Tag: Musings

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I suspect that I’ve been a canary in a coal mine.

Unfortunately I’m not alone.

I’d actually hoped that the emerging patterns in society were transient anomalies. I’d also hoped that I was seeing things that weren’t there, that I was crazy, that I simply misunderstood or misinterpreted the bits and pieces of information flowing past me.

Oops! Maybe I wasn’t.

For a long time I’ve been noticing things. Small little things about the way people were behaving, trends in social justice, and the way so many people appeared to not only be polarized, but also unwilling to have a discussion with anyone who held different opinions or beliefs. 

When I mentioned the things I’d noticed, my friends and family shut me down immediately. Usually they’d tell me that I was wrong and making a bigger thing out of something than it was. Eventually I stopped even trying to talk about what I’d notice and assumed that I was maybe too sensitive.

One of the first things I recall noticing was how differently Men were treated in sexual harassment situations. You could end a man’s career with only the accusation of Sexual Harassment.

Sitting in a sexual harassment training class in the ’90’s I innocently asked if the same rules appleid to women. The Female trainer treated me like I was insane and confidently told me that Women don’t sexually harass men.

When I explained that at barely 18, I’d had a female boss say, “Fuck me or you’re fired,” The sexual harassment trainer called me a trouble maker, a liar, and told me and the class no woman would ever do that.

She denied my actual lived experience, choosing to treat me like I was the aggressor instead of legitimately the victim by her own definition of victimhood. This kind of denial, that Men could be victims of sexual harassment, continues to this day.

For me it’s fascinating how utterly dismissive HR, Upper Management, and society at large are of this phenomenon. Women in my experience don’t sexually harass Men as often, but how would we really know?

Since men are dismissed as aggressors, troublemakers, or crybabies if and when they report it, are they likely to actually report it? Most men will simply think to themselves, “There’s no point in reporting it, that’s a waste of time. So I’ll just have to put up with it until I find a new job.”

Then they go out and find a new job. Over time, some men I suspect begin looking only at those positions where they will be working for other men. From my personal experience, I’ve had a lot more bad women bosses than bad men bosses.

At this point in my life, I’d rather work for a man. I don’t mean that to be misogynistic, it’s simply a statement of fact. Over 40 years of employment, the bad female bosses greatly outnumbered the male ones.

Zero Tolerance policies started showing up in schools, and businesses. These policies referred to sexual harassment in the beginning but rapidly expanded to include almost anything.

Does anyone remember the PopTart incident? Apparently a 5 or 6 year old cleverly chewed around a PopTart until it looked like a gun. The Horror!

The child was promptly removed form the snack area, remanded to the principals office and I recall his parents being called to the school. I don’t recall offhand if the police were also called. This was a direct result of contextless Zero Tolerance policies. He’s a child, it’s not likely he was going to hurt other children with a PopTart.

Policy is policy. Except when it isn’t.

When Zero Tolerance showed up in business, if you made someone uncomfortable or treated someone badly, or unintentionally slighted someone in some way. You’d have the HR department on your neck. Suddenly you couldn’t say someone was flat out wrong. You had to couch it in all kind of sweet language that served no purpose because you didn’t want someone taking you to HR for a reprimand. 

After seeing a couple of coworkers toasted because they spoke plainly and honestly, I chose to keep my mouth shut. I’d execute whatever harebrained bullshit plan the boss wanted, even if it ran the project right off a cliff. No-one was interested in what I might have to say, much less my experience. So I’d let ‘em learn for themselves.

I was ahead of the curve in “Quiet Quitting”.

There were exceptions. If a boss was approachable and open to real discussion then I’d happily provide whatever insight or concern I had about a particular project. Trouble was, a large majority of bosses were not interested.

I’ve been honestly amazed at how many times, bosses have had an entire department plow the same ground, stumble over the same rocks, and then blame the employees for the failure.

This confused me, then It occurred to me that most of these people had exactly the same degree, taught from the same books. Then it wasn’t a mystery anymore. What remained a mystery is that so few of them learned from the mistakes.

In retrospect, if you believe you are absolutely right and that the failure is due to incompetent employees, then I suppose introspection wouldn’t be the first thing on your mind.

I must admit, I admire that elitist mindset.

Zero tolerance policies are never enforced equally. There is more zero tolerance for a white Male, or White Female than for a person of color.

