Five Least Popular Cities

I saw a list of the five least popular places to live in the country on the web today. These are all big cities that, despite the ability to get high paying jobs, people still are not willing to live in. The funny thing is as I clicked through and read about each city, I realized that I have lived or spent some significant time in all five and I completely agree that I would never move to any of them…EXCEPT for the number one least popular place to live. Here are the cities in reverse order:

5. Chicago – Yeah, no kidding. I lived there for 18 months and it was the longest 18 months of my life. People who took the survey said it was too cold – No Sh*t! They also complained it was not affordable. Affordable? They could give me a place there and I still wouldn’t live there. The winters are brutal and the summers are worse. It is a great place to visit, about three months out of the year.

4. New Orleans – I think this one really made the list because of Hurricane Katrina. Katrina has made the cities population shrink, the murder rate increase and caused tourism to suffer dramatically. But I have to tell you that I would not have lived there before the hurricane hit. Forget about the fact that I wont live anywhere where hurricanes hit on a semi-regular basis, the crime there is outrageous. During Mardi Gras tourists are warned not to go north of Bourbon St. as you might not come back. Living there would also require me to take a vacation every February as I don’t want to be around the city when the thousands of college kids show up to get drunk, throw up and pass out in the streets. And since I was there for Mardi Gras some years ago, I know what I am talking about.

3. Los Angeles – OK maybe it is because I am a “NCal Guy” which predisposes me to hate all that is SCal, but I would never live in LA. I lived in San Diego many years ago for about 12 months and absolutely loved it. However LA has not only encroached upon, but totally swallowed SD to the point where SD is nothing more than a suburb of LA these days. Who wants to live with the crowds, the traffic, and the smog. Not to mention that, if you have ever been in LA proper, you know it is a pit. I would not live there…not ever!

2. Detroit – LA’s reputation is fantastic in comparison to Detroit’s. The Mayor went to jail recently for lying in a sex scandal. Or is it laying…either way. I was there a few years ago and a local recommended a great Italian restaurant. The restaurant had been there forever, but the neighborhood it is in had disintegrated. The local told me not to worry about the neighborhood but to make sure I ate and left before it got dark. What a great city. Detroit’s reputation is that it is a dangerous city full of slums. And that was when the auto industry wasn’t about to fold up camp. What will become of that city when EVERYONE is out of work next year.

And the number on least popular city to live in…

1. New York City – Come on now! Are you kidding me? NYC is the best city in the world. Who wouldn’t want to live here, at least for a few years? Plenty of high paying jobs, Central Park, great public transportation and not to mention one of the best restaurant, bar, music and art scenes in the world. Sure you pay a lot to live in a shoebox, but we must all make sacrifices. Apparently most people think it is too expensive and there is too much crime. I don’t care, I would still live there - anytime.

Well that was the list. I guess getting 4 out 5 right isn’t bad. But they really missed the mark with NYC. There are a whole bunch of other cities I would never live in for sure. How about you? Would you live in any of these cities? Where wouldn’t you live?

Just Catching Up

So I haven’t written much lately. I am really not sure why, funny things happen to me all the time and I just don’t seem that motivated to write them down. Maybe I am just over blogging. Maybe it is because we have so many other quicker options for daily expression – Facebook, MySpace and Twitter come to mind. We really are a society built on convenience and it is so much simpler to just change your status on Facebook than it is to write a post on Blogger.

Overall life has been good – although my brother called me to let me know that my mom thought I sounded depressed on the phone the other day. Depressed? Moi? I am not sure I have ever truly been depressed, but I certainly have not been “blupressed” for a while. Don’t worry mom, my life is peachy. Most of the time I would say it has never been better. And my only real complaints are about work and the economy – like most people today.

Anyway, here are a few of my latest happenings and some thoughts of mine.

The Rose bought a newly used car. I like the new car, mainly because it is a convertible and I miss mine terribly. Unfortunately, we really won’t be able to enjoy the wind in our hair until spring. And yes I have hair, it is just really short. Speaking of her new car…

The Rose and I drove to Poughkeepsie last weekend for a wedding in her new ride. K’s brother got married and as I am an adopted part of their family, I scored an invitation. I would suggest that everyone who has Poughkeepsie on their list of places to see before they die, should really remove it. I think The Rose hit it on the head when she said that the town peaked in the 70’s. And although I applaud their recent efforts to bring it back, it really isn’t worth the trip. The drive up was very nice though as it is fall on the east coast and as a west coaster, I did not grow up with fall. On the west coast we tend to go straight from summer to why won’t is stop raining. It was nice to drive up through the mountains with all the fall colors. Oh, and the wedding was nice.

I also went north earlier this month for Sam’s first birthday. She is already getting big and the party was, well overdone, as I guess they should be. I am always amazed at the effort that parents put into the first birthday party since it is the one birthday the child is sure to never remember. Sam did seem to enjoy eating her birthday cake. Pictured below.


