Safety through fear

A review of bicycle helmet laws shows that more laws reduce cycling-related head injuries. They also reduce non-head injuries and increased head injuries in other sports. Put simply, campaigns to promote helmet-wearing appear to be most effective in making people too afraid to ride their bikes.
Dave Horton, a sociologist at Lancaster University, amplifies these findings in a series of essays that show how the media and civic leaders of present cycling as a strange, reckless, and dangerous practice.
I routinely see similar effects with regard to online safety. We've made sensible people of all ages afraid because somewhere, someone has done something bad. The Internet is a dangerous place where bad people are armed with malware that will steal your money, identity and/or children.
Mississippi TV station WLOX reports on an FBI program that educates kids on online safety. "We need to be able to educate these children to the dangers and the issues that they're going to face online," said FBI Special Agent Scott Wells.
Safe Online Surfing is an educational game that teaches young people about cyber words, cyberstalking, and how sketchy websites are trying to steal your identity. (It's also a game done in Flash, meaning that people who iPads or other mobile devices can't play it.)

FBI Safe Online Surfing 

Guess the wrong answer and you deprive an underwater princess of air. Predators, we learn, will try to lure you in with inappropriate topics, not try to win your trust by playing a game.

Indeed, the web is a troublesome place, as demonstrated by the WLOX viewers whose fifth most popular news story is, well, this. With video.

 (h/t to MeFi)

Mr. Hakkarainen goes to Helsinki

If you refer to blacks as niggers but don't call yourself a racist, then you're not a racist. So said Timo Soini, leader of the True Finns party in a BBC Hard Talk interview. (The video clip does not play on mobile devices. When I find an audio link, I will update this post.)
Soini was defending his party leadership when the interviewer asked about Tuevo Hakkarainen, who had used neekeri-sanan in a speech in Parliament. "Don't use that kind of language," said Soini.
He went on to say that it isn't OK to use that kind of language, even if you're not a racist. "You should be improving in your behavior."

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This post is one of a series about Teuvo Hakkarainen, the True Finns Party MP from Viitasaari. For the record, my grandfather was born in Viitasaari.

Happy 23rd, Michael

A sunny cake from long ago

RIP - DER - `10 years gone

The eyeball on the left courtesy of Don's daughter, Sarah

More on sacred texts

Sandra's father's family hails from a red-clayed corner of the Great White North. To the folks of  Prince Edward Island, Anne of Green Gables is a sacred text. To many Japanese girls, the Anne stories are an inspiration beyond words. These stories tell of an orphan girl who is a adopted by an aging brother and sister and who thrives by wit, pluck, and imagination. There was a mix-up in the request to the Halifax orphanage. The couple was looking for a boy to help around the farm while the person arranging the adoption thought that they were looking for a girl about 11.
At the core of the story is the girl's determination to survive life as a red-head. On first meeting,  Matthew Cuthbert remarks that her hair is red.

"Yes, it's red," she said resignedly. "Now you see why I can't be perfectly happy. Nobody could who has red hair. I don't mind the other things so much--the freckles and the green eyes and my skinniness. I can imagine them away. I can imagine that I have a beautiful rose-leaf complexion and lovely starry violet eyes. But I cannot imagine that red hair away. I do my best. I think to myself, `Now my hair is a glorious black, black as the raven's wing.' But all the time I know it is just plain red and it breaks my heart. It will be my lifelong sorrow. I read of a girl once in a novel who had a lifelong sorrow but it wasn't red hair. Her hair was pure gold rippling back from her alabaster brow. What is an alabaster brow? I never could find out. Can you tell me?

Because the Anne books are in the public domain, anyone can publish a new edition and publish they do. There are innumerable print and electronic editions as well as movie, television, and cartoon remixes. What's newsworthy about another edition of a book about an 11-year-old, red-haired girl?
Here's what:

Cover photo via Techdirt

As you'd expect, this edition, its cover since removed from the Amazon listing, unleashed a torrent of vitriol comparable to what might happen if a favorite sports hero appeared in a porn flick.
One takeaway message from all this is that, through our copyright laws and freedoms of press and speech, we can bring to market pretty much any full-tilt bozo idea of our choosing.

Most poorly timed promotion of the year, so far

Thank you, AARP. I'm certainly thinking about an Alaskan cruise this night.

More on science

Three quick notes on the ways that science making our lives, um, interesting.

• We've often heard that printer ink is more expensive than human blood. Well, here's a twist: UK scientists have used 3D printers to print human stem cells. It's within the realm of imagination that we could eventually use human blood in printers to make something beyond our imaginations.
• Humans have had a problematic relationship with insects. Some, such as honey bees, do great things for us. Mosquitoes are frog food and carry deadly diseases. We've done battle with chemicals and bazookas.
  Well, insects are fighting back and they've got robots.
• Fish are in schools but, until science showed up, they could never raise their hands when the have an answer to the teacher's question. The Register reports that Fish grow ‘hands’ in genetic experiment.
  
  

  

  Fish testing at Alden Research Lab

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One of a occasional series. A bunch of years ago, I worked for a software company. It was hard work for long hours. At one point, senior management made the pronouncement that the development team needed to focus more on a particular aspect of the product. The QA manager and I agreed that we'd Focused More-ons.

Silicon places

In the early days of the Intertubes, many locations tried to become the next Silicon Valley, if only in name.
We saw Silicon Alley, Silicon Gulch, and a bunch more that are just out of reach of memory.
With this GlobalPost article, Far from San Francisco and New York, Silicon Prairie emerges, marketers are trying to turn corn into silicon.

This Google Trends chart shows the bursts of interest in a few Silicon names.



The best overall list that I found is in good old Wikipedia with its List of places with "Silicon" names. It was there that I learned that Silicon Sandbar (Cape Cod) washed away in 2008.

Bootnote: I've tried various search engines to find a way to search for "Silicon *" as a place name. It was only as I loaded up a search with all of the names that I could recall that I found the Wikipedia page.

More on job searches

A while ago, I signed up with the job search site, Glassdoor. Since then, they've been sending me a list of  suggested jobs in the Worcester area. The jobs, however,  always a great match.

