COMING SOON... Homeland Security, Inc.

A critique of the economic inefficiencies integral to the current relationship between the US Department of Homeland Security, and state and municipal law enforcement bodies in the US, with thoughts on cost/benefit analysis of future improvements.

Highlights and Lowlights

Basically, this was my vacation:

Highlight: The guitar-shaped pool at our Hotel in Memphis completely sucked my kid and my nephew into pool nirvana.
Lowlight: For a 7-year old, going to Graceland and other Elvis-related tourism is in no way as cool as a guitar-shaped pool.

Highlight: surprisingly good quality of the hotels and motels we stayed at- even the ones we didn't prebook.
Lowlight: the welfare motel that was the exception to the rule.
Rebound highlight: the Hilton next door, worth every penny.
It may have been worth every penny, but dammit, those were a LOT of pennies.

Highlight: accolades and adulation from family for putting together an awesome trip
Lowlight: I have a claustrophobia attack in the middle of Times Square, and turn into an 8-year old girl in front of my wife, kid, and nephew, who have to step up and get me back to my car and out of New York City.

Highlight: The Mrs. falls in love with the Blue Ridge mountains in VA. Marital bliss ensues.
Lowlight: The Mrs. tells me that our next house must still be within 30 minutes of The Ant Farm, even though she loved being out in the country. Marital bliss makes a landing-gear-up style landing, and bursts into flame, colliding with a day care center, a homeless shelter for female porn stars, and an Arby's in the process. A blue funk ensues.

Highlight: the owner of a little diner in West Virginia is so taken with my wife's exotic look and friendly-but heavily-accented banter that we dine off-menu, eating real country food that I've never even heard of before.
Lowlight: I fart for 9 days straight.

Highlight: hotels and motels in the South cost about 1/3 of similar places up north.
Lowlight: hotels down south shut down about 10pm. My Brazilian family doesn't even like eating dinner before 10 while on vacation. Anything before 7pm is lunch.
Rebound Highlight: finding a Brazilian restaurant 5 minutes from our hotel in NJ, just outside of NYC.
Rebound Lowlight: the waiter hits on my wife, in front of me, using flowery Portuguese too complex for me to understand. I am oblivious.
Alley Oop- my wife tells me to stiff the guy on the tab. She writes something on the bill, using a frighteningly-accurate facsimile of my signature. She leaves the guy 3 pennies, and tells me why about 12 hours later, so I don't make a scene.

Highlight: visiting the Statue of Liberty, seeing a Broadway show
Lowlight: the lines for both.


So, overall, it was a great time. As I wrote, I had a massive Claustrophobia attack in the middle of Times Square. It was hot, and we had come out of Madam Tussaud's Wax Museum, which is where the attack started, as I was constantly jostled and bumped into by thousands (literally) of rude tourists and locals who were adamant about getting their fucking picture taken with plastic mannequins of RuPaul and Madonna. I came out of there frazzled, and onto the 5pm Times Square crowd, which was too much, I guess. Anyhow, I was miserable, and my wife missed the cues, and she's running all over, taking pictures of me while I'm trying to breathe and not to curl up in a ball. I don't feel like reliving the experience here by writing about it. I lost massive face in front of my family, which is important to me. 'Nuff said.
Now, what was amazing was that, after a thorough drunk at the hotel bar that night, and, I'm ashamed to admit, a good fight with the wife, I emerged at 7am, ready for the next day, and another try at NY. We went to see the Statue of Liberty, which took 3 hours to get to, mostly spent in lines to get tickets, go through security, and wait in lines with extremely polite Indian tourists (not a bad thing). In the 95% humidity, and 95+ degree weather, we spent only 45 minutes touring the island, and another 3 hours in lines to get back to the car.
My wife explained it thusly: everyone asks about whether or not a foreign resident has visited the statue. My wife and son (and nephew) can now say yes, they have. The weather sucked the joy out of much of the experience, but it was an experience, nontheless. We definitely shared the space with the tired, poor, and hungry.
We also went to see the Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. This is my 5th time seeing it, but it's still fun. My wife, having never been to a theatre in the US, and being a fan of the show, was completely with child over the experience. She wore a ridiculously elegant outfit that got our seats upgraded to the center-row aisle seats, 10 rows back from the stage. She's good about opening doors that way. The manager was a somewhat heavyset 30-something Irish-looking guy, and he gave me an attaboy, as we looked like cousins.
Oh, and I was hit on very politely, by a guy. Sort of flattering. Then he saw my wife, went bonkers over her blouse, and said congratulations to me. I sense a theme here. Nice guy, anyhow.

So, I'd call New York a hit-and-miss for me. I think, if it were cooler out, and outside of peak tourist season, that I'd have been OK. As it is, though, I'm not cool with how that first day went, and it soured the experience for me.

Anyhow, with 2 days at home before we left for Tennessee, and only 2 days at home before I went back to work, I arrived here on board tired and ready for some of the isolation that is part and parcel of doing my damn job.
And that's the way it was.



Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife, just downstairs from where Elvis died having a shit.

has anyone else noticed?

...that despite screams and whining to the contrary, fuel economies for cars have gotten worse rather than better?

I remember my sister's compact car when she first got out of the navy. 40 mpg. That was 20 years ago. My little compact car, bought for grad school 10 years ago, a Dodge Neon, was comfortable enough, reliable as hell, and had plenty of storage room... 41 mpg.
Today's compact cars get less than 35.

back to work...

