I’m sure you’re all tired of this game by now, but I find it [ever][1] [so][2] [fascinating][3].

And physically. Or I could go with my alternate title “North Carolina, Come on and Raise Up”. Either way, James Taylor and Petey Pablo have something in common, and I am headed to the [Tar Heel State][1]. Not to see any [Tarheels][2] though, actually, to see the marriage of a [Wolfpack][3] (a wolfpack of one?) and a [Blue Devil][4], the latter of which being my sister. So I will be unable to post for a few days, but do not despair, I’m sure my colleague has plenty in store for you. I plan to take some photos during the course of this journey (which I will be making with my two younger brothers) and upon my return will share some choice ones with you as well as relate few tales of the adventure.

Have you ever watched a trapped fly making futile escape attempts, repeatedly crashing into a window, then fluttering around dazed before repeating the stunt? With the [Akismet][1] spam filter built into Wordpres, the comment spammers bear quite a resemblance to the aforementioned fly (man that sounded almost like a commercial…).

In order to keep ourselves out of hot water, I have resorted to amassing a few handy resources. In case you are also contemplating risky journalism, I recommend you visit these links and make sure that you cover your bases.

And now, for some Googley Goodness:

I don’t know if any of you are into water sports, and even if you are, you are less likely to have seen someone surfing on the lake. However, along with wakeboarding, this is one of the activities that my roommate and I engage in from time to time. While I was unable to go on this particular outing (because I was stuck at work all day), Eric (the afore-mentioned roommate) just sent me a few pictures I’d like to share.

Just as everyone feared, the iPhone actually rather revolutionary.

An email from AT&T/Cingular just arrived in my inbox informing me of the new store locater that will enable you find the closest AT&T Store selling cocain [iPhones][1] on Friday. If you’re all rev’d up from my [last post][2] on the subject, you can search for those precious stores [here][3].

In addition to being a rather slow day news-wise, I have been rather busy at work today. Fortunately a few jewels sparkled from underneath the murk of the day’s political propaganda, iPhone malarkey, and other nonsense:

According to [TechCrunch][1], Google is in the process of acquiring [Grand Central][2]. Immediately intrigued by what Google could possibly be up to now, and having never heard of “Grand Central,” I proceeded to investigate. After reading through their laundry list of [features][3], I think that this acquisition will pave the way for a host of exciting new Google tricks – and with that oh-so-slick GoogleApps interface we all love hate enjoy using. In fact, I’m not exactly sure how I managed to miss this one when they rolled out their beta service last October.

[][1]

According to a 1999 study performed by Justin Kruger and David Dunning, incompetent people think that they are actually much smarter than they really are (in a narcissistic moment, the pair termed this the [Kruger-Dunning Effect][1]). The illustrious duo came to this conclusion after designing tests which measured one’s abilities in the areas of logic, grammar, and humor, then asking participants to estimate how well they ranked. They found that the incompetent people thought themselves much smarter, while the truly smart people often undersold themselves.

Check out this really weird, yet oddly cool music video / cover of Gnarls Barkley’s song “[Crazy][1],” as performed on a [Theremin][2] (and other electronic instruments) by [The Ether and Aether Experiment][3].

Victory on the greatest stage: the soccer pitch. Recently, the US Soccer team triumphed over Mexico to win the CONCACAF Gold Cup. The tournament features teams exclusively from our side of the pond, but its winners qualify for the Confederations Cup in South Africa. The game proved to be full of excitement, suspense, and heartbreak (well, for Mexico). The fellows from Mexico lead off with a goal by Andres Guardado (it’s ok, I haven’t heard of him either) in the 44th minute. At the end of the first half, it appeared that our friends to the south might walk away with the crown. However, the second half told the true tale. Landon Donovan ties the game with a penalty kick in the 62nd, and only minutes later Benny Feilhaber sinks (can one “sink” in soccer?) a beautiful volley from 22 yards out to win the game. Hopefully, will be the start of something great, like the US team living up to the hype. And if you are wondering, 26 more days until David Beckham graces us with his presence. Watch soccer, it’s awesome.

In an interesting new “working essay” written recently by researcher [danah boyd][1] titled “[Viewing American Class Divisions through Facebook and MySpace][2],” [MySpace][3] and [Facebook][4] are analyzed in light of the socio-economic (look at me, using big words and stuff) roles that they are playing. Facebook appears to be the choice of most “goodie two shoes, jocks, athletes, [and] other “good” kids,” while MySpace is increasingly the choice of most “Latino/Hispanic teens, immigrant teens, ‘burnouts, ‘alternative kids,’ ‘art fags,’ punks, emos, goths, gangstas, queer kids, and other kids who didn’t play into the dominant high school popularity paradigm.”

When I think “innovation” and “cool new toys,” Microsoft is most definitely not the first name that comes to mind. However, in a surprising turn of events, their R&D guys have been on a roll lately, announcing two new and intriguing new technologies: Surface and Photosynth. While Surface is not a new concept (I’ve seen some really neat tech demos of a similar concept in the past), Photosynth is very unique (as far as I can tell) and promising – if it works like they say.

With the flurry of new activity and the fact that the current [digivation design][1]/layout is growing rather old (approaching the one year mark), I have been contemplating a redesign of the site. This isn’t a new idea – I’ve never been 100% happy with the current layout and have been brainstorming, sketching and creating mock-ups for several months.