I am also looking forward to voting next week for a few reasons. First this is the first time I have lived in a state where my vote might actually mean something. I have always lived in a state where the winner was predetermined before the voting started. That always made presidential elections a little less exciting for me. I mean I lived in Texas when Bush was elected the first time. He was the Governor and although I knew he was an idiot, it wasn’t like he wasn’t going to carry Texas, so why vote? Now I live in one of the swing states and believe me, I long for the days of living with the predetermined. You have no idea how many ads and radio spots we have to endure in the swing states. It isn’t every day or every hour, it is every minute here. I am so over it. I mean really, are there people out there that are still undecided? What the hell are they waiting for? So the second reason I am happy to be voting next week, is that it will all be over.

I am also excited for my sister as she is starting a new business in January. This has been a long time coming and I truly hope that this works out for her.

There is also some exciting news about The Rose and me, but I will save that for my next post.

Fly USA

Warning: My socialistic tendencies will be showing themselves in this post.

I am seriously concerned about the state of the airline industry in this country. I flew to Key West over the Labor Day weekend and I experienced a delay on every flight. This included four flights over two different airlines. My flight never left on time nor did it ever arrive on time. And not one delay was due to weather, every delay was due to a technical malfunction with the plane. Doesn’t that make you feel comfortable when you are boarding a plane?

I was also reading in one of the airline magazines on the plane how the industry in general has formed a coalition to try and get the government to do something about the high price of gas. Apparently, 45% of your airline fare is just to cover the gas costs. This is up from 12% in 2001. Yeah, we really need to come up with an energy strategy in this country and I don’t think the answer is drilling for oil in Alaska or off shore. How about coming up with alternatives for electricity since fossil fuels are used to produce about 70% of the electricity used in the US. But I digress, that is a completely different rant.

Back to the airline industry. I don’t know how long many of you have been traveling, but I have been flying for a long time. And I can tell you that the airline industry has changed a lot over the years. I remember a time long ago when I missed a flight on American and they gave me a voucher on United to get home. That never happens today. There are fewer flights and much higher costs. United had only two flights all day on Monday from Miami to Dulles (Dulles is their hub for those of you not familiar). Two flights to a major hub all day. And both flights were oversold. So there weren’t even enough seats to accommodate all the passengers. Do you remember when there used to be open seats on a plane? Now airlines can’t afford to operate many flights so our travel schedule is at their mercy. Airlines are being killed by gas prices and competition amongst themselves.

Well, I have a solution. Why don’t we create a national airline? Why do we need so many airlines? Let’s have a single airline for the United States – many countries do this. It may seem a little counter intuitive, but fewer airlines could actually mean more flights. Think about it. There were 2 UA direct flights to DC from Miami on Monday, there were also 3 AA direct flights and those are just the ones I checked on. Who knows how many more there were. This is because each airline has to have a minimum number of flights to a location despite the demand. If there were just one airline, then they could manage the number of flights between locations based on demand. So the 12 total flights between Miami and DC could be reduced overall, but you could get on any of them. First benefit – fewer overall flights and more travel options for consumers.

They could also run the “USAirline” as a not for profit business. This is similar to how the government runs the commissary stores in the military. The stores are designed to break even. Therefore, they do not need to mark up their food as much as your typical grocery store. So a gallon of milk in the commissary is only $2.00 and not $4.00. The airline could operate in a similar manner. Make enough money to cover the cost of doing business and return anything over that as a surplus to the people. Next benefit – flights would be cheaper.

I believe there are certain industries that the government should manage as our society has gotten to a point where these industries might crumble under the pressure of capitalism. Transportation is definitely one of the industries that would benefit from a lack of competition and a little more regulation. You see, transportation is one area where we can’t afford to just let capitalism take its course and have airlines go out of business. We need to be able to travel across the US and not by horse and buggy.

If we can’t ensure that every American has health care in this country, can we at least make sure they can fly from Miami to Dulles on a holiday weekend?

Now I am sure that many of you immediately laughed at this idea. And I am sure you can come up with 100 reasons why we the government shouldn’t run the transportation industry in the US. But remember that you scoffed at this idea the next time your tax dollars are used to bail out an airline in bankruptcy. As a matter of fact, I would suggest that the next time an airline files bankruptcy, the government should step in and take over the company. Then they could systematically drive the other airlines out of business with lower prices, taking over each airline as they go. I don’t see how that would be anti-capitalistic…the US government would just become another competing airline…and maybe then the government would really care about the oil prices.

I am sure some of you are wondering how bad my travel was this weekend. Not to worry, my travel experience was not that harrowing. I missed a connecting flight in Miami and had to spend an extra day lounging on the beach at a Marriott Resort in South Beach while drinking pomegranate mojitos. I was also forced to have a really nice dinner at a Cuban restaurant. Yeah, I got it rough.

Just a couple of notes concerning this particular rant:

I have noticed over the years that whenever someone talks of concepts such as universal health care or national transportation, there are always a couple of reactions. First you will get people who will tell you why change is impossible. Don’t just let them tell you why we can’t change, ask them what they think we should do. Should we wait for the system to collapse on itself before we act? What can we do to fix the system today? Ask them to be solutions oriented and not just accept that change is impossible. I am not suggesting that a national airline would be perfect, but shouldn’t we develop a long term strategy before we can’t afford to fly anywhere.

And I would argue that for those people who can’t afford health care, universal health care WOULD be a perfect solution. Remember that just because the issue doesn’t affect you today, doesn’t mean it won’t someday. I mean I guess those of us that can afford health care are happy with the current system. That is until we get sick and can’t afford to pay our share of the medical bills and our health care gets cancelled. Then we may feel different about this issue.

