August 2007 Archives

30 August 2007

So you want to be a travel writer...

Budget Travel says four different readers are going to get the opportunity to travel and report a story for them.

If they like your proposal.

The submission form is here.

I've submitted mine. If you have the travel bug, you might consider doing the same. What the heck?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/30/07 21:50 | Travel | Technorati | Comments (0)

Wanna join our football pool?

Last year, we had great fun with the blogHOUSTON Bad Sports football pool.

Anybody who wants to play this year is welcome to sign up. Details are here.

We'll probably come up with a few prizes to reward the top finishers.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/30/07 09:57 | Sports | Technorati | Comments (0)

29 August 2007

Because he's done SUCH a fine job with CUSA

Sources: At least four vie for Big 12 post (Chip Brown, DMN)

At least four candidates to replace Kevin Weiberg as Big 12 commissioner have interviewed this week with the executive committee charged with cutting the list down to two finalists, according to several sources close to the situation.

Those candidates include Rick Chryst, commissioner of the Mid-American Conference; Britton Banowsky, commissioner of Conference USA; Wright Waters, commissioner of the Sun Belt Conference; and interim Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe, according to the sources.

Two sources said the committee also interviewed a candidate from outside of college athletics, although the identity of that candidate wasn’t immediately clear.

Banowsky, 47, who interviewed with the committee on Tuesday, said Wednesday night he has withdrawn his name from consideration.

“I advised the committee that I appreciated the opportunity to visit with them, but I don’t have interest in the job,” said Banowsky, who served as associate commissioner of the Big 12 before taking over at Conference USA six years ago. “I love working with Conference USA.”

This is what job candidates say when hiring committees laugh at them.

And given Britton Banowsky's tenure as CUSA commish (as he oversaw a once-great basketball conference's decline to a second-rate conference all the way around), I can imagine there was hearty laughter all the way around before the committee sent him back to CUSA.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/29/07 23:30 | Sports | Technorati | Comments (0)

Bad Jingles

Have any of you seen the Safe Auto commercials?

I *hated* the jingle to the commercials when I first heard it.

But even though it's BAD, it's kind of grown on me.

Has anyone else heard the thing?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/29/07 22:54 | Other | Technorati | Comments (1)

27 August 2007

A good use of Greek wine

A political crisis brews in Greece as fires rage (Ian Fisher and Anthee Carassava, NY Times)

When the water ran out, with pinecones popping and the flames still high around his house, George Dimopoulos switched to wine. He made it himself two years ago, and, nearly alone in his village as it all but burnt down on Friday night, he poured liter after liter, 200 in all, into his little copper hand-pumped crop sprayer — and sprayed and sprayed.

“I had nothing else,” Mr. Dimopoulos, 63, said.

His wine helped save his life, his house and possibly his neighborhood.

Callie's response: "The wine really isn't good for anything else."

Honestly, the Greek wine I have tried is horrible for drinking. At least it has other uses.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/27/07 23:26 | Other | Technorati | Comments (16)

25 August 2007

Now THIS is Comcastic

When Comcast flipped the switch on their internet network, I experienced a big drop in speed and reliability.

With the passing of a few weeks (and some tweaking with TCP Optimizer), Comcast apparently has ironed out whatever was causing problems in my neighborhood. As the speedtest.net results below demonstrate, I'm getting very good speeds, and it seems that Comcast's vaunted Powerboost is kicking in nicely in some cases.

These results are NOT Craptastic!

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/25/07 18:37 | Tech | Technorati | Comments (2)

The gloves didn't help

While out and about last night at a couple of local bars, I noticed former Texans and current Carolina Panthers QB David Carr running his new team's offense.

Carr was wearing these bizarre, rubbery-looking white gloves on both hands while playing.

They didn't appear to improve his performance, however.

In about three plays that caught my eye while he was in the game, one was an interception.

Nice job, David! Glad you're stinking it up for some other team now.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/25/07 13:29 | Sports | Technorati | Comments (5)

23 August 2007

80s Friday

We'll be having a blog meetup of sorts Friday night at the Continental Club.

Details here.

We may retire to the West Alabama Ice House afterwards.

Feel free to come knock down a brew with us and enjoy some fun 80s music.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/23/07 14:28 | Announcements | Technorati | Comments (0)

14 August 2007

Denver cabbie amuses

I was in Denver this weekend, and our group was riding in a cab from the airport.

As we got close to our downtown hotel, we saw Denver's light-rail line (which is at-grade in many places), and asked the cabbie if Denver had a problem with cars running into the trains.

He looked at us as if we were crazy, so we explained that we were from Houston, and that drivers run into our light rail trains all the time.

He said no, that didn't really happen much in Denver -- and said it very matter of factly.

It was pretty damn funny, although I don't think he really understood our amusement.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/14/07 23:16 | Houston | Technorati | Comments (5)

10 August 2007

Blame it on the Jäger

Woman 'went crazy' in attack on karaoke singer (AP)

SEATTLE — A woman attacked a karaoke singer belting out Coldplay on Thursday night, telling him he "sucked" before she pushed and punched him to get him to stop singing, bar staff said.

The man was singing "Yellow" when it happened.

"It took three or four of us to hold her down," bartender Robert Willmette said.

When she was escorted outside, the 21-year-old woman "went crazy," Willmette said, throwing punches at him and others, including an off-duty police officer.

Patrol officers and detectives then arrived at the neighborhood bar and blocked off the street, which inflamed the woman's rage even more, a police report said. Before police could handcuff the woman, she headbutted the off-duty officer at least twice.

