I seriously hope that the guys from Improv Everywhere will someday plan to pull a prank when I’m in New York for work.  I would take part in a heartbeat.  I first heard about the group of pranksters through a sports site that linked to a joke they pulled on a large section of Yankee Stadium.  As a read it, I found myself cracking up out loud all alone in my hotel room.  Recently, I’ve gone through and watched a great deal of their past missions.  A great deal of them are just so clever and elaborate.  I’d have to say my favorites are The Moebius, Ted’s Birthday, No Pants 2k6, Best Buy, and Ben Folds Fake.  It kind of makes me want to think up things to pull in Kansas City.

As I was sitting in a plane Friday prior to takeoff, a man in a suit walked onboard and sat down in the seat next to me.  The guy looked really familiar yet I couldn’t think of his name at all.  Soon, though, he dialed a number on his Blackberry and said, “Hey, Jim, this is Sam Brownback calling you back.”  Of course it was him.  I can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner.  This was going to be one interesting plane ride sitting next to a state senator and ‘08 presidential hopeful.

I don’t know a whole lot about Mr. Brownback to be honest.  I know he’s a pretty right-wing conservative, and an article I read recently in Rolling Stone made him out to seem a tad extreme when it came to his religious ideals.  I wasn’t going to outright tell him that I knew who he was right after sitting down, though.  Instead, I figured I’d just try to chat with him a little once we’d been flying for a while.  I wouldn’t argue or debate with the guy, but I really thought it would be interesting to pick his brain a little. 

Unfortunately, no such moments ended up happening because a couple seats two rows ahead of us were empty so he decided to move up to give us both room.  I think it’s safe to say that he likely immediately regretted his decision, though.  As soon as he sat down, a heavy middle-aged woman from across the aisle said, “Excuse me, I’m a huge fan of yours.”  She then proceeded to talk his ear off as he was trying to read the newspaper.  She was absolutely beaming and couldn’t stop flapping her gums.  I felt kind of bad for ol’ Sam because it looked like the scene in Airplane where the main character keeps talking to the old lady and she’s completely uninterested.  Then, a stewardess recognized him, noticed that he had a banana that he was planning to eat with his sandwich, and proceeded to talk nonstop for TEN MINUTES about bananas to him.  It was painful to watch, and I was getting a little irritated just watching these two buffoons try to strike a conversation with a guy that just wanted to relax a little.  I realize that he’s a politician and it comes with the territory but it was still ridiculous.  Brownback ended up cutting his banana in half and giving it to the the flight attendant which I thought was amusing. 

Before my flight took off, I texted a handful of friends to let them know I was next to Sam Brownback.  Even my staunch Republican friends ended up texting me back telling me that I needed to convince him not to run for president.  He may not be the best politician, but at least he’s doing his part to make sure others are getting their daily fruit intake.

I am just now getting over one of the worst cases of stomach flu I’ve experienced in my lifetime.  I’m not sure if it was a flu or food poisoning, but whatever it was, I think it’s safe to say that I pretty much gave myself the equivalent of a high colonic over the course of the past 36 hours.  While I won’t go into too many details, I was pretty much going #1 out of the ol’ #2 hole on an average of once every 45 minutes ALL DAY yesterday. Of course, there were also frequent trips to the toilet to purge out the other end, as well. 

To make matters worse, I had to drive from Boston to Rhode Island yesterday to speak at a meeting.  I then had to drive back to Boston, get on a plane to DC, and present at a meeting early this afternoon in Virginia.  I don’t know how I did it.  Thank goodness for Kaopectate and Pepto Bismol.  I seriously think I should have gone into acting.

Man, I’ve really been slacking with the posting lately.  It’s weird because I feel like I haven’t had much down time to write on here during the week, and I’m too concerned with being with friends or relaxing on the weekends to find motivation to blog.  I did, however, have a pretty fun-filled week and weekend that I feel obliged to write about. 

For starters, I was in NYC again last week.  While most of my work took place in New Jersey, I was able to spend some time in the city while my friend Alicia was on her first trip to NYC.  Knowing we were going to be in town at the same time, I decided to press my luck and put my name in for David Letterman tickets again.  Lo and behold, I was called again and got tickets for the Monday taping for the show to be aired on Friday.  The first time I saw Letterman a couple months ago, the main guest was Richard Simmons.  This time, it was Dan Rather.  While I was definitely hoping for an A-lister or someone I was a big fan of, I found the things Rather said to be very interested despite the fact that he’s about the opposite of Simmons on the excitement scale.

Prior to going to Letterman, we went to the Museum of Modern Art.  I’d been wanting to go to it for a while, and I’m glad that I was able to check it out.  I completely didn’t expect to see works by Van Gogh (Starry Night was there), Monet, Picasso, and a bunch of others being that the place is supposed to be for modern art.  The downside to the visit was that I really only liked about 30% of the art in the place.  I mean, there were seriously giant canvasses painted one color and people were gathered around it in awe.  Stuff like that doesn’t really do it for me. 

