Computers Launch World Domination Plan

Complicated, globally linked computer systems are supposed to be labor-saving devices. But at what cost?

Last week, I went through the Taco Bell drive through for a quick bite and ordered three supreme chicken soft tacos and a medium gluggable. I estimated that the bill would be around (but under) $8, considering I ordered four items, each of which costs less than $2. When I pulled around, my bill was up over $9. I questioned the woman in the window about it. Because "Chicken Soft Taco Supreme" isn't in their computer system, she punched up a fiesta soft taco, minus avocado sauce and fiesta salsa, plus sour cream and diced tomatoes. Each "additional" item cost me 30 cents per taco; but of course I didn't get any "discount" for removing items.

I argued with her a bit. It didn't make sense to me that one taco ought to cost 60 cents more than another with the same number of toppings, as if sour cream (plenty of cows in Indiana) is much more expensive than avocado sauce (plenty of avocados in Indiana?), and — more to the point — that diced tomatoes cost more than machine-processed salsa with multiple ingredients. In the end, she argued that she couldn't change the way the computer rang up the bill.

(To her benefit, I could tell she was frustrated, but she didn't lose her temper with me, and always kept smiling.)

Computers – 1; Humans – 0

Last Friday, I stopped in at Papa Murphy's Take-n-Bake Pizza. The sign out front advertised a large pepperoni pizza for $6.99. I ordered one half-pepperoni, half-cheese and one with pepperoni, chicken, and diced tomatoes (a great combination after I added diced garlic to it at home). The bill: $23 and change. I had been charged full price ($10.99) for the half-pepperoni pizza.

I asked him about this — after it was wrung up but before I signed the receipt — and was told that, because he had to ring it up with "special" toppings (as opposed to, I don't know, pushing the big red "Pepperoni Pizza" button), it wouldn't ring up as the special, so I had to pay full price.

That's right: I paid $4 to have half the pepperoni removed.

(Why didn't I just order a pepperoni pizza and move the toppings around when I got home? Hindsight being what it is, this is what I should have done. I very rarely order uncooked pizza, so I guess my pizza-ordering habits weren't quite ready to make the shift. Plus, I was so excited that they actually had chicken as a topping choice.)

Computers – 2; Humans – 0

Just now I went to Taco Bell again; this time I went inside. The customer in front of me ordered a simple lunch and gave the cashier his credit card. She ran it through the Credit card machine and waited. And waited. And waited. She ran it through again. More waiting. She ran it through the machine in the drive-through area. More waiting. Apparently, the credit card machine broke just before I got to order (I was paying with a credit card anyway). A couple of other people tried things, but nothing worked.

It must have been 10 minutes of waiting. Not until production slowed to halt — because no one else could order — did someone with some knowledge and authority assess the situation. Yup. It's broken. Cash only.

The guy in front of me and the people waiting in the drive-through got their food for free. I only had a little cash on me and ended up spending less than a third of what I had planned at Taco Bell. Production stopped, customers got frustrated, and Taco Bell lost money, all because one little piece of technology stopped working.

Computers – 3; Humans – 0

Keeping all this in mind makes me wonder if I really should be worried about the big atom smasher in Switzerland.

A New Face(book), and a Surprising Jump in Readership

On Sunday night, I finally opened a Facebook account. Why, after avoiding what will surely become another time sink for so long, did I finally decide to do it. Because I had a reason, for once. The Indiana Wind Symphony now has a Facebook page, and I figured I, as president, ought to be in there, too. (I didn't say it was a good reason.) There are probably a dozen or so other IWS members in there, too, that I've already "friended."

I don't know whether it's related, but this weekend saw a (for me) huge jump in readership on my other blog, Logophilius. I got five new comments from five new people in the last three days. I think that just about matches the number of comments I had gotten the entire year before that.

But, now that I know there are actually some people reading it, I'll have to actually update it more regularly. And I don't mean once-a-year regularly. I'll be happy with once a week.

The Abe Martin Lodge

I took this last week before school off to have a little vacation with the boys. Monday, we went to the Indianapolis Children's Museum. Tuesday, we were going to go to Conner Prairie, but it rained a lot the night before (and it was raining that morning), and I thought it would be too muddy.

