| December 1, 2006 | Goodbye 'Portal Shortall' |
 These past two weeks have been all over the place. I was up in Toronto to say goodbye to Greg Shortall (a.k.a. "portal Shortall") and to interview new editorial candidates for Yahoo!'s Canadian Broadband team. As Greg told the candidates we were interviewing to fill his vacated position, "Karaoke makes up about 18% of this job." How true! (Especially when I'm around.) The day after I returned to LA we moved into our new house (more on this soon), and my mom flew out to visit us from Boston one day later, and the very next day we drove six hours to Prescott, Arizona to see Chris' family for Thanksgiving. It was a lot of fun and a lot of craziness. Labels: greg, job, karaoke, mom, prescott, strimbus, toronto, travel, work, yahoo posted by Jess Barron @ 6:02 AM 
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| December 20, 2005 | Items I am Bringing into Canada... |
I needed to fly to Toronto this week for work to visit our Canadian Yahoos! and concoct our plans for global domination. Then on Wednesday, it's on to Boston to visit my mom for Christmas.  Since I have one of those skinny velvety sugar glider-type pocket dogs (a.k.a. Bocce the fruit bat), she goes home with me for Christmas (and everywhere else). She was in the Virgin Islands with me earlier this year, as well as New York City, Florida, San Francisco and Los Angeles.Why should Canada be deprived of her bony translucent alien presence and her winning personality? "You better make sure she'll be allowed into Canada," my mom said in a phone message. I was already all over the internets researchin' this exact topic. According to the U.S. Department of State's Tips for Travelers to Canada, "millions of U.S. citizens visit Canada each year" and some of these citizens are dogs. Currently there is no quarantine on the import of pet dogs to Canada, but "if you have several dogs you may be asked to provide certification that they are your personal pets and not for resale." I also needed to be sure to bring her rabies vaccination certificate. I was curious to note the other items that I was allowed to bring into Canada: So, I packed up my suitcase full of cashmere sweaters and long underwear (did I mention that it's 18 degrees in Toronto?) and some fully tanned hides and skins (nutria, of course!) some tea bags and wood carvings. I left all my baked goods and candy containing meat at home, though. The great news is, Bocce made it through customs (though flagged in red letters as a "Dog"), and she's now reclining on the bed at the Four Seasons. Neither of us is certain we can brave the 18 degree (!) temperatures to venture outside. Have you ever had any interesting experiences with Canadian customs or crossing the border between U.S. and Canada? Have you ever been to Canada? Are you Canadian? Declare yourself! posted by Jess Barron @ 6:50 AM
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| October 31, 2005 | Can You Distinguish Substance from Fluff? |
Dear fans of math and logic puzzles,  I have some questions for you to ponder. If Jess Barron was in New York City for 4 nights and slept no more than 3 hours-per-night (for a grand total of 12 hours of sleep in 3 days):1. How many fellow journalists did she exchange business cards with during the ONA conference? 2. How many cocktails did she consume? 3. How many hours did she spend in the post-midnight pre-dawn hours running around the city with co-workers and friends? 4. How many seconds was her face in lights on the enormous Reuters billboard in Times Square? I've been pondering these questions for several hours myself on the plane ride back to the West Coast, and the only answer I can determine is A LOT. If you can provide more specific or accurate answers, perhaps you should consider applying to Mensa. Or perhaps you should stop stalking me. Contrary to the popular belief of my co-workers (Dave Carpenter, for example), I do usually like to get 6-8 hours of sleep per night under normal circumstances. My body wants that much sleep, and on some greedy nights my brain would probably be happiest with 9-10 hours of sleep. But the problem I run into again and again is that there is generally so much I want to do and sleep merely gets in the way of my ability to get it all done. There are so many people love spending time with, there is so much work I want to accomplish, and there are also numerous personal projects. As a certain boy famously told me back in February 2002 "You have -- as we say in the office -- 'a tendency to overcommit.'" It's become ever-increasingly true, and it seems like I'll never stop trying to stretch the space-time continuum. My professional work-type duties while in New York included:
