Transit Strike - Day 2

Christine was able to catch a ride from her co-worker Ade, this morning. They also picked up one of my co-workers, Rosa and gave her a ride to 48th street and 5th avenue west. They had a full car (4 people) this morning. Christine said that the commute went more smoothly and it only took one and a half hours to go 9 miles. She also has a ride lined up for Thursday, so it looks like she is taken care of. I, again, walked over to the couch and plopped down. So far, it hasn’t really affected me. There were a couple of great articles today that give more of a background on why the Union’s strike is so reprehensible. The first articles is from Forbes TWU International President Rallies to Bloomberg's Cause where it shows that even the local unions own parent union does not agree with the strike. The second article “Transit Pigs from Outer Space” gives more background on what the Union is demanding and how much they actually make in salary. The article discusses what the MTA demanded, discusses the average salary for Union workers, and finally discusses the “surplus.” One of the issues I didn’t know about is that the MTA has 22 BILLION in debt right now. The “surplus” should definitely be used to either clean up the subways (they are filthy), expand service, or pay down debt. Excerpts: “Let’s look at what they want--an 8% a year raise, each year for the next three years of their contract. And they want to keep the benefits they have unchanged: retirement at 55 and no contribution to a lavish health plan. That's only the top-line of what has to be one of the most outrageous pay and benefit packages in the nation.” “According to the Manhattan Institute, the average bus or subway driver--the most-skilled job in the union by most standards--is already paid $63,000 a year. The person who sits behind the bullet-proof glass in what used to be called a token booth, and who now says for most purchases you have to use the metro-card machines, takes down an average of $51,000. And the least-skilled work, though certainly the dirtiest, is the subway cleaner who clocks in at an average of $40,000.” Stay Tuned

New York Transit Strike and other Adventures

Thursday, December 14, 2005 Christine’s Mom Carol came into town for a conference and then stayed until Sunday. It was a great time had by all. On Friday, we went to see Christine at Mount Sinai and then from there we went to our doctor’s appointment with Dr. Tocce. I know I said last time that the baby was 13 weeks and 5 days; we now think that the little one is only 13 weeks and 1 day. The sonogram looks great. It was very special having Carol with us and having her see the baby on the sonogram. The baby did a whole body move. She/he must have known Grandma was watching. It was really cool to see. Christine is feeling a lot more energetic and looks great. You can just start to see a baby bulge starting to form, but mostly her tummy still looks flat. She looks amazing. I don’t know what it is, but she absolutely glows and looks more and more beautiful each and every day. I get little chills when I see her! I also have been talking to her tummy. Most people if they see me, would think I am loopy, but we all know I am just saying hello to our little one! Actually, now that I think about it, maybe in New York no one would think I am loopy. We see people talking to themselves every day. Crazy conversations that go on and on and on!! On Friday night, Carol cooked us Prime Rib and it was fantastic. We had a great time. On Saturday, Christine, Carol, Sara and I took a ride on the Subway to central park where we had reservations at the Tavern on the Green. It is a very fancy smancy restaurant overlooking central park. It was very beautiful and got us in the Christmas spirit. After brunch, we walked down Fifth Avenue window-shopping. Holy cow there are some expensive stores! Needless to say, we didn’t buy anything. One of the highlights of the day was being able to briefly see my great friend Angie and her fiancé Jeff. We met them on Fifth Avenue and had a great, but short, conversation. They are doing great and we wish them all of the happiness in the world. We hope to make it to there wedding in May, but will have to see how big Christine is by then and whether she will be able to fly to Kansas City. Saturday night brought another round of fabulous cooking from Carol who made her world-renowned eggplant parmesan. It was again, amazing. On Sunday, we saw Carol off around noon and then decided to relax and see King Kong. This was a 3 hour and 7 minute movie, which really didn’t seem that long because of how good it was. Peter Jackson, once again, did a great job of directing. I felt it really captured the essence of the storyline of the original. A majority of the special effects were amazing. Every once in a while you could really tell that a scene was computer generated, but for the most part it was just amazing special effects. The ending was very sad. I’m sure the PETA fanatics would not like how the gorilla was depicted. Transit strikes hits New York City – Tuesday December 20, 2005 All buses and subway workers walked off the job leaving 7 Million commuters looking for alternate means of transportation. People begin to walk and bike to work with the Brooklyn Bridge packed with people walking to work. They put limits on cars entering Manhattan that require a minimum of four people to a car or they will turn the car away. My take: I am totally against the Unions viewpoint and their strong arm tactics to try and hold the city hostage in order to get what they want. The Metropolitan Transit Authority offered the union a three-year contract that provided raises of 3%, 4% and 3.5%. The Union wants 8% each year. Currently, Union workers average pay is $45,000, which is pretty good for driving a train or bus. In addition, union members do not pay ANY health care and also are able to retire at age 55 with full pension benefits. The MTA has proposed that any NEW worker start to pay 1% of health care and move the retirement age to 62 for all NEW workers. The Union rejected that offer. How many of you that are reading this don’t have to pay any health care? How many of you have a minimum retirement age of 62 or greater? This is standard in most jobs these days. The Union thinks that the offer that the MTA gave them is outrageous given the fact that the MTA will show a 1 Billion dollar surplus in 2006. While that may sound like a lot, the Union does not acknowledge that beginning in 2007, the MTA starts showing huge deficits to the tune of 1 billion a year due to the high pension costs associated with retiring early. It is crazy to try and reap the benefits in the short term and cause such pain in the future. As for affect on Christine and I… Since we don’t have any cars, we totally rely on public transportation. Without Subways, we need to find alternate means to get to work. It really sucks for Christine since she left the house at 6:00am and was still commuting at 8:45am. The city placed a restriction on all cars entering Manhattan, requiring them to contain at least 4 passengers. A coworker picked her up this morning, but since they only had two people in the car, they randomly picked up two people that were about to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. Once on the other side, they let the two out of the car and continued on their way. However, the streets are packed with cars, so it still took them over 2 and a half hours to commute a total of about 8 miles. Not fun. She has a ride to work on Wednesday, but we aren’t sure what to do for Thursday and Friday. As for me, it was a VERY TOUGH commute! I rolled out of bed, put my jammy pants on, and trudged over to the couch and sat down on a nice cushy pillow to start my work day! :) Over and Out

