Sedona,AZ?Grand Canyon

Ok, it's been awhile. Trying to get back into the swing of things. Here are some pictures I took while on a much needed vacation to Sedona, AZ with my wife, Michele.
Ganesh, he can be found even in the dessert mountains of Arizona. This is a nice trip if you just need to relax and find gazing into a huge crater exciting. There are pubs, Mystics, Palm Readers, Tarot Card readers, Cowboys, Cowgirls, Cowgays, Cowpokes, Cow Chips, Havelinas( Pigs that rulke the night), 15 varities of Rattlesnakes and a place called the Cowboy Club where I was lead to believe you could get a good piece of free range beef and a whore. ! out of 2 prooved to be correct.
Take the Pink Jeep Tours if you do the trip. Its like riding with Barbie and Ken is her bitch. Rocks. Yes , did I mention rocks? Red rocks, big rocks, phallic rocks, rocks that look like the virgin Mary, rocks with other rocks on top, rocks with rocks underneath, pretty much Sedona rocks....
We flew into Phoenix, 114 degrees F. "Its a dry heat", hell stick your head in your oven after pre-heating it to 114 degrees and tell me its a dry heat. Horse Patootie, its just freakin hot. Sedona is a 2 hour trip north, 20 degrees cooler. It actually rained on and off a few days. There are ancient American Indian sites you can visit on one of the Pink Jeep Tours, that was fun.
The trip to the Grand Canyon was an all day deal, left at 7:30am got back 5:00pm. We learned that a man had committed suicide the week before we got there by driving off into the canyon. LOL. The tour guy told us that they lose about one person a week to the canyon, not all suicides, some just stupid people who should have died years before, I am sure. The guide said he looked at it as thinning out the herd. After sitting on a bench and watching the other tourists I can see why, it would be like driving to the North Carolina Fair and picking up some of the locals there putting them on a bus and driving it off a cliff on Grandfather Mountain. Which by the way may not be a bad idea.
I could tell there were some transplants from California in Sedona as this one couple were engaged in a tongue duel in the Pub in the picture below. They finally came up for air after the waiter came by and threw a bucket of water on them. I thought maybe the dude had swallowed a big piece of meat and the dudette was not familiar with the Heimlick Manuvere and was going in with her tongue to check for debris. LOL.
All in all it was a pleasant trip and I was actually relaxed for 3 days after returning.
More RTP people's pictures and dirt to follow.
Happy Trials.

Now that I am back, I promised my India colleagues I would continue to share the RTP team with them as they have seen pictures of the Monheim team when I was there. I left off with Lari Dingman and ays guest appearance is Christy Crump. Seated in her cube smiling like she hasn't been up working since 6:00am and will do that until 10:00pm tonight. If you look close in the background you will see the light of her life, Morgan Ashley Haynes Crump, her daughter who keeps her busy when UCB doesn't. Her husband Derek is a lot of fun too. Christy has worked at RTP for what seems like forever. All of us at RTP have worked with each other at some other CRO or Pharma. I worked with her, Brian, Kevin, Lari, Cliff, Eileen, Kim Eggleston, David Hebert, Cindy McShea, David Sen, Marty Johnson,Deanne Dilley and Mike at Quintiles years earlier and I worked with Kym,Todd,Phyllis,and Cindy at Inveresk. Christy has an impressive resume and a personality to go with it and is especially sweet when she is wearing her favorite color ....pink...right down to her sandals.

I'll be Back

I'll be back to India soon. Friday was cultural day, everyone dressed in cultural wardrobe.

Are they not beautiful and handsome women and men, especially the dude with the turban??

LOL. Bhavesh and Satish paraded me around the Accenture grounds so that everyone could 'take notice', I'm sure it was more like laugh at an old man dressed up, but I went along with it because it is exactly what I would have done too. Payback is coming, gentlemen....This is the India GSP and RM teams combined, called ORCHID. The Phoenix team was short lived because some other client had that name, so the big bird took a dive back to the firey pit.

Orchid is a force to be reconned with as all will see in the near future. Joerg, the team lead for Monheim - Rotigotine, was a great asset and his knowledge transfer to the team will make for an easier transition. He is knowledgable, kind, well liked and has fallen in love with the Indian cuisine and people. The team would like to have had him for one more week....I am now in Frankfort in the Lufthansa Lonuge drinking "coffee"....No Kingfisher here boys. I introduced Bhavesh and Satish to Sherry ( no not some caucasian street ho!!!) , the drink. LOL. They are addicted, got to go.

More to come. RTP ....I am on my way back.....Monheim, I will visit soon. Mumbai..... I miss you already.

