Although I really want to be, I am not a hat person.
Oh, I've tried. I usually end up in baseball cap land. I wore the occasional cap as a kid (and actually at one point had a cap for each major league team, but that's another blog post), and I had several versions of Boston Red Sox caps, because Sawx! Since I started shaving my head I'm very conscious about wearing a cap when out in the sun during the summer.
In the late 70's - early 80's I had a Greek sailor's cap that I wore sometimes. In the 90's for a while I wore a black fedora that I picked up on St. Mark's Place in Greenwich Village. This was before all the hipsters discovered fedoras. But overall nothing really seemed to stick.
I bought a beret when the band was having its "rummage sale" and were getting rid of the surplus tuba berets. It's not in the greatest shape (the felt is great, but the band is quite ragged), and it's okay. However, Ellen bought one too, and started wearing it regularly. I thought we'd look really dopey if we both wore one out together, so mine hangs above my desk.
The other issue I have is the size of my head. I have one of those big "pumpkin" heads, so it's hard to find a hat that fits well. If you know anything about hat sizes, I'm a 7-7/8, or an 8. That's huge. So, getting a hat can be a challenge, especially as I want to try it on to make sure I won't be squeezing my head in a vise.
I have wanted a "driver's cap" for a while, something like Burt Lancaster's character* wore in Field of Dreams,
Lancaster and hat in Field of Dreams
or like Burt Lancaster's character wore in Local Hero.
Lancaster and hat in Local Hero
[Hmmm...maybe I just want to be Burt Lancaster. I'll have to look into that one.]
I've never found the right one, or one that I wanted to plunk money down for, assured that I wouldn't look like a total dork wearing it. Today, I found one. We were at Target, and while I was waiting for people to come out of the dressing room, I found one that looks good, fits amazingly well, and is a decent price. So I bought it. Might be a keeper.
* Did not know that Archibald "Moonlight" Graham was really a ballplayer in 1905 and actually did only play one game in the majors, playing right field in the bottom of the ninth, and never coming to bat. He then went back to the minors, and after leaving baseball became a doctor in Chisholm, MN. Although the book Shoeless Joe gets his details correct, the movie Field of Dreams takes some liberties with dates (both of Graham and the game in which he played).
I saw Neil deGrasse Tyson last night. His lecture didn't have a title (that I know of) but he said that by the end of the evening we would understand that this was The End of America as we know it. He actually talked about how the failure to focus on science leads to the downfall of the society as a world/intellectuall power.
It was a fascinating lecture, where he talked about the importance of science in the cultures/countries around the world. He pointed out that the "golden age of Islam" was from 800-1100 AD, and Baghdad was the scientific center of the world, where people of varied religions (including atheists) could come and discuss scientific and mathematical concepts. From this came huge advances in science and math, while at the same time in Europe, they were killing witches.
Here is a good video of Dr. Tyson talking. It's not the subject of the lecture I saw, although there is a lot of it that was the same. Like all his stuff, it's really good. It's an hour long (and there are a couple of commercials) but it's well worth your time.
After the presentation, it was announced that Dr. Tyson would be autographing copies of his book(s) in the lobby. I didn't have any of my copies with me (didn't think this one through), but decided to get in line anyway. When Beenie found out that I would be going, he asked me to ask Dr. Tyson a question for him. I told him that I didn't think I would get that chance, but had him write it down anyway. Here was that chance.
I got in the (huge!!!) line, and waited patiently. When I got to the table, I asked him Beenie's question - "If you were to send uranium into a black hole, would it spaghettify and cause a nuclear explosion?" Dr. Tyson told me that it would spaghettify, but it wouldn't cause a nuclear explosion. I then asked if he would autograph the question for me to give to Beenie. He said of course, and to make sure that I continued to encourage him in his scientific curiosity. He even volunteered to answer the question in writing on the paper for Beenie.
The thing I found the most interesting is what Dr. Tyson did next - he felt the paper. Determining the texture of the paper, he then selected the appropriate pen from the several he had on the table and signed the question. Very cool.
Since it's World Cup time (yay!), I guess I should report on how Blue Albatross FC did this fantasy season. If you'll recall the last time I reported on the status of the team's performance in the English Premier League, we were (temporarily) in first place. True to form, we dropped back to third (gasp!) the following week. There we sat for the next couple of weeks, although we managed to climb up into second place going into the final week of competition. Surprise of all surprises, we pulled out of the week scrabbling up into the number one position, and that's where we finished this year's EPL campaign!
Now, as for the Champions League, and the Europa League, well, we didn't fare as well there. Finished 6/23 in the Champions League (although only 13 points separated 4th and 7th places), and finished 2/7 in the Europa League. I consider those to be pretty good, as I really don't have a good handle on who the decent players are in those leagues (especially the Europa League). And, for the record, these rankings are for the leagues in which I was participating. Overall, I finished thusly:
English Premier League: 491,826 out of 2,322,686 with 1,975 points
Champions League: 44,015 out of 349,293 with 543 points
Europa League: 1,232 out of 52,013 with 593 points
It was a good campaign, and I look forward to signing up again in the fall.
And, yes, Blue Albatross FC is represented in the FIFA World Cup Fantasy League. Wish us well!!
David Tennant has announced that he will no longer play Dr. Who starting with, what I am assuming is, the next full season of episodes (scheduled to run in 2010). This makes me very sad, as I have fully enjoyed his portrayal of The Doctor.
I did have the same reaction when it was announced that Christopher Eccleston would be leaving the part, so I hope that they (the BBC) can find someone just as good as these two to take over the role.
