Merry Christmas!

Whether you celebrate it or not, I hope you all had a wonderful, joyous Christmas.  I wish for peace and prosperity for everyone now and in the coming year.

I have this...well, extended family down here in Florida.  They are not blood-relatives but about twenty years ago either I adopted them or they adopted me, I forget.  It's a long story.  In any case, I am inextricably intertwined with their lives. 

For whatever reasons, my siblings and I (two brothers and three sisters) are not close.  It's kind of sad, in a way.  But on the other hand, people sometimes just grow apart.  We all have our separate lives, and we don't socialize often.  However, after the convivial get-together we had in New York back in September on the occasion of my mother's funeral, some thought was given to regrouping again "sometime soon."  Well we missed Thanksgiving, but Christmas might work, no?  Now that I have a car that gets upwards of 40 mpg, I could get up to New York easily and cheaply.  I know that some people prefer to fly but I don't.

Well, before I could firm up my plans for New York, my Florida family announced that they'd be doing Christmas at my house.  I could have put my foot down and refused, but that would've made me the Bad Guy.  There really wasn't a good alternative for them.  I said okay and asked for a head count.  The number swelled to sixteen people.  Then two dropped out leaving us with fourteen.  Their family is scattered just like mine.  They came from different parts of Pensacola here, but also from Panama City and Atlanta, Georgia. 

In planning a turkey dinner, all of the websites suggest figuring around two pounds per person when buying a bird.  Although people usually don't that much, you have to account for the carcass, legs and other bits that people usually don't or can't eat.  That meant I needed twenty-eight pounds of turkey.  I ended up with two thirteen-pounders.  (We did have three small children attending.)

With that many people, everything has to be up-sized.  You have to make twice the usual amount of side dishes - twice the green bean casseroles, etc.  Extra drinks...extra desserts...  Not only that, but my dining room table only seats ten.  I set up a second table for six more (just in case - you never know who might pop in).  This meant that I also had to have double the number of salt/pepper shakers, gravy boats, cranberry sauces, rolls...  I realized that I do not have nearly enough serving spoons for a group that big.  I'll rectify that.

I don't mean to sound like I'm complaining.  I love feeding people - I think it's one of the best things you can do.  I consider it an honor.  I love the act of "breaking bread" (as we used to say) with others.  But it is an effort.  Thankfully, the meal was a true collaborative effort.  People pitched in and either brought stuff (like wine and desserts) or helped me cook.  The kitchen was a chaotic madhouse at times, but we all managed to stay out of each other's way, nothing got dropped or broken and amazingly, no blood was spilled.  Both turkeys came out pretty darn good, if I do say so myself.  And there wasn't all that much left over!

But being on my feet all day was kind of tough work.  Once I plunked myself down to eat, I didn't want to get back up.  My buddy Matt always kept a good bottle of wine open and my glass full.  Now there's a true friend!  He was not always a fan, but I've turned him into something of a wino.

One of my blogger friends, Bob and his family do a non-traditional, internationally-themed Christmas.  His family will pick a country (this year was India) and then use that as the basis for their Christmas dinner.  I so wanted to emulate him this year - do something different than the standard turkey-and-mashed-potatoes drill.  My buddy Terry and his girlfriend Lisa grilled steaks.  Steaks!  On Christmas!  Well...why not?  Do we have to always do turkey?  I think not.  A Chinese-takeout Christmas might have been fun.  And easier.  And possibly cheaper.  Maybe next year...

In any event, as "boring" and traditional as it was, our Christmas Dinner 2018 was a roaring success!  I hope yours was too.

Merry Christmas!

Anger Issues

People. I just don't understand them. For instance...

I'll be standing in line at the grocery store. The person in front of me will have a shopping cart that's jammed full of stuff. And they'll just be standing there like an idiot as the cashier scans all their items. Then, at the VERY END...when every last damn piece of crap is scanned, and bagged, and handed to them, the person will suddenly wake up out of their coma and realize that, oh yeah, they have to pay!  Wow, what a shock!  Only then will they pull their wallet (or invariably if it's an older person, a goddamn checkbook) and begin the payment process.  Half of them seem completely befuddled by the point-of-sale payment device.  And I'm, like, “WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING AS THE CASHIER WAS RINGING YOU UP???”

It's not that I'm impatient, but I swipe my card through the credit card reader thingee as soon as the cashier has run up two or three of my items. I hit “No” when it asks if I want cash-back, and then hit “Enter” for credit. When all of my stuff is scanned, as the cashier is handing me the last bag, the register dings and prints out the receipt. Then I'm on my way. Easy-peasy.

(It must be noted that not all stores allow you to swipe your card during the scanning-of-items process. At those stores I at least have my card ready once the total pops up.)

Or how do people not know the basics of “keep right?” If two grocery carts meet head-on in an aisle, each person goes to the right. I cannot tell you the number of times I've come across people who don't seem to grasp this fairly simple concept. They should be glad I do not carry my gun into Walmart.

How's about people who go into McDonalds, and once they get up to be #1 they stare at the menu like they've never seen it before in their life. ”I'll have a....ahhhhhh....hmmm....ahhhhhh... Say, what comes with the....”

Really? YOU'VE NEVER BEEN IN A GODDAMN MCDONALDS BEFORE???”

And what's up with people who get gas at a busy station, and then once they're done they leave their car at the pumps and go inside to buy their cigarettes and beer? ”Oh, thank you very much for blocking the diesel pump while you go in to get your lottery tickets, you sonovabitch.”

Yes, I have anger issues. I'm working on them.  Progress is...inconsistent.

Our Former Ferry Service

Well as predicted, our much publicized and anticipated ferry is no more. The company that was contracted to operate the service bailed, claiming that it wouldn't...and couldn't make money. It didn't last six months. Can't say I'm surprised.

To the dismay of many tourists who come here to visit, Pensacola, Florida is a coastal city but it is not actually on the beach as you might expect.  To get to the beach you have to travel over eight miles from downtown to Santa Rosa Island, a thin strip of tenuous, fragile "land" that is mostly national seashore.

It's been a long-time dream of some to have a ferry boat service that linked downtown Pensacola with Pensacola Beach. Trouble is, those two points are not exactly close. There are two bridges that must be crossed, and one of them charges $1.00 toll.  Plus, if you look at the above map, there's a big ol' peninsula of Gulf Breeze jutting out into Pensacola Bay which provides something of a roadblock to people going from the city to the beach by both land and sea.  (The main part of the beach is where the smaller of the two bridges comes across.) 