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One of a occasional series. A bunch of years ago, I worked for a software company. It was hard work for long hours. At one point, senior management made the pronouncement that the development team needed to focus more on a particular aspect of the product. The QA manager and I agreed that we'd Focused More-ons.

Chasing shadows on Groundhog's Day

It's almost that day again, when something means something in our dreams.

Click to enbiggen and to see the full Pogo strip

Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham has taken up the cause that Massachusetts needs an official groundhog.

Do you know that Massachusetts has been without an official groundhog for centuries? Outrageous!

Abraham's column includes a conversation with meteorologist Mish Michaels about Woodchuck B, whom Michaels believes should be our official mascot. Woodchuck B would be the featured attraction in educational presentations about weather science.

Good idea. We shouldn't forget local gal Laurel and Worcester's Brewster:

Sunday in the Park with Laurel - "The shadow knows . . .", 

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More on the Great White Elephant of Social Media

I've long said that if someone presents themselves as a social media expert[1], run away.
This is not that, but I'm not sure what it is:

The video link explains something.

[1]alternate titles include the following, by themselves or in combination: ninja, guru, black belt, rockstar.

Citizen science: to observe and record

How do you talk to your kids about big hard subjects? You talk to them. Then, you give them something to do about it.
Kids know and feel a lot about troubles in the world. They might not always know the details of the problem, but they know something isn't right. They might think it funny at first that a shipment of yellow rubber ducks fell off a freighter and is adrift in the Pacific. Then they realize that not all trash in the water is cute. Most of it is ugly and all of it can make us sick.
So what do you do? Well, for one thing, you can send them to the water's edge and have them count pieces of debris along with thousands of other folks around the world who are part of the International Coastal Cleanup project. Each year, volunteers walk their coasts and up trash. Before they toss it in the receptacle, however, they record what they've found. Cigarette butts, plastic bags, shotgun shells and casings, cars, and appliances. (You can see the full data set here.)
The ICC project lets kids of all ages do something not only to clean up our messes, but also contribute to scientists' research into our oceans. These most basic skills, to observe and record, form the foundation of all scientific research. This is work that's done by citizens. Dr. Loree Burns, writes in her third book, "Citizen science, then, is the study of our world by the people who live in it." Her book is Citizen Scientists: Be a Part of Scientific Discovery from Your Own Backyard.
Learning from litter

Dr. Burns talked to a dozen of us in meeting room at the Wachusett Meadows Audubon Sanctuary the other night. She tells her story easily, of graduate studies in biochemistry, the ways that kids push our lives in directions we'd not planned or even thought possible, and, as noted earlier, the challenges of talking to kids about big and sometimes troubling ideas.
So when she read a brief article Dr. Curt  Ebbesmeyer, an oceanographer who was tracking debris, including rubber duckies, that was riding the Pacific currents, she saw a way to continue with her scientific work and, at the same kids, keep kids like hers, and such as hers, busy with meaningful projects. That became book the first, Tracking Trash.
Is Mom killing the honey bees?
Her second book, The Hive Detectives, takes readers on an investigation to find out what's killing the honey bees.
At one point during the research cycle, the media misreported that bees were hypersensitive to cellphone radiation as well as chemicals we use in our yards and farms. The kids heard those stories as well. When the kids saw their mom using her cellphone, they panicked for bit.
Yes, the radiation may not be good for the bees, but one phone call, by itself, isn't going to destroy a hive. A lot of factors go into the colony collapses. "There's not one thing responsible for the death of the honey bees," said Dr. Loree.
Rarely does science tie things up nicely and put them in a box. Maybe there are seven factors contributing to an outcome that we don't like; maybe there are 70. If we eliminate or reduce two or 10, will that make enough of a difference.
We're not sure.
You know what? Kids are OK with that. They can work the ambiguities as long as they know their work is making a difference somehow.
Ladybugs are carnivorous.
The Lost Ladybug Project is part of the work to find out why certain types of ladybugs were increasingly difficult to find. Professor John Losey is an etymologist  at Cornell, researching ladybugs. Through field work with his young son, Ben, he discovered that children could be valuable research assistants. So valuable, in fact, that two Virginia siblings, age 10 and 11, found the first nine-spotted ladybugs seen in eastern North America in 14 years.
Ladybugs, by the way, eat aphids, making them a favorite for farmers. Ladybugs, by all accounts, don't like the taste of humans of any age.
What if you don't have a backyard?
We talk about our world as if it's universal when, in fact, its only the world that we see. When Dr. Loree talked to a group of kids in an urban school, they were puzzled at the thought of looking for anything in a backyard. Outdoors was often dangerous.
It turns out that you can raise sunflowers and other plants in a window box, the flowers of which can attract bees, even in the city. We may think of nature as only existing in the countryside. In a world increasingly urban, nature follows us. It looks different, but it's still nature and it still needs scientists.
Kids pay attention to what we do and how we do it.
If we, as adults, are afraid because we don't have the answers or afraid of the answers we've found, kids will notice. They're not always looking for a definitive answer. They're looking for ways of dealing with all this stuff, dealing with change, dealing with things that aren't going well, that are scary. If we can show them how to understand problems by observing and recording, they might not feel so helpless. They've got something to do that part of something bigger than themselves.
When we figure that out, for ourselves as well as for the kids, we get better, too. That's how it is that Dr. Loree can say, as she did at the end of the presentation the other night, "There's a piece of this that is, for me, just joy."

Worcester's Best Chef - Glory is fleeting

The web story on Sunday evening reported that Sonoma's chef had won the competition for Worcester's best chef.

Sonoma chef sizzles in restaurant competition
PRINCETON HAS 'WORCESTER'S BEST'

By Monday morning, however, the headline and page title matched the picture caption and story.

EVO chef Albert Maykel III wins Worcester's Best Chef competition

Gradations of graduation

We think that the headline writer meant Graduation.

Telegram & Gazette - 1-26-2013 9-25-05 AM

Nevertheless, The Google sez that gradation is kinda, sorta OK.

Happy Birthday, Mike

n.b., picture taken at Cassie's birthday party. Mike is probably not going to have a Monster High centerpiece at his party. 

