Author: Adam Lesh

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Utah Mighty 5 RV trip, Day 1 – Saturday, 12/19 – The Adventure Begins!

Utah-M5-Day1

On December 25, 2015 I will turn 50, so I decided to have a brief mid-life crisis and do something a little crazy.  My family and I have always talked about renting an RV for an extended road trip to several national parks.  With a college freshman (Isabelle), high school sophomore (DJ) and a girlfriend (Teri) who works at a school, opportunities for extended trips are actually rare, but there is one time of year when everyone is free – winter break, which is, of course, not the ideal time of year to drive a RV (for the first time, mind you) through the Utah wilderness, but that’s just what I decided to do.   We’ll be visiting the Mighty 5 national parks in Utah – Arches, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Bryce and Zion – via RV.

I did a great deal of research on RV’s – rental places, type of RV to rent, RV campsites, etc. and the weather in Utah this time of year.  I rented a 28 foot RV from El Monte RV, a national chain with decent reviews.  Weather was a risk.  There was no doubt it would be cold, but snow was an unknown.  As it turns out, it snowed before we arrived and will continue to snow on and off during the trip.

Each day, I will highlight the original plan, any revised plans, the reality, the good and the bad of the trip.

The Plan

Fly to Salt Lake City from Los Angeles, pick up the RV, and stock up with food and supplies.  Drive from SLC to Dead Horse Point State Park Campground just outside of Moab.  My father and his girlfriend, Susan, were also meeting us in Moab.

The Reality

Our plane was delayed an hour at LAX but we arrived in SLC with all of our luggage and plenty of time to get to the RV place.  After a brief tutorial and instructions on how to maintain the RV, which we promptly dubbed “The Behemoth,” we were off.   The snow made the roads, parking lots and side streets slippery and I had to get a feel for the stopping time of the Behemoth, due to both the size and weight of the vehicle and road conditions.  The width of the Behemoth, especially the large side-view mirrors, required some adjustment as I had people screaming at me that I was too close to cars and other obstacles on both the left and the right at times, particularly on city streets.

The Good

Just flying into Utah was beautiful made even more so by the recent snowfalls.  We made it to Whole Foods and Target and stocked up with little incident.  We had prepared well in advance and knew what we needed.  Once we hit the major freeway from SLC to Moab, driving the Behemoth was no problem.

The Bad

An overturned big rig delayed us even further and we arrived at Dead Horse after the park technically closed.  It wasn’t a real problem because we were able to drive right in, with a little help from my father who had scouted the site earlier in the day, and set up.  There was a ton of snow on the ground, but I just drove slowly which was not a problem since we were pretty much the only vehicle on the road to Dead Horse.

The biggest problem was that I had made my first rookie mistake.  I was told that the most important hook-up needed was power since the built-in generator could not be run all night and, as you might imagine, we had to run the heater all night.  Turns out the heater runs on propane, not power, which is both efficient and cheap.  Much more important is water, which Dead Horse did not offer.  Fortunately, there were open, if chilly, bathrooms at the site, so we were able to make do.

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A User-Friendly Ticket Experience

Anybody get tickets last week for Coachella?  Anybody?  Bueller?

I didn’t and neither did anyone I know.  Now, that’s OK.  Demand far exceeded supply and pre-sales were strong, so everyone isn’t going to get tickets.  My beef is with the process.

In case you haven’t purchased tickets lately, this is how it works.

Promoters announce a date and time that tickets will go on sale to the general public.  Shortly before that moment, anyone who wants tickets opens up the app or website and waits, cursor or finger poised over the appropriate button.  At precisely the designated time, thousands click, more or less simultaneously.  Most then get a spinning wheel of death of one form or another and wait while the lucky few start buying tickets.  When tickets are sold out, which can take minutes or hours, the page is updated and those out of luck have to move on to Craigslist, Facebook, StubHub, or wherever and try to purchase tickets on the secondary market.

Not the ultimate in user-friendliness and since tickets usually go on sale during business hours, a disruption of the work day.

Ironically, this is actually worse than the old days when we would line up at the ticket booth and hope we get to the front of line before they sold out.  There is no strategy, no getting there days early and camping out, no hope of industriously gaining an advantage or even a business opportunity (like those people who, for a healthy fee, will wait in line for you to score a new iPhone).  In other words, it is completely luck of the draw.  This, again, is OK.  I have no problem with a random process, but why, with all the technology available at our fingertips, do buyers need to hover over mice, phones and tablets at an exact time just to try to get tickets?

I have a suggestion.  What about offering registration for an event in advance of ticket sales?

