“I’ve always thought America stands for [rewarding success]. You finish high school. You work hard, go to college and you hope to succeed in life. I never knew it’s a class war—that those who succeed in life are the ones that have to bear all the burden. I never realized that. It will be a whole change in America that those who succeed and work hard, we’re gonna tax ‘em more than anyone else.”
– Democratic Mayor of Chicago, Richard Daley as quoted in the WSJ on Feb 2, 2010.
Right before the holidays, our old Sony camcorder died. It was about 7.5 years old and standard def so I didn’t mind replacing it with a Canon Vixia HF20 High Def camera. (I wasn’t planning on spending an extra $700 right before Christmas… but memories are priceless. Right?)
The camera has acquitted itself quite well and I’m really happy. Except…. (You knew there was an except coming, didn’t you?) Except… I’m not fully sold on flash memory & hard drives as a long term storage method. Tapes were cheap and, when stored properly, would last. Flash cards aren’t nearly as inexpensive as tapes. Which means I have to offload my video to a hard drive for storage. But hard drives fail (a lot). So, now I have to maintain multiple backups of my main drive for when it inevitably becomes corrupted or dies. To make matters more complex, what happens when the physical interface changes (again). SCSI anyone? Firewire? USB? Something new tomorrow? And disk formats change as operating systems evolve. What are the chances that when my daughter gets married in 20 years, I’ll be able to access the video of this Christmas? Am I going to have to keep an old computer system in storage to be able to access and view the video? Am I going to have to invest significant chunks of time every few years migrating the files to new systems and new codecs? Will AVCHD even be supported in 10 years?
Normally, I’m the first one to adopt the latest, greatest technology… so a Luddite I am not. But the old Apple IIe and OS9-based Twentieth Anniversary Mac in my closet make me painfully aware how rapidly technology changes. I’d just like to feel a little more comfortable that those priceless memories are going to be there for me in coming decades.
Last week I posted a fairly scathing review of Part One of The End of Time. Having just watched Part Two, I feel obligated to hand out props for a good episode and a great send off of David Tennant. There are a whole range of things I liked about this one… the verbal play between the Doctor and the Master, that Wilf (Bernard Cribbins) was the one who knocked four times, Timothy Dalton as Rassilon, the obvious nods to Star Wars and Star Trek, “Worst Rescue EVER!!!”. My favorite thing was Tennant’s last line though. Most regenerations are fairly peaceful, with the Doctor accepting his impending change, safe in the knowledge he would live on. But the 10th Doctor, he loved life, he loved being him and he didn’t want to go. That love of life is the essence of this show.
In fairness, this wasn’t the best Doctor Who episode. There were a lot of plot holes that I’m choosing to overlook. Like the Doctor sky diving without a parachute, crashing through a glass dome, smashing into the floor and not being dead. Or the fact that in earlier episodes he absorbed significant amounts of radiation only to expel it in his shoe… but here it killed him (slowly). Or the purpose of the Master’s super powers being to hold off Rassilon. Or how 6 billion Master’s weren’t all trying to be the one in charge. Or why Donna was there at all. Or how easily Rassilon reversed the Master’s “transplant” yet seemed to get stuck when he decided to kill the Doctor… at least long enough for the Master to tell the Doctor to get out of the way. Or… several others. But even so, the emotional impact of the episode made me willing to ignore the holes (for the most part).
I have to say, I am excited about the new Doctor. We only got to see 60 seconds of him on screen but it was enough to make me curious. And I’m really excited to see where Steven Moffat takes the series because his stories tend to be more internally consistent and plot driven than Davies’. Even so, I will miss David Tennant. It’s a shame he didn’t choose to stay on. Best of luck in Hollywood.
On Christmas Day in the UK, BBC broadcast part one of “The End of Time.” The second part will be shown on New Year’s day and it represents the last episode of David Tennant’s tenure as the lead in Doctor Who. It’s also the last episode written by Russell Davies, who was the driving force in resurrecting the show. I, living in the States, downloaded the show through the magic of the internet and watched it this evening with my wife. Here’s my question:
What the heck was that? (Caution… spoilers)
Loved Timothy Dalton as the Time Lord. Loved the scenes with Tennant and Cribbins. (Although, the conversation in the diner wouldn’t have made much sense if you didn’t know the back story. But I quibble.)
But what THE HECK was that?
