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Left Coast Crime

3/3/2016

Thursday morning class

didn’t understand what this conference was all about. I thought it was another writers conference where there are session on the craft and a chance to meet other authors.

I was wrong. This conference was mainly about the readers of our genre. There were hundreds of avid fans there and the presentations were mainly a way for the readers to get to see their favorite authors.

I was invited to give a presentation at the event. In my ignorance, I scheduled a talk on emarketing. Do you know how interested this topic is to the average fan? Yeah right. I had one person there, another author.

We sat and talked one on one about marketing, the process of writing and the state of the world. It was fun, but I sure didn’t reach many readers. Lesson learned for next year. By the way, next year’s conference is in Hawaii. Wanna go?

I got to meet a bunch of neat people, both fans and authors. Among them L.J. Sellers, Lala Corriere and Pam Beason. L.J. writes a detective series based in Eugene, Oregon, my home town, and is a loyal Duck fan. Lala is a totally outrageous lady who writes romantic suspense.

Pamela Beason is a private investigator. You can bet I’ll cultivate that relationship to add more authenticity to Cartrina’s stories.

There was a wonderful class on social media on Thursday morning. It was the only class offered during the conference, but it was good.

My new bestie, L.J. Sellers

There was a wonderful class on social media on Thursday morning. It was the only class offered during the conference, but it was good.

It was our first trip to Phoenix. We stayed at a perfectly lovely B&B on Wednesday night, because I didn’t make hotel reservations for the day we got in. It turned out to be fun and was $120 a night cheaper than the hotel.

But the hotel was lovely. We had a room on the fifteenth floor. At night, we slept with the windows open, watching the lights of the city, the airport and the stars. I usually awake around dawn, then try to go back to sleep. The sunrises were spectacular.

Pink light crept over the horizon, growing deeper and deeper in color until it was a fiery orange, then old sol poked his head over the horizon. It’s eerie how fast the sun seems to be moving when it is on the horizon. You can actually see it climbing in the sky. (For you super-scientific types, yes, I know that the earth rotates around the sun, but it looks the other way around from ground zero.)

I wasn’t particularly impressed with the food, but we got a limited sample and all within walking distance of the hotel. However, I was impressed by the prices. I paid $3.99 for a Margarita that would have cost me $8.99 in San Diego. For happy hour it was $2.99, but we missed the window.
Gasoline was $1.35 a gallon. I filled the tank as we limped into San Diego on the return trip for $2.79, a dollar forty-four difference. C’mon guys, what’s going on here? As a matter of fact, the California State Legislature has set up a committee to investigate why the prices are so high for gasoline here.

Dawn had a great time. While I was in the conference, she spent her days roaming Phoenix and relaxing at the hotel. It was a great de-stresser for her.

I got to touch base with Robert Dugoni, a best-selling writer friend from Seattle. Just think, I knew him when. I also ran into a couple of San Diego writers I know and some that I haven’t met yet.
This was an expensive conference, with the cost of the hotel and the cost of gas driving the seven hundred miles to Phoenix and back. Was it worth it? I’m not really sure.

I got to meet a lot of great fans. I’m sure that some of them will read my books. However, the conference was geared more towards traditionally published books. I think we need to start a conference for those of us that publish ebooks.

Okay, here’s the commercial part:

I’ve gotten back the beta copies of The Cartel Strikes Back and I’m impressed with some of their ideas. Today I start the first re-write. (As Hemmingway once said, there are no great writers, only great re-writers.)

I think this is going to be a bigger job than I had anticipated, there are so many good ideas. I may have to push publication back to May to have time to do a thorough re-write. Then I still have to go through the editing and proof reading process.

In the meantime, if you haven’t read The Mexican Connection, you need to get a copy today. You can order it at http://tinyurl.com/na75hk8. The Mexican Connection is the third book in the Ted Higuera series, but the events in that book directly cause the results in The Cartel Strikes Back. I don’t want to give too much away, but one of Ted’s old enemies escapes from prison and (SPOILER ALERT) Ted proposes to Maria. I can’t tell you her answer, but you’re going to be surprised.

I hope you all have a good week. I’m going to spend mine either heads down editing or working on the boat.

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On The Road Again

2/16/2016

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Notice Bocas del Toro at the top left side of the map

We are about to undertake a big new adventure, so I thought I should give you the heads up. You’ll probably be reading mostly travel logs here for the next few months.

Dawn’s mother lives in Bocas del Torro, Panama. Bocas is a group of islands off the north coast of Panama on the Caribbean side. It’s one of their prime tourist destinations. We plan to take a long road trip to see her.

But first off, Nephew Paul will visit us from Cleveland next week. We only have a couple of days to see him, then we’re headed to Phoenix for the Left Coast Crime writers conference.

After the conference, we’re taking the Victory to Ensenada, Mexico for much needed maintenance. We’ll haul her out, paint her bottom and topsides, repair some rotted wood on the cabin top and redo all of the bright work (that’s varnish for you land lubbers). It will probably take us a week or ten days to get all of this done.

When we get back, we’ll close up the apartment, put all of our stuff in storage and take off for Panama, by car (Okay, we’re taking the truck, but “by car” sounded better). It would take much too long to take the boat there.

This will be a long, lazy journey of discovery. I want to spend about three weeks in Mexico, seeing some of the sights and visit some places I’ve wanted to see all of my life. It should take us less than a week to drive through Central America to Bocas.

The view from the deck

Once we’re in Panama, we’ll stay with Wes and Joyce for a couple of weeks, then we’ll house sit for them while they take a break from Panama. When Wes and Joyce get back, we’ll use their place as a home base while we explore Central America. I want to see Costa Rica, Belize and more of Panama.

On the way there and back, we’re going to be looking for a place to drop our anchor. If we still feel like traveling, we’ll drive along the Gulf Coast, down Florida and hop to the Virgin Islands. Somewhere out there we’re sure to find the perfect place to build our little grass shack on a secluded beach.

This is going to be an epic journey, I expect our trip will last from six months to a year. I’ll update this blog whenever we find Internet access. That won’t be a problem in the cities, but in some of the more remote locations, we may go days between WiFi hookups. There is no Internet at Wes and Joyce’s house, I’ll have to drive into town to find an Internet café.

Naturally, I will keep writing. I’ll update you on the progress of my books. I’m hoping to have The Cartel Strikes Back published before we leave, but it will be a tight deadline. Next up is another Catrina Flaherty novel. This time she is looking for a serial rapist who preys on undocumented Asian women. And look for a big twist in her love life.

That’s it for now. I need to go find a canopy for the truck.

Click on the pictures below for a full-sized view and explanation of what the picture is about.

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BookBub Promotion for Authors

2/1/2016

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Most of the authors I meet are desperate to figure out how they can market their books. Today I want to talk about the most successful promotion I’ve ever run.

