Route 53 - Life is A Highway, Travels: The Route 53

Palm’s Place (Vegas)

March 7, 2010 erikhom@aol.com 2 Comments

The Palm’s Place (Las Vegas, NV)

4381 West Flamingo Road, Las Vegas, NV 89103
Reservations: L 702-932-7777 | F 702-944-3257 |

http://www.palmsplace.com

The Palm’s Place in Vegas offers the perfect alternative for someone who enjoys the glitz and glamour of the Vegas club scene but likes to retire to the peace and quiet sanctuary that bigger hotels don’t offer, yet keeps the flair and sense of style that made Vegas famous during the Rat Pack years. There is something about driving up to a hotel in Las vegas without seeing any cabs. There is even more when you walk into the lobby of a Vegas hotel and realize there are no slot machines, gambling tables in sight! The peace and quiet was deafening. Oh, and you couldn’t smell a hint of cigarettes or cigars.

Upon a longer stay you will also note there are few chambermaids (not sure if we ever saw one) blocking your hallways or chattering outside your room. The front desk was very helpful with reservations and providing us with amenities into the nightclubs at the Palm’s Casino.

Originally designed as condos only by the Maloof brothers, many went unsold and are used as hotel rooms. Included among the amenities are a beautiful spa, a great restaurant, beautiful pool with cabanas, and a quiet bar. Separated from the Palm’s Casino by a 300 yard indoor moving walkway which protects you from the Winter cold or the Summer heat, one has access to the casino, top concerts, movieplex and 4 top notch clubs (Ghost Bar, the World’s only Playboy Club, Rain, and Moon) without ever needing to step outside, deal with coat checks, valets, or taxis. It should be noted that when makeing a reservation one should also check the Palm’s Place for specials which might get you priotity access to one of the clubs, spa credits, restaurant discounts and/or free drinks. A recent stay in December 2009 netted $50 in restaurant credits, a free entry for two to the spa, and two drinks at the bar (the bartender served us another on the house)

The Simon Lounge Restaurant looks over the pool deck which offers a very open feeling and probably some good people watching during the summer months. The food while good probably isn’t up to par with what you would find at Caesar’s or the bellagio, but it was above average and with a $50 credit, we weren’t being picky.

The Palm’s Place rooms offer private balconies with views of the casino as well as the entire Strip as it sits on Flamingo across the highway (a $10 cab ride to Caesar’s). Each room provides a modern efficiency kitchen, spacious bathroom with jacuzzi bath and walk in rain spout shower. The jacuzzi tub is encased in frosted transluscent glass which seems to be the new architectural feature du jour (see the Thompson LES review) along with the rain spout shower (see Carneros Inn).

As one who believes that cooking while on vacation is not a vacation, I am usually not a fan of condominiums, but this room was very well done. I like full service resorts and hotels with great little amenities, stylistic design and great service. The Palm’s Place is definitely an upgrade over the Palm’s Casino.

Most of the rooms are designed as studio suites. So they might not be large enough for many. A note about a condominium that is designed for a GQ bachelor. The room had two flat screen TVs, a lounging area that you could sleep in, mirrored walls with New Century stone wall accents to make the room feel larger than it is. There still is only one bathroom, one sink, etc. The lighting is subtle and the room might feel like a night club even in the middle of the day.

There is a 2 bedroom option which has a unique feature of a soaking bathtub in the window overlooking the Strip. You can’t get more fabulous that that!

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Running for my Wife

March 1, 2010 erikhom@aol.com 2 Comments

Bronze medalist Joannie Rochette

For all of the plans we’ve made,
There isn’t a flag I’d wave,
Don’t care if we bend,
I’d sink us to swim,
We’re marching on,

– Marching On by One Republic

As I watched Olympic skater carry the Canadian flag tonight the words to the One Republic song, Marching On, came to my mind. The courage of the young lady from Canada who performed her best just days after her mother died captured the heart of the whole world. Marching on….. People ask how she did it. When asked, she replied that she was able to get into a zone and for those few minutes on the ice her focus was on competition and not on her own personal grief. For Joannie, it was her 3 minutes of outer body experience. The focus and determination needed to compete consumed her. The same was for Lindsay Vonn suffereing days earlier from a shin injury. As soon as her run was completed, she collapsed. These stories repeated themselves over and over again. There was the story of the cross-country skier who pulled herself out of the hospital to compete and get a bronze medal only to collapse at the finish line and be taken back to the hospital.

