I am not a .net programmer, but I work with lots of ‘em, and every once and a while they make a mistakedo something that takes our development site down for a while. The other web designer and I love looking at these messages for their unintentional and very geeky humor. For example, here is this morning’s error:
I’m not sure how computers/servers do things “lazily”. I also got this today:
“Actively refused” huh… this is the one I see quite often. Good times. I love .net today. If ever a post deserved the tag of “geeky”, this one is it.
The window for transfers (kinda like free agency) in the EPL comes to a close at midnight tonight. Due to the strangeness of this time, it has been dubbed “silly season” because rumors fly, player value can skyrocket, and crazy things can happen (like Fernandes’ abrupt about face on Sunday).
Well, in the 11th hour, Everton just got linked back up with one of Argentina’s best players, Juan Roman Riquelme. This is the second time this rumor has surfaced in the last few months, but if it were to happen, that would be EXCELLENT. Riquelme is easily one of the top 15 players in the game today, and it would be a real coup if the blues were to land him.
Yesterday Everton welcomed back former Everton fan favorite Thomas Graveson on loan from Celtic to help in the midfield. I’m looking forward to seeing this guy play. The fans had specific songs for him and he is described as “fist-pumping” and “mercurial” and has the nickname of “MadDog”. Even if his form has started to pass him by, he should bring some passion and competitive spirit back to the blues. Hopefully we get to catch a glimpse of him this weekend in the game against Bolton. Go Blues!
In a saga that has taken way too long, all the terms agreed to, phyicals passed, work permits secured, “i”‘s are dotted and “t”‘s crossed, Yakubu finally completes his move to Goodison Park. Maybe we will even get a chance to see him on Saturday?
As many of you know, I’ve been getting interested in photography lately and am entertaining the idea of getting another camera. If I do, I’d be looking for an upgrade from my trusty PowerShot A610 – minimum of 8 megapixels, a little more zoom (or an SLR that would let me grow it as much as my wallet will allow). Maybe something like the EOS 40D, Digital Rebel XTi, or even something like the PowerShot G9 that could give me the simplicity of a point and shoot, with the expanability of an SLR … I honestly don’t know right now.
Does anyone have any suggestions or know of any good camera/photography resources? I’d like to do my homework and make an educated decision. I’m familiar with retailers like B&H and Adorama, but if anyone has any other suggestions, I’d love to hear it. I’m accumulating info right now, no purchase is imminent.
So I submit this to the collective knowledge of teh internets. If anyone knows any other good online resources, or has good first hand knowledge of any products (for or against), I love to to hear your stories. I know many of you have a camera or two, what do you like and dislike, etc…
Wow, I didn’t realize I had 3 soccer (football for the europeans) related posts in a row. I’ll try to be a little more balanced in the future. Its just that time of the year and I’m a bit excited about all that is going on, especially in the Premier League (EPL) right now.
In what would undeniably be the biggest move (so far) in soccer this year, Chelsea FC’s billionaire owner, Roman Abromovich wants Brazilian megasuperstar Ronaldinho (his brilliance can be seen in the video below), and he wants him by Friday (when the transfer window shuts). Ronaldinho currently plays his club soccer in Spain for Barcelona where he runs with the likes of Lionel Messi, Theirry Henry, and Deco (another rumored Chelsea target).
Would be amazing if it happened. Scary to think of that attack (Drogba, Ronaldinho, Schevchenko, Lampard, etc… the list could go on and on).
A day after tying Blackburn in a hard fought game, Everton Football Club (my favorite team) have gotten some bad and potentially devastating news. Early in the preseason we lost forward James Vaughan to a dislocated shoulder. Shortly thereafter, we lost our center midfielder/Australian international Tim Cahill to a foot injury. These two injuries effectively decimated our depth in offensive positions. The speculation over the last 2 weeks has been that Everton was going to buy 2 new players to help with this, Middlesbrough striker Yakubu and Benfica’s Manuel Fernandes. Yakubu is a proven striker in the EPL so the Toffees (Everton’s nickname) were understandably excited, however Fernandes was the one we were most excited about.
Fernandes was on load with Everton for a few months last year and he was special. He was a playmaker, seemed to like the team, and really understand what the manager expects from his club. He made things happen on the field, and was a young and upcoming star. The thought of a midfield with Arteta, Cahill, and Fernandes serving up strikers AJ and Yakubu had most Everton fans salivating.
