My Brutus Buckeye Story

Long before I attended Ohio State to earn an MBA, I often mocked the fans for their devotion of football, the Neutron Man, "Script Ohio," and Brutus Buckeye. I attended my first Buckeye basketball game in 2006, the season the Buckeyes made an incredible run to the NCAA finals.

I was given free tickets to the OSU basketball game against Kent State, so Danielle (we broke up in July 2007) and I went. Parking was $7.00 and the guy did not appreciate my using the $1.00 coins the USPS gave me as change.

"You don't have anything else?" "Nope," I lied. He had already given me attitude because I asked why parking is free for concerts (2 Springsteen shows attended,) but not free for a basketball game. "This is my first night working," he said. So for the record, he started the lying.

Our seats were in Section 203, Row A. About 4 1/2 feet below us was the aisle where people and security could walk around the arena and there was access to the handicap seating.

With about 10 minutes left in the 2nd half, I noticed a couple cheerleaders suddenly below us and a guy with a microphone. The guy had used the microphone earlier in the game for announcements during timeouts. Then I saw Brutus.

He is perhaps the ugliest mascot in the world out side of my undergrad's mascot, Rudy Flyer. Dan Patrick, a UD alum, once had to defend Rudy against another analyst because that guy commented Rudy's head looked like a giant potato. Rudy is a seriously ugly mascot. I'll give Brutus the second ugliest award though.

Brutus came bopping over after giving high fives to a lot of children in the section across from us and perched his Charlie Brown sized head right in front of us, facing the court.

"Brutus!!!" I heard someone behind me shout. Remember how he is four plus feet below me? He turned around and stuck his hand up to wave and it was face level for Danielle and I, so I gave him a high five. No big deal although for some reason, thousands of Buckeye fans are probably jealous because I am one of only a few hundred thousand to have done so over the years.

I actually received an envious email from Scott Herd about my giving Brutus a high five because he had never had the opportunity to do so.

As I turned to my right and say something to Danielle, I saw between her and I the hand of the 50+ year old guy behind me and I then noticed Brutus turned around.

I STOLE THIS GUY'S HIGH FIVE!!!

Not a big I would think, but this is a member of the Buckeye Nation. He had probably been waiting his whole life to finally give a high five to this mascot as a life long Buckeye fan and I snatched his dream and tore his heart out with one simple motion because Brutus was now facing away from him and his hand was left hanging in the air unslapped. The problem for Brutus is the big giant head does not move so he can't look up and see that someone unworthy as myself snatched the ceremonial hand slap. He simply waited for anyone to slap his hand and then turned around once he felt it.

Having dashed the dream of this Buckeye fan behind me actually made me feel all sorts or guilty. He would go home and cry to his wife in their trailer how some jerk stole his one shining moment (not counting the three marriages that were probably the previous shining moments up to that point) and live his life in a depressed state until he finally whithered away by refusing even to eat pork rinds.

A few moments, when microphone guy finished up, I called out to Brutus name and asked him to give the gentleman behind me a high five (my Catholic guilt getting to me,) so Brutus obliged.

The 50+ something guy thanked me. LOL. And people think I need to get a life.

OSU won BTW.

Tomorrow night I am stealing candy from trick or treaters.

My Sister's Haunted Crack House

It was in 1998 when my sister Stacy and her first husband, Richard, moved into their first house at 1431 Thornberry Avenue in 1998.

This house is in an older neighborhood, off of Taylor Boulevard within a half mile of Churchill Downs. My mom described the house as the nicest crack house on the block.

She and her family moved to Arkansas in 2001 and my dad moved into the house when he separated from his second wife for a while and then my brother lived there before she sold it off and the family moved to Florida.

My dad came over to my mom's house one night and my sister was there when we were sitting in the kitchen and my dad told a story how he got up the other night, swearing there was someone in the house as he heard footsteps.

"Doesn't surprise me," she said casually. "The house is haunted." She said it in such a casual manner, it took us both a couple seconds to digest what she said.

The screen door slams

I just sat there listening as my dad had what I would describe as a sense of relief, if that's possible, because he thought he was going crazy.

The back door of the house had a very heavy screen door that was impossible to open and even more impossible to close. When you let it close naturally, it had three distinct points that it would stop, swing back out a little and then continue to close. It was impossible to make this door slam.

My dad said earlier in the week he heard that screen door suddenly slam shut in the dark hours of the morning and he woke up immediately, sitting up in bed. He walked out if the master bedroom, through the adjoining room that was Calvin's bedroom just across a hallway that was only 3 feet long.

The adjoining bedroom had two doors on opposite sides and the far door led into a room that looked like an extension that was added after the house was initially build. This was the family room. Around the corner was a small hall that led to the kitchen and the back door was here, opposite a full bathroom. The kitchen ran back the length of the house to the front of the house to a living room where the hall that connected the two bedrooms and the central bathroom sat. There was also a stairwell to the basement area where they put a bedroom for Jessica, Richard's daughter from his first marriage, and a play room for the kids.

