Foolery's Blog

 

 

September 12, 2006 - 10:00pm

A lesson in Voting...

 Ever since I turned 18 I have voted in the elections every year. I feel that this is one of the more important responsibilities I have as a US citizen. Nothing gets me going more than when someone will stand there and go on and on loudly criticize a government policy or a politician and they did not even vote, I tell them that there verbal protests fall on deaf ears b/c they did not do the one thing they could to change what they appose and that is Vote. Every election is important, even primaries, just ask Joe Lieberman. Sometimes an election means more to you personally for example when I was in college I voted via absentee ballot b/c my dad’s county job depended on which County Executive was elected that year. The right one was elected and my dad kept his job.

 So today is the Electoral Primary in the State of NY . My plan was to head over to the school around the block, cast my vote and go get some lunch. Boy was I in for a surprise. Like I said earlier I am seasoned voter and I know how the process and machines work. I checked in at the front table. They send me to my district table (the 34th).  I presented my ID, sign the voter registration book and was handed a green card to give to the nice lady at the voting machine.  She asks me if I know how to use the machine and I say yes. She does what ever they do on the side of the machine to set it up and I walk through the curtain to vote. I pull the big lever to the right. As I look at the board I know that I can only vote in the Republican primary as I am registered Republican. I reach to cast my vote for the one primary race and “oh no” it wont move, the switch wont move. Oh no I think, they didn’t, did they? I reach up to one of the Democratic switches and it moves.

 Now I am a registered republican living on the upper west side of Manhattan . It’s the most democratic neighborhood in a VERY democratic borough of a hugely democratic city. I mean I am probably one of 100 Republicans in my neighborhood.  Trust me on this b/c it was brutal to be a Republican during the ’04 presidential election in this city.

  So I walk back out of the booth and alert them to their mistake, “oh you are a republican, I just assumed you were a democrat, you are the first republican today” she replied in a very condescending tone. The lady who is in charge of the voter registration book says, “well it was not in the book” as she flips through the pages to my name and says, ”oh… look at that you are a Republican” once again condescendingly. The next few minutes can be described as a lot of scrambling, a higher authority is called in, they try to reset the machine, the board of elections official is called in, and then I am apologized too profusely. Bottom line they screwed up my vote even though I made no selections they can not reverse the process in the machine. It is set up that way to prevent voter fraud.  “OK I understand, let me go back in and try again on the machine”.  No they say, we are sorry but if you want to get a second chance at voting today you will need to go see a supreme court judge at the Board of Elections office and file a petition to get another chance to vote. You then come back with a signed court order and we will let you vote. Oh and the Board of elections is located at 200 Varick street , all the way down town.

  What!!!???!!!! You have to be kidding me right?

  Now at this point a busy person would have just said, ‘screw it I have to get back to work’.  Not me. I decided right there that I was going to do this.  

Now 3 things you should know. First I am currently on sabbatical and freelancing so I have a lot of free time to do this. Second, I am fascinated by politics and the political process and the idea of going before a Supreme Court judge to petition my right to vote is very intriguing. Third, I am still bitter about the 04 presidential election and all the Bush/Republican bashing by democrats I had to put up with, and the fact the a lot of NY Democrats ended up voting for Bush in the end but would not admit it. (Take a look at the 04 statistics. Its mind boggling trying to figure out where all the votes for bush came from in a city that is soooo democratic) And the fact that they assumed I was a democrat just made me want to go through with it and get my vote in for my party even though it has no effect on their party. Errr! OK I am better now, let’s continue

The board of elections official fills out some paper work, gives me the address and sends me on my way. A 10 minute subway ride down to Varick and I am at the Board of Elections office.  I am directed into a room full of people in suits sitting on folded chairs around folding tables.  I have to say it does not look very official. I tell someone why I am there and everyone jumps up and starts moving around as if an alarm went off at a fire house.   

