Teachers are scary

So, most of the time I've very grateful for the men and women who dedicate their lives to teaching children. It's an important way for our society to progress and continue to evolve towards a better tomorrow.

But sometimes teachers forget that they aren't the only ones who decide what's best for kids. I'm always amazed/frustrated when I read stories where the teachers did not ask for any sort of parental input or engagement. I don't think that teaching should happen in a silo.

Anyway, read this story and tell me what you think.

Teachers stage mock attack

More Apocolypse

I can add to the recent signs of the times being reported.

On Friday I put the air conditioner into our bedroom window by myself, and in about 5 minutes.

I credit this to rote memorization from the last four years rather than any actual handyman skills of my own.

My bike ride

Apparently, my style of posting does not attract people to read my blog. Fortunately, I'm mostly only writing for my family but I thought I'd try my hand at something longer.

Maybe I'll get a few links from the few people I know that blog.


So... topic... topic... topic.

The problem is that I spent my days on serious stuff so I'm not sure that I could whip out something funny. And, since I doubt that anyone wants to read my pontification on marketing, I'm going to write about biking.

Recently I had a conversation with some friends about biking. One of my friends asked what kind of bike I had. To which I confidently responded "A Schwinn". And of course, that showed just how little I knew of my new hobby.

I can now give the update that I have a Schwinn 26" Men's Ranger. Which is more specific but I still don't know what that means in comparison to other brands or models.

But, what I can do is talk more about the ride. I used a Google Maps mashup to calculate that I ride about 4 miles one-way. It's not that long, but there are a couple of hills. It takes me about 35 minutes to ride to work. That's much longer than I want to take each morning. And much longer in the afternoons once work is done. So, the first thing that I'm working on is improving my speed. I can feel it in the muscles on the tops of my legs (quads for you smart people).
Which is working. I have already noticed that I'm able to go faster, which makes my legs hurt even more. Hopefully at some point in the summer the hurting will stop.

I've also got some cool biking equipment. I won't spend too long talking about the shorts ;) but I've got a nice helmet, a pedometer, and sunglasses. I've also been using my iPod on the trip since I ride along the river trail here in Boston. I don't have to worry about getting hit by cars (for you worried mothers, my wife already brought up that point).

Because I ride along the river, I tend to ride through clouds of gnats on the way home, when it's warmer and humid. The sunglasses are a lifesaver. But the river is so green and lush that it's totally worth doing.

And one last thought about biking is that it makes me much more aware of the weather. I never really cared before because I'd just be driving and then sitting in the office all day. But now, I always have to know what the weather is going to be like the next day (or the morning of) so that I don't end up riding in a rainstorm. I did that my first week of biking... it was not fun.
In fact, Mia picked me up at the grocery store along the way. We had to put my bike in the trunk with the back wheel sticking out. Every bump along the road made the trunk smash down on it. Even after I tightened the bungee cord that was holding down the trunk.
I don't want to repeat that kind of abuse to my new bike.

Anyway, I'm a biker now. Next step is a tattoo I suppose.

Yearly Links

So, there are some blogs that do weekly links... I don't do that.

But, since I did want to link to some of the cool things that I use and since Zack posted some videos of Aida, I thought I'd do it now.

First, I think that Aida has a little Ethan in her.

Second, since our laptop hard-drive is getting full already (it's 60GB and we thought that would be fine), I haven't installed any chat programs except Yahoo! for video chatting with my parents. Instead I use Meebo

My dad turned me onto the TWiT podcast and I listen to it now while I ride to work. It's good because they provide perspective on all the new happenings online. A very grounded perspective.

And lastly, I want to put in a plug for Google Reader. If you aren't already using RSS feeds, you don't know what you're missing. And I can't explain it.

Internal clock

Mia just called me and put a very sad Ethan on the phone. He woke up from his nap and I wasn't home yet.

I normally would be. But, Mia worked on Wednesday this week so I came home early then and I'm staying later at work today.

I wonder if Ethan has a long-term internal clock that beyond just regulating him to 2 hour naps or getting up at 6:30am each morning. His longer clock tells him that on Friday, even though he can't conceptualize that as a day of the week, he should wake up from his nap and see me.

Interesting thought. No idea if it has any merit though.

Happy Father's Day

This one's for you Dad.



Also, if you have a Google account, you should be able to log in to Blogger and update your profile to United States (and you can even keep it private). That might trigger an English page and you can still leave anonymous comments.

Blogs vs Bloggers

I was reading today at Marketing Profs. (sign-up req'd) about the dark side of blogging. The main theme was warning against the addiction of blogging.

This was in the context of using blogging as a platform for business, specifically trying to start or promote your own business through blogging. So, I'm going to take exception with some of the article.

Blogs and Bloggers are two different things. I have a blog, but I'm not a blogger. I update my blog for personal reasons, family reasons, friend reasons. I like doing it but as anyone who's followed my blog knows, I don't post every day.

I think, that this is also the reason that I don't twitter. I'm not trying to gather a following, I'm not trying to be a thought leader and give people frequent updates so they'll always know what's on my mind.

However, one thing that I did find true was the desire for feedback. Having a few friends and family that check my blog now, I'm always hoping some people will leave comments for me. I'll have to try and fish for them better.

I've toyed with the idea of becoming a blogger. But I keep resisting because I don't think that I want to get addicted.

ABCs

This is the final post in a series that I recorded a while ago. This is a cute little video of Ethan trying to recite the ABCs. He's getting pretty good... but not quite there yet.

Grilling Season

It has begun. The weather was so nice yesterday that we decided to make hamburgers yesterday. And then today, I decided to do some grilling again.

Now that we have a gas grill, I think we'll be doing much more grilling this summer than we have in the past.

I'm excited.

Addict

One thing that I've discovered, or rather articulated because I remember feeling this way two years ago when I was running in the mornings.

While there is some inertia to get over when starting an exercise regime, once I get going I crave more of it. After having ridden my bike about 5 times now to work, I totally want to keep doing it. Even though my legs are sore, and I still get very winded, I want to keep doing it.

I'm not going to take a before picture but maybe when the summer is over, I'll post up an after picture of how good I look.