Arkansas EPIC Road Trip
On a road trip like this, I tend to do a little write-up after the fact. Kind of a journal of sorts. It's from my perspective and what you read will be mostly true, but I completely understand if you stop right here and delete the email.
OK. If you're reading this line then you're still with me. The brainchild of this road trip took shape many years ago when the home and home with Arkansas was announced. I have four states left to visit and Arkansas is one of them. I figured I would go to the game and kill two birds with one stone. The predecessor to this trip was a jaunt to Tennessee back in 2019. You can read about it here: http://scogg.blogspot.
We've had a couple other road trips over the years. In 2011 a few of us made the trip to Vegas for the MWC Basketball Tournament. Jimmermania was in full force. You can ask Mark Christensen about it. I'm sure he still has fond memories. A group of us also made another trip to Vegas in 2017 for the BYU-UNLV game. Keep in mind this is the 4-9 season for BYU. Maybe some will remember the illustrious Joe Critchlow quarterbacking the Cougars to victory. Both trips were good. The company was better, but the opportunity to go into SEC country makes these trips a little more epic. We also had the trip to Vegas for the Arizona game in 2021 in which spouses joined us. Cursing was kept to a minimum with all of these fine ladies joining us and overall was a great trip.
Coming along to the Tennessee game was me, Chris Hillman, Rick Davis, Jamie Davidson, JJ Allen, Spencer Kyle and Rodger Worthen. Rodger has since passed away, but his memory lived on during the Arkansas Road Trip. So why is it important that I list who came to Tennessee? Because it was the same crew that came to Arkansas. You may ask, why was it the same crew? Because, (1) THESE GUYS KNOW HOW TO PARTY!!! (2) They knew what an epic road trip would look like. We did add David Packard to the trip in replacement of Rodger. It's obvious that David can spot epicness (I think I just made that word up) a mile away. Or at least 20 feet away which is the distance from my office to his.
You wonder how a young David was going to mesh with all of these crusty old guys on a trip like this. David happens to be a Seinfeld savant. Quoting numerous lines had him fitting in right away. Him and Rick could go on for hours exchanging Seinfeld quotes and thus an acceptance was forged. Welcome to the party, David.
You may remember (or not) an email I sent on Friday, January 13th at 4:16 p.m. inviting any and all to join me on a road trip to Arkansas for the BYU game. Here were the immediate responses:
Rick Davis- "Count me in!" (Email was sent 3 minutes after I sent my original email. I'm guessing his wife wasn't consulted.)
JJ Allen- "Don't even need to think about it. I'm in." (13 Minutes after original email)
Chris Hillman- "I'm in if there is a Waffle House in Fayetteville." (Email sent the next day. Probably saved his marriage by consulting with Julie first.) I'm guessing there is a Waffle House in Fayetteville, but there was for sure a Waffle House in Bentonville. More on that later.
Seth Perrins- "Maybe I might come, I think, or maybe not. We'll see. If I get around to it. Or something." (OK, not actually verbatim like the other responses) Spoiler: Seth didn't make the trip.
Commitments from Jamie, Spencer, and David came later and we were set. Tickets were secured via the Cougar Club. Flights were arranged and the literal countdown began.
One issue with the Tennessee trip was that it was pretty quick. We flew in on a Friday, went to the game on Saturday and flew home on Sunday. I wanted us to have a little more time together so I decided that I would fly into Dallas on Thursday before the game, rent a car and drive to Fayetteville (5.5 hour drive) on Friday. Go to the game on Saturday and fly home on Sunday. I propose this to the group. They have the option of flying into Fayetteville and meeting us at the game or flying into Dallas and driving in. Unsurprisingly everyone chose to fly into Dallas and drive to Arkansas. Chris Hillman offers to host the group on Thursday night at his home. We take him up on it.
