RE: Oddly Specific

Last week, I ordered myself a snazzy new 13" MacBook Pro, and I've been pining away for it ever since. I decided in my nerddom to look up in Google Maps the distance between Shanghai and my apartment to see how long my love has to travel to be warmly received in my arms.

I discovered that Google Maps does understand I can't drive across the Pacific Ocean - but it does not understand that I could fly. Not only does it specify that I must travel the sea, but it also specifies that instead of something like a yacht or a cruise ship or even a sail boat, I should be paddling my ever-loving arms off in a kayak. Across the Pacific Ocean.

Also, this journey, Google informed me, would take me 37 days and 16 hours. How does Google know that? How does Google know, specifically, how long it would take me to paddle a kayak across the freaking Pacific Ocean?

Update: Wolfram Alpha handles this request more accurately, but less hilariously.

Re: Personal Broadcasting

I find myself wavering between two general feelings about social networking (which I'm writing about on a public blog, I know...)

1. Keep it close to the vest. Blogging, Tweeting, Facebooking, etc are narcissistic and unnecessary. And ultimately, boring.

2. If you feel like getting it out, get it out.

I seem to be on a huge upswing of the latter. I'm tweeting, facebooking, myspacing and blogging. Sometimes simultaneously using ping.fm via an iPhone application known as Pingle. Part of it is wanting to share experiences of my day and get feedback and encouragement from others. Part of it is that the technology is sort of fun.

I don't know how I really feel about this. I suspect a little of both, and I just go with whatever mood I'm in. Thoughts? Anyone think I should worry that all this social networking will come back to haunt me one day? All two of my readers have access to my updates on one if not all of these platforms, so you can pretty safely judge that.