An Open Letter to Microsoft and Google

I know you think you're very clever.

I'm talking metadata here. All those little fiddly bits of code that float around in the background of every Microsoft Word document I create. I appreciate that it's there. It keeps my sentences spaced correctly, my fonts in place, my bold and italicized text bold and italicized, my margins straight and every other little bit of my document life right exactly where it should be.

Until I copy and paste my pristine little words from MS Word to Blogger.

For some devilish reason, MS Word thinks I want all that metadata to follow. And in most cases I would -- copying and pasting from document to document is handy when all the formatting follows as well.

But Blogger doesn't know how to digest all that metadata and thus spews it all over the page. That spacing meant to be preserved? It's gone. But not to be forgotten, because it appears in odd little places throughout my text. Not where I want it, of course, otherwise why would I complain?

And yes, I can open Blogger's HTML viewer and delete the metadata. But that's a chore. Far easier just to settle for wonky formatting or just type the whole damn text in all over again (like I'm doing now) rather than bothering with the copy/paste. I can spend twenty minutes clearing out the metadata only to miss one fiddly little bit and have the whole post blow up on me.

Not. Worth. The. Trouble.

And Microsoft Word used to let me inspect a document and remove the metadata before I copied and pasted. That doesn't seem to be working any more.

Maybe we need dumber software. Or an option somewhere to leave the metadata behind when I copy/paste from one bit of software to another. Or Blogger could be programmed to ignore imported metadata. Either way would work with me. Come on guys, throw me a bone.

Artsy-Fartsy Books by the Foot

Photo from Slate.com.

I don’t deny that we are heading into a world of digital books.

This year, I have read more digital books than I ever have, and likely will continue to read more of them. Although I do like a printed book (I must, I have more than a thousand of them) what gets me coming back to certain books again and again are the words, the story, the images that form in my mind as I read what the author has written. It’s these images – not the visceral feel of the book in my hands as the images form in my brain – that I remember. So there will be little lamentation on my part as we move into the digital era – that is if they ever can come up with a legal used ebook marketplace, since most of the books (the physical ones) I buy are used and, thusfar, all of the ebooks I’ve “bought” have been free.

But reading Michael Agresta’s article on what he deems as the future of physical books leaves me a bit cold. Throughout, he writes about the physical appearance of books, how they will evolve and how the artisinal ones – the twee ones with the cutout pages, the hand-illustrated drawings, the accordion-folded ones, the ones printed on enormous maple leaves, etc. – will come to dominate the printed world. He’s likely right. So the printed world, in the future, will likely be dead to me. Here’s what he says:

As paper books become more unusual, some will continue to buy them as collectors’ items, others for the superior sensory experience they afford. There’s reason to think this is happening already: Carl Jung’s Red Book, a facsimile edition featuring hand-painted text and illustrations, sold well in America in 2010 despite its $195 price tag. When readers believe that a book is special in itself, as an object, they can be persuaded to pay more.

Bookshelves will survive in the homes of serious digital-age readers, but their contents will be much more judiciously curated. The next generation of paper books will likely rival the art hanging beside them on the walls for beauty, expense, and “aura”—for better or for worse.

I can buy off on the more heavily curated collections. And I’ll certainly buy off on the for better or worse part because nowhere in his little article does he talk about the readability of these printed wonders. Maybe some of them are wonderfully written. But it’s my sad experience that with most of these artisinal books, the focus beams in so much on the design of the book that the designers and authors, at the end, kinda forget they’re supposed to be telling a good story.

Good story physical books? They’re dinosaurs, according to Agresta:

There’s a whole class of paper books we haven’t discussed yet—the paratextually unremarkable, unimaginatively designed rows of paperbacks and late-edition hardcovers that line most of our shelves. These are headed for the same place most manufactured objects go eventually—the scrapheap.

