mayo-moyle

Category: Iowa

  • Round-up – August 5

    Of interest:

    The true face of Medicare fraud (ie the real “welfare queens” aren’t the people most people picture when talking about Medicare abuse).

    Don’t commit a crime while wearing a FitBit.

    The reason your city can’t have fast internet access.

    The truth is finally revealed: I’ve Been Kenyan This Whole Time.

    Bloom County Returns!

    Seth Godin: Telling, Not Showing

    Semi-related:

    Satanic baby killers are putting dead babies in Pepsi.

    Airlines made $38 billion from extra fees (and it’s only the beginning). For the last couple months, I’ve been doing a lot of traveling (and flying) for work. While most of the associated hassles of air travel don’t really bother me all that much – crowded flights, the herd mentality that surrounds getting on and off planes, TSA checks, etc., the extra fees is the one that really bothers me.

    Who said it? Donald Trump or Frank Reynolds?

    Related: Trump Tells Iowa Dairy Farmers 500 Times Bigger than Theirs

    How experts protect themselves online. This is a really good list of how the “normal” computer users attempts to secure their information differ from how most security experts secure their systems. Glad to see that my strategy has fallen closer to the “security expert” side. Key points:

    • Keep your system updated
    • Use two-factor authentication (ie have Google, Facebook, etc send you a text message when you log into their servers from a new computer so they know it is really you – it is extra work, but makes a HUGE difference).
    • Use unique and strong passwords and use a password manager. The graphic breaks these down into three different areas, but really they are interrelated. Installing a program like LastPass not only lets you store all your passwords in one location but is excellent at generating new passwords – therefore you can have it create complex passwords like: g9xDJisX5F@3 that have an incredibly low likelihood of every being guessed by a brute-force attack (hack), and you can have a different password for every site you use, instead of always using the same password for multiple sites, with something that is a common word or phrase that is easy to guess. 

    25 things you should know about Detroit.

    How to piss off someone from Iowa. Numbers 6-9 are probably my favorite with #9 being a must read.

    Dan Dick: Who are we again? – excellent reflection on United Methodist identity.

    Semi-related: Jeremy Smith’s article: While the UMC was distracted by Covenant, Wesley Church broke the Connection.

    Just stumbled upon this great video by Kalle Mattson, like the song quite a bit too, called “Avalanche”:

    And since it has been a while since I’ve given this blog any love, here’s another song, Yo La Tengo covering The Cure’s “Friday I’m In Love”. If there was a KRUI (college radio station I worked at) for old people, I’d have this in heavy rotation.

  • I hate music, what’s it worth?

    Trying hard and failing hard to get back into a regular routine with this blog. Anyway, here’s what I’ve found interesting over the last few weeks:

    The EduPunks’ Atlas of Lifelong Learning sorts a wide variety of online, offline, and hybrid learning opportunities. A couple I’d recommend include Codeacademy and Academic Earth.

    42 Amazingly Free Things That Will Make You Smile

    The Smiths lyrics + Peanuts cartoons = This Charming Charlie (via AV Club)

    The Beloit Mindset List for the class of 2017 (this year’s college freshmen) has been released. Among the highlights:

    • GM means food that is Genetically Modified.
    • Having a chat has seldom involved talking.
    • Rites of passage have more to do with having their own cell phone and Skype accounts than with getting a driver’s license and car.
    • Captain Janeway has always taken the USS Voyager where no woman or man has ever gone before.
    • As they slept safely in their cribs, the Oklahoma City bomber and the Unabomber were doing their deadly work.
    • Their parents’ car CD player is soooooo ancient and embarrassing.
    • They have always been able to plug into USB ports.

    Not only does that list make me feel old, it also reminds me that whether I realize it or not, I do have to face a significant generation gap as I go back to school for another master’s degree. (At least my professors will hopefully get my references to Gary Coleman, Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo, and using Pine to access e-mail).

    ESPN has a fascinating story on Dan Gable.

    What You Never Realized While Reading a Postcard. I’ve had this fantasy of turning a bunch of my photos into postcards, and then developing a weekly discipline of sending a card with a personal note on it to a different friend every week. Maybe this will help push me to make that happen.

    Jason Micheli is looking at some of the “top” heresies on his blog, I especially liked his thoughts on fundamentalism.

    Friend and colleague in ministry, Bri, offers a powerful reflection on Luke 13:10-17 in her post Why not here? Why not now?

    Jeremy Smith: Preacher or Performer? The Crying Baby Test.

    Borrowed Light:

    This isn’t my “official” music selection of the week, but it’s something you’ve got to see (as it blows up all over the internet). Ylvis – “The Fox”:

    And just so you don’t have “what does the fox say” stuck in your head the rest of the day, here’s a new song from Superchunk, off their album, I Hate Music, called “Me and You and Jackie Mittoo”: