Various and Sundry, March 11

So strange to be writing this ahead of time. I'm probably missing all sorts of good obits and things major natural disasters that make everything else pale in comparison. At any rate, here are a couple of items I noted before I left town.

As I look for a position in marketing using social media, I've started following a ton of social media blogs. I kind of lost it the day I saw the blog entry, "22 new social media platforms you must know about if you dare call yourself anything other than a brain-dead Luddite." OK, I'm kidding about the second half of the title, but I'm not kidding about the number 22.

Thank heavens for The Anti-Social Media, a blog that is keeping me sane with its no b.s. perspective. I particularly liked this entry, How To Use _________ For Marketing, subtitled "The easy way to use to use any social network to sell crap." Nailed it. Thank you, Anti-Social Media! Oh, wait, he's flown off to tackle another platform.

I loved this infographic comparing apples to oranges. Because apparently you can, and the results will shock you.

Fans of the movie Up and nerds in general will appreciate that "The National Geographic Channel and a team of scientists, engineers, and two world-class balloon pilots successfully launched a 16' X 16' house 18' tall with 300 8' colored weather balloons from a private airfield east of Los Angeles, and set a new world record for the largest balloon cluster flight ever attempted. The entire experimental aircraft was more than 10 stories high, reached an altitude of over 10,000 feet, and flew for approximately one hour." h/t Design Fetish, where there are lots of great photos.

Finally, if you're still looking for something to do this Lent, I really liked this idea of Praying Facebook, a group started by a woman who has used this as a spiritual practice. "What I have done in the past is spend about a half hour each morning and a half hour each evening going through my news feed and praying for each person by name. If there is something specific they mention in a post I pray that too...I invite you to join me on the journey, post if you want to, share with others and see how we can get our Lent on this year."

I guess it's time to get our Lent on.