My dad's advice when I told him on the phone about the podcasting panel, "Just don't drink too much the night before." In addition to these professional obligations, I had planned to see my longtime friends Jeff and Lee and also possibly meet Jeremy Abbate who wrote a song called "I Wanna Be as Cool as Jessica Barron" after reading my blog without having ever met me. Of course, there were other friends and people I wanted to meet (including Brooklynite Ted Gesing who created the infamous and much-loved Nutria documentary), but I figured it might be prudent if I focused only on these three. Even though neither one of them has yet to compose a single song in my honor, I gave my scheduling priority to Jeff and Lee since they've been my dear friends for 16 and 10 years, respectively. (I met Jeff when we ran against each other for a student government position in 1989. I met Lee while traveling in Turkey in 1995.) After they've put up with me for so long, it's the least I can do. I arrived at JFK at 5p.m. on Wednesday, and called Jeff and Lee during my cabride to the hotel (the Hilton on 6th Ave). Jeff took the subway to my hotel and we hungout in my room and raided my mini bar, concocting what seemed to be some really strong gin and tonics. Though you will actually be charged on your bill for the snacks and liquor you take out of your hotel room mini fridge, breaking the plastic seal on the door still feels more like "raiding" to me. It brings me back to hotel stays during barely-chaperoned junior high and high school class trips when we would physically break the cheap locks on the mini bars and spend the evenings getting drunk on the little nip-bottles we didn't quite understand how to combine and mix. Jeff suggested the idea of eating at The Odeon in the East Village which he (and Citysearch) described as a place that had "a decadent heyday during the hard-partying '80s." Since I can hardly resist anything that's decadent, hard-partying, or from the 1980s, I announced that I was game. Lee called to say that he and his girlfriend Brett would meet us there for dinner. The food was decent. I had an heirloom tomato and goat cheese salad (my two absolute favorites) followed by an entree of broiled scallops. Jeff had a steak. We debated and discussed San Francisco versus New York City versus Los Angeles. After dinner Jeff and I went to the Stone Rose Lounge, a big airy bar inside the Time Warner Center with high ceilings and floor-to-ceiling windows. We drank $17 martinis until about 2 in the morning. When arrived back to my hotel room, I couldn't sleep. Throughout the evening I kept calling the West-Coast-to-East-Coast time difference the "West Coast Advantage" to my friends, because it enabled me to easily party until dawn, but as I sat propped up on pillows in bed checking email on my laptop until 4 in the morning, it was clear that it wasn't quite an advantage. Especially since I needed to be at the Associated Press office by 8:45 a.m. for an all-day Flash class to learn how to build automated slideshows with audio soundtracks. Wednesday night (umm, that'd be Thursday morning) I slept from 4:30 a.m. - 7:30 a.m., and I was still 10 minutes late for the class. Though I generally have a strong aptitude for picking up computer applications, it was quickly apparent that I was the worst student in the Flash class. I had to ask the teacher to explain everything and show me everything personally one more time. I was pathetic. And, sadly I can't honestly blame my remedial status on the lack of sleep and amount of drinking. Between timeliness, layers, keyframes and tweening, Flash is a complicated program, and it can easily explode your head. Or, at least it can easily explode my head. I wasn't familiar with being the slowest student in the class, and consequently it was a very difficult day. When I got back to my hotel room a little after 6 p.m., Lee called and told me he made 8:30 reservations at Bread Tribeca. "I made reservations for 4 of us," he said, "So you can bring one of your friends." I was starving, and I wanted to make the phone calls to see if Sam or Dave had arrived in New York yet and extend an invitation to dinner, but first I needed to close my eyes and attempt to extend myself an invitation to an hour-long nap. I set the alarm on my cell phone, took off my clothes, put on a t-shirt and curled up under the covers. As exhausted and drained as I was from a day spent inserting keyframes and creating tweens in Flash class, I closed my eyes but could not sleep. Still, I was determined to keep my head on the pillow. At 6:45 p.m. my phone rang, and I jumped out of bed to answer the call. It was my friend Sam who works on content programming for yahoo.com. He had arrived at the hotel and asked if I wanted to go grab some food. I invited him to dinner and quickly got back into bed to try to catch that elusive nap before it was too late. Twenty minutes later my phone rang again. It was Dave from the Toronto office. He had already arrived and headed out to dinner by himself, but suggested that we meet up later for drinks. I tried for a third time to nap, but quickly gave up and turned on the TV and started changing back into my clothes. Sam, Lee, Brett, and I had dinner at Bread Tribeca. The food was decent. I had cauliflower puree soup as a starter followed by linguine with clams. We also shared a few bottles of red wine. After dinner Dave called and said, "I'm at a really fun karaoke bar in the East Village called Second on Second, you should come over