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Nashville Blog: Day 01: Part One

Today starts a series of live blogs in Nashville, TN. We had to get up at 4 AM to get to the airport within “the appropriate amount of time” and I am a little tired, but that didn’t stop us from hitting the ground running. We arrived in Nashville at 8:30 AM (local time) and easily secured a cab to our hotel. Our room wasn’t ready, but the hotel staff was happy to suggest places to kill time, so here is the run down so far:

[The Capital Building]

A few blocks from our hotel, the Tennessee State Capitol Building offered us a chance to kill 35 minutes. The Tennessee Capital building is one of the oldest still in operation today. When we entered, we were greeted by a very friendly state trooper who was quite excited to meet a real “Jersey Italian”. The thing that stands out about the building is that it is all stone. ALL STONE. From what I heard from the educational children’s tours, there was a massive stone quarry that was used to create most of the historic buildings.

The other “big feature” is that a few people are buried at the site: Samuel Morgan (Chairman of the Building Commission) and William Strickland (the architect). Besides that, the building has too many oil paintings of long dead historical figures and very slippery floors. The building itself is awesome, the stuff inside, not so much.

Moving On…

[The Free Library]

Right across the street from the Capital Building is the Free Library. We didn’t go inside, but the exterior courtyard was awesome (check out the pictures below).

[The Ryman]

One of my “must-see” places was the Ryman Auditorium. Home of the famous “Grand Ole Opry” during it’s peak, the Ryman now hosts tons of contemporary artists. I was a little shocked when we walked in and was told the walking tour would cost $14.00 per person: it’s basically a converted church. We opted for the tour anyway and it was conducted by a gentlemen named Bill who might have taken his job a little too seriously. Bill first took us to the “Johnny & June Cash Dress Room”. The room was built in 2003 and Johnny never used it… He proceeded to take a revisionist’s approach to Nashville’s treatment to the Man in Black (saying how Nashville eventually opened their arms to Johnny again, which wasn’t true as stated by the man himself in “Cash” by Johnny Cash) when I corrected him, he got flush and shot me a look, I think I was on his shit list for the rest of the tour.

We saw more dressing rooms that were named after people who never used them and eventually we got to see the stage. I will admit I thought it was awesome to see it from that view, but the tour was a total rip off.

[Jack’s BBQ]

We exited the Ryman and Allison noticed a BBQ place, we walked down the famous Ryman alley and entered a room that smelled of charcoal and pork. We ordered up some BBQ pork and Beef Brisket sandwiches. Very good, not mind blowing, but there is a strip of BBQ joints to go….

Okay, I am taking a nap. That’s all for now!!!!

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Email Best Practices

I have come to realize that a good portion of my life has centered around email. When I got out of college I was assigned to the email support team of my company and quickly became the one stop shop for 40,000 employees email accounts, I did that for four years. I also started a small computer repair shop/consulting firm during that time and did a good deal of small business email configurations. During my time as “Computer Joey” (that was my business’ name if you didn’t figure it out) I also had a chance to talk at schools about technology and how to be safe on the internet. Those talks came to mind when I was building a contact list for my homeowners association. Long story short, I think it would be helpful to list some pointers about incorporating email into your life:

  1. In your email address, refrain from putting any personal information (besides your name) before the “@” sign. Examples of this are: Your birthday (JohnDoe01051975@yahoo.com), your home address number (NancyDoe80@yahoo.com), Any part of your social security number, Don’t include your zip code, don’t include your age, etc.

  2. If you are still in the work force, try to avoid using “cute” email address names like “SweetSk8rgurl@yahoo.com”. If you lose your job you don’t want to put an email address like that on your resume, and checking multiple accounts can get tiresome. On the flip side, if you are retired or close to it you might want to avoid putting hobbies into your email address. Example: “Mustanglover40@hotmail.com” could make you an easy target for an internet scammer. They might find an in by sending you an email about Mustangs or classic cars.

  3. Try to avoid using the email account that your internet service provider’s (Comcast, Verizon) gives you. If all of your friends know your email address is John.Doe@comcast.net and you decide to change service providers, you will lose that address and your friends might not be able to find you. I suggest signing up for a free account at Yahoo, Gmail, or Hotmail. They provide a huge amount of space for free and those accounts tie into to other great free services. My personal recommendation is Gmail but you should check them all out to see what you like best.

  4. Try to avoid forwarding chain letters. If you don’t know what a chain letter is, basically any email that asks you to forward to all of your friends is a chain letter and spammers can use those chain letters to get your email address.

  5. On that note, whenever you are sending out an email to a large group of people, use the BCC feature (BCC = Blind Carbon Copy). There is always somebody in the group who decides to Reply to All and the next thing you know your inbox is full with generic responses, this will eliminate that problem.

  6. You should not use company email for personal use. You can’t control your friends from emailing you something you should not get at work, don’t put yourself in that situation. I would also suggest that students leave their school accounts for school only (it is an easy way to find someone).

  7. Don’t say anything in email that you would not say to anyone’s face. It is easy to form a sense of detachment when you are sitting in front of a computer, remember there is a human being that is going to read that email.

I think that is good for now. Good luck out there on the internet and try to be safe.

Other Useful Email Tips:

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IRS Refund Checker

Here is a quick and helpful post:

I have been wondering where my federal tax return was, so I called my cousin Anthony who is an accountant if there is a place to check. My man rocked my mind with this site:

IRS Refund Checker

This is the real deal directly from the IRS and you can find out when your money is coming in 2 seconds.

You need to know EXACTLY how much is due back to you, but besides that, great tool.

Good luck and THANKS ANTHONY!

(If you use this, Thank Anthony in the comments!)

