Flight of Fear (or “FoF,” as we have nicknamed it) is an enclosed roller coaster. 100% of the ride is indoors and in the dark, which adds to the experience and excitement of this ride. The majority of the ride takes place basically inside a huge cube, so track is twisting and turning and placed in the most ridiculous locations that you could possibly imagine. Since the ride is mostly dark, people generally don’t get a chance to fully enjoy the beauty of the design and implementation of this ride. That is of course unless you get stuck inside!!! (or you pay a few bucks for the ‘behind the scenes tour,’ I’ll post the link when I find what I’m looking for)

We started the ride like normal, accelerating from 0-60mph in about 4 seconds, and then flipping upside down a couple times, twisting and turning through the steel track. About halfway through the ride the track goes level and applies some brakes before the grande finale. Usually the brakes slow the train down enough to let riders catch their breath before a few more twists, turns, and inversions. However, this time the brakes stopped us completely.

We sat their for a moment of two, feeling the track shakng back and forth beneath us. Another moment or two go by, and I wonder if something could be wrong…will the brakes let go?

And this is the point when I start to get really excited. Seriously, right now I’m hoping that the ride has broken down and that we’ll have get off the train and walk down those metal stairs that you see on nearly every ride. We wait another minute or so until a KI employee shows up on the platform. “Um, we’re having some technical difficulties right now, and we’re doing our best to resolve the situation. The mechanics are on their way over here right now.”

That was when I took out my trusty iPhone to start documenting the whole thing. I took some pictures, I took some video, I even called Kevin because I knew that he would completely appreciate our current situation. I tried to update Twitter, but there was some stupid problem with the API at the time. Stupid Twitter.

About 12-15 minutes later the brakes on the track released and we got to finish our ride. At the unloading platform there were ten or so KI employees and 2-3 mechanics, waiting to make sure everyone was alright. We were…but some people were more “agitated” than others. I was thrilled. I wanted to do it again.

For years I have always wanted to get stuck on a roller coaster and have to climb down to safety. It has never happened, and I can always hope that someday it will…but I sure got to take home a great story today!

On July 16, 2009, I received an email from Nikon, Inc., alerting me about a “service advisory” (aka, recall, see here) regarding my camera. Nikon requested that D5000 owners with particular serial numbers send their cameras in to get checked for a problem with the power switch not actually turning the camera on. I had not experienced any of these problems, so I was a bit hesitant to send my camera in for service basically due to the sheer annoyance of me having to be without a camera for an extended period of time (insert ominous music here). I finally decided that I [probably] wouldn’t need my camera for a decently long period of time (two weeks…Nikon shouldn’t need more time than that, right?), so I packed the thing up in a box, slapped my prepaid UPS label on it, and sent the D5000 to Connecticut. I should note that the only thing Nikon ever stated when referencing to the amount of time that it would take to get the camera fixed was: “Nikon will return serviced cameras to customers promptly, employing (whenever possible) transportation that limits transit time to two days.”

This is where you laugh and say “I know what’s going to happen next. Lepolt is going to need/want his camera before it’s fixed!” You and Murphy would be correct…almost as soon as I sent the camera in, I wanted to use it.

A little background: Seapine Software has purchased tickets to the Western & Southern Financial Group Masters Open for the past few years, and has graciously offered tickets to employees. I have graciously accepted said tickets, and have been able to see the likes of Roger Federer (Pics from 2007) smacking that little yellow ball around on a court in Mason, OH. I figured this year would be no different, so I put in my request for tickets. Again, Murphy’s interference: I wasn’t able to get tickets at the end of the tournament like I expected, but more toward the middle.

At this point I knew I was in trouble. My camera was in transit to Connecticut, I was in Cincinnati, and the tennis tournament was in a little over a week.

What do I do? I NEED my camera by Saturday! Let’s call Nikon. I’m sure by calling their 1-800 number I’ll be able to speak with someone that can tell me the whereabouts of my camera and when I can expect it to return. Right? RIGHT?!

<insert laughter>

This is where the fun begins…I called Nikon on Sunday evening and talked to Cynthia. I asked her where my camera was. She told me “it was out of her hands.” I asked how I was supposed to find my camera, and how I could get it back by Saturday. She had no idea. She did tell me that she would email the service facility, and she would email me their response by Tuesday.

