Erin went up for a header in her soccer game today, missed the ball and made great contact with her opponent’s teeth.
Head Meets Teeth
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Category Archives: Uncategorized
Crossing Signal
Indianapolis has an interesting take on crossing signals. Rather than blink on and off, the woman dances.
Trouble Just Follows Me
Protest at the Hyatt in Downtown Indianapolis
Making the Case for Your Opponent, King Flag Version
You’ve likely heard about the controversy surrounding the flying of a Christian flag at a public veterans memorial in King, NC. It’s been going on for a few months, but the headlines really started when the King City Council voted to stop flying the flag for fear of violating the law over the whole separation of church and state thing. After the decision lots of pro-flag folks started protesting, marching, etc.
The council reconvened and revisited the matter, eventually deciding to pursue a compromise which would have them rotating the Christian flag with other sectarian flags recognized by the military. That decision has ticked off some of the Christian flag folks. Now keep in mind that at least some of them have been saying that they were arguing for the ability to fly any religious flag, not just the Christian flag. Also keep in mind that the folks opposed to the flag were saying all along that they were opposed to any government endorsement of religion because there are Americans who are unaffiliated with any religion and they shouldn’t be made to feel uncomfortable at a public memorial.
All that sets the stage for a story today about a pro-Christian flag group threatening to sue if they don’t like King’s policy. A quote from a group member makes a perfect argument in favor of the flag opponents’ position:
“Now the group, known as “The King Veteran’s Memorial Preservation Foundation,” said it plans to see exactly how the City Council’s new plan will work.
“The question we’re raising now is the possibility of having say, the Wiccan flag flown or the Satanic flag flown, which are recognized by the U.S. military — or a Muslim flag flown over a U.S. veterans memorial,” group leader Stephen James said.”
Seriously, can he not see that he’s making the perfect argument for those who are opposed to any sectarian flag flying at a government owned facility? Folks if it’s okay to fly a Christian flag then it also has to be okay to fly a Wiccan, Atheist or Muslim flag.
I have to ask Mr. James one question: If those symbols are good enough for the US military because people with those beliefs have fought and died for our country, why are they not good enough for you and your fellow members of the The King Veteran’s Memorial Preservation Foundation?
Here’s a link to the story.
What they are
Here’s one of the kids’ projects after a little more work. In the previous post I asked for some guesses as to what the kids were making for their school projects. One guess was brains, another Rice Krispie treats. Both were close, but the answer is skulls made out of Rice Krispie treats. The flag you see identifies the frontal lobe, and many more flags will be added.
What are they?
Pictured are my two oldest children in the midst of a school project. Any guesses on what they’re making?
You Are Here
I hate malls. I hate shopping. So why am I at Concord Mills? Well the plan was to hit the outlets in Blowing Rock, but then we heard that today is App State’s homecoming. The only thing worse than shopping is shopping in the vicinity of a bunch of drunken homecoming folks from a school that is not your own. Thus we made the trek to the home of more than one million square feet of retail. I’ve gotta qualify for some sort of husband-dad award for this, right?
Experimenting with Pro Sports
Here's a very interesting article about the NHL's R&D program:
The truth is, such a mess would be improbable at best on Bettman’s watch. Under him, the NHL, sometimes under fierce criticism, has become perhaps the most research-friendly of the major professional team sports leagues in North America when it comes to the conduct and rules of the game. It wasn’t always so. In 1998, when the league had a Fox TV contract and arranged for a Las Vegas IHL game to be played in a four-quarter format, the experimentation was met with catcalls. The improvised research and development camp held toward the end of the 2004-’05 lockout was viewed as a desperation measure.
But the more carefully planned R & D camp held last month has mostly been welcomed and applauded. The scrimmages, held at the Maple Leafs’ practice facility on Aug. 18 and 19, featured some jarring, Martian-looking innovations. The players—who were, in an attention-getting wrinkle, mostly top junior stars eligible for the 2011 draft—road-tested everything from two-on-two overtime to shallower nets to having the second referee view the play from an elevated off-ice platform. On day two, viewers were confronted with the bizarre spectacle of the traditional five faceoff circles being replaced by three, running up the middle of the rink.
Such an exercise is unique among the staple North American sports. If major league baseball’s powers-that-be ever got a notion to play experimental games using five bases and four strikes, they would surely do so on a closely guarded Pacific atoll.
My roommate in college once stated that the NBA would be infinitely more interesting if they put circles on the floor at various places between the three point lines and were rewarded with higher points the farther away the circle was from the basket. So if you hit a shot from beyond half court you'd get six points. I laughed at first, but the more I thought about it the more I liked it. Actually I thought that you could set up zones in between the three point lines (circles being a little to easy to guard). I really think it would bring about the rise of the "designated heaver" which might keep some old guys in the league much like the designated hitter does in baseball.
Oh, and don't get me started on baseball. Anything they can do to keep me awake past the third inning would be welcome.
Unleashing the World’s Creative Types
I have no idea what the future holds, but I have an inkling that technology is going to unleash the creative types. I know, I know the changes being wrought upon the publishing industry are well documented, but sometimes it's hard to grasp what's going on until you see small examples of those changes. For instance, yesterday at lunch my Mom handed me a "proof" of a book she's been editing and was written by a fascinating man from the Blacksburg, VA area. The proof was as professional-looking a book as you're going to find and a publisher wasn't involved; it's being self published via Amazon. (FYI,when it's ready for sale you'll find it here).
But the sea-change that's occurring in the world of the arts really hit home with me when I saw this short done by an amateur Russian filmmaker that's described thusly by Cory Doctorow on Boing Boing:
A Russian amateur filmmaker called Alexander Semenov produced this 2.5 minute bootleg Transformers short with a couple of sub-$1,000 cameras, two hours' of footage and a month in the editing suite. It is insanelybadass: a perfect vision of an alternate universe where shirtless Russian thugs go bot-to-bot on dusty distant roads; more fun that the big-budget Hollywood equivalent.
Transformers from repey815 on Vimeo.
I'm really very excited to see where this explosion in artistic availability will take us.
Plan a Rooftop Party in August…
and you run the risk of rain. Looks like it’s clearing up though. Fingers crossed.
Befuddled 