here." It was approaching midnight, and as much as I love karaoke -- I wanted to head back closer to the hotel. I honestly every intention of getting to bed at a sober and decent hour. With that in mind, I asked Dave to meet Sam and me at the W hotel bar because it was the only thing I could think of. During our cab ride to the W, Bill and Chris called. Bill was out with colleagues and asked me if I had talked to JB yet. I told him I hadn't but that I had left a message. I also told him that Sam and I were heading over to the W. Chris and the Yahoo! News team had just finished dinner and were wandering around Times Square near our hotel. I told them we were in a cab headed for the W. They said they might meet us there. Dave found Sam and I at the W, but by y 1:30 or 2, we hadn't seen Bill nor the Yahoo! News folks. We were wondering what to do when Bill phoned to say that he and JB were at a bar called Faces and Names near the Rihga hotel. We left the W to walk over to Faces and Names and phoned Chris and Ron on Yahoo! News to let them know. By 2:30 we were all hanging out together at Faces and Names. By 3a.m. there was talk of heading back to the hotel. JB, Chris, Sam, Dave and I started the walk back, but were immediately seduced by the bright white lights of a neighborhood pizza place. JB ordered us a pie to go, then he and Dave went into the bodega nextdoor to pick up some beer while we waited for the pizza to be ready. We carried brown bags of pizza and beer back to the hotel and decided to continue the party in JB's room. I headed to my room to get Bocce since she had been cooped up in the hotel all day. We ate pizza and drank beer until around 4 a.m. when we were kidnapped and gagged by guerilla marketers for Yahoo! News' Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone. Bocce liked the pizza, but didn't necessarily enjoy her time as a walking Hot Zone advertisement. At 4:30a.m. Sam and Dave headed to bed. JB, Chris, and I took the dog outside for a walk, and Chris snapped action photos of me picking up Bocce's poop. Can you say poop-arazzi? I thought you could. After all that excitement, Bocce and I decided it was time for bed. The next day I attended some panels and prepared for my own. It went fairly well (you can listen to a portion of my talk), though afterward I wished I had talked more about content for podcasts than mostly just focusing on the how-tos. After the ONA-sponsored cocktail hour where I met Mark Fiore, some folks from CBS News, Anj from Yahoo!s Toronto office and many others, we all headed back to our rooms to freshen up and then bundle up and agreed to meet up at 8:30 at South's in Tribeca where we would have some more drinks before our 9:45 dinner reservation at 66. While back in my hotel room, I decided to don my Jackie Kennedy outfit which I had packed in case an inkling of Halloween spirit hit me. Post-cocktail-hour I felt it was a great idea to wear a bright pink suit and pillbox hat even though none of my other compatriots were dressed in costume. This is how I roll. Lee and Brett met Sam, Dave, Anj and I at South's. Then Bill showed up carrying an unopened container of marshmallow Fluff that he said he had brought for me. "I hope you're not implying that our Yahoo! Broadband Portal content is fluff!" I said giggling and grabbing the container of Fluff. After a while, the Yahoo! News crew (Neil, Ron, Oren, Chris, Sarah, and Peter) arrived at South's, and we all walked down the block to 66. Jeff and his boyfriend Daniel were sitting in the lounge drinking cocktails when we arrived. Sam -- who was just meeting Jeff for the first time -- commented: "It was obvious that Jeff had known you for years because when you walked into this chichi restaurant dressed as Jackie Kennedy and carrying a giant container of Fluff, he wasn't the slightest bit surprised." At 10p.m., we found out the hard way that NYC reservations for big groups rarely start on time. At 10:30 p.m. we were drinking ginger margaritas in the lounge area and noshing on appetizers as we waited for our back room to be ready. By 11 p.m. (I think) we were seated for dinner at three tables in our own room. I was seated at the end of a table surrounded by my NYC friends. Daniel and Jeff were on my left, Lee and Brett on my right. Before any of the food started arriving on the tables, Bill instigated the idea that he and I would open the container of Fluff and offer it around to the other tables. "Would you care for some fluff?" I said as I did my best 1960s stewardess impression. Our hard work and dedication paid off. We were triumphant. We managed to get nearly every person to try a spoonful of Fluff -- and several brave souls plunged their fingers right into the container. Others used chopsticks. The barbarous and uncouth "Fluff course" of the meal mortified my black-clad NYC friends. Living in San Francisco for five years (and going to Burning Man five times) definitely enhanced my already overactive capacity for absurdity. If a group of twenty of my co-workers are giggling and sticking their fingers into their mouths -- in my mind it was a great ice-breaker. It