life hereafter

random musings from a wannabe economist

I just received a post-card in the mail from my employer stating that in January they are launching their “eco-pay” program, whereby paper pay-stubs will no longer be mailed and employees will receive statements online. This is all designed to help the environment. Did anyone stop to think about the huge waste mailing a post card to over 100,000 people creates? I wonder how many trees had to die, and how much electricity went into printing the post-card, not to mention the petroleum used by the post-office to cart the cards all over the country.

I guess it’s okay becuase it’s printed on recycled paper that they ask you to recycle again…

I spent the past few days in and around the wondrous city known as Detroit. Or as the French call it, Détroit [det wa!] This was one of the many fact’s I learned about five minutes after I arrived at my hotel and was held hostage in an elevator. A clearly intoxicated man, who was obviously very proud of his city managed to trap me on my ride up to the ninth floor of the The Westin. The conversation started off innocently enough, exchanged names and fist pounds. Next he asked where I was from, presumably so I could return the favor and learn that he was from Detroit, and a huge Red Wings fan. He then proceeded to ramble off many facts about the city. About thirty seconds into the ride, the elevator reached my room and I made to get off. At this point he puts is arm out across the elevator doors to stop me from leaving. He then puts his hand on the door so that it stayed open. The facts did not stop. At this point I was trying to figure out how to click the “Emergency Call” button on my phone without him noticing. Then, out of nowhere he steps aside and I get off the elevator. He later screamed “I hope you enjoy your cheese steaks at Le Bec Fin!” as I scurried to my room.

Every conversation with the residents of this fine American (barely) city inevitably made it’s way to the “big three.” I heard stories of people reciving threats for buying non-”American” cars. They referred to “foreign” cars as if they were illegal aliens in this country, attepting to take it over and steal their jobs. I was truly sad indeed.

Wednesday night, my colleagues and I attempt to have a “night on the town.” We head into GreekTown, have a great dinner at Fishbone’s. I recommend the Alligator Bites. We later go to the GreekTown casino and give it some of our money. The highlight of the evening was a tour of the GM Tower (or Ren Center). The building was quite impressive and had a lovely view of Windsor, Ontario. After this fine evening we head back to our parking garage to find that the car lights were left on, and the car would not start. Fantastic. That is exactly the situation you want to be in at 10pm, in a parking garage, in downtown Detroit. The terrible thing, was about four hours earlier as we were leaving the car I asked my colleague who drove if the lights would turn off themselves. “Sure,” he says. I believe I gave him the look of death at this point.

After asking a few folks if they had jumper cables to no avail, someone came up to us and said that his “friend” would jump-start our car for $30. Uh. No thanks. After much digging I find the number for Budget Roadside Assistance. Well, the number was for the roadside assistance in another state, however the guy on the other end was kind enough to give us the number for Michigan. (I am feeling real warm and fuzzy at this point.) My colleague calls the number and we manage to get a tow truck dispatched, ETA of about 35 minutes. At this point I get the urge to just try and start the car one more time. Lo and behold, it starts after about five seconds!

Whew.

I have to start off this post with a statement; I am impressed, but not impressed all at the same time.

When I arrived Sunday night Hertz asked if I would like a free “upgrade” to Toyota Prius. (Gee, I wonder what I was getting before…) I of course said “Sure!”, as I had never driven one but was interesting in trying this whole “green” thing out.

The second I got into the car I was confused. They definitely should put instructions in there somewhere. Eventually I figured out that I had to take the little black rectangle thing they gave me as a “key” and insert it next to the steering wheel. I then had to hit the Power button twice to “boot up” the car. My on-screen dash was then loaded up with an image of four wheels, the electric motor, gasoline engine and battery level. Kinda cool. After getting the hang of “shifting” into different modes (Park, Drive, Neutral and Reverse) I was on my way.

It took me a while to realize you can’t put the car in reverse unless you power on the car with your foot on the brake. The car makes an obnoxious noise when you put it in reverse. Just like the beeping sound a truck makes. Except you can’t hear the beeping outside of the car. Just inside, when you clearly know that you put it in reverse. And if you didn’t know, the big monitor in front of you which shows the back of your car will remind you.

Today I took the car on the highway. Honestly, aside from the winding sound it makes when you press on the pedal to accelerate quickly, the car got up to speed very quickly and handled speeds around 80mph fairly well. You could tell that the car was extremely light as it kind of gets blow around the highway if you are not careful. It also handles stop and go traffic extremely well. Every time you hit the brakes the energy is transferred from the engine to the battery. So just by driving you are essentially charging your battery. This is definitely a car which was designed for city driving, but handles just fine on the highway.

After about 100 miles of driving, the fuel gauge has not even moved. I’m impressed.

The one thing I truly hate about the car is how it looks. I think the back looks ridiculous. The whole car looks like it is scrunched up, when in-fact it is pretty roomy on the in-side.

Bottom line. Stop making green cars look futuristic for the sake of being futuristic. I just want a car, that looks like a car but uses less gas and is better for our world. Oh, and costs about the same as the regular gasoline versions. When you have a car like that, people will really start to migrate.

This hotel has seriously disappointed me. The TV here does not have TBS or TNT.

What kind of outfit are they running here?! I guess I’m not going to be able to watch family guy, 10 items or less and burn notice.

Oh well. At least they comped me dinner for delivering it to my room an hour and a half late.

Sometimes I feel like I have a really expensive storage unit. Due to traveling for work, and the fact that for the next few weekends I am going to be out of town, I realized that I won’t be in my apartment for a month. All that means is that I am paying for a really expensive storage unit!

Imagine my surprise as I am getting ready for work this morning and just as I am about to leave the hotel I check one last time in the mirror and I notice that my shirt is ripping from my elbow to my wrist. WTF!

How does that even happen?

Unfortunately, I did not bring a spare shirt and will be “recycling” this week.

I am spending the next two weeks in Florida (my second home.)

Friday night I flew down to Naples, I am spending the weekend in Naples and then driving up to Tampa on Monday. There I will meet up with two other people and drive up to Orlando for a week of training put on by The Firm. Next Friday, I’ll hop on a plane down to Fort Lauderdale to visit family for five days.

Unfortunately my weekend in Dewey has resulted in some severe sunburn on my upper back, chest and shoulders. After spending a week religiously applying aloe and moisturizer to my skin, I laid off on Friday. Of course, that means that after my flight landed and I looked under my shirt, all my skin has started to peel off. Ugh. It’s actually one of the grossest things I’ve ever experienced. I am molting. My first stop in Naples was at a target to buy SPF 50 sunscreen and bottles of moisturizer. After a few swims in the ocean I seem to have “exfoliated” a majority of the dead skin. I have now revealed my semi-burnt, semi-pink, semi-white next layer of skin that is very sensitive to the touch.

I think I have learned my ‘not wearing sunscreen’ lesson.