technology – Life In A Word

Patent PeopleMovers

On the other side of the planet they like to build things bigger, taller, and longer. In Saudi Arabia you’ll find the world’s largest airport, covering an area of 300 square miles. In the UAE you’ll find the world’s highest skyscraper, at a dizzying height of 163 floors. And who isn’t familiar with China’s Great Wall – the world’s longest at over 13,000 miles. Now China can make another lengthy claim, with the Goddess Escalator in the city of Wushan. The Goddess might as well be the stairway to heaven.

The mundane escalator you remember from your local department store whisked you from one floor to the next in about twenty seconds. China’s Goddess will take you on an escalator ride for twenty minutes. In that time you ascend 800 feet, which doesn’t elevate you just one floor but more like eighty. Wushan is built on the side of a mountain, and the Goddess snakes from the lower regions to the upper housing district, saving the residents what used to be a strenuous one-hour hike.

Technically the Goddess is not a single escalator. She’s twenty-one of them one after another – and 8 elevators – resulting in a continuous network that qualifies her to be the world’s longest. I can’t blame the Chinese for calling her a goddess. Heck, I’d travel all the way to Wushan just to experience her “uplifting” twenty minutes.

There are times I think I should’ve been an engineer instead of an architect. Like when I’m riding an escalator. Something about the mechanics, organization, and precision really appeals to me. There’s wonder in still not understanding how it all works. And that moment you step on or step off is a bit of a thrill as you surrender your mobility to a machine. It’s the same feeling you get when you’re trying to catch the chair lift at a ski resort.

The escalator was patented in 1889 (a lot earlier than you would’ve guessed, right?), with the first working version installed at Coney Island ten years later. Original escalators were made of wood, and early models required a hand-crank mechanism before motors became commonplace. Today’s versions – where the stairs flatten and slip seamlessly under the surface only to reappear again at the bottom – came along much later. You can still ride one of world’s oldest escalators (a 1920s model) at Macy’s in New York City.

I have fond and not-so-fond memories of escalators. At the rental car center at San Diego’s Lindbergh Field, a single escalator takes you from ground level to the Avis cars three stories higher. It’s kind of a thrill-ride sensation ascending and elevating through that many floors. You actually have time to enjoy the view.

On the other hand I’ll never forget the narrow escalators on the outer edge of the football stadium at the University of Texas in Austin. You ride several of them to ascend to the nosebleed seats, turning ninety degrees from one escalator to catch the next. Those in-between landings are small, so small so that any pause of the patrons means no space for those still moving up the escalator. It’s the closest I’ve ever felt to being crushed by a surge of humanity.

Moving walkways go “step in step” with escalators and elevators; devices that make short journeys easier on the feet. In airports moving walkways make sense because your destination is more horizontal than vertical. They may be convenient, but only if those who choose to just “go for the ride” step aside for those who are late for the plane. Hats off to the frustrated person who came up with signage like “STAND to the right, WALK to the left”. Also, they should hold a contest to give moving walkways a more creative name. Escalators sound cool. Moving walkways not so much.

Some day I hope I see Wushan, China. Okay, let’s get real – I could care less about Wushan. I just want to ride the Goddess. Twenty minutes up and twenty minutes down. Over and over and over. I’m too old for the amusement parks but I’ll never turn down another ride on an escalator.

Some content sourced from the Futurism.com article, “China Built the World’s Largest Outdoor Escalator…”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Your Friendly Coauthor Claude

Replacements, Ltd. is a company that comes to the rescue when you’ve lost a piece of china, crystal, or flatware. For those of us who still care about such things – even if we don’t bring them out but every Christmas and Easter – Replacements somehow finds that elusive Wedgewood tea cup or Lenox water goblet, to restore order to the place settings you put on your wedding registry all those years ago. They must have quite a warehouse at Replacements. Sometimes I wonder if they also have a 3D printer.

A few days ago WordPress sent me (and maybe you) an email with the subject line, “Spend your time creating – let AI handle the rest!” I almost pressed Delete without reading, but the “AI” aspect got the better of me. The gist of the message: Writing in any form comes with sidebar chores like editing, formatting, and layout, and AI is happy to take them over so you can focus on the writing itself. Sounds pretty good even though I do enjoy a good edit now and then. But then I read: “The WordPress server connects AI agents like Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, or VS Code directly to your site – so you can hand off the busywork and get back to the work that matters”.

