Flight of the Fenix
Originally uploaded by sailorbill
Flight of the Fenix
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Google URL Shortener
Stop sending long URLs!
Google has a new URL shortener at http://goo.gl
Copy a long URL from a page you want to share and then visit http://goo.gl/ and paste in the long link and hit submit.
The site will return a much shorter link that you can share with people.
As an example, here is the long url to this post:
http://www.billblevins.com/2011/01/google-url-shortener/
Here is the shortened link using Google’s URL Shortener:
Shortening links avoids all sorts of problems with email clients breaking long urls into pieces and give back many of your characters to use in your Twitter message.
You don’t need to sign in to use it. However, if you do sign in with your GMail account, the new Google URL Shortener will save all of the links you shorten and report to you how many people clicked the link you shared. Go now and check it out and stop sending long urls!
There are many other sites that do this too including tinyurl.com and bit.ly.
Do you sometimes you get a shortened url sent to you in a message (especially in junk mail messages) and you’d rather know where it was going to take you before you click? Try http://longurl.org/.
Six Things Every Great Leader Does
Great leaders READ.
Great leaders WRITE.
Great leaders THINK.
Great leaders EMPOWER.
Great leaders DELEGATE.
Great leaders WORK. HARD.
Leaders aren’t lucky.
Matt Heinz of Blogging Innovation writes about the Six Things Every Great Leader Does.
A List of My Most Interesting iPhone Applications
- WeatherBug – The best weather app I’ve found with good radar however WeatherUnderground has the best “mobile” web page for weather at the moment (ie: no need to download an app).
- FourSquare – Where are you? Where are your friends?
- RadarScope – Collection of weather radar views from the NWS
- Google – Pretty good voice search so you can do that while you are driving and still keep your eyes on the road.
- Words With Friends (Free) – A Scrabble game you can play with your friends who also have the app. (Not sure why Scrabble hasn’t sued them but anyway, it is good.
- Twitter – Twitter client.
- Bump – Transfer files between mobile devices via bluetooth after you bump the two devices together (and they have a cool domain name: http://bu.mp)
- Shazam – Hear a song on the radio, hold up the app and it will tell you the name of the song, artist and links to iTunes, etc. to buy it.
- SlingPlayer – Watch your TV at your house via a SlingBox connected to your home TV.
- FlightTrack Pro – Connects to TripIt and alerts you when flights are delayed
- SkyGrid – Top trending stories of the moment with multiple links to go read the details on the web
- DoodleJump – Odd little game where you jump a bug up the rungs of a ladder except there is no ladder and it really isn’t a bug and you can shoot things and … etc.
- Loopt (don’t really use this anymore but it is kind of like FourSquare but I keep it on my phone because my sister still uses it and she won’t switch to FourSquare)
- CardStar – Transfer all of those little key fob membership cards from all of your favorite stores to an app and you can just show your phone instead of the card. It hasn’t worked for me yet anywhere I’ve tried it but one day it might. I don’t carry the cards with me anyway so maybe if it works…
- Groupon – Deal of the Day
- ColorSplash – Turn color photos into B&W photos, then color parts of them. Pretty cool.
- Police Radio – Listen to the police scanner for most places around the country when the person who streams the channel has their site online. Monroe County, NY is offline more than it is online.
- 1Password – I have no use for this app but I LOVE the browser / computer application and the app syncs so I just mainly use it as a backup for my passwords on my computer if that ever fails.
- Shooger – Coupons
- 2D Sense – Scan the QR and QC codes
- Angry Birds – Game where you slingshot little angry birds at green turtles or some other little green animal.
- Facebook – Social networking site that garners 15 minutes per day (or about 7 hrs per month) of the average user’s time. Not me.
- MotionX GPS – A really nice GPS that I don’t use because I really only need a GPS on a boat and this just isn’t accurate enough yet so that I wouldn’t run into a dock or the shore.
- HomeWeather – Links to my home weather station, CWOP DW3513 in Fairport, NY
- iPatch – Mainly just to put a patch over Jonathan Biddle’s eye whenever I see a photo of him.
