2011 Road Dog Odyssey

cc licensed ( BY NC ) flickr photo shared by duncan Wow, I do a little bit of internet fiction of oneself and people stop believing me. I swear, honestly, this really happened to me yesterday. What can a swear on a stack of? On the trip from Daniel Boone National Forest (Kentucky) headed towards Blacksburg, Virginia, I enjoyed some beautiful two lane driving over the autumn doused mountains. cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog Heading west to Bristol on highway 58, I was drawn in by the sign for Natural Tunnel State Park. It is really a naturally formed tunnel through the limestone that is used as a passage for the railroad. My kind fo place to wander, take photos, enjoy in the non-tourist season. After parking at the top, I managed to miss the trailhead down to the bottom, where the tunnel is (and [...]

cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog As usual, stats through last Thursday posted a tad late! These week includes the gap of time during my falling into a rabbit hole of internet fiction Number of days on the road: 119 Miles Driven: 11,035 Most Recent 1000 mile marker: 11,000 miles, east of Nashville, TN on October 21 Number of States/Provinces driven in: 21 Number of US/Canadian Border Crossings: 4 Money spent on gas: $2934 Cheapest gas price: $3.08/gallon (FOuntain Inn, SC). Highest gas price: $5.64/gallon (1.39/liter) (Wawa, ON). Photos posted: 2360 (that is an average of 19.8 per day) Most scenic foliage drive: Blue Ridge Parkway, North Carolina. Number of books read: 12 (Most recent: Things the Grandchildren Should Know) cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog Number of nights in hotels/B&B: 12 Number of nights camping: 18 Number of un,non,anti conference family [...]

cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog I was excited to have my Journey to the Center of the Internet weirdness interrupted by an invitation to do an informal workshop/demo of the StoryBox Project for Brock University. On my pass through the region in August, I missed out on their Narrative INstitute, and was please to hear of their interest in this project. Thanks to Guilia Forsythe for helping me weave this into my own sputtering narrative. I have a full audio archive but want to jot down some ideas, thoughts as they evaporate. StoryBox Demo at Brock University I framed my own interests in web storytelling, a bit of 50+ Web 2 Ways to Tall a Story, Five Card Flickr, and my notion of practicing improv via pechaflickr. In framing storytelling, I used an example I’ve tapped into before, of how good cinematic techniques (short cuts, [...]

I’ve lost any sense of what the search for the Center of the Internet means, but now, with the assistance of Obi Don Potter, I was able to get the message on the device left for me in Philadelphia. It appears I am needed to give a Storybox demo at Brock University, and I have to get there tomorrow. Some back tracking… cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog After traveling by buses from Philadelphia, I got to the Port Authority bus terminal in New York, and found my way to the pre-arranged meeting spot with Obi Don Potter, here at the Bleeker Street subway. He was confused at first by this device I brought, and seemed skeptical of who I was, but seemed to have a sense of what to do with it. “We do not have long,” he said. “Ride with me uptown, and I [...]

cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog Do not take this boyish innocent smile lightly- Tom Woodward is a force of creative and sarcastic genius. It was yet another highlight to have spent tim with Tom in person a few clicks back, and to get to visit with him and his family in Richmond. Until then, I had skyped with Tom when he provided his Amazing Story of Openness for my 2009 Open Ed presentation and probably the most over the top presentation done in Second Life, when he and Jim Groom did The Revolution will Be Syndicated, with extra zombies. cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog While at Tom’s house, we broke out the StoryBox and did a 20 minute bit of live broadcasting on ds106 radio. ds106 radio with Tom Woodward Don;t take this all literally- Tom has a great wry [...]

I’ve had to keep moving around here in Philly to escape notice. There are way too many people walking around in dark shades, carrying radios, looking around. I apologize for my friends who are here for the EDUCAUSE conference, but I can’t be socializing or hanging around sessions. But I now know my next location I need to get too. I found a quiet spot to sleep 3 hours last night (thanks @pumpkiny for sneaking me some vendor food in a bag and @GardnerCampbell for the night cap) inside a closed up restaurant off of 10th and Race Street. I heard foot steps at 5:00am, and a gentle knock. By the time I pried the door open, the street was empty, but my eye caught an envelope sticking out of a grate at sidewalk level. All it said on the outside was @cogdog. There was nothing inside, but when I [...]

Things are getting crazy here in the underground. Perhaps it is dark matter or super neutrinos, but I have somehow been transported through some sort of space/time dimension. Let’s recap what’s been happening. When I last reported, I was sticking to the instructions/clues provided by @0pcode49 and following the railroad tracks. Spooked by the scary dudes in the van, I decided to parallel the tracks but stick to the adjacent forest. This was, in hindsight, a bad idea, because I lost track of the tracks, and could not even back track to the tracks. They were gone. So I opted to continue in the same general direction (southwest if I am using the sun and my watch correctly), when I came upon a road sign that bore a clue. cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog Speed limit 49? Uh-huh. Written in marker on the rear of [...]

I fund this post lingering in the drafts. Next week’s will be hard to document! cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog Number of days on the road: 112 Miles Driven: 10,859 Most Recent 1000 mile marker: 10,000 miles, just west of Richmond, VA Number of States/Provinces driven in: 21 Number of US/Canadian Border Crossings: 2 Money spent on gas: $2934 Cheapest gas price: $3.08/gallon (FOuntain Inn, SC). Highest gas price: $5.64/gallon (1.39/liter) (Wawa, ON). Photos posted: 3241 (that is an average of 20.9 per day) Most scenic foliage drive: Blue Ridge Parkway, North Carolina. cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog Number of books read: 12 (Most recent: Things the Grandchildren Should Know) Number of nights in hotels/B&B: 12 Number of nights camping: 18 Number of un,non,anti conference family reunions attended: 1 Bavastock! Most unexpected activities: Riding a tractor on the Durnin Farm, [...]

Hmmm, I am not finding too many answers to some funky behavior on my MacBookPro. If I was paranoid, I might be taping up the windows, but am, more concerned about being able to continue to do my work on the haunted machine. For the last 2 weeks, I have noticed when using Tweetdeck, when occaisionally I minimize the app in my dock, there is a lingering back window that is labeled “Tweetdeck Update”. I’ve seen it but not paid much attention. But today, I noticed there was a different one behind the main screen, and I barely managed to get a screen shot before it disappeared: Some sort of programming code? functions, maybe memory addresses? is ts = timestamp?? Any clues? I really cannot afford to do anything like rebuilding the machine while on the road. I just want to edit photos, make ds106 MacGuffins, listen to ds106 radio…. [...]

Now this is getting cool. After posting of my plan to follow Dean Shareski’s learning project, I started with my video announcement of wanting to play blues harp (and not have it sound like dying dogs). Bryan Jackson, gifted with music and generosity, responded with a first video lesson for me. So I set out with the recorder on today (just Quicktime player on my MacBookPro) to follow along I also found some of the free content on Harmonica Lessons.com where I found some useful tips on breathing (it is not sucking and blowing, eh?). And now, in my second video, I tried to follow Bryan and practice the breathing too Getting that one note is hard, but I’m going to keep practicing. There are about 2 million videos out there, like OZHarp who starts with a tiny kid playing it better than most of us That’s all for now, [...]