Pandora

I've been checking out an Internet build-your-own-radio-station site called Pandora. Once you enter an initial "station" (artist or song) it goes to work suggesting others based on your preference for that kind of music. You can accept or deny the suggestions and build a list of your own radio "stations" (artists or songs) to listen to whenever you log on. It's based on the Music Genome Project -- analysis of music based on hundreds of unique markers (acoustic, folk, female, major key, minor key, etc., etc.) It seems to do a good making suggestions. And, it's free.

Father and Son

Besides being a committed follower of Jesus, Doyle Dykes may be the best acoustic-fingerstyle guitar player in America. (That's not just my opinion.) The following video is of Doyle and his son, Caleb, playing a duet together. Lovely to watch and hear:

Profile in Courage

I know John F. Kennedy wrote the book, Profiles in Courage, but I don't think there's a better profile of courage than the following -- at least in athletics.

The video below is a short overview of Lance Armstrong's amazing climb up Luz Ardiden, one of the highest peaks in the Alps in the 2003 Tour de France. What makes it so remarkable is the freak crash he endured on the way up, and how he recovered and went on to pass his rivals and win the stage alone at the top of the mountain. This is ranked #2 in the 30 greatest moments in the history of the Tour de France.

I hope you'll watch this -- you'll get a quick idea of why Lance Armstrong won an unprecedented seven Tours de France races (1999-2005) AFTER surviving a life-threatening bout with testicular cancer.

The following notes will help you enjoy what you'll see on the video. (I know most Americans are completely unfamiliar with the Tour de France -- you'll see images that show why Europeans are so fanatical about this three-week race.)

1. Armstrong is in the yellow jersey. He is battling his two main rivals, Germany's Jan Ullrich (turquoise jersey) and Spain's Iban Mayo (orange jersey).

2. On the way up a steep climb, Armstrong's handlebar caught on something help by a spectator and it flipped his bike right over. Mayo was right behind him and crashed also. Ullrich manage to avert the crash. (There's a commercial running on this year's Tour broadcasts that has this (paraphrased) line: "If you want to know what it's like to crash in the Tour de France, speed your car up to 40+ miles per hour, strip down to your underwear, open the door, and jump out."

3. Bike-race etiquette says that you don't take advantage of a competitor's crash, but that you slow down and wait for the victim to rejoin the race. Ullrich slowed "a little" but Armstrong quickly caught and passed him. (Armstrong had waited for Ullrich a couple years earlier when Ullrich went off the side of the road and had to climb back up and rejoin the race -- so Ullrich knew he had to wait for Armstrong, though initially he pedaled right past and kept going, perhaps thinking Armstrong would be out of the race since the crash was so hard. Little did he know . . .)

4. Armstrong almost injured himself again when his foot slipped off the pedal.

5. Some kind of fire ignited in Armstrong and he raced, out of the saddle, up the mountain, leaving Ullrich and Mayo in his wake. One of Armstrong's teammates, José Rubiera, began pacing Armstrong up the mountain to catch Ullrich and Mayo.

6. One lone rider had been ahead of the peloton (main group) all day and Armstrong caught and passed him as well. When going past, he gave him a "Good job" pat on the back as he went by.

7. Note the fanaticism of the orange-shirted (Spaniard) Basque fans (Mayo's fans) taunting Armstrong as he rides between them (it's a half-taunt, half-cheer) -- and how these fans paint the names of their favorite riders on the surface of the roads on the way to the top in the mountain stages.

8. The physical strength Armstrong displayed to stand up on his pedals and crank out kilometer after kilometer up the side of this Alps mountain is unequaled. Knowing how painful it is for me to pedal like that for just a short distance, it's amazing what Armstrong did -- like a machine.

There's a level of courage and strength in the human body and spirit that may go unrevealed in most of our lives because it never gets tested. Who's to say what each of us might accomplish in the right moment?

Hope you enjoy:

More Sweepstakes Key Words

Here are five more keywords for the Fly to the Finish Sweepstakes (from the last two days):

musette
swede
podium
slipstream
jet inspired

Enter here.

Carowinds

Spent the day Friday at Carowinds with Daniel, Jennifer, Ellen, Arianna, and Jen's mom, Kathy, who drove down from Mountain City, TN. Here are a few snaps from the day:

Waiting for a gigantic bucket to fill and dump out thousands of gallons of water:



The dump:



The girls (young and younger):





Raft rides -- great fun!





At the wave pool:





We survived the Log Ride/Plunge/Soaking:



Zapping spooks in the pitch-dark haunted house. (These were literally point-and-shoot since I couldn't see the girls.)





Daddy and girls:



The last water ride of the day. Daniel and I were laughing so hard because we'd struggled all the way down to turn the raft around in the plume as we came down -- unsuccessfully, as it turned out:





You can't see them very well, but Daniel and the girls are in the "bucket" that I keep following with the camera. This (riding backwards and in circles) left Daniel kinda dizzy for the rest of the day. (The girls were fine, of course.) I wouldn't even attempt it -- don't do well going in circles, surprisingly. :-)



And a video to end with of Daniel, Jen, and the girls coming down the plume: (We rode lots more water rides than this one (plus other non-water rides) -- somehow just ended up with more pix of this than the others.) Poor Arianna at the end: "Hey, a little help here!"

A great day -- lots of good fun, sun, and food.

Review of 3G iPhone

Here's a balanced review of the new Apple 3G iPhone by a trusted source:

Sweepstakes Key Words

Here are today's key words for the Tour de France Fly to the Finish Sweepstakes:

first class
general classification
sprint

Enter here.

