One Trick Pony

You know those little refrigerator magnet collections you can write poetry with? Now there’s a site where you can piece sentences together word by word and hear Dubya say them. This could be fun.

The first high point of today’s advisory board meeting was a field trip to C-SPAN. We met two of the on-air folks who do Washington Journal every morning, something June and I often wake up to. No sign of Brian Lamb, who to me serves as a great example of what one person can do with skill, persistence and vision.

Washington Journal has the Capitol building as backdrop, a view so perfect that it almost seems as though it must be greenscreened in. As we toured the studio where that takes place every morning I was gooing and gahing so much about it that one of the other board members asked if I’d like my picture taken sitting where the host sits.

So there I am, so hurriedly squatting there that there was no time to straighten my tie or wrestle my coat into order. The tour had already moved on so this felt slightly illicit. Quite a thrill.

The afternoon was spent actually responding to Cable in the Classroom’s plans and having our brains picked clean. Lots of good ideas flying around.

OK, I’ve written before about the Somali guy who often turns up to take me to the airport in San Diego. Tonight I’m in DC for the first meeting of Cable in the Classroom’s National Education Advisory Board. I noticed the driver’s accent the moment he spoke. Not the usual Nigerian dialect… this one was sparking off synapses in me that hadn’t been stoked in years. “Na Salon yu come out?” I asked him, which is to say, “Are you from Sierra Leone?”

His jaw dropped. “What are you saying?”, he asked. No doubt my accent is bad after 30 years of not speaking it, but also he was completely unprepared to have a white guy talk to him in Krio. We had a great time talking about Sierra Leone and in just a few minutes I was able to dredge up memories of some old Krio proverbs and the afternoon greetings in Temne. The four other board members crammed into the back seat were somewhat mystified, I think.

Oh, and the board meeting was cool, too. What an interesting collection of people! Tomorrow we’re touring C-SPAN before settling down to work.

Thanks to MeFi, I just learned of the existence of “West Wing” Watch: A guide for the discriminating viewer of my favorite show, and Television Without Pity, another site. I’ll add them to my Thursday morning surf routine.

From Pedro Meyer, an Argentine photographer:

“On June 17th, every year, the family goes through a private ritual: we photograph ourselves to stop a fleeting moment, the arrow of time passing by.

I wish we had done this ourselves. A nice way to savor life’s unfolding. [from GeekPress]

By now you’ve probably heard about Microsoft’s short-lived answer to the Apple Switcher ads. Daring Fireball summarizes the story and points out the obvious bogosity of Microsoft’s version of what happened. It’s disheartening to see such amateurish gamesmanship on Redmond’s part, but more disturbing is how slack the mainstream media were in getting at the facts. Whatever happened to that Woodward and Bernstein fervor?

I’m heading to Portland this evening, thus knocking one more state off my list. Unfortunately all I’ll see will be the usual airport->hotel->lab->airport circuit, though I hope to have lunch with an old friend. More later.

Well, that’s an exaggeration, but it’s official today: I’ve lost 20 pounds since July! Another 20 and I’ll again be the guy that June married.

Only grayer.

Here’s a detailed analysis of last night’s speech by the Commando-in-Chief. Lots of data missing for such a momentous undertaking. Where’s the beef?

A UK company has announced a Tablet PC designed for use in schools. Some of its features:

• Mark homework by annotating directly over common file formats.
  
• Collect homework, naturally hand mark it, and return it to their network folder with your comments attached. (when used with our RM Community Connect 3 network).
  
• Include hand drawn sketches, diagrams and drawings quickly and easily to any assignment.
  
• Gather data and take detailed notes during?field trips, writing and drawing your notes in a format you can use later on.
  
• Present a lesson to the whole-class, while facing them, using Easiteach Studio.
  
• Prepare lessons from the comfort of your home, on the train and in the staffroom.
  
• Read and annotate electronic texts during study or discussions.
  
• Notes are stored in Microsoft’s new ink format, and can be searched later as if they were text.
  

What’s interesting about this is the price: around $1250 if my conversion is correct. That sets it apart from the Tablet PCs coming out next month which are pricier than laptops and aimed at the mine’s-bigger-than-yours business user. Once these get down to $300 or so, we’re onto something.