Would the Real Low Cost Carrier Please Stand Up

The model for LCC airlines has changed over the past few years. At last week's World Low Cost Airline Congress, that question kept popping up.

Ralf Anker of Anna.Aero does a good job of keeping things in perspective. I really like the website and recommend people who are interested in the model to read it on a regular basis.

He gave a spirited presentation last week on the subject comparing the top real LCCs. The interesting thing is that he has so far not taken into consideration the GCC carriers such as Fly Dubai. Nor does he rate Vueling as a LCC - which is understandable as they have become more like a full service airline.

The emergence also of long haul airlines is beginning to show. Feel Air CEO Kai Holmberg was on one of the panels.

Clearly across the board the adoption of some of the successful LCC characteristics are paying off. You see the unbundling of the product occurring in almost all instances. At the same time you also see the hybridization by the LCCs of things like - offering a frequent flyer program, participating in the GDS and moving to regular airports. But the core principles seem to stick. Focus on costs and simplicity of product.

As was said several times during the conference - the big boys are coming to the LCC model. Few are going the other way.

Cheers

Where Have All The Flowers Gone?

New data from the US TIA shows that those long wilting violets - the US traveller has finally woken up and started travelling outside of the USA again.

With good numbers showing 11% growth in June - we could think that there is a mini-boomlet going on.

Not so fast.

The market characteristics are showing a high degree of fragility.

The bright spots are Latam (Mexico exempted though in this report they are showing good numbers - but this was before Mexicana tanked). The astonishing growth is coming going to the Middle East.

Here are the hightlights:


• Overseas markets increased 11 percent in June and increased four percent year to date.
• Europe increased 11 percent for the month but decreased one percent for the year.
• Asia grew 14 percent for the month and was up ten percent year to date.
• Canada increased nine percent for the month and grew six percent for the year.
• The Caribbean increased six percent in June and increased four percent year to date.
• For the month, air traffic to Mexico increased 15 percent. For the year, air traffic to Mexico increased eight percent.
• South America was up five percent for the month and grew one percent year to date.
• Central America increased five percent for the month but was down three percent year to date.
• The Middle East was up 24 percent in June and up 30 percent for the year.
• Oceania increased 34 percent for the month and grew 18 percent year to date.
• Africa increased 20 percent for the month and increased 17 percent for the year.

For the latest stats go here:

http://www.tinet.ita.doc.gov/view/m-2010-O-001/index.html

Cheers

Rich Folk Don't Have Time To Shop....

I always thought the concept of a personal shopper was complete BS. But it seems that there are quite a few of these people out there. Real professional shoppers who use OPM to do the dirty deed.

I find that I spend less and less time in a store. About the only time I visit a real Retail Outlet is at airports. Especially as I seem to spend so much of my time there. Indeed I was trying to think when was the last time I actually was in a shopping mall. I can't honestly remember.

But I do shop online. I also when I have a moment do go to a particular store to look at some things. For example I am looking to acquire a new PC so will likely go to the real store and buy or examine there and then buy online.

I don't consider myself by any stretch of imagination to be an affluent person. I would describe myself as "comfortable" but like just about everyone else I am a working stiff. Probably more so than I should be at my advanced years. They say that teaching doesn't pay very well and I can attest to that fact.

One thing I find just abysmal in shopping both online and offline is customer service. The ultimate oxymoron in my view. In the retail stores - the amount of useless sales people who dont know their products is legendary. I am however very happily surprised when I come across an individual who does know his product and is prepared to help address my questions and interact with me accordingly. For that I have time and respect.

So what of the affluent. How are they handled and what is their value? eMarketer did a nice piece on this.

I once visited a well known travel attorney who had this poster on his office wall. I thought that a little tacky. I wonder if its still there.

One critical factor for anyone dealing with servicing these folks is the ability to be 100% comprehensive. In my view that is essential and so my advice is to offer live chat and/or telephone support right there. Otherwise these people will not wait and will go elsewhere.

Enjoy that glass of champers

Corporate Bloggers Off Point - Me Too?

As a blogger - I sometimes wonder if I am doing the right thing or bad thing for the world. Am I contributing for the benefit of the travel community or simply spouting a load of BS that no one is interested in?

Well wonder no more Professor has some answer.