It’s Tuesday. I’ve heard nothing from Cynthia. I’ll call back. This time I talked to a guy and had to explain the whole situation to him again. He told me right away that “it was out of his hands,” and “we (customer service) are not handling that.” I asked him if he knew where my camera was and he said, “it’s in Connecticut!” I calmly asked if he knew for certain that my camera was in Connecticut, or if someone else’s camera was in Connecticut. “Well, that’s where all the D5000 cameras are going.” I asked again where MY camera was. “Well, we don’t have access to that information.” I called BS and said there had to be someone there that knew what was going on. He put me on hold for five minutes…then hung up. Intentional? Probably. At least that’s the way I’ll spin it.

So I called back. This time I got to talk to Vinnie. I told Vinnie my sob story (for the third time) and mentioned how the previous support representative had just hung up on me, and how the first support representative had failed to follow through on her commitment. Vinnie really felt my pain. “It’s not funny,” he said. “I understand your inconvenience.” At this point I could pretty much recite Nikon’s whole script of how to deal with a frustrated/angry/jackass customer and knew that no one at 1-800-645-6678 would be able to do a damn thing for me. I told Vinnie that this whole situation was unacceptable, and that I was really starting to get angry due to lack of communication between Nikon and its customers, and Nikon between customer service and the repair facility. We spoke for about 25 minutes while I tried to get a loaner camera from Nikon and he read from the script which was full of “I’m sorry’s” and “I understand’s.” Probably to get me to shut up, he finally told me he was pretty sure (although he wouldn’t guarantee anything) that I would have my camera back in time. He was going to email yet ANOTHER department to see if I could get a loaner camera by Saturday. Again, he was “pretty sure” that I could get a loaner camera (but wouldn’t guarantee anything).

I’m not buying it for a second. No chance. Zero. I’m not getting my camera back or a loaner by Saturday. They’ll have to kick the thing out the door first thing Wednesday morning to have any chance of me getting it.

One interesting tidbit that I did manage to extract from Vinnie was that it could take five business days once they received the camera to generate a service order number, and they could work with me from there. Hmmmm. Five business days. This information would certainly have been useful BEFORE I sent the camera in! Stupid Nikon!!!

I realize that this whole situation is a little bit my fault…but when it really comes down to it, I feel like Nikon should have done a better job of everything! They obviously know how long it will take to repair a single camera, how many cameras they have sold, and how many cameras they could expect to receive at their repair facility. They could have provided me with a rough estimate of how long I should expect to be without my camera! All they told me was they would try to ship it back within two days wherever possible. That’s worthless to me. Unbelievable. I can send something in the mail and tell you that it will take 2-3 days to get there! The useful information is how long it will take them to fix once they have it…information they neglected to share. Oh well.

So, I guess we’ll just wait and see. Hopefully I have something to use come Saturday…Federer is in town.

Most people have heard of Garmin. They’re the ones that make the GPS devices for your car so you don’t get lost looking for some specialty store that you’ve never been to in an area of town you’re unfamiliar with. What you probably are not aware of is that Garmin makes other GPS-enabled devices that aren’t designed for use in your car. For instance, Garmin also makes devices for running, hiking, biking, fishing, phoning, flying, and others that I choose not to list here. This post will focus on the running aspect of the aforementioned list.

Upon initially taking the Forerunner 305 watch out of the box the first thing I noticed was it’s size. It is one of the larger watches that I have come across, but considering the fact that it’s a small computer that communicates with satellites in outer space it’s really not that ridiculous. Putting the thing on my wrist didn’t look nearly as bad as Abi’s, but she has tiny girl wrists and I have thick, hairy manly wrists. In either case if you make the comparison between cell phones in 2009 to the Zach Morris Phone in those old ‘Saved by the Bell’ episodes, the Garmin watch really isn’t all that bad.

After charging up the internal lithium ion battery, we were ready to go for a run. The one crappy thing about any GPS device is that it must communicate with satellites that are very, very far away. Like 12,000 miles away. Sometimes it takes a while to get a signal from one or more of these satellites. Once the watch is turned on, it immediately begins searching for available GPS signals. Depending on the surroundings, these signals may be found more quickly than others. For instance, if you’re in a large, open field it will be easier to find a signal than if you’re hiding in the woods somewhere. After a signal is found, you’re ready to go.

Pressing the start/stop button does just that: it starts the timer and begins tracking your run. The Forerunner 305 has a whole slew of items that you can display on the main screen at any given time. Anywhere from 1-4 items can be viewed simultaneously, including but not limited to your time, current pace, your average pace for the run, your current/average speed, the total distance traveled, the distance traveled since the last split, and even a small map of where you have been in case you get lost in a neighborhood (it’s been done before…thank goodness for the map). There are other nifty fields that we don’t use very often like elevation, GPS accuracy, grade, heading, sunrise, and sunset (for a complete list of everything, check out the user guide).

