Why I Oughta...

Whodathunk?

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite days of the year. In fact, I think I like it better than Christmas. It's a perfect combination of wonderful things. I have a ton of things to be thankful for and they all seem to come together on Thanksgiving. From my annual " night out " with my crew last night, to spending the day strapping on the ole' feedbag with my entire family both in Frankfort and in Naperville - I get to spend lots of time with the people that matter most to me. The other part of Thanksgiving that I like is the traditions. From the family, to the food, to the weekend cutting down of the Christmas Tree - it's all fantastic fun. While all of those traditions were started without me and I'm simply a participant, there's one tradition that I've started that makes me enjoy Thanksgiving morning . While most Americans are tuning into Matt Lauer and Al Roker to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, at my place we're watching The

How ‘bout the Illini, eh? Taking down then #1 OSU and having an improbable run to possibly 9 wins after back-to-back rebuilding years. I couldn’t be more proud to be an an alum of both the program and the university. The program appears to have turned a corner, and with all the talent that’s starting to pile up down the road on I-57, we should be a force in the Big Ten for many years. This doesn’t appear to be a fluke (like the 2001 Sugar Bowl was). All that stands in the Illini’s way from a New Years Day Bowl Game and possible BCS bid are the Wildcats from Northwestern this Saturday. Should be a slam dunk win for the Illini, no? It should. I’ll be going nuts, rooting for the boys from Champaign-Urbana, right? Ummm…. Not so fast. What? Am I questioning my allegiances? Sorta. At age 29, with a day job that I love and a fiancé pursuing her PhD full-time, the time couldn’t be more right for me to head back to school and get an advanced degree. Earlier this

We've missed you .

I need some help from the East Coaster's who read RhodesSchool. I've had nothing but bad luck from pretzel vendors. First it was in NYC, today the problem occurred in Boston. I enjoy the speed of acquisition and feel for food cart vendors on the street. I've done plenty of shopping from street vendors for "goods" and I will, on occassion buy a meal from a street cart vendor. I like that it's all cash. I like that it's a one-man operation. And...I like the whole thought about cart "turf" that I have in my head. ( how do you get the prime corners? Seniority? Does the Outfit control the turf?, etc... ) In the midwest, where I grew up, we had "big" or "jumbo" pretzels that were served hot. They were always, without exception soft. They were chewey and usually had salt applied to them and if you were feeling friskey, you'd even dip them in some yellow mustard - they're fantastic. In both NYC and now in Boston

September 6, 2008. 365 days away. If you head over to our wedding blog , you'll see the countdown widget is finally under the one year mark. Natalie and I were engaged last December, so we're 9 months into it with 20 to go. Seems like a long time, eh? It is. But for Nat, the planning never stops. I'm excited about gearing up for this year and all that it entails. We've secured the venue, the caterer, and the church. That leaves pretty much everything else. Nat's on top of it, so I don't have to be. We're having a discussion over the band as we speak. I want one group, she wants another. We all know who's going to win that battle. There's so much to do and see that Nat has even started to write a secondary blog about all the wedding things she sees and reads about called i heart peonies . She's a great writer who puts a smile on my face. You should go subscribe to her feed on the site now. I'm excited that she's enjoying t

I'm supporting Rudy Giuliani for President in 2008. I like who he's picked to head his campaign in Illinois: Tom Cross and I like what he brings to the discussion. I also think he can actually win in November and not make this election a referendum on Iraq. Over the long holiday weekend, the campaign launched a new website. Go check it out here . It looks nice, doesn't it? All shiny and patriotic, right? There's a few things wrong. First of all, there are zero feeds on the site. I can't subscribe to his news, blog, press releases, video. Nothing. Shame. I know I'm not the only one who would subscribe to the blog. (if it were actually a blog...) They've made, what I consider a larger error, however. The campaign had offered some nice badges on the site as a way to embed some javascript and demonstrate your support for Rudy. I had one of them on this very blog over on the right. See where it just says: JoinRudy2008.com? That used to be a nic

As Nat and I are packing our bags and heading out the door this afternoon for a drive down to St. Louis for the Labor Day weekend, my mind keeps wandering back to a post I wrote almost a year ago . We're multi-tasking in St. Louis: Nat is going to a wedding and I'm going to see my Illini take on the Mizzou Tigers in something they're billing as the "Arch Rivalry" . I'll be tagging along to the wedding, and Nat has consented to joining me at the game, so it's a win-win for everyone involved. While I'm putting on my orange t-shirt, I keep thinking that we should have a similar impact on St. Louis that Clemson has on towns they travel to. In fact, other teams could/should be doing this, too. The Hawkeyes of Iowa are playing NIU at Soldier Field tomorrow. Imagine all those crazy farm folks from Iowa staying at the Fairfield Inns and La Quintas around the Chicagoland area spreading out 2 dollar bills with yellow hawks on them at the Chi-Chi's and O

