FLIP + CHING

Happy Hour at El Camino

Posted on March 29, 2021 by Ching under Food and Drink, Travel.

Brian and I really liked El Camino. It was our first stop when we arrived in Delray Beach because we were both starving from the trip.

El Camino has great happy hour menu but we were so hungry we decided to order off the regular menu instead.

The food was pretty good. I enjoyed my tacos and black beans.

But I enjoyed my blood orange margarita best of all.

Brian enjoyed the hot sauce. Maybe a little too much.

More about our recent trip next time. Until then, GNG.

First Time at the Belmont (and Frost)

Posted on March 28, 2021 by Ching under Food and Drink.

Brian and I finally got a chance to check out the Belmont. The place is so popular that it is extremely hard to get in during regular hours. The times that we’ve tried to eat there, the wait has been too long and so we’d never been until now. The funny thing is, we didn’t even plan to eat there. We were out for a drive on a beautiful day and on the hunt for root beer floats. We decided to go to TJ’s since we were at Seneca Park but we were too late. I’d forgotten that they close at 2 PM on Sundays.

Plan B was to get our root beer float fix at Ziggy’s. Ziggy’s also has great root beer floats. But on the way there, we saw that the Belmont wasn’t busy so we ended up ditching the root beer float plan and going for happy hour instead.

We’d never been able to get in before so we decided to take advantage of this opportunity. It ended up costing us more than what it would have cost us had we stuck to our original plan because we also got a cheese board but happy hour at the Belmont is actually really good. They have $8 pitchers of beer and their cocktails, which are normally $10, are only $6 during happy hour.

I really wanted to try all six cocktails but Brian wouldn’t let me. Since I could only have two, I decided to try the first two on the list: Calumet and Daylight.

Even though both drinks were very good, I liked Calumet (pictured above) best out of the two. Daylight (pictured below) was yummy too but was a bit tart.

Here’s a picture of our cheese board.

When they brought out our check, they also brought out a couple of cookies. One was oatmeal raisin and the other was snickerdoodle. I’m not a fan of snickerdoodle cookies but this one was really good. Hands down, the best snickerdoodle cookie I’ve ever tasted. The experience made me realize that I probably don’t like snickerdoodle cookies because I’ve only ever had bad ones before.

Our server told us that the cookies were homemade by the Frost people next door. As it happened to be Pi Day (March 14), we decided to walk over to Frost to get a piece of pie. However, they were overrun and were completely out of pie (except for pecan flavor, which Brian doesn’t like). We ended up with a slice of chocolate cake instead. You can never go wrong with chocolate cake.

Here are a few pictures we took at Frost. They’ve only been open a few months and we’d really not even heard of them had it not been for our server mentioning it. Frost is totally worth checking out if you’re ever in the College Hill area.

I guess that’s all for now. Until next time. GNG.

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Linwood Recreation Center

Posted on March 26, 2021 by Ching under Community, Hobbies.

After two solid years of playing pickleball, amazingly enough, I’ve still never visited all of the locations that offer open play in our area. I think what happens is that, now that I’ve found places that fit my schedule close to me, I don’t ever venture out to new places any more. Once established, it’s always hard to step out of our comfort zones. That said, I’m going to try really hard to hit (and take pictures) of the various places on our Wichita pickleball open play schedule.

First stop: Linwood Recreation Center. I visited the rec center for the first time ever a few weeks ago. With rec centers, you never know what kind of surface you’ll be playing on. Most of the time they have wood gym floors. Occasionally, you’ll run into vinyl tile floors like at Linwood when they use a multipurpose space.

At Linwood they have room for three pickleball courts and play using temporary portable nets. Similar to the format used at Edgemoor, everyone lines up on the chairs set up at one side of the room and they use a “four on, four off” rotation. As each game finishes, the games shift toward the furthest court so that they’re always feeding into the nearest court. This limits the need for players to walk back and forth and interrupt play.

I’m not a huge fan of the “four on, four off” system because sometimes you get stuck playing with the exact same people for the entire open play but it does keep things moving and, even when there are over twenty players there, the wait time is limited. Groups do get mixed up a bit when there is an odd number so there’s opportunity to play with different people.

