21st century begins now

I've entered the new century. Today, I bought a Roomba Discovery robotic vacuum cleaner. It was on sale at Canadian Tire, and I simply could not resist. The Discovery comes with a Home Base for charging the vacuum. After completing the initial charge, I activated the vacuum while the dogs were in the living room. I thought there'd be more commotion, but because the vacuum is relatively quiet and relatively small, the dogs were not intimidated. On the contrary, Buddy was initially aggressive, refusing to yield ground when the Roomba approached. Once he saw that the machine meant him no harm, he allowed it to run without interference.

I was eager to see the Roomba seek its home base, so I activated the "dock" command and watched the Roomba navigate its way back to the Home Base (charging station). It sat there for a few hours charging...

Later in the evening, when the dogs and wife had been put to bed, I activated the Roomba for an actual cleaning cycle. The main level of our home has a front part, and a rear part that is just slightly lower (about 1 inch lower). The Roomba has a sensor that detects drops that are too large to navigate, and the 1 inch drop was sufficient to trigger this detection. Unfortunately, there was one damaged linoleum tile on the lower level that stuck up just enough to fool the sensor into thinking the lower level was not very far away. So, during one of many approaches from the "high" ground towards the "low" ground, the Roomba decided to make the jump. It got hung up on the broken linoleum tile and had to be manually repositioned. At that point, I put up a baby gate to stop the Roomba from approaching the back of the house.

With this path plugged, I was anxious to see whether the Roomba would be able to manouvre itself through all the rooms on the main level (excluding my office, which has far too many loose items - clutter - scattered on the floor). To my surprise, the Roomba did a remarkable job cleaning the area. It found its way into every room during the 45 minutes or so that it was running, and did a decent cleaning job (needing to have its dirt bin emptied three times during that stretch). Being that this was the first time I had tried the Roomba, I was unclear what would happen when the "Power" indicator went from Green to Yellow. I assumed that the unit would start looking for the Home Base to dock itself to, but the unit was busy cleaning an area of the house that was nowhere within sight of the Home Base. On this occasion, I used the remote control to steer the Roomba back into the living room. To my surprise, as soon as it detected the InfraRed beam from the Home Base, the Roomba went into survival mode - totally ignoring my remote commands, and instead finding, then mating with, the Home Base.

The next time I clean, I'll be more patient and see whether the Roomba can actually maintain enough juice to find its Home Base regardless of where it is within the house.

By the way, it did a decent cleaning job, though I wouldn't have been too upset if it hadn't!

I found a video on YouTube that pretty much shows the vacuum in action. While our environment is much more challenging (more furniture, and nothing to stop the Roomba from wandering room-to-room) this video still is interesting. Enjoy.

Windsor, Ontario on review

Yes, I'm from Windsor. It's a small-ish large city (ranked 20th in population in Canada) best known for its strip clubs and its ties to the automotive industry. While the auto industry is in a tailspin, thankfully, the strip clubs have seen their business increasing!

Windsor occasionally makes the national and even international spotlight. Last year, we were featured as the "Sin City" of the north during the Superbowl XL festivities in neighboring Detroit, Michigan. Most recently, Windsor was mentioned on a popular alternative news program. Click on the video below to see what I mean.

I hate computers

OK, it's not computers I hate. It's MICROSOFT. This has been a particularly unhappy week for me thusfar, and it's only Monday! I could have let things pass, but I just suffered a browser crash of monumental proportions, and that was the last straw. Earlier this week (yesterday to be exact), I found that Microsoft's TZEDIT utility is useless. I had used it to update several clients' machines for the Daylight Saving Time situation. It seemed to work as advertised. When I edited the timezone files on various computers ranging from Windows 98 to Windows Me and Windows 2000, the rules seemed to change, and I had confidence that all systems would click over with no issues.

Well, that didn't happen, and I heard from every one of the people whose systems I had "fixed". This made me look incompetent, and I don't like it when someone else makes me look that way.

