5 Thoughts for August 11, 2015

1. It's a bit amusing to think that Oregon is home to both a terrible municipal fiber network that sucks up a lot of resources and is likely not viable on its own, and one that is successful and profitable. This profitable fiber network belongs to the City of Sandy -- are you sitting down? -- which charges just $40 a month for 100 Gbps service. The first fiber build out in Portland to offer 100Gbps, is going to be the winner -- true for anywhere, really -- regardless of whether or not that company is named Google Fiber.
2. Google's reorganizing itself into a holding company, named Alphabet, with its assets separated into companies, one of which is Google -- but from the write ups and comments I'm seeing online, I'm not sure people fully comprehend what's going on here. Google is transforming itself into becoming the Berkshire Hathaway of technology, with the goal of being on the front lines of developing new technologies. BTW, the abc.xyz URL for Alphabet, has a mild reference to Alpha and Omega (the beginning and end / first and last); while Larry Page refers to Alpha-bet as a bet on returns of investment, if you walk back the origin of Alphabet, in Hebrew it refers to Aleph - Bet / Father -Son / 1 - 2 -- and I'll just leave it at that.
3. The first -- preseason -- ESPN PAC-12 Power Rankings were posted, and it's impossible to ignore that the PAC-12 South is expected to be much stronger. Oregon is tops, but 2 - 6 are South teams. USA Today's Dan Wolken says the PAC-12 South might be the most loaded division in college football.
4. I actually spotted my dad and his old car in a Google Street View. Hilarious and awesome, because he's an analog guy who is now embedded into digital history.
5. Last week I was at Safeway and I saw that Bob's Red Mill products were on sale. I've never had TVP (Textured Vegetable Protein) before -- or so I thought -- but I'd been interested in it as a camping / emergency dried food for use in cooking. They were under $2 each bag (10 oz), so I grabbed a couple. I immediately opened a bag up and rehydrated some, then tasted it -- tasted like dried, fried tofu. Then I did some research online about the history of TVP, and realized that I've unknowingly eaten TVP many times -- it's in your veggie burger, your protein bars, canned chili, and at some fast food restaurants that serve products with something called "ground beef". If you're vegetarian, you're probably eating a lot more of TVP, knowingly or unknowingly. Anyway, I've since used it in a beef soup and curry, and I did not notice that it was in there.