We have a blended family. My daughters and wife have Macs and I have a PC.
In fact, if you recall the Mac/PC ads, compiled here, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZSBWbnmGrE, you will recall how cool the Mac guy was and how uncool the PC guy was, that basically describes us.
So yesterday, Saturday, Ellen went to NYC to provide moral (and physical) support to Miriam to help with her apartment move from someplace in Brooklyn to some other place in Brooklyn (you can tell how well I know Brooklyn). BTW, among other things Ellen spent five hours (FIVE HOURS!!) with Miriam and Miro (Miriam’s roommate) at IKEA. I am not sure what would happen if I was in IKEA (any IKEA) for five hours, but the one thing I could not do is stay there.
Regardless, I was then faced with a dilemma. I could have gone to Synagogue (probably the right thing to do). At Synagogue there were two family events. The way it works at our Synagogue is that often families having family events ‘enhance’ the kiddush meal (making it nicer, adding options). I suspect the kiddush meal was probably pretty nice. ALSO, downtown there was the option to go to Penn Quarter, spend $13 and participate in the all-you-can-eat ice-cream sandwich activity. Evidently ice-cream sandwiches have joined yogurt, donuts, macoroni and cheese, and so on as sort-of gourmet foods (who knew).
However, yesterday was also the opening day of the Maryland Rennissance Festival, http://www.rennfest.com/. And I had a family obligation, since Miriam was coming home for Yom Kippur, Saturday, September 14 (near her birthday), and we all would be going Sunday; there was an opportunity to scout ahead to make the September visit more smooth (I admit that was a pretty weak rationale, but it was the best I had yesterday morning). Also the weather was nice.
The Festival for all who want to know is once again a great event.
I recently read an article about the annual BronyCon, www.bronycon.org, held a few weeks ago in Baltimore MD. After finally realizing that this was a real event, I naturally turned to the Internet to find… How Do You Handle a Brawny…, I mean Brony…, Um
An interesting article in InformationWeek Government about DOI’s plans for cloud computing: The Department of the Interior’s (DOI’s) decision to invest as much as $10 billion to migrate its IT operations to the cloud, through… Department of the Interior and the Cloud
I finished watching Ballad of a Soldier earlier this week, http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/ballad_of_a_soldier/.
Ballad of a Soldier per Rotten Tomatoes, was “the first Russian film to score an American success during the Cold War era”. It was released in 1959. The movie has a relatively rare 100% rating in Rotten Tomatoes, one of the reasons why I added it to my elliptical-walker-exercise-queue.
The story tells of a young Russian soldier during World War II who is given leave to visit his mother at home as a result of him knocking out a couple of tanks during a battle. While traveling home random events occur which lead him to do a number of good deeds for people and end up limiting the time he actually was able to spend at home. We are told at the very beginning of the film that he died during the war, which strengthens our feelings toward these events.
Last Friday, I was on the Federal News Countdown on WFED, hosted by Francis Rose, along with Steven Bucci, Director of the Douglas & Sarah Allison Center and Senior Fellow for Defense & Homeland Security at The Heritage Foundation.
Here is the link to the broadcast: http://www.federalnewsradio.com/156/3425850/Federal-News-Countdown-New-DHS-contract-standardizes-cyber-protections-DoD-cuts-force-lower-sights-on-drones.
The way the News Countdown works is that each of the guests talks about their third most important story of that week relating to the Federal Government, then the second and finally the most important.
The following are the three articles I selected plus some additional comments.
An interesting take on the impact of Big Data, measuring it by its overall impact on the world economy. If Big Data is, in fact, important to improving business (or organizational) behavior, one would think… Is Big Data an Economic Big Dud?
FEDERAL NEWS COUNTDOWN
As many of you know (assuming that there is in fact a ‘you’, that is people who read this), I am fortunate to be asked back by the evidently non-discerning, but always interesting and entertaining, Francis Rose to be on his show the Federal News Countdown, http://www.federalnewsradio.com/?nid=155.
I will be on tomorrow, Friday, August 16 at 3pm, on AM 1500 on your radio dial.
The way the show works is Francis invites two ‘experts’ (his words) who ‘discuss the three news stories they think are most important in the world of government’. I learn a lot from the experience.
First, I am forced to think about what I actually think are news stories that have some importance, at least for the week I participate. I even have to rank them from third most important to the very most important article.
Second, I always learn from the interaction with the other guest. Francis is great at getting together two people who bring different perspectives; it is always great fun for me.
Federal News Countdown, the Nationals, and the Maryland Renaissance Festival
For the last, well, forever, Ellen has pointed out that I have not been a very enthusiastic visitor to Art Galleries or Museums, which are places she really likes to visit. All of my attempts… Cultural Enhancement
Please join AFCEA Bethesda and the Advanced Mobility Academic Research Center (AMARC) at the Mobility Technology Symposium to be held on August 8, 2013 at the Grand Hyatt in Washington, DC. This half-day education forum… AFCEA Bethesda Mobility Technology Symposium, AMARC is an Educational Partner