Nevertheless, a group consisting of the Pensacola City Council, the Escambia County Commission, the Santa Rosa Island Authority, the National Park Service and the Navy conspired to initiate a ferry service. One can only imagine the LSD-infused, circle-jerk meetings in which they all convinced each other that such a thing would be a Really Good Idea. (I'm envisioning the cemetery scene from the movie, "Easy Rider.")

But a ferry service costs money. Ticket booths and waiting areas/shelters/restrooms would have to be built; docks would have to be modified with fencing and gates; boats would have to be procured and outfitted; employees would need to be hired... There would have to advertising, and government approvals. These are up-front costs that cannot be deferred until the revenue starts rolling in.

The City opined that the ferries could carry as many as 900 passengers per day. At $20 per ticket that could be $18,000 per day which, if you like to blow smoke up peoples' butts, you might (informally, not-for-publication!) extrapolate that and project a monthly gross revenue of $540,000. Not bad!

It wouldn't be that high, of course, because some of those passengers would have tickets that were discounted (e.g “frequent-flyer,” military, group, senior citizen...) And of course it would not be 900 passengers per day every day. Weekends would be busier, weekdays would be slack. The City did not say whether they thought that “900” was a weekly average or just what a busy Saturday and Sunday might generate. But it was a nice round number. Except...I'm not sure who came up with it. It's almost as if they pulled it out of their...umm, hat. Many of us were skeptical because we know that getting Americans to give up their pickup trucks is a tough sell.

The BP Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster in 2010 proved to be a blessing-in-disguise for the Gulf Coast. The Pensacola area received millions in punitive damage compensation for the harm to our tourism industry. On TV, our beaches were made to look like the shoreline of Alaska after that hungover, sleeping skipper of the Exxon Valdez oil tanker let the galley hand drive the boat and run it aground.  It wasn't as bad a the media made it out to be, but the touristas did stay away for the better part of two years.

The National Park Service got $5.2 million from BP. City and County leaders prevailed on the NPS to use some of that money (maybe all of it!) to purchase two ferry boats. Once that was done they contracted with a supposedly-experienced company that ran similar ferry services in other parts of the country. The protracted process of getting this thing going! was actually making some progress.  Construction of docks and infrastructure was finally begun in 2017. After many delays, ferry service began on June 22, 2018.

Here's a route map of our ferry service.  You can see that it originates from downtown and stops both at Fort Pickens National Seashore and Pensacola Beach

By early October, things were looking grim.  Gulf Coast Maritime Services (GCMS), the company that ran the ferry reported that in the first three months of operation, 5600 passengers had been carried. Due to these less-than-expected numbers, George Aswad, owner and operator of GCMS announced that they were cutting out weekday service, adding that if ridership didn't improve he was not optimistic that the service could survive. Spoiler alert: It did not. By the end of October GCMS had called it quits. Obviously they had some sort of “early-out” termination clause in their contract.

Let's do some math! 5600 people at $20 per ticket is only $112,000...or about $37,000 per month, give or take. I'd bet that the amount of money they spent on diesel fuel was pretty close to that! Nevermind lease fees, payroll, insurance, debt service and God-knows-what-else. Hoo-boy!

Oddly, nobody was tracking where the passengers were from (e.g. Locals? Tourists?). The spokesman for the National Park Service said that “anecdotally” it appeared they were mostly locals, which would make sense. So his thinking was that if they were able to get the word out to visitors before arriving here, then the ferry ridership might improve. Thus, VisitPensacola and the local hotels were solicited to push the ferry service when people either asked about coming here or made actually made reservations. (I didn't take Marketing in college, and I'm no genius, but I'd imagine that would be one of the first  things you'd do, not the last.)  But it was a classic case of "too little/too late."

Businesses are so focused on immediate profits these days. Companies live and die by the quarterly results. And if next quarter doesn't look more promising than last quarter, CEO's are quick to cut-and-run. Shareholders aren't going to put up with this...  I mean, look at General Motors!  Who would've ever thought in a million years that they'd be basically getting out of the car business?

I'm kind of surprised that the Pensacola ferry service was set up as an unsubsidized endeavor. In addition to buying the boats, the government consortium should have set some of that BP money aside for operations – at least for the first year. Forcing GCMS to be a profit-making venture from the get-go was a bad, bad idea. It was doomed before it began. Such a service needs time to develop its market...time to get the word out and get people accustomed to using it as an alternative to driving to the beach. That doesn't happen overnight.

So now the two ferry boats sit idle, tied up at the pier in Pensacola, not preserved or even in drydock. They are deteriorating on a daily basis. They will obviously be sold – at a loss, I'm sure. Construction on the terminals has ceased. The grand scheme to have a ferry service in Pensacola appears to have failed.

And there they are, the two Pensacola ferries sitting forlornly at our almost-completed downtown terminal.  (Oh, and I couldn't help but get the Sportster in the picture.  Sorry.)

The ABCs of Naming Children

There this idiot parent from Texas who, in what must have either been a cruel joke or perhaps for misguided comedic effect named her child Abcde. The mother, Traci Redford says it is pronounced, and I kid you not, “ab-si-dee.” It turns out that the name is not entirely uncommon. According to THIS story in the Washington Post, at least 328 other idiots named their baby girls "Abcde” in 2014.  I mean, why on earth... oh never mind.

Anyway, Traci and little five-year old Abcde were on a trip, headed back home to Texas from California. They were preparing to board a Southwest Airlines flight when the mother overheard the gate agents making fun of her little darling's name.  One cannot imagine that it was her first time hearing such things.  She asked them to stop. They did, but not before taking a pic of the boarding pass and posting it on Facebook, because that is what you do, no?

The mother complained of course, and Southwest apologized, of course. But Ms. Redford said, ”...after two weeks of doing a formal complaint, Southwest hadn't done anything.”  So she brought her traumatic tale of woe to the mainstream media.  

Of course.

I'm not sure what Ms. Redford wanted SWA to do. It begs the question: What was she expecting...a refund? The article leaves us hanging.

Nowadays, people do expect something if they feel they've been wronged. If we are “injured” in the slightest way...even emotionally...then we want compensation, dammit! And it's not so much that we want it, but we think we deserve it. We're entitled!  A public apology is never enough.

It's gotten bizarre. Sometimes I think that there are people who intentionally go looking for some sort of conflict so they can “get over” on someone or some company. Parents who name their child, Abcde, for example.

