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Greece

2009-06-05T14:12:00.005-04:00

We decided on Greece for our first excursion from Amsterdam. It was early April, so we wanted to head south. It was Easter weekend, so we wanted to stay away from Rome. In Greece it wasn't Easter, so we wouldn't have to contend with the local holiday coinciding with our holiday. So we went.

We connected in Athens and flew into Santorini for a three-night stay. Santorini is a beautiful island formed from a volcano. The always-freshly-painted-white buildings built into the side of the dark cliffs of the caldera are a beautiful sight, as our one-thousand or so pictures can show. We stayed in a town called Firostefani, at a place called Dana Villas. We can highly recommend both.

We may not have realized this going in, but Santorini was our perfect vacation spot. There are great activities like swimming in hot springs, sailing, or hiking along the cliff. There is incredible natural beauty: very interesting geological features (the reddest rock faces I've ever seen), and amazing sunsets. And it is surprisingly not over-commercialized or over-priced.

And then there's the food. I was not prepared for the food. Since moving to New York ten years ago and discovering great food, I have considered Greek food to be in my top two favorite foods. An evening at Symposium with warm pita, tzatziki, stuffed grape leaves, olives, and feta could not be beaten. But for some reason it never occurred to me in all of the lead up to our trip to Greece that *there would be Greek food there*. I embarrassed myself at every meal acting like every bite of food was the most delicious I had ever tasted in my life. Because it was!

Athens was amazing for completely different reasons. It is touristy, but not in the good way where you have a nice clean accommodations. It is touristy in the crowded, cheap souvenir way. The problem we had in Athens is getting our minds around time. The oldest buildings in New York, I'm going to guess, are from the mid-to-late 18th century. Our canalhouse in Amsterdam was built in the mid-17th century. Amsterdam itself was established in the 13th century, but I'm not aware of anything that old that's still standing.

Athens has structures ("ruins" I guess, but that doesn't do them justice) that were constructed in the 5th century BC. It's too big a leap. I can't get my mind around it. There is a complete reconstruction in the agora that was created with the same specifications and materials as the original. It's impressive by today's standards -- 2500 years later, whatever that means.

We also embraced the early Christianity "Paul was here" aspect of Athens. We climbed atop the Areopagus on Easter Sunday and read the passage from Acts where Paul enlightens the Athenians about the unknown god they "have worshipped in ignorance." And the next day we took a tour out to Corinth and saw where Paul spoke in the Agora there. Again, we tried and failed to really grasp the power, wealth, and influence that this city had over two thousand years ago.

Next stop: Keukenhof

The Honorable Dutch

2009-05-20T13:23:00.004-04:00

Since we've been here, we've spent a fair amount of time on trains, subways, and trams. We were surprised to find that things work more or less on the honor system.

You can walk into the subway, go down the stairs, and hop on the train. No turnstile. No ticket taker. The trams have a driver and occasionally someone in the back who will sell you a ticket, but I've never seen them call anyone out. And on the commuter trains, I've only had a ticket taken on a longer trip. I've never seen a ticket collected between the airport and central station. The idea is that they take tickets only occasionally, and they enforce compliance by charging fines if they find you without a ticket.

There are other types of tickets, but for the most part we use something called a stripkaart. You buy your card at a newsstand. They come in various sizes, but typically have about 15 lines on them. When you get on a subway or tram, you're supposed to use a machine to stamp the date and time on one of the lines on your stripkaart. If someone comes around to make sure you paid, they'll look at your card to see that you stamped it. Once you run out of lines on the card, you need to get a new one. (it's actually a little more complicated than that, because depending on how far you're going, you may be required to stamp two to four lines just for one trip).

So we were on our way back from running errands and we went to take the subway. Our stripkaart only had one line left on it and we needed four. We couldn't find anywhere to buy a new one, so we just stamped the last line and got on the train. This was the first time in all of our riding that we had "jumped the turnstile". And wouldn't you know that about five minutes into our ride two policemen entered the front of our car and started checking tickets! I seriously almost told Beth to get off the train as quick as we could...if we hadn't been in seats, we might have. When they got to us, I showed him the stripkaart and was about to start making our excuses ("but we're Americans - we didn't know!") but he just said thanks and moved on.

The next day we bought the jumbo stripkaart -- we're set for a while.

Our Bikes

2009-05-06T14:36:00.005-04:00

Bikes are everywhere in Amsterdam. For most, it is their primary means of transportation, even for those who commute from out of town. We started looking for bikes within the first week we were here. Considering how ubiquitous and important bikes are in Amsterdam, it was surprisingly difficult to find our bikes. We visited many secondhand bike shops to find a very small selection. It was also surprising how expensive a secondhand bike is. We knew that Dutch bikes were very basic -- you don't want a bike that stands out in a crowd, because they get stolen all of the time. Considering their no-frills nature, we were surprised to find that secondhand bikes are typically between 125 and 175 Euros.

We found ours at a store called Fietspiraat (Bike Pirate). I would tell you what brand they are, but I honestly don't know. Needless to say, they're not Trek or Giant! My bike says "The Ranger" on it -- yeah, it's pretty awesome.

Once we got our bikes, the city shrank. It took us about 30 minutes of tram-riding and walking to get to Fietspiraat; it took us about 6 minutes to ride home. With the exception of our grocery store and our gym, which are within walking distance, we ride everywhere now.

It is amazing how much area we can cover now. We can be out of the city within about five minutes. If we ride to the south, we can see the tulip fields. If we ride to the north, we can see windmills. If we go to the east, we can ride along one of the dikes that keeps the country from being flooded. And if we ride to the west, we can reach the beach. The Netherlands is ideal for touring by bike. The whole country is less than twice the size of New Jersey, and flat as a pancake. Which reminds me, they have great pancakes. More on that later.

Living in Amsterdam

2009-04-19T12:56:00.004-04:00

We moved to Amsterdam on the 24th of March and plan to live here until the end of September. This is the first time for either Beth or I to live outside the U.S. Just within these first few weeks, we've had numerous experiences that we want to be sure not to forget, and many that we want badly to share with our friends and family. So we will resurrect the blog for the purpose of sharing some stories and photos from our adventure.

We had a lot of people supporting us in our move. My company relocated us, and made available professionals to take care of everything from visas to packing, from apartment-hunting to cultural training. We made an "orientation" visit to check out neighborhoods about a month before our move, and we purchased and read many books on Amsterdam and The Netherlands.

So it was surprising how difficult it was to do the simplest things when we got here in late March. We arrived with four suitcases (well, we didn't exactly arrive with them, but they made it eventually), and that was all we had for the first two weeks we were here. The apartment came with furniture, but when it came to "stuff" for the kitchen, bedrooms, bathrooms, etc. we had to start from scratch.

Beth and I soon agreed that rather than filling us in on all of the cultural differences between the Dutch and Americans, it would have been a much better use of our "support team" for someone to just take us on a shopping trip! Just show us where to go to get a hair dryer, help us recognize the difference between laundry detergent and fabric softener, point us to a reasonably-priced secondhand bike shop, ... everywhere we turned there was some small need that we found ourselves unable to address.

There are still a few of these things left (we still need to get a dutch mobile phone), but over the past few weeks we've been able to solve most of these "problems" and form a routine. Our life here is night-and-day different than New York -- in some ways better and in some ways not. We are doing our best to live as locals, not tourists. We want to experience as much as we possibly can during this window of opportunity.

I already have subjects for the next 11 posts. I'll try to get around to writing as often as I can. It's nice to think that we can, in a limited way, share our life here with our friends. Until next time...

Mark to Market

2008-09-28T11:47:00.003-04:00

I'm a huge fan of Dave Ramsey, but as I've been busy keeping up with things at work lately, I haven't spent a lot of time listening to his show. So today as I was walking the dog I listened to a couple shows from last week.

As you would imagine, the main topic of discussion was the financial crisis and the pending bailout. Dave spent considerable time in a "teaching" section of the show saying that one of the primary causes of this financial crisis was the "mark-to-market" rule in Sarbanes Oxley. Dave urged his thousands of listeners to call their congressmen and congresswomen and demand that they change the mark-to-market rule.

So what is mark-to-market? It's an accounting rule that says that when a company is valuing the assets on their books, they should use the market value (rather than the price that they paid, for example). Sounds reasonable, right? It's a market-based approach to determining the value of assets.

So how was mark-to-market involved in this crisis? It turns out that the investment banks were not only selling a lot of these CDOs (the mortgages bundled into bonds) to investors, but they were keeping a lot for themselves (not sure if it's because they really wanted them or if they just couldn't move them fast enough). As these CDOs plummeted in value on the market, these banks had to update their books to reflect that the value of their assets had decreased.

So what would eliminating the mark-to-market rule do? Without mark-to-market, the banks could claim that the CDOs were still worth what they paid for them. It would allow any public company inflate their balance sheets by hiding the true value of their assets.

Don't we want (shouldn't we demand) transparency from our public companies? Of course. So which is the correct valuation of assets? The market value of course! That's what the market does! I'm sorry to say, Dave, but removing the transparancy and hiding the problems under a rock is NOT a solution. Most every economist is saying so; it's only in the political arena that this is being discussed ... so why is that?

Much like the "blame the poor for it" approach, the "blame regulation for it" approach is the next best thing for Republicans who thought that free markets would solve any problem. So Dave urged his thousands of listeners to call their congressmen and congresswomen and demand that they change the mark-to-market rule. As I mentioned, these shows were from a week ago, so I can only assume that Dave and others like him were part of what caused House Republicans to have their "the Democrats will have to pass the bailout" moment last week.

I predict that in four years, as Republicans are preparing to run against an incumbent President Obama, that they will resurrect this theory of over-regulation as both the cause and the neglected solution for the financial crisis of 2008. Don't buy it!

We sponsored the Olympics!?

2008-08-11T20:49:00.005-04:00

Shamelessly copied from this Slate article by Bruce Reed:

Perhaps most urgently, the next president will have to admit what George W. Bush would not—that if we don't put our fiscal house in order, China will foreclose on it.

Think about that for a minute

As Obama has pointed out, "It's very hard to tell your banker that he's wrong."

