Tag: New Jersey

Eagles Win!

The Eagles beat the Giants on a last minute field goal. It was not their best game. It was good enough.

At halftime, Pam Oliver asked Andy Reid what he thought this game would come down to. Reid answered, “The wire.”

Toward the middle of the fourth quarter, the three of us, sitting in the family room, got very quiet. There was the unspoken undercurrent of the Eagles snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. And we were feeling this way while the Eagles had the ball!

Even as the Eagles took a time out with under 20 seconds to go, we worried the Giants would be left with too much time. The Eagles must have figured that out too. They called one more play. Garcia plunged up the middle and the clock was stopped at 00:03.

David Akers. Good. The final was 23-20.

Next Saturday the Eagles go through this again. Helaine and Steffie will be here. I’ll be in New Jersey with some friends. Thank heavens for cellphones.

How strange is this game of football? Unless you’re in the Super Bowl, the season has been a disappointment. Sadly, every team but one exits the playoffs with a loss.

Clicky To The Hospital

Helaine and Stef went to a concert Saturday night and took “Clicky,” my Canon 300D “Digital Rebel” with them. Unfortunately, not one of the photos Stef took came out!

It’s not her fault. This is a well documented design flaw in the 300D. Sometimes it happens while the camera’s in warranty. In my case, it waited over 18,000 shots and a few years before it broke.

This afternoon I went to the attic and my stash of bubble wrap. “Clicky” is now safely ensconced in an old QVC box, ready for his trip to New Jersey.

In a way I’m happy this happened now. In October, Helaine and I are going out west. It will be a trip made for photography. Imagine if the camera would have broken then!

I’ve actually been anticipating this moment and worrying it wouldn’t happen until October.

After around a week, and with more money than I’d like going to Canon, “Clicky” should be back home. From what I’ve read, once this fix is made, the camera will live a much longer and healthier life.

In the meantime, I was able to manually set the broken piece for one last photo.

Rand McSteffie

Steffie’s college roommate is back at school for some summer classes. Steffie thought it might be nice to bring her their shared television and some other things we’d stored here in Connecticut. So yesterday afternoon, with her friend Sam in tow, Steffie set out for Long Island.

It’s really not a difficult trip and before long they were there.

Flash forward to departure time. By this time Sam, suffering from a headache, dozes off in the front seat. Steffie hops onto the Meadowbrook and heads home.

Everything was going so well, so smoothly until she got to the Cross Island Parkway. That’s how Helaine and I get to the Throgs Neck Bridge. The problem is, just at the point you exit to the Cross Island there’s a sign beckoning you to a different exit for the Throgs Neck!

Confused, Steffie followed the sign… and so began her great adventure through the boroughs!

Instead of heading north, into the Bronx, she was heading west toward Manhattan. Somehow she got on the Long Island Expressway, driving past the apartment where I grew up, past Queens College and the New York World’s Fair site.

Her exact route isn’t certain. She doesn’t totally remember and probably had no way of knowing anyway. I am reconstructing it from a conversation we had a little after 1:00 AM.

“You know that tunnel,” Steffie asked?

“Did you go up on a very high section of roadway with a great view of Manhattan?”

Holy crap! Steffie had made her way to Long Island City and was heading into the Queens Midtown Tunnel.

“It went on forever and was really narrow,” she said.

She’s right. The twin tubes of the Midtown Tunnel run around 1¼ miles. The lanes are narrow and the tunnel does curve. Even worse, as you leave you’re faced with three choices, “Uptown, Midtown and Downtown,” none of which would make any sense to Steffie!

She remembers Lexington Avenue and seeing Times Square on her right. She was totally lost.

“You know the glass building?”

Glass building? I looked at my toes – where all answers emanate. Glass building… uh… “You mean the Javits Center?”

It was around this time in the conversation that Steffie admitted that she knew she’d drive in Manhattan at some point, but had hope she’d wait until she was around 40.

Back in the car she pulled into a parking lot, hoping to find an attendant. No dice there. She yelled across at a taxicab stopped at a light. As he explained, the light turned green.

The time between a green light and horn honk in Manhattan is measured in milliseconds.

The were signs for the Holland Tunnel. She knew she didn’t want to be there. There were also signs pointing toward the George Washington Bridge. That sounded more familiar.

She didn’t know it at the time, but she was now heading north on the West Side Highway.

On family trips, we often make a decision as we approach the George Washington Bridge. If there’s heavy traffic on the bridge heading into the Bronx, we continue north and wind our way through the Bronx and Westchester. If the coast’s clear, we take the easy way – I-95, the Cross Bronx Expressway.

Steffie looked at the bridge and decided to continue. It’s lucky for her she did, because as it turns out, she would have taken the GWB. She would have headed across the Hudson into New Jersey!

Heading north, the West Side Highway becomes the Henry Hudson Parkway. She drove through the toll, over the Henry Hudson Bridge and into the Riverdale section of the Bronx.

