McCain ahead in the Polls???....cool!

I could not believe the news earlier today.....McCain surging in the polls! Did I hear that right! The would be Mr. World President is behind? Now there are many ways to slice up the numbers...registered voters....likely to vote, voters...blah blah blah.

Put it all together and we are close to a split decision in my mind.

I have also heard that McCain is starting to attack Obama in his advertising.....That a boy John...go gettem.

Lastly, on the radio this morning Mitt Romney was holding an interview and was discussing the vice president position. I would be surprised if Mitt is out there discussing it without the RNC behind it. I think Mitt would be a great running mate.

This is starting to heat up!

I think the whole "It is our time" speech that World President Obama performed hurt him. It should his smugness....hope it comes back to haunt him!

Dogs cannot change their spots....uncool!

I have never really watched Extreme makeover, but I have seen the highlights and commercials. I guess ABC builds a show around rehabbing someones home. They get most of the stuff donated. I have seen the tear jerking moments of the people when they see their decrepit old house turned into a beautiful new home. There is always a story that goes along with the families hardships..... You think that these people after getting a brand new house FREE OF CHARGE...would be pretty set.....NOPE!

This story in yahoo goes to prove that a dog cannot change his spots! EM Home Edition built a mini mansion in 2005. The Harpers decide that after they are given a brand new $450,000 home and also they receive a $250 fund for scholarships for the kids and a home maintenance fund....to screw it all up!

These people who had nothing......got freebies totalling $750,000 decide to start their own construction business and collateralize the home. The whole thing....they take out a business loan for $450,000. Oh guess what? The business goes under and the house is now in foreclosure. I do not even feel bad for them. Cripes, most people could of lived great on that $750,000 gift.

Living beyond your means....the downfall of not only individuals....but nations.

Obama's great European Tour...not to cool!

OK...so everything this guy does...well almost everything..just gets me nervous. He now thinks he should travel through Europe and get the world on his side. It's unprecedented that a candidate for president has taken his campaign to the European market.



"People of Berlin, people of the world, this is our moment, this is our time" State Obama in Germany. This is scary....."Our time".....=What, is he running for the President of the WORLD? Remember the new world order....he thinks it's a good idea. Who cares what the people of Germany think of this guy? He goes on to pontificate that he wants to abolish nuclear arms, end Aids, feed the poor in Chad and Bangladesh and unites Muslim extremests with he world and lastly stop global warming.... This guy is so full of crap it's outrageous.



Let's go through a few things...no where in the speech does he say he needs to get the largest economy back on track....the Germans don't want to hear that...but as goes the US economy goes so does the world. Let's not worry about anything that is in the US.

Nuclear Arms? forget that issue Barrack...unless you want to start the fight with your buddies in Iran.
Uniting Muslim extremists???? did I hear that right? How will this guy integrate a small minority of the Muslim population into mainstream when their belief is to rid the world of anybody who is not Muslim?

Stop Global Warming....tell that to mother earth...she has gone through freezing and warming before and she will again....with man or without him.

And let's feed Chad and Bangladesh......yup let's not worry that our cities are crumbling....our education is not the premiere system in the world...our currency is in the toilet.

Listen "Self Anointed "World President Obama.....stop parading around the world acting like the president. Your a junior senator from Illinois for cripes sake.

McCain....wake up and get the election train moving!

Back to politics...cool!?

I am pretty lethargic regarding the presidential race. Obama has a head of steam....and the McCain group is almost asleep. He better wake up and get his butt in gear or we will wake up in November and have the most left leaning guy we have ever seen during our lifetime take the presidency.

So with that said....I need to rejuvenate my conservative spirit. Let's start with Government spending. What a cluster Bush has made of that. We need to first start to educated on the issue.

Here is a site http://perotcharts.com/ Remember Ross Perot? The big ears, big charts and plain talk? On this website he explains the numbers. It is worth the view. It will take an hour to get through the presentation, but you will then be up to speed on the spending issue.

I read it yesterday and was really surprised on the percentage of the budget that GVT programs take up!

Take a look see.

Lying is never cool!

