tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-82161072571752009472024-03-13T08:37:46.974-05:00The Red PushpinA blog detailing random thoughts at random times by one very random person.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.comBlogger67125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-6349133686101178942016-05-13T16:08:00.000-05:002016-05-13T16:08:21.943-05:00Advice I Would Share With My Son… If I Had One<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9wkHaW2jiTI/VzZB6zwEpfI/AAAAAAAAAeE/Iep1jCzDCsEzmxZjcOKxAgnZM6zgf6eTQCLcB/s1600/gender.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="253" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9wkHaW2jiTI/VzZB6zwEpfI/AAAAAAAAAeE/Iep1jCzDCsEzmxZjcOKxAgnZM6zgf6eTQCLcB/s400/gender.jpg" width="400" /></a>I have a daughter of my own, and soon enough I'll "officially" have two step-daughters (although I've <br />
considered them my family for quite some time). I love our blended family and wouldn't change a thing about it, but there have been times when people realize that I don't have a son of my own that they look at me as if they are sympathetic. I've had people ask if I ever plan to have more children and if I'd like to try for a son. I have even had complete strangers approach me when I'm out with my family and make little jokes or comments about how difficult it must be to be the only male in the family or act as if they pity me for having to deal with all girls.</div>
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I have to tell you - it isn't a pity. In fact I feel as if I hit the family lottery and I consider myself very, very lucky to have the family I do. I have never in my life, even for a single second, thought to myself that I would have preferred to have a son instead of a daughter. I've heard comments about how I won't be able to pass on my name (do people really care about this in the year 2016?) and how I won't be able to teach a boy how to play baseball (trust me... I'm in no position to act as a mentor for anything that involves athletics). The thing is, I don't think in those terms. </div>
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Yes it is true there are many differences between boys and girls, and yes there are things about girls I simply won't understand because I never had to deal with some of the same things as they have - but I think I'll manage. I was a single dad for enough years yet I still figured out how to braid hair, paint fingernails, and coordinate an entire outfit consisting of pink and purple clothing. I may not have had experience with these things when I was growing up, but I did ok even if my braids still aren't nearly as good as they should be. At the same time this likely means some of the knowledge I've gained as a male isn't necessarily applicable for my girls, because they just don't think the same way.</div>
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Yes I will admit it - I acknowledge that even in a world which is striving to become more and more gender-neutral there are still many inherent differences between boys and girls. I know my girls are capable of anything, and I know they aren't about to let gender stereotypes get in their way, but I can already tell that their predilections suggest there are certain things they just won't have any interest in. So when I'm getting excited about a home improvement project or when I'm drooling of a new electronic gadget they just might not care. When I see a Tesla Model S on the road and start talking about the powertrain or the horsepower they likely will just tune me out and would be more likely to point out the pretty yellow VW Beetle instead.</div>
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Differences are ok. I have no problem with there being differences and we shouldn't push people and make them feel that their differences are a weakness because that simply isn't the case. Yet I acknowledge these differences and realize there might be a few things I could have taught a boy that just won't be as useful to my girls. Granted much of my advice could be applicable to anyone regardless of gender, but from the mind of a father I started thinking about what I might try to tell my son if I had one, and this is what I came up with.</div>
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<h3>
<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">The Advice:</span></h3>
<ol>
<li>Take
chances. There are no rewards
without some level of risk. Many of the most influential and well-regarded people throughout history failed many times before getting it right.</li>
<li>You
only get one set of eyes and one set of ears. Safety glasses and hearing protection
might seem like a hassle until you spend 20 minutes removing a splinter
from your hand or a piece of sawdust from your eye.</li>
<li>Do
everything in your power to ensure the "one who got away"
doesn't actually get away. </li>
<li>Don't
confuse correlation with causation.</li>
<li>Apologize
if you hurt someone and always be willing to be the bigger person.</li>
<li>The
easy way out is rarely the most beneficial in the long run. Take the harder classes, accept the
punishment if you did wrong, and ignore the short term while looking
forward to the big picture.</li>
<li>If
you have five close friends in High School, chances are you won't even
know the home addresses of four of them by the time you graduate
college. Enjoy your friends while
they are there, but realize as you evolve, your relationships will evolve
with you.</li>
<li>Don't
get rid of your Legos. Ever.</li>
<li>Read
the entire magazine - even the boring parts. If you only read what appeals to you,
then you'll never really know what appeals to you.</li>
<li>Go
for it. A year from now you won't
remember the feeling of embarrassment if she says no, but I guarantee
you'll remember how excited you are if she says yes.</li>
<li>Learn
how to sharpen a knife and how to tie a necktie. You may not need either skill very
often, but you'll be glad you have it when the need arises. </li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Find your
creative side. Whether it is building,
painting, writing, or playing an instrument it is a side of you that will be
important throughout your entire life.
It will serve as your therapist, your outlet, and your voice - so
embrace it early and often.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Avoid the
word "someday". Define your
goals in concrete terms.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Shop at
thrift stores. Not only will you save
some cash, but you’ll see things, and people, you had no idea even existed.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Introduce
yourself to the new person in the room.
You just might make a friend for life.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Practice. Most people are not born with specific skills
or abilities and had to work to be the best at what they do. The only thing that sets you apart from those
around you is how bad you want it.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Don't
ever cheat on her. She may never know,
but you always will.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Before
you get that tattoo, look at your school picture from 10 years ago and tell me
if you would be willing to be stuck with that outfit and hair style for the
rest of your life.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Don't be
ashamed of what you like. If you enjoy
it, you shouldn’t feel the need to defend it.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Some
teachers are better than others, but you can learn something from all of them -
even if it has nothing to do with the subject they are teaching.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Don’t
submit to peer pressure. Leaders make
the decisions, followers just take orders.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Save
often and keep a backup of your important documents and pictures. One day something tragic will happen to your
phone or your computer and you'll be thankful you were prepared. You can buy new things, but you can't buy new
memories.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Acknowledge
when it comes to politics, religion, or love… there is more than one acceptable
viewpoint. </span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">If you
aren't comfortable being average then prove it.
The standard pace is designed so everyone can keep up… so don't be
average.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">You will
meet people throughout your life which are toxic and who will poison your
relationships, your career, and ultimately your happiness. Don’t ever feel bad about eliminating these
people from your life. They feed on
drama and you are their food source.
Without you they cannot survive.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">There
will be aspects about yourself you are powerless to change, but they shouldn't
get in the way of the things you can.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The time
you spend in a gym should be for yourself.
You will always know when you gave it your all or when you cheated.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Buy a
nice stereo - it will be worth it.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Opinions
are personal, facts are universal. Learn
to separate the two.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">If you
put it on your head or your feet, don't shop based upon price.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Even if
you aren't a famous politician, actor, or athlete you can still make a positive
difference in someone's life.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Learn how
to change a tire and your own oil. You
may opt to pay someone else due to convenience, but at least you’ll know they
did the job right.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Learn to
sew on a button and how to cook a meal from scratch. You'll eventually find yourself needing to know how to do both.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Cynicism
and selfishness aren’t attractive and never will be.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Ask
questions. Don't take everything at face
value. Challenge universal truths and
don't believe something just because everyone else does.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Never let
anyone else define your priorities.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Calculate
your next move and the move after that.
Have an exit strategy and a plan… even if it is subject to change.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The only
way to solve a disagreement is for at least one person to be willing to admit
they were wrong. If that person is you,
then admit it and move on.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Don’t
assume you know all the facts before you actually know all the facts. Experts spend entire careers studying the
same subject and they continue to learn something new each day. You won’t be an expert based upon a semester
no matter how hard you might study.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">You don't
need to understand why flowers mean so much to her… just buy her the flowers.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Always
remember that although you are special to someone, you aren't special to
everyone.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Hard work
is always rewarded even when nobody notices.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Impress
others with your words and actions rather than your things.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">When a
tag says “dry clean only” or “lay flat to dry” it actually means it. It isn’t a recommendation.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">As soon
as you have your own place, put together a very basic toolkit. You don’t want to be the guy who is trying to
hang a picture by pounding a nail into the wall with a can of tomato sauce.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">People
listen to managers because they have to, people list to leaders because they
want to. Be a leader.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">If
someone asks you a question to which you don’t know the answer, your response
should be “I don’t know, but I will find out”.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Nobody
will ever be perfect, so give people second chances and they will do the same
for you.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Each time
you fall in love it will be different.
Don’t ever confuse ‘different’ and ‘better’ and remember you decide
whether your future is based upon fate, luck, or action.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">If you
can purchase someone’s loyalty or integrity, then be prepared to be outbid.</span></li>
</ol>
<br />
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
</ol>
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So there it is. Does this mean I don't have any advice for my girls? Of course not - and as I said much of this could apply to them as well. The truth is, this was just an idea I had that was sparked by so many of the comments I've heard over the years. Eventually I started to wonder if I was missing out on something by not having a son helping me on a carpentry project or someone I could teach how to wire up a three-way light switch. Perhaps it would be nice to have a boy who expresses interest in electronics or who wants to help me mow the lawn.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But after really giving it serious consideration, I don't think I'm missing out on anything. Because I have girls that have a way of teaching me things. I am being introduced to new things and seeing the world through their eyes which is far more fascinating than teaching a boy how to solder or cut a miter joint. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So am I saddened that I'll never have a son? Nope... not at all. Because I have daughters.</div>
Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-70250453583107991012016-05-06T12:26:00.000-05:002016-05-06T12:26:22.579-05:00The Lawn<div class="MsoNormal">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-PzIv8n3lt8U/VyzS5WPapcI/AAAAAAAAAd4/0Ev7smWY5GorzolFPsy0fLrVifjVlc32gCLcB/s1600/IMG_2578.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-PzIv8n3lt8U/VyzS5WPapcI/AAAAAAAAAd4/0Ev7smWY5GorzolFPsy0fLrVifjVlc32gCLcB/s400/IMG_2578.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
Mowing my lawn is always an interesting dichotomy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I often treat mowing as something of a chore… something that I have to plan ahead for as it isn’t a priority.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because of this, I tend to wait too long
before mowing or find excuses to postpone (“oh those clouds look like it may
rain”, or “I have some errands to run so I’ll get it done tomorrow).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the other hand, mowing is one of those
things that allows me to get outside and enjoy the spring weather.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps I’m getting older or perhaps it is
just selective memory, but our most recent winter seemed much longer than years
past.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Although we didn’t experience
record amounts of snowfall, the temperatures and the wind seemed to drag on for
weeks longer than it should have, and there were just enough days in the 30s
and 40s to tease us into thinking spring was around the corner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, after a harsh winter I’m happy to be
mowing simply because that means it isn’t raining or snowing nor is it cold or
windy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is just a regular spring day,
and that gives me no room to complain.<br />
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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There is something about a fresh cut lawn – so uniform in
height, natural yet maintained, tidy and welcoming.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As such there is always the debate about how
much time and energy to devote to that little piece of Earth versus the benefits
gained from it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many think fertilizing
and watering a lawn is a gigantic waste of time not to mention the negative
impact upon the environment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can’t say
as I fully disagree with that notion, and I myself have debated as to how much
water should go towards making a lawn “pretty”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Yet part of me takes pride in looking out across my back yard and seeing
a carpet of thick green grass that begs for people to walk barefoot or that
beckons us to simply go outside.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I don’t live next to a lawn-nazi who has turf a golf course
superintendent would envy, so it isn’t as if I need to compete with anyone for
the best lawn in the neighborhood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet
even though it probably doesn’t matter, I do spray my weeds, I do fertilize, I
do mow and edge and weed-whack and rake and I’ll even admit it bothers me when
I see a dead spot or a thin area where grass has trouble growing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Am I perfectionist?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not really – I realize nature isn’t perfect
and since I’m not willing to spend 20 hours a week all summer on my lawn, I
know it will never be one of “those lawns” that people admire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is better than some, not as impressive as
others, and I suppose will always struggle from years of neglect by former
owners.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps the only way to ever
really fix a lawn is to tear it up and start over, but that is a drastic step
that hasn’t found its way on to my ‘to do’ list quite yet.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For now, I’m just going to continue to enjoy what I have and
be thankful I don’t have to put too much into it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll address the major flaws and consider the
rest part of the character.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll enjoy
the smell of a fresh cut lawn and try to strike a balance between how much
green I want on the lawn vs. how much green it will take to pay for the water
bill.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll start projects that I need to
do or want to do without worrying about a few brown spots, because at the end
of the day we all have our blemishes, so the lawn isn’t all that unique.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-57853575331995634192015-10-01T12:37:00.000-05:002015-10-01T12:37:23.766-05:00Does Competition Exist in the Audio/Video Community?<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3yZP0cjzbQI/Vg1uz-lzaHI/AAAAAAAAAck/anSKzH_pB5E/s1600/Electronics%2BStore.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3yZP0cjzbQI/Vg1uz-lzaHI/AAAAAAAAAck/anSKzH_pB5E/s320/Electronics%2BStore.jpg" width="320" /></a>I have written about some of the various questionable sales tactics that exist in the audio / video community in the past, but as I’ve been doing some shopping lately I’ve witnessed even more head-shaking behavior by several different manufacturers. For the most part, the industry does a fairly good job in policing itself and in the era of online reviews and blogs it is more difficult to con the consumer than it has been in years past… but as I will show, it most certainly is not impossible. <br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Rebadging: A Product by Any Other Name…
</b> <br />
<br />
One of the trends I’ve started to notice is simply rebadging one product under the name of an entirely different brand or manufacturer. This isn’t all that unusual of course and we have seen this occur in a variety of different industries over the years including automobiles, cosmetics, clothing and food. <br />
<br />
Whether it be a Toyota Matrix being sold as a Pontiac Vibe, or a package of ice cream being sold under the Edy’s label in one area but Dreyer’s in another, this type of situation occurs each and every day. That in itself isn’t really an issue, because over time some companies have purchased other companies and brands have merged, or in some cases (such as mattress sales) the industry uses different brands to prevent direct comparison shopping.