If you think Guitar Hero is popular on college campuses across the country, wait until they get their hands on this . Midway, the video game manufacturer, is coming out with Beirut or Beer Pong for the Wii. Video game publisher Midway has a new game coming out for the Wii system. “Party Game” will consist of several games including shuffleboard, darts, and ski ball, but the game that will take over college campuses this fall is Wii beer pong. Or Wii Beirut. Or “Ping Cup” as Midway refers to it: The object of ping cup is to use the Wii remote to throw a ping-pong ball at a pyramid of cups. Seems like that "Flippy cup" game is a natural fit for the Wii isn't it? A little flick of the Wiimote and you turn your cup over? That would round out the package.

One of the by-products of traveling for work is that you end up alone in a smallish hotel room with nothing to do but surf the web and watch television. If that wasn't bad enough, for me, it's been summer-time television - which means a lot of reruns, reality shows, and filler. Last night I ended up watching part of Last Comic Standing, which is a show that is trying to find the "best" comic in America. (as a side note, they must be looking for the best amateur, right? But...what really is an "amateur comedian"?) Anyway, I think I might have found my new favorite comedian: Lavell Crawford. He made me laugh out loud repeatedly. This morning, one of the first things I did was look up some of his other material on YouTube. It's priceless. I have no idea if he survived last night's show, but if his act was the only consideration, they should hand him the prize right now.

My old stomping grounds, Memorial Stadium in Champaign is getting a major facelift. They're adding new permanent stands to the North Endzone, and updating both the West and East Halls. The addition of a new press box and an assortment of luxury suites will bring the Illini in line with the majority of the schools in the Big Ten stadium-wise. They have trained a webcamera on the Northside construction. I've been checking out the feed everyday. I think if I put this image up here, it'll show what's doing for you live on this blog. If you see little men working, hit refresh and they should have moved! Pretty nifty. (picture taken down) While all the talk recently has been on how tough a place to play our basketball areana, the "House of Paign" or Assembly Hall is, I think Memorial Stadium, when rockin' is a very formidable home. It has classic lines with the columns, and once the horseshoe portion is done (phase 2?) and there is a more direct link wit

There's plenty going on down in Champaign and it's not all football related. First, Yahoo announced that they're expanding to bring an office to campus , then Valleywag reported that the U of I will partner with the Library of Congress to preserve Second Life as a museum artifact. All of it makes sense. It's a great engineering school who's churning out great talent. We need to do everything we can to keep those bright minds here in the state.

I can't stop listening to this song. It's the Strokes from "Top of the Pops". Equation Boy/Man took me to see The Strokes a year or so back at the Aragon Ballroom. I bet they played this one.

Someone, somewhere once wrote/said that The Band played Mavin Gaye's "Don't Do it" like it was their own. There are a few songs that a group or artist plays so well and so convincingly that it somehow/someway becomes "their" song. This is one example. Although some will squabble with this, for me, below is just about the most perfect piece of rock and roll ever created.

I kinda-sorta made the Sun-Times today via Richard Roeper's column . In it, he takes on the Amy Jacobson story and points to some headlines in the blogosphere: I loved all the talk about whether or not it was "newsworthy" for WBBM-Channel 2 to show that videotape of Amy Jacobson, formerly of WMAQ-Channel 5, hanging at Craig Stebic's house. Let's see. A well-known and well-respected reporter who has been covering a high-profile case involving a missing woman and her estranged husband is seen on her day off at the couple's home while the husband is there. She seems comfortable and relaxed as she works the cell phone and watches the kids. Uh, yeah. That's news. That's why the Sun-Times and Tribune had major media columns about the issue on Tuesday. That's why it was Topic No. 1 on the local talk radio dial. That's why it was a story on news stations across the country. Among the headlines from blog-land: "Pool Party!" "The Worst C

Some of the folks who are reading this blog may be startled to find out that I was once an exercise fiend. Yup. I was in a daily routine that included plenty of exercise and a healthy consumption of food. Somewhere in the midst of training for my 3rd marathon, I had a severe flameup of some back issues and that's where I fell off the wagon. Aside from the occassional jog and a 5K here or there, I've followed the doctors order's pretty strictly. When I asked him what I should be doing, he said, "Stop running". So I did. And guess what? My fitness level dropped like a stone. The "el-bees" piled on. I lost my focus. There's plenty of attention on how brides need to/want to/should attempt to get into shape for their weddings, but there isn't a general guide for grooms. We want to look our best, don't we? I think that, knowing Natalie, we'll have those pictures up in our house for a long, long time, so it's in my best interest

