My Annual Columbus Day Rant

It is Columbus Day, my office is closed, the United States Federal Government and most government offices are closed, and frankly I am not sure why.  Saying that Columbus "discovered" north America is like saying that I "discovered" women. North America was here, and others had been here before him - native people lived here and had highly organized societies,  long before 1492. 



European scholars of of the 1400s, had calculated the circumference of the earth with amazing accuracy.  As a navigator, Columbus had to know that he had not traveled far enough to be in India, he know how far India was by the land route east from Spain, he was hoping to travel to it by going west across the Ocean.  If he calculated the distance east, and the distance he had traveled west, he knew he was not in India, and yet he said he was in India - he was lost or lying. He dubbed the natives he encountered as Indians - a mistake that has stuck for centuries. His disdain for the native people was deplorable.  He described them as savages, barely bright enough to be suitable as slaves.  

Bottom line, Columbus was either lost, or lying to the world, his sponsors and his crew about where he was going, where he went, and what he found.  He was an incredible bigot, who didn't discover anything.  And yet we shut down the country for a day, some places still hold parades in his honor.  

There is a native american movement to eliminate Columbus Day, bravo!   

If we want to honor great Italian achievement, there are a boatload of scholars, and artists we can honor.  

Five Morning Questions

Some of us are morning people, some of us aren't.  What are your mornings like? 

1: Do you set an alarm clock? 
2: What is the first thing you do when you get out of bed in the morning? 
3: Caffeine or no caffeine first thing in the morning - if yes, what is your caffeine delivery device of choice? 
4: What is the first thing you read in the morning? 
5: Are your mornings leisurely or rushed to get out the door?   

My answers: 
1: Do you set an alarm clock?  - Rarely, only if I have an early flight or meeting. 

2: What is the first thing you do when you get out of bed in the morning? Turn on my computer - then head to the bathroom. 


3: Caffeine or no caffeine fist thing in the morning - if yes, what is your caffeine delivery device of choice?  Yes, Coke Zero or Iced Coffee. 


4: What is the first thing you read in the morning? Blogs, starting with Ken at Living the Life: http://ckenb.blogspot.com/.  I don't know why, but he is first on the list and has been for years.  


5: Are your mornings leisurely or rushed to get out the door?    Normally quite leisurely.  On average it is 2-hours between my feet hitting the floor, and my leaving for the office.  I recently realized that this is one of my most precious "me-times."  

Give Me The Real Deal

Venetian Hotel, Las Vegas 

Venice Italy, the real deal 

I can remember being awed by the World Showcase at EPCOT, then I started traveling to Europe and realized that the Disney version was an idealized, sanitized - well really a fake.  A few years ago I was in Las Vegas and I had dinner at Mario Batali's restaurant in the Venetian hotel (great imaginative food.)  I saw the gondolas on the simulated grand canal, really an elongated swimming pool. Then this last year I had the opportunity to see Venice, to see the real deal.  Water you wouldn't want to swim in, crowds, history, smells and sounds.  

The American fakes, are far to perfect, to contrived, to controlled. EPCOT is kind of like a plastic pizza, you really wouldn't know what a pizza is from looking at a plastic model of one. To know a pizza, you have to smell the yeastiness of the freshly baked dough and the anchovies, you have to burn yourself on the melted cheese. To know Paris, or an English Village or Venice, you need to see, hear, smell the real deal.  Get out and go - there is a big world out there to see and only a finite number of years to see it.   

Traveling in Discomfort and Style

One of the projects I am responsible for at work is organizing a national conference.  Managing the conference is frustrating at time, but I love doing it.  This year is a smashing success, we have sold out the venue and had to turn people away.  So I have started the process of finding a venue (hotel) for next year.  The hotel contract also locks in the dates.  

I am working with a "meetings and travel" professional, who worked with me to put together a bid package that was sent out to probably 100 hotels in the DC metro area.  Three bids came in last week, two more today.  Of the three that came in last week, one caught my eye, and another one was workable.  So we set up site visits for me to see two hotels.  One is a mid-price national chain, the hotel is three blocks from a metrorail station and they gave me directions on how to walk to the hotel from the subway.   

