Falconportal.com
Who got hacked is really not the important part. Yes this year's Pwn2Own gave the flame warriors plenty to argue about because a certain machine, made by a certain company that happens to have a certain ceo, that likes to keep his users in the dark, got hacked. It could have just as easily been an Ubuntu machine. Like I said, even though this story is great for fanboys to cause flamewars over, it doesn't solve the problem of security. What truly solves the problem is honesty and open-ness. When something is found on a platform, ANY platform, the makers, coders, users, should work together to get a patch to their user base to close that security hole. Not wait until right before a hacker contest to dump a massive amount of patches in hopes of holding off the embarrassment. Both companies need to get with it.
Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to go an update my Ubuntu machine.
Category: Technology | Permalink | 0 comments
Let's just clear the air. I am being watched. Right now I work with people who are higher on the food chain then I, are reading this blog. The idea never really worried me all that much but the reality has been a bit more real if you get were I am going. Something I say here could in fact impact my profession, that being teaching. As you know many changes are coming that Catholics are, how would you say, not pleased about. I want to talk about them but with certain eyes looking in I no longer feel totally comfortable.
At the same time I started a blog somewhere else and hooked all my social type stuff into it. No where does it connect to this site so I can be slightly "more myself". I know that sounds strange but that's where I am right now. If you would like to follow the new blog please email me and I'll forward you the url. It has a different voice and I notice I'm talking about training and other things alot more then here. Why? I don't know. Need?
So will I keep blogging here? No clue,the whole idea of maintaining a website is starting to be a bore me as well. To be honest I'd rather go outside and play with my kids, or work in my garden or go and workout then crunch code. I teach some intro programming stuff in Python so maybe it's feeding my need there. I also maintain a website for all my classes so again I'm geeking out just in other places.
So as you can see I'm in a transition period and I have no idea where I will end up. I can also say that I'm getting more and more concerned about the stability of this country, the internet as we know it now and a few other things. To be perfectly honest, I would not be surprised at all to find the internet as we know it today to be drastically different in 5-10 years time. If it does happen I will place all the blame on those who ruined what was such a great thing in order to make a buck. Web site owners who bombarded us with coma inducing flash ads, dumped crap on our machines and all the rest. I blame comcast and all the rest for not treating the internet as a utility like the phone is. Not to mention Verizon and Comcast for pushing for a tiered internet. Trust me when I say this, I cannot talk about this subject because it infuriates me so much.
I'll end this dump session, rant, whatever here and say that I typed what I felt and did not edit this at all. I may read over it once just to make sure I didn't swear (nope I'm clean) but this was a pure and simple brain dump. I hope you understand.
Like I said, if you wish to continue reading my posts, email me and I'll send you the url.
God bless.
Category: Family | Permalink | 0 comments
If you haven't heard by now Sony's PS3 security has been broken. In response to this Sony has decided to sue those who would make this knowledge public. Now before we go on, let me be perfectly honest. First, I own a PS3 and was not happy that they took away the option to run linux on the hardware that I paid for. Next I bought a Game Shark which allowed me to play backup games and imports on my original PSX. I admit it, I backed up every game I owned. It wasn't much but I did it. When I wanted to play over a friends house, I only and always brought the backup. That way if something went wrong I always had the backup original. I also bought a few used imports so the game shark was a smart purchase for me. With that out of the way let's get to the questions.
1. When you pay for something in full (payment plans et al don't count) do you own it completely?
2. Does that ownership allow you to do anything you wish with that device?
3. Do you feel it's ok or wrong for companies to prevent their products from being modified in any way?
4. Do you think Sony will win their lawsuit?
Enjoy.
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 2 comments
As you know I no longer discuss a certain company because I dislike their walled garden approach and their fanboys can't seem to act appropriately. But what I really dislike is people getting sick.
Category: Technology | Permalink | 0 comments
So it's been a while and you can blame it on everything and nothing all at the same time. So let's jump in.
1. Have you ever watched the tv show mythbusters?
2. Do you enjoy it?
3. What do you think of their testing methodology?
4. Do you like or dislike the extra added people...two guys and the girl?
5. What was your favorite myth they worked to prove or disprove?
Enjoy.
