- Keep the hate coming, Twitter trolls. San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin
Kaepernick has heard your scathing, 140-character criticisms of his game and
not only does he not object to them, he wants you to keep them coming.
Following two straight terrible games that his supposed Super Bowl contender of
a team lost big, the third-year quarterback admitted he reads the critical
messages fans send his way on the microblogging site and rather than block his
trolls, he is favoriting the tweets. Kaepernick, who has become a frequent star
in various commercials and ad campaigns since leading the 49ers to a Super Bowl
berth in his first 10 starts in the NFL, was asked about his response to tweets
that often border on the vulgar and downright offensive. "It's something
that I do for me,” he said of favoriting the tweets. "It helps me.” The
obvious conclusion to draw from that statement is that the negative messages
provide motivation to work harder and improve and when asked if that was the
case, Kaepernick responded, "I guess you could say that.” Whether he means
it or not, at least Kaepernick has a unique approach to handling an issue that
leads many athletes into ugly verbal battles that end with them F-bombing fans
or unleashing profane tirades that they end up tagging with team-ordered apologies.
Either way, the 49ers are mired in a two-game losing streak and face a road
game Thursday night against a tough St. Louis Rams team that they went 0-1-1
against last season. Win and those Twitter trash talkers will have to go away
for a week, but lose and turn in another subpar performance and Kaepernick
won't need to ask for more hate tweets because his phone will be blowing up
with them…….
- How does one find a stolen vehicle that seems lost and
gone for good? Google Earth, anyone? That’s how a George County, Miss. man tracked
down his stolen GMC Yukon SUV. According
to Sheriff Dean Howell, that SUV was reported stolen in March and the
owner was able to locate his missing ride simply by logging on and taking time
to use Google Earth to scan land he regularly hunted on. According to police
investigators, the man told them his SUV was originally s stolen from a
convenience store off of Highway 26 West. For months and months on end,
there was no sign of the car. It didn’t pop up on Craigslist or Autotrader.com,
nor did parts show up for sale as a chop shop in some remote corner of the
state. Instead, it simply vanished….right up to the point the owner checked out
the terrain that he hunted on with Google Earth. His research revealed when looked
like an illegal shooting house. Being the good Samaritan he is, the
man headed out on foot to check out the area for himself. He and his son
visited the land and began walking the general area where he spotted the
unusual sight online. They even went high tech by plugging in the coordinates
on his GPS and those numbers led them straight to the SUV, tucked far back in
the woods and covered in brush. Howell believes the vehicle may have been left
there because of the area’s proximity to an old logging road. Once the vehicle
was located, District 4 Supervisor Larry Havard and his crew helped brought in heavy
equipment to pull the SUV out………
- Amazon is certainly trying new things. One of its new
things is two
new high-definition tablets featuring a unique on-screen helpdesk feature the
company hopes will give it an advantage over devices from rivals Apple and
Google. Its new Kindle Fire HDX tablets feature what Amazon has called the 'Mayday
Button,” a feature that instantly launches a video chat with a tech-support
representative who can tell a user how to operate the device or even do it for
them remotely if they are too stupid to do it for themselves. If a person is
willing to spend big for an HDX tablet, he or she can enjoy this support for
free 24 hours a day, with a maximum promised response time of 15 seconds. The
chat window can be moved around the screen and although users will be able to
see the representative helping them, the support staffer will not be able to
see the person they are helping in order to protect privacy – allegedly. Amazon
has always attacked the tablet market differently than Apple, electing to sell
its devices at close to cost, then profiting off the sale of digital content
such as video and music. Since its first foray into the tablet market in 2011,
Amazon has seen modest success with its successes as virtual vending machines
for purchases. The company’s launch for the HDX tablets did not include
information on how the video support feature will affect prices. "This is
the kind of feature that we are well-suited to do," Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos
said. . "Many of the things we've done marry together high-tech with heavy
lifting. This is one of those things." Bezos claimed the company is in the
process of hiring and training thousands of support staffers for the new
endeavor and vowed to be ready for the upcoming holiday season. The 7-inch and
8.9-inch models are to be lighter and more powerful than the last Kindle HD
line and will come in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB storage sizes………
- Do any of the above actually matter at all in the grand
scheme of life: Leah Remini, ABC’s reality ballroom dancing show “Dancing With
the (D-List) Stars” and the Church of Scientology? Probably not, but the ongoing scrap involving
all three can still be entertaining. Remini, a contestant on the seventh season
of the reality dancing show, left Scientology several monhts ago and the split
has been an ugly one. She has accused the church of openly harassing her since
she left it and the issue came up again Monday night in a video clip that aired
performance on Latin night of the show. "I'm going through a personal big
change for me and my family," Remini said. She exited the Scientology
arena amidst a disagreement over differing points of view and allegations that
she was mistreated after a confrontation with church leader David Miscavige at
the 2006 wedding of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes. She later accused the church
of depleting her self-confidence and addressed the issue a filmed conversation
with her professional dance partner, Tony Dovolani. "I was always so
scared to be myself," she said. "You're used to everything that
happens to us is our fault. You're used to taking a lot of negativity on
yourself." She reserved her biggest bomb for the end of her rant and dared
to suggest that a bizarro church organization has a rooting interest in the
outcome of a reality dancing show. "The church is looking for me to fail
so they can say to their parishioners, 'See what happens when you leave the
church?'" Remini asked. Oh, and she’s hoping that appearing on the show
will help her clear her mind and get out of some of the bad habits she has
fallen into……..
- The world is looking at you, government of the Maldives.
In fact, the international community is watching you and wondering if you’re
going to do the right thing and go ahead with a presidential run-off election due
this weekend even though your Supreme Court has suspended it. Canada, Australia
and the European Union are among those calling on authorities to hold the vote
on Saturday as previously scheduled. That has to come as good news to ex-president
Mohamed Nasheed, who is widely viewed as the front-runner. Canadian Foreign
Minister John Baird boldly urged Maldivian judicial authorities "to not
unduly delay the expression by Maldivians of their democratic will,” which was
much stronger than Australia’s stance, which was to inform the Maldives that it
“hopes to see an early resumption of the electoral process.” Baird also took a
moment to condemn reported pepper-spray attack on Nasheed during a protest
following the Supreme Court's suspension of the run-off on Monday night.
Ignoring the right of a free society to mace its elected officials is a balls
play, but Baird had support from European Union foreign policy chief Catherine
Ashton, who called on the island chain to push ahead with the run-off. "I
urge all Maldivians to work together to safeguard the integrity of the
democratic process and ensure that the second round takes place in the same impartial
and effective spirit as the first," Ashton said in a statement. So far,
only India has been concerned enough to send election observers to the Maldives.
The Indians noted that the court case has resulted in "uncertainty
concerning the second round, which may have an impact on peace, stability and
security in the country." President Mohamed Waheed was none too happy
seeing foreigners pushing for an election that will likely boot him from
office, branding those making the remarks as "irresponsible" and urging
the international community to halt speculation over the issue. "I... call
on foreign governments, the UN and the Commonwealth to show responsibility and
to refrain from issuing statements commenting on, and speculating about, the
ongoing court case," Waheed said. "Irresponsible statements by
foreign governments and international organizations would not be helpful in
consolidating democracy in the country." Spoken very much like a man who placed
last in the September 7 first round with just over five percent of the popular
vote……….
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