Now nothing looked familiar! Exits came and went, but no names she recognized… until Mosholu Parkway.

Unfortunately for Steffie, she knew the name because we’d had brunch at the Mosholu, a boat moored on the Delaware River in Philadelphia. She took the Mosholu anyway.

Even with a map, it’s tough to reconstruct her trip from here. She did panic a little when she saw signs pointing to Albany. A little after that, a sign for the Hutchinson River Parkway.

Steffie headed north on the “Hutch,” finally breathing a sigh of relief as she passed the “Entering Greenwich” sign. She was back in Connecticut.

The 100 minute trip had taken her four hours. She had visited Queens, Manhattan, The Bronx and was within a few hundred yards of Brooklyn.

Steffie probably expected Helaine or me to get angry. We didn’t.

Do I wish she would have called me at some point? Of course.

It’s a great story we’ll have forever… one of those family fables grandparents will someday tell grandchildren about their mother.


MythTV – My DVR

A few days ago, I wrote about the DVR I’d assembled from an old PC and a spare tuner card. The more I look into it, the more impressed I am. This is very cool technology.

First, a little about the computer. This was originally my ‘main’ desktop machine, but probably 6-7 years ago. It wasn’t homebuilt, but built to my spec by Axis Computing in New Jersey (I believe they’re long gone).

The CPU is an AMD 500 MHz model, with 387 mb of memory. originally, it was built to process TV, and had an ATI All-in-Wonder video card. It is my understanding ATI is less than helpful in the Linux community, so that part is useless to me.

Now, for video, there’s some old, nondescript Nvidia card (I can’t even find a model number) and a Hauppauge&#185 Win-TV GO card, which acts as a TV tuner.

In 2006, this is a lumbering slow machine with not much going for it. If you had one at home, you’d probably be thinking about how to get rid of it and replace it with something more modern.

The specifications for this DVR call for a much more powerful chip. It doesn’t seem to make much difference, because this works!

In order to accommodate the older hardware I’ve cranked down the quality of the video I capture. It can’t record and play at the same time either, something it should do.

A few things about this system have astounded me. First is the KnoppMyth distribution. This allowed me to stick a CD into the computer and let it do most of the rest. I had to dedicate this machine to DVR, but it wasn’t doing much before!

Second is MythTV itself. It is a visually pleasing system. In fact, as a DVR, it is much more sophisticated looking and easier to deal with than my cable company DVR.

What I can’t do is play my video on a TV – at least not now. The system is designed for that, but my set-up just doesn’t lend itself to that outcome.

The system is divided into two basic parts, frontend and backend. The backend is the guts. it’s where the recording takes place and where data is manipulated.

The frontend is how the user interacts with the system and controls it. The frontend doesn’t have to be on the same computer as the backend. In fact, I can control much of the frontend on any web browser.

With that ability, I can program this DVR from work or while on-the-road.

The frontend handles viewing the video. Right now, that means dealing with files too large to easily watch out of the house. I’ve read about some modifications that will enable me to stream the video in a more highly compressed form, and I’ll be working on that tonight.

I am not sure this method of DVR building is right for everyone. There were loads of configuration choices I had to make. I think I did OK, but I can’t be sure. Certainly, I was on my own as I decided whether this or that box would be checked or unchecked.

This is more a project for someone who enjoys tinkering – and I do. And it’s probably the kind of thing I’ll keep tweaking and refining until I break it!

&#185 – Hauppauge is a company that makes video products for computers. They have some of the best video capture boards and are well respected by hobbyists. Hauppauge is the name of the town they’re in.

Alas, I think they’d probably do better in business if you could easily spell their name! I wonder how many people look for Hauppauge and give up.

In the 21st Century, spelling counts.

What Hath AccuWeather Wrought

I was scrutinizing Drudge last night when I saw the headline.

ACCUWEATHER: US Northeast due for major hurricane…

I began to get upset. Then, I read AccuWeather’s release, which was headlined:

Threat of Major Hurricane Strike Grows for Northeast

AccuWeather.com Warns That “Weather Disaster of Historic Proportions” Could Strike as Early as This Year

The release went on to quote Joe Bastardi, one of AccuWeather’s meteorologists as saying:

“The Northeast coast is long overdue for a powerful hurricane.

That’s like saying a slot machine is overdue because it hasn’t paid out in a while. In statistics, the likelihood of a 100 year event doesn’t increase just because you’ve gone 99 years without seeing one.

I went to the weather bulletin board where I sometimes post and left this:

I read the AccuWeather release and my blood boiled. As far as I know, there’s no such thing as “overdue” in statistics. I’m assuming all their meteorologists, including Joe Bastardi, took statistics courses.

When people come up to me in the supermarket and say we hype the weather – they’re talking about stuff like this.

What AccuWeather missed – the real story – is, a Hurricane of ’38 scenario would create a civil catastrophe before it struck! Though they mention Providence as the storm’s focal point, the center actually struck nearly 100 miles west, in Milford, Connecticut.