With these stories, you can very much understand where Joannie is coming from. Finding that place to escape has been what has helped my wife and I move on past her cancer. Escaping the day to day worries and immersing ourselves in other tasks has driven us for the last 18 months. Yes there still are the monthly shots, the black and blue marks, the pills, etc. which remind you every day. Monthly I catch a glance at her abdomen which is bandaged from her monthly shot and am reminded of where we’ve been and how far we’ve come.

Tonight it hit me when I logged in and saw that I had reached 2500 miles. That is 2500 miles I’ve run since my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer. I’m not sure why, but I decided early on that this was going to be my own cause and I was going to use our pain and will to survive to drive my exercise. I remember being so grateful to her doctors that I vowed to personally contribute $.50 for every mile I ran to the hospital’s foundation. I didn’t want to be part of a large walkathon or other event for a national plan, but I needed to make this my own personal journey, my own run for my health and for my wife. This battle with my wife’s cancer was personal although I valued the community of survivors who gave words of encouragement and wisdom.

I can’t remember half those miles run. I was running numb and hiding from my pain and my fears. I remember some of those nights right after her surgery when I would put her to sleep and then just go for a run fighting back the tears at first and then those fears turned into energy fueled by my passion to not feel sorry and to start wanting to make a difference. I understand where Joannie Rochette was mentally when she skated this past week. Her inner strength and will to do her best under such extreme scrutiny and pressure in the face of such heartache was fueled by her passion and her will.

When we finished a recent vacation with our kids to our favorite resort, the hotel staff told us how they missed us. We missed them too. We had gone almost every year until we were given my wife’s diagnosis. Why hadn’t we returned earlier? I guess we just weren’t ready to truly resume our lives in a care free manner. It has taken us that long to feel like we can celebrate our opportunity to move on in life. We almost wondered if we had waited too long. We sat out on our lanai as our children slept at night and felt the sea breezes on our faces and asked that question. It didn’t matter. We were just happy to enjoy our wonderful spot again together. It was good to be in our happy place.

Cancer sites can be a very great resource for community therapy. In fact we have made so many friends and are especially grateful to a friend in Hawaii who showers us with gifts and has really truly helped my wife as a personal confidante on many recovery issues. Other than that, though, there has been a separate private struggle to return to normalcy. The struggle is to keep busy, do the things you love and get on with the things you always wanted to do, yet find the balance to give back and show your gratitude to those who helped along the way. My personal donation of running for my own charity and benefit for my wife’s cancer is not a poke against the Susan G. Komen walk or the Avon walk. For me, my wife’s battle with cancer was a personal matter and I wanted to give it back on my own time and my own terms and for my own personal battle with the pavement.

Route 53 - Life is A Highway

The Rio All-Suites (Vegas)

March 1, 2010 erikhom@aol.com Leave a comment

Rio All-Suites Hotel ( a Harrah’s Property)

3700 W Flamingo Rd
Las Vegas, NV 89103
(702) 777-7634

www.riolasvegas.com

This is my second review of this hotel. Please feel free to look into the archives.

If size is your thing, the Rio All-Suites is one of the better bangs for your buck in Las Vegas if you aren’t traveling on some kind of loyalty package. If you are in the Masquerade Tower (Ipanema is the other) you’ll have a nice view of the Strip although you will be far from the convention area. The rooms are quite spacious in size although those who prefer a luxurious bathroom will be sorely disappointed. Many of the newer and modern hotels have better amenities than the Rio which is in need of a bit of a refurbishment. There is an odd feature of a see-through window from the bath/shower into the bedroom, but other than that the room is pretty much non-descript. I’m not an interior designer, but the decor of the room (the bedspread) was definitely not appealing to me. An update is definitely needed.