The other is a "luxury chain"  and email message said, "we will send a car to pick you up at your office and drive you to the hotel, the driver has been instructed to wait for your return to the office so you won't be delayed."  My immediate reaction was my mother's voice screaming at me, "behave and know your place."  I don't know about you, but I don't normally ride around town in a chauffeur driven Cadillac CT6, but I did today.   

It started with a text message the evening before, saying that the car would pick me up at 10:30 AM at my office.  About 10:15, my phone chimed, I looked at it about 10:20 and it was a message from the driver that he was out front.  I grabbed my phone and glasses and headed for the elevator, texting the driver that I would be there in five minutes.  Damn, someone who is even earlier than I am.  I stepped out front and the driver jumped out, ran around and opened the rear passenger side door before I could get across the sidewalk.  He recognized me, someone must have found my picture online and sent it to him (the hotel sales guy had read my resume online and knew where I went to school at.) Off we go, at a snails pace in DC traffic to the Ritz.  

Now it is a nice way to travel.  There is a certain style about it, but I somehow felt oddly uncomfortable, a little out of place.  I looked down and I was wearing the running shoes I wear on the metro, I had intended to change into dress shoes before I left the office, but with the driver being early and rushing to leave, the basic black Asics Cumulus 17s were still on my feet.  At least my black shoes matched the car, black, with black leather interior. The chauffeur, he gave me his card and that is his title, was wearing a black suit, white shirt and tie.  Thank-gwad, he wasn't wearing a funny hat. 

The ride out took about 30 minutes, including driving past the Metrorail station that is 4-minutes and 48 seconds walking time from the hotel - at the pace the assistant sales manager walks.  The hotel was nice, and is a viable option.  I have one more to see, plus look at the late bids that came in. For the next one I take the subway and walk, that will not have the style, and be more in my comfort zone.  

Gotta- go- gotta rush - place to go

I grew up in a family where if you were not 15 minutes early, you were late.  My mother always said, plan to be early, then if something happens you will at least be on time.  We rushed from place to place like the world would come to an end if we arrived behind schedule.  That is an efficient (and safe) way to run a railroad, but it leads to a life that rushes past life.  

I have spent the past 20 years trying to overcome my upbringing on this issue. It is not easy.  

This behavior pattern shaped the way I learned to travel.  Map out the most efficient route, drive long hard days, and don't stop to dally along the way.  My parents and grandparents had traveled this way. My grandmother commented that she had driven past the entrance to Mammoth Caves National Park 30 times, always wanted to see the park, but had given up asking my grandfather to stop.  After he died, I drove her to and from Florida a few times, and we stopped. 

When I was in Nevada a couple of weeks ago, I flew into Reno and drove across a small mountain range to Incline Village at Lake Tahoe.  I forced myself to stop a couple of times as I was crossing the mountain to enjoy the scenery and take a few pictures.  Remember to stop and smell the roses along the way.  

In the Shadow Of

I was very fortunate to be able to attend law school in my late 30's.  I knew at the time how lucky I was, to be free from making a living for three years, given the opportunity to engage in a purely academic pursuit with the brightest bunch of people I have ever had the pleasure of spending time with.  One of the great wins of my life.  

So I spent the better part of three years in Louisville, Kentucky.  Louisville is an old river town on the Ohio River, it is a mid-western rust belt city.  I very much enjoyed my time there. 

The University is south of downtown in the shadow of an old industrial area.  Part of the campus was once an assembly line for Ford Model Ts.  Vendome is just past the parking lot, north Americas leading manufacturer of distillery equipment. If you drink a distilled spirit made in America, odds are it passed through equipment made in Louisville.  Next to that is a large cooperage, a factory that makes oak barrels for aging bourbon, in the winter you could see the fire and smell the smoke from finishing barrels.  

An interesting piece of bourbon trivia.  Bourbon must be aged in new charred american oak barrels to be called Bourbon (it's the law.) How did charring the barrels get started?  A distiller in Bourbon County Kentucky was shipping whiskey to New Orleans.  He was having trouble finding new barrels, and found used barrels that had been used for salted fish, and pickles.   He washed them, and charred the inside.  Filled them, shipped them down the Ohio River to the Mississippi River, and by the time the whiskey from Bourbon County arrived in New Orleans, it had taken on a wonderful color and mellow flavor.  A much better color than whiskey shipped in new barrels.  The call went out for more of that wonderful whiskey from Bourbon County, and aging in charred oak barrels became the standard.  