<br />
<br />
We have seen situations for years where a manufacturer will produce a single product (lawnmowers, snowblowers, and bicycles for example) and then they will sell that product with different paint colors and badging to different stores. So while one store offers a Husky snowblower, you might find a Yard Machines snowblower down the street that is identical aside from a few stickers and the color. Another store might have a Bolens snowblower, while another has a model with the Toro brand. They might all use the same parts, the same engines, and come from the same assembly line, but to the casual observer they appear as competitors.
<br />
<br />
Another example from several years ago was when I noticed some “Scott’s” brand lawn tractors for sale at Home Depot, but a year later that same exact model was sold under the John Deere brand name. It was obviously the same tractor aside from some decals and badging, but you can bet the John Deere version sold better and it most likely reflected a premium price. I’ve found this same scenario time and time again throughout the power equipment industry, but there are many, many less obvious examples such as oil filters, canned goods, generic pharmaceuticals, and batteries. <br />
<br />
<b>The Competition Really Isn’t
</b><br />
<br />
As is the case with many industries we also see this same rebadging scenario within the consumer electronics industry, and just like with garden tractors or snowblowers sometimes the appearance of a competitor can be deceiving. For instance, you can purchase an Onkyo home theater receiver that is practically identical to a model sold under the Integra name. Both are made by the same parent company and in some cases they share the same chipsets, specifications, and features – yet the Integra model can run hundreds of dollars more. Someone buying an Integra might feel they are getting a better, more exclusive product, and I’m sure the salesman will try to present it that way, but they might have a hard time explaining why a few years ago when Onkyo had to issue a recall due to some defective components, that Integra had to do the same.<br />
<br />
The thing is, Integra is typically sold via a select dealer network which includes custom installers. So these installers can sell a unit to a customer as part of a home theater room install and they can explain that they are the exclusive dealer in the region. Integra limits pricing to MSRP with very little room for adjustment, so if the customer happens to shop around they will find no matter where they look they will be spending about the same. Now think about an installer that jacks up the price of an Onkyo, and then the customer types the model number into Google only to find out they spent $1200 for a receiver that retails for $799 on Amazon. In this case, it makes sense for Onkyo to offer a standalone product under a different brand. They can offer a different warranty (Integra will come with a full three year warranty while the Onkyo twin will only include a year) and they can ensure it is only sold via a select number of hand-picked installers who cater to that specific customer market.
<br />
<br />
Another example of this is Runco, a high-end brand of home theater equipment (primary televisions and projectors). Runco is a subsidiary of Planar technologies, and as one might expect there have been numerous products sold under both the Planar and Runco names that were practically identical aside from minor cosmetic differences or changes in firmware. In the past, Runco sold televisions that were essentially rebadged NEC (Pioneer) models, and rumors of them rebadging products from others live on in many audio and video discussion forums. In some cases this may be justified if there are significant changes from the base model or when they are simply outsourcing for select components and then enhancing them, but one starts to wonder at what point is someone merely paying a significant price premium for a product that just happens to carry a high end brand name?
<br />
<br />
<b>The R&D Problem
</b><br />
<br />
The problem with some of these boutique manufacturers is they tend to cater towards a high-end segment. A company like Sony or Samsung might offer numerous different models of televisions or home theater receivers designed to appeal to consumers at all pricepoints, but the bulk of their volume will come from the end-user community who purchases a device, takes it home, hooks it up, and uses it. On the other hand a company like Runco is more likely to sell their products through dealers/installers who work with a client to design a system and then the dealer handles the installation of the system. Because this high-end market is significantly smaller than that of the mass-market segment, companies who sell these high end products know up front that their sales volume will be much lower. <br />
<br />
So how does a company cover all of their research and development (R&D) costs when they know they will only sell a limited number of units? It seems there are two possible options – number one they simply raise the price of the end product to compensate, so the percentage of that product devoted to R&D ends up being significantly higher than it would be on a mass-market product. The second option is to lower R&D costs by either outsourcing some of the development or engineering, or by building upon existing technology. Both of these options are used with great success in the market, and I’ll talk about each next.
<br />
<br />
<b>Raise Prices to Capture Costs
</b><br />
<br />
In the first scenario a company simply raises the price of the product to compensate for their R&D, which logically results in a product being more expensive (often significantly more expensive) than the competition. In some cases this increased cost may even be justified because the product is a substantial improvement over standard offerings, but I have seen many times where the more expensive product isn’t actually superior to one sold at a much lower pricepoint. If you think about it, this is a difficult situation as a large company who sells millions of units every year will obviously have a much larger R&D budget. They can spend a lot more to develop new products knowing the costs will be distributed over a much larger number of units sold. On the other hand, a small niche company will not have as large of a budget and will not produce as many products, therefore they are not as able to absorb losses if a product fails in the marketplace. In some cases the only way to compete is to charge significantly more for their product while trying to convince the consumer that the price is justified.
<br />
<br />
<b>The Example
</b><br />
<br />
To use an example, let’s pretend there are two companies developing projectors for the home theater market. For this example, the companies are called “Epsomate” and “Rumcorp” (of course any resemblance to existing companies is purely coincidental).
<br />
<br />
Epsomate spends $20MM in R&D to develop their latest projector. They expect to sell 250,000 units worldwide, and the cost of components including assembly in their new design will run around $1200. So if we forget about marketing, administrative, or other expenses, Epsomate would need to see each of those 250,000 projectors for at least $1280 just to break even.
<br />
<br />
Now let’s look at Rumcorp. Because they wish to be an industry leader, then tend to spend more on R&D than their competition in an effort to produce a higher end product. In this example they spend $30MM in R&D to develop their latest model. However, since Rumcorp is a much smaller high-end company, they can expect to only spend a fraction of the amount of projectors that Epsomate might sell, and in this case they predict they will see around 20,000 units worldwide. The cost of components including assembly is higher due in part to smaller volumes (suppliers are less likely to give discounts for smaller quantities) and due to them specifying components with tighter tolerances. In this example cost of components including assembly is $1600. Again we exclude marketing, administrative and other general expenses which results in Rumcorp needing to sell each of those 20,000 projectors for at least $3,100 just to break even.<br />
<br />
So at this point the Rumcorp projector already needs to retail for at least 240% more than the Epsomate projector. That in itself limits their market, but when you also consider efficiencies of scale that Epsomate may have and how they can use some of the technology from their latest projector on several models designed for the business community or for the educational segment you start to realize how the smaller custom segment is at a disadvantage. Then you start to realize that a full page advertisement in Sound and Vision magazine is going to cost just as much for Rumcorp as it does with Epsomate, meaning their marketing expenses may not be substantially different (although there is a chance Rumcorp would forego any marketing and instead focus upon training their dealer network).
<br />
<br />
Next you realize that the Epsomate model will be sold through a variety of brick and mortar stores as well as online from numerous different sources while the Rumcorp model will only be sold through a pre-selected integrator/installer network where price-matching and comparison shopping is all but impossible… and you suddenly realize it is entirely feasible that the Rumcorp projector may end up costing three or four times what the Epsomate projector costs regardless of the performance.
<br />
<br />
So what happens when someone decides to compare the two projectors side by side and they realize the differences in performance are rather minor? What happens when the high end projector produces a better picture, but not substantially improved over the projector that costs a fraction of the Rumcorp? What happens when a typical consumer cannot discern a difference between the two at all, or what if an actual industry analyst is unable to consistently pick the more expensive projector during blind testing?
<br />
<br />
The truth is, price isn’t always indicative of quality, and when it comes to audio and video equipment, often times the increased cost of a higher end brand has more to do with dealer markup and higher profit margins than it does with better components or design. This is why when you read unbiased reviews and when you compare specifications on some high-end equipment you often find the higher end brands fail to impress. It isn’t that they aren’t good products, but they often aren’t good values. <br />
<br />
Most people aren’t willing to spend four or five times more for a product that has only a marginal improvement in performance, especially when that marginal improvement is practically undetectable outside of a lab. Of course those that do spend much more for the boutique brand products may attempt to justify their purchases by proclaiming they can discern a massive difference or that some random engineer from an obscure website did a review and was very complimentary, but that is fairly typical of self-proclaimed videophiles, who <a href="http://redpushpin.blogspot.com/2012/07/why-i-hate-audiophiles.html" target="_blank">much like their audiophile brethren</a> like to equate price and exclusivity with performance and quality.<br />
<br />
<b>Outsourcing
</b><br />
<br />
So if the boutique manufacturers are unable to compete by raising prices to offset their R&D costs, if they are unable to justify the much higher price of their products based upon name brand alone, or if the cost to develop their own in-house product is simply too expensive there is always another option. <br />
<br />
This route involves reducing costs by letting someone else handle the actual R&D. This is done a few different ways, but primarily it comes in the form of a company outsourcing their development and engineering, or in other cases a company may borrow (license) technology from other firms to use as a starting point for their own enhancements. <br />
<br />
More than a decade ago I worked for a computer company called Gateway, and to many people Gateway was a PC manufacturer. However, what most people didn’t know is that Gateway was essentially nothing more than a specifications company who assembled PCs. Gateway didn’t manufacture motherboards or processors. They didn’t build CD drives nor did they write device drivers. Gateway didn’t even produce the metal cases the PCs were shipped in nor did they produce their own keyboards, mice, or speakers. <br />
<br />
Each and every component of a Gateway PC came from another vendor who designed that component to meet the specifications that Gateway required. So basically what Gateway did was purchase motherboards from one supplier, processors from another, cases from yet another, cables from this supplier, power supplies from that supplier, and cables and cd/dvd drives and software and hard drives and everything else from dozens upon dozens of suppliers. They shipped all of these materials to a production facility where the parts were assembled into a case, software was loaded, the final PC was put into a box and it was ultimately shipped to the consumer. <br />
<br />
That isn’t to say that Gateway didn’t have a hand in the design, because they worked with suppliers to design the cases and components and picked the features they wanted included or excluded. They picked the colors and the styles and decided where the logo would be… but they never actually built the individual components. In fact, some of the suppliers that Gateway used also supplied other PC manufacturers that were direct competitors to Gateway. I worked in an engineering and testing lab and can still recall working with one of the suppliers (Tottori SANYO) on a new laptop design. When we were presented the mockup of the laptop it was actually shipped to us with a Dell power brick. The final production model (Gateway Solo 2100 for those interested) was practically identical to a laptop produced by Dell, and aside from the exterior plastics, BIOS screens, and the labels – it was in effect the same computer. In fact, some of the removable components such as the CD-ROM drive or floppy drive were actually interchangeable between the Gateway and Dell systems.
