Proof that anything is cool if you do it with your iPhone
Like, for instance, typing with your nose. According to CNET, it's a useful skill when you want to dial a phone number, but you don't want to take your gloves off on the ski lift.
Those with insanely good memories will remember back in July of 2007, when I learned of the fire at Este Pizza by analyzing my web server logs. Este Pizza, of course, is the Salt Lake City pizzeria that was the source of the not-yet-executed-but-still-hoping-it-happens-one-day Great Simple Tricks Pizza Challenge, in which Chenopup (and Este's owner, Dave) attempt to defend their claim that Este Pizza makes a pizza that "rivals or excels over the best New York has to offer."
At any rate, I received this e-mail from Chenopup this evening:
From: Chenopup Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2008 9:12 PM To: <Various> Subject: Este Pizza Back in Business!!!! ------------------------------------------ I just got word today that Este Pizza has reopened and done a little stylin' in the same location but interior has changed now. I'm going by tomorrow to take pics.
Spread the word. The gates to Pizza Heaven have reopened :)
Cheno
I'm thrilled to hear it. Gentlemen, start your ovens...
So I get this e-mail a couple of weeks ago from Citigroup, marketers of my Citi MasterCard. It says I have an opportunity to purchase advance tickets to Billy Joel's "Last Play at Shea" concert on July 16th, which will be the last rock concert at Shea Stadium before they tear it down in favor of the new Citi Field, currently being built in the parking lot next door (funny how Citi's name is all over everything here, right?)
Little did I know how valuable an e-mail that was...
At 9AM on Saturday (2/16), I logged on to 507tixx.com and put in my special password. Viola - I got right in and purchased four tickets on the field. They were a bit pricey ($110/ticket), but what the heck - it'll be a special night, right? The last concert ever at Shea Stadium. History.
Well, not so much. It seems that Mets season ticket holders were allowed to buy tickets two days earlier, and then the rest of the stadium sold out in 48 minutes. Also, 507tixx.com had problems handling all the volume, and by 10AM on Saturday, a lot of angry, shut-out Billy Joel fans found 441 listings for tickets on StubHub, top asking price: $99,215. As a result, a second show was added on July 18th, making the show I bought tickets for the (somewhat less historic) Second-to-Last Play at Shea.
I'm of mixed emotions on this. On the one hand, I thought I was going to see history being made, and now there's a little less of that. On the other hand, Joel has always been disgusted by scalpers, so I'm sure he's no fan of StubHub either. Adding a second show definitely gave fans who weren't able to buy tickets another chance to do so at (somewhat) reasonable prices. On the third hand (what? why can't there be three hands?), history aside, if I knew there were two shows in the first place, I would definitely have tried for the Friday night show, avoiding the need to trek out to Queens on a Wednesday night (I live in New Jersey, so it's a schlep - especially on a work night).
On the whole, I'm not really upset at all. I've always enjoyed his concerts, even the more recent ones, and this will still be a special night. Also, it's not like there isn't any history here. The July 16th show will make Joel the first (and last) musician ever to play New York's four major sports venues: Shea Stadium, Yankee Stadium, Giants Stadium and Madison Square Garden. And the concert will be the night after the All-Star Game, which will take place across the river in Yankee Stadium, so we'll get to hear Billy Joel's take on that game first hand. All in all, it should be a great night...
Encore #3: Arirang (a folk song beloved in both the North and South and often used as a reunification anthem at friendly events between the two Koreas)
Kim Jong Il did not attend, but the Vice Culture Minister did. He said this:
I can say that through the concert tonight, all the members of the New York Philharmonic opened the hearts of the Korean people. . . . The concert serves as an important occasion to open a chapter of mutual understanding between the two countries."
When the concert ended, the audience "stood and applauded enthusiastically, waving to the musicians."
If you haven't seen the New York Times' recent article about John McCain yet, it's here. Allow me to summarize by reading through the article and pulling out the relevant points sequentially (all emphasis is mine):
Eight years ago, McCain's campaign staff thought he was having an affair with a lobbyist, Ms. Vicki Iseman. Without telling him, they met with her and told her to stay away from McCain. Even if they weren't having an affair, his advisors were worried that too much contact with a lobbyist would damage his reputation as "the ethical candidate."
-----Continue reading The Other Mac Attack... Nineteen years ago, McCain got caught up in the Keating Five scandal, the Savings & Loan debacle that sent Charles Keating to jail for four and a half years. After the scandal, McCain dedicated himself to improving ethical standards in Washington. Over the last nineteen years, McCain has shied away from the appearance of impropriety, including accepting free flights on corporate jets, chairing non-profit groups involved in campaign finance reform, etc..
Twenty Eight years ago, Charles Keating was a big contributor to McCain's first run for the House of Representatives. Twenty Two years ago, they vacationed together in the Bahamas, and Cindy McCain invested in an Arizona shopping mall with Mrs. Keating. Nineteen years ago, Keating was convicted. Seventeen years ago, three of the Keating Five senators were censured, although McCain was only sighted for "poor judgment" and was re-elected the next year.
Fourteen years ago, McCain attacked congressional earmarks, and then moved on to campaign finance reform, angering many conservatives. Eight years ago, McCain made the influence of special interests a central point in his failed presidential campaign.
Six years ago, he passed the McCain-Feingold Act, which banned soft money from campaigns. Seven years ago, he founded a nonprofit group that took soft money, and severed ties to it three years ago.
This year, McCain has several former lobbyists working on his campaign. Some of them are working for free, which could be considered a "gift." His campaign points out that there's nothing wrong with that, unless he "gives you special treatment or takes legislative action against his own views."
