Delta Airlines, here’s a message for you.  Your voice recognition system sucks.  Big time.  I’ve tried everything and the only way it seems your system works is if I sound like Lillith from Frasier.  Yes I look strange in a crowd talking like that on the phone, so honestly, can you do something about it?  I mean how can your system not understand the spoken letter “A” from the letter “T”  They’re not even in the same phonetic camp.   I’m tired of telling your system the same thing over and over only to have your system give me that bright and cheery phrase “I’m sorry, I did not understand that, please try again…” 

Is it really worth the hassle you put your customers through?  Is it?

Now Playing: Reba McEntire - It's Your Call - It's Your Call

I knew that United and Delta were planning to offer internet connectivity on their flights, but I didn’t know about Southwest.

Well, according to the article in TCDaily, they are.  And unlike the other players, Southwest is talking about making it free.  As in Free.  As in not $12.95 per leg of each trip you take.  As in where do I sign up?

The big difference is that Southwest is using a service through a satellite link. American Airlines and other carriers are using technology that connects Internet users through ground-based signals.  That surprised me in that I would expect a sat link to be more reliable over a cross country flight, but we’ll see.

So once we get the internets in the sky, come the inevitable questions.  Skype.  Do I really want to hear the person next to me talking loudly to his friends on the ground?  Opening certain emails that are definitely NSFW, let alone with children in the row behind you looking over your shoulder?  That’s just for starters.  And you know it will happen because, well, people are idiots. 

But hey, free is free, so I may be flying Southwest even more. 

Now Playing: Bryan Ferry - Boys and Girls - The Chosen One

OK, it is officially Summer.  People are traveling.  So to everyone who has a child under the age of ten, here's a tip.

I travel.  My bag weighs a lot.  Sometimes, I go on a bowling trip, which means I carry a big bag with three 16 pound bowling balls in them.  When I'm taking the bag off of the carousel, the last thing I want to do is whack your little dumpling with a fifty pound bag of equipment.  So, I know, they really want to help.  But the fact is, there are lots of people around all trying to do the same thing I'm doing-getting their bags and leaving. So keep your kid away from the baggage carousel area.  Because if I don't accidentally hit them, someone most likely will.  And they may not be as nice as I am. 

Not unless you want your child in Darwin's waiting room.  Just saying...

OK, if you're feeling like Aquaman, and have more money than sense, here is the deal for you.  The Poseidon Undersea Resort  lets you rest underneath the waves in a room made mostly of acrylic glass. Located in Fiji, the resort offers guests private plane transport from a Fijian airport to the Poseidon Mystery Island, where they'll enjoy a week's stay — including two nights in the underwater hotel, with a personal 1,000 foot Triton submarine at their disposal. With a coral reef to explore, beach bungalows for above-sea level accommodations, an underwater library, wedding chapel, restaurants, and more, it's an out-of-this-world experience just 40 feet below the surface.  Also, maximum capacity is 144 guests.  

Face it folks, this is pricey - Exclusive use of the Poseidon Mystery Island for seven days and Six nights is $3,000,000.00 USD.  Just grab 143 friends and the cost is only $20, 833.33 each. 

And that's OK, especially if I'm riding the planned Bullet Train between L.A. and Sacramento.  From Gas 2.0, State environmental impact assessors have approved the plan from the California High Speed Rail Authority, and implementation of an 800-mile bullet-train system that will connect Sacramento, the San Francisco Bay Area, the Central Valley, Los Angeles, the Inland Empire, Orange County and San Diego has begun.  trains are expected to run aroun 220 MPH and a trip between L.A. and San Francisco would take about 2 hours and 40 minutes.

The State will have a bond measure of $9.95 billion on the November 2008 ballot, which requires a simple majority vote for approval. The measure allocates $9 billion for the high-speed rail system and $950 million for improvements to other rail services that connect to the high-speed service.

Considering the current Amtrack service between Portland Oregon to San Francisco is around 15 hours, this is what I call a smart move.

I lived for a couple of years in Portland, Oregon.  Portland is a very walkable city, and by that I mean that everything I needed: grocery, bank, retail, restaurants, etc... were within about a ten to 15 minute walk from where I lived.  If I needed to go downtown, there was a bus stop just up the hill.  If I needed to get to the airport, I could take the bus downtown then take the light rail to the airport.  I could get from where I lived to the airport in about 45 minutes to an hour.  Pretty good.  I think in the two years I lived there I put under three thousand miles on my car, and most of those miles were driving up to Seattle.

