4000 Days

Tuesday

2012-02-14T12:14:00.001-06:00

Happy Valentine's Day to all!!!

Monday

2012-02-13T22:04:00.001-06:00

A little bit of Winter in the QCA today. Not a lot of snow, but the inch or so has covered the sidewalks and makes the streets slick in spots. Of course, a year ago we had a storm of 15 inches or so. Not sure if all those folks still have their power restored.

So the SI swimsuit issue must be headed to the stands. The cover girl made the on-line headlines this evening. As I have stated here in recent years, I've lost interest in this charade. It would be nice if the models were old enough to vote. Still, I'm not cancelling our subscription at the office.

I sent out the first of my clients' 2011 tax returns today. Most of our smaller returns have been voluntarily "e-filed" with the IRS (and the states) these last several years. This year, the IRS is requiring basic returns prepared by a firm filing 10 or more returns to be e-filed. Interesting. I don't have a big problem with that protocol, but it is another example of Big Brother looking over us.

The tax software that I utilize these days is like a thousand times more powerful than what I had access to in C-town a few lifetimes ago. At that time, we actually filled out input sheets for each item on a return, handed them in to a "computer girl", who in turn bundled the day's collection, and put them in an over-night package to Fast Tax, Inc. in Dallas. A couple days later, we'd get the processed returns in preliminary form, which we could edit. The "computer girl" had a data entry machine that could make these small changes, and then issue the "Print" order. To Dallas. We'd get the printed returns a couple more days later. For assembly.

I suppose that most businesses that are data-dependent have had similar leaps in processing capabilities in the last 30 years. The computer just changes everything. Daily.

The key to the Federal budget...eat the rich. Why wouldn't you? Buffet's secretary most surely could be the key term in a new drinking game.

Am I missing something, or is there a "red carpet" awards show every month that the networks hype to the max? And mostly, the award winners must be from another planet, or I live in The Twilight Zone. Which is probable.

Happy Tax Valentine's Day to all.

BCOT

Saturday

2012-02-11T18:53:00.000-06:00

Throwing up a few lines here before 2, 4 and I head over to Augie for their last home game of the season. I'm still learning about the ins-and-outs of the use of the regular keyboard and monitor when feeding off of the laptop. And I don't have a work surface other than my coffee table at this point. But it is a lot less-frustrating than the laptop keyboard that sends the cursor all over the place.

Augie has under-achieved this year. The loss of their center at Christmas-time seemed to destroy the team's chemistry (or substitution rotations), and they have struggled to score points in close games. At this point, they are just trying to maintain their 4th place position in the league to qualify for the 4-team conference tournament. If they get there, and win a game, they should make the D-III field. Bottom line? They were probably over-rated going into the season.

Great time last night for wine at Bass Street in Moline. They have half-priced bottles on Friday night and the Oakville Cabernet that we drank is near the top of my current favorite list (that is affordable). In Hy Vee, you can get it for $35-40, and it was $45 at it's 50% price from the Bass Street wine list. 2 and 4 agree to it's drinkability. My pal Ron joined us too, and it was an excellent two hours. (FYI 3, Ron finally got the save-the-date card in today's mail.)

The mini-digi Fuji arrived yesterday by FedEx. The work order stated "replacement". They included a new battery and camera strap that I must have include in the return box. Bad news is that the memory card that I didn't return was/is bad and I had to buy a replacement. And I bought another small case. So my situation has been rectified, I'm back in business with a min-digi (and I have a cheapo back-up). I feel better.

Aunt Martha, I think that the folks "assembled" their Wausau home in the mid '70's. We were still in the old place when I graduated from ND in 1971, but I think that they had moved to the new one by the time we went to Chicago in 1976. Funny how that big of a transition for them gets lost in our memories in 35+ years.

RevKev,the car show was our version of Detroit or Chicago's. All new stuff. The dealers do such meager business in the Winter months that they use the car shows as a way to get people out of their houses to check out the cars. 4 and I spent about an hour going through the local show. Not much to get excited about. You can spend a lot of $$$'s on some of 'em. Sticking with my current stable of 3!

I came across a local example of the dangers of trying to enter the debate on current political
issues in the country. A friend of mine who retired from the financial business a couple of years ago has written a few Letters to the Editor in our local fish-wrap. He always had an above-average grasp of the machinations in the business and wrote a decent monthly news-letter to his clients. Anyway, he recently submitted a letter that was published trying to explain the differences in taxation of ordinary income and capital gain income. The few Comments on the post were largely negative, and not particularly civil.

It reminds me of a principle of conduct in sports: Never get into a conversation with a loud-mouthed fan. And don't even consider acknowledge the riding that might come from the opposing bench. The folks on the other side have no interest in your position or thoughts. Which pretty well describes the gulf between the aisle these days in Washington.

OK. Maybe some more after the game.

BCOT

Thursday

2012-02-09T22:05:00.002-06:00

Last night's 200th episode of NCIS wasn't much for the viewer except for an opportunity to try to identify all of the characters who passed through Gibbs' dream sequence. It was a little like the Seinfeld ending two-parter where the four main characters were on trial for their apathy and the prosecution brought all those bit players from prior episodes to testify.

The one thing that did catch my interest, at least in retrospect, was the rapid montage of scenes from the 199 previous shows that they used as a special introduction to this show. They always have a short montage at the start of each show as they introduce the stars with short clips from the past. And they accelerate the pace at the end of the introductions. This one was just longer and had many, many brief scenes or pictures from the old shows. (The Big Bang Theory has a similar montage vehicle at the start of that show where they depict The Theory of Evolution in about 10 seconds!)

The thought I had this evening during spin class was, "What would be in the montage of The Life of LtPC?" The more I thought about it, the more I wondered whether a proper montage is just pictures of buildings, people and landscapes? And who would be interested? Tough questions.

Included in my montage would be scenes that capture at least theses things:

1. St. Pat's grade school and church in Ottumwa.
2. The old house on the farm.
3. The barn on the farm.
4. Wapello County Courthouse.
5. A shot of old downtown Ottumwa, including the bridges.
6. Walsh High School.
7. Vet's Auditorium in Des Moines.
8. Evans Junior High Gymnasium in Ottumwa.
9. The Eldon, Iowa fairgrounds.
10. The Golden Dome.
11. The Loop in Chicago
12. Old Capital in IC.
13. Lake Macbride in Solon.
14. The train station in Arlington Heights.
15. The house on Scott Street in Davenport.

Obviously, I could go on, but who beside me would be interested? And these are just a few of the places. Add in the people and it gets pretty lengthy. But you can control the time by speeding up the frames. Hmmm. I might do it elsewhere at another time. I think that the long story can be told with just the visuals. Filmmakers do it all the time.

Another thought while on the bike tonight: Top Ten best liquid refreshments in LtPC's history (not necessarily in order of grandeur): And have I done this previously? Whatever.

1. Ice cold Coke after high school basketball games. Chilled in the snow outside the locker room.
2. Fresh-squeezed iced-lemonade at the county fair in Eldon.
3. Blooy Mary's with Major Peters spicy mix. Playboy Club Chicago.
4. Rum-spiked lemonade-icey's at Wrigley. We could carry in a cooler!!
5. Ice water in Mason jars in the hay fields.
6. Camus Select Cabernet..Jordan ain't bad either.
7. Chilled grapefruit juice. There once was fruit station at a Marriott in Orange County...
8. Starbuck's Americano (as hot as they can make it). It had to be on the list!
9. Beefeater and tonic. There was a time before I discovered wine...
10. Coor's Light on the deck at Gov's with @bcbison after a Summer ride.

Sorry if this was a repeat. It's fun going through the archives of the frontal lobe.

Enjoy TGIF. Looks like it could be the QC Car Show with 4 tomorrow afternoon, and maybe wine at Bass Street with 2 and 4 after 5. They have a good wine list at Bass Street...and it should be 1/2 price bottle night.

BCOT

Wednesday

2012-02-08T17:31:00.000-06:00

The new Home Page pic was taken just outside of the house on Harvest Path in Woodbury last weekend. The early morning frost was so thick, you could almost measure it with a ruler. Each branch of each tree was fully encapsulated. Here's a pic of the small tree in the parking by the street. Very cool.

This exercise also proved that the desktop tower has a workable entry-slot for the camera memory card. Very slick.

I received email today that Fuji Film is sending back my mini-digi...supposedly repaired. I gotta believe that they'll just send a new unit. I mean, it has to be more efficient to confirm that the old unit was defective, and reach over for a new one off the shelf. They don't "repair" tail light assemblies in cars anymore do they? And those things are way more expensive than that camera. Stay tuned.

The airfare algorithms have caught 1 and 1.1 with a bad case of the "gotchas" for #07282012. While the Quad Cities contingent has secured round-trip fares to RNO in the $440 range (from MLI), 1 has encountered $600+ for the MSP to RNO flight...that is our connecting flight from MLI!!! Truly the kind of pricing that creates the bad name for the airlines. Hopefully, there will be a better resolution in the near future to this disconnection.

I had lunch today with my pal Terry O and we decided that the grocery stores' pricing of fruit followed some of the same principles as in the air fare business. I mean, one day the price per pound for a type of apple might be $.99, and the next day, it could be $1.99. I know that there is a shelf-life that applies here, but as a knowledgeable fruit buyer, I can attest that the pricing tends to be random. No algorithm required.

My plan is to head down to Geneva tonight for dinner. There's a monthly minimum that members are supposed to spend in the dining room, and Wednesday evenings are usually well-attended. Maybe see my pal Cal as well.

I used to have a daughter named 4. Is she still around here?

BCOT

Monday

2012-02-06T18:09:00.002-06:00

At least the Monday-morning-quarterbacking on the Super Bowl has a half-life of just a few hours compared to the the ceaseless coverage in the two weeks prior to the game. I'm thinking that the post-game interest in Madonna or Gisele has already fizzled and there'll need to be a serious wardrobe malfunction to re-capture the imagination of the the collective sports/entertainment/voyeur world. Let's hear it for the return of Big Monday basketball!

As a cycling enthusiast, I was disappointed to read of the two-year ban handed down by the Court of Arbitration de Sport in Geneva to TdF champion Alberto Contador. Irrespective of whether you're a fan of the guy or not (I"m not), this is a bad result for the sport. He's stripped of his 2010 title, and loses all of his placings since then. And there's a money-thing that has yet to have been decided.

From what I've read, there's not a debate that a banned substance was found in his blood in a test during the 2010 Tour. Contador tried to argue that the ingestion had occurred randomly from tainted food. From afar, that sounds like a weak argument. With no convincing position to explain it, the Court essentially had no place to go except for the penalties.

On a slightly related matter, the US Department of Justice has decided to walk away from it's fraud case involving Lance Armstrong. I think that their appetite for high-profile cases has waned with their poor results in the Barry Bonds and Roger Clemons investigations. Note that Contador's situation was on the doping itself, while the LA case was on deceit to the USPS who was the team sponsor at the time in question.

(The US Anti-doping Agency says that it will continue to look at LA on the doping-side. There are definitely some folks in cycling who want to hang Lance out to dry. A couple of his former teammates have fallen on their swords about their own doping, and feel like LA has gotten away with it, and profited greatly. And, unlike their facts, his money has allowed him to fight the DOJ system with the lawyers and PR people experienced in such dog-fights. Which raises one of my long-standing opinions about law: court cases aren't about determining right and wrong; its about winning, Baby!)

Speaking of something's half-life, when will the media be satiated of the sexual escapades of Camelot? That pillar of hard news in broadcast television, nbc, (I refuse to capitalize it!) has the now-68 year-old former intern to JFK on their prime-time news(?) program. I mean really. Let's pull something salacious from 50 freakin' years ago and call it news-worthy! I actually kind of liked Brian Williams at one point several years ago. The cool aid really got to him.

One of the nice little features to my new laptop is a standard memory-card reader. This allows me to just pull the card from either of my cameras and directly download the pics. Very handy. (Now I see that my new desk-top tower has a similar slot!) This is in contrast to a corded download process originally, and then a USB port thingamabobber converter that I had used up through Christmas. Makes you wonder about the technological half-lives of thingamabobber manufacturers.

More later.

BCOT

Sunday... Post Super Bowl!

2012-02-05T21:49:00.000-06:00

Here's my first effort to hook up the regular monitor and keyboard to my laptop. I just kept plugging in cords until it looked like everything was somehow connected. Instructions? Not even out of the sealed plastic envelopes! For the long term, I'm going to have to find a small table for the monitor and the seat for the laptop that I can move easily toward the couch. I really like having a full-sized keyboard for the blog work.

The weekend on the road was successful, but its always good to get back to my own space. The folks on Harvest Path have their hands full at this point. Here's a couple more pics from the weekend that didn't make it to Twitter. 1.02 is getting big! He's still not on a regular schedule, and 1 doesn't get very good sleep. Hope that changes as he gets just a little older.

1.01 is a pistol. She's definitely in the Terrible Two's. There's not a lot of changing her mind once she has her own idea. Bribing only works so far.

We did a JV game at 1's high school on Friday night, the library on Saturday, and the coffee shop this morning on my way out of town. About a half hour or so each. Reminds me of the times when the girls were all under 10 and we'd go to church. We'd stay as long as the mayhem was below a small roar. Then it was off to the real important stuff like the Quick Shop for soda, and the hardware store for chips!

The conference in Des Moines on Thursday was an update on some new Department of Labor rules that come into play for retirement plans later this year. Investment advisors, service providers and plan administrators have so many ways to get in trouble, they might as well just surrender their licenses to the authorities now. Very discouraging.

How many bikini shots in the SB ads?

A second page story in tomorrow's sports page will be that the kid who blew the big lead last Sunday won the PGA event today down in Phoenix. Of course, the kid who lost gave up a six stroke lead, which keeps the story going, I guess.

No travel for me this week. My goal is to get back to normal both at home and at the office. We'll see how that works!

BCOT

Monday

2012-01-30T17:32:00.000-06:00

Brilliant mid-Winter day here today. It was 55 when I was out for lunch. This will make the Winter shorter, for sure.

That entry yesterday from home convinced me to hook-up the regular keyboard and big monitor for my laptop home use. Those attachments were part of the "upgrade" and I still have them in boxes behind my sofa. This laptop keyboard is so sensitive, and my keyboarding technique is so bad, that I have to redo almost every sentence because of the cursor getting lost in the previous sentence or paragraph.

I thought that this machine might be better than my old one since it doesn't have that annoying little blue button smack-dab in the center of the keyboard But I was definitely wrong on that one. The cursor on this one is out of control. Couldn't possibly be the operator.

4 made it home from NYC without travel issues...except that her ride wasn't at the airport in MLI on time. Sorry about that, Kiddo. We fumbled that hand-off.

I see where Starbuck's has made a bit of a national news splash for public endorsement of same-sex marriage. It won't change my coffee habits. Seattle qualifies as a Left Coast city. Why wouldn't they endorse same-sex marriage?

The Super Bowl media blitz is in full swing. Between the concerns about what Madonna might wear, and the possible winners and losers in the commercial wars, a person could almost overlook the fact that there is a game to be played on Sunday. I see where they are dusting off Ferris Bueller. Will there be frogs too? Over/Under on number of scenes with bikini-clad model across the full lot of commercials? 4. Bet the Over.

#07282012 looks very close to 180 and counting down. I haven't jumped on the ticket yet, but it looks like a flight out of MLI on Sunday morning will actually be cheaper than going to C-town. Delta. I think I'll be shipping my bike as added-carry-on as well.

Headed out to enjoy the evening.

BCOT

Sunday

2012-01-29T19:48:00.002-06:00

Pretty nice weekend at this end. Tomorrow is supposed to be even better with highs in the 40's. Suite!

2 and I went over to the Augie game last night and, while I knew it wouldn't be much of a game, it was just awful. We left well before half time when the home team was already up by 40! Millikin needs to re-look at their commitment. This is too good of a conference to send up a JV team.

(Small aside. For the Augie game on Tuesday night, I had gone over by myself after a meeting after 5, and was a little late getting to the gym. I whipped out a $10 for the cute admission girl, expecting a $5 in return. She hands me $7 instead. I look at her funny and ask if they had changed prices. Her response, "No. I gave you the senior discount". Out of the mouths of babes...so to speak.)

Hard to believe that the guy who had a six-shot lead for most of the day in the PGA event managed a triple-bogey 8 on the last hole and is now in a play-off. Goes to show that no lead is ever safe on the tour. This is the same guy who Steve Stricker beat here in the John Deere tournament last year by making an All-World birdie on the last hole. Trial by golf will kill you or make you stronger. (Wow. He loses in the play-off! That'll leave a mark.)

I picked up my replacement Oakley sunglasses today. It was only $25 for the deductible. Interesting revelation was that the Pearl Vision and Lens Crafter's stores are owned by the same holding company. In the time after I dropped my broken glasses off a week or so ago at Pearl Vision, they closed that store. My call for the pick-up came from Lens Crafter's. No problems for my situation. And the bonus is that the eye doc in the Pearl Vision store has relocated to the Iowa Target store which is much more convenient for me.

One of the factoids that made it's way to my consciousness recently was the realization that 2012 is my 30th year with my own professional services practice. (My CPA career actually began in 1976 in Chicago, but it was 1982 that I got the brilliant idea that I wanted to run my own business.) Obviously, the actual anniversary date is later in the year, but I have decided to make a little to-do about the milestone over the course of the year with my clients and business associates. The exact type and content of the to-do is yet to be decided.

Lots of water has run under the bridge since that fateful decision to go out on my own in 1982. 1 would have been 1.01's age, and 2 was a babe like 1.02. 3 and 4 were still in the planning stages. In the world in 1982, we had the following:

1. Cal Ripken started his consecutive games played streak.
2. The movies E.T., Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Chariots of Fire were released.
3. Madonna has her debut single.
4. Cats opens on Broadway.
5. Michael Jackson releases Thriller.
6. EPCOT Center opened at Disney World.
7. The Commodor 64 computer was introduced.
8. Time Magazine named The Computer as Machine of the Year.
9. Cheers debuts on television.
10. The Viet Nam Veterans Memorial is dedicated in DC.

I think that I will plan to do at least one blog entry per month during the course of this year to share some of the history that went on during this 30 year journey. Some of the decisions that were made, or the directions not taken might be of some interest to the Peanut Gallery.

I'm giving 3 and 4 recognition today as Daughters of the Day. 4 is visiting in The Big Apple and I'm sure that its been a great weekend. Miss you guys!

Hope everyone has a great week.

BCOT

Thursday

2012-01-26T14:05:00.003-06:00

So after Tuesday's rant, I'm off to the kinder, gentler soul today with some real serious questions about athletes and athletics. I had actually started this yesterday (Wednesday) afternoon, but ran into a conflict with work (Egad!) and wasn't able to get the message out.

My thought actually got co-opted this morning on the Mike and Mike radio show on ESPN2 when one of their guests, Mark Schlereth, led a pretty humorous discussion on the wearing of a wedding ring in a professional football game. The holder for the New York Giants in last Sunday's game, Sam Weatherford, was wearing his. I noticed this at the time Sunday when they repeatedly replayed the winning field goal for viewers, several times in slow motion and with a spotlight on the hold.

I actually thought there would have been a rule banning this kind of thing in the NFL. I mean, we had to put band aids over the ear lobes of any of our sixth grade AAU girls if they had on earrings that couldn't be taken off. And most safety procedures in manufacturing, or other blue-collar labor jobs have prohibitions against hand jewelry. But I guess no such rule exists with the pro's.

Then again, Weatherford is a kicker, and those guys usually come from another planet. The guy's Man-Card may be placed on probation.

But it does raise the question about the appropriateness and usefulness of non-essential paraphernalia in sports. Or, perhaps more interestingly, does wearing jewelry create a legitimate case against the activity being considered a sport?

What does a wrist watch do for a golfer, a sprinter or a rower? Who knows what a NASCAR driver might have under that fire suit?

Baseball players wear a wide range of neck apparel, from gold chains to hemp loops. With baseball being a sport rife with superstitions, these neck things probably all have stories.

For basketball players, I think its the silly headband. You see a few guys wearing these things. If head sweat was really a problem, why wouldn't everyone have a band?

OK. Need to get back at it. We are continuing to have LAN issues and coordination with our phones. The IT experts want to toss blame to Quest. Why wouldn't they? It surely can't be anything that they have control over.

More here later.

BCOT

Tuesday

2012-01-24T17:02:00.001-06:00

So I'm going to make some comments today on one of the hot topics on the minds of the political pundits and other interested commentators: Mitt Romney's tax disclosures. Keep in mind that I don't have much of an opinion about the candidate. If he were to run against The Big O, he would have my support. Beyond that, I've grown hugely weary of all the nonsense and look forward to November 7th of this year.

Anyway...

None of the reports today suggest that Romney has done anything "shady" on his returns. (He does have some "carried-interest" income that is statutorily eligible for the 15% capital gains rate, a concept that has many detractors, but that's a different kettle of fish.) He has made substantial contributions to the Mormon Church, and to his own private foundation. He's paid millions in Federal taxes. My guess is that the searchers will eventually find some "loose ends" that will be considered aggressive tax planning steps.

My experience is that The Man (or Woman) on The Street's eyes tend to glaze over when you start talking about marginal and progressive tax rates, double taxation, Social Security and Medicare tax rates, investment income versus earned income, and Subchapter S income versus wages. And for good reason: as a republic, we have constructed our tax system based on a variety of social, political and financial goals such that there are few straight lines of logic in the Theater of the Absurd that we call the Internal Revenue Code.

Most people in the tax-paying population (and I use that term in recognition of the fact that we have in excess of 40% of households not paying income tax), simply want to know, "What's my refund?" when they sit down to complete their return. (Heck, used car places now advertise that they'll help prospective buyers complete their returns to facilitate the use of the refund to buy a car or truck.)

The sitting President made it clear in his campaign four years ago that "sharing the wealth" was a philosophical premise of his beliefs. He never disputed the famous exchange caught on tape with Joe the Plumber in Ohio, and his administration has continued the mantra of "shared sacrifice". He's received high profile endorsements for higher taxes on the wealthy during his tenure from the mega-rich likes of Warren Buffet and Mark Cuban. (How many times will he in his SOTU address tonight make reference to Buffet's secretary who will be, just coincidentally, sitting alongside the FLOTHUS? Over/Under bet here at 4KDAYS is 3.)