[snip]

According to bartender notes, she had only a single shot of Jägermeister.

That stuff will make a person crazy.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/10/07 23:29 | Other | Technorati | Comments (2)

I still hate the Southwest cattle call

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice...

I did something really dumb earlier this week.

I flew Southwest.

I haven't flown that airline in 8-9 years, because I hate the cattle call, and I particularly hated the way they canceled my Dallas-Houston flight 8-9 years ago because the cattle car apparently wasn't full enough (it was a real inconvenience as I had a meeting I needed to get back for).

So, flash back (or is that forward?) to this Thurs, when the Tulsa to Dallas segment of my Southwest flight wasn't bad (I was surprised). And then.... We were scheduled to land in Dallas, wait, and head on to Houston. I didn't really like the routing, but it put me back at the right time, so that's why I booked it (choosing to shave $100 off Continental's price on two tickets). And it was all going okay, until the plane had deboarded, and the Southwest flight attendant announced, "Though passengers to Houston need to deboard and proceed to Gate 11."

No explanation as to what's up. Just get off and go, you cattle! At least they didn't use cattle prods on us.

There was no explanation for the change at Gate 11, where a frantic, harried, inept agent informed us she was holding a flight for us (I bet the 9:00 flight folks LOVED being held till 9:30), and then she stumbled and bumbled for 10-15 minutes with names before finally walking us on board. Where we all got middle seats (and peanuts). Because that's how Southwest's cattle call rolls.

And still never an explanation as to why our flight was canceled.

It wasn't obviously mechanical, because the plane seemed fine from Tulsa. It wasn't weather. It was most likely Southwest wanting to cram full every single seat on another plane rather than fly a plane with a few empty seats, to hell with the preferences or comfort of its passengers.

Anyway, it was informative, much like the mileage run I took on Delta metal earlier this year (Delta is a good airline in the mornings, and service/scheduling tends to go to hell later in the day). Southwest has a perfect record of canceling my Hobby flights from Dallas (two for two in the last ten years), the cattle call is still just as sh!tty as I remember, and I still have no reason to believe people who say they have great service (sorry Matty B).

I should have spent the extra $100 on Continental, and will next time. Larry Kellner's the man. Gary Kelly is not.

I did send a letter to Southwest asking why the flight was canceled, and why they didn't think it was worth informing their customers what was going on. I wonder if I'll get a straight answer. I'll update the post if I do.

Anyway, this was a pretty minor blip as far as some of the real fiascoes travelers have experienced this summer. It's not really intended as a bitch post so much as a review post of an airline I don't (and won't) fly much. Maybe your experiences on Southwest have been different.

So... more flying this weekend. On Continental. I already have an exit row lined up for the outbound segment (no cattle call!), so this should be a better experience.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/10/07 22:53 | Travel | Technorati | Comments (2)

Danger Train collision (2007-08-10)

Child hurt when car hits MetroRail train (Houston Chronicle)

A child suffered minor injuries after a car struck a light rail train in downtown Houston this afternoon, authorities said.

The car, traveling on Congress near Main about 4 p.m., ran a red light before striking the MetroRail train, said Metro spokeswoman Raequel Roberts.

The child was taken to Ben Taub General Hospital with minor injuries, Roberts said.

No other injuries were reported.

The train was replaced, Roberts said, and MetroRail has resumed normal operations.

The local media don't bother to report most of these collisions anymore. I'm not quite sure what made this one any different. Maybe that a child was injured?

Meanwhile, METRO continues plans to build even more at-grade rail right in the middle of some of the busier surface streets in Houston. That seems like a really good idea.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/10/07 19:15 | Danger Train | Technorati | Comments (0)

BigCo: Where you're a number, not a name!

This memo just came out from someone in accounting here at BigCo:

Your vendor number is xxxxx. This vendor number needs to be on all expense reports in the proper slot. We no longer pay employees by name but by vendor number. Without this number on your report, it could slow down the payment of your report. Thanks for your help

You're certainly welcome!

I would HATE to slow down accounting with pesky personal info, or any other human pleasantries.

It's too bad the memo referred to employees, though. Our new CEO (or, as he puts it, our "CEO and Coach" -- I kid not!) has made a big deal about referring to us as "colleagues."

I guess that makes me Colleague #xxxxx.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/10/07 14:31 | Other | Technorati | Comments (7)

09 August 2007

The best time of year

I don't care that it's pushing mid 90s with humidity that feels about the same in Houston, even though it's been mild most of the summer (by our standards).

The long, bad part of the year is officially over, because football is back.

And all things seem possible in preseason (unlike, say, December when the Jersey Con Man is in charge of your team's defense) -- Woo!

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/09/07 17:54 | Dallas Cowboys | Technorati | Comments (2)

07 August 2007

National Night Out

During National Night Out, I went to the gym in my neighborhood for a long workout.

I then went to the Cafe Express (not in my neighborhood) for Caesar salad and a glass of wine.

By the time we got back (after dark), the National Night Out festivities in our park were done. This neighborhood is no place to be out at night, after all. :)

How did you spend your National Night Out?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/07/07 21:36 | Other | Technorati | Comments (5)

02 August 2007

Comment Spammers

Comment spammers seem to have figured out how to bypass the Captcha challenge, which was effective at keeping the b@stards out for quite a little while.

I've taken some additional measures that seem to be working for now, but we'll see how long they are effective.

It's entirely possible that the changes may cause problems for legitimate commenters. Please let me know if you try to leave a comment and there's a problem.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/02/07 19:44 | Announcements | Technorati | Comments (10)

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