Free Food Samples (Click Here)

I've been eating healthier. I'm avoiding processed foods, artificial sweetners and foods high in sodium. Kashi brand makes healthy snacks. They are currently sending out a free sample to people who visit their website. Click on the title above to get your free sample.

Birthdays

I have a couple of friends/readers who have celebrated or will be celebrating birhtdays.

Happy Birthday to Amber (one of my best friends) 8/24

Happy Birthday to Maribel 8/30

Happy 30th Birthday to Frank (aka White Frank/Salt) 8/31

Say "No" to Foie Gras? (Click Here)

Philadelphia was definitely a interesting city to walk around. Lots to see and do. While walking back to the subway, Kelly and I heard people chanting and screaming. There was a group of protesters outside of a very fancy restaurant. There were police and a growing crowd of people. We wanted to know what they were protesting. The were protesting the treatment/abuse of geese in the production of Foie Gras (Goose Liver). I asked for a flyer from one of the protesters. Here is a link to the website to learn more about the practice of Foie Gras.

$1.5 Million Home (Click Here)

While walking through Philadelphia, Kelly and I saw a sign for an "Open House." The neighborhood was very old and had a lot of character. It was also near Independence Hall. We decided to take a look. The house was beautiful; an old Philadelphia Row House. The house was built in 1801 and has 5 floors. We looked at the listing to discover the house was $1,450,000! If you would like to know what makes a house cost that much, click on the title above.

Philadelphia

Kelly and I stopped into Philadelphia after our trip to Hershey. When I invited Kelly to Philadelphia, she had two requests. She wanted a Philadelphia pretxel and a Philly Cheesesteak. Kelly and I took the subway into the city and visited Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell. From there we walked through some 200 year old neighborhoods to South Street. South Street is a very elcectic part of town with tons of shops and restaurants. The city is fully of history and we wish we had more than a day to see the city. Here are lots of pictures from our personal walking tour.

Philadelphia is also building a new Skyscrapper, the Comcast Center. That is one of the last pictures in this set. It's set to be one of the tallest buildings outside of New York City and Chicago. Cut and paste this link to find more information.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comcast_Center_(office_building)









Kelly and here cheesesteak
Duck Boat on South Street

Hershey, Pennsylvania (Click Here)

After speaking on Friday night, Kelly and I decided to turn the rest of the trip into a mini vacation. The town of Hershey was about 45 minutes from the hotel. I promised Kelly I would take her to the Chocolate World Factory in Hershey. What a GREAT time. When you drive into the town you drive past light posts shaped like Hershey Kisses. The smell of chocolate is definitely in the air.

Kelly and I did the tour to see how chocolate is made (FREE TOUR). Then we did like the rest of the tourists. We sampled lots of chocolate and took lots of pictures. Enjoy some of our funny moments.

P.S. – Staff at Hershey gift shot treated us good. We had a 2+ hour drive back to our hotel in Philly and it was over 95 degrees outside. Kelly bought a insulated Hershey Bag and they gave us dry ice to keep all the chocolate Kelly bought from melting.

Albright College (Click Here)

Friday night was great. I was booked to do a show at Albright College for the freshman class, the class of 2011. I was at the small private college in Reading, Pennsylvania to give my “Creative Dating” speech/show. I was surprised to walk into the campuses main chapel. I met a student named Katie. I told her that I’ve never done a show in a church before. She told me not to worry because everything was covered up. “It’s just a building with then curtains cover things” was what she told me. I got set up and did my sound check.

About 30 minutes later over 500 energized freshman and transfer students showed up with over 80 orientation leaders called “the POPS.” I knew the night was going to be a lot of fun when I heard more than half of the students signing to “Big Girls Don’t Cry” by Fergee and “Sweet Escape” by Akon and Gwen Stefani. The show started off with me and the 80 POPS dancing to the song “It feels good” by Toni, Tony, Tone. The POPS were on the Church State behind me and the students were dancing and clapping, looking like church congregation. The funny part was I was about to start talking about dating, relationships and sex! The show was great, the students were a lot of fun and the night was memorable. Thank you Albright College. I would also like to thank Katie and Sally. Thank you for the “Green Monkey” t-shirt and taking care of me.

