Greensboro-based blogger Lenslinger, he that is a photojournalist for Fox 8, or as he calls it el Ocho, was snapping some pics of co-workers from his station when he lost control of his camera and it plunged into the depths of a Greensboro storm cavern. One of his co-workers, a fellow photog, shot some video of ‘Slinger diving for his lost treasure which you can view below. Amazingly the ‘Slinger’s camera still works.
Disability Awareness day was being observed at Fenway Park. An autistic man was singing the national anthem and got a case of the giggles. At first the crowd laughs with him, but when he kept giggling the crowd started singing with him. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard that many in a crowd sing the anthem before and it was way cool. Don’t know how I missed it when it happened since I’m sure it had to make the sports highlights that night, but it’s still really cool to see. Video is below.
What with all the bad economic news lately I’ll take any good news I can get. Here’s some from PTI:
For the first time in two years, more passengers are flying out of Piedmont Triad International Airport than in the year before.The growth rate isn’t much: just one-third of 1 percent. But that’s better than the airport’s recent history.In the previous two years, boardings at the airport dropped by about 200,000 passengers.
I’m no expert on the wireless business but my instinct is that Verizon Wireless just made a shrewd move. They are opening up their network to any third party hardware and are going to allow any application to work on said hardware. Some folks think they’re doing it because of Google’s recent announcements about their plans for wireless, and others think it has to do with the upcoming FCC auction of the 700mhz spectrum which will require the winner to enable consumers to access their network with any device or software they wish.
What I think this means is that we’re moving closer to having wireless services similar to Korea’s and Japan’s. In short order I think you’re going to see the other providers do the same thing in order to stay competitive, and then you’re going to see an explosion of innovation for your phone(s).
I’ve been a Verizon Wireless customer for years, not because I love going to their store and navigating their byzantine pricing plans, but because they provide more consistent coverage in my town. Heck, they’re the only one that provides a decent signal in my house. Now if I can get any phone or software I want to go along with that strong signal I might actually like being their customer.
I’m sure most people have one teacher they remember as being tough yet are thankful for their efforts years later. Mine was my 10th grade English teacher Mrs. Swanson who taught me what little I know (remember?) about grammar. No matter what I did I couldn’t seem to ace her class, and I remember distinctly my mother telling me that Mrs. Swanson was the best teacher I could have wished for. I didn’t believe her at the time, but now I’m thankful for every paper I got back that had more red ink than black.
Our youngest son Justin really liked both of his teachers last year, Mrs. Tarmey and Ms. Beavers, but he’s probably going to remember Mrs. Tarmey how I remember Mrs. Swanson. Mrs. Tarmey required her students to write in a "reading response" log every day. They were to read for approximately 1/2 hour and then immediately jot down their thoughts. Justin loves to read, but he HATES sharing his thoughts about it whether it’s in writing or verbally. Consequently it was like pulling teeth to get him to write his log. On the other hand Ms. Beavers was responsible for running the multiplication game which Justin enjoyed thoroughly and enabled him to whip his siblings at our "who knows the answer" games over dinner.
Today I was going through some stuff and I came across his reading log. The first thing that strikes me as I read it is the brilliance of the format that Mrs. Tarmey used. Each day’s entry is written as a letter (Dear Mrs. Tarmey…) and she would write a reply to each one. Some of her replies were one or two sentence questions while other days required more feedback and would begin with "Dear Justin." Poor Mrs. Tarmey had to exhort the boy on a daily basis to share more of his thoughts and feelings. He tried to get away with regurgitating the plot of each book but she would have none of it. Then he started sharing random thoughts that had little to do with what he was reading ("I hate war") and she’d reign him back in with a "Dear Justin" message.
My favorite entry is one that Celeste shares regularly when she talks about the log. It’s dated 12/14/2006 and it begins this way:
Dear Mrs. Tarmey,
I’m writing very slowly so I have less time to clean my room. Well, Bobby and Loor are underground. The reason they’re underground is that the crowned prince was murdered and the chances of stopping a war with him…
In the margin next to the first sentence Mrs. Tarmey wrote "Sneaky!"
The next entry was a perfect example of how Justin tried to fill space and Mrs. Tarmey had to redirect him. Here’s how he ended his entry:
I only have one thought that’s even slightly related to the book. The thought is: This was just thirty pages in the book! A personal thought that I’m having is: I like the song I’m listening to right now. I don’t like this song, I love it!
I’ll see you tomorrow,
Justin
Mrs. Tarmey replied with this in the margin:
Don’t listen to music while reading. Our brains cannot focus on more than one thing. Either read or listen to music.
Then she whipped up a "Dear Justin":
Dear Justin,
Please tell me your thoughts on what you have read. Are you enjoying the book? Would you want to live in a fantasy world? What would it look like?
Sincerely,
Mrs. Tarmey
Sure enough in the next few entries the boy started focusing on giving his thoughts about what he was reading, but of course within a week or two he’d ventured off into la-la-land and she’d have to reel him back in. Throughout the year she managed to do so in such a manner that she wasn’t harsh, but she was just clear that she expected more. And when he did well she made sure to write that too.
