Goles de Selección

The story behind the picture after the jump…

If you blog it, they will come - that’s the tag of Jayvee’s Blog and Soul Movement - and so far, it seems to be holding true. With a tag reminiscent of the Field of Dreams, the Blog & Soul Launch saw 60 bloggers gather in a field of sorts - a Mrs. Fields.

Last night, 60 or so bloggers gathered at a soon-to-open branch of Mrs. Fields Cookie Cafe - and I was one of them. As usual, I hid behind a camera and kept clicking away.

The thing is, last night wasn’t all about the movement - it was also about our venue - the Mrs. Fields Cookie Cafe. Let me repeat that - the Mrs. Fields Cookie Cafe.

Yup, Mrs. Fields is rebranding, and they’re going beyond just cookies and brownies - they’re going for the whole cafe experience. I’m not going to explain it here, but I will quote some facts shared by Our Awesome Planet’s Anton:

• The first cookie cafe branch was opened in Trinoma and the second one will open soon in Manila Pavilion (sept. 1)
• Mrs. Fields is now 30 years old when it was first opened in Palo Alto by Debbi Fields on August 13, 1977. In the Philippines, Mrs. Fields arrived 12 years ago.
• They are relaunching the brand in the Philippines to attract the coffee crowd and the blogging crowd with wi-fi access (yes!)
• It is a romanticized kitchen store concept which is a unique combination of home and kitchen in a modern cafe setting.
• The brand was revitalized by the husband-and-wife team of Gerwyn and Sheryl See of Ababa corporation who bought the master franchise last year.

My words? I’ve already linked to them. See my 4200 words worth in my gallery.

Other posts about the event:
“See†is for Cookie @ blogandsoul.net
Mrs.Fields Cafe Bloggers Meet @ ourawesomeplanet.com
Two launches @ dine.racoma.com.ph
A Cookie. A Movement. And a Paperclip. @ mypaperclip.blogspot.com
Whee! The way the cookie crumbles. @ magikel.blogspot.com
Sommelier Selection, Wikipilipinas, and cookies @ aboutmyrecovery.com
If you blog it, they will come @ baratillo.net
Oh sweetness! @ annalyn.net
More blogging news @ alleba.com
Mrs. Field’s Cookie Cafe @ jengkiejourneys.i.ph
What I learned from the Mrs. Field’s brand relaunch @ bayanihanblogs.com
Ang sarap ng cookies!!! @ pinoyfood.nimrodel.net
the second coming of mrs. fields @ evilmartian.org
Of blogs and cookies @ justwandering.org
Havin’ a Mrs. Fields day @ arpeelazaro.blogspot.com
Look! Mrs. Fields baked the best cookies for me! @ byahilo.com
Mrs. Fields Cookie Cafe and the Blog and Soul Movement Launch @ southbound.ph

Tags: Blog & Soul Movement, blogandsoul.net, Mrs. Fields, Field of Dreams, Anton Diaz, Our Awesome Planet, ourawesomeplanet.com

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Kudos to Jason Holsman (D-45) of southern Kansas City for taking the lead to move regional light rail forward on the Missouri side.  He might be the first politician to take a public stand on not waiting around for Joco to get on board. We already have the state authorization for a multi-county regional transit district for Jackson, Clay, Platte, and Cass Counties.  All we need now are more leaders like Jason Holsman to step up and push it onto the ballot.

Obviously a regional transit system won’t be complete without the Kansas side, but there is no reason we can’t go ahead and start building on the Missouri side - especially since the majority of the metro area is on this side of the state line.

Prime Buzz: A first step in Missouri pushing ahead without Kansas on light rail?

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Nice info if you are looking for clearance deals at Target.

Tips for Perimeter Perusing at Target | Wise Bread
Daily Markdowns – In addition to the odd lot items that may be lurking among the regular merchandise and could be haphazardly stashed at the end caps, Target has a system for marking down their merchandise weekly:

Monday - Electronics, Kids Clothing and Stationary (Cards, GiftWrap, etc.)
Tuesday - Domestics, Women’s Clothing, Pets and Market (food items)
Wednesday - Men’s Clothing, Toys, Lawn & Garden, Health and Beauty items
Thursday - House Wares, Lingerie, Sporting Goods, Shoes, Music / Movies, Books, Decor and Luggage
Friday - Auto, Cosmetics, Hardware, and Jewelry

Sen. Manuel Roxas II did not attend, but issued a warning to Arroyo against her continued “stonewalling.”

