Link spammers

I got a couple of emails and comments recently from people who wanted to exchange links. I put the links on my blog but didn't see anything on theirs, so I'm de-activating the links. I'm also not sure there is much benefit from these kinds of links unless the other person has a quality blog. Not sure if these are quality blogs.

Electrolux vacuum

We have an Electrolux vacuum cleaner. It's about 11.5 years old, so I think it has lasted as long as we figured it would when we bought it. At the time, it seemed very expensive, but it has done a good job over the years and hasn't been much trouble. However, recently, it has started to break down a little bit. The tube has a hole in it and there are some missing pieces of plastic where the attachments get attached. We also have an Electrolux carpet cleaner which we bought used about 9 years ago. It has also started to fall apart a little bit, although it does still work pretty well. We don't have much carpet, and what we do have should be replaced, but the cleaner at least makes it acceptable for a few weeks at a time. Electrolux seems like a very conservative company. The equipment we have is non-stylish, in contrast to the vacuums from Dyson. However, the Electrolux website is full of Flash and moving stuff and color, so maybe they are making a move into the 21st century. When I look for a new vacuum, I'm not sure I want to spend a huge amount of money again, but I'll take a look at what Electrolux has to offer since their products have been so reliable.

Scottie Pippen comeback

I don't think Scottie Pippen is the Roger Clemens of basketball. He doesn't seem like a guy who's going to come in mid-way through the season and perform at a high level. The conditioning factor for someone who hasn't played for 2 years seems like it would be a huge thing. On the other hand, he does seem like a guy who could help a team like the Lakers since he knows their offense and has played for Phil Jackson. Whether his contribution would make much of a difference is hard to say, but you can always use another guy who can pass the ball and play defense.

NBA All Star Game

The NBA All Star game is usually a no defense high scoring event which gets close in the fourth quarter when guys try to win the MVP award. I think I prefer to watch the skills competitions like the 3 point shootout and the dunk contest, although the dunk contest has that goofy rule where guys can keep trying over and over to make a dunk. That was not fun to watch last year. I don't care much for that 3 person team event with one old guy and one woman and a current player. Probably the best event this year will be the Dick Bavetta - Charles Barkeley race. I'm putting my money on Bavetta.

Global Warming

I guess George Bush and his guys are still debating the existence of global warming. They didn't do much to help that with their policies and pseudo-science. While everyone else in the world seemed to see the evidence, the US was in denial. Well, it's 86 degrees here today in the middle of February. Not necessarily evidence of global warming but it's still an odd thing in the middle of winter.

Learning from mistakes

I realized after the fact that I could have done a better job with some of the action photos I took at Astrocamp. I knew that I wasn't getting what I wanted at the time I was taking the images, but I wasn't really sure how to correct the problem. My night photo instructor had some good tips which would have been even better if I had them on the spot. Next time I'll be ready but for now I did at least get a few good shots. I plan to have my DVD done by this weekend and will hand some out next week.

Vegetarians not visible for school events

One thing I've noticed over and over is that local school events which involve food almost always assume that everyone eats meat. I know that vegetarians make up a small percentage of the population, but since I'm in that percentage I notice it more when there's nothing on the menu I can eat. My wife and sons are going to a spaghetti dinner tonight at the school and the two options are meat sauce or butter. I'm not sure what kind of restaurant is providing the food, but is butter really the way most people eat spaghetti? What happened to olive oil or marinara sauce? Maybe they can bring their own or just eat it plain like we did at Astrocamp...

Subsitute teacher convicted for school tech screw up

The story of Julie Amero and her conviction for exposing 7th graders to porn on a classroom computer is like something written by Kafka. The school's spyware license hadn't been updated because the renewal was sent to an incorrect email address. She allowed students to use the computer and they inadvertently clicked on a link that generated a bunch of pornographic pop-ups. She didn't know how to deal with it although she tried to keep the students from seeing what was there -- she had been told not to turn off the computer for any reason. So she ends up being convicted for exposing students to pornography. The whole thing is absurd and the prosecutor didn't do his job. The computer wasn't checked for spyware and adware by the prosecutor and an expert for the defense who did check it wasn't allowed to testify about it. There is a potential 40 year prison sentence in this case, but the whole thing is ridiculous.