This morning (Wednesday), we got on the road at about 11:00 and drove down to brown County State Park and checked into the Abe Martin Lodge, which is where I'm writing this post.

We had come here with Grandma for Easter dinner back in the Spring. At that point, they were in the process of creating a little indoor waterpark (which they laughingly call and "aquatic center"). Now the waterpark is done, so it seemed like the perfect place for a vacation. When we get tired of the waterpark, we're in the middle of Brown County State Park, where we can go hiking, or find a playground, or even leave the grounds and go over to nearby Nashville, Indiana.

So we checked in a little before 2:00. I discovered when I got here that the normal check-in time is 4:00, which I thought was really weird. Luckily, they had a room ready for us anyway.

We spent about an hour in the waterpark after we unloaded our stuff. It's a neat little place: one water slide, a little water volleyball "court," a splash area with all sorts of falling and shooting water, and a hot tub that isn't too hot for kids. The deepest part of the pool is the water volleyball "court," at 5 feet. The majority of the pool is 3.5 feet, including at the bottom of the slide, which means Hollandbeck the Elder has a full run of the pool (he even went down the slide a dozen times, after I talked him into it), and Hollandbeck the Younger has a lot of room to splash around in and have fun.

I have heard that the residents of Nashville are a little pissed off about the waterpark because it isn't open to the public; only registered guests can use it. After being in there, I see why that is a wise choice. If you've ever gone to a public waterpark during the summer, you probably remember how crowded it was — lines for the water slides, people running into each other underwater, all the chairs taken. A waterpark of this size just couldn't handle that many people. You could certainly cram that many people into it, but very few people would have a lot of fun there.

Anyway, it's a nice little place. The rooms are nice, and they're done up in a rustic look. The beds have quilts instead of comforters, and the pillows have quilted covers with a picture of (in our room, at least) big owls on them. The entertainment center, tables, chairs, and headboards are all woodsy, with a lot of bark still on the wood.

Oh, and they have free WiFi. But no free breakfast.

Oral Topography

Talk about a horrible day . . .

 

About a month ago, I discovered a big gap between a couple of molars. I thought one of my old fillings had broken, creating the gap. I let it go because it was just a nuisance at the time.

A couple days ago, it really started to hurt, and the pain expanded through the whole right side of my jaw and up to my ear. It got to be so bad that I left work early and drove over to the Immediadent clinic at Castleton Mall. This was the bad news:

I had a cavity eating its way under an old filling. The sudden gap was most likely caused by a chunk of my tooth falling out and the filling shifting a little into the space left by the cavity. The pain started when the cavity ate its way down to the nerves in the tooth.

I had two options:

• A root canal, which would cost nearly $2,000 and involve a minimum of two visits to the dentist.
  
• I could have it pulled for $288.
  

I mulled it over for a while. It was a tough decision. I hope I made the right one. I had it pulled.

I got to see the tooth after it was pulled. (I wanted to keep it, but apparently the law doesn't allow it.) Teeth are apparently like trees: there's more below the gums than there is above. It seemed like it was huge!

I guess, in the grand scheme of things, I've done well. I went 33 years without requiring any stithces — at least that I can remember. Still . . .

 

Talk about a horrible day . . .

Heather B and Bad Prom Night Memories

[Written on July 10, but posted late.]

I wasn't always the well-adjusted, polite, thoughtful megalomaniac that you know and love today.

Wednesday night, after rehearsal, I stopped in at Starbuck's for a cuppa and ran into Heather B, who was working there part-time. I went to high school with Heather B, and very nearly went to the senior prom with her. In fact, I asked her to go, even though I really didn't want to at the time. But time was running out, and in my teenage mind, getting to the senior prom was a very important thing to do. And there it was, the week before prom, and I didn't have a date.

I found out that Heather didn't have a date yet and asked her. I found out soon after that Stephanie, the German foreign exchange student, didn't have a date either. So I snuffed Heather and asked Stephanie. Now, I don't remember the order in which things happened, but Heather actually said yes to my offer, which means I basically dumped her, leaving her dateless the week before the prom, to take Stephanie.