I am first directed to a very non-descript guy sitting in a chair, a Supreme Court justice. I tell him my story. He listens intently to my story then has me sign a petition to vote in the Republican Primary. Next he asks me to raise my right hand and swear under oath that I am who I say I am. By the way they never asked for my ID, I actually offered it up to them so they could spell my name correctly. Next he points to the guy sitting next to him who is the attorney for the Board of Elections and says he will take your deposition. The attorney listens again to my story.  He then in a very official tone recommends to the judge sitting next to him that I be allowed to recast my vote in the Republican Primary because of the mistake made by the poll workers. The judge in a very official voice stated his name, the district I am voting in and declares that I can recast my vote. All the while a court stenographer is sitting to my right typing away and the other 15 or so people in the room are all staring at me. Apparently I was their first ‘customer’ of the day at 2:00 in the afternoon. The judge then signs the court order which I then signed, then someone else signs it, the second judge signs someone else’s name to it,  finally it gets the state seal. Done! I can now go back up to the upper west side and cast my vote in the Republican Primary.   

I returned to the polling station at the school. The Board of Elections official is actually happy to see me and excited that I actually went down to see the judge. He reviews the court order and personally sets up the machine for a Republican vote.

 So today I unintentionally tested the integrity of the election process and procedures and I learned something.  That after an honest yet biased mistake by a poll worker an ordinary person in this country can go before a state Supreme Court Judge and petition for his right to vote.

 

September 11, 2006 - 2:00pm

5 Years Past...

  As I sit here on 9/11/2006 I feel anxious, sad and a bit lost a what to do with myself, as I do every year.  I had a long conversation with a friend yesterday and she agreed with me that it’s tough for NYers on September 11th every year. The repeating message is “Never Forget”. I feel its an important message for Americans and others around the world, however NYers will never forget, we cant b/c we live with it every day… with the Movies and media’s over the top programming each year I feel many NYers are like me and just don’t look forward to the “mandatory depression” forced on us by the rest of the country. Trust me we NYers will never forget the lives lost, I for one had to commute through ground Zero for 2 years to NJ. And every day I walked through there and thought about it. Every day!  Now please understand me when I say I am not complaining, I am just expressing an emotion, a feeling that many NYers get every year on 9/11….so 5 years after 9/11 people are asking the question where you were that morning…. I don’t think I have ever told my story in full to anyone before. I shared most of that day with my 2 friends Jennifer and Gabby… and this is how I remember that day…………….

 

My train got into Grand Central around 8:30, I was walking to one of our offices on 51st and 3rd Ave. talking on the phone with my high school buddy Ian, he had called me to bullshit about girls, sports etc, the call was suddenly dropped, I did not give it much thought b/c I had Sprint Service and that happened a lot back then, but looking back it was around 8:45 when the first plan struck that the call was dropped… I stopped to get a coffee at the deli next to the office and the radio was on and the guy was going on about a small plane hitting the WTC… great I thought, I should probably find out which one as we had a data center and people in 1 WTC…

…10 minutes later I was in an meeting when my boss came in and said i needed to get across town b/c there was a fire at our one world trade office and they could use my help to manage the shut down of our systems....   I grabbed a ride with our security guys in their van on the way to the Time Square office when I got a short phone call from my brother kurt who works on west street next door to the WTC, he said it looked like a small plane hit Tower 1 where our office was, i then lost the call, (part of me doesn’t really know if Kurt called me but I think he did) at that point it came over the radio that the Pentagon was hit and that tower 2 was hit....  my buddy who is ex-military &  head of security at our firm turned to us in the van and said, "This aint right, we are under attack"...  we came to a dead stop in traffic at that point and jumped out and jogged the rest of the way across 42nd street to our Time Square office...  I walked in to my office on the 10th floor and everyone was in the south facing offices b/c there was a direct view of the WTC from there and you could see the top half of the buildings burning, then right before our eyes the first tower fell...it was very surreal to me b/c there was a TV in the office and for 15 seconds I kept looking back and forth between the monitor and the widow, some how hoping that this was not happening, then, the reporter on the TV said that the it fell on to West street and into the other buildings… my heart stopped, Kurt, shit, shit, shit, he is right there, I thought he is still in his building and it fell right on him… I tried calling, nothing, at that point I decided I needed to do 2 things, take care of my people and find my brother, I sent my people home to get them out of Time Square I was concerned that another plan would hit Time Square, we matched people with others from the neighborhoods and got them on their way....  that taken care of, I now needed to find out what happened to my brother...

