Still trying to get a feel for 2009

This week I was in Las Vegas and I was curious on how the economy would weigh on people’s minds. What is in store for us in 09? As expected it was a mixed bag… the good news was the many General Contractors I met with were confident that 09 was going to be OK. The majority of them felt that 09 would be lighter on the commercial side but not deathly. And all felt that the heavy load of institutional work will help carry us through. Still everyone had an example of banks hurting their business because projects had been postponed thanks to the recent crisis. But amazingly the attitude this week was brighter than it was a month ago at GlassBuild- so that was encouraging. The bad news was from the manufacturing side. Many major players were pushing doomsday scenarios. In fact one major player on the glass side started cutting its sales workforce in efforts to reduce it by 17%.... (I know who, but waiting for the glass media to catch it before I comment- I have had enough trouble for this week!) So while some see the glass half full many others see it half empty. As I have said many times before, I think it’s gonna be a bumpy ride.

Elsewhere…

-- No NFRC on this post (hooray’s come from the masses) but I’ll have a full NFRC post for the end of the week… (because without it so many would be lost and the NFRC would not know what to respond to…)

-- As I have written here before- flying has become no fun at all. On the flight now and I am crammed into the smallest seat possible. The guy in front of me has his seat reclined all the way back and then every few seconds repositions himself to make the chair push into my knees even further. On the window side, the gal sitting there will not put the shade down, so the sun is streaming in and of course making this hot plane even hotter. And of course she is asleep! And my lap top is half open with keyboard on my stomach and my hands uncomfortably trying to type. Pure misery.

-- Happy Birthday to blog reader and friend Matt Ferguson of AGC… worked with Matt years ago and heard he’ll be 49 this weekend.. 49? Man I can not believe it. Anyway a happy and healthy one bro.

-- From the trends… Solar continues to every day make news, but lets not forget about the previous hot topic.. BIM… slowly but surely there’s new BIM folks popping up on every street corner. You gotta love how the me-too trends work in our world huh?

-- One trend that I think will have good growth is the blast and security side. Starting to see and hear more of that on a daily basis.

-- For those of you smarter than me (yes I know that would be... everyone)… saw an ad for plastic that has Low E values. How does that happen? Do they coat it like the glass guys do? How good can it perform? Any insight would be great… just seems very odd to me.. You know since I am anti plastic and vinyl and all.

To the Links…

-- This article says it does not matter who is president, that the stock market will recover… you know I have no clue what makes that market tick- never had and probably never will.

-- Great article (thanks to the link chick!) about Green Prisons… yep even your inmates can be green but what’s funny on this one is the talk to a guy who is in for Murder but the prison is “Minimum Security” – how in the heck? Then again the prison is in Washington state… and Washington state is home to one John Hogan who believes that skyscrapers can be made from Vinyl. So why not.



No video of the week- I may put one on the forthcoming NFRC extravaganza post…