A taxpayer making millions in income, and paying millions in tax is not sharing the wealth because the actual percentage that he is paying (through legitimate means) is lower than the percentage paid by a wage earner. People of the Peanut Gallery, read closely: This is purely Political Pandering and Hyjinx!!! (And at the risk of eye-glazing, there's already a minimum tax out there that gets many of these types of returns to 28% anyway.) If you eat the rich now, who pays for the next 100 years?

I think that the concept that the POTHUS believes in, and that the media will hammer Romney on, is that these wealthy folks should just pay more tax because they can afford to do so. Period. It is an emotional rationale (where's Spock?) that resonates to many people. And there'll be a big "AMEN" out there from that 40+% not paying tax, the Occupiers, Organized Labor, and the other folks who have drunk the cool aid.

A couple of quotes always come to my mind in these discussions: 1) Loosely attributed to Margaret Thatcher; "The trouble with Socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money." and, 2) Even more loosely attributed to Charles Barkley; "I ain't never got a job from a poor guy."

My solution, which I may have stated here previously, and which has no chance of being implemented, is to reduce tax rates, eliminate deductions, and tax everyone and everything. Churches, schools, foundations and all the not-for-profits would have to step up and pay as well. (Get rid of the tax CPA's and attorneys!) Fundamentally, you need to broaden the tax base and reduce the future funding of Social Security and Medicare. The only part of this equation that is rocket science is getting politicians to do their jobs.

In summary, be careful of the conclusions from comparative tax rates and the definition of shared sacrifice. This might be a routine SOTU speech in other years, but make no mistake about tonight, this is the White House's official launch of the re-election campaign. It's now and forward all about November 6th.

BCOT

Monday

2012-01-23T17:09:00.000-06:00

I'm going to transcribe below in full a short essay that I wrote to myself on January 13, 2005 that I found in one of my infamous "piles" while I was rearranging my office over the weekend. It struck me a little uncomfortably that I had let the anniversary of his death pass last week without mention. Perhaps it was the travel, the IT problems, or just plain self absorption. I regret the oversight.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

This is the day after the eleven-year anniversary of Daddy's death. I'm not sure if that seems like a long time or not since his funeral.

I had my 56th birthday last week. In the little age game that I play, Daddy was 56 in 1966. In 1966, I completed my junior year of high school and began my senior year. That made me 17 years old. Also then in 1966, Rosie would have been 20 and a sophomore at Creighton. Those ages make things pretty comparable to my current age differences with Mary and Kristen.

At 17, I spent most of my time playing baseball, basketball and working on the farm. I dated Jane Doe (obviously an alias for the blog!) almost exclusively and we were "in love". I drove an old Chrysler, I think, and made my first ever visit to Notre Dame. (I rode the train with an Ottumwa lawyer who had graduated from ND and we stayed at the home of one of his classmates who lived in South Bend.) In basketball, we got beat before a SRO packed-house at the Evan's gym by Ottumwa High School in OT in the district tournament. I played baseball with most of the guys on the OHS team, and it was a bitter loss.

Its funny how life goes on. I remember some of those things from 1966 in pretty vivid detail. I wonder if my girls will remember their 17th year in the same way and if they will remember me in a positive light.

At 56, Daddy had been milking cows for over 40 years. But the real joy in his life, I think, was politics. By 1966, he had been an elected county supervisor for at least 8-10 years and he had a very busy world in that regard. He loved talking with people. And he went to many, many funeral home visitations. If there was the remote chance that he knew the family, he would attend the evening service. And he had quite a few evening meetings for the county supervisor's job as well.

Mother worked the 3-11 shift at Ottumwa Hospital at that time, so I rarely saw her of an evening. I don't think that I stayed up as late as her arrival home after work. She worked as a nurse-aide and earned minimum wage. I think that we needed the money, and Daddy always said that she was as happy with that job as at anytime in her life.

She usually fixed me a dinner that I would heat up in the oven...no micro wave!! She frequently cooked extra chicken on Sunday and made home-made TV dinners for me to have later in the week. Chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy and corn!

I never had a job off of the farm, but I always had chores to do with the cows. In summers, there was always lots of work with haying, fixing fences, and lots of other farm stuff. I don't recall receiving a fixed allowance, but I always had enough money for treats with Jane Doe. My summer free time was usually spent playing baseball. Our American Legion team travelled to Cedar Rapids, Galesburg, Moline, and usually a long trip to Nebraska. These were the trips where I learned to play cards...euchre, I think!

So anyway, 56. Its not a bad time. It wasn't bad at 17 either.

=====================================================================
These little essays are littered in no small numbers along my winding path to here. There are almost never any conclusions.

More later.

BCOT

Saturday

2012-01-21T17:21:00.000-06:00

The snow that came in yesterday gave us a sample of Winter. Cool again today, but they say highs in the 30's tomorrow. I'm thinking that Winter not really arriving until the middle of January will make the cold season almost tolerable this year.

My precaution to start my snow blower after Christmas proved fruitless. While I had it running after just a few pulls then, when I got home from work last night anticipating a fairly quick blowing of my drive way, I was rewarded with not-so-much as a sputter out of the blower. So it was back to the basics and the shovel. So far today, I haven't had the shoulder pain that I had expected from the repeated tossing motion. The sick blower heads to the repair shop on Monday.

I did some major re-arranging in my office today. This happens every 10 years or so. There's really only a couple of positions to set my desk, and it was time to revert back to that other option. I spent a couple more hours going through old binders taking up space, and 80% were not kept. We now have several boxes of empty three-ring binders if there's a need out in the peanut gallery. And I still have more to go through tomorrow to complete the project. Come Monday, I'll be working from a clean slate.

The winds out West have been causing havoc. Tahoe Phil alerted me to the wind-driven Reno brush fire, and the PGA tournament today in Southern California has been halted due to high winds. They just showed film of score boards and other structures set up for the tournament now in the water. You don't hear of winds causing delays in many sporting events. (I guess that the Clinton Foundation, one of the tournament's new sponsors, does some good work, but I've always had trouble getting that photo of Bill as a long-haired hippy out of my mind. And that was few decades before Monica. That woman.)

Just to throw it out there, March Madness in the TC will need to be March 16-18, or March 23-25. I prefer the second week, but I defer to others who have more limited schedules.

I'm headed over to the Augie game tonight. The team has under-performed so far this year.

More later.

BCOT

Thursday

2012-01-19T07:58:00.000-06:00

I'm really not sure how the week has gone by this far with such little attention here, but I plead a medical defense based first on the sore shoulder and then on the dental procedure yesterday. I need to get ready for a visit from an IRS agent this morning, but I refuse to let the Service take me totally off my game. So a few lines here before breaking open those audit files.

Two years ago this week I was down in Orlando for a conference. I remember having to find some shade when I took a walk outside at lunch time because of the heat. Last year, I was still dog-sitting The W while 2 was traipsing about Asia. And we had full-Winter going on last year on those Winnie-walks!

RevKev's post about his private pilot licensing brought back memories of my very limited experience with flying lessons while I was in ROTC at ND. I think everyone in Air Force ROTC was supposed to take flying lessons (that the USAF paid for) in order to do an initial screening for pilot-track guys. I wasn't that interested, but I wasn't smart enough to say "No thanks" either. So I went up a few times with an instructor, confirmed my scaredness, and became a ground-pounder. They didn't try to convince me otherwise.

I was a little surprised to learn that my locally-owned camera store owner essentially said that the failure of my December-purchased Fuji Film water-proof digi-camera was essentially my problem with the manufacturer. I had taken the camera into the store shortly after New Year's when it was apparent that water had leaked into the unit while it was either in my gym bag or my car, and the clerk had basically given me the "send it in for warranty" story. The owner was on vacation until this week. I took it back in, and the owner was similarly matter-of-factly unresponsive. Interesting.

This lack of standing behind a product sold by the store doesn't resonate well for the concept of supporting local small businesses. My experience with the "big box' stores is that a quick return of a failed product shortly after purchase is almost a no-questions-asked event. Maybe the financial dynamics are just easier for the big box to navigate. Whatever. I won't be back to the local guy. And he was very unconcerned by that fact.

The laptop is finally back in operation. Our IT provider made the case that it truly was a Dell problem. I let my pal Bill handle the peace-making with our vendor. The bottom-line is that I am back to normal communications capability. In the long run, I may be looking at an Apple notebook to address my needs for access while on the road.

OK. I need to get ready for the IR of S. Maybe more here later.

BCOT

Monday...UPDATED

2012-01-16T11:09:00.003-06:00

The new Home Page pic looks suspiciously close to what may have appeared here in prior years, but it is a current photo of one of the par-three holes at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale. We play each of the two courses at Grayhawk each year, and then rotate the third track. This year that third choice was Camelback Golf Club, an older course with not so much desert.

I was not able to get to the blog due to continued non-performance by our IT experts. I went to Scottsdale without my regular laptop with the Verizon card, and the back-up laptop that I lugged all the way down and back was never able to pick up a Wi-Fi signal at any of the places that had the service. I was not a happy camper.

Lots going on here at the office today. I'll try to add to this entry before going home...because I still don't have my laptop!

Here's belated recognition to 1.01 as Granddaughter of the Day. What a cutie!

UPDATE....

Just a few lines to check back in before heading out for a 1730 meeting. Jet lag kicked in the middle of this afternoon and I'm going to need to suck it up to get through this session. You play, you pay.

I also need to stop at Pearl Vision while I'm over on the Illinois side to drop off my Oakley prescription sun glasses that have a broken lens. I pulled the glasses out of the protective case (for the first time in a month or more) at Grayhawk on Thursday morning only to find them broken. Ouch. They are insured, but the deductible will still cost me out-of-pocket cash. I love this country!

For the record, my Perfect Neighbor did shovel/snow-blow my sidewalk/drive-way while I was gone. Suite! Was there a doubt?

Its pretty hard to see in this photo, but MetLife did send the blimp down to capture course-level video of our foursome. News about our group is not a small thing in the desert. (Actually, I'm guessing that the blimp was there for the Phoenix Marathon that was run on Sunday.)

(Speaking of marathons, the first and second place finishers in the US Olympic Trials marathon held in Houston on Saturday were both former Quad Cities Bix 7 winners. 1 and 1.1 both did the Houston Marathon a few years ago. With support from 2 and the Lt.)

Now gone. See you here tomorrow.

BCOT

Monday...EVENING UPDATE

2012-01-09T07:15:00.002-06:00

Great weekend in Missesota. Here's a couple of pics of the Woodbury family.

We really didn't do a lot of stuff. Visits to the library and the coffee shop were the highlights!

They say that my laptop is to be ready today. It was a little odd being on the road without it. Not to mention the crimp that not having it put into the blog business.

This week holds a couple of busy days, and then departure for Scottsdale on Wednesday afternoon. Golf on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Return Sunday. It will be a quick week for sure.

I'll try to get back on here over my lunch hour. Hope everyone has a good week.

UPDATE...So the new Home Page pic was one that I snapped on #6301082012 on Interstate 380 heading South toward Cedar Rapids with my iPhone camera. I had noticed the shadow of my own car along the same route when we came home from the TC on Christmas Day, but I didn't have the right combination of idea, camera and implementation (and light traffic!). Kind of an interesting view, eh?

The scene reminds me of that James Bond flick when Sean Connery was riding along in reconnaissance in a one-man mini-helicopter when he looks toward the ground and sees his craft's shadow followed by some big ones flown by the bad guys.

Today was re-proof of why I don't schedule meetings for Monday mornings. This was a meeting time not of my choosing, but it was the only time the other parties could do it either today or Tuesday. That meant that several other things had to be juggled, and other projects that should have been taken care of this AM are still open. Yuck! 3, I feel your pain!

Maybe more later...if the laptop shows up.

EVENING UPDATE...Just a few lines before taking off for the barn. Our expert IT outsource guys have delivered as expected on the laptop...so I have no computer at home tonight.

I have near zero interest in the BCS game tonight. Let me re-phrase that. I have NO interest in the BCS game tonight. Re-runs of NCIS, if anything.

In the same vein, I have near zero interest in tomorrow's NH primary. And the same re-phrasing applies.

My original intent was to make tonight an alcohol-free evening on Maplecrest. Midway through that morning meeting, it was clearly evident that the Under bet would be paying on that vino-no vino wager.

Wheels-up at 1325 hrs on Wednesday. Busy times before then. Any entry tomorrow will be brief.

BCOT

Friday

2012-01-06T15:16:00.000-06:00

No laptop for the weekend. We'll see if I can make an entry from Woodbury.

This is just to show that I stopped here today. It is the feast of the Epiphany in the Catholic Church. The Wikipedia folks had the religious connotation down several paragraphs in their explanation, choosing the contemporary usage of "sudden realization" of something as the more pertinent discussion. Hmmm.

The PGA season starts today in Hawaii with an event for players who won tournaments last year. The first full-field event is next week, also in Hawaii. While professional cycling has not really had an "off" season, the major riders haven't been involved much for the last three months or so. And they start up with the Tour Down Under in Australia later this month. And for you NASCAR aficionado's, Daytona is still a month away.

OK. Gotta head out for Minnesota. Have a great weekend.

BCOT

Thursday

2012-01-05T12:22:00.000-06:00

I'm trying to sneak in a few lines here at the office before I head out to lunch and a 1300hrs appointment. Shockingly nice day here today...50's and sunny!

The report on the laptop is "water damage". Dell has to replace the operating innards. Not sure where the water came from, but the condensation on the screen had lead me to that conclusion as well. Our IT vendor says that it is covered under their installation insurance so at least I'm not out-of-pocket any dinero. Inconvenience remains. I hope that they can get it back to me for the weekend.

Word from 3 is that the Friday venue for the pre-wedding-day party has been secured. Details to follow.

I'm thrilled that the Iowa Caucuses are over. Shakespeare had it right: Much Ado About Nothing. I suppose that the process has to start somewhere. Not sure if Iowa is any better or worse as that starting point. At least a couple of the candidates are now toast.

One of our other software providers has thrown out a fee of $100 per box to scan the files in the storage boxes in our basement. Those boxes are what we call "banker boxes". Legal paper size, measuring approximated 20 inches wide by 30 inches long and 14 inches high. We have between 300 and 400 downstairs in storage. Do the math. What a bargain.

I'm sure that we could get this done with interns at a lower cost, but would we ruin our scanner by working it non-stop for two months? On the other hand, the storage of paper is a mess. And can we just convert by attrition as we use less paper in the future and destroy the older stuff downstairs as we get to the end of the normal 10 year life cycle of files?

I'm thinking that it will be nice enough tonight to do a BBQ on Maplecrest. Now that's an idea that doesn't hit the headlines in January very often!

Thanks for checking in.

BCOT

Monday

2012-01-02T16:23:00.004-06:00

Welcome to another edition of Big Ten Football New Year's Bowling Beatdown. Or choose your own title.

I am officially holiday-partied-out. I need to rest.

The laptop is toast. I'm thinking that water somehow got dumped onto the keyboard. When I opened it up today, there was significant condensation on the outside of the screen. Never a good sign.

The island nation of Samoa elected to convert their time to the West side of the international dateline effective last week. So they "lost" Friday. Hmmm. The math on this reminds me of a genealogy discussion with Tahoe Phil. Apparently, they decided that going back to the West side (from which they had jumped a hundred years ago) made economic sense with their Australian and New Zealand trading partners.

(There's a separate island group called American Samoa to the East of the Samoan Islands. I guess today the two Samoa's are at least a day apart, if not world's apart.)

The TV was on during most of the evening at the New Year's party that I attended, and I couldn't help but wonder about the not-so-ageless wonder, Dick Clark. I just confirmed that the guy is over 80 years old. The make-up artist in charge of him for the show should have received combat-pay. It's one thing for an 80 year-old to want to stay in the game...think Joe Pa...but really, trying to mask that many years for the klieg lights is A Bridge Too Far. Not to mention that most of the people who might actually remember him from his glory days are either below sod, or asleep. Let Ryan call the ball, please.

Bob Barker is another guy who hasn't been able to quit. Scary. Chuck Grassely? At least Hef isn't on the tube.

Interesting that in competitive sports, you really don't have an option: when you can't perform at the highest levels, you retire voluntarily, or are unceremoniously cut from the team.

I have determined that the local Country radio station plays three distinctly different "countdown" shows each weekend that review the current hits in country music. Kix Brooks (formerly of Brooks & Dunn) does one now that he's no longer singing, and there are two other long-standing programs. I suppose that each station can choose...and pay...what they want to do for weekend programming. It just so happens that the local station uses all three offerings. And that Kix Brooks show is played multiple times for good measure.

I'm guessing that a local radio station can be run on weekends with no more than one or two people in the building most of them time between Saturday afternoon and early Monday morning. Role the tape. Or may, run the download. A guy could conceivably do it all from his home computer. Kind of like landing on the moon.

By my count, it's 200 days to #7282012. And it's no longer "next year." We have now moved to "this Summer". It even sounds closer.

(Small UPDATE...3 notes, correctly, in a Comment below that her date is actually 208 days away. My mind was working on the house rental date which is 07/22/2012. Which is technically 202 days...but, I'm just not that good at math!)

Thanks for reading.

BCOT

Sunday

2012-01-01T16:12:00.002-06:00

Happy New Year to all.

Mother Nature is trying to blow Iowa off the map today. Strong sustained winds, and gusts that must be up to 45 or 50 mph. We were over 50 degrees here yesterday, but won't be out of the 30's today, and the 20's tomorrow. We've dodged Winter so far, so cooler temps have to be coming.

I had an unusually late New Year's Eve, but very tame. There may have been too much vino consumed earlier in the week. I'm now trying to convince myself that today is Sunday.

Here's a Top Ten list of my 2011 highlights:

1. The arrival of 1.02 on 12/20.
2. Europe in August with 4. The Tourmalet ascent.
3. A home run at the Turkey Trot.
4. The Big Apple with 3 and Herky in October.
5. Charleston with @bcbison in June.
6. Other trips to Scottsdale, San Antonio, and Tahoe.
7. Augie's nice run in the DIII basketball tourney.
8. Wine nights on Maplecrest and at Biaggi's.
9. Early morning Summer bike rides with @bcbison. And DeWitt too.
10.Exercise and training with The Winniferous.

I consider 2011 to have been a very successful year on a personal and family basis, but only so-so at the office. My big push in 2012 will be to rejuvenate things at work, while continuing the string of enjoyable years at home.

It's a bit interesting to recognize that the excitement in the family with the arrival last month of 1.02 has been a deterrent to blogging. Part of that is just due to the natural distraction that such a family-altering event creates. Plus, who wants to read what's wandering through my Sometimer's mind, when there's actually interesting things going on in Woodbury?

This entry is being made from my desktop. I had planned to post it from home, but the laptop was dead when I opened it up. I'm hoping that it's just a case of me having left the machine "on" when I last put it away, and that it drained the battery. I've left it plugged in this afternoon. If that doesn't do the trick, the on-going saga of our "upgrade" takes on another black eye. Hmmm.

And there's another sorry tale for my latest mini-digi camera that I purchased right before Christmas. Seems as though my water-resistant camera somehow got wet, and it's basically shot. The boss wasn't in the store on Saturday when I went in to take it back, and the tool-of-a-clerk's idea of service was to send it back to China on a warranty return. If there's not a better response from the boss on his return, my commitment to the locally-owned store will be toast.

I'd say that the Hawks, 'Clones and Irish all ended their season's appropriately. Talk about mediocre. I watched only short pieces of these games. And none of any of the other games.

And what's with no college bowl games on January1st? Have they always yielded to the pros when January 1st is on a Sunday?

Here's another example of change in the consumer market place. Santa gave me a new, cotton dress shirt for Christmas. When I pulled it out of the package and unfolded it, I was mildly surprised to find no straight pins in the set-up from the manufacturer. Years ago, they would have as many as five or six pins per shirt (at the collar, cuffs and on a couple of the front buttons). Now they use specially shaped, clear plastic inserts and light cardboard. I suppose it saves a few bucks, and it certainly doesn't hurt the presentation of the shirt. Progress, I guess. (Land's End does still provide a small package of extra buttons with the shirt.)

Finally, while the office is closed tomorrow, I'll be in to re-format my own office to get rid of some of the piles. Spring-cleaning in January. I really want to get the year off on the right foot.

If the laptop has any juice this evening, I'll jump back on and add a couple of pics to this post. Otherwise, look for more wisdom here tomorrow.

BCOT

Wednesday...UPDATED...UPDATE 2nd

2011-12-28T07:54:00.044-06:00

CJ's stay at the top of the blog ends after a week. He will definitely return! The new pic is a shot of the Brooklyn Bridge taken that weekend in late October that I visited 3 in The Big Apple.

4 never received her due last week with all of the news in Woodbury. So here she is as a belated Daughter of the Day. Her quarter-century birthday. This shot is a repeat of the one I posted from France on the August day that we rode the Tourmalet. You 'da girl, Kiddo!

Busy couple of days here at the shop. Lots of year end planning to address. Still no snow.

More later.

LATER...A follow-up comment on the golf simulator experience. This was something that I am not likely to repeat. While it might be billed as golf, it's really not a lot different than other video games. Sure, you swing your own clubs like you are on the course, but it becomes apparent pretty early on that, if you want to pay attention to your score, you need to accommodate the whims of the computer program. So really, we're talking about a hybrid video game.

The computer keeps track of everybody's ball and you rotate shots just like on the course. I went there thinking that we would be doing something for an hour or so, like on the practice range. But we didn't get through eight holes in two hours, and I had lost interest way before that. And they didn't serve wine.

This is not a pic of us at the place on Monday, but it's very similar to the Bettendorf set-up. They have 5-6 of these booths that border an open area with a couple of pool tables and other games. There's a pretty good-sized bar at one side of the room. I think they get live bands in for weekends, and the young folks may gather for apres' ski-like mingling. Not sure if the Summer will be the "in" season. And I didn't see a patio for that kind of Summer socializing.

After having the W around my place for several days, I've caught myself yesterday and today entering my house and expecting to see her. And handling my schedule with her walks included. If there's such a thing as Pavlov's Dogs, there must also be The Winniferous' Masters.

Again, more later.

UPDATE II...I had to stop over at the bank by Northpark Mall during my lunch hour, and I gave into my curiosity to check out the sale at Joseph A. Bank, the men's retailer that advertises heavily on CNBC in the early AM. They're always offering "Buy One, Get One Free", or even, "Buy One, Get Two Free" every once in a while. I figured that I might find some nice, fitted cotton dress shirts to balance out my wardrobe of dri-fit everything.