For those of you on this Pickem that don't know Chris. Let me tell you a little bit about him. Chris is the City Manager of Irving, Texas. Irving is a suburb of Dallas. Back in the day it was the home of the Dallas Cowboys. A few years back Chris was an unrestricted free agent living in Surprise, Arizona. My numbers might be a little off, but Chris was offered a $10M signing bonus and an annual salary that would make a pro athlete blush to be the city manager of Irving. Think Shohei Ohtani type numbers (at least Adam Lenhard will get this reference). Chris's home was amazing. I think he's neighbors with Jerry Jones. We each had our own private room, bathroom, jacuzzi, butler, maid, and masseuse. And we were staying in the guest house. It's pretty much what you would think a Texas city manager would have. Right, Rick?
OK, maybe that was a slight exaggeration. I will say the Hillman's were awesome hosts. Chris had city council meeting the night we arrived, but Julie had everything arranged for us when we got there and even cooked us breakfast in the morning. If Chris's household is anything like mine, it was really Julie who did all the work to host us. I'm sure Julie will never read this, but kudos to her for being very welcoming.
Jamie and I were on the same flight coming in and Spencer landed about the same time we did coming from Portland. We all flew Delta to DFW. JJ, David and Rick came in a few hours later so we had time to go pick up our transportation for the trip. Which was a Ford Transit 12 passenger van. I searched and searched for something nicer but I didn't want to (A) Have the van cost more than the plane tickets and (B) Have us cram into a mini-van where three grown men had to share the back seat. So we settled with the Ford Transit van with some "experienced" seat coverings. But what do I care, I'm driving the whole time and my seat was just fine.
Snacks. Critical component of a road trip. However, I think half of these were eaten by me on the flight to Dallas.
After we snag the van we have a few hours to kill so we stop in Downtown Dallas to check out the JFK assassination spot. Kind of morbid but kind of interesting. There is an actual X painted on the road at the exact spot where JFK was shot. Just to the right less than 100 yards away was the grassy knoll. If you've ever seen the movie JFK it delves into numerous conspiracy theories on his assassination. If you can get through the 200 F bombs, it's actually a pretty interesting movie. Well, I think a couple of people at the site had watched the movie a too few many times. We were approached a couple of times with people trying to tell us that Lee Harvey Oswald didn't act alone. In my personal opinion, I don't think Oswald acted alone, but don't buy into the many conspiracy theories that the CIA, FBI, Fidel Castro, the Mob, the Republicans, the Avengers, and Barbie were all in on it. They had a JFK museum at the Dallas Book Depository where Oswald shot from. It was like $30. No thanks. I'll just watch the movie again.
After that we were on to Dallas Love Airport to pick up Rick, David and JJ, which I believe only services Southwest Airlines. It's for cheapskates. (No offense JJ, David or Rick) I'm not even sure if they have jetways or if they just open the door and throw you out of the airplane. Rick is first to arrive at 3:45 p.m. We get to the airport a few minutes early and realize that Rick had just barely got off the plane. With a tiny airport like Dallas Love I assumed that the exit from the plane to the front door was about 20 feet. Apparently it was a little longer than that so we circled the airport about, I don't know, 40 or 50 times. Finally we get Rick on board and we have to wait until 6:25 p.m. to pick up JJ and David. So we go find a place to park a mile or so away from the airport and sit and chat. Now that we have Rick with us there are plenty of things to chat about. Mostly from Rick. Which, if you know me, keeps me really entertained. We head back over to the airport and you would think we would have learned our lesson. We didn't. While waiting for JJ and David to get to the curb we do another 40-50 laps. Really for Rick's benefit. He missed out on the first round. Finally JJ and David are aboard and we're off to dinner.
If you've been on one of these trips then you know food is a big part of it. Hard 8 BBQ was recommended that evening for dinner and it didn't disappoint. We drove about 20 minutes out of our way to go to this place and it was worth it. Great start to the trip! BBQ in Texas. Check.
Ha! Just barely noticed the guy photo bombing us through the window.
As mentioned earlier we stayed at the Hillman house. We only stayed up till about 1:00 a.m. just to prep us for the rest of the trip. It was like re-living our college years all over again.
The next morning we have a nice breakfast and we're ready to go.
