April 30, 2009
After dinner last night, the entire Career Express team headed to Target. It was just like a Susan Bradley Mountain Dew run, except without any Mountain Dew in any of the carts at all.
What were some of the things people did get?
- Water…lots and lots of water
- Candy
- Trail mix
- More candy
- Music
And because it was Target, there’s a whole other level of affectation required…
But while we were waiting for everyone to finish checking out, I noticed something that, quite simply, take this bus tour to a whole other level of kickass…
Of course, I had to know…
Drunk with our newfound scores, we promptly got lost in the economy-sized elevator…
You know why? Because we’re the creme de la creme, that’s why!
|| posted by chris under community, game, hardware, more cowbell, thumbs up || comments (2) ||
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February 27, 2009
A little while back, Eileen Brown from MS UK posted her experience with a new online distraction from MS Learning called, aptly enough, Are You Certifiable?
First off…this isn’t the typical online quiz game you’d prolly expect from MS. The stuff this thing throws at you are TOUGH! Unlike a real exam, you have unlimited time to look at a given question, but only 60 seconds to sift through the possible answers once you tell it “ready.” Some of the scenarios were as complex as items I have seen on real exams, without a doubt.
Over the course of a couple days, I ended up finishing the full IT Pro half of AYC. That was a grand total of 400 questions. Yes, there were shiny badges aplenty to be had.
And I’ve yet to see anyone even close to my final score of 152,720.
But that wasn’t what kept me going to the end. The fact is, AYC was an amazingly handy way to kickstart my brain while taking breaks from working on other stuff. During mid-morning breaks and lunch I’d run through AYC questions instead of dragging cards in Solitaire or wasting time on Facebook.
I found that when I got back to “real” work, I was able to chop through thorny issues like a hot knife through butter.
I chalk that up to the instant feedback (right or wrong), which let me know right away areas where I was weak, and where I wasn’t. On top of that, I learned almost 2 dozen things about SQL Server during the course of rolling through AYC. Stuff I’ve used in the field since. Things I’ve been able to bill people for.
Which is the whole point of an IT career. If you aren’t committed to constant learning and then turning that knowledge into solutions that make a difference, you might as well get out of the business now.
And if you’re gonna try your hand at some AYC, do yourself a favor…
Turn off the background music before you start trying to answer questions. Just trust me on that one.
|| posted by chris under business, game, it pro, timekiller || comments (3) ||
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November 16, 2008
Like a CMT soap opera set in the Appalachians, Auburn’s season this year has gone from bad, to worse, to abominable.
And there’s really only one person who should be held accountable for that. Tommy Tuberville has proved, time and again this year, that he either doesn’t know, or doesn’t care, how to be the head coach of a Division I-A football program in the NCAA.
Forget streaks, forget the past, forget anything else. Auburn is a dismal 5–6 right now, and are 2–5 in SEC conference play. In fact, since their “lost championship” year in 2004, where they went a perfect 13–0 but were denied a shot at a National Championship, Auburn has been on a continual downward slide in conference play.
The ludicrous Tony Franklin Experiment on offense this year didn’t just show Tuberville’s ineptitude at implementing such a major change. It highlighted his utter lack of leadership as the head coach of the Auburn Tigers.
Tuberville’s skated for many years by sacrificing assistants and coordinators whenever the Tigers failed to perform. So his throwing Franklin under the bus is nothing new under the Auburn sun.
But what has truly cemented Tuberville’s fate is his stunning inability to recruit against the Crimson Tide. From the moment he stepped off the tarmac in Tuscaloosa, Nick Saban basically took Tommy Tuberville out behind the woodshed in what is without question the most important part of any successful program and the most important job of any successful head coach: recruiting.
Successful recruiting is nothing less than laying the foundation for the very future of your program. Successful recruiting is the difference between Tyrone Willingham getting three years at Notre Dame, and Charlie Weis getting four.
Last year, while Nick Saban was putting the finishing touches on wrapping up the #1 recruiting class in the nation…a recruiting class which translated into immediate results for the #1 ranked Crimson Tide this year, where do you think Tommy Tuberville was?
Duck hunting.
After 5 very mediocre years of conference play, Tuberville survived a coup in 2003, thanks to the sports media blowing the lid off the JetGate debacle.
He won’t get a second reprieve this time around.
|| posted by chris under clueless, game, kma, media, thumbs down || comments (0) ||
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November 16, 2008
And yet another shoutout to yet another SEC team who got the job done today to become eligible for post-season play…Ole Miss.
I have to admit, the Ole Miss t-shirt above is now considered a limited edition collector’s item. Since the arrival of Houston Nutt, the Rebels have been playing with an intensity not seen since…well, ever.
Now, I’m in no way, shape or form suggesting that anyone on Mississippi’s campus would do anything to curtail any activity related to their burgeoning careers in professional drinking. Nutt may be a big step up in coaching for the Rebels, but he’s not a miracle worker. And getting anyone from Ole Miss to stop abusing their liver?
That’s the Mississippi equivalent of Mission Impossible.
|| posted by chris under game, rx || comments (0) ||
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November 15, 2008
Big huge shoutout to all the Gold in the house for Vandy’s important win over Kentucky tonight.
That win made Vanderbilt bowl eligible for the first time since 1982, which was during the first of Ronald Reagan’s glorious two terms in office.
Vandy tonight proved you don’t have to be big, dumb and slow to have success in college football.
Maybe somebody could tell that to Arkansas?
|| posted by chris under game, more cowbell, shoutout, thumbs up, travel || comments (0) ||
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