Long Shrift

Quinnapalooza

It's hard to believe that the boy has just turned three. Time surely does go by quickly.

There's a pattern of bad weather on his birthday - not that harsh weather is unusual in Wisconsin in late January, of course. But there was a blizzard the day he was born, a heavy snowfall last year, and yesterday, temperatures below zero on the day of his birthday party. I had to explain what a negative number was; I'm not sure if invoking Babylonian history helped to illustrate my point, but I couldn't figure out an analogy that involved -6 cookies.

Quinn continues to be fascinated by music. The guitar he got for Xmas still holds appeal, and a month is a long time for a toddler. For his birthday he also got a guitar stand, which is something I'd heartily recommend. Obviously, it dramatically reduces scratching on both the guitar and the wall. More importantly... leaning a guitar against the wall is dangerous. If you've ever been walking through a darkened living room and had a guitar shift and slide down the wall, you'll understand.

He's also developed a sudden affinity for trains. We have one Thomas the Train DVD: the plot is disjointed, the musical score is jarring, and it has a distinctly foreign feel - so it's kinda like Barbarella, but not with the cute Fonda. He got a few more Thomas-themed gifts, which is fine, and they serve to remind us that things could have been much, much worse.

After everyone left yesterday, the boy finally wound down and was on the verge of falling asleep on the sofa. He was obviously in need of a nap, but we figured he needed a potty break first. He actually fell asleep while sitting on the toilet, which I'm fairly confident is a trait from his mother's side. Even then - kneeling on the bathroom floor, a sleepy toddler in mid-pee leaning against my shoulder - I am reminded how lucky we are to have the little guy around.

TO BREW COFFEE

The coffee makers around the office seemed just fine to me, but for some reason they had to be replaced. The old ones were pretty simple: put filter in basket, dump in contents of pre-measured packets, put basket back in, push button to start the water flowing. The new ones are slightly more complicated, as evidenced by the directions posted on the company Intranet:

TO BREW COFFEE ¹

THE COFFEE CARAFE MUST BE 100% EMPTY ²

• OPEN TOP OF CARAFE BY DEPRESSING ³ BUTTONS ON EACH SIDE
• LIFT LID
• REMOVE INNER FLOW TUBE ⁴
• PLACE OPEN CARAFE IN A SIDEWAYS POSITION ⁵ UNDER THE BREWER. MAKE SURE THE CARAFE IS CENTERED UNDER THE DRIP SPOUT
• PUT FILTER AND COFFEE IN BREWER BASKET ⁶
• PRESS GREEN BREW BUTTON ONCE
• YOU MUST WAIT UNTIL THE ENTIRE BREW PROCESS IS COMPLETE ⁷
• WHEN BREW IS COMPLETE REMOVE AND DISCARD USED GROUNDS AND FILTER, SET BREW BASKET ON TOP OF BREWER ⁸
• REINSERT INNER FLOW TUBE IN THE CARAFE ⁹
• CLOSE LID OF CARAFE, BE SURE IT “SNAPS” SHUT
• REPLACE CARAFE UNDER COFFEE BREWER IN FORWARD POSITION
• PLACE CUP UNDER NOZZLE AND PUMP THE SILVER HANDLE ON TOP TO DISPENSE COFFEE ¹⁰
• ENJOY! ¹¹

We had problems with people making coffee beforehand; now that you need to be a certified barista to operate this complex machinery, I expect that the coffee shop on the ground floor of our building is going to be doing a very good business.

Other notes and snide commentary:

1. It is helpful to shout the directions out as you go along.
2. You can't get much emptier than 100%.
3. It's not your fault. I know you would have designed happier buttons.
4. If you find the outer tube somewhere, discard it immediately.
5. That is, take a road trip to escape commitment and bitch about merlot.
6. In that order.
7. Do not leave until you have fully discharged your duty.
8. But take note that the Brewer may not appreciate this, and consider the potential for 'roid rage'.
9. Next to the Eustachian tube.
10. With the old coffee maker, you would put the coffee cup down and push a lever to dispense the coffee. Now this is a two-handed operation, as you must hold the coffee cup under the spout while pumping the handle. This is going to be entertaining.
11. You have certainly earned it.

I work in technology, where situations like this - a satisfactory and long-standing solution is replaced by something more complex, with no apparent justification - are not unfamiliar. Our company provides good coffee free of charge, so this will be grudgingly accepted; snarky comments are the first stage in the process.

enter the dongle

Today, Steve Jobs unveiled the new MacBook Air. It's thin, light, and... I can't imagine why anyone would want one.

My first thought was of the old Sony ultraportable that we tossed out the other day. The Sony laptop was about the size of two paperbacks laid end to end - unless you wanted something wacky like a CD drive. For that, you'd have to hook up an external drive, which came with a proprietary adapter - often referred to as a 'dongle' - that was easily misplaced. Then there was the power adapter. So you'd start out with something that could fit on, say, the pull-out tray of an airplane seat, but you'd end up with something that weighed as much as a conventional laptop, and spilled out over the tray like a wheezing octopus.