As we pull out of town we deem our first stop to be at Buc-ee's. If you are not familiar with Buc-ee's it is essentially a mega-convenience store. I am a lover of convenience stores. It drives my wife crazy whenever we travel. As Chris and Rick described Buc-ee's, it was clear that we needed to make a stop there. Even if we had to drive 20 minutes out of our way. I will say that Chris and Rick overhyped this place beyond imagination. And after I walked in I realized they completely undersold it. Convenience stores are about drinks and easy to access food. Bucc-ee's had that in spades. It had a bakery, 100 different jerky flavors, breakfast burritos, brisket tacos, brisket sandwiches, and probably about 30 other things that I can't remember. It had about 10 different drink stations. It had these things called Beaver Nuggets. They have the same addictive qualities as crack cocaine. They even had all sorts of shopping which I didn't even look at. I was too enamored with all the food. It made me jealous that we don't have these in Utah. Time to ramp up economic development in Pleasant Grove.
So with a full gas tank and full bellies, we set off for Arkansas. I can't stress enough how much I love road trips. I love to drive. It's even better when it's with people that you like and want to be around. Our group has commonalities so it wasn't hard to come up with discussion topics. We purposely decided to focus on the positive aspects of working in city government. We talked about our favorite council members and Mayors. We talked about our greatest achievements in city government. I mean, seriously, we do some awesome things and it's hard to talk about it without making it sound like you're bragging. Because we were in a safe space, we allowed ourselves to talk about some of the good things we've done. If there was anybody in the world that was going to 'get it' it was the people in this van. This was my favorite part of the road part of the trip. We also talked about our most favorite vacation we've ever been on. We all felt pretty good about ourselves until Chris took his turn. That guy has done some amazing stuff. He's a guy you want to hang with. I'm just sayin'. We discussed our favorite BYU game we ever attended as well as the worst one we attended. We also talked about our favorite Temari Pickem member. Can't really remember Dixon being brought up. OK, cheap shot at Matt. We didn't talk about that. But I'd be curious how that conversation would have went if we did.
Rick was anxious to move to the next phase which is our worst council member. In a stab at keeping positive we decided that we would broach that subject on the way home and only if BYU lost. If they won, then we wouldn't discuss it. We were all making plans to have this discussion on the way home. However we did talk a little college football. The University of Utah even came up in discussion. I suggested that there were a few positive things to come out of the U including guys like Britain Covey. As I made the comment, I glance at Rick and I see fire in his eyes, steam coming out his ears and his fists balled up. I thought he was going to punch me. I have to say, the U of U, Rick's not a fan. Neither is Chris for that matter. We let these guys take a few minutes to vent their frustrations. Chris tells us a story of his 2008 Rice Eccles experience. His disdain for the Utes is justified. I was at that same game and it was my worst college football experience. And I've been to Laramie a few times. Regradless, we didn't have Mark, Gary, Cory F., Tom S., Cameron, Kyler B., Owen, or whatever closet Utes we have on the Pickem to defend the Utes honor. Maybe next time.
We make our way across Texas and then into Oklahoma. A couple of us got to cross Oklahoma off the list of states that we have visited. We then venture into Arkansas and grab a bite to eat in Ft. Smith. We stop and eat at Ed Walker's Drive-In. I love places like this. Standard drive-in fair. Burgers and fries. And probably the smallest restroom I've ever used. I think it was 3' X 3' and that's probably being generous. The area we ate was decked out in Coca Cola signs and Arkansas Razorback stuff. I thought Ft. Smith was a quaint little town until we saw a sign that said it was around 90,000 people. I think we drove through the rundown, old part of town. I guess we didn't take the time to explore the area.
Now we're off to Fayetteville or, really, Bentonville as that was where we were staying. We roll into town and check into the posh Springhill Suites. We have three rooms. Two rooms have two people and one room has three. David, by virtue of being the youngest, gets the trundle bed. He's young, his back can take it. We quickly head back out to look for a place to eat. Downtown Bentonville was pretty cool. It had a town square like you would see on Back to the Future. Surrounding the town square were a ton of restaurants. We eat at some fancy, schmancy Italian place. I wasn't hungry after already consuming 5,000 calories for the day, but I don't let that stop me from getting a pizza. Hey, you go on a trip like this and sometimes you have to make sacrifices.