Two words....Martha Stewart....Can we not learn from her stupid story. OK so she does a little insider trading...not really a big deal....but what she gets jail time for is "not being truthful" to investigators....

We have the same issue going on here in St. Louis. The Chief of Police for the city of St. Louis, Joe Mokwa, is some hot water.....

Over the past 5 years or so...his daughter along with a bunch of cops have been getting some favors from a police contractor. The low down is this....the towing company was allowing his daughter to "test drive" vehicles that had been confiscated by the city. These cars were in-line to be sold at city auction, with the proceeds to be split with the city and the tow agency.

When the story first hit the papers.....to me it was a who cares....based on the facts they collected.

First of all, 3 of the 4 cars the daughter test drove...she bought. OK she may have "test driven" them for extended periods of time....she also totalled one...probably the one she didn't buy! Also...we are not talking Maserati.....these were low end cars. I think I read that one of them was a late model escort......A new escort is no big deal....an old one???? I guess some of the issue was that she paid way below blue book. So instead of paying the 3k for the piece of junk she paid 1k. The legal beagles say that there were no laws broken.....OK...

The big issue is the lying. FYI...the paper told the police about the up coming release to the public. They had time to get their stuff together. They in fact ordered a private investigation....then Big Joe thinks he should not be totally truthful about the issue....Martha here we go again.

If the guy just laid it out....yeah people may of not liked his kid getting a break on a car most people would not buy....but he could just say...."oops sorry" and all would be done.

But now Big Joe may be the latest victim of Ego....we will see.

My Plumber....not cool!

So what did I do over the weekend? Well, I worked on my favorite project....the bathroom in the basement. Yes...it is now over a year in the making....but I am close.

So we buy these cabinets. I know a guy that will come and help me put them in.....yeah right. I end up putting them in myself. Took me about 3-4 hours....but they are even! The plumbing was another issue...I think I will leave this up to a professional.

So I call this firm I have used a few times. I have yet to have a great experience with them...but I am comfortable with them...what a putz I am. The deal is this. We changed our minds and decided to have the cabinets go across the wall. This left the pipes in the wrong place....this is an issue when you consider I have already tiled this place. So we are going to ruin the water pipes through the side of the cabinets and use the space of one draw. No big deal. Oh yeah....you cannot take in and out the draws when the toilet is in place....to tight a space. So before the plumber comes I had taken the toilet off the floor.

The "professional" arrives at 8:10 am. The first thing he does is screw the new faucet into the vanity top. Note...the vanity top is on the floor in the middle of the playroom. No sense me securing it and making the job harder. I should of known I was in trouble when it took Mr. Butt crack (yup...Chris said the guy was sporting a plumber crack) 1 1/2 hours to screw this stuff together....cripes Chris could of done it faster. I helped him lift the Vanity into place and then I went to work. When Denise calls me at 1p.m. and tells me that the guy broke one of the draws....1 o'clock....!!!! I tell her to get the guy off site. What a foot dragger....

When I get home...this guy used washer hoses to connect the water.....not a bad idea for a homeowner...anyway....but not only washer hoses but 6 foot washer hoses for a 32 inch span. It looks like I have two silver snakes as pets under my sink. What a mess.... I had to fix the draw on Saturday. Not sure what I will do with my new pets...and the guy thinks he is going to charge me for 5 1/2 hours.

So the saga continues as we try out new contractors for the never ending projects of our money pit!

On the other hand.... work on our new custom cable site is really picking up. We are starting to see some real traffic!!! Don't be too critical if you visit us....it's a work in progress....I swear it will not take as long as the bathroom.

BP Amoco Visa was a dud...not cool

So before the H.O.W. trip I try to be the smart consumer and try to figure a way to save money on gas......

I get most of my gas at the BP Amoco station up the street. They have a promotion that gives you 10% credit for all of your gas purchases for the first 60 days on their VISA. So I waited until about three weeks before the trip to sign up. To my surprise, the card came within 2 days. They also started my promo period the day they sent it....that was the first problem.....so I call and the customer service rep tells me....no problem...that does not sound fair.....they will try to move the start date to when I actually opened and activated the card....a few days before the trip. A letter a few days later told me..... tough luck.

