Vague Road Signs

Decided to take a drive this morning following a loop devised by the Chattanooga Bicycle Club for a Century. It is billed as a 3-State, 3-Mountain Challenge so it should make for a nice little Miata drive. Once again we had an exciting time of it following someone else’s directions. A combination of my misinterpreting the instructions, Donna misreading the cue sheet, flaky odometer readings and vague road signs made for a “fun” trip. In spite of several u-turns and a couple of backtracks it really was a good trip, filled with windy roads that were little traveled and in spots quite scenic. Glad we are not still riding bikes as much as we used too though, as we might have been tempted to ride it and that definitely would have been a CHALLENGE.

Triskaidekaphobia

We spent last night in a brand new Holiday Inn Express in Anderson, SC. They put us in room 315. It wasn’t until we were leaving the next morning that I noticed that the room next door was 311. In this place all the odd numbered rooms were on one side of the hall and all the even numbers were on the other. That means we were really in room 313. Would they have gotten complaints about staying in that number room?

Tonight and for the next 3 nights were are staying at the Holiday Inn Choo-Choo Hotel in downtown Chattanooga. Our room number is 1015. In this building all the rooms are on one side of the hall and are numbered consecutively. The room to our left is 1014 and to the left of that is 1013. Go figure.

100 Best Road Trips In America

The people who write directions for books, obviously don’t have someone other than themselves drive it and try it out before publication. We were trying to follow the directions in a book from Reader’s Digest entitled 100 Best Road Trips In America through northern Georgia. We missed a few turns. No real problem as we are on vacation with no real deadlines, but frustrating nonetheless. Found a couple of the highlights, drove by a couple and skipped the rest when it got too hot to keep the top down any longer. On arrival in Chattanooga we circled the downtown area a couple of times looking for the Holiday Inn Choo-Choo Hotel. Finally we double parked in front of the Visitor’s Center and asked. Oops, no wonder we couldn’t find it, either they moved the hotel and train 8 blocks north or our memory of the location was faulty.

Before The Signal Faded

Used the cockpit cover at work and now for the first time, using it overnight outside. Drove to Anderson on a beautiful night and got to listen to the 5th inning of the Braves – Red Sox game on the radio, before the signal faded. Arrived at the hotel in time to see the last 2 innings and the Red Sox lose. 🙁

Only 7 transitions since last Thursday, I thought it would have been more….started down, went up, went down, went up, went down, went up, went down, went up and it is still up.
Top Transitions sine 02/02/02: 168 — posted by Brian the Red at 22:07

Little Notebook

Up at work, down for a lunch time excursion. Back up for the afternoon in the sun and back down for the ride home. Going on a 5 day mini vacation to Chattanooga right after work tomorrow, so I won’t be posting here for a couple days. Don’t worry I’m going to take a little notebook along to keep track the transitions. So check back Wednesday, I’m going to fill a whole post with just up, down, up, downs. Now that is something to look forward to. 😀

Started down, went up, went down, back up, back back down and it is still down.
Top Transitions sine 02/02/02: 161

Damon’s

Went out to dinner this evening after running the Miata Club newsletter through the postage meter at Rader. Damon’s is right across the street and we love ribs, so over we went. It was early, the place was pretty empty so when we and asked for a booth in the No Smoking section, we figured that would be no problem. When the hostess turned right instead of the usual left we questioned her. She said, “This is no smoking.” We said, “But it is right near the bar/smoking section. Could we sit over there instead?” She said, “That section is closed, besides there isn’t any one here yet, so…” That is when we stopped listening, turned around and left. There is a Tony Roma’s a couple of miles away. We have been in too many, there is no one here situations before. Invariably just as we are eating our salads, everyone in the booth on the other side of the little wall will light up. No thanks, there are just too many places to eat out to have to gamble on having our meal spoiled by the stench of cigarettes.

Ninety Nine Cents

5 or so years ago when color copiers started to make their way into the copy & printing places it cost a dollar to make one 8-1/2 x 11 color copy. I have never wanted the services of a color copier until now. I print out the Master’s Miata Club newsletter at work. Always used the laser printer in my area for it, until a year ago. They company bought a color laser printer. I started doing the newsletter on it after hours. I didn’t think the folks at the company minded me running 25 or newsletters off a month, after all the Miata Club is a non-profit organization, so it is kinda like a community service. Well fast forward to now. Business is bad, sales are down, production is down, etc. I’m starting to feel a little like they might not take kindly to me “stealing” there paper, toner, time anymore. For the heck of it I called my friends at the Mail Boxes Etc. and asked how much for a color copy. 99?. Big price drop!?! I guess no one else has made enough copies to bring the price down any, huh? I now print 50 newsletters with just the front page in color. I would need 100 copies, fortunately there is price break at 100, times 78? equals $78. Some how I don’t think the club will want to spend that much on printing every month. August I go back to black & white.