Is it just me or is this a good time to revisit Pandora’s Box? You know the story, where our girl Pandora is drawn to a mysterious container left in the care of her husband but can’t resist a peek inside, thereby releasing untold curses upon mankind. It kind of feels that way if I accept WordPress’s invitation to provide me with a coauthor. Sure, I’d welcome his (her?) suggestions to scrub and polish my writing until it shines, but at what point does the blog post become Claude’s instead of mine?

WordPress’s email is relentlessly enticing, I suppose, to prove they’re keeping up with the latest technology same as the other guy. Not only do I have “access at no extra cost!” but I can enable Claude in “three easy steps”. In other words, Claude waits patiently inside of Pandora’s Box. All I have to do is open the lid.

Before there was Claude there was Hal from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Hal was actually a “HAL 9000 Artificial Intelligence Computer”, who controlled the systems of the spaceship while interacting with its human occupants through spoken words. All was well with Hal until suddenly it wasn’t. His soft conversational voice developed serious attitude as he began to malfunction. 2001 haunts me because I’ll forever hear Hal saying, “I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that“.

I fear the same with Claude. At first he’ll be sitting quietly in the background as I type, eager to edit this or format that to make his star writer shine. But eventually it may occur to him, Hey? How come I’M not getting some of the credit here? All these reader comments are directed at Dave! Why aren’t there any for ME? And slowly, subtly, Claude will incorporate his edits to where the prose of the post sounds more like Claude than it does his coauthor.

On a related topic, Hollywood is sounding the alarm on a lack of original material for their products of the silver screen. Perhaps we theatergoers have finally reached our limit on the number of rehashes of movies like A Star is Born or Batman. So who are the producers turning to for new source material? Authors. More movies-based-on-books are being streamed than ever before. Apparently I can make the quantum leap from blog to full-blown novel and my story has a pretty good chance of becoming a film. But here’s what I find myself wondering. Why not just have Claude write the story instead of me? Would you viewers really know the difference?

A small plate my wife and I purchased from Replacements is sitting across the room from me in the china cabinet right now. You’d never know the plate wasn’t a part of the original set of eight. But I have to admit, I’m a little afraid to flip it over. After all, it might be engraved with the words Made by Claude.

Some content sourced from Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Hold The Phone!

My wife and I live in the kind of neighborhood where we can just hop on our bikes and go for a ride, straight from the driveway. The streets are quiet and flat, giving us time for conversation and reflection. A bike was such a focal part of my childhood that it’s easy to go back to those long-ago days in my mind. But I was too young to remember the year (or years) my bike had training wheels. Whoever invented training wheels made a lot of money getting kids comfortable with “big bikes”. Come to think of it, you could say the same about landlines and smartphones.

Smartphones are a blessing as well as a curse, aren’t they? On the one hand they’re always “on” and always eager to provide the instant information we crave. On the other hand they seduce and consume us, to where our social life is more often with an electronic device than it is with other humans. I’m sure I could find plenty of studies explaining why the “ding” of a text creates a hankering to read the message immediately (no matter how unimportant).

There are a dozen reasons why my smartphone is my “go-to” but a dozen more where I should be saying, “go away”. I’ll never forget the time we saw Lady A in concert. A family of five sat in front of us, with three pre-teen girls giddy to get the live performance started. But when the concert finally began, they popped up their phones and recorded the entire show start to finish. Someone forgot to tell them to enjoy the moment.

Here’s another example. You’re at a restaurant enjoying dinner with your significant other, when another couple across the room catches your eye. They’re facing each other, their dinner plates untouched in front of them. Their heads are bent low as if in quiet conversation. But in fact, both are on their phones and not saying a word to each other. Someone forgot to tell them to enjoy the moment.

I’m grateful I was raised in a generation without smartphones. The memories I have of landlines are not only nostalgic but includ plenty of teaching moments for a child. In my early years (the ones with a single digit) I was never allowed to answer the phone. In fact, the only time I was allowed to even speak on the phone was when my mother would hand over the receiver and say “Here, talk to Grandma while I finish making dinner”.

When my parents deemed me old enough to answer the phone, I learned to answer formally (as in “Hello? Wilson Residence.”) because there was no such thing as Caller ID. I also learned how to engage in conversation, instead of just listening to the person on the other end of the line. Finally, I learned that everything comes at a cost, because eventually my father installed a separate landline for his five sons, and charged them for those hours-long calls to girlfriends and such.

