Took place right after I pickup Colin (Diane’s son) from school.
Colin: Michael, I can build a roller coaster in real life because I made one in a computer.
Me: Is that so?
Colin: Yes. I even know all the magnetism it would take.
Me: Roller coasters don’t run on magnets.
Colin: I figured not, but I’m trying to use smart words like you would in roller coasting.
I had an itch so I read Orwell’s Animal Farm this weekend. I’d always heard how important this piece was in communicating the experience of living in a Communist society – especially one which was transitioning between leaders. However I haven’t had time to read much in the last few years. It was a good way to fill a lazy Sunday morning.
What shocked me was how many events in the book would serve as a dead ringer for our current two-party government. This is not to say I’m classifying our government as a Communist system, but see how many of the following you recognize.
The last bullet is the one which truly separates Communism from Capitalism. In Animal Farm, we follow the story as the intended “free farm” moves through Communism and quickly into a Totalitarian state. Had the farm stayed Communist, all the animals would have worked equally. However once the pigs take over – which is accomplished by all the above actions – there is a clear class delineation where they will no longer work because they are above such activities. In our Capitalist Democracy, the public holds no expectation that lawmakers have any idea what it is like to work in the industries they are governing. The individuals in power are there because they have been groomed into politics and they are the best at telling people what they want to hear.
This type of controversy is what happens when the public wants the government to lie to it. Let me prove that to you.
Pretend for a moment you are walking next to your spouse in the mall. You walk by some supermodel or actor/actress. You are asked if you find that person is attractive. You’re supposed to say no, though the correct answer is most likely yes.
Now say you’re a military spokesman, and the question you are asked is the following; “Would you ever consider using drones against US citizens or within US soil?”
You’re supposed to say no, though the correct answer is most definitely yes.
Let’s go over the question more closely, and why it takes a suspension of logic in order to get in an uproar over the issue. The keywords here, from a logic standpoint, are EVER and OR. To say that one would NEVER do something is a hell of a statement, where all possible reasons need to be examined. Combine that with OR, which is a more inclusive statement, and saying ‘no’ means ruling out quite a bit of possibilities.
The obvious reason drones could be needed on US soil is an invasion. It would be silly to not have drones as an option, given their ability to attack without the risk to (friendly) human life. The other could be a well-hidden terrorist group which has infiltrated the US. Where’s all my Bush-Junior-era Republicans at now? We’ll do anything as long as the terrorists don’t win, right?
It must be noted that a drone action should be viewed as a manned military strike – no more, no less. If the government was asked “Will you ever consider using the military against a US citizen or within US soil?”, a negative answer would be absurd. Every US citizen down to an age of 7 should be able to name a time when both of those conditions have already been met.
Please note I’m not trying to play both sides of the issue here. A drone strike is a military strike. In no way should we have been running drone strikes in Pakistan, on the order of dozens a year since 2008, without facing stronger political backlash over it. In addition, it is a joke that they are being conducted by the CIA. The CIA, at its strongest, should be a police organization. Police do not go ‘on the affirmative’ to murder someone. Their deadly force is used in self-defense or in protection of a captured person. An affirmative police action is an assassination, and runs a high risk of murder charges.
Speaking of police, what if your police commissioner was asked if she wanted her officers to use their weapons “against US citizens or on US soil.” Would you want her to say no?
We’re barely settled into the cozy (tiny) apartment and we’re thinking of moving again. The Texas experiment was a failure, and I can’t believe anyone would want to live here. There are just way too many people.
Trying to get back into “school-mind” has been difficult. Studying in the exact same room I eat, work, and sleep has proven incredibly nerve-wracking. It’s very nice to not have to drive to an office, but rarely leaving a 10×10 room feels more like a cell than a home. For many reasons the move should help to alleviate this problem, even trout I’ll still be working from home.
Stay tuned…
My last days at my office are here. Tomorrow is the last time I’ll make the drive to the Boulder office. I’ll be sure to pay a little more attention to the mountains in the morning, which is the best view I’ve ever had on a trip to or from work.
Going forward, I’ll be working from home. I am looking forward to this for a few reasons. Less money spent on travel is obviously a bonus. Getting two hours of my life back will be nice, though I tended to use that to catch up on podcasts so it’ll be interesting to see how I fill that time.
I cannot wait to begin to integrate my Macs more into my workflow. There are so many amazing workflow programs available for OS X that I’m expecting to be able to get so much more done per unit time. The new corporate borg is preparing to take over; I can’t make up the fact that we are all scheduled to be visited by something called the “IT SWAT team” this week. I have a feeling I am going to lose access to all the (relatively) efficient programs which I’ve sourced for XP – most of which were paid for by my own money.
I do have a whole day of packing a truck, loading the car on a trailer, and then driving 14 hours again. I’m not really looking forward to that, but beyond the pain should be an easier life. Time will tell.
Now my life is at the mother of all crossroads. We’re moving to help my wife get the job she wants. I have a job I am not enjoying, and have not enjoyed for some time. Worse yet, the stars refuse to align in order to pursue an opportunity I would enjoy. I’ve been stuck in this place for over 2 years now.
However, without degrees and certifications, I can’t decide what field to look at next or who would take me.
How does a person who enjoys doing almost anything – pick out that single thing that is right for them?
It is truly difficult to make the decision to go back to school right now. Work and family has got me so busy that even I’m looking back wondering how I did it for so long.