was the least I could do. Dinner ended sometime after midnight. Lee, Brett, and Daniel headed home and many of my co-workers decided to call it a night, but Jeff, Anj, Dave, Oren, Sarah, Ron, Chris, Mic, Peter and I ventured to Second on Second. We arrived, got ourselves some drinks and put our name in for karaoke to do Def Leppard's "Pour Some Sugar on Me." Unfortunately the stack of song requests on the KJ's podium was enormous and we left to head back to the hotel before our name was called. This time the late night after-party was in Ron and Chris' rooms. We drank beers from the mini bars and chatted as music played from Chris' laptop. He played Echo and the Bunnymen and The Smiths at my request. The TV was on playing an endless loop of Larry King interviewing commentators about the Libby indictment with the volume turned all the way down. It seemed certain that Chris and I will become fast friends. And Anj and me too. Even though we just met -- she and I were having a great time hanging out together. Sam, Dave and I are already pretty tight after working together for over 2 years. (Dave and I have even partied in London together on a work trip...) On Saturday I attended a bunch more panels. My favorite was Digital Visual Storytelling, though the Saturday afternoon panel "Journalism 2010: Who's leading the way?" (which our own Neil Budde sat as a panelist on) was also quite interesting with its now-seemingly-obligatory and impassioned blogger versus "dinosaur" bashing. Afterward we went to the Reuters-sponsored cocktail party. Then we headed to a bar in the East Village, where we smoked flavoured tobacco out of a giant hookah. For dinner we went to Il Bagatto (on Jeff's excellent suggestion). I ate with Daniel and Jeff while unfortunately my starving co-workers (Sam, Ron, Anj and Chris) and their entourage of young journalism students were kept waiting at the bar for almost an hour (unacceptable!). Luckily, they made lemonaide from lemons and befriended the perky bartender (she gave Jeff and Daniel three olives each in their martinis!) After dinner we wandered around the East Village spotting (and accosting) folks in Halloween costumes. There were even more Ali G's this year than last year (this Yahoo! one was my favorite). Then we went to KGB for some drinks amid Soviet paraphernalia. We got back to the hotel around 2:30 and I took Bocce for a walk and then went to bed. I seriously needed some sleep. On Sunday morning I packed and checked out of the hotel, and took a cab to Park Slope Brooklyn to visit Jeff and Daniel at their apartment and meet their Great Dane puppy Ace. Ace is beautiful. He's sleek and gray. He's also HUGE! He weighs 125-pounds and is still growing. Jeff and Daniel say he will soon be 50 pounds larger. Unfortunately it was difficult-if-not-impossible for 12-pound middle-aged Bocce to play with a teenage dog who was ten times(!) her size. Jeff and Daniel made us brunch of pumpkin pancakes, eggs, bacon, and Daniel's homemade (from scratch!) pumpkin pie. It was awesome. And then I got in a car to head back to JFK to fly home. I'm sorry I didn't meet my personal songwriter Jeremy Abbate, but I'm psyched that I ended up getting my photo displayed in lights on the huge Reuters screen in Times Square (thanks Sarah!) P.S. Almost all photos I'm linking to in this post were taken by Chris Sarah, Ron, and Jeff as I left my camera behind this time... Labels: bocce, chris, costume, dog, jeff, karaoke, lee, nyc, ona, photos, radio, slang, travel, yahoo posted by Jess Barron @ 11:20 AM
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| October 26, 2005 | From LAX to NYC for ONA |
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In a moment I'm about to take a cab to LAX to fly to NYC to attend the Online News Association (ONA) conference. On Friday from 1:30-3:00 I'm speaking on a panel called "What's Still New in New Media?" My topic is podcasting. I'm excited to talk to some other journalism folks, and also to hangout with my friends Lee and Jeff (Bocce and I are dying to meet Jeff and Daniel's Great Dane puppy, Ace!) and go out on the town with my work peeps. Labels: journalism, nyc, ona, podcast, speaking, travel posted by Jess Barron @ 5:29 AM
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| September 27, 2005 | Toasted (and Slightly Roasted) |
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I'm back from Vail. Ellen's wedding was fabulous. Also, I'm here to report that despite its harsh reputation, being a bridesmaid isn't actually that bad. I think the key was that rather than forcing us to don seafoam green dupioni silk, Ellen told us we could wear any black dresses that we wanted to. It's crazy that brides used to force their friends to all squeeze into the same backless mint green taffeta monstrosity. Not one of the brides at the weddings I have been to this season have committed this terrible sin on their friends' bodies (not Jen, not Selena, and not Ellen). This is because my friends have style and common sense, and also they are not sadists. Wearing various Little Black Dresses (mine was a vintage 1960s sheath