For instance, today I was looking forward to the men’s parallel giant slalom event. NBC starts by showing the qualifying rounds, that’s great, almost complete coverage. But then they didn’t show any of the 1/8 finals, or quarter finals. The runs where US competitors lost or were disqualified were just mentioned in passing. This so they can show hours and hours of cross country skiing.

Last night they didn’t even show the gold medal race for the women’s parallel giant slalom? Huh?

Their fact reporting is bad too. After each run I want to see the standings and I want to be able to see at a glance what’s been done and what’s yet to come. But no, if you aren’t paying very close attention you will have no idea what’s going on and they won’t tell you twice.

They jump all over the place showing 2 minutes of one event, then 2 minutes of another, then 10 minutes of Bob Costas being a total dork. It’s truly ridiculous. I don’t see how they could be doing a worse job.

Furthermore, Bob Costas has had the worst plastic surgery I can imagine and he and the other football sportscasters are honestly horrible at hosting the Olympics. Wherever he is, it’s a giant room with a only desk in the middle and him sitting at it. Sometimes there’s a lone chair. It’s bizarre and feels like the twilight zone.

The Olympics need to be broadcast online so you can watch entire events and watch them at your convenience. I’m on the west coast and I have to wait for events when I could be watching them live or nearly live. NBC messed up the online experience in two ways. First, they don’t provide the opportunity to watch events live and in full. Second, even if they did, they require Microsoft’s stupid Silverlight plugin to watch video. NBC, I don’t want to have to install Microsoft Crapware on my machine to watch the Olympics.

My vote for the next “host” of the Olympics is YouTube.

Montalban Tomorrowland Sushi: click here

I have been sober for something like 2 years (I haven’t really been keeping track.) Since I’ve been sober I’ve spent a lot of time processing my alcoholism. When I stopped drinking, it was a big lifestyle change and it’s been taking quite a bit of time to get used to it, and I’m still working on it. It also takes time to gain some perspective on what was actually happening during the drinking phase of my life. Of course, I was drunk, so I wasn’t absorbing as much information at the time. As an adult I haven’t really ever had serious hobbies or activities, drinking was all there was. Ever since I started college, there had never really been a time where I hadn’t been drunk at least once a week so all told it was more than 15 years of drinking.

There are vastly different kinds of alcoholism, or at least alcoholism presents itself in vastly different ways. I was never physically dependent on alcohol. In fact quitting was quite easy aside from the fact that my entire life was turned on its head. Some people think physical dependency is the definition of alcoholism, and while there are many definitions that’s generally agreed not to be it. Here’s the definition from the Mac OS X dictionary:

an addiction to the consumption of alcoholic liquor or the mental illness and compulsive behavior resulting from alcohol dependency

I was a binge drinker, focusing on the “compulsive behavior” part of the definition above. If I had two drinks in me, I wanted to drink until the bars closed or until the party shut down. After the first drink or two I didn’t make a decision to drink further, it didn’t even occur to me as a decision, I just did it. I would keep the party going if I could.

Alcoholics always seem to avoid the behaviors we personally most associate with alcoholism. For me that meant I never had alcohol at home, I never drank during the day (aside from vacations), I never drank when I was sad (actually, I did, but I didn’t realize I was sad at the time), I never drank alone (in fact I sought out the largest parties I could find), and I rarely missed work due to drinking.

I don’t have the power to stop drinking once I start. This is complex, and it took me a long time to see it, but I don’t have the power because my brain no longer even considers stopping drinking as an option. It literally never enters my mind. If someone mentioned the idea to me, I would think, “Why on earth would I stop drinking?” Right up until before I quit drinking, I thought I had that power, but when I got older and more self aware I looked back I realized it had never happened. I had never once chosen to stop drinking. I saw how I lost my control over drinking, even after alcohol stopped being fun.

Alcoholics protect our alcoholism by trying to be responsible in the places we have control. For some, they drink every night, but they always are home and in bed by 11pm. For others, they always make it to work on time. It’s kind of a classic movie moment to see two obvious drunks and one of them telling the other, “If I’m ever walking around with a lampshade on my head like that, then I’ll know I’m an alcoholic.” For me, I could control myself as long as I didn’t drink, so I wouldn’t go out as long as I had something important to do the next day. But if I didn’t and especially if it was the weekend, I wanted to go out all night. Also unlike more traditional alcoholics, I didn’t want to fix my hangovers with more alcohol, so I only drank multiple days in a row if there were parties going on, and there often were. Gay Pride could easily lead to four nights of heavy drinking. Traveling to circuit parties offered four nights of drinking with little responsibility.