Apparently there are levels to Zero

Persons of color typically don’t have to measure up to the Zero Tolerance policy. There are myriad excuses for this, but the most frequent I’ve heard are, “Their Culture is different,” or “You, white person, just misunderstood.”

There was a lady I worked with who went to HR because a supervisor had actively fondled her breasts while they shared an Uber back to the company from an offsite meeting. She was white, blonde, and pretty. The women in HR told her she was over reacting and that she didn’t understand Latin culture.

This lady didn’t come to work after that, her latin husband came in the next day to deliver her resignation, and clean out her office.

It is fortunate that the supervisor who fondled this man’s wife was not on site. I suspect that had he been, we all would have been treated to a cultural lesson in how Latin men deal with such insults.

At the same company, a black woman who wore an excessive amount of very cheap perfume took her supervisor and two other co-workers who shared cubicles next to hers, to HR.

Her contention was that these people were harassing her by asking her to tone down the perfume and not reapply every hour during the day.

This lady could literally be followed through the building by her perfume. The coworkers adjacent to her cube were having full blown allergic reactions. Swelling eyes, throat constrictions, etc. HR after hearing both sides, told her coworkers to take Benadryl. The supervisor was reduced in rank and that was the end of it.

Until the letter from perfume lady’s lawyer arrived. Then the supervisor and her coworkers were fired for harassment. Perfume Lady went out on stress leave and rumor was, she’d been paid off handsomely on the harassment suit.

I learned working for that company, that Zero Tolerance only worked one way. White people had no right to a safe and comfortable working environment and that complaints, even legitimate ones were weighted by the color of a person’s skin.

I mentioned these things to some friends and family and was told that clearly I didn’t have the entire story and that I must be jumping to conclusions.

5 years later, we can see this philosophy, now called equity, permeates government, business, and education, across the nation.

Equity is not Equality.

Equity is a thumb firmly on the scale. Equality is everyone is treated the same regardless of their appearance or social status.

When the Vice President says that FEMA funding will be assigned based on equity and is not challenged. There’s a problem. The White House and FMEA walked back her statement because there was considerable blowback. But I look at this as a test. The day there isn’t substantial blowback is the day that this weird issue of “Equity” will be entrenched.

At that point, folks from the non equity favored groups will be on their own during a disaster and perhaps on a wider scale too. Imagine the fun that can be had with “Equity” taxation.

There may come a day when certain groups will have an additional tax percentage added or subtracted from their tax bill based solely on the color of their skin.

It sounds outlandish today, but I won’t be surprised if someone floats the idea.

When the canary in the coal mine passes out, the workers evacuate the mine.

When a human canary tweets and chirps about things, they’re called ignorant, racist, homophobic, transphobic, misogynistic, nazis. They’re cancelled if they’re in the public eye, they’re mistreated and / or fired if they’re working for a large corporation. Which is in effect being cancelled. These days with corporations demanding access to an employees social media even what is said to your friends can get you fired, regardless of the context in which something was said.

“Hey Jack do you want to go to the trans abortion parade?”
“No thanks Greg, that’s not something I’m interested in. I have plans to go surfing with some buddies anyway.”

UH OH!

The trans HR worker at your company decides that you’re a closet Transphobe and even though you’ve never said anything offensive to anyone at work, you’re a bad person.

The canceling may be subtle. For example an application to move to another department may be “lost” resulting in the offending employee not getting the opportunity.

A .5% raise may simply not happen due to “poor performance scores” Asking the supervisor what was wrong with performance usually results in “I’ll look into it,” but nothing is ever done and nothing is ever conclusive enough one way or another to take action.

After all that Supervisor is a busy person, meetings to go to and luncheons to attend with all the “Right” upper management and all…

An employee can wait it out hoping the HR person goes to another company, but they’ll never regain traction and will always be underpaid until they too move to another company.

This is probably why some people realize a 5 to 10K pay increase just by moving to another company.

Having seen this kind of thing with my own eyes has made me very selective about which companies I apply at. A big red flag is a HR person asking for my social media accounts prior to an interview.

I have no social media accounts. LinkedIn being an exception. (That account, I am so tempted to delete because it’s pointless to me.) I’ve actually had HR people tell me that I must have social media accounts and that I must share them with the company. They simply will not believe that I’m not sharing my life with complete strangers.

