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Showing posts from October, 2007

NFL in London

I'm really enjoying that as I type this, the Miami Dolphins are playing the New York Giants in London. There's a nasty, cold drizzle coming down, but the stands seem to be packed. I had a lunch meeting at 1:00 so I missed the first half, and the opening festivities. Hey! They just had a streaker! There's a guy who does this at all the events. So, anyway, for me, this is significant. As readers may or may not know, I'm first generation American, born to parents who moved from Liverpool in 1965. Being English-American barely counts as an ethnic category, but yet, I've always felt caught between two cultures. I'm a fan of both American and English football, and so this is a lot of fun, having this game on. I could probably write out a lot of interesting comparisons, but for now, I'd like to see the Dolphins continue to get trounced. If they lose, they will be 0-8 and Outskirts guy will find some way to blame our fair city. When I've been over to England, Am

Drawing your attention to the widgets

One reason I continue to keep this personal blog of mine in Blogger is because of the ease of placing widgets in the sidebar. I don't think they're terribly effective, but they're kind of neat. Of course, you have to come to the site in order to actually see them. One concern I have with advertising on blogs is that the most loyal readers who read feeds throughout the day don't ever have the opportunity to see the ads. Ads in RSS feeds seem to be kind of discouraged, or at least, filtered out. I subscribe to about 200 feeds, and none appear to have ads. So, no one sees the widgets on the side of the screen, and I don't know if they're effective. But they sure seem neat to me at times. First, the top box is just a simple thing that reads the feed of the Charlottesville Podcasting Network . Nothing fancy, and it only seems to post the top item. I'm still looking for a good player to use, and would love to figure out a way to place this kind of a player on othe

Larry Sabato weekend

So, this past weekend was a Larry Sabato weekend for me. On Friday afternoon, I went to the U.Va bookstore to record the director of the U.Va Center for Politics talk about his new book "A More Perfect Constitution" for eventual podcast on the Charlottesville Podcasting Network, as well as for a special edition of WVTF's Evening Edition. And then on Saturday, I recorded Mr. Sabato giving a slightly similar lecture as part of U.Va's More than the Score Lecture series. That recording also features Sabato's Crystal Ball. Go take a listen on the U.Va Minds website .

The real Charlie Brown?

So, what kind of a man was Charles Schulz? I've heard his family is upset about a new biography by David Michaelis' new biography called "Schulz and Peanuts" and I've just read a review of it on Salon . The book paints a picture of Schulz as much more complex than the simple life his official biography. In other words, perfectly normal and just like the rest of us. The difference is, Schulz produced one of the most recognizable works of the 20th century. But, I never knew he got divorced, and I didn't know he wasn't particularly close to his four children. He was known to respond to reporters' questions about his kids by telling tales of Charlie Brown. I think I'd like to read the book. Fantagraphics has been printing a deluxe hardcover reprint series . When I was a kid, I used to devour reprint books, and at one point knew intricate details about the character. Peanuts is what first drew me to serial strips, and I'm still hooked as an adult. I

An update on the incident at this weekend

In advance of the Hook posting an article on the topic in tomorrow's issue, I wanted to say my piece. I've been in touch with the police department through Captain Bibb. He phoned me first on Monday, but didn't have as much information then, as he hadn't spoken with the officers in question, had not gotten their report. On the first call, he did tell me that it was a report of a suspicious person in the area, and he said the officer was a seasoned veteran. On the second call, he had more information. He said the officers were responding to a call made by the elderly woman who lives in a house behind my street. Somebody had been knocking on the door, and she was frightened. When the officers arrived, they heard loud shots coming from the vicinity of my house. That's because we live underneath a stand of oak trees, and when the acorns come down, they're as loud as gun shots. I'll post an mp3 of this later on tonight. They came to my back door, and seeing the