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Paul Simon has a song, “Negotiations and Lovesongs”, I believe, where he says, “everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance, everybody knows it’s true.” Very sentimental. I’m a big Paul Simon fan. Whoever decided on the location of the new Hyatt Recency Hotel in downtown Dallas must have been very sentimental about the sound of trains. The front door to the hotel is a mere 60 feet from a sizable train track.

The key to Paul’s song was, “sound of a train in the distance“. Otherwise, trains are noisy. FYI.

I had no idea that the World Series game I was watching Sunday night would be the clincher for the Red Sox. Otherwise, I would have paid closer attention. Instead, I was sipping wine while having conversations about the dynamics of Google Local and taking a tour of the Apple iPhone.

I gave a presentation at the NMHC Technology Conference on Monday afternoon. I presented alongside Lee Blankenship of Search Discovery, an Atlanta based SEM agency, and Craig Hordlow of Red Bricks Media. Lee discussed some interesting research and trends and showed some innovative strategies for PPC management. Craig captured my attention with his diagnostic approach to monitoring PPC alongside SEO in order help understand how and where to focus effort and spending.

My presentation was mainly an overview of SEO, the Local space and the fundamentals of website optimization.

Many people seemed to be getting their first introduction to some of the technology and ideas being presented - and that was actually refreshing.

I just had the pleasure of helping a friend change their domain name. From the outside, it looked as if I could write some simple rewrite rules, capture all the link juice and pass it via a 301 redirect to their new domain. But then I learned that the site was being hosted on Microsoft servers and that I would have to use IIS for the rewrite.

IIS is crap. On the other hand, UNIX is a mature, superior operating system with a proven track record for oh-so-important qualities such as reliability, performance and security. Web 2.0 is nothing new - collaborative creation started with the Unix operating system years ago. It continues to get better as more people contribute.

Ok maybe I’m showing some bias here. I’ll explain. IIS is crap in this instance because it is impossible to make a full page-to-page site redirect unless the web pages are dynamic. In other words, if you have a flat, html site, you have to redirect all pages to the home page of the new domain. That is sub-optimal at best.

So I moved the hosting to a Unix environment. I wrote 6 lines of code in the .htaccess file and redirected the entire old domain to the corresponding pages on the new domain within minutes. Sweet sweetness indeed. I passed all link juice and all rankings were maintained. Google didn’t miss a beat.

I don’t normally care about Kid Rock or what he does with his life. But when one of my friends is out hanging with the rockster while his is in town to perform at the Tabernacle - now that perks my interest. When I hear that people were taken to jail, wow-wee!

After hearing the story, it appears that Kid Rock ended up in jail essentially because he is Kid Rock (well, that and the violence). And it’s not like he acted like Ray Lewis, he was really just trying to eat in peace. While Bob (Kid Rock) and his entourage were munching out at the Waffle House they were, of course, recognized. But that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Conversations were nice and acquaintances were catching up when a drunk, out of control rap wannabe started barking profanities at a woman who had been talking with the Kid. After many rounds of this degrading name calling, and requests for Waffle House management to call the cops, the drunk was eventually escorted outside.

That’s when things got crazy. The drunk man didn’t leave. Instead, he pulled down his pants, gestured, yelled, ranted and carried on just outside the window where Kid Rock was trying to eat, a mere 1/2″ inch away on the other side of a glass window. The drunk man ultimately punched the window and shattered it, further ruining everyone’s already disrupted meal. No one likes shattered glass with their scrambled eggs. It was this event, this attack, that gave rise to the altercation.

How should one respond to this level of violence in light of non-existent Waffle House security? In lieu of any timely intervention by the authorities, apparently an ass-whipping was warranted, and justified (ok, maybe not justified, but certainly earned).

It is a shame that the ATL proved to be a crappy experience for Kid Rock. Even worse, it is insane that no cops would come arrest a drunken maniac in a timely fashion. But they would show up and chase down Kid Rock’s giant tour bus once the violence was over.

Waffle House will probably make tons of money selling their security video. The drunken man will likely be forgotten. But Kid Rock and his group will end up with mug shot memories of Atlanta, all because a madman decided to attack them.

Born on September 17th, 2007.

With Momma:

The Family:

Molly Solo:

First Night:

With Grandma: