A few months ago I found out I'd be going to New Orleans for work to train some people with the US Corps of Engineers on some software we've been using. I was pretty excited about the prospect because I'd never been to New Orleans before.

Well, I've been here now and let me tell you - this trip has sucked hard.

Initially I was going to be heading down here by myself but we expanded the entourage to include Ryan (another developer at SBCS) and our boss Mark. Last week Ryan and I embarked on a major bug squashing mission. We worked hard and late on Thursday and Friday to make sure everything was "rock solid" and we honestly thought it was. We touched every new and old feature of the sections of the application we were working on.

On Saturday Ryan worked on a user manual and found a couple small changes that needed to be made; so late Saturday night I went into the office and worked for a couple hours to address those things and a couple other small bits I discovered. By Sunday morning the site really was working great and everything felt wonderful.



Monday morning I woke up early, finalized my packing, and waited for Ryan to arrive from Kentucky before we headed off to the Charleston airport. Ryan had never flown before this trip and was really nervous about the prospect. You have to really know Ryan to understand how much the idea of flying affected him. He has a variety of anxieties and flying was a truly daunting prospect for him. His wife brought him to my house at 8am and we loaded up my car for the trip to Charleston. It was obvious that his wife was nervous for him because he was so stressed about flying.

We headed out immediately thinking we would hit a bunch of morning rush hour traffic on the way to Charleston but the highway was almost empty so we made the trip in about an hour which meant we had a couple hours before our flight would leave. The Charleston airport is pretty small and you don't have to arrive that early even in this day and age so I took a detour to the mall so we could kill time without Ryan having to watch planes take off and land. We spent about 40 minutes there walking around before heading to the airport to meet up with Mark.

As we walked into the airport I noticed a news crew was working at one end of the terminal and I mentioned it to Ryan but he thought I was just screwing with him. I wasn't. The news crew was the first omen of what was to come with this trip.

We checked in nice and quickly using the kiosk, had our bags checked, and started to walk toward security. Ryan saw the news crew and we ignored it while he went to use the restroom. While he was gone the news lady came over to Mark and I and asked us if we were grounded. We didn't know what she was talking about and said, "No, we're heading out to Atlanta." She said, "OH, Atlanta, were you pushed back to the next flight?" We said, "No." And she said, "You weren't on the earlier flight?" We looked confused and she asked again, "You don't know what happened?"

As that question ended Ryan reappeared. I told her we didn't really need to know. She decided to tell us anyway. It turns out the flight before us had to abort its' takeoff due to having 2 of it's tires pop during the speedup to takeoff. The plane was broken down in the middle of the runway.

We went through security and headed to our gate. Once there we could see the fire trucks, ambulances, and emergency vehicles all over the runway alongside the broken down plane. Fortunately, I had convinced Ryan to take his first half of a Xanex while we were at the mall.

Eventually our flight was cancelled. However, we really needed to reach New Orleans that day so we could be at the Corps office in time for the first day of training since they had arranged their schedule to accommodate us. I jumped on my cell phone to try and book a different flight and, at the same time, Mark did the same. I had a really helpful lady on the phone but she put me on hold and, eventually, my hold status changed to a disconnected status and I wasn't sure if my flight had been changed.

While we were on the phone we were also in line for the Delta counter and, eventually, we made it to the front of the line where the ticket agent worked with us to get us to Atlanta that day but we couldn't get to New Orleans until the next morning. C'est la vie. Because of the delay in getting to New Orleans we also had her shift our return flight to Friday and Mark called our New Orleans hotel to extend our reservations through Thursday night.

Eventually, we found ourselves on an airplane. Ryan and I were sitting together with me in the window seat and Ryan in the aisle. Ryan had said he didn't want to look out the window but, as soon as the flight started, he was gazing out the window in wonder and amazement. The flight to Atlanta is about an hour long and the entire flight he was leaning over looking out the window with child-like wonder at the miracle of flight. It was pretty awesome to behold. When we finally landed in Atlanta he was equally amazed to experience the amazing time savings of flight over driving. He swore right then that he would never drive that far again (if he could afford it).

At this point we were in Atlanta but we had nowhere to stay and no plans for dinner. However, the Charleston ticket agent told us to talk to a Delta rep in Atlanta to get a hookup for a room and a dinner voucher. She also said she would put some information on our confirmation to help the Atlanta agent.

The Atlanta agent wasn't nearly as helpful as we had hoped. She was fairly difficult to communicate with due to her extremely thick accent and she wasn't particularly interested in making sure we were happy. Eventually she gave us a voucher for the airport Ramada. However, the voucher just entitled us to the airlines negotiated price of $50 a night. She provided nothing for dinner however she did give us an incredibly worthless "overnight" bag which was filled with complete trash.

We laughed it off and headed out to the Ramada shuttle only to be told by the shuttle driver that, even though the bus said "Ramada" on it she wasn't really a Ramada shuttle and that we'd have to wait. So we waited, and waited, and waited, in the cold for a shuttle. In the meantime a guy with the super-8 offered to let us come to his motel and that they would honor the voucher price. We weren't really interested in his offer. Instead I got on my phone and tried out priceline to see if we could get a 4-star hotel near the airport for $60/night. We did and we booked rooms at the Westin (home of the Heavenly Bed)!

During checkin at the Westin the clerk gave me three vouchers for 50% off our dinner at their restaurant after I told her about our crazy day. At this point it was about 8 or 9pm. After checkin we went straight to our rooms, dropped our bags, and then headed back down for dinner. After we ate a pretty good meal we headed back upstairs to sleep. However, our morning flight was really early and we had to be awake by 5am so I slept horribly for fear that I'd oversleep.

Back at the airport we checked in, got our seats assigned, and then headed to security. Mark was on the "stand-by" list because he wasn't scheduled to fly until a couple hours later. In the line for security we picked, by far, the slowest lane but, eventually, we made it to the xray section. However, once we got there the bins were all used and Ryan had to scramble through other lines to get bins so he could pass through. Considering this was his second effort ever at flying he was obviously a little flustered by the experience and in dealing with people who were rushing for other bins so they could get ahead of him in line.

Eventually he got some bins and passed through the x-ray machine. However, on the other side he had a moment of panic because he couldn't find his boarding pass. At this point I told him to take his half of a Xanex again and we hopped on the train to our terminal. We waited for an hour and half until we were finally able to board but Mark wasn't called for standby.

The plan at this point was to fly and then wait a the New Orleans airport for Mark to arrive so we could get our rental car. Ryan and I boarded the plane and found our seats - row 20; the last possible row on the plane, right beside the lavatory. To make matters worse we had no window on our side of the plane, we had no over-head storage as our space was being used for emergency equipment. However, the two seats on the other side of the aisle were empty after it appeared everyone was on so we switched. Sadly, both of those passengers eventually boarded. The first was happy to take my window-less window seat on the other side but the other wanted his window seat so I took one aisle and Ryan took the aisle seat nearer the window.

As we got settled in we were happy to see Mark had gotten a seat on our flight so we wouldn't have to wait around in New Orleans.

The guy who took my window-less window seat had two small carry-ons so one had to go under the seat in front of me and I ended up with no leg room. Fortunately the flight was only 1hr 45 minutes so it wasn't too bad. However, every time I stretched my legs into the aisle someone got up to use the lavatory.

Eventually we were in New Orleans, we had our rental car, and we were at our hotel; the Residence Inn Convention Center in downtown (warehouse district) New Orleans. Our suite had two bedrooms, two baths, and a sofa bed for me to sleep on. Oddly the trip started with just me going to New Orleans and here I was sleeping on a sofa bed.



After we checked in we wandered around until we found ourselves at Cafe Du Monde so we could try some Beignets which had been highly recommended. To be honest, I wasn't that thrilled with them. They were basically just small crispy doughnuts that seemed a little overcooked. However, the hot-cocoa was pretty good!

After leaving Cafe Du Monde we headed back toward the hotel and then Mark and I stopped off at a place called Denie's for po-boys. They were HUGE and pretty tasty. After lunch we headed back to the hotel to rest up a bit and think about what we'd do later that day.

