My kids get mad at me when I can’t remember some event which they remember vividly. I tell them over and over that my brain, much like a hard drive has limited capacity. Everything that comes into my brain must be evaluated for retention or deletion. That is, I tell them that if I keep that memory, I have to throw something else away! I also explain that it could be dangerous especially when driving. What if I throw away the part of my brain where I store how to drive a car? We could end up in a ditch just because they wanted me to remember Justin Bieber is no longer dating Selina Gomez. This doesn’t go over well with them but it is the best way to explain how I just can’t remember anything else. When they ask me when the coliseum was built I ask if they can name the seven layers of networking? I have to remember that for work. Work could care less if I know who is dating who and if my family wants to live off my income I better remember work stuff first. Someday maybe we will figure out some way to increase our capacity with a brain transplant or maybe some near-line storage which will allow me to retrieve these rarely used facts. When they ask I could say, give me a minute I will retrieve that for you. Then in a minute or so the fact will appear in my memory I can tell them the answer and then wipe it. This would save me a lot of eye rolling and exasperated sighs. Then again I would probably just fill it with useless facts about music and computers and still be useless in a teen conversation!

I just read this unbelievable story! Turns out Sprint has a problem with the GPS on their system that makes people using the find their phone app believe the lost phone is at this mans house. Not only the app but 911 has called his house saying they have gotten  cell calls about domestic situations at his home! You can read the story here.

I laugh about this but this is a major issue for this guy and for sprint. As we rely more and more on technology for everything, some of the bugs are life threatening! The reality is every software, hardware or any technology we use has bugs. The developers track them and know most of them. Typically they decide at some point to release to the public knowing there will be issues and that they will have to patch things along the way. Some times like in this case, no one could have seen this issue until it arose after release. To me it is a tolerance issue for each company. Release it early with too many bugs and the public gets mad. Wait till it is perfect and risk being scooped or going broke. The companies that do this the best are the ones that release a good product after sufficient testing, but then respond even quicker when something happens once released. We will have to see how Sprint does with this one.

I looked at the calories in a bag of Nacho Cheese Dorrito’s. It said 140 calories for 1oz. 1oz.? So basically I can lick the cheese flavor from my fingers but eating any chips will put me over a serving! This has gotten ridiculous! I saw a coke commercial last night that was touting how they are a responsible company only putting juice and water in schools and are moving to mini size cans in most stores. They will still sell the two liter bottles but because they are going to sell their sugar-water in mini cans we can all feel that Coke is doing their part to save the world! What happen to my personal responsibility in all this? I guess the government feels I am too stupid to be able to stop eating and drinking until I explode like the guy in that old Monte Python movie. The problem is we have gotten to the point where we can’t call it like it is anymore. If I eat too much, I get fat! If I am fat my insurance company should be able to charge me more for healthcare because I will spend more on doctors. If I spend more at the doctors he should be able to charge me for all those visits or at least buy a big boat to go fishing in on my bills! That is after he pays for the enormous student loans he racked up going to medical school. Instead we take from this to subsidize that, till everything is as useless as a pair of left shoes. All this in the name of being “fair”. I am waiting for someone to come up with a chip bag that automatically locks for 24 hours when you’ve eaten the “portion-control police” serving size. Actually don’t steel that one. I am going to sell it to Frito Lay. I think we need to have a day when we protest this over active, control freak government of ours. We could stand on the steps of our local government building and eat a whole bag of Dorrito’s and wash it down with a 2 liter bottle of our favorite soda! That would show them!

This weekend I walked into our living room to find one of our cats on our couch playing a game on the iPad. If that isn’t a sign of the coming of the end, I don’t know what is? Apparently, there are games you can download for your cat. This one makes a red dot randomly move all over the screen and the cat scores points for hitting the red dot with her paw. I also saw at the pet store a wi-fi collar for your dog that allows you to see where they are and it will text you. What is next, a virtual hamster wheel? What about a virtual fish friend? I weep for our society and what is becoming an increasingly distracted set of priorities.  We have reached some sort of non-sensical threshold to which I fear there is no return. I am all for the ethical treatment of animals but I am going to eat them for dinner! I love my dogs but getting text during the day from them is just more than I can handle! The more we spend our time on these distractions is less time we spend on what is really important. Taking care of our families and our fellow-man is what we need to be about. Look up Luke 14 or James 1:26. If we spend more time doing these things, the rest will fall into place.