Well today we all came crashing back to earth. After passing his physical and having all matters of the contract agreed upon (but not signed), transfer fees set, even being the personal guest of the Everton owner at the Blackburn game, Fernandes has decided to do an about face, and sign with Valencia (in the Spanish league). This move came out of nowhere and has stunned all involved.
To make matters worse, Yakubu’s transfer bid is also looking tenuous as he cannot secure a work permit now to “work” for another team in the EPL. There is a rule for foreign players that they cannot play for an EPL team unless they have played in 70% of their country’s international games over the last 2 years. Yakubu, a Nigerian star, has fallen out of favor with the coach of the Nigerian national team, so while he has been a star in the EPL for 5 years, due to a technicality and a political matter, that transfer may be crushed as well. Everton is appealing the work permit issue for Yakubu and should have a final answer on Wednesday.
And the transfer window is closing fast (all teams need to be set by August 30), and won’t open again until January I think. I hope David Moyes can figure something out…
Looks like we won’t be seeing Manuel Fernandes doing this again this season.
I tried my hand at some action photography this weekend with some mixed results. The shots on flickr aren’t great, and they are undeniably the best of the bunch. My brother’s men’s soccer team (the Lions) was playing in the “state cup for old men” this weekend. Despite the heat, humidity, and only having my trusty little point-and-shoot camera (Canon PowerShot A610), I got a few fun pictures and more importantly I enjoyed it, so all in all, I’d call it a win.
It has been a win for my brother too, they have won all 3 games so far (one more in an hour). I have been at two of the games and the combined score of those wins was 16-3, so they are showing up too…
UPDATE – they won all 4 games and thus the title… good job! Final combined scores – 27-7. Pretty solid tournament guys, good job.
I “personally believe” she truly “such as” has a gift “like” for “and” expressing herself. Third runner up, really? Did she even listen to the question? I’m not sure how she managed to work South Africa and Iraq into this one…
Dan (aka “Ploafmaster General”) has resurrected this semi regular column called “Ask Dan”. Its free, no obligations, just ask and cross your fingers that hechoosesyours! He is able to discuss at lengths subjects that he has some or no knowledge about, so why not give it a whirl and fire one off to him (just leave a comment in his most recent Ask Dan)?
“Google SketchUp 6 is a 3D modeling software tool that’s easy to learn, simple to use, and lets you place your models in Google Earth. Are you remodeling a kitchen, landscaping your back yard or adding a deck to your home? Google SketchUp makes it faster, easier and a lot more fun. From simple to complex, from conceptual to realistic, Google SketchUp helps you see your vision before you build it.”
I’m admittedly intrigued. May have to spend some time playing with this over the weekend. Also interesting to note that they offer a “SketchUp Pro” for $495. I’m curious if this compares to professional level modelling programs (at a fraction of the price). If so, this may justify Adobe’s concern over Google buying Picassa. Maybe there is a Picassa Pro coming soon that will be every bit as robust as photoshop at a fraction of the price…
This mother obviously did a great job instilling her child with that old adage. I’m not sure she thought he would do with for help with his math homework though. Priceless. I hope it was a slow night at the 911 center – if so, I applaud the helpful nature of the man on the line.
Remember 80′s music? Some of it is pretty hard to forget, despite your best efforts in some cases. If you enjoyed 80′s music (or want to feel nostalgic for a few minutes) check out Armstrong Family Circus’s “Best of the 80′s”. Good stuff.
I still get goosebumps hearing “Kyrie Eleison” by Mr. Mister.
With a little time on my hands, I set up two Google products to work with chriswho.com, Google Analytics and AdSense.
The change you can see is AdSense – it displays those contextually appropriate ads at the top of the page. My traffic numbers are currently low enough I don’t expect to make any actual cash, but I thought it would be a fun experiment to do it, and I’m looking forward to seeing what ads google chooses to serve up based off of my blog post content. So far, it looks like PETA‘s protest ads regarding Michael Vick are winning, but on other pages you can get some others… fun stuff (in an ultra geeky way).
None of you will ever see Analytics, but it is very cool. It is another free tool from google that gives me some impressive reporting on the site’s traffic. Once again, very geeky, but this is my profession, so I should be aware of as many of the tools of the trade as I can.
So far, I’m impressed with the quality and ease of installation/use of both tools. I’m trying to learn more about SEO and monetizing web properties, so I think this is a good way for me to “dip my toe in the water” so to speak. So far, I like what I see.