Thank you for the Hotel! 10 times better than the “worst hotel ever!”

West Chester

From 1988 to 1991, I called West Chester, Pennsylvania my home. The town of 18,000 is located about 40 minutes west of Philadelphia. I wanted to show Kelly where I grew up, so I asked her to join me on my trip to PA to speak at Albright College. I was great to visit another one of my many “homes.” I drove Kelly around the town and showed her my old house. I also got to see my old High School. The school is over 100 years old, but has been rebuilt and modernized. I wish I could have stayed in the town more, but I needed to get to Reading, Pennsylvania later that night for my show. Here are a few pictures of the town.




Our "old" house in PA.

Worst Hotel Ever!

I normally don’t talk bad about things, but today I have to! On Thursday night, Kelly and I landed in Philadelphia. We needed a hotel to crash at over night, so I went to Hotels.com to find something close to the airport. Based off of the location, reviews, pictures and price, I booked the “Days Inn Philadelphia Airport.” If you are ever in Philadelphia, NEVER stay at this hotel. It is in Chester, Pennsylvania and across the street from Widner University. We were first told that the hotel’s shuttle would pick us up 5 minutes after we called for the shuttle. After waiting for about 25 minutes, I called again. I was told the shuttle would be pick us up in 3 minutes. It showed up in 10 minutes after my second call.

While driving to the airport, we discovered it was about 20 minutes away from the airport, not near it. The hotel smelled of bug killer. Kelly and I got our room keys and attempted to get to our room. The elevator wasn’t working. We pushed the up button but nothing happened. An older gentlemen came over and pressed the down button and the elevator appeared. We got on the elevator and when the doors started to close; they wouldn’t close all the way. The gentlemen put a hand on each door and pulled them closed!

We got to our room to discover a modest room with a “unique smell.” Nothing terrible just unique…”old hotel” would be the best description. I went to use the bathroom, to discover the toilet wasn’t cleaned. I wiped down the seat before Kelly went in. Kelly went to use the bathroom to discover that the bathtub was black and brown on the inside and had cracks in the lining and bugs. We refused to take a shower. There was a diner (in name only) attached to the hotel, so we went back to the elevator of death. I closed the doors with my hands. The diner had some very scary looking people, smelled of smoke, and had some scary looking food. We looked for something safe. We got a greasy Monte cristo sandwich and some fries. Surprisingly we didn’t get sick.

We went back to the hotel. We joked about the hotel and the night and questioned what the pool looked like. Yes the hotel has a pool! We did check out the workout room. Half the equipment looked broken I apologized to Kelly for booking the hotel. I told her that the pictures on the internet made the hotel look nicer that in was. We were tired, so went back up the elevator of death to return to our room. I pushed the up and down buttons, then closed the doors manually with my hands after we got in. We were kind of scared to sleep in the beds but we did. Getting to sleep was a problem because of the fire station located next door to the hotel. Nothing like the sound of sirens to help you fall asleep.

When we checked out the next morning, we tried another elevator. We got in the other elevator to discover scary dark brown handprints smeared all over the walls of the elevator. I looked like a horror movie when someone dies and they smear there hands on a wall. At this point, Kelly looks at me and asks…”Are you putting this on your blog?” My answer…”YES!” I plan to leave a comment on Hotels.com and Days Inn’s websites. To be honest, I’m going to recommend that Days Inn take their name off the building.

I will say a couple of nice things about the hotel; the room had free wireless internet, a microwave and a mini fridge.

My Return to Cleveland?

Downtown Cleveland from the plane. Click on picture to enlarge.

On my way to Philadelphia for a speaking job, I stopped in Cleveland to change flights. It was weird to be “home” after moving two weeks ago. I was only in the airport because Kelly and I had only 30 minutes to change flights. I called a couple of my friends to say, “I’m back!” When the plane for Philadelphia took off; we flew over my old apartment, job and areas I used to visit. It was good to see you Cleveland! Here is a photo from the plane.

