Brit’s team suffered a heartbreaking 2-1 overtime loss in the finals to the team it beat 3-0 the day before.  

End of the day get together at Dad’s.

Congrats to my little sister who had her Confirmation today. 

Brit’s team beat a silver team one age group above them and secured a spot in the finals.

Mom and daughter.

Had dinner with our friends Pierre and Tomeko at Hudson to celebrate her landing a new print modeling job. She will be the face for a medication touted as Viagra for women. Anyone want a free sample?

Brit and her friend discovered the joys of my camera. 

Popped into the Roosevelt Hotel on Hollywood Blvd to experience some masterful mixology.  Every drink tasted like the farmer’s market.  This particular creation will be featured in Bon Appetite next month. It is a gin based, wild arugula gimlet.  Really good.

Dear Brittany,

For the last 12 years you have played your heart out on the field.  Everyone who watches you is marveled by your motor.  But there is always that moment in the game, particularly after a big run, when you need to stop yourself in order to catch your breath.  And when you did, I was right there on the sideline to tell you to suck it up and run.  Well, turns out you couldn’t suck it up because your doctor just informed us you have asthma.  My bad.  But, at least now you have a treatment.  There’s no telling what you’ll be able to do with a full set of lungs.  And if you forget I’ll be right there on the sidelines to remind you.

Love, Dad

Took a client to actor Ashton Kutcher’s Ketchup in West Hollywood.  Similar to Kutcher’s acting skills, this place was mediocre at best. The real kicker though was the employee we fired was seated right next to us.  Uncomfortable.

Netflixed Bad Lieutenant and I’m surprised to say it was a descent reboot of the original with Harvey Keitel. Nic Cage actually held his own. No actor has more great and awful performances than cage.

The “hit” show LOST is one of the reasons #73 is a goal.  I started watching the mystery show when it debuted six years ago.  I started disliking it by the end of the third season.  Even worse, I kept watching for three more seasons until Sunday’s series finale in hopes of getting answers to the hundreds of questions the show posed.  Unfortunately, the show’s writers were lost years ago and failed to answer the majority of them.  Thankfully it’s all over now.

The engagement benefit tour continues. My dad and Georgeanne treated us to a steak dinner at Mastros in Westlake. Excellent as always.

Our Client & Friend from the great state of Alabama (along with her daughter and a friend) treated us to dinner and an absurdly expensive bottle of Dom to celebrate our engagement.  If I’d had known such unexpected benefits were to come I would’ve asked Sonia to marry me years ago.

Brit finally received her High School All League certificate. Only freshman to make first team. Proud.

This is how I feel now that, The Pacific, Hanks and Spielberg’s latest WWII miniseries has come to an end.  

Nothing like 20 hours of flight to catch up on some movies.  Surprising enough I enjoyed four out of the five. Crazy Heart and Brothers were very good. The Road and Exit through the Gift Shop were above average. And Couples Retreat was average at best.

The Photo Dump.  Here is the link for a bunch of pictures from our trip you may or may not be interested in.

That damn ash cloud has shut down Heathrow Airport again. But as luck would have it, we were the last flight to LA to make it out.

#71 Done. Toured the British Museum in Bloomsbury, London. It’s the oldest museum in the world and has an incredible collection of artifacts. The Rosetta Stone and collection of Eygptian mummies was particularly impressive.

#74 Done. That blank goal was reserved for something big and secret. 

#70 will be epic.  We secured the hottest tickets in town and will join 90,000 fans at Wimbley Stadium to watch Chelsea take on Portsmouth in the premiere league’s FA Cup Football Final.  This is Europe’s Super Bowl, NBA Finals and World Series wrapped up in one.

Antique shopping on Portobello Road in Notting Hill.

#62 Done. Gucci was nixed.  At the end of the day, Sonia decided she was a Louboutin kind of girl. 

Harrods is shopping mecca. You can spend days in the place. Thankfully we were in and out.

Tower Bridge.

#13 Done. Enjoyed the gloomy charm and a pint at the Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese in London. It’s been around since just after the great fire in 1666. Oliver Goldsmith, Mark Twain, Alfred Tennyson, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Dr. Samuel Johnson are all said to have been ‘regulars’. The Cheshire Cheese Pub is famously alluded to in Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities: followingCharles Darnay’s acquittal on charges of high treason, Sydney Carton invites him to dine, “drawing his arm through his own” Sydney leads him to Fleet Street “up a covered way, into a tavern … where Charles Darnay was soon recruiting his strength with a good plain dinner and good wine”.  

Toured England’s most sacred of places, Westminster Abbey. Cameras weren’t allowed inside, but I’m not sure pictures would do the place justice. It’s truly awe inspiring. Most of England’s Kings and Queens are buried here beginning with Henry III. Saint Edward the Confessor was buried here in 1072.  In addition to all of the royalty, the tombs of Sir Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin are pretty cool.  Even cooler for me was Poet’s Corner where some of England’s greatest writers are entombed. Some of the more notable ones are Geoffrey Chaucer, Charles Dickens, Sir Henry Irving, Dr Samuel Johnson, Rudyard Kipling & Alfred Tennyson.

Had a meal at Joel Rubicon’s, L’Atelier in Soho, London. Damn good.

This is probably where Keats wrote poetry.

I recently read a quote by some dude smarter than me who said, “We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.” Moved, I decided to share this sentiment with Sonia while here in London since I like to pretend I’m a character in a Hemingway novel.  We took the Tube outside of the city to a place called Hampstead Heath.  I made Sonia hike two miles through a park to the top of a lush green hill that overlooked the entire city. Interestingly enough, we sat to rest on a bench in front of a place called Kenwood House.  Unable to ignore the signs, I bowed down on bended knee and asked Sonia to be my wife.   Now, I know what you all are thinking, “slow down, cowboy, what’s the rush, you barely know the girl.”  Perhaps, but the heart knows no time table.  Sonia agreed.

Never met a stranger named Kenwood, but there’s a street sign in every city.

At Trafalgar Square.

An early morning walk through Green Park in Mayfair.

At Buckingham Palace. Too early for the tourists. A picture perfect day.

#9 Up and Running. We cashed our first check on the manufacturing side. Hopefully it’s just the beginning.

Had lunch with my Dad today at Tom Colicchio’s, Craft in Century City. After a few Kusshi oysters, I tried the Quail with wild blueberries.  Not a huge meal, but perfect for a guy trying to balance a love affair with food and clothes that fit.  Very good meal.

#7 Done.  

Part of Sonia’s Mother’s Day Breakfast. Egg and Bacon stuffed peppers.

BBQ

Netflixed… Enjoyed.

Making a run for the playoffs.