First, let’s start with the basics. You have to have a good product. If your book in unedited, full of proof reading errors or has an amateurish cover, go to the back of the class. I’m professionalism Nazi.

If we’re ever going to break the stereotype of an indie author publishing their own work because the big publishing houses won’t take them, then we have to produce professional work that matches up well with what the traditional publishers are releasing.

Now to the promotion part. You are sure you have a good product and are ready to unleash it on the world.

I could, and have, writen a whole treatise on emarketing. This is just one piece of a complicated puzzle, but it’s important. You can read the article at http://www.pennwallace.com/emarketing-for-indie-authors.html.

The emphasis of this article is my just completed BookBub promo where I gave away Hacker for Hire for FREE. (Notice that FREE is in all caps. You want to grab you audience’s attention.)
BookBub turned me down in November and December. I was crushed. I depended on them to boost my Christmas sales. Didn’t happen. My November and December sales were pitiful.

I re-submitted Hacker for Hire for January and they accepted it.

Here’s an important note: Before you plan a promo, go to your KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) page, click on “Bookshelf,” and click on the “promote and advertise” button.

This will take you to your promotion page for that book. The first thing you want to check is your book’s status. There are start and end dates for your book’s KDP enrollment. DO NOT ever (and I mean EVER) schedule a promo that runs past your book’s end date.

If you do (and you’ll be sorry), you can only schedule the promo until the end date. Then, when you’ve reached that date, it takes a day for Amazon to re-enroll you in KDP. After you are re-enrolled, you can schedule the free promo for the rest of your dates, but you’ve lost two days in the middle of your promotion.

Drop down the page a little bit and you’ll see “Run a Price Promotion.” Click on the “Run a Free Book Promotion” button. If your book has any eligibility in this time period, you will see it under the “start date” box.

If you have eligibility to run a free promo, go to www.bookbub.com and drop to the bottom of the page and find the “Submit New Deal” under the “Publishers & Authors” list. It’s pretty self explanatory from there.

My promotion started on January 21st. I gave away over 14,000 books that day. For the next couple of days, the give aways dropped to around a thousand books a day. I gave away over 18,000 books for the entire promotion, much less than previous promotions, but my sales figures were the best ever. Go figure.

Okay, I gave away a bunch of books, big deal. What does it all mean?

First of all, more than 18,000 people who never heard of me now have one of my books on their Kindle. Will they read and enjoy it? I hope so, but there’s no guarantee.

The good news? If people like book A they usually buy books B, C and D. Sales for the other three books in the Ted Higuera Series jumped from 29 last month (It was a horrible month for me.) to over 300 this month. That’s a 1000% increase. It cost me $274 to run the ad on BookBub. I made that back on the first day. My book sales revenue for the month was well over $600.

Here’s something else I hadn’t noticed before. KLL (Kindle Lending Library) pages read sky rocketed.

What are KLL pages? Amazon has this lending library, see? Kindle Prime members (and some others) can download books for free. Only books that are signed up for the KDP program are eligible for the KLL. How does the author get paid? We get (at the current rate) ½ a penny a page.

Last month (remember, it was a horrible month for sales) I had about 19,000 pages read which produced around $100 in revenue. As of Janury 20th, I had about 20,000 pages read. Since the promotion, my pages read are well over 100,000 producing an income of over $500.

This is chump change to some authors, but for me, it’s a bonanza.

On days 4 and 5 of the promotion, I decided I needed something to give the give away a little more oomph. I decided to run Facebook ads for those days.

Facebook ads appear on the right hand column of your Facebook page. Facebook has an algorithm that determines who will see each ad. I see different ads than you do. The point is, it is laser targeted to the audience you choose.

Facebook ads are incredibly flexible. You can choose the demographics and tastes of the people who are going to see your ad. I started with a pool of over 300,000,000 people, way too many. There’s no way my book is going to appeal to all of those people and you pay for the ad by the click. Many of those people will click through out of curiosity and decide not to download.
I narrowed down the list to people from 35- to over 65, people who read and like thrillers, etc. I culled the list to about 30,000 people. Then I carpet bombed them with the ad. I ran the ad from noon ‘til 1 am for two days. Only people on my narrowed down list got the ad. I paid $200 for the whole promotion. Almost 50,000 people saw the ad and nearly 800 clicked through to the Amazon page for Hacker for Hire. I assume that most of those 800 downloaded the book because they were interested enough to go to Amazon in the first place.

By the end of the promotion, all of my Ted Higuera books were in Amazon’s top 30,000 paid sales. That’s out of the millions of books on Amazon. The Inside Passage, the prequel to Hacker for Hire, reached #3 in Hispanic literature and #27 in Sea Adventures. Hacker for Hire was #1011 in the Mystery category. Bikini Baristas was #1871 in the Suspense category. The Mexican Connection was #145 in International Mystery and Crime.(Once again, that’s out of the millions of mystery books on Amazon.)

All four of the Ted Higuera books were in the top 15 on the Mexican Writers Facebook page sales list.
As Ted’s Mama says, “A rising tide floats all boats.”

The results? Downloads and sales kicked back up for the last two days of the promotion.
Here’s more good news. After the promotion ended, my sales kept up at a high level. People who read Hacker for Hire for free are finishing the book and buying the prequel and sequels. I’m averaging about $80 a day in book sales and $45 in KLL pages read. That’s a total of about $125 a day. That adds up to about $3650 a month or over $40,000 a year.

Would you like to have those sales? I sure would.

But it doesn’t come easy and it doesn’t come free. I spent $474 on this promotion. My sales increased by $1000 over where they were before the promo. That’s a net profit of over $500 on a five-day promotion.

I ran the promotion over a weekend. Hacker for Hire was free from Thursday through Monday. Give aways and sales were greatest on the first day, but KLL pages read exploded on Saturday and Sunday. I guess people have more time to read on the weekends. On each of those days, I had almost as many pages read as all of last month.

My conclusion: BookBub works. If you can get them to accept your book, you’re home free. If not, there are other, less effective ways to promote you work. Check out my article on emarketing at http://www.pennwallace.com/emarketing-for-indie-authors.html for more ideas.

Whatever you do, don’t give up. Only you can make this work. You need to keep your nose to the grindstone and forge ahead. I’m looking forward to your success.

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Progress Marches On

1/16/2016

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Things are going well with my new book, The Cartel Strikes Back. I finished the beat sheet, character sketches and outline in December. Then I took a two week break for the holidays.

January is here. We’ve been through the holidays, made and broken our New Year’s Resolutions and we’re ready to get going on the New Year.

So, here’s what I’m working on:

First of all, I have to market my books. If I don’t sell books, I don’t pay the rent. I tried several different marketing ploys in the fall and they were spectacular failures. I spent a lot of money and hardly saw a spike in sales. I spent more on advertising that I took in on sales.

