Grant's Place

On Education - On Peter Thiel

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Mon, 21 May 2012 01:42:00 +0000

I'm going to take a break from thoughts of sabbatical to talk about another passion of mine. Education. It's top of mind for me for a couple of reasons. A good friend of mine routinely debate the importance/relevance of an MBA and tonight I watched a story on 60 Minutes on Peter Thiel and his Thiel Fellowship.

From Thiel's website, the mission of the Fellowship is: "A radical re-thinking of what it takes to succeed, the Thiel Fellowship encourages lifelong learning and independent thought. With $100,000 and 2 years free to pursue their dreams, Thiel Fellows are changing the world one entrepreneurial venture at a time."

From the piece on 60 Minutes, a few things that cause me pause:
"The questionable value of higher education." Wow. Really?
Paraphrasing...If your plans are to be a professor or a Doctor, you should probably go to college. If your plans are different, you should think hard about why they are going to college.
"This is going to be a very idiosyncratic and a small program." He said of The Thiel Fellowship. Evidently, the Education lobby got a little worked up about his program. That fact has evidently armed Thiel to think he's bucking the system so he can change the world.

"It costs a quarter of a million dollars to go to college." Did you just make that up? According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the highest yearly average is for Private Non-profit at $35k a year. I'm no math whiz but that sounds like $140k for four years. Not surprising that a tech billionaire that has been drinking too much "reality distortion" Kool Aid would make up his own number. It's expensive, no doubt, not going to argue that. I get worked up when somebody over-exaggerates a number to try and prove his point that college is not worth the money and not a pre-requisite for success.

My perspective on college is that although it may not be a pre-requisite for succes, IT IS and ENABLER for success and is ABSOLUTELY worth the money.

I was raised by a single mother who worked as an LVN to support me and my sister. Her shift started at 2:30 pm so by the time we got home from school, she was already at work. Text book latch key. We grew up on the South East side of San Antonio with little influence from business or professional people. It wasn't the worst place in the world but a far cry from the hotbeds of sophistication that comes from a privileged upbringing. Fortunately, we did have a group of great kids and solid people that wasn't strife with negative influence. In the end, I did okay for myself. Getting into the National Honor Society was my testament to some level of smarts and hard work.

I tried my hand at a local public university (UTSA) without much success. I was going because I knew I had to but didn't know why. Fortunately for me, one day I walked into an Army Recruiter's office and said I wanted to join the Army. For a two year enlistment, my choices were Infantry or Artillery. I chose Artillery and two months later I was at Basic Training at Ft Sill, Oklahoma. That decision, changed my life.

That decision changed my life as it gave me the experience necessary to understand the importance of leadership and discipline. As an added benefit, my time in Desert Shield and Desert Storm made me understand the fragility of life and what a blessing it is. And what a blessing to live in America.

After the Army, I was then enabled for success at UTSA. After my restart, I graduated in 4 years while working full time and serving as President of a National Business Fraternity, Alpha Kappa Psi.

My major was Accounting (I like numbers and the order of accounting) but it wasn't a passion. Fortunately for me, I found my passion in the systems classes that were required. After attaining my Bachelor's degree, I went to graduate school and took 12 hours of systems classes. Those classes enabled me to get a job doing PowerBuilder programming for a start up in Plano, TX. 14 years later, I work for a company (Rackspace) that I love, and I get to do what I love everyday. Coupled with the financial rewards that come along with that, I believe that I am a success. Don't get me wrong, I am not done. I want to do more and will do more. But at 42 years old, with where I started from, hell yeah I am successful!

Without college, the likelihood of that statement being true, is not very high. The part that Thiel and people with a "reality distortion field" fail to grasp is that for the vast majority of the population, college is NECESSARY. We don't all grow up with access to Ivy league type of friends and family. We all aren't smart enough to get into Harvard or Stanford. We all aren't smart enough to drop out of Harvard or Stanford and create a start up that turns us into millionaires or billionaires. For the vast majority of us, college is the place where we figure it out. We need a place to figure it out. To learn. To be with people that want to learn and figure it out. It's as much about the networking and relationships as it is about the education. When you don't have that growing up, you're not going to get it anywhere else. Unless you're incredibly lucky to be at the right place at the right time. And I sure as hell wouldn't give up my college education in hopes that I'm in the right place at the right time.

