Too Much?

From NJ.com - Apologies for the formatting.

How to build a sports superstar in 2015: The engineering of 15-year-old Josh McKenzie

Hours after a punishing game against the defending American Youth Football national champions from North Carolina, Josh McKenzie folds himself up in an attempt to take an ice bath inside his room at the team hotel. 12/9/2014 (Andrew Mills | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

Andrew Mills | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

By Matthew Stanmyre | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com 
Email the author | Follow on Twitter
on September 01, 2015 at 8:00 AM, updated September 01, 2015 at 10:02 PM

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He is 15 years old, 5-foot-9 and 185 pounds of cartoonish muscles on top of muscles. He had six-pack abs when he was 6.
Today, he bench-presses one-and-a-half times his body weight and can leap
from a standing position to the top of a car. He averages four touchdowns
per game and hasn't lost a wrestling match since 2012, making him the
nation's top-ranked football player and wrestler for his grade. And even
though he doesn't begin high school for another two weeks, he already
is one of the most talked about athletes in New Jersey.
His name is Josh McKenzie.

But people just call him Man-Child, D-Train, Animal, Machine or Beast,
and he is a once-in-a-lifetime physical specimen who looks like he was
engineered in a lab, each piece meticulously sculpted, tested and refined.

Josh also embodies the runaway free-for-all youth sports have become.
Specialized training. High school coaches lining up to woo players. Working
out to the point of total exhaustion. Repeating a grade for athletic advantage.
Bouncing from team to team. It's all part of his family's all-in,
college-scholarship-or-bust gamble.

Sound extreme? Consider:

This past year, Josh's family spent more than $15,000 on specialized
training and thousands more to parade him around at showcases,
tournaments and all-star events from Florida to California.

Josh McKenzie's extraordinary training techniquesWith access to 10 private trainers and coaches — at an annual cost of more than $15,000 — Josh McKenzie, 15, trains at a level professional athletes might find overwhelming. Josh, a rising freshman at Bergen Catholic, even wears a specialized breathing mask when running to simulate training at high altitude. (Andrew Mills | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