Christmas Blog

Merry Christmas everyone! We are moving away from our tradition of sending out a Christmas picture and instead posting a picture of our Christmas Dogs along with our first annual Christmas Letter Blog. Dear Family & Friends, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! All we can say is that 2005 has been a crazy year of change. The Move In 2005 we made the big transition from Savage, MN to Brooklyn, New York. We still need to pinch ourselves every once in a while to remind us that we are truly living in the Big Apple. Although the smells, dirt, & crowds of the city remind us each and every day! We also traded in our 2000 square foot, four bedroom, two bathroom, half an acre lot, with two car garage, and a shed, house; for an 850 square foot two bedroom, two bathroom, apartment. Plus we added a roommate (Sara) and another dog (Celia) to the mix. Let us tell you that it has been a major adjustment! Three adults & two dogs definitely make an 850 square foot apartment feel small. Wow. We could never have done it without the tremendous love and support of Neal’s Mom (Sue), Dad (Dennis), Sister (Kristin), Brother-in-law (Jason), and kids (Jaymie and Drew). They helped us organize our house prior to the sale, assisted with the rummage sale where we sold off most of our worldly possessions, and kept us sane and grounded during the process. Thank you for your love and support during that stressful time! Although the move has been an adjustment, we are enjoying our time in New York City. We have taken advantage of Broadway while we have been here. We haven’t really been exposed to this form of entertainment in the past and are finding it very enjoyable. So far we have seen Wicked (our favorite), Avenue Q, Phantom of the Opera, The Producers, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Hairspray, White Christmas, and Goodnight Mother. The Jobs The move to New York was the result of Christine’s opportunity to work on her Psychology Doctorate internship at Mount Sinai Medical School on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. She started the internship in September and it is going very well. She’ll continue with the internship until next September/October when she will graduate with a Doctorate in Clinical Psychology. As Christine was applying for internships in New York, Neal had the opportunity to apply for a lateral position with the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), which is a Department of the US Treasury. He was able to get the job and we had the added benefit of the OCC moving us! Neal is primarily supervising JPMorgan Chase as an Information Technology examiner for the OCC. The Pets In 2005 we lost our good friend Loki (our American Eskimo). He provided us with great enjoyment over the past 11 years. We miss him and hope he is doing well in the great doghouse in the sky! On March 12, 2005 our Italian Greyhound, Sadie was born. We have truly enjoyed having her (most of the time) in our lives. She has definitely been a challenge to house train, but overall she is a wonderful addition to our family. Bailey, our big Persian, is currently vacationing in South Dakota with the Lillestols. We look forward to having the family reunited in July of 2006. The Trips We had the opportunity to visit: Cancun, Mexico for some fun in the sun, Lamoine, Maine to visit Christine’s Mother (Carol) and Step-father (Mark), another trip to Maine for Christine and one of her best friend’s Diana, Alabama to participate as the best man in the wedding of Brian and Darian (it was truly an honor for me), Phoenix where Neal visited his high-school and life long friends, Todd, Jimmy, and Tommy, Minneapolis to watch our great friend Brad graduate with his Psychology doctorate, and two trips to Boston/Cape Cod (once in the summer and once for Thanksgiving) to visit Christine’s Dad (Dick), Step-mother (Susan), Uncle (Ron), and Aunt (Laurie). The Visitors Since we have been in New York, we have been visited by a few of our friends and family. Diana (Christine’s childhood friend and Maid of Honor) came to visit over the summer. They had a great time seeing New York City and then driving to Maine. Next, Carol and Mark visited for a day and we had fun walking around Brooklyn Heights (our neighborhood) and showing them our apartment. Over Halloween, Brad, Bradly & Carrie visited from Minneapolis and Stephanie & Maureen came down from upstate New York. We all went to Time Square to see Avenue Q, which was fantastic. We are waiting for additional visitors; so if you want to see New York City, give us a call! The Family To our family and friends, our thoughts and prayers are with you over this Holiday Season. Those of you who are struggling with health issues, we want you to know that you are in our thoughts and prayers and we love you with all of our hearts. The Baby We have waited to save the best for last. For those of you who slogged through this letter, you will find out that our biggest change and most cherished blessing in 2005 was finding out we are pregnant! Christine is now in her 13th week (14th week by the time this reaches you) pregnant. Many of you know our history of problems and we were delighted to make it past the first trimester with everything looking very good. Christine was very tired those first 12 weeks but has recently gained her energy back. We are so excited and blessed and can’t wait to introduce our little one to everyone in 2006. The Future In order for family and friends to keep up with what’s happening in our lives, we have started a Web Log, or Blog, as they are known in the technology geek world. The address of the blog is http://www.navrat.blogspot.com/ - please check it out and feel free to e-mail at anytime. Love, Neal & Christine

