Connected Well

As the weather warms, I’ve been eying my bicycle hanging in the garage for too-many months. Google Maps is now making it easier to find a quick way from where you are to where you’d like to go following bike-friendly roads and paths.

For example, check out these biking directions from Liberty Park in Salt Lake City, Utah to Sugar House Park. Unfortunately, Utah has few bike-friendly roads (ranking 18th/50 in the USA according to the League of American Bicyclists’ Bicycle Friendly Community campaign) so you may want to check out other bike-friendly cities in the US and around the world:

• Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Portland, Oregon, USA
• Copenhagen, Denmark
• Boulder, Colorado, USA
• Davis, California, USA
• Sandnes, Norway
• Trondheim, Norway
• San Francisco, California, USA
• Berlin, Germany
• Barcelona, Spain
• Basel, Switzerland

And, here’s Google’s own video introducing the service:

Does anybody know if these bike maps show up on mobile google maps’ installs? The Google Maps for Mobile website doesn’t reflect this yet, but this makes a lot of sense, and I am sure it will be there soon enough.

Oh, and you can Tweet to win a new bike using the hashtag #bikewithgoogle (rules/regs)

Rahhb Apps, Tools, human, life, mobile biking, community, commuter, google, google_maps

“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”

“Citizenship in a Republic,”
Theodore Roosevelt’s Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910

[I wrote this once before and found it once again. Now you have found it, and should share it, if you think it worthy to do so]

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The below is a moving video I watched earlier this week of a man, Victor Guzman, who was on the 85th floor when the first plane hit the first tower of the World Trade Center. I won’t post more about September 11th today. Two years ago, I posted “9-11: Where Were You?” which I think is enough. Other than this post, I will remain silent today in honor of those who lost their lives.

His life changed a lot after 9-11. Watch the video to see him tell his story of escaping the tower, only to turn around and watch the building collapse.

“Since 9-11, my life has never been the same. It’s actually better.”

He describes his journey from tragedy and trauma to hope, healing, and renewal through Jesus Christ. I realize with soberness everyone’s journey since 9-11 has not been the same, but I believe in the healing power he has experienced, and I appreciate the chance to share.

Please feel free comment, forward, tweet or share on facebook, etc., if this post moves you.

I will never forget those who died that day and since that day in the name of Freedom.

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William Gibson-Futurist, originally uploaded by MichaelMarlatt.

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Left to itself, a grape plant will always favor new growth over more grapes.

That’s why the vinedresser cuts away unnecessary shoots, no matter how vigorous…

Because a vineyard’s only purpose is… Grapes.

[Secrets of the Vine, p. 59]

Today, I will be bold and honest enough with myself to see, admit and know the difference between leaves and grapes in my life, and treat them accordingly:

• Cut off and cut back the “leaves”–the good but fruitless things–no matter how vigorously they grow.
• Thin the branches to allow nourishing sunlight to reach the “grapes”–true success in my most-important things.
• Add strength and ability to grow new fruit where before there was meager or no harvest.

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Get the video or the song on or download the mp3 from Amazon.

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The New York Post reports that some parents are encouraging their children to get sick (Chicken Pox, specifically) in order to avoid the requirement to have their children vaccinated (recently linked to autism), which is a requirement before entering Kindergarden in New York State:

Since 1999, kindergartners entering school in New York state must have had either the virus or the varicella vaccine, which protects against both chicken pox and shingles. But with recent public controversy concerning a possible link between vaccines and autism, some parents are turning to pox parties to protect their kids—by making them sick. “Measles, mumps, whooping cough…I’m worried about those diseases, so my daughter has had those vaccines. Chicken pox is a joke,” says Angie of why she refuses to get Samantha vaccinated.

But not everyone is partying over this. Trom the article, pediatricians don’t think this is such a great idea:

“Chicken pox parties are a terrible mistake,” says Dr. Anne Gershon, professor of pediatrics at Columbia University and president of the Infectious Disease Society of America. “Imagine how you would feel if you took your kid to one and they came down with encephalitis or group A strep. Most of the time chicken pox is a mild disease, but you can die from the complications.”

Is this a smart idea?

[hat tip: lilsugar]

Rahhb human chicken-pox, illness, life, parenting

Yeah, twitter is addictive. It’s fun. It’s compelling.  Here’s a few tips to help newbies to twitter get the feel of it a little faster:

• SheGeeks’ Twitter 101 post gives pretty good clarification on following other people. In short, give people a reason to follow you before following them. The difference between a friend and a stalker is that you know who your friends are
  “When you first start Twitter, you should build up your stream first. Send out about 20 messages that actually mean something. Talk about your interest, something cool that you like, or something you found out about today. This way, people can get a better feel for how beneficial you’d be to them if they followed you in return.”
• Sarah Hurd points to Jeremiah Owyang (@jowyang). as a great example of twittering “right”:
  “He uses a great mixture of providing helpful and relevant content, championing others, networking, asking questions to generate conversations, providing rundowns of events he’s attending, and laughing about life.”
• Charlotte-Ann Lucas, a journalist, says it this way:

  “Twitter is community.It can be like sitting with your friends on a coast-to-coast couch, eavesdropping on a national conversation.”

Rahhb Networking, Social Networking, human being social, communication, friends, listening, networks, social, talking, twitter

If you follow me on Twitter, the ultra-easy status-update app would have told you that I’ve been camping at Bear Lake last week… but you wouldn’t have known exactly where. That part of the picture is left out.

But more important than you trying to find me, it is still very difficult is to find out what is around you when you are at a place unfamiliar to you–to access the world of knowledge about a place–in a easily digestible map-based, easily transportable format.

For example: Two things I wanted to do this week included getting to the beach, and going for some hikes. I didn’t want to spend a lot of money for access to the beach, and at least one of the hikes I wanted to be enjoyable for some of the people with me who can’t hike treacherous terrain.

To accomplish this, I did the usual–but had to do it all from my Blackberry because my laptop was unavailable–I googled it. I searched phrases like “Hikes near Bear Lake, Utah” and “Good Beach Bear Lake, Utah“. Both turned up promising results, but I had to DIG for them:

Beach Access at Bear Lake:

• There is a State Park at the South end of Bear Lake [Lat Long: 41.965633,-111.3995 (google maps)] that charges $8/car/day for access. Seemed like a reasonable option if a free beach couldn’t be found.
• Bear Lake.org’s Watersports page gave me some good ideas, and I found that there’s a Bear Lake State park on the Idaho side of the lake too (which, honestly I didn’t even really understand we were so close to the Idaho border)
• Finally, I found a PDF file (not mobile compatible, but my Blackberry handled it with a little effort) that shows free beach access all along the South West edge of the lake, just South of Ideal Beach Resort and RV park. Right along the road, at Lat/Long 41.893149,-111.366026 is free, public beach access which is pretty nice.

The bottom-line is, we were able to find things after searching, but there was no clear way to search one place and say:

• Here I am (GPS would be nice, but Verizon disables that in Blackberrys! FAIL)
• I want to ______________________ (insert activity)
• All from a MOBILE interface

And have it provide results.

You’d think we would have figured this out by now!

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I had never seen this before until I spotted it on Chad Bennett’s blog. Take a minute and watch. I am amazed at how emotional this little video is.

Free Hugs

Just another reminder to be human in all that you do, and don’t forget to feel and care.

Rahhb human caring, connect, hugs, human, life, love, real, video