The player demographic at Linwood is similar to the player demographic at most rec centers. There’s more older people than younger people but it seems like, unless you’re playing at Chicken N Pickle, that tends to be the case with pickleball because the sport was popular with the retired folks before it became mainstream.

On the Saturday that I went to check out Linwood, I ran into some people I knew like Ken (above) and Bill (below), and others who I’d never met before.

I also met a new friend, Phil, who recently discovered pickleball and, just like all of us, is now completely addicted.

Anyway, I’m going to try to make it out to all the other locations to take some pictures and videos and meet some pickleball players. If you’re looking to play, here are two things you must do to get started because open play options on the weekend are usually quite limited:

Join the Wichita Pickleball Facebook group.
Sign up on PlaytimeScheduler.

The Facebook group will help you connect with other pickleball players so you’ll get invited to play outside of the regularly scheduled open play. PlaytimeScheduler shows you an open plays arranged by people at the parks (or other locations) that are outside of the normal schedule.

As far as the normal open play schedule goes, here’s what typically happens on the weekends:

SATURDAY

Linwood Rec Center – 10 AM to 12 PM
$2 per person, limited to the first 25 players

Edgemoor Rec Center – 1 PM to 3 PM
$2 per person, limited to the first 25 players

SUNDAY

Nahola – 12 PM to 2 PM (competitive)
$7 per person for non-members

Edgemoor Rec Center – 1 PM to 3 PM
$2 per person, limited to the first 25 players

El Dorado Rec Center – 2 PM to 5 PM
FREE open play

West YMCA – 4 PM to 7 PM
$10 per person for non-members

Now that I’ve been to Linwood, I can saw that I’ve been to all of these places. Now I just have to check out all the other locations which is a bit more challenging because I work during the day. I will do my best to get it all done this year, though. Until then, hope you have a great time playing. See you all on the courts soon!

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Wichita Pickleball Patches

Posted on March 15, 2021 by Ching under Community.

As you know Gregg Smith has been the primary fundraiser for the “Light Up Edgemoor” effort. He has been selling t-shirts, sweatshirts, hoodies, and even hosted benefit tournaments with the sole purpose of raising money for lights at the park. This year he came up with the idea of selling “Wichita Pickleball” patches for $5 each. They are fabulous patches and well-made. The only complaint I’ve received is they are sew-on rather than iron-on.

I’ve sold a few of these for Gregg to help with the fundraising effort. I paid $50 for 10 patches and Gregg gave me one for free — to keep or giveaway to a junior pickleball player or someone else deserving. I decided to keep my free one and put it on my Vulcan tour bag so I can promote Wichita Pickleball everywhere I go.

I couldn’t figure out how to iron it on so I decided to sew it on myself. Not bad for someone with limited sewing skills, right? It really wasn’t that hard so I don’t know what people are complaining about. I think it was just an easy excuse to not buy one. However, I did get a roll of iron-on patch adhesive so I could give some free to those who have purchased patches but don’t want to sew them on.

Brian used the iron-on patch adhesive to jazz up his new travel backpack but the corners were loose so he had me sew the corners down for him. Maybe the iron-on method is not the best way to go? LOL.

Gregg is also selling a sticker version of this same design for those who would rather not sew or iron anything. He’s always coming up with with these fundraising ideas. I often get asked how much money is needed and how much money has been raised so far and I really have no idea. I just help support the cause by buying whatever it is that they’re selling or even helping sell things sometimes. Gregg has all of the details. After at least three years of solid fundraising, I have to believe we are getting close. I hope this is the year that we finally get lights!

You can help us speed up the fundraising effort by sending a donation to the “Light Up Edgemoor” effort directly to the city of Wichita. Here’s the check needs to be made out to and the mailing address for which to send it. Please remember to write “Light Up Edgemoor” in the check’s memo field so they know that your donation is specifically for this purpose.

The Wichita Parks Foundation
PO BOX 3439
Wichita, KS 67201

Thank you to everyone who has bought something, made a donation, helped sell things, supported the tournaments by playing or volunteering, or contributed in some way. You’re making a difference and helping us get closer to our goal. Next time I see Gregg, I will be sure to ask for an update.

Until then, let’s keep playing. See you on the courts! GNG.