From the last post we were all about to meet at the Lakehouse. 11 of us were accounted for and ready for a GUYS weekend.

We all unload or bags. For the record I had one duffle bag half full. Others had air mattresses, egg crates and lumbar support, two or three bags of clothes and magical electric pumps for putting air in the mattresses. It was unbelievable the amount of junk 10 other guys brought.

We all settled in and decided that it was time to start setting up the weekend activities. Item number one was to get the horseshoe pit up and running.

Did I mention that we made two stops before getting to the lake house looking for sand to make the pits with?

The pits are setup. Game one has begun. Someone has gone in and begun to marinate the pork chops that were easily one inch thick.

Everyone else decides to go swim in the lake or sit on top of the dock and mock us.

We have a late arrival show up brining us to the dirty dozen. This late arrival was able to find the lake house with no help at all, except the directions he had been provided by me. This is important

We eat some fantastic pork chops. Country Meat Market once again came through. Not to be outdone by some of the guy’s whimpiness, we did not use forks and knives but only our hands and plastic plates.

We had two pork chops left. Someone did not eat their pork chop because if he was to eat at that time he would have gone to sleep. He only ends his evening with a trip to Whataburger.

The remaining pork chop was for the 2nd place finisher of the Hofbrau Steak challenge back in '05.

Two of my friends had a competition one evening to see who could eat the most.

Brah, 6'2" 170 wet, was legendary for his ability to eat Subway sandwiches, pizzas, chipotle burritos and other large quantities of food for a meal.

Big Tex ( he has another nickname, this one I made up) is 6'5" 220 solid. I mean he doesn't look like me but he tries. He is just a large man that can eat large amounts of food. He also can be very scary. If you have bought a Volkswagen in the past year, you would know him.

These two had battled for months about who could out eat who and they have little satellite Eat Offs. This time we wanted a sanctioned event with real rules and accurate judging.

Enter the Hofbrau Steak Challenge. Hofbrau says that if you eat a 72oz steak with sides, you can leave without charge. If you don't you have to pay $50.00. Oh yeah, and it has to be done in an hour.

The stage is set. We all meet, the orders have been placed. Brah said that sometimes steak taste like air. It just doesn't affect him at all.

The timers were set and everyone was in anticipation of the whirlwind of feasting that was about to unfold. . . . .Until Brah let’s slip that 3 hours prior he had eaten like 3 lbs of BBQ. Would this change the outcome?

The steaks are brought out to the table like the money when the last two finalists in a WPT event get ready for battle. Parents are holding their kids a little closer. Older couples are asking for their checks to leave before the furry begins. Waiters are gathering like it’s a customer’s birthday.

Then the eating begins. Everyone is able to polish off the salad. Then the steaks. Slow and steady Brah takes it. His intestines are doubling in size as he chews every bite. Big Tex is chomping down steak like it’s his job and that night he wanted to clock out early (did I really just type that). BT is halfway done at the 20 minute mark. Brah has some work to do to catch up. With 17 minutes left BT puts down his fork. He said he was done and he wasn't going to push it one more bite. He had 7 bites left. Seven.

Brah had given up with 30 minutes left, or had he. No one finished the 72oz steak that night but there is still some theory about what was witnessed. BT ate majority of his steak in 40 minutes. Brah had whittled his down to a nub by the time we left the establishment.

We still wonder what would of happened had he not eaten 20lbs of BBQ before the meal. Maybe we will find out in a couple of weeks.

I would love to post photographs of this event but that would take too long.
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Oh yeah, so Brah’s calling every 5 minutes trying to get directions from places I have never heard of before. Seven points or something. I also think of the Five Points from Gangs of New York but that’s my crazy mind at work.

Eventually Brah showed up and didn’t want his pork chop. He had stopped three times to eat on the way. He is the fittest of all the guys there.

I lost at poker that night and something happened with a toaster and the remaining pork chops, but this was a Bachelor Party and what makes a bachelor party memorable. . .

That's right 13 large guys on a barge boat.

Stay tuned for the next installment of GUN BARREL CITY PART III: No one left behind.

Posted by James Mayo · July 27, 2007 10:11 PM · Comments (4)

A friend of mine is getting married in August. In order to send him off properly to a life of joy and never ending happiness, we needed to celebrate this right of passage.

The Bachelor party. So many myths. So many memories. So much fun.

This particular gentleman was always the groomsmen and never the groom. Until he finally found the "right" woman. She is fantastic and I wish them all the best. But now the hot details of the bachelor party. Yes I am breaking every guy code right now for readers.

It started about 12:00pm when I picked my friend who just recently moved to Texas from a 7 year stint in LA living the good life.

We proceeded to the BEST COUNTRY MEAT MARKET in all the land called appropriately "Country Meat Market" The service was exceptional and the cuts of meat we were able to secure made the trip memorable. I really cannot express how incredible the meat made the trip. We dined like Kings.