The most recent incident resulted in the HR person telling me that starting out with their company by lying wasn’t going to get me an interview. Since I wasn’t lying, when I said, “Okay. Goodbye.” The HR person lost their shit. “You’ll never work for us!” I paused hitting the disconnect button, “Frankly I wouldn’t want to work for a company that starts out calling me a liar. There can never be trust between us. I really don’t do social media and you can spend the rest of the week trying to find a social media account, aside from LinkedIn but you won’t find one because there aren’t any. Again, Goodbye.”

Honestly, I have 4 friends, and 3 family members. We know each other’s phone numbers. We text or call each other. The rest of the planet doesn’t need access to those conversations.

I have something like 50 former coworkers excluding friends and family in my circle on LinkedIn. Not one of them has contacted me about anything in the past 5 years. So really what’s the point?

It’s not just the HR people from companies. The Headhunters do it too. I know I’m not supposed to call them headhunters anymore but I’ve lost track of what their preferred fancy title is. They’re still doing the same thing, they’re trying to increase the head count at a company… Ergo they’re headhunters.

Again, here’s that canary thing.

More and more studies are suggesting that social media may lead to depression, anxiety, and in some cases suicidal ideation. Some of those studies indicate that much of the social media people post may in fact be fictitious to garner upvotes and feelings of external approval. This is interesting because it speaks to some profound insecurity. Why would I worry about approval coming from someone that I’ve never met and probably wouldn’t recognize on the street?

The only approval I want is that of people that I have a real relationship with.

Full disclosure, I did at one time have Facebook, Twitter, and Parler, accounts. Facebook was the first to be deleted, then Twitter, and finally Parler. Today, I’m better off, less angry, or depressed, than I was when I had these accounts.

You see, I fell into the trap of approval clicks. I was disheartened when I posted something and got few if any responses. On Twitter and Parler most of the responses I got were from extremists. With the Twitterati I was castigated for being too conservative and therefore a hate monger. With the Parlerites I was too liberal and Un-American.

I couldn’t win for losing, and so I took my ball and went home.

Even if I still had those social media accounts, simply having a Parler, Gab, or TruthSocial account would immediately exclude me from most HR department hiring pools. The thought would be, “He’s a MAGA Terrorist! We can’t hire someone like him!”

It wouldn’t matter if I’d never posted one single thing. Simply having those accounts would be enough to activate bias against me. My resume and qualifications would never end up on a hiring manager’s desk.

The thing is, if you don’t post “enough,” whatever that is, then you’ve just created an account to meet the HR requirements. That’s not enough, they want to “Get to know you” through your posts.

Canary Time again. Changing the meaning of common words is bad.

When I brought this up to some acquaintances they told me I was out of my mind. Uhh Nope!

In this context “Getting to know you,” Is another euphemism for “Getting to judge you”. That wouldn’t be so bad if they were judging a person on their work, but this is judging the person on their politics, opinions, and beliefs. Not on their ability to actually scrub the corporate toilets.

I’ve thought about just giving them the address to this blog. Who knows, after some of the people got done reading this blog they might realize that human beings may have differing opinions and that doesn’t mean they’re planning some nefarious crime.

Nah, the HR folks would quiver and quake, then have mental breakdowns from having to read. They’d all go out to their safe spaces or go out on stress leave.

When words have no meaning communication is impossible.

This is especially true if descriptors are involved. If Man and Woman aren’t defined, and pronouns are fluid then what exactly are you saying in legal documents? How about medicine?

Imagine being wheeled into an operating room, and just as you’re passing out from the anesthesia hearing the doctor commenting that your genitalia was completely incorrect for a circumcision but no worries, the doctor would fix it all so that the desired outcome was the right one.

How about losing your 20 million dollar inheritance because you now identify as Zer but the great aunt willed the money to her wonderful nephew William?

Legal documents are precisely written to describe exactly what, when, who, and how. If you no longer fit the definition what happens? If Wilimina walks into the attorneys office will ze get zer inheritance?

If a house is defined by its owner as a tent, then the owner calls a mover of tents to strike your tent and move it to another location can there be breach of contract?

This strange redefinition seen today could lead to Zero Racism though. If you said that everyone in America was colored then how could there be racism? Everyone has some color. The only way they couldn’t would be if they were completely transparent.

Murderers could redefine their act as a retroactive abortion. If they were to convince the court of this, would they only face charges of practicing medicine without a license?

