technology – Life In A Word

Going for a Spin, Spin, Spin

My wife and I enjoy popcorn after dinner, probably because we’re watching more movies at home these days. It’s easy prep thanks to our Presto air popper. Dump in the kernels, plug in the popper, and “presto”; a delicious snack in an instant. Of course, one of these days our air popper will break and we’ll have to buy another one. Unlike our KitchenAid stand mixer, which will spin,spin,spin until the end of time.

If your kitchen is like ours, the cupboards are full of appliances that only make an occasional appearance. Our Breville panini press hasn’t made a “melt” in months. Our Marcato pasta maker last saw action in the early 2000s. And our George Foreman grill is retired for good, because it’s just as easy to fire up the barbecue. But our KitchenAid stand mixer spins to our “Aid” time and again, always ready to make bread dough, cake batter, or cookies.

Stand mixers date to the early 1900s. KitchenAid’s version came along in the 1930s, and it wouldn’t surprise me to learn some of the original models are still spinning almost a hundred years later. The appliance is just that good. The KitchenAid was designed to be as simple, efficient, and robust as possible, and with only one task in mind: to spin ingredients in dizzying circles until they’re thoroughly mixed. Sure, you can add dozens of specialized attachments but none change what the stand mixer does at its core. Spin, spin, spin.

When I make a batch of cookies, I stand back in wonder as our KitchenAid does its thing. As I add the ingredients, the paddle blade works harder and harder to blend them together. By the time I get to the last of a dozen ingredients; say, chocolate chips, the mixer is practically bouncing across the counter as it struggles to plow through the dough. You’d expect the mixer to break down at any second in an explosion of flying gears and sizzling smoke. But it never does.

I know a lot of people who own a KitchenAid stand mixer, and I’ve never heard of one that stopped working. Even if it did break, the appliance is designed for easy repair. The parts can be swapped out individually and quickly, eliminating the need for a repair person or a new mixer. It reminds me of the old Maytag washers, and how their repairman was described as “the loneliest guy in town”.

Like most appliances, Maytags aren’t what they used to be. We yearn for the models from the 1980s or earlier, which could wash anything and never break down. Today’s Maytags are a shadow of their former selves. They don’t do as good of a job, and every five years you’re thinking about replacing them. Not so the KitchenAid stand mixer. I have no doubt ours will be a part of our kids’ inheritance someday.

Speaking of kids, our daughter has her own KitchenAid and it sits proudly on her kitchen counter. Counter space in the kitchen is precious so only a few appliances deserve to be full-time residents. A coffeemaker. Some sort of toaster oven. And a KitchenAid stand mixer, which somehow manages to look appliance-elegant with its curves and swoops.

“Mixmasters” (a popular nickname for the KitchenAid) aren’t cheap. Most models run about $300 USD for the basic setup. Consider though, it’s the only stand mixer you’re ever going to need. KitchenAid even admitted they expanded their color selection and limited-edition models in an effort to generate more repeat customers. (This year – and only this year – you can buy one in “iridescent periwinkle blue”.)

Our Colorado kitchen had a very cool below-counter cabinet, designed specifically for a heavy stand mixer. You opened the door, pulled a shelf handle, and your Mixmaster rose effortlessly out of the cabinet on special hinges, snapping into place at counter level. An appliance has to be awfully special to justify a custom cabinet. Or a spot in the Smithsonian Museum, where the KitchenAid stands as a part of the Julia Child exhibit.

I don’t need to go to the Smithsonian to see a stand mixer (nor do you). I have my KitchenAid right here in the kitchen cabinet. I can put down the laptop and whip up a batch of cookies anytime I want. Like, right now. Time for my Mixmaster to spin, spin, spin again, just like it’s done a thousand times before.

Some content sourced from The Atlantic article, “KitchenAid Did it Right 87 Years Ago”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Feeling Better by Phone

My wife is recovering from a nasty eye infection, one where I’ve lost count of the visits we’ve made to the doctor and the pharmacy. She’s taking prescription eye drops and a strong antibiotic, and covers her eyes with hot compresses instead of her usual contact lenses. We’re hoping today’s appointment is the end of this ordeal. Odds are however, all of our scurrying around won’t be necessary in a year or two. Instead, my wife will simply seek relief from a digital prescription.

