The Colonel's Forum

It's been another busy week here in San Francisco, and I couldn't be happier. The project is moving along well, and we're really going to be delivering something valuable here. The weather here is still perfect, and the city continues to provide an endless supply of dining and entertainment options. It is the antithesis of Findlay, Ohio (thank God). As Ella and I like to say, it is also "not France." When I was entrusted with the safekeeping of some of P. Leroy's (my great grandfather) personal effects, one of the items among them was a St. Christopher's medal. As all good Catholics know, St. Christopher was the patron saint of travelers until 1969, when the Vatican decided there wasn't enough historical evidence to even support his existence. Then again, what does the Vatican know? Most of us (myself included) still consider St. Christopher to be the patron saint of travelers. For additional good measure, the reverse of this medal features St....

I am now in my 4th week of what is proving to be a great project out here at PG&E. As Mark Twain put it though "The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco." He may have over stated a bit, but we're topping out in the high 70s this week and that's about as hot as it gets out here. The bluegrass is experiencing a bit of a heat wave so I can't say I miss that. Things are busy at work, but wanted to update on a few developments of note: 1) Had lunch today at Yank Sing , the finest Dim Sum restaurant in San Francisco. They are only open for lunch, and I was lucky enough to snag a reservation. It was a real treat, and several of the team had never dined in this traditional Chinese style. 2) I'm attending a summer performance of the San Francisco symphony tonight and couldn't be more excited. Nothing against the Lexington Philharmonic, but I'm a sucker for the big city symphonies. Tonights program: "A program for the rom...

Well I had a delightful 4th of July at home with Ella and Tobi. Ella and I actually walked in Lexington's parade, carrying the banner for K.E.E.P. , an organization that promotes legislation to improve and solidify the horse industry as one of Kentucky's key industries. The 7th I spent the day out on lake Cumberland with friends Kris and Michelle. A good day on the lake just can't be beat. Monday however I was back on a plane to the city by the bay. This time I stayed in the Sir Francis Drake hotel. What a joy to be staying a short elevator ride away from the Starlight Room. Of course, I made the most of it. The place was closed down Monday night because several (un-named) major league ball players rented out the entire lounge for a private party. Nice. Work at PG&E is going very well. I still love walking to work and I really don't mind the travel. I'm really only away from home for 3 nights a week. Compare that with the 43 consecutive nights that At...

A chapter in my life came full circle today as I was able to have lunch with my good friend Bruce Bartolf. Bruce is a Senior VP and CTO at Gensler , an internationally reknowned architecture and design firm with a client list that is truly impressive. Bruce went to Miami a few years before I did, and we met back in 1998 when he was visiting campus. We had a few beers uptown, he offered me an internship for the summer, next thing you know I was living in San Francisco for 3 months. It was my first insight into the IT world and I will be forever grateful to him for the opportunity. I hope that someday I can pay it forward. 10 years later I am impressed to see that Gensler has retained some of the same staff. Out here in the Bay area job market, that says a lot about Bruce and Gensler. A wise man explained to me in high school about how people pass in and out of your life all the time, and the significance of the impressions that they leave with you, and that you leave with them. ...

I had an exciting weekend here in San Francisco. I went to the Federal Reserve Bank, the Museum of Modern Art, shopping at Union Square, the Fillmore jazz festival, and "Pinot Days." Along the way I met up with Puja who is out here doing a swanky internship at Yahoo. The FRB is an interesting place. It's a semi-government organization, it's non-profit, and it's a major force in the US economy. Aside from setting monetary policy, the Fed provides a number of services to banks, including check clearing and currency services. The FRB San Francisco has on display the most complete collection of US currency anywhere, including an original $100,000 treasury note, and bank notes signed by Ben Franklin and Paul Revere. They also have some US military (WWII) currency on display. I didn't know it, but we actually printed our own French, German, and Japanese currency for the allies to use. At the MOMA I saw a great exhibition of photographer Martin Munkacsi's...

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...

Or maybe I should say "I'd love to see Fred run." The two-term Tennessee Senator and accomplished actor pulled out of "Law & Order" today and recently announced he is exploring the possibility of a presidential run for 2008. This would be the best thing that happened to the GOP since Reagan, and in my mind the best thing that could happen to the 2008 race as a whole. Thompson has a strong conservative record. This is not to say I agree with everything he says, but rather AT LEAST YOU'LL KNOW WHERE HE STANDS ON THE ISSUES. What a refreshing change of pace that would be. My own theory is that, with a clear conservative in the running, it opens the window for a clear liberal to oppose him on the other end of the spectrum. Ideally, this would pull all the candidates away from the center, which is more crowded than a keg party in a college dorm room. Of course I'm probably being too optimistic here, but a guy can hope, right?

