Amish Country

All,

I've spent the past couple days in the heart of Pennsylvania's Amish country. My hotel was in Lancaster, PA, basically surrounded by Amish farms. Saturday I drove into West Chester and Wilmington, DE to explore a little bit, and got some great views of the little villages that scatter the region. This morning (Monday) during my sales calls, I actually visited an Amish hardware store where they sell a lot of our hand tools, so that was pretty cool! They're great people and I feel fortunate to have spent some time with them.

Tonight I find myself back in Buffalo, and it's far nicer than it was last week. Driving in, it was nearly 60 degrees outside, so I can shed the winter coat this time around! I'll be here until tomorrow, possibly Wednesday, and then I head West to Binghamton for work Thursday, then back to Pittsburgh Friday before spending the weekend in Cleveland.

I'll be in Ohio a lot during the month of April, and I plan to attend the Ohio State spring game the third weekend in April, so if any of you will be around then, let me know.

Hope all is well and thanks for reading!

On the road,

Matt

Steel City

All,

My travels have taken me from western New York to the rust belt of northeastern Ohio and the greater Pittsburgh area. I spent the night Wednesday in Youngstown, just minutes away from my mom's hometown of Warren, the football factory that produced Buckeyes Korey Stringer, Maurice Clarett and the traitors, Prescott Burgess and Mario Manningham of Michigan. Thursday morning, my first sales call happened to be in Warren, with a customer who's been in business since 1959, and whose location was across the street from the mall where my mom worked one summer when she was home from college. Small world! The day ended in Pittsburgh, where I stayed for the night and worked Friday. My travels took me in and through downtown Pittsburgh, and this was really cool as much of my mother's side of the family has roots in the steel city. Both my grandfather and grandmother grew up and went to school in the 'Burgh, and my brother attended college an hour north of the city at Grove City College. My final appointment of the day Thursday was only 10 miles from Grove City, so I drove down to the campus and took a few snaps for my brother and Amber's sake. The first two pictures are pretty obvious; a picture of the Warren exit, and the picture of the Grove City campus. One last picture I had to include, though, is of the Grove City track, complete with a steeple. This is significant because my brother, Ryan, is the school record holder in this event (3,000 meter steeplechase), and I wanted to capture this in my blog. At this time, I will begin singing "Glory Days" by Bruce Springsteen....(inside joke between Ryan and me).

Anyways, this weekend will be spent in Lancaster, PA, where I'll be working Monday. Tuesday will be spent in Buffalo, NY, with the remainder of the week being spent in Binghamton, NY and Pittsburgh again. More updates to come and thanks for reading!

On the road,

Matt

Spring in Buffalo? Good one.

Friends,

This post finds me in Buffalo, NY, where I will be working tomorrow before heading to Youngstown, OH tomorrow night and finishing the week in Pittsburgh on Friday. Driving to my hotel tonight, the snow was falling pretty heavily, with temperatures hovering around freezing. I wasn't expecting sunny weather, but if you told me it was January, I would believe you. I guess I'm lucky I'm here in March and not the middle of winter. I do wish I was here for the weekend so I could spend some time at Niagara falls.

The last couple days I've been in Central NY and Northern PA, and I've come across some pretty interesting places. Yesterday, I drove through New York's wine country in the Finger Lakes region near Corning. One of the attached pictures is a vineyard surrounding Seneca Lake. Today, driving through rural Northern PA, I stopped for lunch at a diner that was uprooted, literally, from its original Jersey home and its second home in Bethlehem, PA, to its final resting place at the location shown. I'm thinking I may chronicle the diners of America this year, as I suspect this was the first of many stops to come! The guys I work with have a bit of a grease fetish... I will say, though, my lunch today was only $3.75, so I guess they're on to something! The last picture you see is what's left of Austin Dam, a dam in Potter County, PA, which served the Bayless Paper Mill in the early 1900s. Due to its poor construction, the dam failed in 1911, killing 78 people and destroying the mill and much of the town of Austin. Willie Nelson narrated a documentary on the disaster. Locals in the town were talking a lot about it, so I wanted to make sure I snapped a picture before I drove by. By the way, I totally ripped all that information from wikipedia...

Anyway, pretty cool stuff and that's what I've been doing lately. As always, thanks for reading and I hope you're all doing well.

On the road,

Matt

Easter in the City

Friends,

Happy belated Easter to everyone. Hopefully it was an enjoyable time for all of you. I spent the holiday weekend with friends in NYC, staying with my college buddy, Danny, whose birthday was on Thursday night. The long weekend kicked off with his birthday celebration, and continued through Easter Sunday, where we went to services at Trinity Church, a block from ground zero in lower Manhattan. It was an awesome weekend and it felt good to get off the road and out of hotels for a few days.

Today, my travels brought me to south central New York. Specifically, I was in the Finger Lakes region, surrounded by vineyards and unique deep water lakes that resemble fingers because they run long and narrow. Seneca Lake was the backdrop for most of the day, and I was told that it is over 600 feet deep and because of this unusual depth, the US Navy does submarine training here! Pretty crazy... The vineyards were nice and the locals tell me that New York wine is quite sweet, far better than you might think.

I'll be in western New York and central Pennsylvania for the next few days. Hopefully soon the weather will warm up here! Scraping ice off windshields in the mornings takes me back to the Dayton, OH days!