Talk of the Nation - life logging

NPR's Talk of the Nation had a program today called life logging and the generation gap over privacy. I only caught a couple of portions of the show, but it seemed to be about how younger people who use MySpace, Facebook and blogs to document what they are doing are often exposing things about themselves that their parents might not think should be put online. Of course, this includes blog entries about personal things as well as photos of activities that might best be kept private. One of the points made by one of the guests was that standards in this area may change and what's considered bad taste today might not be in ten years. I think that is probably true, but I still think there are some things which don't need to be shared with anybody who can get online.

Talk of the Nation does not seem to have a podcast, so you have to listen to the show using RealPlayer online.

Chargers need a coach

After firing Marty Schottenheimer, the Chargers have to scramble to hire a coach. SFGate says they are looking at a couple of 49ers coaches, Mike Singletary and Norv Turner. Turner has been a head coach before and was a finalist for the Cowboys job a few weeks ago. Sounds like he's the frontrunner unless they can persuade Pete Carroll or Jimmy Johnson to give it a shot. If the problem with Marty was that he wanted too much control, then that's probably going to continue to be a problem with these guys.

The Missing Link

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End of Marty Ball in San Diego

It did seem odd that the Chargers would lose both their offensive and defensive coordinators at the same time. Both got head coaching jobs. Two other assistants also left, and despite their 12-4 season, the Chargers fired Marty Schottenheimer today. The timing seems bad since most of the other coaching vacancies have been filled at this point, so you either will get a guy who hasn't been a head coach before or a retread who didn't get any of the other jobs. Maybe Bill Parcells will change his mind and give it one more shot with a team that has a great chance to win next year. I don't think it's the right move to fire your coach because he can't get along with the general manager, but maybe the owner felt the general manager was more important.

AstroCamp and behavioral issues

One of the things that was very clear after spending 2 days with about 50 5th graders is that when even a very small number of the kids have behavioral issues, it can really have a huge impact on the entire group. I don't think I could deal with the stuff I saw during the two days on a day to day basis, and it did seem like the teachers involved had become immune to some of the stuff and just dealt with the more serious transgressions. Lots of kids in the group need medication just to get through the day -- or, more accurately, they have been giving medication to get through the day. I wondered how much of the bad behavior had a biological basis to it and how much was psychological or of some other origin. Some kids were just disruptive all the time, constantly seeking attention in one way or another. It drove me crazy. And in almost every case, the behavior could be related back to the parents or absence of parents. It's easy to get upset with the repeated bad actions of the child, but it's probably the absent parent who bears much of the responsibility.

ArtText or TypeStyler

One thing I have not figured out is why it has taken so many years for the OS X version of TypeStyler to be released. It's still not out yet and I'm sure they have long since lost many customers because of this. It's been "coming soon" for years now. I really liked the program years ago when I used Mac OS 9, but that was about 7 years back. Today on MacZot, you can get a new competitor to TypeStyler, ArtText, for 33% off -- $19.95. I will give it a try and if it can do most of what TypeStyler did, I'll buy it. Too bad for TypeStyler, but how long can you wait?

AstroCamp photos

I took 1250 photos in 48 hours at AstroCamp. There have to be a few good ones in there! Actually, I've got them all imported in to iPhoto and tagged and I've rated about half of them. I'm hoping to have enough variety to make a nice poster using about 80 of them. I will also upload the good ones so other people can have a look. This is going to take a couple of days, but I think it will be worth the effort. The challenge was in getting pictures of each of the 4 student groups since I was spending all of my time with one group. I think I managed to do it, but maybe next year the school will allow me to go up and just take pictures on Saturday without being a chaperone. We'll see.

Return from Astrocamp

Our AstroCamp weekend in Idylwild wrapped up today. We made the bus trip back down the mountain in the rain. In fact, it rained all day today and was cold which made the last day a little rough. Overall, it was a good experience for most everyone involved, although there were more than a few meltdowns by a small number of students. Oddly enough, most of them were by students in my group of 12.