In need of some repairs, my room had chair rails falling off the wall. Additionally, my in-room wireless service was spotty. I told the front desk and they admitted it was a problem and removed the charges from my bill. Overall, those looking for rooms at roughly $129 a night with a large living area and floor to ceiling windows will find some appeal to the room.

Most people attending the Rio are there for the moderate pricing dining and non-pretentious environment off the Strip that reminds one more of the crowd that might be found in downtown Vegas. The other hotels located close by are the Gold Coast Casino next door, which is the economy hotel, and the more luxurious Palms across the way. The Palms though has recently been advertising specials comparable to the Rio pricing.

Shows of note at the hotel are Penn & Teller, the comedic magic duo, as well as the Chippendales revue (yes I saw and heard screaming women as I walked by and saw a few women giggling in the elevator with Chippendales bracelets. The marquee restaurant is the VooDoo steak house which affords more great views. I would say the food is modestly okay for a steak house but there are probably better steak houses in Vegas.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Business - Affiliate Marketing

Internet Marketing from the Real Experts

February 3, 2010 erikhom@aol.com 1 Comment

Internet Marketing My Shawn Collins and Missy Ward

At our recent Affiliate Summit, the organizers, Shawn Collins and Missy Ward unveiled their new book Internet Marketing From the Real Experts, a compilation of lessons from many of our colleagues in the internet marketing world.

The book has quickly risen into the top 1200 list on Amazon with very little marketing….or should I say traditional marketing. The beauty of a book written about internet marketing is that it will likely be marketed well by those who wrote it. In fact, the Gang of 88, as the contributing writers are called, are all marketing the book in their own way in blogs, on Facebook, on Twitter, etc. Shawn and Missy also gave an incentive by giving all people who wrote a review online a silver pass to their next Affiliate Summit in New York in August.

The book is a quick read and for those of us in the business many of the “3 minute anecdotes” might seem trivial but for someone just entering the game and wanting some quick reference points will find this book to be a good useful starting point. While I found myself shaking my head at some passages I also found myself nodding my head at others. There are probably sections I might never read, but that is why the book was written this way.

The book is written so that you can skip around and find the parts relevant to you. Want thoughts on Twitter and Social Media? There is a chapter. Want to know about SEO and SEM? Video? There are sections dedicated to those topics as well. The articles are based upon the writings from the first 7 issues of the of their magazine Feed Front. Some might look at the title and say, “experts”? Well maybe the writers aren’t experts, but they are real people in the industry who do the dayd to day work. Thay aren’t professors or pontificators, but really the people on the affiliate line on a daily basis.

I could go on and on, but I don’t want to reveal too much about the book because I think those interested should purchase the book themselves. Still not sure if this book is for you and perhaps would like a reason to purchase a marketing book? At $14.93 on Amazon the book is a bargain, but not just for the knowledge gained, but because all proceeds from the sale of the book go to benefit and help the Fight Against Breast Cancer, a cause near and dear to the hearts of the authors and those in the industry.

While at the Summit I kiddingly asked Shawn to sign the copy included in my bag. He laughed and I told him I wasn’t kidding. Admittedly he was more distracted by the football game on the screen in front of him as his beloved Jets were playing in the playoffs.

I didn’t read what he wrote until returned home. Hmmmmm, looks like I might have to write something for Feed Front to be included in the next edition. Perhaps the ongoing struggle of running affiliate programs within larger corporations.

Route 53 - Life is A Highway

4 years later – Thanks Dad

January 29, 2010 erikhom@aol.com Leave a comment

“Erik, let’s be careful out there, and take care of your body” – My dad as he used to coin the phrase from the show Hill St. Blues and then add his usual sign-off.

Not really much to say right now. I have about 5 posts all ready to be sent out for this blog but I have been a bit distracted. It is always a tough time of year for me. This week marks 4 years since my dad passed away and every night when I run or before I go to bed my mind has been racing with memories of good times and thinking, “What would my dad do?” it has kind of been a distraction and as the week comes to an end, I think my week of reflection has helped me with clarity.