Maybe I’m exhibiting sour grapes. The only artsy-fartsy books I’m familiar with are the ubiquitous pop-up books which, in my experience, are just more trouble than they’re worth. The writing in them may be excellent, but they’re so expensive and so fragile that you hardly dare read them lest the fall apart like a fragile Japanese kite in your hands. And I have to worry about the gimmickry he describes with bated breath for the coming digital revolution:

Hypertext, embedded video, and other undreamt-of technologies will give rise to new poetic, rhetorical, and narrative possibilities. But a literary culture that has defined itself through paper books for centuries will surely feel the loss as they pass away.

If they add to the story, that’s great. But if they take me off into endless little culdesacs that mire the story down, then they’re little more than distractions. We may yet see purely digital books take advantage of the technology, but not until we have a crop of authors who understand the pitfalls that hyperlinks and embedded video and other gimmickry present to author and reader. Again, I look to DVDs as models. The full movie is there, with extras. But the extras don’t intrude as you’re reading the full story. They supplement, they do not supplant. Books – digital or printed – aren’t meant to be commodities added to or subtracted from just for the sake of some new-fangled technological advancement, like those sold by Books by the Foot. Books ought to tell good stories. End of rant.

. . . and You'll be WALKING to Notting . . . ham

Slate.com has made a very big deal out of walking as of late. As in we, as Americans, do not do enough walking.
On that, I agree – though my wife and I go for at least three good, hour-long walks each week. Moving around a lot (or not enough) is a serious problem – something I recognize as I sit behind a desk for more than 40 hours a week. I know I feel better on the days when I’m able to get out of my cubicle and do some walking, even if it’s as I pursue my other duties at work.
But then Slate.com turns to Walkscore, and with the quantifying of “walkable” neighborhoods files completely off the deep end.

An example: We recently moved from Sugar City, Idaho, to Ammon, Idaho. Both towns, in my estimation, are extremely walkable. From our current home, we can get to our kids’ school, two grocery stores, several restaurants, a hardware store, three big box stores and any other number of amenities ranging from parks to a swimming pool to a big empty field where the kids can run around shouting “walla walla walla walla” if they want to. Our neighborhood nets a paltry 26 from Walkscore – telling us we’re in a car-dependent neighborhood.

Even more laughable is that our old neighborhood scores nearly twice as high as a walkable neighborhood (a 45 versus a 26) even though – and Walkscore would know this if they ever visited the place – there’s a lot LESS stuff worth walking to in Sugar City than there is in Ammon.

This, in my eye, casts doubt on the databases Walkscore uses to make its calculations.

Plugging in another address we lived at – near downtown Rexburg, Idaho – is even more enlightening. This address gets a Walkscore of 89.

There are lots of destinations within a short distance of our old house there – never mind that I couldn’t stand upright in the basement because the ceiling was too low. So it gets a good walkability score. Thing is, when we lived in Rexburg (a town of about 26,000) we walked everywhere, even distant places. We could walk across the whole town in less than an hour. In my eyes, that town is entirely walkable.

Granted, where we live now we have to walk sometimes a mile one way to get to some of these destinations. But you know what – a two-mile round trip isn’t all that bad. Apparently it is to Walkscore – we should have many, many more of these amenities within a shorter walking distance in order for our neighborhood to be walkable.

Feh, I say. Walkability certainly does depend on proximity – walking to a library from where we live, for instance, isn’t doable, nor are there art galleries and such within the neighborhood – but there are other aspects of walkability that I think Walkscore isn’t taking into consideration.

How far is an individual willing to walk? We’re willing to walk pretty far, and without complaint. We enjoy it. And from what I can tell, the folks who live in the cities in France in which I also lived also enjoyed walking, even if they had to walk a long time to get to their destinations. So freaking out because Walkscore deigns your neighborhood as unwalkable is unthinkable.

American Settlers: Aside

NOTE: I was going to append this to my previous post, but I realized instead it should stnad on its own.

To those of you just getting started wtih Oregon Trail: American Settler, let me say this: Don't bother.

If you'd rather not follow that advice, then listen further: Start right now building as many infirmaries as you can and in those informaries start building as many needles and mortars as you can, because you're going to need them.