Looking back I’m sure Justin will remember how much he dreaded the reading log, but I’m also sure he’ll really appreciate what it did for him. I know that he already views language arts this year as a walk in the park by comparison. If he becomes a writer he’ll probably also realize that Mrs. Tarmey was his first editor. (I’m going to sic my Mom on him next. That’ll re-define the word "tough" for him and I have the hatchet jobs she did on my H.S. papers to prove it). From my point of view I’m reading these logs and realizing that Mrs. Tarmey did this exercise with dozens of students. That’s an incredible amount of work.
We’re definitely saving this for the family scrapbook because it is a
priceless look into the year that was 5th grade for Justin. I just hope that there are more Mrs. Tarmeys in Justin’s future so we have more stuff like this to save. He’ll definitely be the better for it.
I got a great comment on yesterday’s post about North Carolina’s water conservation measures over the last couple of months. The commenter, Laura Giovanelli, points out why Winston-Salem residents may not be slackers even though our water conservation measures didn’t match up to Greensboro’s. In a nutshell we have more water available to us thanks to having a better watershed and thanks to some prudent governmental decisions in the past. Definitely read the whole comment to get the full measure of the information.
As a result of her comment I checked out Laura’s blog Avocado Green Oven and I’m wondering why I didn’t visit it before, and if I did why I didn’t get it into my feed reader. It’s great, especially if you’re looking for some good recipes and it’s now a part of my daily feeds (bad pun alert).
While reading Laura’s blog I discovered that she recently launched a personal chef business called The Good Fork. Considering the Christmas holiday’s are fast approaching and time is getting crunchier by the day, I’d think that a gift of a personal chef’s service would be quite nice. Think about it: home cooked meals that you simply have to slip in the oven when you get home. No muss, no fuss.
The past couple of weeks Celeste and I have been experimenting with DreamDinners. Well, I should say that Celeste has been experimenting since my involvement hasn’t extended past heating the food. From what Celeste told me the way it works is you show up at the store, pick your menus and then package all the food items you need for your meals. Then you package them (usually in plastic baggies) and you’re provided with labels that contain the instructions for preparation. After that you bring them home and store them in the freezer or fridge until you’re ready to prepare them.
We’ve been happy with the meals but it still takes Celeste quite a bit of time to do the preparation at the store and you definitely spend more than you would if you bought everything at the grocery store. The upside is that all the items are laid out for you and you don’t have to create the menu yourself. Like I said, we’ve been happy with the meals so far but I don’t know how often we’ll use the service since I’m not sure the convenience gain is large enough that we (Celeste) will be continually motivated to return.
After checking out Laura’s site I can see a greater convenience gain, and since she prefers fine foods, a taste gain as well. Of course that comes at greater expense than something like DreamDinners, but once you have your consultation with Laura and let her know what you want your job is pretty much just turning on the oven and eating. Like I said before, it’s probably a great gift idea for anyone with a jam-packed life who doesn’t want to face another take-out or microwave meal but doesn’t have the energy at the end of the day to cook.
If this was April 1 I’d think that the following story was a joke. I even Snopesed it to be sure it wasn’t a known hoax. Apparently the Department of Homeland Security has asked firefighters to snoop around in houses they’ve been called to help (source Fox News). From BoingBoing’s post about it:
The DHS likes the idea because firefighters aren’t bound by pesky
warrants and probable cause and can therefore report on suspicious
material like blueprints, anti-American literature, and potential
bomb-making materials (e.g., the bedrooms of every friend I had, circa
1985). Firefighters are just the latest legion of potential snoops the
DHS is leaning on — they’ve also asked meter-readers to peer into our
windows and sheds to find evidence of bad-guy-ery. This stuff doesn’t
work and won’t work: amateur pecksniffs snitching on their neighbors
just flood cops with bad intel, and turn the country into East Germany,
a land where everyone is on alert lest they say the wrong thing and get
turned in to the secret police.
And then from a comment on their post:
As a volunteer firefighter, I will say that turning firefighters into spies is a bad idea.
If criminals have to worry that by calling the fire department they are
also calling the DHS, they may be less likely to call in the first
place, putting lives and property at further risk. If they do call,
they may treat firefighters as hostile parties, placing firefighters’
lives at risk beyond the normal hazards of the job.If firefighters have to worry that each call may be a hostile
one, that will distract them from the job at hand–saving lives in
immediate peril–and could delay response time in a business where a
few seconds or minutes often does make the difference between life and
death.The list of "suspicious" things that firefighters are supposed
to be on the lookout for includes cameras, photographs, maps, and
chemicals. In my professional life I am a photographer, so my house is
full of cameras, photographs, maps, and chemicals (not to mention
rubber gloves, an organic vapor mask, etc.)–all perfectly legal–that
might fit the DHS’s definition of "suspicious."
What I find most disturbing about our leaders is that they seem to see our civil liberties as something that needs to be subverted in the name of security rather than protected in the name of civility. Fat chance that will change anytime soon.
Befuddled 