Hi guys. Just thought I’d drop in and say hello on what is a drop dead gorgeous day here in the Valley of the Sun.

I’m in Phoenix for the annual ISTAT conference that starts today and really gets cranking tomorrow.

Ah, and about Foto Friday last week — no, I didn’t forget. We’ll play catch up this week. As I wrote last Friday, I had some elder care issues that I had to deal with Friday — and that kind of backed me up on a lot of fronts.

But you know — we’re all going to be there someday. Old that is. So that’s just the way things are. I figure my parents put up with me when I was little and a pain in the neck — this is the least I can do for them.

Heh.

But have no fear. I’ll have some new shots for you this Friday.

As for the trip report out here — I was a happy camper as I once again scored a cheap first class seat on my Southwest nonstop flight. Yep, even though I was about 12 out in the “A” group, my uncanny ability to persevere came through again. I shared the first class emergency row exit with two nice people as well — was almost as much fun as the old lounge lizard days.

We arrived 20 minutes early and my bag was out pretty quickly.

Great flight.

While the flight experience was good yesterday, I have to ask the powers that be — what the heck has happened to the Southwest Airlines‘ in-flight magazine? Oh, I know it’s not being published by the folks over at AMR anymore. I know the change took place in January. This is more of a rhetorical rant than an actual question.

Has anyone else seen one? This was the first revamped issue I had seen. I hate it. Just simply hate it! Spirit always had excellent, well-written stories. It was the best in-flight magazine out there. I rarely left a plane without taking the magazine with me, because of one or more things in there that were worth keeping.

This thing? In-your-face big typefaces that seem more adept for a first grade reader, writing that is surface and shallow, nothing but one page fluff stories.

Seriously — somebody needs to do something about this — because if I were an advertiser, I’d not be very happy with this product.

Okay, there’s my one allowed rant for the day.

Talk to you later guys! Have a good rest of the weekend!