It didn't take us long to figure out what we'd like to do because that night the New Orleans Saints were going to be having their Superbowl Championship parade. Our hotel was about 1 block from the parade route so after a brief rest we headed back out to the streets to watch the Saints fans enjoy their moment. We reached the parade route at about 3pm and we hung out for a while before the parade started. The parade itself was only about 12 floats but there were a ton of high school bands and, becuase the fans were so happy, the parade often stopped to let the players celebrate on the street with the fans. Thus, we didn't see the final float carrying the coach and the Vince Lombardi trophy until around 8pm. I'm not much of a parade person but it was great seeing so many people so happy all at one time.



If there is one thing that New Orleans knows how to do it is to host a parade. They host tons of them every year for Mardi Gras and yet this parade, the Super Bowl parade, exceeded them all in sheer crowd size. According to the news the next morning this parade brought more people into town than New Orleans had ever had downtown at one time. Think about that. They get hundreds of thousands of people in town for Mardi Gras and the associated parades and this 12 float parade superceded all that had gone before and it sounds like it was by quite a margin.

Before we went to New Orleans I was skeptical of the relationship between the city and the team. I felt like the NFL and ESPN had to be overplaying it. I assumed that the NFL was milking the tragedy of Katrina to garner sympathetic viewers and to create drama where none existed. I was wrong. New Orleans really does love their Saints. The joy in the faces of all those fans and the excitement of the entire crowd was overwhelming. It was amazing and, while it may sound trite to say so, you had to be there; the mood was magical.



The next day we had our first day of training at the Corps. Unsurprisingly, a variety of the features that I had made sure worked solidly the prior week didn't work. They didn't work at all. Crazy, strange, and unusual errors just popped up all over the place. Fortunately I was able to talk to Jason back home and have him fix a couple critical problems and we worked around the others to finish the first day - though by the end of the day at the office I was starving because I worked with Jason through lunch to get some critical issues resolved.

That night we decided to go out and have a good dinner so we called up Dickie Brennan's Steak House which is close to Burboun St and made reservations. We walked the mile or so from our hotel to the restaurant and were seated immediately upon entering. The interior of the restauant was very masculine with low lighting and dark wood paneling. We were seated at a booth-like table on the lower level. If you watch the homepage for a bit the images will change and you'll get a good feel for the ambiance of the dining area.

I had the 12 oz Ribeye and a cup of soup for dinner and both were very good. I believe the Ribeye was quite a bit larger than 12 ozs and it was perfectly cooked. It was probably one of the better Ribeyes I've had. The soup was also very good. Mark also got a cup of soup and my favorite part was how it was served. Both cups were brought out in small crocks within a bowl. Two separate waiters approached our table and, in sycnhronization, they placed the bowls down, lifted the crocks, and poured the soup. It had a very classy feel to it.

After dinner I we had some dessert. Ryan and I each had the chocolate cake and Mark had the pecan pie. I had been told to try their coconut cake but ignored the advice when I read the chocolate cake description. I should have listened. The chocolate cake was ok but it was definitely the low point of the meal and the photo of the coconut cake looked great. It was nice to finish the day off on a high note (dinner) after all the difficulties in the training room.

By, as Lee Corso would say, "Not So Fast!" Later that night I received a phone call and an email from Delta reminding us about our flight the next morning. The flight that we had asked to get off of so we could fly on Friday instead of Thursday due to our late arrival in New Orleans. So, Delta screwed up and Ryan and I were still on the Thursday flight. Ryan got on the phone and about 2 hours later the problem was finally fixed and we were back on the Friday flight. Almost as soon as Ryan hung up the phone the Hotel called us and let us know that our reservation ended the next morning and that we had to get out. It turned out that the hotel didn't really extend our reservation either so Mark had to get online and book us a hotel via priceline and we ended up with rooms at the Radisson near the airport.

The next morning we woke up and headed to the Corps for the second day of training which, of course, went no better than the first day. All sorts of shit broke and we once again had to call Jason to have him address a few problems while we worked around the rest of them. It was really annoying and embarrassing to have everything breaking in front of all the potential end users. Amazingly, the whole training was not a bust. In the afternoon as I demo'd a new and fancy way to edit data in the application the lady in charge of the entire department, Susan, happened to step in. She watched the demo (which went off without a hitch) and saw how the users responded (very positively). It was the last part of the training so, afterwards, Susan came over and had some very nice things to say. It was refreshing to have at least that part of the two day training go so well.

One of our customers who was there for the training, but who is also from Huntington, really wanted us to go to the Red Fish Grill for dinner so she could indulge in the Double Chocolate Bread Pudding so I tried to make reservations but the entire restaurant was closed for a private party that night. Honestly, it kid of fit in with the rest of our plans that week so I wasn't surprised though I did have the difficult task of breaking the bad news to the customer.

Fortunately she took it well so after training we headed downtown to the Harrah's casino to eat dinner at their buffet (not nearly as good as our dinner the prior night at a local steakhouse) but the customer enjoyed it. After the Buffet we walked around and Mark and Ryan tried their hand at gambling. Ryan likes to play Roulette and Mark likes Black Jack. Right off the bat I had a bad feeling about the place so I decided not to play. It didn't help that the cheapest tables were $15 which is outside my budget. Ryan finally found an automatic roulette table that had a $3 minimum so he sat down to play while Mark watched. Ryan watched the wheel for a while and saw a pretty good random pattern of reds and blacks so he decided to bet. He really likes to bet on red so that's what he did and, of course, it came up black. Not once, or even twice or three times - but five or six times in a row. His money was dwindling fast so he bet what was left on Red and, amazingly, he hit and managed to come out only $17 down. While Ryan was checking out Mark found a blackjack table he felt good about, sat down with $60 (enough for four hands if all went poorly). It all went poorly so he got up four hands later with nothing left. We fled the casino and headed to our new hotel, the Radisson.

As we waited to check-in a large man with a baseball bat walked into the lobby with a disheveled looking older man. The baseball bat guy told the desk clerk to get someone now because it was an emergency. The dishelved guy just looked forlorn. It turns out the disheveled guy was a homeless man who had snuck into the hotel and was trying to sleep in one of the meeting rooms (either room 215 or 217). The manager showed the homeless guy the door and the baseball bat wielding man disappeared.

A few moments later two large men were told they couldn't stay in the hotel as long as they wanted to because the hotel was completely sold out over the next few nights. Luckily we were still able to check in, making sure that we weren't getting room 215 or 217, and we headed upstairs to work on some documentation from our last two days with the customers. As we finished up the document we saw the weather man say that with the weather coming over the next couple of days and that we should expect more flight cancellations than at any time since 9/11. Laughing, we logged on the Delta website to check our flight and sure enough ours was cancelled and we were rebooked on a Saturday flight that would pass through Detroit. Of course, at this point we didn't have a hotel room for Friday night and we knew our current rooms wouldn't be available since the hotel was totally full.



Mark spent the next couple hours trying to find a place we could stay that was within some sort of budgetary limits but nothing seemed to be available. Eventually he found a room back at the Residence Inn we had spent the prior two nights at about 3x the price we had paid previously (after taxes and fees). I slept fairly well in the warmth of my own room and under a thick comforter and then we packed up and headed back downtown. The weather was gloomy and wet so we just kind of hung out around the hotel until we haded to head out for our reservations at the Red Fish Grill (which was open and hopefully was a sign of good things to come). I had been told by everyone who had eaten there that the Double Chocolate Bread Pudding was amazing so I made sure I didnd't stuff myself with dinner so I could try this delectable delight. I wasn't impressed. Sure, it was OK but I doubt any dessert could live up to the hype that bread pudding had received over the past four years. Sadly, I also didn't think that much of their jumbalaya either so, for me, the dinner was a bit of a bust. The only good thing about it was we were on Burboun St on the Friday night before Mardi Gras. The bad part - it was cold.



