the mario blog

Whenever Barack Obama is in Portland campaigning (which he has been on numerous occasions this year), he works out at the same gym as I do. Early in the morning. And whenever I set myself the goal to work out before I go into the office, I can’t get out of bed. So already I have missed two opportunities  to see how Barack Obama would measure up against me in the bench press. That’s really all I would want out of the deal. A picture of Barack Obama spotting me on the bench press. Once that happens, I will officially endorse the guy.

Anyhow I hope Hilary Clinton stays in the race just long enough for him to come back to Portland one more time. And I will be working out in the mornings from now on.

Shameless promotion to follow…

I apologize for my lack of posts. Life has been packed with lots of business travel, weddings and well…publishing a book.

It’s called How To Complain For Fun and Profit and it teaches people how to write complaint letters that get results. You might not need it now, but if you have a bad customer service experience with an airline/hotel/restaurant/retailer, and you’re going to complain; then you want this book on your site.

It’s written by Bruce Silverman, a famous advertising copywriter, who came up with the “Never Leave Home Without It” tag line for American Express. He’s also the world’s best complainer and has been doing that for a long-time. This used to be a well-known industry secret (until I talked Bruce into letting me publish it as a book), and many people have gotten lots of free stuff based on writing letters the “Bruce way.” So what you learn in this book really works.

There is a free chapter that you can download to see what the book is all about.

If you’d like to purchase the book, here’s a limited time launch only $5 off coupon code:

chutzpah

It’s a pdf download, so satisfaction is instant.

If you know anyone who recently had a bad customer service experience, send ‘em our way. If you have a website, I would love a link to our book site. If you are a blogger or journalist, please let me know if you’d like to review the book.  If you think this makes a great mother’s day present, give me a call and I will talk you out of it.

Ok, this is my second bad flight experience in just a couple of weeks. Last week I was unhappy because Horizon Air ran out of beer on my flight from Portland to Santa Barbara.

This week, I am writing because I got stuck at the Philly airport for ten hours - thanks to the friendly folks at US Airways. Horizon’s Ginger Ale doesn’t sound so bad after all.

Here’s what happened.

After three days of late-nights, little sleep, flights across the country, preparing, scrambling and then delivering a major presentation; I was ready to head back to the West Coast for a weekend of sunshine and a wedding in Las Vegas. So after checking my bags and getting checked at security, I sat down at the gate, Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich in-hand, to relax for a couple of hours prior to my 6pm flight. Just as I took the last bite out of my sandwich, my flight departure got pushed to 8pm. Two hours of relaxation turned into four.

Then we boarded. Then we de-boarded an hour later because the intercom between the pilot’s cabin and the main cabin didn’t work so well. In the process of such, the guy next to me got picked up by airport security as he decided to de-board the plane rather quickly and ran over a flight attendant. Then the flight crew timed out and went home. So we had to wait another five hours before boarding the plane again.

I guess US Airways did what they could do. At some point, they even gave us $10 food vouchers to feed us while waiting. The only problem was that by the the time they finally decided to give out food vouchers, all stores and restaurants were closed. What a cost-savings initiative. Give people vouchers they can’t redeem.

We finally left the airport at 1am.

I want to take a moment to thank my “almost” seatmate, who’s arrest (or ban) allowed me to stretch out and sleep the whole way back to Vegas.

It has been a while since my last blog entry. Lots of exciting things have been happening, which has kept me from sitting down to write. An epic camping trip, three days of business in Santa Barbara and a day of wine tasting with good friends. Plus, Schalke got kicked out of the Champions League and our coach is now looking for a new job.

Two weekends ago, I went camping with my buddies David, Brad and Jim. What was supposed to be a relaxing day in the sun, turned into a 10 mile, 3000-ft of elevation climb that ended in several feet of snow and some serious splinters from bushwhacking in a dark forest. At least, I decided against hiking in sandals that day.

I spent the majority of last week in Santa Barbara where I was working on a major advertising pitch. After barely catching my Friday night flight (which was preceded by some very fast driving down Highway 101), I went wine tasting with Ryan, Jeana, Ben, Mario, Jim, Kate and Jen on Saturday. It was a long day of trying many different wines, which ended with a 2-hour nap at 7pm.

On Thursday I am flying out to Delaware for another new business pitch, before jetting to Vegas for Jen’s brother’s wedding this weekend. Never a dull moment.