I also happen to be a dues-paying member of IMDB, and take great pride in contributing many of the episode/cast/crew/plot details for the shows on their website. Today, I was entering information about the episode of Cold Case that was on last night. There were lots of guest appearances on that particular episode, and I was busily entering information for more than 30 individual items. For those not familiar with IMDB, when you submit information, there is a validation process performed by the website. When you enter an actor's name, for example, and there is more than one actor with that name, you are prompted to select which one is the "right" one.

In order to do this, and to ensure that I could quickly alternate between the input screen and a secondary screen used for my internal validation searches, I had two copies of a browser open simultaneously (as opposed to using tabs within a single instance of the browser). During validation, I was informed that one of the names I had submitted as a cast member was not already in the actor database. Rather than saying "Yes, add this person to the database", I decided to do some research to see if this was indeed a brand new actor with no previous credits - as opposed to simply a typographical error on my part.

It was during this search process that Windows decided to crash the browser (whether it was the browser, or Windows task manager that caused the problem is really moot - the bottom line is that the browser window just closed and a system error was displayed). That wouldn't have been so bad, since it was not my data entry browser that suffered the error. But when the browser closed down, BOTH INSTANCES (both independent windows) were terminated. All my work - already completed and saved but just in final verification - was lost. Because this was a web session, and the session was terminated, there was no way for me to resurrect the session cookies that may have been used to control the editing process. My work is out there, somewhere, floating like an orphan in space, but there was no way to get it back. The experience left me so frustrated, I decided not to redo the work. Someone else will have to be the one to record the details of that episode.

And I'm left with a real urge to murder anyone I can find that is somehow responsible for this intolerable piece of shit called Windows.

Congratulations Lancers

The University of Windsor Lancers Men's Basketball team captured it's first OUA (Ontario University Association) championship in nearly 30 years last night. After spending much of the past ten years firmly at the bottom of the pack, a newly hired head coach vowed two years ago to have the Lancers back in the hunt for a championship in only five years. He's three years early on that promise.

Going into last night's game, the Lancers had already made the improbable run to the finals by beating the best ranked teams in its division, including the defending OUA champion in last weekend's semi-final game. Their opponent last night was the Carleton Ravens, ranked #2 in the country, and defending national champions.

Like the March Madness tournament in the U.S., eight teams meet in Halifax to play for the Canadian national championship. Windsor had already been guaranteed a spot in that tournament with its victory last weekend. Last night's game was to determine seeding in the tournament. Even after Windsor's impressive rise to the Ontario finals, they had only been ranked #8 prior to last night's game. It will be interesting how they are seeded in the Halifax tournament.

Happy almost-Daylight-Saving-Time

No, you're not hallucinating. DST comes early this year. Next weekend, in fact. If you're still using an old version of Windows (anything before Windows XP with Service Pack 2 - i.e. Windows XP-SP2) then you will need to tell your computer about the new DST rules. For users of up-to-date operating system versions, the Microsoft Update site takes care of this on its own.

For those of you who are net-savvy, you can find instructions or even utilities to help you update your older operating system without my help. For those of you who don't know how, or want my help anyway, just send an email to DST[at]safe-and-secure-computing.com and I'll send you a return email with a small utility and detailed instructions.

Getting busier

From the standpoint of work, things are getting busier. I've been fielding calls from all over, and even was called by a local radio station to offer advice to those who might experience problems with the Daylight Saving Time coming into force earlier than normal this year. People with relatively new computer operating systems will not have to worry, but if you have portable devices that do not synch to a central server (such as wristwatches, PDAs, some cell phones, home appliances with timers, etc.) or if you are using an out of date operating system or scheduling software, then you will need to take some action.

I've been working on artwork for a new rear-window banner for my business vehicle. I thought I was ready to take it to the sign maker, until I received some very important feedback. It looks like I'll need to reconsider some elements of the artwork before I commit it to vinyl.

We got a new dog at the end of January and that's working out really well. He's fully integrated into the family now, and has a personality all his own. Despite having him for nearly a month, none of my family members have seen him yet. I'm looking forward to the inevitable introductions sometime soon.

Tomorrow, I return to the sleep clinic for my next sleep apnea test. I'm already using a CPAP machine based on the result of my first sleep study in December. But the doctor thinks I have a more serious condition that might require a Bi-PAP machine. We'll see how things go...

Dad would have been proud!