Amazingly, the chilly temps didn't deter some of the revelers on the street from doing what they had to do to get some beads and boa's thrown their way. I didn't get to see the same kind of debauchery I had imagined but it was the most exposed breasts I've seen in one night since I left the Army so it wasn't a total bust. While the three of us walked around and laughed at the craziness there were others there with a far more serious mission - to save our souls. Burboun Street was loaded with people carrying signs telling us we were going to hell but that we could be saved. There were people hadning out leaflets and tracts; there were big crowds of young adults just blocking the road, there were men yelling and reciting biblical verses. There were nearly as zealots there as their were partiers. It was a surprising mix.



If you've ever been to Las Vegas you are undoubtedly familiar with the many men who stand along the sidewalk flipping little cards and trying to get people to take them. They flick-flick-flick the card with one hand against the other to catch your eye and then try to hand you the card. On the card you'll find little explicit advertisements for escorts and, I assume, prostitutes. It's funny but I imagine it must also be effective because they've been out there handing out those cards for as long as I can remember. Well, on Burboun St. there was a guy doing the same exact think. He was flick-flick-flicking his card and then handing it out. Except, unstead of pimping an escort he was pimping his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It was laughable so I walked up to him and asked if he had ever been to Vegas. He said he had been, 2 or 3 times on the same kind of mission. I asked him if he had ever seen the guys with the escort cards and he answered in the affirmative. I pointed out the irony that they both were doing the exact same thing to get my attention and then wished him luck. So far, for me, the Vegas card flickers and the Burboun St. card flickers have the same rate of success : 0.



One thing about Burboun St that I've long been curious about is, "How much can people expose themselves there?" Is it limited to the chest or can people show off all their goods and, further, is it limited to just the women? Well, while waiting for a small crowed of young women expose their breasts I happened to look to the right where a man was attempting to expose himself, but not his breasts. Before he could extract anything a police officer took him down and removed him from the street. So, let that be a warning to you guys: keep your privates private. Oh, and ladies, keep doing that thing you do; like the girl in the white striped shirt is about to do in this photo (camo jacket girl did too).



Eventually we extracted ourselves from the mass of drunkards and preachers wearing an abundance of beads and we began the mile long trek back to our hotel. However, as soon as we got back to Canal St. the Morpheus parade was finishing up so we hung out to watch it pass by. While standing there the Morpheus Krewe was throwing out even more beads (bag-fulls) and some cool doubloons. Another parade, the Muses - an all woman Krewe, was going to start up after the Morpheus parade but by then it was getting to late so we headed back to the Hotel to get some sleep before our flight the next morning. Ryan and I were able to check in electronically via the 'net but Mark's ticket wouldn't let him so we knew we'd have to be at the airport at least 2 hours early.

The next morning we arrived at the airport without any difficulties but, when we went in, we saw one HUGE line at the delta counter. Mark tried to bypass the line by using the computer terminals but, just like the night before, his ticket wouldn't let him. Ryan and I were in a short line for baggage check but the line for checking in was so long Mark would have to be in it for at least 2 hours. There was no way he was going to make the flight so I told him to ignroe the line and just walk up to the counter at the other end. For once during the week fortune shined down upon him and the lady at the counter helped him and he was checked in within 3 minutes and we were on our way to security and then our gate.

Initially we were supposed to fly back through Atlanta but after our Friday flight had been cancelled Delta changed our route to send us through Detroit so we were all joking about how we'd be spending our Saturday night in Windsor, Ontario trying to win back some of their gambling losses from Thursday night. The flights to Atlanta were all being cancelled again but ours took off without a hitch and we were in the Exit row so we had plenty of leg room. By this time Ryan was loving flying but still marvelling at how amazingly fast you actually got from point A to point B. I have to admit it really is an amazing thing that I've just become numb to because I've flown so much. We eventually arrived in Detroit and the weather was cold but clear and, amazingly, our flight to Charleston wasn't cancelled so we headed down to our gate to wait.

Of course, nothing could go perfectly smootly and, at our planes scheduled take off time we were still sitting in the terminal waiting for the boarding call. However, instead of a boarding call we were informed that we were being moved to a different gate so we all had to grab our bags and hussle to another part of the terminal to get to our plane. We made it there with plenty of time to spare but at this point we were a little skeptical that we'd actuall be taking off. However, we boarded without a hitch and we were airborne within half an hour. The flight from Detroit took about 1.5 hours and then we were safely down in Charleston.

Ryan and I loaded up my car and drove the hour back to my house where his wife and children were waiting for him. Once they left I gave Lisa and the girls a bunch of beads and then we headed out for dinner at a local Mexican joint. It was good to be done with the trip.

I'd actually like to go back to New Orleans at some point when the weather is a little nicer. I think there would be some cool places to go visit and there were some beautiful neighborhoods I'd like to walk around and see. Plus, it would be nice to go without all the stress of travel plans being spoiled and software demonstrations going bad!

#MyLife #Travel

Please, as you read this, keep in mind which name is listed first in the title. It's important as I'm sure you'll agree.

This year, for Christmas, I received some pretty cool gifts. For, example, I received a t-shirt and hat that I have long been hoping for. I also received a book on Mt. Bike maintenance which I obviously need. I also received a really cool 10 pack of beer from a little microbrew in Cooperstown NY. The 10 pack has five different flavors of beer and, so far, the two I've tasted have been very good. Just with that collection of gifts I think anyone would agree I had a pretty damn good Christmas. Amazingly I got even more stuff that I am not even going to list here.

However, Christmas in my family stretches on a bit. I really celebrate about five times. The first is with my immediate family - my daughters and wife Lisa. From Lisa I received a partially prepaid trip to Niagara Falls. For the past few years we've given each other a trip of some sort that just involved the two of us. This year all four of us will be going and a long weekend right on the falls in a cool sounding B&B. It should be great.

The second Christmas is with Lisa's parents and that's where I got the book, hat, and shirt. The third is on the phone with my older brother Ted. The fourth is on the phone with my Mom and it was from her that I received the beer, a mountain biking magazine and a bunch of other nice things. The fifth is with my Dad and Patty.

By the time the fifth celebration came around I had gifts that covered the present and the future. However, in a rare Christmas moment right out of Dickens I was visited by the past on Christmas number five. My Dad and Patty had purchased a scanner and scanned in every photo that they owned. This covered photos from before I was born, up through me turning about six and then picked up again with photos from when after my parents were divorced and my dad remarried Patty through to some photos taken after I had moved out and had joined the Army.

I have often complained that not many photos exist of me as a child and next to none exist of me as a baby. Ted, on the other hand, has often joked that he was found on the side of the road or adopted. It turns out we were both wrong.

After the images had been scanned Patty had a fully bound book made of photos from our early childhood. The book : "Bill and Ted" starring yours truly with Ted in a nice supporting role.

The book is really nice. It's a hard cover book with a photo of Ted and I standing in a field somewhere in England on the cover. I'm probably 3 in the photo and my head is gigantic. It's a great picture and the book is one of the most thoughtful gifts I've ever received.

Ted received the same book and we opened our gift at the same time while on the phone with each other. It was a lot of fun looking at some of the old pictures and laughing at ourselves.

The gift didn't stop with the book though. We were also both given a digital copy of every photo that was scanned. The resolution of the scans is pretty remarkable and, when all is said and done, is probably about 1500 photos. I'm not in all of them. Heck, I'm not in even 30% of them - but they are awesome nonetheless.

Now I feel inspired to do the same and to get our scanner out and to start scanning in all the photos I have in photo albums. As I go through and process all the scanned photos (they are scanned up to six at a time so I'm separating each out into its' own file) I will upload a few to share.

#MyLife

I suppose now is the time were we should be looking back at the past year to study our success and to learn from our failures. To be honest I'm not sure that's a very easy task. Heck, it seems hard enough just to identify events that might qualify in either category. However I think one success for me has been my increased involvement in my community. I created the website whyhuntington.com last year and because of that I have met many great people and have had the opportunity to help on a few different projects. I've also had the chance to speak with the media in terms of the local newspaper, television stations, and our university radio station about what I think are the positives in Huntington and how we can address some of the negatives. I doubt my voice carries much weight but it's been cool being able to share my thoughts on the subject and perhaps, slightly, help set a direction for positive change.

