Monday

These are just a sampling of our FFF from the weekend. I used an anti-redeye option on the software to try to soften the glare from the mini-digi's flash. We'll do better at Christmas.

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More later.

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BCOT

Sunday

The pics from the weekend will have to wait another day. Since we really never "did pictures", I'm going to have to put the candids on my desktop and use the photo-adjust function to get rid of some red eye and extraneous background clutter. Stay tuned.

Under the presumption that 4 gets back to Lincoln shortly (and 3's flights tomorrow work out), it's fair to say that the Thanksgiving weekend in the QCA was a success. Lots of good food, relaxation and FFF.

My earlier prediction of a 6-6 ND (when they were 6-3) came to fruition. Now the parties need to do the dance and send Weis on his way to the NFL. With his pockets full. Make it quick. The trouble is that they need to get a guy in there who can break the chain: Davie to Willingham to Weis doesn't exactly inspire greatness.

Does Tiger get the same media pass as the Big O?

One of the revelations that comes out of a weekend like this where we spend a lot of time together, and the girls get into wide ranging conversations, is that I have very little clue about what goes on in the culture of 20-30 year-olds. Whether it is music, movies, TV, Internet connections, or any of the topics that might come up in their chats, it's just obvious that I live in another world.

I put my BBQ away for the season this afternoon. And all my garden hoses. Does that mean Winter is nigh?

3 went with me to spin class this AM. I'm thinking that for the next six weeks or so that I'll just do the Sunday and Wednesday classes to keep a base in cycling. I'll wait until mid-January before I get serious about cycle conditioning for the 2010 season. I've got plenty of other exercise equipment in my personal gym to keep me busy in the mean time.

One of the other things that did come out of the weekend is that our crew collectively wants to get the clan's 2010 Tahoe reunion set on the calendar. Keeping in mind that some of us plan to stay a week or more, later in July seems to be the preference. We all have scheduling considerations, but the sooner we can set the date, the better. I'll call Tahoe Phil to get the ball rolling.

More tomorrow.

BCOT

Friday

Here's our post-Trot shot at SB's. It was a successful day for all the runners. LtPC came home in 57:33 chip time, so I over-trained!! 2 was my co-pilot and did a great job of keeping me on track. Thanks , Kiddo.

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4 was the Official Photog for the event, but those pics are on the other camera. I'll post any worth viewing later today.

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3 made it in for the post-race coffee event. Her flight was pretty much on time. (I was glad to hear that she had an 0655 departure from Beantown rather than that 0600 flight, which would mean an extra early oh-dark-hundred wake-up call for a girl who prefers to get her sleep.)

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SRH was the star of the mid-afternoon meal. Turkey with all the fixin's. Lots of grazing the rest of the day.

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The office is casually open today. The staff is off, and I'm hanging out until the market closes. A little down-turn on news from the mid-East. Can you say Dubai? How do you say, "Real estate can only go up" in Arabic?

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Now off to Chilli's for FFF lunch with the shoppers.

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BCOT

Monday

Again, no strong excuse for my absence here. Just never quite got in the mood to sit down at a computer yesterday.


Iowa City was pretty tame on Saturday. It was nice for mid-November, but still a little too cool to be pure party time. By the end of the game, we were ready to fire up the car and get some heat going. It was one of the more boring games that I have attended in a long time. The highlight was a goal-line stand by the Iowa defense. With more punts than total points between the teams, and like 300 yards of total offense, raking leaves would have been more exciting.

My earlier post on Charlie Weis at ND is coming home to roost. A loss this coming Saturday at Stanford, and you have a 6-6 record. Who would have thunk it? While ND may not have the most talent out there, they have enough that a good college coach should be able to get 9-10 wins against their current schedule. I mean, Navy got beat by Temple who lost to Villanova who lost to New Hampshire. Whatever. At this point, I've lost interest.

1 is very excited about Joe Mauer being named American League MVP today. He is a stud. Will they be able to keep him in the TC?

2 and I did a pass-through to the Augie game on Saturday night. The competition wasn't that good, and we left at half with the home boys up by 20+. I repeat my earlier evaluation: these guys could be pretty good by the end of the year. Lots of horses. They'll wear most teams down. But probably not Gonzaga when they play there in a couple of weeks.