Can a trans individual identifying as a birthing individual commit rape against another birthing individual? Or were they just scissoring rubbing one large everted clit against a smaller clit with an inverted passage?

Does the potential offspring from such an event have any legal standing or is the offspring null and void since the rape couldn’t have occurred in the first place?

Something like this might create a whole other set of problems because there are religions who view immaculate conception as a really big deal.

Words matter sometimes

But it seems only when a word may be leveraged for victimhood. The gold standard of this it the forbidden “N” word. This word must never be used in any context because it causes hurt.

It’s hate speech except when it’s not. A person of darker color may call another person of darker color the “N” word. Persons of darker color can use the “N” word in song lyrics broadcast on the airwaves but no-one else may use this word.

If a person of lighter color sings the lyrics of a song containing the forbidden “N” word they may be violating hate speech laws and subject to cancellation, fines, imprisonment, and payment of restitution.

To say Black Lives Matter is virtuous. To say All Lives Matter is racist. For a person of darker color to say White Lives Matter is heresy, that person of darker color is an “Uncle Tom,” a “Hateful bigot,” and should be cancelled immediately.

Saying something hateful like Blue Lives matter is completely Nazi-esq inciting violence and welcoming the police state.

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Yes, I’ve been a looter

I and several coworkers were in the San Jose Convention Center during the Loma Prieta Earthquake in 1989. We were presenters at a Technology convention.

Lomaprietaquake

After the quake we picked our way through the roof panels, broken machines, and shattered glass.

Once outside we quickly realized that everything was changed. The public transportation system wasn’t running. There was  small rubble in the roads, on the sidewalks, and some of the streets had cracked. In the distance we could hear sirens and see smoke. Later we learned the damage we picked our way through was nothing like the damage in San Francisco and Oakland but it was enough to make walking interesting.

We were all dressed in business attire. The ladies with me were in high heels and dresses. Standing there I realized that we were going to have to walk back to our hotel and connect with the rest of the folks from our company who were not at the convention center or who had left the center via different exits.

I explained my thought about getting back to the hotel to the ladies with me. After waiting a little while to see if there were others from our company wandering in the crowd, we set off on foot toward the hotel.

Picking our way through the loose rubble it became obvious that the ladies high heels were a problem. About a half mile from the convention center we came upon a shoe store. The windows were broken and there was no-one minding the shop. We entered the store and located sneakers in the proper sizes for the ladies. 

At this point we were technically looters. We’d entered a building without permission, we were actively “stealing”.

Both of the ladies left notes stating the SKU number, size, and description of the sneakers they were taking. Those notes also contained their names, and phone numbers, with a promise of payment. The ladies put in their notes, “Thank you!” We slipped the notes into the locked register drawer and left in peace.

Several hours later we arrived at the hotel to find chaos. The phones were down, the power was down, but the bar was open and the hotel was providing a free buffet of cold cut sandwiches. About an hour later, hotel maintenance was able to rig up a generator that powered the bar television and we got our first look at the damage in San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose. Later in the night power was restored to the hotel.

A day or two later, when the airports opened, our company flew us home.

Several weeks later, one of the ladies I was traveling with, got a call at her desk. It was the owner of the shoe store. My coworker called me and our other coworker over, then put the owner on her desk speaker phone. The store owner told both ladies that instead of asking for a check, he wanted to let them know he’d framed the notes and hung them behind the cash register. He’d done this because he couldn’t believe someone would do what we did and it gave him hope. 

We asked if the store had been looted further, he told us that the San Jose Police had locked the area down shortly after we’d been there so all of the local shop owners had suffered only minimal losses.

The lesson I learned is that taking something because you need it, and only taking what you need is very different from ransacking and cleaning out a place because you want a bunch of stuff.

According to the letter of the law we were looters. We could have been arrested and charged. We could have been shot and no-one would have thought anything about it.

Flash forward to this time in our history and I’d no more think of doing what we did than think I could fly. 

Fort myers comp

There’s something different in our country today. I can’t put my finger on it. It’s like there’s an overwhelming greed coupled with entitlement.

Now days looting is synonymous with stealing stupid stuff and stealing everything from a store. I guess looting has always been synonymous with these things. People don’t understand that just because something is “insured” doesn’t mean there’s no price.