<br />
<br />
My point in all of this is that it isn’t unusual to a company to outsource some of their development. They might dictate the specifications and they may customize numerous aspects of the final product, but in many cases they won’t actually handle the final design, engineering, or production of a component or even an entire unit. In Gateway’s case, assembling a laptop was simply a matter of installing a processor, some memory, and a keyboard to match what the customer ordered, and much in the same way an electronics company might outsource the production of a CD changer or an amplifier assembly to a company that can produce that unit at a lower cost due to their production capacity.
<br />
<br />
<b>The Blatant Fraud
</b> <br />
<br />
As I have shown above, outsourcing isn’t unusual nor is it indicative of any nefarious behavior. It is a common tactic used successfully across a variety of industries, so in theory it is nothing to be ashamed of. In most cases companies that outsource do so in order to minimize costs or to leverage the expertise and intellectual property of another firm. Then they incorporate the technology into their own products which are sold under their own label. I completely understand why this happens. I understand why there is a need for it, and I understand the efficiencies that can be gained by outsourcing. <br />
<br />
What I cannot understand however, is outsourcing to a company and then essentially just taking their design – putting a new name on the front of it, and selling it at a price which is exponentially higher. For instance, a few years ago an electronics company by the name of Lexicon was caught red handed rebadging an Oppo Blu-Ray player that retailed for $500 inside of their own aluminum enclosure which they then priced at $3,500! Lexicon claims that it is “one of the world's premier manufacturers of home theater and professional electronics”, but does that claim justify them jacking up the price of a Blu-ray player by $3,000 (700%!) just because their nameplate was slapped on the front?
<br />
<br />
Lexicon did try to claim they used the Oppo player and then in turn did some enhancements to it, but unfortunately for them, <a href="http://www.audioholics.com/blu-ray-and-dvd-player-reviews/lexicon-bd-30-blu-ray-oppo-clone/oppo-inside-lexicon-outside-1" target="_blank">the experts at Audioholics</a> not only disassembled both the Oppo and Lexicon players to verify they were identical inside, but they even took it a step further by performing detailed tests on the two devices to verify they were identical in both components as well as performance. So in this case Lexicon was caught and their fraud was shown to the world, but how many consumers purchased a $3,500 Blu-ray player under the belief they were getting the best possible technology available to them only to be handed a $500 player inside of a $3,000 aluminum box?
<br />
<br />
Obviously Lexicon isn’t alone here but they are one of the more egregious examples. I don’t feel it is entirely unfair to call this type of behavior fraudulent, because there is clearly zero justification for the 700% increase in price which is one prime example why I would never do business from a company like Lexicon. However if it were not for Lexicon’s pure laziness in this case, would anyone have really noticed? If Lexicon would have had Oppo redesign the primary circuit board and if they would have rearranged the components (and perhaps even designed their own chassis instead of just using a stock Oppo design), chances are nobody would have ever realized they were the same product. <br />
<br />
They also could have simply tweaked the Oppo design to add features or customize it in some small way by modifying the audio processor and claiming their own engineers simply built upon the existing Oppo platform. Sure many of us would still be skeptical, but at least they would have some small defense for their increase in price.
<br />
<br />
In fact this type of behavior happens all the time. If you take the time to open up the cases of modern electronics, you often find circuit boards, power supplies, or other components which have been produced by third party companies, and often those components (with very minor changes) may appear in multiple different brand name products. Many people are aware of Chinese electronics assembly companies like Foxconn who produce products for companies such as Apple, Acer, Dell, HP, Samsung, Sony, Vizio, Amazon, Microsoft, Nintendo, Toshiba, Motorola and many, many more. <br />
<br />
Other companies like Quanta Computer product products for several different PC companies from the exact same building so it isn’t a stretch to assume in some cases they share components or even assembly lines. This is why it pays to do research on products before purchasing them, and when possible it is always a good idea to do comparison testing with your own eyes and ears. Even if you can afford to pay 200 or 300% more for the same product being sold under an exclusive name, with a bit of research and a dosage of skepticism, you won’t have to.
Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-82835389336394303072013-06-06T14:05:00.004-05:002013-06-06T14:05:57.756-05:00CuriosityAs children we are continually encouraged to remain curious. Parents and educators alike foster our<div>
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-R7xxGc_7YeA/UbDdRrO30nI/AAAAAAAAAW8/eAWqF3-EIB0/s1600/Mario+Question+Mark.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-R7xxGc_7YeA/UbDdRrO30nI/AAAAAAAAAW8/eAWqF3-EIB0/s200/Mario+Question+Mark.gif" width="200" /></a>creativity and our curiosity and push us to never stop seeking answers. As we become adults we have college professors and employers who continue to reward curiosity and who suggest incredible advancement is science and medicine are due to nothing other than human curiosity. We hear positive terms like “visionary” and “inquisitive” attached to those who are naturally curious, and we are taught that asking questions is important.<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Then one day you decide to observe a liver transplant procedure and suddenly the only questions being asked are “where did you get that lab coat” or “how did you get past security” and people start tossing around words like “fanatic” or “felony”... suddenly it becomes obvious that maybe curiosity isn't such a big deal after all.</div>
</div>
Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-85487057730251004222012-12-31T14:58:00.000-06:002012-12-31T15:11:25.276-06:00Give Credit Where Credit Is Due<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5vIwQNu2e4s/UNy6xwHS_NI/AAAAAAAAAVc/suWbs6sTRJA/s1600/photo.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5vIwQNu2e4s/UNy6xwHS_NI/AAAAAAAAAVc/suWbs6sTRJA/s320/photo.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
A lot of people receive preapproved or prescreened credit card offers in the mail, and I am no exception. I sometimes receive several in a week, and on more than one occasion I've received several in a single day. Thus throughout the years I started to wonder how many of these applications are actually sent to me in a given year... and in 2012 I decided to find out. Therefore, beginning on January 1st I began collecting and documenting each and every prescreened credit card offer that arrived in my mailbox not only to determine how many of these offers I received, but also to document the differences between the offers.<br />
<br />
Since January, I have documented a total of 69 offers that have arrived in the mail. Initially I thought about attempting to document offers received via email as well, but I soon realized that would include hundreds of such offers, so I opted to limit this experiment to only offers that happen to appear in my physical mailbox. I then used a spreadsheet to list details such as introductory interest rate, regular interest rate, annual fee, balance transfer fee, as well as any particular "bonus" offered with the card such as airline miles, cashback bonuses, or points per dollar spent.<br />
<br />
Yes... I apparently have far too much free time.<br />
<br />
<h2>
The Offers</h2>
Here is a summary of some of the more interesting facts about the prescreened offers I received:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>57 of the 69 offers included a introductory APR of 0%.</li>
<li>A shortest intro APR offered was for 12 months; the longest for 18 months.</li>
<li>The lowest, regular (non-intro) APR was for 9.99%; the highest was for a whopping 25.24%!</li>
<li>61 of the 69 offers had no annual fee. The few cards that did include an annual fee were typically travel cards that offered airline miles for every dollar spent. The annual fee for these cards ranged from a low of $95 to a high of $150 although in most cases the fee was waived for the first year.</li>
</ul>
<div>
Now as far as which banks were responsible for the offers I received, the breakdown is as follows:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>Discover: 23</li>
<li>Citi / Citbank: 16</li>
<li>Capital One: 14</li>
<li>American Express: 11</li>
<li>HSBC: 2</li>
<li>Comenity Bank: 2</li>
<li>Chase: 1</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div>
It should be noted that in mid-2012 Capital One bought HSBC, so I could have listed those as the same company for a total of 16 offers. Either way Discover is the clear winner here with a total of 23 offers out of the 69 I received.</div>
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If you prefer a visual reference, here is a pretty chart showing the final outcome taking into account conjoined companies:</div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-lCWqXeDPCFg/UNtcMhQ7L1I/AAAAAAAAAVI/zizqD_doyIE/s1600/Card+Count.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-lCWqXeDPCFg/UNtcMhQ7L1I/AAAAAAAAAVI/zizqD_doyIE/s400/Card+Count.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<h2>
Factors Impacting The Number of Offers</h2>
<div>
There are a few specific items I need to point out regarding the total count of prescreened offers showing up in my mailbox. First of all I currently hold three credit cards. I have a Wells Fargo Visa, a Chase Freedom Visa, and a Menards card issued by HSBC (aka: Capital One). My relationship with these companies most likely impacts the number of offers coming from them, as I wouldn't expect to get a lot of offers from companies that I already hold cards with.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
I have been told that Wells Fargo does not currently send prescreened offers to non-Wells Fargo customers therefore if someone isn't a Wells Fargo customer and doesn't receive offers from Wells Fargo I wouldn't exactly be shocked. In the interest of full disclosure I should mention that I do in fact work for Wells Fargo, but I do not work in the Credit Card line of business so don't quote me on how they handle their prescreening process.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
As to my Chase Visa card, I should note that prior to me having a Chase card, I would get prescreened offers from Chase about as often as I do from Discover. Apparently these people don't give up easily. Capital One on the other hand doesn't seem to care that I have a HSBC issued Menards Card, because they continue to send me prescreened offers on a regular basis.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
In years past, I have had cards from Capital One, Citibank, Discover, and retail (store) cards issued by Wells Fargo and GE Financial. The Wells Fargo card was from a furniture store, and the GE account was for a carpet purchase. The cards from Discover and Capital One were closed upon my request because I rarely used them and they were simply taking up room in my wallet. The store accounts were opened at the time of the purchases due to 0% APR offers, and they were closed within the interest free window in order to prevent any interest charges being applied to the accounts. I only mention these cards because I have an account history with these companies which may or may not impact the number of prescreened offers I receive from them.</div>
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<br /></div>
<h2>
My Credit Profile</h2>
<div>
I will admit if you would have asked me how many prescreened credit card offers I receive in the mail over a one year period, I would have guessed at least 150. When the total count showed me that I actually receive less than half that amount I was somewhat surprised, but I cannot state if my estimates were based upon past experience, or if perception simply doesn't match reality.</div>
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<div>
I don't believe my actual credit score has changed much in the past few years, so I doubt that has anything to do with the number of offers arriving in my mailbox. I monitor my credit report on a regular basis and have good to excellent credit. My credit score ranges from high 700s to low 800s depending upon the credit bureau and when I happen to check (the most recent score I have seen was in the upper 700s). I've never been late on any payments and I have verified my credit reports do not show any late or missing payments. </div>
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That said, I have noticed over the past year my credit score appears to have dropped a bit which I attribute to the fact that some of my older accounts are dropping off my credit history due to them being closed. This likely impacts my credit utilization, and because I no longer have a car loan that I'm paying on a monthly basis I'm assuming there is some impact due to fewer types of credit being used. </div>
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<div>
One mistake I made in years past is to close old credit cards and open new accounts when there was a tempting bonus offer. For instance at one point I had a Capital One card with a fixed 5.9% APR, however because I rarely used the card I closed it and opened up a different account with another card issuer because of a $300 cash bonus. Because I don't typically carry a balance on any of my credit cards, I generally don't care about the APR of a card, however the cycle of opening and closing credit card accounts can have a negative impact upon a credit score. Because of this, I plan to keep the cards I have even if I only use them several times a year. </div>
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<br />
<h2>
The Never-ending Sales Pitch</h2>
It seems clear that Discover, Capital One / HSBC, and Citi are very determined to give me a credit card and on more than one occasion I received multiple offerings from these companies within a one week period. In fact, I received an offer from Discover on April 16th, and a second offer from them two days later on April 18th. The offers themselves were identical, so I could see no reason why they were so quick to send a follow-up mailing.<br />
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As mentioned previously, Discover was responsible for sending me a total of 23 prescreened offers throughout 2012 or an average of two offers per month. I am convinced that they are single-handedly keeping the US Postal Service in business.<br />