Next week, life will be normal.

Excuse my lack of blogging these past few days. It has been a very busy week at work. The weather is finally starting to look up in Portland, hence, I am venturing into the wilderness tomorrow to test my new hiking shoes. I will be back on Sunday, but here’s what I learned this week.

• Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story is a very bad movie.
• I will be in Santa Barbara next week, and Delaware and Las Vegas the week thereafter.
• I gave in to Otto’s wishes and replaced his water dish with a Scotch glass. Filled with water, of course.
• He has since then figured out how to open a cupboard door with his paws. My cat is not normal.
• Christian just moved to Austria and is enjoying all sorts of powder snow.

This is the single best Mexican restaurant where my mother could be the chef. Note to readers, my mother is German and can’t cook.

Jen and I went to Acapulco’s Gold on Friday night due to the good reviews on Yelp.com - all of which must have been written by people under the influence of their margaritas.

So let’s start with the positives.

…

Moving on to what made it bearable.

Strong margaritas, fresh salsa and the beans didn’t make me sick.

Onto the bad stuff.
We should have walked out when they presented us with Friday’s special. A hamburger.

Oh, I almost forgot. I thought of another positive. If you love Costco, then you’re going to love their chicken burrito. Everything is made fresh straight out of Costco’s freezers. If you can’t finish your chicken burrito, just save the bird and re-use it in a Chicken Caesar’s salad the next day. That is what it was originally made for.

I am sure some guests love the bowls of chips placed all over the restaurant. Just not if you don’t enjoy stale chips.

Anyhow, their staff was very friendly and I am glad we went. Otherwise, I’d be blogging about Sunday’s trip to Nordstrom Rack and Otto’s dandruff.

There has been an interesting development following my Why Deutschland Loves David Hasselhoff presentation at Ignite Portland. About a week following the event, the friendly folks at Fordham University asked to use the presentation for teaching purposes in their German curriculum. Below is the very nice, and very funny, thank you letter I received from the German teacher who contacted me. I hope you recognize the sarcasm. Click on the image below to read the letter.

I can tell you. I am addicted to them. Every day around 11am, I try to get excited about some kind of healthy lunch. By 11:45am I am starting to waver, and by noon I am standing in front of my favorite burrito cart (Loco Locos Burritos) ordering either a bean and cheese or chicken burrito. It’s just so good. Then by right about now, I am downing cold coffee trying to help make it through my 2pm meeting.

How do I break this cycle? It’s hard. Here’s why:

• Burritos taste really good. And to me, they aren’t even that unhealthy. Note to my readers, I consider everything that isn’t fried or made of corn syrup healthy.
• The lady at the burrito cart is just so nice and she knows exactly what I want (half and half on the beans and easy on the cheese). After my mother and Jen, she’s probably the woman I talk the most to. Plus, she has a really shiny gold tooth.
• It’s nice to go outside for lunch and be in an environment completely different than my work. My lunch peers are construction workers, homeless people, the burrito lady with that golden tooth and all of her brothers and cousins.

If someone gives me a really compelling reason to stop eating burritos for lunch, I’ll try to eat something else tomorrow. I just need your help getting started.

I was just informed by one of my friends in China that my blog is inaccessible on the Chinese Intranet. While I did spend a few weeks traveling through the land with the great wall, I did not think that any of my blog entries during that time were worth banning my site for. No wonder my blog traffic is down. 1.3 billion people can’t access my site.

That’s it. I am not going to watch the Beijing Olympics and will ban anyone in my apartment and on my TV from doing so.

Are there any other countries or Intranets that can’t access my blog?

Jen, her parents and I went and saw the play Sometimes a Great Notion at the Gerding Theatre tonight. Opening day isn’t until Friday, so we got to pay little man’s prices. Lesson #1. It’s never a bad idea to go (and invite others) to the theatre when you can choose the best seats at highly reduced prices. Lesson #2. When inviting your lady’s parents, you might want to double-check if there’s going to be any full-fledged nudity or extended periods of cussing in the play.

Otherwise, the play was great.

And if you live in Portland, then you need to go and see it. It plays in Oregon sometime after World War II and before Germany won the 1974 World Cup, and tells the story of two very unalike brothers and their struggles to keep their lumber business afloat with a flurry of upset union lumberjacks weighing in every step along the way. I give it 4 out 5.