The biggest damage was that far east because it was no longer a classic tropical system. First, it was moving at better than 60 mph (I’m doing this off the top of my head – allow a little leeway). It had also been over colder water and was probably transitioning to extratropical.

How would we warn for a storm which went from the Bahamas to New England in about a day, and whose damage would be so far east of the center? Hurricane Warnings from Atlantic City, NJ to Portland, ME? It boggles the mind.

Would we evacuate all of New England? Could we? Where would they go?

As it is, on a Sunday evening the Mass Pike backs up for miles at the I-84 exit. I-95 through most of Eastern Connecticut is 2-lanes in each direction, and the area just east of New Haven will be under construction for much of the next decade. That’s without all of Boston and Providence heading west.

But, back to AccuWeather. Is this like yelling fire in a crowded theater? I don’t know. I certainly wouldn’t have put out the statement they put out, but that’s their choice to make.

I believe they’re honorable people. Joel Meyers certainly has a long and storied reputation and has been honored for his contributions to the public’s well being and safety.

I know folks at AccuWeather read this. I would like to see Joel personally revisit this particular statement. If this is how he really feels, fine.

My hope is, he’ll provide more specifics and less hyperbole.

So, there you have it. Yes – New England is vulnerable, but no more vulnerable today than it was last year at this time.

We need solid action to prepare, not hyperbole and scare tactics.

Why Wilma Scares Me

Just in case you’re counting, Hurricane Wilma is currently 1735 miles southwest of me. That’s ‘as the crow flies’ miles. Because this hurricane is ready to make a sweeping right hand turn, it would have to travel significantly farther.

How can I be worried about something 1735 miles away? It’s easy – I’ve seen this scenario before. I didn’t live it. It predates me. I’ve studied it because it is the benchmark for New England hurricane grief.

Before you feel my pain, let me talk a little about my parents. They’re ensconced in Boynton Beach, FL. Hurricane Wilma is 640 miles south-southwest of them.

As it stands now, the official Hurricane Center prediction takes Wilma right over… or reasonably close to them. Though the storm will be coming over land, it’s swampy land. There’s warm water and low friction in the Everglades. It’s not perfect for a hurricane but it won’t kill it either.

My folks have hurricane shutters and live in a substantial building. I think they’ll be OK, though I’ll revisit this with them later today.

Here’s the one bit of good news. Hurricane Wilma will be ‘booking’ as she passes through Florida. Coast-to-coast will be 10, maybe 12 hours. The faster Hurricane Wilma moves, the sooner the trouble is over.

Nature adapts to this kind of trouble. Palm trees have decidedly less wind resistance than the deciduous trees we have here in Connecticut.

The Hurricane Center forecasts 110 mph winds at landfall in Florida, dropping to 80 mph by the time the storm reemerges in the Atlantic&#185. Even 80 mph, a small hurricane, is substantial if it passes close by. Most of us have never experienced 80 mph winds… and we’ve all seen plenty of wind damage.

The Hurricane Center used to talk about 80 mph storms as minimal hurricanes. They don’t anymore. That’s a change for the better.

I am anticipating moderate to severe damage on the West Coast of Florida with minimal to scattered moderate damage on the East Coast. There will be a much smaller radius of damage in the east.

Once the storm leaves Florida the guessing game begins. It will really accelerate. This is the part that starts resembling the Hurricane of ’38.

From PBS’ American Experience: Within 24 hours, the storm ripped into the New England shore with enough fury to set off seismographs in Sitka, Alaska. Traveling at a shocking 60 miles per hour — three times faster than most tropical storms — it was astonishingly swift and powerful, with peak wind gusts up to 186 m.p.h. The storm without a name turned into one of the most devastating storms recorded in North America. Over 600 people were killed, most by drowning. Another hundred were never found. Property damage was estimated at $300 million — over 8,000 homes were destroyed, 6,000 boats wrecked or damaged.

Though the storm struck Connecticut’s coast in Fairfield County, the strongest damage was experienced at the opposite end of the state and into Rhode Island.

Here’s what’s most troubling. A storm barreling up the East Coast will leave minimal time for warning. Look at the map. Florida to New Jersey in 24 hours! I couldn’t drive it that quickly.

To get a Hurricane Warning out 24 hours in advance would mean alerting most of the Northeast. An error of a few degrees in course could mean Atlantic City versus Boston.

And where would all these people go? Imagine sending everyone in Coastal New England west on I-95!

This is the worst case scenario. A direct hit to New England would cause as much destruction, and possibly as many deaths, as the unpredicted storm in 1938!

The current projections bring Hurricane Wilma far enough east to spare New England. But there is very little margin for error over a five day forecast. I’m certainly not confident in it. Just a few degrees off…

So now we wait and watch. Like I said, there will be lots of phone calls to Florida tomorrow. I want to make sure my parents have every possible advantage. Then we’ll bring the worries closer to home.

Hurricane Wilma scares me to the bone.

&#185 – The Hurricane Center readily admits, of all the things it does, predicting intensity is the thing it does worst.

