Tag: San Francisco

On The Floor At Midway

Before the entry, two quick notes:

1) The marble floor at Midway, though functional, is incredibly uncomfortable for sitting. As with most airports, the only power outlets are away from the sitting area and not really meant for passengers.

2) The 8:00 PM non-stop to Bradley International will be at least 1:25 late… at least. Helaine and Stef confirm, after a walk down the concourse, some flights are delayed with not time listed. Others have been canceled outright. Gotta love Chicago. O’Hare is no better.

OK – where were we? We spent the night in the motel in Mequon. We were leaving this morning while my parents were moving in with my sister and family for a few days.

Since we had a car, we volunteered to drop them off. Of course we never thought there wasn’t enough room in the La Cross to do that!

With a little rejiggering and bags on each lap, we were able to make it the few miles to Trudi and Jeff’s house. My guess is, we were at least 200 pounds over the La Cross’ design limits. Luckily, no potholes.

We left Mequon and turned south toward Milwaukee. Helaine had stayed at the Pfister and Steffie wanted to see it.

The Pfister is a very old, nicely maintained hotel. The lobby strikes me as what you’d find in San Francisco during the Victorian era. We had a nice lunch in the coffee shop.

Downtown Milwaukee seemed past its prime. There was little traffic and lots of older, ‘short’ buildings. In a vigorous downtown, height would have swept these old buildings away.

The attendant at the parking lot told us all the entrances to the southbound Interstate were closed! There was a roundabout way to get there, which he proceeded to describe.

Amazingly enough, it worked. Before long we were on our way south of I-94 East. If I-94 really went east, we’d be in Lake Michigan, a few hundred yards away. We’ve got the same problem in Connecticut with I-95 North, which runs east.

There was too much time to head directly to Midway, so we stopped in Pleasant Prairie at the Jelly Belly factory. It is located across the way from the Dyslexic Institutes of America (there is more than one I guess).

You would probably be surprised at the crowd, waiting for the free tour. We were! The wait was around 45 minutes before we piled into our faux train for a trip around the factory’s outer wall.

It was nice, but it would have been nicer if we had actually seen them making candy. Everything we saw (other than boxes and older outmoded equipment) was on video.

We took our free samples, spent a few bucks in the company store and headed south, again.

Have you ever driven in Chicago traffic? Holy crap – this was awful. Maybe worse than awful. And, I’ve been told it’s always like this. Yikes!

We went by Downtown. There’s a lot of distinctive architecture there, including the Sears Tower, but my best ‘sighting’ were the apartment buildings pictured on the opening of the old Bob Newhart Show!

They’re still posting 9:20 PM for our flight. It’s going to be a l-o-n-g day… and they still might change our gate as I’ve heard them do to a handful of others.

Blogger’s note: The past few entries have been posted without photos, because it’s a hassle to do when you’re on the road. I’ll add them later.

Don Fitzpatrick

If you’re not in TV, you probably don’t know who Don Fitzpatrick is. If you are in TV, but haven’t been in long enough, you don’t know what he once was and the power he held.

Don died over the weekend in Louisiana. He was from there originally and moved back a few years ago. He will be most remembered for his years in San Francisco.

I first heard about Don right after I got into TV news. He was a headhunter of broadcast talent. He, or someone working for him, would comb the country, making videotapes of every on-the-air reporter and anchor they could see. That was then, and still is, a stunningly daunting undertaking.

Don’s company back in San Francisco, Don Fitzpatrick and Associates, kept those tapes cross referenced in an intricate filing system.

If you were a news director, looking for a reporter or anchor, you could go to San Francisco and look at everyone in a hurry. And, those you were looking at never had to know. It was cleaner that way.

Back in those days Don’s biggest client was probably the CBS owned stations. If Don had your tape, and if you were liked, he had the power to get you moved along. He was a giant in that way.

There was another side to Don. He was one of the first computer publishers. I want to say Internet, but he really was here before the original DARPA Internet became the World Wide Web we know today.