Preach it, Obama

This year's federal budget deficit will be a record $500 billion, not counting wars and economic bailouts. One of history's headlines on this administration will be, "Bush Owes to China."

The rise of China is the story of this Olympics and threatens to be the story of the next presidency. So it's only fitting to give viewers a sense of what's at stake.

My dream ad would show the robot Wall-E methodically stacking pressed blocks of discarded dollar bills to form giant structures, which turn out to be the Bird's Nest stadium, the Water Cube aquatic center, and the CCTV tower. The script would go something like this:

"Sponsor" (60 seconds)

Voiceover: "Ever wonder what Washington has done with your tax dollars? This Olympics is your chance to find out. For the last 8 years, the Bush administration has been paying China billions of dollars in interest on the trillions it borrowed for tax breaks, pork, and special privileges you never got. That money helped create thousands of businesses and millions of jobs—in China. So as you enjoy the games, keep an eye on your tax dollars at work. The way our economy's going, it's tough to pay your bills. But take heart: You already paid China's."

Tagline: "America's Taxpayers. Proud Sponsors of the Beijing Olympics."

I hate alarmist, the-dollar-is-dead, the-sky-is-falling, the-end-is-near economic writing, but this piece paints an interesting picture to think about as we watch these Games and this growing superpower. It's also a good example of a justified reason to be upset about your taxes! How many email forwards have you received bitching about how much we spend on social services, environmental protection, and (I kid you not, I received this one) grants to organizations such as the Special Olympics? How many forwards have you received that make the connection between our taxes and the interest that we pay to China to cover our irresponsible spending for the last eight years?

Broadway

2008-05-12T22:16:00.006-04:00

Beth and I have managed to see five Broadway shows so far this year. Happily I can recommend all of them:
- Curtains
- Gypsy
- The Seafarer
- Sunday in the Park with George
- November

If you know Patti LuPone at all, go see Gypsy. I know her mostly from a few movies and the cast recording of Evita from the 70s. I can't believe she can still sing as amazingly as she does. She received a five-minute standing ovation after one of the songs in the show. Just blew us all away.

If you know David Mamet at all, go see November. It's a great play and classic Mamet dialogue. I love Nathan Lane in it and even four months later I am still amazed by all of the layers of plot Mamet is able to pile on top of one another. I love everything Mamet writes and I'm going to see [the movie] Redbelt as soon as possible.

If you think all musicals are the same, go see Sunday in the Park with George. Most musicals have an amazing musical experience -- and this Sondheim play certainly delivers in that regard -- but this show is an amazing visual experience as well. I came into this show knowing nothing about it, and came away just amazed by the experience. I guess it shouldn't be surprising that a play about the composition of a painting would be visual in nature!

Curtains is hilarious and will be loved by anyone who likes David Hyde Pierce as much as we do. The Seafarer is an Irish play that had an amazing collection of actors, demonstrating an impressive range of drunken acting and uses for the f-word (including my new favorite use). Unfortunately, the show is closed now.

I think this may be a good post to plug my friend Jonathan who is currently in the Broadway production of Avenue Q. We went to see Jonathan play the lead roles of Princeton/Rod last year... we loved the show, but mostly I just came away thinking "my friend is a freakin' rock star". There was a point in the musical where Jonathan came down the aisle close to the audience and these teenage girls surrounding us went nuts over him... really? Jonathan? If you have a chance to see Ave Q, go see it. And if you have a chance to see Jonathan in the lead roles, you're in for a treat!

One of our favorite musicals is Rent, which we saw at least 10 times from the $20 seats while we were Columbia students. Rent is closing this year, so we're planning to go see it one last time. If anyone else is planning a farewell visit to Rent, let us know and we'll join you.

Transparency ... Accountability

2008-04-07T14:47:00.005-04:00

As almost everyone who knows us already knows, Beth and I have been living on "the envelope system" for almost one year. We have cut up our credit cards, "given every dollar a name" at the end of each month, and have tried to work quickly to reduce our debt. As anyone who reads this blog knows, we have not completely deprived ourselves of travel and entertainment, but I assure you that our primary focus for the past five-plus years has been on eliminating our debt.

We use Google Documents to create and manage our budgets. It's a fantastic program and its web-based nature allows us to do our budgeting from anywhere we can find an internet connection (we did our March budget from Barcelona).

This pie chart is tied directly to the numbers in our Google Spreadsheet budget. They reflect actual dollars allocated toward various categories (some of the money is not yet spent, but it's all been "given a name" as Dave Ramsey says) (btw, we have a few more budget categories than this...some have been consolidated for the chart). As our budgets change over the next few months/years, this pie chart will automatically reflect the changes.

Beth and I will finally have our last student loan paid off by this time next year. You may notice that "Loans" is a big part of our budget. One of the challenges that we will face after paying that last loan is how we will use the excess money. We could put it into Housing...perhaps get a bigger place, or move to a better neighborhood. We could put it into Fun/Big Buys...get new furniture and electronics, take expensive vacations. We could create a new pie category called Savings...we still need to build up our emergency fund and eventually save some more money for retirement (full disclosure: we have a 401k that is not part of the budget). We could shrink the size of the pie...if my work becomes unhealthy for some reason, I could take a different job or work fewer hours, even if it meant a pay cut.

Some of those are good options, and we might choose to do all of those things to some degree. But our hope -- and the reason to create this blog post and provide some transparency into our financial life -- is that we will be able to greatly increase that Giving wedge. Please keep an eye on it -- we're counting on you.

Zuper Respect!

2008-03-08T20:02:00.004-05:00

On our last day in Barcelona, we drove to Parc Guell. The parking is very limited in this area, so unless you want to walk several kilometers you must be a fearless parker. Observe my masterful parking job in the attached photo! Manual transmission on a hill! A German tourist walking by as I was finishing parking exclaimed, "Zuper!"

Stop #8

2008-03-08T19:50:00.003-05:00

Saint Pierre des Champs / Carcassonne. We rented a car and pressed ahead to the beautiful Le Roc Sur L'orbieu guesthouse located in Saint Pierre des Champs. This guesthouse is a 1100 year-old castle in the French countryside, surrounded by acres of vineyards. We plan to come back here as often as possible over the remainder of our lives! It was a beautiful old building with surprisingly comfortable accommodations and a charming hostess named Helen. Helen cooked dinner for us and the two French men who were also staying at the guest house (on a fishing holiday) named Serge and Patrice. The six of us had a wonderful evening as we shared about four hours of discussion over many delicious courses. Serge and Patrice were two extremes – Patrice was quiet and Serge was a character. When we sat down at the beautifully-prepared table, he remarked, “oooh... french table... very competiteev!”

Stop #7 (unplanned)

2008-03-08T19:35:00.004-05:00

Saillagouse. After turning around in Andorra, we finally made it to France, albeit later than expected. So it was almost 11 PM when our car suddenly decided to die. We were on a mountain road in the middle of nowhere, 30km from Saillagouse and 20km from Prades. We moved the car to a somewhat safe spot off the road (hard to tell for sure in the darkness) and after a few unsuccessful attempts to flag down a car, we finally got one to stop... and thankfully it was a pair of firemen with a radio! After determining that we don’t know any French and they don’t know any English, we found that we all knew a little Spanish. They took a look under the hood and tried to start the car, but couldn’t determine the problem. After a while, they offered to give us a ride to Saillagouse and hand us off to the police. This was a very small town with only two hotels, both of which were closed at this late hour. However, the police contacted the owner of Planotel, a 110 year-old hotel in town, and asked him to open up for us. They also gave us information for contacting a local garage to fix the car. All of the French people we met were beyond nice, beyond friendly, ... they were magnifiques.

Stop #6

2008-03-08T19:21:00.002-05:00

Andorra is a small country in the Pyrenees between Spain and France. Since we were crossing from Spain to France it made sense to check out this neighboring country which is a renowned ski spot. We quickly located their famous spa and pool facility – Caldea – and treated ourselves to a few relaxing hours. My favorite part was the pool’s tunnel to the outdoors where we could look up at the mountains as the snow fell on us...amazing. Unfortunately, the road we had planned to take to France was snowed in, so we had to backtrack through Spain.

Stop #5

2008-03-08T19:11:00.003-05:00

Tossa de Mar / Roses. We drove through many small towns along the Costa Brava. Each one was unique and beautiful. We stopped in Tossa de Mar for lunch, where we walked through the old fort (castle?) and along the beach. I was shocked by the blueness of the water of the Mediterranean.

Stop #4

2008-03-08T19:00:00.003-05:00

Montserrat. We drove from Barca into the mountains north of the city to Montserrat. We walked the grounds of the monastery and listened to a service of singing from the famous boys choir. It was a transcendent experience.

Language

2008-03-04T17:09:00.003-05:00

I did not brush up on my spanish in anticipation of my trip to Barcelona. My spanish isn't very good to begin with, but it's sufficient to get directions, order a drink, and do most of the day-to-day things a tourist does.

What language do you think is used in the subway advertisement in the photo???

Yep, after spending a few days in Barca, I'm very glad I didn't invest any time brushing up on my spanish -- it wouldn't have done me any good.

Stop #3

2008-03-04T16:55:00.005-05:00

Barca! What a great city -- beautiful parks, beautiful beaches, beautiful streets, and simply amazing buildings. I will have to devote several future posts to the details, but for now I'll just say that stop #3 is beautiful Barcelona.

Stop #2

2008-02-28T07:20:00.002-05:00

I arrived in Amsterdam last weekend. It's such a pleasant, quiet little city compared to London (or NY of course). It feels good to be back. My days have been very full: lots of projects to work on, then drinks and dinner with colleagues after work, then more work from the hotel (the New York workday continues to about midnight CET). I haven't had any opportunity for tourist activities this trip.

It's been a good trip, but I'm really missing my wife! Good thing I'll see her tonight!

Stop #1

2008-02-26T16:49:00.006-05:00

I flew into London on Thursday and had meetings in the City of London. This was my first time in our London office meeting with this particular group. These folks live on an island in so many ways :)

And I finally got a chance to see the Gherkin up close (see the pic). But the highlight of my stay was getting to spend the evening with a beautiful pregnant Katherine and her husband Alex. They took me to a pub for drinks and then a great Indian dinner. Thanks guys!

