life hereafter

A huge pet peeve of mine is when wait staff at nice restaurants feel the need to card. Honestly, I am out to a business dinner. I am about to drop $150 on a bottle of wine and three times that on food, can you cut me the embarrassment of carding me? This has only ever happened twice in my life and I will never forget the restaurants.

The first was at Emeril’s in Atlanta. I picked out a very nice bottle of wine and the sommelier felt the need to card me and only me. That was fun.

The second time was tonight at Stockpot in Portland, OR. The waitress handled it better than the sommelier in Atlanta and carded everyone at the table. However, I still feel as though I lose some credibility with the client when I am the reason we get carded.

I know… in 10 years I’ll regret saying this and wish I was still being carded but whatever.

qotd: “East Portland is an interesting place.” Why you ask? “Well it’s the hookers and blow…” - Executive Assistant

I have been in St. Louis, MO for the past week on business (training). I really underestimated the freaky weather they get here. On Sunday it was snowing, on Monday it was sunny but cold, Tuesday brought warm weather, Wednesday was raining and very cold, and Thursday was just plain foggy.

St. Louis has been… an… interesting city. It is home to the International Bowling Museum! Really, this place exists, and it is in St. Louis, MO! So pack up the kids and come check it out.!I’m sure there are some great pictures, and statues, and…. bowling balls in there… I’m not quite sure, I didn’t go in…

While you are here, you can see the largest man made monument in North America. The St. Louis Arch! Gateway to the west. The Arch is actually pretty cool. In the 1960’s they built an elevator into the Arch which will take you to the top. The only thing is that people in the 1960’s must have been a lot smaller than people in 2008. The “pods” had seats for five people, but in actuality, they really fit about two average Americans. The view from the top was really amazing. On the one site you have a great view of St. Louis and Clayton, MO. On the other, you have a rather boring view of East St. Louis, IL. It’s funny how a river can really socially depress part of a metropolitan area.

On Tuesday night we decided to check out the local casino (Lumiere Place). Apparently in Missouri there is a law on the books which states “an individual may not have a net loss of more than $500 in any odd numbered hour.” This boils down to the casino giving you a card which tracks your winnings and losses at each table and slot machine. If you approach $500 in any given odd numbered hour, you are flagged and must wait until two hours for the card to reset.

Talk about a State making it hard for it’s people to gamble their lives away!

Got a little surprise today when I checked into my hotel. Apparently my Firm and the hotel chain I frequent are having a little appreciation week. I was lucky enough to book a stay at this particular brand on this particular week and benefit!

I ended up with a supremely large room, fruit basket, bottled water, a luggage thing and the opportunity to earn double points the rest of the year.  Not bad for doing something I was going to do already.

On another note, this past weekend was supremely awesome in its own right.  The bike race on Sunday was not to be believed. I’ve never seen that many people, that drunk standing next to that many cops cheering for that many cyclists. It was pretty awesome. Oh and running into kids you graduated high school with but haven’t seen in six years is fun too. Especially when you are out partying.

Watching the races also made me that much more excited to go see the Tour de France this summer.  I’ve come to realize there truly is nothing stopping anyone from taking their road bike and just hoping onto the course, jumping in with the pack (if you can keep up) and essentially joining the race. I swear I saw one guy do it this weekend.

Yesterday was totally worth waking up at 8am for.

No. Not SPAM. I’m talking about the real life in your physical mailbox kind.

I seem to get an awful lot of it compared to my roommate, and it mostly focuses on credit card offers and car insurance quotes. For the month of June I propose a test. Instead of shredding into oblivion each little piece of marketing material that comes my way, I’m going to save it. And, at the end of the month, I’ll count it up and see where I stand.

I’m not sure what sort of conclusion this will yield, or if there is really any point to it… but its a Thursday night and I’m bored people.