Secondly, I would implore you to not fall prey to those people who use the media to spread fear about these issues. Don’t listen to those people who only want to tell you how your life will be ruined if we change. I can guarantee you that anyone who has the money to put together one of these campaigns of fear, does not have your best interest at heart. That is unless you are the CEO of a pharmaceutical or insurance company. I guess what I am really saying is do not let them condition you to automatically dismiss these ideas with their rhetoric. Changing these systems may be hard, but doing nothing will eventually be a lot worse. Maybe we can learn a lesson from the way we handled global warming. We stuck our head in the sand on that one and all we got was a sunburn on our ass.

Rant over.

My Weekend So Far

1. The flight was oversold by 31 passengers. That's right - 31. How do you do that? Don't get me started on the need for a national airline.

2. Lunch at the grandparents was great as always. Needless to say, plenty of food.

3. Big dinner with the family including lobster and steamers from up north. Oh did I forget the chicken, ribs, shrimp with dinner as well. You will never go hungry in Norwood.

4. Now we are visiting the home of the Gorton's Fisherman. Mom would be proud as there is a large Portuguese community here.

More to come if I don't get her shorts wet again.

Update on the weekend:

5. The Rose's aunt has a great house right on the beach. I enjoyed staying there and the beach is fantastic. The weather could have been better, but Sunday was beautiful.

6. The golf course in Gloucester was very nice. A little short for me, but I enjoyed playing. The drinks at the 19th hole were very strong - always a sign of a great country club. Thanks to her uncle for the invite.

7. I might have made my best golf swing of the season on the 14th hole. I was making this swing about 30% of the time last year, but throughout this season it seemed to have vanished. Who knows, maybe it is back.

8. It was fun running around Rockport on Sunday in the rain. But I still don't understand why a lobster sandwich costs $22.00. I guess I should be thankful, it was $29.00 in Nantucket.

9. Of course it wouldn't be a trip without some airline issues. We sat on the plane for 2 hours waiting to take off. Some sort of broken part issue. So we got home very late instead of in time for a good night's sleep.

Overall it was a great trip. I enjoy traveling with The Rose. She has a great family, so it is easy to visit them. Next trip will be Key West in a few weeks.

Island Life

You know how they say you never know someone until you spend a week with them on Nantucket? Well, I am sure someone says it. I have to tell you, it is so true. Let me tell you a few things that The Rose found out about me last week.

I am good for about two hours on the beach and then I am ready to go. I would be useless in a labyrinth. I won’t be going on a boat anytime soon. I am a good moped rider. I am willing to try any vodka – even habanera. I like ice cream. I am pretty good with an outdoor grill. There are limits to what I am willing to spend for things - $330.00 for sunglasses, get real! I have good friends and a very happy goddaughter. And the one thing I really hoped she learned this week is that I really care for her.

As for what I learned about her, well, she is a good fisherman. She would be very useful in a labyrinth. She also likes ice cream. She can cook anything and make it taste good. She is a trooper and will try to stick it out even if she should just say let’s go home. She can spend hours on the beach at a time. She is a good moped passenger. She thinks the Atlantic Ocean is cold. Believe me, these are all good things to know, since we have two more beach trips this summer planned.

As for Nantucket, I think we both agree that it was a good trip, but we would probably not choose to go back. Not that I have a problem with small, confining, overpriced islands filled with the over privileged. But I think you can have just as much fun getting a house at the beach on the cape itself. This would open up many day trip or excursion opportunities you can not get on the island.

Overall the vacation was great. There were a few bumps in the week, but I think we weathered them pretty well. Special thanks to T&K for being very good vacation buddies. It was also good to spend time with Baby Sam as she is really starting to grow and develop her personality. She couldn’t have been a better baby all week.

Oh and happy birthday to my mom. I hope you had a great day.

Op Ed Piece

Spending so much time around people in Real Estate lately, I have come to appreciate the recent struggles in that industry. I have also realized how the media is playing directly into our fears and doubts when they report on the industry. It seems that oversensationalism is the only way we can report news these days. I wrote this opinion piece and sent it to the Washington Post. Needless to say they decided not to run it, so now I will post it here for all six of you to read.

Can we please stop reporting the current housing market as being in crisis? I realize over sensationalizing the news is the norm, but can we please take a step back and look at this realistically. The housing market is not in a crisis, it’s in a correction. Anyone of us who has lived in one of the very expensive coastal states over the last twenty years has thought that property values would eventually have to stop increasing and start to level off. Well, that didn’t happen. Instead the dotcom boom drove the already ridiculous property values to a point beyond ridiculous. The dotcom boom caused a huge spike in property values across the country. And these property values could not be sustained after the dotcom bust. So now the market is trying to correct itself.

Despite what you hear or read, I don’t believe the market is as gloomy as we’re all being told. There are people out there selling and buying homes. It is more difficult to qualify for a home loan today than it was two years ago, but there are loans available for qualified buyers. So what makes up a qualified buyer these days?