The next night, I ended up seeing my first Broadway show.  I was kind of nervous about which show to see because, while I appreciate musicals, I know for a fact that I’d hate anything too happy and cheesy.  We settled on Rent.  I figured that’d be a safe choice because, after all, the story is about AIDS, dying, and being poor.  If there was a show that wasn’t happy or cheesy, that was it.  I ended up thinking it was good — not great, but good.  The first half had me thinking I wasted my money and was doomed to never appreciate Broadway shows.  The second half really pulled it together, though, and I’m hoping to try out some other shows down the road.

I met up with friends the following night to celebrate my buddy Todd’s birthday.  It’s always great to see those guys, and I was glad that the timing of my trip worked out the way it did.  As always, one of the first questions they asked was if I was moving to NYC yet.  I’ve been trying to see if I can move there for work, and there are a couple kinks that need to be worked out in order for me to move.  It’s not set in stone that I’ll be moving, but I would welcome the opportunity if it come along.  Only time will tell, though.

I saw posters everywhere for a new Eddie Murphy movie called Norbit while I was in New York this week.  It’s starting to make me wonder if the guy has it in his contract that he can only star in movies with red font for the title.  Pretty weird if you ask me.

Man, this weather stuff is the pits.  I realize it’s really not all THAT bad considering the winter has been mild so far, but I have a hard time driving anywhere with my rear-wheel drive car when it’s like this.  I left work about an hour early on Friday to try and beat the snow storm, and I ended up getting stopped in my tracks while trying to drive up the hill by Bernstein-Rein.  I was doing everything to move just the slightest bit, but I wasn’t getting anywhere.  The other cars, though, had no problems as the zoomed by me.  I even contemplated going in reverse against traffic just to try to get onto another street.  Luckily, I reached the top of the hill after about ten minutes and it was smooth sailing from there.

I’m now at the KC airport waiting to fly out to NYC for the week.  All flights after mine have been canceled for the day, and my flight has been pushed back two hours now.  I have my fingers crossed that I’ll get out of here today.  The good news, though, is that I’m going to see David Letterman again tomorrow with a friend of mine who is in town.  I also have a couple friends who will be celebrating birthdays there, as well.  It should be a good time…if I ever get there.

People always seem to ask me if I have a preference with what hotel chain I prefer to stay each week when I’m on the road.  It’s really quite interesting to see how loyal people are to their hotels.  I’m a Marriott guy first, but I’ll stay at Hilton’s or Sheraton’s if worse comes to worse.  While I personally think the Marriott Rewards program is better than the others, there is one reason that sets Marriott hotels apart from the others: they wash the top sheets. 

Most, if not all, other chains just wash the regular sheets without cleaning their comforters.  It’s disgusting to think about what disgusting fluids and germs are embedded in the comforter fibers.  Marriott, though, has sheets below and above the comforter that are taken off and washed every night which is so great to know.  The comforter issue is especially problematic for me because I like to sleep on my side with my ear covered.  When I’m in a non-Marriott hotel I have to alter how I sleep because I don’t want to dirty comforter coming anywhere near my face.  Not fun.

I’m staying in a Sheraton in Times Square right now, and I haven’t had very good nights of sleep thus far.  Sure, the comforter is very comfortable, but I had to return one comforter because of some white stains on it. They replaced it with yet another comforter with some questionable markings, as well.  It’s gross and makes me miss my Marriott.  Hopefully I’ll get a better night of sleep tonight.  I’ll just have to not think about that horny, hairy Samoan couple that used my comforter before I got here.

Call me crazy, but I was a tad apprehensive about taking four days off of work to spend time with the family in Branson, MO.  The family part I was looking forward to, but the Branson part really didn’t excite me much.  I really didn’t know what to expect from the place, but I had a pretty good idea that only two types of people enjoyed vacationing there: old people and hicks.  I decided I was going to have to go into it with a strong sense of humor if I was going to enjoy the trip.

My first impression of Branson was that of an odd, if not extreme, feeling of annoyance and frustration.  Before we were in Branson my eyes were bombarded with billboards touting their amazing shows and talented performers.  It was kind of like Vegas in a way except Vegas has some pretty well known entertainers.  Branson, however, has a show featuring an Elvis impersonator, one of Beatles impersonators, Yakov Smirnoff, Lee Greenwood, and many different shows showcasing the talents of various families for all to see.  Those were the ones that saddened me the most.  For example, you’d see a colorful billboard with the headline, “Come See the Amazing McGillicutty Family!” and there’d be photos of their seven year old daughter twirling sparklers while the mom played the kazoo and the accordion at the same time to the image of an American Flag in the background.  When we actually got to Branson, there were wax museums and a Ripley’s Believe It or Not building sprinkled in between tourist shops that sold Branson memorabilia and pro-U.S. propaganda.  It actually kind of made me sick to my stomach to know that there was a pretty decent-sized segment of the population that was genuinely drawn to all this stuff.  Thankfully, I was exposed to the worst of Branson early on and the rest of the trip my family had planned wasn’t nearly as bad.

