Wes's Blog NewsFeed(url)<%)()%> Stuff I hope you find interesting. en-us Nucleus CMS v3.32 © Weblog http://backend.userland.com/rss http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php/nucleus/nucleus2.gif Wes's Blog http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php <![CDATA[New blog software]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1971 http://www.thefondrens.com/wes.

Thanks.]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1971 Thu, 7 Aug 2008 15:21:54 -0600 <![CDATA[I think I'll wait until later]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1958

]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1958 Sat, 2 Aug 2008 20:06:41 -0600 <![CDATA[Funny image from the Woot-Off]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1947 ]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1947 Wed, 30 Jul 2008 21:45:59 -0600 <![CDATA[The Secret of My Success]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1928
Well, it was the worst job interview I've ever had. I left at 4:00 to make to a 8:45 meeting. I was on the road so early, they had shut parts of the interstate down for construction. I lost about an hour. I thought, “No big deal, I left in plenty of time.” I later called to let them know I would only be 10 minutes early and the lady said, “Actually, you're already 50 minutes late.” Yep, my 4:00 AM brain had forgotten they were on Eastern time. It gets worse.

While I had her on the phone, I confirmed the directions she'd emailed me. The first step was exit the interstate, turn left, and go 15 miles until you see a specific milestone. Fifteen miles and 20 minutes later, no milestone. I called her back and she said, “Oh, I forgot you weren't coming from Atlanta. Should've gone right.” I backtracked another 20 mins, go the correct 20 mins, and showed up an hour and 43 minutes late for a two hour meeting. It gets worse.

I ended up meeting for about an hour with different professors. I gave my communication spiel to the chair of the department which is supposed to be the wow-and-impress, shock-an-awe presentation. At the end, she said, “I guess that's good. I'm actually a theatre professor setting in as the interim chair this summer. I really don't know anything about communication.” It gets worse.

Before I left, they wanted to know what days and times I would want to teach in case I was selected (ha, ha). Originally, they had said it would be one 215-student class on Tues/Thur. I told them I preferred mid-mornings, to which the prof replied, “Oops. It looks like we've waited too long to schedule the auditorium. The only classrooms open just seat 40 students. Looks like you'll have to teach five sections scattered over five days a week.” The original plan had provided enough cushion for me to complete my dissertation and not have to move. The new plan provided no room for sleep and involved a full move. Strikes four and five.

The other side of I-20 was shutdown in two places on the way home, so I was detoured twice through small towns not equipped for interstate traffic (or cell phone coverage). The five hour trip home gave me time to realize what a disaster the interview had been and to ponder my lack of employment. I felt like the Job of jobs. Which made it all the more ironic was when they called Sunday and offered me the job that I had to call back Monday and decline. It was hard to make my mouth form the words. They were very gracious throughout the whole process and wished me well.

A good time was had by all.]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1928 Wed, 23 Jul 2008 10:45:40 -0600 <![CDATA[Party favorites]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1926 this kind of makes sense.

]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1926 Tue, 22 Jul 2008 13:40:22 -0600 <![CDATA[Our loss, his gain]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1908
Thanks be to God for his lavish generosity in giving us so many years with my grandfather. And thanks to all of you that asked me regularly how he was doing. I will miss him.

]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1908 Fri, 11 Jul 2008 23:33:32 -0600 <![CDATA[B.O.C. fun]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1872
It was totally worth $8.Here is a pic of the whole stash (the feet were already here).



Here is a walk through. First, there was a red backpack.



An Absolute “three rock” bracelet.



Three wireless phone jacks. This is nice because we wanted to move our answering machine to the kitchen.



The cool part of the loot was a Kyocera bluetooth earpiece and wireless speaker system. It also has a car charger that charges anything USB and a wall charger for USB devices. Most cool.



The best part of the box was the 61 bags of Texas air used for packing. The kids loved them, popping every one with a jump.



Cohen's favorite part was the box.



All in all, it was a great bag of crap. Muchas gracias, senior Woot.
]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1872 Thu, 3 Jul 2008 14:20:38 -0600 <![CDATA[Stewards of Creation]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1864 this link. It's a story about a church in Birmingham that helped clean up a river, which is a good example of what my previous post was about.]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1864 Sun, 29 Jun 2008 07:26:04 -0600 <![CDATA[Good news in the news]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1856 this one make me happy.

Two-thirds care for environment because it's God's creation

From Christians in Hawaii to Buddhists in Connecticut, and from Jews in New York to Muslims in Wisconsin, people of all walks of faith are finding a myriad of ways to care for the environment, according to a first-of-it-kind report from the Sierra Club.

According to the report, “Faith in Action: Communities of Faith Bring Hope for the Planet” 67% of Americans said they care about the environment because it is God's creation.

Highlighting faith-based environmental initiatives in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, the report praises the “breadth, depth and diversity of spiritually motivated grassroots efforts to protect the planet.”

The 36-page report highlights different programs, from Episcopalians working to restrict oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to a large-scale recycling program at a Southern Baptist megachurch near Orlando

The report said faith communities are leading a new eco-conscious wave that is rolling across the nation, “greening” all areas of religious and secular life. Reducing their carbon emissions, protecting endangered species and launching energy awareness campaigns are just some of the efforts being made.

The report is the latest indicator of a fledgling alliance between environmental groups and religious institutions, even as some conservative religious groups remain skeptical about the causes and concerns over climate change.

“Lasting social change rarely takes place without the active engagement of communities of faith,” the report said.

]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1856 Sat, 28 Jun 2008 13:36:31 -0600 <![CDATA[Probably more info than you wanted about television]]> http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.php?itemid=1839 Brian's post today about Tivo's remote and interface evolution were interesting to me. Ironically, I was just teaching about Tivo in class today. Here are a few details that might be interesting.

-The act of recording something to watch later is called “time shifting”.

-Time shifting is a big problem for advertisers (and indirectly networks) as you can imagine; people skip commercials.

-Researchers have found that people are less likely to time shift competitions and reality shows. Viewers don't mind shifting scripted shows. Take a look at last week's Nielsen's top ten most viewed shows. Notice only 40% are unscripted. That's a major changed from years past.

1 NBA FINALS ON ABC-GM 6(S)
2 AMERICA'S GOT TALENT
3 60 MINUTES
4 TWO AND A HALF MEN
5 CSI: MIAMI
6 CSI: NY
7 DATELINE SUN 9PM
8 DEAL OR NO DEAL 6/17(S)
9 HOUSE-MON 9P
10 MILLION DOLLAR PASSWORD
10 SO YOU THINK CAN DANCE-WED

-Tivo and similar services harvest all recording and viewing patterns for every user. Eventually, most intend to sell this highly valuable information to networks and advertisers. The viewer's behavior data is actually property of the company and not the viewer.

-Both Google and Yahoo! have made aggressive efforts to purchase Tivo because they want access to the harvested data.

-Time shifting rocks.]]> General http://www.thefondrens.com/wesblog.phpindex.php?itemid=1839 Wed, 25 Jun 2008 15:24:21 -0600