The personal blog of Jason Parks

Ninja Parade Slips Through Town Unnoticed Once Again

It seems over the weekend, facebook as well as the rest of the population here on earth was in a desperate race against time and people with similar names. Last weekend Facebook announced the ablility to create vanity names and link these to your account. For example instead of someone having to search for Jason Parks in facebook, they can simply type the vanity name eg: facebook.com/jasonparks. However SOME people decided that they needed to grab ALL the names they could. What someone named Jason Parks is going to use more than one vanity page to point to his facebook page I have no idea, but this guy

decided he needed to take http://www.facebook.com/jasonparks, http://www.facebook.com/jason.parks, http://www.facebook.com/jason-parks and who knows how many other vanity locations. And thats why I have added another Jason Parks to the WALL OF SHAME, as well as created my own vanity page which you can find at http://www.facebook.com/therealjasonparks

***UPDATE***

After further analysis of the facebook vanity pages it seems rather than the above mentioned Jason Parks signing up for multiple vanity pages, Facebook itself is generating those pages and pointing them to the original vanity page or simply how there dns resolves. For example my page http://www.facebook.com/therealjasonparks can also can be accessed from http://www.facebook.com/therealjason-parks or http://www.facebook.com/the-real-jason-parks. Since this is Facebook’s fault and not the fault of the anti-Jason previously mentioned in the above post, he has been removed from the Jason Parks WALL OF SHAME. However since he did steal my vanity page which I fully intended to get as soon as it was available but forgot about due to other obligations, and because it’s hilarious I decided to keep his picture up…

Sorry dude

Tomorrow, at 5:45 a.m. I will be embarking along with my son Dylan and aprox. 100 other 4th graders from Midway Elementary School on a tour of Northern Michigan. Along the way the kids will have the chance to experience Macinac Island, the Macinaw Bridge, The Soo Locks, as well as a boat tour through them, the falls at Tahquamenon,  The Great Lakes Shipwreck museum, and Hartwick Pines State Park which contains the largest stand of virgin white pines remaining in the lower peninsula.  Along the way I will be geotagging all my pictures, as well as updating my blog and twittering small updates via my loopt journal on the about page. I have also created a

google map of our trip to assist in itinerary planning, weather conditions etc. This map will be updated along the way. In addition to google maps, I am using a Mac program called knapsack. Once our trip is complete, I hope to be able to embed all the geotagged photos into the google map, with the ability to click on a place and view all pictures taken from that location.

So today I decided to try my hand at social experiments. This experiment seemed pretty straight forward. The premise: See how many people with the same name (Jason Parks) I could add as friends on my face book page. So I crafted a message and started sending it to all the Jason Park’s currently on Facebook. The message I sent contained the following

“Hey, I thought it might be a fun social experiment to add as many people as I could to my friends list that have the same name as I do. If you want to help, just add me to your friends. Then I can tell what ALL the crazy Jason’s are up too.”

However after sending to somewhere between 40 and 50 people, I started getting a warning from facebook saying that I was potentially breaking some rule, and if I didnt quit my account might be disabled or permanently closed. In the interest of Science, I boldly continued sending my message of scientific and social experimentation, and am now currently banned from sending messages on Facebook for the next few days. So after a short day one in my facebook experiment, progress is currently on hold……

To Be continued at a later date and time which will apparently be determined  by facebook.

I have been wanting to purchase a new bluetooth headset ever since I purchased my last one which was a Motorola HS850. The 850 was ok, and the sound quality was probably even better than average. However it was so large that when I would shake my head the boom extension would smack against my face, which as you can imagine became irritating real quick. The headset I decided on was the Motopure H15. The Motopure H15  offers a smaller design, but still includes a folding boom mic that acts as a power switch. In addition to that, it also includes  a new RapidConnect feature, and additional wind suppression.

