pre-vacation blogging lull

I am supposed to be getting ready for my trip. Mostly I have been procrastinating.

training resentment

I spent all day Thursday and Friday in training to be an interviewer. Personally I am a subscriber to the "blink" method of evaluating job candidates. I think every company should be free to decide whom it hires by whatever method it chooses. In a free market, the companies with hiring practices that select the most productive workers for their companies would rise to the top, those with ineffective processes would fail. But, in today's America, companies cannot choose their hiring practices solely (or even primarily) on the basis of selecting the most productive workers. No, they must have a hiring process that is defensible in court. This is what I resented about the training: it is being foisted on us to try to keep the company out of court while maintaining the charade of "we would use this anyway since it is such a great process". If, as they claim, being "fair to everyone" and not discriminating on the basis of anything gives you the best workforce, then why do we need a bunch of laws and lawyers and "victims" running around to enforce that? If it really is the best, the market will bear it out.

On the bright side I got to go to Sonic twice.

rerun rapture

I am intensely enjoying the replays of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. The new season starts September 8. Television doesn't get any better than this show. I can watch every episode again and again.

yelp is back

In the spirit of the Democrat's call in 2000 to "count every vote" I am reinstating the Yelp gadget because after the official vote tally, two more yes votes came in. I do not want to be accused of disenfranchising these voters.

the "people" have spoken

I got four votes on my poll regarding the Yelp gadget on my blog:

• 1 vote for Yes, leave it on
• 2 votes for No, take it off
• 1 vote of "Incapable of deciding"

Recent reviews by Jack O.

What's this?

olympic funny

Watching Olympic swimming you keep hearing the commentators say things like:

• "he's the best breast stroker ever"
• "she has really been working on her breast stroking"
  

Insert Beavis and Butthead laugh here.

olympic sports?

Olympic sports that kick ass:

• women's beach volleyball
• track and field
• swimming
• shooting
• archery
  

Olympic sports that suck ass:

• anything synchronized or rhythmic or artistic
  
• anything involving animals other than humans

Olympic sports that shouldn't be:

• sports that have events and championships that are already bigger than the Olympics (e.g. road cycling, tennis, soccer, boxing, baseball, basketball)
• sports you can play in your basement (e.g. ping pong a.k.a. table tennis)
• sports you have played in your backyard (e.g. badminton)
• sports that require "judging" (e.g. diving, gymnastics, trampoline)
  

training hike 2

Took a hike today on the Illinois River Bluff Trail in Robinson Park. Last weekend I hiked south from Forest Park Nature Center on the Pimiteoui Trail then south on Grandview Drive continuing down Adams to Detweiller Marina and back. Today's hike was much more pleasant due to both the environs and the weather. For both these hikes I loaded my backpack with 30 pounds of weight, loaded the iPod, put on my new hiking shoes and socks and walked. I have taken these hikes to help prepare me for the trip to Colorado with my father planned for the first week of September.

The new trails in Robinson Park are great. You can now hike from Camp Wokanda on the north end all the way south to Route 6. Kudos to all the Boy Scouts whose projects contributed to these trails.

representation inflation

While watching the "parade of nations" I noted discrepancies between the number of athletes listed and the number of people walking into the stadium. Examples:

• Vanuatu listed 3 athletes, but had 9 people (including the flag bearer) walking in
• Gambia listed 3, 9 people walked in
• Benin listed 5, 10 people walked in
• Mauritania listed 2, 6 people walked in
• Barbados listed 8, 13 walked in
• Burkina Faso listed 6, 14 walked in
• Niger listed only 1, but 11 walked in
• San Marino listed 4, but 10 walked in
• Congo listed 5, but 11 walked in
• Iraq listed 4, 10 walked in

There were certainly others, but the above were small enough to count easily and happened to be on screen as I type this. Something about having more people than listed athletes walk into the stadium offends my sensibilities.

Contrastingly, Albania listed 11, but had only 5 people enter the stadium. Bravo for bucking the trend.

I am pretty sure that Palestine is not a country, yet they walked in as if they were.

very refreshing

We watched episode 61 of Gene Simmons Family Jewels tonight. Gene was on the USS Nimitz and was extremely supportive of and complimentary to the sailors there. This was the third episode of the show where Gene has interacted with the US Military. Each time he has been genuinely humble and grateful to the military. It is great to see a rocker who is openly patriotic.