Diamond Club, where have you been all my life?

On Wednesday, I hopped a train to Solana Beach for the annual Tower Records trip to Del Mar.

What? Tower Records? You thought they were long gone, right? Well, Tower lives on in the hearts of all those who ever wore a badge on a chain that proudly declared, "I Work Here." And even though we have all gone on to other places of employment, we still climb aboard the Amtrak Surfliner for a day of fun in the sun and betting on the ponies. It was a small group this year, as many folks dropped out at the last minute (I'm looking at you, Rick Dorsey, Valerie, etc), but we still had fun.

On the way down, Chris Conant told us about theDiamond Club and its "Free and Easy Wednesday." Had we known about this back in the old days, Del Mar Racetrack would have gone out of business. The Diamond Club includes free admission on Wednesdays and half-price admission other days, plus half price beer, soda, and hot dogs. Oh, and did I mention free seats in the Stretch Run area on Wednesdays? No more standing in the hot infield for this crew. Of course, the place was lousy with blue hairs, but they're slow and it was easy to maneuver around them.

We had a great view of most of the starts and all of the finishes.

I made some modest bets and had some gigantic wins--a total of $7.60! Woo Hoo! As usual, I look for a horse that speaks to me. A few years ago, it was my brother Roy's birthday, and there was a horse named Roi owned by William Shatner. It was August 17th and he was the #10 horse in the 7th race. It was perfect. He won, too. Last time we went, there was a horse named "In the Poconos." This year, I found a horse named Neeko and placed a bet in honor of my nephew Niko, who was celebrating his 23rd birthday. It lost. Sorry, Niko.

We nearly missed our train back, but don't we do that every year? Since there were only 5 of us on the train, we set up camp in the bar car and continued reminiscing about all the characters that came along with a record store job. Good Times! Thanks for coming Jeff, Chris, Dave, Alex, Ben, and Marnie!