Dinner With A Hurricane Katrina Survivor

A week ago, as Hurricane Katrina was strengthening in the Gulf of Mexico, I spent some time on the phone with my friend’s 86 year old mom. I tried… I guess I did convince her to leave her New Orleans home.

Before dawn Sunday morning she got into her car and drove to the Louisiana Superdome. This was before all the tumult and grief there. Before long they had her on a bus headed to Alexandria. She never got there. The bus drove 10 hours to Baton Rouge (a one hour trip under normal circumstances) and dropped her off at LSU.

Though we’ve all see the horrific images from New Orleans and the Mississippi and Alabama coasts, Ruth was treated well at LSU. They fed her and there was air conditioning, while the power was on.

We all assume Ruth’s house and all her possessions are gone. The area it’s in was one of the hardest hit, under ten or more feet of water! Her car, in the Superdome parking lot is probably a total loss as well.

A few days ago, my friend bought tickets to bring his mom to Connecticut&#185. She will stay with her daughter who lives here in the Naugatuck Valley.

When I heard Ruth was coming to Connecticut, I told the station’s assignment desk and we sent Darren Duarte to do a story. Ruth is telegenic and articulate. The story was very emotional – as you might imagine.

Astoundingly, and much to her delight, Ruth has become a ‘TV star’. First it was the UPS man, delivering a package, asking if she was the woman from television? Then at Macy’s in the Trumbull Mall.

Last night, Ruth and family invited me to dinner at Tony & Lucille’s on Wooster Street in New Haven. Dinner was exceptional. Even Ruth, a lifelong New Orleans resident… a city known for it’s astounding cuisine… was blown away.

More interesting were Ruth’s stories and her amazing attitude. I don’t know about you, but if I had lost everything, I don’t think I could have maintained her composure and positive attitude.

Everything is gone – photos, letters, memorabilia. Furniture and cars, even houses can be replaced (and, thankfully, she has the insurance to do that). But how do you replace a lifetime of possessions with special meaning? There is no insurance for that.

Ruth has no imminent plans to return to New Orleans. She will probably take up living with her daughter and, if all goes well, just stay.

This is part of what will change New Orleans. At the dinner table we discussed whether New Orleans would ever come back?

Can tourists and conventions ever look past the images of gun toting thugs walking down the street or the misery of the people trapped in the Convention Center, Superdome and even on highway overpasses?

Will those with means, like Ruth I suppose, flee the city? It could turn from a primarily poor and black city to a totally poor and black city. An analogy was made to Newark, NJ.

That would be a shame. Though it’s an overused term, New Orleans really was a one of a kind city. It would be nice to see it return to that stature.

&#185 – When my friend, whose name I have kept from these entries, called his travel agent to tell his mother’s story and get tickets, the agent said the trip was on her company. Some stories from this tragedy are good. Most of us do operate the way you’d like under difficult circumstances.

We’re In Philadelphia

The trip to Philadelphia wasn’t terribly bad… for a Friday afternoon… in the summer… on I-95. There is a place, about halfway through New Jersey, where the four roadway Turnpike becomes the two roadway Turnpike. At the point (or actually a few miles before it) the traffic slows to a crawl.

We made Philadelphia by mid-afternoon. The hotel was easy to find (considering Helaine had grown up here and I lived here for five years, we should know where things are) and nicely located.

We’re on the Delaware River. When I was here, this area was industrial and well into an era of hard times. It’s been reclaimed now as an entertainment area with restaurants and hotels.

Just across the way, and over an expressway, is the main body of the city. The streets in Philadelphia are numbered – so we’re ‘below’ First Street.

After we checked in, we decided to walk north, along the river, and ended up at Dave and Buster’s. D&B is a national chain of arcades on steroids… with a bar!

I found a flight simulator and attempted to takeoff and land without killing any of my passengers. No sweat. Next it was a boxing simulator. I’ve never played an arcade game that took so much out of me. There was even a readout with the number of calories you burned!

While I was playing games, Steffie and Helaine were working the ticket dispensing machines. What were they looking to get? Who knows? They were acquiring tickets as its own end.

I settled in next to them on a machine that tosses a coin onto platform. Small ‘sweepers’ push the coins forward. Hopefully, if your coin ends up in the right place, it will dislodge other coins causing them to fall in a tray, getting you tickets.

By the time we were done, Steffie had a dragon. It’s actually quite cute.

We went back to the hotel to wash up and get ready for dinner. Then, we headed to Society Hill and Old City. The latter name comes from the fact that this was the colonial center of Philadelphia. This is where Benjamin Franklin and Betsy Ross lived… though not together.

It was in Society Hill where the beginning of Philadelphia’s in-town gentrification began with the Society Hill Towers, two luxury apartment buildings. As I remember, they’re condos now.

We walked past Bookbinders and up Chestnut Street. This part of Philadelphia is an amazing mix of old and new. There are glass box office buildings and historical sites. Some streets are paved with cobblestones.