Here's a commercial for my Uncle Lewis' place Download file

So we then proceeded to pick up a friend from Lubbock and another from Colorado. The gentleman from CO had torn his achilles in a flag football game several months prior and was no wearing a pressurized boot. I greeted him with a hearty laugh and handshake.

This brings the total number of gentlemen to 4. We leave the airport and head to the destination that is a staple with any guy get together, Whataburger. I ordered the #4 with no tomatoes. It was delicious. We then headed out to the lake house in East Texas.

While we were driving we learned that another truck load of people (3) had already arrived at the lake house and we waiting on us. I had the only key.

We entered Gun Barrel City and proceeded to the local packaging store where we were met by another car full of attendees (4) who would be participating in the weekend getaway.

As of now we have reached a total of 11 people with 2 more expected to come.

The stage is set and we have now all arrived or had we?

Stay tuned for the next installment of GUN BARREL CITY PART II: Lessons Learned

Posted by James Mayo · July 23, 2007 9:34 PM · Comments (4)

I was rereading my last post and thought since my picture was on the leaderboard today, I couldn't feel good with myself if I did not write a different post.

We used to have this saying when I was working for the largest Marketer of Food in North America about "calling in" orders.

The other day I called collect and they did not accept the charges

Though I cannot refund you any money for the time I wasted you I can give you why I think Abilene is different than most cities.

The tourism bureau needs to sign me up.

Dogs are what make Abilene so different from the only other place I lived. It was not uncommon to see cats walking around aloof on the streets or crying in the middle in Dallas but dogs?

Dogs run free and in packs of 10. I have never seen dogs move around like raptors hunting and sniffing and making me swerve (to hit them, I kid, I kid). Half of me feels sorry for them; the other half makes me think they are all Cujo's.

So in my nice leisurely 7.5 minute drive to work, I came across a Taco Bell dog ( I didn't even want to waste the time to try and type it out. Now knowing that it would have taken less time that it took me to write this parenthetical statement), a mut and two American bull dogs.

The dog is Abilene's horse. If you can't substitute a dog for what ever the chore is then its not worth spending money on. Hunting: there is a strong hunting contingent in these parts and everyone has these "working dogs." I've met some of these trained K-9s and it is fascinating to watch. Mr. Cromeens (our editor) has four dogs that could sniff out a mole in a rain storm but wouldn't give me the time of day if I was covered in bacon. Just for the record, I have never covered myself in bacon. Nor have I ever gone looking for moles in a rain storm. You get the idea.

So why this post after the web 2.0 debacle? Junkyard Dogs!!!

I'm not even going to move it over to the side, you need to enjoy this photo.

In order to protect fenced in areas, Abilene business owners enlist the threats of junkyard dogs. No cameras, no alarms, no witnesses. If you happen to hop into one of these enclosed areas where the dogs roam, its your fault.

Its fascinating in the morning how many places I see unlock their fence and start feeding the dogs. I thought it was funny that people are choosing to have these animals protect their investment. They should do the same at Malls and local parking lots.

A little insight into my life:

My first trip to the Dallas Sportatorium was back in 1986 or 1987. Cats (the musical) was playing in Dallas. My step dad was and is a HUGE wrestling fan.

Loved the Von Erics

So with great anticipation, Ron, Chris (my stepbrother), Joe W. and myself go to the Sportatorium to watch some wrestling. Who was supposed to be there, The Junkyard Dog. So as the evening went on we are waiting for him to show up. They keep giving us updates, "he just arrived at DFW" "He's here" and then "He's not coming out" "He says he hates Dallas"

The crowd is going nuts and chanting and then he enters and fights a relatively unknown wrestler and wins. Who else was present at this match as a manager you ask? Percy Pringle! Who in the world is that?

If you are anytype of Wrestling fan or had to watch it whenever it was on then you were familiar with The Undertaker

Percy Pringle was/is his manager: Paul Bearer

So there you go.

Have a nice day.

Posted by James Mayo · July 17, 2007 2:13 PM · Comments (4)

Here is the geek coming out of me. Several of you might say that it's been pretty apparent for a long time, so why have I just noticed it.

To those I say "all your base belong to us."

Web 2.0. It’s out there. I'm part of it, and so is most of the world. Marketing people wouldn't be doing their jobs if there wasn't a clever name to describe it - (like Gen-Xers, or my favorite, "baby boomers.")

The following is my opinion, so that will normally mean that I have no factual information to back this but experience and a mind that "thinks outside of the box" - another one of my favorite terms created and then overused. If you don't think outside of the box, you are unemployed in my segment (marketing - not the newspaper).

Web 2.0 was basically created in 2001, or that's when I first came into contact with it. When Microsoft switched everything in the WebDev to xml, that was beginning. Now we have these RSS feeds and nifty ways to handle code and cut and paste this and that.

