Driving in New York

Driving in New York is always an adventure. However, I've determined that I enjoy this challenge of the mind and reflexes. The primary goal is of course to prevent it from becoming a contact sport, while getting where you want to be. This is definitely not for the faint of heart. Driving on the side streets provides only one or two lanes, the avenues are wide providing 6 or 7 lanes depending on which one you choose. It is not uncommon to be driving down the center lane of one of the broad avenues and have the center two lanes suddenly become a construction zone. There are constantly people stepping between cars, delivery drivers stopping, starting, loading and unloading their wares. Taxi cabs are noted for being completely insane, but I have found that they behave like packs of roving dogs, and you must not show fear. If you do you will be inundated, you must simply push your way to where you want to go. Simply because you are in a traveling lane does not mean someone can't stop and call it a parking spot. All in all a good challenge and good workings for the mind. If you travel during non rush-hour times it is not insanely loaded with traffic, but even the slightest hiccup can cause insanity quickly. You must be constantly alert. Actually the city does provide a compelling reason for not using a cell phone without hands-free, looking away for a moment will cause you to miss the next obstacle.

New Photo Blog

As many people have, I have taken quite a lot of digital photos throughout the past several years. I've created a new blog to simply display a few of the more interesting ones in a separate area rather than clutter up this blog. I've also become interested in a few other photo blogs - there are links in the other blog to those. Enjoy.

Circuit City Fails Again

Once again I entered a Circuit City store to make a purchase. Once again I received less than stellar service. I decided to avail myself of 18 months same as cash (why use my money when I can use theirs). I was waiting patiently for a sales person to help me purchase a new computer. The existing one is getting a little tired. I waited and waited. I decided to find an application for the credit and fill it out. I easily found the form but couldn’t find a pen. I went to the service counter and asked for a pen to fill out the form: “Do you have a pen I can use to fill this out?” Without even looking up, he said tersely: “No”. being as I saw pens laying right next to him, I knew that he was just being a jerk, so I tossed the form in his general direction, walked out of the store, called the store manager and complained.

Dots Dots Everywhere but not a drop to drink

Frequent readers will notice a new template. I did this to get ready for the new year - Also , I got a little bored with the old one so decided to try something a little bit different. For those not familiar with blogger, try clicking the upper right Next Blog button to randomly be sent somewhere. If you're bored it can be kind of fun. If you hit a dead link just backup and try again.

Christmas fun with Dry Ice

For Christmas - my family received a gift from family packed in Dry Ice. The scientist in me couldn't resist having some fun and playing with the ice since to quote Velma: "When you put dry ice in water, you get a really spooky fog!" We started out trying to pour some water over the ice.

This worked fairly well at generating fog but it mostly stayed in the container it was in and didn't really flow. After a little bit of testing we discovered that putting hot water in a bowland throwing in a few pieces of dry ice really generated some serious fog.

It generated so much that it flowed out of the bowl and down the sides of the counter.
I then took a dime sized piece of ice, a decent swig of hot water and generated a nice cloud from out of my mouth ;-).

Lastly while shuffling around the ice with a spoon so as not to get burned we noted that it sounded quite a bit like it was being tortured when touching the spoon to the ice - check the video (if you can't get the video to play try saving it to your hard drive).
To quote Manav: "Good Fun!"

Plane connections in Cincinnati

I had a tight connection in Cincinnati. When I landed I called Delta and told them I had just landed and was trying to get from the C concourse to the B concourse. If you've been in Cincinnati you know this means riding the bus. The bus to get us was delayed by planes so I called Delta again and said I was on the bus and only a few minutes from the gate. Which I fortunately verified as it had changed from when I checked in at Newarkk. I thought I made it as I was at the gate at 4:05 for a 4:10 plane. No gate agent, no one around and door closed tight. However a plane was clearly visible and a pilot clearly watching me at the window. I called Delta. As I continued to sternly tell them how ridiculous this was I watched the jetway pull away from the plane. I knew what this meant so I increased my fervor. Several minutes passed and the jetway reattached. Gate agent came out and let myself and another passenger on. I was quite amazed. - Frank P. Bresz - Sent from my BlackBerry

The Patio is finally finished

Well they finally finished the patio. We also finally put some trees around the thing to break up the straight lines a bit. Check out the gallery for a surprise ending. There were some visitors across the street after all of the rains in NJ this week.

I am a Borg and I'm IN!

I just purchased a new Verizon Blackberry 7250. Finally - I am out of the relationship with Cingular. They have been quite abusive. Also purchased a Bluetooth wireless headphone with it. Motorola HS820 - very lightweight. I still can't help feeling like I am a Borg when I'm wearing this thing. I think next I'll have to pick up some bluetooth sunglasses.

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I am now totally Verizon. Home phone, office phone, DSL, 4 cell phones, I am so totally IN, and right around National Coming Out Day.

Finally they are installing the patio

Well they are finally building the patio. For those of you who haven't heard the story this job was first awarded to a contractor in April for completion in May. At some point he finally completed the front landscaping, but after repeated calls, never returned to build the patio. After another round of Landscapers's Challenge we selected a new contractor. This one seems very reputable and is making good progress. Watch for more pics as they are available.

Who is Eric Rudolph and why do I care?

Its been a while since posting. I am sitting at O'Hare waiting for a flight home. I've been chatting with my colleague about random business. I've glanced over at the CNN Airport edition a few times. Each time they are talking about Eric Rudolp - the hunt continues, mysterious travel. Who is this guy and why do I care? Is he like Natalie Holloway, that everyone must know about? Do we now need 24x7 coverage of him? Bob Costas was so right to not give these kind of stories more air time.

