John Allen
John Allen
answer basic earth eight expected given head knew lots months personnel public serious slow surprised turn vastness
Am I surprised by how slow he's moving? My basic answer is, yes. I knew he was not going to turn the Earth on its head overnight. But given the vastness of his ambitions ... I would have expected in the first eight months he would be doing lots of things of consequence: more significant personnel moves, more significant documents, more serious public engagements, etc., etc.
couple possibly report specific talked type
I've talked to him a couple of times about some type of possibly expanded role. But we don't have anything specific to report right now.
car fund half invest invested people racing stock
Racing is a $2 billion-a-year industry. Half the people who invest in our fund have never invested before. They don't know a stock from a bond. They like stock car racing.
defense played win
Our defense played well enough to win this game. We just had no offense.
bad describe driving realize saw seeing until words yesterday
Seeing this and what I saw yesterday, there are no words to describe it. I didn't realize it was as bad as it was until yesterday when we were driving around.
almost basis behind believing closed constitution delicacy fatigue forget health restricted schedule
Don't forget he's almost 79 years old. Part of his restricted schedule is not because he's doing feverish things behind closed doors. He's resting. There was speculation in 2002 and 2003 that his health wasn't very good. There is a basis for believing that there may be some fatigue and delicacy of constitution there.
move ok rules strict sure
We've made a lot of contacts. They are strict tampering rules, so we're making sure everything is OK before we move forward.
worked
That worked out so well, and reservations were so popular.
bigger calls complaints couple fans hiatus last miss plan
That was our plan all along, was to go on hiatus and it'll be back, bigger and better. The fans really miss it. We got a lot of calls and complaints about not having it the last couple years.
break color looking somebody
With the discrimination like it was, I was looking for somebody to break the color barrier.
bit chance drive fans gives home hour quite
We thought we'd try something a little bit different. But also, in deference to our fans that do drive quite a ways, it gives them a chance to get here and get home an hour earlier.
business challenges core given half performance result
Given that, and given the challenges there are in our core business over the half year, the performance and the result are very encouraging.
definitely fairly frank highly known six term vatican
Frank is definitely not a keeping-the-seat-warm kind of figure. I've known Frank fairly well for six years. I wouldn't use the term 'rising star,' but in the world of the Vatican he is very highly thought of ... he's someone who could be an archbishop someday.
advantage buy easily people surprising tickets
You have a lot of people with a lot of money. It's not surprising that they are going to take advantage of being able to easily buy tickets online.