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 0 comments
Well it’s the new year and we have the whole year before us. So what are you going to do? Are you going to make resolutions? Promises? Goals? I prefer to make a list, a to-do list if you prefer. On the top of that list is, getting my -beyond annoying Achilles Tendinitis(AT)- to just go away. As you know I took an entire season off to let my left AT heal so as a test to see how my injury was doing I did a 5K race. Mile 1 and 2 went beyond well. No pain, tugging, or tightness and times in the lower 7s for both miles. Making it even better I didn’t really go out full boar. I just held a decent pace and let the crowd “carry” me along. Then about 1min past the 2mi mark, my right Achilles starts up. To say I was confused would be an understatement. “Wait a minute, wasn’t it my left that was the problem?” I remember saying to myself. So I shut it down by slowing the pace to mid/high 8min/mi. After the race the right AT tightened up and I was limping for about a week. Recently it’s been even worse, one run will not set it off but a shorter easier run will. Needless to say I’m a bit frustrated with this whole thing.
Associated with this whole AT thing is getting back to race weight. I did alot of landscaping last year and found myself going way beyond lunch time because I always wanted to “just finish this next thing.” This lead to going beyond hungry which resulted in over eating or being hungry after supper and then snacking before going to bed. Two things put together that will always lead to weight gain. Because of the above mentioned run times I’m not obsessing but if I want to get back to the level I was prior to this injury dropping the weight will be needed.
Next up, lets talk gardening. As you can see, winter is upon us which means a rather snowy scene. Part of me really wants to get out and do something, but there really is nothing to do. By pure trial and error I’ve come to grips with certain aspects of the whole gardening process and started to streamline. My new boxes will be a huge time saver but I need to get the paths squared away. I’ve already started to lay some cardboard into the pathways and plan to collect more. This -more- will be used to cover all the path ways and then cover those with either straw or some other covering that’s cheap. I’d love to lay pavers but now we’re talking serious money which I don’t want to spend.
Compost is another topic which I am getting more and more familiar with. This coming season will see my first real batch reach the 2 year mark. I used some of it last year so I still haven’t obtained a true full 2 year batch. But we’re getting there. In the same vein I’ve settled on what my cover crop/green manure/ winter cover will be. Buckwheat and oats. Trials with everything else have pointed me to this combo. First off, they both winter kill which means no big tilling job in the spring. Just turn over the top layer with either a pitch fork or broad fork and you’re done. The buckwheat is also great during the summer as a smoother crop. The tomatoes love it, given the nutrients it stores in the ground and the price per lb can’t be beat. But I also like using it because it attracts so many beneficials with hover flies being one. Lastly, it grows so fast and with so little extra watering and care that it’s really a no brainer.
One final note, my initial “likes” about coco shells as the mulch to be used in the garden boxes reached new heights recently when I noticed how easily they decay. This in turn will provide nutrients back into the ground making the whole choice a done deal.
As an aside to the garden, I plan to build a bird house with Zack and a Mason Bee home by myself. We all know that the planet’s bee population is dwindling so by giving the practically harmless Mason bees a place to lay their eggs, I’ll get pollinators and they’ll keep from going extinct. The bird house is also kinda for the garden since birds eat large amounts of bad bugs. Yes there is the occasional strawberry or nipped plant but in nature it’s all about give and take.
Ok, one more garden / back yard note. We know we’re planting trees this coming summer, in the back yard, for all the right reasons. But the idea of planting Nut trees is really starting to look appealing. You get the same amount of shade, they last just as long as your typical oak or maple and once again you encourage nature into your backyard. I’ve yet to see a negative for this decision but being the engineer I will continue to investigate.
Well that's about all for now. God Bless and happy New Year. ;-)
Category: Family | Permalink | 2 locked comments
Christ the Savior is born!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Merry Christmas Everyone.
God Bless.
Category: Religion | Permalink | 0 locked comments
One of the people (@misterfonzie) I follow on Twitter created a March Madness type bracket for Christmas Movies. I thought it was fun (as did others) so a bunch of us decided to do the same thing with Christmas Music/Songs. So instead of entering anything here this week, head on over to Donna's Blog and post your suggestions in the comments. Then sit back and watch the fun as voting takes place right up to Christmas eve where hopefully a winner will be declared. BTW, she's @donna_de on twitter.
Enjoy.
p.s. If you want to post your songs here as well you are more then welcome.
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 0 locked comments
To put it simply, the Obama administration will now spend taxpayers dollars to save a dying industry. Although I'm still trying to wrap my head around the whole pharmaceutical angle and how it applies to the entertainment industry.