In many ways my solitude runs at night have been my conversations, my wake up calls, my time alone with my dad. In a way, I like to think the hooligans (a word my dad would have used) who tried to hit me with eggs as I ran the other night were just my dad having some fun with me. I think my dad would have laughed if I came home covered in eggs.

As kids we look at our moms and dads and never really think of them as children of other people and the bond that they have with their parents. I’m sure my kids don’t realize how much I miss him, but the photos of us playing golf and laughing are all around the house and I think there are enough memories for my children to let them know how important a relationship is between a child and their father and how lucky they are to have one.

As I head into the weekend to become a full-time dad for 48 hours ….my memories of dad might fade..but they will always make me smile……Thanks Dad for still being here in spirit.

Business - Affiliate Marketing, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

A New Decade of Affiliate Marketing: New Questions? Or Just the Same?

January 15, 2010 erikhom@aol.com Leave a comment

Intuition becomes increasingly valuable in the new information society precisely because there is so much data.

– John Naisbitt, American Author and businessman

It’s the eve of our main annual Affiliate Marketing Industry conference (Affiliate Summit) and a couple of people have asked me how I see this next year and decade shaping up compared to the past 10 years in the industry.

On the surface there are many obvious changes, but we should look deeper. A decade ago (2000) BeFree and Linkshare as well as large merchants roamed the industry. Today there are many more networks and less merchants and less independent affiliates roaming the halls in my view. The era of banner creatives and tool bars have now progressed into RSS Feeds, widgets and APIs. The names Marciano, Messer and Gerace are now replaced by Collins, Ward, and Brogan. Online communities such as eCircles, Geocities and the Tribe have now been overtaken by Myspace, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook. One thing is for sure the affiliate marketing industry has evolved and matured, certain vertical areas have consolidated ,and many in the industry have learned to fuse either their marketing savvy with their technology hutzpah or vice versa.

Some people such as Owen Van Natta have taken that prowess to the next level. 10 years ago Owen was was in Business Development having led the Amazon Associates affiliate program. Today he is the CEO of MySpace. 10 years ago, Todd Crawford was this upstart with a company called Commission Junction. He sold that network and is now starting the new decade with the launch of a new business which we will likely be hearing more about over the next couple of weeks and especially at this conference. I look forward to hearing the pitch from Todd and his partners.

There are other issues. Even certain industries within affiliate marketing are changing. In the music space, for instance, 10 years ago people would buy a $12.99 CD from Amazon and get an 8-10% commission. Today, more people are buying downloads of single songs from iTunes or $.99 and the affiliate commission is only $.05. This is such that recorded music has disappeared in the affiliate music space as an interesting option.

Okay, so the technology has advanced, the channels have changed, some industries have changed and if the faces haven’t changed they definitely have become a little bit older, but what hasn’t changed is that basic marketing and sales principles can not and should not be ignored.

What will the next decade have in store for the Affiliate Marketing Industry?

Will it work in mobile? Is it Click to call?

(To be continued)

Route 53 - Life is A Highway

I wear Slip-ons and I got Junk…so what?

January 10, 2010 erikhom@aol.com Leave a comment

When you look at the Asians, the Asian is very gifted in creation, creativity and inventions. If you go to Japan or any Asian country, they can turn a television into a watch. They’re very creative. – Reggie White, former NFL start and Hall of Famer.

Okay…this is totally off topic for me. Well not so much, but recently I’ve come across a couple of racial stereotypes about Asians. Nahhh, I’m not offput by either of them. They were both done harmlessly although one I found to be one I relate to and the other made me look at myself in the mirror.

So the first one has to do with the trailer for the new movie, “Up In the Air”. Have you seen it? There’s a part where George Clooney’s character says he likes to get behind Asians in line at the airport because we are fast especially since we all wear slip on shoes. I plead guilty! Although I grew up with lace-up shoes (my Chinese father told me , “Loafers are called that because they are for people who are too lazy to bend over and properly lace up their shoes!), ever since September 11th I have switched to slip on shoes. In fact, I have a real affinity for a particular pair of Johnston & Murphy Men’s Harding Slip-On shoes. LOL! Seriously though, it really makes it easy when you are trying to grab all of your bags off the short conveyor belt while the people around you are busy stripping down or falling over trying to tie their shoes and race through airports. Want another tip from Asians? For the business traveler it’s the Timbuk2 Commute 2.0 Laptop Messenger Bag. Remember when we used to have to power on our computers and then spend a few minutes making sure that the computer powered on and off properly? Thank goodness those days are gone. But still, we have to pull out our computer and put it in a bin. With this bag, all we have to do is unzip it and flip out flat. It will save you another 30 seconds on both sides of the conveyor belt I guarantee it!