Back to Ms. Iseman, eleven years ago she started visiting his office. In February of that year, they had dinner together with several clients, and then took a plane ride together with a campaign aide on one of her client's corporate jets. Two former, un-named associates of John McCain, who describe themselves as being "disillusioned with John McCain" both told the New York Times, in independent conversations, that McCain "acknowledged behaving inappropriately and pledged to keep his distance from Ms. Iseman." McCain, his wife, the lobbyist, and all current campaign staff members disagree with those statements. John Weaver, admits to setting up a meeting with Ms. Iseman, to discuss "her conduct and what she allegedly had told people, which made its way back to us." The New York Times says, "he declined to elaborate," but he told The Washington Post that he was concerned at the time about Ms. Iseman claiming to have strong relationships on McCain's senate committees.
McCain called Bill Keller, the executive editor of the New York Times, to complain about the paper's inquiries regarding Ms. Iseman. Mr. Weaver and others on McCain's campaign staff also pointed out that McCain has often taken positions that don't favor Ms. Iseman's clients, including a vote two years ago to break up cable subscription packages.
Nine and ten years ago, McCain wrote letters to the FCC urging the body to vote on a matter that affected one of Ms. Iseman's clients. The Times says the letters "[urged the FCC] to uphold marketing agreements allowing a television company to control two stations in the same city, a crucial issue for . . . one of Ms. Iseman's clients." The paper points out that the chairman of the FCC accused him of interference, and that McCain was embarrassed when news reports at the time mentioned the Keating Five scandal. McCain released all of the letters, claiming that he was "merely trying to push along a slow-moving bureaucracy."
[Note: although he released the letters to them, the New York Times did not print them. McCain's campaign put out a response to the Times article, in which it quoted them, including this: "I write today to express my concern about the Commission's continuing failure to act on the pending applications for assignment of the licenses of WQEX(TV) and WPCB(TV), Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. . . . This letter is not written to secure a favorable resolution for any party on any substantive issue pending before the Commission. Please treat this letter in full compliance with all applicable, legal, ethical, and procedural rules."]
Finally, McCain issued a statement this week accusing the New York times of lowering it's standards to engage in a hit-and-run smear campaign against John McCain. The statement included this quote: "Americans are sick and tired of this kind of gutter politics, and there is nothing in this story to suggest that John McCain has ever violated the principles that have guided his career."
Now, to be fair, even the left has criticized this article as being light on sources and facts, and it looks like McCain has found a way to spin this article into something that will help his campaign (in a way, it should be noted, that George W. Bush has decidedly NOT been able to do for several years now). What strikes me about the whole thing, though, is how just about everything in the article describes events that happened a decade ago or more. Nothing has occurred in the recent past to warrant the discussion of this, even if there was some impropriety, which there appears not to have been. The New York Times doesn't even seem to have trumped up a reason to run the article, and completely ignores the fact that in the intervening ten years, none of these supposed ethics issues have caused any ill effects, or have even drawn any criticism from McCain's political opponents. It simply seems as though the Times decided it was time to write an article that contained the words "McCain," "ethics," and "romantic relationship."
The only potential story in all of this is the fact that he has former lobbyists running his campaign. In addition to this being something that is happening right now, as opposed to 10+ years ago, it seems like a fair question to ask a man who has staked so much of his reputation on fair play. And if his argument is that these former lobbyists curry no favor with him on any special interests, he should be prepared to defend that claim to the press.
In the meantime, we could all do without the carpet-bombing on his reputation, his politics and his marriage.
Last weekend, my friend Jeff Porten and I were in the same physical location, which basically means we got to stare at the same computer screen, rather than two separate ones.
In this case, I had an Excel spreadsheet to show him, which I had stored on my USB flash drive. I put the drive in his MacBook, and we were able to bring it up in Excel with just a couple of clicks. Excel threw a couple of warning messages at us, but the spreadsheet seemed to work fine, so we didn't investigate.
Anyway, today I tried to use the flash drive on my Windows machine. Well, well, well...
I've got four hidden folders on the drive now, containing a total of 84 files that take up 17.5MB on the drive (to be fair, the spreadsheet has a bunch of bitmaps in it, so it's 14MB on its own). The folders are named as follows:
.fseventsd
.TemporaryItems
.Spotlight-V100
.Trashes
The one with the word "Spotlight" in it has 50 of the 84 files, all with inscrutable filenames, so I'm guessing the Mac tried to index my flash drive and stored the index on the drive itself.
The one called .TemporaryItems has several sub-folders, but eventually I come to a local copy of each bitmap in my spreadsheet, stored in .png format.
The other two folders are empty.
Everything deleted with no issues, and the spreadsheet still works, but it's yet another example of how 100% compatibility is a false hope, as there's always something that needs to be done whenever Jeff and I try to share/swap files.
No big deal for me, but I'm glad I'm not the guy on the other end of the tech support line when a novice user calls in asking if the Mac gave his flash drive a virus...
Given recent events in the baseball world, I thought I'd comment on what Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens have said and done over the last week or so. My perspective is that of a lifelong Yankee fan, and also as a father of two young boys.
I mention my kids because I'm very much of the opinion that sports, for adults, is entertainment. It's a diversion from the things that truly matter in our lives - our families, our jobs, our communities, our politics, etc. As an adult, my interest in whether or not a professional baseball player cheated to win a World Series doesn't amount to much more than idle gossip. It simply isn't that important in the big picture. But kids view sports differently. Kids dream of becoming professional athletes. They emulate them. They watch their every move and listen to their every word. The athletes are, for better of for worse, heroes in their world. Superheroes, like Superman or Batman, but real enough to watch on TV and during the occasional trip to the ballpark.
My older son became fully aware of baseball right as it was becoming obvious that Jason Giambi had been taking steroids to achieve his unusual bulk and, consequently, his inflated stats. At the time, I encouraged him to look up to the likes of Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera, but steered him away from Giambi whenever I could. When he asked (and he did ask), I told him that Giambi was a great baseball player, but not a very good person, because even though he hits homeruns and wins games, he cheats.