The tragic story of the disappearance/killing of Plainfield resident Lisa Stebic took a bizarre twist yesterday. Her husband, who by all accounts is the chief suspect, apparently had some company in the form on NBC5 Reporter Amy Jacobson. That's her on the right with one of my other favorites from NBC 5, Anna Devlantes. ( I sound like Steve Dahl with my " top 5 newsbabes ", don't I ? ) Apparently, "the Jake", as we like to call her, dropped by the Stebic's house in her bikini for a pool party with the accused husband, and brought along her kids. Amy Jacobson, a reporter for WMAQ-Channel 5, is in hot water with her bosses for going swimming on her day off with the estranged husband of a missing Plainfield woman. Dressed in a two-piece swimsuit, Jacobson brought her two young sons, ages 3 and 2, with her Friday when she swam in the backyard pool of Craig Stebic. Lisa Stebic vanished from the southwest suburban home April 30. She and her husband, parent

Natalie and I celebrated the 4th of July up in Coloma Michigan on Paw Paw Lake. It's an (almost) annual tradition that includes a sunset boat ride that leads to 360-degree fireworks. Pretty sweet. Yesterday, on our way to Meijer to pick up some supplies (meat, beer, etc), we saw a new Steve and Barry's store had opened in Benton Harbor. Natalie immediately noted that we NEED to stop there because the new Sarah Jessica Parker line of clothes is only sold there. I told her that we used to have a Steve and Barry's on campus in Champaign and they were the store that sold "Buy one Illini t-shirt, get 2 free". Times had changed, she said. They've apparently expanded their offerings immensly. Their strategy seems to be one of filling up the space of older midsize boxes in commercial areas. Think of the space that JCPenny's would occupy. Or Sears. We pulled in and boy, was I surprised. I'm definitely no clothes horse, as anyone who works with me

As a few others have pointed out, FeedBurner became FreeBurner a few days ago. I'll claim it's because we're patriotic and we're celebrating our country's independence, but it's mostly because we have the ginormous resources of Google behind us that allowed to give up our MyBrand and TotalStats features for free . This is the first of more things to happen as a result of the acquisition. MyBrand is especially important to publishers who want to ensure that they maintain total control of their domain, brand, and name. Freeing it up is the first step. The next step is implementation. It's not simple, but we're here to help. Here's some tips on executing it.

Natalie's been very "in to" our wedding planning lately and it's becoming a little contagious. She's been writing blog posts over on the wedding blog and just this week, she unveiled what I will call her wedding "touchstone". She calls it her "inspiration board" . It's basically a bunch of reference points. She's done a great job of pulling together the details (which are more and more everyday). She's even gone so far as to participate in the wedding blogosphere. One way or another, Nat had her inspiration board featured on one of the more popular wedding blogs called Style Me Pretty. Natalie was really happy with seeing her work over there and reading all the comments about her style. I'm really proud of her. We didn't have a ton of traffic, but a pretty steady stream of regular visitors (friends and family) and quite a bit of search traffic (brides to be, I'm guessing based on their search terms). The past f

ESPN made a great decision this week. No...it wasn't that they're going to move away from their East Coast bias and stop burying the Big Ten in the middle of SportsCenters. They've decided that they're going to take their wildly popular pre-game show, College Gameday to Blacksburg Virginia, home of the VTech Hokies on opening day . The games a dud against Eastern California, but it shows that someone's thinking out in Bristol. "Virginia Tech is a special place and the community is one of the most respectful and passionate we have visited," said Norby Williamson, ESPN's executive vice president of production. "Our coverage will be considerate of the emotional day facing the students, faculty, and people of Blacksburg and the country." Virginia Tech football head coach Frank Beamer added, "Every time College GameDay has come to Blacksburg it has been exciting. This time, I think there will be a greater togetherness than ever before.&quo

I have a confession. I've been going to McDonald's. Yup. Guilty. I'm apparently not alone. The Sun-Times Ted Pinkus writes that McDonald's profits are soaring and has widened its lead as the world's largest restaurant network with an all-time high market cap of $60 billion, vs. $17 billion for Yum! Brands, $3.52 billion for Burger King and $3.18 billion for Wendy's. Natalie's hooked, too. No, we're not scarfing down Big Mac's and Fries, but we're there a few mornings a week picking up iced coffees and yogurt parfaits for her and the BIG 42 oz soda for me. The article speaks to the methods in which McDonald's has really spread out it's offerings and they've done things to appeal to folks like Natalie and I. The drive through also helps, as our Starbucks doesn't have one. I'm not going to go out to McDonald's for lunch anytime soon, but they've filled a nice niche in our eating lives. Kudos to them for figuri