I have a very different view of a mother stealing a can of baby formula or a loaf of bread and can of tuna, than I do people raiding a Best Buy. Yeah you stole a 65” flatscreen but it’s not going to do you any good with the power out. The mother on the other hand is obviously feeding her children.

So you cleaned out a Coach store and stole 50 handbags but what good are they?

I was thinking about these things in the wake of hurricane Ian. 

There are reports of looting in some areas of Florida. The problem is people looting a grocery store to feed hungry children are treated the same as the assholes who clean out a Best Buy. Someone taking one pair of sneakers is treated the same as someone taking 50 pairs.

These are not the same thing. In the moment though, police aren’t going to be able to differentiate the person who’s a criminal out of necessity and the asshole criminal who’s in it due to opportunity, and for greed.

I’d bet that most grocers would hand a mother a can of formula, a loaf of bread and can of tuna and not think about it. That’s serving the community. The grocer would probably be happy to pass out one or two items each, to folks who were orderly and asked nicely.

But when a mob of people breaks in after a disaster, taking entire cases of stuff for themselves with no intention to share, that’s morally wrong and speaks to a selfishness and greed that’s detrimental to the community.

For me personally I always thought there was shared moral code all Americans understood. An almost absolute definition of right and wrong. The past few years have made me question that belief.

I find myself asking what has happened to the country I grew up in. What happened to feeling like you could trust the intentions of others and take their stories at face value? When did we forget that lying is wrong?

I used to stop and help stranded motorists, I used to pick up hitchhikers, I used to buy meals for homeless people or folks that were down on their luck. Now I do none of that. It’s not because I don’t care, it’s because I can no longer tell if someone is really in need, or if someone is trying to play me.

When did we lose our way?

A more important question is, “Can we find our way back?”

I know that looting is going to become a problem in the coming days across Florida. I just hope that the police and everyone else is mindful that, some people are taking only what they need to survive or feed their children, and aren’t too quick to judge.

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One of those weird things that hits me from time to time.

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I was listening to the other half conversing with the dog.

It’s not weird, I do it myself.

The dog is a husky mix, so he talks back. 

In this particular situation, today the dog has been like a 2 year old. He’s bringing things in from the yard or from around the house to “Show” us. Some of these things have been absolute no no’s. A sock, a pair of underwear, a shoe, in these cases rather than taking the item aways from him because that makes him think we’re wanting to play “keep away” we’ll “Trade” something of greater value to him. Since everything revolves around his stomach, a healthy carrot or a dog vitamin will usually resolve the situation. These treats are only given, if he brings us the contested object and drops it at our feet.

The dog is then supposed to sit, and give us a paw.

This may sound like a royal pain in the behind, and sometimes it is. However this is much better for all of us than playing keep away with something that is expensive to replace or worse yet something that could potentially hurt him. For example, the dog didn’t know that pinecones have very sharp little spikes on them when he first came to live here. 

To him, it was an oddly shaped ball and he couldn’t figure out why we were trying to take it away from him. I believe that he thought it was a new game, until he really bit down on the pinecone and I spent the next 30 minutes pulling sharp things out of his mouth and gums.

He now approaches pinecones in a very cautious manner. Thankfully we didn’t have to go to the vet over that incident! Although toward the end both of us were bleeding, He from the scratches in his mouth, and me from the cuts on my hands from his very sharp teeth. 

To be fair, he chomped me reflexively, not out of anger or meanness. I totally understood and kept at it until he was safe. Afterward, he kept licking my hands, while looking at me with a very sad apologetic puppy face.

Call it a bonding moment. Now if he gets a splinter in a paw he’ll bring it to me to look at, and is generally pretty good about letting me pull it out of his paw. Unless it’s in a really sensitive spot and then my even trying to look at it results in my dog suddenly becoming as squirmy as a snake or octopus. I have no idea how he manages to make his bones disappear like that.

The last splinter in a sensitive spot, resulted in a visit to the vet, antibiotics, and the cone of shame for a week and a half.

IMG 2493

Speaking to his generally sweet disposition, the cone of shame annoyed him for the first day, then he found a way to turn wearing it into a game. He found a way to wedge the cone of shame into the stair railing and pull it off. This led to great fun when we tried to put it back on him without making it so tight it choked him but also making it tougher for him to slide over his head. (He was pissed for almost a day at me when he realized I’d tied it to his collar after him pulling the cone off several times a day.)