The other issue was finding a BP gas station. I only hit 3-4 stations in the 8,000 miles we drove. I guess I bet on the wrong horse. I ended up buying a lot of gas from Sinclair?????

Lastly, when the first bill came.....the really small type on the bottom of the page told me about my credit. If I was not looking for it....I would of missed it. I had to call BP and ask them to send me a gas card. I guess they are hoping people will not read their bills or forget...

The only bright spot is that I did get a $50 gift card for the purchases...I was calculating my savings at about $250....still better then a poke in the eye.

Is email not cool anymore???

Last weekend we held a surprise birthday party for my 16 year old. Being a "tech" guy....I use www.evite.com for different occasions. I "thought" it was really cool. It allows you to make an invitation and then send the invitation to all your friends through email. It allows the invitees to RSVP on line. It's really an easy way to keep track of all the people you invite. I guess in the teen crowd....I was wrong!

So we send out about 40 invitations through email......there was the first issue....getting email addresses for 16 year olds. I guess that should of been my first clue......it took a bit of searching and working with a few of her friends. Now we were doing this when we were on the H.O.W. tour....so we are sneaking around trying to get this done without Taylor seeing us. After a week....only one person responds.....only a handful have even opened the email (another great feature of the evite system) So we wait another week....we are doing no better. When we get home...Denise starts to make calls.....almost all the kids called said they don't check their emails!!!!! Don't check your email???? You're kidding right? I have my email automatically go to my cell phone....never know when someone needs a cable!

2 other issues happened....a friend of my girls will be going to college in the fall. She approaches me and asks if I can break the Foley rule and allow the girls to have a facebook page. I ask her why......she tells me that she wants to keep in touch with them./ When I ask her why she doesn't just email them....."you're kidding right? email? that's so blase'" I then tell this story to Taylor and her buddy Sara....and Sara pipes in and tells me that Email is no fun!!

OK I never thought email was fun...I use it as a communications tool...period

Social networking is new to me....I really don't get it....now I sound old. Email.....is for old people???is that what the teens are saying....

I guess I am not so cool after all.

Our new site...it's cool

We are developing a newsite....and yours truly is of course trying to optimize the site. We released a press release this morning, http://www.free-press-release.com/news/200807/1216045407.html We hope this will help in our quest to become dominent in custom cables.

More today on the Inbev issue....my overall....I don't like it!

Food Franchises...not so cool as a business?

How did you like that last post.....yes it was pure advertising...I did eat a ton of Ho Hos on my trip....but as most of you know me ...I don't need diet pills. So lets get back to ranting.

My topic today....Fast Food Places.

A new one opened here in the valley in the past few weeks...Surf Dogs. This is an independent restaurant (I think). The motif is beachy with the an array of different types of Hot dogs and sandwiches. John orders the fish sandwich and I order the chili dog and a Chicago Dog (hot dog, sesame bun, full length pickle on the dog , mustard, ketchup. lime green relish and hot peppers)

Here's the rant....

New Business?....try to be friendly...we are sitting at the counter...they are not that busy...the owner is standing around ....not a word from him...the counter gal....not to friendly...

The Hot dogs....the chili was tasty...the dog itself was bland.....Because they BOILED it. I haven't had boiled hot dogs since camp......and camp is where they should stay. John had the fish sandwich. It was the shape of a triangle....It looked like a frozen Gordens piece...on a bun with nothing else...no tomato...no lettuce.

There was nothing exciting about the service....the buns were unique and they had been steamed so they were extra soft....the main dish was OK. All for $15-$16

I will be amazed if this place is open in 90 days.

I wonder what people are thinking....if your gonna open a place, if this is the dream...you would think they would go overboard with the service...call people by there name....say hello...and then make the signature dish...the hot dog...Dynamite! You can have this model of business. These poor guys are trying to get 80% of their business in a three hour window. With rents in the valley at about $25 a sq ft.......you need to sell a ton of dogs to make a living.

There is a reason why a high percentage of small businesses go under within the first year....#1 reason is cash flow....the second?....not making your business customer centric and unique.