With my new role at the new company, I've taken on some additional responsibilities when it comes to travel. At FeedBurner, I'd make the occasional trip for a conference or to call on a customer, but it wasn't a constant. From the looks of it, we'll be here in NYC quite often and maybe even a trip every once in a while to visit Rick and Don in Mountain View. I've had other roles with different organizations that required traveling (for those keeping score at home, I used to sell Drywall Screws in a 5 state territory), so it's not something I have to get comfortable with. There's all the normal headaches of travel like delays, bad beds, lack of exercise, etc. With plenty of things brewing on the homefront, it's a little harder to get away this week. We have some major decisions coming up that give me pause, but there are also just the little things that aren't any fun missing. Yesterday, one of those little things came and went. My little girl,

Last week, just like my colleagues , I spent some time in the New York Office. There were plenty of things that were mentionable, but one item struck me particularly: in the cafe, they listed on a grease board all of the local farmers where their food supplies arrived from. They were boasting about the "Localness" of their offerings and for good reason. Serving the volume of food that they do, a company of our size can have an impact on local growers. I'm glad that they're so proud of helping bring local food and produce to the employees. There's a movement afoot in places like South Carolina to try to bring more locally grown food to residents. Sometimes it's hard to determine where things are coming from. Unless you go to your local farmer's market, it's difficult to know for sure if something is local or not. In South Carolina though, things are changing. Agriculture officials there have unveiled a new effort to brand locally grown produ

If you're looking for something to spend a few minutes of your online advocacy time on, this seems to be a pretty good cause . Give them a hand by sending 3 simple emails. Montana’s Department of Livestock is planning on trapping and slaughtering 300 wild buffalo – including calves as young as a few weeks, and their mothers. The agency plans to begin the roundup on Thursday, May 31. For extra credit, make sure that you tell Governor Schweitzer that he "could" be the Vice Presidential Nominee in 2008, but this won't help him. Seems that the emails have already helped stall this terrible thing. They've put off the vote until next week. With your help, they'll reconsider.

Did you come just to start a fight? A Punchup at a Wedding Radiohead Hail to the Thief

Over on our wedding blog , we're trying to gauge people's honest opinions on these "buttons" for our rehearsal dinner. I think they're cute and a good way to get folks talking to each other. We'll probably have a pretty big sized rehearsal dinner, so we don't want people to not socialize. It's one of many posts that Natalie and I have collaborated on. Natalie is clearly the more clever, quick one of us. She wrote the punchline, which I think is pretty funny: Buttons that have been rejected from the list include: "I slept with the grooms's mom," "I used to be the bride's sister, but now I'm her brother," "I'm just here for the booze," "I got a pity invite" and "I love lamp." Go on. Head over to the wedding blog and give us your vote. I'm hoping that we'll get these done. We probably won't do buttons as much as we'll probably just do nametags run through a printer.

Here's a few XRT widgets that I fooled around with to show the XRT guys what they can be doing to help get their content disributed: Get great free widgets at Widgetbox ! Get this widget! ↑ Grab this Headline Animator

We've been having a lot of fun over on our wedding blog . Natalie and I have been posting a lot. It's not the most compelling stuff for general consumption, but it's a nice way for us to keep in touch with our families, friends, and members of the Wedding Party. We're able to connect with the folks who will make our Big Day special, but it also allows us to share our experiences with everyone involved. We're trying to do things like polling the audience on how much they'd pay for a hotel as well as sharing our notes from our experience with our vendors . Natalie has been good about giving me a lot of latitude on what I post and what I do with the blog. As we come closer, I'm sure the design/content will come under closer scrutiny. ( Some folks were wondering how I slipped the Major League quote by her. Other's were just puzzled as to why I would slip it in there in the first place! ) Most importantly for me is that the wedding blog provides me

