Pithy Title Here

The announcement came out yesterday that The Freedom Tower will now be called One World Trade Center . I have to be honest, as a former New Yorker, this announcement has only come about 7 years too late. In general, I don't like anything that feels forced. I hate ESPN because they try to tell me what I should like. I like the new U2 album because it's the first time in 10 years they haven't been making music with the overt goal of convincing me how good a band they are. And with the World Trade Center, we've attached so much "importance" to what happened there that we had to attach symbolism. And patriotism! What always irked me when I lived in NYC was how it always seemed that the rest of the country had a lot more say about what happened on that site than the people who lived in New York and the people who had worked in the original World Trade Center. That's funny, see, because up until about 8 a.m. on Tuesday, September 11, 2001 - when I was walki...

I recently attended a fantastic conference on the topic of social media. What made it fantastic? Instead of the usual conference where you show up and listen to people pontificate, it turned into more of an idea-sharing forum. While we were not all presenters in a technical sense, we all ended up participating in the discussion, not just watching and taking notes. Anyhow, a few random observations: One day, Facebook , or a similar as-yet-unknown site, is going to hit a gold mine in that it will begin to assign relevancy to members of your network. Doesn't it suck to sign on and all the updates you see are from that kid you knew in first grade but don't care about now? Of course it does. Because it buries the friends you really care about way down the line. Soon, someone will find a way to change this. And it doesn't take much to see where that could lead... In my business, a lot of people want to post online videos. I mean, all the kids, you know, they're on th...

I've mentioned this here and there before, but it's worth bringing up again since it is NCAA Tournament time... Fantasy sports can suck it. There, I said it. Why? Because it makes me mad Cleveland State beat Wake Forest yesterday. Some little school knocked off a team that was ranked #1 earlier this year. That's something that makes this tournament great. That's why people watch/follow this tournament . And I had picked Wake Forest to go several more rounds, so I'm screwed in the pool. The good news? This isn't costing me money. Never understood pay pools/leagues. I played in a fantasy football league for the first time in three years this past fall. My team, a typical case of looks-great-on-paper, quickly dropped to last. And I have to admit, I made a good decision... I stopped trying to care. The Steelers were playing well. And that's my thing, reality sports are always better than fantasy. Let me give you some examples of why I am pretty much ...

Have you been to Vegas? You have? Why? Even my best friend, who has spent many a weekend in Vegas, says the whole town is fake. And he's right! I took a walk down the Strip Wednesday afternoon. Here's what I saw: Venetian gondoliers paddling tourists down a fake Venetian canal spanned by fake Rialto Bridge . Guys handing out cards for strippers, wearing shirts that say "Girls in your room in 20 minutes." A lot of overweight people. The Eiffel Tower... well a 5/8 replica of such. It was a spectacle, for sure. Here are the good things I can report on: The mountains, specifically the Spring Mountains and Mt. Charleston . I had an incredible view of this range from my hotel and let's just say I tried to keep my eyes there rather than on the Strip. The Bellagio Fountains . These were actually really cool. Though you have to wonder about any place whose best man-made attraction is basically a grand-scale version of something I once saw in a Cleveland shopping ...

There will be much more here... lots of London to discuss and other things. Plus, I head to Vegas today and I cannot imagine not having something to say about that. In the meantime, it it Tuesday and, if you read this blog, you know what that means. If you live anywhere near here, you know how ridiculously warm it is right now. And, sure, it's going to get chilly this weekend. But the buds are blooming, the grass is attempting to grow (the weeds are certainly doing fine, unfortunately). Anyhow, summer is coming. And no one says that better than Matt Pond PA circa 2003: Summer Is Coming - Matt Pond PA

Let it begin! God Save The Queen - Coldstream Guards

As far as I am concerned, U2 spent the last 10 years or so in retreat. Entitled fans bitched and moaned about Pop . They hated Zooropa , too. Nevermind that every band was doing what U2 did on each of those discs four years after U2 first did it. Anyhow, I guess U2 wanted more cash or something so they went through the motions on All That You Can't Leave Behind . At least it was good sounding motions, bc the follow-up, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb , was the most indulgent album in years and did nothing innovative. The high-water mark, for me, since then was this song from Pop , a tremendous tune: Gone - U2 Now, glory be, U2 is back with some real stuff. Is it Achtung Baby ? No. But it is easily their best material in more than 10 years. They finally have the cojones to try out a song like this one... don't let the long intro fool you... stick with it... FEZ-Being Born - U2

I haven't been on a trans-Atlantic flight in nearly nine years. But I can remember most all of it. And one of the first things I recall was putting on the plane headphones prior to takeoff and tuning into Finnair's in-flight "alternative" station. And so, in honor of Wednesday evening's flight to Gatwick , I present the first song I heard on my first flight to Europe. It's going to be good to be back. Go Let It Out - Oasis

By month's end, I guarantee I will be mowing the lawn you cannot see.