The Fake Stat

Tourist Season is in Full Swing

I know I say this every summer, but I hate tourist season at the airport. It's just one large mass of confusion here today. I feel like we've been boarding the plane for an hour already.

Ok. I think I've gotten that out of my system. At least for this leg if the trip.

Asshole Rednecks and Masturbating Pomeranians

We rented a lake house this weekend. It's a great house with a good amount of land for the dogs to run around on. But then, there's the neighbors...

We were greeted by the neighbors dogs, 2 pit bulls and 4 pomeranians. Strange dog combination aside, they seemed friendly enough, plus they were on the other side of the fence. At least for a while. The pomeranains had a secret hole in the fence which allowed them to slip onto our side.

Once there, one continued to bark at us, one rolled on her back for a belly rub, and one started doggy masturbating on the ground. Yes, I said doggy masturbating.

I don't know if I can describe this in it's full weirdness, but I'll try. Imagine a tiny dog humping an imaginary leg on the ground and at the critical point it'd lift both front legs up completely off the ground in a doggy cheer. I really wish I took video of this, because I cannot possibly due it justice with mere words.

If that wasn't bad enough, when our dogs went to check out the pomeranian yap fest, the owner, an asshole redneck, told us to keep our dogs from "charging" at the fence. When we told the asshole redneck that their masturbating pomeranian and friends slipped through the high security chicken wire setup, he told us that the owner of the rental house should fix it. WTF!

We've been here for two hours and we've seen a masturbating pomeranian and met and asshole redneck. The weekend is off to a good start. We'll need more wine though...

The Start of Tourist Season

I think everyone knows how much I hate tourist season at the airport. It seems like it started early this year. The airport is full of confused people wearing Hawaiian shirts and Bermuda shorts. Confused by the security line, the concept of liquid and not a liquid, metal and not a metal, group numbers on the boarding passes. It's just all rocket science to so many people.

Make it stop!

Help, I'm Stuck on a Plane at JFK with a Choir

I'm stuck on the runway at JFK (we're number 30 for take off) after an all day flight from Zurich with 70 high school choir students who just broke out in the National Anthem. I have to admit that it was a very good rendition, but I can't handle an hour of this. This is just surreal...

This has been the weirdest trip in the history of ever. It started with the AA MD80 flight cancellation fiasco. Then there was the storm that ripped the tree out of the yard hours before take off. Then AA lost our luggage for 4 days. Now this.

I can't take any more singing. Shoot me now...

Going to Italy!

I'm headed to Italy for vacation. Yea!!!

That is if the powers that be allow it. By powers that be, I am referring to mother nature and American Airlines. It started a week ago when we noticed that the weather was going to suck this week. DFW can get way backed up with bad weather. Add to that the connection in Chicago and it appeared that we were in need on keeping a schedule with military accuracy.

Then yesterday happened. AA canceled a billion flights. I spent much of today secretly checking AA.com on my phone during a presentation with the president. Everything was ok until about 3:30 when on leg of the flight was canceled. Bastards!

I spent half an hour trying to get connected to AA and another half hour on hold, but finally a very friendly woman saved the day by rebooking us. Either tomorrow I will be on a plane headed to Italy or you'll see a very bitter post. Cross your fingers for us.

The Begining of Tourist Season at the Airport

Spring break marks the beginning of tourist season at the airport. I'm on the west coast this week and have been through 3 security lines so far. Monday morning at the airport I realized that the tourists were out in full force. I've never seen so many people confused by the travel process. Here is the summary for those of you who may be standing in line in front of me in the future:

1. Go to the ticket counter and get a boarding pass. If you are easily confused, chances are that the piece of paper you are holding is your itinerary NOT a boarding pass.
2. Take everything out of your pockets at security. If you cannot tell the difference between liquid, metal, and not liquid or metal, go home. You should not be traveling by yourself.
3. Here is my pet peeve. When your stuff comes out of the x-ray machine, move your ass down the conveyor. Do not try to re-dress right at the exit of the x-ray machine. You are holding up the line and I will push your stuff down the belt.

It's only going to get worse from here on through the end of the summer. Expect more griping on my part.

Back from India

I just got back from India (actually I'm waiting in Chicago for my flight to DFW, but close enough...) and I'm sick. I thought it was just allergies, but I woke up yesterday shivering in a room that was 85^o F. I hope it's just a cold or sinus infection and not some horrible exotic disease.