Flying and Wading Waterfowl.

Give me a chance, and I will help you find true Florida Natives.  Alligators, turtles, and Roseate Spoonbills are true Florida natives. 

The Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge is just north of the Kennedy Space Center.  It is on land that was bought when the space center was being built.  The road out through it goes to the beach.  This picture was take in early September at one of the observation areas on the road to the beach.  

Taxing Rant

When it is possible for people who claim to be worth BILLIONS, and have income of millions to not pay any federal income tax, even to claim that doing so makes them "smart" it is time to revise the tax code.  Anyone who makes millions, should contribute to the cost of running the Country that makes it possible to run a business that makes enables them to make millions.  

I was disturbed by the fact that my father who pays no taxes and makes about the same amount as my middle brother who is a truck driver and my brother pays a fair amount in federal income tax (I prepared his returns for a decade.) The difference is not in ability to pay, it is in the source of the income.  We need to fix this. 

We have two good incomes, we pay more in taxes today, than either of us made 25 years ago when we met.  And I am okay with that.  We can afford it, and it takes a lot of money to run good government - and despite it's foibles we have good government.  If you don't think so, look at Kenya, or Somalia and any of a hundred other hell-holes around the world with corrupt governments that are incapable of providing even the most basic services.  We also under-fund our governments.  We see the failings of crumbling infrastructure caused by chronic under-funding while demanding new - instead of maintaining the existing.  

Sunday Five - home work space

I have posted pictures of my desk at home in the past, so here is an update.  I recently started using a new desktop computer, a 24 inch, HP all-in-one.  I moved from Windows 7 to Windows 10.  I am still getting use to the new operating system. My laptop is Windows 10, so I was somewhat familiar with it.  In the process I completely cleaned off the top of my desk at home.  I don't think this had been done in 6 or 7 years.  I was surprised by a couple of things I found, and by what stayed.  Hence five questions about what is on your desk.  

1: What is the oldest thing on your desk? 
2: What is the newest thing on your desk? 
3: Do you have stamps on your desk? 
4: How many ink-pens are on your desk? 
5: What is the prettiest thing on your desk? 

My answers: 
1: What is the oldest thing on your desk?  - a little wood tray, that was in the center drawer of J's mother's desk.  
2: What is the newest thing on your desk? The Computer - though by the time this posts there will be a couple of new peripherals.  
3: Do you have stamps on your desk? Yes, in the blue-and white china box, I still write and mail checks to pay bills (how old fashioned!) 
4: How many ink-pens are on your desk? 14, I was surprised, there were more than I thought.  
5: What is the prettiest thing on your desk? A little burl wood box from France, my back-up wedding ring is in it.  

He's Back!

All of us have someone who started us on blogging, for me it is Mr Bert (not his real name.)  I guest blogged for him for a couple of weeks 11 years ago last summer, while he was on holiday in France (before the days of easy mobile blogging.)  Shortly after he returned from Holiday, I went public with Travel Penguin.  His original Blog went off line a few years ago, and he has been sorely missed.  

Well, HE IS BACK - with a new blog and a new commitment to sharing his story and opinions at http://www.mrbertblogs.co.uk/  

His 'about me' section on his blog, is kind of short so let me give you a little overview.  He is a Yorkshirman, who lives in the greater London area.  We have known him for about 20 years, his partner  for  a decade or so longer.  In the year's I have known Bert, he has been a theater box office manager, a bookstore manager, an elementary school teacher and a lighting designer.  He has a couple of college degrees.  He is a voracious reader, loves the theater - including the avauntgarde, music and art .  He is a writer at heart. We spent a week with Bert and his Mr Someone in Yorkshire a dozen year's ago. His mother Peggy showed me how to cook lamb stew that is to die for.   

He talks about the art, literature, music, people, and the odd and obscure.  