Not to self: Don’t do that again.

So, I’m back to the tried and true. On January 21st I’ll run a five day free giveaway on Hacker for Hire. Hacker for Hire is the second book in the Ted Higuera Series. In this book, Ted and Chris have returned from their ill-fated voyage to Canada.

Chris is nursing his wounds at Harbor View Hospital and Ted’s looking for his first grown up job.

He finally goes to work for a kick-ass female PI, Catrina Flaherty. Remember that name, Catrina is such a good character that she has spun off her own series.

Cat and Ted get involved in a major high-tech industry scandal and bodies are dropping by the wayside.

If you haven’t read Hacker for Hire, this is your chance to get a free copy. If you have read it and enjoyed it, please pass this on to your friends so they can jump on the bandwagon.

Next time, I’ll give you an update on Ted’s new book, The Cartel Strikes Back. I’ll just say that Ted and his crew are back in Mexico, fighting an old enemy who is causing new trouble.

I’m about halfway through this book and should complete the first draft by the end of the month. For you non-writers, once I’ve finished the first draft, the project is just starting. There will be endless rounds of editing, beta readers, proof reading, cover design, and interior design, etc.

Look for the finished product in early spring of 2016.

I will also be putting out a call for beta readers in a week or so. If you’re interested in being a beta reader, click here. Click here to send me a note from my “Contact Penn” page and I’ll send you a document explaining the process. Please don’t respond unless you really, truly, have the time to participate. This is an extremely important part of the writing process and I don’t want the book to languish because someone hasn’t kept up their end.

I have a page for The Cartel Strikes Back on my website now. In case you want to get a head start, I’ve include the first chapter or so, but it will be rough draft quality. I’d welcome any feedback you have.

That’s enough for now. I’ve got to get back to writing The Cartel Strikes Back.

See you next time.

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The 2015Wallace Family Christmas Letter

1/3/2016

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Odin, the King of the Beach

Dawn and I welcome you to another year of our adventures.

I started knee replacement surgery process last fall and was finally scheduled for surgery in February.

The surgery went well but the recovery was tough. The good news is that I can walk again. Last week I actually had a full day with no pain.

The next big item in our year was losing Odin, Dawn’s 170 pound Great Dane. Odin was a wonderful dog. He lived 11 ½ years, which is like 115 in people years. The average life expectancy for a Great Dane is 7-9 years. He had a great life. He saw the Caribbean, lived in Florida, drove across the country and stopped in all the cool dog parks along the way. He also went on our great sailing adventures with us.

Dawn and Odin were soul mates. It devastated Dawn to lose her friend, even though we knew it was coming and it is better for Odin. He is now out of pain, but we miss him every day.

#1 Daughter, Katie, is on sabbatical this year. We agreed to take care of Kiva, Katie’s cat while she’s on the road. Kiva follows Dawn around the house all day long. They are joined at the hip.

My First Outing After Sugery

The Wallace Family at U.S. Cellular Field

#2 Daughter, Libby, flew out to Chicago to join us. They absolutely wore me out. We hit museums, parks and many, many BBQ restaurants in addition to the ball parks.

After the baseball trip, Katie moved on to Mexico where she spent three weeks. She had to make a quick trip back to Seattle, then flew to South America. She has stops in Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. Libby is flying down to Colombia to spend Christmas with Katie. Connie would be so happy to see how close they are. She always wanted the girls to have a relationship like she had with her sister, Marti.

Libby has an exciting new job. She is now the office manager for a small landscape architect firm and loving it.

My writing “career” is progressing. I published three books this year, two Ted Higuera novels, The Mexican Connection and Bikini Baristas and the second book in the Catrina Flaherty Mystery series, Murder Strikes Twice.

Book sales have gone from excellent to horrible and back again. We’re learning a lot about eMarketing and getting better all the time. Dawn is my right-hand man when it comes to advertising. Social media and networking are huge in selling independently published books. I’ve been fortunate to meet a lot of important people in the industry this year.

I’ve also taught classes at writers conferences and for a local writers group.

Lunch with the girls at Safeco Field

In August, I flew to Seattle to visit the girls. Dawn didn’t go because Odin was in such delicate shape, she didn’t want to leave him.

Being in Seattle was bitter sweet. I got to see many great friends, spend time with the girls and visit old haunts. However, Connie’s ghost was where ever I went. I couldn’t get her out of my mind. I went to bed with an overwhelming feeling of sadness every night.

This fall we had a visit from two of Dawn’s oldest friends. She’s known Anne (pronounced Anna) and Christy since grade school. Anne, her husband, Finn, and son, Sander flew in from Denmark and Christy came down from Seattle. Anne and her family stayed on the Victory. We moved the boat from Chula Vista to Shelter Island so they could be in the middle of the city.

We took them out sailing on Sunday, the first time I’ve had the boat under sail since I had knee surgery. I learned two things. First of all, I am competent to run the boat again. Secondly, every boat should have an 11-year old boy. Sanders had the time of his life and I was taken back to a time when I was fishing with Papa, watching Sander learn. Dawn wasn’t sure which one of us was biggest kid.

Now that we’re free to travel again, I expect to do a lot of it next year. We have a tough decision to make on the boat. We’re taking her down to Ensenada in January for haul out and doing a lot of work on her. Then we have to decide, do we sail away or sell her.

If we sell her, we’ll take a long car trip to Central America and along the Gulf Coast. Dawn’s mom lives in Panama. We may spend some time visiting there. When we make it to Florida, we’ll take a side trip to the Virgin Islands, Dawn’s old stomping grounds.

I’m hoping that somewhere along the way, we’ll discover a place where we want to settle down and spend our golden years. Can’t you just see us in a little house on the beach somewhere, drinking Margaritas and writing books? Okay, to be honest, Dawn’s dream has some Great Danes in it somewhere.

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A Preview of Coming Events. . .

12/15/2015

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I think you’ve read enough about our baseball trip. Today we’re going to take a look at my newest writing projects.

Thanks to all of you, Murder Strikes Twice had a great roll out. Currently it is my bestselling book. It's had a great reception with 23 reviews on Amazon, mostly 5-star.

For those of you who haven’t read it yet, Murder Strikes Twice is the second book in the Catrina Flaherty Mysteries. A man’s wife is tragically killed in a hiking accident, falling off a cliff. The police rule it an accidental death and everyone goes about their business.

But something is not quite kosher here. When Catrina discovers that the man’s first wife also died in a mysterious accident, she’s on the case. I guarantee you, you won’t see the ending coming.

I had so much fun writing this novella, that I’m planning a full-fledged Catrina Flaherty novel for this summer.

But first things first. It’s time to get back to Ted Higuera. What is that rascal up to?