Unfortunately, I see this new craze of code handling and more people having access to modify it as a bad thing. They say there are only two absolutes in life - death and taxes. I think it’s a false statement. I think there is a third that went with software design and web applications: don't let anything be touched by human hands. If you do, then there will be a mistake. The more automated, the safer. Build a nice template, but don't let them touch the source.

The computers of old had the problem of people having to enter in boot disks and run little programs to get the system to even think about running WordPerfect. It was a chore to get anything done, and it took too long to do anything on the computer. Windows was easy because you could click on an icon and it would do all the work of loading the program and then running it. Now we don't even think like that. Now it's fuel injected computers with RAMs the size of hard drives and hard drives the size of data centers and software programs as robust as something that is robust.

WHAT IS THE POINT OF THIS POST???

I just laugh at it all. As far as technology goes for right now and years back, I have been right on. I'm not Steve Jobs or some crazed technology buff who can predict the future, but I can see how new discoveries will apply to the future technologies and one of those was .xml.

BEWARE WEB 2.0

To be honest (my wife's favorite phrase that I use), I made most of that up on the fly just to humor myself.

Good Night, Dear Diary

Posted by James Mayo · July 16, 2007 10:12 PM · Comments (1)

Its July 4. In the big city there were about 8 different places to go see fireworks. In Abilene there's 1. Its great to get the whole city out together and celebrate this wonderful day. Ok, that sounded sappy. But it is neat to know that there were 10,000 people at Nelson Park watching fireworks. The old Wal-mart building finally had people in its parking lot and the police officers on bikes made everyone feel safe.

I myself may have parked illegally but we'll never know.

This July 4th was unforgettable. Why, you ask yourself at home, at work, in the hospital? Is it because I drove by the Beehive four times this week and figured out they were closed for vacation? Or because I played Four Square and broke a sweat?

I think we might not have played by the rules, according to the East Lansing Four Square League Typically I will not put links on this blog that will take you away from Reporternews.com but it's worth a read. Seriously, a four square league?

Or is this July 4th important because I received 1776 mosquito bites while watching/legally shooting fireworks? Nope. This July 4th brought up feelings I experienced one time in my life. I think we all know what I am talking about - September . . . . 8th, 1998.

COMPLETELY SIDE TRACKED:
On my quest to find an article about what happened on September 8, 1998 in the Reporter News archive, I came across this article: McGwire vs. Johnson: power vs. power The reason I found it interesting is because McGwire was 6 for 24 against Johnson but hit his second longest home run of his career off Johnson (530+ feet) in June 1997.

Ok, so I guess you may have figured out that I am a huge McGwire fan. And he hit his 62nd home run on the above date while I was supposed to be in Bill Bryant's Sales class (sorry parents). He gave us a break and I got back in enough time to watch him hit it in the 3rd inning.

So, moving forward, the reason all these emotions were brought up again was because of the Nathan's Annual Hot Dog Eating Contest. There was so much drama going into this event. Kobayashi fell. Does anyone else think of the Usual Suspects whenever you hear his name?

Man, I am picture heavy today.

60+ something hot dogs. The winner ate like 67. It was incredible to watch. For 12 minutes I was glued to the screen. I kept saying, we are watching history, we're watching history. My wife said, "In hot dog eating?" My daughter was bored after 4 hot dogs. I couldn't take my eyes off the screen except when the camera panned to the girls holding up the scorecards in the back. The humor I found in that was that they were about 2 behind what the official score was.

Yeah, we brought the hot dog eating mustard belt back to the United States, whew. Now if we can only get cold fusion to work, all will be saved.

I think in my next post I will talk of the Eating Contest I once witnessed between two friends and two 72oz steaks.

For now you have this: Click here

Posted by James Mayo · July 6, 2007 3:18 PM · Comments (5)

Completely have no idea what that book was about but I remember the bitter rivalry I set up between Beverly Clearly and Judy Blume. Who was I going to read? Mitch and Amy or Super Fudge? "Are There God its Me, Margaret?" or "Ramona Forever."

Random, but I was thinking about that this weekend, why did I read and especially those books.
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I have held off long enough on the sports talk because this is eating at me, Stephen A. Smith ...

He wins. I can't believe it but he wins. I can't stand to watch this guy and will turn off 95% of anything he is on but here I am talking about him. HOWEVA

I discount just about ... no, I discount EVERYTHING he says. Why? Because he is not a legit reporter in my eyes (even though I see that he may have some experience). I have no factual basing for that, but its my opinion.
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The rain fall created by "Evan Almighty's" marketing team is brilliant. Who would have thought that a movie about Noah's Ark would generate this much rain.

Yep, I really tried to tie those two together.
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Still cruising the streets in my Buick. It may as well be a boat in this weather. I also purchased some fireworks for this Wednesday's activities from our friends at Alamo Fireworks. You can see me this Wednesday at Nelson Park. I will be the one with the blanket and a football.
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No pictures, just text in this post.

Todays link is ...

Posted by James Mayo · July 2, 2007 10:04 PM · Comments (1)