Mandy Smile

My beautiful daughter is feeling sad today, suffering a very real sence of loss. I felt like posting this collection of Mandy photos this morning so I can see her smile.

Right now, Atlanta feels sooooo far away. Your mom loves you Mandy.

*** Coy ***

Big Brown Retires ...

Photo from ESPN

Racing fans everywhere watched last week hoping that Big Brown would win the Belmont Stakes and become the first Triple Crown winner in 30 years. Much to everyone's disappointment, he finished dead last.

Boston's, Suffolk Downs was certainly hoping for him to win --> "Suffolk Downs is offering a $5 million purse for the Massachusetts Handicap if Big Brown wins the Triple Crown and both he and Curlin go undefeated and start in the race against each other."

With a dazzling 7 wins in 8 starts, it will likely be that one loss that defines this horses career. Now that he has torn off 3 inches of flesh from his right foot in a workout at Aquaduct on Monday and the injury is expected to take months to heal, the decision to retire him has been made.

Having Big Brown taken out of the line up will take a little of the excitement out of this years final races, but by the end of the year he should be healed and will be off to begin his stud career.

Better luck with that Big Brown.

Ok so it's not a whole week, but it is 5 days. It has been soooooo long since I've had a few days off, 5 days seems like an eternity.

I didn't make any formal vacation plans but Wednesday , October 22 through Sunday, October 26 I am going to just take some time to myself and plan to spend a little time with my friend David.

That Friday and Saturday happens to be the Breeders Cup weekend. David is a big fan of Thoroughbred racing and the Breeders Cup is a horses ultimate shot at the big time, it's what everything else has lead up to throughout the year.

With 23 million dollars in total purse for the event, 5 million for the Breeders Cup Classic race alone ...it doesn't get any bigger than that.

I just realized this morning that Saturday will also be Moon Fest <-- on Clematis Street <-- a huge street party in West Palm with Live Bands, a haunted house, street performers, circus acts and adult costume contests and fashion shows.

This happens to be one of my favorite events of the year. I just called David and told him to eat his Wheaties that weekend because we will be watching the big race at the track via simulcast by day and taking part in the moon Fest street party by night, I can't wait.

Now, to figure what kind of costumes we will wear ... thinking back (photos above) on some of the ones from a face painting convention I attended a few years ago. I'll need dust off the face paints and get the old creative juices flowing.

Ahhh ... so nice to see some of my old friends and neighbors already.
*** Coy ***

Dancing in the rain at blogger

Well ... one click and all of my Rain entries were moved from AOL to Blogger. Not as sad for me as it would have been a couple of years ago, there was a time when my journal and all of my friends at AOL were really important to me. When AOL added the advertisements to journals and everyone scatttered in different directions that importance just wasn't the same.
I have not been journaling much lately (do I have to call it blogging here at blogger?) but who knows, a new location might just kick start some of the old creative juices. I tried moving to blogger when everyone else did and the task seemed much to labor involved, today it was simple, I just clicked on the link AOL provided in an e mail and here I am.
One thing did make me a little sad ... Rain has always been photo journal, without the photo there was no entry and today when I moved to Blogger I realized that the only photos that are still available on the entries I have posted over the years are the recent ones I posted when AOL made it easier to upload. Prior to that I was using Photo Site, they have closed down and I did not move my photos. I wonder if it's to late to do that now?
It looks like the features here at blogger are going to be easy to use, I'll have to come back here soon to figure out how to post photos and maybe I'll feel like journaling again.
*** Coy ***