This morning on the drive into the city, Natalie and I were tuned into WXRT (as usual) and we listened to the movie review by the "Regular Guy". This week, he covered the movie Lucky You , which he said had a stellar cast, but was a below average film. They don't have it posted here on the XRT site yet, but it'll get up there eventually, I bet. His review was fun, as usual, but one thing stuck out for me: he said that there's a new Bob Dylan song in the movie. Turns out Lucky You is directed by Curtis Hanson, the same guy who directed Wonder boys . Hanson must have the "magic touch" because just like he did with the great song Things have Changed , he somehow coaxed Dylan to put out a new track for Lucky You . The new song, Huck's Tune is a great number and a nice addition to the "latest" Dylan work. From what the Regular Guy said this morning, the song only plays over the ending credits in the movie, so I'm sure it's

Somehow this week (stamp machine, I think), I came into a few of the sacagawea dollar coins . They've been jangling around my pockets for a few days and today, I decided to spend them. At the sammich shop down the block from my office, I ordered my meal, stepped over to the cashier, and gingerly handed the coins over to the young lady. She didn't even flinch. Gave me a few coins in change and I went on my way. I couldn't help but feel like I just had gotten away with something - like I got a big discount. Anyone use these things regularly? Did they stop minting them? Should I not be spending them, instead keeping them or something?

Last night when I arrived back from work, I had, waiting for me, a letter from State Senator Chris Lauzen. He apparently, is a reader of this blog. Hello, Senator! Thanks for your cordial letter. I appreciate your interest in my blog. In his correspondence, Senator Lauzen takes issue with my position on Senate Bill 600 and this post . It was nice of him to take time out of his legislative duties to correspond with me and I thank him for that. I won't go blow-by-blog through his letter, but I'll point out a few things. Senator Lauzen states: "I was surprised at the intensity of your sarcasm in pointing out how inaccurate your claim Doug Ibendahl's account was regarding the history of this legislation." Surprised at my sarcasm? I guess you're not a subscriber, eh Senator?!? I hope that you subscribe to my feed via your reader or email. It's over there on the right. You'll get all my posts delivered to you! Next, he includes roll call votes

Sad news via Greg Kots blog : Mavis Staples is performing to support her new record with folks including guitarist-producer Ry Cooder, drummer Jim Keltner and a few others, but she won't be making a stop in her hometown of Chicago. Too bad for us, eh? For a primer on Mavis, check her out with Pop in this cut from The Last Waltz . She's a gem and her voice is tops. (For you Band fans out there, you gotta love Rick Danko's gyrations, right? Or...check out the great dance moves on SoulTrain in the classic "I'll Take you There": Boy...I wish life was this easy. Wearing great threads. Shimmy-ing down the SoulTrain. Great tunes. Doesn't get much better than that, does it?

Congrats to Coach Bruce Weber and the entire staff. After this very challenging year - with the multiple arrests, injuries, and the Eric Gordon to IU saga - the Illini Nation could use the very good news. Jeffrey Jordan, the son of basketball legend Michael Jordan, said Friday that he plans to attend the University of Illinois next year and play basketball as a walk-on. The younger Jordan, a 6-2 guard at Loyola Academy in Wilmette, Ill., where he is a senior, said in a news release that he chose Illinois over Valparaiso University. "After I worked out at Illinois, (met) with the coaching staff and the players, and toured the campus with my mom, I just felt more comfortable with U of I," Jordan said in the release. The insiders are saying that this plays well for the future. Jeffrey's younger brother, who many consider to be a much better hoops player, will be heading off to play college ball in a few years. The recruitment and signing of his older brother will give th

Unfortunately, I rarely get to sit down and listen to an entire record all the way through these days. I have an expansive collection, but it's largely gathering dust because I just simply don't have the time. For my birthday, my buddy Matt gave me some iTunes bucks and I went trolling for some new tunes. I settled on The Shins new record: Wincing the Night Away . I only got about halfway through when something struck me: these guys have been listening to their Brian Wilson records, haven't they? I've since gone back and listened to the record a dozen or so times and that initial notion sticks for me. I'm by no means, a Shins Superfan, rather a casual listener, but to my ear, they've been heavily influenced by the Beach Boys and their once front man Brian Wilson- whether The Shins know it or not. As far as influences go, the Beach Boys are tops in my book, so it's not anything to be bashful about. I've put up a few videos here below. Go ahead.