They did have some cheaper standard cut dress shirts on the sale tables, but the more desirable, fitted ones that I had interest in were all $88 or so. Sure, it was "Buy one, Get One Free", but that still calculated out to $45 per shirt, which wasn't much of a deal in my calculus. If you charge a high enough price for one, that give-away of the second one isn't much of a give-away after all. Shocking.

This week is vapor. BBQ and wine on Maplecrest tomorrow night. Be there.
BCOT

Tuesday

2011-12-27T18:20:00.000-06:00

forStill trying to find "normal" at this end. The weekend was a great success. 1 has a lot of pictures up on her Walgreen's account. I need to work on mine before putting them anywhere. Here's a couple just to get the process in motion.

More later.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-12-22T08:01:00.001-06:00

This is the shot that 1 had on her Twitter account this AM.

1 and 1.02 are scheduled to head home today. More pics should be available at that time.

Busy day here today. Lots to do before tomorrow morning's departure.

Coming Home!!!!

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-12-21T08:30:00.001-06:00

Welcome to the world, 1.02!!!!!

Arrival time approximately 2130hrs December 20, 2011.

7.1 lbs...I think 1.1 said 28+ inches. More details and pics as they become available.

UPDATE: Via text from 1, the length was 20.5. I'm taking the fall on this one. I'm sure 1.1 gave me the correct info originally, and that I didn't get it properly registered.

The early reports from 2 seem to suggest that 1.01 has welcomed her new brother with open arms. I wonder how long that will last? I'm guessing that that last brownie won't be given up freely!

More later.

BCOT

Sunday...UPDATED

2011-12-18T12:18:00.002-06:00

I've put my new flag pole up as the Home Page pic for a couple of days to recognize Old Glory's new spot on Maplecrest. Thanks go to my Perfect Neighbor Jim for basically doing all the work.

The Winniferous and I have made it through another weekend together. We've kind of figured a rhythm to living together for these short periods. She knows that she gets 2-3 "hunts" per day...and lots of treats/snacks. But when I'm out of the house, she's still a kitchen-only puppy. Best adjective for her? Needy!

I'm not 100% sure, but I think that I have been victimized by a minor burglary in the Buick. The car charger to my new iPhone, and the midi-digi camera have both vanished. The charger just never leaves the Buick, and it's not the kind of thing that just falls out of the car or between the seats. The camera is stored in my murse, which I had in the car most of the week. To "lose" both items at the same time is too unusual to be a coincidence. I'm giving it a couple more days for the items to turn up, before calling it theft. Bummer.

As reported on Twitter, Margret is now in the garage on Century Heights Avenue. It was a nice enough day, and I hadn't had her out for a month or more, so I did a little ride in the country to "blow out her pipes" before putting her in hibernation. Her next appearance in the elements will likely be close to April 1st in 2012.

It's another pleasant day here. Mid 40's at least. Lots of golfers on the courses near me. I'm actually going to fire up my lawn mower and collect the leaves this afternoon. Running a lawn mower in mid-December seems a little unusual. Global warming, for sure, Al.

The local paper had major coverage on the reactions to the Stephen Bloom article today. http://qctimes.com/news/opinion/editorial/in-defense-of-skuzzy-iowa/article_11d46296-2866-11e1-84d7-0019bb2963f4.htmlAs could be expected, there was near-universal disdain for the slant that Bloom gave to virtually every segment of Iowa culture. Makes you wonder if The Atlantic was just looking for readership. My guess is that the editors figured that a nice hit-piece on the state could get a visceral reaction and plenty of splash in the extended media, in a news cycle that now has the Iowa caucuses at front and center stage. Bloom just comes off as a high-brow academic.

If you didn't notice, bowl-season started yesterday. Hmmm. Sorry I missed those crucial games.

I hope to get back on here later after my yard work and the next hunt with The W.

UPDATE...Really not much to add here. I enjoyed The W's visit, but I was glad for her to return to Highland Avenue. I ache as though I was still in Turkey Trot training. She should sleep well for 2 tonight.

Sounds like the trip to C-town was a success. I'll be anxious to hear details from the Continent as well.

I don't know the Commenter from IC. There must be a search program out there that just looks for words or phrases and this guy was spending some time looking around on the Bloom article. Maybe the engine picked up the link to the local paper that I included above. Interesting.

My friend Pete is Pal of the Day. He played Santa earlier this week and delivered a case of top-shelf Louis Martini Cabernet Savignon for all of us to share. Suite. You 'da man, friend.

Hope the peanut Gallery has a good week.

BCOT

Friday AM

2011-12-16T08:34:00.001-06:00

Glad to see the end of the week. It feels like I've been busy all week, but I'm pretty sure that I haven't got much done. And now we have another computer problem this AM. I'm guessing that this one is hardware related as it is unusual for us to have a LAN problem, but still have Internet access.

I attended the visitation last night of a modestly distant relative; a first cousin of Grandpa H. The deceased was a priest at St. Ambrose, and was the last man standing of that generation of cousins on Daddy's side of the family. Father William Dawson. Questions on the related branches of the family tree should be directed to Tahoe Phil.

Lots of moving parts to the fam this weekend. 3 and Herky head to London later today, and 2 and 4 join @srh4 for a girls shopping weekend in C-town. The Winniferous and I will be holding down the fort in the QCA.

4's addition to the Comments section on Wednesday is a direct link to the controversial essay in The Atlantic magazine by a professor (Stephen Bloom) at the University of Iowa. The essay goes on for several pages detailing this guy's "honest" appraisal of Iowa's backwardness, small mindedness, and numerous other "ness's", and generally concluding that Iowa is a place where losers to go to die. All this coming from a Left Coast transplant. Maybe he should go back home.

So I'm not much of a Tim McGraw fan. But he has a couple of songs that have always resonated with me, the one currently in mind: Live like you were dyin'. Another close friend from another lifetime passed away this week at age 62 from pancreatic cancer. Tahoe Phil makes the comment that he's in the 1/2 of 1% on the survival rate. We are all so lucky.

I'm headed out to my normal Friday AM "meeting" at Gold's. Hope everyone has a good TGIF.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-12-14T10:40:00.004-06:00

I should be able to add an entry today during the course of this last CPE seminar that I have on my schedule for the year. This one is a satellite program held at the iWireless Center in Moline. I've attended this same annual Tax Update program each of the last few years. Smaller group this year. Maybe the folks have a better handle on their CPE hours for 2011.

There has definitely been a change in the delivery of CPE in recent years. There's lots of in-office webinars that you can catch at your desk, and some of these vendors will do an on-line or satellite deal for small offices where an entire staff can be present. It saves the firm a lot of time and money, and probably gets the same learning benefits. Hello U of PHX.

The computer kerfuffle at the office is approaching a conclusion. We're having a debriefing with the IT vendor next week. That should be interesting.

My friend Lee in C-town was licking his wounds Sunday night from the latest Tebow comeback. 'Da Bears were extremely complicit in the Denver win, but the Tebow legend continues to grow. One commentator (I think accurately) referred to this phenomenon as a "mania". And mania's tend to run their course and eventually go down. But I find the success that Tebow has enjoyed these last few weeks a bit refreshing. And I really like the fact that this success is flying in the face of those so-called NFL experts that declared, flat out, that Tebow couldn't make it in the league.

My spot on the iPhone Learning Curve is below ground-level. I have signed up for iTunes in order to have access to the apps for the phone (even the Free ones). The on-screen keyboard is going to take some time to get used to.

Really impressed that Time magazine has selected The Protester as their Person of The Year. I think that it is fitting that the uni-sex individual on the cover has a covered face. In the under-developed countries of the world, I guess that the cloth-covered face look is somewhat normal, although for us Westerner's, that look gets routinely associated with terrorism. In the USA, the covered face has historically been used by outlaws. Occupy outlaws are just exercising there right of Free Speech. Hmmm.

More here after lunch.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-12-11T14:40:00.002-06:00

Sorry for not getting on here the last few days. Life kind of got in the way.

The saga on computers at my office remains an open exercise. The laptop is now serviceable, but I'm still just getting up-to-speed on the new machine and the updated software. Turns out that the computer came equipped with an additional SEM card that was an AT&T add-on. The Verizon air card couldn't get past the SEM card for some reason. The IT installer finally noticed the extra piece of hardware, pulled it, and wow! The laptop worked.

The desktop is still messed-up. Our contractor has absolutely failed on this project. I was livid on Friday. Inconvenience has moved to unacceptability. To be continued.

2's dinner at the Figge on Thursday night was a success. She served as hostess for the short program following the meal...and did a nice job dealing with an uncooperative sound system. Let's make her Daughter of the Day in recognition of this effort. Way to go, Kiddo!

The Geneva Christmas party last night was a lot of fun. Good friends. Good dinner. Top-shelf wine. That bottle of Jordan Cab may have been the hit of the evening.

It looks like we are close to a final agreement on the house for the #7282012 events. Tahoe Phil made an on-site inspection this weekend and I have contacted the owner about inking the deal. Not far from Phi and Jan's, good space-age, and reasonable pricing. Our check-in will be Sunday, the 22nd.

Anybody catch the replay of the brawl at the end of the Cincy-Xavier basketball game last night? A number of those players should be kicked off their teams, and maybe even out of their schools. Nothing short of thuggery. And then the Xavier players actually go to post-game pressers and justify the physicality/retribution due to Cincy's lack of "respect" for the Xavier team. Just like in the 'hood.

So Pujols took the money and went to LA. It was a choice. Take less money in StL and embellish his icon status in the best baseball town in the country. Or follow the money and become A-Rod in LA. I have no problem with him following the money. And I have no problem with the Cards' not trying to match silly money for an aging star. Maybe Albert figured that he'd always be second to Stan the Man, so why not take the money? It's bid'ness. (A hard-and-fast rule that has application in sports, business, politics and social-climbing: When they say it's not about the money, always remember, it's about the money!)

2's flat tire yesterday morning brought into play a tool that I have never used for changing tires: the 4"x4"x4' club. After finally unscrewing the lug nuts (they were on so tight I couldn't figure out which way was off!), the tire was still held fast to the axle. I tried pulling, yanking and kicking with no success. We actually went back inside the coffee shop to warm up and to review the owner's manual again to see if there was a "trick" that was unique to the Focus. Terry O'C gave his input too. (Uh, Terry...you were worthless!)

I finally went over to the trash bin at the next-door construction site and found the 4x4x4 and began to seriously whale away at the tire. It finally popped free. We got the donut mounted, stopped and aired-up the donut and the other front tire and took the car over to a tire shop on Brady. Surprisingly, the fix was cheap enough for 2 to afford, and she's back fully mobile today.

A small visual factoid: I was wearing the Dale Earnhardt NASCAR gawdy-printed black leather jacket while performing this tire-change service. It was not a quality pit stop on the clock.

Now headed over to Gold's to sweat out some vino.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-12-07T16:48:00.001-06:00

This is another of the "days in history". Pearl Harbor. According to FDR, "A day that will live in infamy". Before my time. But etched in my brain from American History class.

The IT folks have made progress on the conversion here at the office. But they still have several open points. Suffice it to say, they severely under-engineered this project. I'm moving on for sanity's sake.

I'm declaring the Christmas shopping season in full gear. The traffic is now at the high volume that makes ingress and egress to/from any retail/commercial area problematic. Actually, the flow is usually moving so slowly that people will let you in line without you being hardly aggressive at all because they know they can't get anyplace very fast anyway.

Today is RCL day. Always a good day to get home.

I posted this on Twitter at lunch. Roy and I ate at a local Irish bar (Kelly's on 53rd Street) as we do usually once every couple weeks or so. It's bar food, but we know the owner and we usually get well-treated by the waitresses. Anyway, they have a digital sign over the bar that counts down the days until St. Patrick's Day. (Actually, the clock reads down to the hour, minute and second.) And that sign read an even "100" today. A hundred days seems like a long time, but to think that St. Paddy's Day will be less than 100 days away as of tomorrow, makes Spring seem maybe not that far away, eh?

Busy day for me tomorrow. Cedar Rapids for another CPE day. And Susan's Figge dinner tomorrow night. Lots of moving parts.

I'm going to head over for an evening spin class. I may try to hop back on here later, IF they have my air card installed. Hmmm. Taking the Under on that one.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-12-06T13:39:00.000-06:00

This entry is coming your way via the laptop and the Dunn Bros wifi hotspot. The good news is that the laptop does work. The bad news is that the Verizon air-card is still not installed. And the desktop is still a work in progress. I'm now past the point of irritation. Well, maybe not.

I am very close to committing to a house for the #7282012 events with an arrival of Sunday the 22nd and a departure of Saturday the 28th. Tahoe Phil needs to complete an on-site inspection before I send in the deposit, but the location is good...on the Mountain Golf Course in Incline...and the space in the home looks like it can handle the crew. I want to get the reservation done so that we can take this one off the list of open items.

The new Dell doesn't have one of those nuisance balls in the middle of the keyboard...which is good. But I still hit keys that send the cursor all over the place while I input. And since I have to look at the keyboard as I type, I'll be three words or more into a sentence before I realize that I've shifted to the middle of a completed paragraph above my input point. Inefficiency can be my middle name.

This is our first "wintery" day of the season. Snow flurries most of the day. Had to brush off the Beater after early coffee. No accumulation, but it sure looks like Winter outside. Get used to it, eh?

Augie has a game tonight that I may try to get to. They did get beat in StL over the weekend, so the #1 rating is gone. But if they stay healthy, they should have a great year.

It looks like the new party song in the country bars is "Red Solo Cup" by Toby Kieth. I never knew that those plastic beer cups at parties were "Solo" cups. (He sang the song at the end of the country awards show on the tube last night. Country cool...he comes out to receive a big award chewing a wad of gum. And proceeds to sing while still chewing. Very classy.

I may try to slide back on here later.

BCOT

Monday...UPDATED

2011-12-05T12:19:00.003-06:00

This computer thing is beginning to wear a little thin. No entry here yesterday largely because I had no Internet access from my house. And the IT guy has taken control of both my laptop and my desktop this AM. Inconvenient may not fully describe my assessment of the situation.

There was a fairly notably recurrence of my Sometimer's problem on Saturday night. I had elected to wear some non-jeans, dress slacks to Geneva for dinner. I figured that the club would have been fine with jeans, but I didn't want to be the only guy in the place in denim. Anyway, the dark slacks required my black dress shoes, which I store in my bedroom closet. Opening the closet, I find not only the shoes that I'm looking for, but also a new casual pair that I had totally forgotten about...and three long-sleeved dri-fits...all that must have made it there last Spring. No recollection whatsoever. Hmmm.

I had actually purchased a new pair of daily-wear shoes last month (20% off at Kohl's, Revkev!), as I had still been wearing the well-worn pair that those in the closet was obviously bought to replace months earlier. The synapses obviously had lost contact.

The Home Page of my B of A accounts still shows a balance due of $200 on my mortgage, but now gives me a, "Can not process your request" message when I ask for account details. Not sure if that's good or bad.

Interestingly, as I am now on another computer in the office (not my own), the B of A website makes me go through an additional level of security to access my accounts. All you cyber shoppers out there, Beware! The online retailers will be following your electronic tracks forever!

With the Hawks going to Mesa, the 'Clones to NYC, and the Irish to Florida, we've got teams border-to-border. I hope the weather in The Big Apple cooperates. Of all the lower-tier bowls, ISU's spot looks like one of the best. Weather being the down-side.

Maybe more here later.

NOW LATER....The computer guy finally had some success today getting a few things done. My desktop is up and running with the new equipment, and my office email seems to be working. I'll wait until tomorrow before declaring the change-over a full success. He still has some small programming to do to coordinate some of the operational things.

The word on the laptop is not quite as good. He's saying that Dell has to ship him a replacement air-card as the one built-in is defective. Hmmm. It took them this long to figure that out? Whatever.

One of the by-products of the computer project has been the complete clearing of the top of my desk. It had to be done to give the IT guy space to work. Plus, there's about a million confidentiality rules in both the CPA and securities businesses that say, "Don't leave client material out for prying eyes!" I actually like the look. The question becomes, how long can I make it last? I get so much junk mail, and I have so much stuff that takes multiple look-at's to get done, that the pile-building is continuous. But I'm going to take another stab at the goal of clearing it off each day. Wise betters will take the Under on this one.

Thanks for reading.

BCOT

Saturday

2011-12-03T14:46:00.000-06:00

Well, my computer situation hasn't improved much. My desktop tower still hasn't been exchanged for the new unit, but that hasn't stopped the updated Windows package now on the server from screwing-up my office email. We spent most of Friday afternoon trying to isolate the bugs, but I still have a recurring error when more than a couple of inbound messages get in the cue.

And the laptop? Well, I'm basically without a laptop for the weekend. The IT folks had another breakdown in communication, and when the tech handed me the "new" laptop late yesterday afternoon, he was completely in the dark when I asked about the Verizon "anywhere" card that needed transfer/activation. I was a bit miffed. I left while he was trying to call Verizon to determine the protocol. When I came in today, no Verizon capability on the laptop. Suite. And the laptop couldn't even pick up the wireless network in the office. No Starbuck's for you this weekend, LtPC!

My pal Bill has a new granddaughter, born early yesterday. By C-section. Sounds like mother and daughter are just fine. Congrats, buddy.

I reported this on Twitter last night. I have purchased my last couple of cases of wine at the Hy Vee store on 53rd Street. Like most places, they have a 10% discount automatically applied to case purchases. But at each of these last two times, my mental calculations had suggested that I might have only been getting 5% off on the purchase. I took both receipt tapes in last night to show the manager, and he was really flummoxed.

Turns out that the computer wasn't recognizing an Italian red (that had two or three bottles in each of these cases), as wine, I guess. Because the computer was giving me 5% on like 10 bottles. Pretty odd. But it goes to show ya', the computer ain't always correct.

(I had actually gone in to the store to pick up a bottle of Jack London to take over to a party, and when the manager was really struggling with the math, I told him that the Jack London would be pretty close to even-ing things up. Especially since, when I bought that last case, he had only one bottle of the Jack London available. And I had had him actually physically check his back-room inventory for more of it. So a really good manager should really have given me the 10% discount on the single bottle last night. Which absolutely would have made it a pennies-difference deal. He didn't bite, and I had to pay a couple of bucks for the bottle.)

So I need to get going to Gold's. Given my lack of computer access, I won't be back on here until tomorrow.

Make it a safe Saturday night.

BCOT

Friday

2011-12-02T08:34:00.000-06:00

The Over bet on the computer conversion didn't pay. As a matter of fact, the conversion hardly got off the ground. There had been a mis-communication within the IT vendor and the installer guy had the preliminary set-up on my new machine wrong. So I was basically off my desktop for the day, and then when he initiated the change in the afternoon he also kicked me off of my email-to-phone service. Not-so-suite.

One of the by-products of the computer kerfuffle was that my business-meeting-guy had left a message on my desk-top that he was going to be a no-show for dinner. Which I didn't find out about until my second glass of wine. Welcome to our new technology.

Bank of America managed to frost my cookies yesterday. I had called two weeks ago to arrange an early pay-off on a mortgage loan, and the service agent at that time apparently dropped the ball. The end of the month payment then didn't get fully allocated to principal (the system automatically sent $200 to the tax/insurance escrow), so when I checked to confirm the pay-off, there was still a $200 balance due.

So I called the Customer Service number. After fighting my way through the voice-mail system, I railed on the new service agent about the problem. She confirmed that there was a record of my call on the 16th, but no action was indicated. To complete the loan pay-off with the excess in the escrow account would require a letter of direction...and further delay. And there was a $30 closing fee and a $7 recording fee...And I went ballistic!

Long story short; those fees disappeared, and I had a same-day transfer payment made from my checking account for the new exact amount of the pay-off. (The bloated escrow would then just be paid to me.) The great news? Wells Fargo charged me $14.95 for a same-day transfer! Better news? The mortgage account still has a $200 principal balance today after the payment! I love this country!

The Business Ethics seminar in IC yesterday was a crock. All of my professional designations now require different minimums of annual CPE in ethics as part of the total CPE requirements. The licensing organizations are all Madoff-sensitive. Whatever. The guy doing this program was a CPA from Wisconsin who had a sports background, and he used way too many examples of poor ethical conduct from various college and pro sports. Like ethical lapses are rare in college football, eh?

The program was at the former Highlander Inn on the East side of IC. It's a Clarion Inn now. The Highlander was at one time THE hotel in IC. I'm thinking that one of the last times I was there was the night that nephew/cousin Matt stayed there with the U of A basketball team when they were in town for a game with the Hawks. Prior to that, I think I may have stayed there a few times in the late "70's when I was on campus to help with AA & Co recruiting. There may have been some Beefeater gin involved.

Hope everyone has a good TGIF.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-11-30T21:55:00.001-06:00

Is there an echo in here? What happened to November?

Big day in the market today. Don't look for a long, sustained up-turn. Europe is still murky. Holiday sales will lose steam as the discounting goes deeper. (Kevkev, don't even think about buying anything at Kolh's without a 30%-Off-Everything coupon!) The Washington DC fighting will have another kerfuffle, and once the Dow approaches 12,500, the shorts will exert their influence and the selling will pick up speed again. There's simply not an over-abundance of buyers out there.

The Four Letter channel (ESPN) is kicking off a week of fund-raising for the Jimmy V Foundation for Cancer Research tonight. It's a worthy cause. They ran the 1993 ESPY Awards speech again tonight, simultaneously on all of their channels at 1900 hours CST. Here's a link to the video;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuoVM9nm42E

I'm thinking that 4 has become a bit of a Dunn's coffee regular as I ran into her there this morning for the second straight day without any pre-arrangements. And not at my normal mid-morning time. At least today I was quick enough on the draw to notice her before she had bought her coffee. Yesterday, she had already paid and was just hangin' there by the delivery stand before either of us picked up on one another. Definitely a nice surprise.

Dan and Denise get this year's award for the first Christmas card received on Maplecrest. Thank you much-ly.

My pal Bill was at a tax seminar the first two days of this week, and his big take-away was that we needed to establish a secure portal system for access to returns for any electronic delivery. Big penalties apply if the IRS catches you sending taxpayer documents on the Internet without proper security. Basically, the IRS is regulating the preparers to become an extension of their own bureaucratic system. Let's definitely not make things easy on anybody. And we'll need to raise our fees to cover the additional IT costs.

For what its worth, I get it. I blame the attorneys. Cue the joke: What do you call 1500 jailed lawyers? A good start. Bah-da-bing!