 I ran into my friends Jenn and Gabby in the lobby of my building, they did not know what to do (not that any of us really did) so I told them to follow me were getting out of here, we walked out into Times Square and started to cross the street on 43rd, when I heard the sound of a jet…it was getting louder, everyone stopped in their tracks. I mean everyone, thinking back this was probably the one moment in my life when I felt fear so strong that instinct took over, “fuck” I thought, “this is the one for Time Square, come on fucking run” I yelled as I grabbed Jenn & Gab and ran across 43rd towards  6th ave… it was getting louder, I looked up as it crossed 43rd street, it was an F-16 flying about 100 feet above the buildings right down the corridors of Manhattan…  its one of ours, and I had yet another of many surreal moments that day, seeing the F-16 screaming down town hit me deep with the thought, “Wow, we are at war, the world has just changed and will be much different from this moment on”.

 I then looked down 43rd street and realized that there was a mass of people running in our direction. Now what? I thought… we bumped into a group of friends from work who said there was a bomb in Grand Central… I told them, “well its no better going this way back to Times Square, its probably the next big target next to the empire state building”… so like everyone else that day we just started walking uptown… but I did not want to do that, I had to find my brother, I was going to go down town, my friends were telling me there was nothing I could do right now and to come with them… the whole time all this is going on I am speed dialing my brother on my cell but getting nothing, I figure well the phones are overloading, (never realizing that the cell service had been knocked out when the towers fell), I switched my phone to analog and decided to call Kurt’s wife Trish, I amazingly got through to her for a very short phone call, I remember her sounding very off guard or surprised to hear from me, she told me that Kurt had just called her and he was in a car going up the west side highway… I lost the call and dropped into a crouch on the side walk and yelled, “he is OK, he is OK”, I was not concerned about my 2 other brothers b/c one was in CT and the other in Annapolis MD and they were in no danger at this point. (What I did not know was that my brother Erik was in a car on the West side highway in upper Manhattan when the planes hit, he turned around and went back to CT).

  I stood up feeling like a ton of weight was lifted from my chest. As I looked across the street, I saw a woman on her phone crying hysterically yelling into the phone, “He is dead, oh my god he is dead...”  My heart sank, now that Kurt was OK I started to focus more on my immediate space, there was the women crying in to the phone, men and women were walking in the streets up town some with tears in their eyes others in shock, then I saw a guy in a business suit covered in a gray dust walking with his brief case… then a women covered in the gray dust, these were the first of many people who started making their way up town from ground zero… ambulances and emergency cars were racing down town as a mass of humanity was walking up town, the crowds would part like water as the vehicles came racing by … my friend John came up to me and snapped me out of it, “hey your brother is OK, you dodged a bullet. Come on lets go”….I joined the group and started walking up town….

 We walked to our office on 51st 3rd ave where there were many of our employees, I grabbed the first phone and started calling around to my family. Jenn, Gabb and I decided we needed to do something, we heard that they were taking blood donations at he Post Office a few blocks away so we headed over there… the line was hundreds of people deep wrapping around the block, so we decided that there was enough people donating blood and walked into a bar that was right there. It was packed with people but very quiet, the TVs were on CNN which kept showing the planes hitting and the buildings falling… we had a shot and a few beers, not really talking much, after about an hour we decided to get off Manhattan via the 59th street bridge as we were all from CT we figured we could make out way home that way… My dad lived in Queens so my plan was to go there with Jenn & Gabby and have him drive us home at some point…

 we got to 59th street … my god!.... the mass of humanity crossing the bridge was incredible. Wall to wall people as far as you could see… no way I told Jenn and Gabb I am not crossing that bridge, my thought process was that we had no idea what was going on and what if someone tried to take the bridge out… we walked over to a deli to get some water or to just figure out what to do when we heard on the radio that Metro North was going to run a train out of Grand Central… this is it, the 3 of us hustled over to the train station and got on the train, it’s a 50 min train ride to CT, the train was packed wall to wall with people, we sat in a 3 seater and watched as people filed in and grabbed what ever space they could find… when the train pulled out there was a bit of nervousness, we crossed the river into the Bronx and I think there was a collective sigh of relief in the train, no one spoke, I started to look around the train. There was a guy who was covered in gray dust, you could see he tried to clean his face but it was still there… another guy was covered in dust from his shoes to his knees, I guess he was inside when the buildings came down and had to walk through the debris, how close was he I thought,  another woman covered in gray dust and blood…  my stop was first, I said goodbye to Jenn and Gabby and got off in the tranquility of Riverside Ct, with a few others…. Birds were chirping, the sun was out, very “Twilight Zonish”…. I just stood there on the platform wondering to myself, “what the fuck just happened today”… an older guy walked by and looked me in the eye and nodded as if to say its OK…

