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From the BBC – High Tech Loses to Fly Tech
September 10, 2009 at 6:43 am (News, Tech)
SA pigeon ‘faster than broadband’ Winston the pigeon was allowed no “performance-enhancing seeds” Broadband promised to unite the world with super-fast data delivery – but in South Africa it seems the web is still no faster than a humble pigeon
link: BBC NEWS | Africa | SA pigeon ‘faster than broadband’
Understanding countries through maps – Repost from F30
August 29, 2009 at 2:14 pm (History, Images, Science, Travel)
Active or deep interpretation of maps is a subject that isn’t taught nearly enough in schools, which is a bit of a pity as recognizing maps as clues to a country’s character can give students an interest in geography they’ve never had before. Simply taking a good look at a map of a country compared to the other areas nearby is often enough to give one a good idea of what sort of geopolitical situation it happens to be in, and in many cases a good enough understanding of this can aid in even predicting the future between two or more countries.
link: Page F30: Understanding countries through maps
This Is Why I Wanted An iPod in the First Place
August 26, 2009 at 7:45 am (Music, Personal)
I was listening to my original iPod the other day. It’s a third generation 40GB model that is still around and going strong. Of course, it is on it’s third battery, and it resides primarily in my bedroom connected to a set of Logitech speakers, but it still gets used almost every day.
The other morning it was running in shuffle mode was playing such an interesting mix of music that I carried it out of the house with me (neglecting the newer 80GB model). Here is the selection of music it chose that morning:
Lee Ritenour: Asa
Billy Joel: Piano Man
Phil Wickham: I Will Wait For You There
John Pattitucci: Venetian Moonlight
Frozen Ghost: Shake Your Spirit
Donald Fagen: Chain Lightning
Booker T and the MG’s: Ode To Billy Joe
Traffic: Forty Thousand Headmen
Curtis Stigers: Peace, Love, and Understanding
Pat Metheny: Question and Answer
Eric Kunzel and the Cincinatti Pops: Cuban Overture
Bebo Norman: Where the Trees Stand Still
Sting: I Was Brought To My Senses
Phil Keaggy: The Mission
Little River Band: Relentless
Level 42: The Chinese Way – Dub Mix
This really is what I wanted an iPod for in the first place: the ability to take my entire music library with me, and listen to it in any way I wanted, even if the device is choosing the order. Fantastic.
Blog Neglect
August 26, 2009 at 7:32 am (Personal, Writing)
I, like many others, have been guilty of neglecting my blog, and for that I apologize. I, like many others, have been very busy. However, some of my busyness has been directly related to travel, the supposed theme of this space, so the fact that nothing about any of it has been making an appearance here is just plain sad.
Some of the reason for the lack of postings here can be blamed on Facebook, where photos of my trips have been getting uploaded regularly. Most of the rest of it (other than laziness) can be blamed on Twitter, where it is so easy to post a snarky, here’s-what-I’m-doing-ain’t-it-great comment, that almost no thought need wander by my cerebral cortex. These things are too easy and writing a blog post usually takes some actual concentration.
The upshot of all this noise is that I’ll try to do better. I promise. I’ll try.
–Jay
Afar Magazine
August 26, 2009 at 7:21 am (Travel, Writing)
A few weeks ago I received the first issue of a brand new and absolutely gorgeous travel magazine named Afar. You owe it to yourself to check it out if you’re at all interested in travel. It’s the kind of magazine Lonely Planet might put out if they put out magazines. The articles focus primarily on international travel and I was pleased to see that a number of the advertisers were also international. A couple of my favorite aspects of the magazine are that it isn’t about luxury travel (something that is hard to sustain and often rather silly), but about getting to know and getting involved with the locals, and also that it stresses low impact travel. If you want to visit theme parks instead of neighborhoods, look somewhere else. This magazine isn’t for tourists, it’s for travelers. I love it so far.
San Francisco Streetcars
July 6, 2009 at 11:47 am (Uncategorized)
Found an interesting post about the streetcars in San Francisco. Most people are familiar with the cable cars, but few know about the streetcars, which can be a treat to ride as long as you aren’t trying to get to Fisherman’s Wharf on a Saturday by riding them.
Here’s the link: http://sfizzio.com/198866-San-Francisco-Streetcars-Unsung-Historic-Transit.html
– Mobile post
U.S. in 114th Place of Happiest/Healthiest Countries
July 5, 2009 at 4:01 pm (News, Travel)
Just ran across an interesting article from the San Francisco Sentinel about the Happy Planet Index, which ranks 143 countries for happiness and health. The U.S. did not fare well and neither did most other countries thought of as first world. Costa Rica is apparently the place to be if happiness and health are important to you.
Yet more proof that greed and technology are not the recipe for happiness. Envy and bitterness certainly, but not happiness.
This link will take you to the article.
This link will download the index itself (PDF file).
Listening to the “SuperHuman Touch” the upcoming single from Athlete
AT&T Rant
June 19, 2009 at 5:42 am (Personal, Tech)
As a free service to AT&T, I’ve decided to help them be more truthful in their advertising.
In a previous post I said their slogan should be “Fewer Bars in Useful Places”. Today’s entry is “No Bars Where You Need Them”.
All of this stems from how lousy their network is on the rail system in Atlanta. Bear in mind that this city is home to AT&T’s headquarters and that they built a garage at the far end of the rail line for their employees to use. I certainly hope those employees don’t have work to do on the way in that requires using the AT&T GSM network because it isn’t going to happen.
Compare this to the T-Mobile network on the same rail system which is practically 100% the entire way, EVEN UNDERGROUND. I know this because they were my provider before I got sucked into the iPhone collective.
The iPhone is the only reason I’m with AT&T, and so far they aren’t giving me any reasons to stay with them when my contract expires.
AT&T, “No Customers Without iPhone Exclusivity”
– Mobile post
