Author: Bob Benz

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Transcendental Bob

Aspen solitude




aspens.jpg

Originally uploaded by Suffering the Benz

Business travel normally sucks, but last week we held a retreat in Utah, not far from Park City. It was a great trip and gave me a chance to tromp around in the mountains a bit. I’d forgotten how completely, utterly sublime a stand of swaying aspens can be. I tried to capture them with my camera but had only limited success. I uploaded photos of the aspens and our pontoon excursion at Jordanelle State Park here on my Flickr account..

We could smell forest fires that are raging in central Utah while we were there. The smoke and ash added drama to the sky at sunset, but we didn’t see any flames firsthand.

As a perfect close to the trip, I managed to snag first-class upgrades on my flights home. Both flew on time. Sometimes the travel gods smile upon me …

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Travel Bob

Close encounter with Bill Gates in Peru?

Since I returned from Peru, I’ve been corresponding via e-mail with “Dennis of Cusco,” one of the street kids we met there. I received the following note from Dennis yesterday. I have no idea if it’s true. These kids can be pretty crafty, and in the same note about Bill Gates, Dennis makes an appeal for financial help with his education. But with that caveat, here’s his account:

“I was selling postcards June 24 at about 8:00 p.m. I was at the Plaza de Armas, and I went to the ” Hotel Monastery ” to sell postcards for a moment, and four people went out of the hotel. I did not offer them anything, but I decided to discreetly follow them, and they walked first along a few places that are not very touristy and went away later to the ” Plaza de Armas.”
And in the Plaza de Armas, I tried to sell them, I recognized one of them because I read a bit of his life on the Internet, and he was Bill Gates. I tied to sell them, and I told a few jokes, as when you and your friend Jackson were in the Cusco, but only three persons laughed, two women and man. But Bill Gates did not, and later for a joke I bought myself two postcards for 10 Soles, but I wanted to try to sell Bill Gates, but I was treated like he did not seem me, he was very quiet, but I wanted to speak to him, and I spoke to him.

“But he was not saying anything, and later the woman said I could take a photo with him (but I did not have camera). The woman was very nice, and later I said to her that he was a good person, and I went away, and when I went away, there were two persons who him who were continuing for a long time, because when I was in the Hotel Monastery, it should try to sell first two persons, were one of the UNITED STATES and I believe one was from Peru, but they were very discreet, and when I went away, the Peruvian said to me ” molestoso you are “, and I went away.

“I think, I am a very lucky person because not even the press could find Bill Gates in thePlaza de Armas of Cusco, and I was the only one trying to sell postcards to the famous Bill Gates.

“You can believe that Bill Gates walked along the ” Plaza de Armas ” of Cusco, and I was the only person who recognized him.

“Until another day dear friend Bob.

“Your friend dennis del Cusco.”

(This translation is pretty mangled, since it was run through an online translator. I tried to smooth it out some, but my Spanish is very elementary. Here’s the original:)

Continue reading “Close encounter with Bill Gates in Peru?”
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Assorted Bob

Cool stuff …

Several interesting tidbits that have been building over the past several days/weeks:

  • Bottoms up: Got into some moonshine Friday night, and it was great stuff. A friend of mine is working on a documentary about disappearing Appalachian lifestyles, and one of the people they’re profiling is Popcorn Sutton, an infamous moonshiner. My friend had the presence of mind to buy a jug of Popcorn’s finest, which Popcorn even signed for him. It really was amazing. Not the wince-inducing turpentine most people think of when someone mentions moonshine. Check this out for a great photo of Popcorn.
  • Financial bliss: When I switched to a Mac at home, the only regret I had was not being able to find decent financial software. MS Money, which I liked pretty well on PC, wasn’t available, and Quicken, which I eventually settled for, simply sucks. It’s clearly a PC program that was puked over onto the Mac platform. Last week, I stumbled upon iBank. After poking around with it for a bit, I’ve dumped Quicken and made the switch. It’s designed for OS X and behaves accordingly. Only two complaints thus far: It doesn’t allow you to have “twice monthly” automated transactions, but I found a workaround for that by scheduling two monthly transactions, one of the 1st and one on the 15th; and it is a little goofy when you go to assign categories, forcing you to back out to the category option if the one you want to assign doesn’t already exist. Minor issues, compared to the supreme kludginess of Quicken.
  • Jazz find: They played a tune from Michael Blake’s 2002 recording “Elevated” on the public radio jazz show this week. Loved it. Told iTunes to fetch me a copy. I’ve been listening to it non-stop. Definitely worth picking up a copy.
  • Jerry’s Newfs: Read Phil Lesh’s biography several weeks ago. Some interesting inside stuff about the Dead’s early years, but the most interesting fact I found in the book was that Garcia had a pair of Newfs that he swam with during one of his attempts to get clean and fit.
  • Let’s get passive aggressive: I’ve been having great fun reading Passiveaggressivenotes.com on a daily basis. Some of the notes posted on there are a total scream.