That probably turned out to be too much of a rant. When it comes down to it, I applaud Thiel for his program. It's cool to have a crap load of money that enables you to develop your own program. It sounds like a really great program. But your program will be good for some small, tiny fraction of the population (I really want to make up some small number here). Good for you and good for them. But don't fool yourself into thinking that you're creating a new system.

We all know the education system needs some work. And no one knows how to fix the whole thing. But there are organizations and people out there, trying to fix the education system at many levels. Organizations like City Year, Communities in Schools and Diplomas Now are doing good work everyday. Good work for the general masses that don't have the opportunities of a privileged few. Those people are changing the world although they don't get to talk about it on 60 Minutes.

Le Tour de Baseball - Quick View

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 21:36:00 +0000

9300 miles.
45 days.
29 states.
13 regular season games.
1 All Star game.
Blogging for rackertalent.com.
Benefitting Windcrest Little League.
Completing a life time goal of seeing a game in every major league park.
Priceless.

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 21:35:00 +0000

Le Tour de Baseball 2012 - Update.

I will accept donations for each leg of the tour. 100% of the donations will go to the Windcrest (San Antonio) Little League.

Le Tour de Baseball 2012 (Second Draft)

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 02:47:00 +0000

In 1983 I went to my first major league baseball game and saw San Diego Padres. I've been hooked ever since. There was something special about the game. Maybe it was the great San Diego weather, maybe the classic brown and yellow Padres uniforms, maybe it was the greatness of Tony Gwynn. Probably all three. Regardless, That experience led me to an affinity for the great game of baseball. The timelessness of a game not constrained by time. The innocence of the game as depicted in The Sandlot. The poetry of the game as depicted in movies like Field of Dreams and For the Love of The Game. The passion and humor of the game as depicted in movies like Bull Durham and Major League, and the newly minted Moneyball. Yes. All of it. I bought into it all hook line and sinker. And that is what led me to a lifelong goal of seeing a baseball game in every ball park. So that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to complete my tour.

I am going to call it Le Tour de Baseball 2012 (I hope that doesn't bring any copyright infringement lawyers my way). A baseball purist might question my take off on Le Tour de France so here me out. My Mom is not a huge sports fan. Not by any stretch of the imagination, but while I was loving in London in 2007 I told her that I was going to be a race marshall during the first stage of the Le Tour (the stage in London). She was intrigued by that and thought if she watched the coverage on Versus she might get to see her son on TV. Yeah, right, like that would actually happen. But although she didn't get to see me on TV, she found that she really enjoyed watching the race. And I think she developed a fondness for Paul Sherwen and Phil Liggett. Regardless, we now have a tradition. During Le Tour, we watch every stage and then chat in the evening about the day's events. Every day. And we both thoroughly enjoy it. So, since my sabbatical is going to run mid-Jun to the beginning of August, I'll miss watching and talking to her about the 2012 Tour. So I'm creating my own: Le Tour de Baseball 2012.

15 Stages made up of 13 regular season games and hopefully the All Star game in KC.
45 Days
9300 miles across
29 states.

Yes, 45 days is a long time to drive around the country. And at 42, driving around the country to watch baseball games is as close as I'll every come to the athletic accomplishment of completing Le Tour de France. Yeah, I've completed 4 marathons and a 150 mile bike ride in two days, but I have a feeling this is going to be more grueling. Maybe not the same wear and tear on the body, but grueling indeed.
And 45 days is a long time to take off work. Well, thanks to Rackspace (my employer), now that I've completed 7 years of service (almost 8), I get a sabbatical. You know, take some time off, un-plug, recharge the batteries. This is my sabbatical. Drive across America to see the ballparks I haven't seen. And When I am done with my journey, I will have seen a game in every current (and a few that don't exist anymore) stadium.

Before I lay out the schedule for my sabbatical, I am going to list the places I've seen already so you know the parks I've already seen. And so you understand how long I've been committed to this goal.
Working my way to the start of Le Tour de Baseball, I will attempt to share my thoughts on these stadiums I've been too.

