

Climbing to the bottom of the ravine for this shot was a little sketchy. Not a "die if you fall" sketchy, but a "very steep and muddy slick that will make you roll down the hill and have a bad time" sketchy. Still worth it to get up close to the falls.

Finally I  stopped at Moraine State Park to enjoy the sun setting over the lake. My camera's battery died before the sunset, but as with any sunset, it was beautiful. I am looking forward to more random weekend trips. Let's go on one together.

Yoho Crazy in Atlanta

 Last week work required me to attend the Dave Yoho and Associates two day Sales, Marketing, and Profitibility Summit. I normally hate flying, but the two hour flight was much shorter than I was used to. I only had one day to enjoy the sites of Atlanta, so I promptly grabbed a rental car and set off. My first stop was lunch at a delicious BBQ joint where I stuffed my face. Afterwards I headed to The World of Coke, which I definitely suggest seeing.

 There are a few different tours you can enjoy, This photo and the one below is from the brand new exhibit entitled "The Vault" which all centers around the secret recipe. The interactive exhibits were very high tech with lots of holographic images.

 My favorite exhibit was the bottling exhibit which shows you the bottling process. Why was it my favorite? Lots of cool robots and assembly machines.

 The most exciting exhibit at first is the option to try 60 flavors of Coke products from around the world. The reason I say "at first" is that 98% of these products made me gag. Ofthe 3 flavors below, try to guess which was the most bearable. Here's a hint, it's the one you would least suspect. Basically here are the worldwide rankings in my opinion from best to worst. America, Asia, Africa, Europe. Europe was so bad I felt like I was playing a game of Russian Roulette with each tasting.

 Afterwards I went to the aquarium because I love animals. Sea life intrigues me a lot because I am terrified of being underwater with even small fish. I think that's why I want to scuba dive so bad.

 Why so blue, fish?

 Stay away. Crab is my only weakness. Just by looking at you I am starting to swell up and get feverish.

 Charlie watch out behind you!

 CHAAAAAAARRRRRRRLLLLLLIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 I've seen a lot of sharks in aquariums before, but nothing as awesome as a whale shark.

 I have a love for amphibians and reptiles. They are some of the most beautiful creatures on the planet.

 As my last activitiy, I climbed to the top of Stone Mountain, the largest piece of exposed granite in the world. The climb was fun, and the 360 degree view was very nice. I would have liked it to either be more remote or really close to the city, but I'll take what I can get. If you look close enough, you can see Atlanta and some other city in the distance below.

 Finally I made it to the hotel. The seminar was fun. Obviously I would have much rather been on vacation, but for work, sitting in a seminar taking notes is not a reason to complain. I will say that the accomodations they provided were top notch. I have been in plenty of fancy hotels in my time, but the Embassy Suites in Atlanta had some beautiful accomodations. I didn't really need the 3 room suite they gave me, but the balcony view was pretty sweet. I can't wait to do it again sometime.