Just like Ted William's Head

Greetings,

I have decided to put this blog address on hold. I took a new job in DC and I'm no longer technically a civil servant. In addition, you can easily find out who I am if you read through this thing long enough, and that's no good in the private sector. I decided though that I enjoy writing too much, so feel free free to email me for the new blog address. If you don't know my email its in the profile under contact me. I do expect that I shall return to this address and the public sector at some point, so I'm going to hold onto the site.

Be good,

Hero

Stress Relief

So this week I predicted being rough and it has lived up to my expectations. So I wasn't exactly persistent in following through. I also have this concept that my stuff would go down the same day. I was wrong. So it looks like my stuff won't be there until 2 weeks from move day, which is going to be 9/1. Big thanks to Elizabeth for watching them move my stuff in as I plan to be down in DC this weekend.

So in this stressful time of looming deadlines and crap all over my house, and my back going out of wack meaning I can't run. So I found this on Fark. God Bless Fark. Here is what you need to do.

1. Click on this link.
2. These are the candidates for Livonia City Council. Click on some of the links, but save Glenn Moon until the end.
   
3. Click on Glenn Moon's name
4. Thank me.
   

He's on YouTube as well, but it's not nearly as good as the above process.

This has sustained me today. That and the fact that Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is on.

3rd post

So I realized this is my 3rd post for the month, which I know is pathetic and is driving people away. This is a tough month. But I have found a residence and will be signing a lease shortly. This is a good thing, as someone else will be living in my home on September 1.

Tonight finds me in Virginia which is in the South. How do I know its the South? Because if you want good food you have to go to a strip mall. This is a unique phenomenon. In NYC or Boston, good food is located in standalone buildings. Here, it's next to an adult bookstore and Curves for Women location. However, that does not detract from the food. The sushi was choice.

I also bought a bag at Ross's. I finally have a roller board that stores in the overhead. Except on the tiny goddamn planes I fly with USAir. I just wanted to check in to say that I'm still here. I was upgraded to first class on the Shuttle coming down. Ah luxury for 49 minutes. Well, free booze at least.

And my new work friend Kimberly suggested this video, which truly is the most honest R&B video I've ever seen, asides from the fact he's a white guy.

Oh yeah

So I'm going to bed....

I was supposed to be going to my own bed tonight, but apparently fog is not good for flying. So I'm at the Dulles Sheraton in Herndon, VA. I ran for the airport shuttle bus, ordered a chicken caesar salad from room service and then worked on PowerPoint slides for 2 hours. I get to wake up in 5 and fly out hopefully on time at 7:05AM in the same clothes and without deodorant. Sweet.

I would like to correct my former post. Now I am actually a road warrior. Well, a real road warrior would have packed some toiletries in his carry-on.

2 Man Enter, 1 Man Leave

The Road Warrior returneth....

So I won't type long, because I'm exhausted. I will warn my faithful readers of two things:

First, in my search for billable hours and then sleep, I'm not sure what time I will have for this, Facebook, Yelp, SexyGoats.com, and many other sites. So I don't want you to pine away. I'm now on a hunt. It's like a treasure hunt, except the treasure is the "billable hour." This hunt will lead me to not farting around during the day, which is a good thing, but also puts a damper on this stuff.

Second, I realize that I need to move blogs. This blog has too much stuff about me to clean up and I will leave it dormant until I return to the public sector. I also need a more appropriate title. So you will at some point find a post telling you to contact me for my new blog address. Just click the contact me button on the top right.

This Monday I did have a total Road Warrior moment where my flight was delayed enough to miss my connection in Charlotte, forcing me to either spend the night in Philly or Charlotte before continuing on to Orlando the next day. I ended up noticing a Southwest flight leaving in 45 minutes direct to Orlando across the terminal. So I went out of security, and bought a ticket from the ticket counter. Who knew you could do such a thing? It cost $87, so God bless you SWA.

Then I arrived in Orlando and stayed at the Marriott. The kitchen was closed for the night and the only option I had was the "Market." Imagine a bodega, but in the USSR where everything is marked up 500%. So I bought the last sandwich they had. Turkey and Swiss with really wilted lettuce. I choked it down and thought this should earn some traveller medal. Rough business.

Until next time sports fans.....

You're doing it wrong...

Has anybody seen these ads?

Now that Brinks has become Broadview, I see their ads are no less ridiculous. Allow me to expound on how much I hate these things.

The first reason these bother me are that they seem to target white women who live home alone. And who the hells sets the alarm when they come in for lemonade? Does this woman live in Kabul? The guy who calls from Brinks is also some slightly uniformed white guy who seems like he should be a cop. He's not. The people that call are calling from a call center. Which means that they just as easily could be selling Sham-Wows instead of calling you.

The second and most obvious reason is that this isn't how crime works. The most likely character to break into your house is someone looking like this.
This is what came up when I GIS'd "crackhead." They are people who are down on their luck and looking for something easy to steal that will net them 20 bucks so they can get high. These people do not want you to be home when they rob you. This makes it far less likely that they will get your stuff. They also don't have the intelligence or the sobriety to handle a hostage situation. They look for you to be gone, so they do it during the day. The thing I hate about these ads is that the perp always makes eye contact with the victim and then decides to break the glass anyway. Wrong.

Let's say on the other hand that this isn't a crackhead or a professional thief, and they want to do harm to the woman and or child in this clip. This, by the way, is the fear that sells these systems. That some rando is going to come along and rape your wife in the middle of the day. But let's say there is a psychopath who wants to do this. If they see you and break the window, they're not going to stop when they hear the alarm. If they're that determined, they will see their act through because they know that the response is going to be at least 5 minutes or more, because teeth whitened Brinks guy has to call you while you're being strangled and see if you're okay. (Note: This is very, very, very unlikely. Like getting struck be lightning. However this sells the majority of the alarms I would bet.)

I wasn't a cop for that long. But I know bullshit when I see it.

Crisis

So while this move is exciting, it does involve travel. A bunch of travel to the Hampton Roads area in fact. For those that know me, I don't mind travel. And yes, I know that travel gets old. I know that airports and connections are not fun. But they are for me, at least in the beginning. I am a self-avowed aviation geek, loving flying and all the aspects that come with travel. I mean, I am the guy who flew to Hawaii for 18 hours, just to gain status on American.

Here is where the problem starts. American doesn't fly to Newport News, and only flies two flights to Norfolk a day which isn't going to work. There are other choices of course. There happens to be a direct flight from US Air and United, but they are stupid expensive due to the huge military population down in Hampton Roads. Southwest also flies direct from BWI, so that's an option.
However the one logical choice is the hardest one to make.

These guys are terrible. I know this. They came in dead last in survey after survey. There are YouTube videos about how bad they are. It kills me that I'm going to be using these guys. But I already have 10 segments booked on them in my first 7 days on the job. So I suppose I'll see how bad they are. But I don't like this. Not one bit. I find it funny, and not ha ha funny, that I'm close to platinum status with American and yet so far. So I'll let people know how this all turns out.