I know there is more 'newsworthy' stuff happening. Draft Iraq constitution, Israeli pull out in Gaza, oil prices (up or down). I know I've written this rant before - during the “Runaway Bride” incident, but my goodness this is ridiculous.

Don't know for sure but I wonder if Bill Hemmer's (sp?) exodus was precipitated in part by such pop-journalisn. I know in an article I read he would like to just go through the New York Times and report about all the stories therein. No chance of that now at Fox but at least he'll get to report news as he sees it.

Proudly Honor our Military

I won't add to this, as it requires now further comment on my part. I've sent a copy to CNN and one of the anchors I respect - Lou Dobbs - we'll see if anything becomes of it.

New Blackberry 7100g

Well I have a new Blackberry Device, or I should say I had a new blackberry device. It lasted less than 72 hours - I'm sending it back. What garbage. Smaller yes, less functional - yes, irritating - yes, gone - yes.

US Grand Prix - 2005 - The Controversy Continues

Here's an article describing the track's challenges with grinding and resurfacing. After reading this I'd be inclined to say Michelin should have pushed for additional testing somehow. They knew the track had been resurfaced. They knew it was hard on tires (or at least they should have). Granted Bridgestone had the upper hand with data from the Indy 500, but I think some testing (whatever the cost) could have gotten them the data they needed to be competitive. Read Michelin's lame attempt to salvage some reputation. Too bad it is just an excuse for poor engineering.

Giant bust on the US Grand Prix

If you're not a fan of Formula One, you may have missed this news. Michelin pulled their safety certification and 7 of 10 teams did not compete in the 2005 US Grand Prix. My high hopes were dashed to bits on the jagged rocks below.

I've thought a bit about it and here is my opinion.

I blame Michelin. Bridgestone put tyres on their cars that worked. Michelin had more cars and more total track time. Even if they had brought harder compound - fully inside rules, Michelin could have run and probably still beat Mindardi and Jordan. Still a 1-2 for Ferrari but we would have had a race anyway.

What to do

Well for me anyway - I validated I am riding Yokohamas. Still need to check the wife and daughters cars. Wife's got Walmart tires and daughter has what her car came with. I will never buy Michelins again.

Hope

Maybe we'll get some money back - but I'm not counting those chickens.

Here's a few links to stories.

• Times Online
• Sports Illustrated
• Max Should be Axed
• Michelin's Stock dips - GOOD!!!

US Grand Prix - 2005

So I am going to the US Grand Prix tomorrow.

Here are a batch of pictures from today's qualifying session. I put only the better ones - which I think are fairly good. The good news is that Ferrari did not have a good showing. The bad news is neither did BMW.Williams. Let's see if we can do better in the race. Toyota finally scored a pole with Jarno Trulli - an odd individual in my book. Kimi Raikkonen had a good run but not good enough. Here's the full grid for tomorrow. I'm looking forward to a fun day.

Which Star Wars Character Are You?

I am Emperor Palpatine. This really must be a truthful exam, the last time I took it and this time resulted in the same answer, and there are quite a few questions. Not sure of the mapping (i.e. how many characters can really be represented) but it appears as though it is possible to generate 1.5M end results (35**4). If I had the time (which I don't) I'd try to reverse engineer the questions by writing some html to submit the answers a bunch of times and see what comes back. In my youth I may have tried this. Shoot - I'm still a geek - I took a very quick glance at the code, it doesn't require reverse engineering - it is right up front for all to see, and it is even somewhat elegant. The only possible answers are:

• Artoo
• Chewie
• Fett
• Han
• Jabba
• Lando
• Leia
• Luke
• Obiwan
• Palpatine
• Threepio
• Vader
• Yoda

Linked In?

I've LinkedIn to approximately 30 people. I've seen services like this in the past. For reasons that I cannont adequately explain this one seems to be getting more traction than the others I remember. In a stunning bit of foresight, I predict this will be absorbed by google or yahoo in the not too distant future.

Star Wars Episode III - No Spoilers

Well I'm sitting in the theater ready for my senses to be overwhelmed.

It is about 1 hour to showtime. Lots of noise. People in costume are here. I see an Obi Wan and a few Vaders and several Anakins. Quite a mixed crowd. Mostly younger. Doesn't seem quite as many as when I saw Episode II in Columbus.

We managed to get center seats towards the front (I'd prefer to be back a little more).

I am hopeful that much like Episode II this will be a good crowd intently watching the movie and not being noisy during the show.

I'll post afterward with my opinions of the movie. I unlike some others liked I and II. There were parts I didn't but overall I thought they were good.

We'll see what Lucas has in store for us.

Update - After writing the original I felt the need to add that some of the costumed Obi-Wan's and Anikins had a phony light saber battle in the theater. Yikes!!

Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr Pepper

Do we really need all of these flavors mixed together? Dr Pepper is already Black Cherry, so now they've added vanilla, more cherry and taken the sugar out. I think the flavoring of soda has gone completely around the bend. Well at least Coke came up with it and then Pepsi will have to copy. I am most definitely a Coke person. I did really like when Coke came out with Vanilla Coke, and I remember precisely where I was when I called them to ask them when Diet Vanilla Coke was hitting the shelves. I will admit however that Diet Vanilla Pepsi is better than Diet Vanilla Coke.

CNN, MSNBC, FOX what are you doing?

So some woman goes crazy - falsifies a report of being kidnapped - and returns unscathed. Do we really need to spend more than 13 seconds covering her return? What a royal waste of airwaves.
Hayden had it right. They will put anything on to get eyeballs.
Consipracy alert - Personally based on the numerous showers and voluminous guest list, I suspect that in fact the parents of the bride are quite rich. Upon having their daghter vanish - they pulled some strings to get phenomenal news coverage and now have a healthy heaping of crow to eat.