- iHandy Level – I use this to tell when to stop cranking the lift on the front of my power boat so the water drains out the back when I put it away.
- Kindle – Used to read books from Amazon.com
- Buzz – Google’s version of Twitter
- Navionics Lakes East – One day I’ll have a use for this detailed GPS mapping program
- LinkedIn – One day I may need to get in touch with a contact from the past
- LiveCams – A huge collection of video camera from all around the world.
- NightCamera – I used to use this when I wanted to take a photo at night and they kept turning out blurry, this program would wait to snap the picture until when my hands stopped shaking.
- Photogene – Sort of like Photoshop for a mobile phone.
- PS Express – Photoshop for a mobile phone. Sort of like Photogene
- QuakeWatch – Feel an earthquake? Use this app to see where it was and how strong it was.
- RedLaser – Scan UPC codes and price compare and link to sites where you can get more product information
- MouthOff – Characters say what you say with a funny mouth
- Weber On the Grill – Grilling cheat sheet
- Pandora – Streaming Internet Radio
- Paper Toss – You have to be very bored to get into this game but basically it is throwing paper in a can with varying amounts of wind blowing across the room making accuracy random and difficult
- RC Heli Gold – fly a remote control helicopter on your iPhone screen
- Rowmote – Control your computer mouse from your iPhone and launch applications. I use this as a clicker when I’m presenting using Keynote or Powerpoint
- Tipulator – Helps you calculate tips and splitting up bills when you are sharing the cost with a lot of other people
- TripIt Pro – My travel agent when I’m on the road after I’ve planned everything out with my real travel agent
- UpCode – Another 2D bar code and QR code reader
- SpeedTest – How fast is your Internet connection?
- StickWars LE – You have to play this game once. Let me know if you play it twice.
- Trapster – Driving down the road, you can report police activity and view reports from others on the same.
- Trulia – Get information on houses for sale via an interactive map or what is around you that is on the market
- Urbanspoon – Restaurant search with a randomizer!
- WindForecast – What is the wind going to be in a certain spot at some point in the future? Use this app.
- WunderRadio – Streaming radio stations
- EyeTV – Control your EyeTV if you have one and still use it.
- Zillow.com – Really nice real estate information site.
- Waze – Eat cupcakes while you are driving and score points. Help Waze map the United States in the process.
- Whoppa – Keep track of the big fish you caught and see where others are catching them and what they are using for bait.
Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet 21 has a Website
A group of sailors from around the Rochester, NY area with radio controlled model RC Laser sailboats who meet at Canandaigua Lake on Sunday afternoons have now launched a web site. The address is http://www.rcsailors.com and everyone with a remote control sailboat is welcomed to come out and join in on the action.
First RC Laser Regatta was Learning Experience for Three CYC Members
Below is an article that is being sent to the Canandaigua Yacht Club’s newsletter for consideration for use in the Aug. 1 edition.
A group of members have now purchased three RC (remote control) One Design Laser sailboats and there are two more to be ordered (this week, hopefully) and a couple of other people considering the purchase. Shortly, we’ll be joining the North American RC Laser Class Association and forming an official fleet on Canandaigua Lake and racing at CYC. The current leading name is the Canandaigua Yacht Club Remote Control Sailing Fleet (if the club will have us).
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On Sunday, July 18, three sailors from Canandaigua Yacht Club competed in a “first of its kind” (for CYC) Remote Control Regatta.
Sailing RC Lasers at Canandaigua Yacht Club
Skippers Jack Bennett (#05), Bill Blevins (#254) and Nelson Habecker (#54) competed using remote control one design Laser sailboats in a series of round-the-buoy races.
Frank Sacco served as the PRO and his boat, Dr. Heeks also hosted spectators, Larry & Nella Neeck. The boat was also the mobile racing platform for the three skippers. The course was set just South of the mooring field and marks were attended by a spectator boat.
Three races were run, although the final race was shortened due to the number of large spectator boats crowding the course which unfortunately blocked the wind for the small competitor boats.