Death Lurks in Mexico

While Cat has been off on her own adventure, Ted was falling deeper and deeper in love with Maria Gonzales. Maria is the beautiful anthropologist we first met in Hacker for Hire and became a regular cast member in Bikini Baristas.

Spoiler alert: Ted is going to propose in my new book, which I am tentatively calling The Cartel Strikes Back. I won’t tell you what Maria’s answer is, but once again, you won’t see this one coming.

Hmmm. . . The Cartel Strikes Back. What does that make you think of? If you guessed that Ted, Cat, Chris and the gang are headed back to Mexico for round two with the drug cartels, give yourself a gold start.

I don’t want to give away too much of the story, but Maria has a family emergency back home in La Paz. She takes off without telling Ted where’s she’s going or why. Ted’s reaction? What do you think? He goes after her.

El Posolero, the drug lord that Ted and friends put away in The Mexican Connection escapes from prison and is hell-bent on destroying Maria’s family.

Before long Ted is in more trouble than he can handle, so he calls Cat, Chris and Hope to help.

Soon we’re in a rollicking adventure mired in government corruption, police working for the cartels and danger on every corner.

How is the gang going to get out of this? You’re gonna have to read the book. Look for it in the spring of 2016.

On a personal note, Dawn and I are flying up to Portland for Mama’s birthday (Her 91st! My how time flies.) and Christmas. Then we’ll drive to Central Oregon and spend a few days at brother Jon’s Lake House. Dawn is so excited about this trip. She hasn’t had a “vacation” in years.

And I thought that every day was vacation for us!

At the National Antropological Museum

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2015 A Baseball Odyssey - St. Louis and Chicago

11/20/2015

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Day 6 Friday, September 25rd, 2015, St. Louis, MO

The Gateway to the West

The gateway to the west. We finally made it to St. Louis. I don’t know why this feels significant to me. It certainly was never on my life-list to visit St. Louis. Maybe it’s the history that makes me fell this way.

Whatever it is, I’m glad we’re here.

We have a much better hotel here than the La Quinta in K.C. We’re close to downtown and they have a shuttle to and from the ballpark.

Of course, I have to talk about the BBQ. All my life I’ve heard that Kansas City is the world capital of BBQ. Well, St. Louis sure gives them a run for their money.

Katie and I managed to find Papa’s BBQ and it was wonderful. Katie bought me a T-shirt with a take-off of the Cardinals logo. It has a baseball bat running slightly diagonally with a cardinal (bird) sitting on each end and the word “Cardinals” underneath.

The T-shirt had the baseball bat, but instead of birds on it, it had pigs on each end and the words “Papa’s BBQ” under the bat. It’s great.

Apparently we weren't the only ones to discover Pappy's. We got there at 1:30 and there was a line out the door. It took us almost thirty minutes to work our way to the front of the line. But when we got there, it was worth it.

I hardly need to say the BBQ was out of this world. I’m not sure why we made this trip, to see baseball stadiums or eat BBQ.

Finally, the front of the line

We got off the trolley a couple of blocks from Busch Stadium. Even though this is a new ball park and not the one where Stan Musical and Bob Gibson played, I could feel the history and tradition from blocks away.

The area looks newly renovated. Everything is stylish and upscale. There is a mall called “Cardinals Nation” across the street from the park. It is lined with food outlets, bars and sports paraphernalia stores. We walked through it just to check it out.

It was like Times Square on New Year’s Eve. You didn’t have room to breathe. There were tables in the atrium in the center of the mall. Giant screen TVs (think scoreboards in baseball stadiums) lined the walls and people spilled beer, chicken wings and nachos all over each other. One giant party. And this didn’t include the 40 or 50,000 fans inside the park.

Like many of the new ball parks, New Busch Stadium has that retro-look. Red bricks and a curved entrance with arches makes it look like an old-time ball park. Inside, it was a modern as any stadium.

There were two remarkable things about the amenities in the stadium. First of all, you could get any kind of beer you wanted, as long as it was Budweiser. Anhauser-Busch owns the Cardinals and they aren’t about to share their thirsty fans with some other brand. There was one craft beer stand, but it was from a micro-brewery that Busch owns.

The second remarkable thing about the stadium was the lack of food choices. You could get hot dogs, hamburgers and popcorn to your heart’s delight. You couldn’t find tacos, sushi, Italian or any of the other innovative foods found in other ball parks. I get the beer thing, but do people in St. Louis not care about food?

Oh, yeah. There was a ball game there too.

Inside Busch Stadium

The monuments outside the stadium

Most stadiums have some sort of race about the break in the fifth inning, to keep the fans interest. Busch was no different. In Seattle we have hydro-plane races, in San Diego they have go cart races, on the city streets. There were the famous sausage races in Kansas City. In St. Louis they had the farm to table races.

You heard me right. Farm to table races. Farming is a big thing in the Mid-West.

A cow, a pig, an ear of corn and a soy bean raced around the bases for the honor of being first. The corn got off to an early lead, but the cow tripped him up and the soy bean pulled ahead to win.

I guess you gotta do something to entertain the customers.

Like in K.C., there was high fan engagement. There was a constant murmur and cheering. The interesting thing is there were no organized chants like “Go Mariners” or “Edd-gaaar” in Seattle of “Here we go Dodgers, here we go.” There was also that sense of friendliness we felt in K.C. I guess it’s a Mid-West thing.

Katie noted that seeing baseball played in all of these different places reminds her that baseball is America’s game.

She also pointed out an interesting thing. In the enterance to the ball park, there are bronze statues of all the Cardinal greats. There was Enos Slaughter, Stan Musial, Lou Brock and Bob Gibson to name a few. But what about the man who hit more home runs in one season than anyone else? Mark McGwire was not represented.

I’m sure you all remember the steroids scandal of the 1980’s and 1990’s. McGwire was one of the players identified as being “juiced.” He was not elected to the Hall of Fame in spite of his stellar career and is not honored in his home stadium. If you look at the people entering any other stadium you will see fans wearing the jerseys of famous players who are no longer playing. My favorite T-shirt has the number 24

We had a great time. After the game, there was a fireworks and laser light show. I’m not sure what they were celebrating, but it was fun and we stayed to the end.

It was no trouble catching our shuttle back to the hotel and we went to bed right away so we could get up early and drive to Chicago.

Day 7 Saturday, September 26th 2015 - Chicago

In Millennium Park

Up early and on the road to Chicago. Chicago!

It’s a long drive from K.C . to Chi-town. Probably about five hours. Katie took the first shift and I missed all the countryside. I slept.

When she woke me up to take a trick at the wheel, I was surprised. Once again, the Mid-West did not look like I imagined. There were groves of deciduous trees along the river, there were a few rolling hills. I expected pancake flat land.

Libby got a bargain flight from Seattle, so she arrived at 6 am. She called Katie and told her they wouldn’t let her into the hotel. I had to stop (we needed gas anyway) and call the hotel to give them the okay.