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Speaking of Discover, their typical offer included a 0% intro-APR for 12-15 months with a regular APR of 9.99%. However in May I noticed their regular APR moved upwards to 10.99% and in July it moved up to 12.99%. In August the APR reached a peak of 14.99%, but two short weeks later in September they were back down to 9.99% where they have remained until the end of the year. I'm not sure what drove the varying interest rates, but it seems odd that an APR would slowly rise only to drop 5% in a matter of two weeks. I guess this is one case where it clearly pays to keep track of the various offers before sending in an application.<br />
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<h2>
The Outliers</h2>
If this little experiment has taught me anything, it is that there are vast differences between offers when you look at the details. Late in the year I received two offers issued by Comenity Bank for the "Express NEXT" card (a store credit card for the Express clothing stores). This wasn't exactly shocking to me because I had recently signed up for a rewards program in my local Express store, and shortly thereafter the prescreened offers showed up. The disturbing aspect of this was that the regular APR for this card is a whopping 24.99% which was second only to an offer received from Sears.<br />
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Speaking of Sears, their offer (issued by Citibank) not only was the highest APR of any card received throughout the entire year at 25.24%, but they didn't even include any type of intro APR. They were nice enough to offer a $10 statement credit after the first purchase, but honestly... I find this offer insulting. I realize store-branded cards typically hold higher APRs than regular bank-issued, non-branded cards, but a card with an APR above 25% is simply insane especially considering the card offers no significant benefits on top of a traditional card.<br />
<br />
I realize Sears has been losing billions of dollars a year for the past few years (yes that is billions with a "B"), but if they want to stay in business and build brand loyalty it probably isn't a great idea to attempt to return to profitability on the backs of their credit card holders. To make matters worse I hold a Sears loyalty card with VIP status meaning I have spent thousands of dollars with Sears in a one-year time frame... and this is the way that loyalty is rewarded? I'm underwhelmed Sears... <a href="http://redpushpin.blogspot.com/2011/11/open-letter-to-sears.html" target="_blank">but that really isn't anything new</a>.<br />
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<h2>
The Fine Print</h2>
I of course am not about to list all of the fine print for each of the offers I received, but I will provide a little insight as to my methodology. <br />
<br />
First, if the regular APR was listed as a range (for instance 9.99% - 12.99%) I always listed the lowest APR in that range to correspond to a person with good to excellent credit. Obviously not everyone would qualify for the lowest APR, but this was one way to level the playing field.<br />
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Next, most APRs were listed as varying with the market based upon the Prime Rate. I documented the APRs at the point the offer was received, but if the Prime Rate happens to change, it is assumed some of the APRs would as well.<br />
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Finally, I didn't list all of the bonuses that are included with each offer. I did document them in my spreadsheet for comparison sake, but I didn't take the time to outline each here for space reasons. Most of these offers were for point or mileage bonuses after charging so much on the card within a specific time period. For example it is very common to receive 10,000 bonus miles or $100 statement credit if $1,000 is charged within three months. A few offers included gasoline gift cards, cashback bonuses, or bonus miles upon an approved application as well.<br />
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<h2>
Stop The Madness</h2>
As fun as this process is, I really have no desire to receive dozens upon dozens of these offers each and every year, and because of the ever-increasing threat of identity theft, I'm forced to shred these offers rather than just chucking them in the trash. Therefore, I will be putting a stop to most of these offers by following the recommendations of the Federal Trade Commission.<br />
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The <a href="http://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0148-prescreened-credit-and-insurance-offers" target="_blank">FTC advises</a> anyone who wishes to stop such prescreened offers to call toll-free 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (1-888-567-8688) or visit<a href="https://www.optoutprescreen.com/" target="_blank"> www.optoutprescreen.com</a>. Either of those options should remove your name from the mailing list for five years, which for most people is probably a good thing although if you do decide you want a credit card you may have to reach out to a card issuer rather than waiting for them to reach out to you. However as a bonus, you will probably save several trees due to the massive reduction in junk mail arriving in your mailbox.<br />
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Do you have a question or comment about this post? Sound off in the comments and I'll do my best to respond.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-38051439342269108022012-11-19T18:25:00.000-06:002013-01-07T14:50:38.897-06:00Motoring Memories<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This is one of those blog posts that is more of a mental memory dump. I was thinking the other day that I've owned a lot of cars throughout the years, but I've never actually taken the time to count them. There are also a few of them that are a bit blurry as far as the year or exact model, so I felt it was a good idea to just go ahead and write them down once and for all.<br />
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<b>1986 Chevy Cavalier CS</b><br />
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This was my first car that my dad bought for me. Technically he bought it for my sister and it was handed down to me a couple of years later, but who was I to complain. It wasn't the sportiest car around, and it was nothing more than a typical four door econobox, but I loved it just the same. <br />
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It had a white exterior and red/maroon interior and originally it came with a AM/FM radio with two speakers in the dash. No tape deck, no rear speakers... just a AM/FM radio. There were no power locks, no power windows, no rear window defrost, and no keyless entry. Heated seats hadn't even been invented yet, and the term airbag was something associated with politicians rather than automobile safety. The Cavalier had a 2.0 liter four cylinder engine that produced a whopping 86 horsepower (thank you Wikipedia), and yet I still managed to get something like three speeding tickets while driving it.<br />
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Eventually my father paid to have a tape deck installed and some rear speakers, and I actually felt that stereo was pretty nice. A few years later when CD players became the norm, I installed a CD player and then proceeded to install various amps and speakers to ensure my neighbors hated me each and every time I arrived home.<br />
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I was involved in my first accident in this car during a winter storm. The car in front of me lost control on an icy road and slid sideways blocking traffic, and I in turn bumped into the side of their car because I couldn't stop in time. It was a minor no-fault accident and the only thing that was damaged on my car was the plastic bumper... along with my ego. Months later I was rear-ended by a different car while I was sitting at a stop sign and it practically destroyed my car. I still remember it was $2600 in damage which doesn't seem like a lot now, but in the early 90s it was probably about half what the car was worth at the time. The accident blew out my rear window and pushed the rear fenders up into the rear tires along with causing significant damage to the trunk, bumper, and taillight areas. Eventually the car was fixed, but I continued to find little bits of broken glass each time I vacuumed the interior even months later.<br />
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At one point in my high school life I ended up foolishly attempting to drive through a puddle out by a lake and the car stalled. The interior filled up with muddy stagnant water and I ended up having to walk to a nearby home and call a friend to come get me. Eventually I was able to tow the car out and it started just fine, but the next several weeks involved a lot of vacuuming with a shop vac to pull the nasty water out of the water logged carpeting, several different types of carpet deodorizer, and a continual need to drive with my windows open regardless of the weather due to the unpleasant smell. I think I eventually got it all cleaned up, but I swear on a hot day there was still a little aura of swamp stench in the air. Good times.<br />
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Everyone has a special place in their heart for their first car, and part of me wishes I could find it because it would be neat to own again, however the reality is I'm 99.7% sure this car has long since been crushed and recycled into something a lot whole more useful than a 86 Cavalier.<br />
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<b>1987 Oldsmobile Cutlass Calais</b><br />
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The Olds was a car my step-mom drove while I was in high school, and because it was a two-door and had a few extra horsepower on top of what I had in the Cavalier, I thought it was a pretty nice car. When I was in my freshmen year of college my dad offered me a deal that I could buy the car by giving him my Cavalier plus $1000 cash. At the time it was a pretty good deal, so I jumped at the opportunity.<br />
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The major issue with this car was the fact it was this horrible brownish orange copper color. Sure in 1987 it was probably ok, but when I owned the car (circa 1994) that copper color was incredibly ugly, and it seemed anytime you saw a copper colored GM car it was probably a 1987, so I'm assuming this particular color was not a great seller since it only seemed to last that one model year. For whatever reason about a year later when I bought my next car, my dad wanted this thing back so I sold it back to him. I think they drove it for a couple more years and eventually passed it on to another relative.... I never heard what happened to it, but I'm pretty sure it is either sitting in a shelterbelt somewhere or it was melted down to make new manhole covers.<br />
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<b>1983 Mazda RX-7</b><br />
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Sometime around 1993 or 94 my brother Dean had purchased this RX-7 and he was ready to get rid of it a short time later. I loved the idea of a small sporty car, and I loved the idea of a manual transmission, so we worked out a deal where I traded him a laptop computer and a few hundred bucks for the car. My father thought I was nuts because it was several years older than the Olds, but to a teenage kid there was no comparison between an Olds and a RX-7. <br />
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I loved driving this car, and I have a lot of great memories with it. It wasn't the fastest car around, but it handled well so I managed to get into trouble from time to time. I even had a little incident that involved being unsuccessfully pursued by one of Mitchell's finest which looking back upon probably could have landed me in jail. Who knew that driving about three times the speed limit is typically frowned upon? Granted not pulling over when you see flashing lights is even worse, but I'm pretty sure the statute of limitations is up so I can probably admit to it now.<br />
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Also, due to the car being so low to the ground I was actually able to drive under the barriers they used to close down the public beach at the lake which meant I could park at the beach at night without ever worrying about being bothered. Years later I was told they modified the barriers and thinned the trees so you could see the parking lot from the road all because of rumors that people were driving under the barriers when the beach was closed... I suppose that is part of my legacy.<br />
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One feature of the RX-7 that I always loved was the fact it had a manual choke. This is something that was almost unheard of at that time, and I still remember pulling on the choke in order to start the car in the winter. As the car would heat up you could push the choke in further and further until it was closed, but if you left it wide open and came up to a stop sign, as soon as you pushed the clutch in the engine would rev up. It took a while to get used to, but it was just one of those things that made the car special and unique.<br />
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Unfortunately the RX-7 was a maintenance nightmare and it required something to be fixed or replaced about every other week. The AC never worked and was way too expensive to fix, and eventually the car started burning so much oil that I feared OPEC would start sending me Christmas cards. It had some electrical quirks that were impossible to trace down, it was starting to show many signs of significant rust, so I figured it might be time to look into something a bit more reliable. <br />
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By the time I traded the RX-7 in, the fuel tank would start leaking if you filled the car up more than half way, the rear bearings were howling and needed to be replaced, the AC still didn't work, the car would not downshift into second gear and would often grind a bit when upshifting, the APEX seals on the rotary engine were all but shot, and I'm sure there were at least 20 other things wrong with it. It was fun while it lasted, and I'm sure I was responsible for many of the things that were wrong with the car simply because I was so hard on it. However all good things come to an end, and I ended up trading it off on my next car. The funny thing was that they gave me $1800 in trade-in value which was far more than the car was worth at the time, and was more than Dean had paid to buy the car a few years earlier.<br />
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<b>1989 Chevy Cavalier Z24</b><br />
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I bought this car in 1995 or so and I must say I loved it from day one. It was a two door and it had a V6 which was actually pretty powerful for its day. It had a maroon exterior with some gold accents along with a black interior. I spent a lot of time and money on the stereo and to this day I've never had a stereo that was as loud or as nice as what I had in this car.<br />