A cult of women following a recipe in “Book of Saxon” try to resurrect the Master. Really? Ok, let’s say I buy it, which I didn’t. To make it work they needed his bio-imprint (which I assume was his DNA). Where did they get this sample? By wiping the lips of his ex-wife with a hanky. Seriously? How longs the guy been dead? A couple of years? And she hasn’t washed her face in all that time? And they extract it from her with a hanky. Really? Lipstick wasn’t going to cause any problems? Her own DNA wasn’t going to screw it up? (Ohh… John Simms with breasts.) It didn’t look like there was any real tech involved in the ceremony. They just dropped the hanky into a pot and poured in some liquids from a few vials. When did Doctor Who go all “Charmed”? How about an attempt at an explanation that would make me want to suspend my disbelief?
So, The Master, not actually resurrected but in spirit form in a magical column of light, decides to engage in a conversation with his ex-wife. (Huh?) And the ex-wife, expecting this entire sequence of events, throws a potion of her own at the Master in the light, blowing everything up. (WTF?) The Master, in turn, comes back as character out of the X-men – shooting lighting bolts out of his hands, eating anything alive (anything) and showing us his skeleton through his skin when he gets grumpy. Really? This is the best Davies could come up with?
Having completely left the realm of interesting sci-fi, done away with any shred of plausibility, what is Davies’ grand plan? He’s going to to have the Master borrow the “Gate of Immortality” from the latest idiot British PM and turn every human on the planet into an exact duplicate of himself. This has now entered the realm of sheer STUPIDITY. Actually, I should have guessed this was going to be ridiculous when Obama kept getting plugs as the savior of the global economy…
You could have kept the bit about the Ood, Cribbins and the Time Lords, deleted everything about the Master (an Obama) and had a decent intro to a good 90 minute show. I even liked the close up of Dalton’s spittle during his speech. I look forward to the obvious comparison of the Time Lords to the Daleks (anyone else think the room full of Time Lords on floating platforms looked a lot like the Daleks in their ships?)
Using past finales as a benchmark, I expected a great opening episode, a good second one and a lame ending. For example, Utopia/Sound of Drums were awesome. The resolution in Last of the Time Lords, ehh. Turn Left/Stolen Earth… great. Using the TARDIS to drag the Earth across space in Journey’s End… not so much. But this… this was just BAD. Here’s hoping part 2 is a major improvement. Otherwise, I wish Tennant’s Doctor had regenerated in Stolen Earth. This is an awful way to close out the run of one of the best Doctors.
OH MY GOD… WHAT WAS THAT????
For us, Christmas is typically insane. To begin with, both of our families are in different Philly suburbs (and we’re not). So we’d hike up I-95, a month after doing it for Thanksgiving, stay with one of our parents, rotating each year, and then basically live in the car. We’d drive to see other family, to see friends, to pick up the last minute items, etc, etc. Christmas day itself was always a ridiculous blur of relatives (the families live 45 minutes apart), food, small talk and presents. Then, we’d pack the car like it was move-in day at college and hike back down I-95, shipping back whatever we couldn’t fit. I’m tired just thinking about it.
Last year, we decided we had had enough. We wanted our kids to have Christmas morning in their own house… to come down their stairs to find presents under their tree. So, we stayed home and did the same this year. Yeah, it still feels a little odd not rushing from place to place. And it is strange not seeing our parents and siblings. But….
The kids woke us around 8am. We opened Santa’s presents, had a snack, played with Santa’s presents and had breakfast. Then we opened all the presents that family had shipped to us and spent the day exploring the new games and toys. We probably had lunch at some point and around four I finally made the kids get out of their pajamas. Kathy cooked a fantastic turkey dinner with stuffing and sweet potatoes, which we ate in the dining room, on the good china (which impressed the kids to no end) and they loved driving sparkling cider out of the grown up glasses. Of course, we called our relatives throughout the day and I’ll send them a DVD of the kids opening their presents. But it was just so much fun for all of us… and dare I say…. relaxing?
Next year, there will be quite a bit of pressure to go north for the new baby’s first Christmas. Doing so would force us go up in 2011 as well so that both sets of grandparents get their turn to host Christmas morning. Personally, I think we should stand our ground and make this our Christmas tradition. It was fantastic!
I don’t usually let work bleed into my personal blog… but this is kind of entertaining. We’ve just launched a new version of IBM Sametime (of which I am the Senior Offering Manager) and I’ve done a series of video demos highlighting new functionality. The first was just posted to Youtube. Enjoy!