COMPLETED:

Padres at Jack Murphy

Rangers at The Ballpark in Arlington

Astros at Astrodome

Cubs at Wrigley

White Sox at Comiskey

Giants at Candlestick

Devil Rays at Tropicana

Indians at the Jake

Rockies at Coors Field

Athletics at The Coliseum

Reds at Great American

Brewers at Miller Park

Yankees - Old

Mets - Shea

Nationals at Nationals Park

Phillies at Citizens Bank Park

Orioles at Camden Yards

Yankees - New

Mets - Citi

Red Sox at Fenway

Astros at Minute Maid

Dodgers at Dodger Stadium

Le Tour de Baseball 2012 Draft Schedule:

Stage	Depart		Arrive		Game Day	Team	Opponent
1	San Antonio	15-Jun	Phoenix	17-Jun	18-Jun	Diamondbacks	Mariners
2	Phoenix	19-Jun	San Diego	19-Jun	22-Jun	Padres	Mariners
3	San Diego	23-Jun	Los Angeles	23-Jun	24-Jun	Angles	Dodgers
4	Los Angeles	24-Jun	San Francisco	26-Jun	27-Jun	Giants	Dodgers
5	San Francisco	1-Jul	Seattle	3-Jul	4-Jul	Mariners	Orioles
6	Seattle	5-Jul	St Louis	7-Jul	8-Jul	Cardinals	Marlins
7	St Louis	9-Jul	Kansas City	9-Jul	10-Jul	All Star Game	AL v NL
8	Kansas City	9-Jul	Kansas City	9-Jul	13-Jul	Royals	White Sox
9	Kansas City	14-Jul	Minnesota	14-Jul	15-Jul	Twins	Athletics
10	Minnesota	16-Jul	Detroit	16-Jul	17-Jul	Tigers	Angels
11	Detroit	18-Jul	Toronto	18-Jul	24-Jul	Blue Jays	Athletics
12	Toronto	25-Jul	Pittsburgh	25-Jul	25-Jul	Pirates	Cubs
13	Pittsburgh	26-Jul	Atlanta	27-Jan	27-Jul	Braves	Phillies
14	Atlanta	28-Jul	Miami	29-Jul	29-Jul	Marlins	Padres
15	Miami	30-Jul	San Antonio	1-Aug

Innovation Games

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 22:01:00 +0000

Blog Post Disclaimer: Initial post is stream of thought and not edited for consumption.

I have spent the last couple of days in training called Innovation Games. As a Product Manager, I went into the class with high expectations associated with the word Innovation and low expectations that a class was going to teach me games that I could play with my customers to help me innovate my products.

Luke Hohmann, author of the book "Innovation Games, Creating Breakthrough Products Through Collaborative Play, " taught the class based on his book and exceeded my expectations. The class was a great combination of theory and practice.

Context:
As a Product Manager in Rackspace's Cloud Integration group, we build software that accelerates the development of our Cloud Products. So our customers are internal development groups. As you might imagine our internal development groups compete with each other on some level. To that end, internal prioritization is one of our challenges.

Learned Solution:
With what I learned in the class I now know enough to select one of the twelve innovation games to run with my customers.

Right off the bat, I am going to plan a "Buy a Feature" session for all three of my products. I am excited about what I am going to learn and equally excited about what my customers are going to learn about what each other want.

Context:
As a curious person, I was fascinated to learn about the three archetypes, they have discovered in analyzing the data acquired by running theses games. I look forward to see what happens with Collaborators, Kingpins and Sharks. Are there more archetypes?

Vegas Baby!

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 18:57:00 +0000

I know, I know, I know. What happens in Vegas is supposed to stay in Vegas. For years, on our guys trip, that is the standard operating procedure we went by. The challenge with that SOP is that we go on a yearly guys trip and because, for the most part, we don't remember who was on what trip.

When did Grant start going?

Brad? Spring of 2006 and every year since.

When was the last time Jeff or Rick went?

How bad in Rick's snoring?

So I've decided to publish some stuff from our trip. If anyone objects please let me know.

Craig, Keith, Phil, Brad and Grant @ The Flamingo. Where else?

Friday

The rooms were so bad this time, that it has been decided, this was the last time at The Flamingo. Yes, we've heard that one before, but the rooms were REALLY bad this time. Please don't use the blacklight!

When did the pool get that cool? Met Jen and Cindy. Great times!

Dinner at the Belagio. Meh.

Mandalay Bay for Minus 5 Ice Bar. Very cool! Literally! Red Bull and Vodka was made to be drunk from an ice glass.

Lobby bar for dancing to a great 80s bad hair cover band.

Grant gets voted to redemption island because of a missed opportunity.

Saturday

Carnegie Deli at Mirage. Don't eat the egg salad. Pastrami all the way.

Jimmy Buffett block party at the Flamingo

Ranger game at Legasse Book at the Palazzo.