I do my last training run for the TT tonight. A very light workout tomorrow night. Spin on Wednesday AM. And then it's Showtime. The Danny Sheridan line on me making it home in under an hour just moved to +120 seconds which means that "the house" thinks my time will be 62 minutes plus a second. On that analysis, take the under.

I'll get back to this after I do my run.

BCOT

Thursday

Wednesday November 18, 2009.

Chicago.

Life In The Fast Lane!

I want to provide some more details on the trip to C-town. I've edited this a couple of times as Blogger keeps messing with me on the size of print after that original posting of the first picture. If there are some Word protocols that they follow here, I haven't figured them out.

How did the timing work out? Pretty suite. No trouble with the flight. Departed Davenport around 1530. The driver was waiting for us at the private terminal at Midway (Are you Bill?), and he got us through traffic to the Near North area for pre-dinner cocktails at Kiki's French Bistro.

What was it all about? The four of us were celebrating our 25th year in business together. My pal Bill and I wanted to do something way out of the ordinary.

And the planning? All Bill and myself. The girls were not told anything other than that we would be going out to celebrate with a nice dinner. Bill may have got a little help from a friend who does some party planning. LAM and TDS claim that they were totally surprised when we drove up to the Davenport airport.

And the private plane? Well, we wanted to do something out of the ordinary. It's not like it was the jet or anything. We chartered the cheapest King Air in my pal Roy's fleet. It seats like eight or nine. Took about 40 minutes from Davenport to Midway.

Dinner? We ate at what I would call a medium high-end place call "mk" in the 800 block of North Franklin. I'd say the food was ok (notice the lower case), and the wine was excellent. We couldn't tarry, as we had a 7:30 show to catch at the Apollo Theater in the 2500 block of North Lincoln Avenue.

And the show? Worth the price of admission. The Million Dollar Quartet. One of the more enjoyable live events that I have been to in a while. We were about six rows up, center stage in a 40% full 450 person theater. See chart attached.Google the name for some details, as the show is based on a real event. It's probably got some legs for theaters on the coasts.

The homeward leg of the trip? Piece of cake. The driver (different guy and vehicle, same "Are you Bill" question) was waiting for us outside the theater. Easy trip (with no traffic at that hour) to the airport. Our pilot was waiting, and we were in the air in about 10 minutes. Another 40 and we were back home.

So that's about it. Sorry for doing a "What I did today" entry, but the event was worthy of recording. Another element in what has been a great year for Lt. PC.

Now with a return to normalcy, let me just say...

BCOT

Wednesday

Short entry today. My pal Bill and I are taking our two assistants who have been with us now over 25 years out for the evening. Detail and pics to follow tomorrow.

Winnie and I did a 3 mile run last night and she shows signs of being a good workout companion. Also signs of the carefree puppy.

I manage to partially unhook Winnie harness after the run, and unbeknownst to me, she chewed through one piece rendering the harness useless. I gave 2 a $10 bill to buy a replacement. Since when does dog-sitting cost the sitter? Then SRH told me that she had picked up the harness at Wally World for $3 bucks! So 2 makes $7 on the deal? No wonder 4000 Days ain't getting shorter!!

2 did confess that my Sunday entry had her hooked until the end. How do you spell "easily swayed"?

My front landscaping is 75-80% complete. I think that the the prairie flower stuff and mulch will wait till Spring. Pic to follow.

Now headed out for the evening. Can you say, "Private plane to C-town"?

BCOT

Monday

Hawks ahead.

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Hawks behind.

Sunday

So I missed the official anniversary day of the blog. Not a bad day. Just didn't prioritize.

Thought it was time to move on from the Italy pictures. This is a shot from our last official FFF in StL last Summer. We need some new material from the upcoming Thanksgiving weekend.

A reporter named Rhonda Michaels (not her real last name) from the Fort Wayne (IN) Journal Gazette called me yesterday afternoon to follow-up on a lead that she had received from a guy I knew in Chicago a couple of lifetimes ago. The paper was running a series on former Arthur Andersen accountants and somehow my name had come up. They had done a Google search and, remarkably (actually, shockingly to me), had found 4000 Days. (The story on how they got my cell number really doesn't wash, but I'm not quibbling on that one.)