He's on a roll (and She's earning her reputation)

2008-02-13T00:17:00.004-05:00

Obama is on a roll! He's now won 23 of 34 contests, including the last 8 in a row!

I'm incredibly optimistic that we're going to pull this thing out and I could not be more proud of the manner in which we're winning -- with integrity and a positive, hopeful message.

ON THE OTHER HAND, Hillary has been embarrassing herself since South Carolina. The Clinton campaign has mentioned race at every turn in this campaign. She pledged, along with all of the democratic candidates, not to campaign in Michigan and Florida. But when it came down to it, she was the only candidate not to remove her name from the ballot. When she "won", she actually held a victory celebration! And now her legal team is calling for "every vote to be counted" and for the Michigan and Florida delegates to be assigned to her.

Last Wednesday, the Clinton campaign finally announced their contribution total for January -- $13 million -- and acknowledged that $5 million was on loan from the Clintons themselves. Her problem, according to many articles, was that she had already raised the maximum allowed ($2300) from many of her donors. Her solution to this problem was to ask those donors to give another $2300 to her general election campaign! Apparently this is legal; however, if she does not make it to November, her campaign will have to refund all of that money. How irresponsible can you be? By contrast, Obama's huge number of donors (418,000 so far in 2008) have given only $25-100 each, permitting them to make many more donations before reaching the limit. Speaking of which: please donate to the campaign if you can; we have Texas and Ohio coming up in a couple weeks and we're going to need the money.

And finally, Hillary has refused to even acknowledge that she has lost the last 8 contests. It's customary to congratulate your opponent on their victories, as Obama has done each time. Clinton is in denial now, but I don't think it will be long before she has to face reality.

It was a super Tuesday for me

2008-02-06T11:20:00.005-05:00

For the first time in my life, I became a campaigner! Last Saturday, Beth and I paid a visit to our local Obama 08 campaign office, picked up some materials, and attended a rally in East Harlem. Last Sunday, I campaigned in front of markets and churches on the Upper West Side. There were several meeting places to choose from; I went to the Starbucks on 103rd. I couldn't believe that at 9:00am on a Sunday morning that there were FIFTY volunteers assembled and ready to go. It was a cold day, but I spent about four hours standing on the sidewalk, holding an Obama sign, handing out flyers, and asking people to "Vote Obama!" It was one of my best New York days ever! It was amazing to talk and interact with so many people -- the other volunteers, the Obama supporters who were ecstatic to see us, and some folks who were not happy to see us. It was amazing and strange to be proclaiming my politics so publicly. People would just stop and ask 'so why do you support Obama' and I'd have a chance to tell them.

It was such a good experience that Beth and I spent another hour Monday evening handing out flyers and talking to people as they exited the subway. Then, on Super Tuesday, I campaigned from 7 to 9 in the morning and 5 to 9 in the evening. The Obama volunteers were amazing! We had someone on nearly every street corner up and down the UWS. During the evening shift, I campaigned 100 feet from a polling place adjacent to a small group of Hillary supporters (the only Hillary supporters I had seen all weekend). We talked to each other about our candidates, the issues, our predictions for the night, and the (un)likelihood of an Obama/Clinton ticket in November. I campaigned with an old gentleman who is a former NY State Senator and with a lovely woman who campaigned for Bobby Kennedy in 1968. She said that this is the first campaign she has seen since that 1968 campaign that has inspired so much grassroots enthusiasm and participation.

My efforts on that Tuesday may or may not have won many votes for Obama, but I was rewarded to come home exhausted and hear Obama deliver this great speech:

"Change will not come if we wait for some other person or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek."

Keep Hope Alive

2008-02-02T23:17:00.001-05:00

Went to an Obama rally today with supporters of all ages!

Super Tuesday -- Yes We Can

2008-02-02T12:00:00.001-05:00

A huge win!

2008-01-26T22:40:00.000-05:00

Even after the huge misinformation campaign, the Clinton/Edwards tag teaming in the SC debate, and repeated attacks from Bill Clinton, Obama is unstoppable!!! Not only did Obama win, he pulled in more than twice as many votes as Clinton!

It's tough to maintain a positive message of hope in the face of everything that was thrown at him in South Carolina, but Obama managed to finish even stronger than he started. We're almost there, folks! -- 22 states go to the polls on February 5th. If you haven't had a chance to make up your mind about the field of candidates, learn more about Barack at his website and donate to make sure we get the right person into the White House!

OBAMA

2008-01-13T18:41:00.000-05:00

About three years ago when presidential candidates started campaigning (okay, maybe it hasn’t been quite that long), I began to take an increased interest in Barack Obama. I was mesmerized by his presence and his message of hope at the Democratic Convention in 2004. That night, I talked to my mom on the phone and she said “I want to vote for that guy!” I was one of many who were privately wishing for Obama to enter the 2008 race. When he did, I was cautiously optimistic.

When he joined the race, I began to pay attention to his news coverage, subscribed to his podcast, and generally did everything I could to keep track of him. The more I listened and the more I learned, the more I believed Obama was unlike any presidential candidate I’d ever seen. He spoke about issues in such a reasoned and rational way, without any of the sensationalism that is typical of a congressman trying to get his or her name in the paper. Obama is older than I am, but for the first time I felt like I was hearing the voice of my generation: someone who wants to address the issues that I care about, who really appreciates the complexity of these issues, and doesn’t just treat them as a prop in his sound bites. In short, I believed that he must be completely unelectable!

Last Tuesday, the day of the New Hampshire primary, after Obama had won the Iowa caucus, the front page of the Wall Street Journal had an article about how Obama had double-digit leads over Hillary in NH polls. I was beyond ecstatic. I literally felt the same way that I felt on Election Day 2004 when exit polls showed John Kerry way ahead of Bush. I now completely despise pollsters, by the way. When Obama was edged out in the NH primary, I felt motivated like never before: This is too big an opportunity at too critical a time for our country. On Wednesday, along with more than 20,000 others similarly motivated, Beth and I donated to Obama’s campaign. We later discovered that our brother- and sister-in-law (registered Republicans, for the record) had also donated to Obama on Wednesday.

This is the first of many ways we hope to be able to support the campaign. I’ll post more about that later, but for now let me encourage you to go to the Barack Obama website. It’s a fantastic site and if you don’t know anything about Obama it’s a great place to see where he stands on the issues and watch some of his speeches. If you come away with as much hope as I have, then make a donation.

Going Under the Scope

2007-11-29T17:17:00.000-05:00

I hadn't planned to write again so soon after my last post. Two posts within such a short period of time only calls attention to the long span of nothing between July and November. But I decided to post anyway, since I will be "going away" for a while.

A few weeks ago I finished the job on my ACL while playing soccer (the only way I would have it). Tomorrow afternoon I will go in for surgery. Dr. Schell will cut out part of my kneecap tendon and use it as a new ACL. I'm planning to remain conscious during the procedure and hope that the experience will be very educational. I learned a lot by staying awake during my knee surgery five years ago.

I am glad to have the surgery scheduled for a Friday, so that I can have the weekend to begin my recovery. And I blocked out my meeting schedule on Monday and Tuesday in case I need to work from home, and I expected to be back in the office on Wednesday, even if it was on crutches. This seemed reasonable based on my experience with my previous ankle surgery and two previous knee surgeries. However, I spoke to Dr. Schell today and he told me this was going to be a completely different type of recovery. Gulp.

So now I'm scrambling to prepare for what may possibly be a week or more of being very doped up and/or in quite a bit of pain. Today they delivered a "knee bending machine" to the apartment. I haven't seen it yet, but I am supposed to use it for FOUR HOURS A DAY every day after surgery. From what I've heard, it basically just bends my leg back and forth over and over. I'm sure I'll come to hate it.

Thanks for your good wishes. Please send DVDs in lieu of flowers. Comedies. I don't think I'll be in the mood for deep meaningful art films.

Busy days

2007-11-27T10:53:00.000-05:00

When I finished school in May I felt like I had an abundance of free time. No need to sit in class for six hours a week; No need to put in countless hours of reading during my weeknights; No dreaded group projects to suffer through on my weekends. Of course, we tend to fill whatever time we have available, don't we? So part of my newfound free time was given over to teaching a Financial Peace class on Sunday mornings as well as becoming more active in my role as Shiloh board member. (I also tried to rejoin my soccer team, but that had a swift and painful conclusion).

For a while, my work started to fill up that time as well. My trips to Amsterdam created a great deal of work for me to do, and for a few weeks this fall I would leave work, get home, eat dinner, pull out the laptop, and get right back to work. This obviously wasn't any fun for me or for Beth. So I started enforcing a no-work-from-home rule. I assumed this meant one of two things had to happen: stay late to get everything done, or leave without finishing everything. But what I found was something in between. By setting a deadline for myself each day to leave work on time and refrain from doing any work at home, I have been able to do a better job of addressing the more important tasks and finding other ways to deal with the less important things (which could mean delegating to someone else or letting them remain undone for some period of time). I have since learned that this is in line with Parkinson's Law which states that "work will fill the time available for its completion."

I am now able to finish everything that I need to accomplish and still get home at a reasonable hour and have a nice evening with Beth. There are still a number of projects that I would like to do and simply don't have time for, but I'm hopeful that I'll find a solution that doesn't involve working longer hours. I think I know a good place to start: Yesterday afternoon I was looking through my Sent Items on my email program at work, trying to find a message I had sent in the morning. It wasn't a particularly busy day for me, but there seemed to be a lot of sent messages to look through. It turns out that I sent 112 work-related emails yesterday. Over a 10 hour workday, that averages out to one email every 5 1/2 minutes. Considering the hours spent in meetings each day, the rate of emailing is even higher (not to mention all of the IMs and phone calls). There must be a better way...

Notes on Amsterdam

2007-07-14T12:37:00.000-04:00

This week I had a business trip to Amsterdam to meet with colleagues from the Amsterdam Stock Exchange (the oldest stock exchange in the world) which is now part of the same company as the New York Stock Exchange -- NYSE Euronext. This was my first trip to Amsterdam and although it was only a few days and I had only a few hours of free time for exploring the city, I had a wonderful experience and learned a great deal about the city.