Sonogram - 12 Weeks 3 days

I heard through the grapevine that I haven’t been keeping you all informed of our happenings. My sincere apologies! We have had some exciting times since I last updated the Blog. On Wednesday, December 7th (Mom’s birthday), we had another sonogram using a more high powered machine to focus more clearly on the baby. They measured the little one to more accurately predict the age and to give a better idea of the due date. At the same time, they took measurements and blood to identify if the baby was at risk for down syndrome. Both the measurement and the blood work came back negative, so that is great. The baby measured 58 Millimeters long and had her first pictures! Note: I use her & him interchangeably, so don’t read anything into it! We aren’t sure if she was shy or what, but she was being feisty and wouldn’t get into position for the camera! The sonogram technician said she was not being very cooperative. Hopefully that is not a sign of things to come! :) As you can see by the picture, she is smiling, so she must have been having a good time! After the appointment, we went right away to Kinkos and digitized the picture so that we could send it immediately to our grandparents to be! Everyone was very excited and said she looks like a movie star! (No pressure little one! :)) Oh, and I almost forgot…. Based on the measurements our baby actually gained age and is now 13 weeks and 2 days as of December 12th. The exciting thing is that we made it past the critical first trimester and are very hopeful for smooth sailing for our little miracle! Ok, enough on the baby for now. We went to another Broadway show last Friday evening to see Chitty Chitty Bang Bang at the Hilton Theater. The show was good but definitely more kid friendly. Our seats were good (orchestra) but the acoustics were not very good where we were sitting. The actual car prop was very cool but some of the songs are just cheesy. It has been a long time since I saw the Disney showing of Chitty on Sunday evenings when I was growing up, so I forgot a lot of the premise behind the show. The worst thing about the show was I still can’t get that damn “toot sweet” song out of my head. I swear I wake up every morning with that crazy song rattling around in my noggin! It is very unpleasant. We also saw the movie, Chronicles of Narnia this weekend at the movie theater across the street from our apartment. It was decent but both Christine and I are both a little fantasied out after seeing Harry Potter the previous weekend. That is about it for our excitement. We are now just waiting for Christine’s Mom, Carol to visit this weekend. Take care .

Wicked

Monday – December 1, 2005 Hello. We hope everyone had a great thanksgiving. Ours was wonderful. We spent a very relaxing weekend with Dick and Susan. After we got back to Boston from the Cape on Friday, they surprised us with theater tickets to White Christmas by Irving Berlin. It had been a long time since I saw the movie with Bing Crosby so it was fun. The play was held in the Wang Theater in Boston. I have to say, that is the most impressive theater I have seen to date! It has beautiful engravings throughout. It is a huge theater. Our seats were great. We were in the orchestra section and only 5 rows back. We loved the singing and tap dancing. And, during the white Christmas song, it began to snow on stage and then in the audience! It was a great way to get into the Christmas spirit. Tonight (Wednesday) we are going to wicked so I’ll let you know how that is later. We got our tickets on eBay and they should be good seats. Christine and I met at union square and then made our way to time sq. We ate at a steakhouse off of 51st and Broadway called Gallaghers. The steaks were overcooked and expensive and we would not recommend it. After dinner we went to the Gershwin Theater for the Wicked show. Upon entering the theater the first thing that catches your eye is the set design and the big flying mechanical dragon that looks like it is about to swoop down from above. The set design is truly amazing and I can totally see why it won a Tony for the design. The entire show exceeded our expectations, which were already pretty high coming in. I don’t know if I can accurately describe it. It was simply amazing from start to finish. Beautiful costumes and scenery. Amazing singing. The two actresses that played the witches were phenomenal. The wicked witch of the west was probably the best live singer I have ever heard. Just amazing. I’m typing this on my Treo 650 phone and its late, So signing off. Take care