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Today Oil prices jumped over $10 a barrel, although I really don’t know how big that is but according to the New York Times it is the BIGGEST JUMP EVER. Just Frakking Great.

How did I know something was up, I noticed the stock market was taking a nose dive. So now everyone’s savings, 401K, [Read more →]

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Quick, what bills are these?

In 2002, the American Council of the Blind began a lawsuit against the U.S. Government claiming that our existing currency discriminates against the Blind or the visually impaired.

In 2006 the decision came in in favor of the American Council of the Blind. The Treasury Department Appealed.

This month in 2008, the Appelate ruling is in and the decision stands! The American Council of the Blind wins for now.

I applaud them, but it’s not over yet. The Treasury has 90 days to appeal or as for Supreme Court review.

Before I go into this topic let me discuss my bias and existing point of view. [Read more →]

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So I haven’t been posting alot lately. There has been quite a bit going on… of which I’ll post more later.

But while I was updating a few other blogs for folks I finally made the jump to the newest version of wordpress for my own blog. Isn’t it funny how you always put yourself last in updates.

Anyway, a few things fell out of the mix in the upgrade. First, the old polls just didn’t transfer over very well and I decided to delete them. I know, the best pizza in Denver poll got a good amount of traffic. But the fact is, that poll was over a year old and every once in awhile you need to blow things out and start fresh or the info is dated. Maybe the best pizza in 2006 just isn’t the same best pizza in 2008. It’s good to ask the questions again.

And of course the theme had a few hiccups too. Now if I am going to roll out a new look I might as well get one that can handle all the fun plugins that are out today. So have patience with me and feel free to email me any that you like. I’ll be adjusting them a bit.

Cheers.

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It’s that special time of year when kegs of Guinness are flowing fast and hangovers are growing even faster. Yes folks, the Saint Patrick’s Day holiday is upon us.

But make sure to plan accordingly because unlike all the St. Patrick’s Day holidays of the past this one WILL NOT be held on the traditional March 17th. Due to a little scheduling problem the Church is moving it. Changed by the Roman Catholic Church to avoid conflict with Holy Monday that falls on 3/17 the 2008 Saint Patrick’s Day holiday will be celebrated on March 15th just a few days away. This is the first time the date has been moved since 1940 and the next time it will need to change will be all the way in 2160.

What will you be doing to celebrate? I remember the days of waiting in line for my old watering hole, Byrnes Pub, to open in the wee hours of the morning. There was some serious Irish pride going on at Byrne’s and folks waited all year for their favorite holiday to be celebrated right. What surprised me is that Byrne’s and many other establishments are still planning to celebrate Saint Patrick’s day on the 17th (the traditional day) which led me to wonder if there might be a revolt of sorts against the changing of the date. Are some out there making a statement that Saint Patrick’s day is simply to important to be swapped out because of a conflict with another event. Or did some folks just not get the memo? Here’s one story talking about how different cities are having different reactions.

For those of us how are consuming the beer it is far better to have a nice Sunday to recover than to be looking at a workday to follow. You know when that happens somebody will have the “great idea” to schedule a 7 am meeting. I imagine that businesses are probably pleased about the date change as well as it means they can avoid a possible crew of zombies on one of their supposedly productive days. I am not sure if it is better for the bars or not. They might certainly have a great night of beer sales for a Saturday, but that probably happens anyway. With a weeknight Saint Patrick’s Day they might just boost it up to being their best week ever.

Of course the smart Irish man or woman might want to celebrate twice just to make sure. You don’t want to tick Saint Patrick off by missing his day now do you (bar managers trying to boost beer sales, this might give you a record breaking week).

What’s your thought on the date change?

Whichever date it is my plans will be milder as I am quite a bit tamer than I was back then. Now I prepare by surfing Itunes to assemble an Irish mix of my favorite bands for the occasion. These would include such groups as Dropkick Murphys, Flogging Molly, The Skels, Blood or Whiskey, The Tossers, and of course The Pogues. I haven’t quite decided what I’ll do with the mix since I’m not hosting a party… but you never know when it might come in handy.

