On Sunday I attended the 4th Annual Rotor Fest with the Central Florida Rotary Crew. Wow! What a turn out! Dozens of rotary powered cars of all years, makes and models! For those who don’t know, the Orlando rotary scene is predominantly Puerto Rican. So I’m generally one of the few white dudes in attendance and certainly the tallest person! The Central Florida Rotary Family is such a great group of people and I always feel very honored when I have the opportunity to spend a day with them!

After a few hours of poking through car parts, I headed to Orlando. My friend Tracy had some things going on over the weekend so the only day I thought we were going to be able to hang out was Thursday. We had a great time hanging out and laughing. Tracy’s Mom showed up for the weekend to spend time with Tracy and we all went out to Tijuana Flats…which is kind of like the Mexican Mellow Mushroom.

On Friday I headed out to lunch with Rush at the Mellow Mushroom and we caught up on life and business and such. That evening I went out in Baldwin Park…the nice area with Tracy lives for dinner. I sat outside and looked over the lake and just…relaxed. I really love the area she lived in and I’d love to be there. I think it would be great to relax and work on the porch or look over the lake and have things to do.

Saturday morning I woke up and headed to a big RX7 parts meet in Orlando. I met a lot of great people and sold a few parts. It was a loooooooong day! I went back to Tracy’s house and crashed for about 30 minutes. I woke up to fresh Chicken and Dumplings cooked by Tracy’s Mom and decided I was awake enough to head back to Gainesville…so I did.

Each time I go to Orlando I really have a great time. More and more I feel like I need to live someplace different and leave Gainesville. I’m just tired of being here after 14 years. I guess we will see what opportunities come around in 2011 and where they take me.

The trip itself was only about 24 hours and since I had just broken another window regulator in the convertible I rented a Jeep Patriot for the trip. It still feels weird to be in a vehicle that high.

Thursday evening was a business dinner hammering out the details of a couple of projects. Friday morning was breakfast with Steve and Friday afternoon was lunch with Rush and Todd. I think I may go there for a few days in June while Lindsay is off on her trip so I can do some more catching up.

The end result? Watch my Slip n’ Slide Skillz!

The ceremony took place at a church in Winter Garden, FL and while a relatively short ceremony, the presiding minister did a wonderful job of interjecting a little humor into the proceedings and starting the day off right.

As the wedding party took photos, the guests headed over the a beautiful area known as the Leu Gardens for a cocktail hour which was followed by dinner. The reception was well thought out and then the “Duh” moment when I remembered that Judy, Rush’s new wife, did event planning for a living and had handled it all.

Following the reception, I stayed with my friend Tracey and had a very amusing conversation about the guy she is dating thinking I was going to kick his ass. Now neither Tracey or I understand where this is coming from but the guy is from a different culture so to speak. When Tracey asked him why I would kick his ass, he just replied, “Because Kevin is a large guy.”

Now we are both perplexed how me being a large guy has anything to do with me wanting to kick his ass for no reason but…um…whatever. Between this and the bear comments of a few weeks ago I am further considering the elimination of everyone under a certain height. =)

I have a lot of positive opportunities that are popping up in my life right now and I feel I need a change to help me clear my head and make the right decision. Should be a good time.

On the way home, Orlando continued its tradition of owning me. Between Dawn, Rush, and Tracy I have developed a decent understanding of the roads in Orlando. For the life on me, when I leave, I can never get back on the Turnpike correctly for some reason. Sure enough…I left at 5AM from Tracy’s but it was actually 5:45AM before I managed to get on the Turnpike. My secret? When I hit the Mall of Millenia I *know* I’m going the wrong direction!

The Memorial Day Weekend has been nice as I’ve managed to finish some work, lay out by the pool with Cris a couple of times, watch UFC 82, and train Megan. So busy, busy, busy!

Once Dr. Smith arrived, we exchanged some small talk and decided to break my Tijuana Flats virginity since I was hungry and off we went. Tijuana Flats was fairly decent although there was a rather eclectic mix of music being played…Humpty Dance and REM come to mind high on the WTF? meter.

The cool thing about Tijuana Flats is it has a fairly decent select of hot sauce…all of which you can disperse to yourself in dainty, cups of death. I swear the containers are the size of a thimble and someone as big as myself looks like a complete retard prancing around with one in each hand. Dr. Smith related her continued status as "Target of Opportunity" as I have yet to meet someone who is such a magnet for weirdos and harassment as she is.

After returning to Dr. Smith’s house, I finally setup my voice mail (yay) and finalized plans for my next Orlando visit. I’ll be house sitting Tracey’s cats and home for about a week from May 17th – 23rd or so. Yes Rush you fgt, I’ll come hang out with you.

I’m exhausted…time for bed!

I had a restless night of “sleep” and didn’t go to bed until about 5AM. I woke up at 9AM, washed the convertible, and met up with Tory to go the Tampa Racing Mazda BBQ. I was a bit disappointed by the turnout as I expected around 30 – 50 cars and I think there may have been 15 and only about a 1/2 dozen 7′s. We get more than that at the meets I setup in Gainesville. Still a good time.

After the meet I drove to Orlando to hang out with Dr. Smith who I hadn’t seen in 2 years. Between Tracy and Rush, I’ve now got a great reason to keep visiting O-town (even though I agree with my sister that it is kind of ghetto, but less snobby than Tampa) plus Ikea!

Tracy and I went out for Sushi and caught up and enjoyed or usual mutual humor. Highlights included me confusing a story of frozen iguanas falling from trees with a story about some of Tracy’s Hispanic clients and ending up with Mexican lizards. Later on Tracy referred to “The Holy Land Experience”, a religious attraction in Orlando, as “The Ned Flanders Family Park” which was a good Simpson’s reference. After dinner we met up with one of Tracy’s friends who was annoying but that really didn’t damper my fun. We went to an Irish Pub at Pleasure Island and hung out for a couple of hours listening to music.

Sunday (wow today) I woke up, had breakfast with Dawn, and went to Ikea to buy a bed. God Ikea is great for people like me who are poor but like nice looking furniture. While leaving Ikea, my sister Karen called and said she was in Orlando and had my Christmas present with her…which was an Ikea gift card…thanks ass…a month too late.

Utilizing creative packing, I managed to fit all of the bed components into the convertible with top down. One small problem…the forecast was rain. On the Turnpike between Orlando and Ocala it started to rain. I pulled into a gas station for gas and a Good Samaritan offered me some plastic to cover the bed frame parts.

Surprising note about the ‘vert. Almost no rain got into the car with the top down, even when pouring. The only reason my head got wet was, well because it sticks up above the windshield a bit! God I need to get a roll bar. So…I got a little extra bathing action plus countless bemused looks from other drivers on my way home. Once home it took about an hour to assemble the bed upon which I am currently residing comfortably as I type this. I’m hopefully going to Tampa in 2 weeks for Kim’s birthday and Gasparilla!

A very nice weekend!