Firstly I guess I have to answer my own charge. There are quite a few unique visitors to the blog every day. Counting the RSS and the email subscribers we are looking at more than 1000 per week. So that is a reasonable number in my view. The make up is interesting but also is how they come. Consistently over one third arrive from google searches. So I thank you for reading and am humbled by your attention to this little blog.

As I am not a corporate blogger and (well most of the time) do not use the blog to promote my company or my clients I find it interesting to read other people's blogs. In general Corporate Blogs fulfill a useful purpose of getting a story out. By definition they are self serving as one would expect. I think everyone is fine with that. Not if however a private blog is used to push a corporate agenda.

eMarketer just did a report on the subject. What is astonishing in my view is how off point people are on the subject of not being true to the corporate need.



In the report there is a great statement. "Distorted messages are not a new phenomenon; they have been a problem in mainstream media as well. Still, the message gap between companies and the traditional media is significantly smaller: Less than half of all messages in mainstream media failed to reflect company messages, and here the US performed above average."

So are blogs in corporates therefore mostly a personal vehicle for commentary by the blogger.

That is an interesting question

You Just GOTTA Go To This

Are you a left or a right brain person?

Most conferences are somewhat dry and focused on the functional set of industry issues.

For the past 5 years I have been going to the WIT - Web In Travel Conference in Singapore. By far it is the best conference going. What makes it different? apart from being the only real representative of what is going on in Asia, it is the context of the content that makes the difference.

If you want to stimulate your right side hemisphere and still satisfy your need for left hand side knowledge acquisition - then this is for you.

Check out their video. The talent assembled is pretty darn good.

Cheers

Farewell CO. No Longer Moving Its Tail

Today is the last day you can buy a Continental ticket.

The last day you will take a Continental Flight.

The end of a golden era of US Aviation history. The airline of Bob Six and (not so fondly remembered) Frank Lorenzo... it is now going to be a distant memory

I flew CO on so many occasions. International and US domestic. The Proud Bird was also my livelihood for a while too.

So let me just add my farewell

Cheers

Open Travel Has An Open Position

Here is a request that has come out from the Open Travel Alliance team.

Members and friends of OpenTravel,
OpenTravel is looking for a talented part-time technical resource for a Specification Coordinator position beginning ASAP as an open-ended contract. The job description is available by contacting below.

If you are interested in being considered for this position, submit a cover letter and CV/resume along with an hourly or monthly rate to positions@opentravel.org by Tuesday 12 October 2010.

Ping them if you want the job spec

Cheers

Mobile OS very like GDS

If you watch the world of technology - the battle for the Operating system has been a long and interesting one. Back in the early 1980s there were some significant players who really knew about how to talk to machines.

IBM had about 7 or more ranging from big mainframes (VM, MVW and TPF) to mid range (Sys36 and Sys 38)and then the PC - OS/2 and Dos. Plus some weird ones. Now there are really only a few - zTPF, VM iSeries and of course they are big Linux fans now.

In the mobile world Symbian used to be the Amadeus of the mobile market. Now we see them losing customers and now their only major customer is Nokia - itself a company not in great shape. So the image above looks a lot different now that Sony Ericsson has pulled out.

So who are the new kids on the Block?

As we move to smart phone we have several.

Mr Closed is RIM and his enemy Mr Apple iOS
Mr Open is Android and WebOS (now HP)

So its the big 4 vs all the others. Sound familiar?

Cheers

Why Can't We Create a Self Ironing Shirt?

....And other questions of the universe have been troubling me for some time. In my head there are questions that never get answered and ones that are almost always there to be slowly chipped away.

One of the key questions I ask myself is do we have good data to make decisions. Those who read the Professor on a regular basis know that I have this progression of data to power.

Data--> Information --> Knowledge --> Power.

One of the critical issues facing our society is the overload of data. How do we create ways for us to comprehend all the data available.
How much of it is useless?
How much of it can be inferred?
How much is qualitatively good?

As lately I have been looking at different ways to refine the process of getting at the relevant information this makes me think about search - I keep coming back to the data driven pure objective search all the way through to the highly subjective desirable results. Search remains a thoroughly unfulfilled experience today. Both in the B2B environment and of course the B2C web based environment. And I doubt highly that Google will make it - sufficiently - better when they acquire ITA as they surely will be able to.

I have no answer - I am thinking about search a lot. Fortunately the Shirt problem is not urgent. The search to the better result however is very urgent. And it is a critical matter.

