Billboards I Like to Argue With 1

Billboards I Like to Argue With 1

Cara has often pointed out that I like to argue, sometimes just for the sake of arguing. It is a source of some frustration when I try to start a lively debate with her, and she is less interested in exploring the merits of the flat tax, or ground based laser defence systems. sometime I must take my ire out on less articulate opponents. So I present to you "Billboards I Like to Argue With"

This is a prime example of billboards that do not really make any sense and kind of piss me off. I will let the whole circa 1995 Jerry Sienfeld look alike contest thing slid and move on to the content of the ad. This is a guy who is clearly just starting out and wants to get his name out there. That is why his name is 6 times as big as anything else in the ad, with the possible exception of his gigantic head looming over that small town.

Then there is the tagline or Time Hoss's slogan. Real Estate the "Fairway"[sic]. Now I am not the grammar police. In fact they probably have a warrant out for my arrest, but I really have no idea what this means. I can only assume that he is some sort of golfer and this is a "clever" play on words. Perhaps he should have had some sort of golf club to clarify his message.

What he may be unaware of is that many people consider the use of quotation marks to imply sarcasm. In this case I would have to assume that 1) he mistakenly misspelled fairway, and 2) that he is a shady realtor who will do whatever backhanded things it will take to get the job done. He will lie steal and cheat to get you what you want in this fast paced real estate market. Ok, maybe I should give him a second chance. If I am buying something I would kind of like him to be an evil slit your throat Jerry Sienfeld. On the other hand what motivation does he really have to get me the lowest price it it is just going to bring his commission down. I am going to pass on your services for now, Jerry "Fairway" Sienfeld.

While that may have been a leap what I can actually infer from this sign is that this is a guy who is so interested in golf (and puns) that he put that ridiculous slogan on his sign. I can only assume that this will somehow bleed over into his work. Where is my realtor? Out playing golf. What are these open hose decorations? Golf balls and Caddie hats (I am not complaining about the BBQ meatballs on golf tees). Where is the closing? At the pro shop.

Whatever it is he is going for on this sign, he is not getting it across, at least not to me. Then again I am not an avid golfer. I really only make it out once or twice a year. Maybe it is an inside joke that only golfers get. Maybe he was so excited to get his enormous head looking down on the Barr Real Estate office that he hurriedly threw that up there with out really getting any constructive feedback. Either way I am going to go watch Caddyshack and see if I can't figure this whole thing out.

Cloverfield live review

Cloverfield live review

Hey rememeber how crappy blair witch project was...
Well cloverfield is 2 leat 5 times as horrible.
Yes that is right I am exactly 23:36 into the movie and i have almost puked twice.
seriously this is the worst thig I can ever seen. Cut shots of random crap...
That is the best part of the movie.
then there is all of the first person camera evcuation....
I think I am going t puke...
PS we all realized like 20 min ago that HUD the main characters name is the name ofa Japanese movie characers name.... bleh

ok now I am going t throw up... cut shots and rapid camera angles. Yeah, just like Blair witch, excetpt horrible. Dood this it the worst thing have ever seen...
Well it is 34 min in and I am giving up... Ill leave the rest of these suckers watching the movie ... I am going to bed L8R

Vegas Baby... Vegas 3

Vegas Baby... Vegas 3

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Lesson of the night... never pay full price for anything in Vegas. So tonight we decided to take in a couple of shows and dinner. We got a package deal for dinner, some drinks an impersonator show and a trip to the top of the tower (more later). All told it was fairly cheap and a good time. then we had a coupon for another show later in the evening. We got all signed up and got all of our tickets, then Cara signed up for the casino rewards program. All we had to do was lose about $10 and then we got a free admitance to the "romance lounge" and a buy 1 get 1 drink ticket.

The impersonator show was pretty good (Elvis, Some Country guy, Rod Stewart, Agularia and, Michael Jackson). It had its highs and lows (I'll let you guess), but over all it was pretty good, and we got free drinks while we were there. The dinner was about what I expected. Then we went to the second show which had 6 things that John loves: Classic Rock, Magic, Acrobats, Vampires, and Light Show. After that we went up to the top of the tower "the tallest structure W of the mississsippi" It had some awesome views. We went to the romnce lounge which was a bar on the bottom of the wig sphere looking out on the city. the 1/2 price martinis were about as much as normal in champaign, but WTF its vegas, and you are really paying for the view. Well I have to turn off this horrible movie w/ freddie prinz and ving raims. L8R

BTW the wig sphere did not have any wigs but there was a wig store right out side... It is only a matter of time.