Congrats to 2, 3 and Revkev on their workout challenge.

The Augustana basketball team is rated #1 in D-III this week. They won a tough game last night against local rival St. Ambrose at the SAU gym before a full house. Their rating status will likely get a strong challenge this weekend when they go down to StL for a 4-team tourney. Wash-U is always competitive. Regardless, Augie could have a legit shot at the national title if they can keep healthy. They have a 6'8" guy at the three spot who could be the D-III Player of the Year. He tossed in a little 38 against Ambrose.

My desktop is supposed to be swapped out in the AM. Over/Under on a smooth transition? I'm fooling you and taking the Over. Maybe that's just hope, eh?

Just a reminder, every once in a while, Blogger's spell-check won't work. When that happens, my Rick Perry-esque-ness may come out. Sorry. Blame Blogger.

Hope everyone has a good Thursday. Thanks for reading.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-11-29T16:57:00.000-06:00

So we're back to the mountains. If I can come up with a theme in the next few days, I'll go to a more topic-specific Home Page photo.

Our computer switch-over is in process. The IT vendor has had a guy here almost full-time over the last several work days to load-up the new machines with the designated software. The idea is to make all of the desk-tops almost identical so that there's not the constant question of which computer has which software. It's always surprising how many different programs we each end up using on a regular basis. I think that the server-switch is tonight.

I had been on the side of "Who Cares?" when it came to the NBA strike/lock-out. That's unfair to the little people who staff the arenas or work in the ancillary businesses that depend on the league operating. So for the sake of all those employees in the related activities, a shortened season is better than no season. But just to confirm the obvious, I won't be on line at Ticketmaster for Bulls' tickets.

Not that I was ever a Herman Cain fan, but the guy has hit a bit of a rough patch on the Political Trail recently. We live in a different time. Politicians, athletes and entertainers (talk about redundancy!) are all free game and the paparazzi are always there. Once there's blood in the water, it's a race to Hangman's Tree.

And I've never been a Syracuse fan. But I wonder if Boeheim can survive? If you're fully in charge, and there's a felony (or more) perpetrated under your watch, how do you avoid the ax? While there appears to be no evidence of convenient ignorance on this one, I think Boeheim will fall by organizational protocol.

Two games for Ndamukong Suh. But he's appealing to the league for leniency. Now that's rich! I'm sure that the player's union is pushing the appeal. But really. If this guy has the idea that he's being misunderstood, take the two weeks off and retool your image machine. Right now, it ain't workin'.

Now headed out to run with 2 and The W. Maybe more here later.

BCOT

Saturday

2011-11-26T16:39:00.000-06:00

The weekend has been a big success. The great thing about Thanksgiving is that those left-overs keep on giving!

Here are a couple of pics from the outing today to the John Deere pavillion.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-11-24T11:47:00.003-06:00

Under bet pays!!!

Chip times not yet posted on-line, but I crossed the finish line as the race clock hit 59.30...I should be in the 58's. What a great way to get to Thanksgiving dinner!

Missing 3 and Herky.

More later

BCOT

Wednesday...UDATE with 1.01 Pics

2011-11-23T16:37:00.003-06:00

Here's a few lines for the day before Turkey Day.

I would be remiss if I didn't wish everyone Happy Tax Thanksgiving!

Here's notice to 3 and Herky who will be celebrating in NYC. This was a pic from that weekend that I spent with them last month. This photo makes them Fiance's of the Day. Enjoy Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade!

The Trot Challenge is fully subscribed. Thanks to all those in the Peanut Gallery who elected to participate. I'm thinking that I can make 62 minutes, but 59:59 may be a road-too-far. But with a favorable weather forecast, you never know.

The new spin bikes at Gold's have had the curious result of the instructors going to a quantitative approach to leadership in contrast to a more qualitative methodology with the old equipment. The new bikes each have an electronic read-out device that reflects cadence, mileage and heart-rate among other things. So the instructors have adopted instructions such as, "Okay. Get that cadence up to 70-90." And, "Up the cadence by 5."

Rather than painting a picture like, "Okay. You're coming up on three bikers and they don't want you to pass. You need to pull, pull, pull!" Or, "Just a few more stokes before getting to the top, and then charge down the hill. Go. Go. Go."

I noticed this change with the first class I had with the new bikes on Friday with my favorite instructor, Kandi. I've always enjoyed her classes as I have felt like she actually went at it as a coaching assignment, giving thought and energy to her words of encouragement. When she reverted to cadence counting, I thought that it kept some of her best talents on the sidelines. And the gal who led last night's class did much the same thing.

Preliminary conclusion: the bikes are night and day better than the old ones. (And after two classes, I still haven't figured out the best settings for the adjustable seat/handlebar combinations.) The instructor's have some learning too. I'll be disappointed if the quantitative method becomes standard.

I don't watch DWTS. Not even when EA was on the show. Never heard of this this guy who won last night. But I would try to learn to dance too if Karina Whatshername was my partner. Sorry.

Is Urban Meyer going to OSU the worst kept secret in sports?

Off to get ready for company. Look here to the right on the Twitter feed for a TT report by 1030hrs tomorrow.

Who is this little star?

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-11-22T11:34:00.001-06:00

I'm a little surprised that I didn't see any reference to this anniversary in the papers this AM at coffee. That must mean that the writers and editors are too young to have the November 22nd date etched into their memories.

High school biology class for me.

News about Dancing With The Stars, the failure of the Not-So-Super Committee, and early shopping for Black Friday are today's headlines. What does that say about our collective consciousness?

More later.

BCOT

Monday

2011-11-21T09:39:00.003-06:00

That was a quick weekend!

Great start on Friday night with a big group for wine at Biaggi's. 2 and 4 stopped by...2 on her way to a foo-foo Festival of Trees event, and 4 on her way to bed (after 24+ hours without any sleep). And then we closed out the weekend last night with BBQ and modified fff on Maplecrest.

You can really tell that the holiday shopping season has begun by the amount of traffic on Kimberly Road and Elmore Street this time of year. On a Friday afternoon, the back-ups are impressive. Left turns out of parking lots on to these roads (with no traffic light help) become pretty much impossible. I'm thinking that the European system of roundabouts makes our lighted intersection format a failed experiment. Then again, I remember that the big downtown traffic circles with multiple converging thoroughfares often had lights as well.

Not sure how many weekends that the Clone's, Hawk's and Irish have all won on the gridiron this year. Huge win in Ames on Friday night, and then important wins on Saturday for the other two, so we can all celebrate a little. Not that the state of the world was all that much affected by those results.

The early forecast for Turkey Day has a high of 55. And 57 for Friday.

So I mowed my front yard on Saturday to gather the leaves. Obviously, on Sunday, you couldn't tell that I had made the effort. And they aren't even my leaves! It's a common problem.

I remain unimpressed with the clothing selections of runners and walkers on my normal training routes most evenings. Almost everyone wears dark stuff with little or no reflective material. My day-glo orange shell with reflective striping and blinking pin-light is the only bright color that I usually see out there.

My latest term that I've come up with to describe my habits and preferences is "spaceage" (which looks curiously like a NASA word when I spell it out. Hmmm.) I use it to describe the personal space I like around my person. Which is often more than I'm given in a public setting. Like at Sunday coffee at Dunn's where a group of 8-10 folks regularly come in after I've set up shop, and proceed to take up way too much of my spaceage.

Hope everyone gets through these next three days to celebrate the rest of the week.

BCOT

Friday...UPDATED

2011-11-18T08:39:00.002-06:00

Just a few lines to catch up this AM.

3 texted me a pic yesterday morning from her gym that overlooks Wall Street, of the mounted police facing-down the Occupy nuts, and I was literally watching the same scene on CNBC. Even the mainstream press has begun to tire of the antics. Of course, they are waiting for the "go" sign from 1600 Pennsylvania before they actually say anything negative about the movement.

NASCAR ends the season this week down in Florida. It looks like the year's champion will be either Edwards or Stewart, neither of which is a particular favorite of mine. But I'm glad that it isn't the 48. They take off most of the next three months, and then start it up again at Daytona in mid-February. NASCAR had a better year this year viewership-wise, but the price of sponsorship has fallen, and there are lots of cars looking for money.

Can't say that I am all that excited about college basketball yet. With most of the good teams recruiting players that will only be around for a year or two, the continuity for the average fan is a bit lacking. For instance, I kind of follow KU, and I couldn't name a player on this year's squad without going to Google. Once they start the conference season's, after Christmas, I might pay more attention. Big Monday!

And the NBA? Does anybody care at this point? Poll question: Are you more sympathetic with the Occupy protesters or the NBA Players Association?

Another abuse story in college athletics this AM. Hate to say it, and kind of reluctantly agree with the Catholic haters who continue to channel the priest abuse cover-ups, but it looks like the schools have been doing the same thing with any messes in their houses.

Now headed to my 0900 meeting at Gold's. More here later.

Have a great TGIF. I will for sure.

#7282012. Be there.

UPDATE...Davenport Gold's fully swapped-out their spin bikes. The old ones were definitely past their useful lives. But 30 new machines wasn't a cheap date. I had reached the point last Spring where the poor quality of the bikes was a factor in whether I would even attend a class.

Wind and fire in the news for our relatives in the Reno/Tahoe area. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/nationnow/2011/11/caughlin-fire-20-homes-destroyed-9500-people-evacuated-in-reno-blaze.html

The new flag pole on Maplecrest should be up for Thanksgiving. My Perfect Neighbor is in charge. The hole is dug. Concrete this weekend. The flag, pole and hardware are already in our possession.

Clones tonight with Okie State at Jack Trice. Terrible report today for Cowboy Nation. Plane crash with the head women's b-ball coach and top recruiting assistant aboard. No survivors. Life is too short.

Hawks try to win a game on the road at West Lafayette. Hmmm. May want to take the Under on that one. Domer's entertain a mediocre BC team on Senior Day. Irish should go to 8-3, with Stanford then to close out the season next week on the Left Coast.

Looking at yard work, a long run and some other errands tomorrow. We'll see how hard the wind blows. Shouldn't be too cold.

Ya' all...

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-11-16T17:31:00.001-06:00

The last couple of days have disappeared quickly. That tends to happen when you get placed under some stress, and I had another IRS auditor in town looking at a complicated return. The complications were really not from the activity reported on the return by the entity, but rather the organizational structure of the group of companies that the one shareholder/taxpayer owned. I can't even write a simple sentence to describe it. After a day of preparation and a day of the agent on-site, I'm thinking wine.

And I had to deal with another computer issue that kept me off my desktop most of Monday. My web-based financial planning software provider did a maintenance upgrade over the weekend, and when I went to sign on on Monday, I got the diagnostic that my local anti-virus software was out of date, so I couldn't access the programs and data. We tried to upload the current version and couldn't, which meant a call to the IT vendor. And they dwadled around all afternoon with it. Okay now, but extremely inconvenient when I was trying to get ready for the audit. Grrrr.

While Monday was the anniversary of 4000 Days, I was advised this afternoon that today is the 21st anniversary of our firm moving into our building. Now that does seem like a long time ago. I remember bringing the girls over to the construction site and having pizza during the build-out stages. Building the building was not a riskless investment, but it has proven to be one of our best business decisions. We continue to benefit from the revenue stream created by this asset. It has financed a lot of education, wedding(s!) and will do so for years into the future.

My pal Roy and I went over to the annual golf clothing/equipment sale that the various clubs put together at a big reception hall up from our office on Kimberly. Pro shops have some of the most expensive polo shirts that you can find. Why you would pay $80 for one in July when they will absolutely be dumped at the sale in November for $32 is beyond me. We each bought a shirt, mine being a long-sleeved black (why not?) dri-fit pullover with a Hawkeye logo on the left front.

I still have a few spots on the Trot Challenge if anyone is interested.

Maybe more here later.

BCOT

Monday

2011-11-14T12:27:00.000-06:00

I'll try to get back here later, but no promises as I have a busy day/evening ahead of me.

But the news of the day is that this is the official six-year anniversary for 4000 Days! I knew that I had started it in the November range, but I didn't have the exact date registered in the cerebral cortex. It popped up on our Outlook system this morning. Not an insignificant passage of time.

The good news is that six years gets you well-past the half-way point toward 4000 total days. The bad news is that I've kind of extended the total by three years or so. Which means, it's way too early to look too far down the road.

Thanks for reading.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-11-13T21:37:00.002-06:00

You're going to have to give me a little literary space on this one.

So at spin class this morning, I'm pounding along trying to figure out some mental diversion from the monotony of the spin Nazi's rant. I drifted over to some marginal analyses of age and various activities, envisioning your standard x and y axes and the various curves that might best describe the relationships.

Actually, it got a little confusing when I was trying to keep straight whether x was the horizontal axis or the vertical axis and which axis worked best for which variable. I had this idea that I could superimpose on a single graph several different curves that could be viewed from 10,000 feet and some fundamental truth about my life would crystallize. The idea never got past the foggy stage.

I did though have one thought that stuck. My life has been and continues to be, in a very satisfying and interesting way, a series of visits to a park bench (or an equivalent spot from which to watch the world go by). This is one of those things that, when you can identify recurrence over 30 years or so, is pretty good evidence of truth. Obviously, the start of this thing began at Adventureland, but I think that I have perfected the park bench to an art form.

Let's review the evidence, not necessarily in order of precedence:

1. Football at Kinnick Stadium: I'm the guy staying in the parking lot with the Saturday NYT puzzle.
2. FFF at major city hotel: I'm the guy in the lobby on the laptop.
3. Tahoe Phil's boat at Tahoe: Lots of time on the front of the boat reading a book.
4. Wrigley Field: Why go into the game when we can hang at the Cubby Bear?
5. Starbuck's Anywhere, USA: Why wouldn't we hang at SB's?
6. The driveway on Maplecrest: people come for the wine and conversation.
7. Table 101 in the bar area at Davenport Biaggi's: Why wouldn't we?

I'm sure that there are other examples, but you can see where I'm headed. I have skills in this area. That said, I'm not sure that it adds a lot to the resume.

The Trot is getting closer. The count now also includes Tahoe Phil and Jan, may pal Ron and Jane, and RevKev and Erica, as well as cousin Carrie and David. So we're at 8 of 30.

Hope everyone has a good week.

BCOT

Friday - Veteran's Day Edition

2011-11-11T15:19:00.004-06:00

I'm never quite sure what the Blogger rules are sometimes when it comes to putting pic's up for an entry. It seems to default to a text protocol that has text begin in the middle of the page, and then expand to the margins. Very odd.

Anyway, I met my pal Bill at the Arsenal for the Veteran's Day ceremony on Arsenal Island. Smaller than normal crowd this year, I think. The speaker's included both the Iowa and Illinois Congressmen from either side of the river, and the general in charge of the Island. The best presentation was by the lady who sang the National Anthem a cappella.

I'm giving props to 4 as Daughter of The Day for her efforts to get to 0900 spin class this AM after her graveyard shift at the station. The pic is one that appeared here in August to celebrate our climb up the Col de Aspin in southern France. I think this was the day that she wiped out going down the mountain (as we had parked at the top with the idea of coasting down and then cycling back to the top). But she sucked it up and made the climb with ease. Good thing I had that cortisone cream to medicate her roadrash!

A flag on Maplecrest to celebrate the day. If I could load a youtube of Lee Greenwood's God Bless The USA, I would.

RevKev is #3.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-11-10T22:30:00.000-06:00

That little episode of snow showers yesterday morning definitely served notice that Winter is in the offing. Nothing much stuck and what did was gone by lunch time, but it was clearly Winter weather. Then again, it's almost mid-November...

My friend Rick who took his two adult kids and another couple or two on a commercially-organized/led bike tour of Napa over Labor Day, has been forwarding to me the solicitations that he has begun to receive from the tour company (Trek Tours) on TdF vacations next Summer. For around $5K each, you can watch some of the stages, ride the mountains, and generally kill yourself for a week. I suppose that a glutton for punishment could do more than one of the week-long tours. Way too much work for the amount of wine I would be looking at.

Interestingly, my desktop has now been displaying Trek Tour ads when I access Google. If you could put on super-duper-double-techno-xray-vision goggles, grubby little cookies would be all that you could see on my machine. A tekkie germaphobe wouldn't touch it. I think all that CSI stuff is real.

Cousin Carrie (and David) are Numbers 1 and 2 on the Turkey Trot Challenge.

The TV was on earlier, tuned to CBS's Person of Interest. I wasn't paying attention, but when I looked up, the scene being shown was in Washington Square Park in Manhattan. Web photo from an elevated location. My midi-digi just of the arch. 3 and I had been there that Sunday of my visit and I was able to identify the location shown on the tube by the distinctive Arch at one end of the park. And 3 and I had talked about the amount of filming done in the city. The Big Apple lives up to it's name. Very cool.

The plan tomorrow is to get to the office a little early, make my regularly scheduled Friday 0900 meeting (Spin at Gold's), get back to the house to shower, and then meet my Vet pal Bill for lunch and the Arsenal program. How does 2 get the day off?

There may be an IC trip in our future for Saturday. Not likely to get into the game, but Airliner pizza sounds like a good option.

Make it a a good TGIF.

BCOT

Wednesday - Turkey Trot Challenge Edition

2011-11-09T09:07:00.000-06:00

So here's the flyer for my personal Turkey Trot fund raiser. Susan says to send me the checks, but if you will just indicate in the Comments section that you have made a specific contribution to either the ACS or Komen, I'll make the matching contribution accordingly. I'll give updates in my regular entries here on how the progress to the goal is doing. Thanks in advance for participating.

More later.

BCOT

Tuesday II

2011-11-08T22:43:00.000-06:00

I had planned to head out for another training run this evening, but the rain convinced me otherwise. Tomorrow is another day.

So the two names dominating the news today, Joe Paterno and Herman Cain, both look to be fighting a tidal wave of substantial negative press. Mostly on stuff from a decade or more ago. Did Jo Pa do enough? Did Herman do too much? Joe Pa seems to have some support among the student body, judging by the display on his front yard this evening. But the broader-based community may not be so forgiving. Not doing more earlier may force him to fall on his sword now as the most powerful statement that he can make on his commitment to the University. Its not the act. Its the cover-up. How many has that oversight caught?

Cain's situation is different in that he has a lower general stature, his sins are less clear, and the vertical media has been seriously digging for dirt for several weeks to discredit his bona fides. It is a bit interesting to a disinterested observer the fervor with with media vet the backgrounds of certain candidates while giving certain others a pass. (It also suggests that Mrs. Palin truly has nothing to hide. References to her by the legacy press and the Left ( pardon the redundancy) now must simply belittle her competence as their efforts to find the damning character evidence under the rocks proved fruitless.) I didn't ever think that Cain was going to get the nomination, and this just gets that conclusion done a little earlier.

I'll post my Turkey Trot fundraiser flyer here in the morning. 3 did the design for me, but I couldn't figure out how to get it attached just now. She gave me a PDF file and Blogger wants a JPEG picture. And I couldn't transfer an image of the PDF file because the instructions on the flyer need a better clarity than I can pull up from a digital pic. Technology is great if it works.

I guess that I should acknowledge here the passing of Smokin' Joe Frazier. I have never been much of a boxing fan, and have never been to a live fight. But it was hard not to notice the Ali - Frazier fights in the early and mid -70's. I vaguely remember their first match in 1971, getting updates over the radio that night at ND. Ali had been out of the ring for his war-objector status, and the fight was a huge deal in the sporting world. If you had a Jeopardy question on who won that first fight, I would have got it wrong. Frazier won at MSG. Ali won the 1974 rematch, and their third and final fight, the 1975 "Thrilla in Manila."

I'll update this in the AM with the flyer.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-11-08T08:45:00.000-06:00

Vote early. Vote Often. It's the Chicago way!

BCOT

Monday...UPDATE

2011-11-07T22:22:00.001-06:00

Glad to see RevKev finally back up on his blog. I think the modified fff at Incline last weekend included a few nudges his way. Nothing like peer pressure to break Writer's Block.

The time change means that evening training runs are now done in the dark. Lots of traffic out there at 1800 hours, so you always need to be looking back over your shoulder at even the least-busy intersections. People are anxious to get home. The Winniferous and I managed to avoid things tonight.

This is an UPDATE that allows me to give recognition to Tahoe Phil for his hospitality last weekend at the lake. The pic is a little dated, but the subjects are all I have to work with! He is Brother of the Day.

The economy in Incline Village is a bit iffy. Granted, early November is off-season, but there are many "For Lease" signs in the areas that we regularly frequent. For instance, I noticed yesterday morning on my coffee run that the Subway on Village across from the Raley's entrance was closed. And most of the spaces in the Starbuck's commercial center remain empty. With a relatively low number of permanent residents, there's just not that great of a need for stuff (or services) not otherwise available at Raley's. Controlled development has some disadvantages.

More signs of the oncoming Winter on Mt. Rose and in Incline Village, are the extensions on the roadside poles (to 6 feet or so) to give the snowplow drivers a reference point when the snow begins to accumulate after they clear the roads. Not sure if that's so much good news for the beach crowd. It's a long time until Memorial Day!

Pretty sure that heads will role in State College. Joe Pa may not be able to survive. This is a situation that could be more damning than a couple of losing seasons. I mean its not like its a case of innuendo or rumor. The guy was taken away in cuffs. Even rabid fans won't put up with responsible officials not doing the right thing with this kind of stuff.

The new computers are physically in our building, but not yet ready for installation. Our IT vendor is pretty good, but I'm inclined to take the Under when they make the switch later this week.

All for tonight.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-11-06T21:52:00.000-06:00

The new Home Page pic was taken this morning (Sunday) from the traditional overlook spot above Incline Village. Tahoe Phil was driving 3 and myself down to Reno for our flights home and I took one last stab at getting a current photo for the blog. My effort to capture a good pic on the Sand Harbor route earlier in the morning was less than stellar. Too cloudy and dark. This one will have to do for a few days.

Busy weekend at Tahoe. I'll write more tomorrow. Here's a couple more pics that will be included in a Walgreen's share-file tomorrow as well:

This is the wedding venue. This is the view looking at the rear of the building. And the interior view of the ballroom.

Long day for the travelers. Here's what it looked like as I went out for the early coffee run. I wasn't quite mentally prepared for a weekend of "Winter" when I was doing my planning. Cool, sure. But I came away with a tangible reminder that we have some snow and cold to get past before we get to enjoy those beach days of July. But a great weekend to see 3 and all the folks that hung out with us on Cristina Road in Incline.