You knew it was coming. The FDA approved the first smartphone app designed to address a diagnosed medical condition, and it’ll be ready for download in just a few months. Rejoyn (don’t ask me where they come up with these names) is a digital prescription designed to combat depression. The patient’s six weeks of self-administered tapping and typing trains their brain back to a healthier state. Or at least, that’s what’s supposed to happen.

My first thought here was, an app used to address a diagnosed medical condition sounds kind of silly, like playing Tetris or something. But then I realized a prescription of Rejoyn would be one less dose of drugs. Pills removed from the equation is a good thing. But then I read how the results of a Rejoyn beta group were no more successful than those of a group prescribed a sham app. Finally, Rejoyn only works in conjunction with a regimen of traditional medication.

You can see why I’m struggling with the concept. I mean, you still have to take the meds you were already taking and there’s no guarantee the app will improve your condition. So why invest the time and money in your phone? According to an authority from the Division of Digital Psychiatry (which couldn’t have existed even ten years ago), “If the benefits are minimal but the risks are [also] minimal, perhaps there’s no harm in trying it.” Does that strike you as a glowing endorsement of the technology?

Rejoyn is the beginning of a wholly different approach to healing. One of these days you’ll find yourself at the pharmacy looking to fill a prescription, and instead of a receiving a bottle of pills you’ll hand over your phone for a download. Then you’ll go home to your couch and – doctor’s orders – spend more time on your phone than you already were. Oh, the irony. Experts say spending too much time on your phone causes depression. Now, the cure for that depression will be to spend more time on your phone.

A digital prescription gives a whole new meaning to “overdose”. What happens if you indulge in twelve weeks of screen time instead of six? What if you get so addicted to your electronic cure you can’t pull your eyes and fingers away from the screen? Will the app timeout after so many uses, forcing you to plead with the pharmacy to “renew your subscription”?

Then there are the side effects. Headaches, loss of sleep, loss of appetite; maybe the same ones you’d experience if you took a pill instead. Maybe the same ones you experience from any use of your phone. And what about your email, social media, and games. Will they be neglected because of all the time you spend on Rejoyn?

Electronic medication is a novel concept, I admit. It’s like having an IV drip of something that makes you feel great, only it’s “wireless” and you don’t need the nurse to give you a dose. You have a little doctor right there in the palm of your hand. But is that little doctor really going to make you feel better?

There is one indisputable positive to a digital prescription. If you fill your meds at a grocery store pharmacy you’re going to save money. After all, those fifteen minutes while you wait for the pills to be bottled are spent wandering up and down the food aisles. A digital prescription can be downloaded instantly. Now you’ll no longer buy the impromptu groceries you never needed in the first place.

Some content sourced from the CNN Health article, “FDA clears first digital treatment for depression…”

Curtains for the Big Show?

My daughter and her husband went on a date the other night. They dropped their little one at our place because they wanted an evening to themselves. “A date” meant going right back to their own house and getting a few projects done without the distraction of an active one-year old. Really? That’s a date? I figured they’d do something like go to the movies. After all, the theater’s only five minutes from their front door.

The same theater’s only twenty minutes from our front door. It’s the only show in (our small) town but it still carries the first-run films. So now I’m asking myself, why haven’t we been to the theater either? I mean, we’ve lived here almost two years yet we’ve never even been tempted. Does our own dating routine need a little recharge?

The truth is, like most who don’t go to the movies much anymore, the COVID years played a big part in our change of behavior. Before then we were regular patrons, drawn to the promise of a well-reviewed blockbuster or sappy rom-com. No matter the size of our TV or the quality of our sound at home, it couldn’t hold a candle to the big-screen experience. Plush seats, popcorn, and larger-than-life images were the way to go.

But movie theaters struggle now. We’re already two years past the last U.S. state mask mandate (time flies), yet theaters haven’t been able to bring back audiences in numbers comparable to the years before COVID. The only movie to get my wife and I up off our couch and into the theater was Top Gun: Maverick, which seems forever ago now. Much as I’d like to blame the pandemic for our recent lack of attendance, other forces are at work here:

1) Streaming. Just as we all hunkered down in 2020 to wait out COVID, on-line entertainment options went full-stream ahead. My wife and I cautiously subscribed to something called Netflix back then (knowing we could cancel at any time), and in no time we became the very definition of “binge”. Today we plunk down money for several streaming services, which come and go according to what we choose to watch. In other words, “network television” isn’t the only option to the big screen anymore.