My dad walked through the entire circle of the house and walked into the basement thinking someone had broken in. He stopped first at the back door, unlocked it and tried to push open the screen door and it was as stiff as ever taking a lot of effort to open it and it would not shut. Even pulling it shut, the door was resisting as he pulled it. He also noted there was no wind that night.

He went back to bed, but he said he just felt like there was someone in the house.

Stacy nodded.

That had happened to her as well.

Then dad talked about the footsteps one night and grabbed a bat and walked the full circle of the house looking for an intruder and there was no one else in the house. He kept the bat next to the bed after that.

And we danced like spirits in the night

Stacy had started letting the dog go to bed with her if she was going to bed before Richard got home. Often the dog would suddenly sit up and go walking out of the bedroom and then come in by himself and climb back into bed with her. When Richard would come home and the dog would go out to greet him. The best we could figure is perhaps Sierra thought Richard was home hearing someone out there and she'd get up and go out.

Stacy thinks it was someone else, perhaps someone who had died in the house. In fact she said she thought it was the ghost of an old man in the house with them.

I did not experience anything directly as my sister or dad did, but there were two things in retrospect that I mentioned that night and my sister nodded.

When they did not have Jessica and I was visiting in town, I stayed in Jessica's bedroom in the basement. It was near Christmas, perhaps as late as February, and I went to bed well after midnight. I heard footsteps and being in that dark bedroom without any light, I had no idea what time it was. I honestly thought it was Richard returning from work because he forgot something.

I found it puzzling when I mentioned him coming back in the house the next day and he said he had not returned. I can dismiss it as perhaps the dog, but the dog had a fast gait being a whippet; much faster than the slow creaking of the floorboards overhead the basement bedroom. Calvin was still a baby and Stacy said she didn't get up.

I don't think at that time she suspected the house was haunted.

But that night in mom's kitchen I told her something that I saw, it was nothing significant at the time, but it was like having a piece of the puzzle without knowing what it was a picture of.

The door between the family room and Calvin's bedroom would latch shut when it was closed. We would be sitting there watching TV or playing with the kids and it would unlatch by itself and swing open into the family room and hit the wall. What happened in mom's kitchen though was the realization that I also had witnessed on several occasions the door close by itself from the wall to the door frame.

And Stacy and my dad are sitting there and Stacy says, "Yeah! I've seen that, too!" Dad nodded as well. He had seen that, but he had not thought about it.

It was nothing we really thought about, usually a door will swing just one way in an old house because perhaps it has settled over the years, but to swing both ways from a complete stop (or being latched) is bizarre.

Spirits above and behind me

A few months later, I was home and my brother was living in the house with a roommate. It was Derby weekend and I remember Brandon and his roommate were hanging out.

I mentioned something about it being the first time I visited the house since dad, Stacy and I had that conversation about the house being haunted and Brandon nearly had a fit.

Brandon had several experiences he started telling us about and he had been freaked out living there as the medication he was taking had an effect as well and he thought he was going out of his mind.

When Brandon's roommate came out, I don't recall his name, we told him about the stories of the house and we saw a grown 26 year old man reduced to tears. He and Brandon apparently had never discussed some of the odd things they had seen or experienced in the house with each other.

Brandon's friend was not on medication affecting him. One day while reading on the couch in the living room, he felt like he was being watched and as he looked up, he saw an old man standing in the hallway where the two bedroom doors and the bathroom door meet in the three foot hallway, then the man just disappeared. It scared the $%#* out of him.

He was shaking while telling us the story and crying because he thought he was going insane with a couple of the things he had seen, including the apparition. He thought there was something wrong with him.

My sister had indicated before this that she always "felt" it was an old man's ghost in the house and it was funny that Brandon's roommate said he saw an old man in the hallway that just disappeared in front of him. Stacy never felt unsafe or threatened, just occasionally uncomfortable and creeped out by a presence she thought was there in the house.

I've always wanted to go back to the house, but she sold it and I've wondered if the current residents ever experienced anything there.

The Marysville Post Office

(From November 11th, 2007)

I was in the Marysville post office on Saturday morning. I was in line wanting to ask the person if their flat rate boxes came in a different dimension because I had a package that was too large for the standard flatter box when the lady at the service desk asked a related question. As I happened to be standing next to the display and I was holding a box. I suddenly became the focus of all attention in the office lobby as the following conversation took place.

I really hate being that center of attention like that and would do anything not to draw attention to myself, but I also have a habit of trying to say something amusing without knowing my target audience.

The lady asked the postal worker, "So how much can I put in the box and still send it at the flat rate?"

The postal worker replied, "As much as you can stuff in the box as long as it's under 70 pounds."

At this point I wondered what would weigh 70 pounds to fit in a box that is approximately 3 inches x 11 inches x 13 inches. Gold bricks came to mind. Uranium is pretty heavy as well. I had a Scrubs moment as I envisioned telling the postal worker 'yes' when asking if anything in the package was hazardous, liquid or fragile. "Yes, I am mailing uranium."