Knowing What We Know

Research is showing that we've figured out quite a bit about developing applications that use cloud services.
Read more at my Develop in The Cloud blog post: Knowing What We Know

More on 4G wireless

The advent of 4G wireless for our mobile phones is changing the ways we work and play. There are many times when the 4G speed is faster than what I'd typically get in a coffee shop or other public WiFi location. That's goodness.

Availability of 4G is, however, quite uneven.

The other day, I pulled over to the side of the road on Route I-190 in Sterling, Mass, a place devoid of houses or businesses. Here's what I got on my phone:

Here's what it looks like on Google Earth:

I later stopped at an intersection in our part of town.

Here's the view from up top.

Abbreviated education

UMass offers online undergraduate and graduate programs. To learn about the programs, you need to fill out a form and select the program(s) that interest you before you can download a brochure.
The form lists several programs, including some with long names that are truncated by the form window. Too bad. I was wondering what a degree in Education Specialist Degree in Curriculum and I might encompass.

But, wait, there's more. If you view the source of the page, you can see the full description of the programs. You also see, but without explanation, that the form page starts with 147 blank lines.
If you stumble around the site, you can also find out more about the programs on their Programs page.

Technology in education - are the roads wide enough?

Last week's Technology in Education conference left me with a couple of ideas to ponder:

1. There are a lot of good people on the front lines of education, teachers and administrators. They have the smarts and commitment to do great things. They're creating lots of small successes, even in small, rural school district where bandwidth and access to computers remains an issue.
2. During the morning sessions, including the keynote and two workshops, no one asked a question or made a comment. (One person did ask for clarification about the location of some materials, but there were no questions about the content.) Attendees at the afternoon sessions talked more. 

In 2007, ABC News ran a story, The Future of the Workplace: No Office, about the changing world of work. More than 40% of IBM's employees don't have a full-time office in an IBM facility. They work from home, customer sites, hotel rooms, airplanes, or, occasionally, an IBM office that's set up to support visiting workers.
While K-16 (kindergarten through college) education brings lots of money and attention on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, the STEM curriculum, little is said about the way that people work.Collaborating with teams around the country or the world requires much more intentional communication. You can't rely on corridor conversations to exchange ideas or schedule changes. You can't keep your project plan on a whiteboard in the main conference room.

via Mr. Boffo Archives

The people from the Lower Pioneer Valley Educational Collaborative included the ABC story in their presentation. After their talk, I asked the presenters how well educators understood the ways in which work has changed and will change even more. They said that there was little evidence of widespread appreciation of this type of change. Teachers and parents were OK with the new content included in STEM education, but weren't seeing a need for learning about new ways to work.
Teaching new material in traditional ways fits well, in my opinion, with an educational model that lines up with standardized tests as the measure of educational success. Teaching old or new content in new ways may not.
Watching a couple hundred people sitting and listening to ideas about radically reinventing education is unsettling. It reminds me of my classes in the 60s, where a radical history professor would be spouting revolution and the students in the back of the classroom wondered if the Yippies were going to be on the mid-term.
Every airplane carries a black box (which isn't really black, but orange so that it can be found easily after a crash) that contains recording devices that stores vital data and voice recordings.

Do you know why they don't make airplanes the same way that they use in the black boxes? Because the roads aren't wide enough.

(A plane built like that wouldn't get off the ground and would have to drive to its destination.)

Educators are keenly aware that they're measured by the kids' test scores. Federal and state funding is tied to improvements in the numbers. Change has to be introduced carefully, lest it disrupt what's already proved to work well enough. 

Added to that is an academic environment for educators that rewards obfuscation in language and thought.
The result is a risk-averse spirit that wraps innovation in thick protective layers.
The entrepreneurial spirit that we expect of our kids when they go to work is punished when applied to education. Entrepreneurs know that  meaningful failures are essential to eventual success. An essential element of physical and emotional well-being is resilience, the ability to adapt to change and setbacks and find new ways to move forward.
For the many people in politics and in the general public who don't like government or educators, lower test score means that schools are failing again. Never mind that the lowered scores might be the result of incompetence or an experiment that didn't turn out as hoped. The remedies for each type of failure are quite different.
Marco Annunziata is Chief Economist and executive director of Global Market Insight for GE. reported on on GE's annual Innovation Barometer. More 300 global business leaders who were surveyed said that they want governments to cultivate more innovation in education to prepare students for often chaotic work that's ahead. One respondent endorsed "strengthening the education system in a way that not only gives students a solid basis of knowledge, but also fuels an entrepreneurial culture and creates a closer alignment with business. "
This new world of work is less than a generation old. We don't yet have proven methods for educating large numbers of students in the technologies and processes that will be a part of their lives.  We need to try some things, many of which may not work. No one likes the idea of experimenting on our kids. Truth be told, however, I don't think we have much choice. We're not going to get them to their future by driving down I-91 in a jet. 

If you knew how to spell Wachusett,

and hadn't learned two years ago, you might still be working at Rite-Aid.

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Quick-Starting Startups

Building stuff so developers can build stuff. Read more on my Develop in The Cloud blog post, Quick-Starting Startups.

R.I.P, Huck

Six years ago, on a night made quiet and dark by an ice storm, my father sailed away.

Happy Rocco Gotcha Day

Two years ago, we picked up Rocco from his foster family in Manchester NH. He was and is a quiet guy, with good instincts and good training. His quiet manner makes his silliness and excitement all the more delightful.

One morning a week, Rocco and I help to get Cassie onto her school bus.
A couple of times a week, he accompanies Sandra on visits to her mother at the nursing home. He's a comforting presence amid people who appreciate comforting.

Happy 17th Birthday, Krista

Photo by smh

Apps by the People, for the People

Governments can do some clever stuff if we get government out of their way.
Read more at my Develop in The Cloud blog post, Apps by the People, for the People

Fixing software with documentation at Harvard

Much has been made of Harvard School of Law's online course on copyright law. The course, given by Professor William Fisher, covers a range of topics related to the theory and application of copyright law in the U.S. and other countries. The course is limited to 500 attendees, participating in groups of 25, giving a small-class feel to a massive open online course.
Registration closed on January 3. As a result, we are told to ignore the big registration button on the course page.