A few nights ago, Natalie and I took it all in at the Orland Park Costco. In addition to buying a HUGE jar of Giardinara, enough yogurt to feed a football team, and of course, a $1.50 polish sausage/Diet Coke combo, I also picked up Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2007 for the Nintendo Wii. I've toyed with it in just about all of my free time the past few days. My first impressions: great extension of the core Wii Sports golf game. In playing all of the Wii Sports games, I found both bowling and golf the most fun games to play. That's largely due to the ability to go through the entire range of gameplay in both bowling and golf. Baseball would be great if you could run the bases, throw people out, and manage the game and boxing, well boxing is just too much work, frankly. Tiger Woods 2007 PGA Tour brings all of that (the good stuff) to golf. You can create a player (which I already did), get him his tour card, upgrade his skills, and go head-to-head with the PGA's best. My ar

Madonna, The Police, Beastie Boys, Smashing Pumpkins, Foo Fighters, and.....Spinal Tap?!? You read that right! They're getting the band back together! Spinal Tap, the fake band, is fake reuniting for a gig this summer to benefit environmental causes . The show, coincides with their "new" release: Warmer than Hell . The best part? Rob Reiner also directed a new short film that chronicles the band and their current whereabouts that's being screened tonight at the Tribeca Film Festival. That needs to be on YouTube soon. Back in 1990 or 1991, I caught This is Spinal Tap for the first time. My buddy Neil McAllister turned me on to it, probably through his older brothers. Immediately, it struck a chord with me. I ran back to the video store and rented the VHS a few times. Then for either Christmas or my birthday, someone bought me the tape. I just about wore it out. Then came "Break like the Wind" . Released when I was in 8th grade, I again, colle

The body needs sleep. There's nothing you can do about it. You can't put any time in the bank before you go to Las Vegas. You just need to pay the piper when you get home. I learned that lesson on Sunday night and last night. This morning, I could barely crawl out of the rack. It took me a few days, but I'm finally fully functional after my first excursion to Las Vegas. I'll do my best to recap and highlight some of the weekend - one which I really enjoyed and can't wait to repeat. We left Thursday night and were delayed a few hours at O'Hare. That was time well spent in the Fox Sports SkyBox tavern out on the concourse. We had a small crew there at the airport because some folks arrived earlier, later, or on a different airline (Matt). I slept the entire way out there, thinking that I could bank the 2-3 hours for the long weekend I was in store for. We arrived and spent quite a bit of time gaming. I believe it's either called "Old Town&

If for nothing but the press opportunities and having MJ attend some games, I sure hope that Coach Bruce Weber and the Fighting Illini can close the deal to bring Michael Jordan's boy onto the squad . Of the places he's looking at, the Illini program is clearly the best. Wilmette Loyola senior guard Jeff Jordan is seriously considering walking on the Illinois basketball team. Jordan made the trip to Champaign with his mother Tuesday and played with the Illini during a pickup game at the Ubben Basketball Complex. Jordan already has been accepted to the university, and the Illinois coaching staff talked with him about joining the team as a preferred walk-on. The 6-foot-2 Jordan is rated as a three-star recruit by Scout.com. If Jordan would choose Illinois, he likely would arrive for the start of the summer semester, when the five-man recruiting class will reach campus. Thus, a decision is needed soon. But imagine MJ sitting on the sidelines next to the Orange Krush to see his s

Anyone else notice lately that the Gawker sites are going a little crazy with the keyword linking? I read both Deadspin and Valleywag everyday and they have all these unnecessary links in their posts deep linking to category pages on their own sites. Take for instance this post on Deadspin. What's with linking ESPN to this page ? Same with Kobe Bryant and Paul Shirley. It's a wonder they didn't link the word "douche" to a tagged page. Same with Valleywag. Why link to an environment page on this post ? All this linking makes me not even click the links to the outside sources. I know that SEO is a very dark art that I don't come close to understanding, but is this an attempt to bring more search traffic in? Create these big lengthy verticle pages with post after post about a particular topic and hope/know your search rankings will rise on that word? Sounds like a SEO Honeypot to me, no? Who knows, it probably works. I need to talk about smelt a lot m

Can't say that I've watched even one minute of American Idol in my life, but like a little schoolgirl I voted last night for Sanjaya. Not just once, either. I voted like 15 times. I know...Weird, right? I couldn't help myself. Howard Stern made me do it . What's that you say? How did Howard make me do it? He made it soooo easy. When I was in my car, I had Howard 100 tuned in and guess what kept flashing across the screen? The words "Vote for Sanjaya" and the number to call. I called. And called. And called. I kept looking around at the stop lights wondering if the folks next to me knew what I was doing. Stern's crew have really figured out how to leverage the device to their benefit. There's a few million of those things around the country and more than a handful were probably tuned in to Howard. They knew that, and figured it was a great way to incent folks to act. I'm sure that this is just the first way in which they'll use

