FLIP + CHING

Ben Johns Clinic at Chicken N Pickle

Posted on July 5, 2020 by Ching under Hobbies.

Here are some pictures from the Ben Johns clinic at Chicken N Pickle a couple of weeks ago. I decided to take time off work to do the clinics because I had a lot of vacation time still available to use this year after we’d had to cancel a couple of trips. I took Thursday and Friday off that week.

This is our group photo from our intermediate clinic in the morning. Our group consisted of Beth, Margaret, Wanda, Debbi, Tommy, Brooke, Kim, and me.

Tommy, who celebrated his birthday that day, and Debbi both completed the intermediate clinic with us that morning.

Here are a few pictures from our clinic that morning.

After a little break for lunch and an outfit change, I participated in the advanced clinic with my friends Jarred, Kimberly, Tiffany, Amy, Matt, and Karen. There was only one person in our session who I hadn’t met before.

Karen was brilliant and got some individual coaching.

Of course, we had to get a photo with Ben.

That night there was a Team Ben and Team Matt exhibition, and we got to watch two hours of amazing pickleball. Ron Ponder and his friend reffed matches between the pros (from left) — Jocelyn Devilliers, Patrick Smith, Matt Wright, Lucy Kovalova, Chris Heck, Ben Johns, Altaf Merchant, and Collin Johns (not pictured). Collin didn’t make the group photo because he was walking his grandmother to her car at the end of the event. How sweet is that?!

Here’s a better group photo from my friend Debbie’s phone.

Brian came out to livestream the event. He was a little stressed out because, even after we tested everything two days before, when we got to Chicken N Pickle, nothing worked. Good thing we got there early so Brian could implement plan B — using his MacBook. It all turned out okay but Brian was stressed out nonetheless.

Here’s Debbie and Jenny with the “Don’t Miss!” sign that we made for Chris Heck. It is his #1 rule.

Debbie with a new friend she made holding the “Team Lucy Kovalova” sign.

Debbie with the KaChing sign. KaChing is the team name that Karen and I use whenever we are playing together.

Debbie holding an “I Love Ben Johns” and “I Love Lucy” sign. She did a much better job of taking pictures with my signs than I did.

We got a fun group photo with Lucy at the end of the evening — (from left) Kelli, Krista, Lucy, Debbie, me, and Karen.

That whole day was so fun. I got to spend the day learning from Ben Johns and then got to watch some amazing matches during the exhibition. It’s a day I won’t soon forget. I can’t wait until the next one!

P.S. Here’s a link to the video of the Q&A and exhibition matches in case you want to watch them. Enjoy!

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Downtown Eureka Springs

Posted on July 4, 2020 by Ching under Travel.

While we were in Eureka Springs a couple of weeks ago, Brian and I decided to ride the trolley and check out the downtown area.

Here are some pictures that we took that day.

Face coverings are the new norm these days.

We did take a few mask-less photos too.

Here’s a panoramic photo of downtown.

Brian found a fun store that he liked.

We also found some “shit” at Silly Chile.

Here’s a couple of pictures of Brian.

It was fun exploring downtown. We did miss out on Local Flavor, a highly recommended downtown restaurant, because they closed that weekend because of some health issues. We still had a great time overall, though.

That’s all for now. Until next time. GNG.

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Our Little Treehouse

Posted on July 3, 2020 by Ching under Travel.

Brian and I stayed in one of the cute treehouse cottages in Eureka Springs, Arkansas over Brian’s birthday weekend this year. I went to the Treehouse Cottages website last fall and, after some research, I booked us the Lofty Lookout cottage.

Here are some pictures of the treehouse cottage we had for the weekend.

Our treehouse had a lovely walkway that led from where we parked our car to the cottage door. It was a lot better than the other treehouses where you had to climb a bunch of steps. All of the treehouses are identical on the inside but almost all of them have stairs that go up to the treehouse. This was the only cottage with a nice walkway. I definitely picked the best one.

The deck wrapped almost all the way around the treehouse.

The treehouse was almost 30 feet above the ground and surrounded by beautiful trees. Inside it was both comfortable and cozy.

Here’s a picture of the fireplace. We didn’t need it, of course, because it was summertime but I’m thinking we should definitely return in the winter and fire it up. I think it would be amazing to stay in during the winter.

Here’s a picture of the little kitchen with a small table and two chairs.

Here’s a picture of our four poster bed, and of Brian enjoying it.

And here’s a picture of the heart-shaped tub surrounded by windows so you feel like you’re out in nature.

And a picture of me in it. The soak was relaxing but I think it would be even more awesome in the winter time.

Brian was a party pooper and didn’t want to get in.

These next set of pics are of the nearby treehouses.

This one is the Bungalow treehouse cottage.

This one is the Whispering Wood treehouse.

This one is the Towering Pines treehouse.

The Bungalow treehouse has a sunrise view. Towering Pines and Whispering Wood, like our treehouse, both have a sunset view. I figured Brian wouldn’t be down for being woken up by the bright sun so, besides the nice walkway instead of the tall stairs, the sunset view is one of the selling points of the Lofty Lookout for us.

Here are some pictures of our nightly visitor, Roscoe the raccoon.

Roscoe came to raid the bird feeder every night at nine o’clock.

Our cottage had a guestbook with fun messages from previous guests like this one.

I left our own note which wasn’t quite as fancy.

It was so beautiful out on the deck that we had to take a few selfies.

And I took this great photo of Brian.

It was the nice we decided to grill out.

Everything was perfect except for all the bugs. LOL. Brian lit a bug stick but it didn’t phase the bugs one bit. We still got a bunch of bug bites.

Other than the bug bites, we thoroughly enjoyed our stay. The cottage was lovely and I would totally stay there again. More pics from our weekend in Eureka Springs on the next post. Until then. GNG.

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Angler’s Restaurant in Eureka Springs

Posted on June 28, 2020 by Ching under Food and Drink, Travel.

Brian and I found a great little restaurant in Eureka Springs while we were there celebrating his birthday there a couple of weeks ago. He liked it so much that we actually ate there twice. Here are some pics.

While we were there, I discovered a new beer I liked. It’s a grapefruit radler by Stiegl and it’s absolutely refreshing.

They had stringent rules at the restaurant. You had to wear a mask unless you were eating. Lucky for us, Brian and I came prepared and brought several of our Sofibella masks on the trip with us.

On our first visit, Brian got a chicken sandwich with French fries while I got a shrimp basket with sweet potato fries.

Brian liked the chicken sandwich so much that he ordered it again on our second visit. And we both like the fries so we got an entire basket of it to share.

I got a fish sandwich this time. It was delicious!

Since we were in a celebratory mood, we decided to get a fried pie for dessert.

More pictures from our Eureka Springs getaway next post. Until then. GNG.

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Pickleball with #TeamModel

Posted on June 21, 2020 by Ching under Hobbies.

A few weeks ago, Karen had this idea to ask Jocelyn Devilliers and Patrick Smith to play with us. I didn’t think they would be open to it because they are way, way, way out of our league but I guess Karen is friends with Jocelyn and so, while I wouldn’t even dream of asking, she wasn’t afraid to ask. At the time, Jocelyn was only playing singles (because of social distancing) but both he and Patrick seemed open to playing with us. Patrick said the four of us could play once Jocelyn is ready to play doubles again. But even after he was ready, it still took some doing to get our schedules to line up. We finally got to play together a couple of weeks ago.