Here's a curious tidbit. Apparently Ms. Redford is thirty years old. That would put her being born in 1988 or so. I was struck by the spelling of her first name, Traci. A more common spelling around that time would have been Tracey or even Tracy. Spelling it with an “i” was very rare back in the 1980's. So it must be acknowledged that Ms. Redford's parents were also somewhat, um, unconventional. The apple didn't fall far from the tree, I'd say. Moving on...

In the mid-1980's there came to prominence a porn actress by the name of Traci Lords. Don't ask me how I know this. Before Ms. Lords hit the big-time, there were few Traci's. I don't know about you, but if I were a parent of a newborn daughter, I'd be a little reluctant to name her after a well-known porn star of the day. I mean, couldn't they have called her Roberta? But no, they chose “Traci.” 

And maybe there's absolutely no connection whatsoever other than in my perverted mind.  Maybe ol' Traci's father didn't watch a lot of porn back then...I dunno.  But every time I see the name, “Traci,” I think of Traci Lords.

Time And What's It's Worth

Recently, my Uber-buddy, Terry was complaining about how little we make per-hour with Uber. We never worried about this so much when we owned taxicabs, but Uber drivers like to focus on this false metric of hourly wage. It's probably because so many conventional jobs pay on an hourly basis. But for some situations, paying by the hour is not always appropriate.

On a slow day at the airport, sometimes the taxi queue would look like a scene from The Walking Dead.  Bored, zombie-like cabdrivers saunter up and down the line, chain-smoking cigarettes, desperate for something...anything to do or talk about.  You can't leave to even go get lunch because you'd give up your position in the line.

Back when we owned taxis, sometimes Terry and I would go down to the Navy base on a weekday...and sit. Not a lot of people leave the base during the week, unless they've graduated from the NATTC (Naval Aviation Technical Training Command) and are headed to the airport and their next duty station. Classes are staggered and the course lengths vary depending on what the individual sailors and Marines are being trained for.  If a big class (like 50 or so kids) has graduated, a cabdriver might make three back-to-back $35 trips to the airport.

But if there are no graduating classes that day (the Navy does not publish a schedule), then nobody might leave the base. Frustrated cabdrivers like Terry and me might sit all day long without a single ride. It has happened. I'd make the half-hour drive from my house down to the base, get there at eight a.m., hang around until two p.m., and finally give up and go home. What was my hourly pay for that day? Zilch-o-rama.

Of course we usually make it up on the weekend. If the Navy and Marine kids have gotten paid and if the weather is warm and sunny, then you'll be working non-stop as every one of the 4,000 NATTC students wants to be off-base.  Ninety-nine percent of them don't own cars.  It was not unusual to make $200 or more in an eight-hour day. So you say to yourself, “Yay, I'm making $25 per hour!” But you'd be neglecting the day you made nothing. Or the day you worked twelve or fourteen hours and only grossed $100. I never averaged out my hourly pay as a cabdriver, but I know it wasn't much

...Just as my hourly pay with Uber is not much.  (I feel kind of badly for people who depend on Uber for their entire income.  And many do.  I think Uber always intended for it to be a "side-hustle" - something you do in addition to your full-time gig.)

On the other hand, what else do I have to do? I could stay home and play on Facebook all day. And yes, there are always things around the house that need to be done. There are tons of ways a productive person (in other words, someone who is not me) could spend their free time.  On bad-weather days I could (and should!) be practicing my guitar or working on the book I've finally decided to write.  On nice days I could (and should!) be out riding my motorcycle.  But I choose to spend my spare time sitting in a car doing crossword puzzles while waiting for the elusive ping! that means someone needs my services.

And what about the time that I spend, not in my car but at home with the Uber app on? I'm technically “working,” in that I am waiting on trips, but if you're in your own house doing nothing but “waiting for the phone to ring” so to speak, are you really working?

The sitting-around-all-day can be mentally fatiguing. It can put you into a mind-numbing stupor. You have to keep your mind occupied or it can drive you crazy. Terry and I have our own individual methods of doing that: He likes to read and write; I like to nap. (No, in all seriousness, I read and I write. And I nap.)

If I had a family, being a cabdriver would suck. Because while you can “make your own hours,” you really do have to be out there where the trips are – meaning the airport during the week and on the Navy base on weekends. You pretty much live in your cab.

With Uber I can make as much during the week as I used to in my cab on weekends. Plus, I can sit in my house and get Uber trips, something I couldn't do with the taxi. With Uber, I can come home between trips and still be "on the clock." Do I love Uber? Oh yeah! But I don't pretend that it's a high-paying job, or even that it provides a good hourly monetary return for the time invested.

Fortunately, at the moment the one thing I have a lot of is time.

Happy Thanksgiving 2018

Well it's finally here - the day I've been waiting for! Yes of course Christmas is important to many of us, but Thanksgiving is a holiday that everyone, even atheists can love. Because today we don't just 'remember' to be thankful (we should do that every day)...no, no, today we *celebrate* our gratitude! And we do that by gathering around our friends and family in a joyous feast of fellowship and love.

Back in the 1980's my parents lived in Manhattan. For a number of years my mom organized a big Thanksgiving Day dinner for the elderly and shut-ins of the parish. It was held in the basement of Our Lady of Good Counsel Church. Big crowd...multiple turkeys...side dishes galore...desserts... Even though she didn't do all the cooking, it was still a tremendous amount of work for mom. Looking back, I don't know how she did it. All of us kids pitched in. I'd drive around, scooping up those who wanted to attend but needed a ride. It instilled in me the knowledge that feeding people is one of the greatest things we humans of any belief system can do. To this day I enjoy having people over and putting on a big meal - especially now but even when it's not the holidays.

And so Thanksgiving provides me an opportunity to cook! However, sadly, the number of people at the house today will be smaller than usual - smaller than I'd hoped. And though it won't be with my actual family who are all still up in New York, it will be with people who've become my family here in Florida. And they've all generously offered to pitch in and contribute something for our meal today, greatly easing my tasks. Do not call it "workload" for it is not.

Obviously, not everyone can be a part of a big, family get-together today. Hey, I've spent plenty of Thanksgivings by myself, eating a cold-cut turkey sandwich. That has never bothered me. Life ain't always perfect. But we should recognize that we all have blessings...things to be thankful for. And I surely do! Even my friends and extended family down in Panama City, Florida where Hurricane Michael recently hit and did so much damage...even those people are having a big Thanksgiving meal. For them it is especially poignant this year. You could forgive them if they didn't feel particularly thankful that they've lost so much. But we're humans; we stay positive.

Whether or not you have people to celebrate this holiday with or maybe you're spending it on your own, I hope you do take the opportunity to celebrate your blessings and have a wonderful, warm and Happy Thanksgiving.

