http://www.azuen.net chris palmer Tue, 29 Jul 2008 22:55:36 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en So I'm at EXL these two weeks, which is a symphony in three parts, though one played by an Eastern European radio symphony orchestra which is still being paid in Soviet era expired rubles, and unafraid to take it out on the music. Running a camp is fraught with dangers and ... http://www.azuen.net/2008/07/29/camp/ So I was thinking a little about the experience of NFL Finals.  I saw three main finals (US Extemp, HI, and LD) and two supplemental finals (Storytelling and Editorial Commentary).  I was officially present for the Oratory final, but Oratory tends to bore me to tears, so I opened up ... http://www.azuen.net/2008/07/07/nfl-finals/ A few words about Las Vegas: It's a strange town.  There's the sudden and overwhelming artificiality of The Strip, but if you go more than a quarter mile beyond it in any direction, you find yourself in the most banal and faceless suburb known to man.  It's a rather strange contrast ... http://www.azuen.net/2008/06/24/viva-las-vegas/ It's the night before I depart for Vegas and the NFL Tournament. I have a sequence of horrible flights, but I can't really complain too much since they're a freebie from the airline. I also now am on some list of terrorists, so I can't check in online ... http://www.azuen.net/2008/06/16/the-night-before-nationals/ The field of IT and system administration is infected by a lot of visionaries. It's a relatively new field; by the most generous definition there have only been IT workers and sysadmins for 40 years. That makes computers and IT a sexy field that people who feel they're ... http://www.azuen.net/2008/06/13/visionaries-and-futurists/