My father grew up in Europe during the depression. He was a big believer in conservation, and never throwing anything away that could be used again. For his 84th birthday, two months before he died, my wife and I had baked him a birthday cake and placed two candles, an "8" and a "4" on the cake. We joked with him that we would save those candles for my wife's 48th birthday, which was to take place four months later. To honour his memory, we kept those candles, and did, indeed, use them for that occasion. Fast forward nearly three years...

I've blogged before about the coincidence of both my grandchildren being born on the same date, four years apart. Today is their birthday. They turn 8 and 4 respectively. And we plan to use those very same candles for their cakes.

Dad would have been proud.

Nothing happens around here

It's not that I don't enjoy keeping up this blog. I do, really! But what the heck are you supposed to write about when absolutely nothing is happening? Every day seems to be like every other. I don't do very much of anything... interesting or otherwise. If I try to focus on any one day and try to recall something memorable, I fail. If it wasn't for the written log I keep for business expense purposes, I wouldn't be able to remember anything distinctive about any recent day.

So, I choose not to write when there is nothing to write about. The only reason for this post is so I can say I posted in January.

That is all.

Happy New Year!

The new year will be happier for some than others. Today at lunch, we went to the same restaurant we always go to on Saturday mornings... the same one that hosted my wife's surprise 50th birthday. Nothing is weird about going to this place on Saturdays. What is weird is that on Friday night, we couldn't think of anywhere to go to dinner, so we went to our usual Saturday spot. As we prepared to go again for lunch today, we even toyed with the idea of going somewhere else, until I mentioned that the owner might have a heart attack if we didn't show up at our usual time to sit at our usual table.

So we went. And it wasn't there. I don't mean the business had closed overnight. I mean the building (or at least most of it) wasn't there. The owner was standing in the deserted parking lot, along with what seemed to be half the Windsor Fire Department. But the building was gone, except for some cinderblock facia. This restaurant has had a sports theme, and there was a ton of priceless memorabilia inside -- signed jerseys and rare photographs of deceased sports legends, and the like.

It will take some time to determine the cause of the blaze, and the owner has indicated he intends to rebuild and reopen (thank goodness!), but for now, a lot of good people will have been thrown out of their jobs, and the owner will have to live with second doubts about whether there was any way he could have foreseen this circumstance. Early coverage of this event is already on the internet and will probably appear in the next issue of the local paper.

I wish him, and all you readers out there, the best of new years.

Merry Christmas

Sure, I wish there was world peace. But in lieu of that, this is the next best thing.

The Funeral

Max's funeral was today. It's mid-December, and the weather was wonderful. There was a bit of condensation from the previous day, but otherwise, the weather was agreeable -- not even cold enough to see your own breath in the air!

The funeral services were well attended, and the procession to the cemetery was long and very impressive. Max was truly well-liked. At the gravesite, the earth was soft and easy to shovel, and many took part in the honour of heaping dirt onto the casket. Back at the wake, there was much food and many people available to do the prayers. It remains to be seen how many men show up this week for the twice-daily prayer meetings, but today, there was a lot of respect shown for Max's memory.

Moratorium on Florida and California Death Penalty is stupid

This post is not about whether the death penalty is justifiable or constitutional. It is about the laughable state of affairs currently existing in Florida and California, two states that currently have the death penalty. It seems that there have been recent botched attempts to put inmates to death in these states, and because of the possibility that the inmates' constitutional protection against cruel or unusual punishment may have been violated by these botched attempts, executions in general have been placed on hold.

Let's examine the insanity of these claims. If we assume that the only people who are actually strapped to the tables are those whose appeals have all been exhausted (and I'm not speaking of guilt or innocence here -- that's fodder for another debate entirely), it seems clear that by this time, it is the state's intent to kill these people. At the rate of something less than 10 executions per year, and no way to do "dry runs" on real people, it's understandable that some procedural errors are going to occur due to lack of practice. After all, when you're trying to stick a hypodermic needle into the arm of someone who doesn't want it there, you might make a mistake caused by stress or personal discomfort. And those types of errors, while not intentional, may cause distress to the inmate when the chemicals start to enter his/her system.