My efforts to get involved and help bring about change are also the source of one of my failures this year - my effort to join the Cabell County Board of Education. I am glad I tried and I think my primary effort was well executed I think I could have handled the pettiness of the process much better. I should not have lost my temper with Ted Barr (RIP) who was, at the time, the board president. Regardless of what I thought of his tactics I should have kept my cool and expressed my opinions in a more constructive way. I'm not sure how I could have done that but I believe I could have done better.

Another big victory for us was getting a better handle on our finances. While we are no-means perfect at saving money we have done much much better. This started a couple years ago really when we decided to take half of any pay raises or sudden windfalls we got and to put those directly into a savings account that is difficult to tap into. Sadly, we've tapped a few times anyway but at least, at this point, we have something in savings. A nice plus to saving half of these bonuses is that you still get to enjoy the increase a little bit while at the same time you are saving money without feeling any pinch. This is a tactic I want to teach the kids in the upcoming year and, since they have no expenses, I'd like them to start saving half of all income they receive - or maybe I'll get them to save 40% and have them find a charity for 10% that they can donate to each year.

All of our financial preparations couldn't have come at a better time because as 2009 comes to a close and we approach a new decade our family is deep in a period of uncertainty; specifically concerning Lisa's career. Her company was purchased earlier this year and after the merger happened no personnel decisions were immediately announced. Instead we were told we had to wait until January 8 to find out her fate. Thus we are looking at the new year as a time of change more than we normally might. If Lisa does get laid off she has decided that she would like to try and be a stay at home mom. This will cause us to seriously escalate our efforts at living life more frugally as her income will be sorely missed if we continue to live as we do. However, we think it will be possible based on what little information we have at the moment.

In November I hit my 10 year mark with Strictly Business. It's pretty amazing to me that I've lived anywhere this long let alone worked for the same company for such a big chunk of it. I don't technically hit my 10 years of full time employment until May or June but it's close enough for me. It is nice having a sense of job security right now more than ever!

So that is last year - what's up for next year? First off I'm thinking of running for the Board of Education in a real election. Lisa's job situation will have a major impact on that decision so I'm still holding out on throwing my hat in the ring. There are, I believe, 3 seats that will be up for election so I feel like my odds might be pretty good. I am also hoping to help the Tree team for Tomorrow get the tree planting progressing. We raised a bunch of money but so far we haven't actually planted any of the seedlings yet. I am also considering getting involved, somehow, in an after school computer program at Shannon and Emily's school. It is just an idea I have floating in my head so I don't know if that will happen or not but it's something I'm tossing around.

I would very much like to get more involved in the girls lives than I am currently. I feel like I am just a weekend dad and that bothers me. I'm not sure how or when I will be able to do that but it is, beyond making sure I stay employed, my biggest priority for the upcoming year. I'd also like to get my aches and pains healed up so I can start riding my bike and maybe playing frisbee again. I know, there is only so much time in a day so I'll probably not get all of this done to my satisfaction but I want to make an effort of it.

Finally, I want to finish the few home repair/improvement projects we have started in the past. These include, but are not limited to:

• Bathroom Drywall Repair
• Back Patio Repaving
• Secret Door Trimming
• Kitchen Floor Trimming
• Upper Patio Trim
• Bottom Deck Handrail Replacement

I hope to get a few of those done in the first couple months of the year. Hopefully I'll have reported the good news that I finished them here on my blog by April!

#Family #MyLife

Well, fall has managed to sneak up on me and I haven't posted in, probably, over a month. I'm a disgrace to the blogging community! Be that as it may I have decided to throw out a new family update to keep my diasporic friends and family informed. You can thank me later and, yes, I made up the word diasporic; sue me. No, please don't sue me I can't really afford to defend myself - in fact, just forget about the diaspora I suggested and focus, instead, on what follows. After my bad luck bike ride where I ended up with two broken chains and a flat I don't think I've made it back on the trails again even though I did replace my chain. I think I need to tweak a tooth on my second chain ring and thus I've been making excuses to not ride. Not only in blogging have I been a slacker. However, I have not just been sitting on my ass. No, I've been out playing ultimate frisbee again, which, truth be told, has been a blast. Sure, I've sucked - but I've had a lot of fun. I've played once or twice a week over the past three weeks and it has been a great change of pace. My left Achilles tendon doesn't care much for it - but the rest of me is feeling great. In a completely unrelated topic my website, WhyHuntington.com, is still going pretty strong. It has never gotten as many other contributors as I would have liked but it's going OK. Because of it I have been asked to speak at the Create WV Conference being held in Huntington Oct 18-20. I'll be a speaker in the Business Tracks session on "Why West Virginia?" This will probably be my largest speaking audience since High School Debate so hopefully I don't make an ass out of myself. Shannon and Emily are both busy with school; Shannon in 3rd grade and Emily in Kindergarten. They both have homework every friggen night which is a real drag. How much homework should a kindergartner have anyway? Granted, Emily needs to work a bit harder during the day, in school, but sheesh I'm not sure they both need to have so much to do every night. Shannon is working on a solid "C" in her conduct grade becuase she is such a screwball. She talks, pretends like she's sleeping, doesn't turn in homework - or tests for that matter - and is generally a non-model student in class. In large part this is our fault becuase I don't think we've really instilled much responsibility into her so now we are trying to think of some ways to get her to me more responsible. I'm not entirely sure where we are going with that but hopefully, in the long run, we'll pick a winning strategy. Emily, on the other hand, is no better. She doesn't really listen in class, does her own things, and makes up excuses for why she can't do things all the time instead of trying to figure out how she actually can do something. This whole parenting thing is no walk in the park let me tell you. Of course I have no idea how to make her not be a total slacker - but we are trying and hopefully, again, we'll figure out a good strategy for straightening her out a bit. Even with these past two paragraphs as evidence against the girls, in general, they kick ass. They are great. They both keep the house full of joy and creativity. If you're a friend of Lisa's on facebook you've undoubtedly seen some of the breakfasts they've made for her over the past few weekends. They crack me up. I'm pretty sure there still hasn't been a day in Shannon's life where she hasn't made me laugh and smile. Emily is super excited about her upcoming birthday and everyday she comes up with something else she wants. I don't think she'll be getting any of the things she has asked for. She knows her birthday is in the fall so when she heard fall started she was pretty certain it was her birthday. She cracks me up. Lisa just had her birthday and I threw her a surprise party to celebrate the birthday she had while I was in Hong Kong. While she had an inkling I was doing something she didn't realize the scope of the crowd that would be there so I partially surprised her which was cool. It is really hard to schedule, plan, and pull off a surprise party for another adult living in the same house. Especially if the party is in the house. The next time I try that I'll see if someone else will host it or I'll have it at a place. Lisa is working, working, working and hoping for good news around Thanksgiving when she will find out if her companies merger will leave her unemployed. Hopefully the new company realizes what an amazing asset she is and they keep her. Otherwise she will get to fulfill her second career dream (after being a pharma rep) of being a stay-at-home mom. If we thought the budget was tight now I can't imagine how frugal we'll have to become if that happens but I imagine we will figure out some way to work it out. I know our annual vacation will be on the kibosh, as will TV, internet, and any eating out ever. In fact we would probably have to sell our house and move to a much less expensive residence. It would be an interesting change of pace. Our babysitter has been pretty sick lately so Lisa has been with her at the Hospital a lot lately. She was diagnosed recently with several pulmonary embolism's so she was admitted to the Hospital a little over a week ago. Now she is on some blood thinners that are insanely expensive (for a variety of reasons). She also has no health insurance so, initially, we were really concerned about her financial health as well. Fantastically, the state of WV stepped up and gave her a medical card for the next six months which basically covers all of her medical costs. Every six months they will review her financial status to see if she still qualifies. What a great program! I know some of you may be bothered to see the government interfering in health care - but I think she is exactly the type of person who should be getting help. I'm sure there is a lot more I should be saying right now but I can't think of anything so hopefully this will be enough to sate your appetite for all things Rawlinson in Huntington.

