I think I’ve seen someone do this before. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t done as well as this:
Saving much? I’m thinking of stuffing mattresses. On the same day that Nasdaq just … broke … there was this news.
After a lifetime of working, the median Boomer household has managed to accumulate $12,000 of retirement savings.
That means that 50% have even less than $12,000 for their retirement. These 55 to 64 year olds are up shits creek without a paddle. No wonder the percentage of over 55 people working is at an all-time high. Every age bracket has been living in a land of delusion.
So I went out for a ride. I’m trying to build miles back into the faux-training almost-routine for a couple of century ride possibilities that are coming up. I’ve fallen into a lull of short rides and so today hurt. And it was only a 42-mile route. But, still, that was my biggest ride since April 1st.
Of course you’re right in the middle, the perfect halfway point, when you wonder if you feel like doing it. Stopped at a gas station to buy a Gatorade. It was August, so I’d already had 64 ounces of water. Enjoyed my 32-ounces of fake electrolyte beverage and then re-filled one of my bottles at the gas station. That’s another 24 ounces.
You’re supposed to have some chocolate milk after long rides to repair your muscles. Honestly, I couldn’t drink another thing.
Four new things on Tumblr. More on Twitter. And something tomorrow, too!
At least it is the kind of illness — sinuses, really — that let’s you know precisely when the medication has worn off. That’s considerate. And either this is a super allergy/sinus issue or the over-the-counter medicines have a lot less potency than they used to. It is possible that both are true.
We finally visited Dunkin Donuts today. Took them forever to open, and town was filled with news of rumored false starts. It became a thing to video yourself going to the drive thru and knocking on the window. Finally the sign said “Opening May 28th.”
So we went on the 28th at about 10:30 p.m. Only they weren’t open for 24 hours on their first day. They’d already exhausted themselves.
This morning they were open again. I counted at least 14 people working there, surpassing the number of people that were sitting at the little round tables at the time. They have hi-def menu screens and two rows of doughnuts. The kid that got our order got it wrong.
The doughnuts were not especially good. (But it is their first week.) They were no Daylight. They were no D Square. They were certainly no Krispy Kreme. Somehow they will probably be more successful than all of them.
Still not sure how Daylight closed. It went dark about a year ago, just down the road from the new Dunkin spot. The parking was bad, and maybe the location was a factor, but the doughnuts were good and the burgers would surprise you.
Gave a tour of downtown and campus today. I invoked Sundilla and discussed the Harpers. We pointed out buildings with famous names and famous tales and sweated on a beautiful May afternoon. We discussed the old stuff and guessed at the new stuff.
At dinner I felt the moment precisely when the old drugs stopped working and then, a bit later, precisely when the new antihistamine kicked in. Breathing is a wonderful thing. Also it is underrated.
A few more days of this and I’ll be fine. I’ll try the doughnuts then, when I can properly taste things again.
Twice today I’ve read things that I’ve earlier made predictions about. This would make a person insufferable, he said insufferably, if it wasn’t done in a charming way.
The titles belong to Warner Brothers, MGM and Universal, which are pulling them from Netflix and instead housing them in their own subscription-based “Instant Warner Archive” which you can access for $10 a month.
Two years ago I called this the HBO problem. Entities that own the content, having seen the success of Netflix, and having now verified that achievement by HBO’s own gated community, will pull their own material in favor of a branded digital platform, as we first discussed on the campus blog last March. That’s in addition to the Hulus and Amazons of the world, too. Netflix becomes just another layer in the stratification.
Of course, now, you have to have a paid membership to everything, which is expensive, learn new interfaces and have the proper smart TV and so on — or do without programming.
Eventually some format wins and all of these things come back together again, somehow.
Here’s the other thing I sort-of-somewhat-guessed-at. The New York Times launched their new mobile site today. It is something of a shame that this is a big deal — I would have thought we’d be beyond this point by now — but there is something important here. As Nieman Lab said:
In typography and story layout, it’s much closer to the Times’ iPhone app, edging closer toward cross-platform parity. (Headlines are still just Georgia, not the custom version of Cheltenham it uses in print, in apps, and on Skimmer. But they’re now black — no longer 1994-weblink blue.) Presentation of images, captions, and credits on article pages are also much closer to app styles.
[…]
Overall, the takeaways seem to be: a common visual experience across mobile platforms and a cleaner, more premium look.
Two months ago, after a sneak peak of the new version of the website, I wrote:
But look at the layout they are showing you in this prototype. That’s as indicative of mobile as a traditional news site has thus far been. They may be conceptually starting with the article, but they are designing for your phones and tablets.
As the Times goes on this design, so will many folks follow.
The last part still remains to be seen, but give it time.
Digital tools help produce quality content online, but it can be tough figuring out where to start. Here are 10 online tools that can help improve journalists’ reporting and storytelling, and engage readers in multimedia.
Reporting resources: These tools can help with research and sourcing.
[…]
Data compilation and resources: Datasets and social media backlogs can be intimidating for any reporter; these resources help share, gather and handle large shares of information.
[…]
Data presentation: These tools can help process and design otherwise-cumbersome data sets in a way that makes them easily accessible for stories.
What the drone debates really tell us, then, is not so much about drones. What they do, unfortunately, tell us is how ill-prepared we are institutionally, and as a culture, to deal with the challenges and complexities of rapidly evolving technologies. In an age when emerging technologies become ever more integral to geopolitical positioning, and military and security competence, this is a weakness that any society can ill afford.
