Random thoughts

• Barry Bonds may have tested positive for amphetimenes. Isn’t that like Ken Lay being busted for speeding?
• New York Times editorial about the strange smell in NYC on Monday:

“…Has air quality improved so much in New York that we can actually notice an odd smell?”

• Could Indiana University (my alma mater) basketball actually be on the upswing with new coach Kelvin Sampson? We played #5 Ohio State very close in Columbus, beat #24 Michigan State and totally stomped Purdue 85-58.
• On a related note, had Bob Knight broke Dean Smith’s record while still at Indiana, the media would have made a much bigger deal of it.
• Creator of Scooby-Doo (Iwao Takamoto) passed away this week at 81. Can anyone name the famous voice that has played the voice of Shaggy for longer than he’s been famous for what he’s really famous for? (ok, call the grammar police for that last sentence).
• iPhone hasn’t even been released yet and Apple is already being sued by Cisco over the trademark of the name. Usually Steve Jobs is a marketing genius. Excuse me, nail down the trademark first perhaps?
• And rumor has it that a world famous search engine firm is about to buy STARS Enterprise…
• Cool things about raising a child in Brooklyn:
  • Children’s books are about places we actually go
  • Dan Zanes (Playhouse Disney channel, lots of children’s CDs) lives in our neighborhood and leads the annual Halloween parade
  • Our daughter has seen more live performances at four than I had at fourteen (and much better quality)
• Bad things about raising a child in Brooklyn:
  • This condo is for sale on my block. It’s very nice (of course I checked it out), though not quite what we’re looking for (the garden in the back has a pond with actual carp – we’re thinking more like swings and a sand box). And it’s a bit smaller than the place we are renting (remind me not to mention what we are paying in rent). When $1.5 million doesn’t get you what you are looking for, it’s a tad depressing.