As I type this, I’ve spent 17:30 on the phone trying to book a hotel reservation for an industry trade show. The “conference rate,” which involves pre-allocating a block of rooms in exchange for tacit endorsement of the hotel as a preferred venue, is a substantial break over the hotel’s normal mid-week rack rate. Because […]
Hotel reservations Read More »
In 2005, I looked at the economies of bike commuting. It elicited a lot of good questions . Generally, I made a lot of simplifying assumptions, avoiding counting anything that would require a double-blind scientific study. For example, one of the biggest, immeasurable arguments is “improvement to health and exercise.” An additional cost, also immeasurable,
Costs of bike commuting Read More »
As a numberphile, I often find amusement in tracking numbers and analyzing the results in different ways. For example, when I flew, I maintained a logbook of every landing, aircraft type and flight conditions. In the unlikely event I would be quizzed, I could rattle off a variety of facts like “the last night landing
A few months ago, my FSA administrator company went bankrupt. My company covered my potential exposure — about $380 — so after reading some of the headlines, I forgot about it. Today, I received a copy of the blog posting used as a vehicle for communicating to the broad group of people affected by this.
As happened to Susan, my American Express/Costco card went AWOL. I’ve been through this enough that I have a theory how it happens: Unlike WalMart, the “greeter” at Costco’s entrance is primarily there to ensure I’m an actual Costco member. Sometimes they’ll hand me coupons valid for the following week. (“Six thousand tooth brushes for
Squeaky clean AmEx card Read More »
I’m coming down from yesterday’s math-dorphin high, having found the optimal point for the set of variables. How did I do? Be there to conduct my business. Uh-huh. Minimize the cost to the company – This was trickier than I had hoped. The airfares for Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday departures were $880, $911, $1,400
The trip is booked… Read More »
Business trips bring out one of my weaknesses: trying to exploit the airline pricing system for my own, secretive purposes. For example, I finally have a set of dates for Norway (Germany fell-through) and have spent waaaaaay too much time trying to balance the factors important to me: Be there to conduct my business. Obviously.
I was at work until 9:30 this evening building demos for the trade show next week. This is the latest I’ve biked home since the summer, and it wasn’t too bad: very light traffic, wet roads, 34°F and clear sky illuminated by a sliver-short-of-full moon. Near home, it got interesting. The temperature had dipped below
Having an ICE ride home Read More »