And no one likes to play with a cheater.
My younger son is now at that age where he follows and roots for the individual players. And, of course, my older son is still fully fixated. Therefore, the widely publicized Pettitte/Clemens events present me with another dilemma. When the season kicks in, they will almost certainly hear about it and ask me what I think. And here's what I think I'll tell them:
Andy Pettitte is also not a smart person. He got hurt twice, and instead of listening to his doctor, he took medicine from someone who was not a doctor. That's a very dangerous thing to do, and he's lucky he didn't get sick or make his injury worse.
But he didn't cheat like Jason Giambi did. It's true that taking the medicine was against the rules, so he did break the rules. But he didn't take the medicine every day to make him pitch faster, strike out more batters, or win more games. What he did was wrong, but he wasn't lying to his teammates every time he played in a game. Also, he admitted that he was wrong and said he was sorry. And that's why his teammates supported him.
It's hard to call what Pettitte did role model material, but at least based on what we know right now, he's doing a pretty good job of showing kids how to handle things after you've made mistakes.
Roger Clemens, on the other hand, continues to surprise me. Back in December, I wrote this:
Instead of lawyering up, Clemens is adding the charge of "lying about steroids" to the one of "using steroids" that Mitchell delivered . . . For all of his on-field accomplishments, he's counting on being proven (or believed) innocent at this point, because if he's ever actually proven guilty, his actions today will do just as much to keep him out of the Hall of Fame as any drug he ever took.
Given Pettitte's testimony to Congress, and whatever physical evidence Brian McNamee may or may not have, Clemens seems to be losing that battle. If it turns out he did use steroids or HGH, I will waste no time in telling my kids that what Roger did was even worse than what Giambi did, because not only did they both cheat, but Clemens also lied about it - loudly and frequently, and that's the opposite of saying you're sorry.
And good boys always say they're sorry. Otherwise, they get punished.
The international community should work with the Cuban people to begin to build institutions that are necessary for democracy. Eventually, this transition ought to lead to free and fair elections - and I mean free, and I mean fair - not these kind of staged elections that the Castro brothers try to foist off as true democracy. [If Cuba remains much the same], political prisoners will rot in prison and the human condition will remain pathetic in many cases.
Unless he knows something we don't know (and that's entirely possible, of course), I would think this is a giant missed opportunity. Why not invite Raul Castro to Washington, DC on his very first day in office, and then get him in a private meeting and explain to him the untold benefits (financial and otherwise) of forging a strong and lasting alliance with the United States. If he demurs, we're no worse off than we were, except now we have the moral high ground. If not, Americans instantly have better cigars and a new vacation hotspot in the Carribean.
Peter Kornbluh, senior analyst at George Washington University's National Security Archive, believes the next U.S. President will probably take this kind of tack, but "the current U.S. president is unlikely to make any changes in a hostile position towards Cuba." He doesn't say why, but I think if history has taught us anything about George W. Bush, it's that he really doesn't like to change his mind...
OK, now that I've covered Dolly Parton and Harvard University, I simply can't resist the first (and likely only) opportunity to mention Paris Hilton in three consecutive posts.
Over at Defective Yeti, Matthew Baldwin has one of his patented Bad Review Revues up, this one about The Hottie and the Nottie, executive produced by and starring Paris Hilton. Here are my favorites:
"It's not like Paris Hilton to rise above her material, but The Hottie and the Nottie sinks so low that all she has to do is stand upright." -- Sam Adams, LOS ANGELES TIMES
"Great actors make the craft look easy. In this Paris Hilton comedy, acting looks very, very difficult." -- Kyle Smith, NEW YORK POST
"How bad is this feature from deservedly unknown director Tom Putnam? How's this?: It's a blot on Paris Hilton's dignity." -- Andy Klein, LOS ANGELES CITYBEAT
Click through and read the rest for yourself. It's oddly satisfying. Or, if you like, click all the way through to Rotten Tomatoes, where the movie is currently scoring a whopping 7%, and check for new hi....er, lowlights!
Next, upon hearing about the award, Paris Hilton agrees to come to Harvard and accept the tropy in person. Apparently, she doesn't know (and nobody told her) what the word Lampoon means.
Then, it's raining on the day of the event, and about 200 Harvard students wait more than an hour in the rain to see her.
Next, Lampoon's president, Chris Schleicher, is accused of pulling a prank. He has to stave off an increasing wet and impatient crowd by saying, "All of you can stab me if she doesn't come. She's really coming."
But, of course, this is Harvard, so intelligent discourse eventually provides the proper perspective. First, we have Matthew Sussman, a 26-year old English major who says, "Someone just accosted me and said, 'Why would you stand in the rain for Paris Hilton?' But I think that she is an icon and we see her image multiplied numerous times and numerous ways." Good point, Matthew. Good point. Matthew also added, "It's also a dubious distinction. We don't know if she is in on the joke or not," proving that he's not a total idiot.
Then Paris finally arrived and provided the student the kind of intellectual red meat you'd expect from such a weighty mind: "You guys are so hot. Harvard's hot."
The title of this post is an actual headline at MSNBC.com (as opposed to, say, The Onion).
Here's the pull quote:
LOS ANGELES - Dolly Parton's breasts may be two of the wonders of the entertainment world, but the country music icon says they are a pain in her back.
Parton, 62, said on Monday she would postpone her upcoming North American tour after doctors told her to take it easy for six to eight weeks to rest her sore back.
"Hey, you try wagging these puppies around a while and see if you don't have back problems," the folksy singer-songwriter said in a statement.
