Colombian PhotoBlog

I got an email the other day pointing me to a photoblog of Cartagena, Colombia, the hometown of The Missus. Some very cool photos there, mostly of the older part of the city that is within the walls. Here are a few from our trip in 2006 also.

Cartagena is a popular vacation destination–lots of history, shops, beaches, restaurants, etc. It was once a very popular port of call for cruises in the Caribbean, but fell out of favor because of the political turmoil and shadiness going on in Colombia. It’s becoming popular once again with Colombia’s recent economic turnaround and increased stability. Despite what you often hear about Colombia being dangerous, I never felt unsafe for a second while there. No sniper fire at all.

Here’s the Wikipedia article on Cartagena if you’re interested in more about the history.

On a side note, I’m really loving the ease of posting photos and galleries in WordPress 2.5

The Blogosphere Is Going to Implode? Nah.

According to Gawker’s Nick Denton, yes.

Gawker head honcho Nick Denton explained to Silicon Alley Insider that the decision to sell the sites was based on the economy, lack of advertising, and his desire to get lean before the blogosphere implodes.

Wait.  Don’t panic.  One prognostication does not a bubble burst.  Don’t rush out to the nearest convenience store to trade in your shares of www.itfrom.us for beef jerkey and (used) scratch of lottery tickets just yet.

Any reasonable person knows that the blogosphere is not going to implode, at least not until someone invents a cheaper and more efficient way than blogging to waste time and money.

HT–Michael Silence

You Wanna Know Why?

I’ll tell you why.  Or I’ll let MonsterNoodle explain it:

Keep on loaning to people that can’t afford it, for things that are not worth it. Enough said.

Read the whole post.

It’s The Hard Knock Life? For Us?

Jigga What?“In my business, we like to say we’re from the hood. We’re not in the hood. By no means. Not even close.”

-Jay Z in “Water For Life”

I bet I catch some flack over this one, but it has to be said…

Over the last few weeks I’ve read several posts around the blogosphere about how tough times are financially right now. Gas prices are soaring, and…people are still complaining about traffic, so someone’s driving. The stock market is sort of…just steady. And I guess if you’re basing your assessment of your financial situation on how well your stock portfolio is doing, that’s not all bad. Interest rates are…near an all time low, though artificially. Unemployment is…5.1% (low). And the obesity rate of our country is reaching a level of crisis, so I guess there aren’t that many people going hungry.

Is this as bad as the Bush administration could screw things up? Is this all they’ve got?

Believe me, I’m a little frustrated too that times are so tough here in the land of milk and honey that we can only get milk and honey a few days a week. The other days we’re stuck with choosing either milk or honey.

Jigga's Problems

It’s gotten to the point that even the Jigga Man has problems. Based on what I’ve heard and the evidence presented in the graph above, he has at least 99 problems.

Then again, I don’t see any basic needs of survival listed as any of his problems either.

Seriously, I know there are people out there who are struggling just to get by. I know that. But what does “get by” entail here?  And how many bloggers are rummaging through virtual dumpsters to get a virtual meal via their high speed internet connections?

What are we actually struggling for? Bandwidth?

Are there problems? Hell yeah! Should we be concerned? Of course. But let’s keep things in perspective here. Having to sacrifice by doing things like cutting back to basic cable, making coffee at home and carrying a thermos, carpooling to work (with air conditioning), or not going to Disney this year are not the end of the world.

You hear it all the time, but it’s true. Go to some other country where people are really poor, and you’ll come back thankful for all of the luxuries the poorest of us enjoy here. When you see firsthand that “average” or “struggling” here is better than “wealthy” in many places, your perspective is changed forever.

It’s not just me, either. My grandfather, who grew up dirt poor during The Depression (capital letters, because that was for real) had this to say in his journal about his travels to New Guinea during World War II:

The only identity of men or women in their dress was their breast. I saw women with breast that hung down to their belt line. The men used pits to trap hogs and they would catch small pigs in them. I have seen women feeding babies and pigs also. They would feed the pigs until they could eat solid food or other things. They sure had a hard way of survival. I always thought I was poor and brought up the hard way. The only comparison I had up to that time was with people doing better than we were. When I saw a different comparison, I suddenly discovered that I had been rich all along and didn’t know it.

Not trying to trivialize anyone’s problems here, but please, let’s keep some perspective.  It’s not as though our women are breast feeding piglets to the point that they can eat solid foods so that we’ll one day (hopefully) be able to trap them, slaughter them, and have a meal.

By the way, if you are interested in helping someone who is trying to survive day to day have clean drinking water, please consider helping at PlayPumps.org.  You can also learn more about Jay Z’s travels to Africa to document their water issues at MTV.com.

Big Oops for Former Electrical Engineering Professor

J. Reece Roth was allegedly involved in providing sensitive data to the Chinese.

I had professor Roth for a class.  Here’s how remarkable the guy was–I’m not 100% sure what class it was.  Plasma engineering maybe?  All I remember about him is that he was slightly on the tubby side, the suits he wore included a vest, and he seemed very disinterested in dealing with undergrads.

My class attendance record probably insures that he remembers even less about me.

Write It All Off

Cosmo KramerKramer: They just write it off.

Jerry: You don’t even know what a write off is, do you?

Kramer: Do you?

Jerry: No, I don’t.

Kramer. Well they do, and they’re the ones writing it off.

Jerry: I wish I had the last 20 seconds of my life back.

