Tonight, The Record hosted a blogger meet-up at Valley Brew, right off the beautiful Miracle Mile. With “We’re bloggers. You’re bloggers. Isn’t it about time we meet face to face?” as the only introduction to the event, I signed up to attend.

For a first-time event there was a good turnout: Tara Cuslidge, Kirk Barron, Ian Hill, Sean Polay, David Siders, Bill Ries-Knight, Wes Rhea, Patrick Giblin, Hilary Shepherd, John Sterni, Record Publisher Roger Coover, and others. Some I had already met while with others, it was an awesome chance to put a face and voice to the blogs and tweets. We had the opportunity to talk with Mr. Coover and Mr. Polay, Product Manager of Distributed Media at Dow Jones, the parent company of The Record, about the future of blogging and social media at The Record. It was refreshing to hear that the paper is taking the local blogger community seriously. We heard about some new things the team at The Record are considering to tap into the draw of local bloggers. Above all, it was a wonderful opportunity to geek out with fellow bloggers and tweeters.

I’m definitely looking forward to the next meet-up! It’s also pretty apparent that we have more than enough of an appetite for a Tweetup... which I’m sure is coming soon.

Thanks to the Community Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired and the Stockton Sports Commission headed by Don Miller, the Beep Ball World Series in being played in Stockton!

This is great news for our city and we are very proud to share Stockton with the other 13 teams that have travelled from all over the US and Taiwan.

Tonight, we went to the opening ceremony at the Hilton Hotel. After an address by David Smolka, the NBBA President and Don Miller, Mayor Ann Johnston took the stage. She welcomed all of the players and thanked the Commission, CCBVI and the volunteers for helping to bring this event to Stockton. Mrs. Johnston encouraged everyone to spend some time throughout the city taking in local entertainment.

After a few more remarks by Mr. Smolka, each of the teams were introduced. Most of the teams had their own cheer but the Taiwanese team had the coolest!

To learn more about the NBBA, visit them online at http://www.nbba.org. For more information on the Community Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired and the Stockton Stingrays, check out http://www.communitycenterfortheblind.org/ and read the recent article on The Record. To watch live coverage, visit The Valley Sports Network at http://valleysportsnetwork.com/

Best of luck to all the teams!

We are approaching the ninth anniversary of Mom passing away. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of her. I miss her dearly.

There are a great many things that remind me of her. They come from all over the place and at the most random times. Recently, her name popped up in a strange place: my Google Analytics. Starting on May 15, 2009, there have been a small number of visitors that have come to my site after searching for “”faith beckwith” stockton” in Google. Not a lot of hits, but a small number nearly every day since mid-May.

I have no idea who is searching the web for things about Mom but it made my day to see that someone did. If you knew her, I’m sure you miss her, too. We all do.

Family is forever.

Happy 4th of July!

Even though the city of Stockton cancelled our annual fireworks show due to the current budget crisis, there was still reason to be down at the waterfront on Independence Day. The second annual Taste of San Joaquin was held along with the first annual Way Out West BBQ Championship was held at the Weber Points Event Center on a perfect July day.


As soon as we paid our $1 dollar admissions we could hear an 80s rock band playing on the main stage. We made our way back and hung out and watched Aquanett perform songs from Ratt, Metallica, Poison, AC/DC and other rock bands. These guys really rocked. The guitar player was incredible. He had all the licks down and easily went from Kirk Hammett to C.C. DeVille without missing a beat (and thankfully didn’t dance like C.C.).


After listening to Aquanett for a while we ventured out to try some of the BBQ prepared by the 20 or so competitors. By the time we got there most of them had sold out of their BBQ but there were still a few remaining with plenty of chicken, ribs and brisket left. From what I tasted, Smokin’ Yankees had the best brisket and East Side BBQ had the absolute best pork ribs. After a few samples of BBQ we tried some specialties from local restaurants: egg rolls from On Lock Sam and nachos from Bradley’s were the best.

Loki Rhythm entertained on another stage, bringing world music and jazz to the waterfront with their African drums and beats.

After a full day of music and food we headed out to Lodi to watch the fireworks.



Check out the rest of the pics here.