Random Thoughts 9/12/09

• I'm not a car guy, not even a little, but even I think this new 571-horsepower Mercedes is really something. And it's only a cool $257,000!
• Census workers have badges and official forms and don't ask for your bank account number. Read more here.
• Here's movie news for two years from now. Pirates of the Caribbean 4 has a script and a release window. My older boys really enjoyed these movies and I'll bet they'll be waiting in line for this next one. In fact, it may easily be Brennan's favorite Disney franchise.
• Best FREE apps on my iPhone: Facebook (recently improved), Dictionary (from Dictionary.com), Bible (from YouVersion), Movies (by Flixter), Scorecenter (from ESPN), Coupon Sherpa, Flood-It!, and SnapTell, among others.
• Dorks unite against the Friday Night Death Slot, the television slot on Friday nights where sci-fi shows go to die.
• It looks like DirecTV dropped the sports channel Versus because Comcast wasn't playing nice with them. Now how am I going to get my NHL hockey coverage? Actually, Versus carries some Big 12 sports, so it will be missed (Duke @ KU next Saturday). But college sports' ESPNU (which carries four Jayhawk basketball games this year) is now part of my package, so that makes up a lot.
• Well, in college football it's the non-conference part of the season. So KU plays on an obscure 2nd-tier cable sports channel, Mizzou is on pay-per-view, and poor K-State isn't on TV at all, anywhere. Ho-hum.