Today at polling places all across the Village of Frankfort, residents went to the polls and voted. I'm lucky enough that they placed their confidence in me by re-electing me to another 4 year term on the Village Board! Granted, I was running uncontested, I still was nervous all morning. Turnout was low, and I expected that, with not many contested races in Frankfort. When I voted at 8 am this morning, I was only the 7th voter in my precinct! I'm incredibly grateful for the support that both you guys (my friends) and the voters in Frankfort. I'm humbled by the confidence that you all have placed in me. I'm pleased with all that we've accomplished so far, but there's much more to be accomplished: downtown wi-fi, widening of Route 30, banning of all new banks, and dragging the Village of Frankfort into the 21st Century technology-wise. While I was unopposed this election, that's largely due to you. I've been successful in fundraising and for that

Continuing our annual tradition, Matt Pawlak rounded up our crew and others and we headed out to Montrose Harbor last Friday night for Smelt Fishing. We were right in the sweet spot of the smelting season, but, much like last year, our efforts didn't produce a heckuva lot of smelt. In fact, this year, we caught exactly ZERO smelt. Didn't matter that much as we were thinking ahead and brought a bunch of the suckers from Jewel! Libations were plentiful and the burn bucket kept us warm all night. Thanks to Tom Cactus Vlach for bringing the gear, Matt for much of the logistics, and Dan Fetterer for logging the most miles (NYC to Chicago!) to make it out to Montrose Harbor. Even though we came up largely empty on the fish front this year, make no mistake: we'll be back at it in April of 2008. Here's a few pictures: Matt Pawlak and Tom Cactus. The question of the night? Where's Rob? The Dauphinais Brothers and Mark Kwilosz stay warm by the burn bucket. Neil McAl

I'm heading to Las Vegas for the first time this Thursday for my good buddy Mark Dauphinais' bachelor party. We're set to be there through early Sunday morning and I'm sure that things will be debaucherous. As luck would have it, one of my favorite blogs, Dethroner , announced that his "theme" this week is Bachelor Parties . Some great posts already and I'm looking forward to even more this week. I've alerted my crew that's going to be trouncing around with me about the Theme, and I bet we'll get some pointers/tips that we can utilize this weekend. The party itself is actually an event that is being put on for 2 bachelors. Mark and one of his college buddies. Because of that, there appears to be in excess of 20 dudes heading out there. From the tone of some of the emails, most of the guys that I don't know (Mark's college buddies) are going to really turn one out. As a first timer in Las Vegas, I'll have to strike a nice b

I'm either too cramped for time, or too lazy or both to write a full post, so instead, I have a bunch of stuff rattling around my brain and I'm dumping it here so I can move on to more important things like whether I'm going to get a meatball sandwich or the Italian Beef at Venice Cafe for lunch today. I hate it when people on the train wear a ton of purfume/cologne. I also hate it when people smell. Sure, we all have our off days, but my goal in life scent-wise is to leave no footprint - have no smell. Shouldn't that be everyone's? The best sports blog out there is Deadspin. Hands down. One of the best parts of the blog are the comments. My co-worker Matt and I were just chatting about them this morning. The best description I've ever read about the community there was written on CopyRanter : "If you have time, read the comments; his readers are both batshit insane and very entertaining. " I wonder if there's a Beer-O-the-Month-Club

Some companies fascinate me (FedEx, Sirius Satellite Radio, Toyota, Google), some companies that I hate (sometimes FedEx, Kerasotes Movie Theaters, Clear Channel), and other companies I love. One of the companies that I love is Patagonia , the maker of gear and apparel. "There is no business to be done on a dead planet." - Sierra Club executive director David Brower On certain days, I'm decked out head-to-toe in clothing and gear from Patagonia. As Natalie would tell anyone, I'm not that fashion-conscious and I usually have a hard time dressing myself in the mornings. I don't have that much clothing from Patagonia, but I have a few "everyday items" like coats, shoes, and my computer bag. Toss in a few shirts, some pants, and a hat or two, and that rounds out my whole collection. I try to avoid clothes with lots of labels, while at the same time wearing clothes that are comfortable and wear nice. There's nothing worse then when I bring home a p

This morning on my radio program of choice (Howard Stern), I tuned in to find a guest that has appeared many times before. He's also a popular guest on programs like The Tonight Show and Late Night. That guest was Richard Simmons. Richard is a popular guest because he's usually enjoyable to listen to/watch as he hams it up for the host and the audience. It appears that he knows his niche and he's parlayed that to a pretty sizable empire. This morning, in addition to the "Which guy(s) are you dating?" jokes, Stern also chatted with Simmons about the "Strengthening Physical Education Act of 2007". Before Simmons scurried out after an insensitive joke, he spoke about how the "Leave No Child Behind" act is squeezing out physical education classes from America's schools. Much like there are standards for reading, writing, and arithmetic, Simmons bill would amend NCLB to provide a national guideline for minimum standards for health and fi