Canals

Amsterdam is a city built on water. Well, it's built on land, but it's very wet land (in fact it is named for the dam on the Amstel river). In addition to the port on the river, there are canals running throughout the city. Over 100 kilometers, in fact. The city is 85 square miles; over 20 square miles of that is water! These canals make for a beautiful and pleasant city experience with more than 1,000 canal bridges.

Bicycles

Soccer is the most popular sport in Amsterdam (and I hope to catch an Ajax game when I go back), but cycling has got to be a close second. No, I don't mean that they are big fans of the Tour de France. I mean that everyone rides a bike! They ride their bikes to work; they ride their bikes to the store; they ride their bikes to restaurants; they ride their bikes everywhere. I watched in disbelief as men in suits pedaled their way to work past older folks riding to the store. And in the evening young folks dressed up in their "bar scene" best hopped on their bikes and rode to the club.

For the most part everybody rides inexpensive, cruiser-style, one-speed, pedal-brake bikes. You don't need anything too nice -- the city is built on water so there are no hills anywhere that might require more than one gear.

Beverages

Heineken and Amstel Light are two of my favorite brands of beer -- both from Holland -- so I had high expectations for the beers in Amsterdam. I wasn't disappointed. We enjoyed many Dutch and Belgian beers as well as a Dutch gin called Jenever.

Beverages in the workplace are different in Amsterdam. People don't just get up and go grab themselves a coffee, water, or tea. Instead, they grab a tray and ask everyone whether they would like a drink. Sharing beverages together and serving each other is an important part of their culture.

My flight from New York left at 6:30 Monday night and arrived at 8:15 Tuesday morning. After arriving, I went straight to the office and began a blurry-eyed day of meetings. Needless to say, I drank and enjoyed coffee for the first time in my life on Tuesday.

English

I have visited many countries where English is not the native language. In those cases, I have usually managed to get by with my very poor Spanish, German, or Italian. And when I could not manage, there was almost always someone nearby who spoke English and could help out. But sometimes I could sense impatience or resentment from those helpers and others in the room that were subjected to this foreign language called English.

In Amsterdam, however, English is pervasive in spoken form. Whether it was a worker at my hotel, a clerk at the bike rental shop, or a random person that I stopped to ask directions -- they all seem to speak great English and don't mind at all. As for written language, the official signage is almost always in Dutch. But storefront signs, menus, advertisements, and most anything else that you need to read are written in both Dutch and English.

Realists vs. Optimists?

When I met one of my Dutch colleagues, I noticed a good-sized paperback on his desk entitled How to Work with Americans. Since our merger, my company has been learning about the cultural differences between the US and Europe when it comes to workplace practices and attitudes. The Amsterdam office had recently brought in an expert to speak with them about what to expect when working with Americans. One of the biggest differences that he pointed out was that Americans are generally optimists and Europeans are generally realists. This manifests itself in many ways in the workplace, usually with Americans wanting to dive right in to new strategies or product lines, while the Europeans are much more cautious and deliberate in their approach.

I was mindful of this when, during a conversation at dinner, one of my Dutch colleagues mentioned the "golden years" when answering my question about the prominence of Indonesian culture in the city. I recalled from one of my business school classes that The Netherlands was the economic world power during the 17th and 18th centuries (after the Italians and before the British). Their colonization of Indonesia (the Dutch East Indies) allowed the Dutch East India Company to become the most successful company in the history of the world. I am hypothesizing that this may explain the optimist vs. realist situation in which we find ourselves... we Americans are living in the midst of our economic dominance; we think we are invincible.

Thinking about the famous Dutch business acumen, I'd also like to mention here that our association of Holland with tulips may have different origins that you may believe. The Dutch are not famous for growing tulips; They are famous for their tulip market -- selling options on the tulip crop! Isn't it easy to see how New York evolved from New Amsterdam?

Global Warming

Another dinner conversation was about American politics. They are actually very aware of our presidential race and asked questions about Hilary, Obama, Bloomberg, McCain, and Giuliani. It was clear that they really had just one issue in mind -- global warming. They are big believers that human actions are shaping the climate and that they have already seen some changes in Amsterdam. I had seen An Inconvenient Truth just a couple weeks ago and mentioned that Amsterdam was featured prominently in a section of that film. They said that they were very hopeful when that movie came out that it would initiate a big change in American policies. They asked if I thought there was any chance that Gore would join the race for president and whether I thought he could win if he did. It was hard to break their hearts.

Pulp Fiction

Yet another conversation at dinner turned to films, including Pulp Fiction. One of my Dutch colleagues mentioned that it was not until she saw Pulp Fiction that she realized that the rest of the world might put something different on their french fries:

Vincent: You know what they put on french fries in Holland instead of ketchup?

Jules: What?

Vincent: Mayonnaise.

Jules: G-- d---!

Vincent: I seen 'em do it, man, they f----n' drown 'em in that s---.

Jules: That's some f----d up s---.

And I fulfilled a curiosity that I have had for 13 years:

It was delicious, but I couldn't finish the whole thing -- their mayo is much richer than ours!

Mozy

2007-07-06T21:48:00.000-04:00

I have been looking for a good PC backup solution for about 8 years now. About the time that I started taking digital pictures, sending significant email, buying music, creating anything that I wanted to be sure not to lose ... I have been looking for a way to protect it from that inevitable day when a hard drive crash would wipe it all away forever.

I have used zip disks, which were fine at the time but soon became insufficient. I tried CDs, but it was painfully slow. Then I added a second hard drive and backed up one disk to another and more recently I've used an external hard drive. These solutions work great, but it gets tricky when trying to back up multiple computers and I always need a larger drive eventually. And then there's the what-if-there's-a-fire issue...not a good idea to have the backup stored 2 feet away from the original.

Real exciting, I know. But this is where Mozy comes in.

Since March I have been using an online backup service called Mozy. This service backs up files and folders from both of my PCs by securely transferring them to online storage. As you might imagine, this was a slow process; But eventually everything was backed up and now any new files are backed up immediately. And best of all, Mozy provides unlimited storage. Currently, I have 115 GB of files backed up!

Overall, I have been pleasantly surprised with how well it works and I highly recommend it if you're looking for an easy way to back up your stuff.

Picture tour

2007-06-17T13:02:00.000-04:00

Spent memorial day weekend with my dad and brother in Las Vegas. Won some money, but not as much as I lost :(

Poor penguins! Dallas?!?

The bus always has the right-of-way

My wife arranged the most wonderful date on Wednesday -- a two-hour sunset sail on the Schooner Adirondack down the Hudson to the Statue of Liberty. We sipped wine, ate chocolate-covered strawberries, snuggled under our blanket, and enjoyed the city views. Only when she tried to prevent me from singing "My Country tis of Thee" at the Statue of Liberty did things get tense...

Knee Update

2007-06-07T18:46:00.001-04:00

The so-called "professionals" disagree with my MRI reading ... slightly. They're calling it a "high grade partial tear" of the ACL. I think I would rather it be a complete tear... this diagnosis puts me into something of a grey area to choose between surgical reconstruction and rehab without surgery. Given my age and activity level, surgery still seems like the most likely option.

So the next step is to have another examination by a doctor who specializes in ACLs. That will happen next Tuesday afternoon...

MRI

2007-06-03T23:09:00.000-04:00

I injured my knee in a soccer game last Tuesday. I was running to get back on defense, I caught up to the guy with the ball, I made a big step to get in front of him and when I planted my right leg I felt it land... and then I felt my knee give. After a minute I was able to walk away, but I knew that there was definitely a problem.

So today I went to have an MRI of my knee taken. I have had four of five MRIs before, so I knew what to expect. But not long ago, I read an article about a guy who died getting an MRI and it has freaked me out ever since. In the story I read, someone had left a steel oxygen tank in the MRI room and when the machine was turned on, the powerful magnet attracted the tank and the patient was hit in the head. So today I was sure to take everything out of my pockets before climbing up onto the table. But as the table started to slide into the machine, I felt my waist being pulled upward! "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" She stopped the table. I lifted my shirt and saw my belt buckle (I never wear a belt which was why I forgot all about it) being pulled away from me. I took off the belt as I lay there and as I held the belt by the middle, the buckle was strongly pulled away from me pointing up at the machine! I pulled it away and gave it to the technician, who asked in way-too-surprised-a-manner "could you feel the magnet pulling it?" Really freaky. I didn't relax the whole time after that.

So I have my films and will deliver them to my doctor in the morning. But of course I can't wait to know the result so I found images of good knees and torn ACL knees on the web, and I've been comparing my films. I'm 99% sure that I have a torn ACL. There is clearly supposed to be a dark line (the cruciate ligament) connecting the two bones. My ligament is clearly not connecting as I see it. Any radiologists out there want to disagree? Please???

Life After School

2007-05-21T21:02:00.000-04:00

It's been two weeks since I submitted my final paper for my MBA at NYU's Stern School. I am incredibly happy to be done, as you might expect -- it's been a long four years! But there is definitely part of me that is sad to be done. I have had the opportunity to hear lectures from brilliant men and women for two nights a week and I've been challenged to think in ways that were completely new to a math/engineering guy like me. For each of eleven semesters, I excitedly reviewed the course catalog and considered what I wanted to learn next. Of course the learning won't stop with the end of school, but the opportunities won't be the same and I just hope that I made the most of my time at Stern.

Now that I am finished with school it feels like I have a lot of free time, even with that pesky full-time job! There are many, many things that I hope to do with this new-found freedom. I want to spend more time with my wife, which I have been missing for a long time. Hopefully, we have a long summer of camping trips ahead of us! And of course I really want to spend more time reacquainting my body with physical activity -- soccer (the season is already underway), golf (ok, maybe it's not physical activity, but I'm dying to get back out there), the gym (at least more frequently than I already do), and hopefully I'll soon get a bike and begin cycling with my brother-in-law.