I write this mainly because of an interview that Treehugger.com had with Andy Kunz, an urban designer and town planner who is also a leading figure in the New Urbanism movement.  A very interesting article concerning rail, light rail and the US.  Kunz starts off with the obvious points:

• Our national road system and aviation operations are both overloaded past capacity and must be vastly expanded to meet projected demand.

• All systems (rail, roads, bridges, waterways) are in need of huge investment for maintenance upgrades and replacements.

• There is no possible way to double the capacity of our road system or our aviation network to accommodate the projected doubling in travel demand on both systems.

• Our road/car system and aviation operations are the main cause of global warming.

• The entire system is totally dependent on oil – a finite resource that is running out.

The article then goes to talk about mass transit and Kunz's call for a three tiered mass transit approach: national, regional and local.  the meat of the article concerns high speed rail and the push to start setting up high speed corridors in the US. 

All in all, it is an very good interview and oddly enough a very low keyed "common sense" approach to an ever growing problem. 

I've been known to travel a lot. There are some matters about flying that I don't like, but have no control over, like airport security and small, unruly children.  So I grin and bear the security and try to ignore the demon spawn.

But there is one thing that I view with a mix of humor and dread.  That is the businessperson in the seating area that has to be so connected to work that they are holding conference calls in the middle of the plane loading and then carrying it on to the plane until the very last possible moment when the staff tells them nicely, but firmly to turn the damn thing off. 

I wonder about these people.  I mean, other than a transcontinental flight, how long is an average flight, and really, can it not wait?  Is this person so important that they have to be connected with everyone they work with, and if that is the case, why are they flying coach?  Really, if they are that important, then they should either be flying first of on a private jet.  And why are they braodcasting their business plans to everyone around them?  If you were spying on a competitor, just have someone follow one of these people around and you'll soon know everything you want to know, just by overhearing the phone conversations. 

So when the FCC said they were thinking about allowing cell phone calls during flights, I thought, "Great, that's jutt what I need, some overbearing gasbag sitting next to me letting me know all the reasons why I should not have stock in his company. "  It was enough to make me start swearing off flying.  And apparently, I am not alone in this thought.

But, there may yet be hope.  Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin is recommending the FCC drop its tentative plan to lift its ban on in-flight cellphone use, three agency officials say. Good for them I say.  granted, the continuation boils dow to the major playors not wanting to share the airwaves with each other, but in this case, I say Greed IS good.  Please Lord, let them continue to fight so that my flight is quieter.

There's a little blurb in the Sydney Morning Herald concerning Google Map's apparent inability to get you to cross the street without going ten kilometers out of your way first.  While this seems a somewhat embarrasing scene for those in Google-land, those of us who have used mapping programs will most like yawn and say, "Only ten?  Please, they haven't heard about..."

I'm one of those guys.  I'll admit, when mapping programs first came out , I thought "OK, no more getting lost with a map that has the streets in microprint.  Just print up your directions and away you go."Stupid thought, that.  You see, I am convinced that mapping programs are set up to break down at the most critical point of your journey, sending you light years out of your way.  Much like the local who gives you those Larry the Cable Guy instructions "You'll come to where the road turns left, right by Ruby Maidland's whore house and then, you'll want to keep on a goin'..."

Yeah, Mapquest, Yahoo! maps and Google have all given me bum steers when I needed the right directions the most.  Like the time when my buddy Anthony and I were looking for a restaurant in Baltimore.  Yahoo conveniently forgot that the intersection we were at was a five way stop.  Make a right, the instructions say.  Right turn or bear right?  Both are possible.  The right turn landed us in a section of town where we did not need to be.  After all, when you're on the corner of Urine and Crime Spree, you know you need to get out.  Fast.  We finally made it back to the original intersection, took the other right, and found the restaurant in no time at all.

Granted, in most cases mapping programs get you where you need to go in safety and comfort.  But as for me, When I map directions, I now zoom down to street level.  Google Earth is great for that, as well and MSN's newest offering. Because I want to see every bear rights and curve in the road before I get there and wonder, where should I be going?