Cheers

Lies, Damn Lies and then there are Fees...

I think we all know what it is like to be lied to. Politicians lie. Pressure groups lie. Advertisements lie.

So it is somewhat bad that respectable organizations such as ASTA align themselves with other organisms that are not telling the truth.

So here is the headline from BTC:


MORE THAN 50,000 TRAVELERS TELL THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION THEY ARE “MAD AS HELL!” ABOUT HIDDEN AIRLINE FEES

Consumer and Travel Groups Deliver Petition Signatures to DOT on “Mad As Hell Day!” in Support of Secretary LaHood’s Efforts to Require Airline Fee Transparency.

Er... excuse me that is actually a lie.

As I noted yesterday the issue of airline fees is but a small part of a far broader rule making input that the DoT is requesting. Further transparency of airline fees is no better - but definitely no worse than the issue of say special fee conditions that a travel agency has to live with.

While I don't personally like fees - they are here to stay. I am one of the 50,000 people who signed the petition but I was very clear that I was signing the petition for a reason to state that I supported the right of the airlines to charge the fees.

Further I also made it clear in both my submission to BTC and the coalition as well as the DoT itself that the mechanism of making the airline fees "transparent" as advocated by the Coalition was itself highly misguided. IE that making the fees transparent via the GDS channel would create a burden on everyone that was unnecessary. IE the airlines would have to do extra work and the agencies would have to do extra work and the consumer would not be any better off.

Forcing such a process would make every airline rule and regulation required in each GDS. Something that is a backward step - 15 years ago before the internet became so important to our society - yes. Today no.

So I do hope that some people will stop with the misrepresentation and the lies. Also the coalition should stop hiding its intentions and be very clear that it is against fees. Wait... isn't that what it says? Mad as hell about airline fees...

Read the fine print my friends and then decide if you want the government deep in regulating the distribution of airline products. Heck why not re-regulate the industry and re-award mail contracts.

.... BASTA as the retiring DG of IATA says. Let's not waste the government's time for something that is already more than adequately in place.

I really do wish the coalition would stop rubbishing the hard work that agents on the line do. But then I guess the real little people don't matter when you are trying to get media attention.

Cheers

Airport Delays? What Airport Delays?

So the great debate can finally be put to bed....

Yes the Tarmac rule was successful. Last month a total of 3 delays. Of course some people are cheating but still the performance during the busy August travel time was a marked improvement.So now airports will be wonderfully quiet places as people will be flying not waiting.

Further this topic of delays is also being beefed up with more regulation. And this leads me onto the other point... The issue of airline ancillary service fees.

This is likely to embolden the Anti-Fee brigade. But caution. The characterization that the Proposed NPRM is all about fee disclosure is out and out wrong.

Contrast the two statements:

This is from BTC:(Today's email blast from Radnor)

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) is accepting industry comments until September 23 on a Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM). DOT is asking for comments on whether airlines should be required to make ancillary fee information available in a timely manner to travel agencies and travel management companies.

This is from the Official DOT Proposed Rule Making

The areas specifically stated in the NPRM.....

mentioned as being under consideration were as follows:
(1) DOT review and approval of contingency plans for lengthy tarmac delays ;
(2) reporting of tarmac delay data;
(3) standards for customer service plans;
(4) notification to passengers of flight status changes;
(5) inflation adjustment for denied boarding compensation;
(6) alternative transportation for passengers on canceled flights;
(7) opt-out provisions where certain optional services are pre-selected for consumers at an additional cost (e.g., travel insurance, seat selection);
(8) contract of carriage venue designation provisions;
(9) baggage fees disclosure;
(10) full fare advertising; and
(11) responses to complaints about charter service.

So in fact the wording of the comment period almost excludes the generalized comment on fees. It only specifically allows the addressing of baggage fees (Article 9) disclosure.

For a full view of all the documentation and the right place to comment go here:

http://www.regulations.gov/search/Regs/home.html#docketDetail?R=DOT-OST-2010-0140

Cheers

Expedia Rating Cut on Google Fears

Today I almost feel like a regular journalist - the headline was pure Newspaper.

However the issue is that one of the leading Internet Stock Analysts Marianne Wolk at Susquehanna Financial cut her rating for Expedia on the fears of Google entering the Travel eCommerce arena. You can read about her here.