Bradley Burgers makes an appearance.

Switch at the Palazzo.

"Boom stick!" makes its debut. Much to the chagrin of the other black jack players in Vegas.

"B'Gack!" falls by the way side.

"Brakes!" stays in play.

Sunday

NFL Football at Mandalay Bay. The Lost Ticket of 2011.

Note to all: don't put $800 parlay ticket into gym shorts pocket. It will fall out.

Follow up note: If it happens talk to the supervisor. They have the data!

Grant makes his way off Redemption Island.

Not that it mattered anyway. Thank you to Detroit Lions for a pathetic finish.

And thank you to the trio of cigar smokers in our vicinity.

The Rio buffet is back in play. Great sashimi! And yes, Rio Brad is still there waiting tables. He looked so beat down when KD yelled, "Brad!" as if he'd be glad to see us.

Downtown: Golden Gate. Our second home.

Lots of good black jack and blue drinks. And the roulette supersystem.

And "Q" - he stands for quality and quantity. The second time we were solicited for drugs.

Dear Bob and Dan...

After a late night of gambling...is it g to hang back at the room gabbing?

Key to quick recovery on way home...airport oxygen bar and chair massage.

2011 is in the books!

La Clemenza de Tito

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 04:54:00 +0000

Last weekend I went to Prague. It's a magical city with a lot of history. One of the things on my list to see was the Estates Theater. It's famous for being the home of Mozart's Don Giovanni. I am hardly an opera buff. To be honest, my first opera was less than ideal. Actually, I found it quite boring. I wanted to go the Proms in London so I went to see Wagner's Gotterdammerung. It met all my preconceived notions about what an opera would be like. In fact, I only lasted for 2 of the 6 hour program. Granted, it was probably a little too heavy for my first opera and I thought it would be my last. But the show playing that night in Prague was an opera. Mozart's La Clemenza de Tito.

The Estates Theater is amazing. It's exactly what I expected. Opulently decorated. Intimate. It just oozed a sense of history. Everyone was dressed for the occasion and it felt like a proper night out. Granted, I was probably the only single guy in the place. And other than kids who were dragged along, probably the youngest person in the place. Regardless, I was looking forward to it.

My view from the second balcony center was perfect for taking it all in. Everything in its place. Very traditional setting except one thing - the stage. It was set up as a large white wall with a small opening with light shining through. You can see a picture of it in my web album. At first I thought there was some construction going on and it wasn't really the stage. Well I was wrong. It turns out this was a progressive interpretation of the opera. The scene opened up on this stage and when the white wall essentially the curtain was raised it revealed an equally stark white tunnel. Completely white with no decorations save a couple of dark diamond shapes in the center of the stage. The end of the tunnel was open and was about 6 feet high. The costumes weren't traditional either. They were dressed in very modern clothes. They were kind of costumes but overly so. In fact, a couple of the outfits probably wouldn't look out of place in a night club. Another interesting point is that two of the male characters were sung by women. Well of course I had to read the synopsis to try and understand what the program was about.

It turned out to be an interesting story and one that I could follow along because they actually had a screen with the English and Czech translations of the Italian that it's sung in. I know it sounds crazy but I actually enjoyed the opera. I really found it entertaining and not only did I not fall asleep. I stayed for the whole show and had a smile on my face at the end. It was definitely an enjoyable experience. And the good news for me is that I will probably pull a Costanza and end on a high note. =)

Le Tour 2007

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 04:51:00 +0000

I was going back through a few of my posts and one thing that struck me was how many posts I've made about sport. The Tour, rugby, basketball...I love sports. Good ol' American sports and new sports as well. One of the things I appreciate about living in London is the exposure to new kinds of sport. Both good and bad.

Le Tour is one of my new favorites. I don't know that I am a cycling fan per se but definitely Le Tour. The reason is simple - sportsmanship.

The evidence is bountiful...Stage 18 - Sandy Casar won. He won after a running into a dog crossing the course. After hitting the dog he took a nasty spill, I mean nasty spill that landed him splat against the road. He got up on his bike and received treatment while riding. No complaining, no whining - just focus. One mission to get back into it. The fact that he stayed with the lead group was impressive enough. The fact that he won the stage is amazing.

Also in the same lead group, a rider had a mechanical error with 20K left. The other three riders slowed to allow him to work through it and get back to the ride.
Vinokourov - one of the pre-race favorites - out. Tested positive for doping. No questions asked - gone from the race.