#Family #MyLife

A couple of weeks ago Lisa came across a really nice bike on eBay that she thought I should bid on. I debated about it until the auction was almost closed becuase, quite frankly, I wasn't sure if I wanted to invest any serious money into a sport that I am so obviously bad at. Eventually the deal proved too tempting to pass up and I made an offer and won the auction. However, it seemed I was not going to get the bike becuase my offer was less than the sellers "reserve" price. Undeterred I emailed the seller directly and asked him to inform me if the bike was relisted as I would consider re-bidding. He responded and told me I could buy it for what my max bid was (well, that + $14 to round the numbers out). I accepted and within a week the bike was delivered to my office by our UPS driver.

The bike features an '08 Santa Cruz Superlight frame, an '08 Rock Shox Reba front fork, all sorts of Shimano XTR parts including hubs, shifters, Hyrdaulic disk brakes, and derailleurs, a Chris King headset, a Fox Float RP 23 rear shock, a Thomson seat post, Kenda navagel rear tire (running tubeless) and Mavic DT Swiss rims. Honestly, I barely know what all of that means so if, at this point, you are lost don't worry you aren't alone. The basics are this is all pretty high end stuff that passed the muster of my more knowledgeable and skilled friends.



The bike arrived last Wednesday but we weren't going for our normal mid-week ride due to the bad weather so I had to wait until Saturday. Over the course of the next couple of days I managed to transfer my crappy nylon pedal's onto my highly tuned racing machine. It's was sort of like putting a Yugo Emblem on a Ferarr and I caught some nice crap from my friends for it - but I just don't have the necessary confidence for clip in peddals (more on those later).

On Saturday we hit up our normal trail but we went about it a little backwards and climbed the hill we normally ride down. Almost immediately I noticed some differences in the overall ride of the bike. The front shock, during the first 400 yards of the ride, saved me from going over my handle bars and the efficient shifters and gears that actually stay in gear made the climbs much, much, much easier. I also noticed I was able to make a turn I usually have trouble with thanks to the improved stopping power of my vastly superior brakes. I was feeling great. In fact I felt so great I was riding a bit more aggressively than I normally do which, when looking back with hindsight, may not have been the best idea.

One area I always walk through is a tricky rock garden and the surrounding trail that occurs about half way up to the top of the mountain. This time I decided I would try to ride through the surrounding trail and that I would just walk the garden. Unfortunately when going over a decently sized rock (about 12-18" tall) I steered poorly between the second two rocks and my front tire lodged into one of the neighboring large rocks. If you've ever ridden a bike or a skateboard before you can imagine what this did to me - I flew right over the handlebars. Fortunately I'm actually pretty adept at landing after that particular dismount so I didn't really get banged up at all and I was quickly back in the saddle and riding.

Later we approached a section of the trail that has been dubbed "Bills new Nemisis" becuase I typically won't even try to ride down it. I have ridden down it successfully once but most of the time I don't even bother. However, it was the first real bit of downhill for the day and I wanted to see what this full suspension bike was made of so I just dropped in and rode. Intially I did ok but I started to build up some speed which made me nervous so I used my rear brake to slow down. Then my back tire started to skid and I was hitting some big rocks kind of hard so I released the brake because, in my limited experience, it is easier to go over most of these things with a bit of speed. Unfortunately it can also be hard to steer when you're going over rocks and ruts while picking up speed and you don't have much confidence. One larger rock kicked my front tire to the left and started to point me off the trail towards a tree so I applied my back brake again so I could correct. Almost immediately the loose soil and my rear tire started to slide so I released and then tried to steer back to the right. However, the slipping I was already doing proved to be too much and my bike just slipped out from under me and I slid down the hill while still sitting in a normal riding position (just lying down).

My legs both hurt a little from the fall and slide but overall I felt OK considering I had avoided hitting the tree and I wasn't really hurt so I hopped back on the bike and finished the trail out to the road where we found Ed fixing a flat. When I passed up Ed to stop and help he noticed that my back tire looked a little funny so we investigated and quickly discovered that my rear rim was pretty badly bent. My ride for the day was officially over after 1.5 miles. It was pretty disheartening that I had just bought this expensive bike and immediately had to take it to the shop for repairs - I had never had to get my much cheaper bike fixed. My bike was still ride-able down the street to our car but not safe for trail riding so we headed to the car and then I went to the local bike shop to drop mine off for repairs. At this point I had been in possession of the bike for less than 3 days - that was on Saturday afternoon.

I just got the bike back from the shop (today is Friday). So, at this point, the repair shop has had nearly twice as much possession of my bike as I have. I can't afford to keep that trend alive so hopefully I don't break it again.

The only thing left to upgrade on the bike are the pedals. They really do suck. Even though they are textured because they are nylon they get pretty slick when they are muddy and I have a lot of trouble keeping my feet on the bike. Most mountain bikers use clip in pedals (STB, Egg-Beaters, or Time ATAC's) becuase they give you a better base on the bike, improve pedaling efficiency, and help you when you need to hop up the hill a bit. However, I'm a little nervous about the idea because you are locking your foot into the bike just like you do with your boots and ski bindings (practically the exact same mechanism really except it locks in at the ball of your foot instead of the heel and toe). I know that I need to overcome my fear on this issue so I have bought a pair of shoes and some Time ATAC Alium pedals that I will be installing on my old bike for a week so that I can practice getting started and locked in and, just as importantly, releasing when i need to. I figure after about a week I can transfer them to my new bike and I'll go out and try just the river trail and some other easy bits of up and down so that I can get comfortable enough with them that I can ride without being worried about my knee being destroyed when I crash.

I'll let you know how that goes.

#Sports #MountainBiking #FunStuff #MyLife #Featured

A week prior to this last Saturday I went with Gilbert, Ed, and Mike to Kanawah Sate Forest (KSF) just outside of Charleston WV for our weekly mountain biking ride. For a few months now the guys have been telling me about how they wanted me to go out there to ride (they had been there previously) and Ed, specifically, couldn't wait to read my blog on the trip - so here it is.

After my Mt Wood trip where I ended the day totally gassed and seriously malnourished I decided to be a bit better prepared for the KSF trip. At Mt Wood we rode about 16 miles and the plan, going into KSF, was to do just over 20. Just like on the Mt Wood trip I had a big bowl of oatmeal for breakfast - however, unlike the Mt Wood trip, KSF is only a hour from the house so the oatmeal was still providing energy when we started riding.

The ride started off innocently as we headed down the river-trail away from the parking lot. We rode that trail ad a bit of road for about 2 miles before we encountered the first climb of the day. Barboursville has a couple "longish" climbs that really wear me out but none of them are nearly as long as this first ascent in KSF; fortunately this one was on a fireroad so the soil was well packed and the climb was just a matter of strength and endurance and thus no technical skills had to be brought to bear.

I managed to ride up that first hill a long way before I eventually had to get off the bike and walk it for a bit; even though I had to walk I was pretty pleased with how far I made it. Eventually I caught up with Ed who was having some breathing problems but it wasn't long before he resumed riding and pulled away from me. Finally I reached the summit where Mike and Gilbert were fully refreshed from having waited on me for so long.

I'm going to let you in on a little secret here - I really suck at mountain biking. I have weak legs and poor endurance so the climbs kick my ass and alot of times I think to myself, "man, I hate these climbs." Sadly, the descents are no better. While my lack of endurance doesn't come into play my lack of skill and confidence do. That shit is scary because I know that at any second I could fly off my bike and get seriously hurt and thus I often think to myself, "man I hate these downhills."

At this point you may be wondering why I ride at all and the answer is that as much as I hate both of those parts I also love them. Both aspects of the ride provide me with personal internal challenges. Each time that I make it further up a hill without stopping I have a small celebration on the inside and each time I make it down a tricky bit of downhill I silently pump my fist in exultation. It's a great thrill to overcome my weakness, my fear, and my lack of ability.

Sadly, the first downhill of the day didn't provide me with any victories. Instead I found myself walking my bike over a bunch of obstacles that I realized I could have ridden over. I had built up so much trepidation about this trip going in that my lack of confidence really kept me from enjoying the first downhill in anyway. That sucked because the first climb was a bitch and without some reward at the top it's hard be happy when you reach the second climb.