Adding the OTAs to the mix of people threatened by the Google ITA acquisition now makes clearly two. The Meta Search companies and the OTAs.

In my view - there are two more - the suppliers particularly US airlines and the GDSs who are faced with disintermediation.

As you travel around speaking to industry heads - I find this is not something that is well understood as yet but as more people think about the individual impact - no matter how Google spins it - this is a major shift in the balance of power in Travel Distribution.

In my view that represents a major threat to a large number of players. And this is now only becoming clear to them.

If you are further interested - please feel free to contact me ProfessorSabena@gmail.com - notice the irony of the use of Google's mail.

Cheers

Has America Turned Socialist?

Americans love conspiracy theories.

The emergence of the Tea Party as an anti-government movement is a trend that will worry some but delight others.

But in reality has America turned socialist and its organizations fallen to Socialism?

The answer of course is that insanity reigns and yes America has become far too Socialist for anyone's sanity. The Socialism I am speaking about of course is Social Media. The adoption thereof has become insane.

Consider now that everyone is on Twitter. Exactly how much time would we be on the darn thing to be productive. Twitter is the ultimate time waster. It has value in selective occasions and occasionally I tweet but only when I have something to say. for the Faithful who read this blog - it seems there are now quite a few of you - it has to worry you as to the volume of stuff you are reading all the time.

If you read the true definition - well at least the Social Media version - aka Wikipedia - then it can apply in a perverted way to the use of Social Media: Socialism is an economic and political theory advocating public or common ownership and cooperative management of the means of production and allocation of resources.

In my view we are reaching a point of diminishing returns on Social Media. But it is still growing. Recent articles have started to question things such as privacy and the one big bugbear I have which is VOLUME.

Infoworld's Columnist has a great one on this:

http://www.infoworld.com/d/adventures-in-it/have-we-hit-social-media-overload-802?source=IFWNLE_nlt_notes_2010-09-20

It poses the same question in a humorous way. But the volume is no laughing matter. STOP!!!

I for one am getting off some of the insanity.

And thanks to Cowbell A Rays Blog for the image.

The Quick & The Dead - Who Cares About Anything Else?

When it comes to websites - if you want to show how good you are don't dwell on the issue of delight. Give the ADD SOBs who visit what they want and fast.

Of late - I have been experimenting with websites. What happened to 3 clicks to booking. I am tracking an average of 20 clicks from opening site to a decision point.

Gerry McGovern picked on the recent study in HBR - which is to be highly recommended reading.

http://hbr.org/2010/07/stop-trying-to-delight-your-customers/ar/1

In my view we are now going to have to deal with speed as a major issue. Gosh it has been years since we had to worry about dogs (ie r e a l l y slow) such as AOL browsers. Now we going to be concerned with an expectation from the user community that travel results will be instant.

And this creates a problem for all of us... except Google. Consider this. If big bad G has cached avails on most airlines then he can serve that up as instant results to a user using free text entries. Everyone else will be at least a click away. Google therefore WILL have an unfair advantage over everyone else in air search.

Think about that....

And the reference to Quick and the Dead (in this case meaning everyone else but Google - check out the biblical reference).Does this give Google a god like quality. Perhaps that is why they chose G as the initial for their name.



The phrase is part of a passage in King James version of the First Epistle of Peter (a book in the Bible) which reads
For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries: Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you: Who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead.
1 Peter 4:3-5

Panasonic updates on their technology and philosophy

Panasonic's Neil James describes how the company focus has evolved regarding connectivity and its embrace of more open standards. For industry insiders, this change in approach is revolutionary. The new thinking was matched with real creativity in new products and future thinking demonstrated at the event.

The Googlesphere Is Already Googleopoly

I have written in the past about the nature of Google and how I believe Google is incapable of living up to its stated goal of "Do No Evil."

Much of this is based on my observation of behaviour of the juggernaut. Having worked at a company previously labelled a "monopoly" - aka Microsoft, I believe I can put my views in context that is meaningful.

I am particularly worried by the Google/Verizon view of the future two tier web. The issue of the proposed ITA acquisition allows us to examine Google's behaviour and motivation.

Professor HB sent me a link to a discussion which is one of the more scholarly assessments of Google's behaviour. There is a lot of data you can find at The Googleopoly Site. I encourage you to spend some time looking at it

In particular download this presentation.

