Go Fast

I had an early hockey game the other evening, so Aimee and Evelyn came to watch. Even though it was an early game, it started at 8:30. Evelyn was certainly tired before the game even started. When she gets tired she frequently talks a lot. After we lost our game, got dressed, and returned to the car, Evelyn was chattering at full speed. On the way home she pretended to be a driving instructor in the back seat, educating me on the proper way to drive a car. Mostly I just focused on driving until I heard her instruct me to use the "motorfast handle". "What is a motorfast handle?" I wondered. Seeming to read my mind, she dropped her instructional air and asked me "Dad, what is your hand on right now?" "It's the shifter, honey."

Easily Confused

I bought a car last week against the advice of my brother who observed that the car is impractical and that I paid too much. Of course, that kind of nagged at the back of my brain. On the day I drove it home I had an incident in a parking lot where it wouldn't start. It turned over like a champ, but refused to start. I opened the gas cap, tried again, and it fired right up. Now I really started to worry. What if my brother was right and I'd been taken? The same thing happened again yesterday morning. It was sickening. Naturally I pulled out my smart phone and started searching for similar problems. Someone mentioned an issue with the chip in the key going bad, others complained of a blocked fuel filter. I decided to start with a filter replacement in the near future. Later in the day we drove to Lansing and it refused to start up once we got there. This time I checked the dash for the theft indicator to see if it was the chip in the key. Sure enough, the theft indicator was flashing! So I turned the key around to see if that helped. Nope. Then I looked more carefully at the key. It turns out that the trunk key will fit the ignition, and even turn the engine over. It just doesn't have the chip to get the engine to start. Not surprisingly I have not had any issues since I took the trunk key off my keychain.

BYOD

In retrospect, the term BYOD should have seemed like more of a harbinger to me than it did at the time. In case you have never heard the term, it refers to "Bring Your Own Device". This phenomenon has been ushered in by the plethora of Google and Apple devices that consumers have become enamored by. When people change jobs, they are reluctant to leave their cherished devices behind.

Although I had read a lot about the BYOD phenomenon, I always thought about it from a security perspective. It never occurred to me to think about it from a "What will happen to Blackberry" perspective until our network administrator took me aside and said "We only have five Blackberry users left in our organization. Can I buy them iPhones and shut down the Blackberry server? They are a lot easier to support."

Suddenly, I really like BYOD. I also realized that RIM was facing an unprecedented uphill battle to reclaim their share of the phone market.

Pavlovian Shopping Experience

Aimee and I went to pick some stuff up from Wal-Mart last night. Ok, it was a lot of stuff. So much, in fact, that when we checked out I grabbed a second cart to put our groceries into. While I was waiting for Aimee’s turn in line, I sat on a bench at the end of the checkout. It wasn’t long before my eyes wandered to the piece of metal dangling from the bottom of the cart to the floor. “What could it be?”, I wondered.

When Aimee finally arrived at the checkout, she caught me fixated on the bottom of the cart. “Are you ok"?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just wondering why there’s a lightning rod on this cart”, I responded. It was just a hunch but it was also the only logical reason for the piece of metal. It just wasn’t clear to me what it was for.

Aimee clarified that for me. “Oh! What a great idea! I hate getting shocked by the cart!” That solved the mystery. Wal-Mart found a way to ground its carts, despite their rubber wheels. It really surprised me that any company would worry about something as minor as an occasional static shock to its customers. It made me wonder if they are concerned that shoppers are being conditioned to experience physical pain when they shop at a Wal-Mart.

A phone for the rest of us!

John Doe,

This is certainly one of the more unusual requests that we've had in quite a while, but we appreciate your help in this regard. I'm going to go ahead and close this ticket.

Thanks!
Gary

-----Original Message-----
From: John Doe
To: Gary
Subject: Re: Supervisor Phone


I have no need for a supervisor phone. If my new phone could be red however with the words "Big Deal" on it, that would go a long way.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless Phone



----- Reply message -----
From: Gary
Subject: Supervisor Phone
To: Bill
Cc: John Doe

Bill,

I don't see why anyone has to have access to the supervisor phone, perhaps we should move it from John's office to the server room?

John Doe, I'm assuming this won't hurt your feelings? If necessary we can buy a second supervisor phone, but since we intend to substitute data for a supervisor anyway, seems like a waste.

Gary

Cinderella trying to go to the ball

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