Philadelphia has a system of streets and alleyways. In some ways, that makes its downtown similar to Boston’s. Some of these alleys are just wide enough for a car – barely.

We went hunting for a restaurant to have dinner. Steffie and Helaine read the menus posted near the doors. We finally settled on an Italian place, Amici Noi, at 3rd and Market.

Good choice. The food was excellent and the portions large.

Surprisingly, all the restaurants we look at were fairly empty. Maybe Philadelphia isn’t the tourist city it should be. Certainly, on a hot Friday night, plenty of locals would be headed to the Jersey Shore.

It’s a shame, because this is such a beautiful and livable city.

After dinner I decided to head to South Street, knowing Steffie especially would like it. First, a detour. I wanted to see Independence Hall.

I remember, back when I lived here, how cool I thought it was to just drive by the Liberty Bell or Independence Hall. It’s no different now. There’s something very impressive knowing these icons of American history are right in the middle of modern life.

We walked down 4th Street past some beautiful neighborhoods of very expensive, very small homes. I can only shudder to think how these places have appreciated since I left 25 years ago this month.

How to describe South Street? Eclectic. Bohemian. Over the top. Very much like Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles.

South Street is where you find stores… like Condom Kingdom!

We walked and Steffie darted into some stores looking at clothing. We also stopped at Rita’s so Steffie and Helaine could get ‘water ice’ and I could get some custard. Perfect.

Meanwhile, South Street was packed with cars and cops and parking enforcement officers. I have never seen tow trucks move as quickly and deftly to get cars off the street! Something tells me this is a very expensive way to get unwanted valet parking.

We headed back to our hotel. We were, to understate it, tired. In fact, I went to bed a good seven hours before my normal bedtime!

Today, we head to the Vet&#185 for the Phillies versus San Diego Padres. I’m psyched.

&#185 – The Phillies play in Citizens Bank Park. I know that. I still want to say they play at the Vet… and it is, after all, my blog.

Destination Revealed

I woke up today waiting to go on my mystery birthday trip. Helaine held the secret.

We headed south down I-91 to I-95 and then turned toward New York City. I asked if we were taking the Cross Bronx Expressway? We were. We headed onto the George Washington Bridge. We weren’t going to New York.

I turned to Helaine and asked, “Are we going to Philadelphia?” She said, “Yes.” So, here we are.

We’re in a very nice hotel on the Delaware River, across from Camden, NJ. Camden looks very nice from this distance.

There’s a lot to tell, but I am totally bushed. There will be lots of photos. That much is already established. And, tomorrow we’re seeing the Phillies play San Diego.

How cool is that?

Buying Computers In A High School Gym

My first computer show was in Atlantic City, NJ. You want to know how long ago it was? It was pre-gambling!

Since that time I’ve been drawn to out of the way… strange places… where computers are sold by the people who build them.

Over the years I’ve spent significant money in these computer shows. Mostly I’ve bought parts – little bits and pieces of computers. But I’ve also brought people to these shows so I could talk them through buying full systems (often assembled right there).

I’ve gone to them in school gyms, hotel ballrooms (and its adjacent swimming pool) racetracks and fairgrounds. If you had an unused, open space on a weekend, a show was going to take place.

The amazing thing for the promoters was, they could charge the vendors and charge the attendees! Yup, you paid for the privilege of buying.

Yesterday, my dad and I attended one not far from here and this might be my last.

We each paid $5 to get in. He bought some disk labels for $10 and I bought a very cool, lit, optical mouse for $8. The spark is gone.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately – it depends on which side of the table you’re on) most of what was only available at these shows is now available online and in brick and mortar stores. The prices online are cutthroat. The advantage of a local show is gone… at least to me it is. I saw nothing I can’t see here on my PC.

I was surprised this last time to see some software that was surely bootleg. And I looked at some merchandise that was more expensive here than elsewhere. In fact, when I got home, I bought two more mice for $5 apiece.

It’s a shame because there was always a bit of an outlaw feel to these shows. You were getting a real deal, buying from someone who was also getting a good deal because his uncle or brother or cousin lived near the factory in Taiwan or Korea.

Like I said, I’ll be surprised if I go back.

Greetings From Ventnor City

I’m writing this from the kitchen of my friend Peter’s condo in Ventnor City, NJ. Honest, there is a Ventnor City, NJ… just down the road from Atlantic City. The people here call it Ventnor.

My journey started after work Friday night. Knowing I have no organizational skills, or willpower, going home after work would have just meant an extended period of putting off going to bed… so I set out for Peter’s house, in Cherry Hill, NJ at 11:35 PM.

That was a good idea because traffic was light and I made it in just under three hours. Not bad. EZ-Pass is good on the NJ Turnpike, making the trip even easier.

I didn’t relish the idea of a long drive but I had my cell phone along with the earpiece I seldom use. I knew if I got my Cousin Michael on the phone from California… well, let’s just say Michael is never at a loss for words.

