Amarillo hospitality

Tuesday was full of the generous hospitality that makes Amarillo a wonderful place.

When planning the visit from the Panorama staff, I made a few calls to arrange tours of key places and meetings with some key people in our community. Everyone has been great in helping our visitors learn more about Amarillo.

Tuesday included a tour of the American Quarter Horse Association Museum and offices. And the tour was given by Gary Carpenter, the museum's executive director, and Don Treadway, AQHA executive vice president. If you haven't visited the newly renovated museum, you should do that soon. It's very well done.

They also presented the group with an autographed, coffee table book called "The Texas Cowboy," which featured information and amazing photos about the cowboy lifestyle.

From there, we visited city hall and Mayor Debra McCartt, who spent nearly and hour with the Panorama staff. The session included a tour of the major's office where she talked about everything from her accuracy on the shooting range to meeting several U.S. presidents.

The photo below was taken in her office, and later in the city commission's conference room, Iluliia presented the major with a special gift from Ukraine. They were pleasantly surprised to find a woman elected official who still acted like ... well, a woman. In Ukraine, the women in politics seemed to be a little more masculine. The current prime minister of Ukraine - probably the equivalent to our speaker of the House - is a woman who is running for president.

From city hall we visited the Globe-News Center for the Performing Arts and finished the evening with dinner at the Amarillo Club.

I'm greatly appreciative of how much time many important Amarillo residents have taken to spend with my friends for Panorama. It's making a great impression on them and I know they appreciate it as well.