Picto Diary - 18 to 20 March 2025 - March Madness at Sea

Above: Biltmore Hotel, Coral Gables, FL. 18 March 2025.

Start of transatlantic cruise to Barcelona and a 10-day road trip in Spain. Time relaxing at sea is expected to facilitate recovery of my cracked ribs suffered in a ski accident earlier this month.

Above: Brickell Key. Miami, Florida. 19 March 2025
Image from Regent Grandeur docked at Miami Cruise Port.

Fleeting stay in Miami this time after twelve years of living here. 86-89; 91-99.

1994: Lunch at Joe's Stone Crab with Miami philanthropist, Shepard Broad. "Steve, they ought to erect a statue in Bayfront Park to the man most responsible for Miami's extraordinary success." "Who's that, Shepard?" I asked. Shepard replied, "Fidel Castro."

The incredible, Castro fleeing, Cuban diaspora...ignites the morph of Miami from a sleepy southern town (Miahmuh) to the creation of one of America's, and the world's, great cities.

I loved living in Miami for its aspirational bent. Miami drive is a reflection of many other US past immigration successes and current ones too. The Indian diaspora and Elon Musk come to mind. Ongoing immigration of talented and aspiring people is essential to America's ongoing progress.

Above: Miami Harbor. 19 March 2025.

Bridge to Key Biscayne (left). Brickell Key (right). TIMDT and Mwah (sic) stayed in an apartment on Brickell Key for two months in 1986 pending move to new home in Coral Gables. Now chock a block with skyscrapers, then Brickell Key had only three or four buildings. Image is from our dinner table at Sette Mari restaurant on new Regent cruise liner Grandeur.

Above: Great Stirrup Cay Bahamas. 20 March 2025.

Above: Our Regent Grandeur cabin. 20 March 2025.
At sea.

Above: Regent Cruise ship Grandeur. March Madness. Essential activity on a transatlantic cruise. BYU beats VCU. 20 March 2025.

SDT a BYU fair weather fan. And, today, with a March Madness BYU victory over VCU, the weather was fair.

I don't usually engage in puffery, but many BYU fans will recall the key role I played in building BYU's basketball program into the powerhouse it has become today. I was a scholarship player on BYU's freshman team during the 1968/69 basketball season. I played from the bench... eight minutes a game and averaged four points a game. Former BYU basketball coach Roger Reid was on the BYU 1968/69 freshman team and later a starter for BYU's varsity basketball program. But any contribution Reid made to BYU's basketball program paled into insignificance relative to the lasting impact I had in setting the future direction for the BYU basketball program. The key was this. Coming from left to right, I had an awe-inspiring jump shot from the top of the key. My BYU freshman team coach, former BYU great, Gary Earnest, while shaking his head derisively, famously commented on that shot, made on the home floor of the BYU Fieldhouse, against the Utah State University freshman team: "That damn Taylor. That shot is the only thing he can do."