I'm Back

Hola, I am back in the land of farms and flat land. Another long and boring sales meeting is in my rear view mirror. Let me insert a quick apology here. Sorry I did not call you ES, my phone was about dead (I forgot my charger)and I thought I better save it for bidnez. There were two interesting things that happened. We went go-kart racing. The high end very fast kind. It was a hoot. In one of the 7 lap qualifying heats one of the Chinese guys from the company plowed right in the back of me at more than 40 mph. He hit me so hard I flew over the tire barrier and into the wall. The impact knocked off one of my shoes, if you can believe it. It felt like someone hit me in the back with a bat. I have been in pretty severe pain since.

I still made the race for the top 11 drivers (11th starting spot!) and ended finishing 9th overall. I was fourth fastest prior to the crash and I just never was able to drive the hairpins as aggressively after I hurt my back. The pain got worse later in the night. I think I will survive though.

The second event was I found myself across from one of the big wheel mucky-mucks from the company at dinner one night. This guy was one of those North East ultra left liberals I have heard of. In all honesty, the so called liberals in the Hoosier State are pretty conservative. Anyway, I have never heard such anger and hate. This guy could have been a poster over at the Daily Kos or Democrat Underground. Usually Religion and politics are never discussed in business settings, but this guy went on and on about how he does not trust any electric voting machines because the Republicans control that industry and have written code in the software that allows the results to be manipulated. He told why we must not let any other Republican nominate a judge for the Supreme Court, and how Bush is personally to blame for every thing wrong in the world.

You would have been proud of me, peeps. I did not slam him in place with his crazy talk. I just smiled and stayed out of the fray. I just put in a few jabs on occasion. For instance when he started in on Bush causing oil to rise and that Bush was responsible for the foreclosure rate I pointed out neither were issues before we elected a Democrat-controlled Congress. Then, in a completely out of character moment for me, I let him off the hook by saying that I am not sure either crises was caused by the President or Congress, and that long-held banking policies and economics had more to do with it. He told me we never had such issues under Clinton. For the most part I let it ride. It was a real treat to meet one of these guys in real life -- kind of like seeing the snakes at the zoo.

I will be back later with a Friday Five. I hope you are ready to play.