Santa Anita Trip #2

Went to Santa Anita today with Melissa and her boyfriend Kyle. It didn't rain! It was cloudy pretty much the entire time and sprinkled for maybe 30 seconds at one point, but the rain stayed away from the time we arrived to the time we left. It started raining when we got into SB County, though. So it wasn't too hot at Santa Anita and it wasn't too cold. It was pretty good weather. We had lots of fun and did the tour, got free BBQ aprons, and I bought a sweatshirt from Santa Anita. I'm going again in 3 weeks for the Santa Anita Derby and I want to get another pen from there, but I'm pretty stocked up on Santa Anita stuff now. :P I love that place, though. It's got a nice energy and is just fun. I like looking at the horses in the saddling paddock, the paddock, and when they race. It's an exciting 1-2 minutes and everything that goes with it helps build it up for sure. The only thing I dislike is the smoking. Gah. It wasn't like someone smoking in my face the entire time (only happened once) and you usually can move out of the way fine, but it's just the stale smell of smoke near the main entrance of the grandstand that is just annoying. No headaches because I was never near enough at one time, but it's just not always fun. I placed no bets, but Melissa and Kyle did. I'm not sure if they were up or down. Melissa had a good first bet. She got $5.50 back (in addition to her initial $5) on a show. Kind of downhill from there. I didn't do too shabby on my hypothetical betting. I hit the board a lot, but not in the right orders. I got one right here and there (always did a win, place, show or trifecta), but who knows. I have never paid so close attention to odds in my almost 10 years of horse racing! So I learned something new. :) I am a little sore in the legs too. We walked/stood pretty much from 10am to when we left at 4pm. We sat for maybe an hour total here and there (e.g., for lunch). We also went up and down a lot of stairs. Good workout, I suppose!

Anyway, here are the photos with captions here and there: Santa Anita Trip #2

I also got to see The Factor's Rebel win at Santa Anita on the TV monitors (Rebel is at Oaklawn in Arkansas). He was able to go 2-turns so he's now my emotional favorite for the Derby. We'll see how he does in the Arkansas Derby in about a month, but his trainer is Baffert (one of my favorites) and he's a grey/roan (my favorite horse color). He's a freak too (horse racing terminology for super talented -- basically off the charts). He's got some AMAZING speed. I'm not sure how far he can carry that since he doesn't seem to like to rate and going in the Derby, he could wire the field (start to finish in 1st), but...that's not normal when there will be 20 horses in the field. So I don't know if he can win the Derby, but he'll be a fun horse to watch this year.

Saw Limitless yesterday. It was a good film, but Chris and I both agreed for a guy who is supposed to be using 100% of his brain at all time so he's (basically) the smartest man alive, he made some pretty stupid decisions. Shouldn't his brain he working fast enough to be able to work out scenarios out ahead of time? Oh well. It was a nice little action-adventure/psychological type film. There was a gross scene (guy drank a dead man's fresh blood), but other than that it wasn't bad. Wouldn't see it again and it's not quite good enough to buy on DVD. Glad I saw it, though. Grade: B-/C+