India always amazes me. I was there for a trade show. We arrived 15 minutes before the show started and the place was a total mess. They were still laying carpet and there was trash everywhere. A company with a working vacuum cleaner would be huge there. You're not in Kansas anymore...

The carpet was small pieces with rolled up edges that would be considered a lawsuit waiting to happen in the US, not there... The floor of two of the halls was plywood and the companies had installed huge, heavy chillers and equipment on these saggy floors. I think the whole place just implodes at the end of the show so there is no tear down needed.

The airports are pure confusion. Leaving today (or was it yesterday???) was total confusion. People cutting in line, not having the right paperwork, people stopping in doorways to dig for crap in their bag. And all of that is before you even get in the airport.

They boarded the plane First Class and Business Class last (obviously not understanding the whole First and Business Class thing), but they didn't announce that we were last. The boarding happened in what was essentially a funnel created by construction barriers. So the First and Business people walk up and find out they can't get on and step aside. Eventually the funnel walls are three people deep in First and Business class people. It's midnight, people who think they are really important are being denied their right to board first, it got a little snitty...

I like India, but I'm amazed that the country works at all. It's REALLY good to be home.

3 More Checked off, 959 to go

I just got back from Sweden that included a weekend stay in Copenhagen. We did some power sightseeing while we were there and I managed to check off 3 more from the list of 1000 Places to See Before You Die.

To be truthful, actually I'm being a bit liberal in my interpretation of one of the places, the Ice Hotel. I tried to get time to fly up there to see the actual hotel and have a drink in the original Absolut Ice Bar, but I couldn't work that out (especially for just 1 drink...). So I did the next best thing - go to the Absolut Ice Bar in Copenhagen. It was a blast!

We saw Tivoli, the oldest amusement park in Europe, but they were closed. Besides I heard that it's nothing compared to Six Flags, so we felt a visit would leave us lacking.

The pictures are on my Flickr site. I'm still going through all of them, so more will be posted as I get a chance to clean them up, but the Ice Bar and Glyptotek pictures are pretty cool.

Stuck in Chicago

I know I've said this before, but today has been travel day from hell. It started in Copenhagen this morning, which was last night to most of you. The line for the British Airways check-in was 2 hours long and completely unorganized and unsigned. We finally figured out that you could use self check-in (it was not obvious at all since it was buried in the counter lines), but when I tried, it told me I couldn't check in. When I tried again, it told me I was already checked in. Very frustrating!

We finally figured out that we could go to the "Fast Bag Check" line. In this instance, Fast must have stood for F'ing Annoyingly Slow Ticket. The line was short, but unbearably slow. It was supposed to be just for handing off your bags after self check-in, but I think some people were playing dumb and trying to buy tickets, rebooking flight, and refinancing their houses from the line. On a positive note, since ticketing was so slow, security only had to handle 1 person every 5 minutes, so that went fast.

Although rumor had it that Chicago was going to be bad, our flight from O'Hare to DFW was not canceled, yet. We did have the sense to call our admin assistant to check for delays / cancellation and rebook us or at least get a hotel. We got a hotel...

So now, me, my colleagues, and about a million other people are stuck in Chicago. To finish the evening, our cab driver had to call to get directions (to the wrong hotel), missed the exit twice (to a hotel less than 1 mile from the airport), and drove like a madman on the slick streets. He was kind enough to not charge us for the trip from the wrong hotel to the right hotel.

There is something wrong about the weather in Chicago being worse then Sweden...

IT and Drunks at Bars

Here's what I learned today. First, IT departments are the same everyehere in the world. Individually, I like all our IT people, but as a department, you can almost guarrenty that the network, system, or progream will not work when you are in the middle of a demonstration. That happened to our hosts in Sweden today.

The other thing I learned today is that drunks are the same everywhere. It seems that, even in Swedish, the drunks do not finish their sentences and ramble on about nothing, or maybe it is everything.

I learned this because, at the end of the night, when there were only 3 of us left at our table, a drunk wandered up, sat down, and started rambling. I asked our translator about what he was saying, but it seemed that he was not completeing any of his sentences. It's almost comforting that there is some consistency in the world... To be harrassed by drunks all over the world - priceless...