Libby checked in and went out to explore the city. She did a lot of walking and went on a breast-cancer awareness walk before we got there.

When we arrived at around 1 pm, Libby was flaked out on the bed.

I have read that Chicago has the second best public transportation system in the country. I wasn’t disappointed. We bought 3-day transit passes and could get anywhere.

We got on the “El” for Wriggly field.

I expected a little bit of baseball heaven. What we got was a very old, uncomfortable stadium. It’s dripping in baseball history, but there are soooo many steps.

Our seats were in row 500, the last, highest row in the stadium down the left field line. The stairs were very narrow and very steep. It reminded me of climbing the Pyramid of the Sun. There were no hand rails. I don’t do stairs very well anymore. I got to the top and told Katie that I wasn’t leaving until the game was over. She’d have to go buy me a bratwurst and I’d pee in a paper cup.

During the breaks between innings, they played what they loosely referred to as “music.” Katie says it was rap “music” from the Deep South. I don’t do rap, but I got a kick out of the players singing, dancing and clapping along with the music.

The Cubbies played the Pirates, a game I correctly predicted was a preview of the Wild Card playoff the coming week. It was fun and after the Cubs pitcher, Jake Arrieta, hit a home run, the bucs pitcher was all shook up and let the ball game slip away.

The best part of the whole experience was the lunar eclipse. Being in the top row, we had first class seats to the blood moon. It was way cool. I missed a couple of innings watching the eclipse.

Day 8 Sunday, September 28th 2015 - Chicago

Chicago's #1 Tourist Attraction

The next morning my nephew Paul and his lovely wife Jamie joined us. Paul and Jaime live just outside of Cleveland where Paul is a professor at Hiram College.

The Ducks were playing on national TV, so I connegiled everyone to going to a Duck bar and eating pizza. We got there and the hostess made a comment about us being very loyal fans. I didn’t get her meaning.

We ordered some fairly decent pizza and a couple of marvelous salads (remember: Chicago is known for its salads), drinks and settled in to watch the game. We were a bit early. When 3 pm rolled around and the game didn’t come on, I called the server over.

“Aren’t you going to show the Ducks game?” I asked.

“Oh, yes sir. It comes on at 7 pm tonight.”

Curses! Foiled again! I have this problem with time zones. I’ve done this a number of times. Growing up on the West Coast, I’m used to subtracting hours to make up for the time zones. This time, I was in Central Time and the game was being played in Pacific Time. I should have ADDED two hours. We were four hours early.

We put our heads together and decided to go on our already paid for river tour. Katie managed to move up our reservations, then we’d return to the Duck bar for the game.

But we had a couple of hours to kill. No problem for Paul, he took us on a walking tour of Millennium Park. Or should I call it a death march.

Millennium Park is a wonderful place and I wish I had time to tell you all about it, but if I devote a thousand words to the park, we’ll never get on to baseball.

After a few miles walking through the park and down to the river, we boarded our tour boat. It was a fun experience. The boat took us up the river. Keep in mind that I’m from the Northwest. Rivers there are lined with trees and rocks and underbrush and filled with rocks and rapids. You sit by them and while the day away while you have a fishing line in the water. (Okay, that’s only during our three weeks of summer.)

Sunset over the Windy City

In Chicago, the idyllic rivers are lined with skyscrapers. Huge modern buildings shoot up from the river banks. This is some of the most expensive property in Chicago.

The boat took us up river a ways and we learned all about some of the most impressive structures. We watch Chicago Fire on TV and now, when they charge into a building to save the damsels in distress, I can say, “I know that building.”

The tour then went through the locks and out into Lake Michigan. We only went a couple of miles up the coast and returned, but it gave me the feeling of being out on the ocean. Who ever thought that a fresh water lake could be so big? And the wind. A steady fifteen to twenty knot breeze came out of the Northwest. It was just like a real ocean.

By the time the boat trip was over, I was exhausted. I asked Paul to go get the car and come back to pick me up. Needless to say, I was too worn out to go back to the Duck bar; we just headed back to the hotel.

The next morning the Gaffneys (Paul and Jaime) met us at our hotel then took us to a soul food restaurant for breakfast. The brunch bar looked absolutely marvelous, but I ordered off the menu because I couldn’t make a dent in the buffet.

It was a cool experience. We were some of the few non-black people there, but with two Asians and one Mexican at the table, I felt we were helping their diversity quota.

After breakfast, we said our goodbyes to Paul and Jaime and they headed back to Cleveland. Katie had the Museum from Hell day planned for us. We started out at the Planetarium. I was surprised that Libby wanted to see it, but she was Space-Girl when we got there. I got dizzy sitting in the seats, leaning back and watching the ceiling rotate above us. It was really cool and I’d love to spend more time there, but we were on a schedule.

The Fam at Celluar Field

We had to take a lunch break. Paul told us that the three things we HAD to eat while in Chicago were Chicago-style pizza, a Chicago Dog and an Italian beef sandwich. (Now when I watch Chicago fire, I see Italian beef sandwich places on every corner.)

We found a place downtown for the sandwiches, then trudged back to the Field Museum. I’m sure Katie was trying to kill me. I can’t begin to tell you about the Field Museum. It is, hands down, the most fabulous museum of natural history I have ever seen. I want to go back to Chicago and spend a week there. But, alas, we got there at 4 pm and museum closed at 5. We just had the smallest taste.

I can’t leave our Chicago story without commenting on Soldier Field. Many of Chicago’s buildings are built in the Greek Revivalist style. I love it, you feel like you’re in downtown Athens in the Glory Days of Greece.

Soldier field, where da Bears play, was built in the Classical style. As new stadiums were built, the Chicagons felt their stadium was out of date. But Chicago has a good notion of their history. They weren’t about to tear down their classical masterpiece. So, what did they do? They built an addition on it. Now it looks like a giant space-ship landed on top of the stadium. It’s kinda funky and kinda cool. Chicago, I salute you for moving into the modern world while clinging to your history.

We drug home for a couple of hours and took naps. I was running out of gas, but we still had a White Sox game at U.S. Cellular Field.

The Sox were out of the pennant race so the crowd was much smaller than our previous games. They were playing our old friends the Kansas City Royals. There were more Royals fans in the park than Sox fans. The Royals made short work of them, then went on to win the World Series.

Cellular Field is a nice, new stadium. It isn’t a baseball palace like Safeco or Petco parks, but its modern and comfortable. One of the interesting things there was that between innings, they showed the menus of the various food outlets on the big screen. Good marketing.

Another unusual feature was the limbo cam. Reggae music played and people in the stands danced to it like they were doing the limbo. The camera then showed them on the big screen and imposed a limbo bar over the dancers. It was a little different.