1. You need to have 10% down
2. You need to have good credit
3. You need to be employed

These don’t sound like unreasonable requirements to get a loan. Probably the same requirements you would ask for if you were going to give someone a rather large sum of money. As a matter of fact, these are the same requirements you needed ten years ago to qualify for a loan, before the lenders decided to cash in on the housing boom and give anyone a loan, no matter if they could meet these requirements or not. Not surprisingly, the lending market could not continue to hand out unqualified loans, so it corrected itself.

The housing market is also trying to correct itself. There are a few things we can do to try and aide in the correction. For one thing, real estate agents should do their jobs and manage expectations with sellers. Have the tough conversation with your clients and tell them that their house just isn’t worth what it was two years ago. Putting your house on the market at an over inflated price won’t do anything except cause it to sit on the market for a long time and make buyers think that your have become desperate to sell. It is not that you can’t sell your home, it’s that your home won’t sell at that price. Real estate agents need to be honest with their customers and explain the current market and price homes accordingly. Remember that something is only worth what someone is willing to pay, and not necessarily what you think you should be paid for it. Pricing homes correctly will help them sell quicker and eliminate the perception that the housing market is in crisis.

Sellers can also help speed up this market correction. Most people probably think that the majority of people selling their homes today are people who bought a few years ago and now can’t afford their loan or are upside down on their house. That isn’t who is selling homes today because they can’t afford to sell their home. They have wait for the market to stabilize and eventually return to the normal appreciation trends we saw before the dotcom boom.

The people selling today bought their homes five to seven years ago, before the unrealistic increase in home values and are now trying to escape with their profits. Their unwillingness to face the fact that their home isn’t worth the $800,000 that it was two years ago is a driving factor in prolonging the perception of a market crisis. Now they can only get $700,000 for their home that, by the way, they probably paid $400,000 for five years ago. And although they may feel like they have lost $100,000 on their home in the last two years, they haven’t. They have really made $300,000 on an investment in five years. Do you know of any other investment where you can see a 75% return in five years? I don’t. So let go of the notion that you are some how due the value of your home from 2006 and move on to 2008. You are still making a lot of money off a very short term investment.

I was one of the people who lived through both the technology boom and bust and I had to battle through the market correction that ensued afterward. And just like the technology sector was able to weather that correction, the real estate market in the U.S. will also survive the correction it’s enduring right now.

I could have written a lot more on the topic, but the Post limits all opinion pieces to 800 words. It was a good exercise for me and I think I will try again in the future. Who knows, maybe I will find a subject that they find suitable.

Have a great weekend. I know I will as I am off to Nantucket for the week. I will try to post while on my vacation using my BlackBerry…love that thing.

I am saving room for dinner…

I spent last weekend visiting The Rose’s grandparents in a small town outside of Boston, where they have lived since the 50’s in their small square grandparent’s house. They are without a doubt the nicest, littlest, oldest people I have ever spent any time around in my life. Her grandfather spends his days in the garden and her grandmother spends her days cooking.

You have to understand that I lost all of my grandparents when I was still a child. I believe the last of them died when I was around 14 years old. Now that I am old enough to technically be a grandparent – don’t get any ideas Nick – my parents are the oldest people I know and they are in their early sixties. The Rose’s grandparents are in their mid eighties. They have been married since they were in their early twenties…yeah, they will be married sixty-six years in August. Imagine that sometime.

Her grandparents are great. Her Nunna is constantly cooking and thus tried to feed me all weekend. There is always room for a little more macaroni. She is the type of grandmother that makes something special for you because you like it. Her brother made a random comment, around the time the second or third course came up from the basement, about not having fried meatballs and low and behold, ten minutes later – fried meatballs. Oh and delicious fried meatballs. I mentioned to her that I like the bragiole she cooked Friday night and so she made it for me again on Sunday. Again delicious.

There was so much food and it just kept coming up from the basement – where her SECOND kitchen is. I got to the point that, if asked if I needed more food, I would always respond, "no thanks I am saving room for dinner," even after dinner was served. We had home made pasta with “sauce” – you Italians will know what that means – and bragiole, sausage, meatballs, pork and lamb for dinner. Oh and lest I forget the chicken cutlets. This was after having soppressata and cheese as well as meatballs and fried meatballs for a snack. AND THIS WAS JUST FRIDAY NIGHT! We had a BBQ on Saturday – for the cousin who graduate high school – and another big dinner on Sunday. I have never eaten so much food in three days.

After dinner Friday night, Nunna said she had thought of making rice pudding but hadn’t gotten to it, so The Rose and she made it together, just in case we had saved room for dessert. What room? Her brother could barely move while sitting in a chair after dinner.

We spent a lot of time this weekend just talking to them and I found their lives to be fascinating. They are funny and insightful. Her grandfather told us stories of delivering mail before there were zip codes. He is a retired postal worker. Nunna spent her youth sewing in a sweat shop in Boston.

We discussed what it was like to raise a family in the old days. How they didn’t have heat growing up so in the winter time they would sleep with a hot brick in their bed. Or how it was so cold they would close off the front room of their apartment because, according to her uncle, ”it would snow in there.” How they used to use every ounce of food they could get and how meat was a luxury. How they used to “fight over the last piece of fried blood for breakfast,” according to her dad. The conversations were great and I don’t think I have laughed that hard in a long time.

And Nunna, don’t worry I will still talk to you even if you vote republican this year.