That’s a good thing because I enjoy talking with him. Between Michael, Melissa and Max (their son) I kept busy through the Bronx, over the George Washington Bride and well into New Jersey. Finally I gave up because my ear was getting sore.

I also decided to run a ‘science experiment’ during the drive. I put my laptop in the front seat, powered by an inverter, working off the car’s battery so it would last the whole trip. The laptop had a wireless network card and GPS receiver hooked up and ran a free piece of software call NetStumbler.

As I drove along, sometimes every few seconds and sometimes only a few times an hour, a little sound went off and the computer would log the presence of a wireless access point. Some were password protected while others would have gladly (OK – gladly is overdoing it) allowed me to connect to the Internet or anything else behind their firewall!

After I return to Connecticut I’ll try and publish some lists and maps to show you what got logged. It was very interesting to me and I tried disparately not to look at the computer screen as I sped along at 70 mph.

I made it to Peter’s house around 2:30 AM. For me that’s the shank of the day. For Peter, it’s the middle of the night. He woke up and let me in. He even nuked a few burgers for me!

Saturday morning started with a visit to his nephew’s baseball game, breakfast at a deli and then a trip to the Jersey Shore. Peter recently bought a 2005 Acura RL and we felt it was necessary to test all the buttons&#185.

Some parts of the car, like the XM Satellite Radio, were interesting. Peter and I agree the XM ‘decade channels’ play too many marginal songs (not hits) – probably an effort to avoid repetition and there’s no real ‘oldies’ channel as such. I did find the comedy channels interesting and am envious of his ability to hear every baseball game… though as a non-sports fan he will listen to none.

When a car is packed with gadgets, as this one is, there are things which seem superfluous or a little over the top. If, instead of touching a button, you’d like to wait five or ten seconds and hope your command is understood, you can tell the car’s climate control system to turn down the fan or adjust the temperature. Using the button is easier!

Mostly this is a sweet car and I enjoyed the ride to the shore.

Though sunny, today was blustery and cool. Still, we decided to take a walk down the boardwalk. The water was rough with spray coming off each breaking wave. The beach, as you might expect for April, was empty.

As we walked the beach, we ran into a flock of tiny birds. Though they do fly, most of the time they scamper on the sand, chasing the waterline in and out with the waves. They’re looking for food, I’m sure, but they were fun to watch because they’re totally in sync and choreographed perfectly.

There is no outward sign of communications between these birds, but they must know what the others are going to do. They change direction on a dime and never bump into each other!

Tonight we had dinner at the Tun, near the Atlantic City Convention Center. I’m on Atkins (again), so I told my waitress I’d rather not have the potatoes with my meal. Could she substitute something else? “How about French Fries,” was her reply.

The steak was very good and there was plenty of it. There was no Splenda for my coffee (a recurring theme of late), so I pulled a pack from the stash in my wallet. This is what 54 year old guys carry in their wallets instead of condoms.

After dinner we went to the Tropicana to see a comedy show. The Comedy Stop at the Trop has been there for at least 25 years. Recently it moved to nicer quarters in the hotel’s new wing called The Quarter. In fact the whole addition is very nice, somewhat reiniscent of the shops at some Vegas casinos.

We stopped in the Spy Store where I found some items going for many multiples of what the same thing sells for on EBay. I wasn’t expecting bargains, but this was a little ridiculous.

The comdey show itself was good and the comedians fine… at least that’s my impression from the audience reaction. Maybe I just wasn’t in a comedy mood tonight?

&#185 – There is a button that Peter just can’t figure out. If you have any idea what the “DISP MODE” button does, drop me a line.

Cherry Hill and Back

We had to make a rush trip to Cherry Hill, NJ earlier today. Google’s new maps program says the round trip was about 354 miles. That seems right. It’s about the limit for driving and getting anything accomplished before heading home.

Luckily for us traffic wasn’t too bad. We missed morning rush going into New York City and afternoon drive coming home. The only real snag on the trip was here in Connecticut, around 6:30 PM, traveling through Fairfield County.

I have no idea why went went slowly… but it did. It was worse than anything we saw on the Cross Bronx Expressway, if you can believe that.

I would guess a large park of our traffic free passage had to do with the advent of E-ZPass. Having this RFID tag in your car eliminates making the trip unnoticed, but it sure does speed things along.

The toll booths near Meadowlands Stadium were always a choke point. With E-ZPass we breezed through at highway speed. Same thing for the George Washington Bridge.

My only concern was a cryptic message at NJ Turnpike exit 4, when we saw a sign that told us to go – though our tag hadn’t been read. Honest officer, it was on the windshield.

It will be a surprise to find out what the toll actually is. I have no idea. It wasn’t posted anywhere.

This is a trip we used to make all the time while Helaine’s parents were alive.

I remember stopping on the Jersey Turnpike, driving our Mazda 929. When Steffie was an infant, the 929’s trunk made the perfect open air changing table.

The rest areas are still named after famous New Jersey residents like Joyce Kilmer, Vince Lombardi, Grover Cleveland and Thomas A. Edison.

