The Colonel's Forum

Here you can see the massive wheels and motors that turn the cables through the streets of San Francisco. The motors are GE electric motors that put out 510 horsepower using 500 volts and 800 amps. These are big motors. The simplicity and mechanics of the whole system just astound me, so I'm going to ramble about them for a bit. Your average cable car line is about 5 miles long, which means it needs a 10 mile "loop" of cable to operate. This powerhouse (pictured above) is located at the approximate center of all 3 lines, which means at some points, these motors are moving a cable car full of passengers that is 2 miles or more away. Oh yeah, and your average cable car weighs 16,000 lbs before you fill it with oversized American tourists. Oh yeah, and there can be as many as 4 cars on a given route at a given time - some cars will be moving, and others will be loading/unloading passengers. Yet all cars on a given line use the same physical cable. So these big motors ...

I'm happy to report that San Francisco is even better than I left it some 10 years ago. The streets are cleaner, public transit has been improved, and new sky scrapers are going up in areas that were "dead zones" last time I was here. I'm staying in union square with a couple other guys from the team. Dinner Monday night was curry garbanzo bean soup followed by shrimp risotto at Scala's Bistro . Last night we found the perfect Irish pub ( O'Reilly's ) off Columbus Ave for a few beers after work, then wandered over to Mangarosa where I had homemade gnocci in a garlic cream sauce followed by strawberry bread pudding for dessert. Breakfast today was a Jamba Juice smoothie - $4, 300 calories, 5 servings of fruit, 100% of the RDA of vitamins and they taste great. I got in touch with Puja yesterday and we are going to try and meet up this weekend sometime. So pretty much I'm having a great week.

The best idea in air travel... ever. Some airline in Ecuador is offering lingerie fashion shows on its flights.

After a nice relaxing anniversary weekend with Ella at Disneyworld, I'm happy to report that I'm back on the job with EDS. I'd been on the bench for several months so it's good to be once again practicing my trade. IT strategy is a lot more interesting than the other types of consulting I've done, and this time it takes me to the city by the bay for a project at Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E). Many of you may remember PG&E from the movie Erin Brockovich - these are the guys who poisoned the water supply of Hinkley, CA, lied about it, and ended up settling to the tune of $333 million. Not the kind of PR you'd like to be remembered for, but this is a matter of public record. On a positive note, all signs indicate that they've learned from the experience. You can't get on an elevator at this place without reading about the importance of safety, protecting the communities in which they work and protecting the environment, and corporate ethics...

For saying this week what our President has needed to hear for some time now from a member of his own party. Lugar is arguably the most respected senator in terms of foreign policy, and one of my favorite politicians. He ran for President in 96, but dropped out before the GOP convention. In my opinion, his campaign should be counted among the losses from the Oklahoma City bombing. The bombing took place literally hours before Lugar publicly announced his candidacy and, rightfully so, the news coverage in the following days and weeks was dominated by the tragedy that took place that day. One effect of this was that very few people even learned that Lugar was running for President until a week or two later. I was in downtown Indianapolis for Lugar's announcement, and I still have a "Lugar for President" poster from that day. I wonder how different things would be today if we'd skipped a 2nd Clinton term and put a real diplomat in office. Zbigniew Brzezinski know...

Here are some travel websites I use all the time. I hope you'll find them interesting, perhaps even useful. Seat Guru - This guy has all the data on each airline's planes in terms of seating configuration. Specifically, he shows you which seats are good and which ones don't recline etc. He also shows you the measurements of each carrier's seats. Did you know that seat pitch (the distance between your seat and the seat in front of you) can vary from 29-36 inches and seat width can range from 16 to 21 inches? Look at his comparison charts to compare seat sizes across airlines. 7 inches of legroom and 5 inches of seat width goes a long way. On time % - Did you know that some airlines are only on-time 65% of the time, while others are on-time as much as 80% of the time? This site allows you to search by airline, and even search for a specific airline at a specific airport. For example, you can learn that Delta is 85% on-time at it's Cincinnati hub, but only 78...

This week marks the end of an era. This Friday, Bob Barker's final episode of "The Price is Right" will air on CBS. Those of use who are loyal fans of the show ( TPIR , as we call it) knew that this day would come, but that doesn't make it any easier. Bob Barker is on my own short list of iconic people who make this world a better place. Johnny Cash is on the list too, and I have no qualms about admitting that I shed a tear when I heard the news that the man in black had joined June and Mother Maybelle. In a different way, this Friday will be just as sad for me. TPIR is not what you'd call high-brow entertainment. It's really just one big hour-long commercial for Proctor & Gamble, interrupted by commercials for the scooter store, liberty medical, denture adhesive and life insurance. The beauty of TPIR is in Bob's ability to make guessing the price of a can of Campbell's soup so exciting. It's the cheese factor on the pricing games. It...