I also hope to spend more time studying one of my favorite interests: personal finance. This may sound like a strange thing to list as an interest, but I believe it's a powerful force in people's lives that can either be the cause of enormous distress or freedom. It's made a big difference in my life and the lives of people close to me, and I hope to find a way to share some of that peace with others. Lastly, as I alluded to in my last post, I joined the board of a non-profit and look forward to assisting with its growth. The non-profit is called Shiloh, which is an organization that serves at-risk children in New York City through neighborhood programs and a summer camp in upstate New York. I have seen Shiloh work in the lives of kids firsthand through my involvement over the past seven years; I am proud to be able to serve Shiloh in a new capacity.

Yep, I've been waiting a long time for this free time and I plan to put it to good use. I'm even going to try to do a better job working on my blog, but more on that later...

We went to Spain!

2007-05-06T15:56:00.000-04:00

And London! And Palm Springs... and San Antonio to meet our new nephew... and my friend Irene came to visit... and I joined the board of a non-profit... and the spring soccer season began... and Beth had an awesome birthday party...

All kinds of things have been going on since my last post, but I have not taken the time to blog on any of them! One of the primary reasons for that is school... but not for long. I'm working on my last paper for my last class of my last semester... finally!

Once the semester is over, I am going to try to become a more regular blogger. I have a long list of things I intend to write about, but just very little time. Hopefully, finishing school will change that.

In the meantime, here are a couple photo albums:

Spring Break 2007 with Nephew Austin

Spain 2007

Amazing valentine

2007-02-15T23:27:00.000-05:00

I have the most amazing valentine. My wife decided that she was going to take charge of Valentine's Day this year -- and she went ALL OUT!

First, dinner at the very romantic "The Place" in the Village

Then, to watch Kristin Chenoweth in The Apple Tree

Next, a quick stop at Chevy's for margaritas and a late night snack

And finally -- rather than waiting for a late-night subway and going home to a cold apartment -- we crossed the street to our room in the 4-Star Times Square Hilton!

It was an amazing night. I'm a lucky, lucky guy!

Bow tie

2006-11-09T13:41:00.000-05:00

I see an occasional guy in a bow tie around Wall St. They're not as popular as suspenders, but certainly more common than top hats -- I haven't seen anyone wearing a top hat in days. So when I see one of these guys with the bow tie, I can't help but wonder: At what point in his life does a man begin wearing a bow tie?

Can a guy wear a necktie to the office for years and then one day just show up in a bow tie? That would be a long day of answering the same question. How would you begin to explain it? How do you explain it to your wife?? You might as well tell her that you're changing your name. Or your religion. No, I think you're either born a bow tie person, or not.

I must admit that I make snap judgments about the guys that I see wearing them; They fall into one of two groups -- comedians or pompous assholes. In my experience* these judgments have been correct nearly 100% of the time -- and I don't know any comedians.

You should never trust anybody who wears a bow tie. Cravat's supposed to point down to accentuate the genitals. Why'd you wanna trust somebody whose tie points out to accentuate his ears?
- David Mamet, State and Main

By the way, I might as well plug this great website which has the answer to every clothing/etiquette question you'll ever have.

* Lark excluded

Separating truth from satire

2006-11-03T14:28:00.000-05:00

I listen to various news podcasts on my ipod every day during my commute. I also have some podcasts that include fiction, commentary, and satire (like The Unger Report). Yesterday, I listened to a story so ironic that I had to double-check and make sure it was real news!

By now, we're all familiar with global warming and the fact that it's happening*. One of the leading causes of global warming has been our wildly increasing use of fossil fuels, which pollute the atmosphere when burned to make energy (and one "solution" to at least slow global warming is to use alternative sources of energy). Global warming, as we've all heard, is causing the polar ice caps to melt which may have severe consequences on the earth's climate.

The story that I heard yesterday talked about the world's "last big land grab" that is taking place at the north pole. As the ice caps melt, countries (and certain companies) are scrambling to lay claim to as much of this land as possible:

Russia has been quick off the mark, laying claim to half the Arctic Ocean. Denmark has designs on the North Pole. While Norway is claiming 60,000 square-miles of seabed... the melting Arctic ice cap is clearing the way for economic opportunities once thought impossible.

Why is everybody so eager to get their hands on this new territory? Wait for it... oil rights! That's right, folks, even in the Day After Tomorrow world of melted polar ice caps, we're still going to be oil crazy.

* if there's still anyone that doubts that global warming is occurring, the fact that greedy companies are pouring cash into preparing for it should be evidence enough!

Beginning to look a lot like...

2006-10-17T13:41:00.000-04:00

When I got to work this morning, the guy in front of me set off the metal detector so he had to go back around and try again. When I went through I saw his things coming out of the x-ray machine ahead of mine and noticed his ipod was still playing. I glanced at it just to see out of curiosity what he was listening to: "Silent Night" from Al Green's The Christmas Album.

Yes, it has become quite a bit colder in NY in the last few days, but Christmas music??? It's beginning to look a lot like FALL! And hopefully it will be a nice long season.

Nine-eleven

2006-09-11T13:40:00.000-04:00

For the last five years I have cringed at the mention of "Nine-eleven".

For the first year after 9/11/01, the words "Nine-eleven" evoked a very powerful feeling...the vivid memory of a huge explosion outside my office window...the unprecedented fear that I was not safe...the smoke that enveloped the neighborhood that day as I walked out; the smell that lingered everywhere for weeks...and my co-workers who literally ran for their lives to get out of tower two, and those (that I didn't know) who didn't make it.

For the last four years, the words "Nine-eleven" have been used as a political trump card to justify postures and policies, to berate those who disagree, to invoke fear. It drives me crazy when I hear them used so casually.

Today, as with each anniversary, I will try to remove the jaded, skeptical part of my "Nine-eleven" associations. I will try to go back to remembering what that day was, before it became so many other things.

This is an email that I sent to friends and family on 9/13/01:

Tuesday morning was the most extraordinary morning of my life. I have found it helpful but difficult to write about the things that I experienced and felt on that day, and would like to share them with you. My experience is not unique, and compared with those of thousands of others, hardly seems like an experience at all. Thanks to those of you who called, wrote, and offered your prayers.

I got off the #2 train at the Wall Street stop at about 8:15 Tuesday morning and headed toward my office on the 22nd floor of the New York Stock Exchange. After going through the usual security checks at the door and waiting for the elevators I ride to get to my floor, I walked into my office at about 8:25. I started answering emails and talked with some of the guys on my floor about last night's football game, etc.

At about 8:45, I was walking back into my office when I heard a whining sound (as a shooting missile sounds in a movie) that lasted for about one second followed by a very low BOOM that gave my office a thump. You hear many strange sounds in New York and teach yourself not to pay attention to them, but there was never any question that this sound was completely out of the ordinary. I looked out my window and saw the World Trade Center tower (see the attached photo of the WTC that I took from my office window on August 17th), which is about 3 blocks away, in flames at least as tall as ten floors. Others on my floor rushed into my office and we stood for a few seconds trying to comprehend what we were looking at. "Someone got a bomb into the World Trade Center" was the first thing out of my mouth. We view the WTC from the Southeast, so from our view the damage took place from the inside out. Once the flames died down a little bit, we could see the huge gash in the side of the building. Smoke was pouring from the building and the sky was full of papers, flying everywhere, some of them landing on my window ledge. Though my windows were closed, we could smell the ash. All I could think about was that many people had probably just died.

We immediately began calling news stations and family to report what we saw. Within five minutes, we found news stories online with pictures of the smoking tower and eyewitness reports that a plane had crashed into the building. We thought that the eyewitness reports were absurd (we couldn't see the north side of the building where the plane hit) and could never believe that a plane could be off course or out of control so badly that it could hit a major building. We continued looking out the window and debating the cause, while watching pedestrians below run through the streets, some of them abandoning their cars in traffic. Then, one of my co-workers, Erbil, arrived. He said that he had been getting off the PATH train from New Jersey (in the World Trade Center, where the train station is) when the building began to shake. He said that people were screaming and panicking in the lobby of the Tower. They didn't know whether it was safer to stay in the building or leave and try to avoid getting hit by the falling debris outside. Erbil had decided to make a run for it and made it all the way to the Exchange.

At a little after 9 a.m., we heard the same whining, rocket-like sound followed by the same thump, and our stomachs just sank. In that one second, we knew that whatever it was that happened the first time was happening again. This was the instant that the real panic set in: if it was an airplane that hit the first tower, then this was another, which means that it was definitely no accident. The second explosion left a much larger gash in the tower, from our point of view. The plane had hit from the west, but most of the damage was to the south face of the building, which we could see distinctly. We watched for a few seconds in silent disbelief. This was something that you might see in a movie, but never in person.

Soon, we began to fear for ourselves. This attack was getting closer to our building and we felt like the NYSE might be a target. We quickly grabbed our things and headed downstairs. After slowly making our way down 22 flights of stairs, we were ushered onto the trading floor to await further instructions.

The trading floor was loud and busy (and awe-inspiring, as it was my first time to be on the floor), not with trading but with people trying to get information about what was happening outside. Our cell phones won't work from the trading floor (for security, no electronic signals from the floor can be detected outside), so we had to find phones that could give us an outside line. When I did, I left a message for Beth, who was in class, and called my dad to let him know I was okay.

For the next several minutes, we watched the television monitors to find out what was going on. In disbelief, we watched reports that indicated that commercial planes had been hijacked and flown into the World Trade Center and we finally saw footage of what the other side of the towers looked like. From our firsthand views, nobody in my circle of discussion ever would have thought that the towers were in danger of collapsing. Never. The damage seemed to be significant, but the fact that the towers didn't collapse immediately led us to believe that they would continue to stand. These buildings were so enormous, not only in height but in its perimeter, that it was unimaginable that they could ever fall. The TV reports now indicated that the same type of attack had struck the Pentagon. I felt frightened for the country. I felt like anything could happen now -- the Capital could be decimated, or the White House; the President could be killed -- nothing seemed out of the realm of possibilities. Announcements were made informing us that no one would be allowed to leave the building. The borough of Manhattan was sealed off, the condition of the public transportation was uncertain, and we were told that it was simply too dangerous to risk going outside.