2) The cost. A few weeks ago, my wife and I binged the twelve-episode first season of a Hallmark Channel series, for $10.79. Season 2 cost us $25.37 for the same number of episodes. Season 3? $26.99. Sneaky streamers, huh? They get you hooked on the first season, then charge big-time for the rest. But here’s the thing. Those thirty-six hours of television cost us less than two dollars an hour. A movie in the theater runs four to five times that much.

3) The annoyances. Before online tickets, you could show up at the box office and be reasonably assured of getting a seat, for the face value of the ticket. Now – for the popular movies at least – a “walk-in” is virtually impossible. You’re going to pay fees, whether for the online service itself, the movie’s time of day, or the theater’s better seats. Once you’re in your seat the annoyances bloom, whether the advertisements before the movie, the cell phone going off in the next row, or the couple behind you who simply can’t stop talking throughout the show.

4) The product. IMHO of course, the movies being made today simply aren’t what they used to be. Those mainstream blockbusters and adorable rom-coms of yesteryear have given way to so-so remakes, Marvel characters, and independent films that rarely appeal to the masses. Sure, I could (and probably should) expand my horizons to other film genres, but first you’re gonna have to address items 1), 2), and 3) above.

The summer blockbusters begin Memorial Day weekend but they’ve taken a hit this year because of last fall’s writers/actors strike. Movie theaters may be a little – ahem – breezy as a result. They’ll aim to draw in more patrons with re-releases of films gone by, mini film festivals, and sales of film-related merchandise instead (themed popcorn tub, anybody?)

The sustainability of the movie theater is in question, the same as the drive-in that died before it. Will the product and price attract enough patrons to keep the experience viable? Will a trip to the movies morph into a wholly different kind of experience (like dinner, drinks, and a movie, or a stop at the in-house video game arcade first?) And will the concept of a movie-house subscription ever be more attractive than simply buying a ticket?

All good questions there. Whatever happens, I hope the curtains don’t close on the big screen for good. When a film is worth watching, alongside an audience willing to behave, it’s a great date night. Without the movies, my wife and I might be forced to complete a few more projects around the house.

Some content sourced from the CNN Entertainment article, “Movie theaters are getting creative to appeal to audiences”.

Teeny-Weeny Towns

My daughter forwarded a video about a suburb of Knoxville known as Safety City. In this little town you’ll find roads and traffic signals, businesses and shops, but no cars. Sidewalks are for pedestrians while streets are reserved for bicyclists and other “non-motorized vehicles”. Everything in “SC” is an easy walk, whether to the post office, football stadium, movie theater, or dinner at Applebee’s. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention… everything in Safety City is miniature.

Safety City is a novel concept because it reduces the real-life aspects of a town down to a dimension children can relate to. And relate they do. Entire classes bus over to Safety City to experience vehicular, pedestrian, bicycle, and fire safety at a young age. So much more effective than traffic school on a blackboard!

I’ve always been a fan of miniatures; a feeling hearkening back to my childhood. Anyone who read Gulliver’s Travels knows “miniature”, as in the inhabitants of the (literally) small town of Lilliput. Anyone who ever held a snow globe imagined those little places and figures inside the glass coming to life.

I wonder if grade-school children still make dioramas. What a cool concept for a kid. Within the confines of a shoebox you create a miniature world of your liking: buildings, people, animals, trees, etc. Then you cut a peephole in the center of one end of the box and cover the open top with tissue paper. When you look through the hole you see your little diorama world, with the light filtering through from above. It gives your creation a startling sense of reality.

Model trains certainly fueled my interest in miniatures. I remember several friends who collected the popular “HO”-scale sets (1:87, or about 2″-high trains). They could buy so many accessories (endless tracks, buildings, trees, and figures) they could create an HO-scale world big enough to fill a two-car garage. Go figure, the only train set I ever owned was the “G”-scale, where the train’s a good 8″-10″ in height. Not so miniature.

Speaking of model trains, one of my favorite episodes of the old television series The Twilight Zone was called “Stopover in a Quiet Town”. A couple wakes up in a strange house after a night of partying, can’t get the phone or the lights to work, and find the refrigerator stocked with plastic food. They walk outside, only to discover the surrounding town is utterly still – no people, no sounds, no movement. Then the train whistles and pulls into the station, so they hop aboard, hoping to be taken back to somewhere familiar. But the train merely travels in a wide oval and returns to the same station where it picked them up. As the couple steps off the train, the giant hand of a child reaches down to grab them, while a mother’s voice can be heard saying, “Be careful with your pets, dear…” Twilight Zone indeed.