which I accessorized with gold shoes and Monica Lewinsky hair), Ellen's bridesmaids partied like rock stars all night long, especially Cat. It was great to hangout with Jeff and Daniel. And even though Brandon, August and Daniel wouldn't dance, Jeff and I went crazy on the dancefloor to many, many songs including "It Takes Two" by Rob Bass, "Groove is in the Heart" by Dee-Lite, "Tainted Love" by Soft Cell, and "Mr. Brightside" by The Killers. After a few drinks, I successfully (I think) encouraged Jeff to touch the bride's lower back which was seductively exposed by her gorgeous gown. Ooh la la. On the evening of the rehearsal dinner -- I wanted to give a toast to Ellen and Jarrod, since I was one of Ellen's oldest friends (I've known her since second grade), but I was worried that I wouldn't be able to come up with any Ellen-related anecdotes that were clean/innocent enough for Ellen and Jarrod's parents to hear during the rehearsal dinner. After an hour spent drinking vodka and sodas in the hotel bar and scribbling on cocktail napkins and Vail Cascade Resort & Spa-branded stationary here's what I came up with: I met Ellen when we were in second grade in Mrs. Marson's class in Southboro, Massachusetts. Out of the whole second grade class, Ellen had the best stuffed animal collection. Not only did she have the most stuffed animals, but they had the most interesting names -- from her giant Zebra named Monaco to her giant pillow-sized fluffy red Main Lobster named Bisque. Ellen also had the best sticker collection. On Sunday morning, after our late night of crazy partying at her wedding, I asked Ellen what it felt like to be married. "Well, I have a helluva headache," she said, without missing a beat. I love this gal. Labels: ellen, highschool, jeff, speaking, toast, travel, vail, wedding posted by Jess Barron @ 8:30 PM
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| September 22, 2005 | This Altitude is Making Me Drunk |
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I drove up from Denver to Vail this afternoon. The drive through the mountains was beautiful; some of the leaves were changing to yellow as I drove 120 miles up and up. The only problem was that zero FM radio stations came in after I left Denver, and my rental car (a Toyota Solara convertible) was not equipped with Sirius satellite radio. But even though I didn't have good music, I saw bighorn sheep grazing right near the side of the highway. It was insane! Vail is 8,150 feet above sea level, and this evening out in a few bars with Brooke, Cat, Ellen, and Jarrod I only had two margaritas and two beers and now I'm totally loaded. The altitude is messing with me. San Francisco is pretty much at sea level, and every time I stay somewhere at a high altitude it seems to take me 48 hours to acclimate. Same thing happens to me at Burning Man. So I've had only four drinks, and I'm drunk. And I'm on the internet in my room. This could really be a problem. According to the internets, there is half the amount of oxygen in Vail (8,150 feet) as there is in San Francisco (sea level). According to the internets, I need to drink lots of water to avoid altitude sickness. Jeff and Daniel arrive from New York tomorrow. I'm totally challenging them to a shot contest. By then, I should be almost acclimated. Have you ever had altitude sickness? Or, do you have any drinking tips for me? Please share. Labels: drinking, ellen, jeff, travel, vail, wedding posted by Jess Barron @ 11:16 PM
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| Off to Vail |
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Here are some photos from Selena's wedding up in Portland last weekend. Right now, I'm headed to SFO to fly to Vail for Ellen's wedding. Well, I'm flying to Denver, renting a car and driving up to Vail, but that's just too many words. This time, I'm a bridesmaid. (It's my first stint at this, so wish me luck.) Labels: bridesmaid, ellen, photos, selena, travel, vail, wedding posted by Jess Barron @ 9:43 AM
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| September 17, 2005 | Off to Portland |
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This morning I'm off to SFO to fly to Portland for Selena's wedding. The wedding is Sunday, and I'll be back in SF Monday night. Labels: flying, portland, travel, wedding posted by Jess Barron @ 6:05 AM
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| August 17, 2005 | Brides, Bachelorettes, and my Scorching Hot Social Calendar |
