20th Anniversary in San Francisco

KaReen and I just spent the last week in San Francisco celebrating our 20th wedding anniversary.  Our actual anniversary isn't for a couple of months, but since our oldest is between college semesters, it seemed like an opportune time to claim free babysitting.  Our six children range from 19 yrs to 1.5 yrs in age.  We're masochistic parents.

Planning the trip was a reckless ride.  We realized the narrow window of opportunity to take advantage of our live-in babysitter the NIGHT BEFORE our flight left.  I was up late last Sunday night deciding on a destination (Hawaii was the first choice, but last minute flights were financially out of the question).  I chose San Francisco because I knew KaReen would love to see the play "Wicked".  I booked the hotel and rental car, purchased the airline and play tickets, and asked my boss for permission to take annual leave, all in about a two hour window.  It was totally reckless, but it added to the overall excitement of the effort.  We were on the plane about eleven hours after booking the flight.

We totally lucked out on the hotel. I was looking for something in the vicinity of the location of the "Wicked" Orpheum theater, and decided that the Fisherman's Wharf Radisson was close enough.  As it turned out, we couldn't have chosen a better location if we knew what we were doing.  The hotel had a unique hallway that connected right onto Fisherman's Wharf.  The hotel wasn't the nicest we've ever stayed at, but for the location, it's the best our budget could afford.

I enjoyed toying with KaReen about the "activity" we were going to do Tuesday night.  I didn't tell here we were going to see "Wicked" until the day of the performance.  Unfortunately, we underestimated how difficult it would be to navigate to the Orpheum theater.  Downtown San Francisco is a nightmare of one-way streets, and lanes that only taxi are allowed to navigate.  For some inexplicable reason, all of the one-way streets were pointing in the opposite direction of where we needed to go.  At one point, we accidentally ended up on the Bay Bridge heading out of town in rush-hour traffic.  There's was nowhere to turn around until we hit Oakland!  Luckily, we left ourselves a lot of time for just such disasters, and we were able to make it to the theater before the play started.  "Wicked" received four thumbs up from us (two each).

Alcatraz Island was more interesting than I thought it would be.  There's a great deal of history there.  I was impressed (or depressed as the case may be) with the amount of rust and decay.  Apparently the amount of moisture in the air accelerates the rate of deterioration.  Old, torn down buildings are covered with vegetation.  metal guard towers and water towers look like they could fall in on themselves at any time.  The island itself was once a military base, then a prison, and is now a national park.  We ended up spending all morning wandering around the spacious island.  It was obviously not the height of the tourist season.  Temperatures were relatively low (high 40's to low 50's).

When it comes to "surf and turf", I'm more of a "turf" diner.  The whole time I was there I was craving a nice New York steak, but the price of steak was ridiculous.  The first night there, I ordered our favorite appetizer: peel and eat shrimp.  I love the way it is prepared cold at McGraths in Layton.  But here at Fisherman's Wharf, they serve it hot and with the heads and eyeballs still attached.  It wasn't bad, but I still prefer McGraths.  I'm not much on anything in a "white sauce" but on the advice of a friend I tried a bowl of the obligatory clam chowder at the Blue Mermaid.  It was surprisingly good -for a type of soup I don't care for.    

Boston Interoperability Conference

The National Governor's Association (NGA) and the Department of Homeland Security, Office of Emergency Communications (OEC) sponsored a Statewide Interoperability Coordinator meeting this week in Boston, MA.  I was impressed with the format of the conference.  There were good presentations -particularly the ones that were followed by roundtable discussions or break-out sessions which allowed us to interact with our counterparts in other states. 

It was interesting to see how other states address their interoperability issues. Through discussions with other states, I realized that although many states are dealing with the same problems we are, some of them have found solutions.  I was taking careful notes so we can discuss these items within our state.

With relatively limited funding, I think the OEC is smart to invest funding in bringing interoperability coordinators together for these kinds of conferences -as well as the FEMA Regional Emergency Communications Coordination Working Groups (RECCWG).  As most states are drastically cutting their travel budgets in the current financial crunch, the ability to meet face-to-face and discuss interoperability issues will have relatively high ROI.  

Boston

While attending the National Governor's Association (NGA)/Department of Homeland Security, Office of Emergency Management (OEC) Interoperability Conference in Boston, I went for a walk with a friend down a portion of the Freedom Trail. We even paid the fee to walk through Paul Revere's house on they way to the Old North Church.

Boston is a very interesting city. It reminded me of a recent trip to Chicago. Like Chicago, Boston's downtown buildings are built on streets that were designed for the width of horse and buggy traffic. They are a stone's throw apart from one-another (an underhanded toss at that). Layed out within a semi-circular penninsula, the streets are nothing short of mad. There are one-way streets that cut across each other at odd angles, and some of the two-way streets are seperated by just enough median that they've named each direction a different street name. Very confusing. Every once in a while, we ran across a pedesetrian who seemed to obey the traffic signals, but that may have only been incidentally.

Even with the strange traffic layout, the overall effect of walking through the city was wonderful. There is a certain "old world" feel to the streets and buildings. Many of the buildings have obviously been around for a very long time. They were clearly retro-fitted with modern lights and other technology that was not dreamed of when they were constructed.

When we stopped for lunch at a rather large mall (Quincy Market), we were surprised to see an indoor food court that was full of several dozen places to eat, but had so little room that many of the tables for dining were four foot tall and designed for 'standing room only' diners.

Rain in Boston

While waiting to check my bags with the concierge here at the Seaport Hotel in Boston, I was watching the rain through the lobby windows. I was impressed not so much by how hard it was raining -Utah has hard rains from time-to-time also. I was impressed by how steadily it was coming down. Utah's rain -when it rains hard, tends to come in brief torrents. If it rains for a long time in Utah, it usually 'sprinkles' for hours. This morning in Boston, it was raining hard and steady. I could just sense the rain was going to be around for awhile today.

On the street, people were carrying umbrellas. It reminded my of my early years growing up in Oklahoma (please don't 'Take me Back to Tulsa...'). Growing up, I can remember rainy days that lasted through the week; thunderstorms that rumbled and grumbled all through the night. Storms just don't do well in Utah. Like fish out of water (curious metaphor), Utah storms don't seem to know what they are supposed to be doing in the strange desert environment. It was good to once again see rain that was in it's element.