I’ll likely have a beer or two, laugh with some friends, and exit before things great really rowdy as I plan to hit a beach the very next day and that is when the real fun starts. But you have fun this Holiday and share your favorite way to celebrate Saint Patrick’s day here in Denver.

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Something interesting is happening this holiday season in the world of Real Estate. As reported by the New York Times today, a huge number of Europeans and tourists from other countries are taking advantage of the weak dollar to purchase their U.S. second home.

While the article’s focus is the sale of real estate in Manhattan I would think that our wonderful ski resorts would be a great target as well. So as our dollar continues to plummet the rest of the world looks at our prime spots as one big investment opportunity. Too bad it’s not the other way around, I’d love to pick up a nice Italian villa on the ocean or a crash pad in Paris.

But this isn’t about what I want.

It’s about the holiday season and to a certain extent a move towards world peace. As the world becomes more global and we criss cross our homes, vacations, friends and experiences from one continent to another we also build understanding, relationships, and a foundation for communication. Maybe someone from Europe loans their Manhattan condo to some friends who have never been to the U.S. They have a great time, tell great stories, and the flow of people back and forth increases. It’s alot harder to be grumpy towards a country you have visited and one in which you have made friends.

Let’s continue the global spread of travel and second homes (note the term home, that certainly implies a stronger relationship). If we can get this flow of travel and experience going back and forth between the most strained of relationships who knows what we could to to build friendship.

Now just make sure you greet the next international neighbor you meet with kindness.

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In a fun twist the blogging on the recent Colorado Rockies ticket snafu got noticed by some folks involved at Bernstein Crisis Management PR Firm.

These folks have taken an interesting angle on blogging with regards to the immediate availability of news through the blogging community over status quo news agencies. Basically if you want to find out what is happening you might be better off doing a google or technorati search instead of just hitting the standard news channels. The reasoning is simple, with cell phone cameras (both photo and video) and sites such as youtube or personal blogs regular joes like you and me can be giving the rest of the world news faster than organized news channels. Interesting and fun for this blog to have gotten a little press so I hope you don’t mind my sharing. [Read more →]

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I recently had the opportunity to attend the Urban Land Institute’s Fall Session in Las Vegas. Forgetting that Vegas is an adult Disneyland with more than enough fun to kill someone the event had some really cool sessions to learn from.

One of the sessions that drew my eye talked about getting families downtown. As one might expect, many cities wrestle with the loss of families in their downtowns. Denver seems to be no different, as friends I know continue to abandon their urban desires and pack their yoga bags for the burbs. Of course, they often speak later with regret about how bored they are but martyr themselves for the sacrifice they made for their children.

That sucks.

There is no reason that urban living and family life have to be mutually exclusive. The discussion I attended took on these issues head on and discussed some specific projects in Portland that were trying to do a perception change with it’s residents. The first question is what needs to be added to keep families in their urban lives. [Read more →]

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Yep, this one didn’t go quite as well.

I was on the phone with the hosting company a few times. I was hoping it wasn’t the same snafu as before and wanted to help. I started to tell them what I was experiencing and they suddenly got excited. I guess they weren’t sure where the hangup was. So I told them. I even sent them information on where the system was hanging up after they asked for my help. And it got something moving because they said it was what they needed and I got the following email back after sending the error info when I asked if my email made it to her or if it disappeared.

From: “Cheryl XXXX”
Date: October 23, 2007 12:59:23 PM MDT
Subject: RE: stop page

No, it didn’t disappear! I’m thinking you may be the “man of the hour”.