Bennett’s racer seemed to develop a mind of its own, and on multiple occasions did penalty circles for no apparent reason. Mark-set-and-spectator-boat driver Gary Schmidt was sent to rescue the wayward craft a few times throughout the afternoon.
Habecker’s craft was on course for the gun and a bullet in the first race, but at the last minute, the skipper decided to ride a wind shift directly into the beam of the Race Committee boat which left Blevins clear to overtake from behind and cross the finish line first.
Two other races were completed but the results are still under review for various reasons, and thus are still deemed unofficial.
Informal races are planned for Sunday afternoons at the South end of the CYC waterfront, sometime around 4 p.m., or whenever the crews and boats arrive and feel like sailing. Additional regattas will be announced in the future. For more information on joining in on the fun around this exciting sailing opportunity, contact club members Bill Blevins or Nelson Habecker.
If you are interested in obtaining a RC Laser Sailboat, visit http://www.sailrclaser.com. The boats are available as a ready-to-sail kit that includes the boat, 3 sails, transmitter and travel bag. All that is needed to sail are double A batteries. Setup time is about 5 minutes from the bag to the water!
Everyone is welcomed to participate (with a RC Laser or any other RC sailboat) or just come out as a spectator.
We’ll bet you haven’t seen racing like this before!
Racing By Myself on Canandaigua Lake
How can the only boat that starts a race end up in forth place?
I raced in Canandaigua Yacht Club’s 75th Anniversary History Regatta a few weeks ago, sailing my 2.4 Meter. The race was pretty neat. It took the fleet from the starting line in front of the club, down Canandaigua Lake and around marks that were set in front of all of the old locations of the yacht club in years past.
View while sailing down Canandaigua Lake in my 2.4 Meter during the CYC 75th Anniversary Race.
Before the race, I reviewed the racing instructions. The document stated that we would have a windward start.
The morning of the race, I attended the skipper’s meeting. At the end of the meeting I asked the question about the starting line and if we were doing a typical start to windward. I was told, “Yes” we’ll be starting to windward with the first rounding mark “off of the mooring field in front of the club”.
Once I was out to the course, I watched the marks get set, the RC flags to go up, and then I noticed that most boats were tacking back and forth OCS (on course side) of the line.
I sailed around behind the committee boat, approaching on a starboard tack, hailed the PRO and asked about the starting line and if we were still going to windward at the gun.
“Windward start, round the pin and take a sharp left,” was the reply from the PRO or ”Principle Race Officer”.
Cool.
With a minute to go to the start, I made my way on down towards the pin on a close starboard reach and waited. With 30 seconds to go, I was STILL the only boat behind the starting line and everyone else was on the course side coming right at me!
I’m not sure how many times I could have asked for clarification and in what other form I needed to check, so when the gun went off, I pinched up to a close-hauled course, crossed the line just after the signal, then reached off a hair and jibed around the pin end of the line, barely missing a couple of larger boats coming towards me in the opposite direction. At that point, I headed on down the lake behind everyone else.
No other boats started the race to windward, in the same direction as I did.
Everyone else reached across the line starting line in the OTHER direction, sailing on down the lake when the gun went off.
The rest of the race was uneventful. I managed to stay in about the middle of the pack of boats, not bad considering I probably have one of the slowest boats on the water and three legs of reaching isn’t my strongest point of sail.
I crossed the finish line between a couple of other cruisers and Ensigns and then decided – just to be safe – that I should round the committee boat and cross the line in the direction I started the race. After the technicalities were taken care of, I headed on in to shore for the after-race awards and party.
When I got to the clubhouse, I questioned the President of the club, who was on the committee boat for the start of the race, about the start. She said, “You were the only person who technically started the race.”
No one else had crossed the start line in the proper direction!
Awards were given out for all of the fleets. I was awarded the first in fleet for the cruisers. Then, surprisingly, my little 2.4 Mr had been calculated to be the first place boat overall – kewl!
Last night, (six weeks after the race) I got a call from the Vice Commodore. He let me know that the results had been disputed and I was being moved to 4th overall after the revision.
How can the only boat that started a race end up in forth place?