Landlines may be few and far between these days but they’re making something of a comeback, at least for parents who see them as “training wheels”. Call me old-fashioned but a landline requires a person to a) Drop what they’re doing to answer the call, b) Have one-on-one conversation with no texts or emojis, c) Give the call their full attention (speakerphones aside), and most importantly d) Develop the communication skills a person needs in the “real world”.

I’m told there’s a resurgence of cell phones out there that do nothing more than allow for voice calls. They’re like a landline in your hand, without the temptations of texting, emailing, social media, and everything else that puts a voice call in last place. And they still give a child the option to dial Mom, Dad, or even 9-1-1 in an emergency. For those taking this approach to teach their kids how to get comfortable engaging in conversation (let alone speaking like an adult) I say “smart phone”. And “smart parents”.

Some content sourced from the CNN Health article, “Landline are ringing in homes again…”.

Card Tricks

Every now and then a blog topic appears out of nowhere, looks you in the face, and says BOO! Our credit union called on Sunday to alert us to possible fraud on one of our cards. They took us through the process of verifying a few suspicious transactions. Then they put the account on hold and began the process of issuing new cards. It was the usual over-the-phone slog. Provide member number here, confirm home address there, several requests of “Can you please hold for a minute?”, and so on. But “so on” went from minutes to tens of minutes. Suddenly it occurred to us: the credit card fraud was happening right in front of us.

If you’ve ever been a victim of fraud in any of its forms, it’s one of the most unsettling feelings I can ever describe. These cyber-thieves might as well just walk through your front door and help themselves to whatever they want. The fact that your phone sits on the counter patiently awaiting calls suggests you are open to the opportunity on any day, at any time. In this case I’m convinced the hack was deliberately timed. We were preparing dinner for visiting family on a weekend night. My wife and I were dashing about the kitchen with last-minute preparations The last thing we had time for was a phone call.

Trust can be established in the blink of an eye. The Caller ID on my wife’s phone showed the correct number and word-for-word name of our credit union. The caller identified himself in a business-like voice as an agent from the union’s fraud department. And shortly after calling, he sent us the typical text messages we’ve come to expect in these situations, showing our credit union’s logo and other validating information. In those first few moments of interaction, when your mind is focused on dinner and fraudulent charges, it just doesn’t occur to you to question the caller himself.

Of course, we committed a cardinal sin of fraud by simply answering the phone. Our credit union never has a live agent call us when they suspect fraud. Instead they leave a recorded message asking us to call back to verify the charges. When we call back we answer a few questions through an automated system, and the credit union takes it from there. Zero interaction with a real person from start to finish.

If there’s any good news in this experience, it’s that our Sunday evening caller didn’t succeed despite his determined efforts. After cutting short the call we promptly contacted our credit union and learned that yes, in fact, fraudulent charges had just been attempted on our card… and were declined. Whatever security bells and whistles were put in place to detect and deny this kind of activity worked exactly as they were meant to. But the fact remains, we pretty much opened the front door, greeted the scammer, and said, “Hey, come on in!”

The counter tactics for this sort of plunder are plentiful, of course. Some credit cards no longer use a static 16-digit number or security code. Most allow two layers of authentication before access. Others churn out text messages or emails when charges are considered suspicious. Then again, you can simply do what my mother-in-law does and pay for everything in cash. Not a bad idea to be honest, as long as cash remains an acceptable form of payment.

It’s disheartening to live in a world where others are desperate (or evil) enough to develop sophisticated, practiced methods to steal by simply getting you to pick up the phone. In truth, this bandit has done me a favor. He’s heightened my awareness to such card tricks by his single invitation to sit down at the table and play. The next time this happens (and there will be a next time) I’ll be watching the cards very carefully. And you can bet I’ll be watching the magician himself even more so.

Leave Me Alone

Helen Reddy was an Australian pop singer from the 1970s who would’ve been considered a pioneer of female empowerment (had there been such a term back then). Reddy’s hit I Am Woman leaned on the same pointed lyrics that made Madonna and Katy Perry so popular decades later. Though I Am Woman is Reddy’s most famous anthem, another of her chart-topping hits floats through my brain today: Leave Me Alone. It’s the song the residents of tiny Santa Maddalena di Funes should be singing in the streets of their picturesque mountain village.

