A penny for my thoughts about the penny

If it wasn't for the radio - yes the radio - I wouldn't have known about the redesign of the penny - or the one cent piece if you're all old-timey. If it weren't for the internet, though, I wouldn't have known just how terrible its new design was.

Which leads me to an actual point. Where do most people get their news? It's been studied and rehashed on an almost daily basis. Newspapers offer up a text and photo-based approach but once a day but to get that particular breed of news in a format you can hold in your hands costs a quarter or two each and every day. Sure, you can get basically the same news as you'd get in print for free on most every newspaper's website but newspaper websites are a pain in the ass to navigate through without using their lousy search functions.

The internet is available, if you don't mind looking over your shoulder, while at work to plenty of office workers. The most accessed time for many news websites in this particular corner of Minnesota is between 11 AM and 1 PM which correlates with lunch time across the different timezones of the United States. But what do you do if you don't want to or can't access the internet for news while at work?

If you're like me, you have a crappy, barely together radio sitting at your desk. My trusty $5.99 earbuds from Menards attached to either it, my iPod or the headphone jack of my computer I keep myself not only entertained/distracted from the outside noise of the office but informed, too. Getting that information/entertainment mix is a bit of work here in the Twin Cities. I can't find a radio station I could tolerate for the course of a workday so I mix it up. I have appointments with certain stations on various parts of the dial but I actually seek out the 4:20-ish news update with Bob Collins on 89.3 The Current. Maybe it's because he has an attitude about the world that matches mine (we're all doomed) or maybe it's because his banter with Mary Lucia is genuine but whatever the case the news he mentions during those few minutes - while not always the biggest headlines - seems almost tailored to my tastes.

And without that newscast and his daily mention - via Lucia's asking - about what's on the News Cut blog, I would have never known about the morons in government with nothing better to do messing with the U.S penny. Screwing with the design of a coin which nobody already gave a damn about is equal to tax forms using a font size 1/2 point smaller than they did previously. Nobody's going to notice! Way to waste money, geniuses! And thank you Bob Collins because without your blog post mentioned on The Current, I would have never known about something most would see as trivial but something I see as wildly maddening.

The only thing more maddening that a new design for the penny is missing an update of MinnPics. Don't miss the kick-ass photos from all over Minnesota including recent name-dropping of Olympic sports. Go now and check it out and subscribe to the RSS feed or I'll write another blog post about curling.

My old lady's obsessed with curling

In the ten or so years I've known her, I've never seen her get so obsessed with a sport that she neglects her everyday tasks. It's both humorous and sad but I'm impressed by her new devotion to the U.S. Olympic Curling Team. In a mere three days of watching the U.S. Olympic curling team on CNBC for three (or so) hours per day she has picked much of the terminology of the sport. She knows who the team captains are and she is very much a U.S team backer.

Last night, after I arrived home far too late for my own tastes, I found my old lady sitting on the edge of the couch nearly screaming at the TV while the toddler sat in her high chair throwing her supper on the floor. "You suck! How could you miss that? You HAVE to stick it on the button! You can't give up another point to DENMARK!" I thought I had walked in to a very unpopular sports bar but upon further inspection it was most definitely my house and the yelling was that of a rabid curling fan.

But for every rabid fan there's a detractor who just doesn't get the sport of curling. I listen to KFAN for 2 or 3 hours each day and Dan Cole has called curling boring plenty of times but has also admitted to watching men's figure skating because it's on during the primetime Olympic broadcast on NBC. Maybe my household is more of a niche household. Maybe if the networks paid more attention to supposed niche households like mine, curling wouldn't be viewed as boring. It would be a widely understood sport. Curling clubs would outnumber bowling alleys here in the great frozen north known as Minnesota. Maybe instead of viewing my old lady as an obsessed curling fan I'd see her as a normal American because she'd fit right in.

Nothing's more American than photos so check out the spectacular photos of Minnesota at MinnPics!

Your complete Olympic Curling TV schedule

Face it Americans, Curling is the only Olympic sport that anybody really gives a damn about but it's a bitch to dig through hundreds of pages of Olympic broadcast schedules to fine out when Curling is being televised. But look what I've done for you - I put all the info (local to the Central timezone) right here for your enjoyment. Now you can sit back and watch those heavy, polished stones glide down the long span of ice as the teams jockey to score the most points and bump their own stones closer or bump opponent's stones out of contention. God, I love this sport!

Tuesday, February 16
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Men's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Women's Curling

Wednesday, February 17
1:30a - 4:00a CNBC
2:00a - 4:30a MSNBC - Men's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Women's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Men's Curling

Thursday, February 18
1:30a - 4:00a CNBC
2:00a - 5:00a MSNBC - Women's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Men's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Women's Curling

Friday, February 19
1:30a - 4:00a CNBC
2:00a - 4:30a MSNBC - Men's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Women's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Men's Curling
9:00p - 12:00a CNBC - Women's Curling

Saturday, February 20
2:00a - 5:00a MSNBC - Men's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p MSNBC - Men's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Women's Curling
9:00p - 12:00a CNBC - Men's Curling

Sunday, February 21
2:00a - 5:00a MSNBC - Men's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p MSNBC - Women's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Men's Curling
9:00p - 12:00a CNBC - Women's Curling

Monday, February 22
2:00a - 4:30a MSNBC - Women's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Men's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Women's Curling
9:30p - 12:00a CNBC - Men's Curling

Tuesday, February 23
2:00a - 4:30a MSNBC - Men's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Women's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Men's Curling
9:30p - 12:00a MSNBC - Women's Curling

Wednesday, February 24
2:00a - 4:30a MSNBC - Women's Curling
4:00p - 7:00p MSNBC

Thursday, February 25
2:00a - 4:30a MSNBC - Men's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Women's Curling: Semifinal
4:00p - 7:00p CNBC - Men's Curling

Friday, February 26
2:00a - 5:00a MSNBC - Women's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Women's Curling: Bronze Game
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC - Women's Curling

Saturday, February 27
2:00a - 4:30a MSNBC - Men's Curling
11:00a - 2:00p USA - Men's Curling: Bronze Game
5:00p - 8:00p CNBC - Men's Curling Gold Medal Match

So there it is, two solid weeks of Curling goodness. Grab your popcorn, a few bottles of beer and throw kepe your remote handy as you hop between three obscure cable channels to get your Curling fix. Hey, at least most of these broadcasts will be live so when America brings home the Olympic Curling Gold Medal we'll know about it before it hits Twitter. Unless NBC drops the ball like usual and fucks us all.

For photos of Minnesota where curling, beleive it or not, is wildly popular check out MinnPics!