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For all intents and purposes the car was actually pretty reliable. It wasn't horrible on gas (although my driving style probably didn't help matters), and it was comfortable. This is probably one of those cars I wish I would have kept longer, but I have often been guilty of simply getting bored with my cars and feeling the need to trade for something else. I suspect another reason I ended up trading is because at one point I was stuck in a snowbank for four hours during a blizzard which made me think I should really have something that was 4WD. The day after that little blizzard I was stuck in a different snowbank when a woman in a minivan rear ended me. Thankfully the accident was relatively minor and it was ruled her fault, plus it has given me some good stories to tell, so it really wasn't a huge deal even if I wasn't so impressed at the time.<br />
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<b>1995 Jeep Wrangler Rio Grande</b><br />
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I think Jeep Wranglers are one of those vehicles that everyone should probably own once. What's not to love about something as versatile as a 4WD convertible that has a trailer hitch?<br />
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The biggest mistake I made with buying the Wrangler was buying the four cylinder engine rather than the V6. I think that engine had something like 115hp, and due to the total lack of an aerodynamic shape, it honestly struggled to hit 75 on the Interstate. In fact at one point I tried pulling a trailer out to Rapid City to deliver some furniture to my sister and brother in law, and there were points even with the pedal to the floor I was unable to hit 65mph. <br />
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The other main issue with this idiotic vehicle was the fact I was so in love with the idea of owning a Jeep that I ignored the fact that it was bright orange. Officially Jeep called this "Bright Mango" and it was a very, very rare color. I'd like to think it was rare because it was a limited edition or something, but I'm fairly certain the only reason it was rare is because it was ugly. In the right light it looked orange, but other times it looked red, and I even had someone ask me if it was pink (I'm assuming that person was colorblind, but you never know).<br />
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My Jeep did have the hardtop, and I purchased a softtop for summer use. It was also a manual transmission which was perfectly fine for day to day use, but the few times I went off-road it was less than ideal. Of course I soon found out that in the winter time Jeeps are essentially worthless because of the short wheelbase and lack of weight. The other negative was the heating system in a Jeep was superb at roasting a person's feet while they were freezing from the waist up, and even with the hard top installed there were still gaps and cracks that resulted in a cool breeze blowing through the passenger cabin at highway speeds. To make matters worse, the Jeep was horrible on gas at any speed above 35 and because I was commuting about 30 miles each direction at the time, it wasn't exactly efficient.<br />
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<b>1998 Chevy Cavalier Z24</b><br />
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This Z24 was my first new car. I bought it in late 1997 and at the time I was incredibly proud. I think the purchase price was right around $17,000 which was a lot for me at the time, but I made it work. This was my third Cavalier which probably tells you I had fond memories of the first two, and I honestly have to say this was probably one of the most reliable vehicles I have ever owned. In fact during the time I owned it, the only thing that ever broke was the latch to the glovebox. Mechanically speaking aside from routine maintenance and a couple sets of tires I never had to spend a dime on the car.<br />
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The Cavalier was bright red with a gray interior, and I opted for the 5-speed manual transmission. Chevy had started using four cylinder engines in the newer Cavaliers so it didn't feel quite as powerful as the V6 in my previous Z24, but it was plenty peppy and fun to drive. I even drove this car from Rapid City to San Diego and back again only stopping for gas and food... it was over 26 hours each direction and the car never let me down. Note this is not something I would recommend someone do, but I was young and stupid, and there was a girl involved. Enough said.<br />
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Anyway the car was very good on gas, it treated me well, and I drove it over 87,000 miles in four and a half years. I owned that car longer than any other vehicle, and I have no regrets about buying it. If anything I probably should have kept it longer since it was such a great car.<br />
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<b>1999 Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited</b><br />
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Looking back buying this Jeep was a really, really bad idea. It was fairly expensive to buy, and it was one of the most unreliable vehicles I have ever owned. Within the first month I owned it I had to take it in twice to have issues worked on which thankfully were covered under warranty. Then it seemed that almost once a month I was taking it in to the dealership for one thing or another. It was a very comfortable vehicle, I liked the styling, I liked the color, and it had a large V8 engine that made boatloads of power... so had the thing actually been able to go six months without a trip to the dealership I might have kept it longer.<br />
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The truth is I still have a soft spot for Jeeps, but based upon this particular vehicle I haven't been willing to take another gamble. Whenever I see a similar body style Jeep driving along the road I always feel sense of pity towards the owner knowing they are probably on a first-name basis with the service advisor at their local Jeep dealership.<br />
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<b>1990 Volkswagen Jetta Wolfsburg Edition</b><br />
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This Jetta was a gigantic pile of crap, and is by far the worst vehicle I ever owned. I bought it from the back lot of a dealership because they were sending it to auction. That probably should have been a clue that it wasn't worth buying, but if I recall correctly they only wanted $1500 for the car. This was going to be a second car for me in addition to the Jeep, and the goal was to just have something I could drive to work without worrying about door dings. At the time I was parking in a ramp where the spaces were very small, and I was do a lot of driving from building to building for work... so the idea of a small economical car was very appealing to me.<br />
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I kid you not - after I signed the papers to buy this rolling disaster I was on my way back home when a warning light and buzzer came on indicating low oil pressure. This light would come on at any time the car was at idle, and the only way to stop it was to rev the engine, so you can imagine sitting at a stoplight was less than pleasant. There were a handful of other things wrong with the car too, but for $1500 I thought I could afford to put a little money into it. I paid a visit to a junkyard and picked up a few parts, and then I took it to a local indy mechanic who did a few things for me. However - the more I drove it, the worse it got and it slowly became clear it was going to nickel and dime me to death.<br />
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It was nice to drive a car that I didn't have to bother locking the doors on, but it was not nice being worried that you weren't going to make it across town before it broke down.<br />
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<b>1996 Ford Probe GT</b><br />
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One day when I was driving the Jetta I drove past a local user car dealer that had a dark red Ford Probe GT on the lot. Years earlier a friend of mine had one (well technically it was his mom's car but he drove it much of the time) and I had always loved those cars. There was something about the styling of them and just the way they drove that I really, really liked. <br />
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So there I was staring at this Probe and a saleswoman approached. We spoke about it for a few minutes and she offered me the keys for a test drive. I can still remember to this day being so impressed at how much power the car had and how it seemed to lurch when the RPMs hit 3500 or so. It was such a violent surge of power that I actually opened the hood and searched for a turbocharger thinking a previous owner may have installed one. <br />
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The idea of having another manual transmission was a nice bonus, and the overall allure of the car was simply too much. I ended up agreeing to a trade and soon enough the Probe was mine while the Jetta would be retired. At this point I had only owned the Jetta less than two months and I didn't even get the title in the mail yet.... but I knew the Probe was a much better option.<br />
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As with most of my cars, I spent some time fixing a few things that previous owners had overlooked, and I bought a few parts from junkyards to get things just how I wanted them. I really did enjoy driving the car and for the most part it treated me well. The problem I had was that at this point I had two fairly nice cars... the Jeep and the Probe, and I was considering the purchase of a motorcycle so one of the cars had to go.<br />
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I tried to sell the Jeep for quite some time, but had little success, so eventually I tried to sell the Probe and it sold fairly quick. As with most of my old cars I sort of miss having it, and if I ever saw a nice clean Ford Probe GT sitting on a lot I might be tempted to pick one up just for fun... but I doubt that will ever happen.<br />
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<b>2003 Volkswagen Jetta 1.8T</b><br />
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This was another new car that I bought when I started to realize the Jeep was probably not the best vehicle for me. I wanted to get into something that was a bit sportier and the idea of a German sports sedan was appealing. I traded the Jeep in on the Jetta and probably came out ok on the deal, but in the end the Jetta wasn't much more reliable than the first Jetta I owned.<br />
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Thankfully I had a warranty, but after three or four trips back to the dealership in the first six months of ownership I was less than impressed with the quality. The other major problem was that when I bought it I couldn't get the color I wanted (white, or possibly gray) so I was stuck with what the dealer had on their lot, and to get a manual transmission with the turbo engine and the options package I wanted left me with one color option... black. I hate black cars, and I really hated them after owning this Jetta.<br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white;">This was also about the same time I bought my first home, and I soon realized trying to haul trees, shrubs, and building materials home in a Jetta didn't exactly work, so I started looking for a pickup. I only owned the Jetta for about a year and although it was a nice car, I can see now it was a mistake to buy it.</span><br />
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<b>2004 Ford F150 FX4</b><br />
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I set out to buy a small used pickup... something like a Chevy S-10 or a Ford Ranger. However after test driving a Ford Ranger, I opted to test drive a full size F150 and the differences were huge. Yes it was more expensive, but at the time I sort of got wrapped up in the moment. I did like the truck and it was reliable, but I never really fell in love with the color (red and gray two-tone). I also regretted not springing for the four door truck and instead I got the extended cab version. <br />
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The F150 was also my first (and last) experience with leasing, so after 39 months it went back to Ford and I had nothing left to show for it. I decided at the time that I would never lease another vehicle and I also decided to shy away from buying anything new. I do still like F150 pickups though, and I may own another one someday, but it won't be new, and it most certainly will not be leased.<br />
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<b>2003 Audi A6 2.7T</b><br />
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When the lease ran out on the F150 I opted to buy something that was considered to be a luxury automobile. I can't explain why I opted for an A6 or even why I focused on Audi, but I do recall trying to decide between an A6 and an A8. My local VW and Audi dealer is known for bloated pricing (which I learned from trying to buy VWs from them in the past) and I wasn't able to find anything locally, so I ended up buying a car via eBay.<br />
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From the moment I got the Audi I loved that car. I flew out to Cleveland, OH to buy it and I drove it all the way back to Sioux Falls. I loved the way the car drove, I love how it handled, I loved the power, I loved the options, and I really loved the color (white) - it was a great car. At first, the A6 was fairly reliable and didn't give me any troubles, and as time progressed I just had to do a few minor things. However this was at the same time that I found out I was going to be a father, and I started wondering if having an Audi was such a great idea.<br />
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I weighed the pros and cons of the Audi versus getting something like an SUV, and it was about this time I started suspecting the turbochargers were going to need to be replaced soon. I also knew the car was going to be due for a timing belt, and the front suspension needed to be replaced. All things told, if things suddenly got bad I could have been looking at $4000 to $5000 in repairs, so I opted to trade the car off and move to an SUV.<br />
<br />
I do still miss the Audi though, and it was the nicest car I've ever owned. Because of it I have developed an affinity for Audi and fully expect to own another one in the future. I just hope I can find out that is a tad more reliable than the A6 I had.<br />
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<b>2004 Honda Civic</b><br />
<br />
I can't really say all that much about this car. My ex-wife (Katie) bought it while we were dating so technically it was never really mine. I only mention it because after my daughter was born I ended up driving the Civic while Katie drove the SUV since she was responsible for getting Tae back and forth to daycare the vast majority of the time, and we both felt it would be safer for Tae. In addition to that, I worked on the other side of town so the gas mileage was also a factor. The Civic was a reliable vehicle and was great on gas, but it just wasn't exciting to drive. In fact it was flat out boring and I almost felt embarrassed to drive it because it seemed like a "girl car" for some reason. After the divorce Katie took the Civic and she put something like 110,000 miles on it before finally selling it, so if nothing else she got her money's worth out of it.<br />