I wish you could be here with us.

Money Is Green, Not Black and White

Conventional wisdom says that here in Pensacola, Florida it's better to have a minivan as a taxi than a regular sedan. The thinking is that a van is better because there are so many tourists with lots of people and luggage, and the Navy kids always have a shit-ton of bunk, trunk and junk with them. Both of those things are true. And seven years ago when I bought my first taxi, it was a 2006 Ford Freestar minivan.

The Freestar was great. But the downside was that it got horrible gas mileage. As gently as I could baby it, I never got more than about 14mpg in the city, which is primarily where I drive. On the occasional highway trip it never did better than 23 mpg. But I made a lot of money with that van, and it was paid-off so its poor gas mileage didn't seem to matter.

As 2018 began, the Ford was, let's say “tired.” It had more than 210,000 miles on it. The interior and exterior were still great, but every week something else was breaking. At my local car-repair place, the guys and I were on a first-name basis. We never could get the air conditioner working right – but Lord, how they tried!

Coincidentally the taxi business here in Pensacola was dying a not-so-slow death thanks to the rise of the ride-shares. In April of this year I made the decision to switch over to Uber. The Ford van was just not suitable. This meant getting a newer, more dependable vehicle. (Here in this city Uber allows cars up to fifteen years old.) Naturally I began looking for another...well, van.

Sure enough, I found a super-clean, loaded 2010 Dodge Grand Caravan at a local dealer. It had a lot of miles on it (slightly over 100,000), but the dang thing looked, ran and drove like a brand-new car. It was in immaculate shape. Perhaps because of the mileage, or more likely the fact that it was literally the last day of the month, the salesman immediately came off their sticker price (which I already knew from my research was pretty fair). Inside, as we worked up the numbers I got him to come down even lower. They really wanted that van gone. In the end, I think I got a very good deal, which is often hard to say.

Many of my Uber passengers thought it was a brand-new van. I got many compliments on it, both verbally and, more importantly, noted on the App. I liked the “new” Dodge even more than my old Ford. (The automatic doors and built-in satellite radio helped.)

But again, the problem of gas mileage immediately made itself known. I thought it would do a little better, but my average city mileage was horrible. Over the six months I've owned the van I've averaged only 15.8mpg. Ouch. In October, my fuel cost per mile was $0.18.

So I started thinking about other cars, regular cars...more economical cars, especially hybrids. There is a reason that a lot of Uber drivers use the Toyota Prius. But I didn't want a Prius; I'd heard too many negative things about them from my passengers. Trouble is, hybrids are expensive to buy even if their operating costs are low. And there were no hybrids that I really liked.

But then I remembered the Volkswagen diesels! The VW Jetta diesel (the model is known as “TDi'”) was reported to get 40mpg on the highway and 30mpg in the city. I thought to myself that if it only got 25mpg in the city I'd be pleased as punch, as Hubert Humphrey used to say.

Volkswagen had a big scandal starting back in 2012. They got caught with a clever “cheater” program in their computer engine controls which could detect when somebody was doing an emissions test of the car. In that case, the computer would make the engine run super-duper-clean to pass the test. Once it was over and the test equipment unplugged, the car would go back to it's normal settings – which by the way were the same settings that Volkswagen used everywhere else in the world. It was only in the U.S. with our more-stringent nitrous-oxide limits that their cars would not pass (and some of them, like the 6-cylinder diesel, could not even be made to pass). And they got caught. Oopsie!

It's not that Volkswagens are unsafe, or even that they are serious polluters; they're not. The U.S. just has some crazy-ridiculous standards for diesels to keep passenger cars from running down the road smoking like an old eighteen-wheeler at full-throttle. And it's not like VW sells all that many diesels in the U.S. every year. But the feds caught them cheating and imposed some extraordinarily steep penalties. One of them was, of course, that they “fix” all of the non-compliant cars. Which they did. Another was that they no longer sell diesels in the U.S. Which they don't.

For the car buyer, Volkswagen diesels represent a hell of a bargain. They are seriously undervalued. People have heard of the scandal (it was called “Dieselgate”), and even if they don't know the details of it, they shy away from VW “TDi models” as they are known because they seem tainted.

I'll cut to the chase: I found a very nice 2012 VW Jetta Tdi at a dealer. It had the federally-mandated fix, and only had 71,000 miles. It's loaded and, again, like my Caravan it's gorgeous – it looks and drives like new. The dealer didn't want a lot of money for it either.

Needless to say, I cleaned out my van and drove home in the Jetta. On Interstate 10 on the way home the little gauge on the dash was showing 41.1 mpg. Who knows how accurate that is. (The one in my Caravan said I was getting 14mpg; in truth I did a little better than that.) In town, the display in the Jetta shows an average of 28.2mpg. I haven't put many miles on the car yet, so I haven't filled it up to calculate the actual fuel mileage (don't say “gas mileage” to a diesel driver!). But we'll see. I'm optimistic. If I can get an average of 28mpg, and with diesel being $3.00 per gallon it means that my fuel cost per mile will now be $0.11. That's about a 30% improvement!

But as usual, I didn't think this all the way through, as my friend, Terry was happy to point out. You see, 15% of my Uber revenue came from the higher-paying XL trips (more than 4 passengers) in the Caravan. So I'll be losing that money. I'll have slightly higher car and insurance payments...which is bad, but lower fuel costs per mile...which is good, but 15% less revenue...which is bad. Terry noted astutely that I'll probably just break even on the deal.

Nothing in life is ever black or white.  Certainly not money.

Driving For A Living

As someone who's driven for nearly fifty years, and who's made a living at it for most of the last eight years, I have a couple of observations. Bear with me while I rant, okay?

Most people think they are “above average” drivers. Obviously half of them are wrong...maybe more, I was never very good at maths. People claim to be good drivers by pointing out that they've never had an accident. This means nothing. All it tells us is that other drivers have been good at avoiding being hit by them. Miracles do happen.

Everyone is Mario Andretti. And one thing you can never do is question another person's driving ability. They'll take it as a deeply personal insult. There is a strength of conviction that is almost religious in fervor.

Guys feel as if they own a certain amount of space in front of their car. God forbid that you violate this space (by, say, changing lanes and pulling in front of them). Instead of just slowing down and readjusting that following distance, they will demonstrate their displeasure by riding your bumper, honking their horn and/or other, more graphic gestures of anger.

