iPad 2 coming March 2

I got my eye on one of these. Hopefully the first generation of iPad will come down in price as there will be a second generation:

The company sent out a media invite for an event March 2 in San Francisco. If you have been keeping up with all things Apple lately, you know this is 99.9 percent likely the unveiling of iPad 2 which is rumored to be thinner and feature dual cameras for videochatting. And by now you've figured out the double meaning behind the No. 2 in the invite.

Depending on who you believe, this iPad could also have double the resolution, a high speed connection to another device or make pancakes. And while an announcement is all but a lock, we don't know when the actual iPad will ship.

As someone who has been blogging about Apple for several years, I can tell you that while you should be excited, the pancakes are definitely out. Definitely expect a thinner device - all of Apple's offerings pretty much shrink in size between iterations - and the cameras are a lock. You are going to see Aunt Penelope's goiter in so much detail.

Of course, there's at least a strong likelihood that the new iPad is just one announcement. New laptops are expected, along with a new technology to rival USB 3.0. Should be an interesting day.

I can also look at those iPad alternatives that are out there as well. Hopefully cheaper if I buy them brand new.

Retailers tap into iPad, hoping device will help you buy

Click for iPad website

Talk about the future being now. It used to be old style tubes for TVs on storefront displays now it's an iPad being considered for use in storefronts:

Since Apple Inc. unveiled the iPad in April, a spate of retailers including Burberry, Puma, Things Remembered, Converse and Nordstrom, to name just a few, have rolled out tests of tablet computers at select stores around the country. The move is all part of retailers' response to how consumers are shopping everywhere — online, on their smart phones and in the stores.

Retailers are using iPads as mobile catalogs so sales clerks and shoppers can browse inventory not available on store shelves. They are fastening the tablets to counters so shoppers can design their own products. They are arming sales associates with the electronic clipboards to gathering customer data. And they are testing the device's potential as a portable cash register.

"It is taking retail outside the four walls to where the customers are," said Sandeep Bhanote, CEO of Global Bay Mobile Technologies, a South Plainfield, N.J.-based mobile retail software firm. "You're talking about changing the way you do business. That's what this is all about."

Make Up For Ever, a unit of French luxury conglomerate LVMH, was among the first retailers to give the technology a try. The cosmetic company set up iPad stations in October at its boutiques inside Sephora stores in New York's Soho neighborhood, Costa Mesa, Calif., and Las Vegas.

The iPad is fixed to a gondola and allows shoppers to update their Facebook pages, tweet about their shopping experience and access face charts for browsing makeup combinations. Eventually customers will be able to upload a digital photo of their own faces for a virtual makeover.

Now if Border's had begun using the iPad or at the very least had an online presence to really utilize the iPad or similar tablet devices. Who knows they may be in better shape instead of having to close 30% their stores amidst bankruptcy.

All the same this underscored the conclusion I have about the iPad. It's a luxury item and is being treated as such. A cool device at home that could also have commercial or academic uses in the real world. It's very cool that one could fork up a lot of cash to be able to use such a device at home.

VIDEO: "Battle of Maxia" - Picard Manoeuvre

This CGI animation is of the unseen Battle of Maxia and it's aftermath. This was an engagement of Capt. Jean Luc Picard's previous assignment, USS Stargazer against an unknown adversary. In the Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG) epsiode "The Battle" we found out that Capt. Picard - who later became Captain of the USS Enterprise - had actually fought a Ferengi vessel. As it turns out this Ferengi commander who's son had actually commanded that destroyed ship Picard had fought has designs of revenge and years late gave Picard a gift...the Stargazer.

Why am I typing this out? Because The "Battle" was an awesome episode!

Would've liked to have seen this episode of Jeopardy!

Yeah a computer was a contestant on an episode of the long running game show Jeopardy! story from AP:

The computer brained its human competition in Game 1 of the Man vs. Machine competition on "Jeopardy!" but bombed on the final answer where the correct question was: What is Chicago?

That Final Jeopardy answer: "Its largest airport is named for a World War II hero; its second largest, for a World War II battle."

Both champs Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter knew the right response was Chicago.

Watson, their IBM supercomputer nemesis, guessed doubtfully, "What is Toronto?????" It didn't matter. He had shrewdly wagered only $947.

On the 30-question game board, Jennings and Rutter managed only five correct responses between them during the Double Jeopardy round that aired Tuesday. They ended the first game of the two-game face-off with paltry earnings of $4,800 and $10,400 respectively.

