Southwest To Test Assigned Seating

I learned that Southwest Airlines is testing the use of assigned seats on its flights. The test will take place on flights outbound from San Diego beginning July 10th.

A lot of Southwest newbies complain about their open seating. Fine. Learn how it works and be prepared next time. Print out your boarding pass before you get to the airport and you’re golden.

I don’t know why Southwest would screw up a good thing. I like the ability to get my pass early and pick my seat as I go. I like not having to sit at the back of the plane, or the middle seat, leaving those for the slackers.

Consequently, if you’re late getting to the gate, it sucks to be you. You don’t get to put that mega roller bag into an overhead bin, nor should you. Don’t delay my flight finding a seat just because you couldn’t be bothered to get to the gate on time.

If Southwest assigns seats, it will become just another airline. That would be a shame.

(h/t, Newmark’s Door)

Update: Post your thoughts directly on Southwest’s Blog.

New Cable TV Rules On The Horizon

WRAL alerted me today to upcoming changes in the state’s cable television laws. A bill entitled An Act to Promote Consumer Choice In Video Service Providers And To Establish Uniform Taxes For Video Programming, or short title “Video Service Competition Act” (House Bill 2047) would take away local franchising authority in favor of state oversight. Supporters claim this will enhance competition because Big Telcos like Bellsouth wouldn’t have to negotiate for each franchise.

I have mixed thoughts about this. In essence, what’s wrong with local franchising authorities? When your cable service is out and the lazy repairmen won’t fix it or charges appear on your cable bill that you didn’t authorize, the local franchising authority can be a powerful ally in getting the problem fixed. Does anyone really think the State of North Carolina is going to take these issues more seriously than the local government?

Generally, I’m in favor of pushing authority on issues out as locally as possible. Raleigh knows what’s best for Raleigh. Ditto Durham, Charlotte, and other places. You’ve got to have a really good reason before you consider taking that authority away. What reason, other than Bellsouth lobbied for it, is there to upset the apple cart? Why does Bellsouth not want to play by the rules that everyone else plays by?

The real reason this bill is being pushed by Bellsouth is that Big Telcos want satellite services like Dish Network and DirecTV taxed similarly to terrestrial services like DSL and cable television, even though satellite services don’t use any public right of way! That’s right: Hughes Electronics invested many millions in building and launching their satellites and uplink facilities. Millions of their own, private money. They don’t use public resources like rights-of-way. Why should DirecTV be taxed like a franchise if it’s not making money with public dirt like the cable and phone lines?

To me, this bill sounds like a giant win for the Big Telcos and a big blow for advocates of cable TV accoutability. I welcome comments from state legislators who wish to prove me wrong.

Rain Rain Go Away

Okay, Okay. I know I begged for rain a few months back. But this is ridiculous! Two inches in two days. That’s plenty, thank you.

Please stop with the rain, ok? Just stop. We don’t need any more now, thank you. You can stop now, can’t you? Please? Pretty please? Just stop? Maybe throw in a sunny day or two?

Hearing While Cycling

Last weekend when the family and I went on a bike ride, I realized just how dangerous it is not to be able to hear behind you when cycling. Fortunately there wasn’t any danger on that ride, but the threat exists. You can’t hear anything a fellow rider might be telling you, nor do you hear approaching traffic.

I’ve got an idea that addresses this, but I haven’t baked it long enough to share here. If you’re an investor sitting on a pile of cash, though, you’ll find my email address on my resume. 🙂

Amsterdam

Everyone’s asked me how Amsterdam was. Truth is, due to the busy schedule I got less than three hours to tour this city. After the class wrapped on Friday, I packed up the class equipment and took it back to the European office, after which I took a tour. I had a little time to change into more comfortable clothes and spent the rest of the time at the train website trying to plot a course to Amsterdam. I caught a train that took me to Amsterdam Centraal station, arriving a little after 7PM.

