Random thoughts, etc.
Seeing the news today about the horrific wildfire affecting Gatlinburg, Tennessee and surrounding area is heartbreaking. I vacationed there 2 years ago. It’s a truly fun tourist destination. I’m at least happy to hear that Emergency Management officials initial report that Ober Gatlinburg ski resort had been destroyed turned out to be false.
This seems like a good time to take a look at my photos from Gatlinburg when it wasn’t the frightening disaster area it is right now.
With both my father and my grandfather gone from the world now, Father’s Day is just another day on the calendar from here on out. However, it’s also a good day to take a moment to remember my father. The easiest way to do that is to take a look at the memorial website that I created when he passed away. It’s a static website (unless anyone submits new memories to be posted) that remains as a tribute to to him.
The site can be found at emilgatti.com.
I’m not usually one to get sappy or emotional over the ending of a TV series (ok, maybe The West Wing a long time ago) but the final episode of MythBusters was tonight and it’s truly the end of a great era. It started more “water cooler” conversations than can be counted. It’s put so many words and terms into public view. I mean, really, who would know what ballistics gel or ANFO is if not for seeing it on MythBusters.
It’s also given us catch phrases that stuck with us. Who could ever forget “Jamie wants big boom,” “Am I missing an eyebrow?” or “When in doubt, C4!” Of course, my favorites are still “I reject your reality and substitute my own,” “Failure is always an option,” and “Anything worth doing is worth overdoing!”As much fun as it it to see the guys (sometimes gratuitously) blow things up, there was a more important role played by MythBusters over the past 13 years. Adam and Jamie showed us that the scientific method can be fun and rewarding. They also showed that almost any problem can be worked out and resolved using science, engineering and patience.
In particular, they taught the younger generation (or two) that this might be something they want to do for a living. I guarantee that our country and many others around the world have MANY more scientists and engineers because of MythBusters and I’m sure there are so many more students at every level studying science, technology, engineering or math (aka STEM) right now because Adam and Jamie taught them it’s fun, exciting and cool.
Think about that… A TV show that was meant to entertain, educate and have fun with common myths and misperceptions, starring two guys that none of us had heard of 13 years ago, managed to play a real part in shaping the future of the science and engineering communities. Who would have thought that was possible? Well, OK, I know who thought that… every single one of us who ran into work or school on 24 Jan 2003 and said “OMG, you have to see this cool new show that was on Discovery Channel last night!!!”
It’s always sad when the Olympics are nearing an end. You know that you’ll have to wait another 4 years (well, 2 years, really, even though the Winter Games are much better) for them to come around again. Going into this year’s Olympics in Sochi, I wrote a post about not being as excited as I have been other years. That was partly because I was busy in the weeks leading up to the Olympics, but moreso because of the location. Prior to the start of the games we heard nothing but stories of how hotels weren’t ready, terrorist attacks were a real possibility, the Russian government would curtail some human rights, Sochi had gone so far over budget, stray dogs would be slaughtered and so many other negative things. Now, with the closing ceremony less than 24 hours away, the games seem to have gone off without a major hitch. Bob Costas even made it back so we didn’t have to endure any more of Matt Lauer and Meredith Viera!
What’s more important, it seems like everyone, myself included caught the Olympic spirit once the competition got underway. I watched way more of these olypics than I expected. Thanks to my DVR, I recorded dozens of hours worth of Olympic broadcasts. The best part is being able to fast forward past the stuff I don’t want to see like figure skating and cross country and catch all of the events I do want to see. I even got into curling a little bit this year for the first time.
Did Russia deserve the host the games? I’m probably not qualified to answer that question. Did they pull it off successfully? It certainly appears so!
I understand that the Olympics are a competition, but I can’t imagine what kind of miserable human being watches a young British athlete see her Olympic dreams dashed and responds by sending her threatening messages? Do these same people see an injured person or animal on the ground and rush over to them to kick and stomp on them?
Especially because they say the harassing messages possibly came from South Korea, I hope Christie makes a great comeback at PyeongChang in 2018!
I understand that the Olympics are a competition, but I can’t imagine what kind of miserable human being watches a young British athlete see her Olympic dreams dashed and responds by sending her threatening messages? Do these same people see an injured person or animal on the ground and rush over to them to kick and stomp on them?
Especially because they say the harassing messages possibly came from South Korea, I hope Christie makes a great comeback at PyeongChang in 2018!
Anyone who has been following my blog for a number of years knows that I’m a fan of the Olympics, especially the Winter Games. Heck, it’s the only sporting event I actually care at all about except maybe an occasional Philllies game. I’ve been a fan pretty much all of my life and can name the host city for each winter and summer Olympics since I was born. I think I became interested when my mother bought me a little eagle mascot from the 1984 Summer Games in Los Angeles.