The H15’s design is unique: It looks like a black plastic bean. At the top there’s a volume rocker, while a large multifunction button takes up most of the front panel. The small metal boom folds in and out on a sturdy hinge; when it’s extended, the H15 is powered on. The H15 comes with a small, flexible plastic earhook and an array of five separate rubber ear cushions, two of which feature extra rubber loops for a more secure fit. All of which I didnt recieve in my package. However I got mine for 60 bucks, and the list price is around 129.00 so, I can do without. In the box you’ll also find an AC adapter and a docking station, but no extra ear hooks. I found the H15 to be more comfortable than the HS850, but still a pretty noticeable given its slightly loose fit.

I used to be one of the biggest carnivores (OK omnivore if you want to get technical) that ever lived. My diet used to consist of meat and potatoes strictly, with a side salad and bread thrown in occasionally for garnish if anything. However this all changed about 6 months ago when my wife Cherissa and I decided to become vegetarian. Actually the correct term would probably be pescetarian due to the fact that we still consume fish, eggs and cheese. According to the all knowing Wikipedia pescetarianism is : “a dietary choice in which a person, known as a pescetarian, eats any combination of vegetables, fruit, nuts, beans and fish or seafood, but will not eat mammals or birds. Some animal products like eggs and dairy may or may not be part of a pescetarian diet plan.”

However since switching to this type of dietary lifestyle, almost everyone asks me why. There are, I think many compelling reasons to either become vegetarian, or at the very least limiting what type of meat and other foods you do eat. That being said, I won’t be getting into the semantics of vegetarianism where we could discuss for several days the unethical treatment of all the animals that have become the result our society’s food chain problems. So without farther delay, the following are a few of the most compelling reasons why I chose to change my diet to a vegetarian (or pescetarian) one.

Transition to vegetarianism:

For me, becoming vegetarian is a long-term goal for various health, environmental, and ethical reasons, and the pescetarian diet is sometimes seen as a way to transition towards that goal without having to switch overnight from the traditional western diet of quick fix fast food to a vegan or vegetarian diet. Not to mention that I LOVE to grill, and sticking to veggie kabobs gets old after awhile.

Health benefits:

One of the most commonly cited reasons is that of health, based on findings that red meat can be detrimental to health in many cases due to non-lean red meats containing high amounts of saturated fats. Also digesting meats is very energy intensive on your body, and a vegetarian diet will actually leave you with much more energy for other activities. Furthermore, eating certain kinds of fish raises HDL levels, and some fish are a convenient source of omega-3 fatty acids, and have numerous additional health benefits.

Ability for animal to feel pain:

Some people believe that eating mammals and birds is more unethical than eating fish. Reasons include both cognitive differences and ability to feel pain. Scientific studies seeking to answer the question of whether fish feel pain have yielded mixed conclusions. While I do feel that humans are superior in many ways to animals, There are many things that we can do, but probably shouldn’t when given a better alternative.

My Carbon footprint:

Some people view meat from land-based animals as an inefficient food source. Most cattle, pigs and chickens that supply the United States meat market are not free range. Instead, they are fed grains (not grasses) that are grown for the sole purpose of animal feed. The amount of calories in the grain needed to feed a cow, pig, goat, lamb or chicken greatly exceeds the nutritional value of the meat these animals provide. Were this grain to be used for human consumption instead, far more food could be provided. Statistics have shown that if the meat eating community were to cut their intake of meat by 10%, the excess land, water and grain not used for meat production could put an end to global hunger.

A 2006 report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations estimates that livestock are responsible for roughly 18 percent of the global warming effect, outstripping even the contribution of transportation. The main greenhouse gases produced by livestock are methane ? the natural result of digestion ? and nitrous oxides emitted by manure. Furthermore, the deforestation needed for grazing lands also contributes to global warming, by eliminating the CO2 sinks that forests provide.

So what is the bottom line you ask? Perhaps the most compelling reason I choose not to consume meat anymore, aside from the obvious health benefits is my carbon footprint. You see, I drive a V8 gas guzzling SUV with leather seats. And I love it, and wouldn’t trade it for a fleet of Toyota Priuses (or however else you would refer to a prius in plural). Sooo if I can somehow make up for that by decreasing or eliminating my consumption of meat, and at the same time live healthier and possibly longer why not?

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