AED Reliability
As any engineer can tell you, product reliability is a huge challenge. How exactly are you supposed to prove a device will last for 5 years, when it will be obsolete in 2? Consumers are a fickle lot; if their shiny new iPad works flawlessly, they will brag to a few friends. If the […]
Oldest Flight Attendant
If you are an average Joe like me boarding a United Airlines flight these days, you will have to wait in line behind the Premier Associate, Premier Silver, Premier Gold, Premier Platinum, Premier 1K, Global Services Elite and Infinite Elite. Some of these folks will have earned their status by flying a lot in […]
No More Britannica
Both of my parents were educators, and my Dad was, in today’s lingo, an early adopter. Our first TV was about the size of a washing machine, with a small, roundish black and white screen. I don’t remember many of the programs we watched, and in those days there weren’t many to remember. We also […]
Guns on Campus
Do the names Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold ring a bell? Depending on how you look at it, the state of Colorado either has a short memory, or is at the leading edge of the whole Constitutional Rights thing. It was April 20, 1999 when the aforementioned students went on a shooting rampage at Columbine […]
Turd Burgers
Spoiler Alert! If you are eating while reading this, or getting ready for a meal, I suggest you come back another time. At the latest count, there were 6,998,608,412 people on the planet. The United Nations estimates that around 850 million of them will go hungry each day. This presents a serious challenge for both […]
Energy Demand
I drive a 2008 Prius, not because I am on a personal campaign to save the planet, but because gas is $4 a gallon and there are other things I would rather spend my money on. I am always a bit amused when my friends in their all-electric Nissan Leaves (nobody in my neighborhood can […]
Watch What You Eat
The year 1984 came and went with very little fanfare, and only scant reference to George Orwell’s dystopian novel and its predictions of pervasive government surveillance. It certainly isn’t lack of technology that keeps us from realizing George’s vision of the future. Not only do we not trust each other, but we apparently don’t […]
Brown Raises California Taxes
Definition of a politician: A man who can make his wife feel sorry for the girl who left her panties in his glove compartment. Of course politics involves a lot more than just eliciting empathy; success also means appearing mainstream regardless of what stream you happen to be in. Unless you are a […]
Pink Slime Delicacy
Over the years, my family and I have hosted several Japanese exchange students during the summer months. Their first food request after they get off the plane is always the same – “American Hamburger”. Although McDonalds now spans the globe, a burger in Tokyo is just not as good as one in the […]
The Age of Anxiety
In an age where cave dwellers ate small animals and worried about being eaten by larger ones, anxiety was a good thing. “Fight or flight” has seen its day, and that occasional, sudden bolus of adrenaline has been replaced by a lower, 24/7 time-release dosage. “The Age of Anxiety” by W.H. Auden won […]