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<b>2007 Honda Pilot EXL</b><br />
<br />
I sort of purchased this on protest as I was never a huge fan of Honda Pilots. Katie wanted it and although I had agreed to trade in my Audi, I had my heart set on a white Pilot. For whatever reason, I have had this thing about white cars and felt a White Pilot looked better than any other color. My first car was white, and my Audi was white... it just seemed like the perfect color.<br />
<br />
However, after a couple of months of shopping we were never able to find a white Pilot. So one weekend we were wasting some time at the dealership and thought maybe we should take a Pilot out on a test drive. We drove one, and it seemed nice. I hated the color (black) but Katie was really excited about getting a newer car so she pretty much had her heart set on it. Against my better judgement I opted to go for it, and a short time later we were signing the paperwork.<br />
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After our divorce I ended up with the Pilot and it was a good car. I suspect there is nothing very exciting about any Honda, and the Pilot was no exception. I never got excited about driving it like I did with previous cars, and I honestly never really cared for it. I hated the color and I was never sold on the styling, but I must say it was super reliable. I changed the oil and put gas in it... that was about it. I did have to put brakes on it, but it also had over 80,000 miles so that isn't unheard of, but aside from routine maintenance the thing just ran. I drove it for over 50,000 miles on it and it never left me stranded... it just worked.<br />
<br />
Anyway eventually Katie decided she wanted to buy the Pilot from me, so we worked out a deal and I passed it on to her. It is still going strong and I expect it to have another 100,000 miles ahead of it if she really wants to keep it that long.<br />
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<b>2003 Chevy S-10 ZR2</b><br />
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When Katie decided to buy the pilot, I was sort of under the gun to buy something quick, so I started shopping. I had been thinking about trying to get a pickup although I still liked the idea of driving a car on a daily basis and just having a truck for when I needed to haul something or when weather required four wheel drive. Therefore I opted to start shopping for a less expensive truck along with a nicer car.<br />
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After a bit of shopping and narrowing down my choices, I settled upon the S-10 with the ZR2 off-road package. I always liked the S-10 trucks ever since I was a kid, and I have memories of my grandfather buying a new GMC S-15 (the GMC equivalent of the S-10 at the time). The S-10 was discontinued in 2004 and the ZR2 package was last available on a 2003, so I knew in order to get one it was going to be a bit older and probably have higher mileage.<br />
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Thus the search began. This time around I knew I wasn't going to settle for black, and I really wanted a white one. However, finding a white S-10 was more difficult than I had anticipated, and finding one that wasn't entirely rusted out or that was in need of major repairs was difficult. I eventually found a one-owner white 2003 with zero rust, but it was up in St. Cloud, Minnesota which is about four hours away. I made the deal over the phone, and my brother and I drove up to get the truck. <br />
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Thus far I'd have to say I really like the truck. No it isn't the most powerful vehicle around, and it doesn't handle like a sports car. It had 125,000 miles on it when I bought it so there were a few things that needed to be cleaned up and the normal Chevy squeaks and rattles here and there, but overall the truck is in fantastic condition for its age, and I think I got it for a fair price. <br />
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<b>The Next Vehicle??</b><br />
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Now that I have the truck to get around in, the search has started for the car which eventually will become my daily driver. I'm focusing my search on RWD or AWD four door sedans, and ideally I'd like to find a vehicle with a manual transmission. I'm looking at something that is probably about five years old because I don't want to pay depreciation of a new vehicle, and I don't want a run-on-the-mill Toyota Camry or Chevy Malibu, so it will take a little hunting to find the right vehicle.<br />
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I would consider an automatic transmission if it were a dual-clutch / sequential transmission to allow manual shifting, but I really don't think I want to go for a straight automatic. The problem is finding a sedan that happens to have a manual transmission is very, very difficult and generally limits me to only a few cars such as select vehicles from Audi or a Subaru. I also am about 90% sure I want the car to be white, although for the right car I would consider silver or gray. I can say for certain that I won't be doing black however... that much is a given.<br />
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15 cars seems like a lot I suppose, but what can I say - I just like cars. If space and money weren't an issue I'm quite sure I would probably have a dozen vehicles to suit my needs and desires on any particular day, but since space and money are always issues I suppose I'll have to limit myself to perhaps no more than two vehicles at any given moment... not counting motorcycles of course. That is very much a different topic for a different day.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-13727647084084951222012-09-13T10:18:00.001-05:002012-09-13T10:18:30.835-05:00Things Even James Bond Can't Make Look Cool<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lsMyMKawJ7A/UD6GI_wqSgI/AAAAAAAAAUY/PSfXZFXK8BM/s1600/007.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="109" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lsMyMKawJ7A/UD6GI_wqSgI/AAAAAAAAAUY/PSfXZFXK8BM/s320/007.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<a href="http://redpushpin.blogspot.com/2012/08/bond-james-bond.html" target="_blank">In a recent post</a>, I spoke about James Bond films and the actors that portrayed him. The character of James Bond is known to be cool, calm, tough, smooth, and to have truckloads of confidence. He is good at practically everything, rarely makes mistakes, and it is safe to say every man who has ever watched a James Bond movie has wanted to be James Bond at one point or another.<br />
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With that being said, there are several things that even James Bond couldn't make look cool. What are these things you ask? Well read on:<br />
<ul>
<li>Eating gummy worms</li>
<li>Flossing</li>
<li>Tripping on his way up a flight of stairs</li>
<li>Wearing skinny jeans</li>
<li>Trying to run while on ice (without the special shoes made by Q)</li>
<li>Hanging out at a Star Trek convention</li>
<li>Wearing socks with sandals</li>
<li>Clipping his nose hair</li>
<li>Wearing those gigantic hipster glasses without any lenses in them</li>
<li>Trying to scratch a spot on his back that is just out of reach</li>
<li>Walking a tiny dog and then having to use a plastic bag to clean up the resulting "landmine"</li>
<li>Driving a Smart Car</li>
<li>Using a Snuggie</li>
<li>Tube socks with shorts... enough said</li>
<li>Utilizing a fanny pack</li>
<li>Talking on a Bluetooth headset while buying ANYTHING from Walmart</li>
<li>Wearing New Jersey levels of self-tanner</li>
<li>Using a hula hoop</li>
</ul>
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I'm sure there are many, many more - but the point is even the smoothest guy on the planet can't do everything. I mean really... could anyone actually make a Snuggie look cool? <br />
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I rest my case.</div>
Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-7557629674841051822012-08-29T16:09:00.000-05:002012-08-29T16:09:17.206-05:00Bond... James Bond<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I've been a fan of James Bond movies for as long as I can remember. I recall watching Bond movies every chance I got whenever they were on television and I'm sure I have seen every single movie numerous times. As a kid I fell in love with the gadgets, the watches with lasers, the cars that could double as submarines, the stunts, the action, and yes... even the Bond girls. <br />
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I also came to love the theme song, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't ever fantasize about being a government spy or actually being James Bond. The films invoked a lot of emotions from me... I suppose to some degree I have to equate them to what those horrible Twilight films do to teenage girls, but I somehow doubt Twilight will ever have the staying power to match James Bond. Or at least we can hope not... because the idea of over 20 Twilight movies is rather disturbing.<br />
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I know some people have a strong opinion on which actor was the "best" James Bond, and it seems many people prefer Sean Connery for several reasons. First of all Connery just had a certain swagger to him and was a bit of a ladies man... so he was believable as a womanizing spy type. He was also the original Bond, so to some degree he will always be associated with the role and he set the standard. Finally, Connery had staying power - he became a major Hollywood star and he had a career that spanned six decades, so he wasn't easily forgotten and to this day remains a fan favorite both for his work as James Bond, as well as his other major movie roles.<br />
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I do think Connery was a great James Bond, but his one fatal flaw was probably the fact that he never bothered to even try to fake an English accent. Then again, I don't think anyone really cared that he was Scottish... at least Scotland is still part of the UK, and since most people outside of the UK can't explain the differences between England, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom, I suspect most people heard Connery's accent and simply said "close enough!".<br />
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After Connery, George Lazenby starred as Bond in one film entitled <i>On Her Majesty's Secret Service</i>. I actually liked the film, but due to him only starring in the one film he isn't often mentioned when people talk about the "best" Bond. Lazenby was actually Australian rather than British so the credibility factor may have hurt him a bit, although I don't recall his accent being all that distracting. Lazenby didn't have much of a career after Bond and he was never considered a household name, so I suspect the fact that most people can't even remember his name means that he will likely never be mentioned in the same sentence as Connery or Roger Moore.<br />
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Speaking of Moore, he starred in a total of seven Bond films and some argue he was even better than Connery. I liked Moore in the role, and I probably associate him with Bond more than anyone else merely because his Bond career lasted 12 years, and his films seemed to be the ones shown on television so often. Back in the 1980s and 90s it seemed there was a Bond marathon on television about once a month, and Moore's films like <i>Octopussy, A View to a Kill, </i>and <i>The Man with the Golden Gun </i>were staples on television and I watched each of them to the point I can still quote lines from them to this day.<br />
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I will admit that although Moore was a fine actor, I never felt he was as believable in the role as Connery. I did appreciate the fact he was an English actor and as such he had the proper English accent, but the whole concept of Bond being such a ladies man was harder for me to believe with Moore in the role, and I can't really put my finger on why other than to say the scenes with him kissing women seemed almost forced rather than convincing.<br />
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After Moore retired from the Bond role, the next actor to play the role was Timothy Dalton. Many Bond fans are a bit harsh towards the Dalton films, but I have always felt it had less to do with him as an actor as it did to do with the scripts he happened to star in. Dalton has shown he has incredible acting range and he has had a strong career outside of the Bond films, and I felt he was very believable as Bond. He had that certain look, he had the proper accent, and he just pulled it off. <br />
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In truth I would have loved to see Dalton play Bond in a few more films, and in fact his original contract was for three... but due to lawsuits between studios and production companies that lasted for several years, Dalton went another direction and the search for a replacement Bond began.<br />
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Pierce Brosnan became the fifth man to play James Bond, and I still remember when it was announced that he was going to start in the next Bond film. I had become familiar with Brosnan from the television series <i>Remington Steele</i> and I seemed to like him as an actor so I was pretty excited to see what he was going to do as James Bond.<br />
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At the time, I felt the Brosnan-era films were the best James Bond movies to date, and he had the right mixture of charm, believability, looks, and attitude to successfully pull off the Bond role. I have a hard time picking a favorite Bond actor because time tends to blur some of what separates them, but I do think Brosnan is near the top of the list. He may not have won the praise of all the critics, and I will admit his final Bond film <i>Die Another Day</i> flirted with jumping the shark, but that had more do with a heavy reliance upon gadgetry and CGI than it had to do with Brosnan or his talents.<br />
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But seriously... a palace made out of ice, Madonna playing a fencing instructor, and an invisible Aston Martin? It is no wonder that the Bond producers decided to reboot the series after this movie was released.<br />
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I will say that I was fairly upset when I learned Brosnan wouldn't be starring in another Bond film, and I can still remember an interview where Brosnan was asked who should play the next James Bond where he emphatically responded with "me!". When I found out Brosnan's replacement was going to be the first blond James Bond, I was fairly certain the end of James Bond films was near.<br />