The Forerunner 305 also includes a heart monitor, which is useful [and entertaining] to see how hard your body is actually working during a run. I’ve heard that some people actually think that running by heart rate is better than running by pace/speed, but I don’t have any research or links to back that up. All I know is the better in shape I am in, the less work my heart has to do to keep me at a reasonable pace.

Perhaps one of my favorite features about the watch is being able to download runs onto a computer by attaching the watch to the computer via USB cable. From within the Garmin Training Center software, you are able to track your run on a map, as well and view detailed statistics about each lap. Below I offer a few screenshots of a run Abi and I completed last summer:

This is the breakdown of each lap from this particular run. We had the watch setup to automatically split after each mile.

This is the map of the run. Each dot represents a transmission from a satellite. The watch updates every one second or so. The further you zoom in, the more dots you see.

This is a graph of pace vs. time, and heart rate vs. time. Other items can be graphed such as speed, elevation, distance, and cadence (for biking). The Windows version of this software enables you to smooth out the line a little so you don’t get the constant up/down rocky line. This probably has a little something to do with the accuracy of the watch, and the lack of support for the Mac.

Overall I have to say that I am thoroughly impressed with this purchase. At first I wasn’t a believer, but now I tell everyone about how cool this watch is and constantly recommend it. There is a new model of the watch out, the Forerunner 405, which I know very little about. I looked at the specs of the 405 versus the 305, and it looks like very little has actually changed, but it does come in green. The 405 is slightly smaller, and can wirelessly transmit data to your computer instead of using the provided USB cable…but other than that it doesn’t look like the price jump is worth it. I would buy another 305 if I were purchasing a new GPS watch tomorrow.

Let’s recap

Pros
Accuracy – I was running down a standard residential street and just for fun ran back and forth from curb to curb on either side of the street. The results of my zig-zag run were recorded.

Features – There are 32 different pieces of data that you can put on the main display of the watch, up to four at a time. The display is large enough to read all four.

Size – For a GPS communicator it’s quite small, especially compared to GPS watches from a few years ago or the devices most people are used to seeing in cars.

Cons
Cost – Last check on walmart.com, the watch was still $215. It’s still pretty expensive, but if you use it regularly I think it’s worth it.

Size – For a wristwatch it’s still pretty big.

Difficulty finding satellites – Sometimes it takes five minutes or so to find a signal strong enough to use before you can start your run. Personally I use the extra time to stretch out a little more.

Mac support – Software support on the Mac is mediocre, at best. Windows support is much better…but I refuse to use it!

I hope you have found this review somewhat useful. If you are a serious runner, I would highly recommend using a watch like this for training. If you are a recreational runner training for a race, it will definitely be helpful, but might not be worth spending this much money on a watch. If are someone that goes out running right now without any watch at all, the Forerunner 305 probably isn’t for you!

I’m not expecting fans to ignore these feats. I won’t do it myself. I went to a number of UC games as an undergrad and was treated to some of the best basketball games I have ever seen. No, don’t forget about those. What we need to do however, is keep moving forward.

I understand that there is a big game on campus tonight. It’s a big game for both teams. UC and WV are both middle-of-the-road teams in the Big East, both fighting for that first (and second) round bye in the Big East Tournament. What’s not a big deal is the relationship of Huggs and Cincinnati for ANY player on EITHER team. Huggins’ last season with UC was in 2005. It is now 2009. No player on Cincinnati’s roster in 2008-09 was on the roster in 2004-05. Zero. There’s a chance that most of the players on WV’s team don’t even know where Cincinnati is. These players don’t care about the drama; all they want to do is win a basketball game tonight and move up in the Big East standings.

Most current students at UC weren’t around in 2004-05 either. All they want to do is watch the Bearcats win a basketball game tonight and move up in the Big East standings.

The UC athletic department decided that tonight would provide a great opportunity to recognize Bob Huggins for his exceptional efforts from 1989 to 2005. There will be a short video before the game tonight highlighting some of the great years Huggins had at UC. I feel that doing something like that TONIGHT is probably dumber than hiring Nancy Zimpher to begin with! In case you missed the first paragraph, Huggins is the opposing coach! He is coming to the Shoemaker Center tonight with plans on BEATING Cincinnati! We’re not friends tonight! Tonight we’re enemies! Why are Earth would UC take time out of pregame to say, “Huggs, you’re okay! Let’s be friends! Thanks for everything you’ve done for this program even though we suck right now thanks to controversy from your days of coaching!”