They made me feel like a part of the family and I am really glad I got to meet them. It makes me wish that my grandparents had lived long enough for me to become an adult and truly appreciate their experiences and their lives. If you are lucky enough to have some old timers still around in your family, take the time to learn about their lives. It is truly amazing how different our lives are today from theirs. I really don’t know how they made it.

I met most of the Rose’s family this weekend and I am amazed at how close they all are. I am lucky that over the last decade I have gotten close with my immediate family – my siblings and parents. But it is different for The Rose. Her entire family is very close. Aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews are all part of one big family unit. They celebrate and commiserate together. And although I may think it a little strange to travel to Boston just to see a cousin graduate from high school, I think it must be incredible to have a family that would.

A Good Golf Memory

Quick story from the golf trip…I was playing the first morning with three guys. Four of us went out to play while we waited for some of the others to arrive. There was a round later that afternoon with the entire group, but for some reason, the four of us seemed to think we needed to cram a sixth round into the weekend.

I knew one of the guys in the foursome, but I met the other two that morning. One of the new guys started out the round struggling very badly. I waited until about the 5th or 6th hole and then I asked him if I could give him some advice. I told him that I could not help him with his swing as I have never played with him and had no point of reference. However, I asked him if he had ever played a good round of golf. He laughed and said yes. I told him that instead of focusing on figuring out what he was doing wrong today, he should think back to that day when he played well and focus on how he felt that day. Think about that day and what he did to play well. I explained that focusing on what you are doing wrong is a common amateur mistake in golf, and he would be better off to focus on something positive.

He began playing a little better over the next few holes. About four holes later after hitting a great shot, he turned to me and said all he was thinking about was the day he got a blowjob on the golf course.

I have to admit, that wasn’t quite what I had in mind when I gave him the advice, but hell, whatever works. I am a little surprised that I needed to remind him to think about that day. If that had happened to me, I would think about it everyday.

This was just day one – round one - of the trip. Imagine what happened after that.

Someone Pass Me the Pepto

It has been a long weekend of golf, drinking and eating way to much chicken. These guys really like wings - we ate at Hooters, Buffalo Hot Wings and too much KFC. I could use a good fish dinner.

The golf trip was great. Twenty guys competing on the course and boozing it up at night. I played too many rounds - six total in four days. I am exhausted and really tired of being in the car. I am writing this to pass the time as we are about four hours into a seven hour drive home. Brutal.

I like most of the guys on the trip. I did seem to have a golf course personality clash with one of them, but that is likely to happen with so many guys.

It was also tough being the only low handicap golfer in the group. With a low handicap comes a lot of expectations. As I told The Rose, I think I lived up to the hype. The golf definitely got worse as the weekend progressed, but not just for me, everyone seemed to play a little worse each day.

It really has been a long couple of weeks. Vegas last week and Myrtle Beach this week. The nice thing is I won money on both trips. Of course I spent it all, but that's what these trips are for.

Next for me will be a trip to Atlantic City next month. It will be a short trip - one night. The Rose and I will meet K&T for some light gambling and a good dinner. We are also talking about renting a beach house on Nantucket in July. My first time in Nantucket.

Next week I will be back in the gym as all the good work I have done over the last few months was undone in the last two weeks. I need some ruffage and a good workout.

Quick Notes...

From my ski trip this weekend.

• I am SO over my twenties. I spent the weekend in a four bedroom condo with some twenty-somethings and I can tell you that I am so past all the issues that twenty-somethings have. I must admit that these were very put together and successful twenty-somethings and I was still blown away by the issues they think they have.
• I am very hopeful for the future as we had two 18 year old boys with us for the weekend and not once did they try to drink any alcohol. If this is typical behavior for kids today, then we might be better off in the future. I am convinced that the people running the world today were more like me in high school and killed too many brain cells to make proper decisions. Maybe the future is not as bleak as it seems.
• As someone who has been through both, I would like to give this little pearl of wisdom. The dating pool may be deeper in your twenties, but I guarantee the water is much nicer in your thirties. Hang in there, life is long.
• The Rose is very easy to travel with. She packs fewer clothes than I do and is pretty low maintenance on trips. She has taken to calling me Metro and those of you that know me would agree with her. I had a great time this weekend and most of that had to do with her. Some of it had to do with all the wine we drank.
• Speaking of wine, I have a new rule. If your tasting menu has more wines on it made from miscellaneous fruit than it does wines made from grapes, then you don’t get to call yourself a winery. Anything made purely from raspberries, blackberries and blueberries is not a wine, it is spiked syrup.
• We also need to redefine when you are allowed to call yourself a ski resort. I would think that a “mountain” would be required in order for you to call yourself a ski resort. This was not a mountain. This was barely a hill. And although I will admit that the weather last week did not help, they did not have any snow either. Snow is sort of a loose term…I meant ice and little white pellets that look similar to snow. There was so little snow in the area we went, that they have an 18 hole golf course next to it and it did not have one snowflake on it. I could have played golf on Saturday – it was definitely warm enough.
• The Rose and I agreed on the way home, with some help from MS, that we are not dating anyone else and we don't want to date anyone else...We are almost boyfriend and girlfriend...man that is commitment huh? Things between us are good.

All in all I had a good trip. I hadn’t skied in many years and I accomplished my goal…I didn’t break anything.

