chase the light

Horse racing! Always bet on the Irish horse. They always kick our California horses asses. You’d never know gambling’s illegal in California. Somebody should probably tell the Indian casinos, lotteries and race tracks. I arrived too late to bet on the first race but I was on fire for the next seven! Aw yeah, steak dinner for me! So here’s my new absurd rule in horse picking… if it’s a turf race and the horse has the word “turf” in his name. Bet on him. Like Turf Flyer. Good name, pick him. Asphalt Flyer, um no, not so good.

Imageworks was sponsoring two races (not sure what you have to do to do that) so they allowed 10 of us to go down trackside for the two races and watch the ponies. It’s like thunder when they come flying by throwing dirt clods around with their hooves. So amazing. We had about 100 people show up but I only knew about a 1/4 of them. I bought a $45 ticket with the intention of putting $5 on each race but for some reason I wasn’t thinking and forgot I’d already missed a race and that there was only 8 races total. So I split the last $20 on two races and won one of them. This is why I don’t go to Vegas. I would be homeless from stupid bets.

Also on Friday nights in the summer they have a band play after the races. It’s usually a third tier band that hasn’t really had a hit in awhile, or only had one hit. The Motels, Berlin, The Fixx, Sugar Ray, Baha Men, Fishbone, etc. Tonight was “The English Beat” or “General Public” or “Dave Wakeling, the guy with the funny looking guitar and strange dance move.” “Save it For Later” indeed. It was boring so I left since they probably weren’t going to play that song until the end of the set. And I wanted my steak dinner! As I went down some steps out of sight of the concert some security guard yelled at me saying “Hey you have camera, what’s the name of this band?” Well, yeah I know the name of the band but it’s not because I’m carrying a camera! Funny odd.

Oh then… I have my camera around my neck and a different security stops me and says they don’t allow photographs. ! ? Huh? Four and a 1/2 hours after carrying around this giant white lens and I’m on my way out you tell me? Ha ha ha! Ok, buddy, I’ll put it away. Thanks for heads up! He even thanked me for putting it away. Funny odd again.

So, there ya go, cameras are not officially allowed at Hollywood Park, but if you’re carrying around a large SLR, down by the track, and mixing with the jockeys I wouldn’t really worry about it. Mmmmm…. steak dinner.