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From the yearly archives: 2010

Ten Tech Gratitudes for 2010

By ~LS~ On December 30, 2010 · Add Comment · In Pedagogy, Technology, The Web and tagged Tagged With: Droid, Educational Technology, Teaching Speech, Tech Toys

(In no particular order)

1. Droid

I bought my Droid in November 2009 and it has changed how I interact with people, sometime for the worse, but usually for the better. On the one hand, even though I’m a technophile, I really don’t like the 24/7 culture of new communication technology. When I first got a cell phone, I only used it to call out and only for emergencies. Now, the convenience and entertainment value of a smart phone make me wonder why I went so long without one. I still have a bad habit of leaving my ringer off, missing calls, and forgetting all about the phone’s existence. But there have been so many situations where the cell phone saved me many hassles and headaches.

2. Palm Pre free WiFi hotspot from Verizon

You can’t go wrong with free wifi.

3. Audible.com

Essential for long trips. I’m working my [...]

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New Year’s Resolution for 2011

By ~LS~ On December 29, 2010 · Add Comment · In The Quotidian (yadda yadda) and tagged Tagged With: Goals, Holidays

New Year’s Resolutions: A year in review

I only remember one of my 2010 resolutions: Do a better job of staying in contact with friends. On a scale of 1 – 10, I think I managed about a 3, unless you count Facebook, which we really shouldn’t.

One resolution only. That’s pretty bad.

I checked my last year’s blog entry and here is my list and how I’ve judged my success:

1. Be a better friend by staying in touch. Results: 3.

I started out fairly strong but by the end of the year I was reduced to holiday postcards from Tokyo.

2. Socialize more. Results: 5.

My success on this front is reflected in how much money I spent at restaurants, coffee shops, and venues, and how many check-ins I have on Foursquare. Of course, by the end of summer, I lost mayorships to everything but my dentist and [...]

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Tokyo Metro

By ~LS~ On December 23, 2010 · 2 Comments · In Travel and tagged Tagged With: How to do stuff, Tokyo Trip, Travel

Trains provide an excellent location to study a culture. They are at the nexus of so many life patterns, work, play, family time, doctor’s visits, shopping. In a city like Tokyo, people from all walks of life take trains, unlike in the US where there’s a distinct distaste for mass transportation in all but the largest cities. So you can learn a lot about people’s customs by observing the world of trains. In Tokyo, the train culture is fascinating, both in infrastructure and in people and their behaviors. The Metro system in Tokyo is complex but it reflects the way people manage to negotiate all this complexity with a host of implicit and explicit norms to orchestrate behaviors. As a tourist, you can see this from the outside so what’s normally invisible is quite visible.

1. Train Lines:

The trains in Tokyo are run by several companies so there [...]

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Mt. Fuji Tour Guide (I’m just wild about Harry..)

By ~LS~ On December 16, 2010 · Add Comment · In Travel and tagged Tagged With: Tokyo Trip, Travel, Trivia

Day trip tour guides are hit or miss, in my experience. Only two guides stand out for me from all my tours. One was very fun; he made us dowse for ley lines at the Avebury stone circle in England. The worst one was on our tour to Hadrian’s wall in Northumberland at the border of Scotland and England. He had on a kilt and hiking boots. It should have forewarned me about what to expect. In any case…

Our tour guide to Mt. Fuji stands out as the best and most entertaining I’ve ever had. He went by the name of Harry, obviously a concession to English-speaking tourists. Like most guides, he regaled us with trivia, interesting stories and local legends, and explanations of our spots of interest. This man was quite a character, though. The breadth of topics that he covered was mind-boggling. Even more unexpected, [...]

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In another part of the world – Viator Mt. Fuji Tour

By ~LS~ On December 15, 2010 · Add Comment · In Travel and tagged Tagged With: Family, Tokyo Trip, Travel

The Viator day tour to Mt. Fuji is underrated. This is an indisputable fact. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. The itinerary is pretty easy. We took a bus upto Mt. Fuji, stopping first at a small rest stop along the way. That rest stop is purely a pit stop and an opportunity to look at the top of the Fuji volcano in the distance. We were there for maybe fifteen minutes.

Our second stop was at the fifth way station up the mountain, which is as high as vehicle traffic is allowed. We were very lucky because usually that level is generally inaccessible in the winter months due to snowy or icy weather and poor visibility. The weather the two days we’d been in Tokyo prior to the tour were terrible and the forecast did not look good. We were predicting that we had wasted our money, but [...]

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Droid Does – The Tokyo Episode

By ~LS~ On December 13, 2010 · Add Comment · In Travel and tagged Tagged With: Apps, Droid, Tech Toys, Tokyo Trip, Travel

We have arrived in Tokyo and time-wise I can’t tell if I’m coming or going because I still haven’t adjusted to the time. The logistics have been much smoother than I predicted. All the little things that you take for granted are up for grabs when traveling in a non-English speaking country and I was predicting doom and disaster for the most minor of needs and requirements. My greatest concern is getting around and getting lost. My other concerns were the bizarre bathrooms and money conversion. So far due to the Droid’s superpower capabilities, I have been victorious over these challenges. Of course, this is only day 1.

1. Money – I have a nifty conversion app that switches from Yen to USD and back. I have a hard enough time with simple addition much less converting a dollar to 84 cents. So my 6,000 yen add up to about [...]

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Ten Tech Gratitudes for 2010

New Year’s Resolution for 2011

Tokyo Metro

Mt. Fuji Tour Guide (I’m just wild about Harry..)

In another part of the world – Viator Mt. Fuji Tour

Droid Does – The Tokyo Episode

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Ten Tech Gratitudes for 2010

New Year’s Resolution for 2011

Tokyo Metro

Mt. Fuji Tour Guide (I’m just wild about Harry..)

In another part of the world – Viator Mt. Fuji Tour

Droid Does – The Tokyo Episode

Categories

Archives

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Blogroll

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Meta

Catch me if you can!