Has anyone else noticed that the person most directly responsible for Dolly Parton's famous breasts is . . . Dolly Parton? Especially now that she's 62 years old, and the world has folks, like Pamela Anderson and Paris Hilton, who promote their breasts by making "accidental" porno videos with their boyfriends, rather than just talking about them all the time?
Not that I'm suggesting Dolly needs a new marketing strategy. I've seen all I need to see, thank you very much...
Anyone who has kids is surely familiar with Margaret Wise Brown's Goodnight Moon. Entertaining kids since 1947, and no one's quite sure why...
If that includes you, then you'll probably be interested to know that her sister recently found a "sheaf of yellow pages held together by paper clips" in Margaret's attic, which turned out to be a sequel to the now-famous book.
The new book, entitled The Moon Shines Down will be available, including Clement Hurd-style illustrations by Linda Bleck, in November of 2008.
Goodnight, nobody. Goodnight, mush. And goodnight to the blogger whispering, "Hush."
Another request from Jason Bennion (I aim to please). This one's called the 123 Meme.
1. Pick up the nearest book ( of at least 123 pages). 2. Open the book to page 123. 3. Find the fifth sentence. 4. Post the next three sentences. 5. Tag five people.
Well, the book currently in my laptop bag is James Patterson's 7th Heaven. To page 123 we go (if this gives away the murderer, I'm going to blame it all on Jason...)
Reluctantly, Conklin said, "My notes would be more of a verbatim account, but ---"
"But still, you felt it was appropriate to throw them out? Is there a shortage of storage space at the Hall of Justice?"
OK, Jason, you're safe for now. And yes, in Patterson's universe, the place where all the San Fransisco cops work is called The Hall of Justice. I keep reading them because I'm waiting for Wonder Woman to return on her invisible jet with Aquaman, Batman & Robin, and the Wonder Twins (Form of: something completely unuseful in this situation! Shape of: something random and completely incompatible with what you're forming! Someone find that damn monkey - he'll ironically save the day!)
OK, tagging five people. This is problematic. I only know a small number of people who both read my blog and have a blog of their own. So I'm going to have to be creative here:
1) Jeff Porten 2) Mike Chenoweth (Thank God Jason didn't tag him - gives me another name...) 3) and 4) Someone of Jeff's and Mike's choosing (see how now they have to pick six people? Pretty devious, huh?) 5) You. Yeah, you - the guy/gal reading my blog because Google brought you here and you just can't look away. Like staring at a car wreck. Well, now you've gone and done it. You don't even know me, and I've tagged you with a blog meme. You'll be thrown out of the blogosphere forever if you don't respond when tagged with a blog meme. It's true! I read about it on the InterTubes...
Bought everyone in the bar a drink? No. Quite frankly, the occasion to do so has never come up.
Swam with wild dolphins? No, but I had the chance to on my honeymoon in Hawaii. The line was really long, it was really expensive, and it didn't seem like that much fun to do, other than being able to say later "I did that."
Climbed a mountain? Well, that would depend on whether you mean climbed on a mountain, or whether you mean climbed an entire mountain (yes; no). Also, it would depend on how big a hill defines a mountain. But, guessing at the spirit of the question here, I'm going to go with no.
Taken a Ferrari for a test drive? No. Man, I'm doing well so far, huh?
Been inside the Great Pyramid? No again. Harumph.
Held a tarantula? No. Shut up. Go away.
Taken a candlelit bath with someone? OK, now we're getting somewhere. I'm going with Maybe. There was a bath. I honestly don't remember if there were candles. But, I've probably already shared too much...
Said "I love you" and meant it? Hell, yeah. Every day. OK, now I'm on a roll...
Hugged a tree? What? I'm going back to no, but this time I think that's the right answer (YMMV)
Bungee jumped? No. And no plans to, either. If I'm ever given government clearance and someone wants my secrets, this would be a good place to start...
Visited Paris? Yes. During a layover in Charles DeGaulle airport. Here's the summary of my visit: One train ride from the airport to the Eiffel Tower. About a dozen photographs of the tower and the Seine. One baguette (for my wife). One train ride to some random Paris suburb (got on the wrong train and either no one spoke English or no one cared to). One train ride from the suburb to the airport (a lone angel in a sea of unhelpfulness). One mad dash to the airport gate. Takeoff. Needless to say, I plan to one day go back & take things a little slower...
Watched a lightning storm at sea? Yes. But from a non-scary distance.
Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise? Yes. Once or twice in high school and fairly frequently in college.
Seen the Northern Lights? No. I've never been that far north. One day, perhaps...
Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa? No. I stood in front of the LTOP and took that picture, but people were not allowed in. Ilya informs me, though, that the rules changed in 2003. I may one day go back, but not just for the LTOP's stairs. Sorry...
Grown and eaten your own vegetables? I think that was an elementary school project at one point, so I'm going with yes.
Taken a trip in a hot air balloon? No. I think I'd enjoy it, though, if the balloon basket was big enough to get rid of that "just about to fall" feeling.
Watched a meteor shower? No.
Gotten drunk on champagne? Drunk? Probably not. How's tipsy?
Given more than you can afford to charity? Well, no, by definition. But I think it's fair to say that we've given more than our share.
Looked up at the night sky through a telescope? Yes. Very beautiful. I tend to walk away feeling sorry that I don't know more about what I'm looking at. Such a geek...
Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment? Hmmm....undefined term here. I've had giggling fits, but not typically at "bad" moments, let alone the "worst possible moment."
Had a food fight? Yes. Nothing too crazy, though...
Bet on a winning horse? Yes. Senior week at Penn, just before graduation. We spent a day at a track. I lost around $20, then bet the longshot on the last race and won back my $20. Sadly, though, I bet him to Show.
Asked out a stranger? No.
Had a snowball fight? Sure...
Screamed as loudly as you possibly can? Yes. Both in the good way and the bad way, unfortunately...