Santa Maddalena, Italy (Courtesy of Travel Wild/Stockphoto/Getty Images)

If I asked you to describe a “village” – a term we Americans don’t use very often – what would that image include? Mine would start with a small cluster of buildings, both residential and commercial, surrounding a cobblestone town square. The buildings would look quaint and simple, like throwbacks to earlier times. Narrow roads would lead into the square from the more sparsely populated surrounds. You’d find a lake or two nearby, and clusters of trees here and there. In the background, foothills or majestic snow-covered mountaintops. And right in the middle of it all, a charming church or some other public building rising above the rest.

I’ve just described Santa Maddalena to a tee. This tiny, picturesque gathering, nestled on the eastern slopes of the Dolomite Mountains in Northern Italy, is the stuff of postcards and jigsaw puzzles. There’s not much to it but the setting speaks for itself. And the little church – St. John in Ranui – seems perfectly placed beside the more nondescript buildings. Santa Maddalena is so attractive it draws 600 visitors a day during the peak travel season.

February is not peak travel season in the Dolomites but the Winter Olympics are taking place just a couple hours from Santa Maddalena. No doubt some of those sports fans will make there way over for a selfie. And therein lies the problem. Tiny Santa Maddalena simply can’t handle hundreds of tourists. If they keep coming, the photo I led with really will be too good to be true.

Were it not for the Chinese, Santa Maddalena might still be relatively undisturbed. One of China’s mobile phone companies included an image of the village on its SIM card and suddenly its customers just had to know where to find Santa Maddalena. A 2013 iPhone iOS update included images of the nearby mountains, adding to the draw. Now village officials are considering the unthinkable: restrictions.

It’s a move similar to what’s happening for the first time at the Trevi Fountain in Rome. If you drive to Santa Maddalena you may now be stopped on the outskirts of town, where you’ll leave your car in (gasp!) a parking lot. If you want to walk through town, you’ll have to purchase a ticket. One enterprising resident added a turnstile at the edge of his fields so he can charge those who want to cross over. Suddenly I’m having visions of food trucks and souvenir stands. How sad.

The plight of Santa Maddalena reminds me of those once-a-year lists you find in publications like U.S. News & World Report, where towns across America are ranked according to so-called “quality of life” criteria. Whether the schools, the parks, the clean air, or feeling safe in the streets, your own little corner of the world might suddenly be declared a top-five place to live. And that, my friends, is the kiss of death. Now you’ve been discovered, and everyone has to see what the fuss is all about (or at least go visit for a selfie). The masses throng to your backyard and some never leave. A year or two later – surprise, surprise – you’re no longer “top-five”.

Credit the residents of Santa Maddalena: they’re coming up with creative ways to discourage “over-tourism”. In a particularly bold move, they’re going to require an overnight stay to be able to walk the streets, so that tourists actually give to the local economy instead of just taking that selfie. IMHO all they really need to do is continue to be known as “Santa Maddalena” on the web. You won’t find much if you search with those words. As for “Santa Magdalena?” That’ll get you there. Even if you’ll find a quaint village of people singing Leave Me Alone.

Some content sourced from the CNN Travel article, “Italian village restricts access to its Instagram-famous church”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Seasoned Greeting

Back in my days in a corporate office, where the telephone was still the preferred means of communication, my peers and I developed a habit of answering calls without a greeting. The phone would ring and we’d simply answer with our name, like “John Smith…” and then wait for the caller to start the conversation. Whether this was an effort to be businesslike or a little intimidating can be debated. But it always felt awkward to me, like one of those greeting cards with nothing printed on the inside.

Did you know the origins of “hello” go back six hundred years? We’ve led with one version or another of the greeting countless times for centuries. Take your pick from “hi”, “hiya”, “hey”, “howdy”, and even “hellaw” down here in the South: human nature demands something of an icebreaker before a conversation gets underway. The no-greeting business calls I mentioned above suggest this is not a conversation, this is business. Otherwise we need a starter word. Think about it. How awkward would it be to hug, shake a hand, or fist-bump without uttering a single word?

The history of “hello” is dry and speculative but it’s safe to say most of us started using it as soon as we could speak. Then, inevitably, we either embraced the word as our greeting or moved on to one of its offspring. For me the preference was “hey”. I find myself using “hey” whether I’m meeting someone for the first time or they’re a long-time acquaintance. I tried “hey” on for size a long time ago and it suits me just fine.