Here's another thing: Does no one else work in these towns? Yeah, yeah, I know. I can get "friends" to come do chores in my town. Go online and get your friends helping, that's how you build a community! Whee! I don't mean that. I mean in-game, does no one else work in these towns? I'm so busy running a sick ward that I've got crops rotting in the field and taxes/revenue going uncollected because very energy bit i get is going towards making medicine. And you know what: They're all going to die before I can get to them all.

[Insert here lesson on how I finally figure out the social gaming aspect and how this is supposed to teach me that It Takes A Village to Raise A Child ® and that the game is a microcosm showing how the liberal/progressive meme of working together with others is supposed to be beter than the conservative do it all yourself/get bootstrappy meme.]

Stuff that. It's just a game. And if they want to inject politics into this kind of thing, then give me the option of kicking some fannies in order to get some of the other denizens of this little pioneer village to do some of their own damn work for a change. Because the truth behind social gaming is not the concept of getting everyone to cooperate so that two plus two can equal five, but so more people get suckered into these games and thus boost the publisher's numbers and the possibility that some idiot will actually start making in-app purchases either to save a dying village or to help a friend.

So tant pis pour cochonnet.

My Kingdom for A Can Opener

This photograph is in the public domain. I sleep better at night knowing that.

I'm going to rant a bit, first by asking a question:

Has anyone, in the past five yars, been able to purchase a can opener that works?

I ask -- obviously -- because we haven't. We've got two can openers upstairs, one just like this one, the other electric. And it's hit and miss as to whether they'll work when we have to open a can.

The hand-crank jobbie is the worst. We've gone through three of them in not too long of a time, probably three or four years. Each time I have to use one of these devices, they end up just mauling the can rather than opening it. I cut my finger on the lid of a can tonight because I had to finish by prying the chewed-up lid off the can with a butterknife.

The electric one is no better. Heaven forbid I push the can against the blade to get I to catch and cut. The blade just folds and the opener makes the can spin merrily while not opening the can at all.

I blame consumers, frankly.

I remember the can openers of my youth -- they always worked. Even I, as a child back then, could count on being able to use one to open a can. I can't do that with my kids these days, because it takes a lot of effort to get one of the stupid things (the can openers, not the kids) to work.

I do blame consumers, because we're all out there looking for the cheapest item. And yes, they can make them cheap. But the problem is, they're cheaply made. The ones we've bought lately are crap. And worse yet, crap is all we can find, because every store we go to now carries the same crappy brands. I'm about ready to go to the kitchen supply store in a nearby city to get a can opener because all of the ones available locally just suck. I know because, over time, we've bought them all. And if the kitchen supply store can't fit the bill, I'll go to the army surplus store and find one the army uses. Certainly they don't allow people who have free access to bayonets and guns put up with crappy can openers.

Rexburg Needs These Lumps

There's been a lot of hand-wringing in Rexburg the past week over the negative attention the town has received since news of a handful of school children chanting "Assassinate Obama" on a school bus spread worldwide. Both the mayor and the superindendent of schools issued apologies over the incident, at the same time engaging in damage control over the sullied reputation of "America's Family Community" -- Rexburg's motto.

Most of the community, however, remains in denial, choosing instead to blame "liberals" for making a tempest in a teapot.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: These kids didn't say anything they haven't heard at home. I can't count the lies I've heard spread about Barack Obama here, nor the many times I've heard him referred to as Barack HUSSEIN Obama, as if a middle name is enough to make someone the epitome of evil. I've heard adults here say Obama should be shot before he tkes ofice. I've heard people say George W. Bush should refuse to leave the White House rather than turn it over to Mr. Obama. I didn't dare put an Obama sign in my front yeard prior to the election because I didn't want my house vandalized. So to hear that kids are repeating what they've heard Mommy or Daddy say at home doesn't surprise me much. Because those little pitchers, they have big ears, you know.

And we've heard it all before. I can't count the number of vile things I've heard said about Bill and Hillary Clinton, including that both of them deserve to be shot, buried alive, et cetera, et cetera. Maybe these things are said in jest. But kids don't know that. They take what parents say as gospel. And they repeat it.

