Reno Part II

OK so now I’m in Reno and this is Nevada where you can gamble anywhere you want and smoke anywhere you want. The first thing you’d expect to see is a slot machine right. Sorry my world traveler friend, it was an iPod vending machine. A what? Yep, an iPod vending machine, where you can insert two hundred to three hundred dollars of your hard earned, or hard won dollars, in a machine and take home or on the plane a shiny new iPod. I wondered to myself what good it would do you to buy one before you got on a plane? It would not be charged and it would not have any content on it. After I get over that shock then I see the slot machines. I realized we weren’t in Kansas anymore or New Jersey for that matter.

iPod vending machine

After clearing up a little confusion with the rental car we are desperately were seeking some lunch. We head for the nearest semi fast food place we can find, which turns out to be TGIFridays. Which is ok because the have beer, which makes my Polish friend feel better. We order lunch and a drink and wait and wait and wait and wait. The waitress (aptly named) then informed us that the computers were down and they had to enter our orders by hand and that it would be a little longer……. The computers were down? What the Fu Fu F u uFu u c…..What do they have to do, download the recipe for a cheeseburger? Fries? Come on …..Anyhow.

Then it was off to our intended target. A Mom & Pop business that my company just bought. I not sure, that, had my bosses really looked deeply into this company, they would have bought it or burned it. Let’s put it this way, they are not building the International Space Station or the Hubble Space telescope but I found 30,000 drawings on there network! And I use the term network loosely. One woman actually used GoToMyPC to access files right there in the office. I will spare you all the technical details but it was nightmare of Homeric proportions.

Our hotel.......just kidding...actually Reno's first TV radio repair shop.

The company we bought.........just kidding

The Atlantis Hotel Casino and Spa

After we discovered what faced us the rest of the week we decide it’s time to check in to our hotel. Which by the way is a spa and a casino and very tacky and very smoke filled. Even though I had a smoke free room, the stale smell of cigarettes still waffeded up the elevator shafts and permeated the room. I did not gamble very much. As an Armstrong I have learned that our luck does not show it self at the tables. More often it shows it’s self in the company we keep and the relationships we forge.

The rest of the week proves to be fruitful. We slog through all there files and manage to glean the information we need. By week’s end I am exhausted and almost ten pounds heavier. I can not eat out three meals a day. I simply do not have the discipline to have just a salad or just some fish when needed. Especially when you’re at Outback and the guy from corporate, turns out to be Ex-Army and it’s two for one drink night. My boss even asked me if he was going to have to carry me back to the hotel. To which I replied that I turned pro at age 15 and that, “if your going to drink like a sailor your going to get up and go to work the next day like one too”. I think he felt a strange sense of relief.

That pretty much sums up my trip. Hey, I know it wasn’t China, or India like some of my contemporaries have so courteously reminded me that they go on real business trips, but it was my first and probably my last. I am sure I will remember some little snippet that I have forgotten about the trip and maybe it will be enough for it’s own post. We’ll see.

All the pictures are here: http://tjarmstrong.smugmug.com/gallery/2071912

there not much but they are all I have......

Cheers,

Tj

Veteran's Day

Today is Veteran’s Day. There’s a great sale at Wal-Mart. Where you can buy the latest mass produced goods from China. I hear there’s also a great sale at JC Penny’s where you can pick up a simply stunning terrycloth bathrobe made with pride in Shri Lanka.

That’s where you must have been today. You must have been out at all those great sales. I hope you got some great bargains. I hope you got a good jump on all that pesky holiday shopping, we all know what a pain it is.

The reason I know you were out bargain hunting is… I did not see you down town at today’s Veterans Day ceremony. It was a brief affair. A few words from the mayor, a little prayer from the padre, the laying of a wreath to honor the fallen. That’s all, not much. It just would have been nice if more than fifteen people showed up for the ceremony. In a town of six thousand plus people you would think there would have been a better turn out. They were out in force at the High School football game. The whole fuckin’ town was there. Do you think you could have stopped by on your way to the game or on your way to the mall to downtown and shown your support for the men and women who defend this country? Most of whom spent at least four years and maybe as many forty years of their lives making sure you had the freedom to go to football game or to the mall.

I am a Veteran and I did not join the Navy so that some day people would bow down to me or raise me up on their shoulders and carry me through town. None of us did. And that is why you need to remember. You need to remember on your own, with out having to be asked. You need to remember that soldiers died today. You need to remember to show your respect when there isn’t a parade that you have to go to because your son or daughter is marching in it. You need to remember.

For the last few weeks the nation has been bombarded with election news and advertising. The news media has told us that the number one thing on voters minds was the war in Iraq.

Was it.

Was it really.

Tj