Most of the 10 specialized
personal trainers he will see during the year — that's right, 10 trainers —
rely on state-of-the-art techniques and put Josh through futuristic workouts.
He takes it a step further by wearing a Darth Vader-like elevation mask to restrict breathing and simulate training at elevations.

~~~~~~~~~~

There's much more to this story that can be found at the link below.

http://www.nj.com/sports/index.ssf/2015/09/the_engineering_of_15_year_old_josh_mckenzie.html#incart_river

The Cost of Being Brown & Smart in America

Ahmed Mohamed, the 14 year old student who built a clock to impress his teacher, and was later arrested when it was thought to be a bomb. President Obama got whiff of the nonsense and invited him to the White House.

Be Prepared . . .

For the next round of GOP debates with this spot on Bingo game.  Add a chip every time you hear one of these catch phrases uttered.

http://onpolitics.usatoday.com/2015/09/16/republican-debate-bingo-reagan-library/

Just Like Us

Rejoicing in Cuba

From The Root - 

Black Cuba Declares, ‘Obama Brought Us Internet!’

The opening of U.S. relations with Cuba has brought a rapid technological change to the island nation, with more Afro-Cubans having affordable access to the outside world.

BY: AISHA M. BELISO-DE JESÚS, PH.D.

Posted: Sept. 16 2015 8:49 AM

 

Hundreds of Cubans and visitors from other countries gather across the street from the newly reopened U.S. Embassy to observe the flag-raising ceremony Aug. 14, 2015, in Havana.
CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES

T

he recent opening up of the Internet in Cuba is creating new international connections between Afro-Cubans and broader black global cultures. Francisco, a dark-skinned Cuban based in Havana who practices Santeria, an African-Diaspora religion from Cuba, stated, “Now we are finally connected,” as he added my email address to his phone and told me he would friend me on Facebook.

This past month, during carnival festivities in Havana and Matanzas, the opening up of relations with the United States was visible on Cuban streets. Amid the crowds of people enjoying the parades of Afro-Cuban music and dance ensembles (las comparsas), groups of local Cubans were huddled in open-air public spaces accessing the newfound Wi-Fi hotspots brought about by the agreed opening up of online technologies for Cuban nationals. Standing outside hotels, on small cobblestone streets and in parks were Cubans of all generations chatting on phones, using tablets and typing on their laptops. A black Cuban woman in Matanzas using her iPhone to video-chat the carnival floats to her religious family abroad told me, “This just happened a couple of months ago. Thanks to Obama!”

In the upper-right corner of the photo, an iPad user records the Carnaval Matanzas.
AISHA M. BELISO-DE JESÚS

Previously, Internet connectivity was one of the most coveted and highly monitored international relations on the island. During my research between 2004 and 2012, to even be able to purchase an Internet card required a passport, and the unreliable Internet connection cost CUC$6 (Cuban convertible pesos) an hour, or slightly over US$7, a significant expense considering that the average salary in Cuba is less than US$20 a month. Legal email and Internet use was allowed either at the local phone company’s computer stations or at tourist-only hotels. Now, not only are Cubans finally admitted into hotels, but also anyone can purchase Internet cards that provide up to five hours online for CUC$10.

Wi-Fi (pronounced in Cuba as “we-fee”) hotspots are currently transforming Cuban cityscapes. People recognize these shifts in technological access and international connection as directly related to the opening up of relations with the United States. Afro-Cubans I spoke with told me that “Obama brought us Internet!” which they saw as a form of “black remission,” an outside resource seen to typically benefit mostly whites on the island (particularly those with family ties to early Cuban exiles in the U.S.).

Havana residents huddle around their iPads and cellphones to get online.
DUANE LAWRENCE

So, what will new Internet relations do for Afro-Cubans? Media technologies have been key in allowing previously marginalized communities to have access to transnational relations. For the Santeria practitioners I work with, media has facilitated new religious economies. Attracting a wide range of diverse practitioners globally, Santeria has brought travelers and tourists of all socioeconomic, racial and ethnic backgrounds to black communities on the island, and these visitors have begun to provide Afro-Cubans with formerly scarce international resources. Indeed, many Santeria practitioners supplicate the Afro-Cuban gods (oricha) to continue these positive political changes. 

Francisco saw Barack Obama’s mulato (mixed-race) heritage as key to the opening up of relations with the U.S. “It’s as Fidel said,” he declared. “We wouldn’t have change until there was a black president in la Yuma [the U.S.] and a pope from Latin America.” The Castro “quote” (it’s disputed whether Castro actually made the statement) circulated online as a popular meme that depicts the former Cuban president, in a Nostradamus-like prophecy, purportedly telling foreign press in 1973 that the U.S. and Cuba would settle their differences only once there was both an African-American U.S. president and a Latin American pope. With the Argentinian-born Pope Francis’ arrival in Cuba this weekend and Obama’s second term seeing a flurry of transformations within the socialist island, this purported Castro prophecy certainly points to the power of race, politics and religious imagination.