Moving on, let's keep in mind that the music industry has been found guilty of countless payola schemes, not paying any of the musicians
they supposedly sued "downloaders" for, and countless other things. The fact of the matter is this, artists are making more money and the middle man, the RIAA, is being cut out. Don't Believe me, look at the numbers. Because of this the industry has raised the flag on downloading and it looks to be working since the Govt appears to be listening. How far it will go? Only time will tell but when you read some of the comments at /. it's easy to see people are sick and tired of pathetic copyright laws. They want to see artists paid but they are done with DRM and the like. That why the following wonderfully written entry was found in the comment section of this story is perfect.
"Ya this is my problem (Score:3)by Sycraft-fu (314770) writes: on Monday December 06, @04:19PM (#34465104)
I support copyright. You need to be able to make money from creative works if we want people who work on that kind of thing full time. So there has to be some kind of protection, exclusivity, otherwise you can't make money in a capitalist society. Now if you want to replace capitalism with something else, that's another issue so let's not discuss that here. However in the framework we have, we need something like copyright.
Fine, however we need to recognize that it IS an artificial construct, and the only reason we have it is to, as the Constitution says "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts." Well to best do that it needs to be a reasonably limited period. That ensures a few things:
1) You can't just make money forever by doing one thing. If you wish to continue to make money, you'll have to continue to make new works.
2) It ensures works get distributed, not locked away. When they are under copyright you want to distribute it so you can make money for the short period permitted, and after that anyone can distribute it.
3) It allows for others to build on existing works. Creativity does not exist in a vacuum, we build on idea from the past. When idea enter the public domain it allows them to be used as the foundations of new ones.
So I agree, we need a shorter copyright term. Personally I'd do it something like thus:
Upon the creation of a work you get an automatic 10 year copyright, no work required. This means that even if you create something you don't think has value, but realize later it does you aren't screwed. During this time you have unlimited control and rights over the work. You do as you please with it. At the end of 10 years you have three choices:
1) Do nothing, the work then falls in to the public domain.
2) Register for an exclusive extension. You then receive another 10 years of exclusive, unlimited control. After that the work will be public domain.
3) Register for a non-exclusive extension. You then receive another 30 years of rights, however you are required to license derivative works for a standardized fee to all that want it. You can profit from your work, and from the derivatives, but you MUST license it for derivatives and the fee you get is fixed.
My objection now is this forever copyright thing we've got going.
"
It will never happen but at least they can see that we the consumer doesn't mind paying artists fairly.
Category: Technology | Permalink | 2 locked comments
To begin, there really isn't much to talk about garden wise if you consider veggies the only topic (ok the care of them is included in that) worth noting. For me that doesn't really capture all that is gardening so here is a few bits. I've only had a real garden for 3 years now so there is still much to learn. The biggest being, which plants I should stick with and which I should ditch. If you've been reading along I recently moved to a raised / boxed garden set up so I expect a learning curve to occur as well. If nothing else, if it helps with weeding, I will declare victory. In a future post I plan to lay out next years garden so look for that.
Training training training. No consistency No consistency No consistency. That pretty much sums it all up. I plan to do A, B, C and D but lately it never works out that way. I understand that setting up a vocational based Engineering class/shop is no easy task but I didn't think it would eat into my training time that much. I still have hopes of losing some of the weight I've gained since my Achilles tendinitis injury but it may have to wait until after the holidays. As for my running I'm officially up to 3.1 miles of running once a week. It's taken a while but I'm there. That's the good news. The bad is I'm running 8min miles. Needless to say I have some work to do to get back to 20min 5Ks without re-injury. My last run was a 24 5K which was nice because technically I was avg 7s. Very high 7s but 7s none the less.
The writing of my next short story has ground to a halt given everything mentioned above. This is killing me because I've got another story all worked out in my head AND on paper. This story researched itself by way of one fact fitting so nicely into another and then that one into another. What is really going to be tough is the time-line. I really want believable (fiction wise). When people read the story I don't want to hear, “There is no way that could ever happen in that amount of time.” That's all I'm going to say for now but I look forward to when I can just sit and write.
To end, and as some of you noticed, I got a bit of comment spam right after my 'no more fruit stories' post. Don't know if it's a coincidence/related or not but they're gone. I can say this, I did get a few emails encouraging me to post more FOSS stuff so that's uber cool. On the other side I got an apology from a fruit user. He agreed 100% with my decision and wished people were just as passionate about their faith and helping their fellow man as they seem to be about the things they buy. Couldn't have put it better myself.