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Tonight was a whirlwind night before leaving las Vegas. We went to see the fountians at the Belagio which were pretty cool and free :). Cara found some tickets to a free magic show that we were intrested in. I was skeptical ♫Nothing gets you nothing♫. As we approached the hotel which was off of the strip the density of people deccreased exponentially. When we got there the place seemed kindof shady.

We sat in the lounge and had a beer while we contimplated our next move. while we were there there was an older couple fiddiling with some sound equiptment on the other side. Behind us some woman one a small amount of money on a slot machine. Unfortunatly these machines did not actually pay out directly. She went to get someone to open the machine and give her the money. At this point the elderly gentelman got up and introduced himself his wife and his friend, and informed us that they would be starting the keroke now.

Exerpt:
Old man (yelling to the bar): "Hey can you turn that music off"
no response
Old man (louder): "HEY! would you turn that music off"
Old mans wife: "Honey I think it is the TV"
Old man: "HEY! would you turn that TV off"
Old friend: "I actually think it is one of those slot machines" (it was)
(Old man begins singing)
Epilogue: The woman who was playing the twight zone slot machine, after she realized that she was inadvertantly causing all of this comotion slowly packs up her things a cashes out. The bartender came over to give retrieve her winnings from the machine, or at least the remainder of her losings. The old man never realized what had transpired, but seemed happy that the noise was gone. Cara and I mad a hasty exit.

The whole experiance was kindof sureal, like we had some how entered some alternate retirement home version of vegas.

After that we went back to the strip for a delightful dinner at a parisian cafe in the Paris casino. It was probably the best meal we had the entire time and was very reasonably priced for Vegas. We waxed extatic about our time in actual paris and enjoyed the short respit from the hectic rush of the strip. Then we hectically rushed next door to a varity show we had gotten half priced tickets for. There were some pretty awesome jugglers, gymnasts, and some awesome short shows with some fantastic special effects, at one point I was slightly concerned the theater might burn down. After that we made a slow retreat to our hotel past the throngs of day labourers handing out prostituse playing cards (they may have been advertisments, i did not ask), and tried to get some shut eye for our long day of travel.

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This morning we made a 30 min trek to get some free Starbucks that Cara had a coupon for. I tried to point out that, while we were on vacation our time did still have some value, but it was nice to get some fresh air and excercise before being confined (not unlike the gymnasts) to a very small space for the next 10 hours. On the way back in I still had $10 in chips that I figured I could either lose or win big. I played couple rolls of craps, and a couple hands of blackjack and lost it in no time. I did not win a single hand in blackjack.

We tried to make one more trip to the lazy river, but alas it was closed. So we splashed around in the wave pool for a bit and then went to pack up. Caught our shuttle and hurried off to the airport. At one point going through the security area there were no slot machines around. The people in front of us commented on how quiet it seemed. I guess you get used to the constant clang of 1000 slot machines all clamouring for your attention.

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We made our flight with a few minutes to spare, and then on the connecting flight we had to run down an entire concorse get on a tram and then run down another entire concorse to jump on our plane just before it left. They closed up everything and pushed away from the gate...stopped... pulled back in... opened the luggage compartment... threw in our bag... and pulled away. We pulled into bloominton @ around 10 and our bag had indead made it. It took us some time to find the car. We had parked in the Itchy lot. We got to our car, and realized that someone had left the dome light on [sigh]. A nice gentelman helped us jump our car. Yeah Bloomington again.

So this concludes the vacation blog. I hope this has been as exciting for the 3 people who read it as it has been for us to write. OK lets hope it has been more exciting.

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Vegas Baby... Vegas 2

Vegas Baby... Vegas 2

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We made it! After getting in to Vegas about midnight (2am to those on Central time) we partied till dawn...ok, we checked out a brew pub, then gambled away $3 at the nickel slots and went to bed. Looking out our window we can see a castle (Excalibur), several sky scrapers, and a roller coaster! John was excited that our hotel has a magic shop (sigh). John says the lazy river isn't in today's plans, but we'll see. The weather for Vegas for the next week will be 83-85 for highs and 65-67 for lows. The weather forcast had a big banner across it that said NO CHANGE. You don't see that much in IL! We'll come back with more adventures!