Yeah why didn't I see that show whenever it aired?

Another Roseland neighborhood picture

On Sunday, Unknown Chicago over at ChicagoNOW offered another street quiz and I instantly recognized this picture. The give away was the marquee for the long demolished State Theater you see in the background. This picture is looking north along South Michigan Avenue in 1934.

The land where the State stood is now a parking lot for a nearby post office most of the buildings in this pic are long demolished replaced by a Walgreen's on the west side of the street and a currency exchange on the west side of the street. Of course street car service had been eliminated by the CTA in the late 1950s.

I also had to look up the Parkway Theater which you see in the foreground on the east side of the street. If Englewood was noted for the many theaters that were operating near 63rd & Halsted, the Roseland neighborhood had their own treasures of which only one, the Roseland Theater, still stands today.

In any event in the post where I would've had to identify the various scenes; there were two that were identifiable without a doubt. The first two pictures in the gallery especially the pic above. The post that offered the answers gave me an education as to where those other scenes were located.

Who knew Hyde Park had a Reagan connection?

832 E. 57th St.

ALSO note that this home was the subject of a post over at Unknown Chicago, a ChicagoNow blog.

So Hyde Park can now claim two Presidents although one of them spent only a brief time in this area of my city. Brought to the fore thanks to this Sun-Times article:

Locked up, abandoned and forgotten, the vacant six-flat standing at the northeast corner of 57th and Maryland has no plaques or statues and few clues to its history.

Now, the little-known childhood home of Ronald Reagan in Hyde Park could soon be torn down by the University of Chicago, which has quietly plotted its demolition, the Sun-Times has learned.

The plan has made unlikely allies of conservatives who consider Reagan an icon and liberal Hyde Parkers who say the university’s secrecy is typical of how it has treated its neighbors for decades.

It puts the school that provided the intellectual force behind “Reaganomics” in the awkward spot of attempting to destroy what was until the election of Barack Obama the only home in Chicago where a president has lived.

This is what the need for preservation is about:

Hyde Park Historical Society board member Jack Spicer, also the president of all-volunteer Preservation Chicago, said the Reagan six-flat — just a mile south of President Obama’s Kenwood home — is the finest remaining example of what was once a solid working and middle-class black neighborhood. Destroying it would create “a medical canyon” that separates the hospital from the city and risks deepening long-standing wounds in university-resident relations, he said.

“Whatever you think of Reagan — once the building’s gone, it’s gone forever,” he added.

Landmarks Illinois president Jim Peters also said that he would like to see the block preserved. Reagan’s home is protected by a zoning giving critics 90 days to object if and when the university announces a plan to destroy it, he said.

Further headaches could come from conservatives keen to name everything from aircraft carriers to schools in Reagan’s honor.

How did they find this place?

Park Ridge resident Tom Roeser, 82, discovered the link in the early 1980s when he pressed Reagan for details of the home during a visit to the White House. Reagan couldn’t remember the address, but passed on a message: “My father was picked up often as a common drunk — the police records should have that fact.”

Records confirmed that John R. Reagan was arrested by Chicago Police for drunkenness in 1915, giving the 57th Street address, said Roeser, a former op-ed columnist for the Sun-Times and a former Quaker Oats vice president.

You never know what place or places have an historical connection.

VIDEO: Chicago Blizzard 1967 in Historic Pullman

This video takes you closer to my part of town. The Pullman neighborhood famous for originally being a planned community before it became just another Chicago neighborhood. Here's a description:

On January 27, 1967, a massive blizzard hit Chicago. In Historic Pullman, Al & Marilyn Quiroz picked up their shovels and cameras to capture the event.

Found via Lee Bey, where he has a couple of other videos from both 1967 and 1979.

VIDEO: Chicago Blizzard 1979

Found this on the CapFax in their morning videos post with a wintery theme of course there are some summer scenes from the Illinois State Fair last year. Description from YouTube:

"Chairs" by Nick Despota, John Mabey, and Bob Snyder. During the 1979 Chicago Blizzard, people saved shoveled parking spaces with chairs.

If you want to know what I see this morning in my neighborhood two cars on the street have been PWNED and so has thegarage looking from the backyard. :(

OH YEAH, as an added bonus check out this spoof of a 1979 mayoral campaign ad. In 1979, Jane Byrne became the first female Mayor of Chicago defeating incumbent Michael Bilandic. I've got to check out this website MediaBurn.