For practitioners of Afro-Cuban Santeria, this new global relationship is reconfiguring practice, and many see “blessings” such as Wi-Fi accessibility as related to Obama’s blackness. Young Afro-Cubans see more than just racial symbolism in the ethnic makeup of U.S. politicians. People expressed great admiration for Obama, with feelings of excitement for a new age in which Cuba and the U.S. could put aside old differences, and they looked to younger generations for hope. (This inspirational Cuban message sounded remarkably familiar to the Obama campaign’s 2008 slogan for hope and change.)

As the United States looks toward the next election, however, it is crucial to think about how different political regimes (such as a shift from Democrat to Republican) could impact the world. For Afro-Cubans in particular and Cubans in general, the opening up of relations with the U.S. has meant very visible shifts in everyday life. What might be seen as an “Obama generation” of young black Cubans is nervously celebrating the potential for more relations with the U.S. and, hopefully, an end to the woefully unsuccessful U.S. embargo. And yet there is legitimate concern that an anti-Cuba U.S. president could crush this positive momentum, creating, instead, a return to the stifling politics of the not-too-distant past.

http://www.theroot.com/articles/culture/2015/09/black_cuba_declares_obama_brought_us_internet.html?wpisrc=sl_ipad

Stevie Wonder Carpool Karaoke

Way to Go, GoPro!

From Atlas Obscura -

FOUND: A GOPRO THAT WENT TO THE EDGE OF SPACE AND GOT LOST FOR TWO YEARS

BY SARAH LASKOW / 14 SEP 2015

What the GoPro saw (Photo: chanmnb/Imgur)

In June 2013, after months of planning, five friends launched a GoPro to the edge of space. They attached the camera to a weather balloon, along with a phone that logged the contraption's location and was programmed to send back a message once it returned to cell phone range.

They sent the phone off from a spot about 20 miles from the Grand Canyon. It went up, up, up…and then disappeared. They never heard back from the phone about its location and figured they'd miscalculated at some point.

But two years later, the phone and the camera reappeared. This is what the camera had seen:




It turned out that the team had calculated its trajectory more or less accurately. The problem was that the area where it landed, which had looked, on the cell coverage map, like it would have been fine, did not in fact have good coverage. So the phone never knew it was back on Earth.

But recently a hiker—who happened to work for AT&T—came across it. She took it to an AT&T store, where they traced the phone to its owner using the SIM card. And, two years after the launch, the five friends finally got to see the results of their handiwork.

http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/found-a-gopro-that-went-to-the-edge-of-space-and-got-lost-for-two-years?utm_source=Atlas+Obscura&utm_campaign=2d2004be4a-Newsletter_9_15_20159_14_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_62ba9246c0-2d2004be4a-59905913&ct=t(Newsletter_9_15_20159_14_2015)&mc_cid=2d2004be4a&mc_eid=866176a63f

Bringing Some Color to the Land of Google

Being Black at Google 

Black employees at the tech giant are building their own community in an industry known for its lack of diversity.

BY: NIGEL ROBERTS

Posted: Sept. 15 2015 3:00 AM

 

Google employees Jackson Georges, Torie Bates, Willie Lamar, Chris Clark, Larisse Voufo and James Goree teach children in Charleston, S.C., about computer science during the Black Googlers Network annual outreach trip in August 2015. COURTESY OF GOOGLE

I

t’s a challenge for African Americans working in California’s Silicon Valley to have a sense of community. Clennita Justice has worked for several technology companies there over the past 25 years.

“At many of those companies, you could go for days without seeing another black person,” says the senior engineering program manager, who now works at Google.

Continue reading at -

http://www.theroot.com/articles/culture/2015/09/what_it_s_like_to_be_black_at_google.html?wpisrc=newsletter_jcr:content%26

He Stepped In It

Not smart Matt.

Not smart.



http://www.theroot.com/blogs/the_grapevine/2015/09/matt_damon_probably_doesn_t_have_any_more_black_fans_after_arguing_with.html?wpisrc=newsletter_jcr:content%26

In Any Language . . .

Interactive iPad Games

Vancouver Never Plays Itself

Xavier University!!!

Xavier University, one of the Historical Black Colleges and Universities located in New Orleans, sends more African-Americans to medical school than any other college in America.

An excerpt for the New York Times article -

Today, Xavier’s campus is mostly wedged between a canal and the Pontchartrain Expressway in Gert Town, a neighborhood in the western part of New Orleans. It has some 3,000 students and consistently produces more black students who apply to and then graduate from medical school than any other institution in the country. More than big state schools like Michigan or Florida. More than elite Ivies like Harvard and Yale. Xavier is also first in the nation in graduating black students with bachelor’s degrees in biology and physics. It is among the top four institutions graduating black pharmacists. It is third in the nation in black graduates who go on to earn doctorates in science and engineering.