The rumor around the office is that this cutie checks this blog quite regularly while hanging out with his pop. In case you are seeing this, I just wanted to give you a shout out. FYI little dude, if you ever see the gremlin baby on the streets, just walk the other way, he will pick a fight with anyone …
In case anyone is curous about “The Dark Knight” (the next installment of the new and improved Batman saga), some photos have appeared on flickr. No spoilers (that I am aware of) but it looks like the Tumbler is back, and this time it has a friend. Also, Heath Ledger as the Joker looks like it could be a stroke of genius.
Scared of the “sky is falling” attitude regarding the US economy especially in regards to real estate foreclosures? While there is a real problem, Richmond is actually fairing better than most expected. In fact, according to the article, we are actually the city doing the best right now. Pleasantly surprising news.
The Richmond chapter of James Madison Univerity‘s alumni association has a new webmaster for the website – richmonddukes.com. Yup, Matt and I are taking it over and hope to do something fun with it. Sadly, we just found out it runs on a pretty rigid custom CMS system (likely some computer science student’s final project). I look forward to the challenge of figuring out what things I can and can’t get around on this system. I’ll post again when there is something worth looking at over there.
Something tells me, if nothing else, this could be a fun experiment for showing, hiding, and repositioning content with CSS … Wish me luck!
I love weather, I love storms and clouds, and hope to one day take a turn as a storm chaser. I had never heard of a “gravity wave” in the clouds before.
Violated this man’s rights under the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 8th, and 14th amendments (really, the second amendment? how did he affect your right to bear arms?)
Attempting to sue for $63 billion, he actually managed to sue for $63 billion billion (backed by gold and silver by the way)
$63,000,000,000,000,000,000 – I know player’s salaries are ludicrous, but come on
Assuming my math is correct, that is 1300 times more than the combined Gross Domestic Products of every country in the world in 2006!
Vick stole two dogs
Damaged RFID chips
Fought the dogs
Sold them on ebay
Bought missles from IRAN (didn’t see that coming, did you)
Pledged allegiance to Al-qaeda
Subjected him to microwave testing
Used drugs in school zones
Is “in the business of” illegal steroids
Managed to “physically hurt feelings” (I’d pay money to know how this is even possible)
Is ordered to stop “dashing my hopes”
Wow. Reading that lawsuit was undeniably the highlight of my day. I am a little sorry that Vick will have to spend real time and money fighting these slanderous and obviously false claims, but it brought a little humor to my day.
Thanks Giselle for sending me this wonderful mockumentary about the developers of MS Paint. Brilliant. This reminds me, I should write Adobe a “thank you” note for creating Photoshop (then again, the outrageous price of their software reminds me that I hate them too).
Manchester City (an English Premier League club) has a new legendary coach (Sven Goran Eriksson), eight new players coming from all over Europe, and a new owner (Thaksin Shinawatra) footing the bill for all of it. The new owner is a little different from the other owners – he ran a country before he took over the reigns of the football club.
Yup, he was the prime minister of Thailand. Wait, this story gets better. He has been under investigation for corruption by Thailand’s government. Well that “investigation” just resulted in an arrest warrant for him as well …
Spring is wonderful for a sports fan. College Basketball gives you March Madness, the NHL and NBA playoffs (the only time I care about either sport). The English Premier League is coming to a close… so many excellent options. Sadly, during the summer, baseball and golf are the only “games” around (I don’t want to really call either a sport), and I strongly dislike both.
The MLS helps fill the void, but it has yet to get to the level where I can get passionate about it.
The good news is as of this weekend, GAME ON! The NFL pre-season and most importantly, the English Premier League season have begun. And for those of you keeping track, my teams, the Redskins and Everton both won yesterday!
SAJ (aka my day job) has recently started a blog (when we are ready for traffic, I’ll post on here again). So I don’t screw with the production site, I may be testing out things over here, so if you show up one day and it has completely changed, don’t worry, I’m just screwin’ around.
I saw the new Bourne movie over the weekend and I loved it. But this is not really about the movie, as much as it is the ad campaign… How interesting is it that they put a 15ft x 50ft billboard saying “Bourne comes home” on the side of Matt Damon’s NYC apartment building (where he literally “comes home” every day). While I’m sure he probably is used to it, how surreal would it be to come home to a 10x life-sized version of you every day.
While Jeremy Cowart is far from a household name, chances are really good if you listen to music or watch tv, you have seen some of his photography. Jeremy just released a new version of his site, which I find quite inspiring (both the site design AND the photography).
