Canada Success!

Notwithstanding our problems with the expected border crossing, we were able to distract the border agent with some folksy talk about our love of mooses and hockey.

We checked in at the Fallsview Marriott and got a room overlooking the falls on the top floor (Tony RUMJog is Platinum level for the avoidance of doubt). The Canada side is much better than the American side - the contrast is almost as stark as East and West Berlin in the 1960's.

The exchange rate is 1.37 so essentially $3 gets you C$4. There is a nice casino next to hotel and we will check it out tonight. Hopefully Canada plays by the same rules as Vegas.

2017 Niagara Falls Jaunt

Tony RUMJog is reactivating the hugely popular Pedantic Prattles blog feeds.

TJ and I are off to Niagara Falls. Here we are in the United lounge in Terminal A awaiting our flight to Buffalo.

We are going to attempt to stay on the Canada side and have made reservations next to the horseshoe falls.

Both TJ and I have some issues with the Canadian authorities and there is no guarantee that we will be able to cross the border.

Plan A - act straight and hope they waive us through.

Plan B - sneak across border later tonight.

Plan C - dress up like Mexican field hands and swim across.

We will keep you posted.

Back to College

Heather and I took Sarah back to Rutgers for the 2014 Spring Semester. Sarah is a sophomore this year and Heather is an honorary freshman.

We stopped at the dining hall and Heather got pizza and bacon. They have Heather so much bacon that she immediately applied for early admission.

Here is a picture of my two RU babes with their new hoodies.

Sarah Cruise Trip 2013

Sarah and I made our way down to Fort Lauderdale, Florida today as we plan to set sail for our cruise tomorrow morning.

We are staying about 5 miles from the cruise terminal on the beach at the Sheraton Hotel. The hotel is very old and as it turns out, it is a landmark of sorts. The hotel was very popular in the 1950's and was called the Yankee Clipper. There is a bar one level below the pool where they do mermaid shows looking though the underwater pool windows behind the bar. The filmed a scene from the movie Analyze This with Robert DeNiro and Billy Crystal.

After we got settled, we drank a few beers on the balcony of our room and then headed over to Sarah's restaurant choice, Chipotle Mexican Grille. When we got back to our room, the thunderstorms off the Florida coast put on quite a light show.

Tomorrow we get on Royal Caribbean's Oasis of the Seas, which is a monster of a cruise ship with over 5,000 passengers and about 4.5 times the size of the Titanic. We have an ocean balcony room and I am looking forward to ordering breakfast room service on the balcony, relaxing, and doing some reading. Sarah will be doing the rock climbing wall, surf rider wave pool, zip line, ice skating, cupcake chef class, and try her hand in the casino. It should be lots of fun.

Touring Paris Day 1 Part 2

After cruising the left bank of Paris, we headed up to the Montmarte area to check out the Sacre Coeur church up on the hill overlooking Paris. The steps leading up to the church are a famous hangout and TJ bought a few pony Heinekens from illegal immigrants on the steps.

Afterwards we got some dinner at a local restaurant - Chez Eugene - on the artists square next to Sacre Coeur.

After dinner we stopped in a cool cafe outside the tourist area - Chez Plumeau - and bumped in to French actress Marion Cottilard. You may have seen her in Midnight in Paris or Inception.

After we closed Chez Plumeau, we walked back to the Metro and passed through the red light district and got out cliche picture in front of the Moulin Rouge.

Back in room at 3am.

Touring Paris Day 1 Part 1

Back in Paris

Bonjour Paris

We arrived in Paris this morning after taken the overnight train from Munich. We had a private cabin with bathroom and shower and arrive well rested. First, we dropped off our luggage at the Marriott Rive Gauche situated just south of Paris' famous left bank. Then we grabbed our backpacks for a quick overnight jaunt to Normandy to see the World War 2 D-Day sites.

Our train left from Gare St. Lazare in the northwest part of Paris. Our first stop is going to be Caen and WW2 museum and then to Bayeux for an overnight stay. In the AM we plan to going on a guided tour of the Normandy D-Day sites as well as some of the Band of Brother sites like Brecourt Manor.

We had an hour in Paris before our train to Caen and that was enough to enjoy a cappuccino at a Parisian Cafe. I can tell TJ is going to like Paris.

Operation Overlord

Arriving in Caen and Bayeux

Rise of the Third Reich

Wie Gehts Deutschland

TJ Graduates

TJ the DJ

TJ is a DJ host in Rutgers 90.3 FM radio station. Sarah and I stopped by today to put in some song requests and pay the 2013 Spring Tuition bills. This is the last semester of two simultaneous bills.