One of the Sox hit a home run and fireworks went off. I guess that way the people outside know what’s going on.

As usual, I was dead when we got home. Remind me never to go on a trip with a couple of Millennials again.

Day 9 Monday, September 29th, 2015 - Chicago

U.S. Cellular Field

Day 9 Monday, September 29th, 2015, Chicago, IL

Our Baseball Odyssey was over. I got up early and took Libby to O’Hare to catch her flight home. Upon returning to the hotel, I took a short nap before I had to take Katie and I to Midway.

We parted at the airport. She had a one o’clock flight to Seattle and I had a three PM flight to San Diego.

I had a two hour layover in Dallas and got home around 9 PM. As expected, Dawn was waiting there to meet me and take me home.

It was a wonderful trip. I got to spend a week with nothing but baseball, BBQ and my girls. It is a highlight in my life. I definitely want to go back to Chicago. We didn’t scratch the surface, and the Field Museum is still waiting for me.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the trip with me. I know that it has taken a long time to get the whole story posted, but I have been super busy getting Murder Strikes Twice ready for publication.

Click back to my books page and take a look at what I’ve written. Then Click Here to sign up for my readers list.

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2015 A Baseball Odyssey - Day 5 Kansas City (again)

10/24/2015

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Preparing to Say Farewell, Old Friend

Mr. Odin, the King of the Beach (or wherever else he goes)

Things are a little sad around Casa Wallace. Odin is approaching his final days.

We shouldn't be that sad, he's had a great life. He's 11 1/2 years old, that's like 115 in people years. He's traveled all over the country (and Caribbean) and had great adventures with his Mom.

He has been well loved, but now it's time to say goodbye.

He can't stand up by himself (and I'm putting my back out lifting 175 pounds of dead weight), he can't walk anymore. He falls down every time he tries to turn around, his hind legs get all tangled up with each other and he goes down.

It's been hard for me to watch him deteriorate like this. Dawn is absolutely in tears. He can't last more than a few days.

Thank you to all of our friends who have expressed their sympathy to us. I'm afraid that the next time I post I will have sadder news for you.

Enough of this foolish sentimentality, let's get on with our story

Kaufman Stadium, Kansas City

Day 5 Thursday, September 24rd, 2015, Kansas City, MO

The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum

This was a big baseball day, but first, we had other priorities. Kansas City is the home of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum. We couldn’t come all this way and not see it. Katie wanted to tour some breweries while we were here and there was a convenient one not far from the National WWI museum. Guess who went to the brewery and who went to the museum?

The day started with the complimentary “breakfast” in the hotel’s lobby. I made the stupid decision to have a waffle. They didn’t have sugar free syrup and I was sick before I was half-way through. I should know better, but somehow my brain switches off when I see food in front of me.

Katie slept late so I took her some fruit and a container of yogurt. We got going and headed to the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum.

The museum is located at 18th and Vine, the heart of the Afro-American community in Kansas City, directly across the street from the old Gem Theater. The Gem was the center for KC Jazz in the thirties.

The Old Gem Theater

Usually you enter a museum with a sense of awe. There is a hushed tone as people whisper about this exhibit or that.

Not so at the NLBM. Sharing the same building is the Museum of Jazz. Snappy tunes filled the air and people swayed to the rhythm as they moved about.

If you’re not familiar with the old Negro Leagues, this was in the time before Jackie Robinson. Baseball was segregated and blacks and whites played in different leagues. The Negro Leagues were a great draw and regularly filled the stands with the same number of fans as the Major Leagues. They even played in some of the same stadiums. The difference was the color of the players and the fans.

I was impressed by the exhibits and learned a few new things. In one room they have a baseball diamond with bronze statues of the top players at each position. Some of my favorites, like Buck O’Neil and Cool Papa Bell were right there, life size, in front of me.

Cool Papa Bell was the fastest man in baseball. He practically invented the running game we now see in modern baseball. It was said that he could turn off the light switch on the wall and be in bed before the room was dark.

Katie is every bit as knowledgeable a baseball fan as I am. She dug into the old lore, but soon we were out of time. Unfortunately, the trip was planned (by Katie) to run on a tight schedule.

Puerta Vallarta or Kansas City?

Exiting the museum, we were both in dire need of sustenance. When what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a block that looked like we were in Puerta Vallarta. The whole block was filled with Mexican businesses. I can’t miss the chance for a taco, so we pulled over.

This was just a snack, mind you, to hold us until dinner time. We shared a plate of chicken enchiladas. To my amazement, they tasted just like the ones Mama used to make. With the frijoles, arroz and chips, (plus a Margarita) it was much more than a light snack.

Okay, we’re refueled and ready to get back on the treadmill. Katie wanted to visit some breweries while we were in the Mid-West. I didn’t have any particular desire to see them, so we split up.

I dropped her off at the Boulevard Brewery and made my way to the National WWI Museum.

I hope Katie had a good time, because I was in a little bit of heaven. I could have spent days there.

The museum is underground. The area looks like a large grassy lawn with a memorial and an obelisk in the center. You go down a ramp to what looks like WWI underground bunker.

Inside, the museum was modern, airy and bright. Docents in every room stood by to answer your questions and give little ad-hoc lectures.

I entered the building and crossed over a bridge traversing a poppy field. The poppies represented the American dead in the war. It was way too big.

The National WWI Museum

Once over the bridge, I ran from room to room to see as many exhibits as I could. I only had an hour for that stop.

I stopped in my tracks when I came to an exhibit featuring field artillery. Papa had been in command of a battery of French 75’s between the wars, and there it was in front of me. The French 75 that I had heard so much about. I must have spent half my time in the museum examining the piece. I felt very close to Papa in those moments.

My only complaint was that the air war was not well represented. There were two replica airplanes hanging from the rafters, one of them way out of the way in a corner of the auditorium. I’m a flyin’ kind of guy and expected to see dozens of WWI aeroplanes. No such luck.

I could have spent days there, but I had to leave the museum and pick up Katie. She jumped in the car and we made our way to our next destination: Kaufman Stadium.

Baseball in Kansas City is a whole different experience. In Seattle there is an amazing street culture around the ballpark. Street vendors selling sausages and kettle corn vie for your attention with people selling popcorn and peanuts to take into the game. Mimes, clowns and musicians stake out there corners and perform for tips. We didn’t see anything else like this at the stadiums on our tour, but in Kansas City we found a whole different style of baseball.

Tail Gatin' at the Kauff

The first thing we noticed was the tailgating. There are hundreds of acres of parking surrounding the stadium. Every few feet we noticed people partying, bar-b-queing their favorite treats. On this grill were sausages (very big in the Mid-West) on that steaks and on another hamburgers or chicken. Music poured from portable stereo systems, people walking down the parking lot would see someone they knew and stop to chat. Before you knew it, they had heaping plates of BBQ in their hands.