I believe that I may have had the best food item that I have ever tasted yesterday at my sister Vic's house. Most of my family headed over there for Easter brunch-ish. (10 am to noon) There were the usual suspects on the menu: bagels, quiche, ham, etc. Natalie and I brought a banana cream pie, courtesy of my "Two-Time Pie Eating Champion" winnings. I made my way through the spread without much delight. While, as most people know, I really enjoy a good spread, I'm not really into breakfast foods. Vic tipped me onto the Gorilla Bread , and I'm thrilled she did. While not the least bit healthy, (the recipe doesn't mention that Vic uses Martha's cream cheese frosting recipe to top this whole thing off!) it may be the best thing I've ever tasted - not to mention it's President Jimmy Carter's favorite food. When discussing my favorite foods, I tend to skew towards the italian beef/pizza area of the food pyramid, but this new Gorilla Bread e

Dear Illinois Legislators, More often than not, I know that more and new laws are not the answer to problems facing residents in Illinois. Many times, they aren't the solutions - they're the problems. That's why, it is with great trepidation that I am requesting your sponsorship of a bill that would modify the Illinois Vehicle Code. As any commuter, or for that matter - any driver in Illinois, can tell you, road construction is the source of many headaches. While we all understand that constuction and improvements are a necessary part of the roadway system, most drivers try to avoid the construction areas at all costs. Avoiding the construction zones is good practice, but sometimes it's unworkable. What makes travelling the construction zones worse is what, for lack of a better term, I'll call "Cheaters". These are the folks who run up the right lane, when 2 miles back there are merge left signage that indicates that the right lane is closing. Most

Although most, if not all of you didn't notice, our own Chicago Bulls have quietly secured a clinched a playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. I haven't watched a Bulls game in quiet some time. I catch the highlights every morning on SportsCenter and it appears that Luol Deng has matured into quite a player. Ben Gordon is somewhat of a "proven commodity" and Ben Wallace has been a great anchor in with the "trees". Wallace, who's been the source of some controversy this season because of his headbands (why not let him wear them, guys? He has them on in your billboards, promo materials and tickets, right?), but he's also gaining some press for something else he's wearing. Wallace has joined up with Knicks guard Stephon Marbury to roll out a sneaker that retails for $14.98 . You read that right: less than 15 bucks. Right now, he's wearing Marbury's shoes, but next season, he'll have his own line - The Big Ben. He's doing

With the arrival of a new year in my life (29th!), I thought that it would be appropriate to move RhodesSchool over to a different blogging platform. I've been on a custom-made blogging platform that has served me very well since 2004 and I am not done with it. My Wedding Blog is still on the platform, as are a whole host of my other sites. With RhodesSchool, I wanted to bring it to a new platform because this is the type of issue that I deal with on a day-to-day basis at FeedBurner. We deal with publishers who have to modify their .htaccess file, install the Ordered List WordPress plugin, and embed various widgets and items into their sidebars. I wanted to roll up my sleeves, get a little dirty, and get better acquainted to this particular platform. Will I stay at WordPress forever? I doubt it. It's one of many blogging platforms that publishers are using. Rick Stratton is using Feed.us and that looks to be a promising tool. I am planning on giving it a try next.

Yup.  If you've arrived here, you are discovering that I'm finally growing up and bringing my blog over to MY domain.  It'll still be called Rhodesschool, but in an attempt to make it more personal, I'm bringing it here.  I've got to try to figure out a way to bring all the old archives over from RhodesSchool.com, but in the meantime, all the old "stuff" should work.  The feed will be the same and I'll repost stuff here that I've recently put up at RhodesSchool.

What's that you say, Jake? We're where? The "Golden Age" of Bob Dylan. Come on, now. You can't be serious. You can't compare Bob Dylan of today with Bob Dylan of yesteryear. What about Blood on the Tracks or Blonde on Blonde or Nashville Skyline or Desire. Good questions, right? I agree. There are a ton, an absolute ton of fantastic Bob Dylan records. There are even a few spectacular "periods" where the output was amazing. Look at the first few years. While some of the tracks weren't his material, from 1962-1967, Dylan put out 9 records. That's almost 2 per year. And they were incredible. (Go here to get the full timeline breakdown of Dylan's records .) Maybe it's because the last 3 Dylan records are the 3 that I "came of age with", but I really think that these 3 can not only "stand up" to any period in his life, I think they are the best collection of 3 records in his career. The three that I am talking about