First stop was to get more Euros, so I looked around until I found a change place on the main street. Armed with cash, I set out to see the city. Immediately I found two of the students who were in my class and chatted with them for a bit. Originally we were all going to go into town together but the office tour and packing up stuff I did gave them a head start of a few hours. They were headed back at the time, so I ventured alone around town.

So, first stop was the infamous red light district. I had to see what the hype was about, you know? So I walked down the streets and crossed canals until risque pictures appeared on the store signs. I took a walk down one canal side street and up the other. There were windows here and there, most of them with lights in them and curtains pulled. Occasionally I would see a woman in a bikini in a window. She’d be Eastern European in appearance, be a bit out of shape, and look really, really bored. Maybe its because of my sailor past, walking down many similar streets in my time, but nothing I saw here made me even break my pace.

Yawn. On to the museums!

I followed the tram tracks in an effort to find either the Van Gogh museum, the Rijksmuseum, or the Anne Frank House. I walked a good long way, enjoying the canal houses and outdoor cafes I passed along the way before I came upon a crowded square.

I walked over to three ladies holding a map to ask directions. They were Dutch but not from Amsterdam, and told me they thought most museums would be closed by now. I knew at least the Anne Frank house was open until 9, so I asked if they could point me in that direction. A look at my watch showed I had 30 minutes to get there before it closed, so I walked briskly down a side street, following a canal to the museum.

I got to the Anne Frank house with ten minutes to spare, not recognizing the steel-and-glass exterior for the warehouse I’d always been led to believe was there. Once I’d purchased a ticket and entered it became obvious that the interior was still as it was. There were many multimedia presentations running throughout the museum but I skipped most to spend more time in the annex area, where the family lived.

It was sad seeing this tiny space where the Frank and Van Pels families desperately waited out the occupation. Anne’s room itself was no bigger than a closet. So sad. Even standing in the same rooms I could not imagine what it must have been like for them.

At the end of the tour I signed the guestbook, not being able to resist adding my blog address. I was paying my respects to Anne, a truly world-famous blogger.

The rest of the night was spent looking for dinner. I stopped at a place on the main street and enjoyed a decent steak dinner. Then it was a race back to the train station for the 90 minute ride back to my hotel.

Thus completed my visit to the Netherlands. Its a beautiful place which deserves more time to explore. Perhaps next time I’ll visit with the family.

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Back At Home

I got back home around 6 PM after a fairly smooth trip back from Holland. My colleague Al was kind enough to drop me off at the Rotterdam train station early Saturday, where I caught a quick train to the Amsterdam airport. Heading through the Amsterdam airport was practically worry-free. The most time I spent doing anything in the airport was simply walking from the customs counter to the gate: the airport is huge!

At the Amsterdam airport, each gate has its own security screening, probably due to the amazing variety of airlines which serve it. I got all the way to the gate area wondering “hey, am I ever going to get screened for this flight?” Then I saw the metal detector and figured things out. A short hop later and I was in London.

In Gatwick airport I got in a long queue to be re-screened. I was told only when I got to the front of the line that I needed to check in at the airline gate first. D’oh! Add another thirty minutes to my travel. At least the UK hasn’t gone overboard with their security screening. Belts and shoes stay on and laptops stay in bags. It was a pleasant change, actually. Gatwick seems to wait to the last minute to tell you which gate your flight is leaving from, even though the plane at that gate must have been there hours beforehand.

American Airlines’ service to London has slipped a few notches. On any other international flight, you get complimentary drinks. The woman next to me was miffed – and rightly so in my opinion – to have to pony up five bucks for a gin and tonic. That’s just cheesy, especially after you’re already spending a fortune for the privilege to be wedged in a seat for 8 hours.

The flight was smooth for the most part. I’d requested a window seat so I could take some pictures. Instead the sky was a cloudy blanket below us. Bah.

