Bag of Randomness for Friday, August 7, 2015

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  • This summer is killing me emotionally, coming of age wise.  Letterman retires, Stewart hangs it up, my old phone died, I turn 40 at the end of the month.  I’m not sure I can take all of this.  Hey U2, please stick around just a little bit longer for my sake.
  • Stewart finale thoughts:
    • I loved how they brough back all the old correspondents, even though you could see that coming.  The same goes with the Trevor Noah appearance and bit.
    • It was nice to see Wyatt Cenac make an appearance after his so called falling out with Stewart.  You can say the same about Sen. John McCain.
    • Craig Kilborn is still alive.
    • Stephen Colbert is good at going off script, and as good as he can be going into character, it’s easy to tell when he’s being sincere.
    • I love all the Arby’s appearances.
    • The Goodfellas behind the scenes skit was fabulous.  It reminded me of Letterman’s behind the scenes piece, but this was much better, and I always love it when the man in charge is able to give all the off camera staff a hat tip.
    • And just like Letterman, he didn’t want the teary sendoff, he just sent it off to a great band and made the show run long.
    • “This show isn’t ending, we’re merely taking a pause in the conversation…That’s our show…Here it is, my Moment of Zen.”
    • I’ve posted this before, but I shall post it again.  Stewart found out MTV was cancelling his show and at the height of David Letterman’s fame, he made sure to be on Stewarts last show and told him, “Cancellation should not be confused with failure.”  I’d say Stewart rebounded well.
  • Jon Stewart raised more than $2.2 million for autism with final episode
  • There’s a Republican presidential candidate debate with Donald Trump as the headliner and there’s no ‘Daily Show’ coverage from either Stewart or Noah.  Man, they scheduled the finale and reboot badly.
  • I’m looking to get a screen protector for my phone, any suggestions? Off hand, I’m thinking of getting something from Zagg or BodyGuardz.
  • DaughterGeeding is about to enter kindergarten at a charter school and yesterday we took her in for an evaluation at her new school, basically some tests to see where’s she at.  The charter school is about to start its first year of existence, is run in collaboration with a college in Michigan, and seems very strict about things.  For instance, kids have to wear uniforms with the school’s emblem.  A lot of the staff moved down from Michigan and seem a bit cold and sterile, and they were all under-talkers.  When they spoke to us, it was as if they thought they were speaking at an acceptable volume but it sounded like a whisper to both me and WifeGeeding, and we weren’t in an environment that needed to be quiet for any reason.  It makes me wonder if Michigan folks are quiet people like many think New Yorkers talk fast and Texans talk slow.
  • It’s going to take a while getting used to a school that doesn’t have a principal but a headmaster.  It sounds so formal.
  • Construction wise, the school is going through finishing touches, and even though the assistant headmaster gave WifeGeeding and BoyGeeding a mini tour while I was away filling out paperwork, I wasn’t allowed to check anything out.
  • The teacher’s aide that evaluated DaughterGeeding was going over her completed test with us because WifeGeeding asked about something, and in doing so, the aide discovered that he looked over an entire page of tests he was supposed to give DaughterGeeding.  I wonder if WifeGeeding didn’t ask a question that caused him to look at the paper, would the blank page be counted as if she couldn’t comprehend the material or if they would have contacted us to come back and finish the overlooked section.
  • In some ways, I’m starting to see me becoming a “that parent”.  For instance, DaughterGeeding can write the entire alphabet, we’ve seen her do it many times at home, but she left out several letters on her evaluation.
  • I remember watching the episode of the Johnny Carson ‘Tonight Show’ after his son’s death from a car accident.  At the very end of the show, he asked for a few brief moments to talk about his son.  He addressed his son’s passing and stated he wanted to show a picture of his son, one better than his driver’s license photo which has been plastered all over the news.  From that moment, whenever I see a picture of a dead person on the news, I wonder how that photo was selected, and I wonder what’s the last picture people will see of me.  In a way, I kinda think it will be like the Elvis stamp – Fat Elvis or Thin Elvis?  Chubby Geeding, or Chubbier Geeding.  Longhaired Geeding, or Bald Geeding.  Bearded Geeding, or Clean Shaven Geeding.  Hopefully, not a younger looking Hitler Geeding.
  • Random Johnny fact –  Carson attended neither of his parent’s funerals.
  • I watched a little bit of the debate last night.  I’ll have to hand it to Fox News (something I thought I’d never say) but they seemed hard on the candidates and asked some hard personal questions, with some good follow-up questions.  I expected the candidates to lay off each other and focus on a unified message of anti-Obama and anti-Hillary, but they seemed to go after one another quite a bit.  In particular, Christie and Paul’s exchanged seemed heated.
  • TIME – Earlier on Thursday, Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina—or someone on her staff—used a hotel printer to print out a closing statement for the Fox News debate, then forgot to pick it up.
  • Rick Perry gets a pass for possibly saying “Ronald Raven”.  He definitely knows who the man was probably just had debate dry mouth.
  • All my work passwords can be typed with one hand from the home row.
  • GIF – Wisdom tooth extraction
  • Rolling Stone ranks the 25 Best ‘Daily Show’ Correspondents.  I always like how they all held a “Senior” title in a specialized field.
  • Buzzfeed – The 19 Strangest Items From Republican Primary Candidates’ Official Online Stores
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EPIC View of Moon Transiting the Earth

A NASA camera aboard the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) satellite captured a unique view of the moon as it moved in front of the sunlit side of Earth last month. The series of test images shows the fully illuminated “dark side” of the moon that is never visible from Earth.