Hope you're all well and thanks for reading!

On the road,

Matt

When in Rome....New York

All,

I'm still up here in New York's upstate, chilly and soaked due to a steady drizzle the past couple days. Lucky for me, the temps have hovered in the upper 30s, so I haven't had ice to contend with on the road. I've seen some cool places so far, and met some interesting folk, that's for sure. Drove by Lake Oneida today, which was pretty nice. Went right past the church where a scene from "One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest" was shot. Other than little things like that, it's been pretty same 'ole same 'ole.

I did want to share a funny family story, though. Years ago, my dad spent some time in nearby Rome, NY during his Air Force days as there used to be a base here (it has since closed down). During some time off, he and his buddies had dinner one night at an Italian place in downtown Rome. Authentic. Big portions, lots of garlic, guns hidden in bathroom stalls, etc. Well, when I told him I'd be nearby, he recommended it, so tonight I had dinner there. I took this picture that's attached mainly for him to see this place and remind him of the old days.

This job has given me some really cool chances to do stuff like this and I'm enjoying the randomness that comes with it!

I'm heading down to NYC tomorrow afternoon and will spend the weekend there. Surely, there will be some stuff to report from that trip!

On the road,

Matt

Back in the Saddle

All,

My apologies for not updating this thing sooner, but there wasn't much to report. After a couple weeks of spinning my wheels professionally due to logistical delays, I'm out on the road once again. I spent an amazing two weeks relaxing in Charlotte, waiting for my new trailer to be completed in order to set it with merchandise. This "waiting around time" was awesome though, because I was able to have a great time with friends in town. Having gone to school an hour south in Columbia, I consider that region of the Carolinas to be a slice of heaven. I love spending time there and whenever it's time to go, it gets harder and harder to leave. Nevertheless, I signed up for this adventure, and am excited and eager to continue with it! With that being said, I wanted to talk about what's been going on the last couple days...

I left Charlotte early Sunday morning en route to Upstate New York. After passing by the Mason-Dixon Line, Gettysburg, Scranton, PA (home of Dunder Mifflin Paper Co. for all you office junkies), and Cooperstown, thirteen hours and five, yes FIVE fill-ups later, I arrived in the town of Johnstown, NY, on the southern ridge of the Adirondack mountains. Snow was still piled up along the roads, but the weather was, and still has been quite mild (sunny and mid-40s). During my sales calls today, I spent time in Saratoga Springs, Lake George, and Albany, before crashing for the night tonight in Utica, NY. As my Mom pointed out to me this afternoon, little did I know but Rachael Ray's hometown is Lake George. NO WAY!!! ...haha. I threw that in there because I'm sure some of you reading this might think that's pretty cool. It was a nice town, though, so good for her.

Overall it was a great day, though, as people up here are salt-of-the-earth and enjoyable to be around. The remainder of my week will be spent upstate before I head down to the city Thursday night for my buddy Danny's birthday bash + Easter weekend in Manhattan. Should be a blast. I'll probably have more pictures to post soon.

The pictures I did attach are of my final gas stop of the afternoon, about an hour south of Johnstown. I took these because at this stop, my fleet gas card was shut off because I evidently surpassed the daily limit for fill-ups. Diesel is around $4.50/gallon up here, so do the math-my gas bills are scary right now. The diesel tank was right next to the actual pump. Pretty funny and ridiculous. These events make me laugh and really add humor to my daily life, so hopefully you guys find irony in them, too!

Anyways, that's all for now. Thanks for reading and I hope you're all well.

On the road,

Matt

Re-charging the batteries

Friends,
Sorry for the post-drought the past several days. I can't say that I've been too busy, either. Since arriving here in Charlotte from Phoenix Sunday night, I've been spinning my wheels a little... My new trailer is still not done (i.e. no graphics yet, peg boards not installed, etc.), which means I'm here at "home base" just waiting, trying to stay busy catching up on other things. The reason for the delay, we think, is that the trailer company we use happens to be the same Concord, NC-based company that services many of the NASCAR teams' units (hence the significance of Concord-location of the NASCAR headquarters, just 15 minutes from our offices!). So, we deduce that we must not be a big customer of theirs, so they don't feel the need to meet deadlines they've promised. Not a good situation. At least this gives me an opportunity to rest up and spend time with friends around here.
Before we found out about this delay, I was going to be headed towards the Boston area next week, but now it looks like that trip will be scratched and I will get going again in Upstate New York 3/17, in a town called Mayfield, near the Adirondacks. From there my schedule looks something like this:

3.18 Clinton, NY
3.19 Rome, NY
3.20 NYC
3.21 NYC

3.24 Alpine, NY
3.25 Wellsboro, PA
3.26 Angola, NY
3.27 Hermitage, PA
3.28 Tarentum, PA

3.31-4.4 Buffalo, Binghamton, NY and Everywhere, PA
4.7-4.11 Everywhere, OH
4.14-4.18 Everywhere, MI...and Toledo
4.21-4.25 Everwhere, IN...and God's country-SW OHIO!!!

I could've taken the schedule out longer, but frankly, I got tired of typing. Hope you're all well. More blogs to come when there's more news. Thanks for reading.

On the road,
Matt