Thursday April 15, 1999

Day One 4:00 p.m. Chapter one of the HH Nitro '99 Tour is complete. While the beautiful people do this on a laptop, your humble HH servant does it on a ten cent note pad with a pencil. It's note-taking time in a hot, stuffy, expensive bar inside Seatac Airport.

Outside it's like summer as the mercury bubbles well over the 70 degree mark and the barometric pressure is the highest ever recorded here in April. I have not checked the Boise weather, but if it's even close to this it will be a fine weekend.

On my way here I make a detour to the Fremont area of Seattle for a long overdue visit to Jim Sorenson of Mysterion Screenprint. Now GO HERE then come back.

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Back in the bar I dream of that long-awaited Powerbook, jot down this last line and watch an L1011 thunder down the tarmac. Next stop Boise Idaho.

11:00 p.m. OH MY GAWD...what a day this has been! I'm sitting here in the Holiday Inn Boise Airport, WCW is on the 20" Phillips, my tummy is full of nice Idaho grade A, and man...where do I start? How about walking down the isle of the jet and being seated right next to...

oh my...ESPN, Midnight. I will remember like Kennedy where I was the instant I learned Gretzky has retired. "The most significant person in the most significant sport in my home country". Love him or hate him the guy was the best.

...ok, ok now where was I? Right, so I'm stumbling down the isle looking up at the row numbers, find it look down and who is my lovely traveling companion? How about Bob Hafner. He can't believe it as can I, then I realize I am surrounded by Team Giuliani. Needless to say it was a fun flight!

It's a beautiful clear evening as we wing our way southeast and set our watches ahead one hour. Then about nine minutes after takeoff Leo Grocock points out my first view of Firebird Raceway from a couple thousand feet up and a few miles north. It's a beautiful sight as I look down and realize my camera is wedged tight under the seat in front of me. Then the city begins to appear below and it becomes obvious just how spread out this city of 150,000 is.

Off the plane and to the place all passengers hope they never have to visit, the baggage claim desk. I'm missing a little something. Carlson arrives directly from the track and shakes his head. Then the girl tells me she has my bag behind the counter. Seems you CAN get to the airport too early.

"We ran late tonight" says Rich referring to the free Test and Tune day all pre-registered competitors received. He has a few other stories as well. There are at least eight A Stockers here, Fords, Chevys and Mopars from all over the country. We may see some records...in fact we did. Melanie Troxel's 255mph practice run set the track record for speed then was quickly followed by a 500 foot off-the-end-of-the-track excursion when the chutes got caught up in the wheelie bar. This demolished the old, old record of 300 feet off the end set by Terry Capp many moons ago. Thankfully there is a massive smooth grass field out there and neither car nor driver suffered any injuries.

Our dinner this evening was at a place called Quinn's just up Vista from our hotel. The place looked deserted from the front, but as we walk in who do we run into? That Giuliani crew again! I tell them good things happen in threes and I will see them again LATE Sunday. Also inside was Nick Drzayich, Craig Blood and their respective families along with Langley 'Poison Dart' boyz. It was a fun time with your webdude sampling a number of Idaho's finest brews. Finally back into the hotel parking lot and we nearly run over Gord, Frank Nelson Jr. and Stevie Wong. I get a big hug, and only later do I learn where these guys, along with some others, were tonite...that hug was maybe not a smart move Pfister...

...but that will have to wait for the next chapter tomorrow, when we will feature the A Stock battle of the decade and more record runs than any strip in Division six has ever seen.