What finally made realizing I was an alcoholic important was that really bad things kept happening. Almost every time I drank something horribly embarrassing or unfortunate happened. Then for two days after a night of drinking and the related issues I was filled with self hate and misery. I started to see that my personal life was a disaster. I was completely and totally wasting my life, spending most of my free time either drunk or hung over.

I have a lot to say on this topic and there will be more posts to come, but that’s a good start. Declaring my alcoholism gives me the same power that coming out of the closet gives me. It allows me to own it and it releases the stress around it. I’m not ashamed of being a recovering alcoholic, it’s just what I am.

I don’t normally watch award shows but I’m watching the Golden Globes because Ricky Gervais is hosting and I’m hoping it will be funny. Since I’m watching I decided to record the red carpet as well.

It’s a major mess this year. First it’s raining, but second NBC has decided to have their correspondents in the middle of the red carpet. From what I can tell, normally the correspondents are on the side leaving the main carpet to be an actual walkway. But now, it’s like the correspondents are being pushed around and tripping over everyone and it’s kind of a mess. Umbrellas are releasing water onto everyone.

I like the fact that Billy Bush is comedically hitting on all the men, but everyone seems to dislike him (regardless of that fact that he’s hitting on them.) I don’t particularly like Billy Bush, but I don’t hate him either. Anyone that’s not Ryan Seacrest is fine with me.

I’m currently watching the SBS Championship at Kapalua in Honalua Bay Maui, Hawaii, on Golf HD and I’m really enjoying it.

The Announcers: Kelly Tilghman and Nick Faldo

The announcers on Golf HD are the best. They have easy voices to listen to, and they are funny. Watching golf is about relaxing. I really don’t like it when they try to have a football type announcer for golf, it’s really annoying.

Golf Club Grooves

In 2010 clubs are not allowed to have the v-shaped grooves that put more spin on the ball. The feeling was that people no longer had to be accurate driver’s because even from the rough these clubs would allow them to hit and stay on the green. The fear was that people were just whacking the ball off the tee as hard as they could without worrying much about direction. With the new groove rules they hope to reward the better golfers with more skill instead of people who can whack the ball harder.

Tiger Woods

Tiger Woods is missing by his own choice. When I first heard the story I wasn’t too surprised as I expect all professional athletes, especially ones as rich as Tiger, to cheat. However, after it has set in, I realized the extent to which he cheated really affected my opinion of him, probably permanently.

I realized, I’m not ready for Christmas to be over yet. The day is nearly done, and that’s what I was feeling, but I’ll really miss the season. This was a really good Christmas, I did a lot of things right this year to have a good Christmas and both the season and the day were great. It made me think seriously about how to keep that Christmas Spirit alive for the whole year. I don’t mean listening to Christmas Music for the whole year, but trying to make my life happier and keep that honest and fresh and pure feeling that Christmas brings.

There have been a lot of change in my life in the last few years, and here I am again at a point where I realize even more change needs to happen. Not of location or even job, but of me, of how I look at the world and what I bring into my life. I like how I feel after a month of watching of movies and listening to music about good things happening.

Christmas is a special time of year, but this year I’m going to work on making its effect last a little longer.

I had always meant to see the movie Sideways, but I hadn’t until recently. I thought it was pretty good movie, and then I realized that the character played by Thomas Haden Church, Jack Lopate, is a perfect example of someone with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. He’s so right on, that I’m sure the writer must have had plenty of experience with these creatures.

Narcissistic Personality Disorder is a very tricky thing. Even the definitions of it in psychology are misleading because it’s understood better by some of its victims than it is by psychologists.

People often claim that people around them have “Narcissistic Personality Disorder”, usually because they are mad at that person. But unless you’ve dealt with one (or more) people with NPD you really have no idea. A person with NPD may be arrogant, selfish, self-involved, greedy, uncaring, (little-n) narcissistic or any number of things, but those traits by themselves do not guarantee a person has NPD. Someone who is (little-n) narcissistic is still very unlikely to have Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

When talking about NPD, everyone gets nervous that they have it. A person with NPD would never even think to worry that they have NPD. In fact, they would probably be confused by the topic or blow it off completely. Talking about yourself and having your own issues is the furthest thing from NPD. Being concerned with your own life and even your own needs first is human. Everyone is like that and that’s okay.