So what constitutes cruel or unusual punishment? My opinion is that to qualify as "cruel", these infractions must be intentional in nature (i.e. wanton torture, either physical or emotional -- which is intended to harass or degrade the inmate). The lawful application of a final judgement, to me, does not constitute an intentional infraction, even if a procedural error occurs in the process.

When you examine any punishment that requires that an inmate be prepared prior to execution, either by being strapped to a table with hypodermic needles inserted, or strapped to a chair with electrodes affixed, there is a possibility that the preparatory procedure will be botched. It is indeed possible that lethal injection, death by hanging, and death by electrocution are prone to a greater degree of error in the preparation. I believe the only process that makes sense is death by firing squad. Human firing squads can practice on dummy targets without a great deal of preparation, and the skills required to deliver death by firing squad are not any different from the skills required to kill in combat, making the act less "unusual" than that of hanging, electrocuting, or injecting someone. However, in this day and age, I don't believe it is fair to place the psychological burden on a human firing squad. The introduction of robotic "marksmen" with laser sighting technology that could home in on a target patch affixed to the inmate over a vital organ would allow for virtually instantaneous death.

If states wish to repeal their laws authorizing executions, let them do so. But while these laws are on the books, the use of a firing squad as a means of execution should allay everyone's fears about cruel or unusual punishment.

Mixed feelings

The last 24 hours have been strange. It started yesterday morning at the daily prayer meeting. One of the guys was holding the latest version of the Jewish Community Centre news magazine. It's published three times a year, and the Chanukah issue had just hit the streets. I have an ad in that publication, so I took a look. My ad had been professionally prepared based on a concept I had sent to the artist, and it looked perfect. It was also in a great location within the publication. If that didn't brighten my spirits enough, my friend Max had come up to me, that perpetual twinkle in his eye, and commented on how nice my hand-writing was. I had sent Max and his wife a card thanking them for their patronage, and wishing them a happy holiday.

Among the thoughts in my note was how I appreciated his efforts in organizing the breakfast that is served to members of the congregation that show up for Sunday morning prayers. I had been thinking about donating some food to help out with that breakfast, and after weeks of procrastinating, I finally decided to take the plunge for this Sunday's meal.

I tried to call Max to find out when I could deliver the frozen food to him but his line was busy, so I tried someone else who I know has a key to the synagogue. He told me that Max had passed away during the night.

You never know when you, or someone you know, will leave this earth. I'm so glad that the last words I had with Max were kind and pleasing. And though I'm saddened that he won't be around anymore to help brighten each day, I know that his time on earth was wisely spent, and that he will now be honoured for his efforts.

Keeping busy

Yeah, I've been keeping busy, but that heading isn't about me. Right now on TV, there's a movie called After the Thin Man. There's a bit player in the movie who I think is named Lee Phelps. He reminds me of Ed Asner. In fact, I thought it was Ed Asner, until I realized that in 1936, Ed Asner wouldn't have looked that old. I looked up Lee Phelps on IMDB, and discovered that this actor had been cast in nearly 600 movies during his career. Which got me to wondering whether any other actor in history has been in more movies. If anyone wants to do the research and let me know in the comments area, I'd be curious to know.

Blind Hatred

I want to start with a statement of fact. I don't watch political commentators on TV, nor do I listen to them on radio. Such commentators, regardless of their political views, are on the air to get ratings. Without ratings, they have no platform. Therefore, I believe, specially during "sweeps week", the shows that would be broadcast are more inflammatory in nature than you would normally find.

That being said, there is no denying that there are places in the world where blind hatred is taught to an entire society, beginning with the children. As a Jew, I have experienced personal persecution during my lifetime. Sometimes, the persecution was the result of child peer pressure ("he's a Jew, it's alright to pick a schoolyard fight with him -- we'll back you up"), sometimes it was the result of "innocent" remarks ("I went to a store to buy something, and I Jewed the guy down a few bucks").

