June 7th, 2001

Fresno, California

Gorgeous sunny day today. It's going to be pretty hot too... in the 90s Sandy was telling me. Started out the morning in the usual way... stumbled around until I was awake for the most part. Visited with Ed a few minutes before he left, then visited with Sandy for a while. Did some work on this webpage too, as well. Took a little swim, showered.

I'd like to take a moment and just say how completely shocked I am at how... easy it was to connect to everyone out here. It's interesting... Sandy and Ed have their morning rituals but they just sort of accomodated me into them like it was no big deal. In fact, after only a day out here this place already feels like home to me. I mean... 14 years since I've seen some of them and it's like a beat hasn't passed. I guess it goes to show that if people really want you around they'll find ways of bringing you in and doing it so you don't feel like you're putting them out. Over and over again I'm just amazed at how friendly they all are.

For instance... Tina's husband, Dan. He's letting me borrow his Jeep Grand Cherokee to drive around town today. I about shat when he said I could. I was like "Oh my. I'll try my damndest not to wreck it." To which Tina said, "You better not, it's paid for."

Just popped out front for a minute and ran into the neighbors. They're nice too! They were like "Are you Dan?"
"No, I'm Peter, Sandy and Ed's nephew."
"Who's your dad?"
"Dave... he's been out here a few times in the past year. You might've met him."
"Oh yes. They're all wonderful people. Can't find any better."

I grab Sandy's cell phone and directions to her work, look over the Jeep again and get inside. I'm still shocked that this guy who I hadn't seen since I was a little shit was letting my cruise around a city I'm in no way familiar with in his Cherokee-Tank. When I was out here last his friends would tell me to go to the deep end of the pool and see how long I could hold my breath for. When I'd come up they'd tell me, "That wasn't long enough, do it again!"
I like to think they were just kidding. ;)

Well, I'm heading over to Sandy and Ed's work to harass them a while. Taking the camera too...

Out and about in Fresno...

Well, here I am driving around Fresno, on my way over to Sandy and Ed's workplace. I'm still in a mild state of shock over Dan letting me borrow this truck... it's a veritable tank compared to my little Honda Civic back home. Thankfully, I rented that monster pickup truck a couple weeks ago to move my stuff with, so this doesn't seem so alien.

Again, driving through Fresno I'm reminded of Jacksonville in a lot of ways. Fairly heavy traffic, large roads, palm trees, mini-malls scattered around. The traffic was easy enough to get used to... it's better off not letting it freak you out or else you'll make mistakes and make someone a road pizza.

So I get to Dawn Corporation. This would be Sandy and Ed's interior decoration store. I missed it on the first go around and had to loop back to find it again. It's sorta hidden off the road a smidge.

Ed takes me to the back and gives me a quick tour of their warehouse and production area. They do wholesale interior design supplies... drapes and the like. They do a pretty brisk business too, it looks like.

Afterwards Sandy shows me around their front office area and introduces me to their two office manager ladies. Shortly thereafter Ed takes me out to Lunch.

He takes me to this place called Maria Calendar's. It's a pretty neat chain resteraunt that serves a sort of AppleBee-ish sort of menu. I get a Roast Turkey Lunch and Ed gets Roast Beef. We talk a while about his business and how he's got things running. Then he smiles and tells me that now he can write this off as a business lunch because we talked about business. He also tells me about this person he knows from his cabin who owns like 100 different Subway franchises in California. He tells me about how when this person and their friends would go out to eat this owner would all have them say "Subway" on the count of three... and then they'd write their meal off as a business expense.
Ed's such a trip. He has the craziest most laid back sense of humour. He'll come up with some of the funniest off the wall stuff just out of the blue. It's great.

After lunch we head back to the office, and from there I wander around Fresno a little bit. Eventually I can feel the turkey kicking in and decide it's time for a nap. So I head home, nap a bit, then go for another swim.

As I'm finishing up Ed gets home... and soon after Sandy does as well. She's picked up Gen and from here we're heading over to Kate's preschool for her graduation. Dan and Tina and all their kids, Gen, Sandy and Ed and I are all there to watch.

It was cute to watch, each class did a little song number where they sung about stuff they'd learned in school. Afterward there was cake and punch.

Dan, Tina and their kids stayed for that. Sandy, Ed, Gen and I went out to eat at this place called Mimi's Cafe, which is a sort of New Orleans styled eatery. They had some kickass VooDoo Beer there, and a really awesome corn chowder.

After eating we took Gen back to her home and walked around her neighborhood a bit with her. Then we headed home. Ed turned in shortly after we got back and I stayed up pretty late talking to Sandy about all sorts of things. It was nice...

Sandy told me that one of her office lady's sons is thinking about going white water rafting next Tuesday. He's going to try to bring a bunch of girls along with. Sandy's thrilled. I think she's conspiring to keep me out here. ;)

Friday early afternoon we're heading out to the mountains. I can hardly wait...