PaGA 2017: Day 39 Kenji's Golf Safari Day 1

For the first two days of Kenji's Golf Safari, we are golfing at the two best golf courses in this region:  today, Rancho Solano and tomorrow Paradise Valley.  I unveiled my new golf set:

Callaway clubs with an Odyssey putter.  Kenji drove:

Dave, Gerry and Kenji, looking at the Sun.  My first swing with my new Fusion driver:

It took some time to get used to my clubs, so I did poorly in the front nine.  Again purple flowers:

Kenji offering some red wine, Merlot, to resident geese:

I golfed well on the back nine, and won low handicap. I love my new clubs.  It would be too gauche to indicate who finished last, but his first name was Kenji.

We had pre-dinner drinks at the Hampton pool:

Dave went to sleep.  That window in the background is his room.  We then went to Fuso, an Italian restaurant, where we all ordered rib eye and Caesar salad with beer.  I forgot to take a photo at the beginning so, here is the ending, with my take home sandwich, because we tee off at 11AM at the Paradise Valley Golf Course tomorrow and will miss lunch.

Coming to Fuso in June is Neil Diamond...or at least as performed by Bob Green:

Tomorrow, perhaps gin martinis with blue cheese stuffed olives.

Tropical Cyclone Donna just attained hurricane strength, will attain at lease Category 3 status and threaten Vanuatu:

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PaGA: Day 38 Vacaville

Ugggghhhhhhh, but it was 5AM when Kenji's / Gerry's plane arrived at SFO.  They rented a Toyota Sequoia and picked Dave and me up to first have breakfast at IHOP.   The drive took a little more than hour to Vacaville (66 miles).

Why Vacaville, you ask?  They have a lot of purple flowers and is just the place for the best Cinco de Mayo Festival in the world, which is this Friday.

Vacaville, and I'm reading their travel brochure, is where you come for a stressless vacation:  view the otters at Lagoon Valley, picnic at any of their 30 beautiful parks, visit Nut Tree Plaza and stay in hotels that average $100/night, as versus San Francisco ($450) and Napa Valley ($320).  Close by is Travis Air Force Base (where we golf at least once every time we come here), the Jelly Belly Factory, Budweiser Bottling Company and Six Flags Marine World.  Sacramento is 33 miles north and the village of Napa is 25 miles west, so wine country is around us.

We stopped by Walmart to purchase some Nitro golf balls and an assortment of drinkables and eatables.  We tried to check into the Hampton Inn and Suites, but there was only one room available, so Kenji went to sleep while the three others went to Starbucks for coffee, then to lunch in town.

Then later in the afternoon we had drinks at the Hampton Inn pool. From the left, Dave from Florida and Gerry, Kenji and I from Hawaii.  Kenji has had his golf safari for two decades or so.

We then went to Umi Sushi for dinner:

I had Ikura Oroshi (salmon eggs over turnips), salmon kama (collar of salmon), hot sake and cold beer:

Kind of a boring day, but a restful beginning.  Tomorrow, golf at Rancho Solano with my brand new golf set.

Tropical Cyclone Donna is not quite at hurricane strength yet, but could attain Category 3 status and strike Vanuatu:

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PaGA 2017: Day 37 Palo Alto to San Francisco

My final dinner in Palo Alto was a Kirk's hamburger.  There were no MacDonald's in my undergraduate days, and Kirk's was all there was.  One of the attractions was that you could create your own add-ons.  Still an attraction:

You can put together a whole salad:

The next morning, Caltrain to Millbrae:

Then BART to San Bruno, where I walked to Golf Mart (which is linked to Roger Dunn's):

That golf bag holds my new Callaway clubs.  I'll unveil them when I first golf in two days.  I paid around three times more than expected, but, the total cost was only around ten days of travel.

Caught a taxi to the Four Points Sheraton:

Just as I walked into my room I got a call from David Block, who just came in from Florida to join us for golf.  We decided to catch BART into San Francisco for lunch:

Tadich has been a tradition for me since my Stanford days.  We both had their cod:

Dave directed the Florida Solar Energy Center for more than a third of a century, passed on that responsibility about a decade ago, and has pretty much finally decided to retire in August.  One more year and he would have served 50 years for Central Florida University, now the second largest campus in the USA.  When we first met, the University of Hawaii was twice the size of CFU.  Today, CFU has three times more students than the UH.

We walked around San Francisco to the Ferry Building:

Bought some truffle oil at this mushroom shop.  Outside, my Blue Bar Pigeon welcomed us to San Francisco Bay:

Tomorrow we get picked up by Kenji Sumida for five straight days of golf in the Napa area.

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PaGA 2017: Day 36 Donald Trump versus Patrick Takahashi

Today I purchase a whole new set of golf equipment, from shoes to clubs.  But as only a very few out there would be even remotely interested, I thought I'd again match myself  against another luminary.  Today, President Donald Trump.