Diet Pills.....cool for some...but confusing!

Can there be more infomercials on diet pills? Stay up late and you will be bombarded with actors dressed up as doctors proclaiming the next great discovery for weight loss. Check out www.weightlosspills.net, this site actually compares different weight loss pills for their safety and effectiveness. This site will definitely help you find out which pill is best for you. They have about 20 different pills listed in which they list the good, the bad and the real skinny about each of them. I was surprised how many different pills there were on the market. I am sure there is a huge market for these things. Look around....most Americans are overweight....OK I will get comments on that one....but the truth hurts. It seems like people may need help on this issue. My opinion...these pills can help...but you need to also be exercising and eating right. In that combination...it's a winner.

If your looking for information on Diet pills, I would check the site out.

My Brother Mike......Cool!

My oldest brother turns 51 today. Happy Birthday Mike. My brother was my first and has been my most loyal reader of the blog....so...A little tribute to my bro....

I have many memories of growing up with my brother Mike. Mike is 4 years older then me. The two that always bring a smile to my face and most often come to mind are these:

As a family, camping was our only option as a vacation. I have very fond memories of all the camping trips our parents took us on. We once camped in PA. Our site was right on the river. I remember sitting between my brother's legs on an inner tube and having him paddle up stream so we could float back down. Just Mike and I for what seemed like hours. For an 8 or 10 year old (not sure how old I was) ....getting to hang with your big brother was really cool.

The other time came when one of the neighborhood bullies decided he was going to pick on me in our yard. Now all kids get picked on when they are young....me????probably more then others...I was small and a smart ass. My brothers were basically fend for yourself kinda guys. This one time though....This kid pissed Mike off and Mike physically picked the guy up and threw him out of our yard. Mike was much bigger and was into the weightlifting at that time. I don't remember that bully ever bothering me again.

Mike is a good guy. He has a great heart and when I lived closer....he was always the first to lend a hand on a project or problem.

Hope you have a great day Bro! Happy Birthday.

Bathroom Converstaion...ok so it's not that cool

As you are now probably aware...I have issues with most bathrooms....

Let's talk about drying your hands....

I have put up with paper that is not absorbant...or as rough as sandpaper....

Then it was the short lived cloth roll....was a disgusting idea. I don't care what the machine said about always being clean....it was GROSS....I ran into one throughout the trip.

Then the "I wish they would get rid of these" blow dryers. These are worthless, except if you need to dry your hair. Many people use these in their bathrooms.....Every time I run into one of these....it's a dry my hands under the pits routine.

Lately the newest thing is the automatic dispensing paper machines that works on motion detection. I started out OK with these....I thought ...."cool, nothing to touch " But my gripe today is the adjustment some cheapskates do to these machines.

Since I have lived in public bathrooms for the past 6 weeks...I have found that the amount of paper dispensed can vary. The ones I can't stand are the ones that give you about 6 inches of paper. I don't know about you, but that's too little! So you are left waiting for the machine to "think" your not there and waving your hand like an idiot under the thing to get extra paper.

Just to spite the idiots...I get extra!

Inbev.....not cool for St. Louis

Well, I am back in the saddle....5 1/2 weeks off...wow....now it seems like I never left! One thing I missed out on was news when I was on my trip...no radio, paper or TV...so getting back to reality was ......fun.

OK so InBev wants to buy Anheuser Busch! I guess from an investor's side....I would think, take the money and run. However, being from St. Louis....it's a different play.

Inbev, a Belgian outfit, along with the rest of Europe is fat with cash. The dollar is a mess and with the stock market where it is....companies look cheap to Europeans, not to mention most of the rest of the world.

I hope AB fights this with all they have....I have heard that AB has been a great corporate citizen and also great to it's employees. They are not perfect....remember when they bought Rolling Rock? They closed the facility in La Trobe PA and made the stuff in Jersey. But overall, AB is a great place and part of St. Louis history.

This along with many of the aqusitions by global companies will not help our economy. AB needs to buck up and fight the good fight.