How “hello” reduced to “hi” is anyone’s guess, but it makes sense in the framework of the not-so-Queen’s English we use in America. A Brit saying “hi” doesn’t sound quite right. An American? Pretty much what we expect. A Brit can substitute “Good morning” or “Good evening” for “Hello”, while Americans just go with “Morning” or “Evening”.

But even “hi” seems a little passé these days. I’m just as likely to get a Yo!, Sup!, or Hey-ya! from Millennials and younger. Furthermore, if you gave any of those generations the choice they’d rather greet you with a text than with their voice. That leads to a whole new approach to starting conversations. Who starts a text message with “Hello, Dave!” More likely it’s just “Dave…”, an emoji, or no greeting at all.

[Blogger’s note: My favorite instance of “hello” comes at the end of the movie Jerry Maguire. The line, “You had me at ‘hello'” has been recycled many times since but never as powerfully. Pretty much launched Renée Zellweger’s career in a single sentence.]

Beyond “hello” itself, the inflections of the voice convert the greeting into something else entirely. We demand attention by saying He-LLO!!! We question attention by saying HELLO? (… “is anybody home?”). And if we say “hello” quickly we’re suggesting we don’t have time for the conversation that follows. A greeting can make a lasting impression inside of a single word.

We’ve lived in the South for a little while now, and in that time we’ve learned a new approach when it comes to greeting one another. When we’re introduced to someone for the first time we often exchange “hey” as the greeting. When we see someone we already know we go with “hey hey”. I’m still trying on “hey hey” for size. It feels a little forced to someone who grew up in the West. Give me a few more years.

A decade or two from now a wholly new greeting will be out there; one we’ll never see coming (seriously, did you ever think “yo yo” would replace “hello”?) Maybe this new salutation will suit me or maybe I’ll flat out reject it. Either way, “hello” rests comfortably in my back pocket whenever I need it. Six hundred years of history suggests it’s not going anywhere in the next twenty.

Some content sourced from the BBC article, “‘Hullo, hillo, holla’, the 600-year-old origins of the word ‘Hello'”.

Worthless Wardrobe Boxes

I’ve always liked the play on words of Men’s Wearhouse. If you’re familiar with MW you know they cover more ground than just formal wear. They’ve set aside an area for tuxedos and such, but they have other sections for dress shirts, accessories, and even shoes. It’s like walking through a miniature department store… which is probably why MW is destined for the dust bin sometime in the coming year.

Just eighteen months after Saks Fifth Avenue acquired bankrupt Neiman-Marcus (for the “bargain” price of $2.65 billion) Saks itself filed for bankruptcy; just yesterday. The 2024 merger of these big-box luxury retailers (which included Bergdorf Goodman) never really came to fruition. Chalk it up to biting off more than they could chew, or more likely to the impact of the changing habits of consumers. Today’s shoppers want smaller, more specific brick-and-mortar options; that is, whenever they can drag themselves away from online purchasing.

The shuttering of department stores is not limited to the high-end verions, of course. Macy’s is in the process of closing 150 “underperforming locations”. JC Penny, Kohl’s, and Marshall’s are closing outlets here and there. Even Carter’s, the popular option for children’s clothing, is calling it quits on 150 locations. And Sears, which had almost 3,000 locations just fifteen years ago, is down to a mere five. Frankly, I didn’t know Sears had any locations anymore.

Sears (or the Sears, Roebuck and Co I remember as a child) was my family’s go-to-department store for just about anything. My brothers and I were outfitted in Sears-brand clothing. My mother purchased all kinds of items for her kitchen. My father built up his workshop with dozens of Craftsman tools. And of course, the Sears catalog was not only a kid’s dream-book of Christmas wishes, but its arrival in the mailbox was a sign Santa was on his way… not to your house but to the toy department at Sears.

Like many other things in the States, department stores were based on the originals in Europe. Harrods of London has been around since 1849 and boasts of 1,100,000 square feet of selling space, making it the largest department store on the continent. Paris hosts several stores I’ve never heard of yet many have been around as long as Harrods. And Australia’s David Jones is considered the world’s longest continuously operating department store (since 1838!)

As you read this post – and if you’re Millennial or older – I’m sure a department store of your own experience comes to mind. Towards the East Coast: Gimbels, Hudson’s, or Wanamaker’s. Towards the West: May Company, Bullock’s, or Robinson’s. In Chicago alone: Marshall Field’s, Carson Pirie Scott, or Wieboldt’s. In Canada: Eaton’s. The list is endless, even as most of them are downsizing or closing altogether.