Rasmussen - at the time the holder of the yellow jersey. Sacked by his team. He didn't test positive but it came out that he wasn't truthful about his whereabouts a few months prior on a trip to Mexico. I'm sure we don't know all of the details but the team felt that was enough to force him out.

All of the doping seems to continuously be an issue with the racing. But is it an issue? The fact that there is such a no tolerant policy seems to be evidence that it's not an issue. You cheat - you're out. There's no lingering doubt. You're out. The majority want to do right. Now I'm not naive and I know there are still shades of gray within all this. But they WANT to do right. Sportsmanship is a huge part of this sport. And for that. I am now a cycling fan.

All of that doesn't even begin to describe the excitement of the Peloton catching up to the lead group and the sprint to the finish of the stage. This is exciting stuff! This is sport!

On top of all that, one more thing has pulled it all together for me - my mom. She's not a huge sports fan, but this year she started watching The Tour because she thought I was racing in it. When I told her I was volunteering she misunderstood my role. Maybe it was my participation in the MS 150 a couple of years ago? Maybe cause it started in London this year? Regardless, she started watching. And she was hooked. She was so hooked that she knows what a Peloton is. And she appreciated the excitement of it. Throughout the course of the three weeks we regularly shared stories of the last couple of stages. I have to admit that was very fulfilling for me. I will never forget our first Tour together. Even though I'm in London, thousands of miles away, we were able to share in the sport. I will never forget that and hope it's the start of more to come. We're hooked.

I've been a fan of sport the majority of my life. As most fans of sport, I've wondered what sport if any I would have been good at. What I enjoyed the most. I think it might have been cycling. Throughout high school I rode my bike. I rode BMX street freestyle. I even tried my hand at BMX racing. I never pushed it too hard but if I had to do it over, I would have. If I had the opportunity to do it over, I would have tried cycling. I suppose I still can. =)

Grocery Shopping in London

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 04:43:00 +0000

Today I went to my local Sainsbury's to do my weekly shopping. Run of the mill stuff...grey...rainy...the usual London way. Should have been non eventful but something happened on the way out. I couldn't leave. Nor could anyone else.

On my way out, I noticed a bit of a crowd at one exit to the market. They were all standing around with a perplexed look on their face. No one was terribly excited, they were all just milling about. Almost as if there were some big celebrity in their midst and they were waiting to get a glimpse. I'm not the stars truck type so I just kept walking to my exit. As I made my way, a couple of Metro Police made their way in. Still nothing unusual at this point so I kept on walking. As I made it to the entry way to drop off my cart, I started to realize something was going on. The automatic double door was closed and there were about 15 people standing outside trying to get in. Okay, now this is not right. People standing around inside and people standing around outside? What's going on???

So I put my cart in the queue and make my way down the exit. It's locked. Strange.

At this point, I start to feel guilty. Obviously, not that I had done anything wrong but because I was trying to think how to get out.

Next to the cart drop off point, there is a Starbucks. Your run of the mill, American channel that is part of the grocery store. It has a separate door that at this point wasn't locked. So as I make my way to the door to get out, a security guard stops me and says I can't leave. Nor can anyone else.

I ask why and he just says that no one can leave.

Again, I ask why and he says that no one can leave.

No one can leave? What is this? How can you tell me that I can't leave?

It's a grocery store? What the hell is going on?

For a minute he walks away, with the door still unlocked and I plan my getaway. I gather up my bags and make for the door. Unfortunately, there were so many people in front of me that by the time I got a chance to get out, he was back.

I'm sorry you can't leave. No one can leave.

No explanation other than the fact that we're stuck. At this point a couple of other Rackers asked me what's going on. They were just as curious as what's going on. I had no explanation of course. So we stood around for a couple of minutes. Then the doors opened. People could leave and come in. We then went about our day.

But really? How can this happen. How can you forbid people from leaving? As it turns out

the police were evidently looking for someone but were so clueless as how to find them that they closed the store. No one could enter or exit. Fortunately they must have found them and then opened the doors. So this leaves me wondering does that ever happen in the States? What kind of place am I living in? In my previous 36 and a half years I have never experienced such a thing. 6 months in London and I am given the privilege. In the grand scheme of things it was only a couple of minutes. But for those couple of minutes I really started to wonder about how great this city is.