 …and yes my world did change after that day like every one else’s… I was part of the business continuity team for my firm and was back in the city on Thursday morning and like many people proceeded to work for weeks on end to help put things back together, we had about 200 people in our 1 WTC office all on the lower floors, we were lucky to only lose 2 people, our CTO and his head of technology, they were at the conference at the Windows on the world…

 I moved in to Manhattan a few months after 9/11. (This was already planned before 9/11) I have been here ever since. In the 5 years of living here I have become very aware of my surroundings, I notice when there are extra cops in the subways for no reason, I notice bags & backpacks… I have a go-bag and a plan on what to do the next time something happens, and it will, as a NYer you have to except that something will happen and live with that, but you can not let it bother you or interrupt your daily life… my personal feeling it that what ever happens next is going to be big and hopefully I will be lucky enough to be out of town….

 … I have become more aware of world events, politics and cultures. I realized that the force behind what happened that day came from outside our country and I had no idea who or why… so I keep myself informed via books and the internet…

 The other thing that has changed for me is that I don’t take life for granted. I try to live life to its fullest, do as much as I can, and do what makes me happy. Ironically I feel this has made me a selfish person in ways b/c I do what I want and I can be a bit out of control at times trying to have fun which I am sure my friends can attest to… It is hard for me to stay settled for long as I am always looking for the next adventure and taking advantage of life…. 

 So anyway… that’s my story of where I was on the morning of 9/11 and where I am today…

 Shapoopy…..

 

 

September 29, 2005 - 10:00am

Are you a Democrat or Republican? Do you really know...

Things you learn in College
A young woman was about to finish her first year of college. Like so many others her age, she considered herself to be a very liberal Democrat, and was very much in favor of the redistribution of wealth. 

She was deeply ashamed that her father was a rather staunch Republican, a feeling she openly expressed. Based on the lectures that she had participated in, and the occasional chat with a professor, she felt that her father had for years harbored an evil, selfish desire to keep what he thought should be his. 

One day she was challenging her father on his opposition to higher taxes on the rich and the addition of more government welfare programs. The self-professed objectivity proclaimed by her professors had to be the truth and she indicated so to her father. 

He responded by asking her how she was doing in school. 
Taken back, she answered rather haughtily that she had a 4.0 GPA, and let him know that it was tough to maintain, insisting that she was taking a very difficult course load and was constantly studying, which left her no time to go out and party like other people she knew. She didn't even have time for a boyfriend, and didn't really have many college friends because she spent all her time studying. 

Her father listened and then asked, "How is your friend Audrey doing?" 

She replied, "Audrey is barely getting by. All she takes are easy classes, she never studies, and she barely has a 2.0 GPA. She is so popular on campus, college for her is a blast. She's always invited to all the parties, and lots of times she doesn't even show up for classes because she's too hung over." 

Her wise father asked his daughter, "Why don't you go to the Dean's office and ask him to deduct a 1 .0 off your 4.0 GPA and give it to your friend who only has a 2.0. That way you will both have a 3.0 GPA and certainly that would be a fair and equal distribution of GPA." 

The daughter, visibly shocked by her father's suggestion, angrily fired back, "That wouldn't be fair! I have worked really hard for my grades! I've invested a lot of time, and a lot of hard work! Audrey has done next to nothing toward her degree. She played while I worked my tail off!" 

The father slowly smiled, winked and said gently, "Welcome to the Republican Party."

 

August  21st 2005 5:30

Summer Sabbatical ...

