I’ve been looking for a project where I could try a video-on-video effect I like. I had some suitable background video from my 24 Hours of Amtrak Hell and this song is one I like. Ideally I would have waited until I was more proficient with the song but I’ll be 68 in a couple of weeks so we go with what we got. (This was easier than I expected, mostly because I used Screenflow instead of iMovie.)
A Few Words In Defense of Our Country
Tumblr, teenagers, and digital marketing
Let me say up front, this is a very long article. But I found it most interesting. Couple of nuggets:
“They are the most brilliant digital strategists,” she said. “These teens are better marketers than anyone in the game right now.”
“Tumblr culture has developed over the past five years as the smart weird kid in school connected with all the other smart weird kids from all the other schools all over the world”
My takeaway: There’s a big online world of which I am totally oblivious. And, maybe, tweens and teens today are fundamentally different creatures from anything I can relate to? As one who is child-free, I can’t be certain of that. Just a feeling after reading this piece.
When time stands still
In late summer of 1972 I had been “promoted” from baby-sitting the automation that ran our FM radio station to a live shift (3-7 p.m.) on the AM station. I had recorded weather reports for the FM station but being on the air live was intimidating.
Our stations had no affiliation with national news networks so our only source was the Associated Press wire. Every hour the AP teletype would spit out a national news summary, timed to run about five minutes for a typical reader. At our little stations, the announcer on duty did everything, including reading the news at the top of the hour.
At precisely the top of the hour, the FM automation stopped cold for exactly five minutes. The person “running the board” on the AM would throw a switch that “simulcast” the two stations for those five minutes so the same live newscast could go out on both the AM and the FM. At precisely five minutes past the top of the hour, you throw the switch back as the FM automation takes over again.
I found this procedure challenging. More accurately, I found the last 30 seconds challenging. If you were in the middle of longer story you had to find a place to break in order to “make the join.”
After a week or two I started getting comfortable with this operation and then one day I finished reading the news — every story — and looked up at the clock and saw that I was a minute early. I couldn’t flip the switch to send the FM back to automation because it would result in a minute of dead air. The Ultimate Sin for new radio guys.
I don’t remember how I filled that minute. Probably with weather, maybe a couple of “community highlights.” All I really remember was the knot in my stomach and the sense of time dilation.
It’s unlikely that I’ll ever be in a situation where I have to “fill” for a minute. But if I am, I’m going to tell this story.
Mantan Moreland and Ben Carter
SALT Gun
Last fall I came across a story (and video) about the SALT Gun, a non-lethal home defense weapon. Think of a paint-ball gun except the balls are filled with some combination of chemicals that incapacitates. This video is what persuaded me to order one of these. And I like the idea of a weapon that won’t kill my drunken next door neighbor if he stumbles into the wrong house at 3 a.m.
After reading the operations manual and handling the gun for a bit, I decided to return it. (The company has a 30 day return policy.) Here are a few of the reasons I decided not to keep the gun. First, from the ops manual:
Pressurize the SALT Gun only when it will be immediately used.
At 2:00 a.m., in the dark, with a stranger in the house… will my wife remember this extra step?
Firing the SALT Gun – Eye protection must be worn by the user.
I’m guessing this something they have to put in the operations manual but it raises the question: Is this device save for my wife to use? Must she keep safety glasses with the gun?
I found the Trigger Safety Button hard to operate. Had to push very hard and fiddle with it to move it to either position.
And finally, I found the gun bulky, a bit heavy for a woman and generally unwieldy. This might be the perfect solution for some… but not for us.
What Is Tao?
Taoism regards the entire natural world as the operation of the Tao, a process that defies intellectual comprehension.
Taoists understand the practice of wu wei, the attribute of not forcing or grasping.
Jen – a human being will always be greater than anything they can say about themselves, and anything they can think about themselves.
Tao is a sort of nonsense syllable, indicating the mystery that we can never understand — the unity that underlies the opposites. […] Tao is a reality that we apprehend deeply without being able to define it. […] Anything that is expressed about the Tao is not the Tao.
We have been trying to fit the order of the universe to the order of words. And it simply does not work. The real basis of Buddhism is not a set of ideas but an experience.
When we say that we are trying to make sense out of life, that means that we are trying to treat the real world as if it were a collection of words. (Words are just symbols)
We are taught to figure things out, and our first task is to learn the different names for everything. In this way we learn to treat all of the things of the world as separate objects.
Humans get in their own way because they are always observing and questioning themselves. They are always trying to fit the order of the world into the order of sense, the order of thought and words.
Every stream, every road, if followed persistently and meticulously to its end, leads nowhere at all. […] Any place where we are may be considered the center of the universe. Anywhere that we stand an be considered the destination of our journey.
“The mystery of life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.”
Craig Watson
This one is for posterity. I haven’t seen or heard from Craig Watson since the 50s. Our fathers worked together at KBOA (Kennett MO) back in the day before Craig’s family moved to Memphis, TN where his dad was a well-known TV sports reporter. We were born on the same day so I wound up with some photos. If you’re out there, Craig… hey! call me.
What, me worry?
