Interesting statistics on politics and Facebook membership here. About 9.4% of New Hampshire’s adults have Facebook accounts. That is a little above average but nothing like Washington DC with over 40%.
Facebook and Politics
January 2nd, 2008New Year’s Resolutions
January 1st, 2008I don’t make New Year’s resolutions. People never keep them anyway and I’m not that different from most people. I do set goals but they are not tied to the fact that there is a year change on the calendar.
January is typically the start of my annual self-evaluation phase though. For the last 14 years or so I have spent January and February evaluating my job and trying to decide if it is time to actively look for a new one, stay where I am at or just be open in case a new one pops up. This last year I decided to do the same thing during the summer as well. Twice a year seems like enough times to do serious soul searching, thinking and praying about ones career.
I start with an open mind. It helps that I start after a short vacation (I’ve been on vacation since the Friday before Christmas) so my mind is cleared of stress (well work related stress) and related activities. So I have no idea what I’ll decide. Though honestly I am far from unhappy with my present job or company.
I am trying to lose weight but that has been ongoing. I put on some weight over the summer and early fall. It has been tough losing it but it has to be done (doctor’s orders). Obviously I’m still working on that but you can’t call that a New Year’s resolution. As part of that I am trying to exercise more and get into better physical shape beyond just being thinner.
My third goal these days is to some up with more goals. I just don’t feel like I have enough on my plate to really make my life interesting. We’ll see how it goes.
Who are these people and why are they looking for me?
December 28th, 2007Several times a week someone comes to one or the other of my blogs after doing an search for my name (often with the word "blog") on a search engine. Some or Google, some on AOL Search and some on Live Search. They are doing it from all over the world. Today it was someone using Google.jp (Japan) but its also been from all over the world. Places as random as Brooklyn NY and Manila the Philippines. South Africa and Norway. North, south, east and west.
But why? Are they looking for someone else with a similar name? Perhaps. But the ones that include the name of the company I work for along with my name are, I am pretty sure, looking for me.
On one hand it is sort of flattering. On the other I just have to wonder "why?"
As Seen on TV
December 28th, 2007Mrs T picked up some little lights that stick up anywhere and run on batteries. I noticed that the packaging said "As Seen On TV." Wow now there is a reason to buy something.
OK I know perhaps someone is shopping for the same item they have seen on TV and this will tell them these are the same items. But if they meet the need do you really care that they are the same ones as on TV? Not unless you believe that somehow being advertised on TV makes them better. Generally it just makes things more expensive.
Or perhaps you are not deliberately shopping for this item but see them and the notation on the box reminds you that you thought they looked cool when you saw them. Here now a chance to buy them without making a telephone call and paying for shipping and handling. Such a deal! How can you ever pass this up?
I’ve seen other things advertised in magazines with the comment "as advertised on" followed by a list of impressive shows or networks. As if somehow the fact that the company has paid a lot of money for ad time on those shows that somehow the product gains some sort of imprimatur or extra credibility from the experience. Do people fall for that? I assume that some must or the companies would not do it.
What kind of people come up with these marketing ideas? How does their brain work? And how can I avoid it happening to me?
Merry Christmas and Happy Boxing Day
December 26th, 2007So Mrs T is out shopping with our son. Apparently they have already got him a suit for an amazing price. They are having fun. Shopping on one of the busiest shopping days of the year is not my idea of fun though so I am glad I got to stay home.
In theory I am cleaning up from Christmas. In practice I slept very late, fixed some leftovers and have gotten very little done. I hope to get some things done before they come home though. At the very least I will put away my Christmas presents and break up all the cardboard boxes for the recycle bin. But I get distracted.
One of the first gifts I moved out of the family room was a special "day light" light that is supposed to help with seasonable affective disorder. I don’t know that I have it for sure but I do know that I really crave the sunlight when I don’t get any for a while. I set up the light in my office which has no windows and there for no natural light. I like the way it feels so I decided to blog a bit for a while. It’s medical – that’s my story and I’m sticking with it.
I have a number of things that I have to put together. Why is it that I always get stuff like that? One or two I will try to do today but that garden wagon can wait I think. There is too much snow outside to use it anyway. So I will move it down to the cellar and put it together there one night when TV is boring. Given the writer’s strike there will probably be a lot of boring TV nights real soon.
Besides things that have to be put together I seem to get organization tools. This year I got some sort of box with 31 slots (one for each day of the month?) and some drawers. It’s nice but will it help? History suggests no but I’ll try. I think the only thing that would really get me organized is a professional assistant. Though to be fair Outlook has been a huge help and goes a long way towards keeping me on track and sane.
No clothing this year. Thank goodness. I have more clothing then I know what to do with already. A few gadgets though and those are always good. A handheld Sududo game which I expect to enjoy on some flights. And the best gift of all is a new Magellan GPS. That will get lots of use.
Well I have another week off now. This is the only time of the year when I take a vacation that doesn’t involve traveling somewhere and doing something. It sort of feels like a waste but I can really use the mental and physical down time. I hope you are all getting and enjoying some down time of your own.
I’m Not Laughing
December 18th, 2007This is ironic. That’s a lot of security holes to patch at one time. But I understand how hard getting security right in an OS. So I feel sort of bad. At the same time I’m glad I didn’t buy the hype they keep trying to sell me.
Lights
December 2nd, 2007So I’ve been looking for ways to save money and energy. One of the most obvious things to do about the house is to replace conventional bulbs with lower power bulbs. For the longest time I have been replacing conventional bulbs with compact florescent bulbs. There are two problems with this.
