I noticed that the Qango directory is still going.  Qango dates back to the early days of the web is run by one man, and has always tried to list only sites that are useful to the searcher.  In other words,  Qango has always tried to be a directory built for people not for search engine spiders.  The difference is profound because the former builds a useful web navigation tool while the latter end up being spam filled garbage. While it looks like Qango had to start over with a new database, it is good to see that they have not given up.  And note they still list personal homepages that are not on their own domain!  That too is a sign of a good directory because some of the best content on the web resides on free hosted sites.  Good luck Qango.

This article is a perfect example of why the government should not use eminent domain for private enterprise.  The fact that the woman in the article will not sell is immaterial, what is material is that the developer offered her 1 million dollars for her property.  If the government, or a redevelopment commission with eminent domain powers had come in and condemned the whole block the woman might have only gotten $120,000 dollars.  If the government had condemned the property it would have been a forceful transfer of wealth from one private entity to another - not for the public good.  See the difference?

Vespa, the scooter company, needs a much larger dealer network. I'd love to buy one of the larger Vespa scooters (one with a 50 or 54 inch wheelbase) but the nearest dealers are in Chicago or Joliet Illinois.  That is just too far from NW Indiana to go for service, with the logistics of getting the scooter in for service being just too much hassle. It is a shame because, Vespa makes the best looking scooters out there, bar none.  Everybody copies them but nobody does it better than Vespa. It wasn't always like this,  20 years ago there were 2 Vespa dealers very close by: one in NW Indiana and one just across the state line in Lynwood, IL.  But somehow Vespa let there dealer network lapse leaving this area unsupported. I'm sure their must be a lot of other customers like me who would buy a Vespa in a heartbeat if only there was a local dealer.

I have just been burnt by The Scotts Company (the lawn products people) and my purchase of their Accugreen 1000 drop spreader. See I want to use products by companies other than Scotts in the Accugreen 1000 drop spreader.  Unfortunately, all the instructions that come with the spreader say is: 'Find the rate setting for "Scotts Drop Spreader" found on the back of the Scotts product package.  In other words - this is a proprietary spreader intended only for use with Scotts products.   I tried calling the Scotts customer hotline but they could not give me a way to convert lbs per 1000 sq ft rate to a setting number on their spreader. See the problem is I wanted to use an organic fertilizer product made by another company and it just gives me a rate of X lbs. per 1000 sq. Ft. I get this feeling that Scotts wants to lock me into using only their product with their spreader.  Unfortunately it is likely to have just the opposite effect: I will probably boycott all Scotts products.  Burn me once shame on you, burn me twice shame on me.  Be warned, if you buy this spreader you better be prepared to use Scotts products or only products that list the Scotts spreader settings.

I rode just over 100 miles yesterday on the scooter. Mainly I was testing routes from my home over to the next county where my dad lives, then down to where the motorcycle driving test is administered, then to a town in the southern part of the county and then home - mostly on county roads but a fair amount on 2 lane highways. Beyond scouting routes, it is good practice, which I feel I need before I take the driving test to get my motorcycle license.  I want to keep this up while the weather is good, even at the expense of riding my bicycle and some other important projects until I feel ready to take the test.

Steve Williams wrote a thoughtful post about seeing and experiencing the world differently when riding a scooter, particularly under 35 mph.  Being a photographer, he contends you really can't see the world photographically while driving faster than 35 mph. This is what I like about scootering,  you see details along the road that you would never see enclosed in a car.  Literally all your senses come into play: you smell the scents around you, you feel the change in temperature when you enter the shade of a forested rode, you feel the wind, and you hear things, even above the sound of the scooter's motor, that you would not hear in a car. The other thing is it is easy to stop on a scooter and have a closer look.  That is different from a bicycle, where I don't like to stop too much because it breaks the pedaling cadence I am trying to maintain. I guess the final thing is I ride my scooter for inexpensive transportation.  I could literally buy 3 scooters and not equal the price of a car.  Plus the scooter more than doubles the gas mileage. But I really thing experiencing the world around you so differently is the most important reason.

Around the end of May I bought a Honda Metropolitan II scooter. After a couple of weeks of riding two things became appearant to me: 1) I really enjoyed riding a motor scooter, and 2) at 6 ft 4 inches tall and no string bean I was way too big for the Metropolitan, 3) I wanted to go longer distances than the Metropolitan could take me. So I bought a '07 Honda Helix. This is one big scooter, weighing about 400 lbs and a very long wheelbase. It is very comfortable to ride. Honda says:

'... it's pretty easy to see why this 244cc, liquid-cooled four-stroke scooter has been a popular favorite for both the urban and suburban set for years.'

The important words there are 'urban and suburban' the Helix does well in town, although it is not as nimble as a Vespa, but it is very at home in the suburbs and in getting from one town to another. Anyway, I've been having so much fun learning to ride it, and exploring coutry roads that I've been shamelessly neglecting my online responsibilities. Sometimes you just have to follow your muse. ;-)

I like my iPhone and I like eating at Panera Bread in Valparaiso, IN. But I always have a hard time logging into the Panera free wifi service. A friend of mine cannot login use the free Panera wifi at all. I'm not sure what the problem is but I think it must be a problem between Panera and the iPhone version of Safari browser. It is not a huge thing, I can get along without Panera wifi, and I still like their food, but free wifi was one of the things that made me try Panera Bread back when I only had a laptop and it is disappointing not to be able to use it with the iPhone. Hopefully other people with iPhones will report the problem to and the powers that be can get this sorted.

In the Mac world I use the Flock browser.  I don't use half the features on it but I sort of like the way it all works.  One thing that is important to me is being able to specify the default search engine in a browser.  (One major reason I refuse to use Safari is it forces me to use Google which I refuse to use.)  Well Flock is available for Linux, but there seems to be no nice GUI way to install it.  I wish there was because I would use it.  My knowledge of compiling and command line in Ubuntu is not enough to tackle this yet. So, the Ubuntu default browser is Firefox.  Thank goodness they have Firefox because at least it is a full featured browser with a first class rendering engine.  With that said, I'm not a big fan of Firefox every FF install I have had had gotten weird after awhile, although I will say this Linux version is the best Firefox I have encountered yet.  Still FF is slow.  Not unusably slow but slow enough to be noticable. Which begs the question: What other browsers are available for Linux? Hmm. Well, IMO not too many.  I did manage to install Opera from the terminal, which was a bit scary but it worked out just fine using these instructions: Opera for Linux works just fine.  It may just beat Firefox out and become my default browser.  Opera is fast and seems quite stable.  One vast improovement, is they now let you change the default search engine.  The control is buried, but it is there.  Moreover they have made it easy to add new search engines.  The problem is that since I installed Opera from a command line I don't think I will be getting any automatic updates when new versions are released.  I'm not sure exactly how to update from a command line, I suppose just install a new version.  I guess I will have to try that. Midori - this is a browser with a lot of potental.  It was pretty easy to configure it to what I want.  The problem is it is just not far along in it's development yet to be usable for me.  However I am going to keep my eye on it for the future. Konqueror - Konqueror is the main browser for the KDE desktop.  I've heard a lot about it over the years