Unless you had abnormally thin fingers, you'd need to hook up a full-size keyboard. And if you wanted to see what you were typing, you'd need a full-size monitor. All the power of a graphing calculator with the simplicity of a slide rule.

Then I got to thinking about dongles.

Most of the time, when people are talking about dongles, they've probably been looking at images on Google with SafeSearch turned off. The second most popular use of the term is to describe adapters that connect a peripheral device to a computer, which you'd use to connect, say, an optical drive to the MacBook Err - um, Air.

But the first time I heard the term, a dongle was a copyright protection device. In a previous life, I worked for a start-up that was going to produce software that would - well, it wasn't going to change the world, unless actuarial tables were somehow going to help humans reach the next stage of evolution. Anyway, when you start thinking about how to price a piece of software, the conversation naturally turns to the realization that people might simply steal the software.

Enter the dongle. Basically, a dongle attaches to a port on the back of a user's computer. The software will periodically check for the presence of the dongle, and if it isn't there, the software stops. Software can be cracked or copied, but the dongle would prevent roving bands of actuaries from pirating our software.

That particular project was never finished, for reasons that would sound familiar to anyone who has worked for a startup. The owner would see some new feature and insist that it be incorporated into the software, regardless of cost and the disruption of the development timeline. My boss was charismatic, his belief was infectious, and his vision was seriously skewed. With taffy-like slowness, I put down the Kool-Aid and made my exit.

I realize now that had we actually gotten the software done, a dongle would have been perfectly apt. It didn't take long before people figured out how to defeat the dongles of the day, and a flawed protection scheme would have been appropriate for the flawed product. For me, dongles have come to symbolize wasted effort, futility and empty promises.

I understand that there are still programs out there that use dongles... if they aren't stolen, anyway.

the decomposition

I approached the produce guy carefully. He was putting broccoli on the shelf, but he seemed to tense as I pushed my shopping cart toward him. He sensed my presence but he wasn't going to acknowledge it until absolutely necessary.

Years ago, I too worked in a grocery store. Maybe that's what literally drove me to this encounter - a feeling of solidarity, of some kind of karmic payback for the nice customers I so rarely encountered. Or maybe I was tired of being the person who, upon seeing an injustice, would just avert his eyes and move on.

"Excuse me," I said.

"Yes?" His half-lidded expression spoke of years of inane questions. He was already calculating how he could conserve his precious and meager supply of customer service for a question worthy of his time.

"I was just down by the gala apples - "

"You mean the gala apples?" He pronounced it 'gal-ah', in sharp contrast to my 'gay-lah'.

"OK, sure. Well, one of the apples has rotted, and I thought you might want to take it off the table."

His face fell and he walked away.

Quinn looked up at me. "What that man is doing?"

"He's cursing my existence. Let's go find you some cantaloupe."

resolved, new resolution joke needed

Made a passing remark that my new year's resolution will be 1440 x 900. Maybe even 1920 x 1200.

Even in front of my geek peers, this joke fell flat.

hummer haters

A few years ago, I went to a car show with my brother. I don't remember exactly why - it's not like I come from a family of car guys. Anyway, the only car that I remember was a well-worn Land Rover, complete with a small decal in the rear window: "Official Humvee Rescue Vehicle," similar to the one pictured here.

I understand that Humvees have served the military well, and when I saw my first privately owned one on the road, it stirred some vestigial urge deep in my gut, somewhere east of my large intestine. Then I heard stories about how uncomfortable they were, and how much gas they guzzle. As much as I appreciate that the tires can be partially deflated for better traction in wet conditions, I figured my days of running moonshine through the Everglades were long gone.

While I haven't pinned down my feelings on Hummers, there's no shortage of people who hate them. I can sort of understand why people hate the H2 in particular...

Hulking black Hummer
Purchased in rank atonement
small peckered driver

... but I have to point out that extending your middle fingers in front of an unoccupied H2 seems like an impotent gesture in its own right. However, if you own a Land Rover or a Jeep, then you are at least better positioned than others to make fun of the Hummer.

The Hummer folks are trying to make their product a little more appealing by playing up its attributes, although it appears the only thing they have to show for it is a small group encouraging people with Hummers to become Red Cross volunteers. I think this is a great idea: if you suddenly need to evacuate the city, it's good to know that these beasts are going the other way instead of blocking traffic.

And while stock Hummers aren't exactly known for being fuel efficient, there's nothing stopping you from making a few tweaks to improve their mileage... well, except a few thousand dollars. If you can't afford a Hummer, though, you can at least smell like one.

There's a demographic that wants to drive big things, and the Hummer folks are just feeding that demand. Of course, they're also helping to create that demand. But those people are going to buy a big thing, be it a Hummer or an Escalade or something else. Personally, I'm not sure why anyone would want to own a Hummer, considering how many people would snicker at you as you drove by.