More tomorrow.

BCOT

Friday

2011-11-04T11:26:00.000-06:00

The Home Page pic is not all that of a stretch. It snowed last night and it looks like there was at least an inch and a half here in Incline Village. Tahoe Phil had to go back down to Reno last night and he said that it was "white-out" conditions at the top of Mt. Rose on the way home. Glad I elected to stay in and let him make that trip on his own.

Pretty easy day of travel for me yesterday. The Southwest flight left a little late, but made up the time in the air, and I got in just a little early. I got lucky and found an aisle seat on the plane and was able to stash my carry-on without a problem. Most of the people behind me in line got stuck with middle seats in the Open-seating protocol followed by Southwest. TP was there for my arrival, and, other than high winds that made landing a little exciting, it was an easy trip.

Looking forward to seeing 3 later today. She has a ride with RevKev from Sacramento later today. Wine is waiting.

More here later. Have a good TGIF.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-11-03T08:46:00.000-06:00

Hello and Good bye from C-town!

Had a real enjoyable dinner last night with my friend Lee at an Italian restaurant not far from Midway. He and I have a lot in common both personally and professionally. He's a few years younger than me, but he works a lot of the same technical areas, runs his own practice, and sees the many changes that our industry faces in the non-too-distant future. And he is looking at an exit strategy as well.

My hotel was just a few blocks away from the airport. It was okay, but they had a $12 parking fee that they kind of missed in the room-rate quote. I mean, a Sleep Inn with a parking fee? Gimme a break.

Southwest doesn't charge a bag fee, but they sent an email earlier in the week that you could up-grade your boarding pass for an additional $10 per flight. Among the listed benefits, earlier boarding for better access to the overhead bins. Everybody wants a little more for everything.

Looks like there may be another ontime departure in my future. Arrival in Reno right around noon. More here later.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-11-01T21:27:00.001-06:00

Just a few lines before hitting the sack. Busy night even though I didn't actually get that much done. Does laundry count?

Still trying to figure out the legitimacy of a speeding citation that Turino, Italy sent me this week for a violation there over two years ago!. They want like 200 euros! For a 10k over-the-limit violation! And I know that I have previously paid a fine through my Hertz rental that came through my credit card a month or two after we got back. I'm guessing that Turin has out-sourced this work to a contractor like the local towns around here have done with the speeding cameras. There's got to be a pretty good return rate on these solicitations. But after two years?

Anyone else notice that on the ESPN website, if you click a story, when it comes up, there's always a video that pops up as well. And even if you turn the auto-audio to "Off", the next story that you click will have another annoying video, with sound, come up with the article.

And on any of the sites, that big, Home Page ad will have the X-Out box in a different location almost every day. They don't want you to develop a habit of easily getting away from the ads. Everything is work!

I stopped by the library today to get some instruction on the uploading of books to my Kindle. I thought that there was going to be some ability to use a USB cord connection to handle this service, but with my model, its all wireless, but you still have to go through your own Amazon account. There's a two-page instruction sheet that I still have to go through. I may just do a couple Amazon downloads tomorrow at the office before I take off for C-town.

While at the library, I took advantage of the opportunity and cast my vote for the election next week. I mean, I was right there, no line, and I was in and out in five minutes, tops. No controversy to speak of in this election here this year. And to think we are looking at a full year of the garbage surely headed our way in major races in 2012. Ugh. I think I'll go Occupy someplace.

My packing goal for Tahoe is to limit myself to the duffel bag that I used last weekend for NYC. There's an extra night to address, but I think that I can cheat by hanging my Thursday shirt and slacks in the car and thereby not have to inventory that day's attire in my luggage. 2 has taught me well the Power of Minimalist Packing!

Had Margret out this afternoon, it was so nice out. Her days for remaining use in 2011 are numbered.

When I dated a signature on a form today, it caught my eye: 11-1-11. In ten days, Veteran's Day, the superstitious among us will have a field day.

Good luck to the Peanut Gallery on Wednesday. See you on the road.

BCOT

Monday

2011-10-31T20:05:00.001-06:00

This is the best we have for 1.01's dress-up outfit for Halloween. Sitting on her rock in her back yard. She still gets the nod as Granddaughter of the Day.

I took the night off from TT training. The kids in Bettendorf had official Trick or Treating hours between 5 and 7 this evening, which is prime training time for me. So I punted.

Tonight is also the play-off game between Bettendorf and PV (at Bettendorf's stadium), the two local high schools that are within shouting distance of one another. Bettendorf should win. It wasn't much of a game when they met in the regular season. UPDATE: The fourth quarter report from my pal Pete is 28-0 Bettendorf. Not shocking, but Ouch!!

The big news in Cardinal Nation today is Tony LaRussa's announced retirement. Not so much of a surprise to me. I mean, the guy is 67 and has won the World Series three times. Why not smell the roses? (I do think that he should let up on the Grecian Formula. Nobody has hair that dark!)

Letting go of Pujols is a different matter for StL. They're in the same position as the Twinkie's were with God. And that hasn't worked out so well for Minny. Whadda ya do?

We had a server down at the office this AM. It actually went down over the weekend, so we knew going in today that the IT folks needed to get cracking right away. We were back on-line by 1030 hours. Not sure of the cause. But when our computers are down, billing stops. Not a good thing.

Didn't even know that there had been a Kardashion wedding. Is there more than one girl in that crew? Is that the family that Bruce Jenner married into? And how much work has he had done on his face?

It has been well-documented here how my year has gone by in a flash. Well, starting tomorrow, November will be more of the same. Tahoe this weekend. Thanksgiving. I'm thinking the Iowa game on the 13th. A couple of CPE days. A couple of Geneva events. In a whisper, it will be December.

All Saint's Day tomorrow. I wonder if its as big of a day in Lourdes as 4 and I determined that August 15th had been? Boy that day in Lourdes seems like a long time ago. But I remember it well. (Blogger is not letting me move this pic further up the page without going all the way to the top. And its really a good pic. Click on it to make it bigger for viewing.Grrr!

All for tonight. Make Tuesday a good one.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-10-30T13:57:00.000-06:00

So I pulled this picture from the New York Daily News site this morning, depicting a runner in Central Park yesterday. What a difference a week makes! Last week at the time, 3 and Herky and I were spending a leisurely two hours in Central Park with several thousand other New Yorkers, in decidedly more enjoyable weather conditions! See below.

Pretty low-key weekend here on Maplecrest. The cycling club dinner with guest speaker Bob Roll on Friday night wasn't too bad. There was a little kerfuffle when a couple elected to crash our table and refused to honor our reserved status. Which led to our whole group picking up and moving to another table at the back of the room rather than spitting our party. Leaving that twosome by themselves at the premium-seating table. Very surprised that people would dig in for spaces at an event like that. Why would you choose to hard-line it at that kind of function? It takes all sorts, I guess.

Anyway, Bob Roll stayed in character for his talk. Which is to say that he played a bit of the fool. Lots of drinking stories. Lots of hyperbole on different things that happen on the Tour. Not much organization to his remarks. But still entertaining. His appearance doubled the attendance for the dinner from last year. And he hung out another day for a 40-mile ride with club members yesterday. I chose to work in my yard!

Not sure if this is lottery-ticket stuff, but I did get all but a couple of single boxes in both the Friday and Saturday NYT crosswords. This after somewhat easily nailing the Saturday puzzle last weekend while on my visit to The Big Apple. Either the moon and stars are in favorable alignment, or I'm spending way too much time sharpening the noggin on extraneous information. I probably need to get out more.

All of the local towns have (or have had) their "Trick or Treating" schedules either this weekend or tomorrow night. Bettendorf's is tomorrow, so I'm thinking that there may be a Biaggi's dinner in my future. Halloween remains my least-favorite celebratory day.

NASCAR has various things going on to celebrate Breast Cancer Awareness month. Pink curbs at this week's race in Martinsville is a new one for me. (With the 24 pretty much out of the hunt for the championship, I haven't followed the races that closely in recent weeks. But with no-name games as the only TV sports fare today, I have the race on for background noise.)

I gave into the elements yesterday and moved my indoor plants that had spent the Summer on my deck back inside for the on-coming colder weather. A few of the higher branches on the big ficus trees had already been nipped by frost in spite of some attempted blanket coverage the coldest of those nights. It's a bit of natural trimming that keeps them short enough to fit in the room!

I've been doing some more math. Actual retirement. I think that what's going to happen, provided the health stays on plane, is that I'll keep throttling-back a little each year until sometime in the year that I reach age 70. (More than a few people wonder whether I have already retired, given my coffee-shop and travel habits.) So while the original 4000 days estimate might have been a little short on total days, I'm guessing that it will be right on target for applied hours. I take some comfort in being able to identify a definitive date to put out there. You can do the math.

I have a busy week ahead. I have an evening meeting in suburban C-town on Wednesday night, and then fly out of Midway on Thursday morning for Reno, and a three-day weekend in Tahoe. 3 has bid'ness in California this week, and will be coming up to the lake on Friday (Safe travels, Kiddo!). Should be fun. And we hope to add to our knowlege-bank on our service-providers come next July.

Maybe a little more later. Off for TT training.

BCOT

Friday

2011-10-28T16:03:00.000-05:00

So I did, in fact, go to bed last night at the end of the 7th when the Cards were down 7-4. That early departure for DSM just kicked my rear and I was outta gas. I checked the score at 0130 when I got up for a bathroom break. A very pleasant surprise. But like one commentator said, if Texas wins tonight, Game 6 becomes just another good game, not something all that historical.

Hard to believe that it was a week ago that I started that great weekend in NYC. Funny how time rushes by when there's lots on the schedule.

As noted on Twitter, I went to my first spin class of the season this morning. That 0900 Friday class will be on my schedule when I'm in town between now and March 15th or thereabouts. (Maybe 4 can join me on a regular basis when she gets off that graveyard shift and doesn't have an IC work commitment?) I'm considering the 0800 class tomorrow led by the same gal (who is my fav instructor).

The Bob Roll cycling club dinner is tonight. I'm guessing that there may be a larger-than-expected crowd. Although Game 7 may discourage a few race-day sign-ups. Pics to be posted.

The Do-Gooders in charge of Iowa High School football re-organized the classes in the last year or two and expanded the fields to 32-strong in the large-school division. (I'm not even Googling the facts because it doesn't merit the time.) But you have teams with 3-5 losing records in the play-offs! Let's hand out participation trophies to everyone!

No big weekend plans after this evening. I'll be adding to the blog for sure.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-10-26T21:41:00.001-05:00

I'm giving a nod to a local girl today. Here's to 2 as Daughter of the Day. The Winniferous just gets in the picture.

I've taken to listening to the Modern Country channel on DirecTV (814) in recent weeks when there's been no games on or when the other shows didn't peak my interest. Such was the situation tonight with the Cardinals' game cancelled. As I worked my way through the clicker, I hit on one of those music-marketing channels, this one selling Classic Country. I've been listening to it for the last hour. John Schneider (Dukes of Hazzard) is the host along with some gal I've never heard of. She keeps talking about Schneider as a music star? Since when?

Anyway, one of the featured singers is Barbara Mandrel. She had a few years in the '80's when she was the hottest thing going, had several No. 1 hits, and her own weekly TV variety show. (I Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool ) She was a fav of mine. A check of Wikipedia proves that she is a couple years older than me. Funny how memories of folks we never see, are stuck on the visions of old. Many of these singers are still alive. But the CD package is being sold with film clips from the 70's and 80's. Funny how they can re-master the sound recordings to better-than-original condition. Not so much so for the actual singers. Hmmmm.

The pictures that I posted yesterday were obviously from NYC. The two of the "occupy" crowd give you a sense of the relatively small size of the park in the news. The trees were from an area in Central Park. And that's 2's friend Amanda. The final pic was one I snapped of the tourists getting their own pictures taken with the mounted cops at the corner of Wall and Broad. Tourists are nuts.

Another day of note here. The RCL was in the house. It's always a good day coming home to freshly cleaned living spaces. (Interestingly, my pal Bill's spouse had her antennae up one day a month or so ago when I was talking to Bill about my RCL, and later inquired if I would share her number. I did, and now there's another recurring job on the RCL's Bettendorf schedule. I'm definitely a trend-setter.)

Our local Augie basketballer's are opening the season ranked 2 and 3 in the D3 polls. Pretty heady stuff. But they should be good with all the talent coming back from the Elite Eight team of last year. (Of course, they'll be 0-1 out of the gate as their first game next week is at D1 Valpariso in a Christians versus the Lions match.) 2 and I will be ready for hotdogs in two weeks.

I completed my first Kindle book during my trip East. The best feature of the device is size and ease of carry. (Is that two features?) I can fit it in my murse. The biggest down-side at this point is the "oops" touches that move the page or send me back to Home. I'm sure that that is just a usage thing. I'll definitely be downloading more things for travel times.

And I took a couple of test drives on 3's iPad last weekend. Not sure if that toy will be in my future. We go through our hardware upgrade at the office in two weeks and my laptop is also being swapped-out for a newer/sleaker device. My biggest complaint about my current laptop is that it feels like the equivalent of a bag-phone from the '80's. So if the new one is a decent improvement, I think I'll save my shekels. (An iPad would not be a substitute for the laptop. I'd incur the acquisition cost as well as the additional monthly access fees. And that just doesn't make any sense for a man on my wine budget.)

All for tonight. I'm headed over to DSM at oh-dark-hundred for a 0900 meeting. Make your Thursday a good one.

BCOT

Tuesday Pics

2011-10-25T16:34:00.000-05:00

Tuesday

2011-10-25T09:21:00.001-05:00

A few lines this morning to catch up with The Maddening Crowd.

Fun times in NYC. Air travel was fairly uneventful. My hotel in the financial district was a good choice. The weather fully cooperated. Event planning was a success. And we did a lot/saw a lot without ever feeling rushed.

Not that I am anxious to return to a life in The Big City. I like my green-space here in the prairies.

The police presence in the financial district was significant. Many of the streets were either blockaded or had limited vehicle access. Wall Street was closed to vehicles. The cops came in three's and four's at every corner or pedestrian crossing area. Mounted patrols came in three's and four's as well. If you wanted to make trouble, you would have been greeted quickly by several of New York's finest.

We actually did pass by the "occupy" park on Friday evening as we headed to our meeting place with 3's friends. The park might be a half acre in size, and was packed solid with an assemble of hippy-ish folks. They displayed a variety of signs, protesting not only corporate greed, but every other issue popular among the leftward-leaning population. Not sure what it means when your cause turns from a social statement to a tourist attraction, but judging by all of the camera's being used by the passers-by, the movement is in the curiosity space at this point.

A Top Ten list of NYC observations that I will expand upon later this evening:

1. The caricature of The Japanese Tourist has substance.

2. Central Park is worth the trip.
3. Ethnicity has no barriers.
4. The trains work. You can get around.
5. Cab drivers only use English as a second language.
6. Not much price difference at Starbucks from Bettendorf.
7. My "top-shelf" wines may be a little less so in NYC.
8. The Concrete Jungle and The City That Never Sleeps are accurate descriptions.
9. An endless variety of options for dining.
10.Having a few extra dollars probably doesn't hurt.

So I'll jump back on here later. (That's the Brooklyn Bridge in the background of this shot of 3. We were at the tip of Manhatten on Sunday morning checking out the tourists' boats and the markets.)

BCOT

Monday

2011-10-24T12:30:00.000-05:00

Thursday

2011-10-20T21:52:00.000-05:00

I'm watching the World Series as I get my act together for my NYC trip tomorrow. 2 and I opened a bottle of Dry Creek Cab after our run (to bide some time for her to avoid some Homecoming Parade traffic). So I've had to finish it...since I'll be gone for a few days. Life's a beach.

Lots of moving parts in the fam this weekend. @srh4 is up North visiting 1.01. (LBH, 1 and 1.1 are extras in this play.) And 4 has IC duty on Sunday. Pretty sure that this is my first trip to NYC since New Year's Eve bringing in 1976.

I stopped in to have the oil changed in the Buick over my lunch hour. I went to the shop over on Brady Street that I have used for many years. I discovered upon arrival that I was dealing with a different owner/operator this time. The third one at the location in the last five years. Not sure what that means other than that the margins must be pretty thin. (No wonder they want to sell those air filters!) And they didn't honor the coupon I had received in the mail from the Valvoline folks. Again, life's a beach.

ND has USC Saturday night in South Bend. Neither team is rated. Pat Hayden, now the AD at USC, and, up through appointment to that position a couple of years ago, NBC's ND football's color commentator for 10 years or so, says that the game is just another game these days to the players. This in contrast to the feelings of the long-time alumni who haven't forgotten the rivalry. And Hayden was a USC quarterback back in the days. (He says he still goes to the Grotto to light a candle for his Mother whenever he is on campus.)

3, Herky and I are going to find an Irish bar in NYC for the game.

The graphics on the TV screen for these post-season baseball games have been impressive. Not only do they now have the box in the upper left with the score, outs, pitch-count and inning, they often show in the bottom right a display of the pitches against the strike-zone. When they don't have these displays on the screen, you're a little miffed not knowing all the stuff. Are we Pavlov's dogs or what?

If any of you in the Peanut Gallery have applied for a bank loan recently and have been put-off/offended at the back-up information requested by the bank, get in line. Our deep-pocketed clients are having to supply not only current personal financial statements, but also copies of the brokerage statements supporting any investment accounts, and a detailed list of any "contingent" liabilities. Bankers are scared silly.

So my plan is to jump on here from MLI and ORD in the AM. Departure is 0905 local.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-10-18T13:27:00.001-05:00

The Home Page pic changes again. Those Fall colors just didn't do anything for me. This is one of my favorites from the last few years, taken by 2 just after I reached the summit of the Galibier in September of 2009. It might be consider as a nod to the effort just completed for that last group of extended tax returns. I'll come up with something a little more timely in the next day or two.

The death of the Indy car racer at the Las Vegas track on Sunday is resonating through the auto racing industry. NASCAR has taken very strong measures for driver safety, especially after Dale Earnhardt and Adam Petty's deaths several years ago. Not only do they continue to make design advances in the cars, but they also have installed "safer" barriers at almost all of the tracks. These "safer" barriers are walls that "give" on impact to soften the blow of a car hitting the wall. Indy cars go so much faster, have the open-wheel design, and just can't hardly touch one another without something bad happening.

I generally don't mind the bumping that goes on in NASCAR, and at most of the tracks, trading paint is part of the race. But when they go to Daytona and Talladega, the high-banked, super-speedways where the cars never let up off the gas, big wrecks at high speeds always occur. (Dale Sr. was killed at Daytona.) I'm not one of the viewers drawn to the crashes. Kind of like I can't watch the replays of football and basketball players tearing up knees and ankles.

The 2012 TdF route was formally announced this week. (So the Home Page pic can be in recognition of that as well.) It goes clock-wise next year and will make a third-week visit to the area near where 4 and I stayed in August. Practically, the hills that have become part of the fabric of the TdF are in fairly small areas in the Alps and Pyrenees such that you can be fairly close to a particular year's route while staying in the prior year's hotels. On the map, you can see that the Western part of France is mostly avoided in 2012. Those areas tend to be predominantly flat, and I'm guessing that while the race is likely obligated to get there regularly, there's not the draw there like the mountains to the South and East.

A couple of names in consumer sales have recently announced some store closings: Lowe's Home Improvements (20 stores), and Gap (almost 200 stores). These are well-known names that are reflecting some economic realities. Lowe's may have grown too quickly and not addressed the challenges of the real estate market collapse as well as it's main competitor, Home Depot. Personally, I like the local Lowe's store better than Home Depot. (And that has nothing to do with the fact that the 48 is known as the Lowe's Chevrolet!)

Then Gap is in the middle of the clothing wars with all of the other retailers. My guess is that growth on the Web and overseas will replace any of the lost volume from the bricks and mortar locations. I assume that they will still sell my jeans to me on-line. I haven't been in a Gap store in years, but I've worn nothing but Gap jeans for probably 15 years. Gap is the only store credit card I have besides Kohl's. Hmmmm. I wonder: maybe the market ought to be able to short LtPC preferred providers.

Plans are to hit the road with 2 and The W later. We normally run on Monday nights, but Biaggi's got in the way yesterday. The number of TT training days has slipped below 20. If you're betting today on the 60 minute target, take the Over.

More later.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-10-16T09:02:00.002-05:00

Happy Birthday to 3!!!!

I've had pretty good luck over the weekend of using my preferred interests as my Home Page photo, so I figured we might as well use a nice pic of the birthday girl for today as well. I'm having her share the spotlight with her Maid of Honor as this was a pic that had a couple of great smiles. You 'da girls!

In most years, October 15th is a weekday, and October 16th is either a short day or a day off for me. Not so much this year. With the 15th falling on a Saturday, the pain actually stretches out to the 17th. So I'm crying in my beer a little today as I get the last of the extended returns in shape for filing tomorrow.

This is not me. And it is not my pal Pete. While we have both gone over the handlebars a few times, this was not our act. (His cast is off, but the weather and the vanishing daylight will limit the outdoor rides to a couple of weekend days for the rest of the Fall.)

Our local bike club is bringing in Bob Roll to speak at the annual club dinner next week. He's one of the commentators on the TdF broadcast on Versus TV each year. A former US professional rider of some merit, he's become the official "goofball" of the TV shows. I have little doubt that his new career as a niche celebrity is generating a lot more cash than any income from his pro cycling days. I'm guessing that the local club is paying him $3,500 or thereabouts plus expenses for his appearance here.

The club got the idea last year that a featured speaker would maybe make their event more than the routine October meeting attended by the same 20-25 hard-core members. And they were right. The dinner last year attracted as many as 125 folks to hear from mountain bike competitor Dave Wiens who had beaten Lance Romance in the Leadville race in 2008 (after Lance's first retirement). 2 and I attended that one, and I've already committed to buying a table for the Roll dinner. Lots of excitement here in River City!

I normally wake up (without an alarm) between 0500 and 0530. This morning, in that time range, I'm laying in bed trying to decide whether I should get going or not (it being a Sunday and all), and I think I'm hearing music. This gets my attention, and I start concentrating, and the music being played is actually "reveille", most certainly from the Arsenal, at least two or three miles away! That was a new one for me. (Reveille brings back some memories from my ROTC bootcamp in Charleston SC, circa 1970, but that's a story I have either previously related, or will relate at another time.)

