Travel Log - Star date 20080421

Plane, train or automobile: All three!

Mission: Travel to Buffalo, NY. Being the good company soldier that I am, I took an obscenely early flight on a Sunday to save us $400. This means that I flew from ROA at 6:10 a.m. What I didn't realize was that I would be experiencing the Detroit Airport for the first time. If you have not been to DTW, I highly recommend it.

Here's why:


And now the monorail:


Here are some still shots of the monorail:

From DTW, I headed to Buffalo, NY. Since I got there at noon (and didn't have to be at my destination until 5 p.m.) I decided to visit Niagara Falls. Bear in mind that I am very frugal (or cheap), so rather than pay $10 to park for an hour, I walked in from a side street and down towards the Falls along the American Rapids:

Being cheap also means that I don't have a passport (does Travel Man need a passport? Does Superman file a flight plan with the FAA?) so all of these pics are from the American side. The "big" part of the Falls is the Horseshoe Falls, which is not nearly as impressive from the USA side:

The American Falls are very impressive however:

I definitely plan on coming back with the Girls sometime. I might even pay to park closer, or (gasp) get passports so we can see everything from the Canadian side.

Number of human interactions: 0

State(s) visited: MI, NY

City visited: Detroit, Niagara Falls

Interesting fact about this city: Um, did you see the vids and pics above?

Halpert says: Most. water. ever.

Travel Log - Star date 20080419

Plane, train or automobile: None. I had a planned week at home this week.

Mission: I had a very quick and vital mission dropped in my lap Wednesday morning. We did an internal Talent Search to assess some Division Manager candidates this week. I figured this would keep my supervisors busy and I could get some catch up work done, and do a little pre-emptive work. WRONG!

I was asked to "grade" some assessments from an activity that each candidate went through. The grading consisted of deciphering the candidates responses and mapping those responses to success factors required for the job they were interested in. There were approximately 60 items on each assessment that took me about 45 - 60 seconds EACH to sort and record. My quick math skills tell me that this meant about 45 - 60 minutes to complete one report. Guess how many I had to do??? 22 of them - in two days. I got about 7-8 done the first day, took 5 home with me that night, and did about 8-9 more the second day. Needless to say, I didn't get much else done. An analyst in our department thought the real purpose of the exercise was to test my knowledge of what behaviors fell into which success factors. I think she was right!

Number of human interactions: 22. On paper. In two days.

State(s) visited: Numbness??

City visited: None

Interesting fact about this city: Looking at roughly 1300 lines of data makes any city fact interesting - pick one!

Halpert says: Keep me away from that stuff!

Travel Log - Star date 20080412

Plane, train or automobile: None, actually.

Mission: Was supposed to be management training workshop. Workshop cancelled by higher ups. I spent some time in the office for once! We have been really busy lately - we have a new CEO and Executive Team, so there is no such thing as business as usual right now. I really like our new CEO - he spent some time with the son of our founder to learn about our core values and he is driving change back to those values. Our new CFO, Mike Norona (not to be confused with the song "My Sharona" by the Knack) is not your typical numbers guy. If you listen to him for 15 minutes, you want to rush home and balance your check book! He is that entertaining and funny.

Number of human interactions: 12

State(s) visited: Nada, zip, zero.

City visited: Salem, VA and Roanoke, VA

Interesting fact about this city: Salem was founded in 8000 BC, making it way cooler than Jamestown, VA (1607) or St. Augustine, FL (1529).

Halpert says: I was looking forward to visiting West Virginia again. Oh, well.

Travel Log - Star date 20080405

Plane, train or automobile: An airplane (or 4 if you want to get specific) and a rental Camcord (Camry / Accord). This was actually the Toyota version - a decent ride.

What a day on Friday!

Original plan - leave JAX at 6:10 pm, stop in Atlanta, arrive ROA at 9:30 pm.

Actual events - board plane in JAX at 7:20 pm. This group of guys in their early 20s is seated behind me and the one guy in the group that has traveled before is trying to impress his companions with his knowledge. He is going on about how we are on an Airbus, when one of the guys asks "Then why is the safety card for a Boeing 757?" He was much quieter after that.

There is a ground delay in Atlanta, but our pilot pushes away from the gate so that we can be first in line to leave when the ground delay is lifted. We sit for about an hour when we are informed that the delay might go until 9:30 pm. The pilot informs us that we are going to head back to the gate if people need to make other plans. This seems to be taking a while when the captain comes back on to tell us that the tug the pulls the plane in broke, so we have to wait for another tug to come over. We get back to the gate about 9 pm, at which time the ground delay is lifted, so we taxi out and are wheels up about 9:15 pm.

We get to Atlanta about 10:30 and I check the Delta flight schedules on the Raspberry. My flight to ROA is delayed until 11:45 - I will still get home tonight! Several delays and gate changes later, it is 11:41 pm. The information board at the gate shows a new departure time of 12:25 am with an arrival time of 11:40 pm. (I'll let that sink in...) The woman next to me sees the new departure time, sighs, then notices that something is not right with the departure time. I lean over and say "The good news is that we arrive one minute ago." She quickly moves to another seat.

