Tag: Grover Cleveland

Super Bowl Sunday With The Foxes

I watched until it looked like Pittsburgh had put it away, then fell asleep. I half heard the 100 yard runback with my eyes closed and head on a pillow on the sofa.

Super Bowl Sunday–I never got out of my pajamas. Didn’t shower until after 10p.

madeline.jpgWe started the day watching the entire “Puppy Bowl V.” OK, I didn’t totally dedicate myself to PB-V but I was in the room. I love Harry Kalas’ voice, but he really isn’t a great v/o reader.

I want the Beagle with lighter brown markings as a family member–Madeline.

We were watching NBC when Matt Lauer interviewed President Obama. Audio problems! Wow. That never used to happen on the network. I’m curious if this was staffed and set-up the same as it would have been 8-years ago?

Was President Obama too casual? No tie. Is it OK for the president to make Inspector Gadget references? Is it OK for a president to be impolitic and take sides in a football game, as he did?

He seemed like the nicest, most engaging and charming president of my lifetime. He makes Bill Clinton seem like Grover Cleveland.

I was uncomfortable President Obama was so relaxed and casual. It’s my problem I suppose. Just not used to it.

Coin toss. Who knew General Patraeus was short?

I didn’t have a lot of interest in the actual game. I watched until it looked like Pittsburgh had put it away, then fell asleep. I half heard the 100 yard runback with my eyes closed and head on a pillow on the sofa.

I did wake up for the exciting conclusion.

One of the best parts of the day was reading Ana Marie Cox (the original Wonkette) on Twitter. Here’s a sample.

A Husky/Beagle mix playing in #puppybowl. That must have been one hell of a blind date.

Will @animalplanet be sued by FCC for showing pussy during halftime of the #puppybowl?

Griffey totally railroaded out of #puppybowl!!! Nipping is the opposite of “un-puppylike behavior”!

Apparently David Patraeus overseeing superbowl coin toss but not the Iraq elections

Are NFL coaches’ headsets the only form of technology that gets *larger* as it improves?

I don’t even really “get” football but even I understand that a 100-yard interception return is bad. Maybe the Cards are McCain after all.

This “Born to Run” song is kind of catchy! I think it could be a hit!

Cheering for the Cards reminds me of how being a Democrat used to feel.

Pitchers and catchers only a few weeks away!

The Web’s Encyclopedia – Wikipedia

I’m going to write a little about the Wikipedia. If you would have told me about this idea, I would have said (without hesitation) it would never work! Wikipedia is the free-content encyclopedia that anyone can edit.

It’s just too strange. Anyone, without even signing in or giving their name, can add or edit any article of the over 500,000 articles. I know because I just added something to an article about Grover Cleveland.

Wikipedia currently has 517864 articles.

That number excludes discussion pages, image description pages, user profile pages, templates, help pages, articles without links to other articles, and pages about Wikipedia. Including these, we have 1465956 pages.

Users have made 13331279 edits since July 2002; an average of 9.09 edits per page.

In my last blog entry I cited Wikipedia’s article on Cleveland. After re-reading the Wikipedia entry, I realized there was one fact that was deficient.

Grover Cleveland lost an election with a majority of the popular vote. Wikipedia said that also happened to Al Gore. That’s true, but it also happened to Samuel Tilden in 1876 – one of the dirtiest, most questionable elections in U.S. history.

I went to Wikipedia, found the article, hit edit and -bing- it’s corrected.

The Cleveland article has been expanded and edited dozens of times since its original 13 word submission in 2001. I know because every change is documented and it’s possible to easily compare two versions of the same entry.

Here’s the weird part. The more I look at Wikipedia, the better its ‘research’ seems. Certainly there’s an inherent bias whenever any person writes. I would venture to guess the Al Gore comment came from a disgruntled Democrat.

Over the long run, with Wikipedia It makes little difference, as bias and errors seem to be quickly corrected. After all, I fixed the Cleveland article (which wasn’t wrong, just incomplete).

The Wikipedia community exhorts users to be bold in updating articles. Wikis develop faster when people fix problems, correct grammar, add facts, make sure the language is precise, and so on. It’s okay. It’s what everyone expects. Instead of asking, “Why aren’t these pages copyedited?”, you should fix the problems you see yourself. It does require some amount of politeness, but it works. You’ll see.

If someone writes an inferior, merely humorous article, article stub, or outright patent nonsense, don’t worry about their feelings. Correct it, add to it, and, if it’s a total waste of time, replace it with brilliant prose (and relegate the deletions to bad jokes and other deleted nonsense or the corresponding talk page). That’s the nature of a Wiki.

Try it yourself. Pick a subject you know and see how Wikipedia does. If it’s a good article, you’ll be hooked, as I am. If it’s bad, you can go away or fix it. I’m guessing you’ll be hooked.

All of this would be so much easier to explain if the name wasn’t so… well, if it wasn’t so ridiculous sounding. Wikipedia! Come on. Who thought of that?

Cherry Hill and Back

We had to make a rush trip to Cherry Hill, NJ earlier today. Google’s new maps program says the round trip was about 354 miles. That seems right. It’s about the limit for driving and getting anything accomplished before heading home.

Luckily for us traffic wasn’t too bad. We missed morning rush going into New York City and afternoon drive coming home. The only real snag on the trip was here in Connecticut, around 6:30 PM, traveling through Fairfield County.

I have no idea why went went slowly… but it did. It was worse than anything we saw on the Cross Bronx Expressway, if you can believe that.

I would guess a large park of our traffic free passage had to do with the advent of E-ZPass. Having this RFID tag in your car eliminates making the trip unnoticed, but it sure does speed things along.

The toll booths near Meadowlands Stadium were always a choke point. With E-ZPass we breezed through at highway speed. Same thing for the George Washington Bridge.

My only concern was a cryptic message at NJ Turnpike exit 4, when we saw a sign that told us to go – though our tag hadn’t been read. Honest officer, it was on the windshield.

It will be a surprise to find out what the toll actually is. I have no idea. It wasn’t posted anywhere.

This is a trip we used to make all the time while Helaine’s parents were alive.

I remember stopping on the Jersey Turnpike, driving our Mazda 929. When Steffie was an infant, the 929’s trunk made the perfect open air changing table.

The rest areas are still named after famous New Jersey residents like Joyce Kilmer, Vince Lombardi, Grover Cleveland and Thomas A. Edison.

Is Grover Cleveland’s family proud to know that this former president’s most conspicuous achievement in the 21st century is having people mention his name when they need to make a pit stop&#185? It would probably be defensible if he were still on the $1000 bill.

Speaking of the rest areas, it looks like they’ve been rebuilt, adding additional outward ugliness to what were ugly buildings to begin with. There are flowers near the sink (and loud music) in the mens room. The restaurant section is a medley of your favorite fast food joints in a food court arrangement.

New Jersey continues to lead the nation in “Full Service” gas stations. From a National Review commentary:

It is illegal to self-pump in New Jersey. You must have a gas-station professional pump your gas and ring up your purchase. This might have made some sense in 1949 when the law was passed and when most of the population still smoked and stupidity could conceivably kill at the gas station. But times have changed and pumping gas is a safe activity that almost everyone but the handicapped can perform with the greatest of ease. Pay-at-the-pump technology is standard at gas stations coast to coast. Motorists fly through stations with the breathtaking efficiency only Americans can take for granted. That is, except in New Jersey and Oregon