life hereafter

The Firm has decided to sponsor two boats in this years Dad Vail Corporate Challenge. Approximately 3.4 seconds after the email caused my blackberry to vibrate I replied and mentioned my interest and the fact that I rowed in college. A few days later I was in a boat told there would be five practices each Saturday before the event (May 10th 2008).

Saturday morning I show up at #5 Boathouse Row (Crescent Boat Club) and find my boat mates. I learn that only two other people in the boat have experience rowing. Our stoke decides to invite us into the boathouse to get changed. After I came out of the locker room I saw the crew in the erg room practicing the stroke on the rowing machines. Next thing I know this loud little woman walks into the room and announces that she is our coach and will be training us for the next five weeks. Then she announces that we will not be going on the water today and will be practicing on the rowing machines. Boy did I regret only bringing sandals to practice.

We strap in to the rowing machines and start out our practice going over some basic drills and form. The coach then tells the crew to follow my lead (which was a mistake, I am not a good stroke). After that painful experiance we did some yoga streaches and started the real practice… Back on the rowing machines coach announces that the corporate challenge races are typically between 1000m and 250m depending on the officials and ability of the crews to line up. So, we do a number of 4, 2 and 1 minute pieces at full rates as practice. Had I been in rowing shape this would have been an easy practice. Being in the shape I was, I felt that my ass was sufficiently kicked. At the conclusion of practice coach announces that she will be sending out cross training workouts to do in between our Saturday practices. And our third practice will consist of racing against the other Firm boat.

Whoa. I thought this was going to be easy and fun…

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!

I forgot one of the most important rules of business travel last night. If you are 1,000 miles from the nearest ocean, do not order the seafood. That was the grossest lobster ravioli I have ever had.

On another note, it was quite disconcerting this morning to notice that my shower head was different than my shower head yesterday.  Yesterday, it was black and had one head. Today it was silver and had two. Really threw my newly developed morning routine off.

is only exciting when you don’t make enough to have to actually owe anything.

I finally filed my return on Friday. It was an extreme hassle this year. Basically the IRS has some silly little rule that says you can’t e-file if you worked in more than four states. Funny thing is, TurboTax doesn’t tell you that until after you have paid for the software and filled out all the forms.

This resulted in my printing over 57 pages of paper forms to file with the five states The Firm made me work in this past year.  I gathered together what I think was appropriately sized envelopes and a ridiculous number of stamps and placed the letters in the mail. Now I wait, hoping I don’t get any “return to senders,” and that the good ole’ USPS doesn’t lose what I sent to Uncle Sam. The only real way I will know that everything got where it should go is when I see that canceled check.

Another lesson learned.

Do not wear a pink polo shirt to the airport on Sunday if you wouldn’t want to wear said shirt to the client site on Monday.

 read between the lines: my luggage was lost.