In the early 80s, his daily “Rumorville” was a must read… at least for the few of us who had accounts on “The Source.” There was little interconnection between the many networked services, like CompuServe and Prodigy and The Source.

Rumorville was fearless. Fitzpatrick would often print what his name implied – rumors. More often than not, they were true. Often they concerned powerful people in lofty positions.

Most of the Rumorville subscribers were news directors and other managers. As an on-the-air person, I was an exception.

I remember Don having trouble accomplishing some bit of computer minutiae. I sent off an email with some tips. This was nearly 20 years ago. I expected everyone using a computer then to be a geek. Don was not.

More important than knowing their inner workings, he was able to see the power of interconnected computers to pass timely info back-and-forth. Again, we’re talking about the early 80s!

As time went on, and the face of broadcasting changed, Don’s business seemed to become more marginalized. Finally, he was out of the talent aircheck business.

Later, Rumorville became ShopTalk, a daily newsletter. It, unfortunately, became a lot more mainstream and fact based. I miss the days when it was freewheeling. I missed the juicy rumors.

I met Don twice. The first time was in Charlotte, NC. I was there giving demos for a weather graphics company at the Radio TV News Directors Association convention. Don tapped me on the shoulder and introduced himself.

I looked and saw a rumpled guy in an poorly fitting sport coat and vaguely matching pants. I had expected to meet a slickly packaged giant. Instead, he was a real person.

Don and I traded emails a few times a year. Though we seldom chatted, I kept his screen name on my Instant Messenger friends list. I’ve watched him sign on at all hours of the day and night.

It’s sad to hear he’s died. He and I were separated by just a year in age – though he seemed so much more worldly and mature, early in my career. I knew he had health concerns, though nothing this serious.

He was one of a kind. He was a trail blazer. He was a king maker. He will be missed – certainly by me.

The New Era Of Communications

I got this email today:

We are in panama we just went thru the locks. all is well we are having a great time mom and dad

What do we have here? Well, certainly, for his next birthday I’m buying my dad punctuation marks and capital letters! More than that, a check of the originating IP address shows he sent this from on-board ship.

My mom and dad are cruising, but the Internet is there with them.

I remember when Helaine and I took a cruise many years ago. We stopped in Puerto Rico and rushed to a pay phone to check in with everyone back home. Same thing in St. Thomas (in fact, I can still picture the pay phones to the left of the main door of the St. Thomas Post Office).

It wasn’t that there weren’t phones on the ship, but it was ridiculously expensive.

Yesterday, my friend Peter left for three weeks on Maui. I spoke to him as he went to the airport. I spoke to him in San Francisco, waiting for a delayed flight. I spoke to him once he got to his Maui hotel. Each time I dialed the same South Jersey cellphone number.

Each of my calls were included in my cell plan with no additional charge… in fact, with no meter even clicking off the minutes.

Calling Hawaii, like making a call from a cruise ship, used to be expensive. No more.

I also played around a little, calling my friend Bob in Austin, TX using Skype. The quality was great, using my laptop on the sofa in the family room and a cheap headset. Of course the call was totally free.

This ability to communicate, whether by computer or phone or a combination of the two is amazing – something we in the 21st century share with no other moment in history. It is, unfortunately, limited to the wealthy.

A little clarification. In this case wealthy applies to the vast majority of people in the United States and many more around the world, who are included in a global middle class. They are only wealthy in contrast to those who are dirt poor – and there are many who fit that category.

Now, maybe there is hope for them to benefit from this communications and knowledge explosion, fueled by computing.

I saw Nicholas Negroponte with Charlie Rose on PBS. Negroponte heads MIT’s Media Lab, a communication and information think tank

In its first decade, much of the Laboratory’s activity centered around abstracting electronic content from its traditional physical representations, helping to create now-familiar areas such as digital video and multimedia. The success of this agenda is now leading to a growing focus on how electronic information overlaps with the everyday physical world. The Laboratory pioneered collaboration between academia and industry, and provides a unique environment to explore basic research and applications, without regard to traditional divisions among disciplines.

