http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog bloggish things Mon, 24 Nov 2008 17:53:24 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I need new Lobster Mitts for winter biking. The Nike mitts I bought, um, 3 years ago(?) have worn off whatever coating was on the fingers, and now cold aid gets through. I suppose I could just paint them with a flexible paint (acrylic?) to make them last another 2 ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/11/24/gift-list-2008/ I'm set to defend my dissertation this winter. Given administrative routing, bureaucratic wait-times, and committee member scheduling, I'd guess that mid-January, before the Spring semester starts, will be the time. I've diagrammed the outline for the dissertation here. All of the papers that constitute it have either been presented at ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/11/19/dissertation-progress/ Last week was the College and University Faculty Assembly (CUFA) and National Council for Social Studies (NCSS) in Houston, TX (link). Proposed by Steve Camicia of Utah State, the symposium I was on included Simone Schweberof UW-Madison, Jeremy Stoddard from the College of William and Mary. The Discussant was Diana ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/11/18/cufancss-conference/ I hate air travel. Tuesday: Madison-> Minneapolis-> Sacramento Wednesday: Sacramento-> Denver-> HoustonThursday: Houston-> Denver-> Sacramento and on Monday (after an all-to-brief Northern CA vacation)Sacramento-> Minneapolis-> MadisonYes, I'd hate driving more. And, yes, it's important enough to go to theses places that I put up with air travel, but honestly, I wish I'd checked ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/11/14/six-flights-in-three-days/ On Friday, November 7, at the Green Charter Schools Conference, I was invited to present on my research on place-based games in the "Outta-The-Box" Schools & Anywhere, Anytime Learning section.Technological innovations are changing the ways young people learn. In innovative new environment-focused schools, students can attain knowledge and skills through mobile and wireless ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/11/12/green-charter-schools-conference/ I have no secret sources to back this up -- it's pure speculation. But at the last Apple press conference (iPod), Steve Jobs allowed that there were some unkept secrets that had been leaked. So I wonder if Apple's planted a red herring with all these "leaked" pics and video ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/10/13/macbrick-rumors-red-herring/ The other day I met with Mary Sisock, a doctoral student in Forestry here at UW-Madison. She’d been told to track me down and ask about using AR in her research. My initial thoughts were “how can AR be used in Forestry? — I don’t know…” and I wondered how fictional ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/10/09/pbi-application-24-landowner-stewardship/ Last Spring, Gwen Drury contacted me about incorporating AR in the planning for a new Union South at the University of Wisconsin Madison.  Problem: The UW is redoing Union South to the tune of a couple million  bucks, and she wanted to know if AR could help them figure out how best to do that.  Solution: Was ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/10/08/pbi-application-22-campus-identity/ Just finished reading BIY, Bike-It-Yourself: Parking on the dane101 blog, and it referred to "duck-bill" bike racks as an economical and efficient style of rack made in-house at the UW-Madison. I hope that "duck-bill" refers to the style of rack in the photo here. If so, major kudos to the  folks who came ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/10/08/bike-racks/ So much fun following predictions for Apple's "Let's Rock!" event today. My pick is Job's retirement. Here's why: "In the phrase "Let's Rock," the rock symbolizes Job's gravestone (we all should have clearly realized this when his obituary was released). It also hints at the iXcaliber sword in the stone ... http://www.regardingjohn.com/blog/2008/09/09/lets-rock/