London Flora

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 04:39:00 +0000

Today I did something I've never done before - I watched a marathon. The Flora London Marathon 2007. I've run a marathon before but I've never been on the sideline. I expected to be bummed that I couldn't run. I was right. What I didn't expect was to have as much as fun as I did. I surely didn't expect it to be the party it was. I started out watching around the 20 KM point on the Tower Bridge. Watching the runners cross the bridge, oh how cool that must feel! I was early enough to catch the runners. Now when I say runners, I mean runners.vThey are FAST. Wow. I have no idea how the human body can run that fast for that long. So after the runners went by, everyone else started to make their way over the bridge. Now I've heard that some people dress up for this but I had no idea how many people did. In no particular order there was...2 Elvis, Superman, Spiderman, Batman AND Robin, 4 Fred Flinstones (1 even had a cardboard cutout that resembled Fred's foot powered wagon. That was clever), Several fairies, sunflowers, the Leicester Rugby Club Tiger Mascot, and several miscellaneous crazy costumes. As crazy as all the was, it didn't prepare me for the guy running in a thong. Yes, I know, I probably shouldn't share that but I had to see it, you only have to visualize it. =)

Like always, there is a smattering of wheelchair racers. But what I didn't expect to see was a double leg amputee who was running on specialized prosthetics. I am still amazed and completely inspired. I think that's really what does it for me. Inspiration. Marathons are full of amazing stories, characters, people from all walks of life, different levels of fitness. Most are just regular folks who have lives. Lives full of full time responsibilities, jobs, kids you know, life. But for some reason they run. They run a lot. In order to run 26.2 miles you have to train. That is one thing all marathoners have in common. You can't just decide to run a marathon. Something has to inspire you. Inspire you enough to run 20-30 miles a week for months in preparation of the big day.

Well done runners, well done.

Now in regards to London. I have only ever been involved with three other marathons, Dallas White Rock, Austin Motorola, and San Antonio. They all have their good parts and bad parts. But London in truly world class. I never would have stopped to think about the logistics of a marathon if I wouldn't have seen genius in action. The London Marathon is truly genius. In spite of the tens of thousands of people along the route and in spite of the fact that London is truly a big city, it was easy getting around on the route. I was able to watch from the 12 mile mark, walk over the bridge and find a nice walk from mile 22 to the finish. Absolutely remarkable.

For the entire walk from 22 to the finish, it was a party. There were several live bands around the course. People were every where walking around with a cold pint or a pitcher of Pimm's and lemonade. The afternoon was very sunny and warm.

Well done, London, well done.

Tove's Wedding

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 04:27:00 +0000

I was fortunate to be able to attend Tove and Richard's wedding on 29 September at St John's in Hillingdon. It was a beautiful ceremony with a couple of interesting differences with my experience at weddings. 1) Tove, the bride came down the aisle first. 2) The ceremony was mostly the same but at the end of it, the entire wedding party retired to chambers to sign as witness. The signing must have lasted 10-15 minutes. It seemed forever. I was thinking, wow if this happened back home everyone would leave and make for the reception.

It actually worked out well for me as I was able to meet my ride. Tove had arranged for her child hood friend to take me to the reception. As it turns out, Lucy and Steve were sitting in the pew in front of me and they overheard my American accent. Lucky me as I really didn't fancy introducing myself to the entire wedding trying to figure out who was to give me a lift.

I sat with Lucy and Steve and a few others. It turned out to be a really nice conversation. A really nice dinner and a really nice reception. I especially loved the Norwegian wedding cakes.They were kind of like krispy kremes. Can't go wrong with that.

Euro Sklar

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 02:43:00 +0000

The vacation has come and gone and there's plenty to share with you. I'm sure Nancy will take you through her slide show of great pictures and Craig will tell his side of it...I would be remiss if I didn't share my side.

Day 1. Arrival day. On advice from a few, they bought into the fact that they would land and stay up. No naps - the best thing to get over jet lag is to fight through that long first day. And that's what they did. With flying colours. After we ate great burgers in my village of Chiswick, we saw the Tower of London, Tower Bridge, took a ferry along the Thames, saw the London Eye, Big Ben, Parliament and ended at Westminster Abbey. We ended the night with dinner at my place. The Sklars had their taste of shopping at my local grocery store, Sainsbury's and we dined on Craig's special seafood pasta.