The other night I found myself watching Wanda Syke’s new show. It was crass chuckling humor and I was using it as background noise until there came a segment called “Know Your Asians”……now I am not someone who gets easily offended at pokes at my own ethnicity, but heck Wanda…what was up with the crack that Asians have flat “backsides”? We do have a little junk in our trunk. We just choose not to wear our pants around our bottoms because it simply isn’t a fashion we enjoy. I had to ask a few of my other Asian friends. We checked each other out. Japanese, nope. Chinese, not really. Phillipino, no way. Then came my Korean friend! Shyly she said she was to blame. There you go Wanda! You need to know your Asians! Seriously! We want a retraction and an apology! LOL! Again, this was all in jest and if you can’t laugh at yourself, you can’t laugh at others. I mean, here is Wanda, a black lesbian with a tranny as a co-host sidekick. We aren’t supposed to take this seriously.

This show is really bad, but if you want to see this clip, here it is: Check it out in minute 36 of this Series Premiere .

Of course, if you really want to help me refute Wanda’s stereotype you can just check out my backside (my junk, my humps, derriere) or whatever you choose to call it. In fact, just get behind this Asian the next time we are at security at the airport. Just watch out, I’m pretty fast through the security area!

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

The New Decade: Looking Forward and Barely Over our Shoulder

January 8, 2010 erikhom@aol.com 3 Comments

The slower we move the faster we die. Make no mistake, moving is living.

– George Clooney, Up in the Air

It’s irnoic that line is the one that will be remembered most from the first big movie in 2010 or in this decade. Maybe that is why I’m running so much these days.

The new decade is here and what a decade the last one was. It is easy to look just back at 2009, but that would be a short-sighted and very depressing one. Wrought with health issues and a world economic crisis, even looking back 2 years might not even be what we need to be able to look back on the past decade with perspective. As I ran down 2009 through a series of runs through the Streets of San Francisco I tried to reflect a little on the past year, but kept pulling more memories out . As I looked farther back, I began to realize that I didn’t just need resolutions for the coming year (don’t like resolutions anyway). I needed to look ahead to the whole next decade! I haven’t written in a bit just because I wasn’t sure as to what to say as the thoughts kept flooding in. “Just put it to paper and let the rhythm flow without thinking” (to paraphrase the words of the lead character in Finding Forrester). So as I put my running shoes and headphones on and listened to my new favorite song, Good Life by One Republic, what I saw was a past that is shaping our future in new ways and some that we could never have imagined.

There’s so much to think about when looking back and trying to eliminate the macro-factors of societal changes and focus on only the things you really can control. For me it was about family, health, work, and friends. How can I proactively move towards making sure I better control these issues in the new decade.

In order to look ahead at the next decade and what it should look like for me, I found myself back in time in 1999 as we were selling our house and i was getting back into the venture business. Yeah, remember the Y2K craze and how much were were going to have to evolve when the computers came crashing down? It was a whole cottage industry for a doom and gloom that never came. We’re still here though. I think I had 3 jobs this past decade and hopefully won’t do that much switching in the next decade. I would never have expected in 1999 that I would end up doing what I do today, but my current job is one I’ve been at longer than any before. Is this my legacy?