Held a lamb? Held? No. Touched/petted? Sure. Have kids, will visit petting zoos...
Seen a total eclipse? Not a total eclipse, no. Partial ones, though.
Ridden a roller coaster? Yes, although I'm not a big fan of the larger ones. Particularly if they turn me upside down. I've learned over the years that my head doesn't appreciate being below my feet.
Hit a home run? Yes, although we're talking the wimpier forms of base-related games here (kickball, softball, etc.). I only hit a baseball over a fence once, and it was just my buddy and I messing around on a baseball diamond. He grooved one and I hit it over the left-field fence. Gotta say, it felt good, though...
Danced like a fool and not cared who was looking? Yes. This is made easier by the fact that if I'm dancing, it's most likely like a fool. So eventually, you give up caring who's looking and there you are...
Adopted an accent for an entire day? I guess a New York accent doesn't count, huh? No.
Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment? Well, sure. It's not a constant feeling, but it comes and goes. And that's probably how it should be. If I felt happy all the time, there wouldn't be much incentive to improve anything, now would there?
Had two hard drives for your computer?The one I'm using right now has two. Yes.
Visited all 50 states? No, although I do keep track. As of today, I've been to 27. My wife has been to 25. My older son has been to 14, and my younger son has been to 10.
Taken care of someone who was drunk? Yes. Not that often, but more often than I prefer to think about.
Had amazing friends? Always. Of course, if I didn't think they were amazing, they wouldn't still be my friends, now would they?
Danced with a stranger in a foreign country? Yes. A couple of times. Amazingly, though, it has led to exactly zero interesting stories. See the "dance like a fool" question above...
Watched wild whales? No.
Stolen a sign? Yes. The Class of '23 Ice Rink sign from Walnut Street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Even hoisted it out my dorm room window to bring it my buddy Paul's house. He's moved a hundred times since, but I think he still has the sign.
Backpacked in Europe? No. My wife did that. I figured Europe has been there for hundreds of years; it would still be there when I could afford a suitcase and a hotel room.
Gone rock climbing? Well, I've climbed over rocks (like in Central Park), but never up a steep wall, which I'm guessing is what this means...
Midnight walk on the beach? Yes.
Gone sky diving? Oh God, no. If bungee jumping doesn't get me to turn state's evidence, try this.
Visited Ireland? No.
Been heartbroken longer than you were actually in love? With the same girl, you mean? No, can't say I have.
In a restaurant, sat at a stranger's table and had a meal with them? Yes. Just the other day, in fact. There's a deli on the East Side of New York that is so crowded that they make you share tables with strangers.
Visited Japan? No.
Milked a cow? No, but my kids have. Field trips are, in some ways, more advanced than they were when I was a kid.
Alphabetized your CDs? Yes. That is, before I ripped them all to MP3's and put them in a box in my basement.
Pretended to be a superhero? When I was a kid I had a towel that I declared my Superman cape, so yes. I distinctly remember wondering why the "cape" was getting shorter, and having my mother explain to me that I was growing.
Sung karaoke? Once. In South Korea. And the TV was showing softcore porn behind the lyrics. Interesting times...
Lounged around in bed all day? Yes. Sometimes due to sickness, sometimes due to being in high school and it being Sunday.
Played touch football? Sure.
Gone scuba diving? No.
Kissed in the rain? I guess so. Never really thought about it.
Played in the mud? Yes.
Played in the rain? Well how do you think it became mud?
Gone to a drive-in theater? Yes. In my parent's car (no, my parents weren't with me) with the automatic lights & hi-beams. No sooner had I parked then the hi-beams went on automatically. The entire lot was honking at me before I figured out how to shut the damn things off.
Visited the Great Wall of China? No. One day, though...
Started a business? No.
Fallen in love and not had your heart broken?But of course...
Toured ancient sites? Yes. Mexico, Israel, and Italy just to name a few off the top of my head.
Taken a martial arts class? Yes. I was a Tae Kwon Do blackbelt (1st degree) when I was 13. If I tried any of it now, I'd be in traction.
Played D & D for more than 6 hours straight? Wow...we played a lot of DVD in the late '70s. I don't know if we ever topped six hours straight, but I'm guessing the answer is yes.
Gotten married? Yes (see in love without heartbreak above).
Been in a movie? No.
Crashed a party? Yes. College. Almost impossible to avoid, really...
Gotten divorced? No.
Gone without food for 5 days? No.
Made cookies from scratch? With help, yes. By myself, they wouldn't survive. Trust me. I've burned microwave popcorn (and by burned, I mean caused to catch on fire - not just turning some of the kernels black. That's for ameuters...)
Won first prize in a costume contest? No.
Ridden a gondola in Venice? Yes. Very expensive and not at all romantic. Two reasons: 1) there are dozens of other gondolas all around you, and 2) our gondolier’s daughter was sitting on the edge of the boat yapping in Italian into her cellphone the entire time.
Gotten a tattoo? No.
Rafted the Snake River? Don't even know where the Snake River is.
Been on television news programs as an "expert"? No, but my wife has. They wanted her opinion of John Glenn going back into space (she's a geriatric nurse practitioner, so she can talk your ear off about the elderly, but we both had to laugh when she went on camera and pretended to know anything about how they held up in outer space).
Got flowers for no reason? Got as in received? No. Got as in bought for someone else? Yes.
Recorded music? Many, many times (see performed on stage above).
Eaten shark? No. Not intentionally, anyway...
Kissed on the first date? Yes.
Gone to Thailand? No.
Bought a house? Yes. Once.
Been in a combat zone? No.
Buried one/both of your parents? No. I think if I tried, they'd get really angry with me (too macabre?)
Been on a cruise ship? Three times. Going back for #4 in a couple of months.