I am sitting here in central park this late afternoon jacking in on a WI-FI signal from some where on Central Park West by 68th street. It’s a nice cool afternoon which is welcome after the heat wave we had in July and early August. I have been spending the weekends in the city and the weekdays out of town. Its nice here on the weekends, its empty except for tourist and NYers who can not afford a summer house at the Shore or in the Hamptons, or if you are on a Summer Sabbatical like me... its great you can walk into any restaurant with out a reservation, the subways are empty and I can rollerblade through the streets with only half the chance of getting killed then I normally would have…

…so its now about 7 weeks in to my Sabbatical… I would have to say these 7 weeks have been the most eventful weeks in my life in the last few years…. You could say that there were many surprising events that have transpired…one example would be that my brother scooter got engaged to his girlfriend Lori yesterday which is awesome, now that just leaves me as the last one of my brothers to get married… there were other events but I am going to keep them to myself…

Now on to Travel….Well I decided not to do the Kilimanjaro trip b/c my knee has been acting up and I want to make sure that its strong for the ski season, I felt that if I did the climb I would be out of commission for a few months. Also it’s the kind of trip that I want to do with friends and not solo… so… I decided to go to New Zealand instead. Yep that’s right the other side of the world. I am going on a National Geographic Adventure Expedition. This link describes the trip which includes hikes, helicopters and river rafting in underground tunnels. I am so pumped for this trip
 View New Zealand Itinerary

my buddy Nick who worked on the floor of the exchange just got let go last week so I now have a "play buddy"…although a play buddy may sound childish, one can get really bored hanging out all day by himself, I think I reached the end of the Internet twice now..:) so Nick wants to travel to, and our other buddy Andre who is currently on Sabbatical in South Beach is looking to join us as well, so we are going some where the last 2 weeks of September, we just need to get together have a few beers and figure out where we want to go…

I have been spending my time on the beach and my tan is very dark, but that is how is should be as I am on a Summer Sabbatical. I went down to Annapolis for 4 days to see Scooter again and I have been up in Rhode Island hanging out at Pete’s summer house in Narragansett, making side trips to Newport and Block Island.

Now for those of you who are wondering, Have I been looking for a job… well… NO and I have decided that I am going to ski all winter in VT and in Europe… so I now need to figure out what to do when the severance runs out half way through January…. But on a positive note I did spend the afternoon re-writing my resume. So I have that going for me, well,... that and total consciousness
 

 

July  20th 2005 7:00

The first Odyssey....by John "Homer" Findeisen

 

Well the first 2 ½ weeks off have been eventful… I have just ended the first of many Odysseys in which I can either adopt the name Odysseus or Charles Kuralt… I have been to Rhode Island, Block Island, Old Lime CT, back to Rhode Island, NYC, Greenwich CT, Annapolis MD, BWI Airport 3 times, NYC Seaford Long Island, East Moriches, Sag Harbor, Shelter Island, the North Fork of Long Island, Queens, Hartford and back to NYC…all in 15 days  Yes that’s a lot of driving but the rig is holding up…

 

 So I started out in Block Island for our annual 4th of July party,  the party consisted of 20 quarter barrels of beer, a generator, over 70 bags of ice and equipment for a 5 person band… our Recon Group of about 14 had to Sherpa the equipment down the Mohegan Bluffs on the south shore of the Island.  Now if you have never been there you have to go down 130 or so steps to a washed out rock face cliff about 50 feet high which resembles a rock climbing wall for beginners. After negotiating the last treacherous 50 feet you then have to hike out about quarter mile on the beach to a rock outcropping. After hauling you and your load over the rocks you then hike another quarter mile to the party’s campsite. The location reminds me of the ending scene in the planet of the apes when Charleston Hesten is on the beach and finds the top half of the statue of liberty, if they ever do a remake of the movie this is where they would shoot that scene…so after all that you join 250 people who were enjoying a nice day on the beach, with a jamming band and lots to drink. I was amazed at how many people showed up this year, its definitely has gotten big maybe to big… not sure the status of next years party as the Recon Group is getting a little older and the amount of stuff we have to carry down is growing exponentially… …quote of the day was by an unknown individual after seeing the 20th and last keg kicked at 6:00 that afternoon, “Dude that’s all you guys brought down?”

 The Recon Group

 

The day after the party I convalesced in old Lime with Colleen and her family, we spent the afternoon Kayaking in the Long Island Sound. On the 4th of July we watched the fire works from the beach in Old Lime. A family friend of Colleens had spent close to $10G on supplies for the day. It was an awesome but dangerous show. Picture 10 guys who have been drinking all day setting up mortar tubes and firing off major, I mean major projectiles. After about 30 minutes of a really good display with only 3 ground explosions some one had the brains to stop, well... someone put the wrong rockets in the wrong mortar tubes thus destroying them so they had to stop... which was a good thing b/c a couple of the ground bursts resembled CNN footage from the war...