The clouds finally cleared around Henderson, NC. I was admiring the green fields below when I felt the plane make a slight turn to the left. At that very moment I was startled to see a single-engine Piper airplane emerge from the clouds and pass right below my seat perhaps a mere thousand feet below! How ironic it would be to travel safely for 3500 miles only to crash a half-hour from home.

The plane landed on time and we filed slowly off. I got on the escalator to the Customs room but the room was already overflowing with passengers. Some idiot at the airline didn’t do the math: if you have x passengers on a Boeing 777 and the room they’re being stuffed into is built for x-50, maybe it would be wise to stop them at the top of the escalator before they get smushed. Instead people piled up at the bottom of the escalator with nowhere to go. Those people got crushed by the people above them on the escaltor, and so on and so forth. Only after many people fell over did the airline staff stop the escalator. Welcome to America.

In spite of the snafus I was in my car less than an hour after landing. Its good to be back.

Thursday Recap

Last night’s post made it sound like I was carousing wildly but the truth is I was making it sound better than it was. The fact is I never left the hotel yesterday. In fact, I haven’t held a Euro in my hand since I arrived, but more on that in a moment.

The training went extremely well, as my earlier post indicated. I wasn’t entirely sure how things were going until dinner last night. One of the Irish participants asked me if I’d noticed a difference in how Eurpoean students responded in class. When I asked him about it he told me that most Europeans are very reserved in class, unlike the Americans. In America, he said, a student is more apt to raise his hand when he has a question. Europeans like to keep a lower profile. So that explains why even though I tried to keep things interactive, there were actually fewer questions than I expected. In spite of his theory, he and his colleague proved it wrong by pestering me every ten minutes with questions!

Dinner and the drinks at the bar turned out to be great fun. I really enjoyed sharing stories with the guys from other countries. One of the m, an Irishman, is marrying his German girlfriend in Germany this fall. Thus, we traded wedding stories and listened to the Germans there talk about the wedding traditions in their country. One friendly African flew eleven hours (!) from Cape Town just to attend my training. Incredible! I’m really humbled by that.

One thing that is markedly different about this training session than the one I did in Australia is the obvious camraderie these partners show towards each other. Though Australians seem generally friendly, the partners I met there were not as open with each other. They seemed to view the other partners as competitors much more strongly than this group does.

I’d had two glasses of wine at dinner and was thinking of holding the line there but I couldn’t turn down an invitation to the bar. I was happy to see practically the whole class there, drinking and laughing. I nursed a pint while discussing world affairs, among other topics. My German told stories of how much he loved his visit to Las Vegas, and how he got a little too free with the speed limit in Nebraska. The state trooper pulled him over and then locked and loaded on him when he unknowingly sprang out of the car. As my friend was lying on the ground, the trooper realized he was German. Having been stationed there himself in the Army, the trooper gushed about the fun he had there before happily waving him on. The German had nothing but good things to say about Americans. I was glad to hear it!

Around midnight some of us had slipped out of the bar. That’s when Niall offered to buy me some whiskey. Normally I shy away from whiskey and I almost made it out of there before he ordered it. But not quite. It turned out to be about a shot of triple-blended Irish whiskey. On ice, no less. So I didn’t get quite as crazy as one might have inferred by my previous post.

Today’s training should be over quickly. I hope to have the team go through the set up and configuration all by themselves and make myself available for any questions they may have. Then they’ll take an exam before giving feedback on the course and heading back to their homes. Hopefully we’ll be done by 1PM, which should give me time to finally look around Amsterdam. We’ll see how it goes.

Oh Man

I should know better than to drink whiskey with a bunch of Irishmen. Tomorrow’s class might be a little painful. Or incoherent.

Man, it sure was fun, though!

Training Success

Twenty-five guys,
crammed into a room fit for 20,
most of which English isn’t their native language,
certainly Southern English isn’t,
even though the room was too warm,
and I’d been talking for four straight hours,
about a geeky network management appliance,
and it was just after lunch,
nobody fell asleep!

Damn, I am good.