The conversation continued....

"So there's no limit as long as I can fit it in the box?"

"Pretty much anything short of using duct tape."

And this is where I need to learn not to pipe in when all eyes were just on me.

I turned to the lady next to me; she was in her 50s. "But what if I wanted to send duct tape in the box?" I said it in a manner I thought she would realize I was making a joke.

She looked at me and said, "I think she means sealing it on the outside of the box with duct tape." She thought she was helping me.

I responded, "Oh," and tried hard not to laugh. I really thought it was clear I was joking and I did not want this person to think I was trying to make her look stupid.

A couple folks around us started laughing, I think realizing I meant it as a joke, and laughing at her reaction or that my attempt at humor backfired. Or maybe they thought I didn't realize what the postal worker meant and they were laughing at me. They are a difficult people to read, these Marysville folks.

Halloween 2007

I found a story regarding Halloween night in 2007. This year I will be at Lyle and Chandra's handing candy out as I did last year. I wish I had the other Halloween stories I have posted over the years (2005, 2006, 2008,) but they have been lost somewhere along the way.

***

A Couplet of Halloween Haiku by Bryon Jordan

Not all kids are cute
Ugly kids need candy, too.
Your face stopped my watch.

I was very bad
I gave all these kids candy.
I am a stranger

***

For my third consecutive year, I handed out candy to the dozens and dozens of princesses, butterflies, frogs, ladybugs, knights (there were several this year,) and other creatures of the night in my little section of the neighborhood. My first year I had about 275 kids; last year it was chilly and I had 225 to 245.

I kept an accurate tally this year; 232 kids. I am not kidding. That is not an exaggeration or misprint. I really wanted to take pictures of some of the costumes to forward to folks with this email, but I also don't want to end up on a government website.

My suspicion is they continue to be shipped in from other parts of Union County directly to my neighborhood. Some of the kids were missing teeth and I don't think it is solely from candy rotting them.

The first semi-decent costumes were of a dad with his three kids dressed as the Big Bad Wolf and the Three Little Pigs. Also in the first 40 minutes I saw a little boy dressed as Donald Duck, an older boy dressed as a baseball player that had a baseball lodged in his cheek and blood on his face (a Tony Conigliaro outfit if I ever saw one,) one boy dressed like Gilligan and there was an Elvis who collected his loot in a guitar case.

The worst costume of the first 40 minute segment was a boy dressed as a girl. I told him he was going to spend years in therapy.

I also saw the Asshole of the year. He was across the street walking with his son who was taking forever (the boy was three or so) and he actually raised his voice at the child to move it or they were going home. He probably would've been better off not trying to also walk his dog at the same time, but guys do like to kill two birds with one stone. I felt bad for the little boy. His dad should have pulled him in a wagon instead.

The second 40 minutes was lively.

My neighbors across the street had a set up of Scooby and the gang. There were holes in the setup for the kids to stick their faces through and parents were all snapping the photos of their kids over there.

The highlight of the night was a cute little girl as a lady bug. Her mom was so hot. Not model hot, just regular hot mom. Wow. If only she were in a Bat-Girl costume (inside joke.)

There was a little boy dressed as a monkey that also comes to mind. It was a great costume. I threw poo at him.

The "I-ain't-buying-it" costume of the night was a 11 or 12 year old boy dressed as a cowboy and he was using a pottery barn bag to collect the candy. Poor kid can't figure it out himself and I didn't want to out him in front of his friends.

At this point I called my mom. They had 12 kids total at the Florida house. My dad, who I called next, spent $40.00 in candy and had 1 kid at this point in Kentucky. I was up to 160 by this point. I may need to hire help next year. (My help from last year and I are no longer seeing each other.)

The last 30 minutes (I stopped at 7:50) was a blur as it got cold. A little boy in a stroller made for a cute tiger. A little girl was a frog. The frog tried to pick my daylily. I took my candy back from her. It was a pretty daylily after all.

The worst costume of the night came after the kids were off the street. A 14 year old boy (or thereabouts) dressed as a ballerina in something that would be too short and disturbing for porn. He had me howling with laughter though as he was walking away from his friends, offered them their "last chance to see it" and then flashed a nipple at them. A joke regarding sausage and pepperoni followed. I can't help it. It was funny and I am a guy. The costume though will haunt me forever. I think I need therapy after seeing it.

Considering the volume of kids I get every year, next year I will outsource Halloween to India.

He's Guilty, (Send That Boy to Jail)

(From events that occurred on 3/11/1988)

I grew up in Fern Creek, a small town outside - but pretty much considered part of - Louisville. Life in Fern Creek was pretty boring. I worked at the Putt-Putt Golf and Games on Bardstown Road and it was there I met my friend Frank. Frank was 2 years younger than myself (I was 18) and I had more or less hooked him on John Mellencamp's music the previous summer. For some reason I can't recall now, Frank did not go to the Louisville show that previous December. Needless to say that show was a mindblowing experience for me and he swore he'd go to the next show that came around. I seem to recall the tickets went on sale during a snow emergency in Louisville, so friends of mine in Dayton, OH, secured our seats for us.