I am a Bob Huggins fan. I liked the guy from 2001-2005 when we were both at UC, and I like the guy today at West Virgina. It’s weird for me to see Huggs on the sideline at a different school, but I still want to see him get smoked by the ‘Cats tonight. Today is not the day to praise Bob Huggins and thank him for what he once did for the basketball program. That day will come…like, say, on another day when West Virginia isn’t in town? Or maybe after Huggins retires from coaching college basketball?

Come on, UC. I know ticket sales are down, but it’s a really shady thing to use controversy to sell tickets. Use excitement! Use pride! Use lower prices!

I will be watching the game tonight, cheering for the Bearcats. I am, and forever shall be, a Bearcat.

C—I—N—C—I—N   N-A-T-I!!! (N-A-T-IIIIIIII!!!)

Jonathan Lepolt
College of Engineering ‘06
RallyCats ‘02-06

• Splitting Wood
• Painting Another Room
• De-icing the Driveway

Thanks to CD, Evan, and Abi for help splitting/stacking wood.

Abi and I were responsible for painting and getting all the winter off the driveway.

Fairbanks provided guests with beer brewed in the home countries of many of the composers that would be featured that evening, including Poland, Russia, France, Austria, Belgium, Argentina, and the United States.

As people sat down with their beers of the world in anticipation of a great show, Fairbanks got things going with some contemporary favorites by the Beatles, Chicago, and Charlie Chaplin. “Songs like these are always fan favorites,” said Roger. “People know the words and tend to sing along in their heads. It keeps them excited for more, and before they realize it they’ve become entranced by the classical pieces.”

The contemporary pieces were followed by a familiar tune, heard recently in an Xbox commercial for Halo 3. It was Chopin’s famous Prelude in D-flat Major, better known as the Raindrop Prelude.

Music enthusiast Joseph Valentin says, “Mr. Fairbanks dazzles audiences again with his latest release, Live in Cincinnati. On his newest disc, Fairbanks displays unusual versatility, bringing to life everything from the nostalgic melodies of the Beatles and Chicago to some of the repertoire’s most difficult riffs from Debussy and Rachmaninoff. Live in Cincinnati will keep listeners interested from start to finish and promises to bring audiences back for a repeat performance.”

For this special event Roger invited his piano teacher to stop by to play a few pieces. Judith Fleitas is a Doctoral candidate at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. Her musical genius was demonstrated tonight as she performed some classical pieces by W. A. Mozart and Alberto Ginastera. She wowed the crowed as her fingers moved magically along the keys, producing a sound that Ginastera himself would have appreciated. A quick biography about Judith can be found at the end of this release.

Between Fairbanks and Fleitas, the night was a huge success. After the concert was over the fans erupted with applause, standing up and asking for an encore. Roger’s CD will be release to the public in the next few weeks, but in case you can’t wait, digital downloads of the individual pieces can be found here: http://www.lepolt.com/roger_live.

Press Contacts:
Jonathan Lepolt
Fairbanks/Lepolt Recording Studios
lepoltje [at] gmail [dot] com

Judith Fleitas is a Cuban American pianist. Ms. Fleitas is completing her Doctorate in Musical Arts at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. Her repertoire includes most of the Classical composers and her specialty is Latin-American Classical music. Besides that, teaching is also her passion. Roger Fairbanks is one of her adult students, and one of the most dedicated and entrepreneurial ones. Mr. Fairbanks has been taking lessons from Ms. Fleitas for several years, and this performance was one at his house, where several friends and music lovers gathered and both, teacher and student performed in an informal atmosphere for fun.

About the pieces: Alberto Ginastera was one of the most famous Argentinean composers of the twentieth century. The piece performed by Ms. Fleitas is from a set of three dances titled “Tres Piezas.” The earlier piece is the second movement from W. A. Mozart’s beautiful piano sonata in F Major K. 332. If you would like to contact Ms. Fleitas, please do so at: fleitasjc [at] hotmail [dot] com.

We actually ended up losing power around 3:00pm Sunday afternoon. It flickered on and off a few times until finally settling on off. No big deal, right? It will come back on sooner or later…or not.

2.5 days later power was restored to our house. As of 1:30pm today there still are over 297,000 customers that aren’t nearly as lucky as we are. Regardless, I’d like to recap the past 2.5 days as a list of things that were good, bad, ugly, ridiculous, etc. Here we go:

The good

• After the wind was done blowing on Sunday, the temperatures dropped into the 50-60s at night, and 70s during the day. This meant that we weren’t going to freeze to death, nor would we sweat to death.
• Although Hurricane Ohio was tough, we never saw more than a sprinkle of rain.
• Our 40 gallon water heater managed to keep enough hot water stored up so we could take minimal showers.
• Team Lammi was supportive throughout this whole catastrophe, as they offered up their hot food and some electricity (hopefully we don’t get a bill).