Defying the Odds

No this isn't a craps table success story. I took some time while I was in Vegas this week to actually get off the strip. I know most of you think Vegas is confined to the two miles that make up Las Vegas Boulevard, but there really are things to do in Vegas outside of the casinos.

For example, a colleague and I drove 45 minutes and visited Hoover Dam one afternoon. We took the extended tour and I have to tell you that this is an engineering marvel. Did you know that the base of the dam is one 600 foot block of unreinforced concrete. One big block of concrete the size of two football fields. It took five years to build the dam (two years ahead of schedule by the way) and cost approximately 700 men their lives. They spent the first two years just cutting the tunnels needed to divert the Colorado river so they could build the dam. The truly amazing thing is that it was constructed in the 30's.  It is hard to imagine we could build this dam with the tools that were available back then.

The most amazing thing about the dam is that not one penny of the cost to build or manage the dam has ever cost the US taxpayers anything. The dam was built with money borrowed on a 50 year loan that was paid off in the 80's. The cost of the dam has always been offset by the revenue generated by the power plant.  Can you imagine if they tried to do something like this today. It would probably cost two billion dollars and all of it would be charged to us taxpayers. And to be honest, we probably wouldn't do it because the politicians couldn't agree on who was going to get the credit or the campaign contributions.

If you ever have a chance you should check it out. It is considered one of the 7 engineering wonders of the modern age.

My buddy and I remarked while we were walking through the tunnels of this marvel that it is unlikely that we as a society would ever take on such a huge challenge again. I can't imagine our society trying to do something that is so out of our technological ability. The last time he and I  could remember us taking on this kind of challenge was the race to the moon in the 60's. When Kennedy promised we would go to the moon by the end of the decade there were so many challenges involved that most of the insiders must have thought he was crazy.  Much the same as when Hoover proposed the Boulder Dam project. Are there other times that humanity has accepted a challenge that stretched our capabilities?

I am not sure that we have the tenacity to take on these types of challenges anymore. I mean we have one staring us in the face and we do everything we can to discredit it or downplay it's significance. I am of course talking about global warming. If there is one challenge that we as a people should step up and take, global warming is it. However I think until the answers to global warming lead to a gain in revenue for big business and not a loss, we will continue to not act. That is until it is to late.

I really wonder how long we will let our country be run by big business and special interests. Marx said that the end of a capitalistic society is preceded by an awakening of the have nots (I am paraphrasing a bit). I wonder if I will see this awakening in my lifetime. I wonder if we will have this awakening in time. I wonder what kind of world my grandchildren will live in.

It has been a long time since I had a good rant. Maybe it is the political season coming out in me, but it sure feels good. Get involved. Vote!

Heading Home

I am finally heading home from Vegas. I know some people think this city is great, but I find it grating after a day or two. Four days is definitely too much. I will be home by dinner time tonight. 

I am excited as tomorrow we are driving to PA to go skiing. This is my first time skiing in quite a few years. It is also the first overnight trip with her.

Speaking of her, it is nice to go away for a few days and actually miss someone. I have not had that feeling in a while.

Have a great weekend. I know I will.

One of THOSE Travel Days

Yeah it is one of those days. It starts with a 5:45 AM alarm so I can head to the airport at 6:30. I don't like to get up before the sun unless golf is involved and 5:45 definitely came way to early this morning.

I get to the airport and as I pull up to the parking ticket machine, the only one of three open for the main garage, it gives me my ticket, but the gate doesn't open. So I sit and wait...and wait. I push the help button and when the man answers I tell him my predicament. His response, use one of the other lanes. REALLY?  Open one and I will. All of the cars behind me had grown tired of waiting and had turned around and gone to the secondary garage. I did too.

I parked the car and surprisingly someone I knew parked his car next to me. He was one of the drivers behind me at other the parking entrance. We used to work together, but he moved to a different company about six months ago. He was headed north today while I was headed west. We walked to the terminal together using the few minutes to catch up. It always amazes me how many people I run into at the airport. Maybe it is the fact that I travel quite a bit as do many of the people I work with.

So I reach the terminal, check in and head to security. The line doesn't seem that long. I am in one of the obscure security lines at IAD that has limited x-ray machines. Things are moving OK, but apparently the people in front of me have not traveled since 2001. They had no idea that they needed to take off their jackets or shoes or that they might want to buy a stroller that might fit through the x-ray machine. I get through the line and head to my gate.

Oh, did I mention I was flying on Southwest today. Not my usual airline and I really can't remember when I flew them last. Well they are in one of the new terminals and the "walk" there is rather long. I finally reach my gate after stopping for some OJ and a bagel.
Now I don't know how many of you fly Southwest, but I don't think they could make their boarding process any more difficult if they were trying. I get the boarding in groups thing. I was in group C - not good for getting a good seat. As the boarding process began, the rather bitchie man working for Southwest explained that not only did we need to board by group, but also by number. I looked at my boarding pass and realized that I was actually C18. They actually expect everyone to line up in order, because if B13 boards before B9, then they cut in line. I am not kidding. The lady taking the tickets actually looks to make sure they are in order. If you are out of order, she makes you wait your turn.

So they herded in the first group, A1 to A30...then the second, A31 to A60. They did the same with the B group. So 120 people got on the plane before my group was called.

