Well folks...
As you know I travel a lot for SatelliteGuys, and I got to admit, this is the first trip I can remember going home feeling happy and satisfied about where we just left. On this visit I feel we touched a number of peoples lives, and they touched ours as well.
Last night its difficult to explain the night other than magical. As I sit here in the Bishop International Airport in Flint I am still riding the high of the entire week.
First off I want to thank SatelliteGuys member "Radio" otherwise know as Jim Carlyle of WION Radio for having us and bring our host for the 4 days we are here. He made us feel like royalty while we were here... but to make things more special the entire town of Ionia, Michigan made of feel welcome. It was amazing and we saw some amazing things and were giving access to some sites and things that nobody else ever gets to see... and they were excited to have us. It was so fun going down Main Street and going into the local shops and doing some shopping, we got great deals but in a few cases made some good friends who we will be doing business with again going forward. Jim enjoyed taking our members on tours of his radio station, and he also loved coming on the tours of the town with us, he actually saw sites and places that he was never able to see before. I think that our visit was as much of a vacation for him as it was for us.
We had the McCord's give us tours of Ionias Historical landmarks and they enjoyed giving them to us as much as we enjoyed going on them. Its hard to explain how happy it made me to see the joy in their faces as they almost never get to show visitors these hidden treasures that Ionia holds.
Everyone also took my wife under their wing and showed her a great time, and on the day of her birthday showed up with cards and gifts. I don't know how my wife felt but I was amazed and humbled by the kindness shown by these people we just met.
Then there was Rich Thompson the owner of the Lamplight Grill, which for this trip was our home away from home. Not only was his food at his restaurant great, but Rich went out of his way to make us feel welcome, including getting my wife a delicious chocolate birthday cake to help celebrate her birthday. Everyone who attended out get together last night all mentioned what a perfect spot it was to hold our event. If you are ever going to or driving through Ionia please do yourself a favor and visit the Lamplight Grill.
We got a amazing all access tour of the Historic Ionia Theater by Amy, and she was so happy to show things off and was able to answer all of my geeky questions I threw her way. She loves the theater and loves the town and it shows. For a theater of its age I have never seen one as modern and clean inside. It was interesting to see how the received the digital movies and how they transferred those movies to their projectors.
Another place you should visit when coming to the area is Danny Boy's Drive In. Unannounced we surprised Bart the owner of Danny Boys Drive by just showing up to his drive in, in the middle of the day and he was just ecstatic to have us there and gave us a deluxe tour of everything that Danny Boy's offers. (I even got to wear the mascot head as you see in WallyHTS's photo above) Now Danny Boy's is not just a drive in theater is it so much more, Danny Boy's does things before movie time that will make memories for kids and adult alike that they will remember for years. Please if you are in the area go check it out, you will not be disappointed. Make sure to check out the bathrooms!
Thank you to everyone who traveled to our event, we had people from as far away as Kentucky and Chicago drive to our event, and I honestly believe all of them went home last night as happy as we were. Everyone who came last night went away with a armful of goodies. I was also happy when we were doing our raffles that Scott Beeman was the winner of the FTA System donated to us by SatelliteAV. Scott is the engineer for WION radio and the entire time we were there he was talking about how much he wanted to get into FTA but didn't have the resources to do so... well now that's not a problem for him. He was so happy when his ticket was picked out of the basket!
The 4 days went quick, but we are now going home happy, we not only made a lot of people happy by having us in their town and shopping in their town, but we made some new friends.
We didn't talk about them much here, but I want to say a quick hi and thank you to some other people that I didn't have time to write about here. I could tell you great stories about each one of them and appreciate their kindness and friendship they have shown, these people include, Vicky and her husband, Dan and his wife Bonnie, Phil, Devin, Leftlane, Jason, Claude, Dave, the other Dave and his wife. (A reminder to all those we met... watch out for Channel 2... its a doozy!) (You had to be there!)
Again thank you to everyone who made us feel welcome and to everyone who joined us for the magical night last night, I truly hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.
I will be posting picture later today or tomorrow after we get home as the camera is in our checked baggage.
And now with that.. I think REO Speedwagon sang it best... "It's time for me to Fly!" Thank you Ionia, Michigan!