I said that was great and all, but wanted to be was the “man at the game”. I was baiting for tickets but they couldn’t do it. I understand, even if I lend a helping hand they were selling the tickets as a company and they (I found out) were not even allowed to buy tickets as individuals. But they told me some things that might block someone or mess with they system. Old cookies might need to be cleared out from when the settings were different at the beginning. Those of you with cookies from the start when the server settings were off might have had a handicap and someone who entered the rounds later might have been better off. They also mentioned something about screening IP’s to block the ticket scalpers. This worries me too since who knows how they decide what requests or IP’s to block.

For all I know, the fact that the whole office, heck the whole network of offices were trying to get tickets might have made us look like an IP to block. My guess is that there were so many mistakes made that who knows what might have thrown a request out. I heard sad stories about my friends mom making it to the booking screen only to have the system time out and bomb in processing (no happy ending, the tickets weren’t purchased) and many others of the same.

But the saddest was the stories I heard about folks who have NO PLAN TO GO TO THE GAME. Scalpers, profiteers, bad guys who were grabbing tickets only to resell them. No Rockies fans, no loyalty. Bleah! And my worry is that all the safeguards that were put into place to block these guys also slowed the system down and it was the regular folks, on their slow connections, with slow computers and no knowledge of how to “clear cookies” or the like who ultimately got denied. It sucks.

And yes, I am bitter. I just jumped on stubhub.com and bought two tickets to game 4 at an exponentially inflated price. Why? It might be a once in a lifetime experience. And because I believe. I got all my other seats at face value, maybe I’ll just rationalize out that this puts me at a slightly higher average.

For the record. I bought 4 seats to all the other national and division games and went to each and every one. I took people I know, and anyone who joined me just paid the face cost. That is how it should be.

I am always looking for a new business idea and I think I just found it. I don’t know what I’ll call it, maybe www.loyaltytickets.com, but perhaps my own ticket system that helps the loyal fans get their tickets first.

Ho Hum, drat and Pbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbtttt to the whole system. Maybe next time use Ticketmaster, as the Rockies are the only professional team here in Denver I heard who doesn’t use them. Now maybe they’ll know why.

Share your experience here and let me know if you gave up to watch at home or if you bought in the secondary market and for how much (and what section). This photo does not represent the section I bought in, I was more around the $900 a ticket range (OUCH). I had some $499 per tickets in the Rockpile but they were gone by the time I clicked through. Already the section I bought in (Pavilion) is jumping above this but who knows.

Go Rockies!!

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Ow…. I am feeling Déjà vu

Still no tickets, and online since before noon. I checked in with the folks doing the hosting and at first they said all things were good.

That soon must have changed because then I encountered long ring cycles and voice mail. I feel sorry for these guys if they have problems two days in a row.

Finally, I get through again and I am told the IT team dead some modifications in the last 90 seconds and to logout and try again. Heck, I’ll try anything.

Either way, I keep getting caught up at ev3.evenue.net which should be the main booking engine. And it just sits, and sits, and sits.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Give me some feedback as to what you all are experiencing or think. But look at it this way, if they sell 80 tickets a day there will be plenty left to buy at the stadium on game day.

**** By the way, I just heard from a someone who had 15 computers going that they did get in (Time 12:44 PM). So we have no choice but keep trying.

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Make sure to check out my previous post for the history on this one…

They are calling it quits, throwing in the towel, regrouping… whatever you want to call it. I just talked again with the hosting company and the official unofficial is that they have cancelled the online sales for now. And there will be NO SALES AT THE STADIUM. They are going to regroup and reschedule and it will likely be tomorrow. I asked her what she thought because rumors are that it might be later today but my source was guessing tomorrow.

Guess that brings this little episode to a wrap. But I am a bit too scared to step back and risk it in case it opens up again later this afternoon.

I just checked with the nice lady at the hosting company and she said there were two bits of good news..

ONLY 80 TICKETS WERE SOLD ONLINE… So that means tons of tickets remain.

Here other bit of good news was that no stadium sales were to be done. I don’t know if that is good or bad news until I see if I get tickets. Lets all keep our fingers crossed.

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