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Forgive me, dear reader. I've been kept away from the blog-a-log internets by my scorching hot social calendar, which had me driving to Tahoe to get gussied up in pretty party clothes with August, Owen, and Bethany to attend Jen and Deneb's wedding. Their wedding was up on a mountain, and we had to take a scary cable car to get up there. And I'm afraid of heights. But we somehow survived. And Jen looked beautiful, and Deneb rocked out. And August, Bethany, Owen and I sat at a table of 8 with Kurt Loder. Yes, *the* Kurt Loder from MTV and Rolling Stone. I was really excited to talk to him, but he didn't want to talk to us very much. Maybe we're really, really obnoxious? Or maybe he's just really, really shy? (He did seem to enjoy August's conversation about '60s one-hit pop bands he loves like Herman and the Hermits.) On the way back from Tahoe, I took August to Sonoma to celebrate his 29th birthday and getting accepted into the 39th ranked Law School in the country (U.C. Hastings). Yay! I celebrated with him so hard and at so many wineries that I ended up throwing up. Not just once, but many times. And I was the only licensed driver out of the two of us, so we were stuck and had to spend an additional night in wine country and then wake up at 5:45a.m. to drive back to S.F. to pick up my velvety fruitbat of a dog from the kennel and then drive down to Sunnyvale to make a 9a.m. meeting. I guess I should be thankful I didn't throw up at the wedding. Then I worked really hard for three days, and did the radio show, and flew to Denver for approximately 28 hours for my friend Ellen's bachelorette party. This weekend, I hafta do all of my Burning Man packing and preparing, and then the following weekend I leave for the playa for 9 days. When I return from the playa, it will be September. I will have one weekend to unpack and clean up my stuff, and then I will be flying out to Vail, CO for Ellen's wedding which I'll be a bridesmaid in. The next weekend I'll fly up up to Portland for Selena's wedding. Monkey and Mici just decided to elope next weekend because she's too busy with Law School to handle taking time out for their October Marin wedding. In October, I'll make 2-3 weekend trips down to Los Angeles to (hopefully) find myself a new home down there (I plan to move to LA on November 1), and then I'll fly to New York for the ONA conference for that last weekend of October. Then I'll start moving. Basically, my entire life is scheduled through November 1. My head is spinning and I have a lotta plane tickets and hotel reservations. Does everyone else have a lot going on too for August, September, October? Or is it just me? Labels: august, bethany, owen, photos, tahoe, travel, wedding, wine posted by Jess Barron @ 12:48 AM
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| May 16, 2005 | Jess and The City |
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I'm in New York City for the week to meet with ABC News for work. Bocce and August and I flew in on Saturday and stayed at Mindy and Erik's place on the way Upper West Side near Columbia. (I think it's called Morning Side Heights?) We saw a teeny tiny baby squirrel in the park. We went to Erik's architecture school year-end party and then went to the East Village to meet Lee, Brett, Will, Daniel, and Jeff. On Sunday we packed up Mindy's car, so that she could leave for Carnegie-Mellon, and then we went to Lee's place in the Lower East Side (which is confusingly layed-out and furnished exactly like his old apartment in SOMA), and we drank a jug of red wine. Then we travelled to Park Slope, Brooklyn to Jeff and Daniel and Lance's compound where we sat at the silver table in their backyard garden and grilled steaks and drank Rasberry Lambic and more wine. Bocce humped Odie (Lance and Mark's dog) who is male and part Collie and much larger and was completely indifferent to her advances. This morning, August and Bocce and I took the F train to Coney Island where we saw Astroland and The Wonder Wheel and the Cyclone, and a clam bar. Bocce didn't want to go on any of the rides. August ate two hot dogs from Nathan's with sourkraut and onions, and I had cheese fries with ketchup. Now we're about to head to the Paramount Hotel on 46th Street, which I stayed at in 2001 when I was travelling for Microsoft to meet with Viacom to discuss interactive music television projects we were working on for UltimateTV. They have a pretty interestingly-designed lobby, and they allow small dogs. On Wednesday I'm going with my work peeps -- Dave, Jen, Heather, and Arleen to the Good Morning America show, but we don't know what the topic is yet. Labels: august, bocce, jeff, lee, mindy, nyc, travel, work posted by Jess Barron @ 3:38 PM
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| March 11, 2005 | Rules for Employees Traveling Together |
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In order to contain the potential loss and disruption associated with a catastrophic accident, Yahoo!'s policy is to limit the number and mix of key employees who travel together and are placed at risk. This applies to airline flights, trains, cars and any other mode of transportation. I'm about to jump on a plane to LAX with the entire Yahoo! Full Coverage team (except Molly). You have seen The Full Coverage team's handiwork if you ever view the headlines underneath the "In The News" heading on yahoo.com. Yes, as I have pointed out in the past many times, actual humans choose our news stories. It ensures that the news mix and relevance is better quality than than what can be found on computer-generated headlines found on some other competitor websites. Anyway, please do not tell the folks at Google News that we are all travelling together. We will be spending the weeking at the Loew's in Santa Monica to see the new Yahoo! Media Center and to look for housing. Luckily, there are no rules in the company handbook limiting how many employees may drink together. Labels: drinking, flying, rules, santamonica, travel, work, yahoo posted by Jess Barron @ 8:42 AM