God Bless.
Category: Family | Permalink | 1 locked comments
We're back, for how long who knows but we're back, now that things have somewhat settled in at school. So let's ask deep questions.
1. On the surface do you agree/support/like Wikileaks?
2. Wikileaks has released alot of military secrets via their site. Do you agree or not?
3. Wikileaks are currently being "hunted" by some in our govt. Do you agree with this action?
4. Wikileaks supposedly has a boat load of docs just ready to go which are rumored to be all about banks, medical fields and such. Will they get to release them? Should they release them?
Enjoy
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 1 locked comments
Before I had a blog I had an opinion regarding a certain speaker maker that I once interviewed for. To be honest I never should have been sent because I wasn't qualified. They wanted a C expert and for the last 3 years I had done Ada. Before that I was a Matlab guy. For those of you who have never had the “joy” of programming in Ada there are no pointers. The reason I went was due to a head hunter. About a 1/4 way through the interview I knew that a) I wasn't qualified and b) I didn't want to work there. That day it all became clear what that maker was all about. It was as if someone had brushed aside the curtain and there staring me in the face was a lot of marketing hype. I remember asking why they never added any frequency response,THD, SNR info to their packaging. The reaction was not one of kindness but anger. After the interview I remember telling my friends about it and was amazed at how some reacted. Anger and insults were the order of the day. I never talked with two of them ever again because of it. Which I thought was insane. Here they were willing to give up a friendship in order to protect the name of a speaker maker. Little did I know that this type of insanity is present in the pc industry.
That brings us to today's announcement. From this point forward Apple nor any of their products will be talked about, linked too or spoken of in this blog. To put it bluntly I'm sick of the hate mail. And when I say hate, I mean hate. Personal insults, swearing and all of it. To be clear Tim and Iceman are not to be held responsible at all. They have conducted themselves in an adult manner. In all cases we have poked fun at each other, called into question each others sanity but have never crossed the line into personal attacks. Lighthearted jabs? Sure. Mean personal attacks? Never. The same cannot be said for the rest of the fanboys who have tried to get vulgar posts or emails sent my way. Technically the emails arrive but I delete them when I see the word Apple along with some swear directed at me. I guess I could ban certain users but with gmail and such you have an endless supply of email addresses at your disposal so what's the point. Instead I will add them to my ignore list along with Bose.
So if you are still confused by all of this and don't know where you stand, watch the Simpsons EP where they lampoon all that is Apple. If you can laugh at it, you're ok. If it made you angry, cause you to write an email to FOX, etc etc. You need help. So congratulations Apple Fanboys, you are now officially worse then MS. I still won't buy MS 7.612543SP3 but at least the fanboys are easier to get along with.
Category: Technology | Permalink | 7 locked comments
I started following the Ford/Stewart team as a way to support a US Formula1 team. Then it changed to Jaguar so I moved along with them. I even still have the mug and polo to prove it. Then it switched over to Red Bull and all the jokes flew about the team being nothing more then one big marketing game. Well joke no more baby because Red Bull are both Constructors and Driver World Champions!!!!!!!!!
"WEEEEEEEEE ARE THE CHAMPIONS MY FRIEND!!!!!!!!"
What a great way to end a 6 year run with a podcast that covers F1 then having your team win it all for your last show.
YIIIIIPPPPEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!
YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 2 locked comments
Make your choices wisely. ;-)
1. Marvel vs DC
2. Bloom County vs Garfield
3. Warner Bros vs Hanna Barbara
4. Twitter vs Facebook
5. Ford vs GM
6. Flat or Philips head
7. Cable vs Sat TV.
8. Nike vs Reebok
Enjoy
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 7 locked comments
Instead of creating relevant ads that don't insult my intelligence, offend my morale make up and infect my machines, you're going to do what?!?
Act like a 3 year old that has to have your attention by getting in your face and not letting you do anything until you listen. I see.
In that case, I'll open my Smoothwall admin page, type in some web sites and voila, EA, Wrigley and Disney are now blocked. Guess they didn't want my business.