That’s some of the least explanatory prose ever written by otherwise educated people.

Negroponte was on to talk about a project I’ve been following for a while – a $100 laptop, to be produced in bulk and distributed for free to students around the world.

If this is the first you’re hearing about this project, please go to their site and read more. It’s really an amazing undertaking.

The MIT Media Lab has launched a new research initiative to develop a $100 laptop

The Meisels Go Home To New Orleans

Back when Hurricane Katrina was threatening the Gulf Coast, I did my best to get Ruth Meisel out. The day she drove to safety up north was the last time she saw her home, until yesterday.

With her two adult children in tow, Ruth Meisel returned to New Orleans to see what could be salvaged and tie up loose ends. She will be among the tens, maybe hundreds of thousands, who will leave their homes and move elsewhere.

New Orleans is being abandoned, wholesale.

I asked her son, my friend, Farrell to type some of his thoughts so I could put them here in the blog. I’ll sprinkle a few of his photos here, though the best way to see them is in this slideshow.

Clean up goes on. 80% of the city was affected. Some parts of the city have begun to function, albeit at half speed. This area is still without electricity and is deemed unsafe. It’s expected that electricity won’t be restored in New Orleans East for six to nine months. My mother returned for the first time since the hurricane and subsequent floods, to survey the damage and see if anything could be saved. She’s suited up and ready to go inside. In the background, my sister, Cheri, ready to suit up, as well.

It’s nice… no, it’s amazing to see Ruth smiling.

Here’s my read. She could be distressed with what she’s about to see, or she could be happy to see she raised her children right, and they are accompanying and supporting her. She chose the latter.

My mother knew from earlier reports and a prior visit by my sister, that things didn’t look so good. She’s been very optimistic and hopeful, looking forward and giving us much encouragement. My mother’s house survived the storm on the outside, but the inside looked and smelled awful and was a total disaster. Entering the front door we were greeted by a living room chair that wasn’t there when my mother left in August. That gives you an idea of how we were greeted.

From the marks on the wall it looks like 4-5 feet of water made it into the house. From the ‘bunny suits’ the Meisel’s wore, you can assume it wasn’t spring water.

Nearly everything was ruined.

One of the things that struck Farrell when we spoke on the phone was the proliferation of signs advertising Katrina related services. There are also markings, scrawled on homes with spray paint.

This house has been FEMA’d. FEMA is not an acronym here. It’s a four-letter word. BTW, so is Bush.
One of the city’s synagogues, Beth Israel, an Orthodox house of worship…Also one of the city’s oldest, which used to be in the historic uptown area until the late 1960s. Also on Canal Blvd, note the watermarks. Reportedly, the head Rabbi fled town, leaving the Torah scrolls to flood and be rescued from religious volunteers. The Rabbi has since been fired. My sister spotted prayer books and prayer shawls on the ground in front of the now-deserted synagogue….a sin in the Jewish religion.

Here’s how Farrell ended his note, and I’ll leave it pretty much intact:

As I visit here, for the first time in several years, 3 months after the devastation that has been chronicled worldwide, I have now discovered: A Missing City. Parts of the city and neighboring parish (Jefferson) we have seen are beginning to function, but it’s slow and without spirit.

In our many conversations with New Orleanians and Jeffersonians, one hears a great deal of anger leveled at Government. I could only find one person with a nice thing to say about President Bush. I asked why? The waitress at the seafood restaurant said it was the Louisiana Governor’s fault for not letting Bush send FEMA and the troops in. I then asked, out of curiosity, did she know that Bush was on a fundraising trip in California for three days before he did a “fly-over”, VP Cheney was buying a vacation house and the Secretary of State was shopping in Manhattan, while her home state, Alabama, was flooded. The waitress hadn’t heard that.

A newspaper stand owner or manager clearly vented his anger towards Bush, but didn’t spare either the local, regional and state governments, but felt, the US Government let Louisiana down.