The long and the short of Ms. Michaels' inquiry was a dead end for her AA & Co story: I had no knowledge of the guys who were still in the C-town office when the Enron thing exploded. But we had a nice conversation comparing dates, places and used-to-be's, and then we started comparing experiences in blogging. She had scanned some of the history recorded in 4000 Days, and she asked if I would respond to some questions for possible use in another personal-interest story in her file. As best as I can recall, here's the gist of that part of the conversation:

RM: So I've read various entries on 4000 Days, but I'm not sure that I have a handle on it's purpose. Can you fit it into a broad topical category?

LtPC: It's primarily a family gig. My kids have been out of the house (and mostly out of town) for many years, and I felt pretty detached from their lives. I literally stumbled on the blogsphere about five years ago, and they say, the rest is history.

RM: And the title?

LtPC: It just came to me. I'd been looking at the calendar, trying to realistically figure out when I might be able to retire, and at that time, 10 years seemed like the closest round number. 10 Years didn't have much of a ring to it, nor did 3650 Days. Since early retirement, whatever the date, didn't seem likely, 4000 Days won out.

RM: So how does that math look today?

LtPC: Four years down now means that I'm a little less than 40% home from the original estimate. That's still ballpark. But, retirement? Who knows. I doubt if I fully retire for a long time. Unless the Powerball comes home. (And you have to play to win. Which I don't.)

RM: Do you have a writing schedule?

LtPC: Not really. When I first started, I tried to write everyday. But for the last couple of years, I've been lucky to get in entries three to four times a week.

RM: And your topics?

LtPC: I haven't checked, but I used to have plenty to say about cycling, NASCAR, and miscellaneous other sports. I've backed off much of any extended commentary in those categories because I don't think my (few) readers have a lot of interest in those things. The same now with politics.

RM: But isn't a blog supposed to be the perfect forum for an author to express his/her opinions?

LtPC: True. But that gets into the debate of the "why and what" for the author. Lots of times, opinions on hot topics like politics, religion, social issues and the like can impede otherwise good relationships. And check the ratings: not a lot of folks out there care about the ascent up Mt. Ventoux, or the RPM's in the 24 car.

RM: For what it's worth, I have no clue what you just said. So what's been the best part of your blog?

LtPC: I like the daily contact with my daughters. I like the outlet for that creative gene that never quite succumbed to the technical deluge in graduate school and my business career. I like turning a couple of good sentences into a paragraph, and a few paragraphs into something cogent. About something.

RM: What is your biggest challenge when you open an entry?

LtPC: There's always a form of Writer's Block with which to deal. I prefer to do something original as opposed to just recount my day (usually very boring). I like humor from my daily life, and I draw upon my relationships with several very good friends. My pals, Pete, Roy, Bill, and occasionally Jake can make things interesting.

RM: But isn't that just more of "What I did today"?

LtPC: It can be, but my friends and I manage to present some trials and tribulations worth a little recognition. We are not a mensa group.

RM: What's the deal with the numbers 1,2,3, and 4?

LtPC: Uh, that's not showing your best investigative reporter traits, Ms. Michaels. It's not much of a secret that those are my anonymous names for my four daughters, by birth order. I generally avoid the use last names here, and for the girls, not even their first names. The blogsphere is a dangerous place.

RM: So have you had any problems of that nature?

LtPC: Nope. You're the wildest hare I've encountered. Although Bob Costas was a little sketchy on the flight back from Europe.

RM: OK then. I've got a deadline to meet. One last question. What do you see for the future with 4000 Days? Any new ideas?

LtPC: My goal is to keep at it. To keep coming up with some original ideas that will make my narrow readership smile. Maybe even lol (...:)) occasionally. It keeps that almost-daily contact going, and gives Dear Old Dad the illusion that he still matters. And it feeds the bandit gene that has never quite left the frontal lobe. I may even write about this interview.

RM: Thanks for your time. We have a great wine bar in Ft. Wayne next to the paper. Let me know if you're ever in town. I have an aunt who might be available.

