Mexican Weather Girl Yanet Garcia Celebrates A Big Day, MLB Beekeeper Becomes Hero & Frat Bros Save America
2024 summer value travel destinations
With the price of everything skyrocketing, I wanted to start a discussion on traveling this summer without blowing out a budget. Yes, I might use a few of these suggestions, but I feel like there are thousands of readers who could use the same information.
I've seen the new Aldi shopping statistics from the latest Wall Street Journal report. I see the Yukons and JEEP Commanders in the Aldi parking lot. I know people are looking to pump the brakes on spending (I didn't say slam on the brakes…jump pump), so here we go with suggestions for those of us who aren't looking to rent the $20k beach house with four other couples.
- Brandon C. in Pinckney, MI suggests:
Yes Northern Michigan, especially sunrise side lower peninsula or UP, is king. But if you want to go someplace else, I can suggest Huntsville AL as a good option. Easy drive from Toledo area, lots of hotels and Airbnb at different price points. Downtown is very walkable with lots of great restaurants.
The minor league team there, the Rocket City Trash Pandas has a a+ facility. NASA Marshall Space Flight Center has tours and there's the Space Camp museum which is awesome for kids.
If you want to do a water thing, about 15-20 min outside of town is the Guntersburg Dam Lake that has lots of lake houses for rent, many with boats included. And if you wanted to break away, the Robert Trent Golf Trail has two courses in the Huntsville area.
- David in Charlotte writes:
Grew up in Lima, graduated from BGSU, and have read your stuff for years. Talk about a dude that is wired into current culture, and knows the really, really, well that would be you. And yes. I mow on Thursdays.
We have lived in Charlotte, NC for years, and it is simply awesome. Clean, convenient, new, and relatively inexpensive.
Now, to your vacation.
Greenville, SC (two nights)-Stay downtown. Based on how family rolls, rent bikes and hit the miles of bike paths that take you through the city, to the zoo($13/adults), a fantastic minor league ballpark, and any type of food you could possibly want. There is a river that runs through the city, that is part of a park, and a curved bridge. The kids will enjoy it. It will be hot in the summer, but the town is treed.
After two nights in Greenville, head to Charlotte(two nights). Stay uptown. Check out the NASCAR Hall of Fame, Segway tour, the best AAA baseball stadium in the US.
The beach or mountains from there.
David adds:
Boone, NC is sort of a quirky, college town where the kids could get their feet wet and dirty.
More low key, and less honky tonk, than Myrtle Beach or Pigeon Forge.
Blowing Rock, five miles down the road, a bit more upscale and fun.
The McAfee popups are insane!
Yes, I spent quite a bit of my Tuesday relaying your concerns to the developers. The ad department assures me they have a third party that screens ads for militants who've infiltrated the ad stack with shitty code, but this one got through the system.
Let me know today if you're still seeing it. If you are, send me a screenshot of the URL that's popping when the ad pops. That helps the team pinpoint which ad in the stack has the shitty code.
‘Should I be using a grill mat to protect my Trex decking?’
- Stephen in Charlotte needs help from the community:
Long time Screencaps reader who lurks in the background without ever having previously reached out. Although not an official TNML member, I do mow my own lawn (on Thursdays as much as possible) with only gas-powered equipment (JD E130 mower and Tanaka TBC-240PF trimmer), keep the garage fridge properly stocked, raising two boys as proud conservative Americans (and trying to hold off on travel ball for as long as possible), and fully support the doing of hard things.
Hats off for all the fine work that you do with Screencaps, and for serving as a sounding board for all the like-minded individuals out there.
To that end, I have a question that I hope you would be willing to present to the SC audience for their consideration and input. I recently replaced the old, rotting deck in my backyard, and was persuaded to go with Trex composite for the decking instead of the tried and true pressure treated pine. After install, as I was moving my grill, smoker, Blackstone, and Ooni to their new places of honor on the deck, the installer cautioned me about Trex's disdain for grease and the need to put down a suitable grill mat to prevent any permanent stains. However, when I did a little digging into the issue, I came across repeated warnings that use of a rubber (or similar) grill mat on the deck can lead to staining or other discoloration of the Trex itself.
Looking further research for a grill mat that offers the needed protection without risk of damage to the Trex either were of no real use, or the few rec's that I did find seemed to always be contradicted by the next set of rec's that I found.
So I come to you, and the vast collective knowledge of the SC community, of which I must assume there must be some Trex deck owners, and ask the following: for those with Trex decks, do you find the use of a grill mat necessary or advisable? And if so, what type of mat (or other protection) are you using to avoid both grease stains and discoloration from the mat itself?
Thank you for your consideration, and keep up the great work!
Kinsey:
Help Stephen and potentially more Screencaps readers who might be in the same spot. The last thing these guys want is to stain that brand new EXPENSIVE deck. HELP!
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com
Andrew refused to define what a ‘real job’ is to him
I looked up Andrew's Internet bio. He's a content creator. I've determined that his email telling me to get a real job is a cry for help and that he actually wants the job I created for myself so many years ago.
The lesson here to hopeful writers and content creators is to not be so jealous of a guy who figured out a way to run a mowing league. The lesson is to figure out how you can do something similar.
Create your own path, Andrew.