What is perhaps the most worrisome is that in every sector where Google has staked a claim it is either the dominant force or the major influencer.

The accepted notion of what constitutes a monopoly in both US Law (The Sherman Act) and European Community Law (Article 102) is as follows:

"A monopoly power is defined as the ability of a business to control a price within its relevant product market or its geographic market or to exclude a competitor from doing business within its relevant product market or geographic market. It is only necessary to prove the business had the "power" to raise prices or exclude competitors. The plaintiff does not need to prove that prices were actually raised or that competitors were actually excluded from the market.

Today, a general definition of a monopoly is where nearly all of one product type or service is owned by one person or group of people within a community or area. Thereby, the sole control of this product or service is given to one party to the elimination of all others within the marketplace."



Note that I am NOT a Lawyer and if someone seeks to take the issue further then I strongly suggest that that you should contact a professional attorney or law firm.

Google's perspective on domination was interesting in looking at the way Google acted in withdrawing from a product area. When it canned Google Wave - it freely admitted that despite reaching more than one million users that was not enough.

Thus for Google only domination is good enough. That my friends is a far cry from "do No Evil" - indeed my view is that sadly Google has forgotten how to do good.

What can be done - or what can Google do about it?

I believe the company should be split up. A breakup is the only effective way of curbing their domination. Our universal dependence on the Internet and Google's domination of the web give them unprecedented power to destroy and do evil.

My previous views can be seen here is several key posts.

http://t2impact.blogspot.com/2010/08/wsj-gets-its-headline-wrong-google.html
http://t2impact.blogspot.com/2010/08/google-on-future-will-it-all-be-good-in.html

Illustrations are Slides 8 and 27 from the Googleopoly VI presentation noted above.

Governments And Commerce.... Never a Good Combination - Terrible in Some Cases

The whole idea of improved security it designed to make the world an easier place for all travellers. In recent times this has resulted in a backup at the airport security which makes travel a far less pleasant place. By forcing everyone through the same pipe - you mix frequent travellers with newbies.

While everyone accepts the need for additional security screening - there has to be a better way of processing people than treating everyone the same way. There are several programs that support biometric scanners to allow a person who has submitted themselves to an external screening check to use the process.

The US program - called Global Entry - is not bad. improves the flow into the USA.

However their first partnership outside the USA is with the Dutch Privium Service called FLUX - which probably stands for something very bad and smelly... the poor passenger has to pay again through the nose for the service. Now they want 264 Euros.

Not exactly a great deal for saving a few mins at the security gate.

If only they could make it free or of higher value.

Oh I forgot this is the government we are talking about...

You have been warned - its not worth it. And judging by the deserted Privium lounge at Schiphol - the careful Dutch don't rate it either.

Cheers

WN WiFi... yes there are some planes flying

Yup that bulge is the WiFi from Row 44

Cheers

Airline Fees - Real Or Perceived Problem

I love to say that one should be very careful about wishing and wanting something. Be careful what you actually wish for because when it comes true - it might not be what you thought is was.... it reminds me of the 2009 Movie, where a preposterous proposition made for great comedy.

So it would seem is the case of the the pressure groups are are demanding action on the issue of "hidden" fees.

Let's distill the problem.

No one is disputing the airlines' right to charge fees. (Actually that is not true - many would like the airlines not to charge fees. And indeed if you ask anyone the loaded question "do you like fees" you know exactly the answer you are going to get.)

However there is a considerable pressure on the disclosure process of fees. Luddites don't like change.

But in this case they want to have everything delivered in the same manner as the traditional fares and pricing, despite the standard way of notification.

If I may QUOTE from the latest missive from BTC:

"If DOT issues a rule requiring airlines to submit data to travel intermediaries, the vast majority of problems emanating from ancillary fees would be fixed straightaway. Without the rule, we are facing perhaps years of inefficiency and untold attendant damage to managed travel programs. The ATPCO OC fare filing and ARC/BSP EMD processes that would put these fees into the marketplace and facilitate payment have been successfully tested by some 26 airlines and 3 distribution systems and are ready to go."

Not so fast hot shot. The Airlines already provide this information. The issue is NOT one of information provided it is of the execution of the information that is the issue.

