Candidates Conversation

SATURDAY the 16th: Pastor Rick Warren (Saddleback Community Church) will host a two-hour conversation (not a debate) with John McCain and Barack Obama this coming Saturday at Saddleback Church in California. Rick Warren is probably the only pastor in America with enough clout to get both the candidates to participate in what is being called a "Civil Forum" on the issues in the campaign.

It will be from 5:00 - 7:00 pm (PST) and broadcast on FOX News and CNN. There will also be a live webcast of the event online from the Civil Forum website.

SUNDAY the 17th: Warren is going to deliver a sermon titled "Making Up Your Mind: Questions to Consider Before the Election" at his church on Sunday. It is supposed to be streamed live over the web though there is nothing posted yet on the Saddleback site as to time, etc. This is their webcasting site so I'm thinking this is where it will show up, but have no idea what time. If I find out I'll post the details.

Given Rick Warren's levelheadedness, I'm posting this info assuming this "Civil Forum" will indeed be civil and therefore productive.

Apple Most Valuable

Apple, Inc., is now the most valuable company in Silicon Valley, overtaking Google. The rise in its stock price, due to sales of recent popular products like the iPhone 3G, has pushed its market cap (shares x price per share) to $158 billion, overtaking Google's $157 billion value. Pretty amazing for a company that many said was dead just a few years ago. Read the story here.

Vegetable Garden at the White House?

The founder of Kitchen Gardeners International has started a movement to get the next resident of the White House to maintain a vegetable garden on the White House lawn. Hey -- it's our lawn -- should be our decision.

Elevated

Fun meeting today with Steven Furtick, founding pastor of Charlotte's Elevation Church (three locations). Started less than three years ago, it has exploded in growth and impact in the city. (They've baptized over a thousand people in the last two weeks. Here's a link to the video testimony of one of the guys that got baptized -- first time Elevation has had to bleep out part of a salvation testimony -- I love it.) Met with Steven to discuss an upcoming book project.

Pictured are (L > R) Lori Black, Steven's assistant; Steven Furtick, and Chunks, the church's exec pastor:

Why Macs Are Better

Bob Levitus is a long-time Mac columnist in the computer world, author of over 50 computer books. In this article he lists 12 reasons why college students should take a Mac to college instead of a PC. Whether you're going to college or to Starbucks, the reasons are still valid for anybody looking to buy a computer.

TIme Warner Road Runner PowerBoost

For those who have TW Cable Road Runner Internet Service, it just got faster again -- this time for free -- sort of. If you are a Road Runner Turbo subscriber ($10 a month extra), you now get the new add-on called PowerBoost for free.

Following is the copy that came in the email -- sadly, almost two weeks after the PowerBoost debuted, so I've been without it SINCE YOU HAVE TO POWER OFF YOUR MODEM AND RE-POWER IT ON FOR THE POWERBOOST TO BE ACTIVE. Once done, I could tell a significant speed bump in the way pages pop onto the screen.

Read the following and take advantage if you have RR Turbo service already:

Dear WILLIAM:

As part of Time Warner Cable’s commitment to provide the latest in technology and innovation, we are pleased to announce that effective Tuesday, July 29, we enhanced Road Runner Turbo with PowerBoost™. Now when bandwidth is available, on our Advanced Fiber Network, Turbo customers will experience faster download speeds (up to 16 Mbps)!

PowerBoost will last for the first few seconds of a file download. Once the PowerBoost burst is complete, your download will continue at your normal blazing-fast speed. PowerBoost will jumpstart a large file download and automatically reduce the overall download time.

PowerBoost activates automatically when network capacity is available and is FREE with Road Runner Turbo!

To ensure that you receive the full benefit of this new enhancement to your Turbo service, you may need to "re-boot" your cable modem by unplugging and re-plugging your equipment.

Sincerely,
Time Warner Cable Customer Care

Men's 4x100 Relay Video

Thanks to Priscilla for this link to the final leg of the men's 4x100 free relay that was so exciting. It's only the last leg, but there is a nice analysis portion at the end showing how the splits came off. I'm posting this for those who have PowerPC Macs instead of Intel Macs. The videos still won't play on the NBC site if you have a PPC Mac.

Best Relay Race in History

I'll try to find a YouTube video to post tomorrow, but if you missed the last race of the night on tonight's Olympic broadcast, you missed what everyone is saying is the best swim relay in history.

It was the men's 400 meter freestyle relay. Michael Phelps was on the team and they needed to win gold for him to keep alive his hopes of winning a record eight gold medals in one Olympics -- but the French team was favored to win. The French, in fact, had said they were going to "smash" the American team: "It's what we came here to do." Phelps swam the first leg and gave the Americans the lead, but it evaporated in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th leg -- until about 15 meters to go. The American swimmer had been gaining on the French guy slowly over the last 25 meters, drew even in the last 5, then out-touched him by .08 of a second, setting a new world and Olympic record.

It was amazing! The neighbors probably wondered what all the yelling was about I was yelling so hard, and crying when they won. And Phelps and the other guys went nuts on the deck. I'm sure someone will put this on YouTube and I'll try to post it tomorrow. (To watch videos on the NBC Olympics web site with a Mac, you have to have an Intel-based Mac -- how ridiculous is that?)

Here are the winners -- Phelps is on the left and the guy that saved the day on the fourth leg is on the right:

Salute Update

Noticed in the men's 400m IM swim awards ceremony in which the US took gold and bronze that both Michael Phelps (gold) and Ryan Lochte (bronze) "saluted" the flag during the national anthem. So at least we know there is no rule against doing it. (Not that I thought there was.)