(The guy didn't even attempt to pick my brain. Sad.)
Travel Ball Chronicles: Stories from the road
Here's your spot to share observations from the world of Hampton Inns & sports complexes that charge you to watch your own kids play. I've learned that there isn't a great place on the Internet where these stories are being shared, so I'll step in and take the wheel.
Share your observations, your feelings, your concerns, your triumphs, your kid's triumph, stories of meeting friends for life, share stories of those late nights in the Hampton Inn breakfast bar area suckin' down Mich Ultras.
This space it yours.
Call me a condescending, jealous rec ball asshole. I'm willing to be ripped. I don't care. Send observations.
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com
– Jeff in Phoenix writes:
I am not seeing the high schools being hit by travel ball at all here in Arizona. I have two daughters, a sophomore and a 7th grader. All of the tournaments here from February-April are limited to 14 and under. There are no divisions for the older girls because they are playing for the high school. Even at the 14U tournaments this time of year there will be two teams that have to combine rosters because they have too many girls that are freshmen playing high school. I am fairly confident it is the same with baseball here. You might see the travel ball takeover up North though since your season is so short.
I am not surprised by Duncan in Georgia seeing the coach get into it with the ump. I am most definitely not surprised this was a Silver bracket game. All of those coaches and parents are frustrated about playing in the Silver bracket and are taking it out on the poor ump and each other. My youngest daughter is on a pretty good team. As they have gotten better and played better competition there is a lot less whining about the umpires and every play isn't treated like life and death. The teams that are hanging on the edges seem to have the most drama around them and stir the pot the most.
– Anonymous would like to share his travel ball experience so far this season:
Travel Ball - January
Wife: Our 12-year-old son got invited to try out for a travel ball team!
Me: What's wrong with little league?
Wife: He says needs more of a challenge.
Me: He didn't make the Little League all-star team.
Wife: Well, my understanding is that he won't get to play high school baseball unless he's on a travel ball team.
Me: If he's good, he'll make the team. They don't look at resumes.
Wife:
Present Day
So of course, I gave in and let him, "tryout" for the travel ball team, when in reality it was the team looking to fill out the roster.
A thousand bucks later, (that's the entry fee, on top of them wanting us to do fundraisers), we're supposed to drive four hours next weekend to a tournament, because apparently losing 17 - 1 to the 12-year-olds here in town isn't good enough. We have to lose 17-1 to an entirely different set of 12-year-olds in the big-city.
We have home uniforms. Road uniforms.
We have practice uniforms, which kills me because I grew up playing every game/practice in the same t-shirt.
There's an app they use for team communications. The app tries to upsell us on a subscription whereupon we can watch the game's live-stream and have access to in-game and season-long stats. A teammate whose dad has the app once reminded my son of his extremely high ERA - an ERA so high it would qualify him to be the Colorado Rockies closer.
The bright side is that he is playing and practicing a lot more baseball. Made some new friends. Keeps him out of the house more, but the travel ball vibe is definitely less fun than our Little League experiences. Very first game I saw a parent shove another parent.
And as crappy as our team is, there are kids on the team whose parents have them in multiple leagues, buying them the latest, priciest gear, and ponying up for personalized one-on-one coaching - all costing thousands. I want to yell, "YOUR SON IS NOT GOING PRO!" but it's none of my business.
"Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to play travel ball." Here's hoping I can get him back in Little League next spring.
What is Dave & Buster's up to by introducing gambling on its arcade games?
Here's the post being referenced.
- Russ writes:
Great article you should consider follow up with consistent observations for future articles. But let’s call it what it is grooming.
Sports has been grooming kids since they started taking gambling advertiser dollars kids see gambling as a normal part of sports now due to constant inundation with commercials, plugs during sports center type breaks, visuals when there is no spoken word about it and announcers talking about it’s sponsors.
My personal opinion is history has taught us one thing: gambling and sports combined destroy the integrity of sports. During the weekend game Bucks vs Pacers, there was a pushing slapping incident between two players one being the Bucks #1 player.
The announcing booth surprisingly brought in a expert to explain in great detail why the penalties were given out the way they were . It was pretty obvious in the actual play and the replay, so it seemed like to me the expert was brought in for a recorded explanation to cover the league's ass in case gambling sponsors raised a complaint.
I think gambling advertising will ultimately end up going the way of cigarette commercials. It will take years.
Once government has to start paying out more dollars for gambling addiction support, especially for young people and the business for treating gambling becomes a big money for politicians they will start dealing with it.
Sorry for the rant but sports was my first love now it’s more like a ex I have to deal with.
Here we go again with the honeybees…they have been SAVED…we keep trying to tell you this
I had to laugh at the story Mike T. in Idaho sent over about a New York Times writer who had a helluva time finding someone to come out and remove honeybees from her house.
Let's go over this AGAIN. The honeybees have been saved. Don't take my word or it. Listen to what the NYT writer found out after being beaten over the head by the maniacs that the bees need to be saved.
###############
That's it. May is officially here. We're ready to have one incredible month that is capped off with the start of the holiday travel season. At the end of this month, I will be going on a golf trip and a short trip with my family.
For now, it's all gas, no brake for the next 31 days. Let's get after it.
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com