Spoken more than one language fluently?No. Unless you include computer programming languages. SUCH a geek.
Performed in Rocky Horror? No.
Raised children? Still in progress...(see "Changed diapers" above)
Followed your favorite band/singer on tour? No. I prefer that he/she/they come to me. That's why they call it a tour, after all...
Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country? Bicycle? No. Tours? Yes.
Picked up and moved to another city to just start over?Not unless you count graduating from college...
Walked the Golden Gate Bridge?No. Driven over it, though...
Sang loudly in the car, and didn't stop when you knew someone was looking? Yes.
Had plastic surgery? No. Closest thing was PRK (laser eye surgery). I try to stay away from surgeons if at all possible...
Survived an accident that you shouldn't have survived? No.
Wrote articles for a large publication? No. Once again, that's my wife's department.
Lost over 100 pounds? No. My record is 40 and, sadly, it's getting time to break it these days...
Held someone while they were having a flashback? No.
Piloted an airplane? No.
Touched a stingray? Yes, but in an aquarium fish tank. Booring...
Broken someone's heart? Man, I hope not...
Helped an animal give birth? No, assuming we're not counting humans as animals here, right?
Won money on a TV game show? No.
Broken a bone? Yes (toe).
Gone on an African photo safari? No, unless you count the simulated Disney ones (real animals, simulated Africa)
Had a facial part pierced other than your ears? No.
Fired a rifle, shotgun, or pistol? Does skeet shooting on a cruise ship count?
Eaten mushrooms that were gathered in the wild? No.
Ridden a horse? Yes. Dude ranches and such...
Had major surgery? Appendicitis. Is that major enough?
Had a snake as a pet? No.
Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon? No.
Slept for more than 30 hours over the course of 48 hours? Hmmm...I may have come close, but I'm going to go with no here...
Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states? No.
Visited all seven continents? No.
Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than two days? No.
Eaten kangaroo meat? No.
Eaten sushi? Yes. All the time. It's good, and I'm frankly not sure what some people's hang up is. The fish you do eat was raw at one point too, ya know...
Had your picture in the newspaper? Yes. Random & sundry events through high school and college...
Changed someone's mind about something you care deeply about? I'd like to think so...
Gone back to school? What, like after a weekend? Nah...just kidding. No.
Parasailed? No.
Touched a cockroach? Yes, but never on purpose.
Eaten fried green tomatoes? No. I'll pass...
Read The Iliad and The Odyssey? Yes, one of them, and in eighth grade. I honestly don't remember which, though, so I guess it's time for a re-read...
Selected one "important" author who you missed in school, and read? No. "Important author" typically means "boring author" to me...
Killed and prepared an animal for eating? No.
Skipped all your school reunions? I missed one high school one, but there have only been two. I've been to each & every college one.
Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language? Yes.
Been elected to public office? No.
Written your own computer language? No, but I've done some creative things with the ones others have written...
Thought to yourself that you're living your dream? Once in a while, yeah...
Had to put someone you love into hospice care? No. An occasional nursing home, but never hospice. Keeping my fingers crossed...
Built your own PC from parts? No.
Sold your own artwork to someone who didn't know you? No.
Had a booth at a street fair? No.
Dyed your hair? No.
Been a DJ? No.
Shaved your head? No.
Caused a car accident? Technically, yes. Nothing too serious, though - a couple of fender benders.
Saved someone's life? Again, that's my wife's department.
Well, damn - that took a very long time. I hope at least one person reads to the end...
The other day, Jason Bennion posted a blog meme called the Really Big Survey, consisting of 148 random questions about his life. Then Ilya posted it as well. I was going to participate, but demurred because I don't have Post Break logic in Blogger (you know, where the first part of the post is visible on the main page, and then you click through to read the rest?), so 148 questions would push every other post in the blog to the archives.
Then, I started thinking, "Well why the heck don't I have Post Break logic in Blogger?" Enter my good friend, Google.
The most definitive entry on the topic was this one from Blogger's own help pages. It gives very detailed instructions about adding the Post Break to your main page, and then hiding the rest of the post's text until the user clicks through to the detail. I eagerly implemented the fix, but soon realized that by modifying the blog template the way they did, the Post Break link wound up appearing on every single post, whether there was more text behind it or not.
Since the convention is to put that link only on posts that have more to read, I deemed this result unacceptable. On the upside, however, the instructions gave me enough of an understanding of how the logic works to write it myself. And so, (drumroll, please...) if you'd like to know how to put Post Break logic in your Blogger blog...
-----Continue reading Post Breaks in Blogger - The Real AnswerPost Breaks in Blogger The first thing you'll need to do is modify your blog template. In the style section of the template (between the <style> and </style> lines, put the following two text blocks:
If your template already has tags like <Itempage> and </Itempage> (mine did), then don't repeat them - just put the "span" commands in between them.
OK, now you're ready to go. When you create a post, type the beginning portion (that is, the portion you want to appear on the main blog page) as you normally would. When you're ready to do a Post Break, type this:
<span class="blog_beforebreak">Continue reading this post</span> <span class="blog_afterbreak"> The rest of the post's text...
Anything in the "beforebreak" span only appears on the main page, not the individual post page. Anything in the "afterbreak" span only appears on the individual page, not the main page. So what we've done here is put the "Continue reading this post" message on the main page, and all the rest of the post's text on the individual page. Cool, huh?
Two more things: in order for this to work correctly, you should make the "Continue reading..." message a hyperlink to the rest of the post. The only way I know of to do this in Blogger is to publish the post, then go back to "Edit Posts," copy the post's individual URL from the "View" link, then click the "Edit" link and go back in and add it. This is, admittedly, a bit pedantic, so if anyone has a better suggestion, please drop a comment onto this post.
