The trip into irony
I just got back from a fun and often wacky weekend in Myrtle Beach for the NAQT High School National Championship Tournament. I usually try to avoid high school competitions primarily because there’s a lot more tension during game play, usually coming from coaches, and I’d rather not deal with that if possible. But it was hard to pass up a free trip to Myrtle Beach and a chance to hang out with a bunch of my friends.

No, they weren’t used as floatation devices
The trip gave me a good excuse to fly Hooters Air. Its price was competitive with AirTran and Delta, so that helped seal the deal.

First off, the company will struggle to make money for a while if my flight was any indication. There was no one sitting behind me on the flight. I was in row 11. There are 20 rows on the 737. And the flight overall had to be about 30-40% full, not a good sign since there’s just one flight from Atlanta to Myrtle Beach and vice versa. Also, at Hartsfield, the airline used a Delta gate and other Delta employees, so it’s a bit hard to find.

The passengers were the standard mix of people you might expect on this route: a bunch of golfers, people of all ages going to the beach, etc. However, I did see a couple of women who might’ve been scouting their chances at getting that treasured role as the flight’s Hooters Girls.

Yes, there are two of them on the flight. They were exactly what you might think they were: blonde, young and vapid. However, they didn’t have the restaurant gear on; instead, they were wearing bright orange jogging suits that could’ve come from the Al Sharpton collection. They made their presence known at takeoff and then again toward the end of the flight, asking a couple of trivia questions and collecting surveys, plus giving away gift cards. That was the real Hooters presence on board. Otherwise, there were a bunch of real flight attendants on board (too many considering how few passengers there were) , including a one who put the Hooters girls to shame.

As for other basics, there is just one class of service, but all of the seats were leather seats, and there was a little extra leg room. Also surprising for an hour-long flight was getting actual hot food, albeit just a sausage and cheese biscuit, but it’s more than what you’d get on other similar flights. However, there were no wings or wood paneling inside the plane. All in all, Hooters Air was a decent experience, but not anything over the top.

Still missing the cut
Good news, I shot an 81 over 18 holes when I got into town. Bad news, it was a par-3 course. Still, it was fun to play and get it out of my system.

It must be an Arby’s night
One half of minor-league sports weekend involved watching this game between the Myrtle Beach Pelicans and the Frederick Keys. The game itself was pretty sloppy – we left after the 10th inning when the Pelicans couldn’t score a run despite having the bases loaded and no outs.

It was fun soaking up the atmosphere of the park, which was just down the street from our hotel. It was a cozy park, with all of the nice amenities/goofiness of a minor-league park. There was a crab race, like Milwaukee’s sausage race. There were cutesy team mascots. There were silly contests like crawling blindfolded to get money and human hamster balls. But the stuff that caught my attention was tying player performances to free food.

One promotion had fans winning a free Arby’s roast beef sandwich if a designated Pelicans player got an RBI. Thankfully, they picked out Andy Marte, one of the Braves’ top prospects. He can hit the ball, but he’s amazingly slow. He came through with his RBIs and thus free Arby’s, which became lunch Saturday.

On the other hand, there was also a K-man promotion, where fans got free cheese fries at a local bar if a designated guy on the other team struck out. I felt really sorry for the kid because you know he’s probably scuffling and holding out hopes of making it to the majors some day. Instead, you’ve got the crowd cheering not just for a strikeout but chanting “Cheese Fries” when he gets two strikes. Alas, no cheese fries.

Oh yeah, matches
I was impressed by how good many of these players were this weekend, but it made sense since this is a national tournament. Plus, I can also read these questions and have a small sense of knowing what I’m reading. It was interesting having a couple of competitors remember me when I read at Emory’s HS tournament last fall. I also ran into a guy who interviewed with me for admission into Northwestern.

I think I read pretty well, and my rookie scorekeeper got the hang of it over time, even though our game room was pretty much a closet – I called it a phone booth, another team called it Milton’s office. The tournament needed to use every possible room for matches. That included the empty office that was my room, a handful of boxes overlooking giant exhibition halls, the exhibition halls themselves, a pantry and even the ticket office.

I’m not a big fan of power matching the way it was done this weekend, because it seemed to slow up things a bit too much. But whatever works for them. And the fire alarm before the last round of the day was also amusing, but just added to much of our aggravation. Still, I think things were run reasonably well. Thankfully, it didn’t cut too much into NIFL time (which will be detailed in another post).

I ended up not reading any playoffs, which may have been a good thing since I wouldn’t have to deal with even more tension from players and coaches. Then again, some of the other readers were solid as well. Byko easily emptied out a packet with time remaining and was both loud and clear.

Hamburger -- $6.95
Cheeseburger -- $7.50
Nothing and like it -- $5.95
Brian and I made a trip to the second branch of the Murray Bros. Caddyshack restaurant. The food was decent, but otherwise, it was just a golf theme restaurant. There was a display case of Caddyshack stuff, but that was about it for the movie. I was hoping the menu would’ve included more lines/references to the movie. Alas, nothing gopher-related, nor any Baby Ruth-based deserts.