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| March 3, 2005 | Mongoose Posing as Ferret |
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Mindy posted her photos from our trip to St. Thomas the day she got back. It took me a little bit longer, but mine are also now available. We saw whales, wild donkeys, and a mongoose (which I incorrectly identified as a ferret!). Labels: mindy, photos, st thomas, travel posted by Jess Barron @ 12:48 PM
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| February 18, 2005 | Disappearing is Easy, It's Coming Back That's Hard |
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I took a long-awaited, much-needed highly-anticipated 6-day vacation last week from my job and from the internets, and I can't get (caught back) up! Yes, the rumors are all true, I have returned from visiting my mother and her boyfriend on St. Thomas in the Caribbean. Mindy flew down from NYC to take a vacation with us, so we got to catch up as well. Mindy was just informed that she has been accepted into Carnegie Mellon's Technology and Public Policy Master's program, so I am wicked proud of her. She also posted her photos of our trip, and mine are -- as usual -- yet to come.
(Dedicated She Said, She Said radio listeners are well aware that I have spent many Friday nights on-air cajoling Matt and/or mayor Gavin Newsom to take me out on a Valentine's date.) Well, Wednesday night Matt was escorting a blonde pony-tailed gal who looked a tad too "Marina" for the show's crowd. Matt!? How could you?! I feel so dissed and betrayed! posted by Jess Barron @ 11:09 AM
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| February 3, 2005 | Things Go Glimmering |
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I'm sitting in Miami airport in front of the American Airlines Admirals Club. They have a wi-fi hotspot for all of my internet needs. To bad there isn't a A/C outlet around here... The Poynter seminar ended quickly with everyone wheeling their luggage and disbursing across the country and world in a matter of minutes. "This was better than Burning Man!" I exclaimed to Howard at the end. To anyone who knows me -- that is a pretty high compliment. You know how I feel about Burning Man. What I mean by that is -- during my past five years attending that art festival in the Nevada desert, I've met some of the smartest, most interesting people -- who are all doing creative, amazing things with their lives. And we have the best conversations. That's exactlly what Poynter was like. Everyone had so much to say, and none of it was mundane or filler. It was the kind of stuff that gets me interested and excited. It reminded me of some of the lines from F. Scott Fitsgerald's short story "Absolution" (that I often quote and like to write about):
I only wish I could have talked to everyone more... It seemed to go by so quickly. I could have talked with those people forever, I think. Or just listened, which you know for me is unusual. *wink* My team (the content team) created a blog to continue our discussions online, and I hope people will go and post there... I'm going tell all the editors at Yahoo! about Poynter. And yes, there *are* editors at Yahoo! who program a good portion of the news. Actual human editors. Unlike at Google. And I think this is a good thing. Here, watch them as they worked on covering the U.S. Presidential Election in November 2004. I'm off to St. Thomas right now to visit my mom for a few days. (Funny because I just visited my dad who recently retired to North Port, Florida). My mom spends the winter in St. Thomas with her boyfriend, Richard, the Italian Rodney Dangerfield. Mindy is flying down from NYC to visit too. Since I worked over the Christmas holidays, I'm really ready for a few days break. I'll be offline until next Friday. This means, I won't be hosting my radio show this Friday night. Carion Boy and Mrs. Lachey will be hosting it for me. I taught them how to use the mixing board and studio equipment, so hopefully it'll go pretty well. So, listen online (6-8p.m. PST Friday night) and let me know how they do. posted by Jess Barron @ 10:36 AM
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| July 11, 2000 | 4th of July South of the Border |