I think that’s the biggest takeaway we got from KC. The friendliness of the people. It had a small town feel. Everybody seemed to know everybody. Strangers (especially ones wearing Mariner shirts and hats – the Royals were playing the M’s that night) were welcomed. In most of the other stadiums, I got a friendly jeering for wearing a Mariner shirt and a Dodgers cap. In KC, they welcomed the visitors.

Katie went in search of beer and food. She found a stand operated by some famous celebrity chef (was it Emeril? I don’t remember). As she placed her order, the manager saw her and came out to chat. He wanted to make sure that she knew where all the facilities were and that she was having a good time.

“We like to take care of our visitors,” he said.

(Okay, I know I’m being a little cynical, but no one offered to take care of an old man in a Mariners shirt, just the pretty young girl.)

Inside the stadium was a sea of blue. Our blue Mariner’s jerseys matched the blue Royals shirts and hats. It had the feel of a college football game. Everyone knew everyone else, excitement bubbled in the air (yeah, I admit that the Royals were on their way to their second World Series appearance in two years.)

And it's Italian Sausage at the Pole

Every stadium has some kind of race on their big screens between innings. In Seattle it’s hydroplane races, in Kansas City, it's sausages. You heard me right. Sausages. There’s a Frankfurter, an Italian Sausage and a Polish Sausage (or people dressed up in those costumes) that race around the bases. It’s totally ridiculous, but kind of fun.

Mike Mussina is the Royal’s third baseman. Everyone calls him “Moose.” When he comes to bat, the crowd screams “MOOOOOSE.” The moose man is a regular figure in KC. He’s a guy with a pair of moose antlers that goes strutting through the stands getting people charged up.

The stadium and the crowd were fun, but the M’s lost. Oh well, it’s been a tough summer for Mariner fans.

We dragged back to our motel and hit the sack. Tomorrow we drive to St. Louis.

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2015 A Baseball Odyssey Day 4 or Goin' to Kansas City

10/12/2015

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Let's Get Business Out of the Way First

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Day 4 Wednesday, September 23rd, 2015, Kansas City, MO

Kansas City, Here We Come

There are only three reasons to get up this early, to catch a tide, to go fishing or to catch an airplane. 4 am came awfully early.

Dawn graciously dragged herself out of bed and drove us to the airport. It was an interesting ride. Dawn is a creature of the night. She just doesn’t function at 4 am. There were several times when I wondered if we would even make it to the airport to start our Magical Baseball Tour.

Somehow or other, she managed to get us to the airport with no injuries. We said our goodbyes and checked in.

At best, travel is boring and tiring. This trip was exactly that.

The flight from San Diego to Dallas was not my favorite. We were shoved into two jump seats behind the exit door row on an Airbus 321. My knees were up around my ears, there was so little foot room. I did manage to sleep most of the way. I chastised Katie for booking a flight on an Airbus. Where is her local pride? We usually only fly Boeings.

The first leg of the trip took us to Dallas-Fort Worth airport. Ho-hum, just another airport. At Dallas, we transferred to a BOEING 737, where we had more foot room, for the flight to Kansas City.

As is usual with airlines flights, it was anything but exciting. I read and Katie slept on this leg. We arrived in Kansas City in the early afternoon, their time. We’re jumping time zones here and that always caused me problems.

The Mutha of all BBQs

We picked up a rental car at Budget and set out to find our hotel. A word about hotels: I was in charge of selecting the hotels for this trip. My priorities were, in this order, price, proximity to the ball parks and amenities. You’ll notice that amenities came last.

Our Kansas City hotel was La Quinta. I used my credit card rewards to book KC and St. Louis. That greatly limited my choice of hotels.

There’s nothing wrong with La Quinta. It was a neat, clean room. However, it was out in the middle of nowhere. There was a Denny’s next door, but we didn’t come all this way to eat Denny’s food. The room didn’t have a fridge or microwave.

We checked in and I immediately flopped down on the bed to rest my eyes. An hour or so later, we both decided that we were hungry. What do you eat in Kansas City?

Get serious here; Kansas City thinks they’re the BBQ capital of the universe. Several of Katie’s friends had recommended Arthur Bryant’s. There was also a big push for Joe’s. Katie looked them up on Yelp! And Arthur Bryant’s was the closest.

When we said we were going to Kansas City, we neglected to say which Kansas City. We were in Mo. Joe’s was in Kansas City, Kansas. We had to pass on them.

Katie's pulled pork sandwich

We jumped into the car and headed out. Following the GPS we headed to a neighborhood that was definitely on the other side of the tracks. It was mostly residential, but after our final turn, we saw an old red-brick building. That was it.

Arthur Bryant’s has just the right kind of BBQ joint atmosphere. When we got out of the car, we could smell the BBQ in the air. The place was a storefront location with big windows looking out on a sad street. A few tables and chairs were scattered around the room and a TV played the Royals baseball game.

At the back of the room was the counter. Made of modern stainless steel and glass it almost looked out of place in the joint. The atmosphere reeked of the 1930’s. I expected to see a Ford roadster parked out front and Bonnie and Clyde at one of the tables.

The people behind the counter were miracle workers. The pig has never been better represented. I ordered a half-rack of ribs and Katie had a pulled pork sandwich. OH MY GOD. I thought I had died and gone to heaven.

I’ve eaten BBQ whenever the opportunity presented itself. In the Northwest we have quite a few BBQ joints, but nothing like Arthur Bryant’s. I find it hard to describe the flavors. The smoke flavor permeated the meat. The outside was nice and crusty and the inside was fall-off-the-bone tender. The meat had a wonderful sweetness to it. Arthur had several kinds of BBQ sauce on the table, but I thought the original was best. Usually I like a blend of sweet and spicy in my sauce. His hot sauce had no hint of sweetness, so I went with the original even though it was mostly sweet and not spicy.

A Gentle Reminder: We're in Tornado Alley

Katie did an admirable job on her sandwich, but I couldn’t eat half my ribs. I got a box and took my treasure home.

While we ate we watched the Royals-Mariners game. We decided to go home and finish the game there. When we got back to the hotel, I switched on the TV. To my horror, we couldn’t get the channel with the Royals game.

What kind of place was this? We had about seven channels. None of them carried baseball. I should have checked on this before I booked the room. But, in all fairness, it never occurred to me that we might want to watch a game on TV, we were going to the game in person.

Fortunately I brought my leftovers home. Before bed, because we had such an early dinner, I was ravenous. The ribs were just what the doctor ordered.

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2015 A Baseball Odessey - Day 2

10/8/2015

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Baseball in Southern California

Day 2 - Monday, September 21st 2015

Today was a free day, no baseball scheduled. I can’t begin to express how happy it made me to have Katie stay with us and get to know Dawn. I was near tears several times.