The images were captured by NASA’s Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC), a four megapixel CCD camera and telescope on the DSCOVR satellite orbiting 1 million miles from Earth. From its position between the sun and Earth, DSCOVR conducts its primary mission of real-time solar wind monitoring for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Full NASA Article

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Bag of Randomness for Thursday, August 6, 2015

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  • You’ll still have BagOfNothing.com to start your morning, at least for the next two years.  Yesterday I finally made the effort to call GoDaddy to renew hosting and domain names.  Even though I only renewed hosting for two years I decided to renew BagOfNothing.com for five, and Geeding.com (which redirects here) for another ten.  Thanks to those of you that wanted to contribute financially to keep this thing going.  It’s tempting to accept such a gesture, but I’d feel weird doing so.  I’ll stop doing this thing if my life gets too hectic or if I find there’s a lack of readers either thought comments or daily page visits.
  • To give you a rough idea of what I pay to run this thing, it’s close to ten bucks a year just to keep the domain and a little under a hundred for hosting.  I’m sure I could get a better deal if I shopped around, but I don’t want to deal with the trouble or stress of moving things over.
  • I appreciate all the comments about pocket knives.  Heck, y’all knowledge about them is pretty impressive. I could easily carry my father’s, and it will one day be given to my son, but I think I just enjoy less clutter in my pocket and that’s why I’ll start with the key knife I bought and will go from there.
  • This Insane Corn Dog Has Five Different Sausages Inside Of It
  • San Antonio is getting Google Fiber, and I’m jealous.
  • I get the impression from Donald Trump that he’s not too involved in debate prep.
  • I wonder what will get higher ratings tonight, Fox News that will carry the debate for the Republican candidates, or Jon Stewart’s final ‘The Daily Show’.  I’m going with the debate as it hits more demographics.
  • I think it’s odd that many Fox News personalities attack Stewart.  The man is a comedian first and first most, of a fake news program of all things.  If he was a member of the actual media, a politician, or a pundit, I could understand why they give him so much attention.  But then again, maybe he’s an easy target for a demographic that can’t stand the man and that pulls in ratings.  Somewhat similar to the Yankees and Cowboys – no matter what, love them or hate them, you want to watch them, to cheer them on or see their demise.  No matter what, they get ratings.
  • Arby’s has been a punching bag of Stewart’s for a long time, so I got a kick out of last night’s show’s open which was actually sponsored by the fast food joint and they also had the first commercial spot which had a special goodbye to him.
  • Louie CK was Stewart’s guest last night, and I never saw CK so well groomed.
  • Staten Island news – Lawyer seeks trial by combat to resolve lawsuit
  • Mississippi – Mississippi trucker wins Democratic gubernatorial primary after spending $0
  • Today’s does of ‘MURICA
  • Techcrunch – Graava Is A $249 Action Camera That Edits Highlight Videos For You
  • A neat little interactive map – What if your hometown were hit by the Hiroshima atomic bomb?
  • Wired – Inside the Company That’s Made Viral Videos Big Business
  • I finally watched the season finale of ‘Halt and Catch Fire’.  There are lots of rumors that due to its low ratings, AMC will cancel the series, but it’s loved by critics.  I like it because it’s based in the early 80’s and it’s in Dallas and it’s fun to pick up on local stuff.  For instance, Belt Line was mentioned.
    • The Atlantic – The AMC drama found its legs in season two, and it could prove a worthy successor to Breaking Bad and Mad Men if it scores a third season.
    • TIME – Halt and Catch Fire Became the Next Mad Men When It Stopped Trying to Be
  • Thanks to one loyal reader, I’m enjoying another AMC show, ‘Humans’.  It’s great sci-fi with solid drama about the moment of singularity with robots that resemble lifelike humans. Thankfully it has just been renewed for a second season.
  • Robert Downey Jr. is the world’s highest paid actor … again – Some of us are old enough to remember that no studio wanted to take a chance on him because of his behavior and drug use.  It looked like his last role was going to be on ‘Ally McBeal’ and he even had to be written out of the script because of drug abuse, again.  Of all people, it was Mel Gibson that helped revive his career.  He’s fortunate he’s gotten many second chances and guidance, many are never able to kill those demons.  His first wife, Deborah Falconer, has a prosthetic eye.  I only know this because she was featured in a video in which you can’t tell which eye is fake, and we were told to watch the video as WifeGeeding was about to have the procedure.
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