People like me who have an unfortunate natural attraction to these people, which itself is a thing, know that people with NPD have the capability to destroy your life if you let them. They are hard to describe, and that’s why I’m so excited that Sideways built a movie around a character with Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

It’s hard to define NPD. I think of it as a person who lacks any stable real emotion and certainly lacks empathy. For instance, a person with NPD may cry hysterically making you think they have one emotion, but a minute later will have a completely different emotion. The character in the movie spends his time cheating on his fiance to the point of “falling in love” with someone else and thinks about canceling his wedding, but then when things start to fall apart in his life, he starts desperately crying at the thought of losing his fiance.

One way to identify people with NPD is by bizarre little characteristics that they tend to have in common with each other, but that normal people don’t have. Again, these things alone are not enough, but in addition to everything else, they help identify people with NPD. People with NPD tell people they love them incredibly quickly, within days. This applies to both friends and romantic interests, and they tend to end phone calls with “I love you” even for their friends. I know, it’s a weird thing, but it’s absolutely true. People with NPD tend to make a lot of bizarre unimportant empty promises that they don’t follow through on, in fact, they often don’t even remember them. For instance, one of my NPD guys would say he would call me that evening when I saw him every day. I didn’t know why he would be calling me, but I didn’t say anything. But then he wouldn’t call and wouldn’t even say anything about it. He did this every weekday for an entire month before I asked, “You know, you say you’re going to call me every day and then you don’t. I don’t care because I don’t know why you would call me, but why do you do that?” He became quite confused, it was clear that he was not entirely aware of what he had been doing and I rocked his world a little. Weird, huh? That’s the thing with people with NPD, their life is not consistent or stable. 1 + 1 does not equal 2. When you point this out to them, they get momentarily confused, sometimes angry, blame you, and then quickly move on. The problem is, they say 1 + 1 = 3 with such conviction that if you’re not checking yourself, or your math skills are a bit rusty, or you’re even just being easy going, you’re likely to go along with what they say assuming they know what they are doing.

Back to Sideways. Jack, the character with NPD in the movie takes a small vacation with a friend, Miles Raymond, before his wedding. This was supposed to be a trip for the two of them to bond and a sort of bachelor party trip. Soon into the trip Jack informs Miles that he intends to get laid before his wedding and doesn’t want Miles to ruin it for him. Miles is shocked, a little confused, but complies uncomfortably because, well, what do you do? Jack quickly falls in love with another woman and is almost completely ignoring Miles even though the trip was originally supposed to be a bonding experience for them.

A couple of days into the trip, Jack talks about canceling the wedding because he’s so in love with girl he just met, Stephanie. But Stephanie ends up finding out about Jack’s wedding and breaks his nose, she’s angry because he said he loved her and also because he was getting to know her daughter. When Miles is talking to someone about Jack’s bizarre behavior he says, “I’m sure he believed everything he was saying.” This is true of people with NPD. They aren’t lying all the time, although they do a lot of lying, their emotions and their behavior are just all mixed up. This is why he would get to know the daughter, which most people on a fling would not, he wasn’t thinking about ever breaking it off at the time.

Jack recovers from his breakup quickly, as people with NPD always do, and hits on a “fat girl”, describing her as “the grateful type.” Jack gets caught and chased out of the house by the “fat girl’s” husband. At which point he needs Miles to risk his life to get his wallet back out of the girl’s house. Miles is in real danger here, because the husband is violent, but Jack doesn’t really care. On the way home, Jack says he feels like driving. Then without even talking about it with Miles he purposely crashes Miles’ car into a tree to explain his broken nose. Classic NPD. He offers to pay for it, but you see how this situation is very bizarre and paying for it does not address the landslide of issues he has created.

This is one of the primary traits of those with NPD. They create one issue after another, taking you further and further into the negative, and there’s no way for the “victim” to ever deal with them all and get back to zero. The person with NPD isn’t interested in discussing it, because they have what they want, and there’s no point in it for them. Jack went on to marry his fiance, and if there were a sequel, he would have undoubtedly put that poor woman through hell.