Most of the Greater New Orleans area, (Orleans and neighboring parishes), as it’s known, with some 1 million people once living there, don’t have electricity, a home, assistance from FEMA, insurance companies, and they feel forgotten just three months after the hurricane and floods.. As is the case with crises the world over, once the cameras leave, the sense of urgency goes with the camera crews.

The stores and shops that are open are operating for limited hours due to two factors: limited shoppers and limited staff.

It’s quite unusual to be driving in one part of the area, say neighboring Metairie, where the shops and malls have reopened, only to continue on Interstate 10 to downtown New Orleans, and pass through darkness because whole areas have no power.

There were some signs of life downtown and in the French Quarter. The beautiful St. Charles Avenue historic areas seemed to be untouched and lit, yet, just a few blocks away, one would have thought we could have been in a war zone.

Rumors of price gouging exist. Household stores are reportedly charging double for goods consumers can buy in the middle of the state or in Mississippi for less. Gasoline is 30 cents a gallon more expensive than in the center of Mississippi or Louisiana reportedly.

Residents feel abandoned now. From the newspaper shop owner to restaurateur, residents don’t feel the city of N.O. census will approach even half of it’s close to 461,000 registered residents.

Employers are looking for employees. Potential employees are looking for housing, assistance from FEMA and the insurance companies, and those are the few, who have returned.

The Times-Picayune reported today that the New Orleans Mayor, Ray Nagin, rumored to be in Washington on business, actually wasn’t there on business, but took his family on vacation to Jamaica. While I’m sure he’s deserving of a break, there are several hundred thousand to one million people, who’d love to take that break, if only they could get some help from the various government agencies so they could get on with their lives and rebuild. And I haven’t even begun to discuss the levee system.

As I write this at 2am Central Standard Time, I was trying to think, after only two days here, how could I best describe what I have seen and heard? The word that comes to mind is “abyss.”

New Orleans, which had once been described as the “city that care forgot,” from an old Mardi Gras tale, has become the bottomless gulf or pit. There are only a handful of truly unique cities in the U.S. with some history and character. When tourists think of those cities, New Orleans had always been in the same company with San Francisco, Boston, New York, Savannah, and perhaps one or two other cities or towns.

It would not be an exaggeration to suggest, if there is no sense of urgency, New Orleans could drop off that list in my lifetime.

Please, look at the pictures. It is so sad… so tragic.

Football Season Ends

The Eagles lost another one last night, falling to the Washington Redskins. The Eagles are now dead last in their division.

One of the Eagles’ problems was the missing Terrell Owens. Owens has been the team’s biggest star and biggest problem child, all at once.

He has criticized his fellow players and coaches and, it seems, taken a swing at a former player who is considered the team’s “ambassador.” Now he has been suspended.

Good going Terrell.

From The Associated Press: This was the second time Owens has been suspended during his controversial 10-year career. In 2000, he was suspended one game by San Francisco coach Steve Mariucci following his infamous touchdown celebrations on the Dallas Cowboys’ famed star logo at the center of Texas Stadium.

Owens clashed with management this summer and earned a one-week exile from training camp after a heated dispute with Reid that followed a shouting match with offensive coordinator Brad Childress.

As a kid I thought my sports heroes were heroes in real life as well. It’s not so. I was innocent. Players like Terrell Owens just go to reinforce that realization.

Owens is now suspended and it’s doubtful he’ll ever play for the Eagles again. He’ll probably find another team sometime soon.

The real shame is, I’m not sure he’s capable of being happy. I’ve known people like that… worked with people like that. It’s no fun. They become their own worst enemy. There’s no doubt that description applies to Owens.

Meanwhile. as an Eagles fan, the season seems to have ended early.

Bob Comes To Visit

I’m writing this early Sunday morning. I want to make sure something’s posted for Sunday and I don’t expect to be home for much of the day.

My friend Bob Lacey came by tonight. Bob has lived in Charlotte, NC for the last 30+ years. First he worked for WBT-AM, then WBTV, and now the FM, “The Link,” where with Sheri Lynch he hosts a nationally syndicated morning show.

I met Bob my first day in commercial radio.