The thing about being brought up with blatant persecution is that you develop a thick skin. You weigh things carefully, trying to determine whether a particular person's actions are the result of ignorance, or hatred. At a recent prayer meeting, a friend of mine asked whether I had seen the Glenn Beck show about Radical Islamic Fundamentalism and the hatred that is taught to their children. I had not seen it, and took some time today to search for a replay on YouTube. I found a video and watched it. It was disturbing. I wanted to post a link to it here, but instead, found another copy of the video with the ability to "embed" the video on a website.

I have chosen to embed that second recording, even though it is not the exact copy I watched. I'm telling you this in case there are problems with the video. If there are, I urge you to go to YouTube and search for "Glenn Beck Exposed". That should result in a suitable video link being delivered. In my original search, I found many show snippets of a few minutes each. There were only two links I found that were at least 40 minutes long (the actual play time, minus commercials).

Here's the embedded link:

Updates

Though each event on its own merits little mention, as a whole, things are moving in a positive direction. Having suffered through a slow October, November is starting out in a positive light, vis-a-vis business. I've had enough service calls during the first two weeks of the month to match the previous two month's revenue (that's not necessarily a major accomplishment, just a fact). I've also been approached to possibly provide a business service that might generate recurring revenue.

Speaking of recurring revenue, I've taken a couple of baby steps forward on one of my pet projects. Having acquired some much-needed research material through ebay, I'm making real progress towards bringing one of my other website ideas to fruition. It might take some time, but I'm hoping things will work out in the end.

On yet another front, I was cruising ebay a couple of weeks ago when I got the crazy idea to check out automobile GPS units. I happened across an auction with less than 1 minute left, and the current price was ridiculously low. I tried to snipe a bid, but by the time I had logged in and done everything necessary, the auction had ended. I was a bit annoyed (though I had no real reason to be), and started looking through some of the other GPS auctions, coming across one that had about 6 minutes remaining.

There was barely enough time to finish reading the product details and place a bid. I won that auction, and three days later took delivery of the GPS unit. It's been an absolutely wonderful toy, helping me navigate to a couple of service calls to obscure side streets that I would have otherwise had to print mapquest details for. I particularly enjoy watching it reroute itself when I purposely make an incorrect turn. With my wife planning to travel out of town this weekend, it will be a perfect navigation companion.

Well, that's about it. You're now up to date!

It's over

I guess I'm a bit disappointed there won't be any hoopla this weekend now that the Tigers have lost the World Series. But I'm also happy that television can get back to normal. The playoffs always last too long for my liking.

The one really bad thing for Fox TV is that the ratings for this series were miserable, and since it was a short series to boot, the network is going to lose a lot of money on this year's deal. Oh well...

Ouch!

Our neighbors in Detroit are stinging from the spanking handed to them in Game 1 of the World Series by upstart St. Louis. All those lovely pictures of the Detroit skyline that you may have seen on the broadcast were taken from across the river - right here in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. Hopefully, some time during the series, the people at Fox might turn the cameras the other way and catch a glimpse of our side of the river. Fair is fair...

Baseball Fever

Just across the river, baseball fever is going strong in Detroit. Our cities hosted the Superbowl earlier this year, and now, it's time for a World Series. I'm glad Detroit won their game today, because if they had to play tomorrow, there would be three professional sports teams playing within a 1 mile radius, with the Tigers and Lions occupying adjacent stadiums, and the Red Wings playing at Joe Louis Arena, less than a mile away. Traffic won't be so bad now!

If the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Mets, the World Series will be a rematch of the 1968 Series. That year, Detroit came back from a 3-1 deficit to defeat the Cardinals. Baseball fever is growing.

Go get 'em, Tigers!

An unpopular opinion - on the record

I think the crash of Cory Lidle's plane into a New York building was a suicide. After a horrendous pitching performance in the deciding game of the Detroit / New York playoff series - a performance that allowed 3 runs to be scored by four consecutive hitters in the fifth inning, I think Cory was unable to handle the pressure of facing his teammates and management. Some witnesses to the crash indicated that the plane was acting erratically before the crash. My guess is that Cory was trying to crash the plane, while the instructor accompanying him on the flight was doing all he could to prevent the crash.

Maybe investigators will be able to shed some light on the root cause, but with such a small plane, I'm not sure there is the kind of tracking equipment that would allow such an analysis to be carried out. We'll just have to wait and see.