On a boulevard (e.g. two lanes in each direction), a guy will dawdle along slowly in the left lane, blocking traffic. He may be focused on his phone, or lighting a joint or whatever, but he is oblivious to traffic around him. Until... Until an opening appears in the traffic and you try to pass him on the right. Then he will suddenly wake up, and it's “race-on!” Happens every time. Every time. Guys do not like to be passed. It's a masculinity thing. They think it's a threat or insult to let someone get over on them or get by them. Guys really are way too competitive, especially behind the wheel.

Which brings us to my pet peeve: Americans simply don't understand the concept of “keep right.” They don't realize that it applies everywhere, yes, even on roads that are not Interstate highways. And on those Interstates, people will doggedly plod along in the left lane, sanctimoniously believing that they're perfectly fine and legal as long as they're going the speed limit. Which is false. Nobody appointed you to be a traffic cop, a controller of vehicle speed other than your own. Just keep to the right and let those bastard law-breakers go by. Karma or the real police may catch up with them eventually, but it's not your call.

I could go on, but I won't. Driving for a living can be a frustrating experience until you learn to just let it go. For me, driving is not a competitive sport. If someone wants to go around or get ahead of me, I just let them. No big deal. It's not a race. Plus, I'm judged and rated on my driving now; too many dings for unsafe driving can get you permanently deactivated from Uber. And yeah, that happens.

I don't know where I fall on the good/bad driver scale, but I try to not make people who are riding with me feel like we're about to have an accident. And if you can make paying passengers feel safe, I guess that's got to count for something.

Customer Service - And The Lack of It

In last week's installment I wrote about experiences I had involving two companies that are seeking to use technology to reduce the number of actual human employees on their payroll. In the Comments section, my friend Bob opined,

”As for McDonalds... anything to enhance their employees' ability to take an order and get it right would be welcome.”

And there's the rub. That part about getting the order right.

Whether the customer inputs his/her order via a kiosk or tells it to a clerk behind the counter who does the same, the possibility of getting the order screwed-up does not change if the food is cooked/handled/bagged/distributed by a human.

I went into our local McDonalds early one morning recently. The drive-thru line was long, so thinking (erroneously, as usual) that I'd be in and out more quickly, I parked and walked in. I was the only customer at the counter, and one of only three in the whole place.

I ordered a "two burritos meal" by number (let's just say it was a #7). The young girl behind the counter asked if I wanted hash browns with that? I said, patiently but somewhat sarcastically that I believed hash browns came with the #7. She seemed surprised. After ringing me up she grabbed a medium soda cup and plunked in onto the counter. I shook my head and asked for coffee. Again, it was breakfast. She withdrew the soda cup and stopped, looking confused.

Someone eventually appeared from the back of the store, carrying a bag, looking at me and announcing, "One breakfast burrito?" I sighed heavily (as I do) and corrected him. This resulted in a call for the manager, a beleaguered middle-aged woman who looked like she really didn't want to be there. Said manager looked at my receipt, rolled her eyes and told the guy with the bag to get me another burrito and a hash browns.

The cashier turned to the manager and said (and I shit you not), "But he wants a coffee, not a soda."  The manager sighed again and poured me a black coffee. This McDonalds does not put out cream and sugar at the soda/ice tea station. Does nobody drink McDonalds' crappy coffee anymore? I had to give it back to her and ask for cream and sugar to be added. But she had filled the cup so completely that there wasn't any room for cream.

All in all, three humans screwed up every aspect of my McDonalds breakfast - which was inputted correctly into the computer! I should add that on my way out of the store I fished the hash browns out of the bag and tossed them in the trash can by the door because they're horrible. I didn't care about them so much...I just wanted my two damn burritos and a coffee! And that's what I just should have ordered.

I had to laugh. Well, it would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

Customer service has gotten really bad in the U.S. - not just with fast-food dispensaries but in general. The people behind the counter seem to forget the "service" part of the phrase.

High school kids in America used to be grateful to snag a job, even a part-time entry-level job at a fast-food joint. They used to be proud to work! Not anymore. Now they view jobs as some sort of inconvenient obligation, and all they need do to get paid is show up and socialize with the other employees. Actually doing the job well is not a requirement.

In my Uber the other day I picked up a young woman at her apartment. She was headed to work at the mall. She asked if we could run through the McDonalds drive-thru so she could get a Mocha-something. It was already close to nine a.m. ”What time do you have to be at work?” I asked, knowing we were still a good ten minutes away from the mall. ”Nine,” she replied, "but they give us a fifteen-minute grace period."  

I was dumbfounded...literally speechless. Employees are so bad at being on-time these days that companies are forced to give them “grace periods.” Just try and make it here between ten and ten-fifteen, mm-kay? Un-bleeping-real.

Heck, maybe we're seeing the unintended consequences of having fast-food restaurants at every major intersection in every Podunk town. Maybe there are too many entry-level, minimum wage jobs.  Trouble is, here in dinky Pensacola we have so many fast-food places that they all can't even stay in business, much less keep an adequate staff of employees.  Google Maps shows eleven McDonalds right here in the Pensacola area.

The Hardee's (on a busy street right near the airport) closed and moved up the same street to a shopping center with a Winn-Dixie supermarket. The new location doesn't seem to do much better than the old. The Arby's which was right next door to Hardee's also closed but did not relocate. (I suspect that the Arby's chain of restaurants may not survive. None of them seem to be doing well when I drive by.  Or it may get conjoined and siamesed with another fast-food place like so many Taco Bell's and KFC's are now.)

The Burger King on the mall property! closed and a brand-new one was built just up the road not far from where the Hardee's and Arby's failed. The shiny, new, modern-looking BK store just recently opened.  It's right near my house.  Every time I pass it looks ominously deserted. The store is open and yet it has big banners outside announcing that they do walk-in hiring on Monday and Tuesdays. Didn't they staff-up before the Grand Opening?

Fast-food franchises used to be gold mines. Has the tide turned? Will lower sales volume and ever-increasing labor costs result in a downturn in that industry? I kind of hope so. More competition for the available jobs might make the people who actually need them and get them be more appreciative of having them. And then maybe, when I walk up to the counter they might say, "Good morning! May I help you?" instead of just staring at me blankly and then getting my order wrong.

Job Elimination in America

The other night I ordered some food from Domino's Pizza's website. They've got a great pizza to begin with, but also a bunch of other tasty pasta dishes (and desserts!) on their menu. I selected my usual, the 16" hand-tossed Honolulu Hawaiian.  Add some breadsticks, a 2 liter bottle of soda (there are three of us here)...and we're up to $50 before the tip. Pricey but worth it, I think.  The Domino's website is super-easy to use, which is why I do.