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So since we are still kinda on central time we should be getting an early start right... Maybe it is the getting to bed @ 4am. Anyway our plan is to mosie up the strip take it all in and maybe see a show. Unfortunatly Cara is not going to let me bring the laptop down the strip so I the next update may be late. Unless... I can sneak my laptop in Caras rediculously large purse. We'll see.


Anyway Here is the view from our room, and it looks like they fired up the roller coster... Well I know where I am going to be!

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Well if took us about 4 Hours to puruse the 4 hotels that are adjecent to ours. We previewed some new show on NBC about a tutor to spoiled kids. We were going to put $10 on Colonel John in the Kentucky Derby, but I did not really know what time the race was, which was ok since the finished horribly anyway. This afternoon we are going to take the monorail ♫monorail monorail♫ up north for a show and the stratosphere (wig sphere). So far in the money losing race Cara and john are tied @ $-3.00

BTW we have picts up on picasa

Vegas picts

Vegas Baby... Vegas

Vegas Baby... Vegas

Cara and I are heading to Vegas for a long weekend and to get away after her National board stuff. I thought I would include the 4 people who read my blog by posting frequent updates (live blagging) the trip. Cara is somewhat sad because she will be missing her Scholastic Bowl Teams appearance @ the state finals "GO Jaguars" but not sad enough to rearrange the trip. We have everything planned and we will be staying at the Monte Carlo (I assume it is in the shape of a giant car). We are not planning to gamble much as we each have taken a high school math class, and are aware of probability, but we will probably each get a small gambling stipend so we can at least have a competition. Lets call it $1 a piece I will post updates as to who is winning. We will probably see a show or 2, but have not made any definite plans yet.

Exciting future blogs to look forward to include:

Waiting at the airport

Layovers

more Waiting at the Airport

So check back often and I will keep you updated.

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The weather graph looks frightful, but we will see how Bloomington fairs with keeping planes in the air. I happen to know for a fact that the planes that fly our of Willard are made out of some sort of sugar based composite because whenever it rains they cancel all of their flights, but I have high hopes that the planes @ BMI are at least wooden if not Alumnium... We'll see If it does get canceled / postponed @ least we can pop over to the Scol bowl (also in Bloomington).

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More awesome transportation news I have been trying to call our pre-reserved trans from the airport to the hotel to confirm, and they have been putting me on hold for ~15 min and then I get dropped. So far I have been on hold for a cumulative 60+ min and have been dropped 5 times. Oh well I am pretty sure if they do not show up that I can figure out a way to get where I am going... It will be just like the amazing race w/out Jeff Probst.

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"Good news everybody"

It looks like all of the weather has mosyied on, and the incredibly professional [sarc] AirTran website says our flight is on time. I got a hold of the shuttle lady and apparently we did not even need to call for an airpot pickup. Also with some help from me and the art teacher Senior Fernslero there are now life size pictures of Cara to go to the scol bowl tournement.

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You know how sharks can sense fear. I think my users can sense when i am about to leave the office early or take a day off. I try not to let word get out but they all seem to swarm me 20 min before I am getting ready to leave.

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Bloomington airport is Grrrreat!

We got in parked Checked in Checked our bags and got through security all in 30 min. Also I forgot to take my pocket knife out of my pocket.

Security woman "you can't take that on the plane"

Me "I know"

Security woman " but you can put it in this envelope and we will mail it back to you at the airports expense."

Awesome

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Apparently our next flight is slightly delayed, but @ least the atl airport has a shit ton of electrical outlets. We went to a seafood resturant in the airport for some overpriced crab cakes and the worst forks ever. Seriously I went through 3 forks. I expect this from fast food, but if you are going to screw me on a pint of beer @ least give me a decent fork.

Cara says:

So I let John choose the restaurant....Cara 1 John 0. I too love Bloomington...free parking and short lines...what more can you want? Got some updates from the state schol bowl tourney. Jefferson won 1 and lost 2...to make us 19-3 for the season. I am super sad that I couldn't be there, but people have little sympathy for me when I tell them I'm heading to Vegas. We'll be in all 4 continental US time zones today, so that's something to look forward to. Tomorrow- Lazy river!