Personally in 1999 I was a new dad in San Francisco wondering how I could move to a bigger place in the suburbs. Well we did do that, but we moved back to San Francisco. Not before we became ice cream moguls leaving a mark with a franchise in Marin County as well as purchasing another one in San Francisco. Anyway, now I’m a seasoned dad with a 10 year old and a 7 year old. So what does that mean? At the end of this decade I will just about be an empty nester as my two kids will hopefully be off to college. It doesn’t leave much time for me to think about how to afford their education and prepare for how I will prepare for my retirement if something like that would ever exist for me. If I thought my children dominated my life this past decade it will surely be a decade of building what will be a lifelong relationship. Maybe I shouldn’t even mention retirement as it won’t happen until after 2020 for sure.

The past decade also came with health issues as well. Losing a parent (which I could have predicted as my dad was already in poor health) was hard to take but reminded me of how important a parent-child relationship is and how fortunate I was to have my children meet their grandfather and develop a deep relationship with my own mother. Emotional preparation for the potential loss of another grandparent in this decade would be something I could easily see in my future. Cancer was something I never would have expected to be part of the last decade. In fact it was a large part with my mother and then followed by my wife and friends. Bad Health is never something you really plan or prepare for. I don’t know how much the next decade will be interrupted by health issues but age will not come without some aches and pains for sure. I have already started preparing myself. The last two years of training have built my stamina to a high level. I maybe not as strong or fast as I used to be, but if not getting sick at all for the past 18 months is any indication, I’ve definitely been fortunate in keeping healthy and maybe if I just keep moving…..

I don’t need to write much about friends and extended family and my expectations there given some recent posts, but this past decade has been about revitalizing past relationships. I only expect that to continue. It seems to be a natural processs as you get older and start to reminisce about times gone by. These are the people who will remind you about your past someday so its probably good to keep them close so that they remember it accurately. For sure their memories are already declining, not to mention their deteriorating eye sight. It just makes me wondering as the baby boomers will be moving into their 50s and 60s, will those people still be wanting to deal with small screens on their cell phones and buttons that don’t work well with arthritic fingers? Remember that this decade started with us using PDAs with a stylus. Now we just push things around with our thumbs. Will everything be voice-activated over the next decade? Will we see the first wave of brain cancer resulting from overuse of cell phones?

We now have a black President. Will the next decade bring a female President? An Asian President? A Hispanic President? A Gay one? Maybe 2 of those. We talk about national security as getting tighter given the terrorism that has started in the US. Is it possible this could get worse? Will the idea of being “green” work. What would people have thought if you used that term back in 1999? They would have thought you wanted to be a vegetarian and were giving up meat. For me all of this just heightens the urgency to show my kids parts of the world that they might never ever get the chance to see or at least the way they could see it today. The world is changing rapidly. How fast? The eco-system even in the SF Bay area was so drastic that one minute the sea lions that inhabit our piers had peaked at over 2 thousand last November yet today there are about 6. The plankton and the water temperatures have caused them all to move to areas up North where they can find more herring. A migration that grew over a 20 year period just disappeared in a matter of months. Will Alaska still be cold in 2020? Will there still be arctic glaciers?

As I continue my running regimen I’m not running from the past but running toward the future. It isn’t necessarily a bright one or even a better decade than the past. It will have its own challenges and we can only prepare ourselves for what will be more of the same yet with more intensity. Of course, we have a chance to shape our own path by planning it before the future comes and dictates our actions.

Perhaps while this decade might not mark the beginning of a new millenium that it might end up being much more important than the past decade This may be the decade where we take control of our destiny and start to dictate what history will be. Maybe Live Strong won’t be an attitude for fighting cancer, but to beat Father Time and prevent him from catching us.

For me the answer is to not prepare for the end, but prepare for the future. Don’t look back too far, but just remember to keep looking forward so that what you left behind stays there and what you want to take with you in the future moves with you. For me that is simple. 10 years from now I want to be standing there proudly with my wife at my side as we watch our son thrive in college as he prepares for the real world and a career of his choosing and our daughter moves off to college strongly independent such that her parents will know that she is prepared for that next stage of her life. Me? I’ll be cleaning out their bedrooms figuring out how I can convert their rooms into my own 3D home theater and 24 hr. fitness club.

