On the Home Front Archives

30 April 2004El Morocco
On the last Friday of every month Jen performs at one of the local Middle Eastern restuarants, a place called El Morocco in nearby Pleasant Hill. When we were dating I would always go watch her and it was fun...
17 March 2004Send Me a Postcard
I've moved and I have new contact info. Here goes: Andrew Hecht PO BOX 241 Avon, CO 81620 (nine seven zero) ...
23 January 2004New Home Sweet Home
My new home in West Vail is a small bedroom with two twin beds, a wardrobe, a chest of drawers and night stand in the lovely three bedroom condo of Roy White from Zimbabwe by way of South Africa and...
18 January 2004How Does Your ZIP Code Rank?
I just arrived back in Sedona after spending the weekend with one of my oldest friends Peter, his wife Lili and their 3 week old baby, Amelia. I haven't seen the Townshends in more than a year since they moved...
14 January 2004Now I Remember...
...why I hate coming to Los Angeles. It's not the smog, which I'm used. It's not the people, which I can avoid. It's the traffic and the way people drive like mindless morons that drives me insane. Not once, not...
09 January 2004Me & My Subaru
09 January 2004Nothing's Sacred
Sedona is a small, sleepy town but it does have it's far share of western conveniences including KFC, Burger King, Starbucks and, of course, McDonalds. But the McDonalds in town is different than every other McDonalds I have seen...
09 January 2004Praise Jesus
We're about to experience a harmonic convergence of sorts here at the Sedona household. Not five minutes ago a FedEx trucked pulled up to my house to deliver the loan check, which is a minor miracle considering how difficult...
06 January 2004Through the Hoops
I just rode down to Arizona Water where the nice customer service rep by the name of Pat not only added me to the account without any ID but also faxed the the new bill with my name and address...
06 January 2004Loan Approved!
Dear Andrew Hecht, Your vehicle loan application has been approved! Based on the type of loan and terms you selected, your interest rate will be 4.99%. We can mail your Capital One Auto Finance Blank Check® Loan Package to you...
06 January 2004New Wheels
I'm trying to buy a car, which, when you don't have car to begin with and you live in a tiny town with no cars for sale, can be a really pain. For many reasons I've decided I want a...
06 January 2004Equifax Sucks
I'm on hold with Equifax right this very minute. I'm being forced to call them because my current address (Sedona, AZ) doesn't match the address on my credit report (Oakland, CA) and it's holding up my car loan application. It...
26 December 2003The Weather Outside...
I just rode the bike into town to pick up a dozen bagels (I got a dozen so I don't have to go back for a few days) and it's so damn cold my face felt like it was going...
08 December 2003The Weather Outside is Frightful...
The mercury has been dropping near freezing for most of the last two weeks so it was only a matter of time before the snow started to fall and yesterday we got snow flurries all morning. The snow was wet...
05 December 2003Please Wait
I've been on hold with first Microsoft and now Dell trying to resolve what would seem to be a simple problem with this home network and that is how to synchronize Outlook Express so that my mom can use it...
03 December 2003Sedona or Disneyland?
One of these pics is from Disneyland and one is from Sedona. Can you guess which one?...
01 November 2003Halloween in the Big Apple
I missed the Halloween parade in the Village, mostly because I didn't know about it until I came home at 4:30am to find an email from a friend asking me if I went. Then when I asked my host about...
30 October 2003"If You Say Anything Else About My Haircut, I'm Going to Rip Your Testicles Off"
I overheard this snippet of conversation when I was wandering around the World Trade Center site the other evening. You really have to admire the deft subtlety with which New Yorkers wield this fine language of ours....
25 October 2003NY State of Mind
I arrived in New York City tonight for the first time since 1986. I took the infamous Chinatown bus which, for a paltry 17.50, will take you from Chinatown in DC to the one in NY, with a few stops...
