Weekly Notes: January 4, 2008

It’s the first week of 2008 and there’s plenty to talk about.

• This afternoon I’ll have a review of Harding’s loss last night in Florence.
• If you’re looking for one site you can bookmark to get a nightly comprehensive college basketball TV schedule, this is the site: Eye On Sports Media. It’s especially nice if you have HD or get channels like CSTV or ESPNU, so you don’t have to scroll through hundreds of channels on your TV’s channel guide, or if you’re into planning out your viewing in advance.
• Congratulations to last night’s Iowa Caucus winners: Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee. I tend to favor one over the other (three guesses which one), and I relish the prospect of those being the final nominees. Iowa doesn’t determine everything, but it’s still important for early momentum. With Chuck Norris on his side, is it possible for Huck to lose?
• My early review of Netflix is that it’s pretty good. We’re getting movies quickly and it’s been nice to line up a bunch of movies I have been meaning to see for a while in the queue. The third Pirates of the Caribbean movie wasn’t exactly a great movie to break in the service, but I suppose I did want to see how the trilogy ended. Next up: all three movies from the Bourne trilogy. I’m catching Melissa up on the first two, and we’ll both see the third one for the first time.
• Last night I made the decision many others have made before me: I will no longer be shopping at Wal-Mart. “But they’re the great American retailer,” you say. Perhaps, but I’m fed up with getting poor customer service and dealing with the interesting crowd there. They don’t have the best track record as a corporate citizen (while Wikipedia’s articles on Wal-Mart criticism have previously been a complete circus, the current one is pretty well-sourced and balanced in terms of POV), so it’s probably for the best. Low prices are nice, but they’re not everything. Regardless of how much they may save me per year in dollars, the other costs are not worth it. I’d much rather shop at Publix, which has a significantly better (but not perfect) record.
• More on Wal-Mart: One prime example of their ambivalence toward the community around them was at home in Chattanooga, where in spite of protests, they bought land from U.S. Senator (then Chattanooga mayor) Bob Corker and built on the site of the Brainerd Mission, the subject of my Eagle Project and my dad’s subsequent work. Thanks at least in part to him, the adjacent cemetery became a site on the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail. A more extensive history of the Mission can be found here. More on the Brainerd Wal-Mart and Corker’s involvement can be found here and here.
• Tomorrow I’ll be making the trip to Huntsville and will hopefully see Harding’s first road win of the season. The game is at 8:00 Eastern time and will probably at least have live stats coming from UAH’s website.

If you want, sound off on these topics or anything else in the comments.