The bad

• After 2.5 days we had to toss out a bunch of food. This was by far the thing that upset me most about the power outage.
• Busy intersections with broken stoplights. At least most people realized they were four-way stops.

The ridiculous

• A few people in our neighborhood were running generators to keep part of their houses powered. Which parts I have no idea. I do know that we saw one guy siphoning gas from his car so that he could run the generator a little longer. Hmmmm, necessary? I think not.

The ugly

• The number of people that thought the world was going to end because of a power outage.

Insult to injury

• Tuesday morning Abi and I were leaving for work when we found out that Abi’s car battery had died. D’oh! Good thing Autozone was open until 10pm.

Things I’m glad we had

• Bread
• Peanut butter
• Honey (goes great with the bread and peanut butter)
• Random snack food
• Flashlights with charged batteries
• Tons of candles
• Matches + lighter
• Cars with gasoline
• Grill with propane
• Friends with power

Things I wish we had

• Ice
• Generator (mostly for the fridge)
• Bottled water
• Ice
• Dry ice
• More ice

Problems for others

• Missing roof shingles
• Missing siding
• Exposed plywood on roof and/or side of house

At 12:49am this morning our power came back on. Things can get back to normal at Casa de Lepolt.

For your viewing pleasure, I have posted some photos of the game: Opening Day 2008

Jonathan Lepolt’s Snow Rules:

1. If it’s going to snow, don’t do it while I’m away from home.
2. If it’s going to snow when I’m away from home, especially don’t do it when I’m 30 miles from home in Mason, OH.

Yes, you guessed it.  I got stuck driving home from work in the snow again.  Some of you may find this funny.  Screw you.  Some of you may feel my pain.  I’m about to start a support group, and everyone is welcome.

So it turns out this blog entry is going to be another rant about the weather in Cincinnati, moronic drivers, and the lack of competence of the local meteorologists.  Last week you may recall that I put a poll up on my blog asking people to vote on how much snow we would get overnight.  Meteorologists predicted 3-5 inches, and we ended up with about one inch and a nice coating of ice.  All I saw on the TV was weather people, weather watches, weather warnings, weather updates, weather-related closings, and salt trucks on call to react to the weather.  On my two-hour drive home today in a stretch of about 30 miles, I think I only saw two salt trucks.

Kevin should be able to attest to that.

So where were you on this one, weather people?  On my way into work around 7am they said the snow wasn’t going to start until 5 or 6pm.  Abi said I’m full of crap and they said the snow was going to start at 3pm, but I think they changed their minds once they figured out how stupid they were.  Oh well, I enjoy stop-and-go traffic on the Interstates.  After all, who needs a 65mph speed limit?

*Allow me to step off of my soapbox*

So, how ‘bout them Bearcats?  Not looking too bad this season after all, and we are sure getting our money’s worth in these close games.  Anyone predicting 2008 NCAA Tournament?

I want to tell a little story about my experience last winter with snow and how my respect for Cincinnati snow has increased dramatically when snow meets hills. It was any old Tuesday afternoon in January, and the meteorologists were predicting a large snow storm that afternoon that would continue into the evening. “Big deal,” I thought, “get over it. It’s just a little snow.” Around 1pm or so the snow started falling; big flakes blowing in the wind beginning to cover everything on the ground. What a beautiful site. It remained pretty solid for most of the afternoon. Around 3pm my boss started walking around the office letting people that lived far away from work leave early to avoid getting stuck in traffic. I thought he was being a little cautious, but nonetheless I took his offer and headed for home.

This is where the fun begins.

I live about 30 miles from work. It generally takes me 30-35 minutes to get home with no traffic. I figured the roads would be a little messy, and it might take me an hour this time. I actually thought that. One hour. Oops.

To spare some of the details, it took me 2.5 hours in stop-and-go traffic to get to the entrance to my apartment complex. Wow, 2.5 hours and I am still just almost there. I’ll just drive up this hill and we’ll call it a day. Gravity was against me. Gravity was against my manual-transmission car and me. I could not get enough traction on the ground to move forward…in 1st or 2nd gear. I had no chance to get any momentum to even try to get up the hill. After about 30 minutes of moving almost nowhere, I finally threw in the white flag, parked my car, and walk the rest of the way up to my apartment. A full three hours after I had left work.

So, what have we learned here? Well, maybe Cincinnatians aren’t being completely ridiculous when they cry and moan about all of the snow, but lack of driving skills sure doesn’t help the situation. I think this year I may carry some chains in my trunk.