The next morning is game day and we see some folks in BYU gear. Apparently there were going to be a decent amount of BYU fans at the game so it wasn't surprising. We learn on the trip down that Rick has an interview with a General Authority via Zoom that morning. His stake is getting a new Stake President the next day and Rick was one of the interviewees. This lead to many questions we had for Rick. "Rick, what happens if you're issued the call and you're 500 miles from home? Will you need to head home? How are you getting there?" To which Rick replies, "I don't think we're going to have to worry about that." We did joke about "helping" him out in his interviews by having Chris (his roomie for the trip) come out of the shower in a towel and walk behind Rick during Rick's Zoom interview. Even better, we thought it would be a nice touch if Chris gave Rick a little peck on the cheek. Well, I'm not sure exactly what happened during the interview but let's just say that Rick isn't President Davis at this given moment.
Before we head into Fayetteville for the game we take a quick trip over to the new Bentonville Temple. It was being dedicated the next day by Elder Bednar who spent a few years of his life in that area. In fact, word on the street is that Elder Bednar attended the football game as well and was rooting for Arkansas. For shame.
Apparently, JJ didn't get the Royal Blue memo. And David's wearing pants. What a rookie.
At this point it's around 11:00 a.m. and it's about a 20 minute drive to Fayetteville. Game time is 6:30 p.m. so we better get going. You never know what could happen on that drive. Those that have been around me in these situations understand that I might get slightly anal. I take pretty much zero chances to miss the game. So by leaving at 11:00 a.m. to drive 20 minutes for a 6:30 p.m. kickoff, in my mind, we were running behind schedule. We pull into town and try to find a parking spot. Because we're 7 hours early we are able to park at the LDS Institute. Because we're all card carrying members, we feel ownership in this building and we walk right in like we own the place. There's a student working on his computer in one of the rooms. They have a library with some nice soft couches so we park ourselves there for about 30 minutes. We weren't invited and I'm not sure we were even welcomed and we definitely didn't bother asking, but for that moment, it was BYU territory for a small portion of the day. We swap stories and eventually end up discussing the 'Boom goes the dynamite' viral clip from the worst sportscaster of all time. It's a classic. It's four minutes long, but trust me on this, it's worth your time.
We're now officially on campus and we figured we check things out. Now the next part of this story was the funniest of the trip. Well, for 6 of the 7 of us. We head to the student center and get a snack and a drink. They have some couches (yes, as a group, we like couches) that has a big screen TV. They are showing a college football game and we have time to kill. Jamie decides he needs to charge his phone and they have one of those phone charging stations that you put your phone in, close the door, put in a code, and then re-put in said code when you're ready to get your phone to leave. The first three steps for Jamie worked swimmingly. The last step proved to be a challenge. Jamie enters the code and it doesn't open. He enters it another 50 times and it still doesn't open. I'm sure he went through every four digit pin code he's had in his life hoping that one of them works. None of them do. So now what? We have like 5 hours to crack the code or Jamie is going to have to decide between a phone and a football game. The rest of us had already made our decision. Go Cougs!
Jamie gets a hold of a student that is manning the welcome desk. She has some special code that is supposed to override the system. It doesn't work either. Jamie looks hopeless. I mean, what are you supposed to do in this situation? I don't know if he contemplated taking this thing outside and smashing it to the ground, but I'm guessing the thought crossed his mind. Next step was to get a hold of a maintenance guy. Welcome Desk Girl tries to track one down, but none of them are answering. One finally answers but he can't be there for another hour. Finally a guy shows up and takes a look. His solution is to take the thing apart. He starts taking off the back of the box. I'm thinking, "It can't be that easy. Anyone could say they left their phone in there, call a maintenance man, have him take off the back of the box, and Voila!, you have a new phone." Well, it works. The back comes off and Jamie gets his phone. Crisis averted.
Here's the photo before the maintenance guy arrives. The look on Jamie's face says it all.