Before beginning the second climb I ate half of a Cliff Bar "Mojo" trail mix bar. It was so much more edible than a standard Cliff Bar that I think I'll replace my normal stash with all Mojo bars. It wasn't nearly as dry and heavy as the standard bars and I felt much better pretty quickly after eating it.

Our second climb was in the woods and was almost entirely trail based. It didn't seem like a very long climb and I was pretty happy with my effort on it because my legs were already pretty tired. At the top I finished off my Mojo bar and then we did the mid trail which was sort of downhill but a much more cross-country type ride (I really enjoy it, it's all small ups and downs with nice sweeping turns). Once we hit the end of that trail we were at the top of the second descent. I barely remember it but I know I liked it a lot better than the first one. I rode almost the entire downhill and had a really good time with it until, that is, I was faced with the third climb.

Ed and Mike had told me stories of the third climb. Ed, a very quiet guy, supposedly even yelled out in frustration the first time they climbed it because it never seemed to end. They told me that I'd see a curve and think "Oh, the end!" only to turn around it and see another steep climb facing me. Oh, and the final stretch of the hill? They said it's the steepest part of the whole thing. Needless to say I felt mentally prepared for this beast.

I wasn't. I wasn't prepared at all. It's a long climb to be sure. Mike, who somehow managed to pedal up the entire rise said it took him 45 minutes. Maybe that doesn't sound very long to you but imagine riding a bike up one hill non-stop for 45 minutes; we aren't in the Tour du France here; we're just some weekend warriors. That is a big ass hill. It took me quite a bit more than 45 minutes and I didn't pedal up the whole thing. Each new incline change presented me with a new challenge. Heck, some of them were so steep that each tree along the side of the trail served as my new goal. If I could just pedal to it I could take a rest. I walked, I gasped, I pedaled, and I wondered if I went the wrong way a couple times but eventually I found the other three waiting at the top. Well, technically it wasn't the top of the hill but it was the entrance to the third downhill section.

If you have ever snow-skied you will be familiar with the green circle, blue square, and black diamond designations for trail difficulty. The first two descents were probably green circle/blue square type hills. However, the third hill is designated as a black diamond. You can ride about 15 feet in, till you reach a big tree, before you actually drop in to the trail. At that point it gets steep, has a big bend in it, and has some really big rocks that totally obscure the trail. Ed went first and made it look all too easy. Mike followed, and while he had a small glitch, he pulled it out nicely and made it down as well. Gilbert followed and once he reached the turn he dismounted and walked his bike past the massive rocks. I walked with him and still managed to hurt myself by accidentally banging my knee into the bike frame.

Once we were past the rocks, however, the trail became pretty fun. There were a couple of other places were I definitely had to dismount but overall it was a really good downhill until we reached a pretty large jump. As I approached Ed was standing on the top of it and announced that he had "talked himself out of it" while waiting. Remember now that Ed is our most experienced rider so it should have been a good warning to everyone that the jump wasn't in our skill level.

Mike didn't hesitate to bypass the jump and I certainly didn't even think about it. But Gilbert - the guy with the least experience of the group - he gave it some thought and then announced that he was going to try it. We all tried to talk him out of it but he wasn't hearing our protests. He had committed himself to the jump and would not be swayed. He was certain that with the amount of dropoff that his back wheel would have to land on the ground first.

This jump, you must understand, was in the middle of a downhill section so that you would jump at one point and not only would you go up but the hill would continue to go down beneath you. Thus, if you hit the jump fast enough and used the correct technique Gilbert was right and you're bike tire would easily land before your front tire.

The problem here was that Gilbert never had enough speed nor did he pull up on his front tire at all. Therefore, when his front tire left the jump it didn't go up at all it just went down and, because the hill was dropping away beneath him, he fell extra far and flew straight over his handlebars. He landed pretty solidly on his shoulder, his bike flew over him (I don't think the back tire had hit the ground yet) and then Gilbert hopped up and shook off the landing.

Here's a video tape of his effort. Sadly I flinched as he landed because I thought he was going to seriously hurt himself.



When he was fully recovered we asked if he would try it again. His answer - "Sure, I'd try it again!" Just not that day. In fact through Thursday of this week his shoulder was still to sore to sleep on.

From the crash site we had a few more miles to go. Most of it was road and river trail. On the road we had a big hill to ride down which was fun but, as I started to pick up speed, I got a cramp in my left thigh. I tried to drink from my water-pack but it was dry; for the first time I had managed to drink two liters of water on the ride. I took that as both a good and bad sign - good that I was drinking consistently but bad that I didn't have enough water with me. Fortunately we only had about 1 mile left from there until we were back at the car and I could get some more to drink.

All in all the day was far more enjoyable than I expected. The way Mike and Ed built the park up for me I anticipated every downhill to be like the first half of the third - a black diamond. Instead there were good challenging climbs and mostly fun and manageable downhills. I would certainly return to Kanawha State Forest for another ride in the future.

#MyLife

The past few weeks have been fun-laden. So much so, in fact, it has been hard to find the time to even talk about all the stuff we have been doing. I think my last update had us returning from our Grand Canyon adventure and since then we've taken two more short trips and we've done a bunch of stuff right around the house.

Our first trip was to Johnson City Tennessee to visit some friends who used to live here in Huntington. Johnson City is about 4 hours drive to the south of us so we drove down there for the fourth of July weekend. We left here on Friday and then drove home on Sunday afternoon (the day Federer managed to pull of the huge Wimbledon win against Roddick). While we were down in Johnson City we visited a couple neighboring towns and, all-in-all, we really had a nice time. Lisa and Sarah went to a healthy food store and Lisa picked up a nice Rain Barrel at a pretty good price even after the exorbitant 9% sales tax.

We also managed to see two separate fireworks shows which the girls really enjoyed (plus a third on Sunday night after we got home). The first fireworks show was in a small neighboring town called Jonesborough Tenn. Jonesborough was really pretty cool for such a small little place. It was setup to be very friendly for people to walk around while at the same time they had really embraced their old architecture and have even become a bit of a tourist destination thanks to their Storytelling Festival each October. Main street Jonesborough was exactly what Disney is trying to capture with their "Main Street USA" but far more authentic. The whole town just had a really cool laid back vibe to it.

The second show was from the back yard of Sarah and Dean. They live pretty close to a school and the city puts on a big show from the schools football field so we could sit on the back deck and watch the fireworks go off. It was nice that the two shows we saw down there were scheduled for different nights so it was easy to see both of them. The kids had a great time not only watching fireworks but also playing with Sarah and Dean's two kids who are very similar in age to Shannon and Emily. Overall it was a really nice visit and, considering how close they are, I can't imagine it will be too long before we coordinate for another visit.

Our next trip was to Kings Island and we did that about 10 days ago. We drove up Friday night after work (to Cincinnati) and stayed in Blue Ash (near the park) and then spent all day Saturday at Kings Island. Shannon wasn't too willing to venture into any new rides but she had a blast on the rides she did go on. The one new ride we managed to get both girls to go on was the Scrambler which has always been one of my favorite rides. We were going to drive home Saturday night but we ended up staying at the park until 10+pm to watch fireworks again so we eneded up getting a room at the last minute at a Country Inns and Suites. Lisa and Shannon had a late nite dinner at the waffle house (which Shannon loved) while Emily and I hit the hay. The next morning before heading out Shannon and I used the hotels pool and whirlpool for a bit (which Shannon loved) and then we hit the road and made it back in time for our Kickball game.

