First day of class

Here I am on the first day of class, playing with Apple's Photo Booth and showing my students how to upload a photo in Blogger.

Everyone set up a blog and uploaded a photo, so I'm happy.

Bad blogger!

Yeah, that's me. A bad blogger.

Reading the really excellent blogging advice offered on Ryan Sholin's latest brainstorm, the Wired Journalists network -- in response to the question, "What advice would you offer a journalist looking to start their own blog?" -- made me realize what a bad blogger I am.

I post irregularly. I started this blog with a focus...info related to my classes, targeted to my students...but I got tired of being focused and tired of censoring myself. I mean, periodically Bush does something so appalling that I just wanna rant. And you can't do that on a blog you're asking students to read.

I decided it was my blog, it has my name on it, and I could do whatever I wanted with it. So I did. I also started keeping separate class blogs.

Now I write about whatever strikes my fancy, whenever I have the time and the inspiration. I don't worry about readership, because I'm mostly writing for my own entertainment and satisfaction.

Of course, my personal blog is not my only blog. I maintain blogs for my classes (such as this one for my online news writing class) and contribute to the J-School's blogs (both of which I started). So I end up doing quite a bit of blogging...it's just kind of spread around and unfocused...kind of like me.

MacWorld!

Oh boy! I get to go to MacWorld today. I promise to share the highlights when I get back.

Good for a laugh

I was on my way to a Sunday evening get-together when I heard it, on the top-of-the-hour NPR news.

The story was about President Bush's Middle East trip, where he was busy hobnobbing with his oil buds in Abu Dhabi and giving speeches on freedom and democracy. He used the occasion to once again denounce Iran and generally try to ignite World War III.

But the part that made me burst out laughing was a clip of Bush attempting to directly address Iranians, telling them, "You have a right to live under a government that listens to your wishes...."

Hah! If Bush really believed that...well, we'd be out of Iraq by now and he would have signed the S-Chip bill to provide health care for low-income kids. Hell, we might even be doing something about global warming.

Too bad Bush doesn't believe his own propaganda.

Here's a link to Bush's speech. For another perspective on his trip, read NYT columnist Maureen Dowd's Faith, Freedom and Bling in the Middle East. Just to whet your appetite, here's an excerpt:

Puddle jumping through Arabia, the president saw his share of falcons in little leather hoods — presumably not a Gitmo reference — and Arabian stallions, including one retired stud from Texas — presumably not a W. reference. But there was a distinct dearth of wives and dissidents....