Replicas of miniature cities can be found everywhere, whether Knoxville’s Safety City, Disneyland’s Storybook Land (viewed from canal boats), or Legoland’s Billund Resort, Denmark’s largest tourist attraction outside of Copenhagen. There’s even a “top ten” of the world’s miniature cities, including “Miniaturk”, 122 famous buildings of Turkey in a park-like setting in Istanbul; “Tobu World Square” in Japan, which showcases the world’s UNESCO world heritage sites in the presence of 140,000 miniature people, and The Museum of Roman Civilization (which I’ve seen myself), a remarkable recreation of ancient Rome’s “Golden Age” thirty-six years in the making.

Maybe all this talk of miniatures has you thinking of the recent trend of tiny homes. Those are an entirely different concept; not at all “miniature”. A tiny home is like a full-scale house with most of the air sucked out of it. The components are still full-scale but the spaces are decidedly smaller than normal. Tiny homes kind of look like shoeboxes to me. Maybe we should add peepholes on the ends so we can watch the inhabitants try to make a living in their cramped quarters.

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

Game, Set, Matches

The LEGO Eiffel Tower is the tallest of its model kits and undoubtedly the largest of its Architecture Series. At a deliberate count of 10,001 pieces, this behemoth is a whole lot more detailed than LEGO’s 2014 original, which clocked in at a mere 321 pieces. So imagine my awe (okay, and shock) when I learned about another Eiffel Tower model; one with a staggering 700,000 pieces. Suddenly 10,000 seems like a nice, reasonable number.

It’s true, of course. A Frenchman recently converted 700,000 matches into a model of the Eiffel Tower, in an attempt to break the world record for, naturally, “tallest matchstick Eiffel Tower”. (Is there a world record for everything these days?) I suppose I can get past the 700,000 matches – even if I can’t picture that many in one model – but what I can’t fathom is the eight years Richard Plaud sacrificed to build his creation. I’m picturing Monsieur Plaud waking up each morning, bidding adieu to his wife after a croissant and some French press coffee, and heading off to his studio to play with matches, a giant bottle of glue in hand. Day after day after day.

Our Frenchman’s accomplishment wouldn’t be so interesting if there weren’t a little drama thrown in for spice. Turns out his 23.6-foot model may not earn the world record after all. Why? Because Plaud cut the heads off the matchsticks as he built. When he got tired of cutting, he contacted a French “matchmaker” (ha) and asked if he could place a massive order of headless matches. And there’s the rub, fellow model builders. Guinness is disputing Plaud’s claim of the world record because the materials used can’t be purchased by you or me, should we try to build our own matchstick Eiffel Tower (but would we?)

Meanwhile, a 21.6-foot Eiffel Tower model built by Toufic Daher (coolest name ever) retains the world record. Daher’s model was completed in 2009 using six million (headed) matches. I have no idea how long it took him to build, but seriously, how long does it take to simply pick up six million little sticks, let alone shape and glue them into a replica of the Eiffel Tower?

Gustave Eiffel (another cool name) surely had no idea people like Plaud and Daher would be obsessed with his tower 135 years after the fact, in pursuit of world records. Frankly (“France-ly?”) Eiffel’s “Iron Lady” is impressive enough to stand on her own wrought-iron feet. After all, she’s among the most recognizable structures in the world. She surpassed the Washington Monument when she opened to the public in 1889, as “tallest human-made structure” (sadly, seventy years before Guinness started tallying world records). Today she still merits an entry in the world record book, albeit for a different reason:”Most Visited Monument with an Entrance Fee”.

There’s a touch of iron-y to this post. As much as I’m making blog fodder of these Eiffel Tower model builders, I’m tempted to become one myself. Not with headless matchsticks; the LEGO version. Several years ago I completed the LEGO U.S. Capitol Building (1,032 pieces), followed by the LEGO Grand Piano (3,662 pieces), and more recently, LEGO Fallingwater (811 pieces). I keep an eye on the LEGO catalog for other models of interest but not one calls to me… except La Dam de fer. But then I pause to ask myself, am I really willing to dive into a project that’s effectively one hundred bags of one hundred pieces each, where ever single piece dark grey? Stay tuned.

