P.S. A Column On Things

Start of Apr. 28 Column. More or Less Continuous News Service since 1998

This and That

Computer Chronicles Time
Richard Dalton Co-Wrote Most Of My Reviews
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Speaking Tips
When I discussed public speaking recently, I said a better man would offer tips. Turns out I am a better man.)
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Old Thing
If television and movies are to be believed, British upper-class adults referred to each other as “old thing,” most recently in the television series Lucan, about the 1974 disappearance of the eponymous lord.

What Will They Think Of Us in 2125? 2525? Part 2

The growth of human knowledge allows us to laugh at our progenitors. Here are some things we laugh at in retrospect.

In medicine, for example, the ancient Greek theory of humors, which led to the use of leeches and bleeding, is probably what killed George Washington and many millions of others.

Unpasteurized milk: not such a good idea. Doctors who did their gardening, then walked directly into the operating room unwashed to perform an operation: yuck.

And then there is uncooled food. Yes, I realize refrigerators were impossible, but iceboxes could’ve been built centuries ago in northern climes – if they knew they should do it and smart enough to collect and preserve winter ice for use in the summer. Yes you can do that without technology. Look it up.

Some species live and learn; others just live. Natural selection can operate among humans. People who die from guns they own, cars they operate, or vaccinations they refuse to get, will help improve the genetic pool for the rest of us. I would point you at some examples, but the Darwin awards are no longer given. No official announcement of their death, but it’s been three years since anything was posted on the website. It’s time for someone to call out the time of death.

You Don’t Need A Weatherman... except

As Nobel Prize winner Bob Dylan once wrote, “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows...” except you need one if the evening news (broadcast live) is to last precisely 28:30, and wishes to follow the show-biz adage, “Leave ‘em laughing.” Or, if you’re a serious program like The Computer Chronicles, you need a light segment at the end. I was the Computer Chronicles’ weatherman. Not for precision time, but for the gentle smile.

(continued here)

Promises To Myself I Kept

• When I was booted out of CMP after 20 years, I: vowed never to learn a new technology again. I use WhatsAp and messaging because they are the only way to reach my children. No social media, now or ever. If old friends want to find me, I am all over the Internet like cheap on a suit, even if they don’t know my middle initial. If they look at the pictures then can tell I am not the lawyer, the, priest or the gay newspaper editor (who graduated from MIT a decade behind me). I hope to die before I am forced into Windows 11. Promise Kept.
• Around the time Dad told me he’d break my legs if I ever went into manual labor, I vowed to only perform clean, indoor, air-conditioned work that did not get my fingernails dirty. Promise Kept.
• In 1969, my last year as a JV tackle on the Benson High School team (yes, Lloyd Grimsrud, I still remember you clocking when a pulling tackle tempted me into the backfield) I made a promise. To make a long story short, after three years of being told not to drink during practice or games because it caused side stitches, I stood on the muddy field (fertilized with dung), shook my fist in the air, and imitated Gone With The Wind. “As God is my witness I will never be thirsty again.” I drink so much water now that friends, family and total strangers have commented on it for half a century. Promise Kept.

Meme O The Week: Resume

Equality

If this were a government site, this item would be instantly deleted for use of the word equal. Maybe my whole column. Maybe my whole life on line. Maybe my social security checks. You get the idea.

While at MIT, I didn’t recognize the origin of the frequently used phrase “All things being equal, which, of course they never are.”

“All things being equal, the simplest solution tends to be the best one.”
--William of Occam

End of April 28 Column (No. 978)

Start of Apr. 21 Column. More or Less Continuous News Service since 1998

This and That

 The Greatest Editing Decision of All Time

—Gene Weingarten
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Great Advice
the great Nicky Mee passes on some great life advice.
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Clothing Tags
You already know the arrow on your gas gauge points to the side your fuel door is on. But did you know that the garment care tag on clothing is always on the left as you face forward?
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Me and Willie Nelson
Willie Nelson’s book, Energy Follows Thought,  proves we are brothers from another mother. Things I say too: no idea where songs come from. Some old songs are postcards from the past. Lyrics come first. He worries each song will be his last. He’s in his 90’s and still writing. I should be so lucky.

Musical Change

First, the big news. My first song, Holding My Heart, while heartfelt and set to a nice melody (thank you Welsh Wonder) shifted back and forth between second person (you) and third person (she) because of my inexperience. A few weeks ago, I decided to fix it. The Welsh Wonder re-recorded six words and didn’t charge me for it, so there is a new Holding My Heart, with a change that I, alone, will notice.

Which got me to thinking. In the first century and a half of recorded music, or for that matter, large-circulation newsprint, any stupid error you made was chiseled in stone forever. Now that physical music (CDs) and printed paper are (mostly) gone, professionals in both fields have an unprecedented opportunity: fix the error so it is as if it were never made.

Every newspaper editor and every musician who worked before the 21^st century must be so jealous. Scrupulous and ethical journalists notate such edits. I, on the other hand, make stealth corrections suggested by my handful of Sunday night readers (mostly MIT grads) before the hordes (if 100 can be considered a horde) arrive on Monday. Musicians who only heard the clinker (missed note) after the record/CD shipped,  once had to live with it forever.  Now, five minutes of digital editing insures no one will ever know.

Knock-On Effects

I am sure the AI which was used to calculate the “Bring American Industry Home” tariffs carefully accounted for knock-on effects.

I am not a winemaker, but I do sit in on a weekly Zoom Call with several of them. I got schooled in the fact that punishing tariffs intended (maybe) to protect the declining American wine industry will likely have the opposite effect.

Liquor delivery trucks don’t go out until they are full. Dramatically decreased imports means it takes longer to fill the trucks that take American wine to retailers. Wineries get paid erratically and later. Which is bad for cash flow. Boxed wine, yes. That great Zin from a small winery? No.

Does anyone care? Yes, absolutely. As much as they care about Social Security (a Ponzi scheme) and the National Park Service (stay open despite the fact that no one works there anymore). A little pain now for a lot of gain later, prescribed by people who will feel no pain because they have multi-billion dollar nest eggs to support them.

What Will They Think Of Us in 2125? 2525? Part 1

A century or more from now people will look back and laugh at us.

It is not an original idea with me, but it certainly seems likely that when people in the future look back, they will think the stupidest thing we did in the 20th and 21st century was to allow frail human beings to drive two-ton cars at 70 mph.

Other things that will be looked at in wonder will include twice electing a man bent on destroying America.  Allowing guns in the hands of felons, or in the homes of children or depressives. A century from now, I doubt we’ll be losing 200,000 people a year to guns and 42,000 people a year to car accidents. If only I could live to see that, if only I am not shot, killed in a car accident, or hit by a meteor.

That got me thinking of the frightening things we did in the past. What they have in common with cars and guns is that they were best practices at the time.

MIT Grad Gets A Job Offer

Interviewer:  So what did you have in mind for a starting salary?

Grad: I was thinking $150,000, depending on the benefits.

Interviewer: How about 5 weeks vacation, 14 holidays, 50% match to your retirement plan ... and a company car of your choosing.

Grad: You've got to be kidding!

Interviewer: Yes. But you started it!

Meme O’ The Week: The Last Supper

Just too late for Easter.