Is Grover Cleveland’s family proud to know that this former president’s most conspicuous achievement in the 21st century is having people mention his name when they need to make a pit stop&#185? It would probably be defensible if he were still on the $1000 bill.

Speaking of the rest areas, it looks like they’ve been rebuilt, adding additional outward ugliness to what were ugly buildings to begin with. There are flowers near the sink (and loud music) in the mens room. The restaurant section is a medley of your favorite fast food joints in a food court arrangement.

New Jersey continues to lead the nation in “Full Service” gas stations. From a National Review commentary:

It is illegal to self-pump in New Jersey. You must have a gas-station professional pump your gas and ring up your purchase. This might have made some sense in 1949 when the law was passed and when most of the population still smoked and stupidity could conceivably kill at the gas station. But times have changed and pumping gas is a safe activity that almost everyone but the handicapped can perform with the greatest of ease. Pay-at-the-pump technology is standard at gas stations coast to coast. Motorists fly through stations with the breathtaking efficiency only Americans can take for granted. That is, except in New Jersey and Oregon

My Trashy Story

Every week, on Friday, our trash goes to the curb. Every other week it’s supposed to be accompanied by recycling. It doesn’t work that way in our household.

Whether it’s our distance from the curb or the amount of recycled newspapers we have (we subscribe to both the New Haven Register or New York Times) or maybe all the boxes we get because of online shopping, going to the curb bi-weekly doesn’t work. So all of this recyclable material piles up in the garage. A few times a year we stuff it into the SUV and I drive it to the transfer station.

Transfer station, what a lovely phrase. It’s so much more genteel than town dump.

I drove up to the transfer station this morning only to find the new policy – no newspapers. I had an SUV full of recyclables, and of course, the supermarket bags of newspapers were on top!

I unloaded the 20 or so bags of newspapers to get to the cardboard and other material underneath. At this point the transfer station folks took pity on me and found a place… a transfer station loophole if you will… that allowed me to drop the papers off. From now on it’s newspapers to the street, I suppose.

I want to be a good citizen, but it is increasingly difficult to follow the rules. In fact, it would be much easier to hide the newspapers and cardboard and bottles with our weekly trash. I’m sure a lot of people do just that. It also always strikes me as a little ironic that the two most talked about recycled products are made from sand (glass) or grow on trees (paper).

I know this is supposed to be good for the environment, and I’m for that. But, is it really? Is this just a feel good exercise with no payoff… or negative payoff?

From “Recycling Is Garbage” – New York Times Magazine, June 30, 1996:

Every time a sanitation department crew picks up a load of bottles and cans from the curb, New York City loses money. The recycling program consumes resources. It requires extra administrators and a continual public relations campaign explaining what to do with dozens of different products — recycle milk jugs but not milk cartons, index cards but not construction paper. (Most New Yorkers still don’t know the rules.) It requires enforcement agents to inspect garbage and issue tickets. Most of all, it requires extra collection crews and trucks. Collecting a ton of recyclable items is three times more expensive than collecting a ton of garbage because the crews pick up less material at each stop. For every ton of glass, plastic and metal that the truck delivers to a private recycler, the city currently spends $200 more than it would spend to bury the material in a landfill.

I don’t know what to think. I want to do what’s right, but I am really not sure. Until I know otherwise, I will follow the rules.

In the meantime, part of our recycling life at home will have to change. Newspapers to the curb. I can hardly wait for the first really big rain on a Thursday night.

Continue reading “My Trashy Story”

Diner Discussions

This was originally going to be called “Dinner Discussions,” but when I made the type to “Diner Discussions,” I realized it fit better.

I got a call this afternoon from my friend Farrell. He and his wife were in Connecticut at Mohegan Sun Casino. Actually, I think Farrell called out of a sense of boredom because casinos were not built for him!

I asked when they were driving back to New Jersey. When it seemed like a reasonable time, I asked if they’d like to stop for dinner in New Haven?

Farrell said he was in jeans and I didn’t feel like shaving&#185, so we decided to meet at the Greek Olive. The Greek Olive is a diner located right off I-95 at Long Wharf in New Haven. It’s about 15 minutes from here and under an hour from Mohegan Sun, but on the way home for them.

Tony and Anna who own it, used to own the luncheonette next to the TV station. I’ve known them and their daughters for years. I eat there two or three nights a week.

I drove to Long Wharf, getting there before Farrell, his wife and sister (who lives in Derby and was invited to join us). It was reasonably crowded, but someone was leaving a circular table tucked away in a corner of the dining room and Anna asked if we’d like it.

I know this blog is read all across the world (that continues to completely stun me), so I should explain the concept of a diner. They will make pretty much anything – from prime rib down to scrambled eggs and everything in between. The service is fast. The portions are generous. The coffee is never ending.

Though I’m not eating desserts at the moment, diners are known for their amazing baked goods – and this place is no exception. As you walk in, it’s tough to miss the huge cakes sitting in a refrigerated, glass walled case.

