Monday, August 2, 2010

Odds and ends from New Orleans


Above: A Dixieland jazz band plays at the New Orleans airport.

I was in New Orleans for four days (Thursday through Sunday) working at the North American Bridge Championship. I did the Daily Bulletin for the Youth NABC part of it. You can see a sample of one here. The kids were awesome. Adult bridge players look like they've just had a root canal, but the kids look like they were having a ball.

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Seen on a youngster's tee shirt:

Parents for sale
Buy one, get one free

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The tournament was at the Marriott on Canal Street. They had something I've heard of, but never seen: smart elevators. When you approach the bank of seven elevators, there is a keypad, and you enter the floor you are going to. It dings, then tells you which elevator to take. When I got on, I kept trying to punch a button for my floor, but there were no buttons to push -- the elevator already knew where to take me.

Because the elevator traffic is controlled by software, it makes the system run more efficiently. Even though it's faster and better, the bridge players griped about it. Most of them swore it was slower. I say that shows something about how grumps approach life -- big negative.

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I took a bunch of photos of the kids. Somebody told me there were some good ones. My reply: It's impossible to take a bad one. The kids are so cute.

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The guy on the plane sitting next to me had an iPad. He gave me a demo, and it's pretty sharp. The display is beautiful with such vibrant colors. My regular computer is seven years old, and, when it conks out, I'll make my laptop my working computer. THEN I'll buy a tablet and use it to travel. Or maybe I'll give in and buy one anyway -- they are amazing. Any reader have one? How do you like it?

Image by MOJO and taken with my P&S.

7 comments:

  1. My goodness!

    Be sure to keep your Mojo hydrated.

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  2. I think you had a good time in NO! Love that jazz band! And what is it with so many adults these days? We've got a bunch of old grumps in our community and most of them don't have a care in the world; they're financially set, living in paradise and they're still mad at everybody and everything! I don't get it.

    By the by, that elevator would not be to my liking, either...it might have something to do with not trusting computers to take me up seven stories...or it may be I'm just skeered of heights.

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  3. Smart elevators? That's pretty cool. Definitely need those. I've got a really dumb elevator at one of the building I go to. It's not uncommon for it to leave me off a floor after the one I pushed. And it really freaks out sometimes when I'm going down to the basement level...

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  4. I have been in that elevator and experienced the same uncomfortablenss about not being able to push a button while in the elevator

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  5. Staying around kids keeps ya young! Nuff said.

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  6. Thanks for your comment, MOJO. The religious nuts are coming out of the woodwork and are very dangerous...cf. Sharon Angle, running for Senate in Nevada...said the other day that entitlement programs are idolatrous because they violate the 1st commandment and make the government god!

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  7. Wow, I did not see that end coming. I thought bridge was rather a sedate game. So coming armed to a Bridge game doesn't seem that far fetched.. Take Care MoJo.

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