I welcome him back, take a look and consider following his blog.  

The picture above, was taken a few years ago when we were in London. "Bert" and his Mr Someone, treated us to a heavenly high tea in a small posh hotel.  Everyone should partake of high tea at least once.  

How Did I Survive Childhood?

Beyond the hotel at Lake Tahoe was a playing field at a local park.  I looked out one afternoon and kids had taken the field to play a football like game, wearing giant inflatable bumpers. It got me to thinking, how did I survive childhood? 

I rode in the font seat of the car, between my parents without a child safety seat.  This would actually be criminal today.  But it was normal, the child seats of the day, had a rigid metal frame and a steering wheel for the baby to crash into, I think my oldest brother had one, it was long gone by kid number 4. I have memories of crawling around on the floor under my mother's feet.  

I would have been 7 when my parents bought the first car with seat belts.  I remember waiting for the dealer to install them, before my mother would let my father drive away in his new Plymouth.  They had to find the right bolts, we didn't get home until after my bedtime.  

I played in the dirt, not a sandbox that was kept covered and sanitized, the end of my mother's vegetable garden.  

I rode in the back of open pick-up trucks.  My grandfather would put the tailgate down and let us ride sitting on the tailgate with our legs dangling in the wind.  

I rode bikes thousands of miles, almost always alone, and long before anyone had heard of a bike helmet.  

I explored miles of back country roads, alone and unsupervised.  

I shot thousands of rounds of target practice with a rifle as a teenager, alone, without adult supervision.  I did ban my middle brother from the field - after a close call caused by my bad habit and his disregard for basic gun safety, that I still don't talk about that.  

I rode mini-bikes, motorcycles, and three-wheel ATVs.  The motorcycles were something my parents didn't know about.  

Maybe I was lucky, maybe I was careful, likely a little of both.  I wouldn't trade my childhood, risks and all, for the padded cell kids in live in today. 

Porsche

The second day of the meeting in Lake Tahoe was across the street from the hotel, in a conference room overlooking the Lake.  I stepped  in front of the hotel and this was parked there. From what I can find, it is late 1950's vintage, -the real deal and not a later clone-, it is a $250,000+ car.  Nice, very nice.  

When I was planning for the drive in Germany, a friend gave me advice on driving on the Autobahn. The inside lane is the fast lane.  You only drive in it if you are driving faster than everyone else and passing.  When you have outrun the traffic, pull over - or the ticket is about $1,000.  Before pulling over into the fast lane, look in the mirror, if there is a smudge on the horizon, it is the Porsche that will be running up your tailpipe in about 20 seconds.  Outrun it, or get over.  Good advice, except it was an Audi that was running up my tailpipe at 108 miles per hour.  

Politics

Home Sweet - I Use to Own That

When I was in Florida earlier this month, I took a morning to drive into Orlando and revisited places from my past.  The city has changed a lot since I moved there in the summer of 1980 - we left there in the summer of 1995.  The population has more than doubled since we left 20 years ago.  Old familiar places, were sometimes no longer recognizable.  

I moved to Orlando to escape the town on the east coast, that my parents still live in.  The move was made possible by a job selling new homes for a small developer / builder.  Laurel Homes - long since gone they sold the building operation in 1987 - I moved onto another much larger builder that summer. 

While I worked for Laurel I built three homes, two I lived in, one was a rental.  The miniature Taco Bell above was my first house.  I built it in the late summer early fall of 1982.  Two bedrooms, one bath, one car garage.  As I recall I paid just over $40,000 for it, and picked up a bargain first time buyer interest rate of only 13.5%.  I sold it less than two years later and made about $10,000.  While I was there I built the rental, not included in these pictures, it became my ex's as part of a property settlement that bought the two of us freedom to enjoy the rest our lives.