There are so many similarities to my own experiences. I’ve never had my car crashed, but I’ve had financially worse things happen. I had an NPD guy cheat on his wife, pull me into the situation as an alibi, and I was thinking we were going to be hanging out. Then he ran off with a girl, which had clearly been the plan all along, and I’m trapped with nothing to do. Interestingly, I actually was told about the grateful “fat girl” theory by him, isn’t that bizarre? When he was cheating on his wife, he was ready to get divorced. But when his wife was pulling away he claimed she was the most important thing in his life and the tears came out. But then he would ignore her anyway. She asked for a divorce, and he acted like he had no idea why that would have happened. Then him and I got into a huge argument because I listed out exactly why it happened, said that it was obvious, and basically said I didn’t blame her, which I didn’t.

During this time of mourning his marriage, I brought up many conversations I had witnessed where his wife had indicated concern, not so subtly, with his behavior. He couldn’t remember any of them. He would say, “Where was I when you had this conversation?” I would say, “I just told you, you were in the car with us, all three of us were in the car having this conversation.” He would say, “I don’t remember that.” And he honestly didn’t, entire parts of his life seemed to be missing from his memory, including entire stories that his wife often told as humorous anecdotes about her crazy husband. I know he was telling the truth because I could see the fear in his eyes that he wasn’t remembering these things, and he trusted that I wouldn’t have any reason to lie about them. With all of my NPD people I’ve witnessed this kind of scary memory loss, and their confusion when it’s pointed out to them.

The movie is great because it so accurately portrays someone with NPD. It shows how a friend can get sucked into their issues and it quickly becomes a huge mess. By the end of the movie, even the viewer can’t list all the things that are wrong with this situation. The victims of someone with NPD are forever trying to just get things settled, and the person with NPD is constantly messing them up.

If you’ve read this far, you see that NPD is a serious psychological disorder. It’s not a condition you claim someone who’s being selfish has, it’s a mental handicap that destroys the life of the person with NPD and unfortunately everyone around them as well.

There is no cure for NPD, despite what the official descriptions may say, and it tends to worsen as the person ages. For the victims near the person, the only way out is to get away. Believe me, I’ve been burned badly by trying to fix that situation before I finally realized it was unfixable. That’s another trait to look for, someone who has a lot of very close friends that they mysteriously aren’t in contact with anymore. Everyone has friends they’ve lost touch with, so it’s just one more thing to add to the list of traits to look for. A person with NPD will usually blame those people, “He was the best man at my wedding, and then he just stopped calling. I’ve had such bad luck with friends, will you be my friend? …”

Well, the solution to this problem is easy. I’m using a Mac, so I just opened up the DVD using the DVD Player app and started playing the movie. Once it got to the main movie, you click on the word “TITLE” in the faux LCD (not the “title” button) and it cycle through information about the title that’s currently playing. As you cycle through you’ll see that it’s currently playing title 30 of 99. That means, this is the correct title and the one you should select in Handbrake to properly rip the DVD.

If you don’t have a Mac, I read on the Handbrake forums that you can use a real hardware DVD player which will also show you which title is currently playing.

Furthermore, if you ever see this again on another DVD you know how to deal with it. So what did Disney accomplish here? They ticked a whole bunch of their customers off. Too bad Disney isn’t in the business of ticking people off, maybe their stock would be higher.

But I want to make two points. One is that the audience in this video applauds at a point in the middle of her talk, and again at the end. While of course, it is polite, both applause breaks are inappropriate. The appropriate response to witnessing this talk is complete and utter silence. She talks about how badly people treat the victims of abuse, they don’t want to be around them, but these victims need support and they need to be able to live a better life. She makes a great point, instead of guarding yourself by facing the fact that you can’t solve these issues (which you alone certainly cannot), think of the one thing, the one small thing you can do to help. Just one small thing.

Finally, when I was watching this, I couldn’t help thinking about Michael Vick. Here is a man that we know abused animals horribly for his own sick enjoyment. In many ways the dynamics are the same as the even more horrible crimes described in this video. And yet, stadiums full of people are now cheering for him when he plays football. What is wrong with us? Michael Vick brutally tortured and killed dogs, and most of us seem to be okay with that. How can that be?