The Domino's store is not far from the house, and the food always comes surprisingly quickly. Indeed it was the case this time. The cheerful, friendly delivery driver brought the food right to my door in record time.  I gave her a nice tip for I understand their plight (and, because she was cute).

Back to the online experience.

After I placed the order, I immediately got a popup screen asking if I would like my pizza delivered by an automated car? It's no secret that Domino's and Ford have been experimenting with cars that are modified into driverless pizza delivery vehicles. The popup window mentioned that I would have to meet the vehicle at the curb and retrieve my pizza myself. I chose, “No.”

When I did, yet another popup window opened. It wondered (rather indignantly, it seemed) why I would not want to use this wonderful service? And it gave a list of five reasons with boxes to be checked. For example: “I don't want to leave the house.” I chose, “Other.” Of course it asked for an explanation and I wrote one. I said, “Just how many jobs can we eliminate in the U.S.? You should be ashamed of yourselves.”

HERE is a YouTube video explaining the new concept. 

By the way, it was only after participating in their survey that they mentioned the automated delivery service is not yet available in Pensacola, but they were trying to gauge customer reaction.  Well they certainly got mine!

Look, I'm not stuck in the past; I'm all for automation and the use of new technology to make our jobs easier. But as a society, how far do we go in using technology to eliminate those few remaining entry-level or minimum wage jobs?

When I was up in New York State recently, I happened to stop at a Service Plaza on the NYS Thruway. In it was one of those newfangled automated McDonalds in which you put your order in yourself via an oversize smartphone-looking device without talking to a human.  Great, more use of technology to cut down on the number of employees.  Still, I had to try it.

Using the touchscreen to order my food was cumbersome, confusing and time-consuming. It took longer than if I'd just told the kid at the counter, “I'd like a number nine to go, please.” Evidently McDonalds did not fully think it through before rushing it into service.

Despite the late hour, the place was crowded. The three hapless employees behind the counter were swamped and overloaded and seemed lost.  The computer wasn't making their lives easier either.  It couldn't predict how many people were in line (or headed in the door) and thus how many loads of fries they needed to drop to stay ahead of the unexpected rush.  And, despite my ordering on the computer screen, they almost managed to screw up my very simple order of a Chicken Sandwich Meal, which took a long, long time to get.

If this is the wave of the future, I'll pass.  Some things just call out for the human touch, and a computer cannot always replace us.

Care Overload

The media is constantly bombarding us with things about which we should care deeply. The President did this...the democrats did that...on and on and on. Every bleedin' thing, no matter where in the world it happened or how insignificant it was gets thrown in our face as if it's a matter of utmost urgency. It's all designed to get a rise out of us – one way or the other. But it's having the opposite effect on me.

I don't know about you, but I get to a point of care-overload. My Care-O-Meter pegs and then breaks. And then suddenly I just don't care about anything. I know it's wrong; I know that there are things that we should care about. But lately it's getting harder and harder to tell what. It all comes across as just so much noise and chatter. It feels as though I'm being bludgeoned with a news cudgel.

Friends and family complain about President Trump. He's awful! He's a game show host!  He's a joke!  He's a disgrace!  They wonder incredulously how anybody could still support him? I just shrug. For I don't care. I know just as many people who'd be saying the same things if Hillary had won. The country will survive; it has up until now and not even a Donald Trump could destroy it. And see, if he's really a horrible president, then he'll be voted out of office in the next election. That's how our government works. And I love it.

I guess I'm just getting too old to get really worked-up about stuff anymore. Temporarily annoyed or peeved...yeah. But pissed-off and shout-at-the-TV-angry? Not so much.

Hurricane Michael: A Close-Call (For Some)

I'm sure that by now you've all seen the pictures of the devastation caused by Hurricane Michael. The Gulf Coast of Florida was where the storm made landfall. Particularly hardest hit was Panama City and the town of Mexico Beach, the latter of which was literally obliterated.

My friend Matt's mother, Carole lives in the town of Lynn Haven, just north of Panama City, almost directly under where the eye passed. Her house was not built to withstand 150+ mph winds. We begged to her to come to Pensacola, but she unwisely decided to shelter-in-place. Carole takes in a lot of dogs and cats that are awaiting adoption, and it would have been difficult to bring them all anywhere. So she stayed, along with some others who lived in even more vulnerable locations and came over to her house to ride out the storm.

Miraculously, the house stood. Carole lost nearly all of the shingles on her roof, along with the siding on one side of the house. A backyard tree had fallen on the house but thankfully did not compromise the structural integrity of the roof. Of course she lost power and water.

After the storm. Matt went down from Atlanta with a chainsaw and some plastic tarps. He cut down the tree and did what he could to minimize any water damage if it rains before repairs can be made.

As I've mentioned, we here on the Gulf Coast have gotten pretty good at responding to disasters of this nature. This time was a prime example. Emergency and relief services were in place well in advance of the hurricane's arrival, ready to leap into action. Trucks and bulldozers were out getting the roads cleared almost immediately. Crews began repairing power lines. Churches and shelters began distributing hot meals. It's nice to be able to get something to eat without having to cook when you've been cleaning up your property all day and are exhausted. And truly, getting everything back to normal is as daunting a task as you can imagine.

Gulf Power published an estimate of when affected areas might have their electrical power restored. Lynn Haven, where Carole lives was in a big area marked “TBD”...to be determined. They said it could be months, depending on the damage to the infrastructure (substations, etc.)

Within a couple of days, Carole happily reported that her water was back on. They could take (albeit cold) showers again. Huzzah! And then, not even seven days after the storm had passed, her electricity incredibly came back on. We could almost hear the cheering 80 miles away here in Pensacola.

You have to be impressed at the effort that everyone from government agencies to big corporations to churches to regular individuals put into making things right after such a devastating event. You read about the stories and see them on TV. It is truly heartwarming to know that so many people care and will go the extra mile to help those in need.  Makes you proud to be an American.

Matt and I were talking the other day. ”You know,” said from the comfort of his house in the hurricane-free zone of Atlanta, Georgia, ”if that storm had hit Pensacola it would have been worse than Ivan.”

He was referring to Hurricane Ivan, a Category 3 storm that hit us in 2004. Ivan was awful for Pensacola. We were both here for it. The destruction was shocking. It took a looooong time...five years at least...to recover from it. And yes, Michael would have been worse. I did not leave for Ivan. I should have. I didn't get any damage but I was very, very lucky.

I live in a strong brick house with a relatively new roof – and I'm about eight feet above my street and 100 feet or so above sea-level. Even so, we were watching the storm track with anxiety. I would have left if Michael hadn't made it's last-second curve to the northeast and spared us – as all the weather forecasters were promising. But it's easy for me: Single, no kids and no pets.