The second house above was the last home I built for myself in Florida.  We built it in 71 days from building permits to move-in, in early March 1984.  It was a bit larger, 3 bedrooms, baths, 2 car garage.  It is on about 1/3rd of an acre.  As I recall it cost me just over $70,000 and interest rates were down to a bargain 11.5%.  It was in my half of the property split, I sold it in 1995 when J and I moved to Kentucky, as I recall made about $15,000 - over 11 years of a dead market. The first house had been as plain and simple as I could make it, the second one was much nicer.  I upgraded trim, windows, door handles, I reconfigured the kitchen and added cabinets (a job the cabinet shop messed up, shorting me 2 feet of cabinets and counter space - but I was in such a hurry to move in let it slide rather than wait two weeks for a remake.)  The brick on the planters was also the wrong color, it was suppose to be grey, and it was brown. The house hadn't been painted yet, so I changed the paint color to work with the brick rather than delay the house waiting for the brick to be changed.  In the long run I was glad I did that, the grey paint faded terribly.  I planted the tree out front, it was about an inch across and about 5 feet tall when I planted it.  

So there are my first two - no longer mine.  What homes have you owned in the past? 

Get Out of My Way!

DC is a bit of  a fast paced city, it seems that people are constantly in motion.  If you move to slow, you will get bumped, pushed out of the way, and on occasion shouted at.  The Condo I live in has a private road to the nearest metro station.  The easement for the road only allows us to operate a shuttle bus and provide alternate emergency access via the metro road.  

A few month ago we replaced the back gate with  a new remote opener.  The shuttle bus operator has struggled with the new gate, it does not move fast enough.  One trip recently it didn't get out of the way in time, and got bumped, well kind of, it was bent in half.  

That will teach it to move faster or get our of the way!  

In your town, are slow people part of the charm or bumped out of the way?  

Cleaning The Closets

I decided that this fall's project was to clean and organize my closet.  I moved into the condo six years ago last January, and the closet had not been cleaned since.  So here are five questions about your closets? 

1: When was the last time you cleaned your closet?  
2: Do you have clothes that are too large or too small in your closet? 
3: Have you "lost" anything that you might find if you cleaned your closet? 
4: If I went through your closet what would the item of clothing that would most surprise me? 
5: What item in your closet should you get rid of, but just can't bring yourself to do so? 

My Answers: 
1: When was the last time you cleaned your closet?  I just finishing, it had been 6 1/2 years. 
2: Do you have clothes that are too large or too small in your closet? Yes, I kept one size smaller - hope springs eternal 
3: Have you "lost" anything that you might find if you cleaned your closet? I lost a blue Adidas shirt when we came home from Germany a year ago, and found it when I cleaned the closet. 
4: If I went through your closet what would the item of clothing that would most surprise me? A chief's jacket.   
5: What item in your closet should you get rid of, but just can't bring yourself to do so?  A sweatshirt from the Hard Rock Cafe in London, I bought on my first visit back in 1990 - I don't fit it, it is ratty - and I can't bring myself to toss it - ROCK ON! 

Travel Tech

Some technology we never leave home without, our phones for example.  Once in the past 10 years I was well on my way to the office when I realized I didn't have my phone with me, I felt so vulnerable without it.  I made it through the day, but I would prefer not to go phone-less.  You never know when you might have a rare opportunity to take a selfie with a curious bear.  

I am using a Samsung Galaxy that is three generations, or three years old.  I like it, it works well, I am comfortable with what it does.  I see little reason to replace it as long as it works well.  I always have a charging adapter in my shoulder bag, in fact two of them, one standard one that will charge my phone, my kindle, or my camera, and one specifically for the phone that has a slightly higher voltage and charges the phone about twice as fast. 

I always have a Kindle with me, and with that half a dozen books to read with only a few ounces of weight to carry.  

For travel I carry a very small, very lite weight laptop or notebook computer.  I prefer a full size desk top computer at home, I find the larger keyboard easier to use, and the larger display allows me to work without glasses.  So the laptop is only for travel.  I am currently carrying an 11 inch Dell, Windows 10 machine.  It does what I need it to do, it weighs less than 3 pounds and it cost less than $200.  I know Mac makes an amazing laptop, but not for that price.  

When I go out of town I carry a compact digital camera.  Currently I am using a Samsung.  I selected it based on a wide-angle to moderate telephone lens.  Camera technology is rapidly advancing, you really need to replace these things every 2-3 years.  I have a larger "through the lens" digital, that I occasionally use, but only then the added bulk and weight seem worthwhile.  