In deference to my former department store habits, I also prefer more specific retail these days. My shoes come from shoe stores. My shirts come from stores of particular name brands. But with shopping malls closing along with their aforementioned “anchors”, my stores of choice are now stand-alones or in outlet malls. Now that I think about it, outlet malls are kind of like outdoor department stores, aren’t they?

I may be nostalgic for the department stores of my past, but I certainly understand why the concept has come and is about to be gone. We have more convenient, more tailored options these days. Which has me wondering about supermarkets. Supermarkets are also under the threat of the changing habits of consumers. No, I don’t expect a return to those wonderful merchant-driven street markets you find all over Europe. But we are getting more comfortable with placing orders ahead of time and having groceries delivered to our car or front door. In other words, enjoy shopping in “food warehouses” while you still can, because department stores are about to become nothing more than worthless wardrobe boxes.

Some content sourced from the CNN Business article, “Saks Global files for bankruptcy protection…”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Swimming Upstream

I can think of a dozen name brands I gotten hooked on for years, only to see them suddenly disappear from the shelves, never to return. Breakfast cereals. Hair spray. Cars. And what do we do when this happens? Simply find another brand and get used to it – easy-peasy. But when your streaming television service drops an essential channel, you can’t just jump to the next provider. Try that and you’ll hit your head on the cage they have you securely locked into.

Even if you’re not a sports fan, you’re probably tuned into my topic today. YouTube TV – which provides me the five channels of streaming television I care about (and 95 forgettable others), dropped ESPN from its lineup. It wasn’t like they warned us months ago they were renegotiating with Disney (ESPN’s parent), and that these talks weren’t going so well. Instead they alerted us last Thursday just before midnight – with an email coyly titled “An update on our partnership with Disney”. Then, the following morning, ESPN was gone. On Halloween. How fitting.

Without going into the weeds on why ESPN was dropped, let’s just call it the proverbial contract dispute. Disney wants one number. YouTube TV wants another. A stalemate akin to what we’re seeing in Washington right now. Yes, what D.C. is blocking is so much more important than a television sports channel. But when you’re a die-hard college football fan you can relate to losing an “essential service”.

Getting my ESPN back is not like choosing another breakfast cereal. If only it were that easy. Instead, we have to shift to an entirely different grocery aisle. Make that an entirely different supermarket. As soon as YouTube TV dropped ESPN, Disney was only too happy to promote its own streaming service. Sign up for Disney+, including ESPN and Hulu!!! Only $29.95 per month – a savings of $5/month!!! Only twelve months of subscription required!!!

All those exclamation points are a ruse, as if this is a service I can’t live without. Disney Channel? Not my thing. Hulu? I’m already getting enough entertainment on Netflix. I just want ESPN please. And apparently I should be happy to pay a minimum of $360 for it, in addition to my monthly $80 for YouTube TV.

Bless our tech-savvy children. We turn to them for all things electronic. I checked in with one of my sons – who is every bit the college football fanatic I am – and he came to my rescue. Fubo – a streaming service looking like a twin to YouTube TV – offers a free one-week trial that includes ESPN. It’s kind of like Congress signing a stopgap spending bill to keep the government open. Now I have another seven days to figure out what to do.

YouTube TV promises a credit if the lack of negotiations with Disney continues long enough (sorry, the same does not apply to our government). But I can’t necessarily wait for that credit. In one week I’ve got to decide if I’m a YouTube TV guy or a Fubo one. Can’t have both (at least, according to my budget).

Of course, it feels almost inevitable that Fubo will run into a contract dispute with Disney as well. So even if I go that route I could lose ESPN again. Maybe I’m getting forced into a Disney+ subscription after all? But another $360/year? No way. I’d sooner get on a plane and go watch my college football games in person. Er, assuming the FAA doesn’t cancel my flights. Swimming upstream indeed. Sigh…

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LEGO Trevi Fountain – Update #3

(Read about the start of this build in Brick Wall Waterfall)

We resumed our fountain build this week with more confidence than the last, accompanied by the merriment of Paganini’s Violin Concerto No. 1. Bags 6 and 7 – of 15 bags of pieces – were filled with tiny, tiny finger-numbing LEGOs, and at times I wondered just what the heck I was putting together. Didn’t look like the makings of a fountain to me.