You can take out the word drone and put in the name Google Glass and have the same conversation.
One new thingon Tumblr today, this from Ted’s Montana Grill in Atlanta. I hear that Ted himself lives just upstairs. I’m told that this has provided many interesting stories to the people thereabouts.
There are, of course, always new things to see on Twitter.
And a video from yesterday. It was omelet day in the caf. Delicious:
I’ve just this now learned an interesting thing about WordPress. When you are in the Dashboard, after you’ve clicked Posts you get that list of entries you’ve been writing about. Some people, and I’ve seen you, have many different posts in progress at one time saved as drafts. I don’t usually write drafts, unless I’m interrupted, but it happens every so often. And it happened last night when the computer popped and the screen turned gray.
Well, OK then. I stared at it for a respectful amount of time, checked the plug, the battery, did the random search on the keyboard for the Any Key and then rebooted the thing. It all came right back. Somehow rebooting the machine, restarting the browser and restoring the tabs meant that I’d created two versions of the Sunday post. I published one, didn’t realize I had the other and it stayed on as a draft.
Write me! Write me!
I didn’t notice that until just now. I have two posts titled Catching Up. Well, click, examine, verify. Problem understood. Now it is time to run the resolution protocols, initiate. So I did all that, realized the draft could be deleted …
No! No! Not me!
And clicked Trash — if ever there was a more prescient judgment of the thing you’ve been working on, there it was. When I clicked Trash that joker disappeared.
There was no “Are you sure?”
“Really sure?”
“Cause we think it’s Trash. Mullenweg says so right there. But if you want to keep this around, you might think about Cancel.”
“No?”
“OK then.”
“Last chance.”
“Seriously.”
“Can’t you hear your words dying?”
“Fine. Let it be on your head.”
“We can’t drag this out any longer. This platform powers 16 percent of the web you know.”
None of that. Just gone.
I’ve just written 300 words on the a delete function. (It took about two minutes. It will not be trashed.)
So a lovely Monday. The sun was out, just a hint of warmth in the air. We hit 76 today, which is just two degrees off the average. I believe I’ve said it three times already this year, but spring is finally here. And if we’re proven wrong again we’re all going to write Al Gore a note.
After purchasing locally grown, artisanally-made carbon offsets printed on fair trade, Brazilian rainforest hand-woven stock. When those come in, and we’re shivering in May, we’d write the former vice president and congratulate him on his success at beating back global warming. The suggestion would be that maybe he turn down the air conditioners in his mansion, close the doors and windows and let us get on with the season.
But it has been lovely today, even for Mondays, which are never really all that bad. I had a burger for lunch, because it is Monday and I do that every other one or so. I watched this clip that landed in my Twitter feed:
It truly is all of the things Ray Hudson said, and so was Hudson’s call. If you don’t know the sport I can’t explain to you how impossible it is to do what Lionel Messi just did. What Hudson suggests is that Messi is a mutant, and that might not be far from the case. He’s short, but fast. His pace over the ball belies his size. He has amazing control of everything, himself, the ball, sometimes defenders and maybe the tides. He has the benefit of playing on a terrific team with other potent weapons and in a system that benefits him perfectly. All of these things are true. It is also true that, for the last three years or so, he’s been not far from becoming the greatest player of all time. And he’s only just entering his prime.
Not nearly as good as all that, but 60 Minutes recently produced a package on him:
Anyway, yes, a beautiful Monday. Everyone is smiling on campus. What’s not to smile about? The sun, the sky, progress!
Someone asked me last week about teaching at Samford. What are the students like? I get this question from time to time. It is a good question, because I get to talk about what they are, and what they are not. I’ve had students who take spring break trips to Jamaica, but not the tourist part, the part where they go do mission work. I have students who’ll spend a summer involved in third-world countries, doing their part against this or donating to that. They are, by and large, extremely motivated, caring people.
“I’m a Homewood PD Officer. I was in the drive thru at McDonalds last night about midnight – I work night shift -to grab a quick dinner. There was a car load of Samford students in front of me. When I got to the window to pay I was informed that the students had paid for my meal. It was a small gesture but it was a bright spot in my shift. Please share this on the page – with any luck they will see it and know it was greatly appreciated.”
In class today we discussed movies and the trade publications of journalism. A student stayed late to work on her foreign language homework. Two others were designing an advertisement sample.
I saw a former student who is shooting a video package and we talked about his summer plans covering political activism in Washington D.C. He’s interning at a church right now, too. Multiple internships are important these days.
Most are drawn to hard work, which suggests they can be successful. They all seem to come from places that make them care about the things around them, which gives me great hope that they might all be content.
If, that is, I warn them about this delete function in WordPress before it is too late.
I’ve forgotten this, but we’ll make up for it now. Normally I add these links at the end of the week, just to be synergistic, but have neglected to do so the last several weeks. So here are things I’ve posted on my campus blog:
Also there are two new images on my Tumblr blog, which has once again returned to action. The first one is here, and has a long quote, which all the Tumblr kids go crazy about. The second one is a drawing involving babies and hearts. What’s not to love?
And, of course, there is always much more on Twitter as well. Tomorrow, more Tuesday than anyone knows what to do with, also the spring picnic!
