An Immodest Proposal

I think we underestimate our own ability to be temporally near sighted.  We say things like, "The lesson of history is that we don't learn from history," but at our core, we don't believe it. If we did, we'd attempt to actually learn a bit of history.  May I recommend the History of Rome podcast.  Over a hundred episodes.  One thing you will learn is that there's not much new in regards to human government, human nature, and human gullibility.  Our advancing technology only quickens and amplifies our foolish, mobbish tendencies.

Be part of the solution, not the problem.  Read a book.  You can download Animal Farm for free from Gutenberg.

Podcasts: Brain Chow

I've owned several Bluetooth devices, but I've either lost them or found the larger of them unusable.  I came on a Plantronics model that isn't expensive and performs fairly well.  Mated with my incredibly awful Prism II T-Mobile phone and the excellent Pocketcasts application I gained access to a large set of interesting, entertaining, and informative podcasts.   There's so much good brain food audio available I find it hard to keep up with the available subscriptions.

Podcasts provide the "smart" in smartphone.

UNIX: Making Computers Easier To Use -- AT

WIMAX

Wimax. It's a dying technology, but this is quite a bit easier to use than the mobile phone tethering I've done in the past. And it becomes an instant hot spot as well as connect by usb. There's something to be said for focused, single use devices.

http://www.clear.com/devices/spots

SINS Tech 1974 - 1980 USN

When I was active Navy from 1974 to 1980, I became a SINS Tech. SINS stands for Ships Inertial Navigation System. This was, by far, the most interesting technical thing I've ever done. It is yet another reason why I consider not staying in the Navy the biggest mistake of my life. Kids, sometimes the hard times are the best times.

Carmen moves on

At the airport waiting for Daddy.
--
From the Sidekick

Half My Age - GE 7-4956B

Cleaning up around the house, I found this old orphan buried under stuff on my chest of drawers. I'm fairly certain I bought this old fellow some time when I was in the Navy. It is at least as old as my oldest daughter. I used it for years, but replaced it with a fancy new-fangled CD playing thing...a couple of them, actually. These newer devices were really quite "functional". Read "lots of buttons". When I'm sleepy before going to sleep and sleepy when I wake up are not times to make me hunt around for buttons or read their lables. As I was looking at this thing, I realized that it had a function that I had not purchased in these other radio alarm clocks--9 volt battery backup! I shook it a bit. Darn! Something was shaking around loose inside. Darn! Probably broken. I flipped it over and checked for screws. It has seven small, easily accessible phillips head screws. Joy! It was a penny rattling around inside. Probably something one of the girls dropped in it a decade or so ago. I cleaned out a ton of dust, much of which was stuck on the speaker, put it back together, and tested it. The radio and alarm functions still worked fine.

Thinking to myself, "Hmmm...I wonder if the cassette tape player/recorder still works? Ahh...who cares...wait! What if my cheap little cassette deck audio adapter would work?" Out to the truck...in it went. It hummed. YYYEEESSSSS!! I plugged in my newest little Digital Audio Player (Iriver T60 - 4 Gig) and out came WONDERFUL (Mono) sound!

"Arielle! Want a good radio alarm clock?"

I gave her the newer CD playing one. Which DOES NOT, by the way, have a way to hook up an MP3 player. Back to the future, again.

I'm listening to an old sermon right now. This is GROOVY!

The Hipster PDA

Keep
It
Simple,
Stupid

clipped from www.43folders.com Introducing the Hipster PDA Recently, I got sick of lugging my Palm V around, so I developed a vastly superior, greatly simplified device for capturing and sharing information. I call it “The Hipster PDA.” Beauty & Simplicity The Hipster PDA (Parietal Disgorgement Aid) is a fully extensible system for coordinating incoming and outgoing data for any aspect of your life and work. It scales brilliantly, degrades gracefully, supports optional categories and “beaming,” and is configurable to an unlimited number of options. Best of all, the Hipster PDA fits into your hip pocket and costs practically nothing to purchase and maintain. Let’s make one together. Building your first Hipster PDA get a bunch of 3"x5" file cards (here’s 500 for around 3 bucks) clip them together with a binder clip there is no step 3

Taken by Evie

Evie asked if she could take a picture with my phone. Serendipity!!

Warning: Here Come the Stuffed Shirts!!!

WOW! And I'm a Johnny come lately to the party:

Blogger Jeff Pulver quit the professional network in favor of Facebook and urged his friends to do the same. Here's why he's not looking back

Confessions of a LinkedIn Dropout

Professionals pushing 40 and older are joining the college crowd on the social
hub. Can CEO Zuckerberg's team give them reason to stick around?

Fogeys Flock to Facebook

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Evie At the Beach - 2005

Evie at the beach in 2005. Happy.

Long, Long Ago, in a Neighborhood Far, Far Away...

Ohhh, these were such cute little girls. But I think Micro-Susie is lecturing me on something about the car.

Life is Short (70 * 365.4)

This is SWEET. Like the Pink Floyd song Time on the Dark Side of the Moon album.

"We get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more. perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless."
- Paul Bowles (American Author)

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Coffee Table

Another view of the coffee table...no flash.

I Made Something

Here's my first halfway quality wood working project. I made it from the cheapest wood I could get. I wanted to avoid ruining good wood as I practice. This was a simple free plan I found somewhere on the internet. I have already thought of one huge improvement. You can't see it from the angle I took the picture from, but the end of the carriage bolts that fix the table legs onto the table are visible at each corner. Yech! AFTER I was done I found several other possible ways of having a similar strong adjustable attachment that would not be visible. I can get the simple, cheap hardware from Lowe's in the same place I was able to get the carriage bolts.

Retrospect is too late, but very educational.

Starting with Courier

Some folks consider me a technology early adopter. Perhaps I am, but not in regards to blogging. At any rate, I'm starting with Courier for my font. It reminds one of that ancient noble machine, the typewriter, and it allows for "ascii art" creations:

#        .
#    ,-_-|
#   ([o o])
#ooO--(_)--Ooo-
#