We finally leave @ 1 am, and are wheels down in ROA at 2:05 am.

Mission: Leadership Skills training for 40 people.

Number of human interactions: Upwards of 50

State(s) visited: Florida ("Long have I yearned to return to the land of my birth...")

City visited: Jacksonville. This is one of my favorite places to visit.


Great climate.


Pro Football Team.


Great Regional Operations Team.


The hotel that I typically stay at is a new Hampton Inn and Suites with a gazillion restaurants within walking distance. I actually ate at Kokopellis two nights and Moe's only once - same type of food, only more veggies at Kokopellis.

Interesting fact about this city: Hosted Super Bowl XXXIX

Halpert says: My first time on a plane! I love the bag of peanuts - just the right size for me!

Travel Log - Star date 20080329

This trip didn't start well for me. Leaving my family on Easter Sunday never sounds like a good idea. Plus, you'll recall from my last post that I have been on the road almost continuously in March. I get into town with my heart set on eating at a Chipotle, which is good enough if there is no Moe's around. God bless those folks at Chipotle - they were closed for Easter (or Equinox (the sign said both)). My Easter dinner was a new Angus Burger at McDonalds.

Plane, train or automobile: Yup, Ol' Faithful. The Exploder got rewarded for many years of service with a brand new set of tires. The lease company was reluctant to replace the tires at the 104K service, but a screw in the right rear tire in the middle of Ohio pushed them over the edge.

Mission: Leadership Skills training for two divisions in Central Ohio. My week got better... I had one of the most humorous groups I have ever had in a workshop and we had a great two days. I always let the group pick a Break Manager to call and manage breaks because I might be setting up for the next segment and lose track of time. I had put these yellow star shaped Post-It notes on the tables without any real idea how to use them. The newly appointed break manager scribbled something on one and stuck it to his shirt. I wandered over to his table to see that he had written "Break Deputy" on the star. We get cranking through the content (maintaing self-esteem, focusing on specific behavior, reinforcement techniques, etc) when I notice the manager next to him also had a star. She really liked the idea of focusing on specific behaviors and had named herself the "Specific Sheriff". Another manager across the room kept going back to the concept of one bad apple spoiling the bunch and she kept using the words "contaminate" and "quarantine". The Break Deputy made a badge for her and she was the newly appointed "EPA Marshall".

At the end of the week, I got an email from the Break Deputy:

You are the "AYATOLLAH of INFORMATION”, the" POTENTATE of PRODUCTIVITY” and the "DUKE of DEVELOPMENT'

FEEL FREE TO GIVE YOURSELF 3 GOLD STARS

What a great group!

Number of human interactions: 30 plus

State(s) visited: West Virginia and Ohio

City visited: Reynoldsburg, OH

Interesting fact about this city: Birthplace of the Tomato!! I had no idea that I was in the stomping grounds of that juicy, lycopene filled fruit... Yes, tomatos are a fruit.

Halpert says: What's a tomato??

Travel Log - Star date 20080322

Plane, train or automobile: The Exploder rides again! This time I got to haul stuff and had a co-pilot!

Mission: This one was a doozy! A few members of our staff that are certified to deliver the leadership training that I do every week were asked to assist at our National Leadership Conference in Nashville, TN. Here is my schedule:

Saturday 15th - Drive to Nashville. Unload and set up registration
Sunday 16th - Church (Palm Sunday!). Run registration booth for @ 300 participants
Monday 17th - Co-facilitate with HR Directors in four breakout sessions
Tuesday 18th - Co-facilitate with outside training firm for 30 DMs

Wednesday 19th - Co-facilitate with outside training firm for 30 DMs (same group)

Thursday 20th - Drive home!

Number of human interactions: Well over 300

State(s) visited: TN

City visited: Nashville

Interesting fact about this city: The Gaylord Opryland Hotel is ginormous and a great place to host an event.

Halpert says: I LOVE the Opryland Hotel!! Check out my TV and the size of my bed (yes, that's me in the middle of the pillows down there)!!

Travel Log - Star date 20080315

Plane, train or automobile: Racking up the miles on the Exploder!

Mission: A lot on this trip... a two-day leadership workshop, then two days of visiting new management Team Members in two different divisions. Oh, and did I mention that I got home at 9 p.m. on Friday and left at 7 a.m. on Saturday for a leadership conference in Nashville, TN?

Number of human interactions: About 20

State(s) visited: GA, SC

City visited: Atlanta, GA; Anderson, SC; Greenville, SC

Interesting fact about this city:
Atlanta, GA - I actually stayed near Stone Mountain. I'd like to bring the girls down with me on a trip so they could see it. I don't do much sight seeing on my trips - I have work to do!

Anderson, SC has a great little downtown area. My mom is thinking of moving south (and leave balmy South Dakota??) and I think this area would be great for her.

Halpert says: Wow, 5 different beds in 5 nights!!! Maybe he really is Travel Man!