So a few months back, the local 24 Hour Fitness made what someone probably thought was an improvement: They added two TV’s to the men’s locker room.

The person who thought of this probably thought, “Hey I’ll be nice and add two TV’s. I’ll mount them high up so guys will look up, and not have to see other guys changing.”

[The cynical part of me adds, "... so that they won't notice that the floors keep getting dirtier and dirtier."]

Unfortunately, whoever thought of this missed the point of a locker room. Hint: it’s sometimes called a changing room.

Since adding the TVs, the room has been more crowded than ever. Why? Because of the TVs - people watch them!

Instead of changing, people are watching the games.
Instead of changing, people are watching CNN.
Instead of changing, people are watching Wheel of Fortune.

So - if having people watch the TV was a metric for measuring success, then I would say that they’ve achieved success.

On the other hand, if having people get in and out of the locker room quickly was a metric for measuring success, then they have failed greatly.

Orbitz’s flight search engine really amazes me sometimes. That’s definitely creative!

Blogthings - You Know You’re From Long Island When…

You never, ever want to “change at Jamaica…”

Yes… that would be the most dreaded phrase in my vocabulary. I only had to do that twice, and it was dreadful. Hurray for the Port Washington line.

You have or someone you know has fallen asleep on the LIRR and ended up in one of these three places; Babylon, Port Washington or Hicksville.

Oh yeah, except for the time that happened. It took forever to get back to Douglaston or Great Neck.

Your parents took you to Nathans or Carvel

Ooh Carvel!

You were upset when all the Roy Rogers turned into Wendy?s.

Still am. The roast beef and the fried chicken were damn good. Especially the fried chicken.

You watched a game show and wondered, “why are these people so happy that they won a trip to New York?”

Hahahaha.

You know the exact point at which Queens turns into Nassau simply on intuition.

Oh yeah. It just feels different.

High school sports aren’t that important.

…and you find out that Fencing isn’t a high school sport at any other high school.

You curse. A lot.

Fucking A!

I probably would’ve added “Chicken parm is a basic food group.”

Anyway, check out the link to see more.

Some highlights;

Your combined household income is $140,000 and you can’t afford shoes for the kids

The median income for a family of 4 is $96,000 so… that kind of explains this one.

You think that American food includes sushi, naan, pho, pesto and pad thai

Yeah… that would be silicon valley. That’s why I live above the one place with good pizza.

You met your neighbors once

I haven’t. But then again, they’re different every 3-6 months.

Even though you work 80 hours per week on a computer, for relaxation you read your email and peruse eBay

Or blog.

You have worked at the same job for a year and people call you an ‘old-timer’

Ah the things people say about my 4.9 years here at Microsoft.

The median price of a house is $500,000…for 1200 sq. ft. with no yard because it’s a town house

Actually the price is $650,000.

You have at least three computers at home.

Or 4?

You own at least one domain on the Internet, probably several.

uh oh.

You take your out-of-town friends to see the techie gadgets at Fry’s. But you don’t let them buy anything.

You know how to recognize re-sealed returned electronics at Fry’s.

Ah, I remembered when Fry’s opened in WA, and those of us here wrote a tutorial for our counterparts in Redmond. “DON’T BUY ANYTHING WITH A WHITE STICKER ON IT. NO MATTER HOW DESPERATE YOU ARE.”

Your out-of-state friends are impressed at how much money you make… until you tell them how much you pay for housing.

Unless your friends are in NY.

You know that a “fixer-upper” home could cost a half-million dollars.

…and there are shootings in the neighborhood.

At least once you have gone to San Francisco for the day wearing shorts and a t-shirt because it was a warm clear day in San Jose. And you froze your little *@#!% off in the fog, drizzle and wind.

7/4/2001. It was cooooooooooold.

Anyway, check out the link to see more.

Blogthings - You Know You’re From New York City When…

Heheheh. Here are the best parts, IMHO:

Hookers and the homeless are invisible.

Also, when “You see people who are in distress and think ‘if they really were in distress, someone would’ve helped them already’.”

You’ve considered stabbing someone just for saying “The Big Apple”.

Oh yeah… that’s definitely true.

You consider Westchester “upstate”.

What? You can go further?

You think Central Park is “nature.”

That’s my favorite outdoors place!

You haven’t seen more than twelve stars in the night sky since you went away to camp as a kid.

Having lived in NYC metro and Baltimore, I’d really never seen so many stars until I moved here and was in Los Gatos one night. It just never occured to me that there were so many!

Your closet is filled with black clothes.

Woolite black is your friend.

You haven’t heard the sound of true absolute silence since the 80s, and when you did, it terrified you.

You don’t notice sirens anymore.

I have trouble falling asleep if its too quite outside. This is due partly to the fact that I lived along a route to an ER for 4 years.

You secretly envy cabbies for their driving skills.

Actually that’s how I learned to drive.

When you’re away from home, you miss “real” pizza and “real” bagels.

CPK is the work of Satan.

You know what a bodega is.

Wait a sec… what do people call them here?

You know how to fold the New York Times in half, vertically, so that you can read it on the subway or bus without knocking off other passenger’s hats.

I confess - I never figured out how to do this.

Your doorman is Russian, your grocer is Korean your deli man is Israeli, your building super is Italian, your laundry guy is Chinese, your favorite bartender is Irish, your favorite diner owner is Greek, the watchseller on your corner is Senegalese, your last cabbie was Pakistani, your newsstand guy is Indian and your favorite falafel guy is Egyptian.

This one in particular strikes me. People in California don’t understand what I mean when I say there’s no diversity here. I guess its hard to explain - maybe ’self segregation’ would be more apt?

Anyway, check out the link to see more.

Blogthings - You Know You’re From San Francisco When…

Heheheh. Here are the best parts, IMHO:

You take a bus and are shocked that 2 people are carrying on a conversation in English.

How true - usually the non-English conversations seem to be in Cantonese.

Someone says TENDERLOIN - you don’t think of steak.

I think “Smells like urine.”

A really great parking space can move you to tears.

There are some friends I just don’t visit anymore because there’s no parking there.

You know that anyone wearing shorts in July must be visiting from Ohio.

Or Mountain View. There was one July 4th where it was mid-80’s here, and high 60’s in SF. I almost turned back when I noticed the fog on 280.

You are thinking of taking an adult class but you can’t decide between yoga, aroma therapy, conversational mandarin or a building your own web site class.

HAHAHAHAHA.

You haven’t been to Fisherman’s Wharf since the first month you moved to SF and you couldn’t figure out how to drive to Coit Tower if your life depended on it.

You can drive to Coit Tower?

You were born somewhere else.

Indeed! It seems like 75% of the people I know in the Bay Area aren’t from here. Especially at work.

A man gets on the bus in full leather regalia and crotchless chaps. You don’t even notice.

I always thought leather was just for jackets, belts and wallets until I came here.

Anyway, check out the link to see more. I would’ve added one that said “You fight to resist the urge to stab someone who calls it Frisco.”

(Thanks Omar.)

Trust me, this is great.

Know how you have to go to Windows Update and Office Update to get your updates?

Well, let me introduce to you http://update.microsoft.com/microsoftupdate

Just go to http://update.microsoft.com/microsoftupdate and start checking for updates. This will eventually be your one stop shop for all updates related to Microsoft - potentially more than just Windows and Office!

So go to it today, and tell all your friends!

What a painful game - until the very end! Came so close to tying - and then it ended.

(Thanks to Brad for the ticket opportunity!)