One is that they just don’t work very well in a fixture with a rheostat such as our ceiling fan. There are some bulbs that claim to work with them but the ones I have seen are too low in lighting power. I’ll keep looking though. Those are the big power eaters in our house.
The second problem is that they don’t work well outside in winter. They take a while to warm up and the light you get is not so hot (minor pun) until they do warm up. So I can’t use them every where.
A seasonal expense has long been lights on Christmas trees. Put several strings of 9 watt bulbs on a tree and you quickly get up to some serious wattage. Even the little bulbs require a lot of power. Ah but this year I think I have the answer – LED Christmas lights. Yes, both Wal-Mart and Home Depot (probably other places as well) are selling LED Christmas lights for both indoor and outdoor use. I figure I am using about 1200 fewer watts of lights this year. A savings on between 80-90%. And best of all I really like the way the lights look so I am not giving up anything.
The LED and compact florescent bulbs cost more to buy but they should last long enough that between using less power and lasting longer they should save money in the long run. If enough people buy them maybe the costs will come down as well.
What I really want to look into next is alternate energy. Perhaps solar to power the light bulbs? It could work couldn’t it?
Off the Wall Thoughts on Airport Security
November 28th, 2007If you go through security at an airport and need to be searched they have men search men and women search women. Well I’m straight so the idea of a man patting me down is yucky to me. Why can’t I request a woman do the search?
I think that the theory behind having men search men and women search women is that they don’t want to searcher to get all excited about searching the person. There are two problems with this. One is that there are these people called homosexuals so potentially there could be a male TSA who gets off searching men. And women who get off searching women. The other thing is that maybe what we want are people who enjoy doing a through search. I mean if we think the search is a good idea don’t we want someone who will do a good job rather than be thinking "how lightly and quickly can I touch and still find things?" Maybe we want someone who will find out if that is a gun in the pocket or are they just enjoying being frisked?
OK so some people are uncomfortable with people of the opposite sex touch them. Fine. Let people request what they want. If I will feel more comfortable having a woman who I can at least imagine is both attractive and enjoying touching me maybe I’ll be more cooperative. Clearly I’ll stand still longer. If you want someone of the same gender frisking you fine – equal opportunity for all.
And then these is thing thing about no electronics being on during takeoff and landing. Are airplane electronics systems really that delicate? If they are aren’t terrorists likely to put electronics in luggage and have it automatically turn on when the acceleration of takeoff starts? Has anyone searched through the wreckage of a plane crash and said "Look at this. A Bose headset turned on. I think we found the cause of this crash?"
And what are the number of crashes caused by portable electronic devices (I’m guessing none) compared to the number of crashes caused by Moslem extremists? And yet we still let Moslems on board planes. Of course banning all Moslems would be extreme and ridiculous. But is banning all electronics during take off and landing much different? During take off and landing is when I want my Quiet Comfort II headphones on the most. How about if I wrap them in aluminum foil?
One last thing. I have a peanut allergy and a lot of airlines still give out peanuts on flights. One of these days that is going to cause me serious problems. Not just from the reaction to the peanuts though that is a concern. What I am also worried about is what happens when I pull out my Epie Pen and jab a needle into my leg. Is some passenger going to freak out on me and get me into serious trouble?
I’m flying to Texas next week. I’ll behave and let the yucky male TSA frisk me if need be and I’ll leave my headset off until the all clear but none of that is going to make me feel any safer at all. If they want me to feel really safe they’ll let me bring a loaded gun and ban the peanuts from the plane. But that will never happen.
Disclaimer: This post is for entertainment value only. Not to be taken seriously. Except for the plea to ban peanuts on planes. And even that you can take with a grain of salt.
We Need Robot Restaurants
November 28th, 2007As I found yet another take-out order gone wrong this week I started thinking about the problem of fast food restaurants and take-out windows. Part of the problem is the people who work these windows. You need someone smart enough to get the order right but not so smart that they get bored and quit right away. It seems like a lot of places skimp on the “smart enough to get the order right” part when they hire people. You can check over here to know more about it.
So I was thinking that this is an area ripe for robots and computer controlled ordering. Voice recognition systems are getting better and seem like they might be as good as some people who work at these drive-through windows. The last time I was in a fast food restaurant where the people seemed really smart and spoke really good English I was in Norway. Lately in US places people seem to be having almost as much trouble understanding me as I do them.
Anyway. I could see a robot operation that took orders using either voice recognition or some sort of interactive display. The food could be cooked and assembled and presented to a person to hand through the window. I’m not sure we’re ready for a robot to hand out the food and collect the money yet. It might work with credit cards though.
I see two major problems. One is that we may need smarter customers to manage computer ordering. There is no way to make it completely idiot proof. There are some amazing idiots out there. The second is that there are already a shortage of jobs for the types of people who tend to take these jobs. High school students, mothers and seniors looking to fill time and pick up a few extra bucks, and people without more marketable skills. So that is a social issue.
We’d still need people to feed the equipment and handle screw ups. Hopefully there would be fewer screw ups in the preparation of the order but remember that a lot of people would be likely to mess up in what they order. But if you could get my with one or two people at times that now require three to five there would be some savings in payroll.
There is one other potential problem. Sometimes companies modify the product to fit production at the cost of quality of the product. I can’t see that being an issue at some fast food restaurants where quality is not so impressive as it is. Plus I think that a lot of semi-automation adjustment has already taken place. How much worse could it get?