As for our French ami Richard Plaud, his eight years of pick-up sticks may not have been in vain after all. Guinness admits they might’ve been a little quick to dismiss his claim. In their words, they wanted to make sure “the playing field is level for everyone”. Playing field? Ah, so this Eiffel Tower model-building is a game, is it? For Plaud at least, I’d call it game, set, matches.

Some content sourced from the USA Today article, “8 years down the drain?…”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Poor Little Ginny

Next Tuesday, if I could drag myself out of bed before dawn, I’d see the planet Venus hole-punched into the inky sky, low and bright. If I looked further I’d probably see Mars – dim but distinctly red. And if I really did see Mars I’d be sad, because I know Ginny’s up there, all alone, waiting for someone to bring her home. I’m sorry, Ginny… I’m so sorry. Nobody’s coming for you, not for a long, long time. Rest your rotors in peace, little helicopter.

Ginny (known more formally as Ingenuity) is a brave little helicopter. She may look like a nasty bug instead of something you’d want to cuddle with, but she’s quietly been filling up the record books with her remarkable achievements. Four years ago Ginny hitched a ride to Mars on the belly of NASA rover “Perseverance”. A few months after Percy plunked down on Mars, Ginny took her “first steps”. She spun her rotor blade into a blur, rose ten feet above the Martian soil, took a quick look around, and dropped right back to where she started. That brief maneuver earned her the title: “first powered, controlled, extraterrestrial flight by any aircraft”.

[Note: You can read about Ginny’s first flight in the post Whirlybird Wonder]

Ginny may not be easy on the eyes but I’m in awe of what she accomplished in her brief time on Earth (er, Mars). I should’ve paid better attention in science class. Imagine the teacher saying, “Okay Dave, here’s your assignment. I need you to design a mini-copter that can travel to Mars, perform a few lighter-than-air maneuvers, and be able to take a few photos at the same time. You’ll be at the controls back here on earth, so whatever communication mechanism you come up with needs to work over, uh, 140 million miles.” Cue my blank stare.

The smarter-than-I-am people at California’s Jet Propulsion Labs (JPL) designed little Ginny to do all those things. What makes her ten-foot hop on Mars so remarkable is this: the atmosphere up there is less than 1% as dense as Earth’s, so there very little to hold Ginny aloft. To put it another way, earthly helicopters can only fly to 25,000 feet. Ginny had to be designed to fly to 80,000.

Let’s call her “The Little Copter That Could”, shall we? Ginny was supposed to fly five times in thirty days. Five little hops in a month’s time and her mission would’ve been considered an unqualified success. But Ginny chose to be an explorer instead of an experiment. She flew seventy-two individual missions, further and longer each time than her JPL designers ever expected. She also captured images as she flew, so scientists could better decide where on Mars they wanted big-brother Percy to rove.

Ginny was more “alive” than any helicopter I’ve ever known. She cleaned herself up after nasty Martian dust storms. Her solar panels froze unexpectedly during the rough winters, rendering her unable to fly or even take commands, yet she still radioed “wellness reports” to Percy so the JPL people would know she was (barely) there. She made three emergency landings when her sensors detected trouble. And even when one of those sensors went dead, Ginny kept her rotors a-whirling on demand.

Ginny captured the shadow of her “broken wing”

Whatever happened on Ginny’s Flight #72 two weeks ago remains a mystery, one Percy hopes to figure out as he rovers back to her location. Ginny had been close to another landing when she suddenly stopped communicating. A day later the JPL team reestablished the connection to find Ginny resting comfortably on the Martian soil. Somehow she’d still landed on her feet. Somehow however, she also damaged a rotor blade. Ginny can’t repair herself so alas, her flying days are over. Now her waiting days begin.

Admirers like me refer to Ginny as “that little extraterrestrial trailblazer”. Haters call the dormant helicopter “the first piece of trash on Mars”. As long as Percy’s in her neighborhood, Ginny will keep sending her little wellness reports (even though she’s really not so well). I just hope the scientists at JPL are already hard at work on their next mission to Mars. A brave little copter is waiting to be rescued and brought home to the Smithsonian.

Some content sourced from the CNN article, “After damaging a rotor blade, NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter mission ends on Mars”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Renaissance Man

In the second movement of Antonin Dvořák’s New World Symphony, the orchestra settles down as the English horn begins its soft, wailing solo. You’ve heard this famous lullaby in one version or another, but never more powerfully than in the “Largo” movement of Dvořák’s symphony, with the strings and woodwinds providing the sweeping background (~45 seconds into the following video). It’s one of my favorite classical pieces, and my performance is flawless every time I play it. Play it in my head, that is.