Many, many long minutes later, I heard a thundering noise, quickly began to smell more ash and soot, and the lights in the Exchange started to flicker. Some people on the floor began to yell in panic and the screams and quick reactions to the sound had everybody on edge -- we thought that the Exchange was under attack. For the next few minutes, rumors circulated that there were people in the building without IDs, that bags were found unattended, possibly with explosives. The paranoia of a few quickly spread to many others and people began dashing for the exit, which was being blocked by security guards. The security guards tackled several people to the ground and Dick Grasso, the president of the Exchange, got on the loudspeaker yelling at people to calm down. The whole scene lasted less than thirty seconds, but it only took seconds for me and others who were calm to become extremely worried and frantically look around the room for something to run away from. The first World Trade tower had collapsed.

We could see it on the TV screens and we had certainly smelled, heard, and felt it happen, but couldn't believe that downtown New York would forever be changed. As the TV cameras zoomed in on where the tower had once been we were amazed to see the sky peeking through the dense smoke. My friend Maneesh was receiving messages on his wireless email device. I borrowed it to send an email to Beth: "Safe on trading floor. Can't leave yet. Love you, B." Two minutes later I got her reply: " Brandon if you are still there please come home as soon as you can. The trading floor does not seem safe to me. I love you."

A few minutes later we felt and heard the second tower collapse as we watched it on live television. For the next two hours, our eyes were glued to the television terminals. Every once in a while, someone would come by with fruit or bottled water and every few minutes they would bring in another ash-covered person in need of medical attention. We walked from trading floor to trading floor (I didn't know there were so many) finding people we knew, asking if everyone we knew made it down safely, seeing who had new information, and if anyone knew when we'd be able to leave. We never felt completely safe in 11 Wall, despite hearing some of the NYSE officials' proclamations that it was the safest building in the city. We knew it wasn't completely safe to leave either, but we definitely wanted to try.

A little after noon, Grasso announced that the Broad Street exits would be opened and that we could leave. We were instructed to head east and then north in order to move away from the world trade center, which was west, and the dangerous smoke, which was being blown south. The great majority of people decided not to leave right away. Most people who work in Manhattan live in Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, Bronx, Connecticut, or New Jersey.

Since every way in and out of Manhattan had been closed, most people would had nowhere to go. Personally, I didn't even know how I was going to get home, since all of the public transportation was reportedly closed. But my Manhattan-residing friends and I decided we would go anyway -- at worst it would be a nine-mile walk home. I called Beth to let her know I was leaving, but that it may be some time before I got home.

We collected some damp cloths from the medical workers who were there and made our way to the exit. The security guards watching the door gave us repeated warnings about turning back if we felt any indication of smoke damage to our lungs or eyes. Apparently several people who had tried to leave had to return and receive medical attention. As I listened to their warnings I was looking out the doors in disbelief. The world outside had turned completely gray. Although it was noon, there was very little light.

We covered our mouths and noses with our towels and made sure that we could comfortably breathe. They opened the doors, and we stepped outside. This was the neighborhood in which we all worked and spent a great deal of time, but the conditions were so disorienting that we began our trip with a brief argument about which way was east (we weren't even sure which exit we had just used). The air was thick and gray, filled with ash. It was difficult to see more than a block ahead. These streets that we walked every single day looked instead like the surface of the moon. The ground was covered in ash more than an inch thick.

In the next 10 minutes, we saw only a dozen other people. We walked east about five blocks to Water Street and then turned north. It wasn't until we had walked another five blocks north that our visibility began to increase and it seemed that we would soon be able to remove the towels from our faces. At that time we came upon two firemen who were handing out bottled water to those fleeing the area. They gave us water, poured some on our towels, instructed us to continue breathing through the towels and pointed us north. This brief stop was the first time that we were able to look back and see the tower of smoke that used to be the World Trade Center.

We continued heading north and eventually met up with hundreds of others who were evacuating the financial district. The area we were attempting to navigate was the lower east side -- a neighborhood I venture to guess that none of us had ever traveled on foot. Water Street to Madison Street. Past the Brooklyn Bridge. Past the Manhattan Bridge on East Broadway to Chinatown. Occasionally, we came across a church or a public building that were already responding to the crisis. Priests and church staffs were on the sidewalks outside their churches with tables of bottled water and fruit.

Poster board signs were on display, reading "Water, Food, Bathrooms, Telephones, Rest, Prayer." We did not take advantage of these offerings, but were moved to see the community reacting so quickly. Other men stood on the street corners -- under whose direction, I don't know -- holding signs reading "This way North" or "A and F trains" with arrows pointing the way.

We headed toward train stations at every opportunity, but always to find that they weren't running. Finally, after walking (in suits and ties, carrying our briefcases) for about an hour and a half, we found a station where trains were running. I took the F train to 42nd Street, said goodbye to my friends, switched to the D train, and took it to 125th Street. When I came out of the station, I called Beth from a pay phone and told her where I was. I began walking home down Amsterdam Ave. At about 121st Street, I saw Beth running up the sidewalk. It was 3 p.m. We hugged and cried there on the sidewalk, and the world was a thousand times better with her in my arms.

As I am writing this, it is reportedly beginning to rain in lower Manhattan.

From inside my apartment I can hear the distant thunder. My innocence is lost: my first reaction is not that there is a storm, but that there is an explosion. I get up and go to the window so that I can listen more closely. I hear police and ambulance sirens. I still think it could be an explosion. In the new world that began two days ago, it could be anything at all.

What are the odds?

2006-08-09T14:42:00.000-04:00

I was "between gyms" for about a year. When I joined my current gym, I realized that I had completely forgotten the combination to my lock. I tried a few sequences, but couldn't recall the correct one. So rather than leave my stuff in the locker unlocked (you know there's a black market for white dress shirts, right?) I bought a new lock from the gym. As I was working out, I repeated the new combination to myself over and over, imprinting it on my brain. Then it occurred to me: I already knew this combination.

I went back to my locker, got out the old lock, tried the combination, and CLICK, it opened. My brand-new lock had exactly the same combination as my three year-old lock! I thought, what are the odds!? Then I thought, what are the odds?

The first and easiest answer may be 1-in-64,000. The combination has three numbers, each ranging zero to forty, so 64,000 is what I assumed initially. This made me feel very lucky. (Lucky doesn't seem like the right word...coincidence-stricken?) As nice as it would be to feel so luck-- er, coincidence-stricken -- I had a hunch there was more to it.

Both locks were manufactured by Master Locks, so I thought that perhaps the people at Master Locks must be so lazy that they actually only use ten different combinations in all of the locks that they sell! I like that theory, but I admit it's unlikely. So I went to the internet to put an end to the mystery once and for all, and what I found was nearly as shocking as the Lazy Master Lock Theory.

I won't bore you with the details. I'll let this guy bore you with the details, and I'll summarize: Because of the way they are made, there are only 100 possible correct sequences to single-dial combination locks. Think about that the next time you protect something valuable with one of these "locks".

Not quite the Gates Foundation...

2006-07-11T10:40:00.000-04:00

I do hope to someday soon post stories and pictures from recent trips to Costa Rica, Missouri, and New Mexico. And pictures of the remodeled full-bath, which has been done for months...

But for now I'll mention something else that I'm excited about. The idea of Giving has been on my mind a lot in the past year or so. We discussed Money and Giving in our small group over the course of several weeks and a few months ago I led a communion meditation during a Sunday service whose theme was Giving. It's a very important topic for me and an important part of my spiritual life.

I remember discussing among our small group the idea of tithing via automated withdrawal. The idea would be to have, each month for example, 10% of my income automatically transferred to churches and charities and whomever else I choose to give to. I already have an automated withdrawal set up from my checking account to Shiloh each month. It makes me happy to know that I am consistently giving to Shiloh, so the idea of extending this consistency to my other giving is very attractive.

However, as my friend Bill pointed out, there may be negative aspects to making giving so convenient. It's possible that the act of remembering and choosing, week after week, to write that check is as important as the giving. As I told him then, I'm not exactly convinced; But Bill is a smart guy, so he's probably on to something. In addition, there is always giving that is irregular. It's never going to be the Gates Foundation, but the idea of accumulating some money to contribute to the starting of a mission team or a new building project is attractive to me.

So here's what Beth and I recently decided to do. We have two checking accounts, one "personal" and one "giving". Each month, 10% of our income is automatically transferred into the giving account. I'm not a legalist with an attitude of "not a penny more or less", I promise. But it does make me feel good to know that it's "not a penny less". My life is busy and there are at least a hundred things that I don't get done each week... sometimes giving is one of them. So now we can write checks from the "giving" account (which will still involve remembering and choosing to give, I believe) and whatever is not given will stay in the account. Over time, perhaps, that extra $100 or $200 a month will become $10,000, which we can use to jump-start some project that is important to us.

It's not the Gates Foundation, but it's a start.

ESPN2 ???

2006-06-12T13:09:00.000-04:00

The most popular sporting event in the world is underway. Team from 32 nations have gathered in Germany for 64 games that attract greater audiences than a winter and summer olympics combined. Costa Rica's president declared a national holiday for their opening game last Friday and game day is a de facto holiday for almost every other nation competing.

...And then there's the U.S.A. Coming off its most impressive performance in recent history (reaching the quarterfinals in 2002) and fielding an arguably better team this year, American soccer fans are more excited than ever to follow their team's progress. Yet in the U.S., the game will not even be broadcast on network television! God forbid we preempt our soap operas. What's worse, it won't even be broadcast on its most widely-available cable sports station, ESPN! (Yes, ESPN, which last week gave the same time slot to the national spelling bee.) No, soccer fans... if you want to watch the U.S. play in the most popular sporting event in the world, you'll have to tune in to ESPN2. ESPN2 ?!?!?!?

Senior-itis

2006-05-12T13:36:00.000-04:00

Yep, I've got it pretty bad. My spring semester ended on Wednesday with the submission of my last final exam and last group paper. This ends my eighth consecutive semester (spring-summer-fall) and gives me 46.5 of the 60 credits I need to graduate. That is 78% which roughly means that I have finished my "junior year" and entered my "senior year".

