Riding with the window down…

I am trying out Wordpress for Blackberry to see how easy it is to do a blog post while mobile. Slow typing but so far not too bad. I wish I had a dropdown box for my categories because I don’t have them all memorized.

Now, I will attempt to insert a photo.

Not sure where it will go in the post but I am going to try a video too.

We’ll see

PS. Just found the category dropdown!

PSS. The video was too large

test photo caption

Okay, so this application is nearly useless for posting images or video. The only resize option is to 640×480 - which doesn’t fit the them and the only placement option is top or bottom of the post. I guess if I just really need to say something (text only) and it can’t wait until I get to a computer, this might be a good way to do it.

Okay, this blog was created back in 2001 as “Chris Doelle’s Reading Room”, in January of 2005, I renamed it after getting feedback from the readers/listeners to “Riding with the window down…” Once again, it is time to change the name.

I want to to reflect where I am in life. No longer am I the bachelor tooling down the highway in a convertible - I am a full on parent, taking kids to school, getting groceries, saying nighttime prayers - you name it.

I want it to reflect my role as a dad, husband, and generally fun-loving guy. So give me some suggestions!!!

I have to thank my good friend Manny for turning me on to the PBS/BBC mini-series “Murder Rooms: The Dark Beginnings of Sherlock Holmes.” He knows I am a HUGE fan of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories. Holmes has been one of my heroes from the very first time I read of his exploits. As a child, I was mesmerized by his deductive reasoning, unerring confidence and unparalleled intelligence.

Murder Rooms is not, however, another retelling of the escapades of Holmes and Watson, but “the dark beginnings of Sherlock Holmes.” It is the story of the author, and the inspiration for the series of detective short stories. The main character in Murder Rooms is a young Arthur Conan Doyle (Charles Edwards), and tells of his adventures with mentor and teacher, Doctor Joseph Bell (Ian Richardson) - the inspiration for the amalgam that became Holmes and Watson.

Each of the four tales in the mini-series is presented as a standalone, feature that comes with great writing, excellent attention to time-period detail, and expertly delivered acting. The feel of the stories is right in line with the Sherlock Holmes pantheon but are delivered in their own unique way. If you are a fan of Holmes, you will love this series. If you are a fan of well-told murder mysteries, you will love this series. If you are a fan of good television, you will love this series.

If you don’t love this series… enjoy your monster trucks and fake reality tv shows.

RATING 9 out of 10

I just got an email from Twitter.com informing me that Belinda Carlisle is following my tweets! Sure, it could be a fake, but I am going to assume she is the real deal until Belinda herself comes to tell me different.

Why do I care? Well, I had a HUGE crush on her in high school - nuff said.

Hey, Belinda - feel free to come by for lunch if you get bored too.

My mother made an interesting post on facebook this morning,

How did this happen to me Chris? You know, how I used to not understand at all the blogging, etc. that you did and all the rest. Now I’m loving the fact that I can make a comment and two or three people are interested enough to comment back and I am interested in them and what they are doing, etc,etc,. I’m loving it.

I responded with the following:

It is the greatest reality show of all time. It’s real. It’s not scripted situations or setups, but connecting with real people in a real way. “All the world’s a stage!”

That exchange got me inspired to write this post. Think about it - the very thing that has been accused of dividing us and forcing us away from conversations with our neighbors, is actually bringing us together. I liken it to the difference between grade school and college. In grade school, you get to choose your friends from a very small number of people (your class.) Most of those friendships are the result of the sheer coincidence that you happen to be in the same class of 20 or so kids. When you get to college, the student population is often 15,000 - 30,000… that is a big cohort to select from. The street you live on versus the Internet is the same thing.

Just because Billy’s family bought a house next to your family, you had to choose from Billy or Stinky Frank for the role of “best friend.” Those are the same people you are escaping when hitting the Internet. Suddenly, Stinky Frank no longer makes the cut because you have millions of options.

The reality show analogy is good, with the exception that television reality shows are actually the farthest thing from reality. What you find on the net however, can be completely real.

In town for the Easter weekend, I swung by to visit Tim’s and Brian’s family (and had a great meal.) Tim was talking about his new vinyl cutting machine (Cricut) and offered to make something for my car. Rather than advertise one of my many businesses, and have to deal with property tax issues, I chose to pimp myself - chrisdoelle.com.

