Driving Nick

High school boys volleyball season is coming up soon and preparations are underway at Bell. Open gyms have been scheduled in the last couple of months, and today was one of them -- the second. And Jake has all these days memorized so he doesn't miss any.

Being a Wednesday, these after-school activities add to the complexity of the carpool pick-up -- mine, in particular. From my experience during the last open gym, I certainly didn't want to wait for 2 hours with nothing to do. So I was set on going back to Fremont from Bell. And the reason I had to go to Bell was to take Jake to dinner before open gym. His class ended at 3pm, and I didn't think he could wait till after 9pm to get something to eat. My plan was to take him to dinner at around 5, and be back before 6. Enough time to digest, rest, and be ready.

With that in mind, I suggested to Nick's mom that I could bring him home since I was heading back to Fremont anyway, but only if Nick could be patient enough to wait till 6pm. I knew his basketball tryout would end at 5:30ish, so he wouldn't be waiting that long. Otherwise, Nick's dad would pick him up instead. But Nick said it was OK to wait. So, going back to Fremont, Nick was my only passenger. Early that afternoon, Coby was picked up because he didn't have any activity after school nor did he want to wait till 6pm.

When I got to Bell, Jake was hungry, alright, but he didn't have any idea what he wanted to eat. The last time, we had pizza. I wasn't familiar with the neighborhood so I was at a lost myself. Yelp and Around Me apps could only provide so much suggestions, but we still had to choose. We narrowed it down to a pho place. And with 4 stars to its credit, courtesy of Yelp, we chose Pho Lynn.

Now, don't ask me where in the world this place is because I really do not know. I had to use Google Maps to find it. And when we got there, Jake was too scared to get down from the car. To me, it seemed like a seedy part of town. But at that point, we didn't have too many choices and time was running out. This restaurant was on the main drag (which I could not remember), but had back parking.

Pho Lynn from the back entrance

We entered through the back and aside from 2 tables, no one else was there. For a Vietnamese restaurant, I was expecting the aroma of hot, steaming broth and grilled meat. Instead, it was some funky, chemical odor that I couldn't describe. It wasn't foul, but just weird. If there was such a thing as a dive pho, this was it. Jake was apprehensive, and I was beginning to be as well. He ordered pho (aka rice noodle soup with meat), while I had a lemongrass chicken rice plate. As we ate, all we prayed for was that neither one of us would get sick with whatever it was we were eating. We consumed our meals as quickly as we could, then off we went.

We arrived at Bell before 6pm. Jake waited in the car a bit before he got off and looked for Nick. Soon after, both were headed back to the parking lot. With Nick on board, Jake strode off to the gym.

On our trip back, I knew Nick was tired. But I engaged him in some small talk. He shared with me his tryout experiences and the little nuances that came with it. We also talked about professional basketball, and some other sports stuff. The conversation was light and short. Nick, after all, is a pretty shy, quiet young man. In between conversations, he was fuzzing over his mobile device, like any typical kid his age. After about half an hour, we arrived at his house. Once he got in through the garage, I was on my way.

Tonight was ragchew night on 40m with some of the SBARA gang. We try to meet regularly at 8pm, every Wednesday to chat on HF, to while the time and to get more hams on HF. There were about 5 of us at the roundtable, and it was quite fun. I just wished I didn't have to cut it short since I had to pick up Jake at Bell. On the way, Al (WT6K) called in on the 2m repeater to see where I was. Whenever I drive solo, I always have my radio on. Keeps me company.

By 9pm, I was at the parking lot close to the gym, as I waited for Jake to come out. Then, we were on our way.

If none of these had taken place, Jake and I would have probably watched the Stanford-Washington women's volleyball match at Maples Pavilion. Well, it's one of those days....

Note:  Author wishes to acknowledge Yelp for the use of the photograph in this post.