I remember the first MBA class that I attended. It was on a Tuesday night. Class started at 6:00 and ended at 9:00. It was so strange to suddenly be sitting in a classroom at 9PM rather than on my sofa at home (or whatever else it was that I did with my evenings in that previous life). I remember leaving the class very excited about being a part of the discussion that had just taken place, but at the same time exhausted from it. I told myself: that was just the first night of the first class of the first semester... hey idiot, what are you doing?!? And that was in September 2003! I have since attended more than 200 nights of 3 hour class meetings, and I'm still very exhausted after each one.

So everybody save the date for my big graduation party; it's just around the corner: Jan 27

Project [basically] finished!

2006-03-12T22:27:00.000-05:00

Well I'm just about done -- a few minor details, like a missing door, still need to be addressed -- but it's looking pretty good.

Working on this bathroom has been a lot of fun and very educational. Big thanks to Todd for letting me borrow his tools and bigger thanks to Bill who donated consecutive Sundays to tiling the floor.

As Beth says, this was "the practice bathroom". Next weekend I'll start working on the full bath. Hopefully, with all that I've learned from this experience, it will go a little more quickly and look even more professional.

Project, cont'd

2006-03-08T22:11:00.000-05:00

Still working...

Project

2006-02-26T00:18:00.000-05:00

Feeling ambitious, my current project is underway...

Before

During

After
???

Basketball

2006-02-24T21:23:00.000-05:00

I saw this on CNN at work yesterday and then saw this CBS coverage online... amazing. Beth insisted that I post the link so that all of her friends are sure to see it: http://www.youtube.com/?v=UBYPaNc57Ik

Athlete's Foot

2006-01-30T22:54:00.000-05:00

Does any disease have better PR than athlete's foot? "Fungus between your toes? Hmm... must mean that you are a physically fit and active person!" Whoever came up with such a great name deserves the thanks of an entire industry of makers of sprays and creams. You may think twice about admitting to being afflicted with tinea pedis, but "athlete's foot"? It's practically a compliment!

What's next? "Take two Tylenol for your genius pain"

Viva Mexico!

2006-01-04T00:38:00.000-05:00

Some pictures from our trip to Mexico

Beth in the courtyard of our hotel in Tepotzotlan

Tepotzotlan street leading to the cathedral and city plaza

Where to find great quesadillas in Tepotzotlan

Beth and her favorite flowers in one of the cathedral gardens

Lunch in Tepotzotlan

Alisa's wedding chapel

Alisa and Patricio going back down the aisle

Weepy Beth and Alisa after the wedding

Part of the fireworks during the reception ("ALICIA Y PATRICIO")

Beth and others protecting Alisa during the Snake Dance

Brandon and Beth with the beautiful bride at the reception

Brandon and Beth on top of the Temple of the Moon pyramid at Teotihuacan

The Temple of the Sun pyramid at Teotihuacan

Beth on top of the Temple of the Sun pyramid at Teotihuacan

Looking up from the bottom of the Temple of the Sun pyramid at Teotihuacan

Building with tile exterior in Mexico City

A street fair in Mexico City

Old and New architecture in Mexico City

Beautiful interior of the Palacio de Belle Artes (museum in Mexico City)

Mexico City skyline

Brandon and Beth on New Year's Eve

Huge plaza in the middle of Mexico City as viewed from our New Year's Eve party

40 Thoughts From My Morning Commute

2005-12-02T14:14:00.000-05:00

I tried to let this sad blog die. I deprived it and ignored it. But still, people read it? Still, they post comments and complain? What's it going to take for people to leave me to my blog-o-silence? Maybe a little stream-of-consciousness will do the trick...

40 Thoughts From My Morning Commute

2/3 or B/C?
Uhhh... it's a little cold, but the walk would be nice: 2/3.
Probably the only fresh air I'll enjoy until 8 tonight.
iPod? headphones?
No, seriously, just enjoy the walk. Listen to the city, the park. Allow someone to start a conversation with you.
Well, enjoy the park, anyway. Wait a little bit before entering the audible cocoon.
It's really not very cold. This is 40?
Either that, or this is a really good coat.
No, I think it's just not very cold.
Strange for December 1st... this is supposed to be winter?
Oh wait, winter is December thru February. No, March. So winter's really just starting.
Why do I always think that winter is over by January?
Probably because in Texas we started our soccer season on January 2nd every year. Yikes!
I'm glad I live where there are seasons.
Train's coming, hurry up.
Oh crap I totally forgot my - no, I got it.
Okay, good swipe, but fast. Make sure you see the 'Go' before running through this time.
Shoot, it's uptown.
Lots of people waiting for the downtown. That's good, I didn't just miss it.
Wait, it's too many people. There must be a problem.
Not what I need today.
Why did I move so slowly this morning? I had plenty of time. I could ha-
Oh good, headlights.
Hurry with the headphones before the train moves.
Let's see, what should I listen to? How about This American Life?
Geez, how can it be so hot in here?
Is anyone else sweating? Doesn't look like it.
This is a good coat.
OK, just relax and think cool thoughts.
Like what?
I need a seat.
Ok, that woman has her bag in her lap like she's ready to go. Stand in front of her.
Good, sitting now. Successful commute.
I wonder what the This American Life people look like. I don't even really have an image in my head when I listen.
Get a good hold on the briefcase and rest your eyes. That's g...
...
...
...
... Hehe, I wonder if anyone was watching me sl-
Wall Street, oh crap!

Keep Off the Grass

2005-10-17T22:58:00.000-04:00

Well we're fourteen months into the Frederick Douglass Circle project and from what I understand -- although the project was supposed to be done this November -- there are still fourteen months to go! Meanwhile, the entire sidewalk in front of our building has been dug up -- steps, trees, and yes... grass.

Fibromyalgia

2005-10-06T00:19:00.000-04:00

I was sick this weekend. I don't want to get into the details, but let's just say that there was a period of intermittent "fireworks" followed by a day and a half of low-grade misery. I was dead tired, my head ached, my body ached, I couldn't eat. At the end of the second day I managed to drag myself out of the apartment and take the dog to the bathroom, but that was only because it was dark and I didn't want Beth to go into the park alone. I threw the tennis ball a couple times for Mia, which in my weakened state caused my shoulder to be sore!

My sickness lasted only a few days beginning to end, and during that time there was not really anything that I felt like doing. I didn't think about work, I didn't read or write email, I didn't work on homework, … I probably could have gone through the motions of doing those things, but the pain I was in would have been way too big of a distraction. For me this was only temporary, but imagine if one day you got sick and the pain never went away.

It was six years ago this month that my wife Beth got sick. She contracted a virus that made her ill and gave her a very high fever for two weeks. The trauma of this illness screwed with her central nervous system and gave her the condition of fibromyalgia (more info). Her fibromyalgia will never go away, although it may possibly get better with time. It makes Beth's bones sore, her joints stiff, her muscles throb, sometimes to the point of being bedridden. It causes her to become fatigued much sooner than she normally would and requires her recovery from activity to be much longer than it normally would, usually a day or more. It causes sleeplessness which can sometimes be treated with medication, which can sometimes cause nightmares. Beth has endured these pains every day during the last part of 1999, all of 2000, all of 2001, all of 2002, all of 2003, all of 2004, and so far all of 2005… six years.

I thought about Beth all weekend. Every time that I whined about my headache or my backache. Every time that I struggled to walk across the room. Every time that I thought, 'I should be…' helping with the dishes, gathering the laundry, reading for class, feeding/walking the dog, paying the bills… and then pardoned myself with '…but I'm too sick.' When I'm feeling bad, I can't imagine having the strength and determination to get off my butt and do any of those things, but Beth does so much more.

I can't begin to say what a tragedy it is that Beth is sick. She is a brilliant social worker, one of the few people I know who really distinguished themselves in graduate school... and in her case it was a prestigious, competitive, top-two-schools-for-social-work-in-the-country graduate school, the Columbia University School of Social Work. The fact that she is unable to share her gift with the world – to live her calling – is heartbreaking. It’s heartbreaking every single day. But she chooses not to dwell on it. She works as much as she can and makes a difference to the people she works with. She volunteers her time at every opportunity, often with full awareness that doing so will put her “out of commission” for a day or more.

Getting a sore shoulder from throwing a tennis ball allowed me to temporarily get a very small taste of fibromyalgia. As much as I hate being sick, I'm grateful for an occasional taste. The fact that Beth’s attitude can sometimes cause me to forget about fibromyalgia tells you everything you need to know about her character.

I Take Responsibility

2005-09-13T13:17:00.000-04:00

Bush says that he takes responsibility for failures in dealing with Katrina. I didn't think that he had it in him -- he didn't acknowledge his tax cuts had anything to do with the deficit, didn't hold anyone of significance accountable for killing and abusing prisoners in Iraq, and didn't hold anyone (period) accountable for the WMD intelligence failures which led to the war. Now for once he's acted like the "MBA President" we were all told to expect: he's fired and replaced his worthless friend to whom he gave the FEMA job, he's said "I am responsible," and he seems to be committed to giving the situation the attention that it deserves. Good.

Unfortunately, his acceptance of responsibility wasn't unqualified; His statement was actually "to the extent the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility." This leaves room for the possibility that the federal government did do its job right, which I think is generally agreed to be ridiculous.

Still, you can't ask someone to change five years of bad habits overnight... it's a step in the right direction.

On the scene in NO

2005-09-08T17:11:00.000-04:00

Turning 30, Part 6

2005-08-22T23:01:00.000-04:00

... in the end, turning 30 was pretty nice.

Turning 30, Part 5

2005-08-22T23:00:00.000-04:00

... where our tent showed its fortitude against a midnight thunderstorm ...

Turning 30, Part 4

2005-08-22T22:58:00.000-04:00

... to Pharoah Lake ...

Turning 30, Part 3

2005-08-22T22:56:00.000-04:00

... then we drove a few hours upstate and hiked about five miles ...

Turning 30, Part 2

2005-08-22T22:48:00.000-04:00

... then my birthday week continued with great friends, many margaritas, and delicious birthday cake.

Turning 30, Part 1

2005-08-22T22:32:00.000-04:00

My birthday week began with the U.S.-Trinidad World Cup Qualifying match. The game was in Hartford, Connecticut on Wednesday, 8-17.

An Energy Bill We Can All Be Proud Of

2005-08-06T18:23:00.000-04:00

I think Jon Stewart said it best...