To those who are upset that this has turned into a "liberal" shitstorm: Wake up. Rexburg, I've noted in eleven years of living in town and in the vicinity, has a penchant for sweeping its ugliness under the rug. Alcoholism just doesn't exist here, of course, but there are many people who are chronic "Nyquil" drinkers. Drug addiction and dealing doesn't exist here, and if it does, it's the fault of the "Mexicans," and if there are troublemakers at school, its highly likely that they're not members of "the Church." Kids here are lily-white. Nobody ever does anything wrong.

This is all, of course, a load of bull cookies.

I'd like the message to get out, though, that not everyone is oblivious here. Thankfully, one concerned parent spoke up about the Assassinate Obama chant. Others speak up about other concerns. I'm fortunate enough to be part of an Elders quorum where we discuss concerns like this openly. We're not all Democrats -- in fact, it's likely that I'm the only Democrat in the room. But we all realize that the ills that beset our society cross partisan lines.

Then we run into people like a BYU-Idaho freshman who wrote a letter to the editor of the college newspaper, basically saying that those in the LDS Church who vote Democrat shouldn't get temple recommends. (Read the paper editor's fine rebuttal to that argument here.)

That being said, I enjoy living here. I like the quiet here. We ahve our problems here, but in many respects there are fewer problems here than in other parts of this nation. I just wish we could discuss this partisan/little pitchers problem more openly, without people once again hiding behind the town's lily-white facade.

Soapbox: Injustice

Two things are on my mind today:

First of all, my 72-year-old mother was denied a drivers’ license last week. She passed all the required exams – but as she was signing her name, the clerk asked, “Oh, do you have trouble with shaking hands?” Yes, my mother does have some trouble – but it’s with fine motor skills, like signing her name, not gross motor skills, like driving a car. The clerk denied her license.

I’d like to see that same clerk when some teenager comes up, signing his application with one hand as he texts a message on his cell phone with another. Bet she wouldn’t even blink.

Last time I checked, it was young males, distracted by whatever including text messaging, who cause the most automobile accidents, not gray-haired grannies with “the shakies,” as our daughter calls it. Her entire driving record: One speeding ticket for going 35 in a 25 mph zone. Tell me she’s a menace on wheels.

Second of all, there’s this story:

http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2008/may/24/30gtteacher-lets-students-vote-out-classmate-5/

In case the link dies, I’ll sum up: A kindergarten teacher allowed her class to “vote out” a classmate because of discipline and social problems brought on by Asperger’s Syndrome. The class voted 14-2 to kick the boy out of their class, as he stood in front of them after returning from the principal’s office. His classmates told him to his face he was disgusting and annoying. And the teacher encouraged this. Encouraged it.

We have a son whom we believe to be borderline Asperger. He has difficulty in social situations, both at home and at school. He’s also a delightful, imaginative child who is very sensitive – as all children are – as to how his peers treat and regard him. We’re careful with the discipline. Oh, we dole it out when it’s necessary. But it’s always in the frame of mind that he’s a good kid, just with occasionally bad behavior. He’s never called disgusting or annoying – even if he is sometimes. That’s just not how you work on behavior. He responds much more favorably – and with better discipline – with positive reinforcement (Here’s what you’re doing right, versus here’s what you’re doing wrong.) I’m grateful he’s had teachers with a better head on their shoulders than this kid’s teacher.

Now, I don’t know the whole story here, obviously. Maybe the precious snowflake’s momma was using the proto-diagnosis (the story says the boy was “in the process of being diagnosed” (which isn’t at all odd, considering the hoop after hoop after hoop you have to go through with this kind of diagnosis; believe me, we’ve been through them all) but to get back to the subject – using the proto-diagnosis as an excuse to excuse his behavior. We certainly don’t – and we don’t even have a proto-diagnosis. But it’s my growing experience that there are some adults out there who look at even mild forms of autism like Asperger’s and then write the kid off as a problem, rather than working with the kid. Like those old t-shirts say, “God don’t make no junk.”

And I’ve been on the other end of this spectrum: When I was a kid, a mentally handicapped kid in the neighborhood tried to choke me when I wouldn’t get out of my brother’s car to let him “drive.” The memories still freak me out, but I don’t brandish pitchforks and torches every time I see a mentally handicapped person walking toward me.

