Royal's home opener 2009

This year's home opener has already come and gone. Friday, April 10th was not only Good Friday but also the opening day for the Kansas City Royals. Every year one of our dear friends has access to a handful of tickets to opening day that includes a pre-game party, T-shirt and a ticket to a future Royals' game. This year a handful of tickets were reserved for fellow Cerner peeps and friends.

Bill, Scott, Bryan, Julie and Sarah "Cerner Peeps"

Last year, the weather was cold and rainy and unfortunately, it looked like we were in for more of the same as it was 44 degrees at 9am and raining pretty hard. Mother nature did her thing and by noon the sun was out and it was a balmy 50ish degrees out. About a 100 people gathered for the pre-game festivities and the game itself was sold out.

Bill and Traci

Matt and Amy Sims

Matt "double fisting"

Joy and Chuck

Julie and John Stoner - Yes, it is a Snuggy

Over the off season, the stadium underwent some significant upgrades and changes. Two major changes that were "supposed to" make a huge impact were more concession stands and a higher ratio of toilets per person. Either the area we sat in had LOTS of people or the stadium failed in their efforts. I spent about 3 innings waiting for the bathroom, they ran out of Miller Light and I didn't even attempt to get nachos as the line was TOO LONG at the only concession stand that sold them.

Statue of Royalty??

The Royals just came off a winning road trip and I was feeling pretty confident about taking on the Yankees and coming out victorious. The National Anthem was played by a jazz player on the saxophone and four A-10 Thunderbolts did a fly over.

A10 flyover

Regardless of the fact that we were in the nosebleed section, the view was incredible and we were one of the only sections that experienced sunshine for the entire game. The Royals ended up losing the game 1-4 and we ate way too many sunflower seeds and peanuts... My lips are still numb. Once the game was over, we sat on the tailgate of my truck and watched the mass exodus.

Bill, Matt, Amy and Traci

Someone has been working way too hard. ;-)

I hope your Good Friday was as good as ours!

Bill and Traci

How do you define a friend?

The picture below was taken about 8 years ago at Magic Mountain in California. We were getting ready to go into the park for a day of roller coaster madness when the camera people stopped us to take this picture. I purchased the picture later that day as it was one of the best times I had had in a while. I screamed like a girl the entire day. :-)

Me, Mike and Patrick McQueen

This picture has had a place on the top of my desk through all those years. It made the move from Tustin to Tucson and now with me in Kansas City. The other day I was looking at it and realized that I had a fanny pack on... funny, I didn't remember ever wearing one of them back in the day. ;-) So I asked Patrick, the guy in flip-flops, if he noticed that I wore a fanny pack. He laughed so hard and said "yeah man, I remember that fanny pack". I asked him why he never said anything to me or gave me crap and he said "that was just you".

So to answer my question: A friend is someone who will hang out with you regardless of how dorky you look. :-)

I hope you find and stay in touch with your true friends!

Bill

Oh boy

A while back the company I work for asked me to do a recruiting interview. The taping was to take place in a part of town known for its cool shops, fancy restaurants and basically a nice place to spend the day walking around, The Country Club Plaza.

As most of you know, I do not fair well in high heat and humidity. As luck would have it, the day of the interview the temperature was warm and the humidity level was just enough to suck the moisture out of my body.

The interview was 30+ minutes of them asking questions and me answering them with little to no thought behind what I was going to say. I am usually not short on words; however, with a two cameras in my face I found it difficult to remember my name.

About a month later, I received an email letting me know that the recruiting video had been edited and I could view it. I was pleased to see that they only used about 5 seconds of my entire interview. I think I said something like, "The Chief, Royals, blah blah blah.... :-)

This past weekend I took a recruiting trip to Arizona and made the most shocking discovery. The remaining portion of the interview was used and put on the Cerner recruiting site for all the world to see.

If you go to the link below and click on "Campus Candidates", you will go to a new page that has 5 silhouettes. Hover until you find me and click to enjoy my sweating story.

http://www.cernercareers.com/

Take care and I hope your surprises are a big as mine!!

Bill