I’ve developed a satisfying habit over the years which you might share (or at least, be willing to try). Think about something that interests you, or an activity in which you like to participate. Over time you’ve developed a fair understanding of your subject, though your level of knowledge and skill would never qualify you as a professional. But what if it did? What if you suddenly had the smarts or the talent to find yourself among the world’s best? Wouldn’t your life be wildly different?

My years of piano lessons never propelled me anywhere close to the ranks of “professional” or “best”. I never even advanced beyond the piano’s foundation to pursue an instrument like the English horn. To do so would’ve meant a wholly different direction in life. More practice and lessons instead of time spent with friends or years in the Boy Scouts. A different college or at least a different degree. Competitions. Travel.

Music eventually gave way to an interest in sports and soon I found myself on the basketball court more than in front of the piano keyboard. I’d practice endlessly at our backyard hoop, imagining myself making game-winning shot after shot. I did play a couple of years of JV ball in high school and went to college games at nearby UCLA. But my skills never developed to the varsity-, let alone college-level. Was I infatuated with basketball at the time? Yes, but I also knew early on I’d never be one of the greats.

You’re starting to see a pattern here and it continued in college. I studied architecture (“I’ll be the next Frank Lloyd Wright!”) but only spent the first few years of my career in the field. I had a good run with info technology companies (“Bill Gates!”) but never developed the level of expertise to be labeled a “techy”. I write these weekly blog posts (“John Grisham!”) but have no plans for the next Great American Novel.

Here’s my point, and maybe you never saw it coming. I find all of this dabbling and dreaming incredibly satisfying. My interest in a subject or activity wanes well before it becomes an obsession, and then I simply move on to the next thing vying for my attention. Why do I behave this way? Two reasons. First, I prefer to be a jack of all trades (or a master of none, if you will), not a virtuoso. Second, more importantly, I am far too content with my life as it is to ever be tempted by the sacrifices necessary for the pursuit of singular success.

There’s a complimentary phrase for people like me: Renaissance Men. We hearken back to the great thinkers and artists who came along just after the Middle Ages; Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo, for example, with “unquenchable curiosity” and “feverishly inventive imaginations”. Mind you, I can’t paint like da Vinci or sculpt like Michelangelo, but my curiosity and imagination may run just as rampant. The modern Renaissance Man, in a nutshell, has “broad interests” and “superficial talents”. Me to a tee.

The next time I hear Dvořák’s “New World Symphony”, I’ll think about playing the English horn. Maybe I’ll sign up for lessons and eventually get good enough to play the “Largo” movement. Maybe then I’ll join the local orchestra so I get the chance to perform in front of a live audience! Yeah… probably not. Long before my much-anticipated stage debut, some other activity will vie for my attention and off I’ll go.

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

Celestial Silver Dollar

I walk the dog late at night, just to be sure he doesn’t nudge me awake in the wee hours of the morning. The walk can be a chore when I’m tired but most nights it’s a quiet, peaceful stroll through our pitch-black horse pastures. We’re usually blessed with clear skies here in South Carolina, which means the stars and planets put on a display worthy of a paid ticket to an observatory. Regardless, the moment I’m out the door I’m in search of my other faithful companion: the moon.

The “heavens” offer a plethora of topics to blog about (which I have: Saturn in Of Rings and Romans or Starlink satellites in Celestial Strings of Pearls, for example) but I’m overdue with a few words about the moon. Our nearest galactic neighbor is a constant wonder to me. The moon (or is it “The Moon”?) is the reason we have ocean tides here on Earth and solar eclipses far, far away. The moon has been the target of some of the most impressive space technology and exploration in history. But let’s put the science aside, shall we? Today I’d rather just muse about the moon as its sits in the night sky, like a shiny silver dollar laid out on top of a black velvet cloth.

My favorite moons are full – the perfectly round ones – but the shadowed partials can be just as beautiful. Depending on the season and the atmosphere, the moon takes on countless looks. Some nights it rises giant above the trees, as if invisible binoculars rest before my eyes. Other nights the moon sits as an elegant crescent, a perfectly white slice of melon. Still other nights the moon doesn’t rise at all, or at least, not until well after I’m in bed. It’s a guessing game every time the dog and I head out into the dark.