Category: Technology | Permalink | 1 locked comments
Normally I enjoy TED talks because what they have to say makes sense. The video which I just watched. In fact the author dances around the idea, and almost gets it right but never actually comes out and says it. Simply put, and this is what he should have said, things don't make you happy in a true sense. Yes that sports car can make you happy because you can take it to a local track and go fast. A house will make you happy because it's a nice place to raise a family. But deep down it's the people who really make you feel happy. If I ever bought a sports car the first thing I would do is take my family and friends for a spin. The first thing my wife and I did when we moved into our house was throw a party so we could share our new house. For me it technically has nothing to do with setting expectations and it has everything to do with the people. Yes if you buy a broken down house you will experience issues but add a loving spouse to the mix and putting up with that situation gets better.
As for the actual choice dilemma, I can't say that I agree. I understand what the author said about some choice being good, and how we have gone way past an acceptable amount of choices, but come on. Doesn't it all come down to the person making the choice? When I walk into a bike shop I am immediately turned off by limited choice. i.e. Only 1 or 2 brands. As an adult I should be able to work my way threw those choices until I have to settled in a just a few options. But according to the author this is where paralysis kicks in. Again I totally disagree. You should be able to wipe out 50% of everything in just a few seconds whether you're looking for a nice bike, breakfast cereal or underware.
I'm sorry but this gets back to how I see society getting easier and easier to the point of putting “your life's things” in someone else's hands. For those of you who question my sanity on this one, use this example. There are a bazillion people on this planet which means you technically have infinite choices in finding Mr. or Mrs. Right. Yet I don't see people flying all over the globe to make sure they research other countries just in case. No they wipe the rest of the world out as an option, then wipe out about half of their state and move on from there. If they can do that with something so important as the person you intend to marry a little thing like breakfast cereal should not paralyze anyone.
Now if you'll excuse I need to test out another linux distro in my
VM just in case my Ubuntu is not the best any more. ;-)
Category: Family | Permalink | 0 locked comments
One of the nicest things about GReader was this really cool plug-in that allows you to highlight or grey out stories based upon your parameters. My filter went something like this, Don't show any story having the following words in the title: Apple, itunes, iphone, itouch, ipad. (as an aside, I do the same thing with TweetDeck but also filter OUT squarespace stuff) After I got this filter set up and working I remember commenting how certain site's numbers nearly dropped in half. (ARS I'm pointing at you)
I have sinced moved to RSSOwl in my continued effort to keep my data away from Google but I haven't set up the avoidance filter yet. Much to my surprise I started to read apple release stories and was blown away.
Let's go over some of their breathtaking and magical new features that I think I'm going to like.
"Launchpad, a new home for all of your Mac apps;"
Wow does that name sound so familiar (cough Canonical) but then again Apple is just so innovative that they always pick names for their products that are carefully and thoroughly researched to insure that they never use a name that's already taken.
"system-wide support for full screen apps; "
Apps will now run in full screen mode? Seriously?!? Man I wish I could have that feature now. But I guess I'll have to wait until the release.
"Mission Control presents you with a unified view of every app and window running on your Mac, so you can instantly navigate anywhere. Mission Control also incorporates the next generation of Exposé, presenting all the windows running on your Mac grouped by application, alongside thumbnails of full screen apps, Dashboard and other Spaces."
You mean like a spinning cube or cylinder, showing all your apps (like a movie actually running) on all workspaces? Wow, Magical as always.
But the news that just blew me away was how Apple is releasing a netbook, er I mean the macbook air. Can you believe it? It actually comes with SDRam in it. Steve really pushed the boundary on this feature. I bet no one up to now had even considered putting SDRam in a laptop. Especially at that price.
I really must bow down before the great and innovat...er innnovaaat..um..InOVate-ting Apple who always leads the market with an outstanding feature set (Hey you can now run programs in full screen mode, where else are you doing to get that feature?) and competitive pricing. Sorry but I need to leave now so I can camp out at my local apple store so I can be the first to get such magical things. And to think I use to be down on Apple. Who knew such magical things such as pixies, full screen apps and unicorns could all come from the same place.
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 11 locked comments
Now don't get me wrong, I like the Register. But sometimes they leave the Monty Python references out and actually report news. Gasp. So when I read today's story about two CEO's trading words like two high school girls arguing who's boyfriend is cuter, I knew the comments would be good. Here is my favorite.
"Perhaps I was just young and idealistic... #
Posted Tuesday 19th October 2010 05:01 GMT
but I remember a time when CEOs said stuff that defined their companies, told us what to expect, excited us even. Now, between Jobs, Ellison, Ballmer, Schmidt. all we get is this laughable doublespeak. How they manage to lead an organisation rather than just cause baldness through endless head-scratching I do not know."
