Online literature pointed to the following symptoms (mostly taken from Wiki):

• Withdrawing from normal activities
• Tiredness
• Loss of appetite
• Exclaiming your hatred of work
• Feelings of nostalgia
• Whining and sighing
• Depression
• Threatening to quit your job

While I won’t mention my symptoms, I will say I fit the bill. To help deal with this disorder, one can (roadandtravel.com):

• Take a mini vacation to relax from your vacation
• Get healthy if sick
• Share your trip with others
• Plan your next adventure

While all are great ideas, the most influential piece of advice was to plan my next adventure. Applying the Amazon.com business model, the flywheel, to PVD, one can conceivably infinitely fight PVD while also increasing work efficiency by maximizing happiness. How does it work? Well, if you’re vacation goes smoothly and you’re happy and ready to work the minute you get back, great! But, if you’re suffering from PVD when you get back, planning your next adventure will get you back to work while also supplying the next vacation, feeding the flywheel until you run out of vacation days or manager patience (read: fired).

Now to find the destination of that next trip…

This is my first attempt at live blogging, and it really didn’t go as well as I had hoped it would, but the hour was entertaining…

2:00 pm
I’m going to try giving this live blogging thing a try.  So far, a surprisingly large turnout as we wait for Starbury to enter. Just some weird powerpoint with some “highlights” of Stephon…

2:02pm
The logo is real. Why, why Stephon?
I was referring to his head tat.

2:11pm
He honestly seems interested in the direction of Starbury. I guess its not too surprising that he’s sincere about it…  New book entitled Can I play? coming out soon…
I thought it fortunate that the one topic he was really articulate about was the Starbury Brand. Although this might be through training or a business requirement, at least he’s serious about it.

2:15pm
Explaining the Knicks. Refers to Duhon as the “other” point guard… Thinks his surgeries are the reason he’s out… Lots of laughs…
I was really surprised he was pretty open about the whole situation with the Knicks, but I guess he probably gets the question all the time…

2:22pm
Thinks he can play 6-7 more years because of his training… Wants to play in Italy… like college ball.
The obvious thing to mention here is that most NBA teams don’t want him around because all he’s proven is that he becomes a distraction. Sad, because he is incredibly talented, but the way he talks, he seems to have convinced himself its the Knicks trying to bring him down.

2:30pm
Haha… NBA owners, using the league to funnel money to buy planes, buildings, etc… Flip Saunders his best coach… Interesting considering he forced his departure. “Larry Brown, he’s crazy.” Did say Brown was a great coach and did grow after playing for him.
Some of this conversation was interesting, especially when he lights up when talking about finally realizing how the owners made money. One thing that was interesting was his discussion about D’Antoni, which sounded nothing like what’s been put out in the media.

3:00pm
I didn’t win a ball. Was interesting to see what someone who you read about in papers is actually like though… Other stuff was mentioned, but we were explicitly told not to publicize it.

side note: Minneapolis doesn’t seem like it’ll happen due to the short notice and stupid airfare prices. One word: lame.

Anywho, probably the best moment of the whole thing was when Jeff Bezos pulled out the adorable gun noises Tina Fey’s Palin made on SNL (http://www.hulu.com/watch/36863/saturday-night-live-couric–palin-open#s-p1-st-i1) while discussing the election.

Also, Tom Cruise ended up showing up and sticking around for a short interview about randomness. He didn’t really seem overly excited to be there, but still kind of cool. The only reason he was there was because we were given free access to Valkyrie, which comes out on Christmas. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make it because I had a double header that night for my basketball league (which was absolutely killer).

We were also given free tics to Bolt and Madagascar 2, but tickets went out about a half hour after the meeting so I never got to them. I might be able to scrounge some up for Madagascar 2 though… Finally, some perks for working at Amazon.

side note: by the way, I refuse to tag Leo in any future posts to prevent him from become a large tag. I can live with medium tag.

in my mind:

me: congrats, you!

me: i know!

me: wow, that’s kind of an arrogant response…

me: whatever, John Hodgman!

end scene