I also make a game of trying to guess when the moon is full just by looking at it. On the nights just before or after it occurs the moon can still appear as full. So you have to look very carefully at the edges to decide if it’s perfectly round or not. Conveniently, the moon is full about once a month, or at least, once every month in 2024. Next year or the year after, perhaps we’ll get a “blue”: that second full moon in a calendar month. Doesn’t happen very often, of course.

Here’s a fascinating fact about the moon. It’s locked into place by the earth’s gravity, meaning it’s always showing you the same face. Try to picture the earth taking a trip around the sun (once a year or so), while it’s spinning on its own axis (once a day), while the moon is spinning around the earth. Technically the moon is rotating, just not on its own axis. So you never get to see “the dark side”.

Here’s another fact that makes me pause. If you drive across the United States from coast to coast and back again, you’re driving about 6,000 miles. Do that same drive thirty times and you’ve driven to the moon. Suddenly our celestial silver dollar doesn’t seem so far away, does it?

The next full moon (from my perspective), nicknamed “The Wolf”, is a week from this posting, on Thursday, January 25th. It’ll be the first full one of the new year. Good timing really, because some of you readers don’t make it to my blog until several days after the fact. If you’re exactly a week late, walk outside tonight after dark. A spectacular scene in the heavens awaits.

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

Calling… Into Question

When I first started piano lessons as a kid, my teacher gave me a little book of scales and keyboard exercises called “Teaching Little Fingers to Play”. I came across that book again recently, and the title made me think about smartphones. Our grandchildren will get their very first phones one of these days, on which they’ll be teaching their little fingers – not their little voices – to play. Maybe the first word they should type is T-R-O-U-B-L-E.

Travis Tritt also wrote “T-R-O-U-B-L-E “, one of his country music hits from the 1990s. The song’s chorus starts out with Well hello, T-R-O-U-B-L-E, Tell me what in the world, You doin’ A-L-O-N-E. Kind of describes kids and their smartphones, doesn’t it? They let their fingers do the talking instead of their voices. It’s hardly a personal relationship with whoever’s on the other end, but more like the one you and I’ve developed through our back-and-forth blog comments.

If you’re an adult with kids who have smartphones, you’ve probably had the following conversation at some point in their lives: Daughter: I talked to Jacob today. Dad: Did you actually TALK to Jacob? Daughter: Well no, we were texting but you know what I mean. Sigh…

Telephones in transition

In a sense (or several senses), smartphones weaken our human connections instead of strengthen them. Think about it: before the traditional telephone our default means of communication was face-to-face (sight). Then the telephone comes along and we go ear-to-ear instead (sound). Then the smartphone replaces ear-to-ear with typing (touch). On the one hand it’s technical evolution; on the other, social regression.

Have a conversation with most members of Gen Z and you’ll want to type A-W-K-W-A-R-D. The dialogue (if there actually is a dialogue) doesn’t flow. They’re hesitant to offer insights or ask questions because they can’t back up the cursor and retype to get their words just right. There are moments of uncomfortable silence; lots of them.

Moments of silence used to be a good thing. Flashback to my teens, when a relationship with a girl meant spending a lot of time on the phone, defined as a corded handset held up to the ear (instead of a speakerphone where you multi-task). Those conversations were priceless to a young person. Phone calls helped to overcome shyness, and were practice to express feelings or ask a girl out on a date. Sometimes we’d just stay on the line in silence, enjoying the fact we were the only person in each other’s moment.

The style I grew up with

Phone calls also helped me learn to talk to adults (and credit to my parents for not making them for me). I still remember those first few dials to people or businesses, nervous over the fact it was me initiating the conversation. What do I say? Won’t I sound stupid? I hope my voice doesn’t crack.

Texting absolutely has its merits, as a recent article in The Atlantic argued. When exchanging brief, useful information, texting is dreamily efficient because there’s none of the “water cooler” effect. As they say, get in, get out, and move on. But when it comes to opinions, recommendations, or more detailed information, phone calls are essential, if only to allow the voice to add emphasis and/or emotion. The Atlantic article made several arguments in support of the “gauche” phone call but surprisingly, “developing conversational skills” didn’t show up until the final paragraph.