Mister state trooper, please don't stop me

We met at the Putt-Putt and left for the show in my dad's Honda hatchback. I normally drove a VW bug, but its history was that it was an undependable car and I didn't want to be stranded in the middle of nowhere. We were on the Gene Snyder Freeway for about 3 miles when I was pulled over for "excessive" speeding. The police officer was a jerk about the whole thing. He said he got me doing 79 mph in a 55 mph zone. I told him I was just keeping up with traffic. He said it took me 3 miles to catch up with traffic. Maybe he was right, who knows now? Frank's laughing as the cop walks away (at me, not with me).

This was a very traumatic thing for me. I never had a speeding ticket before (in a VW Bug? Yeah right.) so I was a little shell shocked as we drove the rest of the way to Rupp at 53 mph. The whole way I was trying to think how I was going to tell my dad what happened. I also wondered how it was going to affect my insurance. At least we left early enough that the ticket did not make us late.

We met up with Chris Wettle and Richard Higgins from Dayton (I went to high school in Louisville with them) and saw a freaking incredible show. During the break Richard and some other guy from Dayton moved up to the seats that John's brother vacated as he left for back stage. Unbelievable seats. I was definitely jealous.

We leave after the show and I'm heading down Main Street that meets up with I-64 in Versailles. It's all 55 mph with only 2 lights. Now of course I'm not going to be speeding because I had a ticket just 4 hours earlier.

Trooper hits his party light switch

I'm cruising along at 53 mph when the trooper hits his lights.

"Cop!" shouts Frank.

"But I'm not speeding," I respond as I look at the gauge. "He must be after someone else."

Yeah right. Buford T. Justice pulls us over and I get a sickening feeling in my stomach as he peers in my window with a look on his face that says "You're my puppy now." I saw the movie "Deliverance" - you get the idea.

"Registration and license, please." He holds his hand over his gun; I guess in case I pull a gun out.

"Is there a problem officer?"

"Registration and license, please."

I open the glove box and hand it to him. It was on top of all the of the stuff in there because of my previous ticket.

"I caught you speeding."

"That's not possible officer. There's no way I was speeding."

"Are you boys from around here?"

"No sir, we're from Louisville."

"Do you go to the University?" I assume he meant the University of Kentucky.

"No, I go to Bellarmine College in Louisville. We're from Louisville." Maybe I said that last sentence in the wrong tone - as in "Weren't you listening 2 seconds ago?"

"Step out of the car, boy." The jerk calls me "boy", but with that southern twang that makes it a two syllable word - Bo-ay. Frank is giggling hysterically at this point. Every time he tries
to stop, he starts up even harder.

The cop is looking me right in the eye.

"You been drinkin', bo-ay?"

"No sir. Do you want to smell my breath?"

At Buford's request, I breath into his face. Since I didn't have anything to drink, he got a whiff of nothing.

He holds his finger up. "Follow my finger with your eyes." So I oblige. Then I made mistake number one (or two counting the "We're from Louisville tone"). I spoke when not spoken to. Never ever offer information unless asked for it.

"Officer, in case you didn't notice, I have a slight lazy right eye, so if it didn't follow your finger, that's why."

"You been doin' any drugs, bo-ay?"

I hear Frank giggling louder through the open driver's window.

"No sir."

"Are you willin' to take a blood test?"

Now at this point, I'm not thinking too clearly. I've already received one ticket, saw an incredible show, and am fearful of a second ticket. I thought he was talking about administering the test himself and I knew the blood would need to be drawn by a needle. I'm not scared of needles, as long as a trained physician is doing the handiwork.

I simply answered him, "Is it going to hurt?"

Frank has lost it. I admit I failed to see anything funny about the situation at the time. Looking back on it, Frank thinks it was my deadpan responses to his questions that made him lose it.

"Get in my front seat, bo-ay."

I'm in it deep now, is all I could think.

I get in the front seat.

"I clocked you doing 71 mph in a 55 mph zone," Buford tells me as he's filling out the rest of the ticket.

"That's impossible." For Chrissakes I had a ticket four hours early, so I know I wasn't speeding! I didn't say this to him though. I do put my foot in my mouth.

"How do I know this was really me you clocked and not the previous person you pulled over?"

After I said it, I realized it was a mistake. He gave me a sharp look and I thought for a minute he was going to hit me upside the head. The sad thing was I was serious and not really thinking straight. I’m glad he didn’t knock my teeth out or beat me senseless.

"I ran a diagnostic on it before I clocked you so I know it's correct," he growls (I swear he growled this!)

"How much will it cost me?" I ask.

He pulls some sheet out and shows me the fee chart. It was something like $72.50 US that I could just mail in to the Scott County Treasurer.