It's official. Well, it's as official as it's gonna get for the time being. I was interviewed last night by the Nougat magazine, Lexington's monthly arts magazine. They're getting ready to put out their June issue which will include coverage of the Gallery Hop . This is a function that the Lexington Arts Council puts on several times a year where art galleries stay open on a Friday evening and people can go around and visit them. I have to say it's nice to be in a town that supports the arts community so well. I was interviewed by the Nougat, because for the June gallery hop, I am an "exhibiting artist." After no small amount of poking ant prodding from my family and friends, I finally took my photography portfolio to an art gallery here in town and was invited to exhibit some of my photos. The fine folks at the Lexington Antique Gallery will be displaying 10-12 of my pictures throughout June and most of July, and the gallery is participating ...

Well yesterday was primary day here in the Commonwealth, and it's shaping up to be quite a race for the Governorship. Democrats held Kentucky for about 30 years before Ernie Fletcher showed up, but his scandals and general sneaky-ness have not gone unnoticed. It appears that a former Lieutenant Governor (Steve Beshear) stands a good chance of putting the Democrats back in office here. The only issues that really concern me in this race are those issues where Kentucky ranks poorly compared with other states. I left Louisiana (49th on most lists) for a state that is 45th or 46th on most lists. Specifically, Kentucky needs better healthcare, better education initiatives, and we need a business climate that welcomes innovation and new industries so we can move away from coal mining and manufacturing. We've got a tiny budget surplus now, but the other big issue is that we need some major "investment capital" to bring the hills and hollers into the 21st century. This b...

I'm happy to report the opening of a brand new Ace hardware store right across the street from our neighborhood. Aside from the convenience of its location, I'm excited to see that there is still a place for a neighborhood hardware store in these times of Lowe's and Home Depot. Ace stores are still small, so I don't have to walk 5 miles across the store just to move between departments. Plus they are locally owned and operated, and they provide better service. I walked in looking for a wrench, and I was literally greeted at the door by "the helpful hardware man." I was in and out in 4 minutes. At Lowe's I always have to go find help, and even on Saturday afternoons they only have two registers open. So I hope this new store does well.

We do know what it means to miss New Orleans. Especially my wife who has great difficulty getting through spring and summer in Kentucky where crawfish are hard to find (and rarely good). Thankfully, we were able to attend a wedding in New Orleans a few weeks back and, as you can see here, we made a pit stop at the Acme Oster house for half a dozen sliders and two pounds of crawfish. I had a shrimp po-boy with tabasco mayonnaise which couldn't be beat, and we washed it all down with some Abita Amber, one of America's finest beers. I won't bore you with the details of the rest of the trip, but we had a blast, the wedding was beautiful, and many parts of the city are (sadly) still in shambles.

Spring has once again arrived here in the Bluegrass region, but only according to the calendars. The picture here shows the scene outside our home last weekend, which was opening weekend at Keeneland race course. Boy those horses were cold, as were us fans. Being the good gamblers we are though, we braved the elements and made a decent showing at the track. I must say I'm looking forward to our trip to New Orleans even more at this point. John & Lisa's wedding will be quite an event, I have no doubt. I have the honor of organizing the bachelor party, and I can guarantee it will be an evening to remember. On the downside of life, John McCain has fallen out of favor (in my book, anyway) now that he has removed all doubt as to where he stands on the (undeclared) war in Iraq. He stands squarely in the coat pocket of our IIC - idiot in chief. This is disappointing. He's fallen behind Giuliani in the polls, which is even worse. Now I have to cheer for Edwards who ha...

I've decided to throw my support (for the moment) behind an Edwards/McCain ticket for the upcoming. There are several reasons for this. 1) I saw Edwards on 60 minutes with his wife and the guy really impresses me. He's charismatic, genuine, and I can relate to him better than any of the other candidates, especially because he's young. 2) I like McCain because of his straight-talk approach. I know some people think it's just a gimmick, and he's waffled on a few issues, but I believe he understands the true spirit of bi-partisanship and that will be key. 3) An Edwards/McCain ticket would appeal to an enormous amount of voters. There's no rule that says you can't have a two-party ticket. In fact, there's no law that says the electoral college has to elect two people who were running mates in the general election. They could've elected John Kerry to serve as Bush's VP (though I'd hate to see where that'd put us today). 4) All the ...

on my old Kentucky home. I've been on the bench for a couple weeks now and am enjoying some time at home with Ella and Tobi. Last week I got into researching my ancestry and actually found out that I'm related to quite a few famous people. I highly recommend taking the free trial over at Ancestry.com and if you'd like, I'm happy to send you a link to my family tree. Yesterday I took a field trip to Frankfort to visit our state capitol. It's a beautiful building and I was fortunate enough to be able to sit in on a session of the Kentucky House of Representatives. They were talking about coal mining legislation which (sadly) still affects a lot of people in Kentucky. On the up side, the session was opened by a live bluegrass band playing in the House Chamber. What a hoot, and only in Kentucky do you get to experience these things. We got our tickets for Keeneland in the mail this week so of course I'm starting to think about the spring racing meets. I...