My personal goal this week is to work harder at tuning out the politics of the day. Not only do you have the nuts in the encampment in NYC, you have things like the Olive Garden restaurant not letting a Kiwanis club display the American flag at their meeting because it might interfere with the dining experiences of other customers, And there's the Massachusetts grade school principal banning recognition of Columbus Day, Halloween and Thanksgiving in her school, deeming them as insensitive. And wearing a flag lapel pin is obviously a firable offense. So I'm just staying with the sports pages.

Again, Happy Birthday to 3. Make it a great day

BCOT

Saturday

2011-10-15T08:39:00.001-05:00

Happy Tax Birthday to 3!!!!

Giving the Hawks a day of recognition as a nod to 3 as well. It worked for the Cards last night.

More here later.

BCOT

Friday AM

2011-10-14T08:06:00.003-05:00

GO CARDINALS!!!!

As I was saying before I had that burst of StL-itis...

A year ago I had a self-imposed deadline of October 13th for my drop-dead tax returns because I had a commitment to travel to the Gulf coast to visit my friend Richard. This year, there was no such conflict in my schedule, so not only has the pain been stretched to the 15th, but with the 15th on a Saturday, I get to enjoy the stress until Monday the 17th. Who says you don't get wiser as you get older?

My early mornings are usually peppered with short periods of watching CNBC's Squawk Box as a way to get primed for the business news of the day. Like most of these newsy/financial/political targeted shows (and because CNBC is owned by Big O lover GE), some of the topics are given the side-by-side screens of opposing viewpoints shouting each other down. But there is less of this on Squawk Box, so I don't have the TV on "Mute" as is my practice through most of the rest of the day when they do the combating viewpoints segments as standard fare.

Anyway, I'm sure that they have had this guy on before, although I have no recollection of listening to him. His name is Roger McNamee and he is a very intelligent guy. He's made a lot of money. And has a very interesting history in technology, private equity, and music. His current position is with a firm called Elevation Partners that works the consumer technology and entertainment media intersection. One of his partners is the musician Bono of U2.

McNamee's comments this AM were very insightful about the use of smart phones, the software that runs them, and the future of where all this technology stuff will take the consumer. He points out that the index search business (like the standard Google search) is now history, as "app" technology is how people will increasingly find things that they seek. (You've seen the commercials where the smart phones pull things out of "the cloud" as a couple moves down a street looking at restaurants and shops.)

He says that Apple makes more money, net, on an iPhone than a Droid sells for gross! Is that possible?

I don't think that I mentioned here that another studio guest on Squawk Box earlier this week was a muni bond guy who I use for some of my clients. Relatively small shop out of NYC. I chat with him irregularly on the phone. I sent him an email after his appearance, and he actually responded to me before the market opened. Very cool, this communication stuff.

3 is headed into a birthday weekend. (4 has already started her weekend since her Friday shift is done!)

More here later. Make it a great TGIF.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-10-12T12:43:00.001-05:00

Another day in paradise.

I noted a couple of points on my way home last night.

As I pulled into Hy Vee, the radio was playing a commercial for the local riverboat casino, claiming that the place had "looser slots". In the course of 30 seconds, the announcer was saying "looser slots" as often as the Big O has been saying, "Pass this bill!" Really annoying.

Anyway, I couldn't help but chuckle to myself, "Is this guy saying looser slots or actually saying loser slots?" I mean, really, that extra "o" is just for the advertising, right? And these slots are looser than what? (Be careful with that response; this is a family-rated blog!)

(I'm betting that this casino doesn't even have a ninety-nine cent breakfast. Let alone a computer-programmed bear-carving machine.)

After processing that advertising delicacy, I moved into the store to pick-up my evening provisions. On my way to the bread aisle, I randomly caught a glace of a display on the shelves for Log Cabin syrup. I don't know whether they were running a special with some signage, or what it was that caught my eye (other than the fact that the display was on an eye-level shelf). My comment? It's an All Natural product...in a plastic container. My internal oxymoron chip may have been on red-alert from the just previous looser slots barrage. But that natural plastic language speaks highly for the ad guys who most assuredly know the folks from the New Coke and the Drake's D+ campaigns.

If its Wednesday, it must be vegetable beef soup at the salad bar. (Now that's the proper use of the loser term!)

Later.

BCOT

Monday

2011-10-10T21:56:00.002-05:00

Giving 3 the nod as Daughter of the Day for dealing with the mess on Wall Street in NYC. Here in the hinterland, we can tune out the noise. Not so much for the folks who live and work in the financial district. Hang in there, Kiddo.

This last week before a return-filing deadline, there's always a lot of data/information that CPA's request of clients and their other service-providers to help finalize the returns. Much of that is email-possible, but in today's world, everyone is hacker-sensitive, and the brokerage firms and even other CPA firms won't send stuff that is not handled through a secure connection. More passwords! And in many cases, they won't send anything except directly to the taxpayer. Let's hear it for the lawyers!

Bad day for the 24 yesterday in Kansas. I didn't even want to read the details today. No title for you this year 24!

No clue about Netflix, but it looks to me like those folks went to the New Coke consultants.

I need a big production day tomorrow.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-10-09T12:33:00.000-05:00

My plans for an entry yesterday were way-laid by a detour for a late lunch and watching the Iowa game at Biaggi's. Not a bad choice. The game wasn't much to get excited about, but the food and wine made up for the lack of Hawkeye offense. (I did have to train a young new bartender on the proper presentation and serving of a bottle of wine.)

Tough day/night for the Hawks and 'Clones. But I'm sure that 2 reveled in the Oklahoma win over UT, and 4 may have taken a little pleasure in the Huskers coming back to beat Ohio State. An Irish win over the USAFA comes with mixed feelings, particularly when the game is not that competitive.

I did a Twitter entry from Dunn Bros this morning on my phone, and it doesn't show on my desktop, nor as an update to Twitter here on the blog. Hmmm. I know that Mobile Twitter runs on different software than standard Twitter, but I thought that it was basically a timing thing. Anyway, in follow-up to a previous entry, here's the Dunn Bros nod to Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Another technical fly-in-the-ointment: when I save a pic to my desktop (or laptop, I think) from an emailed pic to my Yahoo account, and I rotate the pic before saving it, Blogger will not recognize the rotation even though it looks up-right in the My Pictures file. When I add the pic to 4000 Days, Blogger will rotate the pic another 90 degrees for whatever reason. I'll then have to go to My Pictures and re-save the pic to a sideways view and then let Blogger pull it to the entry with it's 90 degree move, so that the pic will actually appear correctly on the Blog! Weird. And with Steve Jobs now gone, we'll never know the answer!

I had to do the second DirecTV receiver conversion yesterday morning, this one being the one here at the office. It was another case where the previous receiver's drop-dead date had passed, and the local channels were not showing up on this TV when I tried to dial them in for network football yesterday. I had the replacement receiver on my floor, so it was just a matter of going through the hardware hook-up process, and then calling DirecTV to have them key-in the software recognition details for my equipment. Again, the only hiccup was dumbing everything down, both hardware and software, to my museum-quality TV unit.

(My Twitter entry from 2nd coffee did post. Gremlins.)

This Occupy Wall Street is moving past the annoying stage. I get it. The economy sucks. Students who never did the math have these loans that, whoa, they're supposed to pay back? Where'd that come from? And they want answers from Washington? Let's face it, if Nancy Pelosi and Jesse Jackson (and the NYT) are on your side, their solution is always more oversight and regulation to control those gosh-darn free-enterprise people. Three quotations come to mind:

1. We met the enemy, and he is us.
2. Be careful what you wish for.

And the one that embodies the most fear for that half of our citizenry that actually pays income tax...

3. I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.

Actually, the NBA labor stalemate is essentially an illustration of the Occupy Wall Street mentality, albeit at a substantially higher rung on the food-chain. Here, the oppressed are the poor players who have to play for chump-change, while the owners represent the greedy establishment. I have no confidence that the P & L statements published by the owners illustrating their dire plights are entirely accurate (and I believe anything out of Washington?), but I suspect that many of the teams are in fact losing money. You wanna go see Sacramento play Golden State? Where does Golden State even play?

Anyway, with the low being rookie salaries in the $300K range, the median for all players in the $2 million range, and the average at the $5+ million mark, the players' union arguing for their "fair share" rings a little hollow. The many definitions of fair share.

BTW, I will not longer capitalize occupy wall street or give it hash recognition.

OK. Maybe a little bit more here this evening.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-10-05T17:52:00.001-05:00

If the football teams can go to pink add-on's for October, 4000 Days can step up as well. Personally, I think that the NFL goes a little overboard, but if they can auction off those items at charity events after their use in games, I say, goferit!

Pretty interesting MLB games in these play-offs. Obviously, I'm a National League guy, so the StL-Philly series has most of my attention, but the Yankees and Tigers both have Old School managers which helps to off-set that DH thing. The Cards need to win tonight to extend the series to a fifth game. (And they're not off to a good start already!) Where's Bob Gibson when you need him?

I caught just a little bit of TBS's pre-game show. They had Cal Ripken, Dennis Eckersley and David Wells on the set, and I give them props for good commentary without jumping out of their shoes like those NFL pre-game guys have a tendency to do. Is there anything that Ripken does that he doesn't do well?

I've figured out that another element of proof of LtPC fully deserving that capital "L" in the middle of my forehead is that I know in advance both soup options (which change daily) offered at lunch at the Kimberly Road Hy Vee salad bar. And there aren't that many strangers there when I go to sit down. On the other hand, the cashiers/clerks don't know my name, at least.

The report on the Taurus is so-so. The problem is not the water pump (which wasn't a bad guess for a CPA with no mechanical skills), but it was the A/C compressor. Which makes sense in retrospect as there were times this Summer when the A/C pushed out nothing but hot air. If they could have just by-passed the A/C, I would have done so, but the cost of the by-pass was going to be $400. So the BEATER is sucking twice that out of my (non-debit-card) account, for continuation as the back-up car on Maplecrest.

Check-out that Twitter pic that I swapped out today.

One tidbit of the baseball game that illustrates the modern ballplayer's shallowness is the disappearance of the flip-down sunglasses formerly used by position players for day games. There was a bit of science to the use of those very mechanical glasses, but they worked. Today, the players wear their Oakley's or other statement-making fashion shades, and more balls are lost in the sun-fields. I'm sure the players would argue the point, but appearances mean so much to today's athletes that a missed fly-ball here and there is an acceptable by-product of lookin' good. Whatever.

Looks like the weather at Tahoe is not too dire. But with snow in mid-May that forced cancellation of those stages of the Tour of California around the lake, and early October snow at elevation, I'm becoming a solid believer with Al in global warming. I mean, we know that the ocean's are warming...because it's snowing more. Hmmm.

More later.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-10-04T20:58:00.000-05:00

http://www.tahoebonanza.com/article/20111004/NEWS/111009988/1061&ParentProfile=1050

Say what?

Be Real Careful Out There

Monday

2011-10-03T21:54:00.001-05:00

Just a few lines tonight to get the week off to a good start for the author.

This pic is of the gift I received over the weekend from my pal Bill and his wife, Teresa. (Hmmm. Is that an initial appearance for her on 4KDays?) It's hard to present a 3-D shadow-box in a two dimensional photo, but that's what we have here. This is shown as now hanging on a wall in my office. Very cool.

Interesting debate out there these days on the debit card fee proposed by B of A. Its a little complicated, but the bottom line is that the banks had their cut on debit card merchant transactions capped by last year's financial reform bill. Here's an article that takes a long way to explain the lobbying and politics of the issue. Like most of the things that you read in the headlines, still water can run pretty deep. In this case, the banks lose and the retailers win. At least for now. We haven't heard the last of this story. http://www.openmarket.org/2011/09/28/blame-not-banks-but-big-box-and-big-government-for-free-checkings-demise/

Then we have that paragon of virtue, Hank Williams Jr., taking all doubt off the table of any possible connection between the processor between his ears and what passes as his voice box. http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/03/showbiz/williams-football/ If this isn't the equivalent of an entertainment personality burning money, I don't know what is. He and his rowdy friends will need another place to hang out.

(ESPN had to do this to Williams, but the network has a very low tolerance for any of it's announcers or on-air talent making any criticisms of the Big O. See this article on the Paul Azinger kerfluffle from earlier this Summer. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/writers/richard_deitsch/09/19/media.nfl/

Hope 2 has a better day Tuesday. I'm making you Daughter of the Day for your efforts to do what's best for the museum.

Maybe 80 here tomorrow.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-10-02T23:02:00.002-05:00

Beautiful weekend here in the heartland. Cool mornings. A little frost this AM, but not enough to kill the annuals. Maybe 70 this afternoon, and the forecast has 80 for mid-week. Perfect Fall weather.

In addition to the bike on the inside rack for the year, the golf clubs are now gathering dust until Scottsdale in January. The event at Geneva on Friday and Saturday was fun, and I didn't play horribly all of the time. The back survived. The goal now is to strengthen my core muscles over the Winter so that I can play a few more rounds next year and lower my handicap to a 12 (It's 17 now). That would mean that I would regularly shoot right around 85.

I've taken some of Aunt Martha's advice ("Get rid of it!") to heart and have filled two bags with older clothes, shoes and other household odds and ends for delivery this week to the Davenport Catholic church that has a free shop for the poor/homeless. Before the RCL came last week, I had moved outside and to new pots the plants that had been in temporary storage in my second bedroom (for the last two years!). So the RCL was actually able to find space to clean in the room. Progress.

I need to take the Taurus into the shop for work on Tuesday. It's making more strange noises than normal. Before I made the call for the appointment, I had to check the insurance card to confirm the year manufactured for the question that the mechanic was sure to ask. I had assumed that it was 2002 or 2003, but never had committed that piece of data to memory. When I saw that, in fact, it was a 2000 car, I felt even more reassurance that the BEATER vanity plate was well-chosen. (Doesn't Buffet still drive the car that his Mother drove to church on Sunday's?)

The MLB play-offs are in full swing. I'm watching the Cards-Phillies game as I make this entry. The TV rights to these divisional games don't make the networks. I suppose that The World Series will be on FOX, but I'm surprised that the first-round games don't make the cut for weekend programming on one of the big four networks. I know that it's all about money, but if baseball is concerned about growth of the game, you would think that they would work a little harder to get these games beyond cable. Whatever.

Speaking of money, the NBA seems determined to shorten (or lose) the 2011-12 season due to labor problems. Millionaire owners want an agreement that will keep themselves from over-spending and incurring the related operating losses, and millionaire players want to make sure that the millionaire owners pay out to the millionaire players a fair share of total revenue. Kind of a shared sacrifice motif. Excuse me while I barf.

Here's a preliminary image of 1.01 with a hair-bob. 1.0 sent this as a text message attachment earlier today. I wasn't able to move that to the gallery in my phone, so this is actually a picture taken on my midi-digi camera of the text message photo on the screen of my phone. I then turned my devices around and took a picture with my phone of the review screen on the midi-digi, and then emailed from my phone that rendition to my yahoo account. I then pulled the emailed pic into my laptop Pictures files, which I was then able to access from Blogger. So 1.01 is Granddaughter of the Day, but LtPC get props for the visual effects! If 1.0 will send the pic by email, I will update this post and get the better photo uploaded to this entry. UPDATED 0900 10/3/2011...much better!

Hope everyone has a good week.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-09-29T22:25:00.001-05:00

OK. So I thought that this was going up last night, but the moon and the stars just didn't line up. When I got home, my TV had that fatal blue screen and a "Contact DirectTV" message with no programming on any channel. Hmmmm. I knew that I had to swap-out the receiver...the new one had been sitting on my floor for months. I guess yesterday was the drop-dead date...and the old one died.

So I spent a half hour on the phone with a kid at a call center in Jacksonville, Florida spooling up my system. It would have gone quicker except that we had to dumb-down the receiver to adapt to my older equipment. It took a couple of pass-throughs to get it right. I still couldn't program the DirectTV clicker to be the only clicker for the TV as the brand wasn't recognized by any of the software. Shock.

Anyway, after that "work" on the satellite system, I was pretty worn out and fell into the vino-and-a-crossword rut.

This AM, I had a few paragraphs to post from my desktop, and that entry got lost in a processing malfunction. Seems as though my Blogger account uses my Google account user name and password, which I opened originally with my Yahoo data. Earlier in my session this morning, I had looked at my G-mail account, which has it's own User name/Password, and that screen was still open. When I went to "publish" my blog paragraphs, the system was confused (as was I), and the input wasn't saved, published or otherwise retrievable. Then work took over and there was nada on the blog.

Tonight was supposed to have been a client event for our firm down at the Figge. Unfortunately, we had more people with conflicts than those who could make it, so I pulled the plug and cancelled yesterday. Bummer. Really a difficult end to what I thought would be an enjoyable evening. But people are busy, and my group of friends and clients is collectively busier than most folks. I'm satisfied that April 15th may be our only event that gets the response we are looking for. Plus, that event already has a following and people talk.

Quite the day yesterday in MLB. Amazing that both the Cards and Rays made the play-offs after trailing by big numbers late in the season. Boston and Atlanta will be crying elephant tears all Winter. But StL has to play Philly and that will be a big hill to climb.

Golf for LtPC tomorrow and Saturday. Geneva hosts it's last event of the season and I decided that I had no reason to say "no". Hoping my back makes it.

The earlier comment from 1 about Michael Jordan was noted. While his contemporary, Dominique Wilkins, was known as "The Human Highlight Reel", Jordan definitely had 3-4 plays that are etched into NBA history. The lay-up where he switches hands never gets old. And you have him making shots against Utah in the Finals, and at Carolina in the NCAA tourney to name just two others. Not sure that any one individually defines him. I think those six rings do.

Talk about passing ships. 4 came by Starbuck's this AM on her way home from work to check in on the rest of the world who were all heading to the office. I made the thoughtless mistake of buying her a steaming Americano...which wasn't what she needed just before her sleep session. Sorry, Kiddo.

RCL day yesterday. Still a treat.

Not sure if I will get on here tomorrow. Hope its a good TGIF for all in the Peanut Gallery.

PCOT

Monday

2011-09-26T11:09:00.000-05:00

I meant to get this up on last night's entry, but it just didn't happen. The shot is of the QC Marathoners (and half-marathoners) coming off the I-74 bridge into Bettendorf around 0800 yesterday morning. I'd put this cross-section of runners in the just over four hour marathon/two hour half-marathon completion times. There were a lot of participants!

This marathon, like most these days, I think, have relay contests as well, and those competitions boost the race's numbers. (They also do a 5-K that is just an out-and-back on the Illinois side.) Pretty sure that the only race in my future is the annual Turkey Trot. Getting my bod through a half is just not going to happen again.

(My pal Cal completed the half in just over two hours and concluded that his registration for next month's Chicago would go unused. He doesn't have time to train, and it's just not worth destroying your body to prove that you still have it.)

More later.

BCOT

Sunday

2011-09-25T22:57:00.001-05:00

Well, I thought I would get back to the blog earlier than this. But a little of this, a little of The Winniferous, a little of that, and pretty soon, it's Sunday night. That, and I really didn't have much to add to the intelligence of the universe.

The pro golf season officially ended this weekend with the top 30 in season points playing for a $10 million dollar payday in Atlanta. I watched some of it each day and it was good theater. The guy who won, Bill Haas, is a 29-year-old middle-of-the-packer who has won a couple of times over the years, but he's never been a headliner. That changed today.

Here's the link to a youtube of the shot that will be all over the web this week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQ-pJ8YRl-A It was really a remarkable shot at the most critical of moments. My guess is that the shot was so singular that it will stay with him the rest of his life. Which brings me to the thought for today's discussion: a person's defining moment.

We hear that term somewhat regularly in sports, although it should not be confused with the over-hyped CBS Sports' love affair with the One Shining Moment video at the end of each NCAA basketball March Madness. Defining moments happen not only in sports, but in all areas of human endeavor. Business. Politics. Art. Science. You name it. How 'bout this as a list of true defining moments:

1. Neil Armstrong's walk on the moon.
2. Clint Eastwood, "Go ahead, make my day."
3. Ted Kennedy's night in Chappaquiddick.
4. Captain Sullenberger's landing on the Hudson River.
5. Rosa Parks taking her seat on the bus.
6. Dwight Eisenhower and D-Day.
7. Jane Fonda's visit to Hanoi.
8. Sandra Day O'Connor's appointment to the Supreme Court.
9. Steve Jobs and the Apple computer.
10. Martin Luther King and I Have a Dream.

These are all extra-obvious, but it is an interesting exercise to go through some records to identify the item, event or factoid that becomes inseparable from the individual. I'm guessing that someone already has a board game out there that uses a variant of this concept. Craig Wilson is likely already on Wikipedia and checking with the Patent Office to secure the rights to another of my ideas.

In sports, the day's performers in the Top Plays become youtube stars almost immediately. But fame is fleeting for these shining moments as tomorrow's games will yield a new cast of players performing amazing feats. But when time has passed, and people remember the exceptional visuals, a defining moment begins to emerge. While team sports produce endless great plays, only a few live on years later. Franco Harris' Immaculate Reception comes to mind. Bart Starr's quarterback sneak to win the Ice Bowl against Dallas. Flutie's Hail Mary against Miami. (I could go on, but you get the point.)

I think each of us has shining moments every so often, when the moon and the stars line up just so, and you have a situation of notable success. You complete a physical challenge after much hard work. You achieve an educational goal. A business effort goes especially well. But how does an ordinary person like you or me have a defining moment? A singular event that makes you what/who you are going forward? And how many defining moments do you have in a lifetime? Hmmm.

I'll take a quick shot at that question (while reserving the right to look further at my response at another time). I say that for most of us, defining moments happen by chance as opposed to effort. You go to the golf course as a single, and get paired-up with a guy who owns a business who needs an employee with your skill-set. You meet your future spouse in a class you signed-up for because of the time-slot. You stop at the coffee shop and meet a guy who becomes your best friend. (This stuff does go on every day, for sure.)

But some of these defining moments do result from the actions that we take, or the commitments that we make. Hey, I enlisted in the USAF, and through the extensive education that ultimately came with that choice, I was able to eventually get to a career path that I'm not sure that I would have taken otherwise. I chose to be a care giver for Mother, and that certainly was a life-changer for me.

Really past my bedtime now. More on this topic tomorrow. Make Monday a good one.

