Brad on Broadcast

Even airports are getting in on the echo-friendly push. Mowing grass is out at San Jose, Seattle, Boston, Nashville, Phoenix, Indianapolis airports.

The solution? Goats.

According to Wednesday’s story in USA Today, airports are planting more native plants and installing fewer grassy lawns, which require power mowing. These airports then use goats and sheep to keep their lawns manicured. So, on your trip home, if you spot a goat next to the runway, don’t worry, just wave. He’s supposed to be there.

For more posts from IBC, visit the BE@IBC blog.

The best thing about conventions is being there. The worst thing about conventions is getting there.

After enduring 22hr, door-to-door travel getting home, I’m ready to endorse children-free airplanes. I was unfortunate enough to encounter several of the most ignorant, selfish parents with small children in all my years of flying.

In both legs of my return flight, there were multiple 3-yr-old-something’s who were allowed to totally disrupt the flights with their screeching, screaming behavior. I watched (and listened) as these acoustic terrorists held all of us passengers hostage, in one case for nine hours. No one, including the kids’ parents, worked to temper the behavior of these obnoxious brats.

I say ban kids who can’t behave themselves (and the parents who refuse to make them behave) to the airplane’s cargo hold. Heck, the kids will probably like it because they’ can play with the other animals there.

For more posts from IBC, visit the BE@IBC blog.

I’ve discovered several ways a tired, perhaps somewhat hung-over IBC-er may be reminded he’s in Amsterdam at the IBC:

1. Your hotel room smaller than your home bedroom, but costs as much per night as your monthly mortgage.

2. Your hotel room doesn’t have a clothes iron, but does have an umbrella.

3. Every street is a something “straat” or “gracht”.

4. By the end of the convention day, your briefcase weights as much as you do.

5. The last thing you hear as you’re being run over is, “brrring, brrring.”

For more posts from IBC, visit the BE@IBC blog.

After a brief walk from my hotel (located in the bowels of Amsterdam) to DAM square, where I could get the tram, my shoes look like I took a shower in them. Now, two hours later, they are still wet and probably will be for the next week!

For those familiar with Amsterdam, weather is always a topic of discussion. Usually the comment goes something like, “It’s raining, snowing, windy or cold.” I recall one reason for moving the show from the UK was to find better weather. Oops, looks to me like the IBC organizers bought into the local weather forecaster’s predictions. And, we all know about the accuracy of weather forecasts.

For more posts from IBC, visit the BE@IBC blog.

I recently spent an entire day cleaning my basement. One result was a small mountain of old computers and electronics to be trashed. My first thought was to simply stack it on the curb on trash day. One call to the refuse company junked that idea.

They informed me that my community had an electronics recycling program. A call to the city told me that this was true, but the cost was $10 per computer or monitor and $25 per TV set. Man, what I considered trash was going to cost me a fortune to get rid of.

It seems that everyone must become a recycler these days. Actually, broadcasters were among the first to help eliminate dangerous chemicals from landfills.

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