Douglas Robinson knows that Southwestern Pennsylvania is something that gets into your blood, and often it’s from the food.
That’s how he explains his passion for sauerkraut to his son, who hates the stuff. Twelve-year-old Doug Jr. told his Dad, “I’m from Southwestern Pennsylvania, too, but I don’t like sauerkraut.”
“I said, ‘You wait,’” his Dad told him. “You’ll be craving that stuff when you’re older because you’ll be smelling it in your head.”
Mr. Robinson, who as a boy grew up in Uniontown, smelled the sauerkraut and the pierogies and chipped ham and the other foods from home during the two decades he lived far away from here in Florida. Like many others of his generation, he couldn’t wait to leave Southwestern Pennsylvania. But after he moved his family back here around the year 2000, “I couldn’t run fast enough to show all my kids the [cool] stuff here.”
He shares his love for his region in a book he recently self-published, the “I Grew Up in Southwestern Pennsylvania Cookbook.”
On to the purpose of Sauerkraut Sundays… As I go through the week, I use Twitter to send out little updates and links. I realize that I do this quite a bit and that not all of you use Twitter, so with that in mind I’d like to take Sunday to do sort of a week in review. I’ve selected the most useful of my tweets from the last week and placed them in to the categories that I use in this blog.
Pittsburgh AND Startups/Social Media!!!
- Great view by @monica_schnitge on local company @Ansys_Inc ‘s $310M Acquisition (HUGE local biz news): http://bit.ly/l9rYey
- Got to grab a glass of wine with the interesting team from @MakerCraft. Check out there company on @Alphalab‘s blog: http://bit.ly/kKCNCR
- Local app producer PS Professionals is pretty smart drumming up some free publicity and a little revenue with @YinzerApp!
- RT @cloudfab: Sweet! CloudFab mentioned as a platform for collaborative creation – http://bit.ly/ktNX94 #brainpickings
- RT @Careerimp: Joey Chestnut can eat more hot dogs. What’s your career niche & how can it land your dream job? http://bit.ly/lbi6mf
- RT @shoefitr: June Feedback of the month: “Very important that I get the proper fit without having to try them on…” http://bit.ly/nelxZv
- RT @LeftRightStudio: Adding more cool features to Mogime…stay tuned! << Coolest product of a cool Burgh startup.
- RT @songwhale: Did you know that Songwhale’s 1st event was on 7/7/07? turn 4 today… might bust out an ice cream cake! <– Congrats!!!
- RT @snapretail: 1 Like on our page equals $1 to the Red Cross – Pls like our page and RT! Almost to 3,000! http://ow.ly/5yvf5
- RT @ConcertOH: Monroeville’s Concert-oh isn’t afraid of Facebook or Google http://t.co/vih7N0z via @PghBizTimes
- I talked about local startup Black Locus once already today, but did you see they got coverage on Read, Write, Web: http://rww.to/ntTvGy
- RT @DejanKovacevic: My Sunday feature on #Pirates #Steelers and #Pens using social media to reach fans, how that affects traditional media
- RT @songwhale: Our CEO Ty Morse explains why he opted to move to Lawrenceville in order to expand @songwhale –> http://bit.ly/n0wv0M
- Giant Eagle launches an iPhone App. http://cbsloc.al/q4qWJf
- RT @yinzcam: THIS. Enthusiastic +1. Thank you! RT @ah_b_normal: @BucsInsider You need @yinzcam here at PNC Park!! << BIG +1
Business
- Hey Enterprise IT Friends… CloudShare feels like a company with a good niche to me (cloud SaaS demos): http://tcrn.ch/osXj5h
- I find it interesting that Zynga, a company that a company that exists almost entirely within the still private Facebook, is going public.
Enterprise IT
- RT @Adaptivity: Our Inflection Point Series is diving in to Business Platform Transformation Strategies: http://ow.ly/5wYvc
- An article about how businesses can market on Google+? How about rule 1 for business: don’t use anything in beta. http://rww.to/mWvaCw
- RT @DavidLinthicum: ‘rogue’ cloud: http://bit.ly/n8t9Ue – Couldn’t agree more, ‘rogue’ cloud will be hugely disruptive (mostly) for good.