Work is insane (crunch time for a new product launch is like that). Kathy’s 7 months pregnant and becoming less mobile by the day. The leaves need raking, Christmas decorations have to be put up, the kids want to play, next year’s household budget needs to be set…
So, let’s talk about something fun, like K-9. With physical construction largely complete, he basically sits under the baby grand piano in our living room, peeking out. Progress has stalled due to my own lack of knowledge. Specifically, I wasn’t sure what kind of motors I would need to make him move. Asking around, I received recommendations for wheel chair and windshield washer motors. But they are heavy (7-10 lbs each) and expensive ($150 per). At the other end of the spectrum, the guys at the local hobby shop swore by these little $10 motors that didn’t look like they could lift much more than a toothpick. To make matters more challenging, the various web sites and stores I visited didn’t use comparable specs to describe their products. “Great for large robots” isn’t helpful. What’s large?
Eventually, I stumbled on the RD02 12-Volt Drive Kit from Devantech at the RobotShop. It looked about right, including motors, 4 inch wheels, motor controller and mounting brackets. The description was clear – “Perfect for robot platforms from 5 to 10Kg”. (To Americans, like me, that’s 11-22 pounds and plenty powerful for my needs.) A little casting about on the internet showed it would work with the Arduino I already had. It looked right. But at $230, it wasn’t cheap and I didn’t want to get stuck with the wrong thing.
Then two weeks ago, during a particularly boring monthly operations call at work, I was Sametime-ing (instant messaging) with our global sales leader. He happens to be a big radio controlled car enthusiast and knows an awful lot about just this topic. I sent him to this blog, we discussed a couple of options and he agreed that the RD02 would be the best path forward. The simplicity of having all the components pre-configured and pre-tested would be worth any savings I’d get from buying individual components or visiting the local junk yard. With his blessing, I placed the order and it should arrive this week. I can’t wait!
Last night, I drove up I-95 from North Carolina to Philadelphia. I wanted to offer a few tips to the many holiday drivers on the road.
First, the LEFT lane is for passing. That means it’s for people moving FASTER than the general flow of traffic. If you are moving SLOWER than than everyone else, MOVE TO THE RIGHT LANE!!! How do you know if you are moving slower than traffic? For one, there’s a long line of cars piled up behind you with extensive open space in front. Another hint… multiple cars have passed you on the right and pulled in front of you. Flashing lights, honking horns and people yelling at you as they pass would be other good signs.
Two, safe driving does not dictate that you keep 15-20 car lengths of open space between you and the car in front of you. And it certainly doesn’t mean you should come to a complete stop with 5 car lengths open. Why? Because it’s dangerous. No one reasonable person can anticipate you’re going to leave that much open space. You’re going to cause an accident. PULL UP!!!
Third, and this one is for Delaware Department of Transportation, why are you doing construction on the Tuesday night before Thanksgiving? The two lanes of I-95 North you closed caused backups into Maryland. It took an hour and a half – 90 minutes – to drive through your state. Did someone not get the email that this is the busiest travel time of the year? And that more of us would be driving because of the disaster air travel has become?
Driving would be a lot easier if people were aware of what was going on around them and our illustrious bureaucrats used a little common sense.
I’ve been watching Stargate Universe since it “launched”… and I still don’t have a good feel for it yet. I was really worried that it had already fallen into a pattern after the first few episodes. In one, the ship brought them to a desert planet where the substance they needed to fix the ship was a major trek from the gate. In another, the ship brought them to an ice planet where the drinkable water they needed was a major trek from the gate. If that was the plan for the next couple of years, I’d pass. But they’ve pulled back from the brink.
What I like.
What I don’t like.
So far, the best I can say is that this has potential. It’s certainly better than Sanctuary. But, its not good enough for me to get really excited yet. Here’s hoping.
For anyone who has had young children in the last decade, you are likely familiar with “Dora the Explorer.” According to wikipedia:
“In every episode, Dora goes on an exploring trip to find something or help somebody. Dora always asks the viewers at home to help her find new ways to get to the places with the help of Map.”
It’s been parodied on Saturday Night Live because Dora doesn’t so much “ask for help” as narrate her every thought and order the audience to stand up or clap or whatever. But Dora’s dictatorial nature isn’t the point to this post. Its the constant narration.
This weekend, my daughter was helping me rake the leaves. To make it fun we had a contest to see who could make the biggest leaf pile. At first, I thought she was trash talking (which was funny from a 6 year old). But then it hit me. She wasn’t trash talking… she was narrating every step before she did it. Just like Dora.
I wonder if the Dora format, which has been copied by many other programs and is intended to make the show more interactive, has actually conditioned our kids to think (and talk) in that way. And, if so, is that a bad thing? Or does it just drive me nuts?
