Tuesday 20 March – Boston

My 9th last day of work, with a two and a half months break afterwards. To put this in context, the next break that I have that will match this one for length could be my long service leave, and I haven’t yet clocked up 4 years at PP. Fair to say that I’m going to look back and (1) be grateful for it (2) given there’s going to be so achieved in that time, it might just be the best two months of my life. It’s also going to be a big step, because even though getting into and around the US was a big move, there’s no real culture shock. Surely setting foot in Lima, Peru on 1 April will be different.

Here’s an indication as to how TV dominates the organisation and scheduling of US sports. The annual NCAA tournament is being played at the moment to determine who is the best college basketball team in the States. The locals are pretty passionate about their college sports, particularly when the college they attended is involved. During these basketball games, which are beamed throughout the day and into prime time all over the country on one of the nation’s biggest free to air networks – CBS – there are a few TV timeouts. These timeouts aren’t called by the coaches, or the refs – a TV station employee informs the refs a timeout is needed to run some ads, so at the next stop in play the refs ensure the idiot box can run a couple of fee-earners for the next two minutes telling us, amongst other things, the virtues of using a cologne spray to improve a single man’s attraction to the opposite sex.

It is even worse in the NFL – there are approximately to 6 TV timeouts per game apparently, at two minutes each.

Just lately I’ve discovered that the people of New England (north eastern US) might have an accent. In particular, the word “room” is said much like Tony Greig would say it (think of Tone saying “giving himself a bit of room” and you might get the picture). For non-cricket followers – it is pronounced like “vroom vroom” is.

Last Friday, we left Springfield (which is an hour and a quarter from Boston) mid morning to ensure we beat the incoming snow storm that was working its way up the north eastern coast, which in hindsight was a very good idea. Schools closed early (they run from 8am to 2pm apparently here, with smaller lunch and recess times) and flights were cancelled, all before a single snowflake had hit the ground. The snow fell from just after lunchtime, and did it fall! Not even Ben Cousins’ public perception has had a bigger fall. Most of the people left work early (say between 1pm and 4pm) to ensure they didn’t leave too late and cop the brunt of it. Vitale actually have an official policy on snowstorms and blizzards which permits this very practice. The only thing that PP need an official policy on might be hand cream...

Unfortunately the fall created havoc with a few weekend travel plans. Libe and her mum Shirley, who planned to leave NY for Boston on a Greyhound bus at 7pm (or earlier), were delayed until the morning. Even worse, Becky’s hubby-in-waiting Jon had booked a flight from DC to Boston, which was cancelled (for the day) on Friday and then cancelled for good on Saturday, meaning he gets a ‘credit’ for a flight with that airline he’ll never take, at least not for a while anyway.

A lot of Jerry Seinfeld looks over here (the jeans with the sneakers). Being fair, Oz has got more than its fair share too, but if there ever was a place to promote a deal where the keen fashion seeker gets a pair of Napisan-white Nikes with their Levi Strauss’, this is it.