24 October 2003Washington Monument
I finally did something today I've tried to do every time I've been to DC, get up to the top of the Washington Monument. You need tickets to get inside. But the tickets are free, which is great. (Then again,...
21 October 2003Pandas
I went to the National Zoo this afternoon with the plan to see and photograph the giant pandas. But they didn't want to cooperate. They both were sleeping inside instead of frolicking in their enclosures like they are supposed...
17 October 2003Culture Shock
Here's a surefire way to give a Peace Corps volunteer a case of reverse culture shock. Remove a volunteer from his country, say, after a year or so at his site, and then drop him in the middle of any...
14 October 2003Meanwhile, Across from the White House...
God bless America: a place for whackos...
14 October 2003A Walk in the City
Today was the first day in DC that my brother had to go to work and I didn't have anything to do. (yesterday was Columbus Day). So I let Brian take his time getting to work by offering to...
14 October 2003Damn These Shoes
My feet are killing me. Part of the problem is that I've been walking all over the place in DC. But the real problem is that I've been wearing shoes every day for the last week after not wearing wearing...
13 October 2003Cell Phone Freaks (Can You Hear Me Now?)
I don't remeber this being such a problem when I left for Samoa in October of last year, but now you can't walk down the street (at least in DC) without seeing (and hearing) someone having a cell phone conversation...
12 October 2003Fall Colors
It was a beautiful day in the DC area. My brother Brian, his girlfriend J.J. and I went with a few of their friends to hike to a waterfall in the Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. We probably were...
10 October 2003Iwo Jima Memorial
My hotel, the Virginian Suites in Arlington, is right across the road from the Iwo Jima memorial. Sometimes Washington seems just one big memorial to war and death. Inside the Peace Corps office, one of the first things you'll...
08 October 2003Feeling Minnesota...
I've had this strange sense since I arrived in DC that I'm wading through molasses as I move around. I just feel so slow. I move slowly. I think slowly. I do everthing with a ridiculous amount of deliberation. It's...
22 September 2003Congrats Marni & Paris!
My sister Marni and her long time boyfriend Paris are going to tie the knot in November and I couldn't be more thrilled for both of them. They're a great couple and this has been long, long overdue. I...
16 August 2003American Policy Upsets Locals
Locals and Peace Corps volunteer alike are struggling with the new American polisy that requires Samoans seeking visas to the U.S. to visit the embassy in Auckand, New Zealand or Suva, Fiji for paperwork, instead of completeing the application here...
07 July 2003Dennis Kucunich is My Boy
It's not easy to follow the American political scene from the middle of the Pacific. So I come to rely on the web and gathering bits and pieces of information wherever it can be had (thanks, Ursula), which is almost...
31 May 2003Rudolph in Custody
It's amazing. The feds finally caught up with Eric Robert Rudolph, the so-called Olympic bomber. When I was living in Atlanta, just after the Olympics, and Richard Jewel was still the suspect everyone was talking about, Rudolph was bombnig abortion...
18 May 2003Surf Girls
If want to see a slice of Samoan life, look no further than MTV. Surf Girls, now showing on MTV every Monday 10:30pm eastern features hot surf babes (wouldn't want to see that?) traveling the South Pacific (that's where I...
24 April 2003Talk About Your High Profile Free Agent Singings
Former NFL standout wide receiver (and congressman from Oklahoma, incidentally) joined my brother's law firm in DC yesterday. No one is fooled here. Mr. Largent is obviously a ringer brought on for an inter-law firm football game. Next week, they...
09 April 2003Saddam is History?
The toppling of Saddam by Oliver Poole in Baghdad and David Blair in Ruweished from The Spectator The tyrannical rule of Saddam Hussein was brought to an end by the American-led coalition yesterday amid wild scenes of jubilation in Baghdad...
09 October 2002Goodbye to Saab
My mom and I depart for the Omni Hotel in downtown LA for the start of staging. Time to say goodbye to my beloved Saab. The car has been so good to me over the last three years. It did...