Some final stats.....ouch ! cool

Here are some of the answers we have been getting since we got home:

We drove nearly 8,000 miles in the 5 1/2 weeks
The highest gas price $5.80 in CA inside of Yosemite.
$3,750 was the total amount of gas we bought....OUCH
We averaged 8.93 miles to the gallon
No, Denise never got behind the wheel. (She asked...I was never really ever tired of driving)
yes, The kids got along great
we took over 2,000 photos.... mostly Denise
we took 6-7 tapes of film.....oh wow can't wait to watch that!!!!
Posted tons of blogs....but only a fraction of what we did
Yes we slept in the H.O.W. all but 4 nights of the vacation.
We do have a list of places that we want to go back....starting with Sedona, Santa Fe and Seattle.

It was a great experience , thank GOD that he allowed us such a gift.

The trip ends....Thanks for hitching a ride! cool

Things are returning to normal. We spent the 4th of July at Bluebird park to see the fireworks with a lot of our friends, It was great as it is every year. (We did miss having my cousins visiting as they have had for years!)

Thanks for hitching along for the ride. This was a trip of a life time for Denise and I. We had discussed it for at least 10 years. (Of course we had to plan it mostly in the last few months) It was a time that we had our whole family together to share some very special times. Before we know it all of our kids will be off to college and then off to their own lives. It will be another blink of the eye. Denise and I both agreed that we would not of changed anything about the trip. It went great, we all loved it....unfortuanetly...it's over!

I hope you enjoyed the blog. I know most of you enjoyed Taylor's blog too. (A few told me how much they liked hers better then mine....I have such nice friends!) Anyway..Denise finished putting up the pictures. She did an outstanding job.

To Denise...Love ya biker women...thanks for the best trip ever!!
To the Foley mob.....SADDLE UP

To my readers...(which there are 40 people average a day): Thanks

Although the H.O.W. is complete...I still blog 4-5 times a week. I mostly rant about injustices of the world....and crazy customer service issues. Hang out if you can!

Hope to see you all some. Come visit us in St. Louis!

No Brakes ....not cool!

As we started to leave Santa Fe the beast starting making funny noises. So being the mechanic I am, I open the hood and stood there like an idiot for a few minute. My usual thing to do would be just drive on until it died.....I didn't think that would work this time with 1,000 miles to go....so I checked all the fluids...sounds like the right thing to do. The steering fluid was empty. So I buy a pint for $2 only to find out by reading the Manuel....if you lose power steering fluid this is an issue. It's not like gas...it does not get "used up"...it means there is a leak in the hydraulic system of the vehicle. (whatever that means)

To cut the story short....we drove 1,000 miles with this issue...constantly replacing the fluid on every stop. I ended up putting 15 pints in the H.O.W. By 400 miles out....no brakes and barely any steering. Since the highway is straight as an arrow those two things are not really needed....so we drove on. Every Hour or two we would just let the beast come to a stop on it's own and pour more fluid in. Then the brakes would be back and the steering would be great.

We finally limped the beast back home and bought It back to the dealer. I was a little bit nervous bringing the H.O.W.back with all it's problems and on account that it looked like hell! The dirt and dead bugs probably weighed in at about 50 pounds. The thing was disgusting.....
Warren at byerly seemed happy as a lark about the condition. Only charged me a $35 extra to clean out a small make-up spill Denise had!.

I was happy to see the beast leave. Jessica was a little sad to see me drive it away!

The last few days of the trip....went well sorta, Cool

We left Sante Fe and our aim was Oklahoma City. As we passed through Texas I spotted this HUGE cross on the side of route 40. As we are driving by, Denise spots the Stations of the cross....so we pull off the exit to find Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ The cross was 190 feet tall and the stations were life size. This was a really cool place. Check out the link. BTW One guy had this built....and paid for it himself..

We then hit OC.....we started out by goinb to the Oklahoma City National Memorial I of course knew about the 1995 bombing of the Murrah Federal Building. What I did not know is how GREAT the memorial and museum was. We spent 2-3 hours going through the place. It was heart wrenching to see how this terroriust act effected so many lives.