This is what we call Fix It in Documentation. The way that the HTML page is stitched together, the registration button is one component while the course description below is another. It works well until it doesn't. Apparently, there isn't a way to disable or otherwise change the display once the registration period has passed. So, two sentences in red text tell you that they couldn't change the button and that you can't do what the button says you can do.

If Developers Wrote the Laws

Code is code, right?

Read more at my Develop in The Cloud blog: If Developers Wrote the Laws

Why is Amazon a Mac hater?

Amazon offers a publishing service that delivers blog content to Kindles and kindred e-readers. The subscription costs $.99/month, one-third of which goes to Amazon.
I set up an account and will make this stream o' bits available through the Kindle channel. (If anyone subscribes, I will donate my proceeds to charity. I'm interested in the publishing process, not in making money.)
One annoying hitch, however, is that, when I go to the publisher's page to log in to my account, I'm greeted with this warning.

Internet Explorer isn't available and you really have to dig to find Firefox versions older than the current  (17.0) release.
It turns out that the message is benign. Safari and Chrome, the two browsers that I have installed on my Mac, work ok.

Beware the unmatched brace

I've been tinkering with the new WordPress Twenty Twelve responsive design template for a couple of other sites that I maintain. Given the increased use of mobile devices, such as phones and tablets, websites have to accommodate those smaller displays. Doing so with multiple style sheets for each possible configuration is possible but a testing and maintenance nightmare. Responsive design templates, where smart people figure out this stuff for us, are the easiest way to get to a good common solution.

The basic Twenty Twelve design, admittedly, is a bit bland. It has a quirk of placing the header image below the website title and tag line.
It also puts a box shadow, albeit faint, around the image.

I cloned the default template, moved the image above the title, and then set about to remove the box shadow. All that I'd need to do is reset the value of header-image in the style sheet.

img.header-image,
{
box-shadow:none;
}

WordPress offers a built-in style editor so that you can make changes to your design as you go.
In a simple case such as this, little can go wrong. If you are making a bunch of changes, however, you discover that it's easy for an extra character can wander in during a copy-and-paste editing session.
The code editor doesn't do syntax highlighting. As a result, if you leave an open curly brace:, the style sheet will fail silently and you've left with a simple change that doesn't work.

{
/* a bunch of code copied from elsewhere
that goes on for a while and then is missing a closing brace.
*/
img.header-image
{
box-shadow:none;
}

Tip: if you've spent what seems like an inordinate time tracking down a style change that's not working, copy your code into a proper editor and let it help you see what you're missing.

You got your Internet in my cheese.

You got your Internet in my cheese.
Thank you, I think.

The Internet of Things, Soon Accessible by Smartphone - Technology Review

A forthcoming packaging chip could let your phone talk to the plastic wrap on your cheese.

There will always be an England

These are the famous Flaming Tar Barrels of Otterly St. Mary. 

In brief, the townsfolk put tar in barrels, set the tar on fire, and carry the barrels around the town. Only local are permitted to carry the barrels, but the competition is open to men, women, and children.

They are worried that they're not able to raise enough money to keep the festival going.
Mark Steele describes the town and its carnival of flaming tar barrels in this BBC Radio 4 Extra show.

Blog tinkering

It's windy and cold outside, so it's a good day for tending to long overdue housekeeping chores on this blog. I've turned off email updates to help avert a flood of new posts and bizarre errors that we've seen in previous    tinkering sessions.

For some email subscribers, blog posts may be arriving through a new service, FeedBlitz. You'll have the usual options to adjust how frequently you receive the mailings and to unsubscribe if you so desire.
For those of you who care about such things, I've resumed with Blogger. I'll discuss the reasons for the change in a future post.

Thanks

Feeding birds by way of ice

A few weeks ago,we had small amount of snow and ice. We also did not have any sand or ice melt. Son Mike and his crew were making repairs on our house. Mike used bird seed to give some traction. It worked pretty well.
Last Monday, we had more ice, so I tossed more bird seed on the ramp and driveway. The ensuing warmth and rain washed away the ice, leaving the seeds. Birds large and small are taking care of the rest.

All the news that's fit to throw away

We get the Sunday-only option, currently costing $7.80/week. As with all print subscriptions, we also get their All Digital Access service, providing web, iPad app, and other mobile options, for no additional charge.
The All Digital Access costs $8.75/week.
To read the Times online on all of our gadgets, therefore, it is cheaper to buy the Sunday print edition and throw it away, rather than buy just the digital editions by themselves.


The New York Times recently sent a letter announcing new rates for print subscribers. Depending on your selection, a subscription will cost 40¢ to 70¢ more per week in the new year. Ours will increase to $8.20. The Gray Lady hasn't said whether there will be a price increase or not for the digital products.

More on Digital Nomads: Panera Bread

Panera Bread was one of the first restaurants to offer free Wi-Fi. It was a good thing. People would use the restaurant as adjunct office, holding meetings or just working for an hour or two. The restaurant would shorten the amount of time you could be connected during the busy lunch period, a condition that seems reasonable.
Of late, however, the Wi-Fi service has deteriorated to the point of dial-up quality.

Even in Leominster, where cell phone coverage is thin, my phone was getting better results on two-bar 4G service (921kbps) than on the store's Wi-Fi (896).
Add to that their use of Flash on the Wi-Fi login page and you have an unfriendly, unworkable setup.
Granted, we're supposed to go to restaurants to eat, not necessarily to work. If your business is offering an additional service as an attraction, it's a good idea to make it something you'd want to use. If you advertise air-conditioning, and can only keep the summertime temps at 80F, you're not delighting your customers.
Dunno where I'll try next, but I'm out of here.
By the way, the mall where the Leominster store is located is called the Mall at Whitney Fields, not the Searstown Mall. The mall was known as Searstown when it opened 45 years ago. It was renamed in 2004 when other anchor stores didn't want to be subservient to Sears.

More on answers

Picking up on Nicole's Answers thread.