Budding conversationalist

When I moved away from Colorado after almost thirty years, I left behind a particularly close friendship, one where we’d see each other weekly for an outdoor jog together. But thanks to Zoom, I didn’t really leave it behind. Once I got to South Carolina we looked at our calendars and booked a monthly videocall, where we could have the same conversations we had on the trail, with added ability to share photos, links, and documents in the moment. Our conversations are as spontaneous as they were when we were face-to-face. It’s a great way to keep in touch and maintain a relationship because technically… it’s a phone call.

Maybe Gen Z will figure this out before Gen A takes its rightful place as America’s youth. If you can’t be face-to-face, at least pick up the phone and have a voice call. Keep the topics light and spontaneous. Let the conversation flow, and don’t get distracted by typing, emojis, or multi-tasking. Build the relationship.

Dare I say it, there’s another word to be spelled on this topic: A-I. I can envision a day when you’re talking to a friend, only you really aren’t because he or she has created an avatar who looks, talks, and thinks just like they do. Heck, maybe their avatar is talking to your avatar, and you’re not even around to witness the conversation! I’d call that another way to spell T-R-O-U-B-L-E.

Setting Little Booklets Free

In Breaking Away, the charming little movie about bicycling and broken dreams, there’s a scene where Barbara Barrie talks with her son about her passport. She’ll never really use it, she says, but she carries her passport all the time so she can present it proudly if ever asked. With newfound hindsight, I should’ve held onto my wife’s passport as tightly as Barbara Barrie held on to hers.

If you have a passport, you know the drill. Every ten years you have to renew the little book. The process is cumbersome, even online, because the authorities ask for almost as much information as they did the first time around. Everything goes into the (re)application except a copy of your birth certificate. Three pages of personal information later, you print, date, and sign, attach an unflattering black-and-white selfie (no smiling!) and mail it in together with your expiring passport.

So far so good with the hindsight. But as soon as I went to the post office last October I made a big boo-boo; the so-called fatal error. The desk clerk convinced me to send the application through regular mail. “Save your pennies”, I remember him saying. “After all, you’re sending through one government entity to another government entity. What could possibly go wrong?” So I saved my pennies… and that’s the last I ever saw of my wife’s passport.

Did this machine eat my wife’s passport?

Okay, maybe not ever. Perhaps the little booklet eventually finds its way home after completing whatever misguided tour it’s been taking. Or maybe, as our travel agent was quick to suggest, it was mangled and shredded by the sorting machine of an automated postal facility. Or maybe #3 – the one that has me staring at the ceiling into the wee hours of the night – it’s the latest identity of the head of an international drug cartel.

Laugh or feign horror at my expense, but you can’t blame me for wandering to the worst case scenario these days. The outside of the mailing envelope said “National Passport Processing Center” while the inside contained what obviously feels like a passport. Easy pickings, especially for an enterprising minimum-wage postal worker. My recurring thought: why didn’t I fork over the fifteen bucks for a secure, insured, overnight envelope? Because I’m cheap, that’s why. Ah hindsight, thee be a cruel character.

Not that you’ll ever need it (because you’re learning from me) but there’s an easy process to report a “lost or stolen” passport. You provide as much information as you can and if you’re lucky the authorities identify and “decommission” the missing booklet, reducing it to mere paper and plastic in the hands of another. But that still left my wife with no passport, which meant filing a new (not “re”) application. Dig out the birth certificate, take another photo, make an in-person appointment with the local post office, and pay another application fee. Mercifully, I watched that application get sealed into one of those secure/insured mailers before disappearing down the conveyor belt.

My first inkling of identity theft hit when our credit card company informed us of a $500 charge from a merchant in Germany, a company I didn’t recognize (and couldn’t begin to pronounce). My second inkling hit when our travel agent tried to make charges for the trip we needed the passports for, and our other credit card was rejected. One inkling makes you pause, but two inklings? That pushes the big ol’ panic button. But the god of credit cards must’ve been looking down on me favorably because the first charge was cancelled while the second charge was only denied because our travel agent had an old card on file. In other words – to my knowledge – we’re talking random events instead of identity theft.

There’s a happy ending to this story. (Actually, it’s more like an intermission since the authorities sent me a letter saying my wife’s passport is still lost or stolen until it’s not.) We have new passports now, which means no renewal process for another ten years. Our compromised credit card was cancelled and replaced. And we froze our credit in case a “new wife” out there tries to open accounts. I’m not convinced that’ll ever happen but I’m breathing easier as the months pass by. And rest assured, I’m keeping our little booklets secure so nobody can, you know, “break away” with them.