The last thing we did was rock climbing.....or should I say Chris and Shelby climbed and I was the ?ballet? that is the person who holds the ropes and then adjusts them to let them down. Denise's arm was acting up. Taylor was sick and Jessica is afraid of heights.....so it was just shelb and Chris. They bulit these rock climbing wals inside old grain bins. There were 5 levels. Chris got to level 2 and Shelby climbed a 3. They went up about 50-60 feet. They loved it.

When that was through...we ate at El Chico...the best mexican food in the states...period. We then drove home.......more to that story......

We are Home....way COOL!

We are home....unpacking and getting the beast back to the dealer. I will be blogging tomorrow or later tonight about our adventures coming home. We found three great stops and the beast went wild. More real soon.

Pete

On the Way home....cool but sad

We have done a couple of other things...I will catch you up later....We started our Journey home. After the rafting trip we went to get some HOLY dirt. (explain later) We then officially ended our site seeing portion of the trip. We have 1,100 miles to drive home, with a stop in Oklahoma city. We drove just past amarillo TX last night. We will stop in OK tonight and then on to Missouri on Wednesday.

The kids are all excited to get home....so am I. We all have had a great time...but as with any vacation....at the end it feels good to get home.

Hope to blog tonight and catch up. We have had limited connection time.

White Water Rafting....very cool

Yesterday we spent the morning with Sante Fe River Rafting company. Jared was our guide. We shot a Level 3, 6 mile stretch of some river....that I have no idea of the name. The kids loved it. We had great weather and the water was not too cold, about 60. We actually rafter for about 2 hours. We had spent the nights at the worst RV camp we have seen the night before.

We had driven up to the pick up point, about 40 minutes north of Sane Fe. I mentioned earlier that I had crossed the country in my early 20's with my buddy Bill. One of the worst memories I had was staying at Chicos Motel, where we slid the $10 for the room through a slot to a man that you could not see....it was scary. The bed had bugs and the place had not been cleaned in 20 years. Well we found Chicos RV center in nowhereville New Mexico. We get there late....the lot was full of weeds....not a good sign...the bathrooms are not open until morning...nor the showers. It was tyhe only RV place for 20 miles...so we stayed. In the morning I go over to the bathroom. I was in a hurry if you know what I mean. I get in there and it's so gross that there is no sitting allowed.......then come to notice ....no TP....a little late to find that out...I was in a rush. so I have to use the seat covers.....cannot believe they even have them. I was surprised the 50 I used went down the toilet....life on the road! Then I go to the office to let them know and.....the nitwit says "yeah I know we ran out yesterday" Now if we were really in the middle of nowhere,....maybe the Amazon...you could understand....but WALMART was less then a mile away! You would think TP was a rare commodity. Well now I am really agrivated. I figure...I will go take a shower. I have to get a key...then un pad lock the place...these are all not good signs. I go into this gang shower facility....it looked like a turkish prison that had not been cleaned for a decade. I just turned around and gave up. When I gave the key bac to the nit wit...I gave it back to her within min utes...you would think she would of asked if there was a problem. Since she did not...I filled her in! Told her that the showers were disgisting and I would not bring my dog in their for a rinse. She just shrugged and told me she didn't work the weekends????
Idiot.

Downtown Sante Fe….very Cool

This is one town that we will go back to. It’s a very upscale artistic town. A lot like Sedona, but more city like. The architecture is really different. They are all brown adobe buildings. We started the day attending Mass at the Basilica. It was a nice Cathedral….but not as nice as St. Louis. We then visited Lorretto Chapel. This chapel has been around forewver and there is this spiral staircae that is an architectural mystery. It was pretty interesting. We spent the rest of the day at the plaza in the center of the shopping district. We just walked around and shopped and people watched. There was a lot to watch….Gay pride was here the day before…so a few drag queens were still hanging around. We then decided to go north. We are going to a place with Holy dirt tomorrow. We will go there after we have our day on the river. We are taking a white water rafting trip for the morning.

We ended up in a town called expand. A little town with a lot of traffic and a very scary RV camp.
Denise has decided that Sante Fe is definitely a girls weekend destination.