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Tag: houston

march 2008

Here’s a month in reflection:

  • NYC is best spent with someone. I can’t go there alone again without an objective, someone by my side, and keeping myself busy.
  • I meet the occasional person who I wasn’t expecting. Once again, that happened. The challenge is to keep it up in the meantime.
  • Next time I get the flu, 3 days max. And, please, not right in the middle of a conference at which I really wanted to spend more time networking and enjoying myself.
  • Austin is a small town trying to feel like a big city, but it’s really a small city that acts like a large town. Keep Austin weird!
  • SXSWi is getting too big for its own good. It makes me wonder what to do about next year.
  • I need to learn how to balance spending time out with friends and making time for myself. I hate sacrificing the chance to see people but I need to spend the time alone that I know I need.
  • Each visit to Houston reminds me of two things: I’m glad I’m living somewhere else but I miss it just as much as always. It’s always bittersweet to go back and return from the city.
  • I let go of a bunch of stuff I’ve had in boxes for years. I didn’t get any time to go through and sort that which I wanted to keep from that which I didn’t want. Nevertheless, it had to happen. Parts of my past went up in smoke, literally.
  • I didn’t have any Easter candy until after Easter when it was all on sale. What a nice way to save money!

20 years of Astros baseball

When I think of the Astros, I think of only a few from my time:

Nolan Ryan
Mike Scott
Ken Caminiti
Billy Wagner
Shane Reynolds
Mike Hampton
Daryl Kyle
Lance Berkman
Jeff Bagwell
and Craig Biggio

Biggio is one of the best players to ever wear a baseball uniform and the best Astros player in its history. He’s a legend and an guaranteed inductee into the Hall of Fame. I’m glad I was able to see him in action.

Thanks for all the game winning home runs.
Thanks for being a huge part of the Killer Bs.
Thanks for your consistency and hard work.
Thanks for stepping up to the plate, even though so many of them were hits by pitches.
Thanks for being a life long Astro.
Good luck to you.

onward home

Leaving Houston is always bittersweet.

I wasn’t supposed to be here this long but last week I decided to extend my stay. It seems like the last few times I’ve been to Houston, I had to make hard choices about what to finish and what to leave behind.

Each visit I’ve made in the past years has been both of pleasure and business. I work and I play, but I never seem to have enough time to do all that I want. This time was different.

I had an abundance of time to accomplish what I needed to accomplish at work. I had plenty of time to not only see most of my Houston area friends but to see several out of town friends as well as a couple I haven’t seen in a few years.

But my stay has been bittersweet as I’ve previously explained. However, it’s good for me to get back out there and on with my life.

I will come home to over a month’s worth of mail, at least five packages, a few bank statements, some medical bills and most of all my own room. It shall be nice.

Several people have mentioned how difficult it is to be away from home; how wonderful it is to get back to their stuff. I, however, feel like I could roam the world for months on end and be just fine. I’ll make the best of my circumstances.

See you later, Texas. You will be missed.

the one that almost hit

Hurricane Rita – the most hyped about, covered and watched hurricane ever. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Rita quickly turned into an arena of bad expectations and intense speculations.

Before we realized it, she became the 3rd most powerful Category 5 hurricane on record. We anticipated all the worst fears; Galveston was about to repeat the storm of 1900, Houston was going to become a swamp of destruction, and gas prices would hit close to $4 a gallon. 80% of Southeast Texas made a very quick, last minute run for the hills in light of this speculation. Early on, all the forecast models predicted doom.

Then she turned. And kept turning until she made landfall hitting the Louisiana state line, Sabine Pass and the poor, unkemptly city of Port Arthur.

It was fun watching the forecasts because they would change so rapidly and showed the unpredictable nature of weather as it happened. But it also showed the human nature of trying to determine what to expect.

Houston dodged a New Orleans sized bullet. It still, however was hit with a financially disruptive BB pellet. Houston will survive and move on, and months passing will leave this potential nightmare behind.

hurricane commentary

Here are a few things comments to make about this hurricane.

  1. Gas prices are going to go up again. There will be some fear on the stock market so the price of gas is going to rise above $70 a barrel. Between Louisana and Texas, this is probably anywhere between 10-20% of oil producation for the US. Losing this amount of production again could be catastrophic for gas prices.
  2. Houston has a HUGE economy in the energy companies. This hurricane is now projected to hit almost dead on target of Houston, but probably just west. This is still, however, going to negatively affect Houston for a while. Just about any energy based technology is going to go up in price, some drastically.
  3. Because the winds have reached over 175 MPH and it’s a category 5 hurricane, it’s very likely that as the hurricane weakens when it hits the shores it won’t weaken below a category 4.
  4. There will be much less human casualities than were in New Orleans. I’ve already talked to so many people today and most of them had already left their homes. The freeway systems, which are much easier to navigate than the LA freeways, were jammed pack going north on almost every road.
  5. This hurricane is quickly on track to become the most powerful hurricane, ever, on record. It’s currently at number 3 as of 10:30 PST. To get expert analysis on what to expect, go here as the hurricane moves closer on land.
  6. You can also visit Houston Chronicle’s Rita coverage page for some great local coverage.
  7. Same with Wikipedia’s frequently updated page.
  8. Feel free to visit my website as well for personal comments.

This thing is likely to hit my home. Where I came from. It has officially become personal.

my weekend plans have changed

Southwest Airlines cancelled my flight. They decided not to allow any flight to or from Hobby past 12 noon on Friday. So, the little glimpse of hope that was there is now gone. In fact, it looks like this hurricane is about to take Houston and crap all over it. Go to the Houston Chronicle for all your local Hurricane Rita information.