 

The next major stop on the Odyssey was Annapolis, one of my favorite places… it reminds me a lot of Westhampton Beach where I went to high school… its on the water and everything you do has something to do with the water. Annapolis is a maritime town for boats and Sailing which is one of my biggest passions next to skiing. As well the Naval Academy is located there. My youngest brother scooter is a cop in Maryland and lives in Annapolis. His girlfriend Lori and I organized a surprise 30th Birthday party at his favorite bar Castle Bay http://www.castlebayirishpub.com/.  We had an open bar with great Irish food. Mom, Roy, Kurt, Erik and Colleen came down for the weekend. He was totally surprised which was awesome.

 

I stayed an extra day and took a tour with my brother. I am considering a move to Annapolis next spring after the ski season. Its time for a change and I want to get out of NY for a while and live some where else for a while. I am getting the 5 year itch which I was either blessed with or cursed with. Every 4-5 years I get bored and need to move on to something new and exciting. Now I am not saying NYC is boring by any means how ever I want to explore someplace new and the city will always be here. Once you have lived here coming back is as simple as finding an apartment and you are back… but I am not set on Annapolis just yet, time will tell…

 

Anyway the final stage of my Odyssey took me to Long Island where I spent time visiting my family and friends out in the Hamptons.  I stopped into see my 2 good buddies Mark and Ian who are both married at least 5 or so years now and they each have a little girl and boy. I spent a night with each of them which was great. Its amazing how different your life is with a wife and kids. As I told them about my Heli-Skiing in Europe and my 2 weeks traveling through Costa Rica they told me about trips to Disney and christenings and work. As we caught up with each others lives over the past year I think there was jealousy on both sides, some day I will settle down and have a family but I have a little more traveling in me. We finished out the Long Island trip with with a stop at a famous Yoga studio in Sag Harbor. Colleen is going on a Yoga retreat next year to Mexico with one of the instructors and she wanted to meet her and go to her class.

 

Well that was the first 3 weeks of the sabbatical… I just wrapped up the planning to Yellowstone in September and I am now working on trying to set up Kilimanjaro for the fall, so far it looks like November is the only possibility. Other wise I need to choose another adventure.  This coming weekend is Dewey Beach Delaware then next week is the MS Party on the Intrepid and Dave Mathews on Randall’s Island

 

June 21st 2005 3:00

Rollerblading in NYC....there is nothing like it

I am a bit of an Adrenalin Junky, well, a self proclaimed Adrenalin Junky that is!... about 4 years ago I picked up Blading after blowing out my knee not once but twice skiing.. at first it was just to keep in shape because I could not run every day but then it became more for the thrill... let me tell you there is nothing like flying down a street in the City and dodging people, potholes, bikes, taxis and the stupid NJ drivers... now many people blade in Central Park or along the water front, then they either swap their skates for shoes or squeamishly blade back to their apartment... not I... my favorite part is gliding out of the park and flying down Central Park West and crossing town back to my apartment... now I must confess I have a few different routes laid out in my head and I know them like the back of my hand otherwise it would be suicide to blast down streets that you are unfamiliar with...

..Yes, I have had my share of accidents... knocked over by a cab in Central Park... ended up on the hood of another Cab after he jumped a red light and my latest near fatal one was having to squeeze between a double parked car and a moving taxi on 70th street...I actually had to climb the side of the car to prevent myself from being crushed and yes it was a NJ plate on the double parked car..

...but still I continue to blade in the city.. its fun and definitely give you a rush... and its one of the quickest ways around town

 

June 8th 2005 10:00

The Summer off as well as the rest of the year...

I found out a few weeks ago I was being laid off from Instinet due to the firm being bought by NASDAQ. Surprisingly to everyone but myself I am not nervous, worried or upset.. I am looking forward to this time off.... So.... I am going to be living on severance until mid January  2006. I am so pumped to finally take some time off after working straight through since college.  I am going to spend the time visiting friends that I have not seen in a long time. I am going to travel out west and possibly to Africa and I am looking into sky diving in Aspen. My trip out west is being planned as a "Clark Griswold Family Vacation" revival... Roy and I are going to rent a Winnebago and go tour the National parks in either Wyoming or Arizona, be on the lookout for more info on this adventure...... But mostly I am going to kick back and relax :)...  I will be doing some side jobs here and there for web sites so If you know anyone who needs advice or direction on web sites let me know...