Stewart: "Energy is clearly an important topic with Americans. That's why before going on recess, congress broke a four year impasse by approving a massive energy bill. And while it did nothing to address our dependence on foreign oil, ... or fuel efficiency, ... or in any way simplify the strategic nature of our relationship with the middle east, ... it does give oil and gas industries $500 million for research and $2.7 billion in tax breaks, even though a company like Exxon Mobil made $7.6 billion in pure profit just this last quarter. And by quarter, ... I mean three months."

"Now, you may find the idea of government using billions of taxpayer dollars to subsidize oil companies as the antithesis of private free market capitalism. You... are wrong."

Joe Barton, Rep., Texas: "This bill is based on the premise that we believe in private free market capitalism to develop the resources of this land in a cost efficient fashion."

Stewart: "Oh my god, we have a winner! Congratulations Representative Joe Barton, you have achieved a lie-to-word ratio of one-to-one! I don't think that's ever been done before."

"There's a very simple explanation for why insanely rich oil companies get money from the government. It's called 'The Oil Cycle'. We begin with the American Family, a hard-working people who have developed a taste for powerful engines and stretch televisions. Through a natural process known as Taxation, the income of these families is broken down and re-absorbed back into a system we call The Government. The Government swallows these funds and converts them into what are called Subsidies, some of which go to giant, profitable oil companies. That 'found' money can then be used to look for new sources of oil, and to use the public's need for this oil to rape them for profits. These profits are then stored in offshore accounts in the Cayman Islands to avoid a process known as Taxation, which was discussed earlier. The Government then... gives them more money."

Which is bigger?

2005-06-29T14:43:00.000-04:00

Which is bigger: the percentage of people in the U.S. who say that they live paycheck-to-paycheck or the percentage of people in Mexico who say that they live paycheck-to-paycheck?

The percentage of Americans is 28%, while the percentage of Mexicans is 7%. Quite striking considering the per capita GDP of the U.S. is about 25 times as big as Mexico's.

What can account for this? Maybe for Americans it is worth living paycheck-to-paycheck as long as they can consume massive amounts of goods and services. Maybe we have a serious "keeping up with the Joneses" issue. Maybe we're more susceptible (gullible) to savvy advertising. Or maybe we have too much available credit and too little self-restraint.

I hope to be posting a few words on credit soon: Some thoughts about how it can be a really good thing and a really bad thing, our "success story" of how we carried huge credit card debt for years without paying any interest, and more. Look for it some time before August (give me a break, I'm in summer school!)

New Meaning to "Get Right Church"

2005-05-07T23:16:00.000-04:00

I am in the middle of writing my term papers, but I can't help stopping to post regarding this ridiculous thing I just read.

Backing up... Last week I was outraged to read about something called "Justice Sunday", a political rally that took place at a church in Louisville, Kentucky. Focus on the Family founder James Dobson shared the stage with Senator Bill Frist and shared this pearl: "The future of democracy and ordered liberty actually depends on the outcome of this struggle." He was talking about ending filibusters, by the way.

And then tonight I read... a church in North Carolina voted out nine church members because they refused to support President Bush. I didn't mistype. The pastor of the church told members last fall that anyone who planned to vote for John Kerry needed to leave the church. Here's the link, you have to read it to believe it.

I've had enough of this. I'm tired of Christians -- ministers! -- allowing themselves to get pushed around by politicians who have reduced the idea of moral values down to abortion and gay marriage. Why do they find it acceptable to ignore thousands of verses about poverty, protecting God's creation the environment, and war? Is anyone actually reading the New Testament??

This is too infuriating and I've got to get back to my work...

I guess I can be thankful that my minister teaches from the writings of Paul rather than the talking points of Karl Rove.

NYSC

2005-04-21T00:12:00.000-04:00

this is a pathetic topic for a post, but I needed to write something... it's been too long.

Top 10 reasons that I love New York Sports Club

10. quick check-in
9. i can get into more than 140 locations
8. reservation system for classes
7. showers are only somewhat nasty
6. "club abs" - who'd have thought that it's possible to do 25 minutes of crunches?
5. spinning class - turn down the lights and let me enter the zone...
4. "xpressline" - a weight workout for every muscle group in less than 20 minutes
3. boxing class - taught by a former pro, the most tiring 75 minutes ever
2. no ambient music!
1. it's exactly 43 steps from the front door of the New York Stock Exchange

Mamet

2005-03-08T14:26:00.000-05:00

American political campaigns increasingly approach the naked avowal of their function as a potlatch. In the potlatch, Pacific-Northwest Indians would set fire to all they own, in an attempt to gain status over a rival - daring their opponent to match their power to destroy. The pols, likewise, involve their rooters in a potlatch of waste: Party A must be more powerful than Party B (and, so, more worthy of fealty) as their ability to waste is greater. How odd, when, one would think, the politicians' primary responsibility would be to act responsibly in management of the assets of their constituents.

- excerpt from "Pleasure Pilgrims" by David Mamet

Snow!

2005-02-22T21:02:00.000-05:00

As I requested in my 2/12 post, we got our snow! Maybe not quite as much as I had hoped, but enough to provide some nice pictures. Check out a few of them below...

2005-02-22T20:57:00.000-05:00

Snow-covered Gates at our corner

2005-02-22T20:56:00.001-05:00

Snow-covered Gates at softball fields

2005-02-22T20:56:00.000-05:00

Snow-covered Gates

2005-02-22T20:55:00.001-05:00

Snow-covered Gates at The Pool

2005-02-22T20:55:00.000-05:00

Snow-covered Gates

What's the Story?

2005-02-14T23:49:00.000-05:00

I'd like to try a game. I'll describe something I glimpsed today on the way to class and you make up the backstory.

Walking through the village at 5:45pm, I passed a nice restaurant just outside of which I saw a man - about 28 years old - using a fine-toothed comb and a small pair of scissors to trim the eyebrows of another man - perhaps 50 years old - who grumpily endured the grooming.

So what's the rest of the story?

'The Gates' Is Up!

2005-02-12T13:41:00.000-05:00

We spent our first few hours today walking Mia in the park, checking out 'The Gates'. It has been an interesting process to be in the park every day for the last several weeks as the installation has gradually gone up. It created an anticipation that might otherwise not have been there.

I have many reactions to The Gates. I appreciate it on a technical level. This is probably atypical, but I have a real appreciation for the precision with which each gate was constructed and the planning that was required to install something on such a scale that would survive in Central Park for 16 days. I also appreciate how such a simple concept has completely transformed the park. Thanks to Mia, we know our little corner of the park like the backs of our hands; It's wonderful to walk into it and feel like we're seeing it again for the first time. I appreciate how it interacts with its natural setting (suspend criticism of central park as a natural setting). There are long stretches where gates are placed every 12 feet and then there is a long break to make room for a tree. Then contrast those long, level stretches with the hills on our end of the park for a completely different impression. In addition, the weather is a huge contributor. As you can see from the pictures below, the sun and the wind add to the effect. I really hope it snows some time in the next two weeks...

What I haven't been able to appreciate yet is viewing the whole thing at once. Of the 7,500 gates, I probably haven't seen more than 100 at a given time. I am going to try to see it from the top of the Time Warner building this week. Not sure if my little camera is going to be much good from that distance.

2005-02-12T13:40:00.000-05:00

We ran into Christo and Jeanne-Claude, creators of The Gates

2005-02-12T13:38:00.001-05:00

2005-02-12T13:38:00.000-05:00

2005-02-12T13:36:00.002-05:00

on the great hill

2005-02-12T13:36:00.001-05:00

Directly across from our apartment

2005-02-12T13:36:00.000-05:00

The softball fields from the east

3 cool new tools

2005-02-04T01:43:00.000-05:00

one from amazon, one from google, and one from microsoft

A9 Yellow Pages
When you tell A9 to find a starbucks near west 110th street, it not only gives you the address but it shows you a photo of the storefront and the storefronts of the adjacent businesses.

Google Video
Remember that Seinfeld episode where Kramer has a line in a movie...? Something about pretzels...? Try searching for "Title:seinfeld pretzels" Be sure to click on the result when it comes up.

MSN Search
Microsoft finally released its "google-killer." It's actually pretty good. MS is taking advantage of its resources such as Encarta encyclopedia. Try searching for "what is the volume of lake michigan?" or "what is the capital of madagascar?" For me, the coolest part about MSN Search is that the bottom of every results page has a link to RSS (for more information about RSS, go here)

Mixed Veggies

2005-01-29T07:51:00.000-05:00

I had mixed vegetables with my lunch yesterday. What kind of a dish is just called "mixed vegetables"? Do you ever see "grilled meats" on the menu? No, of course not. Yet many menus offer a side simply called "mixed vegetables."

So which vegetables would you expect in mixed vegetables? Cauliflower, carrots, and brocolli. Peas, carrots, and corn. Green beans, onions, and potatoes. There are dozens of combinations - I could throw lima beans or peppers into any of the above combinations!!

The only conclusion that I can reach on this issue: culinary experts have determined that any three vegetables, when eaten together, taste exactly the same.

Signs of abundance

2005-01-28T09:51:00.000-05:00

It's not just my imagination. It's not just the fad of larger and larger SUVs. It's apparently not just me who thinks he needs a 42-inch plasma screen to feel complete as a human being. We are truly the spoiled brats of the world...

The average size of a new house in the U.S.
1949: 1,100 sq. ft.
1970: 1,385 sq. ft.
1993: 2,060 sq. ft.
2004: 2,466 sq. ft.
(In case you were wondering, the size of the typical U.S. household (# of people) has dropped in the last 50 years.)

There are more automobiles in the U.S. than there are licensed drivers.

We have so much crap that doesn't fit in our 2,466 sq. ft. houses, that self-storage is now a $17 billion annual industry -- nearly double Hollywood's yearly box office take.

2005-01-19T18:13:00.000-05:00

greetings friends,

i may not have the time to be as diligent as many of you in keeping the blog updated, but i will do my best. i have deleted all of my pre-election posts - well, all of my posts actually - so this is a clean slate. i will try to cover a variety of topics and include many pictures to keep it as entertaining as possible.

btb