Follow the link below to read this remarkable story.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/13/magazine/a-prescription-for-more-black-doctors.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=c-column-middle-span-region&region=c-column-middle-span-region&WT.nav=c-column-middle-span-region&_r=0

Shout

Kudos to These Guys!

From The Huffington Post - 

'Meathead Movers' Helps Domestic Violence Victims Move For Free

The company helps families in need begin a new life.

Cameron KeadyAssociate Editor, Good News, The Huffington Post

Posted: 09/08/2015 12:41 PM EDT | Edited: 09/08/2015 02:12 PM EDT

Safety and support are handled with care by this moving company.

Meathead Movers, a California-based moving company, has partnered with nonprofit Good Shepherd Shelter to help families affected by domestic violence move out of dangerous situations for free, LA Weekly reported.

Read the full story at -

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/meathead-movers-domestic-violence-victims-free_55eefcc1e4b093be51bc226d?cps=gravity_5035_2109188437957686349

What a Smile!

Distracted by his smile - guilty as charged.

Of course, I could be his Momma, but a great smile is a great smile.

Right?

Oh yeah, the topics of discussion are interesting, too.

Calling All Cooks!

The Master Pan Non-Stick Divider Meal Skillet 15" Grill Fry Oven Camping

Brush & Floss

Like forgiveness, brushing and flossing has been a repeated refrain in this space.

I'm reaching the end of a long, (sometimes) painful, expensive process of corrective dental care.

Oh how I wish way back when that I knew what I know now . . .

Dental health is vital and it begins with daily care.

Yes, genetics plays a part in the dental game of the Russian Roulette as to what kind of teeth you begin with.

But . . .

Taking care of the pearly whites you've been blessed with is what really counts.

Yesterday, I had what I hope will be the last oral surgery.

Today, I'm recovering from it.

I spend more time, effort and energy on my teeth than ever.

I have to believe it's never too late to start doing the right thing.

This One Works

An excerpt from Buzz Bizzinger's article   

"If it wasn't for Harlem Lacrosse, I would have been on the streets," said Jordany. "I probably would have been in a gang."

Ever since I wrote the book Friday Night Lights twenty-five years ago, I have immersed myself in the culture of sports in schools.

I have witnessed many programs and written about many more. I have been publicly outspoken about the winning-at-all cost mentality in which lip service is paid to academics and personal growth when it should be the other way around. I have become concerned about the professionalism of sports at younger and younger ages in which the lifelong lessons that sports uniquely provides-discipline, dedication, advancement through the competition and teamwork-take a back seat to the temporary won-lost record.

Then I spent a recent week in July observing the non-profit organization Harlem Lacrosse and Leadership in action. The concern I had about sports in schools, not the sports programs themselves but the misplaced emphasis, turned to excitement. To say I was blown away is an understatement.

Before we go any further full disclosure:

I was approached by the Dick's Sporting Goods Foundation to do a piece on Harlem Lacrosse and Leadership. I did research on the program as well as speak to individuals intimately familiar with it before saying yes. Every expectation was exceeded. Harlem Lacrosse and Leadership is one of the programs being funded by the foundation's multi-year $25 million commitment to supporting youth sports programs around the country. The foundation should be applauded.

Harlem Lacrosse is the single best school-based co-curricular program I have ever seen.

And note that I have left out the word "sports" before "program." Because it is not a sports program. Program Director Joel Censer calls Harlem Lacrosse and Leadership an "intervention" program in which lacrosse is used as the carrot to get kids to stay in school and become motivated far beyond the playing field. It is using the power of sports to unleash the potential of kids, many of whom, like Jordany, live in single parent households, some of who come from lower middle class backgrounds and some of whom live in shelters. It causes them to see a world they never knew existed but also to become a part of it. "If they don't like lacrosse and don't like coming to practice, then how are you going to have the intervention?" Censer notes.

- See more at: http://www.sportsmatter.org/article.html#sthash.hEtc3iQ5.dpuf

Ouch!

Queen Elizabeth Marks Longest-Ever U.K. Reign by “Doing Her Job,” Which Is Nothing

By Ben Mathis-Lilley

Queen Elizabeth II at Tweedbank Station in Tweedbank, Scotland, on Wednesday. Tweedbank!

Chris Jackson/Getty

Queen Elizabeth is now the all-time longest-reigning United Kingdom monarch, having surpassed Queen Victoria's record 63 years and seven months. She marked the occasion by appearing at a railway station. Here's USA Today's headline on the subject:

Screen shot/USA Today

Her job? What job? Queen Elizabeth was born into a net worth of some $500 million because someone she is vaguely and distantly connected to seized control of England by killing people in 1688. She doesn't have a "job."