After my first actual week's vacation as an adult, and 13 years after the last time I took more than 4 consecutive days off for non-work purposes, I'm feeling pretty good. I stumbled onto a pretty good maritime-related issue that I'm fleshing out for submission to a paper forum, and I left home long before the sun was up, ready to return to my little hot metal box for 4 weeks of inquisition.
Before I get underway, I'd like to point out a new glaring character flaw that I've discovered in myself. We had an arab family move in next door to me at the Ant Farm while I was underway with the fam on vacation, and last night, they were being particularly loud until about 11pm. Now, I've only had 3 nights at home since I came back from our trip, and all three nights were busy. Last night, I was hoping for a 4-hour nap before driving the 6 hours down to Philly. I got about an hour, I guess.

I wanted to go say something, but I felt like if I did, the angry looking father figure would send his youngest son over to blow himself up in my kitchen. I mean, the guy looks and sounds angry whenever he's outside.

I'm intimidated. I'll admit it. The problem is, my discomfort will turn to rage before it turns to determination to create meaningful dialogue. I don't like finding weakness or aversion to negativity in myself.

I figure I'll just send him a nice Oscar Meyer gift basket with "Shut the hell up, you rude, stinky prick" written in glitter.

home, for a little while

So, we made it back home, after 3,000+ miles of driving in the past 10 days. It's been hectic, crazy, fun, mortifying, and an experience, everything a vacation could be, I guess. I'm beat. I'll be back to work on Wed, so maybe some time after that I'll write more.

what's doin'

It's hard to believe it, but I've been away from work for one week, effective tomorrow am. Last time I checked in, we were in VA somewhere's, heading southwest. 12 easy, very beautiful hours later, and we were in Memphis TN.
So, fast forward. We did 2 days of Elvis-related stuff, and Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife has been on cloud 9. As a raging fan of the King, she's been in heaven for 48 hours.
One thing I've got to say, the anachronisms that occur across cultures don't quite explain this. While I laugh, heavily and secretly, at my teenage South American nephews and their enjoyment of the works of Michael Jackson, for example, even my mother-in-law can't explain Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife's love for The King. I guess she was hanging out with parents and relatives, and their enjoyment of Elvis was contagious. Whatever, she's so happy that it's really made me happy, just watching her.
In reality, Graceland is pretty neat. Elvis had an understated lifestyle, and the tours are quite short, but interesting, for all that. Absolutely, 100% worth the 1,300 miles.
Oh, BTB, Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife also fell in love with the mountain country of Virginia. It's really, really beautiful out there, especially north of the Blue Ridge mountains. She received her first speeding ticket in 10 years of driving here in the US, too, and even then, she was both shocked that her appearance didn't lead to a mere warning (making me wonder how many times she's gotten away with speeding based on her looks), but also enchanted with the VA statie who ganked her. She's got a thing for blond hair and blue eyes (like her husband, for example). The guy laughed out loud and was very friendly when he learned that he was giving my wife her first ticket ever, but then my wife bursts out with "Choo are so pretty, chust like a beautiful girl with chort hair, but choo ooniformmm is wery masculina, like-a da toy solja." The guy was obviously ambivalent about hearing such a thing, but he was polite and smiling the whole while.
And I've got to say here that my wife's feminine charms have been a real mixed blessing thus far. Entertainment-wise, it's been fun. At Sun Studios, where Elvis got his start, for, example, some midwest 20-something couple was across the crowd from us, and the guy is eyeballing my wife heavily (I didn't notice, which was strange, for me, as I get jealous). The first I know about it, the woman slaps the guy's neck, HARD, with the sound of a mouse trap snapping shut, and she says in a horrible stage whisper (which everyone heard) "Enough! She's with her husband and their kids!" Everyone cracks up, my wife starts giggling, my kid and my nephew (whom we took for the trip) are laughing out loud... and the guy is duly mortified.
BUT, as I said, it's a double-edged sword. We were also coming out of a McDonalds (the kids harangued me into going. I won't actually eat there), and these three 40- to -50ish black guys, on bicycles, no less, start eye-banging her. I get furious, but with two kids with me, I'm trying to keep my cool. One of the idiots has to open his ignorant mouth, however, and says "Sexy Woman," pretty damn loud. In front of kids, for God's sake.
I get jealous, I'll admit, but I also get very protective. I'm furious, however, and can't ignore this affront, but I've got kids with me, one of 'em my own. I'm not going to be an ass, but I can't keep my fool mouth shut. I compromise: I hit the button on my keychain, bleeping the alarm off on my wife's shiny new bright red SUV, and turn around, smiling. "Yes, she is. You should try getting a F*&king job so you're not sitting in a McDonald's parking lot on a kid's bicycle at 2 in the afternoon on a weekday, and maybe you won't get laughed at by women like my wife."
The guys say nothing, and, as if on cue, my wife AND both the kids start laughing at what I said. I'm laughing, too, 'cus, other than the F-Bomb, I did well, and had no idea what was going to come out of my mouth.
Anyhow, it's been good, but tomorrow sees us heading back on the road for our next stop, NY city.

offline for a time

BRB, taking a road trip with the Family B. Day one saw us from MA to VA. Aside from a 120-mile detour courtesy of someone who played bumper cars with a tank truck, all went well... thus far.
Tomorrow sees us, hopefully, from VA to TN.