2 words: whiffle ball

so let me tell you about a little thing i like to refer as "going back to my glory days." as many of you may know, i was once a talented young baseball player. i started playing baseball at the wee age of 4 and was immediately hooked. from t-ball to pony leagues, i lived for the game. i was considered a top draft pick during try-outs, proved my worth during the season and usually ended as a key element and clutch performer to my team. with a career high batting average of .720 and having pitched several no-hitters and one nearly perfect game (i beaned a friend), its safe to say that they truly were glory days.

my baseball ended though as i discovered skateboarding. at times i reflect and wonder "what could have been" if i had stuck with the sport that my father taught me. would i be playing for the cougs right now? who would my friends be? would i have ever picked up my true passion today: surfing? so many questions so little time. where would i be?

the answer doesn't matter. WHY? because the glory days are back. thats right. this past friday was introduced to america's past time once again. In a very Sandlot-esque way. Melzer invited me out to play a game with some of his cronies. i use cronies with the utmost respect. Joel Baer, Nate Barnes, Sean Heatherington, Jake Smart to name a few...allowed me to step on that hallowed ground known as a baseball diamond. and boy was it sweet. i started off a little slow. mainly just enjoyed the wisecracks of the people there. than i got into it, and started to come alive.

i don't wanna toot my own horn or anything....ok, maybe just a little. the kids started calling me "automatic" and i was the new force to reckon with. i was put into 3rd base on defense-my old stomping grounds- and loved every second of it. the "hot corner" was in full effect. i reached base on every attempt, and was a homerun short of hitting for the cycle. i help my team come back from a 14-6 deficit and win. (Joel hit for the cycle on saturday. it was awesome.) but the whiffle ball game definitely rekindled an old flame for me. Who knew whiffle ball could be so amazing?

i'll be home for easter

me and the mrs. came home for this past weekend and thoroughly enjoyed our stay. it defintely was fun to stay home at both our parents' houses and see the fams. I woke up early on thursday morning and enjoyed the first surf sesh in about 6 months. i think the last time i surfed was in November! the surf was really good, pretty glassy, firing lefts and waist to head high sets. because it was pretty good, the joint was packed (i went to Beacons)which made for some interesting situations. one of my favorites was old man withers trying to fight a dude for "snaking" his wave. its really annoying when you have to battle for waves, especially with old locals who think they are local gods, with the right to every good wave. the greatest thing about the surf sessions was listening to my ipod in the water!
it was really good to go home, even if it was a quick trip. It was kind of a teaser, because we knew that we would be comin back in just a couple weeks for good. the best part about goin home was kickin it with the fam. We got to spend a lot of quality time with both families- even if some members were missing-John and Jeff in Moab destroying rental jeeps, Jose in NYC and Miq and the gang with the Provosts. The count down has officially begun though- i think it began lke 3 months ago actually- but time is really coming to an end in p-town. april is half over and we move down to SD on the 28! loco, ese loco.

quarter of a century?

so i realize that it has been quite some time since i have updated anyone on the infamous blog. my apologies. i am sure there are fans out there waiting to hear something new in the wonderful world of mr. lokestrokestroke. the biggest news- I turned 25 last tuesday. yup, the big 2-5. its kinda weird to think that i am now 25, but i am enjoyin it. the big day was pretty sweet, i must admit. if there was one thing missing that day it would have to be a sweet cake by Duff from Ace of Cakes.

etrain's cake was more than enough for me and my closest friends. I was spoiled week by Mama lokestroke. my mom came out ib ny b-day and spen the rest of the week taking care of me and erika. she's the best. the day itself was pretty low key. i was actually suffering from some sort of head cold, so i spent most of the day sleeping. NICE!! when i was awake, i enjoyed the compay of my beautiful wife, my closest friends, and my great mother. I guess you can say that i got really spoiled this year, and got hooked up presents-wise. thank you all, those of you who gave me monetary gifts and those who gave me your time and company. i feel your love. one of the sweetest things that i scored was a water-proof housing for my ipod so i can surf with some tunes. aww yeah. can't wait to try it out. also my new system for the tacoma with the ipod adapter-it rocks my world. new clothes and gift certificates, a sweet watch...man, i am one lucky lil' mexican. here is a few thangs that i am lovin these days:


now all these things are dope as all get out, but more important are the people who gave them to me. i consider myself extremely lucky, and i am grateful for an amazing in every way wife, a wonderful family, amazing in-laws, and the best friends anyone could imagine.

what has changed since i have turned 25? not much really. i certainly don't feel any older or any more mature. especially now that i picked up Guitar Hero II with the cash grandma sent. thanks grandma!!

serioulsy though, i think 25 will be a good year. graduating from BYU, moving back to San Diego, starting grad school at NSAD to work on a masters in architecture, working side by side with papa lokestroke at Aquatic Design Group.... its gunna be a hard one to beat.

frank ghery eat your heart out

ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,
mr loke stroke has an announcement. many of my fans may have known of my plans to attend graduate school and earn a master in architecture. well, the god's are smiling down upon yours truly because i just received my letter of acceptance from the New School of Architecture congratulating me for my fall admittance. wha, wah?!! the plan is coming together nicely, very nicely. this means that i have all summer to work my butt off, learn the ropes at ADG and pretty much dominate at life. thanks to you all for your help, because i definitely didn't do this alone. much love.
da stroke

