I write this from the Northbound Acela, returning home to Boston at the end of \u2013 I think \u2013 my third trip in as many weeks. Perhaps it\u2019s the fourth. I\u2019ve learned that it\u2019s better to not spend too much time counting the little wounds, tracking the indignities. As long as I get home safe, manage a bit of rest, and proceed forward with life not too much the worse for wear \u2026 why keep track? Why waste perfectly good time second guessing time already committed?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fortunately I\u2019ve got computer programs. I\u2019ve tracked 22 unique trips on TripIt<\/a> this year, which squares with what I feel in my gut \u2013 an average of about two per month. Most of those have been two or three day gigs. Of course, one of those was a trip around the world to spend three weeks in Tibet \u2013 so the averages are a bit skewed. TripIt says that I\u2019ve logged about 40,000 miles this year. Marriott<\/a> says that I\u2019ve paid for about 25 nights this year. This makes 2011 a VASTLY better business travel year than 2010, in which I made the 75 nights in a calendar year cutoff for \u201cplatinum\u201d status.<\/p>\n\n\n\n No matter your attitude on the romance of travel, hotels are hotels. Trust me, you don\u2019t want to spend 20% of your nights in them \u2013 even if the managers give you free drinks and greet you by name when you check in. I usually feel a vague sense of dispair when the night desk staff get to know me by name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Triple that if you find yourself doing back to back full weeks in *cough* socially difficult work environments in a town where the best sort of entertainment is to find the most badass martial arts school around, work in, and stick around for the advanced class even though you don\u2019t qualify \u2013 because you just don\u2019t want to go back to the hotel, sleep, and deal with the next day. That not only wears on your soul, but also leaves lasting callouses over the cracked ribs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But enough about me, let\u2019s talk about me for a minute: I\u2019ve been singularly uninterested in blogging for the past few months. I notice a lot of stuff in the world \u2013 but I just never get around to writing about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One example: I wandered through the \u201cOccupy Boston\u201d protest on Tuesday afternoon. There\u2019s a peaceful little tent cluster outside of South Station. Maybe a hundred people chilling, supervised by four or five police. Sometimes someone speaks. Usually there\u2019s an idiot singing. It seems to be mostly college kids and serious burnouts with a smattering of the professionally pissed off. They were peaceful and positive and disorganized and totally helpless to actually change anything. I got a little misty eyed looking at this sad little gathering literally scrunched up against the bottom of the steel and stone castles of finance. I was sort of looking for the boiling oil from the State Street building.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here\u2019s the thing: I support and agree with what they\u2019re doing. I wish I had time to help. However, I\u2019m the establishment now. I *have* a job, and I needed to catch a train. I\u2019m some kind of successful business guy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And that\u2019s it. Already I\u2019m fighting to find another couple of words to say about that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Oh well. I\u2019m still here. Hope you are too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I write this from the Northbound Acela, returning home to Boston at the end of \u2013 I think \u2013 my third trip in as many weeks. Perhaps it\u2019s the fourth. I\u2019ve learned that it\u2019s better to not spend too much time counting the little wounds,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,34,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-consulting","category-equity","category-real-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1280,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions\/1280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}