Two years ago I compared myself with Elon Musk.  I still think he is wasting his money in outer space and will have fatal problems with Tesla and lithium batteries.  I do admire his vision with Neuralink, a company which someday will serve as the interface between your brain and computer storage of your memory.  He intends to plant a device, but I think the more promising path will need to be non-invasive.  This breakthrough is absolutely necessary for eternal life, a chapter in my SIMPLE SOLUTIONS for Humanity.

On this Day 102 of Donald Trump's reign as PUS (President of the United States) #45, it seems timely to analyze how two Americans who pretty much grew up in the same era can be so different.  Let me start with wealth.  He refuses to provide any details, but Forbes, Bloomberg and other financial organizations speculated a range from $2 billion to $5 billion, not the more than $10 billion his supporters boast.  Me?  I'm back to a hand to mouth existence.  I pretty much gave everything away when I moved into 15 Craigside, for they have promised to take care of me even if I run out of money.  However, to qualify as a resident, you need to pretty much cover yourself with sufficient income forever, so I have a few dollars available to allow me to annually travel around the world.  I now and then wonder why I donated my apartment to the University of Hawaii to create a Blue Revolution program.

Marital status?  I've been married once, but Pearl passed away eight years ago.  Donald Trump has been married more times than any other president.  Ronald Reagan was our only divorced (once) president, so Donald Trump has twice the divorce rate of the only other PUS.  These are his three wives.  

That link above, incidentally, indicated he: 

• is a troublemaker
• owned the defunct Jersey Generals, a pro football team
• lives in the former home, Mar-a-lago, of Marjorie Merriweather Post
• while in college enjoyed reading federal foreclosures
• does not drink alcohol
• has one of the 2600 stars in the Hollywood Walk of Fame
• won an acting award...not an Oscar, but a Razzie for Worst Supporting Actor for his cameo in the 1989 film, Ghosts Can't Do It--click on it, watch his performance

Me?  I've never acted.

Apparently, Donald Trump has authored 17 books.  I did not know that.  However, a couple of his co-authors (or ghosters) are his worst enemies today.  I've only been involved with five books, the first two with co-authors and the final three dealing with SIMPLE SOLUTIONS.  I remain close friends with my co-authors.  

As far as I know, Donald Trump has not posted one article in The Huffington Post.  I've written more than a hundred articles.  One of my books, Simple Solution Essays, is a compilation of some of them.  However, he tweets, and I don't.  My Facebook adventure are minimal.  His The Art of the Deal sold a million copies.  I've probably given away more books than got sold.

We have other differences.  He:

• Never laughs.  I do, all the time.  Is he laughing here?
• Not only does he not imbibe alcohol, he has never smoked a cigarette.  I now and then have a cigar or smoke a pipe.  Almost every night is a party at 15 Craigside so I do drink too much.
• A germophobe in the extreme.  He generally won't shake hands, especially with dangerous people like his children's teachers because they touch too many germy kids.  He doesn't touch elevator buttons.  Has never changed a diaper.  But neither have I.
• Doesn't have any pets.  I've had dogs.  He is the first president in 150 years not to have a pet.
• Has bizarre ideas about science, sleep and exercise.  He thinks sleep shows weakness.  I pontificate about the importance of sleep.
• Always wears a suit.  I never do...now.

According to the National Review:

• Trump unblushingly parades his viciousness.  That's not me.
• He is not emotionally healthy.  I hope I am.
• He has a narcissistic personality disorder.  I don't think that's a problem with me.
• He doesn't have the character to be President.  I'll never be president, though, and he is.

We have opposite views on just about everything important:

• He thinks global climate change is a hoax.  I happen to think this man-made phenomenon is important enough to begin to at least develop remediation concepts.
• He wants to build a wall separating us from Mexico.  That is not the solution, which in itself will be expensive.

• He wants it difficult for Muslims to enter the USA.  Sure you have to be careful, as Japan has been, and you need a workable verification system for anyone entering our country.
• He hates Obamacare.  While I'm not in love with it, we are a country that should help the less able.

• He will aggravate racial relations.  Obama tried, but Trump will provoke.
• Equality will suffer in his presidency.  And we were heading in the right direction.

• If you add up #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, and maybe even #8, that total sum is less than what the U.S. spends on war.  We are the only supreme power left.  We are building up to a dozen naval task forces.  Germany?  Zero.  UK?  Zero.  Russia?  Zero.  China?  One, an abandoned Ukrainian carrier which China refurbished.  Trump?  He wants to increase the defense budget.
• He loves guns.  I think the Second Amendment is obsolete and should be abandoned.

We do share a few things in common:

• While he has been careful to say the right things about religion, he is known not to believe in Heaven and Hell.  Same for me.

• He thinks that the USA is getting shafted by our friends and enemies on trade agreements.  He is right.  As a have nation we have tended to be too kind.  Changes will occur, and it will be justified, with agony.
• We golf.  I think he has a 3 handicap.  Multiply that by six for me.
• He has great hair.  Well, mine is marginal, but still mostly there.

I'm not quite finished with this posting, and will probably add a few more items.  But if not, you get the point that Donald Trump and I are totally different human beings.

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