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Productivity Boost: Doodling

In the last few years, I find myself doodling quite a bit while sitting on long and boring meetings at work. At first it was during teleconferences, but it has expanded into actual meetings. I am following everything that is happening, but I need to do more. The other day I found this article that states doodling might be a good thing: Doodling Improves Productivity.

How does it work? The scientists hypothesize the mental load it takes to absentmindedly draw is significantly smaller than the demands of a full-on fantasy, which leads your mind entirely away from the event you’re supposed to be engaged in. That trickle of attention devoted to doodling appears to keep you focused in the present time, while giving you a release valve from a frustratingly over-long group session.

The article goes on to say that the boost is for light doodles (like shading in boxes) and not full out art projects. So do you doodle at work? Does it help or hurt your focus?

(Image Credit: Luke Ross & DC Comics)

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RIP hitman2398.tripod.com

Due to my little video rant last month, I sporadically google myself to see what comes up. Today I noticed my old tripod site that I had to do for college was still alive. It was an interesting snap shot of what my life was when I stopped updating it (abandoned for scrotch.com and eventually joeylombardi.com). In the past I had decided to leave it alone because of said snapshot, but tripod is littered with ads and it isn’t who I am anymore – not by a long shot, so I closed shop.

It’s sad to let go of those little pieces of your youth, but sometimes it is necessary to continue moving forward.

I wanted to commemorate the end of a site that has lasted longer than most of my friendships because I am sure I will forget it.

hitman2398.tripod.com
Sept 1997 – Feb 2009
“Ghetto Fabulous to the max”

A site to talk about friends, college life, publish school work, and indulge in silly fantasies. If it made someone laugh through any of the three published versions it did its job.

PS – Here is a picture I found of Sean in the file structure…

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Honeymoon: San Francisco

Howdy true be-loggers! I decided to lump all of San Fran into one blog because we did a lot of touristy things and nothing crazy happened, so this will be “by the books” for those that follow and for Allison and I to remember…

Saturday

We drove into the city, dumped off the rental car, walked around the city, ate lunch at a super-tourist trap seafood place right under the bay bridge. Our hotel room was finally ready (our room had the best view of the bay) and we checked in and rested a little while. I read about a walking tour of the city that was conducted by a lady in a “vampire character” (LINK: SF Vampire Tour). It got a lot of good reviews and I wrote down the number before we left, so I called the lady and booked the tour. We walked to the Nob Hill area – which from our hotel was ALL UP HILL. We ate dinner at the Nob Hill Cafe (LINK: Nobhillcafe.com) which was really good and then we went on our tour. I should note that the temperature got super cold and Allison and I had to find a place to buy a sweatshirt, which we did at the Fairmont gift shop. Next time I got to San Francisco – I am staying at the Fairmont – it is the classiest hotel ever.

NOTE FOR LISA AUSTIN – They filmed the grand stairwell scene in Gone with the Wind here…

The tour was cool and we learned a little bit about San Fran History and about the buildings. We learned alot about some of the wackos that have emerged from San Fran as well. Only in California.

Sunday

Sunday was our first full day in the city and we did the cultural thing. We want to the Museum of Asian Arts and the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA). The Asian Arts was awesome, MOMA was a huge bore. We then upped the tourist ante by going to Coit Tower. Coit has the best view of the city and to go up the tower you of course need to pay, which is kind of a rip-off since it is a 5 minute thing to do, alas the life of a tourist. We got back to the hotel and researched some places to go for dinner and decided to go to the Thirsty Bear (Link: Thirstybear.com). I really liked this place, good food, good beer, good service. They had a modern Spanish thing going on complete with Spanish dancers and guitar players, but it wasn’t too flashy and we got a seat in the back so we could talk. A good night

Pictures from San Fran Days 1 and 2

Monday

Monday we bit the bullet and did “The Rock”. We went to Alcatraz and I will admit it was pretty cool. There really isn’t much to say that the pictures won’t show you. Although I will say that I didn’t realize that Alcatraz was only used a federal prison for 29 years and JFK was the guy to shut the doors down before he became president. The general rap was the building was falling apart and it was an ecological nightmare, so the doors were closed. The lady from the vampire tour said it was haunted as all hell, so take that for what you will.

Pictures from “The Rock”

Allison and I then went to North Beach (which is the little Italy section). We had a nice lunch at a place called Calzones. We walked around looking for gift to take home but everything look touristy so we bolted. I made reservations to a place called The Cliffhouse for dinner (Link: CliffHouse). It had the best view I have ever had for dinner. The food was good, but it wasn’t outstanding and you definitely pay for the view, but it was worth it.

Tuesday

We were at a bit of a loss for what to do on Tuesday. We didn’t want to go to the Golden Gate. We had seen it from the Alcatraz tour and I just didn’t care to walk over a bridge. Allison and I were hell bent on finding some nice things to bring home as gifts and I will make this short – we failed miserably. Defeated, we went to the best “Mexican Restaurant” in the city. It was called Mexico DF ( Mexico DF). Food was good but very small portions but the drinks were very strong.

We were aimless all day and looking forward to going home. We walked around alot, got nothing accomplished. For dinner, I had read about a place that had an indoor pirate ship (it was at the Fairmont too!) so we went to the Tonga Room (sorry, no website). This place was awesome. We just did happy hour in there and they had a little dinner buffet that we snacked on. I can’t say too much – you guys will have to see it for yourself. We then went to a place called the Four Ovens which was across the street that Allison read about. Food was good, but the service was SLOOOOW. We then went back to the hotel and went to bed early.

Wednesday

We woke up, ate breakfast, went to the airport, listened to a baby scream for several hours on the plane, and I got home a few hours ago and started writing this blog 🙂

Thanks for reading!