GPS'd Bike Route in Google Earth

Playing with technology while I should be working -- uploaded some bike routes from my bike GPS (Garmin) unit to motionbased.com which provides analysis of the ride (speed, elevation, average this and that, plus more I haven't figured out yet). Then exported one of the rides to Google Earth so that it gets overlayed on top of the amazing Google Earth visuals. Then saved a couple of different .jpg's to upload to the blog.

This is an overview of the 32 mile ride, leaving from my house in Stallings, east through Mineral Springs over to Monroe, north through Wesley Chapel, then back to Stallings:



This is a "perspective" (slanted backwards) in Google Earth showing a close-up of the bike route leaving my driveway, out the subdivision, down Potter Road, then coming back on the opposite side of Potter Road, back into the subdivision, back to my house. The GPS differentiates riding on either side of the road, a difference of 20 feet or so:



Pretty cool stuff. Now, back to work.

Man with a Plan

T. Boone Pickins is an 80-year-old Texas oilman. He's pure Texas from the ground up. He started with a $2,500 investment in the oil bid'ness when he was in his 20's and is worth $4 billion today. He's a visionary and a leader and pretty savvy.

He's decided nobody in Washington, present or future, is going to do anything about America's dependence on foreign oil -- which costs us $700 billion a year ($7 trillion in 10 years) -- so he's coming up with a plan. He's funding his own network TV commercials to announce his plan and will have more commercials coming. His plan involves a rapid move to wind power to substitute for the natural gas we currently use on other things, moving the natural gas to power America's automobiles.

Two things I read that he said are interesting coming from an oil man:

1. Our dependence on foreign oil is a problem we can't drill our way out of.
2. My plan is not about making money for me. I'm 80 years old and have four billion dollars. I don't need any more money.

You can go to his website -- http://www.pickensplan.com -- to read more. But here's an introduction to "the man with a plan:"

Like Rats on a Sinking Ship

Axel Springer AG, one of Europe's largest newspaper publishers, is migrating its 10,000 employees at 150 newspapers in 30 countries to Apple Macintosh computers from PC's. They will be second only to Google as the largest corporate base of installed Macs in the world.

Here's the CEO of the company explaining why they made the move:



Ha ha! If you're like me and don't understand German, here are the four reasons they're making the switch as summarized in a Macworld article:

"Most of the company’s layout work was already being done on Macs
"Macs are more user friendly than other computers
"Apple creates the most elegant computers
"Macs are cheaper to buy and easier to maintain than they were in the past."

The migration away from PC's and the horrendous Microsoft operating system, Vista, is beginning. When the (German) people responsible for Mercedes-Benz autos and other precision/quality products move to Macs . . . . If you're still using a PC, don't be the last to see the light.

The Future of Food

David sent me a link to a great price on The Future of Food -- one of the best documentaries available on the (negative) changes taking place in the food industry -- the impact of agribusinesses on smaller farmers, local food production, and the encroachment of GMO's (genetically modified organisms). I own this DVD and recommend it.

You can read about the documentary here, and buy it here for only $9.09 (w/ free shipping) at deepdiscount.com.

Buying these kinds of DVD's for your personal library is an excellent way to evangelize -- people who won't take time to read a book will watch a DVD if you'll loan it to them. Don't miss this great price.

With a tip-'o-the-hat to Dave.

Wednesday 7-9-08 Sweepstakes Code Words

The Fly to the Finish code words for today are:

power
energy
born from jets

Enter here.

Fly to the Finish Sweepstakes

Here are today's key words for the Saab (Tour de France) Sweepstakes for any who are playing:

hammering
fly to the finish
efficiency
fly

Enter here.

Do You Have Yours?

Saab Sweepstakes Key Words

Here are the Tour de France key words I collected today that you can use to enter the Saab Fly to the Finish sweepstakes (see previous post). Enter here.

Key words:
sportcombi (spelling is correct; it's the name of a Saab car model)
hydration
aerodynamic

Fly to the Finish Sweepstakes

Every year, the Versus Network is the only American source for watching the Tour de France broadcasts. (To find the channel number for Versus in your area, go to the Versus home page and enter your ZIP code in the box at the upper left corner of the page.) Versus, in conjunction with Saab, runs a "Fly to the Finish Sweepstakes" every year in conjunction with the Tour. The main prizes are always a Saab car and a top-'o-the-line Cervelo bike.

You enter a key word daily on the Sweepstakes page to see if you're a daily winner. (I think daily winners are entered for the Grand Prize at the end -- not sure about that.) Because several key words are given out each day which can be entered (each word can only be entered once), it makes it challenging to accumulate all the key words. They are given out on the race broadcast and at several other web sites. (If you get behind, you can enter the words cumulatively at any time, I think. You don't have to enter the words on the day they're given.)

If you want to play, I'll post daily all the key words so all you have to do is go to the Sweepstakes entry page and enter the words. You have to register the first time you enter, then use only your email address to enter from that point on.

Here is the Fly to the Finish Sweepstakes entry page. I think the first time you try to enter a key word it will say you need to register to play. Then just enter your email address to make subsequent entries. After entering a key word (and you don't win) click to enter another word until you use up all the day's words.

Here are all the key words that have been issued so far (that I'm aware of). You can go to the entry page and begin playing with these words:

saab
rpm
time bonus
echelon
breakaway

Check the blog daily (preferably near the end of the day so I'll have had time to accumulate the words) and get the key words for the day.