We arrived at the condo we were renting for the week long enough to drop our stuff off before heading over to Silver Dollar City.  I first thought Silver Dollar City was a casino or something based on the name, but it’s actually a theme park set to the theme of the mid-1800s with rides.  Of course, there are some photo opps along the way for families to snap some pictures, and we definitely took part.

At night, they put on four million lights throughout the park and it’s really pretty amazing.  The whole park feels like you’re walking through a giant land of Lite-Brites.

We ended up going to Silver Dollar City twice while we were in town.  The first time, we saw a couple pretty good plays. The first was of A Christmas Carroll and the other was about the birth of Jesus.  The second day was spent riding rides and watching a play featuring a large talking Christmas tree.  The play was for kids so my littlest sister enjoyed it.  I got a kick out of it because the tree sang Christmas songs and everyone, including my dad, sang along.  It was quite the sight.

The rides were pretty good even though I’m a giant wuss and don’t go on many of them.  My sis and I, however, totally rocked the Dumbo ride.  We were pretty excited about it.

As we were leaving the park on the second day, we stopped to see a tree that featured lights choreographed to Christmas music.  My parents said it was kind of neat when they saw it before, but I think we may have gotten a dud performance.  The lights really didn’t seem all that in sync with the music, but it was still entertaining.

We also went to two shows outside of the theme park while in Branson.  We saw Jim Stafford do a show which had some moments of good entertainment amidst the cheese.  I didn’t care for some of the tacky moments as well as the fact that he used his two young kids quite a bit as part of the show.  I mean, his closing song was of his two kids playing piano while he played harmonica to “Memory” from the musical Cats.  As he finished his song with a video of exploding fireworks playing behind him, a large lady with a Southern accent turned to her kids and proclaimed with a wide grin on her face, “Now THAT’s why you go to Branson, kids.  THAT’s why you go to Branson!”  Indeed.

We also went to Dolly Parton’s Dixie Stampede which is set up like of like Medieval Times only with horse competition set to a Christmas theme instead of knights riding horses and stabbing each other with jousts.  It was pretty cool, actually, despite the fact that it was mostly aimed towards kids.  My sister and I were chosen to actually participate in the show, too.  We were first asked to be in the show and then we were told we’d be riding on horses which freaked me out.  Once we got out there, we found out that we were going to take part in a race and we had to ride stick horses around in a circle.  Luckily, our group won and my sis and I were awarded a medal for our awesomeness.  There was also a pretty great juggler that warmed up the crowed before the show.  My littlest sister was chosen to throw a ball for him to catch and spin on top of a ladder which was really cool because all of the siblings were chosen to participate in the show in some way.

While I can’t say I could ever see myself returning to Branson any time soon, I will say that the trip was very entertaining to say the least.

I’ve been meaning to post about my trip to Branson last week, but I decided to write about New Year’s first.  Instead of paying up to $100 at a bar to bring in the new year, my buddy Josh threw a party with his roommates.  The party was complete with tons of snacks, great music, Boulevard Wheat kegs, countless bottles of liquor, and even a flippy cup table.  A few friends decided to travel from out of town so we made sure to do it up right.  My sister brought a couple of her friends, too, including her new boyfriend whom I had yet to meet. 

The fun started in the early evening and kept going until well after 3. 

Josh, Rachel, and I posed for another one of our famous shots.  This is the 6th or 7th of the exact same pose that we do whenever we get to see each other.

Just before midnight, Jessica transformed into a cocktail waitress and distributed Champaign out to the party-goers. I had no lady to smooch after the ball dropped, but I didn’t care too much.

Soon after it was officially 2007, the radio got cranked up and people started dancing all over.

Shortly after watching Josh perform “Don’t Stop Believin’” with a nutcracker doll, some of the members of our clan wanted to check out the bar scene.  We headed to nearby Westport and proceeded to have more fun.  In trying to get a laugh from my group, I ended up doing something that, in hindsight, was pretty darn disgusting.  I spotted a woman with missing teeth, ran over to her and asked if she was able to get a midnight kiss.  She replied that she hadn’t so I planted one right on her lips.  My sister was completely mortified but also ended up crying from laughter.  Mission accomplished.  The worst part of it, though, was that she was looking for me as the bars closed.  I had to hide behind my friends to avoid being spotted.  It was a close call.  Normally I don’t care for New Years because it’s so overhyped.  This year, though, everyone had a blast.