All of this stuff connects with the same USB, or micro USB cables. I carry a couple of them, including one that is 15 feet long.  The long one comes in handy in a hotel room when the only available outlet is no where near where you want your phone (I bought it when I spent a month in hospital rooms.)  I have a small zippered kit with a USB cable, headphones, a standard wall charger, and a 6-volt car adapter.  

I carry a couple of sets of headphones, with microphones in them, so I can make phone calls without trying to hold my phone to my face.  

If I am driving in unfamiliar places,  I carry a portable GPS unit with me.  I know there is GPS on my phone, and I use it when I need to, but the Garmin unit with the suction cup window mount and power cable, is easy to travel with and I am not trying to hold my phone and drive at the same time.  

What do you never leave home without?  

Sunset and a big Moon

When I am home, in the city, I seldom see the sunset, I know it happens, the room gets dark and lights are turned on, but I am almost always too busy to notice.  And there is not much of a view.  
Here along Lake Tahoe for a couple of days, I have noticed the sunsets.  How pretty.  Last night I looked up and the moon was bright and huge.  Part of that is being over 6,000 feet in elevation, and the mountain air is clear, and there is a lot less ground light interfering with the view of the moon. I sure am glad I stopped and looked up. 

Stop and look up, pause to gaze at the sunrise or sunset.  Enjoy your day. 

Working late into the night

Part of the work I do, includes serving on boards for organizations that advance the kind of work I do.  I am in the third year on one of the best board appointments I have ever had, this board generally meets in person three times a year, twice a year at conferences (hence, Newport Beach, California, and Denver in the past year) and once a year the organization pays for an annual "board retreat" two days of meetings in someplace nice. 

The first year was Charleston, South Carolina, it was nice, I was having trouble with my funny walk and didn't enjoy it as much as I should have.  Last year was Portland, Oregon - great fun, I was moving much better and had a nice wander around the city.  This year is Lake Tahoe, on the Nevada side.  A little hard to get to, but it is a spectacular place. 

Most of the board is from the eastern half of the united states, and here we are for the second year in a row, in the Pacific time-zone for the board retreat.  This results in waking up very early local time, and wanting to fall asleep early.  

One of the traditions is the board dinner on Thursday night. Last year in Portland, we met at a nice restaurant 6:30 local time - 9:30 east coast time and they served wine for an hour.  Then we set down and it took the restaurant an hour to serve the first course (salad) and more, much more wine.  Entries were served at about 8:30 pacific time, or 11:30 east coast time, and the wine just kept flowing.  Most of what I remember about desert was that we were having a hard time keeping a couple of board members from trying to dance on the tables.  

This year, it was cocktails on the beach at 6:00, and a buffet at 6:30.  Much less opportunity for people to get crocked before dinner, and while still late by my bodies standards, dinner at 9:30 is much easier for me than dinner at 11:30. It worked much better.  My digestion still does not like the large volume of food and drink at that late hour, but it will calm down in a day or so.  

It is always important when traveling across time zones to keep one's body in mind when scheduling meals. 

Lake Tahoe

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I swear this is work, why else would I get up at 4:30 in the morning, leave for the airport at 5:30, fly 5.5 hours, and drive through the mountains to Lake Tahoe - someone is paying me to do this.  The drive from Reno to Lake Tahoe is breathtaking, in more ways than one.  It crosses a mountain, I passed a sign saying 8,000 feet, and kept climbing.   Reno is very much a high dessert landscape, I love that landscape.  The area around the like is very alpine village - I prefer the dryer side of the mountain, but the lake is very pretty.  Meetings will consume most of the time I am here, and being three time zones away is a bit disorienting.  I surprised by the slot machines in the airport in Reno.  I spent 10 minutes in the casino at the hotel, I was $6.25 ahead and I cashed out.  Now I need to stay out.  

I posted the picture of me on the plane on Facebook and Ron mentioned the aisle seat.  I almost always, book and aisle seat.  I book as early as possible, and I always try to select seats.  If I can't get what I want when I book, I keep checking back online and 9 out of 10 times, I am able to get an aisle seat on the left side of the plane, so my right arm is on the aisle side.