Addressing Arroyo, Roxas pointed out that Friday’s rally was a consequence of her administration’s failure to come clean on the NBN scandal.

“In case you haven’t noticed, Mrs. President, the people are angry. They are very, very angry,” he said, adding: “And if you continue to turn a blind eye to this and sing your chorus that everything’s above board, your so-called ’strong republic’ will just break apart into 86 million pieces. Our country is already broken. The trust of our people in our government, institutions and officials are so low, or zero.”

Welcome to Link Love: the Narcissism Edition. Narcissism? Yes, narcissism - this edition of Link Love is full of shameless plugs and gratuitous links to my work. Can you handle it? Read on.

• First off, I don’t like your site. Wait, that’s not right - I Hate Your Site. Yup, I hate your site, and I said so in Ronald Huereca’s Peeves Week 2 Project. Go on - read my rant, and check out 24 other rants too. After that, you can vote for your favorite Peeve Week 2 posts.
• Meet me (and the rest of the bloggers) at PopPhoto Flash. I did a recap of my posts for PopPhoto Flash recently, but I’ve also got a few newer posts that didn’t make it to that list. Portrait Backgrounds Pros and Cons (11 Jun 2007) and Tip of the Day: Take Better Self-Portraits (12 Jun 2007) came after the recap.
• I shot the MVPMAP’s Philippine Utility Vehicle last week - before the vehicle was unveiled - and the shot you see here (upper right) was used in the June 13 issue of Inquirer. The text of the article (but not the photo) is here.

Ok, I can’t take any more of this narcissism. It’s time to cut this edition of Link Love short.

Tags: narcissism, ronalfy.com, Ronald Huereca, Peeve Week, flash.popphoto.com, PopPhoto Flash, MVPMAP, PhUV, inquirer.net, Inquirer

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• Is pMetrics really all that?

Welcome to Link Love: the Narcissism Edition. Narcissism? Yes, narcissism - this edition of Link Love is full of shameless plugs and gratuitous links to my work. Can you handle it? Read on.

• First off, I don’t like your site. Wait, that’s not right - I Hate Your Site. Yup, I hate your site, and I said so in Ronald Huereca’s Peeves Week 2 Project. Go on - read my rant, and check out 24 other rants too. After that, you can vote for your favorite Peeve Week 2 posts.
• Meet me (and the rest of the bloggers) at PopPhoto Flash. I did a recap of my posts for PopPhoto Flash recently, but I’ve also got a few newer posts that didn’t make it to that list. Portrait Backgrounds Pros and Cons (11 Jun 2007) and Tip of the Day: Take Better Self-Portraits (12 Jun 2007) came after the recap.
• I shot the MVPMAP’s Philippine Utility Vehicle last week - before the vehicle was unveiled - and the shot you see here (upper right) was used in the June 13 issue of Inquirer. The text of the article (but not the photo) is here.

Ok, I can’t take any more of this narcissism. It’s time to cut this edition of Link Love short.

Tags: narcissism, ronalfy.com, Ronald Huereca, Peeve Week, flash.popphoto.com, PopPhoto Flash, MVPMAP, PhUV, inquirer.net, Inquirer

—
Related Articles at drivebyshooter.net:

• Link Love 2007.05.12
• Link Love 2007.04.11
• I
• Why I Love the New Year
• Lovin’ New Year
• Meet My Folks
• Link Love 2007.03.07
• Is pMetrics really all that?

Tonight is All-Star Saturday Weekend, quite possibly the best day for NBA fans in the entire year. Here is live coverage of the All-Star Skills Challenge, Shooting Stars Competition, 3 Point Shout-Out, and Slam Dunk competition read more | digg story

I was doing some random search on Google when I stumbled upon this website called The Morung Express. The name itself suggested it’s a news site. It looked like something to do with India, but not really. I moved the mouse around the home page only to come across names, issues, events, I have never heard of.