There were a ton of great revelations of the day: the red phone booths, although, look cool, smell really bad; public transportation is pretty easy so long as you don't get on the Wimbledon train (sorry about that one!); shopping without a car is a pain in the neck.

Day 2. Paris. 4:30 wake up call. Do I even have to say how evil that was? Eurostar to Paris for a 10:30 arrival. Taking a train in an underwater tunnel would have been cool if we were awake to experience it. Note to self: NEVER utter the words, this is my fourth time in Paris - trust me I know what I'm doing.

We actually made it two days with only one taxi ride. Despite my effort to fight through and find the hotel myself I relented and we took a cab from Montparnasse to our hotel near the Tour Eiffel. It was a valiant effort in taking the Metro down south of Notre Dame but I didn't want to start off the trip with too much. So we made it to the Hotel Orly. Nancy did a great job of finding the hotel with nothing to go on but trip advisor. Great location (window view of Eiffel) and decent accommodation. Never mind the fact that only the three of us fit in the elevator. Our room was plenty big for the three of us. Or so we thought - more on that later. So the day took us through a great walk around the Eiffel Tower; a metro ride to Notre Dame; lunch at a Greek restaurant in the Latin Quarter; a 2 hour WWII walking tour with Fred. Now I could go into a lot about our time with Fred. It was an interesting two hours to say the least. As I type this it brings a big smile to my face. Nancy however successful you were in booking our room

you were equally successful in booking this tour. Really. This really was my 4th time in Paris. And my first time on this tour. Never mind the fact that I fell asleep sitting down outside the Hotel Mercier. It was truly memorable. By this time we've done a good bit of walking. And listening. And learning. We've already worn ourselves out and we're only a day and half into this vacation. At this point our plan is to make it to the Eiffel Tower. We walked by in the morning but the line was too long and we didn't want to waste the daylight. I had never been at night so it sounded like a perfect plan. And it was. Except for two things. The line was still long but it was COLD. Although the day was sunny and in the mid 60s

by the time we made it to the line it was evening and the wind started to blow pretty strong. It was cold. Thank goodness for the red carpet. Evidently there was some sort of party that required a red carpet and French papparazi. Good thing we had something to watch to keep our minds off the cold. We should have known what would happen next. Craig should have known what would happen next. I'm just going to throw this out there...would anyone think that Nancy would make it to the top of the Eiffel Tower? That is except Nancy of course. I had no idea she was that afraid of heights. Actually she corrected me in that she is not afraid of heights but afraid of falling off. In all fairness it was cold and indy. And on the way up to the second levelvmy legs did start to shake a little bit. Regardless it was a great time. We had an amazing view of Paris at night. We snapped some good pictures and got a treat that I wasn't expecting. At night they light up the Eiffel with thousands of blinking lights. Kind of like a Christmas tree. The blinking lights lasted about 10 minutes and was extremely cool. They got some good pics of it that are worth a look. So we're tired and hungry and head back to the hotel. We don't have a lot of energy to spend looking for the right place so we settled for a place. Except for the escargot

the place really wasn't worth mentioning. We finally made it to sleep around midnight. And didn't wake up til 11the next morning. And what a great sleep it was.

So this post is way too long as I've shared way too much detail. But it was a special trip and one worth sharing the details. The rest of the trip comes on the next post.

Day 3. Paris. After we wake up from our hibernation, we decide to get a quick walking lunch so we didn't lose anymore time. Nancy experienced the greatness of the Croque Monsieur while Craig and I had the equivalent version, hot dog style. Yum!

Today we decided to do a little less walking and a little more seeing. So we took the open air bus tour. Again the weather was PERFECT especially from the sunny top deck of the tour bus. So we made it through seeing Hotel Invalides; the Opera House, Musess D'Orsay, the Louvre; everyday Parisians walking around bike tours; Grand Palais; more walking tours; the Seine; two places that we recognized from our tour with Fred - Hotel Ville and the Prefecture of Police; Notre Dame and Place du Concorde. We decided to get off and walk up the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe. Talk about hustle and bustle...outdoor cafes, cinemas, shopping. Incredible. Long but worth the walk. After a few pictures at the Arc we walked back down the Champs back through Concorde and through the Jardin des Tuileries to the back door of the Louvre. Fred thanks for the tip. Wish we would have given you one.

