Ideal Absolutes

Corissia Group Hotels in Crete Greece presents their offering in the village of Georgioupolis, in the unspoiled western part of the island of Crete in Greece. Now is just as good a time as any to disclose that I am not stranger to travel on the islands and I’m sure Greece hasn’t changed much in the last 15 years. However, my recall or lack there of does not include the level of comfort offered by these hotels.

With age comes expectation in travel. For me? No more youth hostels, sandals, a loaf of bread for breakfast and lunch while walking around in a heat not felt since another memory searing surface of the sun heat on a day in Chichen Itza. No can of Coke has ever matched that life-saving magical mixture of sugar water handed to me when I over-heated in Crete.

Needless to say, I cherish my previous life of travel. I loved it. Jump into life 2.0 and join the world in travel. My next trip to Greece — I’m bringing my wife of 10 years. She may have me beat romping around northeast Europe, exclaiming “Oh! look another castle” while sitting comfortably in a tour bus, but I know another mode of transportation and when the gate on that ferry drops in Greece — you run not walk. My goodness, I just now remembered the Greek salad I ate on the waterfront of one of the islands. These are powerful true memories. Looking into travel to Crete brings them all back.

So — looking forward to this summer — I’m weighing my vacation options and Greece is on the list! Of course this time we take the resort route. The road less traveled winding up the hill hoping for a room is a memory and nothing more. Besides, I’m nearly 40. Leave the rough travel for the kids and young adults. Let them acquire the memories to share with daughters and grandkids. Our time will be that of comfort and prepared meals. An umbrella waiting to ease the job of the sun protection cream and a laptop book.

When I started looking into this trip I was directed to the owner of the Corissia Group Hotels in Crete Greece I.Tsiledakis S.A. Exactly the level of comfort one would expect. What struck me right away while visiting their site was the attention to detail in my realm. XHTML, CSS, WAI-A WCAG 1.0, a blog and an RSS feed none the less. Definately not an after thought in bring this online. Mostly surely this carries over into all they provide. I look forward to this visit and thank you.

Folks from SRI, Princeton, Columbia, two from Sun, University of Pennsylvania have put together an interesting article set to appear in the coming IEEE Security and Pricacy journal. In it we’re told keeping data scraping hubs to spy on ourselves poses danger. Them thur turist cud use’t ‘gainst usins. Tip of the hat for pointing out the obvious.
http://www.crypto.com/papers/paa-ieee.pdf

At some point Ollie has mentioned Miffy. Might have been during bedtime - my best guess. Anyway, in reading through “Surrender, Dorothy: Reviews” this morning I caught a glimpse of Miffy’s contest. I have zero information on the contest so you will have to visit http://surrenderdorothy.typepad.com/books for details. Somehow and we are all familiar with the experience– I came across Curious George at Ty’s Toy Store (Google it for link). I’ve seen the Curious George movie and even possess merchandise in the form of the Curious George flash light - push a button and his hat opens to reveal the bulb (ubercool).

OK, so that is on my mind this morning as I procrastinate in setting up 4 or 5 stores I’ve alloted myself for today. What else is going… I consulted on setting up an industry specific social networking site, discussed branding and link farms. The idea is to bring the masses in this particular group all together to discuss their industry and vie for attention and name recognition all while using the platform to lead potential buyers to the group owned stores. This involves a pligg site, discussion forum and multiple stores. Nothing new or ground breaking just time involved setting up these environments.

The specifics in carrying this out are monotonous at times bordering on irritating or mind numbingly error prone in working with the databases, security updates, e-commerce tie-ins and building the communities. Will there be an exit plan or is it set for long haul trickle after the initial boom. In the end I’m recommending a strong brand that is close to duplicate one that touches the hearts of those involved. An Apple, VW or Piggly Wiggly. There are grocery stores and then there’s The Pig. PC’s are generally less expensive up front to own but they lack soul and identity. An hardcore HP fans out there?

Sometimes it’s extremely difficult to articulate the bigger picture especially so if the details could just as easily be understood if spoken in a foreign language.

Cheers,
macewan

Just finished listening to a few minutes of Maria Marsala podcast on articles. More specifically writing articles as in getting your paragraph’n groove on. If you’re interested in downloading a copy feel free. The teleconference clocks in at right around 45 minutes. While I only caught a short snip I felt it worth sharing since I was so impressed with what I heard.

The discussion is relaxed and easy to follow. She starts off discussing article topic selection with questions/feedback from the other callers mixed in. Others callers sounded completely at ease responding to her questions.  “No one sits down and writes an entire article in one sitting.” Loved the myth chatter!

Currently I’m in the middle of teaching 3 folks in the black arts of blogging for BOGIDYBOO money. My friends over at janeybell.net have finally delved into making online videos on the Toddler Reality Show (http://greenville-nc.com/?p=214). Their first video is an ad for Packet8’s newest product and features their son’s stuffed toy hippo. I’m not much of an authority on cute, but I’m pretty partial to my grandballons and the youngest one’s photograph is featured in the ad. Ms. janeybell, herself, is the narrator, and her husband was kind enough to do the camera work and change her background slides. I think its a great step in the right direction as janeybell tries to monetize in my footsteps. Check out the video , and give janeybell a vote in Packet8’s video contest ( http://bix.yahoo.com/contest/33995).

Concert Tickets on your mind? Trust the professionals. Put your money where it can buy the best and trust the best to find you the concert tickets you need. Smart concert goers know to contact a company with access to an extensive network of sources that can delivey the best seats at the most amazing price available. Quality entertainment doesn’t necessarily have to cost a fortune. Within 4 clicks I was purchasing tickets to a Football game. Leave it to professionals who’ve shown they can deliver what you need today. Need a reliable source for the most sought after tickets? Their network has consistently shown their ability to provide quality seating at demonstrably lower prices than other sources. Any concert. Any location. Anytime. Online. Now. All I have to do is hitch a ride to a city, eh? This rural town is the original Podunk, the butt of every country-comic’s jokes. Oh, we’ve got entertainment all right lots of pig pickin’s, deer hunting, and granny roping roping, and some flounder tossing thrown in. Oh yeah, they’re offering a 2007 promotion of 5% off with the promotion code “source07,” so check it out.

So this is what it feels like to be almost famous - I’m a B-list blogger according to Kineda. How is that pronounced? Looks like “Canada” perhaps? Or Kin-ee-dah? that sounds like a town in Wisconsin — Kineda, Wisconsin, Home of Cheese. macewan or MacEwan… blogging word play.

My Alexa is now clocks in at under 125,157, Technorati’s @ 53,143 & Compete showing 94,279. Overall it appears I’m kicking ass. That said - I’m embarrassed to be called a Blogeberty from someone that wastes space discussing MTV’s Next. Seriously, what the hell is that?!

Next? As in What will they think of to get clicks and ad bucks Next? No… not that. Oh, I get it, MTV wants web readers to stumble upon humans, not upon websites. Interesting concept albeit not original to MTV. As usual, under-age teen look-at-me’s will flock to the site and be devastated when no one picks them — just like at school! But seriously, if this is the kind of activity that floats someone’s boat, I say, go for it. The web really does offer something for everyone these days… MTV will do anything for clicks because clicks mean ad dollars. This is an advertising ploy, of course, and maybe it will cause the ad dollars to flow like the Nile for MTV.