Final note: This teacher has been “reassigned” by the district. Hopefully, to the janitorial staff. Though you’d hate to wish that kind of witless behavior on the other janitors.

John McWho?

Okay, I believe it's official. John McCain cannot be our next president. He's just another "feel good" Republican who favors symbolic acts over tough acts that could acutally help people out.

McCain proposes a "tax holiday" between Memorial Day and Labor Day this summer, in which Congress would lift the federal taxes on gasoline. Big. Fat. Hairy. Deal.

Right now at home, gas is $3.28 a gallon. A federal gas tax holiday would see prices drop . . . to $3.10 a gallon. Big deal. We spend about $40 a week keeping gas in our minivan. We don't make a lot of long trips -- one sixty-mile round-trip to Idaho Falls a week is about the extent of our long voyages, with a myriad of shorter voyages, of course. At today's gas prices, that's about 12.25 gallons. McCain's tax holiday would save us $2.19 a week or, over the course of his proposed holiday (and I'll be generous and call it four months) a whopping $35. Thanks to the big-thinking, whiskey-drinking, no-eye-blinking John McCain, we can save enough money this summer -- if this tax holiday idea goes through -- to buy an extra tank of gas. Thanks, John. Talk about symbolism without the substance.

He expressed no long-term solutions. The tax holiday ends on Labor Day, the gas tax reappears, and we're back in the same old boat we never left during the holiday because gas prices are still through the roof. I won't even comment on prices outside the United States, where taxes are much higher than what we pay here. I know we're crybabies. But bear with me.

Meanwhile, crude oil is trading at $113 a barrel today, a new record. That tax holiday isn't going to affect the oil companies one bit.

Here are some more radical ideas I'd like to see a president propose, rather than a ridiculous feel-gooder:

• Cap crude oil prices at $50 a barrel. I think we've seen that the increased prices hasn't soured demand. So let's get prices reasonable again. As I recall, oil companies were still profitable when crude was trading at $16 a barrel in the mid-1980s, so $50 a barrel shouldn't be too big of a burden.
• Increase fuel efficiency standards, ignoring the whining from Detroit. Those boobs making cars need to get their harbls out of the oil companies' pockets.
• Cut consumption. This is a radical idea that freedom-loving Americans will detest. But I think it could work: Limit families to one car apiece. One car. We have two. One, I drive to and from the bus stop, seven miles distant. I still have to put gas in it. It still costs insurance money. We could get rid of one car and save money. Maybe this is as symbolic a gesture as McCain's tax holiday. But it would at least be a permanent idea, not one with an expiration date in four months.
• We could also plan/consolidate our trips better. Last Friday we squeezed everything out of our weekly trip to the big city. We don't make multiple trips.
• Fund alternatives. If Big Oil won't agree to price caps, maybe the government out to just take some of their profits and invest it in alternative sources of fuel. Is this stealing? Is this socialism? Communism? Perhaps. But it beats the highway robbery capitalism we have now. I've posted a video here of a guy who's developed a hybrid engine that runs on gasoline and water. Water. He gets 100 miles on four ounces of water. Why aren't investors beating a path to his door? If you don't want government involved, fine. Get Big Oil to fund privately. But that'll cut into their bonuses and golf games, so it's not gonna happen any time soon. Please step in, Big Brother. Besides, we're seeing countries like India and China sucking up more of the world's oil, which, in part, is what's driving prices up, up, up. If America wants to lead in this coming century, it's time to get off the oil addiction and find something else. And by something else, I don't mean corn ethanol. Cellulostic ethanol, perhaps. Nuclear. Hydrogen. Wind and solar power. Whatever it takes to shut off the oil spigot.

These are all easy suggestions for me to make, since I am not an expert. But I'll bet if there were a presidential andiate out there who was looking at long-term solutions instead of short-term symbolic fluff, a lot more people would be exicted about going to the polls. As it is, I may vote for Ralph Nader again, just so whatever bozo gets in the White House next doesn't get in with my help.