Archive | August, 2010

Links 8/31

31 Aug

What a wild and crazy day for news.

1) Worst Journalist Ever: Washington Post sports columnist Mike Wise thought it was a great idea to tweet three pieces of false news yesterday to “test the accuracy of social media reporting.” The bad news: people attributed the news to him.  That prompted sportswriters to all condemn his antics. It’s the Post’s reputation on the line. The paper suspended Wise for the hoax. Ever heard of an ombudsman, Mike? No one will ever look to him for factual information again.

2) Last Surviving Member of First World Cup Team Dies: Francisco Varallo played for Argentina in the 1930 cup.  His team lost 4-2 to Uruguay.

3) Google becomes all-knowing: Well, at least they know what e-mails you want to read.  Today, Google launched Priority Inbox for Gmail, which will catalog your e-mails based on your friends and what e-mails you reply to most.  There was also a bizarre bug that came with the launch.  Apple reportedly plans to double the sample length for songs in iTunes.

4) Proud to be an American?: It’s getting harder to make that claim these days.  Though the controversial mosque by Ground Zero earned the endorsement of one GOP lawmaker today, the news was overshadowed by suspicions of arson on the site of a proposed Tennessee mosque and a hate attack in Seattle.

5) Hip CPR PR Campaign: It looks cool and is fun to play, but how are you supposed to do CPR now?  Directions are in a video at the bottom.

6) Dance: A compilation of movie dance scenes to the classic “Footloose” theme song by Kenny Loggins.

7) Mystery Meat Means Something New: I wrote previously about a miscommunication about cat meat that happened to me in Italy.  Well, a German restaurant has taken it one step farther.  They are actively seeking donations of body parts for a cannibal-themed dining establishment.  Though most suspect a publicity stunt, the restaurant claims inspiration from the Wari people, a Brazilian tribe that practiced cannibalism.

8 ) English Catholic Women Take on the Pope: Catholic Women’s Ordination (CWO) will plaster buses in London with ads for female ordination ahead of the Pope’s visit next month.

9) Fight Loitering Teens: What’s the best way to do that?  Some cities suggest adding lights works.  Others have tried Barry Manilow music.  Still others will try the “Mosquito,” a loud pitch designed to only be heard by young people.

10) Pro-Bullying Stance?: Apparently, the anti-bullying campaigns are a gay front. Yeah, whatever.

Good Music

31 Aug

Thanks to a tweet, I discovered this song. Can’t beat young Brits.

In case you missed it.  The opening to the Emmys was really well-done.

One More Story From Rome

31 Aug

One evening in Rome, we decided to go to a lovely little restaurant near Piazza Navona for dinner. I remembered this area from a past trip. Darcy and I wandered through the area and eventually found a really cute little restaurant. It was really good. I tried to replicate this with the kids.

As we walked through Piazza Navona, a political rally dominated the scene.  A group of journalists were protesting a new law that allowed the government to listen to their phone calls.  Pretty bad.

Piazza Navona: always beautiful

So I took the group a few blocks away from the noise (we couldn’t get across to where I was before) and found this cute restaurant.  This allowed the kids to try some new dishes.  So they got pasta with pesto, tomato sauce and gnocchi.  I was bummed. It was always nearly impossible to get them to try new things.

Walking to dinner; no photo of the waitress exists

Then, the funny conversations began. One of my kids, Caitlen, was enjoying the conversation a lot, chatting and laughing a ton. All good things.  The waitress began to get frustrated though. She accused Caitlen of talking too much and not eating her food. She felt that the food would become cold. They battled for a while. At the end, she claimed she would hit Caitlen if she came back, but then gave her a quick hug when we left.

The battle was over.  No blood.  But… don’t talk to much in Italian restaurants.

The following day we returned.

Links: 8/30

30 Aug

1) The old way of working wasn’t working anymore: Hard times for the perennial favorite in the dictionary war.  Reports are that the Oxford English Dictionary will stop publishing a print version. Sales are down. Google also plans to launch a pay-per-view video watching system, according to The Financial Times.  The venture could use  YouTube and might be ready by the end of 2010.  This as movie rental giant Blockbuster considers filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in September.

2) Wait, how did that even get published?: Talking Points Memo looks at how one article started a myth that Mexican police officers would be coming to New York City to protect citizens of that country. The article, by freelance writer Jeffrey Smith, appeared in American Free Press.

3) How many people came to Glenn Beck’s rally?: As mentioned before, the estimates vary wildly. CBS News hired “experts” to determine the crowd this. Their estimate was 87,000 people attended. Beck himself estimated that between 300,000 and 500,000 attended.  Infamous Minnesota representative Michele Bachmann said:

“We’re not going to let anyone get away with saying there were less than a million here today – because we were witnesses.”

That’s fine, but upon careful analysis, it seems the CBS estimate wasn’t that bad. Metro later released figures suggesting that traffic was high, more than 500,000 riders, but not nearly as high as inauguration day when more than 1,120,000 people rode the system.

4) Recycled Appliance: A really cool looking sink made from recycled tires. Thanks Boing Boing.

A new design for a recycled sink

5) Cool Experimental Film: Designed in conjunction with Google and the band Arcade Fire, this new project is visually stunning and innovative.  Worth a look.

Knife in the Vatican

30 Aug

I have to jump back to Rome, because I forgot one of the more memorable moments of the trip.  Our second day in the city was notable for the wonderful picnic lunch that the kids bought in the morning.  I sent them off in groups to buy the necessary ingredients.  It was a great success, except for the one group that boarded the wrong bus and ended up in a rough neighborhood outside of town.  But, they made it back and we enjoyed a nice lunch in Piazza del Popolo.

PIazza Del Popolo, where we had our lunch

It helped me a bunch that one of kids brought with them a knife to help cut the food.  After lunch, we headed back to the hotel. We boarded the metro and waited the two stops it would take to get back to the hotel.  And…. here the troubles began.  We arrived at the stop for the Vatican (close to the hotel) and half of the kids didn’t push hard enough for us to get off.  Thankfully, my separation plan too effect.  The kids who made it off sat on the platform and waited for the rest of us to go an additional stop, get off and make it back.

We’re all together.  We head back to the hotel and then have to walk to right outside the Vatican for our tour to begin. I’m worried about the girls wearing appropriate clothing for inside, so that was what I focused my attention on.  Not on knives.

Where groups wait for tours to begin

You have to pass through security in the Vatican.  I’m bringing up the rear with another group leader (all four Italy groups were in Rome together) and heard from the someone else, “One of your kids is being stopped by security.”  Well, he was.  They had found the swiss army knife from lunch.  I was freaking out.  “Maybe they’ll think he brought it to come assassinate the Pope.” That would have been an insane assumption, but sometimes I don’t make sense.

Anyways, they confiscated the knife and put it with the coats.  The only really bad part of what they did was that the student and I had to walk around the entire complex (from St. Peter’s) to pick up the knife after the tour.  In 105 degree heat. Now, it’s kind of funny.  Remember that time you tried to sneak a knife into the Vatican?

Peaking out from St. Peters

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