- RT @Adaptivity: Our CTO @jrhoughton is back on the topic on whether cloud helps/hurts innovation: http://ow.ly/5A0Zd
Local Politics
- More than a year after the last time it was useful, the city finally decides to tear down the arena. #PoliticsIsSLOW
Me
- I’m officially registered for the Pittsburgh Triathlon… will be my first one, anxious to see how I fare.
- I’m at Original Oyster House (20 Market Sq, Pittsburgh) http://4sq.com/q57rOz
Personal Technology
- Am I the only one that thinks being able to Skype someone within Facebook isn’t that big of deal? I mean, just ask them their Skype ID.
- NFC and other features in Google+, do you think Facebook can keep up if this becomes an engineering battle? http://rww.to/p8eFrq
Pittsburgh
- Delta to continue nonstop flights to Paris http://bit.ly/qIlech #pittsburgh
- Loosecubes (essentially airbnb for cubicles) is a great idea… You can even see Eve Picker’s Bruno Building Lofts: http://bit.ly/r6aMCK
- RT @CitizenRick: Not surprising the end of Pittsburgh’s cupcake era is happening at the height of funnel cake season http://bit.ly/oWVKoy #pgh
- Hey @southsidepgh there are two adorable kids running a fresh lemonade stand at the sw corner of 21 & Sarah… pass it on.
Social Media
- Creative little ploy to get hired using Twitter. http://bit.ly/ivREaJ
- Ha, The Google+ User with the most followers? Mark Zuckerberg of course. http://tcrn.ch/kS8Gsv
- In the wake of Obama’s Twitter Town Hall, @parislemon has some great perspective on how far Twitter has come: http://tcrn.ch/oCI7Ri
- RT @Techmeme: Facebook and Google+’s video chat tools compared http://cnet.co/qn7BFR << love to see real competition in social networking.
- Civilization for Facebook is a smart play… I had thought the same thing about SimCity. http://bit.ly/oGvpLr
Sports
- RT @cwpress: Hot off the press #pirates http://yfrog.com/kfti3gdj << Picking one up this afternoon!
- RT @Socctm3: haha leyva’s face in this is pricless http://t.co/K6KqfwB
- .@WHYGAVS On McCutchen’s Standing O: a “Pittsburgh can be a baseball town, critics be damned,” moment. http://ow.ly/5ALZj
Startups
- Standard Term Sheets are great for entrepreneurs and investors… but not as good for my brother (startup attorney). http://tcrn.ch/nbWjop
Tech News
- I have a hard time deciding whether Google’s diverse interest is bad (multi-front war) or good (diversification).
- Microsoft and Apple attempting to beat Android with patents smells of everything that’s wrong with SW patents. http://ow.ly/5AMmK
Unsolicited Advice
- Love @sethgodin‘s post about getting a “Workflow Audit”. Those of us in tech do this on a weekly basis. http://bit.ly/oXeZnu
- Prescription Drug Ad: “Pristiq is thought to work because…” Really? Thought To? That’s Reassuring.
- This book looks very interesting, I added it to my reading heap. http://bit.ly/njivIo
Blog Posts from this blog:
- Blog Post: The Pirates “Miraculous” Recovery, like most Enterprise IT moves is the result of years of careful work. http://bit.ly/mywla6
- Blog Post: This isn’t Google’s first shot at social (Wave? Buzz?), is this one more important? http://bit.ly/riUOoR
- Blog Post: Why this time Google’s Social motives are different. http://bit.ly/riUOoR
- Blog Post: I’m trying to engage with more Burgh Startups on Twitter, help me out… http://bit.ly/oKl1Un
- Blog Post: Apple crossed 15 Billion App Store Downloads, do you think they’ll make it to 30 Billion? http://bit.ly/qtskQH