Hurricane!

Every area of the country has its pluses and minuses. Californians have to deal with earthquakes, draughts, mudslides and wildfires. The central part of the country is called “tornado alley.” The northeast gets winter weather and the occasional “snowpocalypse.” Here on the gulf coast we get hurricanes.

The good thing, if there is one about hurricanes is that we usually know well in advance that they're coming. The various weather forecasting services have gotten fairly good in predicting where these storms are going and how strong they're going to be.

Right this very minute as I type this, the gulf coast is bracing for the arrival of Hurricane Michael. The center of the storm should happen somewhere near Panama City Beach, Florida (the red dot in the picture above), perhaps just to the east. 

Currently Michael is a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 150 mph. Thankfully, that wind velocity doesn't usually extend out very far from the eye – 30 to 40 miles or so. As you move further from the eye, the wind diminishes. But still, even if you “only” see 100 mph winds, that can do some damage.

The threat from hurricanes is threefold.  First is the wind, with its attendant damage to roofs, trees and powerlines, etc.  Ahead of arrival of the eyewall, such high winds also push water ashore, generating devastating storm-surges along coastal zones. Finally, heavy rain bands can cause flash-flooding.

Big storms (e.g. tropical storms and hurricanes) have a counter-clockwise rotation. This means that when the storm is out over open water, the worst weather will be on the east and northeast side. When the storm hits the coast, the best place to be is on the west side. There, people will see winds out of the north and much less precipitation. So when we're watching the storm track on the Weather Channel, etc., we hope and pray that it will go off to our east. Such was the case when Hurricane Michael began seriously strengthening south of Cuba a couple of days ago.

Most of the time, big storms will bend around and track to the northeast. That's just the way the atmosphere works at these latitudes. But not always! You may remember a little event called Hurricane Katrina back in 2005. It crossed south Florida and came into the Gulf of Mexico, tracking mostly to the northwest before finally bending straight northward and into New Orleans. It didn't start heading to the northeast until it was well to the north of Lake Ponchartrain. And even though New Orleans got most of the publicity because of the direct hit of the storm, the real impact and effects occurred along the Mississippi Gulf Coast where the destruction was simply devastating. Sadly, this area got proportionately little news coverage.

In the case of this Hurricane Michael, the satellite and radar images broadcast on the media certainly looked terrible for the last couple of days. It would be easy to assume that the weather within that whole storm was uniformly bad. Not so.

Seeing this and being concerned for my safety, my sister Elizabeth in New York contacted me this morning. She simply could not believe that my weather in Pensacola was so benign. But all morning long, and approaching noon as I write this, we've had very little rain and virtually no wind. However, it is quite a different story just 80 miles to my southeast. In fact, when I pulled up the straight-line distance on one of my aviation apps, I was surprised to see that the distance was so short considering the drastic difference between our weather and theirs. But such is the nature of these storms. I would hate to be 80 miles east of Panama City right now.

The thing is, we here in Florida have gotten good at dealing with storms like this. A local television news reporter mentioned this morning that there were 600 trucks from various power companies all over the country, staged here in Pensacola, ready to spring into action once the storm passes, to get power restored as quickly as possible. The tractor-trailers with water and other supplies are also staged nearby and ready. Presumably (and hopefully!) they won't be needed here in this area.

The good news is that Hurricane Michael will pass through the area quickly. The bad news is that the effects of the storm will be drastic and long-lasting, especially in Panama City and to the east. The good news is that, east of Panama City, not many people live there. With the exception of Tallahassee which is fairly well inland, the gulf coast in that area is pretty swampy and sparsely populated. The bad news is that my friend Terry and I had planned a motorcycle trip down through that area soon – which will undoubtedly need to be rescheduled indefinitely.

But even with the occasional hurricane, I still prefer living here on the Gulf Coast.

Hypocrite!

I broke down and bought a Keurig. I know, I know...after all the whining I did previously (read it HERE) about the need for speed in our lives and how those single-cup coffeemakers were just...you know...silly...I went out and bought one.  It seems that along with drinking coffee, I like eating my words.

Why buy a Keurig? Simple. I make exactly one cup of coffee each day. To do that I boil water in a saucepan. Well one morning I made my coffee and it tasted suspiciously like the Progresso Vegetable Beef Soup I'd made the night before. Yes, I'd emptied the saucepan into bowls, and then apparently put it back on the stove (on an unused burner, fortunately). I'd obviously meant to wash it later but did not. Thus, my next morning's coffee tasted like soup.

Walmart sells the Keurig “Classic” for $99.00. Kind of steep. I didn't buy it, but went home to mull it over. Did I really want to spend a hundred bucks on a damn coffee maker? As luck would have it, as I was perusing Facebook Marketplace I came across a “brand-new” Keurig “Classic” for $25.00. I called the guy. He'd received it as a present but wasn't a coffee drinker and never used it – it was just taking up counter space. Thinking that I'd just stumbled on the Deal Of The Century! I agreed to be at his house in the morning. My friend Terry and I met for breakfast and he went with me on the errand.

Sure enough, the dang thing was brand-new. Looked and smelled like it had never been used. Even Terry (who has one of his own, of course) was impressed. Got it home, plugged it in and it works as advertised. Picked up a carton of K-cups from WM. $10.00 for 18.

As luck would have it, the very next day I was perusing Facebook Marketplace again, and whaddyaknow, there was a Keurig “Classic” for $10.00.  Ten bucks!  I felt like such a chump. I sent the link to Terry, who quipped, ”Tomorrow you'll see one that says, 'Free to a good home!'”

So now I'm expensively making coffee one cup at a time.  Cheaper than buying it at the convenience store, but still...  So yes, you can call me a hypocrite. At least my coffee doesn't taste like soup anymore.

A Ne'er-Do-Well Pilot/Motorcyclist Son

I come from a big Irish-Catholic family. We grew up in New York City. My parents had six kids. I'm somewhere in the middle. I've got an older brother and sister, plus a younger brother and two younger sisters. For better or worse, we're not a particularly close family. Most of us still live dispersed in New York State if not the City itself except for my oldest brother, Bill. My younger brother Patrick and I both live in Florida: He in the Miami area; me in Pensacola – about as far from each other as you can be in Florida.

As I said, we kids are not close. Years go by without seeing each other – or even communicating very much. The reasons for this are complex and not completely understood by this reporter. I hate to use the expression, but it is what it is. Facebook has helped that, but only slightly.