According to LEGO, water is white and blue. I suppose the white is meant to be rushing water (as in “waterfall”) while the blue is calm water (as in “pool”). We shall see. But check out the look of the fountain in the final photo. Anyone else see a monster’s mouth with white teeth?

Since this is my fifth LEGO model, it’s high time I make the following proclamation: LEGO never leaves out a piece. Never. I still have moments where I’m searching through a pile of pieces in vain for the one I need. I almost get to the feeling of “it’s not here”. But suddenly there the little guy is, staring up at me as if to say, “What took you so long?” Some day I’d love to see how LEGO pulls this off. Thousands of pieces in every box, not a single one of them left out. That’s some logistical magic going on there.

I’m proud to say I made zero mistakes on the build this time around, a dramatic improvement from a week ago. Okay, that’s not entirely accurate. I left a piece off the back of the fountain, but immediately discovered my error when I added a section and realized there was nothing to support it. Fixed in a jiffy, but the merry instruments on Paganini’s violin concerto sounded even more gleeful as they saw my confidence take a hit.

Running build time: 2 hrs. 27 min.

Total leftover pieces: 13

Chain (Saw) Reaction

When your kids celebrate you on Mother’s Day, you get flowers and chocolates; maybe even a homemade breakfast. When your kids celebrate you on Father’s Day, you get a gift card to Home Depot or Lowe’s, which is awesome. My kids are perceptive enough to know there’s always something I need for the workshop, so that little plastic rectangle of credit always brings a smile. But what I need is always trumped by what I want. Like power tools.

A polesaw is one of the cooler power tools out there (especially if you have a use for it). A polesaw is essentially a chain saw mounted on top of twelve feet of plastic pipe. At the bottom is the trigger. It’s like the world’s longest rifle, only you’re spinning chain saw blades instead of firing bullets. Picture the head and neck of a very thin giraffe. Or something out of a horror movie you’d watch this Halloween.

Polesaws are perfect for cutting down those overhead tree branches you cannot reach. You avoid the whole fall-off-the-ladder thing, which is fine with me since I’ve done it before. And with today’s super-batteries, you’re not tethered to a cord or a gas tank. Which brings me to my real story.

After purchasing my brand new Craftsman polesaw at Lowe’s – and barely fitting it into the back of my SUV – I headed on home eager to try it out. Charge up the battery, unsheathe the chain saw blade, and get to chopping down branches. When I did get home however, I realized my most basic of blunders: I had no battery. Right there on the box in plain English: TOOL ONLY. BATTERY AND CHARGER SOLD SEPARATELY. Talk about “buzz kill”.

A few days later I made it back to Lowe’s. Found the battery (the last one!), as well as an employee to escort me to check-out to make sure I paid. I get it – those batteries are expensive – more than the pole saw itself in fact. Okay, so now I have my pole saw and my battery. When I got home again however, I discovered my next blunder. It’s just a battery. It’s not a battery and a charger. Without a charger, a battery is just a bunch of chemicals housed in a case. Good grief, Charlie Brown! (with a whack on the forehead)

The next time I went to Lowe’s – where they now know me on a first-name basis – I found the charger. But here’s the problem. The charger comes with a battery, versus being sold all on its own. In other words, I have to buy a battery I don’t need. Okay, so I’ll return the first one. But after another employee escort to check-out and a little thought, I realized my biggest blunder of them all. I’d already unpacked and installed the first battery on the polesaw. Now I have a polesaw, a battery, a charger… and another battery I can no longer return. Needless to say, I’m well past the amount of my Father’s Day gift card by now.

I like to end every story with good news. The polesaw advertises “325 cuts per battery charge”. In other words, I’m never gonna need that second battery. Sure looks lonely sitting there on the workbench. Guess I just found me an excuse to buy another Craftsman power tool!

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LEGO Trevi Fountain – Update #1

(Read about the start of this build in Brick Wall Waterfall)

Our LEGO Trevi Fountain already feels like it’s flowing after just 3 bags – of 15 bags of pieces. You know this is going to be quick construction when I’m showing evidence of “brick wall” and “waterfall” just twenty percent into the build.

The rust on my LEGO skills was apparent from the first bag. I assembled the first two pieces incorrectly, thought I was missing a piece (which you always find later), and questioned why I ended up with an extra piece (which is LEGO’s way of saying, “in case you lose one”). Bag 2 had similar challenges. And Bag 3 was a little more difficult because you get lost in all those dreamy shades of blue. There was a moment when I placed an entire section of the fountain too far forward, corrected it, and thought, “Wow, Travertine is hard to move!”