He could easily slip out of the collar, or the cone, but with the cone tie string through the collar he couldn’t pull the cone off without pulling the collar off too. He’s very attached to his collar and is very nervous if it’s removed even for a few minutes. I found him laying on the deck looking at his collar very forlornly as the cone and the collar lay next to him. I set things to right, and he stomped off to his room. (Seeing a dog stomp off in anger is pretty darn funny.)

He’d take our knees out with the dang thing, then use it as a noisemaker dragging it down the rails of the stairs, he also realized it worked as a megaphone and allowed his bark to be amplified, while at the same time it allowed him to hear dogs barking about things a mile or more away.

Today’s conversation with the dog started with the other half saying;

“No you’re not going to get another treat.“

The dog replied;

“Aww whoo whoo aww“

The other half responded;

“You brought me the ball, made me stop what I was doing and then only brought the ball back once. That is not deserving of a treat. You need to earn it.“

The dog replied;

“Aww awww whoo!” Then threw himself down on the floor effectively blocking access from the living room to the back of the house.

(Yes, the dog is spoiled! And a bit of a drama queen.)

I’m in the office looking for a job, snickering.

5 minutes go by and I hear the distinctive prance of the dog coming through the living room and down the hall to the office. A ball is dropped at my feet. The dog is looking at me expectantly. I pick the ball up. While walking toward the living room, my other half says, “He went out, got the ball, then pranced right past me with a fuck you look.”

IMG 2398

The dog and I go outside to play catch and fetch, our play includes me “Sneaking” up on him while he’s chewing on the ball semi protectively. I’ll tickle his tummy as a distraction then snatch the ball and toss it.

We play like this until his tongue is hanging out and he needs a drink.

I’ll often tell him, “Go get a drink,” he’ll go inside and get a drink, then we’ll keep playing when he comes back outside.

Today, he dropped the ball and walked inside for a drink on his own. I came back inside and the dog is sitting waiting for his cookie.

“Awww oooo,” he says watching me come inside.

I toss the cookie into the air, the dog snatches it and prances by the other half without a glance.

After we finished laughing, I said, “You know, we make more demands of him, than some parents make of their children.”

Thinking about it, now that the dog is snoozing in his favorite spot. That’s a true statement.

We tend to make him earn his treats with good behavior. He’s supposed to follow instructions, (We’re still working on that.) He’s good about letting us know something is wrong. He barks at anyone who comes to our door or the door of the neighbors house. (This door he can see from the deck and he’s often got a watchful eye toward these ladies home.) I think he barks to let their Chihuahua know something is up. The Chihuahua is an older lady and sometimes she doesn’t hear people coming up the walk to the house.

Luckily, the ladies living next door appreciate that he’s looking out for them. If the dog sees an unknown male he’s down at the fence giving them what for until the ladies tell him all is well.

Like our previous dogs, this one has different barks for different things, and the neighbors know if he’s barking about something, it’s likely to be something of concern.

The thing is, we’re very consistent about our expectations. We correct him when he’s misbehaving. We reward him for a job well done. We cuddle him when he’s scared, upset, or hurt, and let his personality develop as is right for him.

Apparently, as of today he has a cookie allowance. I’ll have to ask what the exchange rate is. 5 ball chases and returns for 1 cookie? I guess we’ll have to discuss that tonight.

As I was thinking about all of this, I wondered if we have higher standards for the dog than some people have of their children.

You never want a dog out of control. They can be very dangerous. Yet, children out of control can be a lot more dangerous. We tend to think of taking action to protect children but what about the inverse? Children have opposable thumbs and large brains. They’re more adept at problem solving than dogs. (There are times when I wonder about our dog on this. He’s fiendishly clever and can be sneaky as hell. All parents know if their children are too quiet they’re up to something. That rule applies to our dog.)

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I don’t have to worry about my dog stealing cars. Nor do I have to worry about him painting graffiti on the side of a building. (He does on occasion paint corners of buildings yellow, but it’s not likely to be a pseudo political statement. Although I haven’t seen him around a dog pound…)

Poorly behaved Children on the other hand, well, enough said.

Perhaps we should start treating children more like dogs.

Just a random train of thought…

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Hmm if you want an Apple Watch Ultra be ready to wait!