I felt bad about it at the time, but, if it's possible, I feel worse about it now. It was a really idiotic, selfish, small-minded thing to do. But I think I paid for it. Stephanie was carrying a torch for one of the Schatts twins — maybe even the one who was, at the time, dating my future ex-wife. She (Stephanie) had no interest in me (well, I had no real interest in her, either). I was little more than a way for her to get to the prom without going stag. (Do women go stag? Or do they go doe?)

On top of that, I went with a group that included my own ex-girlfriend, for whom I had mixed feelings. I was definitely the odd man out in this group.

So, Heather B, if by some stretch of the imagination you stumble across this blog post, I apologize for how I treated you during this whole senior prom process. I was a real dick. If it's any consolation, I had a horrible, expensive time, and I'm sure I would have had a better time with you.

Moldy Peaches

I finally saw the movie Juno this weekend. I liked it so much that I watched it again.

"Anyone Else but You" by the Moldy Peaches is my new favorite song. It's the song that Ellen Page and Michael Cera ended the movie with, and I think it captures well what love ought to feel like.

But maybe I'm just a touch too romantic. And maybe I've watched too many movies with happy endings.

Four Fours

I stumbled upon this little brain teaser a few months ago. Since then, I've kept a sheet of paper near my computer that I've added to when something strikes me, and I think I've finally completed it. Here's the puzzle:

1. Start with four fours: 4 4 4 4


2. Add mathematical operators between and around these four fours so that you end up with equations that equal the numbers 1 through 20.

Hint: You'll have to use six different operators, as well as parentheses, to accomplish this.

Here are my answers. Some of these (the first one, is a good example) have more than one possible answer. I went with the one that involves the fewest HTML codes. (And, yes, some of the parentheses are redundant because of the order of operations, but I think they're also easier to read.)

See if you can figure it out, and then click the link below to see my answers.

1. (4 + 4) ÷ (4 + 4)


2. 4 × (4 ÷ (4 + 4))


3. (4 + 4 + 4) ÷ 4


4. (√4 + √4) × (4 ÷ 4)


5. ((4 × 4) + 4) ÷ 4


6. √4 + 4 × (4 ÷ 4)


7. (4 + 4) – (4 ÷ 4)


8. 4 + 4 + 4 – 4


9. 4 + 4 + (4 ÷ 4)


10. 4 + 4 + 4 – √4


11. (4! ÷ √4) – (4 ÷ 4)


12. (√4 + √4 + √4) × √4


13. (4! ÷ √4) + (4 ÷ 4)


14. 4 + 4 + 4 + √4


15. (4 × 4) – (4 ÷ 4)


16. 4 + 4 + 4 + 4


17. (4 × 4) + (4 ÷ 4)


18. 4! – (√4 + √4 + √4)


19. 4! – 4 – (4 ÷ 4)


20. (4 × 4) + (√4 × √4)

Meeting notes

I was pretty tired today because back pain kept me tossing and turning last night. In an afternoon meeting, I even started counting sheep. Here are my notes from the meeting:
Okay, so one of them is really a wolf in sheep's clothing. Either way, it didn't help me fall asleep this afternoon.

FAIL

One of my new favorite blogs: FAIL Blog.

Some happy shots from that blog:

IWS Season Ender

I think that our final concert went well. I got very lucky with the PowerPoint presentation — especially considering that the conductor unknowingly started the second movement before I had even pulled it up on the screen. I've got nothing but compliments about it.

The silent auction, though, was pitiful. We didn't even have two dozen items up for auction. (Last year, we had over 30. But we also had a larger audience.) Last year we made about $1,000; this year we didn't even break $400.

I just don't know what to do to get people in the band to put in some extra work. I know I need to help create a sense of ownership among the band-members, get them invested, so that they will stop just expecting things to happen the way they're supposed to. Most of the people just come and play, and the behind-the-scenes machinations that keep the ensemble going are just SEP: somebody else's problem.

I think we need some measurable goals to work toward. We need both monetary and musical goals, and some way to report how close we are to achieving those goals. That way, it won't just be a string of individual concerts, but a single continuing season. But how do we do that?