Speaking of Kickball - my team is kicking ass right now. We finished the first half of the season at 2-2. We were beaten in one game and in the second loss we had to forfeit because not enough of our female players made it to the game that day (we have to have four present out of our 9). So far in the second half of the season we are 2-0 and we are in sole possession of first place. In that first game (after the Kings Island trip) we played pretty well and scored enough runs in the first inning to seal the victory (there are five innings in a game). This past weekend we had to play the other team that won in week 5; The Cabell Comprehensive Kickballers. They were considered by most to be the favorite going in even though we beat them in the first half of the season becuase they had been scoring so many runs. Well, we won again - this time 9-3. It was our best offensive performance of the season and we played fantastically. Joe kicked 2 homeruns, Ed booted in another, Mike had a triple, we had a few doubles - all in all it was great. I had a single and what should have been a triple but I was waved in on the triple and so I headed home. I had to dive to try and beat the throw but the guys throw was true and he got me in the stomach as I dove so I was thrown out at home. Fortunately, I at least drove in a run but had I scored we would have hit double digits which would have been cool. Only the Kickballers have scored double digits this season.

Along with kickball I've been mountain biking a bit and I've been doing pretty well; I think landing on my head has made me a better rider. While three weeks ago our entire ride kind of sucked (I was all out of sorts, Mike had 3 flats, and Sean had a flat) the past two weeks have been my best efforts yet. Two weeks ago Ed set a really stiff pace for us but I managed to keep up (sortof) and I didn't have to take any extra breaks to do so. Plus, my climbing and obstacle handling was much better than it had been in the past. Then, last week, while I started off a little shaky I picked it up a lot as the ride went by and I managed to navigate through some tricky parts I've not been able to ride before. Usually I end up hitting a root or a rock or something that causes me to stop and then i have to walk. Instead, this time, I managed to ride through it all. I was pretty stoked about it. Sadly, our friend Jason, who was on his first ride in quite a while, ended the ride off by crashing and hurting his ribs. Hopefully he heals up fairly quickly so he can get back out with us again.

I think, at this point, our busy summer is just about to finish and we can settle down and get some stuff done around the house. School starts pretty soon and Emily begins Kindergarten while Shannon enters third grade - it should be an exciting enough time without us going out any more. I know I have a ton of chores to take care of

#MountainBiking #FunStuff #MyLife #Travel

Lisa and I headed to Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago for a sunny vacation with my brother and his wife. We drove up to Cleveland a couple days before we had to fly out and dropped the kids off with Lisa's parents before jetting away on Monday of the week. Our flight, with American Airlines, generally sucked (and unfortunate condition I'm coming to expect from most domestic carriers) and we arrived in Vegas late. We then hired a shuttle service and got a ride to the Westin. I had booked the Westin room via priceline.com back in December when I first told Lisa about the trip as part of our Christmas present and we had a pretty good deal of $70/night.

As the trip approached Lisa was getting pretty nervous about the Westin being off the strip but it wasn't very far off the strip at all and you could walk right across the street to Bally's to catch the monorail which worked out wonderfully for us as Ted and Cyndy were staying one monorail stop up at the MGM Grand. The Westin was OK. I can't really give it a great review but it wasn't that bad either. The hallways were a bit dingy but our room was clean and the staff was generally friendly. However, our initial check-in was full of problems. Our first room (on the fifth floor) didn't have an in-room safe. Of course we didn't know that till we got to the room so we locked our bags in the room and went back to the front desk where we had to wait in line again. We were moved to a new room on the fifth floor but it had two problems. The first was a dead battery in the smoke detector (they fixed that) but the second was the presence of a very large dog in the room beside us. I was unaware that the Westin was a dog friendly hotel. The neighbor dog didn't like the smell of me or something because we could hear him growling through the wall so I went back downstairs and got in line again. We were then given a room on the 12th floor. Finally, we had a solid room with a safe, no neighboring dogs, and a working smoke detector. We were settled in about an hour after we first arrived at the hotel. I don't want to dog the Westin entirely becuase, quite frankly their seemingly hyperbolicly named "Heavenly Bed" is one damn comfortable bed. In fact I'd say it was vastly more comfortable than any bed I've slept on including our tempurpedic (Lisa has always liked the tempurpedic but she even preferred the Heavenly Bed). If I had $3500 to blow on a bed I'd order one today.

That night Ted and Cyndy came down to our hotel and we enjoyed some very light snacks at the hotels mixer for guests and then we headed out and did a little light gambling. Ted, Cyndy, and Lisa all like doing slot machines so that was all we did that night. I don't really care much for the machines but I tried to enjoy them and managed to lose my days gambling money in record time. It was not a good sign for things to come in regards to me gambling during the week.



We had pre-purchased some tickets to go to the Price is Right show at Balleys on Tuesday and so, once we had breakfast, we headed over there and made sure we were signed in and that we had our name badges on. Bally's and Paris are connected so while we waited for the show to start we walked around Paris a bit and did some minor sight-seeing. Then we headed back to the show and had a great time. It was a lot like the version on TV but there were some noticeable differences. First if you were called to "Come on Down" you only got one chance to get up on stage. If your bid wasn't the closest without going over you were sent back to your seat with a tee-shirt as a consolation prize. By rotating contestants through this way they were able to give a lot more people a chance to play which was pretty cool. The second noticable difference was that between each prize round they gave away 1000 gaming credits at Bally's to four people in the audience. Via these two gimmicks they could claim to have more than 50 winners in the show. Finally, in the show case showdown there was only one show-case and both contestants (people who hadn't played in any game at all yet) bid on the same prize package. The person closest without going over would win a cruise to Mexico and if they were within $100 they would win the entire showcase (including a new Nissan). Both players overbid by about $7000. It wasn't that their bids seemed that outlandish but that the value of the showcase was so incredibly low; $13,000! It had the cruise, a 61" DLP, the Nissan, a fridge/freezer, and some other stuff. It was pretty shocking.

We had a great time cheering on the contestants and shouting out "HIGHER", "LOWER", and "ONE DOLLAR!!" and we felt the show was well worth the money even though we didn't get called up to play. It was neat being a part of something we all remembered from our childhood.

Wednesday was a day with nothing planned so we just wandered around a lot and had a good time. To be honest I don't even remember Wednesday.

For Thursday we had a special treat planned as we had pre-ordered tickets to see the Cirque Du Soleil show, "O". All four of us saw "Ka" the last time we were in Vegas and Lisa and I had seen "La Nouba" when we were in Orlando back in 2001 so we knew we were in for a nice treat. Even though Lisa and I were a little let down by Ka after La Nouba our faith in Cirque was fully restored by "O". "O" was much more enjoyable to us than "Ka" and Lisa thought it was even better than "La Nouba" - I'm not sure about that assessment but I really enjoyed "O". My favorite part of the show wasn't one of the acts or athletes but rather the technological marvel that is the stage they performed on and in. "O" is a water based show and the stage can disappear in part or entirely and leave a pool in its wake. It was awesome. At times the entire stage would sink beneath the water while at other times just a small pie wedge would be submerged. The flow of the show was so well timed that it would seem like the stage couldn't have time to disappear before a suicidal high diver would descend head first into the water. It never seemed like the water could be deep enough yet it was. It was fantastic.

On Friday we two couples split up and did our own things. Ted and Cyndy were flying home while Lisa and I were flying, via helicopter, to the Grand Canyon. Our shuttle bus picked us up at the hotel and then took us to a small nearby airport where we met our pilot and, before we knew it, we ascended to about 3,000 feet for a great trip around the Hoover Dam and then onward to the Canyon. We only got to see a small part of the canyon but it was still really cool. We flew past the Grand Canyon Skywalk and then landed at the base of the canyon for a picnic lunch and about 30 minutes of photographic opportunities. After that the pilot loaded us all back up and we flew on a different route back to the airport. Lisa had never flown in a helicopter before so she was a bit nervous before the flight started but by the time we landed in the canyon she was loving it. It was a great excursion and I highly recommend it. However, don't limit your Grand Canyon encounter to just that - you need to make sure you visit the South Rim at some point as well becuase it is a much grander vision than the portions of the canyon we visited. Someday I'll be taking Lisa back to see that part (and, who knows, maybe another Helicopter flight from the Canyon rim).



Finally, Saturday arrived and we had to check out and prepare to leave. By this point I had not won at all during the trip but instead had lost my daily allowance each day. It was very strange. However, even ignoring my losses the trip itself was great. It was nice to see Ted and Cyndy and I was really glad to get Lisa to the Grand Canyon and in a helicopter. Overall it was a great trip and I look forward to our next vacation (wherever that may be).

