Schif

Hey @Johnny Law, Crème Brûlée talk.

That's a good looking board! I haven't heard of Yes until now but cool company.

Welcome to PASR. You are a fantastic new addition to this site, regardless of skiing. Just tell us, how do you feel about planes, beer, and MALVERN?

What's the point of upgrading the Acela right now? My understanding is that they are limited by the track not the train itself in terms of speed. The Acela only gets you to Boston 30 or so minutes faster than the Northeast Regional and both are less convenient and more expensive than driving.

Annoying as I was planning on going Sunday but it's OK. I guess my first day of the season can wait.

I mean I think it's a tad more complex than that. I think there is just something inherently difficult about having that many people living in one place and the places themselves being extremely diverse in terms of not only people but neighborhoods, types of homes, and types of establishments in the area. Couple that with the need for more and more complex infrastructure than less dense areas and you have a recipe for things to not necessarily work efficiently and for the free market to make things spicy.

Amtrak named a new CEO. https://www.wsj.com/articles/amtrak-names-a-new-ceo-ahead-of-federal-infusion-of-funding-11639593002?mod=hp_lead_pos11 Big Takeaways: 1. Amtrak is getting $22B from the federal government. It also will have access to an additional $44 billion in grants, with government and private sector partners, aimed at improving and broadening U.S. passenger rail service. 2. First order of business with the cash is pay off the new trains they just ordered from Siemens at a cost of $3.4B. Which works out to around $46.5M per train. 3. They seem to have a well laid plan for how to spend money now that they have it but it was not detailed in the article.

You're welcome and anytime. I'm always down for geography talk.

Philly and other cities kind of stand out as islands though. I would say that most places are just parts of an isthmus or perhaps a tightly spaced archipelago. If you travel from Scranton through Harrisburg and down to the suburbs of Pittsburgh there realistically won't be too much change that you encounter, but the second you cross the Hudson into New York or City Avenue into Philadelphia things are different. Not saying it's bad, but it's noticeable.

This is an excellent point.

Philly is implementing a vaccine mandate for indoor dining and drinking starting January 3. I wonder if the date of the mandate has anything to do with maximizing revenue in the city during the holidays and not causing trouble/losing patrons for the Mummer's Parade. On the news last night someone mentioned that once this becomes the rule Philadelphia will be "an island" because it's surrounded on all sides by counties without vaccine requirements. I wonder if people who live in the suburbs will be more likely to stay in the suburbs to go out to eat or drink rather than deal with the mandate.

You hit the nail on the head. He's a dude who, through a crazy roundabout way on a podcast, gets to talk to anyone he finds interesting and lays it all out there. The guy had Bernie Sanders on for 3 hours and loves him now. He gets high as a kite and wears a space suit with other comedians. He sits down and has deep conversations with philosophers. Sometimes he talks to scientists/doctors and sometimes he talks to guys who have seen UFOs. He's an equal opportunity chit chatter and at the end of the day if you have the time to sit down and listen to 3 hours of people talking you'll probably learn something. The whole concept of the show is a long form conversation, not a bite size interview or sound bite machine.

He has some pretty interesting guests. I personally think it's a great show. Did you see the one with Snoop Dogg?

Would be cool if someone had a drone and could do a little recon over blue mountain to see where the snow is.

Perpetual?

Did you get to see any more of the slide deck? I got an exclusive look at their business/financial section.

Was in Chestnut Hill last weekend. Mandatory masks in every building, most people wearing them outside too.

Impressive writing in that article. They were misled by a quick Googling. Clearly John P. Wise/KDKA-TV isn't from MALVERN.

Is it a rider of the storm day at Blue?

And Boom goes the Dynamite.

Make this a day of Kindness. All mountains are welcome

The Bike trails will be open this weekend, not the ski trails. Don't worry about going to Blue.

So if they open with only the top lodge, you ski down and your pass doesn't work, do they want you to walk back up? Can't you scan it to verify it at the kiosks?

It's the outdoor version of American Dream. Even though I can't make it out this weekend I'm going to make this a whole week of Kindness where I won't get mad I am not at Blue.

I wonder why they started grooming out the whales so early. Wouldn't it make more sense to just keep them really big and start to push them Wednesday or so?