I can't remember who took this photo, it was Chris or Rick. They show me the photo and say,
"This photo will be funny in 3 months." It's been three months.
You can see Jamie has the "Bro, can I give you a hug?" look
Well after a grueling hour or so of having a friend that has a phone locked away, it took a lot out of us. The only way to solve that problem was to eat more food. We locate a Torchy's Taco just off campus and decide to partake since they don't have those in Utah. Until now. I think Lehi is getting one and rumor has it (started by me) that they are looking at PG as well. It was a tasty meal. Because we're from Utah we head to the ice cream place next door for some dessert. We've got to carbo load since we have a big football game coming up in a couple of hours.
We head back on campus and decide to walk through the tailgate area. When we made the Tennessee trip, the tailgate was one of the highlights. People at the Tennessee tailgate were super friendly, we were offered lots of food and even offered some alcohol via jello shots. Rick was the only one that thought the jello shots were a good idea. Arkansas fans were nearly of the same ilk. We had one guy telling us to come and have a beer. His buddy then says, "You're wasting your time. These guys don't drink." He was correct. I only heard one derogatory comment regarding Joseph Smith, but other than that they were friendly folks. We stopped to snap a photo of the Razorback.
I'll let you fine folks caption this photo
Here's Rick desecrating a beloved Razorback
Alas, we head to the stadium. Apparently we came all this way for a football game, not a phone prison ordeal. The stadium was nice. It holds about 78,000. If anyone ever goes to one of these games with me, they know we need to be within sight of the stadium at least three hours before kickoff. Mission accomplished.
We had a little time to kill before kickoff
You may or may not remember the actual game. Arkansas gets two quick touchdowns and is up 14-0 less than 4 minutes into the game. BYU responds with 3 touchdowns in a row to take a 7 point lead. Arkansas then reels off 17 points in a row to take a 10 point lead which BYU counters with 17 in a row capped off by a one-handed TD catch by Chase Roberts to win by 7. This game had a few emotional swings, but when the game was over, it was euphoria.
There it is. The final score. Of note, the fine Arkansas folks never played a single replay of a play in which BYU did good. We had to go to Twitter to see what Chase Roberts' catch actually looked like.
Seven happy dudes. At this point the road trip was actually worth it. Notice how quickly the Arkansas fans peeled out of there. Same thing happened at Tennessee.
Who knew that this very moment was the apex of the whole season.
So how do seven guys who traveled numerous miles by plane and by transit van celebrate a momentous victory of an SEC team on the road? WAFFLE HOUSE!!! As luck, or fate, would have it there was a Waffle House right next to our hotel. Literally right next door. Let me regale you with some upsides and downsides to Waffle House and probably more specifically, this Waffle House.
Upside
This Waffle House was brand new. I think it had been open for about two weeks.
Downside
It was still a Waffle House.
Upside
It was open.
Downside
The menu was the same as other Waffle Houses.
Upside
It was a 60 second walk from our hotel.
Downside
It was way too close.
Upside
There were only a few people ahead of us in line.
Downside
The place seats like 10 people and we had to wait an hour just to be seated.
Upside
The food is relatively cheap.
Downside
I would like to say that you get what you pay for, but that would be a stretch.
Upside
Food was eaten and stomachs were full.
Downside
It was 1:30 a.m. and we had a 6:00 a.m. wake up call.
Perfect ending to a perfect trip
The rest of the story was uneventful. I got about 3 hours of sleep before I had to drive 6 hours back to Dallas. Fueled by Mountain Dew, I stayed awake most of the trip home. I might have dosed here and there, but nothing that put us in danger. :-)
Yes, Rick was disappointed that he didn't get to talk about his least favorite council member or members. I think Rick has a list of like 20 of them. But because BYU had won we stuck with our commitment.
What a great trip! I'm sure we'll do another one in the future. I send this out so you can all see what you missed out on. One day Seth will quit hemming and hawing and actually join us. All of you are welcome to. As you can tell by what you just read, you can't miss these opportunities. Life is too short. Just don't put your phone in the charging box.
posted by Scott's Blog at Friday, January 05, 2024
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