Fried iPod and other assorted thoughts

Thanks to history teacher, Dave Ehrhart, for correcting my on the name of the ship, here in the Boston Harbor. It’s the Constelation

I had so many wonderful and stimulating conversations at the AIMS event this week.  I did a Web 2.0 conversational session at the conference (actually all of the sessions were conversational), and there was such a difference between what educators from independent schools  want/need to talk about and educators from public schools.  The major focus was on pedagogy, how to get the most instructional benefit out of blogs and wikis.  In public schools the focus is on how to get administration and school boards to allow blogs and wikis.  That’s not to say that permission is smooth sailing for private schools, and that there aren’t public schools who are making brilliant uses of the participatory web.

Anyway, my reason for mentioning this again is that I’d recorded a lot of these conversations for a podcast that is very (very very) late in coming (I guess it’s been a month) — and when I started to put it together, I found that my recordings were all scrambled.  Hard drive problems on my iPod.  I restored the software with iTunes, and as a result, the iPod wouldn’t even boot.  I tried restoring again, the next day, and now it’s working, though as I listened to my Lincoln Child audio book on my drive from St. Michaels to Baltimore yesterday, there were hesitations in the playing.  I suspect that my iPod is showing its age.

So, some more waiting for my next podcast.

Finally, I’m in Baltimore now, getting ready for the MICCA conference (hh), being held at the Convention Center.  It’s been many years since I was here, probably back in my ThinkQuest days.  Having a couple of hours before sunset, I took my cholesterol walk around the harbor.  There were lots of families and other tourists and some business people out and about, and the traffic was pretty tight.  But it was all very pedestrian, and I had a good walk.  One of the most interesting things I saw were two NEVs (Neighborhood Electric Vehicle) that had been converted into taxis.

There were also a bunch of interesting ships in the harbor, including this replica of a Chesapeake Bay Pungy schooner.  I guess that the most amazing sight, to me, was The Constitution Constellation, the Navy’s oldest ship.  I tried hard to get a picture of it, but with only my cell phone as a camera, I just couldn’t get the whole thing in the picture in any kind of meaningful way.

But what struck me, was what people must of thought, who might visit a harbor town in the 19th century, and see such a sight.  How amazed they must have been, that people could build such a thing that could sail, almost undaunted, any ocean it wanted.  How small and humble it must have made them feel and at the same time, proud.

May we never forget, what we can achieve — today!