Finkel's Fast Five - Issue #8

March 23rd, 2018

By far the best thing I watched this week was Take Every Wave: The Life of Laird Hamilton on Amazon. It's a documentary on the surfing legend that opens on Laird dropping in on a mammoth 100-foot wave that looks like a rolling blue avalanche mere humans have no business riding - and then the intensity of the doc picks up. I've long been a huge fan of Laird and whether you're also a fan or you just want to watch a man defy death and conquer the ocean on his own two feet and a board, it's an incredible film. Watch the trailer.  Sticking with the water and things no human has ever done before, bear with me for a brief swimming geek moment. Blake Pieroni, a freestyle swimmer for the University of Indiana, became the first swimmer in the history of swimming to drop a sub 1 minute, 30 second 200-yard freestyle at the NCAA Championships on Wednesday, posting a 1:29.63. That's EIGHT laps of the pool in less time than it takes to watch the new Avengers trailer. In my prime I did this race in about 1:50... So Blake did 8 laps in the same time I did 6 1/2. Insane. His splits are here, courtesy of SwimSwam.com.  I don't always drink coffee, but when I do, it's from a United States Veteran owned and operated small batch roaster I recently discovered called Black Rifle Coffee Company. I'm not a coffee connoisseur at all, but the flavor I bought, Black Buffalo Blend, was really smooth. I brewed it at night and drank it cold before my 5am workout the next morning and it was great. Also took this perfect sunrise shot of the cool bag with an American Flag and a buffalo on it. Highly recommend it.  While looking for a quiet place to do some writing outside this week I discovered a scenic park in Dallas that has famous literary quotes on every step of the centerpiece staircase - one of them from Robert Frost. That night I went down a bit of a Wikipedia wormhole about Frost and discovered that "The Road Less Traveled" isn't even the name of his most famous poem. It's actually titled, "The Road Less Taken". How is that possible? Frost said his goal was to "lodge a few poems where they would be hard to get rid of." He did that, even with the misquote. For a great breakdown of the poem's impact on pop culture, read this.  Since everyone is freaking out about Facebook and privacy like it's a new tech problem, here's a trivia question: Any guesses on when the world's first technology hack took place? 20 years ago? 40? 60? Nope. It happened 115 years ago in 1903. The story involves Italian inventor and radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi and one of the first disruptors ever, Nevil Maskelyne. In June of 1903, Marconi set up an event to demonstrate for the first time ever that Morse Code could be transmitted wirelessly. Maskelyne (hired by a rival cable telegraph company) hijacked the wavelength Marconi was using from a nearby theater and sent this message: “Rats rats rats rats,” it began. Then he wrote a quick rhyme: “There was a young fellow of Italy, who diddled the public quite prettily ...” And that's when trolling was invented. Read the full story here.

Have a great weekend and try not to diddle the public quite prettily!  We're 8 issues into this project and I appreciate all of the tremendous feedback. If you're enjoying it, please don't forget to forward it to anyone who you think will like it. Use the link below. Thanks!  You can read previous FF5 Issues HERE  - Jon