Elephant ride

OK, I had resigned to that fact that there were no elephants in Mumbai, hell there was no spicy food, why should I have expected an elephant? Then one day I while I was expressing my views on my dilemma( you all know me, I was just whinning) , one of our new recruits, Neha, said her family knew of an elephant to ride. To say I was giddy would be an understatement. As I arrived in the van with Bhavesh, all I could think of ,was I going to be riding some plastic carnival elephant? maybe a baby elephant? Maybe a horse with a big nose? You can't trust Bhavesh, but Neha seemed trustworthy.....So the next thing I know she is calling for someone to bring the elephant, I immediately thought of the plastic elephant and that they drug me out here just to make fun of me....who would do such a thing????? Me??? ..... that's right

Ok, so this is the back of the elephant as it passed by, definitely not plastic and had an ass as big as my brother-in-law's , Dan, well almost as big......Dan's tail is shorter, among other things, he had an "enhancement" at work....Melissa said she hadn't noticed....

I was really excited as we motored down the road to a place where I could ride this magnificent beast. Her name was Laxmi ( pronounced lachschmee). 45 years old, I like younger women....

Ok, the smile says it all, my dream come true is strolling down the road, playing hard to get

I don't speak much elephant, most of you know I don't even have a command of the English language, but I KNOW she liked me. Look at that smile on her face. Who loves ya baby?????

I never mounted an elephant before...Shut up Mabe, you too Hebert!!

On top of old Laxmi .....all covered with hair,........ I found my old sweetheart , ....she smelled like a bear....So off we go with the driver, he used a stick and some barbed iron thing to put her in first gear. There is a lot of movement up there. Ole Laxmi had some junk in the trunk, but then she had two trunks, one in front too

I love this picture. We are motoring down the road at a fast pace right here, taxis and auto rickshaws running off the road to clear a path for Laxmi. She was light on her feet and was probably a good tango dancer too

We rode for about a half hour and travelled a 1/4 mile. At times the wind was blowing through my hair, oh yeah, forgot, I'm bald.....the wind was blowing through my hat. At one point we passed a speeding train and a pack of wild dogs, ears flapping...hers not mine...At the end we shook trunks, well she shook hers, mine shook when I mounted her, butt thats another story

Bhavesh insisted I put this in here and say that he had a hard time telling my head from Laxmi, but he said she had more hair and her head was smaller

All in all, it was a fun ride. I want to thank Neha and her family, her dad and lovely sister, Rakhi, who was believing that I got this India Liaison gig from being a professional male dancer for over 20 years.

I apologize to Rakhi for telling a big lie, she evidently could not tell I have no rhythm, and sometimes breathing is an effort, let alone twirling, or tango dancing...But that's why they hired me, I am convincing........

Iris, Pejo,Benedikt and Ann, thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to visit a countrty where the people take an interest in a man's dream and returned a smile I had not seen obn my face since I was a child, yesterday...LOL.

PHOENIX

I am proud to introduce my India Family. These are my Accenture colleagues, with the team name of PHOENIX :
The phoenix (Ancient Greek: Φοῖνιξ, phoínix) is a mythical sacred firebird which originated in the Sub-continent of India in ancient mythologies mentioned in the Egyptian and later the Phoenician and the Greek Mythology.

After an intense 5 week training course lead by Satish Setty and Bhavesh Patkar all passed with an assessment score of 90 and above, and true to the name of Phoenix of "rising above", they are all anxious to start their new journey.

Phoenix Team:
Ann, Mike and I are very proud you all and sincerely wish you the best and look forward to our next trip here.

UFO

An Unidentified 'flying' object was seen in the Eastern sky over the sleepy town of Monheim, Germany last month near the UCB headquarters. A local employee, Sascha ( probably not his real name) was quoted as saying " I was very much in fear for my life and my American colleagues , Christy, Phyllis, Mike and Bill ,who had been attending a cooking class ( can you beleive it?? these poor computer types have to take a class in order to cook ). It came out of the treeline as two orbs glowing in the night. We all huddled close to kiss our arses good-bye as we drank Alt and said our last prayers".
Sascha was obviously shaken and stirred, pun intended. Guido Wendland, an intellectual type, gave his Expert assessment of theis apparition. " It was 2 perfect circles, 1.825 meters in diameter travelling at a speed of 2065.325 KPHs when it passed over my head in my sporty convertible chick magnet. It was at an elevation of 13.189745 meters from the ground and at an angle of 63.572 degrees over the horizon. I was travelling west at 100 kph headed to the Virginian to meet women and set up a tennis match. I thought nothing of this because I had just consumed 3.25 large orange carrots and had experienced this adverse event before."
Christy and Phyliis finally had the wascally wayfarer cornered at the Achat and the mystery was unravelled. A good time was had by all.