NYC Day 2

Our first official day in the Big Apple started off with the long trek into Manhattan from Queens via taxi-after that first night experience, the last thing we wanted to see was a subway. We got dropped off right across from Radio City Music Hall where we stopped into a deli and got some grub. Ryan and Joselyn had tickets to see the Rockettes and we were killing time before their show.

after splitting up we went over to the discount ticket booths to pick out a play for us to see. so many options, so little time. our first choice was Wicked, but you have to get those tickets years in advance so we just asked the thespian at the box office for recommendations. we ended up goin with an off-broadway gig called Altar Boyz...smart move, very smart. the show was hillarious, gut-bustingly funny. we laughed out loud, almost to the point of tears. if you haven't heard of it, its about a mismatched christian boy band who sing to save souls. Matthew, Mark, Luke, Juan, and Abraham...funny dudes.if you ever get a chance, its worth your time.

after the show we headed on up to 5th ave to meet up with Jose and Yeen. on our way we stopped by Rockefeller Center, took a quick little ganter at the "infamous tree"-(which i wasn't blown away by) and the tiny ice skating rink. there was mad amounts of people there, we could barely move. after the tree we went into Erika's personal paradise and heavenly escape-none other than Anthropologie.it was stimulation overload for the lil blondie, and i had to take the reins and pick out all her clothes. i acted as a personal shopper for her, giving the axe to certain items, and pointing out others. she got her fill, well enough for the time we had. we also stepped into H&M for a minute and shopped some more. do you think she's excited?

we ended our quick spree and headed to Macy's to finally see the Gundi's. that is where i will take a break and continue the rest of the day. this entry is allready way too long.

stay tuned kids....

day one of the NYC experience

So the time has finally come to break down the big trip. Much apologies, it has been quite some time since it happened.
DAY 1-
we left P-town bright and early- around 7:00 for a 10 o'clock flight-i have my father's disease of goin to the airport way too early. It was a direct flight with some sweet little tv's which made the time go by much faster. We arrived in New York at JFK in the early evening and met up with Ryan and Joselyn at the bag claim. After a while of trying to figure out where to go for the Airtrain and what stop to get off, we finally found our bus that took us to our hotel. Me and Erika had no idea where the hotel was located because Ryan had planned out our stay, all we knew was that Ryan had picked it out and it was "super convenient." To our surprise, this "convenience" as it were, was in the middle of the ghetto of beautiful Queens, right across form the airport.

We decided to go into the city, because the night was young. we didn't know where the subway was, so we had to hop on the local bus. Thats when things got a little interesting. Allow me to paint you a picture: We get on the bus and go through ghetto Queens, travelling around Rockaway Blvd- the neighborhood that 50 cent comes from on a friday night. We were the only white one's on the bus, and when i say white, we are talking WHITE. Me and Ryan passed for locals- Ryan looked like Joey from Friends, and I can pull of the mexican, latin american pretty well. However, the women were a different story. Here are Erika and Joselyn, both white, blonde and stickin out like sore thumbs. Both wearing white designer jackets with fur, designer jeans, designer purses...plus both them with eyes the size of saucers as the neighborhood locals hopped on the bus.

We finally got to the subway station, and bought what we thought at the time were useful subway/bus cards. It took us nearly 2 hours to get from our Holiday Inn in Queens to Manhattan. We headed into the city and cruised around SOHO a little. Surprisingly Erika handled her fear of homeless people remarkably and we cruised the busy streets. After wandering for a whilewWe ended up in Little Italy starving. Meandering down Mulberry St. we settled at Caffe Palermo aka the "Cannoli King of New York. It was pretty amazing, good paninis and even better desserts.




After eating tiramisu, bread pudding and some sort of mocha concauction that blew my mind we decided to venture around some more up in SOHO and then decided to head back to our "convenient" hotel. The funny thing though, was that we were realtively new to the whole subyway thang. All we thought was the different color lines took you to the places we needed. However we failed to understand that there are different trains within the different colored tracks to take you to the various parts of NYC. Unfortunately we learned that the hard way. and I do mean hard. We ended up taking the wrong, very wrong subway into the heart of Queens, just in time for the last train of the evening left. We were stranded, once again in the ghetto, with no more trains to catch. After watching the locals shoot up and deal different drugs in dark street corners, the girls kind of lost their cool. Upon being extremely terrified of the hood, Joselyn had to pee and was becoming more and more uncomfortable by the second.

After one attempt of catching a cab gone awry, I rolled up to a pizza joint to ask for directions about getting a cab. The pizza dude was real coi aobut showing us the way to "the best cab co." in New York,which ended up to be down a dark alley, with broken down cars on the sides of the streets, under the subway overpass. We ended up getting a cab, and luckily made it back to our hotel safely. Our cab driver lightened our mood a bit as he could tell that we were not from Queens or NY at all. For some reason he kept complimenting Ryan on his ability to score three beautiful women on vacation. The old italian who was obssessed with Buffy the Vampire Slayer and tv in general kept us entertained for sure during the trek around Queens to the sweet Holiday Inn. To this day, we don't know how the driver got so confused- for one, how he confused me for a hot lady- I guess his standards are real low, or he is into his women having some serious 5 o'clock shadow. And 2nd, how Ryan could possibly be percieved as that big of a pimp.

Big Apple

the official day-to-day run down of the trip is coming soon!