Apple fw22 watch ultra1

I want to see and hold one before I plunk down my cash. I’ll probably only get $50 for trading in my Series 5 anyway so there’s no rush.

I’ve been watching the delivery dates stretch out. Two weeks ago, if you ordered an Ultra you’d get it somewhere near the end of Sept or beginning of October. Now it’s all the way out to the first week of November.

Maybe I’ll wait to actually buy one until December. I’ll make it a Christmas Gift to myself. 

I would like to try one on, I can do that easily in a store without having to purchase one. Then I’ll make a decision and either get one or not.

I’m still ambivalent about getting another Apple Watch. The extended battery life of the Ultra seems to be the main driving point of every single article I’ve read. I suspect that is part of what’s pushing the delivery dates further out. The other parts are probably the supply chain and China continuing to lock huge swaths of their population down due to COVID.

Hey Apple, learned anything yet???

I have a sneaking suspicion that there are going to be a lot of returns/exchanges from early adopters. I’m betting that at least some of them will get their shiny new watch and decide it’s too big for their wrists. I wonder if that will work to folks who waited advantage.

Apple sells refurbished A.K.A. returned products at a discount and still provides the full warranty.

I’m ambivalent because there’s a part of me that really likes not having to think about a watch. I like knowing that as long as I’m wearing it, it’s going to automatically be wound and tell me the right time.

From a conspiracy theory perspective, having an Apple Watch is a liability. It’s connecting to the cellular network and the GPS location can easily be broadcast. With the FBI showing up at people’s homes, businesses, airports, and Hardees drive throughs to serve warrants, perhaps broadcasting our location at all times isn’t the best idea. Just a thought…

The same is true of a cell phone or even modern automobiles. My car routinely sends service data to it’s manufacturer, and GPS coordinates in the event of a crash.

There is a part of me that wonders about disabling the cellular modem built into the car. I sometimes wonder what that would entail.

I could still revert to a Thomas Guide.

Screen Shot 2022 09 19 at 1 17 10 PM

Yes, they still make maps.

With a reasonable compass and a map you can navigate as the ancients did 50 years ago. 40 years ago even an outdated Thomas Guide could get you into the general vicinity of a new housing development or urban area and you could bird dog it from there. I say that from experience!

For giggles on one of my old Thomas Guides I marked where I worked, which was in an area the map showed as farmland with the phrase, “Here there be monsters”.

I forgot about it until I loaned the guide to a friend who asked WTF??? He was coming to an interview one morning at the same company. We had a good laugh over lunch, he also got the job. I later found out that he’d shown the map to our boss during the interview. Our boss gifted me a new Thomas Guide for Christmas that year.

This was back in the dawn of time, when Bosses could be human, have a sense of humor, and appreciated hard work with merit raises, even if some of their employees were clowns.

I guess I long for the ancient world. 

Back then, we could do the math. We knew how far we had to go, how long we’d been driving and at what average speed. It was oddly accurate. Even on long trips, you’d pull over at a rest stop, take a leak, inspect your tires, and do a map check. The rest areas were clearly marked on the map so a little bit of math would allow you to find your location and you’d chart the next leg of your travels.

I personally found that on long trips, I’d drive from one fold of the map to the next, then flip the page, or refold the map to better show me the next leg of the journey. It was a simple system, and after all that’s how map lights got their name. When was the last time you actually turned on the map lights in your overhead console?

I find myself wondering if reverting to the “old ways” is such a bad idea.

Don’t get me wrong, I really appreciate the convenience of smart devices. I just wonder if I’ve become too dependent on the bright shiny digital readouts.

I have an appreciation for some of the “Old School” ways because there is beauty in simplicity and minimalism.

If I’m looking at a couple of months before I can simply walk into an Apple Store and try on one of their Ultras. This is probably a good thing.

I’ll be able to see how many bugs Apple let go by on the product and make a more informed choice.

FYI, in addition to the bugs being reported on the iPhone 14 hardware. There have also been a number of bugs reported in the new IOS. I stumbled upon one just yesterday.

This one is in the medications reminder portion of the Health app. It turns out that if, for example, you go wandering through the app and specifically tell it you’ve taken a medication a few minutes prior to the appointed time, and then respond to the notification, you’ll have entries in the medication log that look like you took the medication twice. I haven’t found a method to delete the erroneous log entry yet. I’ve also not been able to find a method to delete a medication entirely. 