Oh, since they say "You never forget your first Doctor", I must confess that mine is Tom Baker. And, yes, I had a scarf that dragged the floor when I was a kid.
And I should leave you with this, an 8-minute mini-episode of Doctor Who produced for the charity Children in Need. In this episode, the 10th Doctor meets the 5th Doctor. Enjoy!
I have had my share of websites that I have set up, or helped set up, and I have always used Network Solutions to check the availability of domain names. I've done that because I trust(ed) NetSol as they were the first registrar of domain names, their customer support has been good, and I believed that I wasn't going to get screwed when I visited their site (except for price, which is why I don't register with them anymore).
Well, it turns out that NetSol is registering the domain names that people have been looking up, thereby denying them the opportunity to register the name somewhere else, at a quarter of the cost, in a process called "front-running". Bastards.
Their "official" line is that they are protecting their "customers" - the people who are looking up the availability of a domain name. In reality they are blackmailing people into using their service. If you look up your domain name on NetSol, then go to GoDaddy to try to register it, it will show as "unavailable", and owned by NetSol. The only way you can get that name is to go back to NetSol and register there. NetSol says they hold the name for 5 days, after which it is released. I'm lucky, in that most of my websites are church sites and the pace of permissions in a church is rather slow, so by the time the request has been approved more than 5 days have passed.
Still, it is an unethical practice, and I will stop recommending Network Solutions to my clients as a possible domain name registrar and web host. Better still, I think I will tell them what NetSol is doing, and let them make up their own minds.
I was having a problem with one of the photo-sharing services I use today. It was about lunchtime, so I figured I'd get the kids fed and I would have a couple of minutes to talk with customer service about the problem. During the course of getting the problem corrected I had to clear my cache and delete my cookies. We got the problem fixed, but the deletions affected another application, so I decided that I would fix that while I had everything up on the screen.
Since this fix didn't involve a telephone call, I thought I could make myself a sandwich and eat it while I worked on the new problem. I got out the bread and set it on the counter next to the computer. I then jumped right in to troubleshooting.
A few minutes later I was feeling a little hungry, so I picked up my sandwich and started eating it. You may have noticed in the above paragraph that I hadn't actually put anything between the pieces of bread. Oops.
The scary part of this story is not that I forgot to finish making the sandwich, but that it actually took me two bites before I realized it!
How pathetic am I? I'm sitting outside on the porch with the kids, trying to get a little work done while they play, when the phone rings. I've got the portable phone with me so that's not a problem. However, it was someone from the museum who wanted to leave a message for Ellen. I took the message, but I don't have anything to write on. My solution?
I emailed her.
Instead of walking the 10 steps inside to find a piece of paper, it seemed like the easier option.
So now the question is - which makes me a bigger geek: that I emailed my wife a phone message, or that I am blogging about it?
So I gave my mom the address for this blog today. This got me thinking that maybe I should post a disclaimer for close family, and then that led into thoughts about why I blog in the first place. It's not that I have a lot to say that I think the world needs to hear, and it's not a therapeutic exercise (although there are elements of both).
When I was a senior in high school, I took a creative writing class in which we had the assignment to keep a journal and write in it 15 minutes per day. I really liked the exercise, and continued it into college. It was fun writing, reflecting, and posing questions to myself. It was even more fun years later to look back on that writing and reflect on how much has changed, how much has not, and what a rambling idiot I was (arguably still am)! So I guess in a nutshell that's why I blog - it's fun writing these things down and then more fun (potentially) looking back at them later. Technology has changed the format, but the rationale is the same.
Now the disclaimer. This is my life. These are my thoughts and reflections. While everything is family friendly right now, I make no guarantees. The f-bomb may come through occasionally, depending upon my mood when I'm writing. Don't be offended. Or do. I don't care. I'm writing for me, not for you. (But I'll try to keep the "kids" postings clean!!)
I just found out that Thursday is the second annual CSS Naked Day. What you have to do is pledge to strip all the css formatting out of your website for an entire day. Why? To promote web standards. Ideally, your site shouldn't look like a bunch of garbage when you do this.
I'm not going to do this, for two reasons. First, all my "real" websites are church sites, and Thursday is Maundy Thursday. If it weren't Holy Week, I might consider it. The other reason is that I have the Webmaster Tools extension for Firefox, and one of its neat features allows you to turn off all styles. When I did that to the website for my church, I saw that it denigrates nicely. No, its not pretty, but the information is all there and logically organized. I am proud to say that I actually organized the html to do it that way, and let the css put it all in the "pretty places".
I got really cheesed off on Friday. I have been listening to WARF in Akron for a long time. They call themselves “Radio Free Ohio” and feature such liberal talking heads as Stephanie Miller, Al Franken, Ed Schultz, and Randi Rhodes. I’m especially partial to Stephanie Miller (where else can you get: Senator - fart joke - Senator - fart joke - Congressman - fart joke - Cindy Sheehan - fart joke...you get the idea). On Friday, I dialed in the station as I always do, only to find a sports show. A quick check of their website revealed that they were changing formats Friday morning, back to all-sports. Bastards. More likely bowing to pressure from that vast right-wing conspiracy.
Of course, I could still listen to Mama on the internet, but the time that she’s on isn’t conducive to my schedule, and sorry, but I don’t want to subscribe to the podcast (only $4.95 a month if purchased a year in advance!). I suppose I’ll survive. I might even become more productive!?!
Just switch to 