About the Connecticut school shootings

A lot will be said about the recent tragedy in Connecticut. Most of it will be an expression of grief and bewilderment. Much of the commentary will be thoughtful and heartfelt. Some of it will be positioned, consciously or not, to advance an agenda. Intertwined with all of it will be observations from people whom we respect, but who are making statements that are passionate, stupid, and wrong. That's who we are, and that's how we have to live together.
Let me add just a couple of quick thoughts based on early and likely to be inaccurate information.

• It appears that the guns used in this shooting were purchased and owned legally by the assailant's mother (now dead by those same guns). Gun control legislation of a type that would pass muster under the recent Supreme Court rulings on the Second Amendment probably wouldn't have prevented these guns from being used in these crimes.
  There may be reasons for considering stronger gun control laws, but this case doesn't appear to be one of them.
• Much will be said about identifying people with mental illness in an effort to prevent future shootings. Our predictive powers regarding the behavior of anyone, mentally ill or otherwise, are nil. We have statistics that will show that a certain percentage of people who exhibit certain behaviors or who have been treated for certain conditions are likely to cause problems. There is, however, zero chance that we can then say with certainty that any specific individual matching that profile will offend.
  Two members of my extended family have done time in jail as the result of their mental illnesses, one for what he did and the other for what he said and that others feared he might do.
  
  • The one who did the crime did so as a complete surprise to all of us.
    
  • The one who said the wrong thing to the wrong person as the wrong time only learned how not to say those things to anyone, including a therapist, again.  Anyone who has been committed to a hospital under a Massachusetts Section 12 knows the magic words not to say. As a result, the person's illness goes underground even further.
  Even as we discuss identification of people likely to offend, we make it more difficult to get the kinds of sustained mental health and family services that might give us a chance to heal what is badly broken.  A person who kills his mother and her kindergarten class isn't going to be made whole by a Prozac presecription. 

There's no question that gun violence and mental illness are causing grave problems in our society. There's also no question that there are some things we can do to make things better. I keep thinking, though, about our invasion of Iraq. The Septemeber 11 attacks deserved a forceful response to confront terrorists in this world. That we chose, under the guise of responsing to 9/11, to invade and occupy Iraq squandered left us neglibly safer at a enormous cost of lives, money, and good will. 

I hope that we're better than that this time around.

More on Charter

You bring your laptop from home to work in a coffee shop. You connect to the Wi-Fi service, start the web browser to check the news, and then go to Outlook to check email. You read what's arrived and write a quick note to a friend to make plans for lunch next week.

Up pops this message:



A normal, English-speaking adult would see a block of more than 700 undifferentiated ASCII characters.

If you happen to guess that that it might be related to your Charter email account and stumble over to the Charter online help, you may find a message such as this:



Do you feel helped?

The short explanation is that Charter has a stupid policy that doesn't allow people to send mail through Charter email servers when they are not connected to the Internet through Charter.

If you go to one place around Worcester, you might be lucky and find that they use Charter for business, in which case you can send your message. Most places, though, have their own national ISP configurations and so block connections to Port 25 used to send email.

The workaround is to use Charter's webmail service, the one that welcomes you with email that includes the following message about the message:



If you have a VPN back to your home and can make a connection through a service there, you might be able to connect.

The other alternative is to use the mobile device settings (mobile.charter.net) and SSL for the IMAP and SMTP servers.. These settings are intended for smartphones, but appear to work with Outlook.

Sometimes, life hands you a banjo

It wasn't just life, though. It was long-time friend Ken. We met for breakfast this morning and talked for hours about flame plate in fighter jets, great teachers, the colored water of the old Nashua River, adaptive learning, and Massachusetts politics. It was the kind of conversation that Ken and I have had since we were in Little League, drops of water bouncing and scattering on a hot griddle.

It wasn't just any banjo. It was Don's 5-string.

Not a day goes by that we don't miss him. Not a day goes by that, knowing that we could have done better, we don't wonder if it would have been enough to make a difference.

First steps will be tune it, learn a few chords, and plunk out a blues progression.



It comes full circle. That was me, back when we were living in the garage, my grandmother looking on.

Sometimes, life hands you a banjo, again.