BCOT

Saturday

2011-09-24T09:53:00.002-05:00

Just to note this AM that today is the two year anniversary of my climb up the Galibier in the French Alps. Its a day that will likely always be on my Top Ten list.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-09-22T17:39:00.002-05:00

Just a few lines this afternoon before taking off for home. My day began early enough in Des Moines and included a march through some rush-hour traffic on the mid-town freeway. I could have avoided that hassle if I didn't commit to a stop at Starbuck's for an Americano. Just a few extra minutes, and the congestion was caused mostly by the blinding sun facing Eastbound traffic.

Really enjoyed the overnight in DM. Golf On Waveland Municipal Golf Course in the center of the city was pretty much what you would expect on a high-use, public course...by someone who hasn't played much this year. (My back is killing me today!) Dinner was at the West Des Moines Biaggi's, which was a new experience for my pal Richard. I had a room at the Chase Suite Hotel (which I think was an Extended Stay place at one time). Good location. Fair price. Top-shelf breakfast (including made-to-order omelets, if you are into that thing).

It was an unremarkable drive back to the QCA except that it occurred to me along the way that Interstate 80 is one of the "connectors" in my life story. I've certainly spent enough time on that pavement over the years for it to merit some recognition. Obviously, I'm hardly the only person in the world who can make that statement, but when a person mentions "I-80" in our family, there is fairly universal understanding that we're working on familiar turf.

(I would make the distinction that I-80 didn't really become part of my world until that first trip to South Bend in September 1967 when Mother dropped me off for freshman year. Up until that time, I was a Highway 63 kid. I mean, we spent most of the time going to and from Ottumwa on 63, and it wasn't like we made lots of trips outside of Wapello County. At least I didn't.)

In my adulthood, I-80 has been the portal for all of the forms of human endeavor for me and our family. Here's a Top Ten list to put meat on that bone:

1. Education. Starting with the ND runs, then graduate school in the '70's, segments to the TC for 1, Missouri and Oklahoma for 2, and the beaten path to IC for 3 and 4.

2. Business. Des Moines and KC have been great for my practice. Lots of Chicago too.

3. Entertainment. Can you say "Adventureland, I saw it first?"

4. Challenge. Uh, I-80 and Winter. Construction? Say no more.

5. Exhilaration. Hitting the I-80 bridge at LeClaire when coming home from school or the USAF was always a great feeling.

6. Adventure. It does go pretty much coast-to-coast, and those were eye-opening trips for me in my early 20's.

7. Commitment. Lots of trips to visit Mother and Daddy as they aged. Every one was worth it.

8. Economics. I'd have 3 run some lifetime operating costs for my mileage, but I know I wouldn't like the metrics of that analysis!

9. Friendships. Those key pals I always talk about? We've spent a lot of time together on that track.

10. Family. From a perspective of just me, I-80 has always been the route to take to see the fam.

As I finish this, I'm thinking that the resident stooge at USA Today will be reading this over the weekend and tweaking it as his own idea as he waxes left-ish on the good old days back in Vermont and how Route 15 was the the linkage to his family, friends and his bucolic way of life. (Sorry couldn't help myself there.)

I'm off to a little din-din with 4 to catch up on her life on the mid-night shift. I'm making her Daughter of the Day for sucking up those wee hours. I did that at Dover AFB when I was about her age, and it was never what I would call fun. Then again, in my case, most of the brass was gone at that hour, which was always a good fact pattern.

(3 has had some excitement in The Big Apple with movers, protesters, and rogue traders. Never a dull moment in The Fast Lane, eh Kiddo?)

I may get back here later.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-09-21T08:14:00.002-05:00

Just a short entry this AM to advise The Maddening Crowd that I will be on the road today and will not likely get back to this site until later this evening. I'm meeting my pal Richard in Des Moines for a round of golf this afternoon, and then dinner tonight. He's the guy whom I visited on the Gulf coast last Fall, and in San Antonio earlier this year. Our relationship goes back 25+ years when he worked in the family business in DM. He's back there to wrap up a couple of loose ends on a real estate transaction.

Dinner on Maplecrest last night was a home run. My pal Pete came over for wine, but couldn't stay for the main course. Advice for future reference: buy the thicker 12 ounce NY strip rather than the 8 ounce option. The thicker cut is so much easier to cook and yields a great result for the medium-rare connoisseur.

September 21? Beginning of Fall. Equinox stuff is too complicated for me today. Here's the Wiki link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equinox

Looks like a really nice day on tap. Make it a good one.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-09-20T12:29:00.000-05:00

The blog tends to get a little less play when there is a family gathering, like last weekend up in the TC. If LtPC is the only absent member, does the designation go to FFf+? I had a little of the left-out feeling, but then I kept reminding myself that it was primarily a shopping exercise up North, and the lawn chair on the driveway then seemed like a pretty good alternative.

So I did my own little shopping at lunch yesterday to take advantage of a discount coupon at my exclusive clothiers, Kohls. I try to freshen the wardrobe a couple of times a year. Not sure if color is part of my repertoire. Check out the additions. Depending on one's perspective, you could say that my fashion consultant has a tough job...or an extremely easy one.

Interesting that last Saturday's opponent in Iowa City will be entertaining the Irish this coming Saturday in The Steel City. Kind of like relationships in a small town; you're never all that far away from some sort of a connection between teams. My guess is that ND will have the same problems containing Pitt that the Hawks did, and it will be interesting if ND goes to the hurry-up offense that saved the game for Iowa in the 4th quarter.

Here's a shot of Kinnick Stadium from last Saturday when the fans were told to wear "Old Gold" to support the team. It was a shot taken with my Droid phone (as the midi-digi was in the TC). The day was overcast most of the time, and the color here is not dramatic, but there was a lot of gold out there. (My pal Doug and I had gold t-shirts on.)

Did I mention that I left the game at the end of the third quarter with the Hawks trailing by 14? Up to that point, it was a boring game for the home crowd. I joined the students in the early departure move. As Doug would say, the true fans stayed. I guess that puts me out there as a parking lot kinda guy. I'm okay with that. Being in the stadium for three quarters is way over the Over/Under line for my GAQ (game attendance quotient).

Nice day here today. Margret is out for some exercise.

More later.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-09-15T22:30:00.001-05:00

Good luck to all the travelers tomorrow.

Just for yucks, I want to make a list of things that I like. The idea kind of came to me from the soliloquy that Kevin Costner's character Crash Davis (in Bull Durham) gave to Susan Sarandon's character when she asked him what he believed in. Crash went into a minute-long rant (a bit randier than I remembered) that hit quite a range of stuff. Listen to it here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBfdl6hNZ9k

Anyway, here's a start on my "like's" (certainly not in any order of importance):

1. A "good" feeling ballpoint pen. Black ink that doesn't glob.
2. A quick shower before bedtime to rinse off the day's grime.
3. October.
4. The National League (MLB).
5. Wrigleyville. KC Plaza. Scottsdale. Incline Village.
6. George Strait. Patty Loveless. Trisha Yearwood. Garth.
7. Private air travel. Duh!
8. The Grotto at ND. Sorry Lourdes!
9. Chicago-style 'dogs. Golick's brats.
10. Drafting my pal Pete.
11. My new Oakley's. Shoulda jumped earlier.
12. Twitter. It has it's faults, but it works for me.
13. Nicely edged sidewalks.
14. 2nd coffee. Duh! Again.
15. Iowa. Winter and all.
16. The U S of A! No stress to wear that lapel flag, Brain-dead!
17. Wi-Fi. Smart phones. Mobile computing.
18. Hand-written notes to/from fam and friends.
19. Entertaining fam and friends on my driveway.
20. John Wayne cowboy movies. Clint. 007.

Well, that's just a start. It's not a Glad Game or anything. More to come soon.

Enjoy TGIF.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-09-14T07:10:00.001-05:00

Giving 4 a little early recognition as Daughter of the Day for her first graveyard shift to produce the early morning news show at Channel 8 here in the QCA.

Great job, Kiddo.

Now...go get some zzzz's!

More later.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-09-13T22:04:00.001-05:00

The new Home Page pic is just for a day or two. This was absolutely the view on Maplecrest when I was pulling into my driveway around 1945 hours last night. And when I went to bed, I had to go back to my kitchen to see if I had left my side-entrance porch light on because the night seemed so bright out. Very cool.

As just a little re-hash, I need to extend thanks and appreciation to the Woodbury folks for a really enjoyable weekend. Low-key to the max, but success on all fronts. 1.01 has an early start on the Terrible Two's (you take something from her and watch the result!), but she's a hoot! And independent. Life will be very interesting when 1.02 comes home to share the limelight.

Prior to my departure, I had to take a spin down pit row to have my "crew" tape up a little cosmetic damage to my front right bumper that had got caught up on one of those cement parking lot wheel stoppers. I had expert help!

I went through one-and-a-third of books on CD during the round-trip drive. The 1/3 came about as I hadn't finished one from that last trip to Lincoln, and I was lucky enough to come upon it on the shelves at the library before I left town on Friday morning. I couldn't remember the title, but I did have an idea on the packaging, and was able to find it. Actually, the story wasn't worth it. Book Two was a little better, and I had to listen to the last disk here at the house to finish the story. I give it a C+.

Local school board elections today. To say that the process here was under-engineered is being kind. After first going to the wrong precinct, my designated voting location at the high school was lost among a completely packed campus with various activities in the football stadium, the gym and who knows where else. I ended up parking deep in the gym lot and had to walk all the way to the other end of the building. One sign announcing the polling place, and that one hidden from the street by parked cars. No reserved parking for voters. For administrators who are always complaining about the lack of public participation, this was the anti-user-friendly approach.

A short comment on the 9-11 anniversary. I chose to not get too close to any of it. I remember being depressed when the original attack took place, and the subsequent investigation, wars, political and bureaucratic debates have done nothing to suggest that I would fare any better today. The one thing that I did have a thought about was the MLB kerfluffle on the NYPD and NYFD hats that the Mets wanted to wear for their game on Sunday Night Baseball. MLB said "No", and the resulting bad press just keeps on coming. While I am sure there have been plenty of sleezy, profit-only items generated by apparel manufacturers to "commemorate" 9-11, the league probably should have ignored it's authority to rule here.

My Friday NYT crossword experience emphasized my fallibility at the art. I started it Friday evening after 1.01 went to bed. I worked on it at various times between games on Saturday. I brought it home and worked on it Sunday night before bed. I finally finished it last night. I never resorted to any help from the Internet. Ultimately, I got it fully done. Correctly. But it took parts of Four Freaking Days! I'm mystified and humbled at the workings of the brain that can unravel one puzzle with reasonable effort and then have to slog through another like boots in muck.

Big day tomorrow.

BCOT

Monday...With Short UPDATE

2011-09-12T07:03:00.001-05:00

Here's a couple of pics from my weekend in Woodbury. I'll get a full post up this evening.

Make Monday a good one.

EVENING ADDITION: Okay. No full entry tonight. One of the goals of the blog was to keep the fam connected. Judging from the steady stream on Twitter tonight, I'd say we don't have a connectivity problem.

Besides, I had to work late, missed the Turkey Trot training with 2 and The W, and generally ran out of time. Tomorrow is another day.

BCOT

Wednesday II

2011-09-07T22:16:00.001-05:00

I have no clue what Blogger protocol that they have sometimes. Whatever.

2 and Winnie and I have begun our Turkey Trot training. Last night and tonight we gave it a go on Devils Glen for about 2.4. With an early start to the season, we won't have to go to the 3.7 route for another three weeks or so. I'm already taking the Under on my hour time target for the five miles in late November. The 2nd Annual LtPC Komen for The Cure Challenge will be posted around November 1st.

On the darker side, I posted my VISA card payment for August today to settle up my European debts. Hmmmm. Not the fun-est part of the trip. Then again, you play, you pay. No surprises. Most of the Euro charges converted on VISA at $1.45 or thereabouts. I had budgeted $1.50. Really, the only unexpected thing was the near $100 in transaction fees from the credit card companies.

Big week in Iowa with the Hawks-Clones game in Ames on Saturday. The line I saw had Iowa -7 with the Over/Under at 44. Hard to say. Neither team is that good. If I had to make a bet, I'm thinking the Over. But I reserve final judgement until Friday.

The obit on the Big 12 is at the editor.

Watching the Jerry and George "gay" episode on Seinfeld. Can't stop laughing.

I have an admission of personal excess. After those good-looking Ray-Ban sun glasses didn't exactly float the boat, I kept thinking about those better-looking Oakley's, and couldn't resist the temptation. Outrageously expensive. But they LOOK good!

Then I have this problem with wine...glasses. I've broken three of those nice, big and deep Cabernet glasses this week! Really not all my fault. I blame Kohl's. The first four that I bought well over a year ago were a little heftier and thicker. They broke after adequate use. The latest set of four that I bought this Summer were cheap imitations of the earlier set. Two of the breaks happened when I was simply drying a glass. I'm going deeper in to my pocket for the next set of replacements.

Props out to the 24 car for the win yesterday in ATL. Empty stands. Lousy TV ratings, I'm sure. If you are running a major outdoor event, weather happens. I'm wondering if ATL can keep two races each year.

Speaking of NASCAR, there was a little dust-up when four well-known drivers passed on the White House visit today to recognize last year's champion (JJ) and the other drivers who qualifies for "the Chase". Scheduling conflicts. Hmmmm. Maybe they had to do their nails. http://www.usatoday.com/sports/motor/nascar/story/2011-09-07/Obama-praises-Jimmie-Johnson-in-NASCARs-trip-to-White-House/50306666/1

More good weather here. May have some rain for Friday from the Texas hurricane? Say what?

Thanks for reading.

BCOT

Wednesday

2011-09-07T21:05:00.000-05:00

Here are a couple of pics that I will describe in a separate entry. I have no idea what Blogger is doing to me.

Check my next entry.

BCOT

Monday

2011-09-05T11:08:00.002-05:00

So here are some pics from our weekend visit from 3 and Herky. Other than a little rain on Saturday nite that forced the BBQ on Maplecrest to an inside event, a good time was had by all. The NYC couple should be winging their way back to The Big Apple as I write this entry.

Let's make 3 and Herky Family Couple of the Day.

My Sunday wasn't overly productive. Late in the afternoon, I decided to make an initial attempt to go through the "junk" boxes in my extra bedroom, a long-overdue project. Let's face it, my extra bedroom is not a high-demand piece of real-estate. I have stuff in there, unpacked, from my last three moves...and my last four (count 'em) cars at time of disposition. Plus some Grandma Margaret items that go back even further.

A couple of observations: 1) junk accumulates in surprising quantities, even for a single person; 2) most of it will get thrown-away sooner or later...if not by me, by my heirs. Now is probably better. (Kind of like how cheap wine is cheap wine, even in Europe, my junk is truly junk, not someone else's treasure.) I'm thinking that you really do make your house a home if you have a true, legitimate "junk" drawer. Maplecrest definitely qualifies as my home.

Here's my list of Top Ten "junk" items:

1. Pens. I'm always looking for a good one, and an extra one for the car.
2. Pennies. No wonder they have to mint more all the time.
3. Instruction manuals. Cameras, phones, mowers, kitchen appliances, etc.
4. Cards and letters.
5. Car glove-box stuff. Maps, warranties, repair tickets.
6. Miscellaneous office supplies.
7. AA and AAA batteries. Do any have a charge?
8. DVD's and associated boxes/sleeves.
9. Pins, nails, business chotskie's.
10. Pictures, postcards, tickets, miscellaneous trip stuff.

One of the more meaningful boxes came from SRH's house. First pictures from my first "good" camera in 1979, as well as pic's from the mid '70's from our Chicago days. Notre Dame stuff, and even some things from high school. That box went to the back closet and will be worth a visit in the future. Moderately meaningful to me. But to others? Makes you wonder about the half-life of interest in the average person's memorabilia, especially to those other than that person. Without the stories behind the pic's and souvenirs, what's their value? Hmmm. Maybe an analysis for another entry at a later date.

What do you say about the Irish's game on Saturday? Losing the turnover margin 5-0 pretty much sealed the deal. If you think these under-the-headline programs don't have some good athletes, get used to playing from behind. The positive from this outcome? Tickets should be available for reasonable prices for other games. They could still finish 9-3. What a thrill. Let's hear it for the You-Name-The-Third-Tier Bowl against Directional U.

My bike season is done. With my pal Pete in a hard cast for another two weeks, I'm staying away from a chance at Rule #1. 2 and I start training for the Turkey Trot tomorrow.

The change in the Hope Page pic is motivated by thoughts of Tahoe next July.

Off to golf with my pal Ron. Enjoy the holiday.

BCOT

Thursday

2011-09-01T12:52:00.000-05:00

Hello September!

August's quick departure was easy to forecast. Two weeks in Europe, with a week of preparation and a week of decompression, and the month was gone. But it sure did go by in a hurry.

The Buick is back in the fold. New battery and a new tail-light. And LtPC's wallet lighter by about $600. No shock there. The car repair folks really don't repair things anymore; its mostly a remove and replace process for problem items. Add in the tow charge, the shop supplies fee, and the up-charge on the parts, and the bill can get there in no time.

The up-charge on car parts at the dealer is comparable to the wine bottle charge at Biaggi's. I just looked up the tail light on Google and the discount house sells the exact same item for $72.95, plus $11.70 shipping and handling. Dealer cost on my bill: $185.12. Plus $45.00 installation. Pretty much three times cost. Just like the bottle of Louis Martini top-shelf Napa Cabernet that's $65 at the restaurant, and usually $21 or so across the street at Hy Vee. It's a great country. (At least at Biaggi's I have the enjoyment of being treated like a VIP by the staff.)

4 points out on Twitter that the college football season gets underway for real tonight on the four-letter-network. There's actually a bunch of games on the schedule, but UNLV at Wisconsin will get the primary airtime. Then they have a couple games on Friday night before the whole onslaught that begins the season for most everybody else on Saturday. The 'Clones and Hawks with home games as well. Direct TV will be wall-to-wall with regional games on the FOX and Comcast channels.

If you didn't notice, 2 added an entry to her blog to recount their Irene weekend. http://www.thehoranies.com/

My pal Pete joined us last night at Biaggi's for a glass and gave us the story on his biking accident. He has a soft cast from his left wrist all the way up to his shoulder. The surgery procedure was necessary to re-attach a tendon to bone on the underside of his elbow. Not nearly as inconvenient as our friend Lee's hard cast on his right arm earlier this Summer, but hardly unnoticeable. He can work the computer and says that he's no longer taking any drugs, but what a pain! I'm absolutely taking his experience as the omen to make me hang up my bike shoes for the year. The Turkey Trot just became my fitness focus.

My RCL was through the house yesterday. What a treat it is to come home after she has done her thing.

I may have mentioned here previously that we are swapping out our office computers this month. Our three-year contract with our tech-support firm expires, and rather pay higher service fees on the older equipment, we'll put in the new machines and pay the much-lower service fees. Its a little more expensive to go new, but the advantages of speed and new equipment makes it an easy decision. They'll sell the old machines to us at $150 each (for any takers out there). My laptop is part of the up-grade too, so I should be getting something a little-less-bulky than my current machine.

Also as part of the computer project, my partner Bill and I are looking at switching our smart phone to the I-phone. Our Androids are OK, but the units are both in need of maintenance tune-ups, and we both would like to improve on some of the functions. Still evaluating the move, but there will definitely be some kind of an upgrade taking place.

More here later.

BCOT

Monday AM...UPDATED...AND UPDATED II

2011-08-29T11:18:00.004-05:00

Welcome to my Monday!

Actually, the problem came to the fore yesterday when I had decided to go for golf in Muskie ,and for that trip I attempted to fire up the Buick (after not doing so for a month). Zippo! Not even a suggestion of juice. I tried to jump it with Margret, but no luck. So I now get the pleasure of helping the economy with participation in the Service Department of my local Buick dealer. Always a thrill.

This is the first posted pic off of the new camera. I think that I am actually going to read some of the instructions for it. The instrumentation is similar to my earlier Fuji mini-digi's, but different, and I have struggled at finding the right buttons to push for various functions to review, delete, control the flash and other features.

Just to confirm, I missed the MTV awards show last night. I know that the channel is on my Direct TV service, but I have no clue as to where. And less interest in finding it. Shock.

One of the small realizations that has occurred to me post-Europe, is that I have less interest in television. Over those two weeks when I was off the domestic TV grid, I seem to have lost any connectivity with any shows that I have followed (like the endless NCIS reruns). I do use the radio stations that broadcast through Direct TV. I'm thinking that less TV is good for the soul.

More later.

UPDATE...Just got off the phone with my pal @bcbison. He had been noticeably below radar the last couple of days, and I had called him and emailed him this AM to get a report. Well, it wasn't a good one. He too ran into Rule #1 this weekend; off a curb in central Davenport, over the handle bars and into the ER for some surgery to attach a tendon to an elbow or something like that! Ouch! Double ouch!

Still adding more here later.

UPDATE II...Low key evening on Maplecrest. The report on the Buick is run-down (read...shot!) battery. There's a shock. Replacement cost, installed? $300+. I mean, why wouldn't you place the battery under the fixed-in-place back seat? You certainly wouldn't want the average consumer to be easily able to swap out the battery by himself/herself, would you? Now the question is, will whatever caused the battery to bleed down resurface and force another tow? At no point in my discussions with the repair shop did "cause" enter into the debate. Hmmm.

The touchy-feely folks at 1600 Pennsylvania floated the terminology "federal family" to describe their coordinated efforts to make their Irene response the anti-Katrina. As in the "ABC University Family", or the "XYZ Directional University Family". I know that I sure have the warm and fuzzies. Yep, they bought into that same PR firm hired by Drake and the Cy-Hawk trophy folks.

Candidate Rick Perry was quoted in the national news yesterday on a campaign stop in Ottumwa, Iowa. Can't recall the quote. But he's some right-wing radical and was probably talking about some fascist (or at least, surely racist) concept like capitalism or balancing the Federal budget. I love ya, Anderson!

I put the Operator's Manual for the new Fuji on to my laptop hardrive. 125 pages. Right. I'm reading that manual tonight. Worth noting: there were pdf files on there in at least 30 languages.

Make Tuesday a good one.
BCOT

Sunday

2011-08-28T11:57:00.000-05:00

While the East Coast and the Southwest have enduring hurricane and drought conditions respectively, the Midwest is enjoying a run of really nice days. Top Ten's for sure. 3 should jump on here and give us a first-person report on Irene.