Katie got to meet Odin, our 175 pound Great Dane. I’m really sorry that she didn’t get to meet him a couple of years ago. He is so old and worn out that he just sits on his bed all day and watches the world pass by. Katie would have loved going to the Dog Beach with him in his glory days.

The day started with Katie taking her cat, Kiva, who’s staying with us, to the vet for a teeth cleaning at 7:30. Needless to say, we didn’t get up for that one. After she got back, she climbed back into bed for a couple of hours more sleep.

After a big pancake breakfast we headed to La Jolla to see the Scripps Institute’s world famous Aquarium. It was a beautiful San Diego day and we lingered at the outdoor tidal pool exhibit.

The Pre-Game Broadcast

After the Aquarium, we headed into La Jolla for lunch. Katie found the El Pescador Seafood Market and Restaurant on Yelp! It was great. Dawn and Katie had salads smothered in seafood and I had a grilled salmon sandwich.

The day was getting away from us and I needed to get cooking. Katie had requested Mexican food for dinner.

We stopped to pick Kiva up and I stepped next door to Von’s to get a few ingredients for my witch’s brew, then we headed home.

I was pretty well spent after a day on my feet at the Aquarium, but I soldiered on. I made beef enchiladas, refritos and rice. Dawn’s brother, Duane, came over for dinner. I was a little disappointed with my enchiladas, I used the ancho chile powder I bought at the Grand Central Market and it was a little stronger than I expected. Everyone else liked the enchiladas. Now that I know what a bang that chile powder carries, the next time I make enchiladas, they will be milder. You want to get yourself invited to that.

After dinner, Duane gave me his old smart phone. He’s always up to date on the latest technological gimmickry, so he had to buy a Samsung Galaxy 6. The old Galaxy 5 is still a great phone so I eagerly accepted it. Now I have to learn how to use the darn thing.

What happened to the days when I just wanted a dial tone?

After Dawn got the kitchen cleaned up, we headed to bed. I didn’t intend to stay up and talk, but when I came out to brush my teeth, Katie was in the living room. We got to talking about one thing or another and soon it was 1 am, way past my bed time.

Beautiful Petco Park

Day 3 Tuesday, September 22nd, 2015

Our second baseball day. Today we went to see the Padres, but first, we had some errands to run.

Katie asked that I make huevos rancheros for breakfast so I got up early to make the ranchero sauce. Everyone was still asleep, so I worked on my book for a while before I finally got antsy and woke them up.

Breakfast was a smash hit. Afterwards, Katie and I headed out to do our errands. We got her glasses fixed at Normal Heights Optometry, a nice little shop where I had just bought new glasses, then went our own ways. Katie got her hair done and I had to get my new smart phone hooked up to my network.

The reason I hadn’t bought a smart phone before now was the expense. I was amazed at how easy the whole thing was. I was already on a data plan that I share with Katie and Libby, and the upgrade to a smart phone only costs me $10 a month, much better than I expected. A free phone wasn’t bad either, thank you Duane.

We met back at the apartment and got ourselves organized, did some laundry and packed. We’re leaving very early on Wednesday on our flight to Kansas City.

The clock continued to tick and soon it was time to go to the Padres game. We didn’t eat dinner before the game since it’s Taco Tuesday at the ball park. All tacos cost $1. Katie couldn’t believe that you could buy anything at a ball park for $1.

I bought a ticket for parking when I bought the baseball tickets. It turns out that the parking garage was about five miles from the stadium. I paid $10 for the ticket. Drive ups only paid $5 for parking. I did feel a little better about it when we passed a lot that was charging $30 for parking.

Petco Park is a beautiful stadium. (Have I ranted about how I hate selling the naming rights to big corporations lately?) I have a friend who thinks it is the single ugliest piece of architecture ever designed by man. He apparently doesn’t remember the Kingdome.

Be that as it may, I like the park. It uses a façade from an old warehouse on the southwest side of the stadium and the old warehouse is now filled with luxury suites. I’ll probably never get to see those.

Baseball Park or Shopping Mall?

Katie was overwhelmed by the walking areas around the outside of the stadium. “This isn’t a baseball stadium,” she said. “This is more like a mall.”

I guess she’s right. I hadn’t thought about it that way, but there are all sorts of high-end shops, bars and restaurants there. You can pay $50 or $60 dollars for a ticket, then go watch the game on TV in a fancy sports bar. What’s not to like?

Okay, Petco Park is built to modern tastes. I’ve already ranted enough about our consumerism in this blog, so let’s just say that it fits San Diego’s young, affluent population to a “T.”

The Padres played the (hated) Giants. The Padres are long out of the pennant chase, but the (hated) Giants are still fighting for a spot in the playoffs. Much to my disappointment, the (hated) Giants won. So far on our trip, the home teams are 0-2.

Did I mention Taco Tuesday? Katie went to find a beer and came back with half a dozen chicken tacos. They were actually pretty good. I can safely say they were the best tacos I’ve ever eaten at a ball park. (I must admit they were the only tacos I’d ever eaten at a ball park.) With Mexico only fifteen miles down the road, a lot of Mexican culture has seeped over to this side of the border.

We left after the eighth inning because the Padres were so far down. The Pads managed to scratch out a couple of runs, but still lost 4-2.

We headed back home to finish packing for our EARLY morning flight. To add insult to injury, American Airlines changed our flight from 7 am to 6 am.

By the time we were ready to go, it was 1 am. We climbed into bed knowing that we would only get three hours of sleep. Oh, the things we do for baseball.

Other News:

You may be aware that my website was down for two days. I'm really sorry. My bad.

I changed Internet hosts a couple of years ago. I thought that my domain registration would go to the new company.

Wrong.

When I got a notice from the old company that my domain registration was about to expire, I ignored it.

Lesson learned. They took my website and email off line. I scrambled to get it back up, but it took two days. Hence my absence on the web. But we're all back to normal now.

We're getting close. Here is the cover for my new Catrina Flaherty Mystery. I'll be contacting readers soon to ask for reviews. If you would like me to send you an Advance Review Copy (ARC) of the book in exchange for a review, please click here.

I haven't been hearing from you lately. Please drop me a line and let me know what you think of my books, website, blog or whatever's on you mind. (I usually don't comment on the presidential race, I'm too busy laughing.) You can send me an email by clicking here.

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My First Outing After Sugery

Day 6 Friday, September 25rd, 2015, St. Louis, MO

Day 7 Saturday, September 26th 2015 - Chicago

Day 8 Sunday, September 28th 2015 - Chicago

Day 9 Monday, September 29th, 2015 - Chicago

Preparing to Say Farewell, Old Friend

Enough of this foolish sentimentality, let's get on with our story

Day 5 Thursday, September 24rd, 2015, Kansas City, MO

Day 4 Wednesday, September 23rd, 2015, Kansas City, MO

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