Come down to the Indonesian Ambassador's Residence for culture, food, music, dancing, and celebration of the 63rd anniversary of Indonesian Independence:

BAZAAR “KAMPUNG MERDEKA” Dalam Rangka Peringatan HUT RI ke-63 Minggu, 3 Agustus 2008 Dalam rangka memeriahkan Hari Ulang Tahun Kemerdekaan RI ke-63, Panitia Peringatan Hari Kemerdekaan RI ke-63 akan menyelenggarakan Panggung Gembira dan Bazaar pada hari Minggu, 3 Agustus 2008 bertempat di Wisma Indonesia, 2700 Tilden Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008.

[ Indonesia Independence Day Celebration - Washington DC ]

And all of that Indonesian basically says what I said above, just a bit more formal... No, really. Anyway there will be a couple dozen booths selling traditional Indoneisan food and some crafts plus a state with traditional music and dancing, and usually there is also a big spectacle like a mini-parade with traditional masks and costumes.

Maryland has the distinction of being the first state to have a state exercise. The exercise chosen is walking, an easy, inexpensive way to stay healthy that can be done just about any time of day.

Though state designations don’t necessarily mean popularity with state residents, (Jousting is the state sport, has been for a long time, and how many jousters do you know?) increased awareness of the benefits of walking is a positive for health.

[ What’s New in Maryland ]

How about these great applications then? Well, so far it's slim pickens. I've installed the following:

AIM "lets you stay connected with the people you care about right on your iPhone or iPod Touch..."

Facebook "for iPhone makes it easy to stay connected and share information"

I guess, though I can't see that it does anything much different than the iPhone tweaked mobile webpage. I haven't played around with this much, but most of what Facebook does isn't available, and it doesn't seem very useful to me. It's still installed, but I'm not sure for how much longer.

Google Mobile App "for your iPhone or iPod Touch makes it fast and easy to search"

Of course Google is right there in the book marks too. The Google app is just a menu for Google sites, really. Most everything you choose just pops up a program in Safari, thus most of what this does can be done with bookmarks or homepage icons. Weak, but still installed for now.

PayPal "application allows you to send money to your friends and family using your existing PayPal account."

Which is not something I do often. I guess I can check my balance too, but I can already do that with my cell phone and an SMS message. Still installed for now, but I'm not sure why.

Salesforce".com has combined the effortless navigation of the iPhone with the world's most powerful web-based computing platform to create a mobile business experience that is redefining the future of the mobile enterprise."

Not for me, though. Apparently you have to fork out a ton of extra cash for mobile access to Salesforce. Since I'm not in sales (yes I know everyone is in sales...) then I can't see why I'd want to fork out that cash when I'm mostly just using SF for tasking... Uninstalled.

Super Monkey Ball "Let's roll! Guide a cute little monkey encased in a transparent ball to victory by tilting and rolling him through a variety of slopes and turns."

This appears to be a stripped down version of the DS SMB game, with tilt controls instead of stylus controls. There are no group games, or minigames, or network games, but for $10 this should give me something to do while waiting in line, or shopping with the family, or in Nate's office... I like this one!

Twitterific "A fun application that lets you read and publish posts (called 'tweets') on the Twitter social network"

I like this one. Doesn't do much but twitter, but it's so much better than the iPhone version of the twitter page, and it does have nice alerts to it. This one is also a keeper!

How about you? What have you installed on your iPhone/iPod touch?

iPod touch applications are unlike anything you’ve ever seen on a mobile device. The world’s best developers are creating applications to leverage the groundbreaking technology in iPod touch, such as the Multi-Touch interface, the accelerometer, real-time 3D graphics, and 3D positional audio. It’s all part of the iPhone 2.0 Software Update for iPod touch.*

[ Apple - iPod touch - App Store ]

Sounds awesome! I can't wait! But wait, the day is here that they announced, so what's the deal?

I know that iPhone users already are sporting their free upgrade, and have been for days. It's bad enough that I have to pay $10 to upgrade the OS on my iPod that is less than a month old, but now they're just teasing me. I just want to get some Super Monkey Ball action, is that too much to ask?

[ Private Pass - Citi cardmember access ]

[ 你不舍得喝的艺术品咖啡--食品资讯--中国食品产业网 ]

Haven't a clue what this page is all about, but that's one cool monkey coffee...

Iman's first cell, originally uploaded by Yaty Yasir Kearns.

I'm officially old.

...mobile phone app Dashwire released Dashwire 2.0, a much improved version of their mobile phone backup and sync service. With Dashwire 2.0, you can backup your phone’s content – like photos, videos, text messages, ringtones, bookmarks, speed dials, contacts, and call logs – to Dashwire’s site on the web. This syncing is done automatically, so if you make a change to your phone, that change is reflected on the web, and vice versa. In addition, the app lets you share your content across several social networking sites. You can easily and automatically send photos and video to flickr, Facebook, bebo, and Twitter and you can also update your Twitter and Facebook status from the app.

• Yahoo Mash
• Orgoo
• Combo.com
• Social Thing
• ImInta
• Google SocialStream Project (not in beta yet...)
  

Mash is currently an invitation-only beta service. The odds are good that one of your friends is in here already. Hit them up for an invite! Already Mashing? Sign in.

Islam is an uplifting, ancient religion, rooted in a search for justice on God's Earth. Diversity is both a Muslim's lived reality (Islam is home to everyone from African Americans to Indonesians to Yemenites) and a goal: "O Mankind!" reads the Quran, Sura 49:13, "We created you ... into nations and tribes, that you may know each other, not that you may despise each other.

...I, like the vast majority of my compatriots, find the nihilistic hatred preached by certain Muslims abhorrent and frightening. But as an American, I was raised to believe that we should judge people by the content of their characters, not the acts of others. I was raised to believe that in this country all are equal, everyone is innocent until proved guilty, and differences are to be respected, not despised.

[ Detroit Free Press ]

I truly appreciate my fellow Americans who can look past the vile hate mongering of the like who commented on this story. If Islam was even 1/2 as bad as the "Anti-Islam" crowd would have us believe, wouldn't we have been in a massive world war for over 1,000 years already? Isn't it more likely that the "problem Muslims" are a very small percentage of the Muslims in the world, just as the hate-filled peoples of other religions of the world?

What’s the point of traveling if I only eat what I’m used to?

[ Dessert Comes First ]

Though I certainly don't have the "iron constitution" mentioned in the post, but if you aren't willing to discomfort yourself in some way, you should have just stayed at home.