My pal Terry O came over last night for a little BBQ on the driveway. Brats and veggies. He supplied the wine (not a bad Malbec) and beer (a foo-foo import or local brew). The original plan had been to do a ride and then find a spot for a sandwich, but I decided that another day of rest was more to my liking. That tooth work wasn't awful, but not a picnic either, and there's a bit of lingering discomfort. Besides, I liked the idea of another driveway evening. It was a good call.

I actually went to my workout-calendar this AM to verify my 2011 "Days Out of My Bed" count, year-to-date. 45 thus far. With a couple of TC trips in my future for certain, and maybe a C-town business conference also, the number for the year we be over 50! A few years back, I would never have dreamed that I would have those kind of annual travel numbers.

RevKev ran into Rule #1 yesterday, and accounts for the spill on his blog. Ouch! I've been lucky this year to keep some rubber between me and the road, but I'll find the pavement sooner or later. Sand, dirt, painted lines, grooves in a parking lot, a blowout. Anything can happen. That's why there is Rule #1.

A final few words on the European trip. I had meant to add the "Bad/Poor/Questionable" moves list in follow-up to that good move list that I posted early last week. Not that there were really any awful things to spoil the adventure, but there's always some things that can go better than what gets handed to you. Here goes:

1. Shattered car window/Lost mini-digi. Both on the same day. Double bummer.
2. Staying that fourth day in Vitoria...Sunday when everything was closed.
3. Getting lost driving in Bilbao...twice. Worst experiences on the trip.
4. Not getting quite as many pics for posterity. Blame it on the mini-digi!
5. Not anticipating/recognizing the foreign transaction fee rules on my credit cards.
6. We probably should have done some gift-shopping.
7. I left my crossword book on the plane going to Paris. Ergo: 11 days...no crosswords.
8. The day we drove up the Tourmalet to scout the route turned into a way-too-long trip when we went down the other side and ended up all the way back at Lourdes.
9. No pre-planning for bringing the bikes home added stress from all of the associated uncertainties in completing those arrangements the last two days of the trip.
10. 4's road-rash experience on the descent of the Col d'Aspin.

So all-in-all, there wasn't too much to carp about on a twelve-day trip with all those variables when you have a very loose plan and are not on a guided tour of anything. We did okay.

Sounds as though Aunt Martha and family took in the sights of the pro bike race in Breckenridge yesterday. http://www.examiner.com/cycling-in-boulder/elia-viviani-wins-second-consecutive-stage-of-the-2011-usa-pro-cycling-challenge. This high-talent-level, week-long race has several European teams entered, and includes among it's participants Cadel Evans, winner of this year's TdF. I think that the state of Colorado has some sponsorship money in the pot to promote tourism in the state. In recent years, Georgia and Missouri have tried to make similar races annual events, but both ran out of long-term money support. It always comes down to the money.

I may get back here later today. Make it a good Sunday.

BCOT

Friday

2011-08-26T16:55:00.001-05:00

Irene looks to be the news of the day. We're probably okay here, but The Big Apple crew is definitely in the line of fire. Reports from the front are welcome.

High school football season comes into full swing tonight. They actually had the first game of the season locally last night in Davenport as the city's three public schools and the Catholic school all share the same stadium for home games, and they need most Thursday nights to make the schedule work. Pretty nice weather for kick-off. Does football mean that it is now officially Fall?

I'm not sure if my faculties fully processed the fact that my VISA and AmEx cards were both subject to a 3% foreign transaction fee for each usage while we were in Europe. I understood that obtaining Euro's at a bank or ATM would have that charge, and I think that when I notified both card companies that I would be in Europe they reminded me of that fee, but it just didn't register with my synapses. My activity statement now carries separate line-items for the fee for each incident of card usage, even the 2 Euro tolls on the freeway. I think that there are some cards out there that specifically market the feature of no-foreign-transaction-fees. Probably worth the price of admission for the next trip.

RevKev's mention on his blog of his interest in acquiring a folding bike sounds a little Left Coast-ish. Very green. It all depends on the objective. If you have a good purpose in mind, I say go for it.

My next bike will be another up-grade to my road-er. That will make my current bike my back-up, which then becomes the sorta-expendable bike that I will ship/carry-on for my next trip. This most recent, generally favorable experience with the carry-on bikes has piqued my interest in bringing my own for that next trip.

My pal Ron has maintained custody of my pal Roy's 40-foot motor home (Holiday Rambler), that Ron's group used for RAGBRAI. And Roy has secured RV parking at Kinnick for the up-coming football season. Do the math, folks. We should have a place to call home for any game that we choose to attend. Suite!

I don't think that I fessed-up here that I lost my mini-digi in Spain. It happened the same day that I had the window problem with the rental car. I'm guessing that I had set it on the car at some point getting the bikes ready to ride and forgot to pick it up. In any event, I've already replaced it with a similar model, a slight upgrade as the particular camera that was lost was out of stock with my dealer. The new one is a blue Fuji FinepixXP20. My only gripe is that its a smidge bigger than my previous camera which matters when the normal carrying spot is the back-pocket of a cycling jersey. Sometimer's strikes again.

I don't have a Bucket List, but I do have the recurring thought that I'd like to go to the night race at Bristol Motor Speedway. It happens to be this weekend every year. Bristol, Tennessee. I actually considered going last year, but just couldn't muster the energy (nor justify the expense). This is short-track racin' in an amphitheater setting where you can see the whole track in front of you. Its one of the most popular races of the year. Any takers?

Looks like a Biaggi's night here in River City. Hello Weekend!

BCOT

Thursday

2011-08-25T12:26:00.005-05:00

I had great intentions of posting yesterday, but that dental procedure put the damper on any creative thinking. Fortunately, there's been little residual aches or pains today, so I'm hoping that I can just move on and let the implant heal over the next few months. And back to normalcy in daily life.

Hardly shocking news here from the NASCAR garage. I'm not sure how good of a driver Danica may be, but I certainly hope that she succeeds. She brings eye-balls to the TV broadcasts and the more viewers for the sport, the better for everyone involved. There's been lots of empty seats at many of the venues over the last couple of years, and the TV numbers are down as well.

There will definitely be a sizeable amount of skepticism from those who think that she made the team based on her looks and sex-appeal. I won't argue the point, but most entertainment stars need a "look" to attract the fans. So she looks good in a bikini. If she can run up front with the boys, the grousing will go away. If she can't cut it on the track, she'll fade to the sidelines. That doesn't mean necessarily that she has to win. She just needs to run well. Go-Daddy will keep funding her ride as long as she keeps in the news.
http://m.yahoo.com/w/sports/home/news/article?urn=urn%3Anewsml%3Asports.yahoo%2Cyhoo%3A20050301%3Anascar%2Carticle%2Cyhoo-ept_sports_nascar_marbles-wp3411%3A1&.ts=1314306971&.ysid=GzYt5vBbEABii3c.ZRoLR5jl&.intl=US&.lang=en

Craig Wilson took the opportunity in his Wednesday USA Today column to take some shots at the Hawkeye state. I'm a bit reluctant to link his article, but here it is: http://www.usatoday.com/life/columnist/finalword/story/2011-08-23/Final-Word-Getting-in-deep-fried-at-the-Iowa-State-Fair/50113130/1 The mainstream media has had a field day with not-so-thinly referenced guttural humor on the politicians at the state fair eating the corn dogs. Wilson just couldn't help himself with a related, gratuitous smack at Michelle Bachmann. Like Wilson was the first to come up with a column lampooning fried food at a fair out in the boonies. (I'm no Bachmann fan, but I'm not letting an East Coast snob like Wilson get away with a free editorial shot either.)

More deserving of ridicule is (was?) the new Cy-Hawk Trophy for the Cyclone-Hawkeye rivalry. http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hjqv-ynRCIjmO92jkgoJI7aks8cw?docId=da61885998334142b6437d6c1275fdf4 The great minds that came up with the trophy worked for the same firm that did the Drake campaign last year. Seriously, who can take a swing at these things and just consistently miss by a mile each time?

More later today.

BCOT

Tuesday AM

2011-08-23T08:09:00.000-05:00

I'm doing just a small entry this AM to kind of get back to something close to normal. By my rough calculations, I'm still about a full night's sleep short of my regular rest. That seven-hour time difference about equals one night's sleep for me. Hmmm.

As I reported on Twitter, I got out for a routine, week-day ride on the bike path last night with a feeling-good result. I figure that I have a couple more weeks of riding before I shift to the Turkey Trot training schedule. There's less than 100 days before the start of the race. Ugh! I hope that The Winniferous is ready to run.

I've thus far encountered no surprises either at home or at the office from my two-week absence. (Definite knock-on-wood in making that statement!) August is always a slow month business-wise, and I have that Perfect Neighbor watching the homestead. My RCL had been through last Wednesday, so my house was guest-ready upon my return.

That travel home on Saturday was no where's near as painful as the outbound-trip. The flights were pretty much on-time, the gate agents in Bilbao and Atlanta did good work with the bikes, the plane from Paris to Atlanta was an older model than from our flight over there and it actually had an extra inch or two of leg-room (which made my comfort measurably better), and for whatever reason, the gate agent in ATL upgraded us to first-class right before boarding for that final leg. Whoa! Three Bloody Mary's on the way to MLI.

The bikes made it all the way with us, with no significant damage. The madam at our hotel in Bagneres, the bike shop owner there who helped us box the bikes, the hotel folks in Bilbao who accommodated us on storage and shuttle transportation, and the Air France/Delta personnel who took various efforts to complete the transport, all contributed to a very positive end to our journey. A bit surprising, actually, to me. Especially once we placed them in the care of the airlines. That result may impact how I plan for the next trip, even to Tahoe next Summer.

Here is a Top Ten list of the Good Moves from our trip:

1. 4 electing to bring along her laptop computer. With wi-fi in all the hotels, we were able to stay connected throughout the trip.
2. Ordering the Amazon travel books for references. They weren't flawless, but they were pretty much on-point.
3. By-passing Lourdes on our August 15th travel day. Lucky move, for sure.
4. Using Hertz and American Express. The small problem with the back window was a non-issue.
5. Efficient packing. Neither one of us over-packed, and we seemed to have the right amount of changes.
6. Getting up the d'Aspin and the Tourmalet will always make the TdF a bit more personal.
7. Making Bagneres de Bigorre our campsite in the Pyrenees. Great location. Plenty of services.
8. Visiting the Guggenheim. Striking facility. Always a conversation piece. But curious art. Two hours was the right allocation of time.
9. Being a bit choose-y on food selections. We never had that bad-shrimp feeling. (With the vino either!)
10. 10 days of visiting places and two of travel was the right amount of time.

So I will add some pic's and other commentary later this evening. Have a great day!

BCOT

Friday

2011-08-19T17:10:00.000-05:00

Homeward journey in process.

Now in Bilbao for the night. Scheduled to depart at 0345 CST Saturday, with arrival in MLI at 2200 hours Saturday night. Delta is involved.

Best wished to 1 and 1.1 on boys names. Hmmm. Never really had to worry about that myself. A new adventure for the fam. I'm wondering about how 1.01 will react to a shared stage?

We may Twitter before we leave the hotel in the AM. Otherwise, the next entry from me will hopefully be on Twitter from an operational Android phone from the ATL late Saturday afternoon.

Thanks for reading. Enjoy Friday night!

BCOT

Thursday II

2011-08-18T15:38:00.001-05:00

I tried to update the posting from earlier today with the pics, but Blogger was doing strange things, so I folded and just started a new entry. 4 is definitely Daughter of the Day in the first entry's primary photo.

(The new home page photo was taken about 5-6 kilometers from the summit, when we stopped briefly on the way down the mountain. We coasted (quickly, with a steady, hard break) all the way to those little buildings at the far end of the bottom of the valley.)

The climb up the Tourmalet was everything that I wanted...and more. A much busier road than what I dealt with in the Alps on the Galibier two years ago. Plus sheep, goats and alpaca's. Seriously. And plus due, the entire population of France had to be on "holiday", and on our road. Unbelievable number of mid-sized RV's on this narrow, mountain road.

We started in the village of Campan, about 4-5 kilometers from the base of the climb in the town of Sainte Marie de Campan. Here I am filling my water bottles at the fountain by that town's church. From here, we ground our way 16.9 kilometers UP. Each kilometer was marked with a sign, counting the distance down, and the average gradient over the next kilometer. 8% is really hard. When it cranked up to 10%, I was crawling.

I'll write more about this some other time. 4 deserves lots of plaudits for her accomplishments here in the Pyrenees. Our rides were not walks in the park.

Dinner tonight was at a quiet restaurant in town. We were in a covered, upstairs balcony as there were sprinkles in the air. French dishes off their menus. We were the only ones in the place who spoke English. But it worked out. I judged my meal to be my favorite of the trip. Beef with salad, potatoes (not unlike what I do on the grill, but with a spiced crust), and a couple of other interesting sides. House wine.

The English-speaking lady at our hotel helped me line up packing-boxes for our bikes at a local cycle shop. We'll do that chore in the AM, check out, and head back to Bilbao. If its nice out, we may do that side-trip to San Sebastian.

We're tired. Bond was on earlier. I think Clint is the late show. LtPC is doubtful. Thanks for reading.

Au revoir!

BCOT

Thursday

2011-08-18T10:19:00.001-05:00

Wednesday

2011-08-17T15:57:00.000-05:00

Here's today's pic of Daughter of the Day. We made it up the meat of the climb to the Col d'Aspin this morning with little difficulty other than the climbing. 4 did great. She's only been actually out on the road for rides less than a dozen times, so today's finish was a great accomplishment for her. Way to go, Kiddo!

There were a lot of people at the summit. Many hikers, lots of sight-seers and biker support folks waiting for their riders. And a widely dispersed herd of cattle!. They wander all over this mountain. We actually had to stop on the drive up for several members of the herd to walk across the road to graze on the other side. Couldn't help but think of Grandpa H and wonder what he might think of the situation.

I place this climb in the category of the Brockway summit at Lake Tahoe (coming in from the Truckee side). The gradual part of the climb which we did yesterday goes for around 12 miles. The flight to the finish is around 3.5, all up, at around 7-8%. Many riders on the hill today. All passed me. 4 was gracious enough to stay with the tired, old man.

To manage our transportation this AM, we parked at the top of the climb and coasted down on our bikes, and turned around at the base where we had stopped yesterday. 4 had a small problem on one of the switchbacks, running into an example of Rule #1. And has the road-rash to attest to it. She popped up like a champ, with scrapes and some mangled handle-bar wrap that I quickly fixed with the electrician's tape that I keep in my seat bag. She medicated when we got back to the hotel with soap, water and the hydrocortisone cream that I keep in my travel kit. A little ibuprofin this evening.

The d'Aspin was enough riding for the day, and we needed to get the scrapes cleaned up, so we came back to the hotel, showered and then drove up to tomorrow's challenge, the Col de Tourmalet. There's a ski village, La Mongie, a couple miles from the summit, and we ate lunch there before going to the top of the mountain. La Mongie is a very metropolitan place; lots of high-rise condo's, cafe's and ski shops. Kind of a small Vail.

The Tourmalet Pass is lower than Mt. Rose, but it qualifies as one of the world's most storied climbs. I estimate that it will take us 3.5 hours to traverse the 16+ kilometers from the base of the hill in the village Ste. Maria de Campon. (We actually drove down the opposite side of the mountain on our way home, and, while neither side is easy, the other side is a bit less-appealing for general "feel" reasons, so we'll ride up this side. The distance is basically the same.)

As reported previously on Twitter, dinner was at our hotel tonight in their restaurant, fixed by the owner and her husband. Really not bad, and we were served very cordially in all respects. She has good English skills, and I asked (she consented) her to call Air France with me at her side in the AM to confirm the carry-on information/requirements for the bikes.

Again, a travelogue. Sorry. To bed for me. Big day tomorrow. Thanks for reading.

BCOT

Tuesday

2011-08-16T17:28:00.000-05:00

Late Tuesday night here now. We had a full day.

The preliminary portion of the ride to the Col d'Aspin turned into a little more work than we actually needed, so I made the command decision to save the last three miles constituting the true meat of the climb for tomorrow. It wasn't brutal this AM, but it was mostly all "up" for 13-15 miles, and you really understood that when you mostly coasted all the way back to the hotel. It was a good preparatory ride. A bit like the first 6-8 miles up Mt. Rose from the gas station start in Reno.

We'll do the summit to d'Aspin first thing in the AM and then a more forgiving route for the balance of the Wednesday ride. We need to save our energy for Thursday's ride up the Tourmalet, the beast of the area. Then we will be done with the riding portion of the trip, and be getting ready for our return to reality.

So we made the pilgrimage to Lourdes today, and I was not prepared for the overt commercialism that now defines the town. Our travel books had warned us that the religious aspects of the town were absolutely still there, but the economics had taken over Main Street. I was stunned at the tourist-trap character of the streets. Think Wall Drug stores side-by-side for several city blocks.

The main cathedral was impressive. We didn't go inside, but we did walk along the side of the church where The Grotto is located, and we lit a candle in honor of the extended clan. I'm sure that Margaret felt the ripple in the force. I told 4 that I felt a little closer to the Blessed Virgin at The Grotto version 1.1 located on campus at ND.

4 and I also did our domestic work today and visited the local laundormat and ran a load of clothes through the wash. Our self-portrait is included here. We had found a supermarket on the edge of town and re-stocked consumables as well. Our deluxe room here does not have a mini-fridge so we are thusly limited on the stuff we might keep in the room.

Lots of cyclists out on the road today. Dozens at least. No teams, but numerous groups of three and four. The roads are narrow, and riders need to be careful, but the drivers really need to give space. It seems like they do. I'll get some pics up tomorrow of biking in this area.

Dinner tonight was another open-air cafe here in town. We each had beef (that was no where near as good as that served off the grill on Maplecrest). A nice bottle of regional vino. Good times.

Sounds like the only viable option to get our bikes home is as carry-on with Delta. What could go wrong with that? UPS and FedEx are priced to say "no". Now I need to coordinate with the airline. Friday could be interesting with that challenge.

Off to bed. Thanks for reading.

BCOT

Monday

2011-08-15T17:20:00.001-05:00

All things considered, we have had a good day.

The distance from Vitoria-Gastiez in Spain to Bagneres-de-Bigorre in southern France is not all that far...maybe 150 miles or so. But we had to take that side-trip to Bilbao to do a car exchange, so we added a little mileage and some time to the journey. Hertz was very professional in all respects, and our call for 90 minutes as the Over/Under bet was way off. (We both took the Under.) It should have been set at 60 minutes, and the Under would have still paid.

The possible look-see at San Sebastian didn't happen. We got just a little bit of a late start, and jumping into another city where we would be driving on unfamiliar roads just didn't sound that good to us. We did get a few fleeting glances at the Bay of Biscay as we drove by in the highlands above town. I guess that qualifies as our visit to the beach for this trip.

Google Maps had us driving on toll roads almost all of the way today. Except for a couple of quick 2-Euro-each stations near the Spanish-French border, I used the Visa card in the automated lanes. No lilt-y greeting from the machines after payment like we had in Italy two years ago. We stopped inside the French border for lunch at a very-Western Interstate-like restaurant with buffet-like options.

You should check out Bagneres-de-Bigorre on line. Its a tourist-trap town of some note. They have natural, thermal spas that have made it a destination for people throughout Europe for quite a while. Lots of native hotels...no Marriott's or Hampty's. This is our room at The Tivoli...and this place got decent reviews! (This back-to-nature part of the trip makes it feel a little like Indian Princesses, as in our over-nights at Camp Abe Lincoln.)

We got into town a little too early. It is August 15th, and I'm sure that all you Catholics out there recall that that means that today is the feast of The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. And they were definitely having a celebration here to mark the occasion. Not a parking spot in town. Fortunately, The Tivoli has free parking on site, and we were able to slide into rock-star parking next to our hotel.

We took a walk downtown after checking-in, made our way to the local tourism office (that was actually open and helpful!), and took our brochures to seats at a cafe table in the boulevard in the center of town. We had beer, not wine, but it was a very Continental moment. (Wesley Snipes -not my fav by a long stretch- did a movie many years ago called The Art of War that ended with him and his love-interest finally getting together after lots of blood and back-stabbing at a cafe in the South of France. For a non-movie-person, that scene stuck with me. Sorry.)

We tried to find an open wine shop, with no luck, and then decided to check out a shopping area on the edge of town. To no avail. Everybody closes early here, I guess. After a drive up the Col d'Aspin to scout tomorrow's ride (a bit scary!), we had dinner at a small pizzaria with a bottle of regional red called madiran. Not too bad.

Sorry to make this a bit of a travelogue today, but you get what you get. After our ride in the AM, the plan is to drive over to Lourdes in the afternoon. We are a little apprehensive of the crowds (which makes today's following of Google Maps rather than an alternative route through Lourdes that I had originally considered an unwitting bonus based on the crowds here today!) We'll see.

OK. To bed for us. Fare on the local TV? Law and Order SVU...in French.

Sunday

2011-08-14T12:41:00.000-05:00

We weren't quite prepared for the city's Sunday shutdown. On a prearranged plan, I had let 4 sleep in for some extra shut-eye, and I had simply taken a leisurely 90 minute ride within the city limits. I stopped at a nearby bakery and brought some fresh things back to the hotel.

Again, as planned, we did the "touristy" thing after showers and visited the art museums and the big cathedral. All on foot.

The next item on the agenda was to be laundry. But we were told that the local places would be closed on Sunday. We took another walk and confirmed the closure at the one place that we had an address, and also confirmed that 90% of the commercial places in town were closed as well. Other than a few cafe's and bars, most of the shops were fully shuttered. And more than a few were on a two-week vacation.

So after our second walk, we enjoyed Tom Cruise in Days of Thunder...in Spanish. (I've grown tired of BBC and CNN, the only English channels on the tube. Their constant drum-pounding of the world news of war, famine, the-USA-is-a-pig, and save-the-planet mentality gets old quickly for me.)

Tomorrow is moving day. The plan is to leave before 1000 hours for the Pyrenees. We have a small detour back through our favorite town of Bilbao to swap out cars. The LtPC had a relatively minor problem in the hotel garage the other night. The over-hang in the garage is not an issue when you pull into the spot front-first. Not quite the same when you back in as I did Friday night. Maybe my first ever accident in a rental car.

I had an email exchange with American Express and they say that a switch of cars should be no problem with my coverage. Hmmm. There are a number of moving parts that make "easy" not the word that comes to mind here. I guess we'll see.

Obviously, not much news here. I'll maybe jump back on after we get back from dinner.

BCOT