• Legislative Assembly elections in Dimapur.
• Bomb attack at residence of former Opposition Leader, I Imkong at Sangtemla ward in Mokokchung district.

Strange, how come I didn’t hear anything about this election or attack. May be I didn’t follow the news properly. Although 7-8 times a day I pass by the office cafeteria and take a look at the TV news and all I see is Indian Cricket team. As if they have not only conquered planet Mars but also have gift wrapped it with nice shiney glossy paper with bow strings attached to be presented to the people of India.

I logged on to NDTV.com to see if I can find similar news. Nothing on the home page. Then I clicked on Nation: Headlines still nothing about Dimapur elections.

I went back to Morung to try looking at the date thinking, may be the reason I don’t know about these people or events is because these news are outdated. But that was not the case. I was looking at a current page on Morung which looked foreign to me.

I moved to Times of India website. Here, I did find a story on the election but only after going through Home >> India >> More news >> Other news.

Where am I going with this? To the question, “Is Nagaland and the other far north-eastern states not a part of India?” How much do we know about these states. True, the news on Morung is regional news but don’t the regional activity affect the whole nation. Particularly the news related to Legislative Assemby elections. As I write this I am trying to recollect when was the last time I heard any news related to the 6-7 states that’s around that belt. You know what, I just realised, I don’t even remember how many states are there and what are their names, all I remember is that there was something like the 7 sisters.

But is it my fault that I don’t know enough about the north-east? Or is it a problem with north-eastern states that they mostly remain invisible when we talk about India? Or is it Centre which failed to pay attention to smaller and far off regions? Or is it a failure, on the part of popular Media, to cover India in its entirety? Or is it a problem about the size of our country and the geographical limitations? Just why do we have this gap.

I have always heard this argument that it is them who don’t consider themselves as true Indians. This is not entirely wrong. Even I have come across north-eastern people who don’t identify much with the Indian tradition or Hindu Rashtra that we keep hearing about. Like, there was this girl who in a college function, where the dress code was traditional, refused to wear a saree as a saree was never her traditional dress. But again is not this isolation caused by the continued failure on the part of Central agencies to reach out to these far regions, are they not more and more segregated because the other part of India didn’t make enough efforts?

In one of the comments here on mutiny, I asked, if the RSS brigade considers north-east states, a part of their Hindu Rashtra but I didn’t get any response from the Hindutva flag bearers.

I also blame the popular Media for this unequal representation of India. Media anyway is busy reporting frivolous news. The first page of Times of India, news in boldest and largest font “Team India arrives in Delhi”. Shouldn’t sports news be only in sports section. The third most important news of the day, “Facebook founder is world’s youngest billionaire.”

Thanks to new media at least now, those of us who are really interested can catch up with all the nook and corners of India and world. My personal request to readers here, please do visit the Morung site to know about another part of India about which no body ever informed you. As a website it has created a nice blend of regional and national news. It doesn’t look like they are only reporting Nagaland. The web interface is also very neat. Worth a visit.

In my quest to deliver the ultimate video quality to my readers, Microsoft Silverlight is a cross-browser, cross-platform, and cross-device plug-in for delivering the next generation of media experiences for the Internet.

Here is quick preview of the video quality, which reminds me of trying to compete after a week of high-volume high-intensity training. The first 9 seconds of the video is pretty funny!

If you click on the image, it will take you to the Microsoft Online Services homepage, and you will need to install the plug-in, just like Adobe Flash. Yes, it even supports Firefox.

What is Microsoft Silverlight?

In a nutshell, Silverlight is “MS Flash”, or Microsoft’s version of Adobe Flash player.

Why is it important to you?

For starters, take the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. Over 2000 hours on 5 broadcast channels live on-line for 17 days.

Imagine, video-on-demand and interactive!

The high quality video will display information such as the athlete’s bio, and expert commentary (as long as we don’t have Carol Lewis). Of course, like a PVR or TiVo, you can rewind, find highlights, view full screen or picture-in-picture (PIP). You can even send your favorite clips to a friend, just like sending your favorite blog articles and videos and emailing it.

If you don’t have high speed internet at home, you’d better sign up now. It’s hard to believe people still use dial-up.