Actually there are a number of issues. How do you display in the standard methodology of an agent's workflow the fees? How are they calculated and managed. These are not trivial matters. Having sat and used a GDS screen for more than 30 years I can tell you the amount of complexity is mind blowing to the average consumer. This is why there are so few good travel agents around. Also the technology to easily integrate is not trivial.

If it was just a question of providing the information for the GDSs to implement then this whole issue would be a non-event because they would have done it by bow!

Ancillary services delivered down the standard GDS pipe are NOT easy and the GDSs are having a hard time with it - EVERYONE is. Indeed I don't want anyone to think I am against the GDSs displaying the data - far from it - we all WANT them to do it. But forcing the airlines to disclose in a singular and homogenized fashion is not the answer.

So I say this - let the airlines and the agents do their job. If the GDSs are having a hard time getting to display things in the manner that the airlines want - then let them fix that with the airlines.

Raising the spectre of hidden fees at the airport is politely a load of Bull. The information is highly transparent and available everywhere. In exactly the same manner that the Airlines communicate with their travel agents and the GDSs do the same. The Web and the GDSs are complimentary. This has been the case for years.

Forcing everyone to use a GDSs to get their data - which seems to be the driving force of the Coalition against fees and BTC in particular - would seem to be self serving. What about all the other people who don't choose to use a GDS or an airline website? Are we now saying that this is the only way?

That hardly sounds like the American way.

So if the coalition really wants to prove their point - let them sit down with a Travel Agent and look at all the current complexity of work that an agent does. And where the agent goes for information. And what she/he does to address the challenges of dynamic product changes that are a hallmark of our business.

THEN if they truly feel that the agent is hard done by - perhaps then the Coalition should consider if the forcing of maximum disclosure actually makes a process harder rather than easier for the poor agent on the line that has to implement and do the work.

I doubt that anyone in the coalition has actually bothered to check this with an agent on the line - so perhaps those that are objecting should look inwards rather than trying to find a scapegoat.

Or perhaps the Coalition likes to stare at goats in order to make them fall down.

Cheers

Sunday Humour - Caution Frivolity Zone

Professor Eric sends me occasionally some interesting plays on words. As a Brit by birth - I love puns and word plays.

So here is his latest missive. These are just funny. For Americans this is where Yogi Berra used to shine. One of his more famous quotes was "The future sure ain't what it used to be".

So read and enjoy... cheers

Subject: A Paraprosdokian
A paraprosdokian is a figure of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected in a way that causes the reader or listener to reframe or reinterpret the first part. It is frequently used for humorous or dramatic effect, sometimes producing an anticlimax. Some examples:

I asked God for a bike, but I know God doesn't work that way. So I stole a bike and asked for forgiveness.

If I agreed with you we'd both be wrong.

We never really grow up, we only learn how to act in public.

War does not determine who is right - only who is left.

Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

The early bird might get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese
Evening news is where they begin with 'Good evening', and then proceed to tell you why it isn't.

To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism. To steal from many is research.

A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk, I have a work station.

How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?

I thought I wanted a career; turns out I just wanted pay checks.

A bank is a place that will lend you money, if you can prove that you don't need it.

Whenever I fill out an application, in the part that says, "If an emergency, notify:" I put "DOCTOR".

I didn't say it was your fault, I said I was blaming you.

I saw a woman wearing a sweat shirt with "Guess" on it...so I said “Implants?"

Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but check when you say the paint is wet?

Why do Americans choose from just two people to run for President and 50 for Miss America ?

Behind every successful man is his woman. Behind the fall of a successful man is usually another woman.

A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

You do not need a parachute to skydive. You only need a parachute to skydive twice.

The voices in my head may not be real, but they have some good ideas!

Always borrow money from a pessimist. He won't expect it back.

A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to the trip.

Hospitality: making your guests feel like they're at home, even if you wish they were.

Money can't buy happiness, but it sure makes misery easier to live with.

I used to be indecisive. Now I'm not sure.

When tempted to fight fire with fire, remember that the Fire Department usually uses water.

You're never too old to learn something stupid.

To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and call whatever you hit, the target.

Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.

Some people hear voices. Some see invisible people. Others have no imagination whatsoever.

A bus is a vehicle that runs twice as fast when you are after it as when you are in it.

If you are supposed to learn from your mistakes, why do some people have more than one child?

Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine.

with a top of the hat to Chris Kavas for the really bad image pun