After I stumbled upon the bug, I decided to go back to my tried and true method of using the reminder application with a daily reminder at a specific time. Sometimes I take my medications 15 to 20 minutes early. I’ll open Reminders and check the box and I’m done. Easy!

It looks like once you’ve used Medications in the health app, there isn’t a way to clear it. 

I’m certain that the Medications function was throughly tested using automated testing, but it appears that Apple didn’t bother to actually do real world user testing. If the user has already taken the medication, then don’t present the notification and for God’s sake don’t double log the medication entry.

I could see this creating an issue for people who are distracted while going about their morning routine then later trying to check if they’ve taken their meds. I’d bet that with some medications, there will be panicked calls to doctors asking about over doses and what to do.

The Medications app is not ready for prime time. I’d say avoid it for the time being

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Ya Know… I’m becoming increasingly uncomfortable with EVs

In principal I like Electric Vehicles.

From a user perspective, I don’t like the range issues, I don’t like the time to recharge, I question the reality of their “Green” status, and I especially don’t like the expense to purchase one.

Lately I’ve been noticing articles describing fires where the vehicle appears to spontaneously start burning.

If you’re old enough, you may remember that most car fires seen in the summertime were VWs. This was a simple maintenance issue. If you didn’t pay attention to the oil level in the engine, then tried to fly down an LA freeway in 100°F temps, the engine block could catch fire. Folks who had their VW bug catch fire would almost always have time to get out of the car, and the fire dept would put the fire out in just a few minutes. Any vehicle fire is a big deal, especially if it happens in an area prone to wildfires.

Tesla p90 d in flames 800x400

My concern is that the EV fires often can’t easily be extinguished. Once compromised, the batteries continue to expose more lithium to the atmosphere which feeds the fire. Even cooling down after the initial cells that burned are extinguished, the surrounding battery cells can continue to melt. Then the cycle repeats.

There are multiple videos of Teslas bursting into flames while parked. One consistent thing I noticed in those videos is what looks like a torch blowing several feet away from the vehicle. This torch in all the videos I’ve watched, show up on the driver’s side of the vehicle between the driver’s door and the wheel.

One video shows a Tesla beginning to burn in a parking garage parked next to an Audi. I’d imagine that the Tesla’s insurance carrier wasn’t thrilled about having to cover a Tesla and an Audi. Other videos are available that show a Tesla that had already burned, been extinguished, and towed to an impound or junkyard lot, spontaneously reigniting the next day.

There is a report of a Tesla catching fire, shorting out the electronics and refusing to unlock the doors. The driver was trapped inside the vehicle at the time. Fortunately, a passerby found a handy brick to shatter the window with.

All of these incidents are concerning. Thus far, they’re few in number.

My concern is the increasing number of people driving Teslas in my community. We’re a mountain town, we are surrounded by forest, with the drought in California, the trees and brush are very dry. A careless cigarette or spark can cause a blaze that spreads very rapidly.

What happens when a Tesla, a Jaguar, or any of the other EV vehicles on the road catch fire in a driveway or wooded neighborhood?

Granted the same concern exists for a standard gas car, motorcycle, dirt bike, or quad runner. However, in all those instances the fire department can throw water on the whole mess and that’s the end of it. With an electric vehicle, that’s not the case.

What happens if the electric vehicle catches fire again while it’s being towed out of the area? Now you’ve got a torch literally being driven through a forest. If there’s already a brush fire being fought where the EV originally caught fire, resources are committed to that location. Then you have the same vehicle cause another fire a mile or two away because it flared up again?

How are the insurance companies going to handle an event as described? Does the EV owner’s auto insurance cover an entire neighborhood being burned?

Is this why auto and homeowner policies are rising so fast? Some insurance companies are already refusing to write homeowner policies in California due to the increased brush fire hazard.

They did the same thing years ago with earthquake policies. Now everyone has a shitty earthquake policy administered by the State of California. I say shitty, because the maximum payout is far less than the payout I had when my insurance company sold earthquake insurance. The California max payout wouldn’t begin to cover repairs to my home. I’d lose my home, or be forced to remortgage or sell at a substantial loss, and the payout from the state wouldn’t make a downpayment on a new home. For all I know, California might find a way to take taxes out of the payout too.

Can a community legitimately prevent EVs from being used within hazardous fire zones?