• Why I hate Microsoft, part 1,392

    I freely admit that I am a Mac user. OS-X just works better for me, and my workflow.  But I will grant that Windows 7 is pretty good, and usable. Of course, since I work in the corporate world, I am forced to use Windows (well, in the past I have been a rebel and…

  • Google All Access versus Spotify Premium

    Recap:  After Google announced their “All Access” plan for their Play service, I jumped on the free week.  The intent was to compare it to Spotify which I had been a premium customer for about a year and a half (I went premium there to get rid of the ads and the “sponsored tunes” which…

  • Physics Geek Alert

    In a meeting today, we were talking about models for contact mechanics to measure the indentation of an indenter probe into a surface.  I got to correct someone that the correct term is Hertz-Sneddon. Ian Sneddon, referred to as a Mathematician, made significant contributions to many areas of physics. Yeah, I am a geek.

  • A good problem

    Life is a series of challenges, but some are more welcome than others. Today I bicycled into the office, showered and changed into street clothes.  I brought in a pair of jeans, a polo shirt and the usual accoutrements. After showering, and dressing I made a stark observation: My jeans are almost too big to…

  • The joys of daily medications

    Since I have had a bout with coronary artery disease (a mild understatement), I get to daily take a fun regimen of medications. Prior to my “event” I had battled high blood pressure (ironically, my cholesterol was OK), and was on an ace inhibitor to keep it in the “sane” range. Post event, my cardiologist…

  • Diet and fitness update

    Last week was a challenge. With the holiday (grilled some yummy steaks), and our anniversary (tried another local Mexican place that is now our favorite), and two days of training a new sales engineer put a crimp on the diet. But all told, I came out of the week down a pound, and once the…

  • Oops, I did it again – The Facebook game

    Lately I have seen people in my friends list tell me to change some setting to prevent their life events leaking into the facebook social graph. Sigh. It seems like every few months, there is some new way that Facebook abuses your personal information, making it harder for you to control who sees what that…

  • Fun with Dentistry

    I had a cleaning and “new patient” visit a couple weeks ago.  My first visit since I moved to Chandler from Tucson.  All was good, but they did tell me that my amalgam fillings were beginning to age, and probably should be replaced. I was not surprised by this, as I had some major work…

  • The search for good Mexican food

    When we moved from Tucson to Chandler last year, the last thing I thought I would have trouble with would be finding a decent, authentic Mexican restaurant. I mean, it wasn’t like we were moving to Seattle, we were still in the southwest, and there are plenty of authentic people of Mexican heritage here. But…

  • My, how risk averse we have become

    On my bike ride today, I was pondering the changes that have happened over the last 20 something years. When I first got seriously into cycling in my mid 20’s, I thought nothing about climbing on, and doing 30, 40 or even 50 mile loops, barely taking a couple of bottles of water with me.…