Post #100!

This is post #100?!  Can you believe it?  This is the one hundredth post that I have put on this blog… kind of hard to believe that I’ve written that many posts AND that people are reading them... 

The CFO and I spent last Thursday night through Sunday morning in beautiful, sunny San Diego, CA.  She had to go there for a conference, so I tagged along for a mini vacation.  It sure is a beautiful place to visit and I would be very tempted to move there… the only  things that scare me about living in CA are earthquakes, cost of living and the politics (although Illinois is just about as bad politic wise, so I guess I could handle that part of it). 

Unfortunately for the CFO, she had to attend the conference on Friday and present on Saturday, which meant that I was on my own for most of both days.  After dropping her off at the conference (we rented a car for the weekend) I drove out to Point Loma and the Cabrillo National Monument.  This are over looks the naval base on Coronado island and downtown San Diego on one side and the Pacific ocean on the other.  It is an absolutely beautiful vantage point and I could have hung out there all day watching the waves crash against the cliffs. 

 I had told Karen that I would pick her up for lunch so we could go to In and Out burger… a west coast burger chain that we are absolutely hooked on thanks to my friend Shawn who recommended it a few years ago when we first visited CA.  Now we always look for them when we are on the left coast.  On my way to pick her up, I stopped and walked through the Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery.  It shared the beautiful views mentioned above and was a powerful reminder of how many people have served this country in the various branches of the military.  I can’t imagine a more picturesque final resting place than this.

After lunch, I dropped her off at the conference and headed for a golf course.  I found a local course that rented clubs and had reasonable prices.  Unfortunately, since it was reasonably priced, it wasn’t a beautiful “on the coast” course, but it was still a nice place to play and I enjoyed my 3 hour play time.  I also played decently too, which was a bit of a surprise since I was using unfamiliar clubs.  Perhaps clubs don’t have that much effect on how you play when you are as bad at it as I am!  We roamed through Old Town that night and ate dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  By the time we got back to the hotel I was TIRED.

On Saturday morning, we hit the road early and went to La Jolla for breakfast at a place that we visited last time. We ate breakfast on a deck overlooking the seals that were lounging on the rocks.   After that, I dropped her off again and then headed to Balboa Park.  I had been told by some locals that there was a nice auto museum there so I went to check it out.  Perhaps I was expecting too much, but it was a bit of a let down and I ended up wishing I hadn’t spent the 8 bucks to get in.  There were a few interesting cars and trucks there, including the car that I had a poster of on my wall when I was younger:  Lamborghini Countach.  It is always fun to see these in person because they are actually a lot smaller than you might expect…  it looks huge in pictures.  They also had a first year mazda miata, which kind of made me laugh since I have a miata sitting in my garage.

After the museum, I roamed around the park for a while, checking out the architecture of all the museums and watching a lot of photographers taking pictures of kids and wedding parties.  Even though I was in a beautiful city, I couldn’t resist the call of UGA football.  I knew the UGA/Ole Miss game was going to be on TV, so I hit In and Out for lunch (AGAIN!) and then went back to the room to watch the game.  Happily, the Dawgs woke up from a first half lull and won the game in convincing style.  If they win this week against Auburn, they go to the SEC championship!  GO DAWGS.  Our other 3 teams all won as well, so we had a 4-0 weekend.  Go Wahoos, Redbirds and Dukes!

It is interesting to see how air travel is changing.  The airlines have decided to nickel and dime you for anything that they can. 

#1) What happened to at least a free packet of peanuts or cookies?  Now all you get is a drink and they charge for everything else.  Good thing we had packed our own bag of chex mix and other snacks.   

#2) On the first leg of our return flight on Frontier, every seat had a video monitor that was mounted in the headrest of the seat in front of them.  I thought to myself, “sweet, I’ll be able to watch football while we are in the air.”  WRONG.  Once the plane pulled away from the gate, the display shut down and asked for a credit card before it would show video.  $4 for flights under 2 hours, $6 for flights over 2 hours.  I guess if you aren’t going to provide free snacks then you certainly aren’t going to provide free tv?  Sure, it is cheaper than going to a movie these days, but come on…

It is also interesting to watch the other passengers on the plane… here are a few items that I have been noticing the last few times that I have flown: 

Mr./Ms. General instructions don’t apply me:  They say over and over that you are going to have to turn off your electronic devices once the plane moves away from the gate, yet there is always one or two who have to be personally told to turn them off.  I watched it happen on every flight that we were on.  That chapter of “shades of grey” or whatever you are reading on your kindle will be there when the plane gets up in the air, turn it off.  I have seen some studies that show that it probably won’t affect the plane, but I'd rather play it safe and not be on the flight where we find out that it actually does.    

Seat recliners:  There should be a switch on the back of the seat that allows the person in the row behind you to decide if they are ok with you encroaching on their already limited space on the plane.  If they are ok with you reclining, then they flip the switch and you can recline if you so desire.  If they aren’t comfortable with it, you are S.O.L.  At a minimum, people should ask the person behind them if it is ok for them to recline. 

Mr./Ms. Me First:  Once the plane lands and you get to the gate, everyone walks off the plane in order, row by row.  Yet there are always one or two people who, as soon as the plane stops at the gate, rushes to try to get two or three rows further up the center aisle before everyone else.  These people rarely get very far and look like total self centered asses once they get stopped in the log jam of people from the forward rows.  It drives me nuts, you aren’t that special, wait your turn.  Or, better yet, pay extra to sit in the front of the freakin plane if you want to get off quickly.  I can somewhat understand doing that if you have a connection to make, but then you should say, “sorry, but I have a connection to make.”  Everyone will understand if that is the case, otherwise, wait for your row's turn.

We're going to be flying a lot over the next couple months, I'll continue to observe these issues.