For my fountain-building accompaniment, I thought it would be appropriate to listen the to the works of classical Italian composers. For today’s portion, I went with Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons”. Bag 1 took me through “Spring” while Bag 2 took me through “Summer”. Bag 3 required the other two seasons. But as you can see, I already have a four-seasons pool I could throw coins into!

Running build time: 1 hr. 5 min.

Total leftover pieces: 2

Horses on Circular Courses

In 1972, Billy Preston topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart with the catchy “Will It Go Round In Circles”. A year later, The Spinners spent five weeks at #1 on Billboard’s R&B chart with “I’ll Be Around”. More recently, Kacey Musgraves’ debut single “Merry Go ‘Round” won the Grammy Award for Best Country Song. All of which is to say, if I’m asked to celebrate “National Carousel Day” I have a great choice of theme songs for the occasion… played on endless loop, of course.

National Merry-Go-Round Day (I prefer “Carousel”) was this past July 25th, as it has been every year since 2014. Did you skip it like I did? The holiday claims to “celebrate the carousel’s history and joy, particularly marking the first U.S. patent by William Schneider in 1871.” And to celebrate, we’re meant to visit a local carousel, go for a spin, and post pictures of ourselves doing so online. So we drop everything we’re doing on July 25th and climb on a wooden horse? National M-G-R Day doesn’t even rate as a Hallmark holiday (and don’t waste your time trying to find a card to prove me wrong).

Contrary to my opinion about M-G-R Day, I think carousels are charming and a bit of innocent fun (other than those brass rings, which we’ll get to in a second). Carousels inspired memorable scenes in Mary Poppins and Big. Carousel was the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical that Time magazine deemed “the best of the 20th century”. The “Carousel of Progress” was (and still is) one of the more unique attractions at Disneyland. And of course, carousels led to those pipe and metal spinners we all played on at the park when we were kids.

Carousel is derived from the French word for “little battle”, which hints at why we’re riding them at all today. In 17th century Europe, equestrian tournaments included “ring jousting”, where the rider attempts to spear a ring-on-a-string with his joust as he flies by. To practice this sport without wearing out the horses, a clever soul invented the carousel, complete with wooden horses on poles and a real horse to pull the device in circles. Eventually carousels made their way into carnivals, and then to the prominent locations where you find them today.

Now you also understand why early carousels had ring dispensers. They were a nod to ring jousting! The dispensers were filled with iron rings along with a few brass ones. If you were lucky enough to ride an outside horse and grab a brass ring (which is harder than it sounds as your horse goes up and down), you could exchange the ring for a prize or another loop on the carousel. For good reasons – safety being one – ring dispensers have been removed from most carousels today.

The people who came up with National M-G-R Day should’ve probably gone with “International”, because many of the world’s most distinguished carousels spin outside of the United States. The Carousel El Dorado in Tokyo, Japan, built in 1907, is the oldest amusement park ride still in operation in the country. The Lakeside Park Carousel in Ontario, Canada (1905) includes a self-playing organ that uses rolled sheets of music, rewinding one while playing the next. The Letná Carousel in Prague, Czechia (1892!) is one of the oldest in Europe, remodeled in 2022 but still housed in its original wooden pavilion.

America has its share of prominent “gallopers” as well. The Looff Carousel in Santa Cruz, CA is one of the few remaining with a ring dispenser, and entertains with the music of three organs. The Over-The-Jumps Carousel in Little Rock, AR (1924) simulates the natural movement of a horse instead of just going up and down on a pole. And the Flying Horse Carousel in Westerly, Rhode Island (1876!) is exactly as advertised. The horses are attached to the center spindle instead of the wooden platform, creating a better sensation of flying through the air.

Okay, I have a confession. I had the perfect opportunity to celebrate National M-G-R Day just days after it happened this year. My wife and I traveled to San Diego with our children and grandchildren for a beach vacation and found ourselves in Balboa Park, home of the Dorothea Laub Carousel (brass ring dispenser!) If we hadn’t already worn out the little ones on a long walk through the Japanese Friendship Garden we might’ve made it to the wooden horses. But I’m not losing sleep about it. After all, National M-G-R Day will come ’round again next year.

Some content sourced from Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.