I have been spending the past 2 weeks getting ready for unemployment, I set up my home office, bought a new laptop and I am getting a new camera so that I can document my adventures during my time off.. oh and I bought a new pair of skis this past weekend as well in case my time off extends into the winter b/c if that happens I will definitely need a new pair to replace the ones I trashed in Verbier... as always I am always thinking a head...

May 18th 2005  - 1:30 PM -
Low Flying planes....

I spend most of my week in my Harborside NJ office which is right across the river from the world trade center...I am on the 15th floor and my office faces south giving me views of lower Manhattan, Governors Island, Varrazano Bridge and NY Harbor.  Although I hate the commute (45 mins from the Upper West Side) and feel like I have been exiled to a Russian Gulag the views here are extraordinary. Most of the businesses here in Harborside came after 9/11 from the WTC towers. Its home to much of Wall Street's back office and has been called by some 'Wall Street West'..

Views from my office:

 

Yesterday in the afternoon around 2:00 I am in my office having a staff meeting when someone says, "What is that?". We all look out the window and coming across the the Harbor is a large white C-130 cargo plane about 500 feet off the water banking towards the Jersey shore and heading directly toward the Goldman building which at 80 stories high is the tallest building in NJ. As this scene unfolds I cant help but think how similar this is to the video of the plane hitting the second tower on 9/11. This large plane turning like a small prop plane. We all just stood there, watched and held outr breath as the plan disappeared behind the Goldman building. Again the images of 9/11 pop in to my head, I expect to see the fireball. After 5 long and tense seconds the plane reappears to the west of the set of buildings, I breath easier... OK this is some yahoo pilot doing something that he is not suppose to be doing. It then  proceeds to circle the Statue of Liberty then turn and head right at the bottom tip of Manhattan. At this point it starts all over again the images my heart races. I am urgently trying to make out what the insignia on the plane is. Its a white plane with an orange stripe on the tail. Coast Guard??? Yes!.. Then it takes another turn and heads up the Hudson river past my view... and I breathed a sign of relief... I thought to myself, "Wow, you got worked up pretty fast there John... calm down, to bad you quit smoking..."

..later last night on my way to the U2 concert in NJ my buddy Harry turns to me and says, "hey did you hear about the plane this afternoon?" He had heard about it on the news. Apparently it was a Cost Guard training mission where new pilots do low flying fly-bys of landmarks to get their bearings of the local geography. The CG did not tell anyone they were doing that. According to the news, people in lower Manhattan watched the same events unfold as I did. Many people did not stay to see what was going on and evacuated their buildings running into the streets. Others flooded 911 with emergency calls about a low flying jet heading towards Manhattan.  Those dumb ass pilots should have known better then to pull a stunt like that... Many people yesterday experienced the terror of 9/11 all over again.. it goes to show you that a generation of NYers will forever be effected by 9/11 no matter how much time goes by...

Incase you were wondering where I was that day.. I was in Grand Central when the first plane hit and spent the early part of the morning in Time Square watching everything unfold wondering where my brother Kurt was and what happened to our employees at our office in One World Trade... all but 2 made it out.. Anil Bharvany and Steve Tompsett....

and then this morning I hear in the News that Trump doesn't like the new Freedom Towers plans and wants to rebuild the WTC exactly like the last one.. I agree, I am not a big fan of the Freedom Towers but Trumps plan is not the answer... No one is going to want to work or live in the buildings if they are built... they will be targets with in a city that is a target... I would never work in those buildings...

and that's all I have to say about that except... Dumb ass pilots!!!!

 

May 11th 2005  - 3:30 PM -
The Beginning....

I am starting my first BLOG  today, I guess this will be where I voice my opinions on things, ...like daily "moments" of  living in NYC.....  POLITICS, yes I am a Republican and a Bush supporter... the war... the Yankees & Jets, my favorite teams... hockey if it ever comes back, stupid union... my many trips around the world, Spain is next... and what ever else i have an opinion on

for those of you who don't know me you may be wondering why the name "Foolery", its short for my nick name in college which was "Tom Foolery" which I received one day from one of a fraternity brother at Bryant College, it just stuck!!!!!! damn it