"I don't think you've been drinkin'," he says to me, "but I think you've been doin' drugs."

OH SHIT! Flashes through my mind.

"But you're OK to drive," he finishes.

I'm speechless. No one to this day can explain this logic to me.

"But your buddy ... he's really messed up."

It wasn't until a few days later that what Buford was referring to was Frank's uncontrollable giggles at my predicament. He thought Frank was flying high on something.

I looked Buford straight in the eye and said, "He's not messed up. His nose just looks that was from a car accident." Frank was in a bad wreck the previous summer when someone hit his mom.

In retrospect, I can see why Buford maybe thought I was on drugs.

On the way home, the alternator went out and we made home on battery power as the headlights slowly dimmed to almost non-existence as I finally pulled into the driveway.

The Judge was Mean John Brown

The next day I call Chris's mom, a paralegal who works for the prosecuting attorney in Louisville. Chris's mom is the funniest person I know. Years ago I called her Mrs. Wettle and she commented that she did not marry her father. I replied, "This being Kentucky, you must've been able to outrun him." So from that day on in high school I always addressed her as Chris's Mom.

"Hi Chris's mom, this Bryon."

"Hello Chris's friend."

I told her the story about the first ticket.

"When is the court date?"

I tell her.

"Is that a Tuesday?"

"Yes."

"OK, I know who will be prosecuting you and he wants me for my body, so I'll talk to him," she says with a laugh.

"I like you a lot Chris's mom, but I don't want you to go that far to get me out of my ticket."

"Bryon Jordan! That's NOT what I meant!"

"I know. Um, I also had this other problem coming home."

I told her about the second ticket, still adamant about not speeding. I told her I thought the cop was a jerk, etc. She told me to go fight the ticket and try and plead defective equipment. Tell them I took it in, had the speedometer checked, the mechanic fixed it, and show some receipt for service.

She thought perhaps Buford was hoping to cage a DUI and that was the reason for the harassment because she could not explain how I could've been doing drugs, but was OK to drive. I’m going to have to ask a physician sometime if this is possible, but I think I know the answer.

The first ticket was knocked down to 14 mph over the limit for which I received traffic school (15 mph was the max allowed for attending traffic school). It was $15 + court fees. It came out to $63 + no record of the ticket for the blood sucking insurance company.

For the second ticket I went to the Georgetown Hall of Justice (and skipping my Economics 102 class) and saw the rest of the cast of "Deliverance." The ticket was dismissed when the judge realized that Buford never wrote down how fast I was going on the ticket.

Fireworks and Paranoia

Welcome to MBA 820

I recently graduated with an MBA from "The" Ohio State University. It was a very rewarding journey that started two years earlier and it was a very smooth journey until the last two weeks of school.

Part of the core curriculum for all MBA students is the MBA 820 class which is a Global Macroeconomic class that covers the political, economic, social and technological aspects of a global economy.

Professor Kistruck was an engaging presenter and he had an interesting project for us. He walked through a local Target and selected items off the shelf that anyone could buy nationwide and our project was to determine why the product was made in its country of origin. Some items selected included baby food, a rubber ducky, a scented candle and sparklers. (And if you have never heard a heavy Russian accent say the word "Rubber Ducky," find a Russian woman and ask her to say it.)

Sparklers sounded intriguing and I was sitting next to Neelima whom I worked with on a project the previous quarter for our Marketing class. She and I joined six other members of the team that selected the sparklers which carried a label "Made in Thailand."

So put your ear close to the phone - Part I

I contacted the manufacturer a couple of times and was unable to get ahold of anyone. We were doing our best to gather information from third party sources, but we had only come up with one item that we identified as why the sparklers could be made in Thailand and that was a duty imposed on sparklers, specifically Chinese sparklers, to prevent their dumping of the product in the US market.

During the summer course, the professor was gone for 4 weeks while other professors taught the class and it was while he was gone, I was successful in contacting the company. Other teams also had a lot of difficulty getting any information from the manufacturer as we did.

On July 24th I called and introduced myself to the operator that answered. The call lasted only 4 minutes according to my phone bill and I bet my cell phone company rounds up.

"Hi. My name is Bryon Jordan. I am a grad student at Ohio State and I am taking a class on Global Macroeconomics this quarter. We are doing a project assigned to us by our professor and our project is on your sparklers. Is there someone I can talk with regarding the manufacturing of your sparklers?"

The receptionist told me to hold on one moment and the phone started ringing again.

"Hello, this is Regina," answered a voice on the other end. (I changed her name in this story.)

"Hi Regina. My name is Bryon Jordan. I am a grad student at Ohio State and I am taking a class on Global Macroeconomics this quarter. We are doing a project assigned to us by our professor and our project is on your sparklers. Is there someone I can talk with regarding the manufacturing of your sparklers?"

I probably repeated word for word my same introduction that I used with the receptionist.

"Where are you from?" she asked.

"Ohio State."

"Where?"

"I am a graduate student in the MBA program at Ohio State."

