Our day at the races

The Derby, itself, and getting dressed up was fun. Santa Anita Park charges $6-8 dollars for parking, depending on where you park your car on their huge lot, and about $5 to actually get into the park and watch the horse’s race. We paid $30 each ($90 total). Why, you may be wondering? Well, because the event that we attended, which was situated along the far north side of the park, was for a warm-hearted fundraiser for inner city youth J and I love to give back to inner city, underprivileged youth. However, this felt more like a cold hearted snake © Paula Abdul, than a warm and fuzzy fundraiser, and not because the sun was overcast by gray clouds that were threatening rain.

We were optimistic at first, figuring that, if nothing else, we could walk over to the other side, bet on the ponies and have a good show, which is what we ended up doing after a while.

The guy sitting at the will-call table when we arrived was very friendly, seemed down to earth, and was quite attractive. He kept saying that he was the fundraising-host’s brother, which made me think he must be terribly proud of his big bro. How sweet. And since he was so nice to me, I asked him his name and he told me “Smiley Guy” (alias, of course) I made a mental note to ask the guy (the DJ) who’d invited us about him. After we’d picked up our tickets at will-call from Smiley Guy, we walked through the tunnel and on around to gate 6 where none of the action was, and found our venue. The blonde girl, who worked for the park and took our tickets, was very friendly as well, so I remained in pretty good spirits. That is, until I walked over to an older black lady wearing a ridiculous chef’s hat and said to her “Hi! What are you cooking up over here?” to which she replied dryly “The free food is over there,” pointing to a table full of crap.

I repeated myself, saying “That’s fine. But what are YOU COOKING OVER HERE?”

And she says “Hot links but they cost money.”

What the hell? I was insulted but then I realized that people with no class are everywhere and we just have to deal with them. Anyway, we brought our lunch, so we found a vacant table and began to dig in. None of us wanted what they were offering for free.

About 20 minutes later, Keisha and I decided to go place our bets on a horse with a cool name. I was torn between “Leaving New York”, “King Red”, and “Sensational News”. Keisha put her entire $5 on Sensational News, which made me think “okay, I’ll forgo Leaving New York, and put $2 on King Red, and $3 on Sensational News. Maybe she was on to something. And for most of the race, Sensational News was #2 and gaining on #1. Leaving New York was nowhere to be found! Then, all of a sudden, just as the pack of horses was about to finish the race, Leaving New York came up from the rear and won the whole thing! Seemingly from out of nowhere, and he took the gold cup! I couldn’t believe it. It made me wonder if the races were fixed so that the house always wins. It wouldn’t be a stretch of the imagination. That’s how it’s done in casinos. So, rather than ripping our tickets in half and throwing them on the ground when you leave, as is traditionally done, we kept them as souvenirs. That part of the day, betting on ponies, I truly enjoyed. Some of the people there for just the races, not the fundraiser, were very nice and kept complimenting us on our hats and outfits. Next time we’ll sit among the friendly folks.

There were many fine, traditional derby hats at the fundraiser. Some were more for Easter Sunday at church, which is okay, but most were appropriate for the Kentucky Derby. Everyone put forth a valiant effort to dress nice; however, many fell miserably short. One guy was dressed well from his neck to his waist – his jacket was too long, his pants were too long and they fell in pools over his shoes. A lady in a peach colored, form-fitting halter dress had on inappropriate undergarments – a thong and an ill fitting bra, no body smoother. And boy was her butt dimply. You could see the outline of her thong, which was tacky. And, as it turns out, she was the only nice woman we spoke to the whole day. I complimented a portly lady on her black and white hat and asked her if I could take her picture. She rolled her eyes at me, never said “thank you” for my compliment, and snarled out “I don’t like having my picture taken.” So I asked if I could just take a picture of the back of the hat then, since that’s all I really wanted, anyway. She rolled her bubble eyes some more and turned and placed her order with the bar tender while I snapped the picture in the post below this one. I tried making small talk with the table next to us and they acted as if I wasn't even there. We had obviously intruded on a college reunion soiree with clique’s and in-crowds, and not a fundraiser for children. Not once did the host of the event make his rounds to say hello and thank people for coming out and spending $30 when we could've just spent $5 and gotten better seats. If he did, he missed us. I didn't even know what he looked like until I got home and saw a picture of him taken at the event online . The photographers went around interviewing particular people and snapping their pictures, but none of them were smiling even slightly. It was the surliest fundraiser I’d ever been too, so guess where I kept my wallet? Locked up tightly in my purse! There was no announcement, no Master of Ceremonies explaining where the proceeds of the event would be going (I only knew because I Googled it before we got there), just a horribly off-key guy singing old soulful music with a lot of passion.

I did remember to ask the guy who’d invited us about Smiley Guy, though. I just asked him if he knew whether Smiley Guy had a girlfriend or was seeing someone. He said, and I quote:

“I think so…I mean, I think he USED to have a girlfriend…but everyone used to, huh? Lol. He’s younger than me, though, only 25.”

“That’s fine,” I said. So he told me he’d find out and get back to me, although he thought smiley guy might be moving to San Diego for a new job soon.

I never heard back from the DJ guy about it so I figured it was a no-go. It would have been nice to get an update, though.

We left the event about 30 minutes before it was scheduled to end and on our way out, I heard someone announce that they would be having a best hat contest. So more than 5 hours later, they decided to start the festivities.

The Derby really could have been a true success had they organized things better. The idea had loads of potential and I just might suggest it to the PTA leader at my son’s high school. Ah well. So a portion of my hard earned dollars will continue to support the kids in my own neighborhood who I know quite well. My son throws a get-together about twice a month and yours truly buys the pizza, drinks, burgers, and games that keep them off the streets.