HT to Auramae via Twitter for this article on Wired. When you’re making a living blogging about your personal life, can you write off personal expenses like condoms? That’s what Soccergirl is attempting to do, and I for one am all for it.

In an age when bloggers and podcasters are making a living — or trying to — by blogging and podcasting about their personal lives, what exactly is legitimate? And if writing off your personal life is as easy as writing about it online and getting some Google ads, why doesn’t everybody do it?

Well, it turns out that you can’t write off things that you buy if you’re using them primarily for personal use, which makes sense. But just for laughs, I thought about all of the things I could write off since I’ve been blogging:

Cable TV (lots of blogging about The Wire, Lost, and Rock of Love), internet access (obviously), gas to drive around town, running shoes, and my taxes themselves.

Haleakala Silversword

Haleakala SilverswordA couple of years ago (in our single days) we were fortunate enough to get to travel to Maui and stay with some friends.  While we were there, we took a day to visit Haleakala and take a horseback riding tour of the crater.  Unlike most horseback tours that I’ve been on, this one was worth every penny, even though it was twice as expensive as the others.  They tell you the tour is four hours, but it’s more like 6 or 7 hours.  No complaints from us though.

There is a plant called the Haleakala Silversword that is only found within the crater of the volcano.  Silverswords are related to the sunflowers that all of us are familiar with, but are very unique plants.  Silverswords usually grow for years, like 30/40/50 years, as a sphere that’s low to the ground.  Each year, in June/July, a few Silverswords in the crater will grow a long flowery stalk, and once this occurs the plant dies.  The dead plant still retains its stalk, but it’s obviously dead

Three Stages of Haleakala SilverswordsHaleakala is littered with dead Silverswords, and there are lots of the live, sphere shaped plants to be seen as well.  We were lucky to have an opportunity to go into the crater while the Silverswords were flowering–just seeing that in itself is pretty rare.  But we were able to get a once in a lifetime photo while we were there.  Here, in one frame, is an example of the Silversword in each one of its stages.  This may be the only photo of a plant I think is actually very exciting.

Test Driving Flock

Is anyone else using Flock exclusively yet? I downloaded it after I saw an ad for it (I can’t remember where) and checked it out. It looks a little smoother and full-featured than Firefox, but I haven’t really hooked in all of my social networking accounts and really tested it out yet. There’s a pretty good writeup about it on linux.com that makes me want to try it again when I have the time to really use it. I haven’t seen enough personally to convert, but there are some pretty cool features described there.

If you’ve tested it, what’s your favorite feature? Is there anything there that I can’t do with Opera or Firefox by using plugins?

8 Shows That Would Be Better Than Rock of Love

I’ll never be able to forgive myself for watching both seasons of Rock of Love in their entirety. The only thing I can do that would possibly atone for my actions is recommend a few shows to VH1 that may allow me to gain some of my self respect back. In no particular order, here are eight shows that would be more interesting and more entertaining than Rock of Love.

Nikki SixxThe Purity is Right With Nikki Sixx

Contestants shoot heroin with the Motley Crue bassist and try to guess it’s purity. The contestant closest to the actual purity level without going over gets to spin the big wheel, which contains various rehab packages. The grand prize includes detox and a spot on Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew. All contestants receive a complimentary double dose at the methadone clinic good for one visit only.

 

 

David Lee RothSurvivor DLR

Contestants are stranded on a deserted island with David Lee Roth. Instead of being voted off of the island, contestants remove themselves voluntarily. The contestant who can stand DLR the longest is the winner. The game gets harder as more contestants leave and survivors are forced to spend more and more time with Diamond Dave.

 

 

 

Kid RockThe Ultimate Fighter with Kid Rock

The concept is pretty simple–we follow Kid Rock as he tours the country’s Waffle House’s and nightly challenges drunks in pugilistic competition. A game show? Not really, although I guess you could consider anyone who doesn’t get Kid Rock’s bodily fluids on them a winner.

 

 

 

Ozzy OsbourneWhat’s My Line with Ozzy Osbourne

Unlike the original “What’s My Line”, contestants on this show simply listen to Ozzy and translate. Contestants accrue points based on the number of words in each sentence they are able to correctly identify. The winner gets to avoid ever having to know anything about Ozzy’s annoying offspring for the rest of their lives.

 

 

 

Lars UlrichName Buy That Tune with Lars Ulrich

Lars hosts this new version of the old classic, but with a catch. When a contestant successfully names a tune they are immediately swarmed by lawyers and retired concert security guys with RIAA t-shirts (sleeves rolled up of course). If the contestant is not able to produce proof that they actually purchased the song they’ve just heard, they must choose between being sued by Metallica’s attorneys or having the security guys bludgeon them with those big flashlights (after which you will be sued anyway).

 

 

 

Axl RoseThe Roadie with Axl Rose

This one is sort of like The Apprentice. Each night, Axl Rose will either cancel an appearance, no-show the event, or storm off stage pissed off. Axl will then decide which contestant was responsible for the mishap and fire one. The winner of The Roadie earns the right to be blamed at the next concert for Axl’s behavior, and subsequently fired.

 

 

 

 

Def LepppardCelebrity Arm Wrestling with The Drummer From Def Leppard

No commentary necessary. On second thought, why did I even post this?

 

 

The Biggest Loser

This one is special because it actually pits celebrities people who used to be in bands against one another to see who truly is the biggest loser, literally. It should probably feature the members of bands like Faster Pussycat, Enuff Znuff, Britny Fox, and Vixen