"Where?"

"Fisher College at Ohio State. It's in Columbus, Ohio," I answered.

"Where?"

Seriously. She asked like six times and I started wondering if she was so far in BFE that she had perhaps never heard of the largest university in the nation. I again reiterated why I was calling explaining I was hoping to talk to someone about their product for a class project.

Finally I received a clue as to perhaps why she was stalling for time.

"I find it awfully suspicious that you are calling me from the state of Ohio and our largest competitor is also in Ohio."

"Really?" I responded. I had no idea. I also had never been accused of corporate espionage, but she was implying that this is what I was doing!!!

If I were trying to obtain corporate secrets regarding their company, wouldn't I pick the one state where their largest competitor did not operate? Seriously! How idiotic is this thought process by her?

I tried to think of how to prove to her I was a student, but I was realizing that she was not open to logic and thinking.

So I skipped telling her a 7th time where I was calling from and asked if there was someone I could talk to about their manufacture of sparklers.

She was clear in telling me that their supply chain consisted of proprietary information and I would not get any information regarding it.

I asked her if I could ask one more question and she did not say, "No," so I asked:

"We came across information that mentioned an anti-dumping duty for Chinese sparklers to prevent them from flooding the US market. Is this why you are getting their sparklers from Thailand?"

She shot back, "I don't like what you are implying!"

I'm sitting on my couch thinking, what am I implying? That you are smart business people to find a way to lower your cost because of a government imposed duty against one country.

I started to press again and realized it was futile, so I thanked her for her time and hung up.

Keep in mind, at any time, all this lady had to do was hang up the phone if she did not want to talk to me. I don't know why she didn't do that.

So put your ear close to the phone - Part II

I jumped online and looked up Ohio fireworks and came across Phantom Fireworks in Youngstown, Ohio. I gave them a call and the receptionist forwarded me to a voicemail of someone in Marketing. I knew this was not the number I wanted to talk to, but I left a message anyhow, hoping luck would come my way.

A little before 3:00 p.m., my phone rang. I answered it and it was a gentleman named William Weimer. He introduced himself as a VP and general counsel for the B.J. Alan Company who own Phantom Fireworks. I know I did not leave the message with him, so I could only assume they contacted the corporate attorney with a message asking about sparklers.

I introduced myself and explained I was a student at Ohio State and I had this project regarding sparklers.

"Why are you calling me?" he asked.

"I wanted to learn about sparklers from someone in the industry," I explained.

"We are finding stuff online, but I really was hoping to talk to an industry expert. I'll be honest, the product our professor gave us was not even your product. It was [competitor's name withheld]. When I called them, well, they thought I was working for you and trying to commit corpoate espionage."

He laughed.

"I know. I couldn't believe it either," I said.

After he had his chuckle he was wonderful in talking with me for almost 30 minutes about the industry and giving us a lot of direction for us to research. His explaining the political, economic and social changes in China and in the industry enabled us to draw our own conclusions and write our paper without ever talking about their competitor.

I thanked him for his help and emailed him a couple times during the quarter to update him as we wrote our paper.

The pretty lies that they tell

Professor Kistruck returned on August 10th to class. On August 13th, I received an email from him telling me he received a troubling email from the company we were given and he and I needed to have a meeting on Monday, August 17th, at 5:00 p.m.

I replied I would be there, but I asked what the email was about, but I figured it was regarding my four minute call. I explained to him in my email reply that I was very polite and professional when I called as I introduced myself as a student [and defacto representative] of Ohio State.

He did not answer what it was regarding.

I walked in on Monday with Amarendra, one of my teammates and we were later joined by Rakesh and Jay.

Regina wrote a complaint to Ohio State saying I was rude and hostile in communicating with her. I asked to read the letter and handed it back to the professor telling him, "She is full of shit."

I brought my phone bill with me to show the entire exchange was four minutes, I retold the story of what happened and how she reacted.

To the professor's credit, he believed me, but he wanted the whole thing to "go away."

"I'd like you to write an email apologizing ..."

"Not going to happen," I said cutting him off. "No way. I did nothing wrong. I do not owe her an apology."

This discussion went on for ten minutes.

"Let's get a recording of the call. She's an attorney." I thought it was a great idea on my part.

"How do you know that?" he asked.

"Because the attorney at Phantom Fireworks told me! She's being a bully and abusive with her power. I don't tolerate bullies! I won't put up with it!"

"But that escalates it and we want it to go away."

"But it vindicates me!" I argued. "If you hear it, you'll know I was not rude or hostile and her email is full of lies."

"But that escalates it and we want it to go away."

Eventually, we found a compromise where I would write an email explaining that there clearly was a misunderstanding and that it would reassure them that I did not have any proprietary information or intellectual property.

The professor felt Regina's biggest concern was that we obtained proprietary information or intellectual properties, which we did not. I also think the professor's ass might have been on the line because we did this under his direction.

According to the professor, in 82 previous projects, they had never had any company react this way.