Second thing, and this is HUGELY IMPORTANT: When you finish your post, make sure to put </span> at the end. If you don't do that, then the rest of your main blog page will still be part of the "afterbreak" span, and will hence be invisible on the main blog page. Whammo! Just wiped out the entire blog in one post! (Actually, no - you've just hidden it. If you go back & put the </span> command at the end of your post, everything will return to normal).
So, there you have it. A somewhat convoluted, but totally workable way to put Post Breaks in Blogger posts.
The 2008 Elections - Indexed for your reading pleasure...
I've been a big fan of Jessica Hagy, author of the Indexed blog, for some time. Now, she's done a 2008 Election roundup for alt.campaign which is excellent. Here's my favorite, but you should definitely click through and see them all.
For months now, I've been missing the ability to look at a particular page (or post) on my site, and find out exactly what page is driving people to visit it. My old Yahoo! GeoCities stats provided that capability, but Google Analytics never did. The best it would do is tell me which domains were sending traffic my way, and even that didn't happen on a page by page basis, only for the site as a whole. Also, the Navigation Summary stats are somewhat flawed, since they always seem to suggest that the most popular source for a page (and the most popular destination) is the page itself. So either I've got lots of readers who click Reload a lot, or they've got a bug.
But all that has changed thanks to Reuben Yau, who has offered two ways to achieve this goal. The first is to use Google Analytics' Filters function, which puts the referral URL in the "User Defined Value" section. The second involves modifying the tracking code that GA puts on each page on your site, in order to embed the referral URL in the existing stats. This seemed more complicated and more invasive, so I went with the first option and in just one day, I'm getting all the information I wanted (including specific search queries from the likes of Google, Ask, Yahoo and others that drove people to specific pages).
Reuben's awesome post provides not only instructions, but screen shots on the setup process and resulting stats, so you can be sure you got things right.
This is probably as close to this blog comes to off-color humor, although there's technically nothing dirty in here at all. That said, I laughed so hard I nearly choked:
Ladies and gentlemen, Sesame Street's Count von Count discussing what he does when the kids aren't watching:
Once again, James Lileks does a masterful job of describing exactly how I feel about something that's happening in the world:
"I'm going to vote for President Hillary," (G)Nat said when we got home. I asked her why.
"Because she is a woman and she seems like a good leader."
Well, let's just Godwin the hell out of this for grins.
"Would you vote for Hitler if he was a woman?"
She stopped and glared. DAD.
"I'm not saying she's anything like Hitler,' I said. 'She's not at all. But would you vote for someone just because they were a woman?"
"And she seems like a good leader I said. Hitler was not a good leader."
I considered noting that Hitler was an effective shaper of public opinion as well, but decided to ask her what made a good leader.
"Deciding the best things for people."
We had a little talk about taxes, and she was surprised to find that the President and the Congresses can just take your money. "That's wrong."
Sigh. Careful. This is civics, not brainwashing.
"No, it's not wrong. We all agree to pay taxes for things we need. We don't always agree on how much to pay, or what to spend them on. But if they take too much, then we can't go to Disneyworld."
Okay, now it was brainwashing. Her eyes grew wide. "I vote for Obama."
"He might raise taxes, too."
She looked bereft: "who else is there then?"
Welcome to the club, child.
My own 7-year old asked me the other night who I was "rooting for" in today's election. I told him that we call it "voting" and not "rooting," and that I really wasn't sure yet, so I wasn't going to vote for anyone.
Tough civics lesson, there - I'm sure they're drilling it into his head that it's his sacred duty to vote when he turns 18, and here's Dad telling him he's abstaining because he has no opinion just yet. The truth is that I knew my ideas lined up pretty well with Rudy Giuliani, but now that he's not running, I simply don't know enough about McCain or Romney to make an informed choice. According to Wikipedia (Dems, Reps) there have been a total of 43 debates so far, and what little I've seen of them has not encouraged me to watch more. And so I'll sit out the New Jersey primary, and do my research on the two who are chosen (by others) to run.
I supsect that most people are as uninformed as I am, but are voting today anyway. I'm not sure how I feel about that. If you don't know anything about the candidates, what's more important? Excercising your sacred right to vote, or not muddying the results with an uninformed vote? Maybe we should have 43 debates on the topic...
Taking the point a bit further, I also suspect that a significant segment of the population feels informed because they've been hearing about poll results for the last nine months, and are simply voting for the person about whom they've heard good things lately. Case in point: there was a man on the street corner in front of my train station this morning holding an octag sign. I didn't have a digital camera with me, but I've recreated the sign to the right. Basically, this says to me, "Vote for Obama - he's winning."
Of course, people are free to vote for whatever reasons they choose, but if this truly is the trend, I wonder whether all of these opinion polls are affecting the outcome (see the Observer Effect). And if that's the case, I think perhaps we could do with a little less information about what everyone thinks.
This is Brian Greenberg, blogging live from a very crowded Penn Station in midtown Manhattan. Conditions here are as follows: GIANTS. FANS. EVERYWHERE.
AND no one knows which subway to take, so they're all standing in the middle of crowded hallways reading directions they printed out off the web, AND they all need to purchase a single-trip Metrocard for the subway, AND none of them know how the machine works, AND I just got hit in the face with a couple of hundred red, white and blue balloons being lugged through the rush hour crowd by some guy with dollar signs in his eyes.
Oh, and I'm pretty sure a bunch of these folks are drunk.
Sigh...Enjoy the parade, folks, I'm late to my 9am meeting.
(P.S. To all you smug commuters that drive or take the bus, note that there's a party at Giants stadium at 2:30pm this afternoon. Have fun with that traffic on the way home!)