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This brings us to the current Bond played by Daniel Craig. Aside from the travesty of a blond James Bond, I will admit I was very skeptical that Craig could pull off the role. I didn't know a thing about the guy other than he was English, but when I saw him for the first time I just didn't see what the draw was. He didn't seem to have the same "Bond" look as I was used to, and I was somewhat convinced the new Bond film would be a flop.<br />
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Oh how wrong I was.<br />
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Since I'm such a Bond fan, I was more than willing to give Craig, and the new film, a fair chance. So I waited until <i>Casino Royale</i> was released and I watched it in the theater. To say my reservations were eliminated was an understatement, and I immediately became a fan of Daniel Craig. Not only did Craig pull of a convincing portrayal of Bond, but he added so much depth to the role. For the first time, James Bond showed legitimate emotion as well as a vulnerability which hadn't been presented in previous Bond films. In a word - Craig was <u>credible</u> in the role. <br />
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The fears of a blond Bond evaporated, and Craig displayed a swagger not seen since Sean Connery's 1960s-era Bond. The script was well written, the film focused more upon plot and action than they did upon CGI and gadgets, and in the end the film was able to stand on its own merits. <i>Casino Royale</i> didn't need to rely upon the previous four generations of Bond films, and the new realism and gritty nature of the film has made it my favorite Bond film to date. In fact I liked it so much that I actually purchased a DVD copy which I've watched numerous times.<br />
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I didn't enjoy Craig's followup film <i>Quantum of Solace</i> nearly as much as <i>Casino Royale</i>, but his performance didn't disappoint. I suppose it is somewhat unfair to claim Daniel Craig is the best James Bond to date considering the script and writing have improved so much that they might make it easier for Craig to succeed, but I do think he deserves the credit for much of the film's success. Clearly he swayed opinions and he made a lot of people eat their words (myself included), and I have no reason to doubt the next Bond film (scheduled to be released in October of this year by the way) won't continue to impress.<br />
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So who is really the best James Bond? I can't really say... because they each brought something new to the role, and they each played the character in their own way. As of this moment I'd probably lean towards Daniel Craig being my personal favorite, but I suspect my opinion may change through the filter of time. If history has shown me anything, it is that James Bond films, as well as the actors portraying him, can evolve, adapt, and improve based upon the demands of the role, so who can really say whether there is only one "best" Bond. Perhaps they are all the best in their own unique way, in their own unique time, and playing their own unique version of the iconic character that is Bond... James Bond.<br />
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Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-85871231579037982132012-07-19T10:27:00.000-05:002012-12-31T15:21:08.685-06:00Online Dating Feature Translator<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-SIaiQmdX_SE/UAgnHLv9tYI/AAAAAAAAASs/ZwXHdzqDym4/s1600/OnlineDating.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="157" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-SIaiQmdX_SE/UAgnHLv9tYI/AAAAAAAAASs/ZwXHdzqDym4/s200/OnlineDating.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<b>Note:</b> <i>This post includes sarcasm and humor. If you don't have a sense of humor, can't laugh at the world around you, and/or you are easily offended... you might want to avoid reading it. On the other hand if you don't take everything quite so seriously then by all means read on.</i><br />
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I've had a bit of experience in the online dating world, and I've learned a few things along the way. The most obvious thing I have learned is that people are less than honest about how they represent themselves in their dating profiles, and with a bit of knowledge you can do a much better job of interpreting what some of these key terms actually mean.<br />
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<strong>Bubbly Personality</strong>: If you read a profile that indicates the person has a "bubbly personality" it probably means they won't stop talking for more than 20 seconds at a time - even while eating a meal. These are the types of people who feel that the number of words coming out of their mouth is actually more important than the words themselves. In short this is like dating someone who acts like they have drank six cups of coffee and slammed two Red Bulls within the last 30 minutes. Much like alcohol and fast food, these are the types of people who are best in moderation.<br />
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<strong>Athletic:</strong> This is a tough one. This can often mean that a woman is referring to her build rather than the type of activities she is interested in. In many cases it means they like to shoot pool or play darts, and they have been known to go bowling, but in other times it simply means they are stocky and look like a softball player... even though they don't play softball. What it does <u>not</u> mean is that they are the type who works out five days a week and has a washboard stomach nor does it mean she is known to wear sports bras and go for a nightly run. Keep dreaming.<br />
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<strong>Enjoy being treated like a lady</strong>: This simply means she has no intention of paying for any dates, and you had better be prepared to go to a nice restaurant, so scratch Applebee's off the list. This also means she will most likely need to get her eyebrows waxed every three weeks, her nails done at least once a month, and she very well may have a membership to a local tanning salon. In short - she is high maintenance, and she knows it. Be prepared to open a lot of doors and don't be shocked if a date gets ruined due to a broken nail at some point.<br />
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<strong>Fun-Loving</strong>: As much as you may want to think this means she enjoys ice skating and trips to Disneyland, it really means her idea of a good time involves a small town bar, a karaoke machine, and numerous rounds of stale tap beer. There is also a high probability that she has had the same friends since high school, and they have a strong desire to talk about their high school classmates even though they graduated sometime in the 90s.<br />
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<strong>Drama-Free</strong>: This typically means her last relationship included a lot of screaming and yelling and perhaps at least one visit from the local police after neighbors called in a possible domestic disturbance. She assumes because they broke up that there will be no more drama and she assumes the former boyfriend and/or husband was the problem. Oddly enough she claims three of her four last ex-boyfriends were all responsible for untold amounts of drama, and if you end up dating her you can anticipate a fight that results in her either threatening to kill herself or one in which she is sitting in the driveway blocking your car as she cries her eyes out and tells you how special you are. Run. Don't even think about engaging her in conversation... just run.<br />
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<strong>Goal Oriented</strong>: This typically means she attended a reputable College or University and earned her degree and/or is currently pursuing a degree, and that she has goals. The goals typically include having anywhere from two to four children, driving a Lexus, and marrying someone who either has a trust fund or currently makes at least six-figures. Oh yea... and they also want to travel to Europe and/or vacation in Mexico at least once every other year.<br />
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<strong>Goal Orientated</strong>: See "Goal Oriented" above, and instead of a college degree from a reputable College or University just assume they attended (or possibly graduated from) a local Community College.<br />
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<strong>Carefree</strong>: Chances are she has at least three collection agencies looking for her, and she hasn't been tested for STDs since the Clinton administration. This is the type of women who might be fun to date once or twice because that is about as long as she will remain interested.<br />
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<strong>Shaped like women should be</strong>: There is no nice way of saying this... if a woman brags that she is shaped like women should be, it simply means she is overweight. Worse than that, she won't admit she is overweight and thus she feels society should adapt to her version of "normal" even if it means her BMI is somewhere north of 30. She will try to fit into clothing that is far too small and she will insist on wearing pants that are so tight that she will have a permanent muffin-top spilling out from her waist. She will also be known to exceed the tensile strength on most of the fabrics she wraps around her body and it isn't unheard of for women like this to carry safety pins and duct tape to address various wardrobe malfunctions if and when they do occur. If you do decide to date a woman like this, I'd suggest wearing eye protection anytime she wears something with buttons because a button under pressure is like a ticking time-bomb and can seriously injure someone when it lets go. <br />
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<strong>Curvy:</strong> This can be a couple of different things. In rare instances, this could be a very average sized woman who is not entirely comfortable with her body. In other cases, it could be a thin woman who has had breast implants and who is very proud of them, but in the vast majority of the time it simply means the woman has a very large backside and instead of trying some targeted exercises to tone up, she is more interested in buying bras from Victoria Secret that will push her breasts together with such force that it can create an optical illusion that tricks the viewer into thinking her breasts and behind are in direct proportion to one another. Let there be no doubt, curves on a woman are sexy, but there is a difference between legitimate curves, and the type of woman who waves hello and her arm stops moving six seconds after her hand.<br />
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There you have it - just a few tips to let you know what you might come across. There are many others of course, but I can't possible cover every scenario here, but it should give you a good head start. Above all else just remember that when it comes to online dating, people are generally liars, and it is in your best interests to remain skeptical about almost anything that comes out of the mouth of the other person until you have time to verify it for yourself. Online dating profiles are a lot like print ads for fast food places... they look nice and peak your interest, but the real thing is often a disappointment.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-64898167968109711362012-07-16T17:40:00.000-05:002012-07-16T17:40:00.208-05:00My Thoughts On: Dog Breed Bans<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b>Q:</b> What is the most common phrase uttered by a neighbor when they find out the guy who has lived next door to them turns out to be a serial killer? <div>
<i style="background-color: white;"><b><br /></b></i></div>
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<i style="background-color: white;"><b>A:</b> "He was always so quiet and he kept to himself"</i><div>
<br /><b>Q:</b> What is the most common phrase uttered by a dog owner after their dog ends up biting, mauling, injuring, or even killing someone? </div>
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<i style="background-color: white;"><b><br /></b></i></div>
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<i style="background-color: white;"><b>A:</b> "He was always so kind and gentle and great with children"</i></div>
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Sometimes things aren't always as they seem, and idiotic platitudes don't really change the facts. <span style="background-color: white;">Like it or not, some dogs are capable of doing much more damage than others. Temperament might have something to do with it, but when a small dog bites someone, chances are the damage can be addressed with a band-aid rather than a trip to the ER. Due to the jaw structure and power of some larger breeds, they can easily result in massive injuries or even deaths.</span></div>
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Check the statistics surrounding dog bite fatalities, and you will soon find that Pit Bulls (and their associated mixes) as well as Rottweilers are responsible for a vast majority of the deaths. <a href="http://dogbitelaw.com/images/pdf/breeds-causing-DBRFs.pdf">This isn't opinion, but rather it is supported by hard evidence</a>, including several studies on the subject as well as government data.</div>
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Since numbers without context are meaningless, lets ask ourselves if we find it feasible that these same breeds make up the vast majority of dogs in the US? I think most people would agree that isn't the case... in fact <a href="http://www.akc.org/reg/dogreg_stats.cfm">per AKC registrations</a>, where Labrador Retrievers are consistently the most popular dog, and Bull Terriers come in somewhere south of 50th most popular, these statistics SHOULD alarm everyone. What we should see is Labrador Retrievers being responsible for the most dog bites simply due to statistical averages. However that isn't the case, and when speaking of significant injuries and/or deaths the numbers are even further skewed.</div>
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The facts are that certain breeds of dogs have a higher propensity to maul, injure, and kill. We can blame this on humans for a lack of training, we can blame it on the breed, or we can blame it on specific dogs, but the facts are the facts. If you read the actual reports from many of these dog bite fatalities, you will find that in many cases the owners had never witnessed any hostility from the dogs in the past, and at one point the dog(s) just snapped. I dare say no matter how well trained they are, almost any dog can still revert to their instincts in some situations, and in some cases those instincts can result in significant injury.</div>
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When you boil it down and remove the emotion to simply look at the statistics and the facts, you soon realize that it is an indisputable fact that Pit Bulls and Rottweilers are dangerous when compared to other breeds. That isn't to say other dog breeds are never dangerous, or that other dog breeds aren't responsible for injuries or deaths, or that certain Pit Bulls and Rottweilers aren't the gentle and peaceful dogs that so many owners claim they are... it is just a fact that as a whole, these dogs are more dangerous.</div>