Overall, it does a nice job and the price makes it extremely inexpensive. Geez, now I better update my website layout to impress all the new visitors

Each year on April Fools Day, the fine folks at Google come up with the “next big thing.” As it turns out, these are usually a bit far-fetched and easily revealed to be a prank. This time however, I saw several people across the Internet that forgot it was April 1st and believed that Gmail Autopilot was the real deal.

Check out the link - they did good on this one.

Yeah, this is one of those posts that is purely observational and analytical - nothing about a new soft drink, a quirky website, or even a humorous anecdote that points out some stupid act on my part.  Just thinking.

I am still cogitating my way through this whole facebook explosion.  At first I thought it was weird because the mainstream populace has discovered the super-secret hideout for us cool kids, but it really has nothing to do with that.  It is a game-changer as it applies to how we, as citizens, behave.

We have all heard tales of people getting sucked into the vortex of this unreal, reality-TV version of our lives, but time-wasters on the Internet are nothing new.  Facebook, however, offers a level of connectivity that previous Web 2.0 and social networking sites have failed to achieve.

Think of the sheer volume of former classmates, neighbors, friends, associates, etc. that are finding it easier to reconnect.  That reconnection is the power here.  The ability to be friends with people that time and distance have removed is huge.  Sure, you could do extensive searches online and find a small percentage of them if you were skilled enough online, were diligent in your pursuit, and more importantly - if they too, were a nominal player in the online community.

I have always been a breeze to find on the Internet - I have had big flashing neon billboards attesting to my existence long before the web existed.  I was a known entity in the bulletin board (BBS) community, heck - even back to the text-based institutional days of academic-only Internet.  The problem was never finding the bleeding edge nerds of the world - it has always been about finding the Joe Six-Pack, Jane Soccer-Mom, and every other mainstream person.  Facebook has changed that.

When I introduced my mother to facebook a few months back, she was a pioneer in her demographic cohort.  I assumed she would have some fun, but knew she would show me the real uses for facebook - the mainstream uses.  It’s not about rocket science - it’s not about the latest software - it’s not even about access to information.  It is entirely about fun.

That fun has taken many forms and it is evident by the evolution of the site itself.  The game playing, which was seen as an annoyance to most of the hard-core techies, has turned into the 800lb gorilla for the average user.  The ability to reconnect however, has shocked even me.  In a matter of a few days, my mother had connected with dozens and dozens of relatives around the country as well as HER old high school friends.  She is nearly 60 years old.

Sure, as Aunt May says, “With great power comes great responsibility,” and for that reason, I am scared about how facebook could totally screw up what they have going in favor of a payday, but will enjoy it while it lasts.  If you are not taking advantage of facebook to reconnect with important people that have fallen out of touch - now is your chance.

Chris Doelle

I found this while surfing for something totally unrelated.

Museum by dumpr.net

Good times at the Dumpr!

It’s true - facebook is officially mainstream.  Not only have I seen it mentioned a half dozen times on television shows now, but a LARGE number of my friends from the past have joined.

I have friended a past high school girlfriend, two former college girlfriends, a dozen relatives from around the country, and at least a dozen former high school friends in just the past two weeks.  (And I attended a country high school with a graduating class of around 50.)  These are all people that wouldn’t have gone anywhere near a social networking site just a few short months ago.  These are not cutting edge technologists - these are normal people.

So what does it all mean?  Does it mean that this bastion of uber-coolness has been invaded by the mainstream?  Yeah, it certainly has changed… but I think for the better.  Does it mean that I have to find something else to remain on the cutting edge?   Well, I kinda do that anyway.

I’m actually enjoying facebook’s explosion because it has allowed me to get in contact with so many cool people from my past.  Sure, it has changed the dynamic of how I view facebook, but its a dynamic that I like.

What are your thoughts?  When did you join?  Are you an old-timer like me, or did you just get sucked in recently?  What got you involved?

Now, I am no fan of Alexa (don’t get me started on how skewed their results are) but it looks like April of ‘08 is when facebook surpassed MySpace.  The incline in the past few months has been surprisingly steep though as it has indeed hit the mainstream.