"I think maybe next year you should not do sparklers," suggested Amarendra.

"Actually, I think you should," I countered. "See how the next group of students reacts to this."

That said, I don't think sparklers are going to be on the list next year of projects.

"Maybe we can send them a copy of our report so they know we don't have any intellectual properties," offered Rakesh.

Amarendra spoke up, "No. This is an MBA project. If they want our analysis, they can pay for it. There's 8 of us, so $40,000 sounds like a good sum."

Not only did this make all four of us MBA students snicker, but it made me realize how shrewd Amarendra was as well as being a great researcher and teammate.

There were several other students that talked me down during this event including a Colonel in the US army who was a classmate, a lawyer (also a classmate) suggesting the best I can do is write that state's Supreme Court, and my teammates who saw me as angry as I have ever been after the stunt the lawyer pulled with that email full of lies.

I wanted a pound of flesh from this woman. At one point, one of the teammates suggested we include photos of our sources and I was going to have the six year old across the street draw a picture of a witch holding a sparkler with a caption stating "Artist's rendition - photo not available." Yong talked me out of it.

And you realize you wanna let go

I was in the lab that Sunday with Shawn, a former teammate in another class, and Rick, a current teammate in a different class. Rick and I were both working on our individual projects for the Stock Market class. They were both aware of the story and Shawn had a few moments to kill as he jumped online behind me.

Suddenly Shawn speaks up. "Is her name Regina Thompson?"

"Yes, I said."

"General Counsel?"

"Yes," I said feeling nervous.

"Is her grandmother named Mabel?"

"Dude! You're gonna get me in trouble!"

We had a brief 20 minute presentation in class two weeks later where I briefly mentioned my being accused of corporate espionage. Before we presented, the professor mentioned he had not heard anything regarding the email I had to write, so it was closed. I finally calmed down by then.

Everything turned out OK and I graduated on 8/30.

I also plan on only buying fireworks from Phantom Fireworks going forward because they were so helpful in understanding the industry.

I'm a Bootlegger Baby

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Boston's Inside Joke

(This is a updated story from an old email about my adventure in Boston, May 20-22, 2005, and was written on May 22nd.)

"Bryon, you're not very adventurous."

I bet almost every friend I've ever had has said that to me at some point because I am very conservative in everything. Then in 1996, I began driving across the country trying to see every Springsteen concert I could. It all started when I met my friend Chris on the old Backstreets email group. He was a doctorate student at Ohio State and I had moved to Columbus in 1993.

The shows changed that "not very adventurous" label I used to carry. On occasion, I even did other things while on the tour like soaking up the culture of NYC with the help of folks like Flynn and Claudine (friends of mine in Queens) as I went to the last seven shows on the 1999-2000 reunion tour. It was fun and exciting, visiting cities and doing things outside the Springsteen spectrum.

For my weekend in Boston I wanted to try something I'd never done, so I stayed an extra night and went out to try something adventurous. It was sort of a mini-vacation for me. Friday night was the show and Saturday was my day in Boston.

I've learned a special secret about Boston. There's a running joke that the locals play on all the tourists. It's a little similar to how we would take newbies on a snipe hunt when I was in Boy Scouts growing up in Kentucky, except it's much more cruel.

Saturday I went on a whale watching tour.

Everyone loves whales. Everyone says you should save the whales. They're intelligent creatures according to people who know these things.

I was excited; like geeked out excited. I stopped down at the aquarium before hand on a cold, cloudy day as the sky spit light rain down on us. After a quick fish sandwich and a butterscotch pudding for dessert, I boarded the tour boat and grabbed a seat on the 2nd deck. I struck up a conversation with a nice older couple in town from Toronto and soon the cruise was under way.

Flashback to the 1970s

As a child and the oldest of three, my mother often shuttled us around in the back of the three or four station wagons (complete with the fake wood grain and the two far back seats that face out the back window) my parents owned. Sometimes (often,) we'd get motion sickness and in those dire emergencies, we carried a plastic purple pitcher in case we got nauseous because it's easier to the dump a pitcher of puke than to clean it up out of the carpet and seats.

*** Historical side note: I remember when the pitcher was used to pour milk on our table prior to becoming a permanent part of the station wagon accessories.

Flash back to last Tuesday

I told my mom I was going on a trip and she asked me if I thought about seasickness. I haven't been sick from driving in a car, being on a plane or on a boat at Nolin Lake in 25 years, so why would I worry about this?

Flash forward to Saturday

It was a dark sky with a stormy surf. I excused myself from the table with the Toronto couple so I could go to the first deck and sit in the middle of the boat 30 minutes into the trip. The boat rocked less there and there was fresh air coming in occasionally. The 7up I bought did nothing to ease my sickness.

There's a joke here somewhere and it's on me

As I fell in and out of consciousness (I swear I blacked out several times) I glanced up at some asshole with his phone pointed in my direction. I think he was taking a photo of me with his phone or maybe waiting for an "action shot." I made a mental note to kick his ass after the trip if I could stand.