We are so uncomfortable thinking about atrocities that we would rather pretend they don’t exist. Sex slavery exists, and it’s horrible. Dog fighting exists, and it’s horrible. Don’t watch this video, I understand why you wouldn’t want to. But please, try to find it in yourself to stop pretending these things aren’t happening or they aren’t horrible. Then the next step, as Sunitha says, is to try to find just one very small thing you can do about it.

The Pizza Haven holds a very special place in my heart. The only one left is the one in the Seattle Center House, which would probably be the best one to be left since it’s near me. But the one that holds the best memories is the one that used to be in The Flour Mill in Spokane, Washington.

My mom is a shopper, and when I was a kid, one of the places she liked to shop was The Flour Mill. This is literally an old flour mill that has been turned into a small mall. The inside is almost exactly what you would think an old flour mill would look like. It has lots of exposed wood beams, levels, half levels and stair cases that lead through spooky corridors to get to your favorite shops. It’s perfect, it’s bright and cheery in most places, but with a touch of Scooby Doo mystery and 70’s hippie.

Pizza Haven was on the bottom level and it was set up as pizza restaurants used to be when people would actually go to them and eat family style. My mom and I would often share a pizza, but I always wanted anchovies which she didn’t like as much. Anchovies on a half a pizza doesn’t really work, so sometimes we’d get them and sometimes not. It didn’t matter, the pizza was really good. I’m sure it wouldn’t win any contests, but with memories like that, nothing can compete with it.

I’m starting to get older and it’s so funny to hear myself pine for the olden days. I’m sure they were not nearly as good as I remember them. When you’re young you have fantasies about your future. When you’re old, you have fantasies about your past.

I just finished watching The Haunting, the 1963 version. You may remember the 1999 version with Liam Neeson and Catherine Zeta-Jones. The 1963 version is great. It’s the perfect haunted house movie!

It contained a huge surprise. A lesbian! Catherine Zeta-Jones played a lesbian in the modern version but I had no idea there would be gay representation in the 1963 version. Awesome! The lesbian character (Theo, nice male nickname) was so obvious in her intentions toward the main character (Eleanor) that I was very surprised. There was an absolutely wonderful argument between the main character (Eleanor) as the lesbian character (Theo) was trying to convince her that her crush on the handsome Dr. Markway wouldn’t work out.

Eleanor: I’d rather be innocent than like you!

Theo: Meaning what?

Eleanor: Now who’s being stupid and innocent? You know perfectly well what I mean!

Theo: Is this another of your crazy hallucinations?

Eleanor: I’m not crazy!

Theo: Crazy as a loon! You expect me to believe you’re sane and the rest of the world is mad?

Elearnor: Well, why not? The world is full of inconsistencies, unnatural things. Nature’s mistakes, they’re called… you, for instance!

[Long silence]

I love it! Modern movies just don’t have such wonderful lines. When you watch dialog like this it really leaves an impression on you. When you take into account the social beliefs of the time, and what a huge thing it was to have this conversation at all, it’s kind of cool. Of course, it’s not cool that she’s calling her “unnatural”, but in a way it kind of is cool. Because really, she (Eleanor) is deeply jealous of the lesbian character (Theo) and this whole discussion is her acting out. The truth is, the lesbian (Theo) is already probably the best friend she has ever had. She’s probably taken more romantic interest in her than anyone else, as well.

Write it down, set a calendar item, and watch this one next Halloween. Or, run out to the video store fast!

McDonald’s really has a good thing going with their Monopoly game. But every year since they started the great online game they haven’t planned for traffic and the server has gone down. I don’t know who’s in charge at McDonald’s, but you know, there are companies that specialize in providing servers for events that will temporarily have a lot of traffic.

Also, it’s very odd that you don’t go to a McDonald’s URL to play, you go to promotions.com? Why? That’s retarded and very unprofessional. McDonald’s people, you realize that you could have the URL monopoly.mcdonalds.com for free and it can even point to different servers than your regular web site, right? This way you get the McDonald’s branding without affecting your regular traffic.

Now, they should know this, but the fact that this keeps happening year after year leads me to believe that they might not. I mean, even if they keep the dumb promotions.com deal (which they shouldn’t) you’d think they’d say, “Our servers have gone down every year now, are we sure it won’t happen again this year?” Is McDonald’s more accountable than this when ensuring that their food is safe and fresh? I sure hope so.