Maybe my break to refine my Calculus skills is going to extend a bit longer.
Choosing the right cellular carrier can be fairly annoying given the fact that there is no proper way to compare given networks without a great amount of hassle. Once you go through the trouble to pick two phones, sign two contracts, get everything setup on both phones, and then run through a proper A/B test, you’ve invested a great amount of time. Not to mention you will have to eventually undo one of those choices.
AT&T is the “nation’s fastest network” and Verizon is the “nation’s largest network”. Which one do you choose?
So far we’ve been using AT&T since the release of the iPhone 3G, which was my first decent smartphone. The coverage is good, but does have a decent amount of dropped calls when swapping between towers. Data speeds seem fine as long as you’re in a 3G area. For most of the world this would suffice, but if you traverse Kansas monthly as I do, there are gigantic pockets of EDGE (2G), or even no service.
With the release of the iPad 3 brings the chance to try out Verizon. For tablets, the data plan is kept separate from your cellular bill (and is contract-free) so the risk is much more minimal.
Using the Speedtest app, I’ve spent the last week profiling every place I would travel around the Denver metro area, focusing on the outlying surrounds. At first I was certain I had made a poor choice by purchasing the Verizon model. Ignoring LTE (4G), which is crazy fast but only exists close to metro areas, Verizon was substantially slower everywhere. AT&T typically measured download speeds of 3-6Mbps on 3G. Verizon’s 3G speeds typically cap at 1 Mbps.
At this point, I was ready to order the AT&T model and process the return of the Verizon. But, luckily, I decided to run one more test. Hunter and I were bored and had a morning to kill during spring break. I loaded up some Clone Wars for him to watch and headed out to Limon, which is about 2 hours East. Before you decide it’s cruel to stick him in a car for 4 hours, he is used to long trips and we did eat there. The boy will do anything for pancakes. Since the iPhone is on AT&T, I used that as the comparison device.
Verizon – Once we cleared the LTE of the airport (27Mbps down, for reference), the Verizon network measured within 10% of 1.05Mbps down for the entire trip. It didn’t matter if we were at the bottom of a hill or in one of the towns along the way, Limon included. There’s no guessing at what you should be expecting from the Verizon network.
AT&T – This proved a rather chaotic test. When there was a genuine AT&T 3G tower to be reached, the speed was (relatively) blazingly fast at 7Mbps. Given this is a completely rural area, that is not too bad. It’s roughly equal to my home DSL, given there’s higher latency. However 3G is a precious commodity for AT&T, and a quite rare one at that. 3G is only available near some small towns, which becomes more rare as you trod on through Kansas. In-between these spots brings EDGE service, with download speeds capping at a blistering 0.1Mbps, or possibly no service at all in many places.
Given that a connection isn’t worth anything if you can’t use it, Verizon wins this challenge by a mile. While my test focused on data, it’s also important to point out that each of those EDGE<->3G tower switches is almost guaranteed to be a dropped call with AT&T. Obviously the spots with no signal on AT&T can’t even support a phone call. This test has therefore taught me that I should have been using Verizon all along for phone service.
This also underlines the importance of contracts to the cellular companies. Since AT&T had us wrapped up in contracts, we couldn’t entertain the idea of switching to Verizon once they were available.
So what about the claims of the carriers?
When you can get a 3G signal, AT&T is faster by a wide margin.
There is no “when you can get a 3G signal” with Verizon, you just always do. So it’s the largest, also by a wide margin.
They are both telling the truth, but in my situation the winner is obvious. Verizon has won the business for my iPad 3 and, as soon as I can figure out a cost-effective point in time to switch the contracts, my phone business as well.
Well it’s now mid-March, the layoffs are announced, and we’re two weeks away from even tighter integration with our new parent company. As mentioned earlier, I am off of school this semester. I am starting to question my approach to my college career. Maybe I should have gone for a shorter degree? Everyone’s advice was to go for what I truly wanted to do (I would agree with that advice). I’m still worried there is to enough opportunity in that space to remain financially solvent. I am aware that no one is safe during an acquisition such as the one my work is going through, but I am trying to put myself in the best position possible. There also seems to be a bit of “changing of the guard” where I can attempt to find new challenges for myself. At the moment, however, there is no clarity to who I will be working for, even in the medium-term.
In lighter news, Hunter’s spring break is here and so begins a vacation for me. A week and a half off should help my sanity a bit. However the house will be pretty full for awhile, and I’m told the in-laws will be here the week after. Part of me this this may not feel like a vacation after all.
I’m very concerned about Apple’s newly announced yearly OS X release schedule. Like most vendors, their .0 releases are buggy and take some time to stabilize. If they release a .0 every summer, I’m worried that the “latest and greatest” will never actually be stable.
To me, this seems like the problem one runs into when trying to use, say, the latest Ubuntu vs the stable release of Debian. One shows off some sweet gee-wiz features, and the other is bland, boring, and works. For a daily-use computer that simply needs to work, you pick Debian in a heartbeat.
Reliability is much more important than “gee-wiz” when trying to win market share. Much of Apple’s skyrocketing success in the hardware space has been because their hardware is actually a cut above the rest. They have focused on making a great product, and that has paid off for them substantially.
Pushing your market base to upgrade each year strains consumers and programmers alike. Mozilla has taken some serious criticism for shoving Firefox to a similar schedule. This is certainly a curious move, and I feel it is one in which Apple did not invest their usual amount of forethought.