 Out of a desire for spontaneous travel to someplace we had never been, Selena, John and I went to Mexico City for the 4th of July weekend. We experienced the Mexican elections and the ensuing celebration first-hand. Vicente Fox won, overthrowing the PRI party which has ruled Mexico for over 70 years. When the results were being announced, a large crowd gathered at the Angel of the Revolution statue, waving flags and singing. Cars driving down Paseo de la Reform were beeping out little tunes with their horns, and the drivers were waving flags out the windows and giving the two-fingered "V" for victory sign. There wasn't any violence, just people cheering and celebrating. It ended up being quite an inspirational experience; we had never seen a whole city so excited over politics. Remember, we live in Los Angeles where violent riots break out when the Lakers win a basketball game. We also spent a day climbing the pre-Aztec pyramids at Teotihuacan -- which I am proud to say I climbed all the way up despite my fear of heights and my impractical (but-ever stylish) platform sandals. Check out the photoset. Labels: la, losangeles, selena, travel posted by Jess Barron @ 7:18 PM
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| October 13, 1997 | The Scatman in Greece's Modern Ruins |
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The first time I heard "Skee-Bop-Bop-Ba-Da-Ba" by the Scatman, I was lying practically naked in a shabby hotel room in Athens. It was 3:30 AM local time. Our bodies weren't acclimated yet. Mindy and I had been sleeping with our clothes off because Greece was sweltering. It was late July and the temperature had topped 100 degrees. Our tenth-floor room featured a small window that wouldn't open (whether it was forced shut from accumulated grime or well-positioned glue, we didn't know), a large dead cockroach (we named him Hephestus and he became our mascot), and a small TV which received five channels (two in English). The ancient fan (there wasn't an air conditioner) was positioned on a short table in a corner of the room. Its blades blew stagnant air across our low pallets. We had arrived in Athens at 5 PM, and after lugging our overstuffed packs through the airport and surviving the treacherous cab ride to our hotel, decided sleep was more important than dinner. Just a nap, we told ourselves, and then we'll venture out to explore the nightlife. It was still too hot to move. We peeled off the clothes we had been wearing since Boston, and collapsed in our bras and underwear on the beds. "I wish I could take my skin off and just lie around in my bones," Mindy had grumbled. I didn't answer. I thought of the cracked buildings and crumbling facades I had seen out the grimy glass of the cab window. Everything looked dirty; it was as if the entire city had been thoroughly coated with a dull beige layer of paint. Or maybe it was sprinkled with the dust of disintegrating skeletons. You may notice that I have morbid tendencies. When we had explained to the cab driver that we had come to Athens for a vacation, he advised in broken English that if we were visiting Greece for a summer holiday we would not want to stay in the city. As per our premeditated plan, we neglected to add that we only intended to stay in Athens two nights before moving on to Turkey. The additional information would have taken too much energy to communicate and would have angered him unnecessarily. I sprawled uncomfortably across my lumpy bed and worried. Would I be able to manage carrying my backpack? Would we be able to get information from anyone (neither of us spoke a word of Greek)? And how would we ever get to Turkey? I wondered whether the trip would be successful. Somehow, my anxieties subsided as I shifted on the lumpy the mattress beneath the gaudy gilded mirror (a price tag in Greek drachma was still stuck on the frame). And then we slept for hours. Mindy woke up first and turned on the TV. The meager options for late-night viewing kept the dial positioned on channel 18, MTV Europe. While most of the videos played by the trendy British VJs were well-known American artists such as Nine Inch Nails or Nirvana, an occasional wild-card was thrown into the mix, reminding us that we were far away from home. When The Scatman came on with his cheesy video, we knew we needed to get out of our stifling tomb. We dressed and headed downstairs. The hotel bar was closing down, from what we could tell. No one could (or would) speak English, so we ventured onto the street without any direction. After walking for a few blocks we found out that the large divided street housed nothing but Italian car dealerships with well-lit glass showrooms that only emphasized the nighttime desolation. One of us wondered aloud how it was that the ancient Greeks had managed to build and maintain aquaducts while the modern Greeks hadn't managed to build and staff 24-hour convenience stores. There were very few cars on the road and sometimes the drivers slowed down to look at us. We attracted attention as "foreigners" without doing anything silly or wearing anything tacky in that way American tourists inevitably do. We realized slowly that we were the only women out walking the street. After receiving catcalls from two men on a motorcycle, we gave up and returned to our hotelroom. Back in the room we broke into our supply of "emergency food" and nibbled Nutri Grain breakfast bars followed by swallows of warm bottled water. Then, in an attempt to entertain ourselves we made togas out of our dingy bed sheets and paraded around the room. posted by Jess Barron @ 8:20 PM
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