I have known Farrell for nearly 25 years. He was responsible for me getting my first TV job in Buffalo. I try not to hold that against him.

Everyone sat down, and the small talk began. It wasn’t long before we began to talk politics and the election. There is no doubt in my mind that the interest in this particular presidential election is just as great, maybe greater, than any in my lifetime.

I don’t think the country has been this divided Nixon – McGovern in 1972. By that I mean the supporters of either candidate find it difficult to understand how anyone could vote for the other guy. Back in 1972 the two side were also far apart in policy but very mismatched in strength. Nixon was a juggernaut in that election.

This time the lines are again well drawn, but the supporting camps are more evenly matched in size.

After a little while Tony walked by, pulled up a chair and sat down to join the discussion. It was great.

Really good discourse of any kind (but especially political) is a lot of fun. It is to your brain as exercise is to your muscles. It made a good meal with friends even better.

I watched Jon Stewart of the Daily Show on Crossfire on CNN a few days ago. He criticized the hosts (Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson) for using dogmatic arguments or quotes out of context or just plain spin to promote people they supported. Stewart claimed this ‘ends justifies the means’ method of political argument seen so often on cable TV does our country a disservice.

I agree.

That’s why this discussion, which was so free wheeling and open was so much fun.

I don’t agree with everything everyone said… in fact I disagree with lots of what I heard. I was just glad to have the workout and suspect everyone there was enjoying it too.

What I expected to be a terribly lonely night, in the house by myself, turned out better than anticipated.

&#185 – If Helaine found out that I shaved on a Saturday while she was away, she would call for an investigation – and be justified doing it.

Why Do They Do It This Way?

Last weekend, shooting stills at the UCONN/Army game was a lot of fun. I would have shot more, but I ran out of memory.

As cameras have ramped up the pixel count, the memory storage requirements have gone up too. I have three compact flash cards that together hold about 1 gigabyte.

Today, that’s not an incredibly large amount of memory, but I remember when it was – and not that long ago.

I didn’t want to get caught short again, so I looked into buying another, larger card. Within the last month, compact flash prices have dropped through the floor. Prices are half what they had been recently and a quarter of where they were last year!

To me, that was a buy signal (though at this rate, I could have waited a little longer until they paid me to take them).

I searched around and found what I wanted on eCost.com. This is an interesting site because there is free shipping – but you pay a handling charge. Exactly what is the difference? And, how can a business, built on handling your order, charge for handling?

The card cost me $84 plus $4.95 for handling. Subtract a $30 rebate&#185 for a net of $58.95. That’s an excellent price – today. Next week it might look like I was ripped off.

Of course I wanted the card yesterday, but that was not to be. Somehow, UPS put this thing on the scenic tour of Eastern America. It’s not that it took so long – it’s just the package made more stops than a presidential campaign!

Oct 1, 2004

12:04 P.M.

NORTH HAVEN, CT, US

DELIVERY

6:27 A.M.

NORTH HAVEN, CT, US

OUT FOR DELIVERY

3:45 A.M.

NORTH HAVEN, CT, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

1:28 A.M.

SHREWSBURY, MA, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

Sep 30, 2004

12:06 P.M.

SHREWSBURY, MA, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

7:32 A.M.

SECAUCUS, NJ, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

6:07 A.M.

SECAUCUS, NJ, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

1:37 A.M.

LAUREL, MD, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

Sep 29, 2004

11:50 P.M.

LAUREL, MD, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

6:30 P.M.

FISHERSVILLE, VA, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

6:16 P.M.

FISHERSVILLE, VA, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

3:45 P.M.

ROANOKE, VA, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

3:12 P.M.

ROANOKE, VA, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

10:46 A.M.

KNOXVILLE, TN, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

10:20 A.M.

KNOXVILLE, TN, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

5:39 A.M.

NASHVILLE, TN, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

1:51 A.M.

NASHVILLE, TN, US

ARRIVAL SCAN

Sep 28, 2004

10:18 P.M.

MEMPHIS, TN, US

DEPARTURE SCAN

8:57 P.M.

US

BILLING INFORMATION RECEIVED

8:12 P.M.

MEMPHIS, TN, US

ORIGIN SCAN

Only UPS understands why it saw three Tennessee cities and drove past my house on the way to Massachusetts… where it turned around and headed back.

The UPS driver walked the package from the curb to my front door. The box was light but substantial at 12″x10″x4.5″. Why? The hard plastic wrapped packaging was only 5″x6″ and without the wrap, the card is only 1.5″x1.625″ .

Not only could this have been packed in a smaller box, it could have been packed in an envelope! It’s difficult to believe the box is protecting the flash card much more than its impenetrable plastic packaging.

Bottom line is, it’s here. Tomorrow Steffie plays field hockey and I’ll attempt to fill it up.

&#185 – Rebates are seriously the work of the devil. I am very careful in how I fill them out, reading every word of the instructions. I still feel I get a very low return. These companies have every possible incentive to not pay me.