My Brother's Blog (Click Here)

My brother recently started his own blog. It has a lot of great videos and website links. Check it out when you get a chance. I will be adding a link to the right side of my blog. Click on the title above to see his site.

Florida

I just got back from Florida. I’ll be back on the road again on Thursday. I’ll be in Pennsylvania at Albright College. Stories and photos to come when I get back.

The Florida trip started off not so good, but ended good. Kelly and I woke at 4AM last Thursday to head to the airport for a cross country flight to Ft. Lauderdale. As the plane pulled away from the gate, we were informed that Hurricane Erin was in the Houston area and our plane was going to be grounded until the weather got better. After sitting for an hour and a half in a plane, we finally took off. The flight to Houston was supposed to be two and a half hours. After two and a half hours, our plane landed in Austin, Texas. We were told that the plane was low on fuel and things were still backed up in Houston. We sat on the ground for another hour in Austin before we finally got back in the air. We finally landed in Houston after being on the plane for 7 HOURS!

Needless to say, we missed our connection to Ft. Lauderdale. After a long process at customer service, Kelly and I were put on stand by for 3 flights to Florida. We waited around for two hours and got the last two stand by tickets for a flight to Miami. We were 20th on the list, so we were happy to get on the plane. During this whole process, Kelly and I really didn’t eat, we were stuck in lines or on a plane.

When we get to Miami, the story gets better. Because or original flight was scheduled for Ft. Lauderdale, or bags were put on the flight to Ft. Lauderdale. We landed in Miami at 10:30 PM. The flight with our bags wasn’t scheduled to land until 12:15 AM. After waiting in line to get this information, we went to look for a rental car. When we got to the rental car locations (not near the airport) we were informed that all the cars were rented. So, we went back to the airport to look for a car or shuttle to Ft. Lauderdale. Several people on our flight had to do the same thing, so it felt like we were on an episode of “The Amazing Race.” We finally found a shuttle and took a 45 minute drive to Ft. Lauderdale. $60 later we got our bags. We did manage to get our bags before the other people who flew on stand by from Houston. After getting our bags, we caught a taxi to meet Rodger at the Hotel. We got something to eat (take out) we finally went to bed at 3 AM Eastern Standard Time; 17 hours after our day started.

The next day we went for a walk on the beach and got lunch at a very interesting restaurant. It’s called “The Oasis Cafe.” The food was good, but the atmosphere was better. The restaurant is right off of the main drag in Ft. Lauderdale Beach. There are great views of the ocean. All of the seats have canopies and the tables rock back and forth on a rail like a swing. Be sure to look at the pictures.

After lunch was a long taxi ride to Miami, about an hour. We got to the hotel in time to unpack freshen up and head across the street to the University of Miami to do our sound check. We had a great time at the show. The students were great and the students and staff working the event were amazing. Things ended around Midnight. We went in search of food and crashed around 3 AM again. Poor Rodger didn’t sleep because he had to be to the airport to catch a 6AM flight to South Caroline for a Saturday show.

Kelly and I woke up Saturday to head back to the Miami Airport to pick up our rental car. We arrived to find a SUPER LONG line. I was worried our car would be gone! I got the keys to the car and headed out to the parking lot. We were expecting a little compact car. We ended up with a 2007 Ford Mustang. The car looks great on the outside, but the inside is another story. The hood is higher than the seats, so it’s hard to see out the front. The driver side seat raises up to help see out of the car, but passenger has no view. My seat was about a foot higher than Kelly’s. The seats aren’t that comfortable either. Not too impressed by the Mustang. We got in the unimpressive car and headed up to Tampa to see my family.

Got to see my mom, sister and brother. It was good to see them all and have dinner. Plus it was the first time for Kelly to meet mom. I think everyone was nervous. Kelly has a great personality and got along great with my mom and especially my sister. The visit with the family was short. Kelly and I got on a plane the next morning to head home.

I’m happy to say that the flights home were uneventful. We finally got home very tired, but the trip that started off not so good, ended really good.

Thank you everyone for reading. Here are some more pictures from the trip.