I remembered that I had with me a generous gift from a lady at work. A vendor had give her a few small tins of mints that could easily be carried in the pocket. I popped a couple of those strong things in my mouth and they helped ease my stomach and head.

About an hour into the trip was the first round of folks getting sick. Moments later the crew was running around handing out clear bags to anyone who held their hand up.

There's something about the sickly smell of vomit that permeates through the air when someone ten feet from you hurls his or her cookies. It's worsened if you watch because the crew hands out CLEAR bags. They can't hand out black ones that are not see through, oh no. They probably have a betting pool on the number of people who get sick (the over under for this trip of about 70 people was probably 40 to 50.) There seemed to be a chain reaction as one person led to two others who got sick.

This was soon followed by the sound of the wet vac that was cleaning up the forward area. The people were cleared out by about four or five people hurling. It's OK if you are not always hitting the bag as sharing with a loved one is the next best thing.

During this HORROR as I listened to sound of gagging from all directions, I continuously popped mints in my mouth and pressed them against the roof with my dry tongue. I had no saliva and I didn't want to try and stand and get water at the back of the deck. My legs had no control at this point as they flopped in whichever direction the boat danced.

My mouth was burning from these powerful mints.

When the second round of continuous vomiting in the area occurred, I didn't have the strength to stick my fingers in my ears. I hummed loudly as I popped mints in my mouth. I tried to hum the entire album of "Born to Run," but I never finished a song and couldn't remember all 8 songs on the album. That's how bad my condition was. If I were in the CIA, the Chinese would easily have me talking by threatening to put me on a boat in the ocean.

I thought for a moment in my delirious state and then I remembered the date: 12/1/1989. Erin Duffy's 21st birthday party. That was the last time I paid 33 dollars when we bought the keg to get this sick. It was like everyone on board was my friend Mike Ferrari from college and they all had too much to drink.

We reached the area and they were telling everyone to look out the windows to spot any spouts of water because that was the easiest way to spot the whales.

Were they ****ing kidding? I could not even open my eyes at this point.

The ride was deathly quiet as everyone was miserable. Then, shortly after, I heard the sweetest words I've ever heard. "We've been told that the surf is getting worse and we're turning around and heading back." This was at around 90 minutes into the trip.

As people threw up constantly, I recall wanting to beg someone to shoot an elderly man choking violently as I think he was on his last three minutes on this earth. "Put him out of his misery," I thought to myself.

Sit tight, take hold

My eyes were shut for about the middle two hours of the trip as I tried some meditation to ease the sickness (along with 75% of my mints.) I've had novice experience with meditation from my martial arts classes over the years and it actually helped.

With about 30 minutes left and as we hit kinder waters, the ship seemed to come alive again as everyone regained their composure. I felt like I woke up from an all night bender and felt hungover from my experience through today.

Between the people hurling, the babies screaming, the sickening smell and the noise of the wet vac, I somehow managed to control myself and not get sick although I admit that I was probably very close at that point. A small burp escaped my mouth and there was a taste of butterscotch.

So Boston had its laugh on me. I was the stupid tourist who gained some sudden insight.

What was really comical was they gave me a rain check for another trip as is their policy because we did not spot any whales. There's about four people at work I don't like at all and I'll probably give this to one of them.

As for the whales, I have to re-examined the theory that we are killing them off and that's why they are becoming extinct. I think that perhaps they are all dying of seasickness and that's why they try to beach themselves.

They say life started in the ocean and that animals crawled out onto land. Maybe they were just seasick?

One of the funniest moments was a family that was leaving and they joked how it was a great bonding experience. There were about twelve of them and they laughed at how they'd all remember the young man's graduation.

As for me, I have eternal gratitude to give to Lynnae (the lady at work with the mints.)

I also have an unused vomit bag proudly displayed in my office.

I also have a raincheck to give someone at work, but who?

Decisions, decisions ...

Hello World

Way back in August, I had a cookout in my backyard with family and friends the day before I graduated from The Ohio State University with my MBA. I have no idea why it is called "The" Ohio State University. That must have been covered in the orientation I missed.

It had been about four years since my last cookout and Linda raised the point that she thought I should be a writer because of the many, many emails I had sent over the years telling stories about nieces and nephews, Springsteen tour experiences and generally weird stories that I seem to encounter.

It echoed what a former friend of mine (Kelli) had once said to me numerous times as well.

I honestly have never felt I was very creative with my writing and it is a labor for me to sit down and type things out sometimes. I have always felt I was a much better as an oral story teller than a story writer.

Having recently graduated, I am looking for a job in the worst economy since the Great Depression, selling a house, moving out of state and have a little more time on my hands than I thought I would, so I made the time to create a blog and write.

My sole goal is that this not become a narcissistic piece of crap and allow me an outlet to tell my stories outside of emails. Hopefully, I'll have enough stories that I can post at least once a week otherwise I may dig into some of the old emails I have to retell some stories as filler.