This is where Coach Sklar became Euro Craig. We all went through the museum we saw Winged Victory

more marble sculptures that I would have ever imagined of course the biggies...Mona Lisa...my favourite

The Wedding Feast at Cana, Egyptian antiquities, Greek...Roman, we spent a good couple of hours in there. After all of this we were DONE. We definitely earned a good meal to end our stay in Paris so we headed back to the Latin Quarter to find THE place. Kudos to Nancy for picking the right alley way to head down. We found the spot...brasserie after brasserie. Plenty to choose from. We picked the right place. And until everyone else picked it would have been perfect. Then the service began to slow and we ended up with great conversation but a less than perfect meal. As they say 'cie la vie.'

Realizing this take is only mine about the Sklars I will offer up one of my idiosyncracies that they discovered. I NEVER ask for directions. Armed with a map and a metro pass I WILL find my way. Especially if I'm in France and I have a 50/50 chance of a surly reply. However, when it comes down to crunch time...like getting back to the train station to catch our 2115 train home

I will take one for the team. =)

Some parting thoughts…

If we knew what we were doing we would have tipped Fred. Thanks Fred. Sorry man.

If I had half a brain I would have realised the red faux leather tickets for Arsenal were too cool to be one game tickets. I would have saved $50 on 2nd day overseas shipping.

If the weather was like it was this weekend I'd never leave.

If I didn't have vacations like this with friends like Craig and Nancy it wouldn't be worth staying here.

Thanks guys

I'll never forget it.

Wimbledon 2007

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 01:12:00 +0000

This post is from my Wimbledon experience last year.

Wimbledon

I went to the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club without a ticket. Not having a ticket on game day is okay because it is one if not the only major sporting event that you can show up on game day and have a chance of getting in. All you have to do is be willing to queue. As you can imagine the queue is quite long. So long in fact that I contemplated leaving but decided to fight through it. I am so glad I did. When you get to the end of the line you're greeted be Wimbledon Stewards who give you a "Queue Card." It's actually printed on heavy stock and contains information for the specific day that you're there. It's actually worthy of being a souvenir. On top of that you also get a couple of "I queued at Wimbledon 2007" stickers. Wow this is pretty cool! As it turns out my wait was only about half an hour. How lucky can you get. So when you get in your main chance of attending the event is simply getting on the grounds. There are 20 courts in play all day long but only three of them Centre Court, Court 1 and Court 2 require reserved tickets. So worse case scenario is that you get to see the action on the other 17. Not a bad deal at all. Turns outI my luck was still on. They had tickets available for Court 1. The ction on Court 1 for the day...

James Blake v. Igor Andreev

Lleyton Hewitt v. Richard Bloomfield

Maria Sharapova v. Yung-Jan Chan

Svetlana Kuznetsova v. Julia Vakulenko

Nice. Maria Sharapova. Greatness.

On top of seeing all of those matches I made it out to the other courts to see some of the other action. Just walking around the grounds is an experience. Eating strawberries and cream drinking a little champagne. Even on the second day of the tournament there was an electricity in the air. My only celebrity citing was a sports one - former tennis great Boris Becker. I pulled a paparazzi moment and snapped a picture of him. He seemed a bit cocky and looked an autograph seeker straight in the eye and didn't say a thing. Just kept on walking. Cocky definitely. Oh well not everyone can be David Robinson. =)

So the day was long. I never would have thought 7 hours of tennis would go by that fast. But at the end of the day it wasn't just about tennis. It was about Wimbledon. Tradition. The grass. The experience. An experience that I will never forget.

I can blog again!

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 01:01:00 +0000

I got my data back thanks to several people at work. Thank you Nathan, Bret, Carmelo and David. You guys are the best! Now, I have my posts from my time in London. I have my posts back and I am rejuvenated and ready to post. As soon as I comb through the csv file to retrieve my posts, I'll put them back up. Until then, I'll start with where I'm at. Woohoo!

Where's my data?

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 20:39:00 +0000

So I just found out that all my posts from the last 2 years are gone. Completely gone. That's what I get for running word press on my mosso sight. It's cheap and easy and I don't have back up. Now it's gone. So i'm now using blogger. Great for my posts going forward. But I've lost all my previous posts. Only important as the last two years I lived in London and I posted on my experience. Most people probably won't care but I would have like to keep them. I'm really bummed about this. But I definitely learned a valuable lesson. Actually, probably a few lessons.
You get what you pay for.
Technology is great - hackers suck.

Does this work?

noreply@blogger.com (Grant Herbon) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 05:06:00 +0000

And will it get hacked?