TJ's radio name is DJ Theo D and he currently has the 11am-1pm time slot on Wednesdays.

In each of his shows, I make sure that I call in at least one request. Last week TJ ended with my request for the Beatles tune Tomorrow Never Knows. This week was Crystal Blue Persuasion by Tommy James and Shondells, but there were some technical difficulties with the old tune.

Send him an e-mail if you have any requests, but keep it cool.

Hurricane Sandy - Aftermath

******THIS IS A LONG POST********

Unless you were under a rock the past few days, you had to be aware of the big storm that has hit the East Coast over the last couple of days.  I will admit that I was a little skeptical of the hype of this storm having been through more than a half dozen hurricanes over the years.  The skepticism proved wrong as I assessed the damage to our town after the worst of the storm passed over New Jersey.

Before the storm, Heather and I made several trips to the local grocery store to watch people stock up as if the world was going to come to an end.  On Saturday, we saw the aisle with potato chips and snacks plucked clean.  Heather was able snag the last bags of Lay's chips.  It was amazing to watch people wrestle for water as the workers brought pallets of new stock to the empty shelves.

Last night I got my first call from a resident who lost power at around 5:00PM.  When I checked the utility company website it showed that only 30 homes in town had last power, so I figured it would be very localized.  However, at 5:30PM, our power went out.  I went out immediately to assess how widespread the outages were and most people around us still had power.  After an hour, we decided to head to the Maroney's, who still had power, and hang out in the lights.  By the time we got there, the winds were really picking up with gusts well over 75 mph.

90 minutes after we arrived at the Maroney's, their power went out.  When I checked the utility company website, it indicated that outages were about 50% of households.  Knowing how the utility companies work, I knew that the lights would not come on for days at this point.  We left the Maroney's around midnight and slept at home last night.

I awoke around 8AM and got dressed and headed out to assess the area.  Everything around us was out and lots of trees were uprooted and laying on the ground and across utility wires.  This would take a long time to clean up.

I headed down to Flemington to see if the commercial area was without power as well.  To my surprise, the Flemington Circle area had power.  2-3 gas stations, a 7-11, and a Dunkin Donuts.  Even though I had a little more than 3/4 of a tank, I decided to top off and then get some coffee and I am glad that I did.  There was hardly any line at the gas station (that would change later in the day), but the line at the Dunkin Donuts was like a bread line from the 1930's.  7-11 only had a few customers, so I got a couple of coffees and a chocolate milk for Heather.

I dropped the coffee and milk at home for Vicki and Heather and headed to town hall to meet with the Chief of Police.  Seeing the power on in Flemington, gave me hope that the situation was not that bad.  However, after we toured the area (see picture) and were briefed by our Department of Public Works, I knew it was going to be very bad.  Essentially, 90%+ of the town was without power and our town was no different than others in NJ.  The towns closer to the coast and on the coast got it much worse as you probably saw in the news.

At this point we are looking at a minimum of 7-10 days without power which is a problem for people like me who get anxious after 7-10 minutes without power.

As the day progressed, things got both better and worse.  It got better in the sense that everyone, including those outside the area, expressed concern and understanding to the devastation in NJ. It got worse in the sense that my fears of 7-10 days were confirmed as a best case scenario on a conference call with state officials.  Essentially, there were over 20,000 sites within the utility infrastructure (down poles, trees on lines, blown transformers, etc.) that needed attention and only 1200 crews available to do the work.  Because the work is very dangerous, there are limits to what volunteers could do to without training - this is something that I am going to follow up with Governor Christie on.

TJ and Sarah were doing OK.  TJ stayed in New Brunswick and his power came back on in the late afternoon.  Sarah hung out with her friends.  There was rumors that Rutgers would cancel classes for the whole week.

After I hung up the from the conference call with the utility company, the Chief called me and said the there was a steakhouse in Flemington open.  So I called Vicki and said I would come by and pick her and Heather up for dinner.  On my way home, I drove through both Somerville and Flemington and there were a few gas stations open.  The lines were about 50-75 cars at each place - power was not going to be the problem - it would be supply.  After I picked up Vicki and Heather and drove by the same gas station - they were out.

The wait at the restaurant was about hour and we hung at the bar.  Normally, we would balk at such a wait.  Not tonight - we could hang at the bar and watch the news and we did.  The news highlights showed the highlights of the devastation around NJ and the images were generally worse than anything that I saw in person today.  So no matter how bad we had it, others had it worse.

We will go to bed early tonight and get up to see what another day holds.

Tony Rumjog