And yet this past weekend I was back up in New York as we all gathered together again. It occurred to me that the last time all six of us were under the same roof was back in 1998 on the occasion of my father's funeral. This time it was my mom's. (She was 94, and it was not unexpected.)

It was interesting to see my brothers and sisters again. We've all aged considerably as you'd expect, but yet we all look pretty much the same. Nobody's gone bald, although some of us (me included) have revealing holes in the hair on the back of our heads. All of my sibs are inexplicably as thin as starving supermodels. I, on the other hand, look like the “before” picture in a Weight-Watchers ad. My younger brother Pat looks and sounds so much like dad that it's spooky. I kept doing a double-take. The rest of us are a mix.

We got together a couple of times after the service. Naturally there was a lot of reminiscing: some good, some sad. My memory is so awful. It's fortunate that your brothers and sisters can fill in holes in your own recollections. I feel sorry for those who come from small families. It was also funny (to me, anyway) that a lot of my memories centered around the kind of cars we had at the time. ”Ohhhhh yeah, I remember now! That was when we had our second Volkswagen Bus.” And so on.

It was a sad occasion, obviously, but I was happy with a number of things:

One, although I refer to (and think of!) us as such, none of us are kids anymore. The eldest being 69 and the youngest is 57. Thank God we are all still in fairly good health. None of have turned into stereotypical grumpy old people. I didn't hear any bitching and moaning or anyone being crabby about anything. It was refreshing and gratifying.

Secondly, it's amazing to me to rediscover how naturally funny my brothers and sisters are. I thought I was “the funny one” in the family. Not so! Compared to my sibs I am a virtual sourpuss. They are hilarious, each with a keen sense of humor that must be genetic come to think of it.  I don't mean to imply that we were yucking and whooping it up on the weekend of mom's funeral. We were not. But neither were we morose and disconsolate. That is not the Irish way!

Finally, we all got along really well. You know that in any big family there's bound to be a certain amount of...tension or perhaps animosities among the siblings.  Mine is no exception.  But on this weekend nobody brought up any drama from the past. If there was any it was kept below the surface.

In a bar after the service (like I said we are Irish after all), one of my older sister's adult daughters asked me, ”Now that your mom is gone, do you think you and your brothers and sisters will become closer?” It was an interesting question and it kind of caught me off-guard. For I don't really know. Maybe. We'll see.

On Monday morning as the Delta MD-88 climbed out and away from Albany, headed back south, I reflected on the events of the past two days, as you're required to do when taking an airline trip. It was, all things considered a nice weekend. We all love our family, of course. But beyond that, I like my brothers and sisters too. I admire them. They're all highly intelligent, funny, well-adjusted people who grew up without drug or alcohol problems, and who have never seen the inside of a jail cell (to my knowledge anyway). My parents (may they rest in peace) can be proud that they raised five wonderful children.

...And one ne'er-do-well pilot/motorcyclist bum.

On Motorcycling

I've always owned motorcycles. Back in early 2016 I bought yet another Harley-Davidson Sportster (my third). This last one is a 1996 model which unfortunately had been sitting around unused for a long time. Outside. It looked great in the pictures, but the pictures were not current. Still, it was ride-able (at least to get it home), but...ugh...it was more of a challenge to get up and running than I'd hoped. I spent more than a year sourcing just the right parts to make it “mine.” Word of advice: Never buy a bike that's been sitting around for more than, oh, six months. I thought I'd gotten a good deal on this thing. I was wrong.

In the meantime while I was fussing and fighting with my Sportster, my friend Terry also bought a Sportster. He'd previously had one of those “dual-sport” bikes, one that you could ride on a dirt road as well as paved streets. Great bike! The trouble was that it was, well, tall. You just about needed a ladder to get on the thing. Younger riders are more limber and have the agility to swing their leg way up and over the saddle just to mount up; but 60-something year-old guys like Terry and I do not. End result: Terry did not ride the bike much.

Since he's heard me prattle on and on (and on), extolling the virtues of the Harley Sportster, he kind of casually started looking at them. And sure enough, he found one that was a really good deal over in Tallahassee, a three-hour drive to our east.

Sportsters come in two different engine sizes: 883cc and 1200cc. Externally they are identical; you cannot tell them apart.  There is no denying that the 883 has plenty of power. Back when the bike/engine combination was introduced in 1957! the Sportster was the original “super-bike.” That was then. Performance standards have changed a little with the advent of much more powerful machines. However the 883 Sportster has not changed much since its heyday. It is now considered weak and slow. Kind of like me.

However, the bigger, 1200cc engine makes the bike into something of a hotrod, and that's what most guys go for. Among the Harley cognoscenti, the smaller engine is the subject of almost universal disdain for its comparative lack of power and “oomph.” Even the stupid salesmen at the Harley dealer insinuate that the 883 is a great “starter bike,” or worse, a “girl's bike.” (Of course, they'd rather sell you a $20,000+ Super Glide than a $9,000 Sportster.) When I tell them that I'm on my third Sportster they look at me funny.

I ride alone, and I'm not inclined (anymore) to drag-racing other riders from stoplight to stoplight. So the 883 is perfectly fine for me. Would I like the extra power of the 1200? Sure, but the 883 has a significant gas mileage advantage over its bigger brother, which should be no surprise. And when your gas tank only holds 2.2 gallons, as mine does, gas mileage becomes uber-important.

The bike Terry and I went to look at in Tallahassee was a 1200, all done up in black and chrome. In pictures it looked great. In person, it really is beautiful, even I have to admit. The bike needed a little work, but it was well worth the agreed-upon price. We loaded it into the back of Terry's pickup truck and beat feet for Pensacola.

So now Terry and I both had Sportsters, and we wanted to do some riding! The one little problem was that mine wasn't exactly running. It took a while – longer than I'd anticipated. I wanted this Sportster to be “just so.” This meant undoing some of the work that the previous owner had done. People always think that the personal customizations/modifications they perform on their motorcycles add value. They do not. Often the next owner (ergo, me) has to come along and spend money replacing those parts. Which is why I got this bike so cheaply. (Not cheaply enough, it turned out.)

Anyway, my bike is finally done. It runs fine and drives great. It's ready for some nice road trips, for which Terry has been patiently waiting. Thankfully, there is plenty of riding season left – one of the advantages of living down south.

Here's Terry with his 2009 Sportster.  Not sure why the picture came out so lousy, but it's a gorgeous bike in person!

And here's my latest acquisition.  I know, it looks a lot like my last Sportster. But no, this one is completely different - it's got spoke wheels!