I’m stuck in LaGuardia airport right now, the victim of two different delays in attempting to get back to RDU. It’s still raining now, and I see an ominously large amount of flights on the big board with the unfortunate red letters “CANCELLED” next to them. Hoping that I won’t be the next victim…
I was somehow able to find a hit-and-miss wireless network in the food court area, which is the only thing that’s keeping me sane. I was able to get online and do a bit of work while waiting, but now my network connection to the Bank is down. So I tried catching up on last week’s episode of the Office. I had heard that NBC is allowing free full episodes on its website for a lot of its shows. Sure enough, I was able to fire up last week’s episode.
My connection is pretty spotty, which makes for several delays per minute – which can actually be kind of funny. See the screen shot below – it turned kind of pop-artsy, but still pretty cool.
Alas, I think my connection’s giving out on me 6 minutes into the episode…i’ll be working to get it back, and hoping even more to see RDU before midnight!
Apparently Steve Ballmer of Microsoft thinks that Facebook is a fad. And he’s not alone in this thinking.
While there’s certainly a lot about Facebook that is inherently faddy, the driving force behind Facebook (relationships…aka the social graph) is about as un-faddy as you can get.
“I think these things [talking motion pictures] are going to have some legs, and yet there’s a faddishness, a faddish nature about anything that basically appeals to younger people.”
“I think these things [televisions] are going to have some legs, and yet there’s a faddishness, a faddish nature about anything that basically appeals to younger people.”
Reminds me of this great Red Hat video – indeed, Truth does Happen.
I’ll be honest, I was hot and cold on Greg Oden last year. Oden came in with LeBron-esque hype, and when his injured wrist threw another variable into the equation, I didn’t know what to think. Was he the greatest center prospect of the last 50 years. Or was he simply an overblown caricature who had been puffed up by our media-saturated/shoe-contract/superlative culture. Or, most importantly, was he 45 years old.
Oden sold me in the national championship game. On the biggest stage, against a better team, Oden was a man among boys. He showcased all of his potential talents, making me excited to watch what’s next.
Unfortunately, what’s next ended up being microfracture surgery. A gloomy fate for sure.
Yet after watching the video below, I can undoubtedly say that I’m a bigger Oden fan than ever before. The guy seems genuine (his biggest worry before the knee injury was “my tonsils”) and unaffected by the fame and fortune he’s already racked up.
Microfracture surgery is no walk in the park, and it’s not clear how it will affect Oden’s long term career. But one thing’s certain – we can all feel good about rooting for a healthy return.
A bunch of us got together to root for the US Women’s National Team (and good friend Cat Whitehill) in their Women’s World Cup game vs. England. In this epic battle of freedom against tyranny, the US came out again on top.
Below is a video which shows two goal celebrations – one after Shannon Boxx hit a screamer past the English keeper to make it 2-0; and the final goal, which saw Cat deliver a deep ball that skidded over the goalie’s head and which Kristine Lilly tapped in. It was really shocking goalkeeping on the third, which led to the epic quote, “you may be pretty, but you’re not good.”
Good friend Cat Whitehill took some time from Women’s World Cup games in China to talk with ussoccer.com’s Neil Buethe in a segment called Studio 90. Cat shows some interviewing skills in trading barbs with Neil and in shamelessly plugging herself for a post-career move to a job in college football broadcasting. Especially entertaining is seeing Cat take the “Back 4 Quiz”.
The Greatest Team You’ve Never Heard of…aka the US Women’s National Soccer Team, has survived the so-called Group of Death and advanced to the quarterfinals this morning in a soggy match against Nigeria.
UNC-alum Lori Chalupny got the goal in the 1st minute. Cat Whitehill led a solid US defense (as usual) to a clean sheet.
Girl, 9, Threatens to Kill Classmate Over Zebra Cakes
“The note said ‘I have a gun and first I’m going to shoot you in the shoulder,’” said Cindy Landfair, mother of the girl who was threatened.
From one nine-year-old girl to another, the note continued.
“…then you’re going to shoot me back with a bazooka, but you’re gonna miss…”
And what could drive a 9 year old to say such things? Little Debbie snack cakes, of course.
The girl’s mother said it all started over snacks. Her daughter traded her ‘zebra cakes’ for a bag of chips. But when the other girl wanted both for herself, the mother said that’s when she wrote the threatening note.
Makes you wonder what would have happened if it had been a Nutty Bar for an apple.
I’m not the biggest fan of Bluetooth headsets. It’s not so much that I dislike the headsets themselves (there’s certainly something to be said for the utility of hands free calling); rather, it’s the people who wear the sets in the grocery store, at a restaurant, or to the movies. Inevitably, these jokers end up talking into thin air (or at least that’s what we think!) and generally make everyone around them miserable.
Yet, I can’t help but think that Jawbone is one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a while. Basically it’s a souped up bluetooth headset that uses some sick technology developed for DARPA to rid ambient noise from the calling experience.
I didn’t know what to believe until I saw this demo.
It’s not cheap – I think around $120 – but definitely cool. Here’s to hoping this doesn’t create a new class of Jawboners willing to wear their earpieces while mowing their yards!
Posted by Zack Mansfield 
Posted by Zack Mansfield 
Posted by Zack Mansfield 