I broke in at WSAR in Fall River, MA by doing an hour of Bob’s show. Bob supervised. It was my first real on-air job. We’ve been friends ever since.

We’ve both been through a lot of living since that day in early fall 1969. I can’t go into all of it here, but there’s not much that’s remained constant, except our friendship.

Bob jokingly calls me his “Gold Friend.” It’s tough to think of anything anyone’s ever said of me that is quite that flattering.

In 1975 out of work and with my life falling apart in Phoenix, Bob flew out and together, we drove the Western United States and a small part of Mexico. That was an amazing trip.

When I think back of what we did, hitting Puerto Penasco, Mexico, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Barstow, Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon, it still boggles the mind.

This was before cellphones and the Internet. We had a little cash and of the two of us, I had the lone credit card – an Esso card!

There were girls we tried to pick up… who blew us off, and two guys in San Diego who tried to pick us up! We cleaned our clothes by the dawn’s early light at a dusty laundromat alongside the railroad tracks in Barstow, CA. I spent all day playing $2 blackjack at Caesar’s.

We got along famously. Bob was my guiding light on that trip. By the time we returned to Phoenix, a new job had mysteriously appeared and I was off to Philadelphia.

Later today we plan on returning to the ‘scene of the crime,’ WSAR at the foot of Home Street in Somerset, MA. Then we head north to Boston and the Red Sox – White Sox game.

We don’t have tickets… but I’ve stuffed some cash in my wallet and we’ll hope for the best with scalpers. This will make three major league games in a month or so, after 15 years with none!

If everything works out as planned (and who knows) I’ll be on Amtrak before dark and in New Haven before midnight.

Photos and the actual trip report to follow.

Concerning Our Movie

My body has still not forgiven me for the beating it took yesterday. Little sleep. Lots of tension. Deadlines to keep. It’s taken me this long, until this late at night, to get to write about our movie, “External Monologue.”

First, if you missed the setup, this is part of Cinemasports, based in San Fransisco. They sponsor the it all… though there’s really no prize and, so far, no acknowledgment of our entry.

Production, as such, went smoothly. Production zealots will notice we eschewed lighting and well placed microphones during taping. The huge amount of voiceover work in the film was done in a professional studio

The script was actually very clever. I play a guy who is hearing voices – voices guiding me through my life. It is only at the very last moment that you realize the voices aren’t really in my head.

As I said, production went smoothly. It was post-production that was the bear. Marrying voiceover work with sound on tape and linking them both to action is not easily accomplished. We get an “A” for effort, but not execution.

As we worked up toward deadline, the clock on my oven picked up its pace. Minutes were 40 seconds long, then 30, then 20. We started sending a movie file seconds before the deadline. Then trouble struck. We resent it. And, with time to work during the resends, sent it again.

Finally, we had a finished product. It was after the real deadline, but we were having so many transmission problems at this point that it made little difference. I sent the polished file.

Everyone shook hands and talked about how satisfied we were with what had happened. We wished we had hit the deadline squarely, but we learned so much. There would be new techniques and internal guidelines when we did it again… and we would.

They went home.

It was then I discovered the file I was sending to San Francisco only contained the last 45 seconds of a three minute movie!

Somehow, during editing, someone had stuck a pointer at this spot. We were stuck because all I had was this version and an older, very rough unfinished version. That’s what I resent to ‘Cinemasports Central’.

Before you click the link you should know this isn’t rated “G.” There is a little salty language toward the end, and some of the imagery is a little dark. Still, I think we’d all like to know what you think.

And now ladies and gentlemen – External Monologue.

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”

Are You Feeling Lucky?

In Dirty Harry, Harry Callahan points his gun at the punk he’s been chasing through the streets of San Francisco, explains that he may or may not have another bullet in the chamber, and asks, “Are you feeling lucky?” In some ways, that’s the way I feel about my appointment today with the allergist.

It’s important to say I have total trust in my allergist. A few years ago, when my lips and other body parts started swelling for no apparent reason he knew what to do – even though he said we’d never know what caused it.

