A couple of weekends ago I had the chance to pay a visit to my old stomping grounds - Tyler, Texas.  For those of you who know me, you know that I'm pretty proud of my home town and that I don't get to go back very often since my family has all migrated to the Austin area.  So, when I had the chance to drive Jan and a friend to a retreat in Midlothian for the weekend I decided I'd dart east to Tyler for the weekend. 

I got to spend some good time with some old friends - Jeff Heimer, Laura and Eric Roberts, Allison Greer, and Catherine Chesley.  It was really great to catch up with all of those good folks and I hope to keep in touch. 

A few highlights from my trip:

• Eating a #6 and a #7 and a longneck Pepsi at Taqueria el Lugar.  This was my favorite place to eat in Tyler.  It's a hole-in-the-wall run by a family from Mexico, and they serve up fantastic Mexcian food that I've yet to find anywhere else.  A true gem.  They actually have two or three locations now.  You must go if you ever visit T town!
• Shooting hoops in my old gym.  Growing up the son a recreation minister had its privileges.  One of those is access to a basketball gym pretty much anytime I wanted.  The gym and Family Life Center at my old church Green Acres Baptist was where I spent countless hours growing up.  It was a big part of my growing up and the place of many cherished memories of being a kid shooting hoops with the older kids, playing ping-pong, refereeing basketball, and having birthday parties.  I have no way of measuring this but I'd estimate that I've shot more baskets in that gym than anyone else.  No trophy necessary, just something I like to think about. 
  
• Taking a driving tour to my old houses and schools.  Talk about nostalgia!  I was able to get pictures of all my old houses...well, almost all of them.  I sent my family all the pictures and Jana asked "where is our 3rd house?"  I can't believe I completely forgot about our house on Huntington.  That neighborhood was by far the funnest one.  Kids would always be playing football in the front yard, or riding skateboards, or riding bikes in the awesome trails that were nearby (which are gone and developed now I've heard.)  What a great neighborhood that was!  We weren't there too long, which may be why I forgot about it when I was taking my tour.  At any rate, it was really neat to see the other landmarks, especially our house in Flint which is where I lived the longest.  

Enjoy some nostalgic pics of B-Dub's Tyler.

Thanks to my brother-in-law (who is of course always conveniently behind the camera and not in the pictures) for capturing these. It is always fun getting that perfect shot for the family Christmas card. Merry early Christmas 2007 from the Wilsons!





Now, I will really know if my family reads my blog.

Jan and I went to Vegas a couple of weeks ago and I'm just now blogging about it.  Deal with it ("D.W.I" as Chance would say.)  Anywho, we had a great time.  Jan was there for a whole week. She went for work because they sent her to the infamous trade show known as the "World of Concrete."  No, it's not an amusement park or a museum as you might think by the name.  Instead, it is the biggest trade show in the country and maybe the world, depending on who you ask. 

I arrived on Thursday to relieve her dad who had been there since Sunday.  We stayed in the Luxor hotel, and they had nice rooms.  The resort/casino was nothing fancy though, especially when you put it up against some of the others.  Have you SEEN the Belaggio or better yet, the Wynn resort?  Good grief!!  I was impressed by a lot of the structural sites and these two were by far my favorite.  Why not?  They only cost 2.5 - 3 billion to build!

We got to celebrate my birthday while we were out there.  Jan took me to see Blue Man Group as my gift and it did not dissapoint at all!  It was an amazing show, filled with awesome music supplied by their heavy percussive rock band, and filled with really cool multimedia visualities, all coupled with good humor by the group themselves.  They had a lot of crowd participation stuff too which made for a very unique experience.  (Thanks Jan for my awesome birthday gift!!)

We didn't blow too much coin on the slots, so we were able to chock (sp?) that up to entertainment.  Next time, I want to get to the point where I can just walk up to a blackjack table and go to town (with a limit of course.) 

The most random thing on the whole trip had to have been when we were on the airport parking shuttle and met last year's Miss California who had just come back from the Miss America pageant (she was a spectator this year) in Vegas. 

Enjoy our blue pics.

Thanks to Dave Terry for sending this to me.  This was taken in in 2002.  Me and Leonard's fashion choices have hopefully improved since then thanks to our ladies.

My parents called me last night to tell me they had just met the Willie Nelson, along with funny Texan/governor candidate Kinky Freidman.  I'm pretty jealous but will let you see their pictures anyway.  They met him at the new Texas Roadhouse just south of Austin which Willie is part owner of.