Crime in suburbia

From The Landmark (subscription required):
[Ed. Note: there were 22 suspicious items this week.]
Holden
Monday, November 26
9:47 a.m. Public service, lock-down drill at school, Jamieson Rd.
1:55 p.m. Vehicle lockout, Main St.
2:29 p.m. Caller complaining about protesters in front of post office, Main St.
4:27 p.m. Person at station to have someone speak to his daughter about underage drinking, Main St.
9:55 p.m. Firewood stolen during daylight from home on Paxton Rd.
Tuesday, November
27
6:16 a.m. Dispute over shared mailbox, Main St.
10:00 a.m. Person at station regarding suspicious phone call, Main St.
10:36 a.m. Caller wants to speak with officer regarding suspicious vehicle, Stoneleigh Rd.
1:45 p.m. Police at post office for follow-up, Main St.
Wednesday, November
28
2:38 a.m. Suspicious vehicle pulled into construction site behind house, Autumn Cir.
9:12 a.m. Tire and furniture left on side of Bond Rd.
10:26 a.m. Police check on suspicious person, Stoneleigh Rd.
12:15 p.m. Red fox in backyard, Beechwood Rd.
12:42 p.m. Car seat installation, Main St.
3:43 p.m. Fox hanging around neighborhood, Nola Dr.
4:43 p.m. Suspicious vehicle parked all day, Mason Rd.
Thursday, November 29
8:24 a.m. Hydroseeding truck sucking up water from swampy area on Quinapoxet St.
8:59 a.m. Officer out with dog in road, Stoneleigh Rd.
9:55 a.m. Someone fooled with caller’s windshield wipers and mirrors while she walked on rail trail, Manning St.
1:40 p.m. Police check on fox, Nola Dr. Fox sent on its way
10:01 p.m. Two suspicious males hanging around area, Princeton St.
11:02 p.m. Car carrier unloading vehicles in driveway, Main St.
Friday, November 30
4:51 p.m. Police check on suspicious vehicle with four occupants, Parker Ave.
Saturday, December 1
12:37 a.m. Suspicious activity in area of Chapel St.
10:08 a.m. Report of hunters too close to property line, Preservation Ln.
11:13 a.m. Police investigate loose cat, Main St.
12:44 p.m. People at station regarding civil issue between two interior decorating companies, Main St.
Sunday, December 2
2:42 a.m. Suspicious vehicle, River St.
10:46 a.m. Caller concerned about illegal flea market in Jefferson Park, Quinapoxet/Princeton Sts.
1:12 p.m. Item found near entrance of rail trail, Manning St.
3:01 p.m. Assist citizen with deer, Reservoir St.
3:58 p.m. Two males in field discharging firearms, North St.
Paxton
Tuesday, November 27
6:30 a.m. Person in woods behind caller’s house, Crystal St.
Wednesday, November 28
7:14 a.m. Caller struck dog, Marshall St.
9:02 a.m. Caller reports livery van crossing center line, Pleasant St.
12:45 p.m. Caller received letter form person in jail, Old Lantern Cir.
Thursday, November 29
1:25 p.m. Assist postal inspector with investigation, Mower St.
Friday, November 30
8:19 a.m. Request for police to check vehicle that twice drove behind building, Pleasant St
2:14 p.m. Truck and trailer on side Mower St., person went into woods with chainsaw
Princeton
Monday, November 26
9:19 a.m. Suspicious vehicle, Mountain Rd.
Tuesday, November 27
8:59 a.m. Graffiti on buildings and sign, Boylston Ave.
9:03 a.m. Suspicious person, Gregory Rd.
Friday, November 30
7:57 a.m. Two suspicious white pickup trucks with campers on back acting suspiciously, Calamint Hill Rd. S
11:26 a.m. Vehicle vs. stop sign, Fitchburg Rd./Rte. 140 N
Saturday, December 1
8:37 a.m. Snow-covered vehicle parked on hill, Rte. 140
Rutland
Monday, November 26
2:04 p.m. Caller regarding hunters on private property, Irish Ln.
Wednesday, November 28
7:05 p.m. Caller reports vehicle pulled in neighbor’s yard and did a “donut,” Brooke Haven Dr.
Friday, November 30
8:17 a.m. Person at station regarding suspicious activity at her home, Bethany Dr.
2:45 p.m. Horse caught up in fence, Central Tree Rd.
4:22 p.m. Mother at station regarding daughter smoking something given at school, Summerhill Dr.
11:52 p.m. Suspicious vehicle, Main St.
Saturday, December 1
12:30 p.m. Assist person locked out of vehicle, Pleasantdale Rd.
12:59 p.m. Woman walking on Edson Ave. looks lost
Sterling
Monday, November 26
7:37 p.m. Caller reports suspicious male in dark green Army coat, Davis Ledge Rd.
Tuesday, November 27
8:58 a.m. Suspicious vehicle and male walking around, John Dee Rd./Redemption Rock Trl.
Wednesday, November 28
6:47 a.m. Black and yellow Lab missing, Redstone Pl. Dog later returned
9:36 a.m. Two loose beagle puppies almost hit by vehicle, Chocksett/Clinton Rds.
12:37 p.m. Suspicious male walking up driveway, ran when dog barked, Wilder Rd.
Thursday, November 29
3:11 p.m. Suspicious vehicle, Jill Ln.
4:08 p.m. Tan and white bulldog in area of Meetinghouse Hill/Stuart Rds.
Friday, November 30
4:40 p.m. Lost, long-haired gray cat, Redstone Pl.
9:57 p.m. Officer checks on person shining flashlight into school building, found to be custodian checking school, Boutelle Rd.
Saturday, December 1
11:55 a.m. Suspicious vehicle, Albright Rd.
Sunday, December 2
9:05 a.m. Suspicious person driving around Wiles Rd.
6:07 p.m. Female walking down road in dark clothing, Princeton Rd.
9:54 p.m. Suspicious vehicle in driveway, Village Ln.

Toward a theory of technology education

Impressive title for a blog, eh?

Well, I'm nowhere near that full theory, but I've got a few pieces that are starting to take shape. The ideas are based on my experiences providing technical support for many people over many years.

Smart, good people call themselves stupid because their computers and telephones block them from doing a simple task. We've created a culture of disrespect that's the result of bad user interface and bad  software release practices (unannounced changes so that something that worked in one way yesterday doesn't work today).

A generation was mocked by the flashing 12:00 on their VCR clocks because a) each VCR had a different way of setting the time and, more importantly, b) the manufacturers were too fricking cheap to include a 50¢ battery that would preserve the time setting when you unplugged the device momentarily.

It's not likely that the industry is going to change its ways, so it's up to us. That's where this nascent educational theory is coming into shape. It has a few core principles that I'll be developing over a series of blogs:

• Language


• Expectations


• Community of learning


• Context

I'll touch on the first one, language, today.

If you don't know how to spell a word, look it up in the dictionary.

How many of you, as nine-year-olds, stared blankly at your teacher when she told you to look up a word that you didn't know how to spell? This moment may have been the beginning of your understanding that adults are nuts.

Second only to English language usage, English spelling rules are nonsensical and contradictory. (The phrase look it up, for example, uses the verb look in an archaic fashion as a transitive verb and sends us looking upwards. Perhaps a grammarian could help me diagram the sentence Look it up in the dictionary.)

The other day, a Mac user tried to explain her problem, that the thing with the pointer was missing from her desktop.

"I use it to navigate," she said.

I asked about the mouse pointer, which seemed to be ok.

"I click on it to read the New York Times," she said.

The icon for Safari was missing from her Dock.



If you saw the Safari icon in the wild, how would you describe it? A compass, right? How does that correlate with web browsing?



Once you make the association between an icon and the idea or activity, you're most likely just to forget that you even know it. Trouble surfaces, however, when the icon disappears. Is the program gone? Probably not.

Recommendations

• An icon dictionary that explains what each icon represents - what program it runs and what you do with the program. In the previous example, describing that icon as Safari wouldn't have helped much.