#FunStuff #MyLife #Travel #Featured #Photos

This past weekend was a long planned Mountain Biking trip to Mount Wood State Park in northern West Virginia (near Parkersburgh). Typically we just ride some local trails so it was pretty exciting to be going about 2 hours out to hit some totally new single track. I woke up pretty early (7am) on Saturday because I couldn't remember what time I was picking Ed up at (9am). Since I was up so early I went to Walmart to get a spare tube and then came back home and had some oatmeal, loaded up the car, and then drove over to Eds. I was still there half an hour early.

At Eds house we filled up our water packs (my house was under a water boil advisory due to a water main break). And then we headed to route 2 to meet up with the other car for the drive up at around 9:30. The drive took 2 hours and then, once everyone was ready to go it was just about noon. At this point I really should have had a snack of some sort but I wasn't hungry and nor was I thinking about food. This was my first mistake of the day.

We started the ride from Mike's mom's house which is in an awesome location about 200 feet from the trail head. We jumped in and started a great ride of short descents and short climbs. The one constant of the days ride is there would be no time spent on flat terrain. Mike has a cool GPS unit and he uploaded the course we rode so you can see all the cool details. The bottom of the page has four tabs (they are really faded so its hard to tell they do anything) but the elevation tab does work and it will show you how the course bounced up and down. It was a ton of fun to ride though I'm not sure I was fully ready for 16 miles of it.

At about the seven mile marker we came out into a place called the Savannah and a really cool, but slightly overgrown, obstacle course was waiting for us. It had neat rails you could try to ride on, a teeter totter, and a long ramped jump. The approaches to many of the parts was really overgrown but we still managed to try a few of the things. I successfully rode onto one of the small rails but had to bail before reaching the second. Ed conquered the teeter-totter and then we each took a try at the jump.



This first photo is of Ed making the jump look pretty easy. None of us got very much air but I think Ed may have gotten the most. He also rode down the jump very slowly and amazed me by nothing flipping his bike in the process.



Mike made the jump too. He didn't get as much air as I expected but he still did a good job. He also rode slowly over the jump and surprised himself by not flipping his bike.

Gilbert followed and landed a nice jump as well.



This photo of Gilbert is great. I like this head on angle becuase it makes the jump look a bit more impressive. Though, honestly, I'm not sure anyone's jump was as impressive as mine.



I had neither sufficient speed to make the jump nor sufficient upper-body strength to save it at the last minute. Nor did I have the technical skills necessary to ride slowly over the jump without flipping so I flipped. Hard. I landed pretty squarely on my head and broke my helmet in three places. I also bruised my face, shoulder, and knee a bit. Thankfully, that was all. The rest of me was OK - my bike wasn't even damaged. Needless to say I think I'll leave off jumping for a while. (This was my second mistake of the day for those counting.)

After this tumble the other three played around a little more then we resumed our trek around the park.

At the 9 mile marker I was starting to feel pretty worn out and Mike offered me a chance to bail and return to his house. I declined (mistake #3) and kept on riding. By the 11 mile marker I was exhausted. My legs were like jelly and I was hiking my bike more and more often. Steering becomes pretty difficult as you fatigue but amazingly I didn't crash again that day but I sure did come close a few times. At one point I was going so slow I just told the others to keep riding and to put stick arrows at any intersection that I might need directions at.

Near the very end of the ride I was getting a bit of a twentieth wind and I managed to ride for the last mile or so without having to hike but boy was I tired at the end!

Once at Mike's house we all cleaned up and then headed out for some grub at Wendy's. I knocked back a half-pound burger and a chili and Dr. Pepper. I also finished off my big Gatorade bottle that I had started before the ride. My total dietary intake for the day was 2077 calories. It wasn't enough - not by a long shot. If you noticed on Mike's Garmin page his computer estimated we burned exactly 2077 calories during the ride. I was at a net of 0 by the time I had eaten at Wendy's - after the ride. Next time I will not only eat a small snack before we start but I'll bring some granola bars or something to eat on the trail.

Even with my crash and my exhaustion I had a great time. The trails were great and the other three guys were pretty patient with my slow pace. I'd definitely return to Mt Wood for another ride.

#Sports #MountainBiking #FunStuff #MyLife #Photos

Baseball diamonds for some harkens back to halcyon days of baseball glory; bats cracking, star spangled singing, and crowds roaring. For others, however, for others, the diamond is the home for an oft overlooked sport - Kickball.

I have gathered around me 21 teammates to craft the Strictly Business Kickball team of the Jewel City Division of the World Adult Kickball Association. That's right - WORLD. Who knew Kickball was so organized but, as they say, 30 is the new 8.

Our team is one of four in the division. Interestingly enough our division is the only one in the region and thus we are one of four teams in the region as well. I'll explain why that is interesting later but keep Las Vegas in mind.

The opening pitch of the Summer 2009 season were rolled out today and my team played in the second game of a non-traditional double-header. The first game featured the BoneCrushers-vs-Cabell Comprehensive Kickballers. The Kickballers are manned by a hodgepodge of serious kickers who have been studying technique and game video on YouTube while the BoneCrushers aren't nearly as fearsome as their name might suggest. In fact the only thing crushed today were the spirits of the Crushers who lost 5-0.

Our game pitted Strictly Business -vs- The CHAMPs. The first inning seemed to bode poorly for our neophyte team as we went 3-up 3-down. In the bottom of the first the CHAMPs got a runner on base after a booming double and then he was driven in by league president Cara after our first baseman seemed to fall asleep with the ball as a pillow.
There are 11 fielders including the pitcher and catcher and no matter how big your leg is you just can't kick a kickball as far as you think. So, with 11 fielders crowded around it can be tough to find a place to put the ball that will enable you to get on base.

At the end of 1 we were down 1 and things didn't look too promising for us. Lisa, our manager, made the call and I came in from the bullpen to provide 3 scoreless innings of masterful pitching on 2 kicks.

The subsequent innings for our offense went a little better as we peppered kicks throughout the game but by the time the fifth and final inning came around we were still losing 1-0. We were up first and if we didn't score the game would end in an embarrassing shutout.

Our first kicker, Brad, stepped up to the plate and drilled a solid single. He was followed by the top of our lineup - Mike, Joe, Megan, and Me. Mike waited patiently for his pitch and then drilled a deep fly ball to center field. The defense bobbled it and before you know it Brad was rounding third and scored easily. Meanwhile Mike was chugging in for a stand up triple! Just like that we had tied the game and we had a man in scoring position with no outs!

Next up was Joe. He saw a opening and he boomed another kick into center field it dropped in the gap between center and right and he too had a stand up triple. Suddenly we were up 2-1. Megan followed up with a short fly ball that was caught for an out. Then I was up and I kicked a nifty single just over the second baseman driving Joe in and giving us a 2 run lead. It turned out to be all we would score but it was enough.

Our reliever was called in and Tim "Soriano" stepped in and pitched a perfect 3-up 3-down inning sealing the deal for Strictly Business's first win of the season.

My entire team seemed to really enjoy themselves and overall it was an afternoon of great fun and comraderie. Next week we face off against the Bone Crushers and we will totally shift our field positions to make sure everyone is getting as much action as they want. Then, in week 3 we will be playing the only other currently undefeated team - Cabell Comprehensive Kickballers. The sports media is in a frenzy of anticipation for this battle of the titans.

I have to take the next two weeks off so I hope to return to the field with us enjoying a 3-0 season record. If we do start off that well we will be well on our way to being the number one seed in the playoffs - which, admittedly, doesn't mean much with only four teams - but if we can finish the playoffs in one of the top 2 positions we will qualify for the regional championships.

The funny thing is there is only one division (ours) in the region and the top two regional teams automatically qualify for nationals in Las Vegas in October. Thus if we can win our division we also earn a spot in Nationals. I don' know how many of our team would actually want to spend money to compete nationally in Kickball but at least we will have the option.

#Sports #FunStuff #MyLife #Entertainment