Via reader AS, a frustrating story of suburban kids not allowed to bike to school:
[Saratoga, N.Y.,] Maple Avenue {Middle School]'s student body of 1,650 is delivered via 39 school buses—and as at thousands of other communities around the country, many parents elect to drive their children. Thus, every weekday morning, scores of idling cars line up behind dozens of buses disgorging waves of kids. Amidst this, Janette and Adam—each of whom was about 5 feet tall—seemed like a pair of diminutive daredevils wading into a tsunami.
As Adam locked his bike to a fence, a radio call came in to the administrative office. "Security told me that two bikes were getting involved with the buses," remembers the school principal, Stuart Byrne. "We hadn't heard from anyone beforehand. My assistant responded and said, 'Where are they?'"
An assistant principal, Robert Loggins, found Janette in front of the school, waiting for a lull in the traffic so she could depart. Adam had already gone inside.
"What are you doing here?" Loggins asked Janette.
Janette thought this an odd question. "It's Bike to Work Day," she said. "Did you ride your bike to school?"
"Bicycling isn't allowed at Maple Avenue School," said Loggins.
I imagine that when they grow up, the portly children of Maple Avenue School will drive to the gym twice a week.
Fortunately, the story has a (relatively) happy ending. But it highlights a number of symptoms that have created a generation of mentally-helpless children: helicopter parents, fear of lawsuits, car worship, middle-school assistant principals—evils which never seem to go away, despite clear evidence of the harm they cause.
I'm not sure what to make of this:
Inside, the capsule's sole passenger would ride in a near-standing position, wearing a G-suit to help force blood to the head during acceleration. The passenger's head would sit in a transparent hemispheric dome topped with an aerospike for better supersonic performance. It gets better.
Dimensions of the capsule's cabin area are roughly two feet (diameter) by 7.5 feet (length). There will be no room in the capsule for movement once the vehicle goes weightless. After launching to 100 miles, parachutes will be used to slow the final descent.
That sounds...well, "fun" doesn't come immediately to mind.
The bridge opened for foot traffic on 27 May 1937:
Naturally, the city is having a party.
The last time I flew home from San Francisco, we landed in Rockford after missing the approach at O'Hare because of wind shear.
Yesterday, we didn't divert to a different airport, but neither did we take the most direct path:
We almost flew into Canada, according to the captain. As it is we were only about 20 minutes late.
Before leaving for California last weekend, I made sure to park my car on a street not scheduled for street cleaning while I was away.
At 9:02 this morning, with me still half a block away, I watched a cop put a ticket on the car.
Two minutes. Because I stopped for coffee. Herp derp.
I'm once again in an airport, on my way home. While you're waiting eagerly for my next blog post, check these out:
Share and enjoy.
Oh, and there's a Lufthansa Airbus 380 parked here today. I really must see one of those monsters up close someday.
At dinner last night with some of my B-school friends, conversation turned to the two most perplexing stock offerings of the last year: Facebook's and Groupon's. In both cases, the companies' very young owners and very rich venture capital investors got rich, but what happened after that? Here's Facebook's performance this week:
And Groupon's:
This morning, Groupon announced a proposed settlement in the class-action suit accusing them of practicing their well-known business model:
If you purchased or received a Groupon Voucher issued for redemption in the United States between November 1, 2008 and December 1, 2011, then you are a member of the class (“Class Member”) for purposes of this class action settlement, and may be entitled to receive settlement benefits, unless you are one of the following: (1) an employee of Groupon, Inc.; (2) a business with whom Groupon has partnered to offer Groupon vouchers (“Merchant Partners”); or (3) a parent company, subsidiary, affiliate or director or officer of Groupon or a Merchant Partner.
Facebook has its own problems. It's been a public company for less than three days, and already the SEC is investigating. Where they go, lawsuits surely will follow:
[R]egulators are concerned that banks may have shared information only with certain clients, rather than broadly with investors. On Tuesday, William Galvin, the secretary of state in Massachusetts, subpoenaed Morgan Stanley over discussions with investors about Facebook’s offering. The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Wall Street’s self-regulator, is also looking into the matter. The chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Mary L. Schapiro, said Tuesday that the agency would examine issues related to Facebook’s I.P.O., but she did not elaborate.
Morgan Stanely, the banker in question, led both the Groupon and Facebook IPOs.
At least they didn't lose $2 billion last week gambling with money insured by us taxpayers.
The fog will roll in after noon, but at 7am there wasn't a cloud:
This is my fourth-favorite city in the world.
This evening's eclipse, through clouds:
Also visible in the shadows:
An hour later, it's a lot brighter out.
I've never seen this before. Here's the French presidential airplane, parked on the south apron at O'Hare yesterday:
Parked nearby were Azerbaijan's, Italy's, and (I think) Russia's, but I couldn't get good photos with my tiny backup camera.
Let me be an aviation nerd for a second. This is an Airbus 320, without any obvious modifications. So how did it get an all the way here from Paris? I assume it stopped at Andrews AFB in Maryland to drop President Hollande off. But even Paris to Andrews seems like a long flight for that plane. The A320 has a maximum range of 6,150 km. Paris to Andrews is 6,183 km—possible, but risky, as it wouldn't leave any margin for error even after flying as efficiently as possible. Not to mention, flying trans-Atlantic westbound goes against the prevailing winds. So did they stop for fuel somewhere? Or does the plane carry more fuel than the bog-standard air transport model?
I realize this is not the most important aspect of the NATO summit, but I am curious.