LtPC: As long as she doesn't read the New York Times. Stay in touch. You can always comment here.

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There you have it. Another reader who just couldn't tear herself away.

Have a great week.

BCOT

Thursday

Just a "Twitter-like" entry tonight. After work, I became the "Winnie sitter" for the evening. We did a three-mile run-walk, that didn't tire her out near as much as it did me. And we watched a little of the Bears' game and CSI. She's a fun companion, but has lots of energy. Maybe too much for an old guy.
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My pal Roy is in the hospital with a case of pneumonia. He had felt bad all week, and finally our pal Doctor Cal took some action by admitting him last night. He was much better this afternoon (after a lot of drug-therapy), and should be discharged tomorrow. Is pneumonia better/worse than H1N1?
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We signed a contract at the office this week for an entirely new telephone system. We'll have the standard features of direct-dialing for incoming calls to specific people, cordless headsets and handsets for several of us, and integration with our Outlook for messages and transfers. Hope to be up and running before Christmas. Cool stuff.
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So looking forward to TGIF. Have been all week.

BCOT

Wednesday

So I dug out some of my old USAF uniform stuff to wear over to the Arsenal later today. I've worn the shirt on an occasional basis over the last few years. Found the silver Lt. bars, but haven't located the blue, plastic nameplate. I'll keep my eyes out for it over the next year.

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My office computer still has a virus. The IT vendor has been trying to isolate and remediate the bug remotely over the last couple of days, and the worm has proven to be very illusive. (The service provider has a "Go To Meeting" -like linkage which gives the tech access to my machine from afar.) Not real dastardly at this point, but a nuisance. It's cookie allows pop-ups to enter just about anytime that I'm on the Internet. I'm pretty sure that the bug was attached to a blue email that I received from one of my better clients last week.

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There will be a small celebration here on the blog later this week as I pass the four year anniversary for 4000 Days. My recollection is that I started this with a 10 year projection to some kind of retirement, and rounded the 3650 total to 4000 for presentation purposes. Four times 365 + 1 (for the Leap Year day) equals 1461, which, when divided by 4000 equals 36.5%. Not sure what that statistic means.

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The media vulchers are circling the football offices in South Bend. Can't say that I am all that troubled by this development. The guy can't beat anyone with a winning record, and I don't think that it is now a question of on-the-field talent. I mean, Navy? (Don't get me wrong; I never cheer against the military academies.) And given the records of their next three opponents, and the passion that those opponents will bring to the games, a 6-6 final record is not that much of a stretch. Certainly if that is the final result, Charlie Weis will be gone. And deservedly so.

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Augie's b-ball season (and one of my main Winter pastimes) opens tonight with a controlled scrimmage against Loras College. They start playing for real next Monday. I had toyed with going to their game at Gonzaga in December, but that is just not going to happen.

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More here later.

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BCOT

Tuesday

Remember tomorrow.

BCOT

Lt. PC

Monday II

That ripple in the water of my home page picture is Lake Garda Nessie stretching her dorsal fin.

My Turkey Trot training has uncovered a serious question with national security implications. Over the last several years, our local communities have systematically converted the sidewalks at most of the busy street corners to a ramp-style grade with no curb to conform with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Around here, most of those new, graded sidewalk crossings have a metal plate about 2' by 4' with "bumps" across it right in the center of the ramp.

The picture is a close representation of what I'm talking about, although this example is a little longer across and orange compared to the yellow ones I'm used to seeing.

Anyway, on my run last Saturday morning in Lincoln, I came across the same kind of plates at the street corners near where 4 lives. As it happened, my pace Saturday morning was a little...slow? Which gave me a pretty good view of each plate. I noticed that the little bumps on the plates weren't fully rounded, but rather, had several little "nubs" atop each, somewhat flattened bump. A little like the Braille bumps on an elevator panel.

Maybe the current television series "V" just has me spooked, but I'm concerned that the nubs on the bumps are actually a series of signals to aliens (or some other form of bad guys) for an all-out assault at some near-term date. Who knows who's reading these signs?

This is really a time to...

BCOT!!!!!!!

Monday

Turkey Trot registration is at http://www.getmeregistered.com/

More later.