Route 53 - Celebrity Sightings, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Monday Night Football and Friendship

January 1, 2010 erikhom@aol.com Leave a comment

Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: “What! You, too? Thought I was the only one.” – C.S. Lewis

One of the more wonderful things I was happy about in 2009 was that I got out a few times with one of my best friends from childhood. We’ve started graying and maybe even have started to repeat ourselves so getting out again with each other and while we didn’t get to great events like a Super Bowl or a Cal-Stanford Big Game with miraculous plays, getting out and enjoying things together with someone and sharing in the joy, the laughter, the sadness, and the disappointment is what makes those events and memories even more special.

My wife often asks me about what it is that makes my friendship so special and I said it is that it is the unspoken. It is that we don’t even have to tell each other about what we were tniking because “we just knew”. The stunned look we gave each other as if to say, “Could this really be happening to us?”

Recently we went to a Monday Night Football game which I have to freely admit is not what it used to be from a television experience, but in a day and time when we see a lot of football played on Sundays, I had forgotten how special a night game in December could be. Granted the 49ers are no longer a dynasty and ESPN does not replicate ABC and Howard Cosell or John Madden, but it didn’t need to.

Just sharing the night with a friend made a special night even more special. I’d forgotten how great and magical Monday Night Football could be. Even without the 49ers making the playoffs for the 7th straight season, the stars were still out.

The cool thing about Monday Night Football is that it is just as big a sporting event as it is a media event. The sports celebrities are as big as the players themselves. ESPN personalities like Suzy Kolber, Michelle Tafoya, Stuart Scott and Matt Millen were all in attendance on the sidelines.

Matt Millen did play for the 49ers so he helped to add to the celebrity status. There were plenty of 49er alumni in attendance from the glory years, some working as media as well as just taking in the whole scene:

Steve Young
Jerry Rice
Keena Turner
Deion Sanders
Steve Bono

As a football fan though, the game was very entertaining as the 49ers beat the defending NFC champs, Arizona Cardinals for the second time this season as they hounded them for 7 turnovers.

More importantly, the game ended with more memories for a good friendship that will leave us with more moments that we will be able to acknowledge with a simple nod and a smile because of its uniqueness in both of our memories. From my perspective, taking photos of my friend both with the owner of the team as well as the 49er cheerleaders cracked me up. Hopefully 20 years from now we’ll look back and them and crack up at how silly we were. They will go in the pile along with the Polaroids (Wait, is it still 2009? No? Time to throw away the polaroids.) we took with Miss Universe 1982, Shawn Weatherly (yes, I still have old polaroids.) In fact it was 1982 when the 49ers were bringing hoe their first Super Bowl (1981 actually). Maybe it is coincidence that I went to the game with my friend Dave. It has been a while since the 49ers had a winning season (they’ve not had a winning season since 2002), so this turnaround is a great time to share with friends.

Here’s to friends, football and pleasant memories. I know this might sound sentimental and mushy, but I watched the movie Finding Forrester with my son. The movie focuses ona reclusive writer who no longer wants to share with others because but a young kid from the neighborhodod shows him the joys of sharing and discovery again. I’ve seen several writings on the Moral Premise of the movie:

Ignorance and avoidance of the unknown
leads to fear, isolation, and despair;
but Knowledge and embrace of the unknown
leads to faith, friendship, and hope.

In the movie, the reclusive author rediscovers the joy of visiting Yankee Stadium and a Knicks game at Madison Square Garden with his new-found friend. This game was just a way for my friend and I to revisit some of those great memories and it just so happens that many of the heroes of our past were there. Seeing Jerry Rice, Steve Young, Steve Bono, Matt Millen and Keena Turner on the sidelines while watching an increasingly competitive 49er team play a game on Monday night brought back many fond memories and good times.

It should be said that fiendships are not only there for the good times. And that is why as we head into 2010 that I can only hope that many of the friendships of 2009 that were rooted in some not so fond times will get to rekindle some good times in 2010.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

A Warm San Francisco Holiday To All

December 22, 2009 erikhom@aol.com 3 Comments

Happy Holidays Everyone,

Before everyone takes off on their vacations from their virtual world, I just thought I’d wish you all a very Merry Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwaanza, etc. Please be safe if you are traveling this season!