Queries were down slightly this month (662 vs. 783). Billy Joel, who had taken the lead in November (the last time I compiled these stats), has fallen back to a comfortable #2 slot, behind the almighty Technology related queries (why don't I write about technology more?), and queries about DSL modems in particular surged almost 80% to 52. Queries about the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree seem to have abated (as expected), and Adult/Porn related queries have also dropped off dramatically (almost 90% to a mere 19). The big winners this month were politics (duh...), Hava Nagila (a top ten pop hit in Britain now) and The Simpsons (two posts in a row!).
The Referring Sites
This month's referring site of the month award goes to CNN.com, who linked to one of my political blog entries via their "Sphere" service.
All told, 662 queries resulted in hits to Familygreenberg.com in January (121 less than were used in Novemberr). Here are some of the more entertaining samples:
We start with Technology, this month's leader in ISBS queries:
Query
Rank / # of Results
Comments
boot camp how to switch back to osx, how to switch back from windows on bootcamp
>500 / 310,000, >500 / 458,000
A perfectionally reasonable thing to Google, but the image of a Mac owner stuck in Windows with no idea how to get back to the Mac OS just makes me laugh
excel makro create table
3 / 990,000
I've said it before and I'll say it again: "I Should Be Sleeping: catering to bad spellers since 2005"
numerical format not acknowledged in lotus 123
28 / 10,900
It is well known that the eventual downfall of Lotus 123 was it's inability to handle numbers.
usb wine
>500 / 703,000
Ah yes, wine. A lovely complement to a fine meal and a kick-ass USB peripheral. Just try to get the keyboard wet...
ie smooth scrolling not smooth enough
25 / 516,000
What you need is the ironing add-on. Works wonders for smoothing out the scrolling...
And here are some of the just plain weird ones:
Query
Rank / # of Results
Comments
"beatles" "calculator icon"
9 / 34
I honestly have no idea what this guy was even looking for.
yakov smirnoff intel
18 / 1,620
Same thing here - what could he possibly have been looking for...
dealornodeal
>500 / 86,500
An interesting approach to playing the game. I know people used to use Google for Who Wants to be a Millionaire, but I don't know if it's as helpful for this one.
flamingos threatened
>500 / 230,000
OK, you dirty birds, put your legs where I can see 'em. Both of 'em! Do as I say or I'll turn that pink into a darker shade of red. Catch my drift?
graphs and chart on family planning in pakistan 2007
46 / 167,000
It's good to see responsible Pakistanis doing such careful planning before starting a family.
hanson update
15 / 481,000
Evidence that the Hanson brothers' mom uses Google. After all, who else...
irish marching bands, levittown,pa.
19 / 772
Yes, that's right. 772 results. You should see Levittown's St. Patrick's Day parade...
is brian greenberg nice?
23 / 382,000
As Dave Barry would say, "I am not making this up." If you're still out there, please allow me to say I certainly hope I am!
saint valentines day sexist nonsense
29 / 16,600
Ironic. This guy (and yes, it has to be a guy) googled in January, and I posted this in February.
"self destructing scaffold"
2 / 2
Well, that sounds like quite the design flaw, no?
And finally, the Adult/Porn-Related queries. As I said above, pickings were slim this month, so I had to expand my definition of "Adult" to include alcohol as well as sex. Here you go:
Query
Rank / # of Results
Comments
anheuser busch powerpoint templates
6 / 1,770
The technical approach to getting wasted.
drunks
>500 / 4,870,000
The simpler approach (although, I'll note, he's still using Google...)
brothel + poland
>500 / 128,000
Hey, cool - the hotel has free Wifi. We'll use the internet to find things to do here in Warsaw...
does ashley tisdale sleep naked
>500 / 173,000
Oh, come on people - she's in Disney movies, for pete's sake...
pitchers of nude people
>500 / 150,000
Three possibilities here: 1) another bad speller, 2) someone's got an awfully huge pitcher lying around, or 3) Jeffrey Dahmer's been Googling again...
selma hayek + porn look alike
>500 / 73,700
Your favorite celebrity doesn't take her clothes off often enough for you? Go find someone who looks like her and does. Ya gotta admit, there's an element of sheer genius here...
Familygreenberg.com Health Check - January Edition
Metric
December
January
% Change
Visits
1,452
1,245
-14.26%
Pageviews
2,317
1,803
-22.18%
Pages/Visit
1.6
1.45
-9.25%
Avg Time on Site
0:47
0:49
4.69%
Bounce Rate
79.68%
81.77%
-2.62%
% New Visitors
88.29%
86.99%
-1.48%
Two down months in a row. Clearly, I need to step up my game. In the "Behind Every Bad Report is a Good Excuse" category, I will note that I basically took the first two weeks of January off, as I was out of town with the family during that time. In fact, if you look at the daily graph (below) of visits per day, you'll see that December (in green) had January (in blue) beat consistently for the first two weeks, then it became a horserace, and then January took over the lead.
Lesson learned: To paraphrase Dory the Fish: Just keep blogging, just keep blogging...
So just about everyone knows that today is Super Sunday. Something about a football game...
As they say in the infomercials, though: "But wait, there's more!"
Tomorrow, my kids' school is having "Super Monday," where the kids are encouraged to wear clothing to signify their favorite sports teams.
The next day, the same school is hosting "Super Tuesday," wherein they will discuss the election process, civic responsibility, and current events.
Man, Wednesday is going to be a real let down, huh?
UPDATE: I was informed last night that Wednesday is actually Ash Wednesday, so it won't be ordinary for some. So some folks will make it all the way to Thursday before their next "normal" day. Glad we cleared that up, huh?
Like, for instance, 
I supsect that most people are as uninformed as I am, but are voting today anyway. I'm not sure how I feel about that. If you don't know anything about the candidates, what's more important? Excercising your sacred right to vote, or not muddying the results with an uninformed vote? Maybe we should have 43 debates on the topic...
