Miscellaneous Hootenanny

My topics and attitude lately have been too serious, and it's time to lighten up a little. Issues usually don't get under my skin, but for some reason the editorial cartoon situation alarms me deeply. Enough about that. Time for a rambling post about all kinds of miscellaneous items.

For any one who working in a corporate IT environment (or may have in the past) the BBC series "The IT Crowd" is worth a few laughs. It's not Ricky Gervais, but supposedly its get better and better. All 25 minutes of the first episode are online at Google Video.

Related to this, I've been reading quite a bit about how the new content distribution model is changing very rapidly. Google might make a very large footprint in this market. More importantly iTunes video has been a success, and even seems to be increasing the TV viewership of the shows that have been made available to download. I won't pretend to know any more than the 10 zillion other people who are observing this transformation, but this much is clear: The massive investment made in the late 90s in Internet infrastructure such as fiber optics might finally be paying dividends.

And finally I'm in the market for a new gadget, preferably one that will allow me to enjoy some wifi capability and write more blog posts on-the-go. I've compared low-end laptops, and it's possible to get an impressive array of features for a relatively small amount of money. But I'm also eyeing the Nokia 770, a wireless mini-tablet that has earned decent reviews for the Debian Linux implementation of an Opera browser and simple wireless connectivity. It looks useful for browsing and scanning RSS newa feeds, but I expect it’s clumsy for typing.

Finally, on a family note, our 10-year-old daughter is overextended. She's playing volleyball, she's in a musical, a variety show, and the church choir - not to mention girl scouts and saxophone lessons. I realize the plight of parenthood involves driving everywhere and encouraging them every time they express a passionate interest - but unfortunately 10 year old girls express many passionate interests, and it may be time for more self-examination and kitchen table conversations before we hit the sign-up list.

And I am tired of these blank gray Ohio winter skies.