Typically, as the games get closer, I get my television viewing schedule all set (a task that is made infinitely easier now that the DVR has been invented), load up the appropriate apps on my phone, sign up for e-mail alerts, etc. I’ve done those things this year, but even though it’s easier than ever to follow what’s going on at the games these days by following Twitter or Instagram, the excitement isn’t there as usual; at least not for me.
With less than 24 hours until the opening ceremonies, most of the news coming out of Sochi is about topics such as the abysmal condition of many of the hotels that the media are being housed in. I know people love to hate the media, but I do think they deserve water in their hotels. Other articles talk about the risk of a terrorist attack. Every Olympic Games carries a certain level of security concerns but when the Summer Games were in London 2 years ago, we didn’t park warships off the coast in case the need to evacuate Americans arose. On the bright side, if any terrorists show up (and I hope they don’t), perhaps the Russian government can send one of the contracted dog murder squads after them.
Regardless of all this, I’ll be watching the Olympics as usual. After all, it only comes every 4 years. I just hope Russia can pull it off and manage to avoid making regret taking the time to watch. At least I’ll be watching from the comfort of my home where I have running water, doorknobs, shower curtains and no ferrel dogs or construction workers living in my bedroom.
Anyone who has been following my blog for a number of years knows that I’m a fan of the Olympics, especially the Winter Games. Heck, it’s the only sporting event I actually care at all about except maybe an occasional Philllies game. I’ve been a fan pretty much all of my life and can name the host city for each winter and summer Olympics since I was born. I think I became interested when my mother bought me a little eagle mascot from the 1984 Summer Games in Los Angeles.
Typically, as the games get closer, I get my television viewing schedule all set (a task that is made infinitely easier now that the DVR has been invented), load up the appropriate apps on my phone, sign up for e-mail alerts, etc. I’ve done those things this year, but even though it’s easier than ever to follow what’s going on at the games these days by following Twitter or Instagram, the excitement isn’t there as usual; at least not for me.
With less than 24 hours until the opening ceremonies, most of the news coming out of Sochi is about topics such as the abysmal condition of many of the hotels that the media are being housed in. I know people love to hate the media, but I do think they deserve water in their hotels. Other articles talk about the risk of a terrorist attack. Every Olympic Games carries a certain level of security concerns but when the Summer Games were in London 2 years ago, we didn’t park warships off the coast in case the need to evacuate Americans arose. On the bright side, if any terrorists show up (and I hope they don’t), perhaps the Russian government can send one of the contracted dog murder squads after them.
Regardless of all this, I’ll be watching the Olympics as usual. After all, it only comes every 4 years. I just hope Russia can pull it off and manage to avoid making regret taking the time to watch. At least I’ll be watching from the comfort of my home where I have running water, doorknobs, shower curtains and no ferrel dogs or construction workers living in my bedroom.
For the past 2 months I’ve been going to different local towns’ farmers markets because our town, Gloucester Township’s market (called Blackwood Farmers Market after the neighborhood it’s held in) doesn’t start until the end of June.
Yesterday morning I went to the opening day excited to be able to shop close to home while still being able to support local farmers. What a disappointment! There were only 2 farmers there. (Luckily one was my favorite, Sorbello Girls.)
While there was a honey stand, bakery and a winery, most of the other vendors did not belong at a farmers market. No one wants to see a chiropractor, buy jewelry or buy other junk at this sort of event.
We did get there just in time for the local politicians to give speeches. :-/
Here’s hoping it improves immensely as the season progresses.
After stopping at a restaurant in Hershey, PA almost entirely because of its reviews on Yelp and UrbanSpoon and being pleasantly surprised at how good it was and how accurate the reviews were, I decided that I should write a review of my own. Of course, since I never do things halfway, I figured that if I’m going to take time to write a review then I might as well post it to a few sites. The sites I chose were Yelp, UrbanSpoon, Google+ Local & TripAdvisor. Once I spent a little time creating accounts on each site, I started to think I should write more than just one review. So, I plan to occassionally write reviews (primarily of restaurants.)
There will be no reviews of mass market chain restaurants, just local places that deserve some free publicity and will hopefully benefit from it. That’s not to say that I won’t post a negative review when warranted. There’s no reason not to warn people away from enduring the same bad food or service I suffered through.
As part of my ongoing attempt to include any content I write for other sites on my own site, I plan to put copies of the reviews in blog entries. They’ll have their own category and will be labeled with an indicator that it’s a review. I know I don’t need more random junk thrown in to my blog stream, but you’ll be seeing some big changes to the site as a whole soon (I hope!) Don’t worry the change is not that I’m converting my site to a restaurant review site.