Tonight the Seattle Seahawks absolutely destroyed the Jacksonville Jaguars. This is what I wanted, but it was still kind of painful to watch. Some of Seattle’s plays were so amazing that I was literally speechless. Some were so amazing that I was on the edge of my seat not believing what had just happened. For a blowout, it was an amazingly fun game to watch.

I’m learning more detailed rules of the game as I encounter them. Tonight I looked on Wikipedia and found out what the “two minute warning” was all about and the special rules that take effect during the two minute warning. I learned that the team in the lead can often run out the last two minutes without playing because of the two minute warning rules. Seattle did just that, to win the game.

Also I thought any time a team “intercepted” the ball that it was an “interception”, but sometimes it’s actually a “recovered fumble.” Seattle had at least one of those in tonights game.

Anyway, it was an amazing game and I look forward to more.

Let’s say I suggest sugar content be limited in any single serving of food product, and let’s say I limit it to ten times what would be healthy for a single serving of food. Not a very effective policy, really.

Well, anyone against this policy, or more likely anyone who’s simply against me can say this will cause jobs to be lost. Cotton Candy sellers will lose their jobs. They might also be considered small businesses, so you can claim that small businesses will be hurt as well. You can then say I don’t care about hard working people or small businesses.

The thing is, anything that effects the economy in any way will cause jobs to shift, and therefore at the very least, some jobs will be “lost” even if there’s a net gain in jobs. But does anyone ever point this out? No.

People can blame the opposition who use this logic to purposely hurt the their enemies, but we should really blame the victim in this case, because they aren’t fighting back. The counter argument to something that’s illogical is real logic, but I’ve rarely, if ever, seen that used.

I want to find out more to see if Jackie O started giving them some money or something. I mean, they were crazy, but I think she could have paid for a maid to clean the place and someone to cook them meals and that kind of thing. I know Jackie O redid the house and some other stuff, but with all the money in that family, taking care of them shouldn’t have been much of a problem. Of course, rich people are often crazy, and the idea of “giving” them money or even basic care may have been very unattractive. Also, being related, maybe Jackie O was equally crazy in a different way.

If you haven’t seen it, it’s interesting and often funny. I think, in an exaggerated way, their relationship and even their lifestyle represents all human relationships from friendships to marriages. If nothing else, this movie will motivate you to clean your house.

I’ve been slow to fully unpack my bathroom stuff because I want to use trays, baskets, or containers to hold all the supplies because my bathroom cupboards have no drawers. So I measured all the available spaces and bought an assortment of trays and baskets to fill each space today. Overkill? Maybe, but it turned out awesome.

This will have a number of great side effects. First, to get at the stuff in the back, I just pull out the tray or basket. Second, when I move again, all the stuff will already be in moveable trays that can be either boxed or are boxes themselves. Third, I don’t have to worry about stuff leaking on the actual shelves or getting lost in the back of the cupboard. Fourth, I got really nice trays and baskets so it looks cool.

The bathroom was only the first step, I plan on doing all my storage areas in a similar way. I’ve always hated that the “stuff at the back” is inaccessible and might as well not exist. It causes one to use up the front of shelves and not the back which wastes space. This is what trays and baskets are made for. I want to preserve my open spaces for living, not shelves of stuff. I want my guest room to actually be a comfortable guest area, not a storage room.

On another topic, I also bought some logs and right now my first fire is burning in the fireplace. I love those, and so does Kody. It’s great while I’m watching the game, which I have taken a break from to write this post. Time to get back to it.

Because of that, I have no desire to do it again, which is good, because I couldn’t do it now. But feeling this way after the move, I really feel my age. I’m not yet 40, but that’s how I feel: not yet 40. What I most appreciate now is that I have no need to prove myself, I already did that. I couldn’t do it better even if I could go back. That’s a life success story, and I hope my future holds something just as exciting except… different.

One benefit is that the new dryer produces sonar tones when it’s almost complete. The old one played sea chanties. But more importantly, the new one is super fast and will dry a regular sheet and a fitted sheet without rolling them into a ball which will prevent them from drying. Who says blogs are boring?

Kody is still getting used to the place. He’s definitely a little cautious and wants to stay very close to me. However, he likes the walks a lot better. Not only do we forgo the stairs, there are lots of places he really likes to do his business. Including, luckily, about three that are right outside the door!