Future reading

The Chronicle reports on two new blogging platforms that purport to make it as easy to blog as it is to twitter. I'd like to take a look at them when I have more time. New platforms make blogging more immediate, mobile

New York's Tumblr, along with San Francisco's Posterous, have simplified the process even more. Their tools remove the headache of figuring out different formats for photographs, documents and other rich media. Users can e-mail, call or text message their updates. There's no need to ever log on to the site.

I hate paying nearly $90 per month for TV. I'm going to come back to this. But we are sports fans... so it may be challenging. Apple TV could let users cut their cable TV bill - latimes.com

The wallet-size device gives users access to plenty of shows, movies and music without having to subscribe to a service. But sports fans won't find much to cheer about.

The Canon by Natalie Angier

I'm currently listening to The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science by Natalie Angier.

It started a little slowly, but it's got an interesting slant that has captivated me now. It is fascinating to review material that I mostly learned in high school, but now I'm looking at it from a much more mature perspective -- particularly where issues of time and scale are at play as in molecules and the Big Bang theory.

It only has a 3.5 star rating, but I give it 4-stars.

Good morning blogistan

Finally a pretty good night's sleep, capping-off a not crazy week.

I almost feel like I can relax and enjoy the weekend.

Have a good day everyone!

Picture was taken during an early morning waterski lesson for my niece in Tahoe this summer. That's the back of Bro1's head in the forground.

That Girl

I was a pre-teen when That Girl was on television, and Marlo Thomas' character was exactly my image of what life could be like when I grew up.

When she did Free to Be You and Me she just confirmed herself as one of the cool adults in my book.

This morning I listened to an interview she did on NPR promoting her new book.
Marlo Thomas Remembers 'Growing Up Laughing' : NPR

Marlo Thomas has written a memoir about the sound and spirit that was so formative in her life and the lives of others. Host Scott Simon talks with the actress and activist about her book, Growing Up Laughing: My Story and the Story of Funny.

I haven't read any of her books, but I'm going to check for this one at my library.

Nellie Bly

Energy rightly applied and directed will accomplish anything.
Nellie Bly's Motto

I was following a thread on the internet, and it led me to Nellie Bly. I had all but forgotten her, although I know her name, and I know that I've read little bits about her. All I remembered was her expose of conditions in a New York mental hospital.

I did not know that she is considered a pioneer of investigative journalism. Here are some other tidbits I did not know about her.

She travelled around the world in a little over 72 days.

She married an industrialist, and upon his death in 1904 she became the head of the company.

She was the first woman war correspondent during WWI.

She also has her own web site Nellie Bly Online if you want to read more about this fascinating woman.

Surprise, surprise... Not the day I expected, but good none the less

Thing2 and I were minding our business this morning. I had just finished my first cup of coffee, and Thing2 had just discovered that our refrigerator had turned itself off. (Thing2: "The items on the door of the refrigerator sure don't stay very cold... wait... there seems to be something wrong with the refrigerator, nothing's very cold.") I get up to have a look at it and I see that the display on the door looks like "0 FF". I immediately thought it was a hexadecimal number, but then it dawned on me. OFF. The refigerator was off. And when I tried pressing buttons to turn it on, nothing happened.

That was when the doorbell rang.

Thing2 said, "Don't answer it." But I said, "It's OK. I can get it."

When I opened the door, my heart sunk. There was K, a lady who we had made an appointment with, and which I had completely forgotten about. She was here to help us sort and store away all our things that we had piled-up in the den. And there she was... I wasn't sure what to do, but I invited her in. I admitted that we weren't expecting her, and I asked her to have a seat because before anything else happened I needed to get the refrigerator turned back on.

Thing2 meanwhile was searching the bookshelf for the manual. I did a quick on-line search. Nothing. Meanwhile, the manual troubleshooting section said to go to the 'How to use the controls' section, which didn't say anything about how to turn it back on!

I decided to try unplugging and plugging back in. No luck.

Back to the internet. Finally I find a forum where someone says that if you hold down the temp and ice buttons for 5 seconds the thing resets. A later comment on the same thread gives the helpful hint that you must do this when the door is open.

I try it, and viola! It's on. Whew! What a relief.

But I still had to deal with K. After talking it over with Thing2, we decided that we could spend a few hours of unplanned work. So I had a quick bowl of cereal and got to work with K.

Now our den is all boxed, and Thing2 and I are exhausted but pleased to have accomplished so much today (although why the refrigerator turned itself off is still a mystery.)

Not the best day...

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

I don't usually blog about work, but today I'll make an exception. We had a meeting that was attended by a General Manager. (Usually these types of meetings are only attended by department heads.) The guy was unbelievably full-of-himself and rude. I don't understand all the dynamics, but I'm rarely around people that act as unprofessionally as he did.

Not. Impressed.

(Fine with me if he wants to be rude and obnoxious to his staff, in my book you don't treat front-line employees badly when you are a GM.)