Hurricane Rita info on Wikipedia

Houston, we have a BIG problem.

Have you tried making a cell phone call to or from Houston lately? Probably, if you have, you are out of luck. I’ve had an easier time getting ahold of a couple of Sprint Customers (though, I did have a little trouble), but it’s virtually impossible to reach anyone using Verizon, Cingular, or T-Mobile. There is so much calling going on that these systems are overwhelmed.

No only are those systems clogged, but the freeway systems are virtually parking lots. I talked to a friend of mine just a little while ago and they left from approximately the intersection of Beltway 8 and I-45 at about 2pm CST. When I talked to her, she was all the way to the intersection of Beltway 8 and 288, or approximately only 13 miles in 1.25 hours! Average speed? around 8 MPH!! I talked to another friend who was almost to Brehnam and she left at approximately 12pm CST. What a difference in only a couple of hours!!

Even if this hurricane doesn’t hit Houston, one thing is for certain: Houston’s going to take a HUGE financial hit for this. It doesn’t matter if there’s no hurricane anywhere near, all of the businesses in SE Harris county or Galveston county aren’t going to be in operation from today until next Monday. That’s millions, possibly billions of dollars a day!

Looks like now is going to be the appropriate time to give more to your favorite charity.

change in plans?

Okay, I wasn’t even planning on writing anything about this because it was supposed to be a nice and short trip. But, it seems that there’s a slight chance that my weekend plans will change.

I am flying back to Houston for only 48 hours to attend a wedding and see family. No time to do anything else either. But, if this storm, as one projection states, get anywhere in a close radius of Houston, the airports might close on me.

You bet you’ll be hearing more of this from me if it does indeed decide to zero in on Galveston and Houston. I’ll be following it with Wikipedia’s continually updated webpage.

Back, Front, Side to Side

I wish I weren’t so bad about writing in this thing, but sometimes I’m just waiting for something special to happen. Other times I can’t think of what to say. And much of the time, it has to do with laziness. I just can’t motivate myself to sit myself here and write. It’s not like this a diary for me and only me cause I’m sure I could just sit and write a lot more. In fact, I sorta had a personal journal in high school (others might call it a diary… whatever). I kept up with it for I think three years or so before I just got sick of writing, which is sorta tragic because I know it improved my thought process. Hopefully I can continue on a semi-regular basis with this blog because I see a really busy time heading my way with what’s on the horizon!

It’s been just over a day since I left Houston and made my way back to LA. It was initially weird to go into the house and go into my room. I felt like I was back to another, completely different life. But, I eventually felt more comfortable. I guess the worst part was starving last night and today because I had no food except oatmeal and Ramen noodles left. So I went out a little today to get some groceries and plan to do the same the next few days. I also have some important phone calls to make regarding jobs as well as finishing up some projects I’ve been delaying. All by the end of the week if I can.

So anyway, Houston was a very nice time. It was such a pleasure seeing all the friends and family once again, if only I could make my visits a regular 6 month thing. I don’t, however, think this trend is going to be able to continue much longer for so many reasons I won’t go into. But, I’m sure I’ll be back before I know it!

And to all you ladies at CLFP, I had a great time as usual playing with you when I “was working”. Well, I shouldn’t put that in quotes because I swear that I really was working, it just seemed like all I did was go to the back with the computers, type and stare at a computer for a few minutes, then make my way to another room. Almost pseudo-work looking like I kept busy. But, little do all of you ladies know exactly what I did, which is exactly the point of my job there! The only thing that I must do sometime in the next few months, hopefully before summer ends, is to send a postcard to you, Dawn. You asked for it, I delivered once and failed once. I shall not fail again! Oh, and if any of the rest of you have any more computer questions and problems, I do have some info on my website that would be very valuable to you, and I also have e-mail so drop me a line. I won’t actually write it on here, but it’s my first name at asuh dot com. Comment me all you want, but if you decide to e-mail me, DO NOT E-MAIL ME from your normal PC at work. Get your ass up, walk over to the Mail PC, and do it from there. When I come back, I’ll check the logs to make sure you listened to me or I’ll bust your ass down so fast…

Okay, enough of my message to all those crazy people (not literally, you crazy people, figuratively). I had a great time meeting up with everyone else I was able to get ahold of and always look forward to seeing other Houstonian peoples. And if you read this, are from the Houston area and didn’t know I was in town or didn’t hear from me, it’s because I was way too busy or don’t like you, whichever is more convenient. :o)

Oh, one last thing, I’m gonna know the location of any new comments to this thread, so no one is safe! I know how to trace everything. MWAHAHAHAHAHA!

2 replies

living the lives

One week and counting. This has been a lot of fun being back in Houston for so long. Seeing people, doing lots of great things. It’s non-stop. But, I’m a little ready for my own personal computer and getting back to some kind of normalcy for what I’m used to. Besides, I have so many different articles that I need to read, and right now just don’t have much time to sit down and read them, so my daily blog browsing is way backed up. Going out of town for over a week can do that to you.

I feel like sometimes I’m living two different lives. I have one in Houston and a really different one in LA. In fact, I could probably claim living in Denver for two years was my third life. Each have their good and bad sides, and I’d love to at one time down the road return to each as a different person. But at present, I feel like the most potential for me being happy is to live the life I’ve started in LA. There’s a lot of really crazy potential just waiting to be pushed out of me, and I hope I can find outlets to release this ambition. I always seem to continue to struggle with this on a monthly basis, but I know that in the meantime I’m having a ball.

Time for breakfast.