BCOT

Sunday

Not the best of days yesterday for the Hawks, Irish or Clones. The moon and the stars had to be aligned on the wrong axis again. At least Iowa still has a chance for Pasadena. Is there a course available on campus, "Horseshoe Quarterbacking for Visitors"?

Lincoln on game day is dressed in red. But the masses are generally well-behaved compared to IC. No Melrose Street mayhem like South of Kinnick. And the bars downtown were crowded, but not packed. (We even got chairs. Is $7.50 a pitcher a good deal?) No obnoxiously over-served collegians marauding downtown with a case of beer on their shoulders.

The home team rewarded it's fans with a victory (as I learned this AM). But it was patently un-offensive. But a win is a win is a win. Don't some of our fav's wish.

Enjoyed (and agree with) yesterday's comments on the library hypothesis. Mostly, I think that the role of libraries has, and will continue to evolve. While I have used the library to find books just to read, my most significant use was for research. (High school, college, grad-school, and originally for my tax work.) And that aspect of libraries has certainly faded with the expansion of the Internet. (We actually had a "library" room in our office building when it was built 20 years ago, but that room has long-ago been converted to more-productive office space.)

For high school and college, the library was definitely a social gathering-spot. "Going to the library" was always my cover for a mid-week date with my high school girl friends. And I met a number of "friends" at the St. Mary's library during my ND days. I mean, ND was a non-coeducational institution in those days.

Tall Americano's for the sleepers. More from the road.

BCOT

Friday

So Friday night coming to you from the newsroom at Channel 8 in Lincoln. 2 and I made really good time and arrived in town a little early. We're keeping an eye on things as the 10PM newscast is being put together by 4 and her associates. Cool!

Need to amend that earlier posting about my stupidity. You could say that I am improving. Or not. But I did find the smart phone holster. Hiding under some stuff in my office. (My new trick is dropping the phone and the little magnetized stylus popping out of it's receded position at the bottom of the phone. So far, I've been able to retrace my steps when this has happened. At least twice this week. But it's just a matter of time.)

Mid-60's today in the QCA. Could be near perfect tail-gating weather tomorrow in IC. Hope the Hawks show up for kick-off this week.

2 and I put a murder/mystery book-on-CD for the ride over this evening. Marginal. We got though just about half of it, so our memories will be challenged come Sunday for the return trip. It does help pass the time. I'm mildly surprised that the library doesn't have a bigger selection.

Query: What is the future of libraries? At some point, won't all of the information be on-line? I mean, look at Blockbuster. That's a business that will be toast in 3-5 years. Star Trek is us.

A couple of points on Starbuck's. As noted on Twitter earlier this week by 1, they are discontinuing the Gold Card program as of the end of the year. Supposedly to give even better deals to their customers. But do the math. The new deal will be a free drink after 15 purchases. Great, but right now I get a 10% discount on every Cup o' Fire. So by the Transitive Principle, I get a free drink after 10 drinks. So why is a free one after 15 a better deal?

It may be to pay for the increase in cup usage as a result of the new policy that they can't use your same cup on a re-fill purchase. I know Wendy's went through the same policy on their unlimited soda offer several years ago. I figure that the SB's change is swine flu related. (I refuse to use the PC reference to H1N1.)

1 reports that the baby aced her first test. All systems were at the "excellent" level in her check-up this week.

So it's getting close to show time. Maybe I'll check in tomorrow. Lots of football.

BCOT

Wednesday

Who are these hotties?

I had a little incident last night that has inspired me to have a Top Ten list of stupid things that I have done lately. Mind you, this is not anything approaching an all-time list. This is just recent stuff that makes you wonder how I get through the day.
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Number One on the hit parade requires a little explanation. So the weather has been frosty at night and I've been moving my big ficus tree into the garage most days because it's so heavy and I'm too lazy to make the effort to get it in the house. But when I take a car out of the garage, or return it, I have to move the tree. So I get home from work last night, pull in the driveway, click the garage open, get out of the car, move the tree slightly (knowing that the tree has to stay in the garage), get back in the car, and pull it into it's space in the garage.
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I shut the car off, pick up some take-home things, get out, open the rear door to take the laptop into the house, close the rear car door, now with my hands pretty full, and click the garage door down. WITHOUT MOVING THE FICUS!! YOU IDIOT!!! How did I miss seeing it in the path of the door? Amazing. The next thing I hear as I'm a few steps toward the house is the cracking of branches. I'm stunned. Too stunned to get my hand on the clicker until the door hits the huge half barrel planter.
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So my most distinctive plant that I had previously pruned so that it would in fact fit in my house for the Winter now has a few more major branches pruned by the garage door. Brilliant.
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2. Lost my smart phone holster. Which leads me to carry the phone in my hand a lot. The phone was one of the items in my hands last night as I was juggling things to get into the house. .