Come join the Fun.
BTW, please save your comments. I don't own any apple products, and I'm currently moving away from Google "stuff". Not to mention I spend a grand total of $100 a YEAR on my phone which is the same amount that some people spend in a month. So to put it bluntly, DON'T CARE. ;-)
Category: Technology | Permalink | 0 locked comments
That's right I was watching Sesame Street with my little one. So lets take a trip back while we all answer some questions.
1. What is your favorite character from Sesame Street?
2. What is your favorite Segment? (i.e. Monsterpiece Theater)
3. Who was your favorite guest star?
4. What is your favorite letter and number?
Enjoy.
Category: Entertainment | Permalink | 1 locked comments
I don't remember when I did my first Workers Memorial race but it was probably during college since the race was held there. At the time it drew a lot of people. The course was an interesting challenge given its constant elevation change. It wasn't much of a change but then it doesn't take much to ruin your time. I was told by a number of people they eventually changed the course to lower costs.(add appropriate amount of salt as needed) Another thing they changed was their t-shirt design. But the one thing that never changed, at least when I raced, was their association with the union. With all of those facts in place, lets step through their missteps.
1.The Course
The new course, which now remains on campus, is kinda boring. It's just shy of two loops which meant you repeated a fair amount of the first loop. I usually did the race as an early season race test because it fit into my schedule nicely.
2.Lack of posted results.
We live in a world where instant online results are not just accepted but expected. I could never find my race results at any of the online race pages.
(CoolRunning is one example) Many of the folks that I would see during the course of the season would complain about this point. Some went so far as to say that unless they start posting their race results online, they weren't going to race.
3.Tshirts
To some, Tshirts are not worth much, but to others, the Tshirt makes the race. Back in the day the shirt had some women with some cool “expression” (with an attitude). The new ones looked very plain with little to no graphics. It was mostly adverts.
4.Lack of photos or worse select photos.
While looking for my results I happened across a site controlled by the union associated with the race. They had race photo's but only of those who were in a union. Fair enough so I emailed them about getting a copy of a picture that I knew was taken during the awards ceremony. It was my best finish ever in a race and in my age group. When they took the photo it was of me getting my “2nd in age group” award and then again with the Top three places. I emailed at least 4 different people associated with the race looking to getting a copy but no one ever responded. If it were only me I would let it go but again people who race the local scene repeated similar stories. Some people may think this vain but I would have loved to show my sons a picture of their Dad getting an award.
5.No advertisement
Getting back to the web, unless I can find the race online or I see it posted at other races, I don't do it. The race had no website, no known place to get an application, nor was it listed on any race sites. This never made any sense to me. If you are trying to build up a race wouldn't you promote it?
6.Uniqueness.
Each race has it's thing which you associate with it. Careful tailoring of that image is vital. Day of Portugal was known for being flat and fast with great after race prizes. The race ran in association with the Festival of the same name. There was also a free kids race that really made the entire event feel perfect for family. The Father's Day 5 and 10K once again created an image of family and fun. Great course, great support, and a different shirt design each year. This is where I think they kinda alienated some people. After the race was done I remember numerous times having to listen to what seemed like a long speech about unions and worker safety before any of the awards were given out. If they were the main sponsors then they had every right to use their event to bring topics to the public eye which they felt important. Problem is when you use the word union not everyone feels the same way and that's where people start forming opinions about the entire event.
A lot of people associated that race with raising money to help support injured union workers. On the surface that's a great cause. Problem is it opened up questions like, “The guy was in the union, I thought they had insurance, I'd rather support all injured workers”, and a few others. So as you can see they let their image get taken over which turned some away. As an aside I would have also donated some of the proceeding to some scholarship and made sure to announce that loud and clear during the awards ceremony. i.e. “With your support we raised $$$ dollars for two students to help pay for their books.”
So lets wrap this up. To be honest I am surprised the race lasted as long as it did. The year I took third in my age group there was about 50. The next year saw me take 2nd in my age group dropping over a minute from my time but there were only 36. As reported by another teacher, this year saw 15 line up and it was announced they were pulling the plug. Maybe someone in the near future will want to get a race going there again. And maybe, just maybe, they'll listen to what I and a whole bunch of people have been saying and create a really nice and well supported road race. Until then, RIP Workers Memorial 5K.