As I pushed through the chilling temperatures and blustery winds of San Francisco during my run last night I kept reminding myself of those cold December nights I’ve spent in New York City, Chicago, and Pittsburgh. Nothing will ever compare to those cold bitter nights when I wore long underwear under my wool suits and wondered why I left my “City by the Bay”. I do remember telling myself that I would remember those days so I would appreciate San Francisco that much more when I would eventually return. Although cold, my run was dry and I ran down the festively lit shopping areas of Sacramento St, Fillmore St., California, and Clement St. distracting myself with the observations of the decorations people had in their windows.

While the glittery lights were dazzling and the quietness of the air still reminded me of how our economy is not quite back up to speed, the most warming images of my run were of the people.

First, there was the elderly couple walking together with their arms around each other as they left their party at Spruce Restaurant (http://www.sprucesf.com). They stopped and kissed saying “I love you” and touching their foreheads together in the middle of the sidewalk as I dodged them. It was a split second of our paths crossing but it was a beautiful image.

Second, there were the two inebriated young ladies in their short cocktail dresses stumbling out of the Elite Cafe (http://www.theelitecafe.com/) before crashing to the ground. I say crashing because they fell backwards into me as I ran behind them. Fortunately I caught one before she hit her head on one of the tables outside. They were inebriated because as the cabbie and I helped them to their feet, neither of them could pronounce their destination. I laughed when she said they were going to New York. A great guy, the cabbie, a little Frenchman in his beret and scruffy clothes had me and one of the waiters watch him as he helped one girl open her purse to find her address. She kissed his scruffy face as he pushed her back into the cab. “Welcome to Christmas on the Barbary Coast”, he said as he tipped his cap to us while mentioning one of the many long-gone nicknames of San Francisco. I think I ran a whole another mile before the whole incident washed behind me, turning towards home. The cab driver reminded me of the kindness of people at this time of year.

As I passed by San Francisco’s only 24 hour Starbucks in Laurel Village (yes I love running by it at night just so that I can get a whiff of the caffeine aroma) a bunch of Fire Engine’s raced by me. Looking for an alternate route, I followed their sirens. A Portable Potty had been set ablaze nearby. This has been the work of arsons as dozens have been set on fire over the last year.

Not wanting to end my run on a negative note, I continued on and started to notice a pattern that is so familiar this time of year. I had been seeing it over the a past week as cars and taxis pull up in front of homes and the dwellers come out to greet and hug a family member returning home. The tears of joy and happiness really signify what this season is about and while the images weren’t exactly Norman Rockwell-esque, they told the story. The story of family and friends coming together. I even saw a soldier returning home a couple weeks ago in full gear as his mother screamed when she opened the door (adorned with a yellow ribbon).

All of these images (including the fiery portable toilet) told the story of 2009. Maybe they weren’t my story, but they were nice ones.

2009 will be just that for me. “A Nice One”. I’ll definitely take that after 2008. I needn’t look much further than 2008 to remember what was happening last year as my wife was recovering from her second surgery in 3 months and we scheduled ourselves for a very low key Christmas with only enough fanfare to keep our kid’s spirits high. Just 365 days ago I sat by her bedside making sure she’d be okay just to get up and deal with Christmas. While 2009 was no picnic, and we did deal with two more minor surgeries, life today compared to last year couldn’t be much better healthwise.

The holiday is often on its long tail as we’ve already had two family gatherings, a work party and a large bash at a friend’s home yet we are still 3 days shy of Christmas. We still have two more family gatherings to go to. Such is the life of the fragmented world and family. As I sit here in my den, I know of local friends spending the holiday in Hawaii, Argentina, Spain, France, England, Italy & Brazil just to name those places not on this continent. They all sound enticing…. the Champs Elysees on Christmas? How magical does that sound!?

Well San Francisco is where we remain and where we will keep our hearts this Christmas! No snow and no sand! The image above is from Sara Showalter, (www.sarashowalter.com) or @gidget on Twitter. A great local artist, the image was used for our holiday card this year. If you are looking for an artist or photographer, I highly recommend her. And the best thing about her? She is a diehard San Francisco Giants fan!