In order to purchase tickets with Front Gate Tickets, the site which sold the Coachella tickets, buyers need to fill out a unique profile which includes the option to save credit card info.  In addition, a buyer could easily enter the number of desired tickets, acceptable sections (if applicable) and a number of other options (e.g., an option to buy, or not buy, fewer tickets, second/third/fourth choices if the same concert/festival is offered on multiple dates, VIP if regular tickets are not available, etc.).

At the time tickets go on sale, all registered buyers could be randomly sorted and the system could automatically handle all sales with the registered information.  Users would get an email or text indicating the tickets they purchased.  There can even be an option to cancel the transaction within a short window (say, 10-20 minutes), making those tickets available to the next buyer.

Yes, this is still a random system and doesn’t prevent scalpers from hiring a phalanx of people to register unique profiles and tilt the odds in their favor, but it is about as friendly as it gets, and lucky or not, the buyers are not wasting their time staring at a screen hoping they hit the jackpot.

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Goodbye 2014, Hello 2015

As most of us have, I’ve been thinking about this past year a lot the last few days.  It’s been a year of high highs and low lows for the Lesh family.  We’ve had some wonderful events, such as Isabelle being accepted into college and DJ becoming a high-schooler, and a few challenging times which I will not detail.  I’ll let that past be past.

However, at the risk of jinxing it, 2015 looks very bright.  In June, my first-born turns 18!  A huge milestone for so many reasons.  Just days later, she will be graduated from high school and just days after that, DJ will be eligible for (and presumably get) his driver’s permit (15 ½ – yikes!).

In August, some or all of us will go back to Outside Lands for the 3rd consecutive year and a couple of weeks later, I’ll be taking Isabelle to start college at Emory University.  That is going to be an emotional time for everyone.

In September, DJ starts at the Harvard-Westlake upper school.

In December, DJ will (presumably) get his driver’s license and, in case all that is not enough, I turn 50!  My father tells me he is sharpening his wicked skills and I am an easy target, so I will spend the year girding my loins for a roasting of epic proportions.

There are some more potential events, but I’m not willing to risk jinxing those just yet.

One way or the other, it’s going to be an exciting year!

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My baby is going to Emory University!

Isabelle was accepted Early Decision to Emory University today.  For those of you with younger kids, there are two types of early applications to college (with a few flavors) – Early Decision, which is binding, and Early Action, which is not.  Some colleges offer both, but most just one type.

Emory was her first choice so she applied ED, which means that’s where she is going to college.  No ifs, ands or buts.  No take-backs.

She has worked hard the past three-and-a-half years, studied tirelessly for her SATs, SAT subject matter tests and Advanced Placement tests and wrote amazing essays.  It all paid off with great grades, scores and admission to the college of her choice.

Isabelle had tremendous support from her school, Harvard-Westlake, especially several of the deans who helped her craft her application and teachers who wrote her recommendations.  Thank you all!

I have to give a special shout out to Judge Michael Nash, presiding judge of Juvenile Court at Los Angeles Superior Court, for whom she worked this past summer.  He has been incredibly supportive of her ambitions and wrote a recommendation as well.  Thank you!

Words can’t express how proud I am of my girl!

A whole new adventure awaits…for both of us.

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Isabelle accepted to Tulane!

My beautiful, talented daughter was accepted to Tulane University!  She’s going to college.  It’s cliché, but it really is hard to believe my baby girl will be off to college in nine short months.  I distinctly remember her first day of kindergarten, a story I tell to anyone who will listen (or in this case read).

She was in the back seat, buckled into her car seat, with her backpack sitting next to me on the front passenger seat.  I pulled up to the drop off point and simultaneously the passenger and back doors flew open.  One pair of hands grabbed the backpack while another reached in, unbuckled Isabelle and lifted her out of the car.  The first pair of hands strapped on her backpack, nearly bigger than she was, and she went running (running!) into school, backpack bouncing, without looking back.  I choked up then and still choke up whenever I think about it.

Her independence, confidence and self-sufficiency continues to this day.  I have no doubt she’s going to kill it at college!

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DJ’s team (HWMS Quantum Potentials) qualify for regionals in 1st FTC robotics event

Toward the end of 8th grade, DJ was recruited to the Harvard-Westlake Middle School robotics team by a new friend.  He needed DJ’s skills to maintain the robot the team had designed but which was not doing well in competition.  DJ couldn’t help last year, but this year he leads the design/build efforts (with programming, the other major component, led by his friend).

They had a spectacular first qualifier.  They won the most points in a single round as well as the most points during the autonomous time.  It’s a complicated scoring system due to the fact that each team is randomly partnered with another team who then complete against another pair of teams (i.e., four robots on the field during each round), but in the end the Quantum Potentials came in third, which was good enough to qualify for regionals.

Impressive accomplishment for a first timer!