When they called the C group to line up, only 5 of us were in line. Now you have to imagine that they have the carpet sectioned off, this area is for 1-5, then 6-10 etc...I was standing in the 16-20 area as I am pretty intelligent and understood the ridiculous system. However the 60 year old Spanish lady behind me, C22, could not quite grasp it. She didn't understand why we needed 40 feet of empty carpet between us and the people by the door. That is when Bitchie began berating her. Telling her she needed to stay in this section because she was C22. He wouldn't let it go and he didn't seem to grasp that she didn't understand. Take it easy on her, I don't think her primary language was interior decorator and there were only 5 of us in the C group. I don't think her going before me was going to make me lose that prime middle seat.

You know I don't care if you don't like your job or if you life partner was an ass all weekend, if you are going to work with the public on a daily basis, you should learn to be more patient with them. Understand that you boarding process is ridiculous and not exactly intuitive. There will be some people who just don't get it. They aren't trying to cheat the system, they are just trying to get on the plane.

Now some of you may interpret my color commentary to mean I have a problem with gay men. I don't. I do have a problem with people who want to be a bitch before 8 AM.  I mean come on, the sun is barely up, none of us needs that crap this early in the morning.

Oh and I have a note for the people running Southwest: Assign seats for pete's sake. Isn't it time to admit that the idea of first come doesn't really work well for air travel.

Personality Puzzle

One of the special things about her is her willingness to handle issues as they come up. More communication is better than less communication. Getting things out in the open is better than letting them stew inside of you. These are also things that I believe. However, I am not always able to start these conversations so easy. She can. This is one of the reasons we are getting along so well.

I think it is difficult to find someone whose personality compliments yours. We all have little idiosyncrasies within our personalities and although it is hard to find that one person that compliments your personality, I believe it is more difficult to have someone change their personality to fit you.

We won’t see each other again until next weekend as I am traveling all week. I am in Vegas meeting with customers. Who am I kidding, I am going to eat good food, drink expensive martinis and play some craps. If I have time, I will meet with customers and check out the CES show.

Next weekend is my first East Coast ski trip. This is my first ski trip in about 6 years. I have heard that skiing in the east is very different than in the west. More ice, less powder. I am sure the trip will be fun, but right now I would settle for a trip with no pulled muscles, torn ligaments or broken bones.

Why do I bother?

I have no idea why I always bring sunglasses to Seattle. I can't remember the last time I saw the sun here.

No Walk In The Woods For Me

I know I haven’t written much lately, but I wanted to post a quick note to say that everything is going well. I am in a new role at my company and that is keeping me very busy, but in a good way. I am learning more about our business and I am getting the chance to create a new product pretty much from the ground up.

I also signed back up on eHarmony a few weeks ago. I am not sure why I did it to be honest, but since I did, I thought I would at least try to follow through with the painful communication process they have. Unfortunately they have sent me about 75 matches so far and the process is killing me. Couldn’t one of you just volunteer to be my girlfriend for a while so I can quit trying to appear as though I am looking for my soul mate? More on this later.

I also wanted to post a picture from Thanksgiving. This is me with Baby Sam. At least one of us looks good.

Baby Sam and Uncle Blue

We had a nice Thanksgiving up at K’s parent’s house. I have known them a long time and they have always been great to me. They moved to the middle of nowhere, somewhere in PA., a few years ago and this was my first trip to their new house. It is a bit of a scary drive as for about 30 miles you are on a road with forest on both sides of you that reminded me of the place they took Adriana to kill her on the Sopranos. I wouldn’t suggest wandering around in those woods, no telling what you might find.

I am looking for suggestions for a good Christmas vacation. I have taken no real time off this year and right now I am thinking of finding someplace where they have a beach, golf course and someone to bring me drinks all day. Any suggestions? Want to go?

Strange Travel

I have to fly up to New York this morning, returning this afternoon. I arrived at National airport, picked up my boarding pass, breezed through security, and then walked right on the plane. No lines anywhere. I left my house 50 minutes before my flight and am now having to wait on the plane for it to take off.

The planes only has maybe 25 people on it as well. Mostly old white guys who also look like they are making a day trip to NYC. You know the type, business suits, balding or managing a great comb over, reading the Wall Street Journal and trying to look important. OK, so that could describe me today as well, without the reading or the pretentiousness. I don't have time to read, I got a bagel to eat.

I am not sure I have ever had such an easy travel day, let's hope the gods aren't saving all my travel problems for the trip home this afternoon.

Why I don’t have a gun rack in my car.

I was driving up to see my new niece Sam for the first time on Friday and the 240 mile trip that usually takes me about four hours ended up taking me over five and a half hours to make. I spent over an hour traveling about 6 miles on highway 78 in Pennsylvania. A two lane road that was supposed to be under construction. They had one lane shut down for three miles and it caused about a five mile back up. Now normally I wouldn’t make such a fuss about a little traffic, well at least I wouldn’t write about it. However, as I was trudging along on the road, trying not to commit a violent act of road rage, I happen to drive up-on one of these.

Radar Sign

So the speed indicator that I happened on was nice enough to tell me that the speed limit through that pass was 40 MPH. And it was also nice enough to tell me that my speed at the time was a whopping 5 MPH. Really, did they need this thing running on the side of the road? Isn’t this sort of adding insult to injury?