I am terrible with names! People tell me their name and I have forgotten it by the time it leaves their mouth. I feel terrible when I do this. I spend the rest of the conversation trying to remember what they said it was. Bob? No, that isn’t it. Maybe it was Greg, they look like a Greg to me! Sometimes I realize that I haven’t been paying attention to what they were saying because of the conversation going on in my head. When I meet them at some later date, I have to go through verbal gyrations because I know who they are but I haven’t got a clue what their name is. My wife will get upset at me for not introducing her to someone but I can’t say, “This is my wife, but I forget your name”. She has asked me afterward. Who was that? I have to tell her I don’t remember. I have tried a few tricks like repeating the person’s name back to them.  I even got that wrong. “Didn’t you say your name was Mark”? Maybe I should start taking Ginkgo biloba, or have my ears checked. Maybe then when I meet someone I know I don’t have to muddle through the inevitable awkwardness of trying to talk to them without knowing who they are!

I work for a tech support company who supports many client. We have multiple departments that do different things. I had to call a person in one of these other groups to let them know there was an issue at a facility we support. It was a friendly “heads up” incase they got a call about it. The problem was this person kept me on the phone for thirty minutes telling me about everything under the sun! I don’t mind friendly chatter when you call someone, or even a quick rabbit trail conversation. Don’t tell me your life story! I don’t want to know that you wish your dog was more active! I don’t want to know your child is on the honor roll, I just want to get back to what I have to get done! Especially if I don’t really know you! Why is it some people feel the need to tell me these things? Maybe I should change careers and become a therapist, because it seem people want to tell me their issues. At least if I am getting paid to listen it work annoy me as much!

I went to the eye doctor and said I can’t see anymore. Her response, your just older! I talked to a running coach and he said I need to be careful about injuries, being older!  I watched my hair fall to the ground as it is cut, and I didn’t recognize the color? When did this happen? Why haven’t we figured out how to stop time yet? One moment I was riding my motorcycle without a helmet. The next I am nursing old injuries? So I am 2 years from 50! This means I have set some crazy goals to prove to myself I’m not dead yet.  I am going to run a marathon, if my leg doesn’t fall off first. Yes I am nursing an injury. My ultimate goal is to run the Pikes Peak marathon. That is to the top (14,114 ft) and back. Today as I rub my sore leg I think this is stupid. What will this prove? Mostly that I am off my rocker! Tomorrow when I see some young kid on a motorcycle blow past me on the highway, I will think it is a noble cause! Maybe someday I will embrace my age and look at it as a badge of honor, but that day just hasn’t come yet. Right now I am fighting it!

There was a shooting at a local bar. The news story said a man had been shot to death by security after brandishing a gun and threatening people. The news anchor said that this bar over the last year had 215 police incidents over the last year. This is the best part, the liquor board was investigating if this bar was a trouble spot! The police were called to this bar, on average ever 1.7 days in the last year but we are not sure if it is a “trouble spot”? I do not frequent bars but I wonder if calling the cops every 1.7 days is not an issue, what is? Shouldn’t death be a marker of trouble? How about dismemberment? I would like to think I am not one to over react to a situation, but I want to sit in on the liquor board meeting in which they go over all the bars that had deaths in the past month. I can see them discussing whether a single death counts or do they rank them by shots fired? Well this bar had only one shooting so they are ok, but this other bar served alcohol to a minor so lets close them! I think I will go out on a limb and say this bar needs a time out, and if the liquor board can’t figure this one out. They do too!

So, this year like every year I need to remind myself of a few things before the year gets away from me. You know, those things I should aways remember like, always have on clean underwear when you get into an accident. Never mind what your body does when hit with a large trauma it is still a good thing because when you wake from the coma you can tell your mother that they were clean before it all went down. Maybe that isn’t a good example? I mean things like, try something new this year! I get stuck in a rut and I need to try new things. That is why I started this blog. I need to get better about writing and this is a good way to hone my skills. Second, I need to find new ways to tell my wife, I love her. If I keep doing what I did for the last twenty-two years it becomes a habit with no meaning. I need to express it in a way that makes her feel special. This is going to take some thought! I can’t just make it simple like re-wiring the home theater so she can figure out the remotes. No, it has to be something that will say she means the world to me, without the cost of buying the world. So knowing I am a man and frankly just don’t get women, I better start trying to figure this out today. It will probably take me till next Christmas to get it right!

Forget JFK or aliens, I have a real conspiracy on my hands. It is dress socks. Rather it is the unexplainable disintegration of them after I buy them! I am on to the manufacturers little games! I buy them in packs of six and for six glorious days I have perfect pairs in my drawer. I get up I shower I find a pair and put them on. That is until they go into the hamper, then the real nefarious deeds begin. Never are any of them found again in a pair! I can find one of them but never two, unless one has a hole in the toe. I believe they make one out of a material that dissolves in the wash. I’m tired of spinning them around to have the hole on the pinky toe. I run around the house until I am ten minutes late for work! Then when I finally give up I wear two very close but not a pair socks, I know they are not! I even made a feeble attempt to fool the sock steeling elves by purchasing two six packs of the same color, but this made them mock me. Socks of other colors showed up paired in my drawer, but not the ones I purchased. I am installing a webcam over my sock drawer to catch whoever my tormentor is and will report back my findings at a later date!