• People who work on the computer must document what they've done and why. The reason that the Safari icon was gone was that the Mac owner's son preferred Firefox and wanted to make it the default browser for his mother. He didn't tell her nor did he set it up so that she could get to the New York Times website as she's previously done.

Google Drive nixed

It took Google a long time to release its Google Drive product. People had come up with work-arounds involving storing files as attachments to Gmail messages. When it was finally released earlier this year, it was almost too late. Products such as Dropbox, Box, and Microsoft's SkyDrive (variously named Live and other monickers) had filled the file-sharing, synchronization, cloud storage void.

Google Drive is an evolution of Google Docs, an online authoring environment for documents, spreadsheets, and presentation. Spreadsheets can have a form-based front end. Recently, I used this form/spreadsheet interface to build an online survey used by a couple hundred folks.

By allowing any type of file to be stored in then-Google Docs, Google's online file service became a handy way to store and share files among teams. You can share individual files or an array of folders, sub-folders, and files with one person, many, or the world. You can even use it to host your web server content.

In parallel, I decided to move back to Linux. There are some tools that I need to use and, I hope, develop, work that is more easily done on Linux.

To my surprise and disappointment, I discovered that I can't access non-document files that are stored on Google Drive when I'm using a browser running on Linux. In this case, I had stored some executable files in a tools folder on Google Drive. I wanted to download them to my Linux installation.

No joy.

In order to download non-document files, you need to have an application running on your system. Google makes its drive application for Windows, Mac, and various portable devices, but not Linux. Note that the error message is so broken that the link to the image is missing.

For today, I'll need to switch back to Windows. Longer term, I will have to move many of my files to Dropbox, which does make a Linux client.

 

How to get a window seat on the bus

I'll be seeing some friends from high school this week. As we swap stories, sometimes we forget if events happened to us or someone else. It's a bit like the bats in the Pogo comic strip, Bewitched, Bothered and Bemildred, who often forgot who was whom.

Anyway, ...

Our junior high science teacher wanted us to study nature. For our spring project, we were to collect 25 different types of bugs. A couple of boys asked if we could go fishing, instead. She agreed. One fish would equal five bugs.

I caught a couple of fish, probably a kivver and a perch, because those were the most easily caught at the camp. Matched up with the 15 bugs, I turned in my specimens and left them in the science project room.

We hadn't thought this all the way through.. Within a day, the science project room equaled the gym locker room for odor and on the second day it won.

I tried throwing away the shoe box containing my project, but the janitor made me take it out of the trash bin and bring it home.

It was a 45-minute ride on the school bus. I had no trouble getting a seat for myself by a window.

The first of December ...

We are well on our way to a repaired home.

You may remember that the hurricane knocked down a tree that knocked down our chimney that broke the ceiling where Sandra sat. The chimney is fixed. A new roof is on. The ceiling will be replaced early next week.

We are, for the time being, nomads in our own home. The living room furniture is scattered to other rooms. We're quite ok, though.

A thin layer of fresh snow may delay some additional repairs on another part of the roof that are planned for today. More snow and ice is in the forecast for the overnight and then a warm-up.

Happy 99th Birthday, Huck.

And, for people of a certain age, here's that song that's in your head today.

Crime in suburbia

From The Landmark (subscription required):
[Editor's note: there were 16 suspicious items this week.]

Holden

Thursday -- November 15

2:24 p.m. Request for officer at high school, unknown issue, Main St.
3:25 p.m. Assist person locked out of vehicle, Main St.
5:14 p.m. Person ticketed for parking in handicapped space unhappy. Claims not to have been in handicapped space. Advised of appeal procedure, Reservoir St.
7:24 p.m. Check on people in field house. All set, winterizing facility, Main St.

Friday -- November 16

12:17 p.m. Complaint of loud music, Princeton St.
3:01 p.m. Multiple occupants of car arguing in parking lot, Reservoir St.
11:47 p.m. Suspicious vehicle, Reservoir St.

Saturday -- November 17

10:05 a.m. Caller found black Lab with leash, Reservoir St.
12:17 p.m. Stray dog in yard, Reservoir St.
12:36 p.m. Crew at vacant house blowing leaves and debris into neighbors’ yard, Lexington Cir.
1:25 p.m. Neighbors hanging around building, Princeton St.

Sunday -- November 18

1:40 a.m. Someone rang doorbell and took off,Salisbury St.
2:17 a.m.. Caller wants to speak to officer about previous call, Salisbury St.

Monday -- November 19

8:32 a.m. Dead animal in Shrewsbury St.
1:06 p.m. Car seat installation, Main St.
4:22 p.m. Vehicle parked beside Rte. 68
6:14 p.m. Suspicious male soliciting door-to-door, Gail Dr.
7:55 p.m. Suspicious vehicle, Colorado Dr./Arizona Ave.

Tuesday -- November 20

7:29 a.m. Vehicle struck deer, Bullard St.
9:36 p.m. Suspicious vehicle. Belongs to individuals involved in Asian long-horned beetle study, Salisbury St.

Wednesday -- November 21

2:04 a.m. Suspicious vehicle, Salisbury St.
7:34 a.m. Assist with car seat installation, Main St.
8:05 a.m. Refrigerator in or near Chapel St./Ottoson Way
12:03 p.m. Suspicious pickup truck traveling up and down Wilde Willow Dr.
2:29 p.m. Suspicious person knocking on doors, Vicksburg Cir. and Ft. Sumter Dr.

Thursday -- November 22

6:39 p.m. Report of male running and jumping in Fairhill Rd.
9:04 p.m. Assist person looking for family member’s vehicle, Main St.

Friday -- November 23

9:30 a.m. Suspicious vehicle, South Rd.
1:10 p.m. Police out with person who reported an unleashed dog on Bullard St. that came after her dog
7:15 p.m. Suspicious vehicles in lot on Princeton St.
7:33 p.m. Caller reports upset carpenter,Shrewsbury St.

Saturday -- November 24

9:39 a.m. Caller requests officer while carpenter removes his tools from her residence, Shrewsbury St.
1:44 p.m. Officer on drug investigation, Shrewsbury St.
4:56 p.m. Suspicious vehicle, Harris St.