3. Pulled Margret too close to the cement island at the bank drive-through, and ripped off a chrome piece on the passenger side below the doors. Really a smooth move there.
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4. Drove 1.5 hours into the mountains in Italy, one way, before finding the bike shop for my Galibier bike six blocks from our hotel in Turin. Maybe a 15 minute walk.
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5. Bought and installed end-to-end about 50 standard paving bricks as edging for the East front half of my house without looking at the brick edging on the other side of the front steps which happened to be a different color.
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That's all I have for now. Maybe a little more of my on-going tale of woe later.
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BCOT

Tuesday

Can you say November? Or Standard Time? I knew that September would fly, but what happened to October? And when you say "The November Classic", the World Series is not what immediately comes to mind. Whatever.

I'm working on a new twist for occasional blog entries using a collection approach. Really just a way to throw out unrelated ideas in the same entry. Some columnists use formats like, Some Things I Think, or Today's Headlines, to structure a repetitive template. My idea is to use title concepts to help bring my thoughts to publish-able material. I dabbled with the idea earlier when I suggested using the standard USA Today sections as creativity catalysts. This maybe expands that thought with almost a Top Ten theme to things.

The title concepts include (and could be added to) as follows:

Travel
Fitness
Nutrition
Politics
Religion
Family
Finance
Technology
Entertainment
Environment
Work
Home
Education
Art
Literature
Science
History

That's certainly a good start. Now I need to figure out if Blogger can help with the presentation format. It would be nice if I could just hit a key and the titles would populate the page. (I doubt if that is going to happen.)

More later.

BCOT

Sunday

So the Hawkeyes managed to give all their fans a complete dose of depression for three quarters yesterday, and then came up with a spectacular fourth quarter antidote. I'm sure that the national press corps will skewer Iowa as an unworthy BCS finalist, but if they win out, they'll deserve at least third place. Under the presumption that Texas and the Florida-Alabama winner are also undefeated at the end of the season, Iowa will most certainly go to Pasadena for The Rose Bowl.

But before anyone gets too excited, Northwestern will come to play on Saturday.

Looked to me like there were more than a few empty seats in the Alamo Dome last night for the ND "home" game. But my guess is that a few dollars were deposited into ND's bank account and that the experience will make the future away/home games even more successful.

Low-key weekend for me. The high-light may have been dog-sitting Winnie this afternoon. What's that say about my life? Also mowed my yard. How often do you mow your yard in November?

2 and I are headed over to Lincoln on Friday to visit 4. Oklahoma is visiting the Huskers (although we don't have tickets). I'm guessing that the Sooners will be spotting the hosts a couple of touchdowns.

Edmunds, Inc ran into the New Reality late last week when they released a report from their research on recent US auto sales, specifically the Cash for Clunkers program. The gist of the report was that the incremental sales from the $3 billion program were only in the 125,000 range, meaning that it cost the Treasury $24K per vehicle to fund it. The White House didn't take kindly to the report and jumped all over it on their blogs and other media. Another example of Don't Mess With Us.

I've used Edmunds' websites numerous times in the past, most notably when I was searching for classic cars several years ago (a search that ultimately led to Margret). I never even thought of them as political. This response from the WH to a mildly critical report smacks of an immature, grade school mentality.

There is a philosophical koolade being passed down from the Democratic leadership, and then around by their complicit friends in the media, that anyone who doesn't believe in true health care reform, abortion rights, taxing the rich, and international appeasement is a member of some right wing fringe group. Whatever.

My new nickname can be Fringe.

Have a great week.

BCOT