It was at that moment I realized why I don’t have a gun rack in my car. I would have taken out my shot gun and blown that sign away. Another good reason that people shouldn’t carry guns in their vehicle. Oh, and by the way, the trip home only took three and a half hours.

And Baby Sam was great this weekend. She is beautiful and lives the life we all strive to have, she eats, she sleeps and she poops – a life of bliss. She did get to take her first trip into NYC this weekend. I think she had a good time, well she slept through most of it. Can you imagine being in NYC and sleeping the whole time? Next time we can take her shopping in SOHO. She might like that more.

How Did They Know?

You know what I got in the mail this week? Of course you don’t. I got some AAA cards. This is only interesting considering the weekend that I had and the fact that it took me two extra days to return from NJ because…wait for it…my car broke down on the side of the highway. This is the first time in as long as I can remember that I have found myself on the side of a freeway as cars whiz by me at 100 mph. Anyone who has had this happen knows that this is not a fun experience.

Luckily I was only 20 miles from my friend’s house when it happened. Oh what is it, you ask? As I was speeding along dreading the four hour ride home, I heard a strange noise, like I had run over a stick or something. I should have stopped, but who really does. The next indication that something was wrong was the warning light on my dash that stated “Batter Is Not Charging.” This made me look at the battery gauge and sure enough it was no longer at 13 volts. It had dropped down to under 10 volts. As I was thinking, what the hell does that mean, white smoke started to pour out from under my hood. This was a sure tell sign that I needed to pull over.

I stopped and opened the bonnet (it is a Jaguar after all) to see my car overheating and smoke coming from everywhere. It was immediately apparent that I had blown my radiator hose, or at least that is what I thought. In reality the hose had slipped off the manifold and water was steaming everywhere. I wasn’t really sure what to do. I let it cool for a few minutes, cursed that I didn’t have AAA and then decided to try and fix the problem. I pushed the hose back onto the manifold, tightened it down with a quarter (MacGyver like) and poured my bottle of water into the cooling system. My goal was to make it to the next exit and find a station to fill up the cooling system.

I drove about a half a mile before smoke stated coming out again. I was approaching the toll gate (Pennsylvania charges people to leave NJ, as they should). I pulled into the Welcome Center right after the gate. I again opened the bonnet again to see that the hose had again slipped off the manifold. I again tried to secure the hose and then used my water bottle to fill up the radiator this time. I was smart enough not to try and leave the Welcome Center right away. I mean I still had 200 miles to go so no need to break down in the middle of Pennsylvania. I started the car and let it run for a few minutes to see if the hose would hold. Yeah, it didn’t hold. It slipped off and water started shooting everywhere. Now one thing I was very smart about was I always monitored my temperature gauge to make sure I did not over heat the engine. Jaguar engines can cook if you let them overheat. My problem was more a loss of coolant and water than an overheating problem.

At this point, it was already about 8 PM, I gave up and called my buddy to come get me. He did and I went back to his house for the night. I had the car towed in the morning to a local Jag shop and let them look at it. Here is the strange part. Apparently that “stick” I heard on the highway was actually one of the belt pulleys that connect to my water pump and alternator. Battery Is Not Charging starts top make sense. The pulley had just fallen off the car. It might have hit the hose which in turn cracked my manifold (it’s plastic) and cause the coolant to shoot out onto my engine which is why I got all the white smoke.

The dealership ordered my parts and had me on the road the next day. My new mechanic did tell me that this problem was probably caused by my old mechanic not understanding how to set up the cables. It looked as though the old mechanic had loosened that pulley to try and tighten the belt instead of doing it the right way. Just goes to show you that a good mechanic is the most important thing when it comes to owning a vintage expensive car.

You know the bad part about breaking down on the side of the road? It isn’t the hassle or the cost of repairing the car, it is the loss of confidence in your vehicle from that day forward. I spent the entire 4 hour ride home

Now let me get back to my surprise mail from AAA. Needless to say I have never gotten junk mail from AAA and I find it really suspicious that they have chosen now to send me this offer. Talk about targeted marketing. I started wondering how they knew I broke down this week. I mean did my mechanic give me up. Or maybe it was the tow truck guy getting a kick back from AAA. I started thinking maybe they are much more sophisticated than that. Maybe they are using spy satellites to monitor the highways in our country just waiting for some unfortunate soul to break down. Then they zoom in on the license plate, run a cross check with the DMV and presto…three days later you get an offer in the mail. I think I remember seeing a job posting for computer hackers at AAA some years ago.

Why is my flight cancelled?

Now as many of you know, I travel a lot. I have had to suffer through many flight delays and cancellations. But I have never had a flight cancelled because of, wait for it, a clogged toilet. Yep you read that right, a clogged toilet. Apparently someone took a huge dump and now they can't get the toilet system to work on the plane. They have been working on the problem all night. I mean really, how big a dump was it?

So here I sit in the Seattle airport hoping that the maintenance guys can figure out how to use a snake in the next 20 minutes. If not, I will have to wait until this afternoon to leave and won't get home until late tonight. On the bright side, I will have a lay over in Cincinnati. And I mean really, who doesn't want to visit the Cincinnati airport. Pray that they find a good plumber in the next 20 minutes.