Sunday -- November 25

11:21 a.m. Vehicle lockout, parking lot, Main St.
11:57 a.m. Check on three youths in parking lot, Main St.
12:57 p.m. Vehicle parked in driveway, Mixter Rd.

Paxton

Saturday -- November 17

6:19 p.m. High school teacher reports a party will take place tonight with underage kids, Howard St.
10:14 p.m. Several cars parked across the street from vacant house, Howard St. Holden PD notified. Assist Holden PD at large party

Sunday -- November 18

1:54 a.m. Caller’s neighbor setting off fireworks, Pleasant St.

Tuesday -- November 20

2:10 p.m. Caller wants to speak with officer about dead skunk on her property, William Allen Dr.

Princeton

Tuesday -- November 20

7:00 p.m. Suspicious vehicle, Hickory Dr.

Wednesday -- November 21

7:26 a.m. Two llamas in Brooks Station Rd. road near church
4:49 p.m. Assist person locked out of vehicle, child inside, Westminster Rd.
7:44 p.m. Suspicious male with flashlight on property on Rte. 140 N. Found to be a solicitor

Thursday -- November 22

8:26 a.m. Officer removes large rock from Sterling Rd.
9:19 a.m. Loose gray dog in Sterling Rd.
1:21 p.m. Police find mailbox in Willson Rd. Returned to owner

Saturday -- November 24

11:19 a.m. Caller received two letters from someone offering to buy her home, Beaman Rd.

Sunday -- November 25

6:19 p.m. Suspicious truck parked on Lovers Lane since Friday
8:55 p.m. Car struck deer, Rte. 140 N

Rutland

Tuesday -- November 20

4:23 p.m. School requesting officer, child got on wrong bus and was dropped off without a parent present, Maple Ave.
7:20 p.m. Officer removes dog from residence, Stevens Way

Wednesday -- November 21

3:22 p.m. Car parked at Rail Trail is sticking out in Pommogussett Rd.

Thursday -- November 22

9:52 a.m. Suspicious male soliciting for gas at gas station, Barre Paxton Rd.

Friday -- November 23

12:42 a.m. Suspicious vehicle parked in lot, Main St.
10:33 a.m. Stray coon hound at residence on E. County Rd. Dog reunited with owner
6:37 p.m. Black bear on porch and wandering through yard, Pleasantdale Rd.

Saturday -- November 24

9:15 a.m. Person wants to turn in old ammunition, Charnock Hill Rd.
2:54 p.m. Caller reports loose horse in road by Rutland State Park

Sterling

Monday -- November 19

6:03 a.m. ATVs in the road. Riders stated a tree was down across the trail, had to cut into the roadway, N Row Rd./Heywood Rd. Advised to stay off the road
3:57 p.m. People walking out of woods and changing direction when cars approach, Greenland/Reed Rds.

Thursday -- November 22

12:48 a.m. Loud noises from apartment for three hours, Patriots Way
4:13 p.m. Elderly female walking in Leominster Rd.

Sunday -- November 25

12:15 a.m. Barking dog complaint, Princeton Rd.
9:55 a.m. Beagle chasing coyote in back yard, Beaman Rd.
3:11 p.m. Suspicious vehicle driving in circles, Kilburn Rd.
6:27 p.m. Missing Rhodesian Ridgeback dog, Clinton Rd.

Walking as a health hazard

I had my annual physical. Nothing much to report. I'm in pretty good shape for the shape I'm in.

We live about a quarter-mile from the doctor's office, a nice walk on a cool morning. On the way, a neighbor drives past quickly. She's talking on the phone and  drinking a cup of coffee. She waves a friendly greeting.

When I get to the office, I mention to my doctor that one of my riskiest habits is walking to doctor's office.

When you need a disk drive on a Saturday ...

One of the family desktop computers developed a problem. The disk drive was failing. After tinkering with various disk repair utilities, I determined that we needed to replace the drive.

We were coming in to the Thanksgiving holiday week, with only two days of school, so I didn't hurry to order one online. I figured I could find one at a local store, install it, and set it up over the long weekend.

When you go to Staples, you discover that the disk drive product boxes on the shelves not only do not contain disk drives, but do not even represent disk drives elsewhere in the store. The message on the box says,  Please ask an associate for assistance. I asked. I learned that they don't keep drives in stock. They could order one if I'd like.

After a Thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat and another day around the house, I thought I could pick up a drive at Best Buy and perform the aforementioned transplant.

Almost.

A kind, blue-shirted sales associate pointed out several drives of varying price and capacity. I picked out one and proceeded to the checkout counter. Best Buy in the Greendale Mall in Worcester has an entrance/exit to the mall. We figured that we'd make our purchase and walk around a bit. The checkout was staffed by another blue-shirted associate who told us that we couldn't check out at that checkout station, that we had to go to the front of the store, the side away from the mall entrance.

Fine.

I brought the drive to the checkout. A loud, blue-shirted employee told us that we could use Register 8. The nice blue-shirted cashier took the drive and brought to another desk to remove the do-not-steal tag on the box. She brought the box back, scanned it, and waited for me to pay the $170 or so. I said that was not the price I was expecting, that the sticker on the shelf said $70. I wanted to go back to the shelf, check the price, and, if needed, pick up one that was truly the price I wanted.  The nice blue-shirted cashier told me to wait.  She told the loud blue-shirted employee who called loudly to unseen person to check the price. At this point, three people were trying to figure out if the scanner was incorrect.

There was a good chance that I'd picked up the wrong box. I was fine with that. I wasn't fine with having to wait while they checked their inventory-scanner system. I left.

By the way, the tools on Hiren's BootCD are very good. I was able to clean up the disk enough to muscle out the User directory tree. I have a disk on order from Amazon (next day shipping), but may be able to get a used one from a local repair guy.

This is the part that the retailers don't get. Online shopping isn't about price-matching. It's about having the product I need and letting me buy it easily. A 10-year-old running a lemonade stand knows this. Staples and Best Buy, it seems, don't.

Serenity Prayer as told by Pointy-Haired Boss

Scott Adams has been reading my mail.


While we're at it, here's a bit of background on the prayer.