I saw him today for my semi-annual visit. After talking for a few minutes he told me, maybe it was time to stop taking my pills. Just as this swelling came on for no reason, it’s now likely to be gone.

He’s probably right… but am I feeling lucky?

I can continue to take my antihistamine forever, There doesn’t seem to be any downside to that, other than the cost (which isn’t that great). Still, even my doctor said, when the choice is between using and not using a drug, not using is preferred.

On the other hand, what if I stop and then start swelling again? I know I can go back on the pills… and would immediately.

My gut feeling is to take a chance and stop the antihistamines. We’ll see how lucky I really am!

It’s An Addiction – I’m Not Alone

Katie Haffner had an interesting story about blogging in this moring’s New York Times. I always thought (and Helaine will confirm) I’d gone off the deep end with blogging, but this article makes it seem like I’m not so bad. There are others who have been bitten far worse.

Thanks God for small favors.

Continue reading “It’s An Addiction – I’m Not Alone”

Alan King

I just heard that Alan King died. It’s a shame. It’s always a shame when someone dies.

Alan King is one of the many entertainers I have stolen from over the years. I don’t steal their jokes as much as I steal their style. Alan King always bit the hand that fed him.

As I remember, and this is a long time ago, King had a routine where he skewered Eastern Airlines (which, of course, he outlived). In the beginning of the routine he would say that he wasn’t going to mention the name of the airline, except it rhymes with “Eastern Airlines.”

My dad remembered the routine:

He asked the agent if she could ship one bag to Hawaii another to San Francisco and a third to Omaha? She said it wasn’t possible and he replied, “You did it last week.”

If the actual words to this routine are hidden somewhere on the Internet and you find them, please let me know.

Recently, he had become more know for a routine where he would read obituaries. They all ended the same way, “survived by his wife.” It was very funny.

When he’d appear on the Sullivan Show, you’d notice how well dressed he was – always in a vested three piece suit. He exuded the aura of success. That was part of his act. Lots of comedian’s were schlemiels. Not Alan King.

I seem to remember him in a Billy Crystal movie, playing Crystal’s father. I can’t think of any others, though they’ll come to me later. His movie career was inconsequential. He will be remembered for his stand-up comedy and his fearlessness in making fun of the powerful.

Blinking Lights

Right before I go to bed, after I turn the lights off in my office, I look back into the darkened room – only to see what looks like a miniature airport. Everywhere you look there are tiny lights. Some are steady. Some blink. Some used to be steady but now blink or quiver with age.

Why are they all there? Why does every new piece of electronic equipment seem to need a light?

Most are dumb. They’re saying, “Hey, I’m plugged in” and nothing more. Some, like the light connected to the charging circuit on my camcorder, blink according to how close to fully charged the battery is.

My cable modem has five lights. One, the test light, is never on. I don’t know how to test the test light. It might be burned out. How would I know? Three others, Power, Cable and PC, remain lit ’round the clock. The data light blinks incessantly as computers from around the world attempt to connect to my computers.

That’s not a good thing.

The blinking data light is chronicling the computer equivalent of walking down the block, stopping at every door and jiggling the doorknob to see if it’s unlocked.

The router between my cable modem and computer acts as a defacto firewall, keeping the miscreants out, so this blinking doesn’t mean someone’s hurting me. Still, I know what some of them are trying to accomplish by looking in the log the router keeps.

It used to take a few days to fill the log. Now, it’s full in a few hours. Here’s a sample:

Thursday, December 18, 2003 8:19:35 PM Unrecognized access from 68.163.201.167:3102 to TCP port 17300

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:01:42 PM Unrecognized access from 82.82.167.36:2219 to TCP port 1433

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:01:45 PM Unrecognized access from 82.82.167.36:2219 to TCP port 1433

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:02:00 PM Unrecognized access from 168.158.192.243:1115 to UDP port 1434

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:03:17 PM Unrecognized access from 64.156.39.12:666 to UDP port 1026

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:32:05 PM Unrecognized access from 68.63.66.150:4625 to TCP port 80

