The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

What I'm reading (later today)

All for now.

Too many browser windows open at work

Because I need to read all of these and have to do my actual job first:

I'll get to these this evening. I hope.

Catalog of New York photos

This is one of the coolest things I've seen in a long time:

A new site called OldNYC delivers a Street View-like view of what the city looked like in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The site includes a map of New York City and a slew of dots that can be clicked on to see different images of that particular location.

According to Business Insider, which earlier reported on the site, it was developed by Dan Vanderkam in collaboration with the New York Public Library, which has acollection of more than 80,000 photographs of New York City shot from the 1870s to the 1970s.

While OldNYC is not a Street View clone—users will not be able to "drive" their way through the streets like they would on Google's service—it's somewhat similar. Indeed, users can zoom in and out on a particular location, pick their favorite crossing, and click on the small red dot. Upon doing so, images related to that location are displayed.

I'll be playing with this for a few minutes...

Sure Happy It's Thursday link round-up

For a couple of odd timing reasons, this is my first full 5-day week at my new job...and it's already a 5½-day week. So I've barely enough time to jot these articles down for future reading:

Have fun. I'll catch up to these in a day or two.

Which city might take over from London?

New York Times business columnist James Stewart thinks it through:

Unless Britain finds a way to undo its decision to leave the European Union, London’s days as the pre-eminent global financial capital, ranked even ahead of New York, may be numbered.

Who might win this high-stakes financial sweepstakes?

Here are the criteria most frequently mentioned: English-language facility, which is essential for attracting a global work force; a favorable regulatory environment, especially regarding employment; excellent transportation and communications infrastructure; availability of prime office space and luxury housing; good schools; good restaurants and cultural offerings; and finally, an intangible quality that includes a certain energy level and openness to an influx of highly paid, competitive City of London-Wall Street types.

I scored numerous cities in the European Union on a 60-point scale: five points for office space and housing, five points for restaurants and cultural offerings — because it’s easier for any city to build new offices and housing, and import talented chefs and entertainers — and 10 points for each of the others.

So who's on top? I'll let you read it, but for my money, I'd live in any of Stewart's top 3.

Bit of a hike

Today was pretty full. I took a train to Tring, hiked for two hours, came back to London, and walked around Kensington for a couple more. Now it's 11pm on Sunday night and everything is closed.

I won't have all the photos I took yesterday and today ready until I get back to Chicago, but here are a couple. First, the Tate Modern:

Second, this guy, who rode in my train carriage on the way back from Tring:

These are just from my phone. I did lug my real camera all over the hills of Buckinghamshire today, so I'll have real photos later in the week.

In the news

Once again, here's a list of news items I haven't fully digested but want to when I have a few free minutes:

There's another major story that I'm following, about which I'll post in a few minutes.

All kinds of PRs

Yesterday's walk had a number of consequences, including some discomfort that has persisted until today. But I also blew away my Fitbit personal records. Yesterday's results:

Which makes my top 5 now look like this:

2016 Jun 16 40,748
2016 Jun 8 32,315
2015 Apr 26 30,496
2016 Mar 8 29,775
2015 Jun 15 28,455

Yesterday's weather worked out, too. It was almost completely overcast, until I hit the heavily-wooded sections of the trail up in Glencoe and Highland Park. And it was cool; I don't think it got above 20°C. So I didn't sweat too much and I was able to keep a fairly brisk pace.

I will now limp to my lunch appointment. And I'll post Parker's birthday photo later this afternoon.