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:32:08 PM Unrecognized access from 68.63.66.150:4625 to TCP port 80

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:44:50 PM Unrecognized access from 67.26.94.85:2911 to TCP port 17300

Thursday, December 18, 2003 9:57:23 PM Unrecognized access from 67.201.162.153:2771 to TCP port 17300

Thursday, December 18, 2003 10:12:22 PM Unrecognized access from 82.139.65.182:55765 to TCP port 17300

Thursday, December 18, 2003 10:39:02 PM Unrecognized access from 203.40.196.206:1239 to UDP port 1434

Thursday, December 18, 2003 10:49:17 PM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:3380 to TCP port 80

Thursday, December 18, 2003 10:49:20 PM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:3380 to TCP port 80

Thursday, December 18, 2003 10:52:46 PM Unrecognized access from 208.30.189.21:4436 to TCP port 80

Thursday, December 18, 2003 10:52:49 PM Unrecognized access from 208.30.189.21:4436 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:03:32 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:4846 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:03:35 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:4846 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:05:17 AM Unrecognized access from 12.231.175.190:3764 to TCP port 17300

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:31:32 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:3089 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:31:35 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:3089 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:48:44 AM Unrecognized access from 202.103.172.45:59355 to UDP port 1026

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:56:01 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:3359 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:56:04 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:3359 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:57:24 AM Unrecognized access from 210.75.208.22:39452 to TCP port 443

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:57:27 AM Unrecognized access from 210.75.208.22:39452 to TCP port 443

Friday, December 19, 2003 12:57:33 AM Unrecognized access from 210.75.208.22:39452 to TCP port 443

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:26:37 AM Unrecognized access from 203.30.181.253:2136 to TCP port 4899

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:27:04 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:4153 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:30:02 AM Unrecognized access from 67.120.13.53:3296 to TCP port 4000

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:30:04 AM Unrecognized access from 67.120.13.53:3296 to TCP port 4000

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:40:25 AM 192.168.123.101 login successful

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:44:11 AM Unrecognized access from 130.13.127.64:3788 to TCP port 17300

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:44:22 AM Unrecognized access from 66.169.181.90:1030 to TCP port 27347

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:47:39 AM Unrecognized access from 221.6.135.154:1097 to UDP port 1434

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:49:30 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:2594 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:49:32 AM Unrecognized access from 68.63.64.108:2594 to TCP port 80

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:51:12 AM Unrecognized access from 67.119.218.75:4868 to TCP port 901

Friday, December 19, 2003 1:51:15 AM Unrecognized access from 67.119.218.75:4868 to TCP port 901

What does it all mean? Let’s take the first entry.
Thursday, December 18, 2003 8:19:35 PM Unrecognized access from 68.163.201.167:3102 to TCP port 17300

It comes from:

Honda Pen Motorcycles

268 Bush St #5000

San Francisco, CA, 94104

US

I have no idea who Honda Pen Motorcycles is, but they’re assigned 8 Internet addresses, including 68.163.201.167. The addresses are, in turn, controlled by a subsidiary of their local phone company:

Pac Bell Internet Services

208 Bush St. #5000

San Ramon, CA, 94104

US

When Honda Pen Motorcycles’ computer tried to contact mine, they’re probing port 17300. That implies that one of the computers at Honda Pen Motorcycles is infected with the Kuang2 virus. In all likelihood, it’s wandering around the Internet, checking for other infected machines, or machines susceptible to being infected. The folks at the Honda dealership have no clue this is going on, or if they do, don’t know how to stop it.

Thanks guys!

Most of the activity causing my data light to blink doesn’t even show up in the log. Little of it is data I asked for. Less is there for my benefit.

There are dozens of little lights in this room. Some, like the blinking light on my desk phone, I disregard. In fact, I disregard most of them. They’re mostly telling me that appliances without on/off switches are plugged in.

All of these together probably don’t draw as much power as a night light. Still, in the aggregate, all these little lights in homes and offices are causing power plants to burn a little more coal or oil.

However, in their defense, my darkened room look very high tech.