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It is like comparing a modern Volkswagen with 10 airbags, ABS, stability control, crumble zones, and active head restraints to a 1950s Volkswagen with no seat belts, no crumple zones, no airbags, and doors that were less than three inches thick. One of these is clearly more dangerous than the other, but it may never be obvious until it is too late.</div>
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Now I should note that I am not sure breed bans actually work, thus I'm not sure they are the answer. Some people who are very much opposed to such breed bans are quick to point out that some people will go out of their way to get a dog that is banned because they think it makes them part of some secret club. I imagine these types of people are also the type of people who like to carry around concealed, unregistered firearms and who do whatever they can to show others that they don't follow the commonly accepted rules that society has instilled upon itself. </div>
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The reality is there is always going to be a <span style="background-color: white;">certain type of person who is attracted to Pit Bull type dogs because they want to have that "wow" factor and they want to be seen as a rule breaker. Just walk though the more "colorful" parts of any city and you are bound to see countless examples of how certain types of people attract certain types of pets. Everyone knows areas like this - these are the areas where you find people with a tattoo to limb ratio above 3:1, and people standing around the street corners wearing their flat brimmed hats over their ears. When these people are out walking their dogs what breeds do you think are most common? I'll give you a hit... it isn't a Yorkie or a Chihuahua.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;">So yes some people might help contribute to certain breeds having a bad reputation, but when a dog is bred to do certain things, those traits can come to the surface even if they aren't desired, and characteristics that were bred into a dog over the course of hundreds of years don't just disappear in a few generations. For many of these dogs, a certain aggressiveness is their nature, and I hope many of the same people telling us how sweet and innocent and kind their Pit Bulls are never have to experience an event that would make them change those opinions.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;">Perhaps we should simply mandate anyone who wants to have one of these dogs registered within city limits needs to be bonded for any potential damage it may cause. The size of the bond needs to be tied to the risk factor... which shouldn't be too hard to obtain since insurance companies already have a pretty good idea of which breeds are more likely to result in their claim payouts being higher (and oddly enough some insurance companies won't offer homeowners insurance to a person who owns a Pit Bull type dog). If someone is found to not have their dog licensed or bonded, then that dog needs to be confiscated from them and they need to be fined at a level which would prevent them from ever doing it again ($500 to $1000).</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;">Finally, I'm not the type of suggest we euthanize any dog which has not shown aggression, but if and when a dog does bite or maul someone it should be put down no questions asked, and again the owner should be held responsible via fines (and likely a nice civil court case from the victim or victims).</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;">Clearly there are other ways to address the concerns with certain dog breeds other than breed specific bans, since people find clever ways of getting around such bans in the first place. The fact is, unless a city is going to perform DNA checks on dogs, it is difficult to prove that a dog is primarily a banned breed rather than a mix with only a small portion of that specific breed. However, I dare say that as long as people remain ignorant to the facts surrounding dog bites and the breeds most involved, and as long as people continue to make claims about how these very same breeds are gentle and loving and would never harm a fly... well then we will continue to see articles in the paper and reports on television of people being maimed and even killed by these same breeds time and time again.</span></div>
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</div>Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-54029591469403119662012-07-01T21:38:00.000-05:002012-07-02T09:29:58.588-05:00Why I Hate Audiophiles<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tWzVSNiKpfY/T-3Y0bHixxI/AAAAAAAAAR4/LILYFI95U-0/s1600/tube+amp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="132" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tWzVSNiKpfY/T-3Y0bHixxI/AAAAAAAAAR4/LILYFI95U-0/s200/tube+amp.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
I've been a "techie" type of person for many years, and I've taken an interest in audio equipment since I was perhaps as young as seven or eight years old. My father had an old Fisher receiver that I used to play with and at the time I thought it was amazing. I can still feel the mass of the tuning dial in my hand as I could flick it and watch the dial swing across the AM/FM spectrum from side to side. I would even make a game of it to see if I could get the needle from one end to the other in one spin... which was difficult but not impossible.<br />
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My father's "hi-fi" system also included an old cassette deck and even an 8-track player that I fondly remember using from time to time. I don't recall the brand name of the speakers (I'm thinking perhaps RCA) but they were the large cabinet type that provided a lot of noise when asked although I'm sure they produced just as much distortion as they did music.<br />
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When I was a bit older, for Christmas one year I was given a small tabletop stereo of my own. It had dual tape decks AND a turntable, so clearly I thought I had something. The speakers were those small cabinets connected by what appeared to be paltry 24ga wire, but at the time I thought they were pretty amazing. I played all types of records on that system and I made more than my fair share of mix tapes from the radio as I listened to American Top 40 with Casey Kasem.<br />
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Eventually my interest in audio led me to expand and improve upon what I had. In college I upgraded to what I thought was high end audio equipment at the time - or at least high end in my particular budget range. That setup included a Sony receiver that had surround sound, a Sony CD changer, and a set of Bose 201 speakers. They weren't necessarily bad components, but knowing what I know now there are much better options for the price. I do still have the Bose speakers and they are still capable of producing a good sound although I am the first to admit Bose is a lot better at marketing then they are at producing audio equipment.<br />
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My current receiver is an Onkyo which is paired to an Onkyo disc changer. I'm well aware this is nowhere nearly "high end" audio, but it is capable of producing clean sound and it didn't require me to take out a second mortgage to purchase it. I've used a number of different speakers over the years, but I'm the first to admit even when looking directly at the nameplates on the speakers my ears are hard pressed to discern a difference between a $500 set of Klipsch towers and a $3,000 set of Definitive Technology towers.<br />
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Throughout the years I've stayed fairly well informed as to the new technologies and I've paid attention to what works versus what people think works. I've read magazines and comparison tests, and in the past I've subscribed to magazines devoted to audio equipment (I recall a subscription to <i>Stereo Review</i> back in high school which was always one of my favorites although it has since been renamed to <i>Sound and Vision</i>).<br />
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I won't claim to be an audio snob, but I have been known to research what type of power supplies are found in various receivers and I've taken the time to research the various <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_harmonic_distortion">THD (Total Harmonic Distortion)</a> levels of amplifiers. I'm not an electrical or audio engineer by any means, but I do have experience in electronics and at one point I was a Certified Electronics Technician and a Certified Broadcast Technologist, so I like to think I have a pretty good understanding of the science behind audio equipment and electronics.<br />
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This is probably why even to this day I simply cannot stand when a self-proclaimed audiophile brags about his (and they are almost always men in my experience) ultra high end audio equipment. These are the types of people who brag about their McIntosh tube amplifiers without having any recognition of the fact that the tubes in these amplifiers are notoriously noisy and require a lot of circuitry required to clean up their signals. Even with that said the THD level of a high-end $5,000 McIntosh tube amp might be in the range of 0.50% with a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signal_to_noise">signal to noise ratio (SNR) </a>of 100dB. Compare that to a off-the-shelf receiver from Denon, Onkyo, or Yamaha and you are likely to find a THD level of something like 0.08% and a SNR of 106dB.<br />
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This is the part where I need to try and explain what THD and SNR are and how they relate. Obviously anyone who cares can read detailed descriptions elsewhere on the Internet, but I'll keep it simple by simply saying these are two of the most often cited specifications provided for audio equipment. THD is simply a way to measure how much harmonic distortion exists in a particular device. A lower THD is better, and the lower the value, the better that device is at reproducing the original signal. So this tells us that the THD of a cheap receiver purchased at Best Buy or Radio Shack is much better at reproducing the original input signal than a "high end" luxury tube amplifier which costs thousands of dollars more.<br />
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SNR is, as the name implies, a measurement of the difference between the original signal, and the noise added by the power supply and circuitry of the device. In this case a higher number is better. It may not appear a difference of 100dB and 106dB is significant, but because dB is measured on a logarithmic scale, this is actually much bigger of a difference than it may appear. I don't want to get boiled down in the technical aspects since this bores most people to tears, but the bottom line is as far as audio quality goes and in terms of how faithfully a musical recording can be reproduced, a modern and inexpensive amplifier will almost always outperform a much more expensive tube amplifier that many audiophiles seem to worship.<br />
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There is a reason that tube amplifiers cannot pass the testing process to become <a href="http://www.thx.com/consumer/home-entertainment/thx-certified-products/">THX Certified</a> even though a $400 receiver from Pioneer or Onkyo can, and it all boils down to faithful rendition of sound. If these audiophiles would simply admit they prefer tube amps because they like the faint glow of the tubes and they think they are "pretty" I might cut them some slack... but I don't see that happening anytime soon.<br />
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The next component that annoys me greatly is the turntable. I like listening to records as much as the next person, but the reason why I like records is due to nostalgia... not because they are a faithful rendition of the original recording. The fact is, audiophiles often claim records "sound better" and that they create a "warmer" sound, but they are actually listening to the scratches, pops, and crackles created by the needle running over the grooves in the record itself - none of which would exist in a live musical performance or in a studio recording. There is a reason why modern sound stages and recording studios are all digital and why they don't burn things directly to a record these days, and it all has to do with how faithful the recording can be to the original performance.<br />
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The fact is, an uncompressed digital format such as a CD will always outperform something like a vinyl record when it comes to the faithfulness of the original sound when compared to the recording. The same is true for analog formats such as a cassette tape or reel to reel tape. That isn't to say some people won't prefer the sound from a tape or from a vinyl record, but if they are interested in reproducing the most faithful sound possible... a record or any other analog source simply will not do.<br />
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Audiophiles are also the same people who will spend thousands of dollars on connecting cables from brand names most people have never heard of. Many technical people will openly mock people for spending money on Monster Cable or other more expensive name brands because these people understand in the digital era, connecting cables are not nearly as vital as they once were... yet to an audiophile, even something as overpriced as a Monster Cable connecting cable would never suffice. These are the types of people who will spend <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Niagara-Audio-Interconnect-Cables-2-0M/dp/B000NAOWTM">$2,800 for a single pair of connection cables</a>, or <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Audioquest-Redwood-pair-Speaker-Cable/dp/B0055OSTS6/">$5,300 for a set of six foot speaker cables</a>.<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NCxOoONUO6Q/T-3Y7U5im4I/AAAAAAAAASA/gs8B_TiwS1A/s1600/Rhodium_Receptacle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NCxOoONUO6Q/T-3Y7U5im4I/AAAAAAAAASA/gs8B_TiwS1A/s200/Rhodium_Receptacle.jpg" width="188" /></a></div>
To make matters worse, these people will actually replace the receptacles in their houses with what they consider "audio grade" and/or "hospital grade" receptacles ranging in price from $30 up to over $150. That is <a href="http://www.wattgate.com/products/381rh/">$150 for a cryogenically treated audio grade receptacle with rhodium plating</a> (because gold or silver would just be too mainstream I imagine). <br />
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The amazing thing h<span style="background-color: white;">ere is that some snakeoil salesman not only convinced these people that they needed these high-end receptacles, but they turned the dial up to 11 and convinced the idiots that they needed high end power cables to plug in to their high end receptacles. Did I mention that these power cables can range from several hundred dollars to almost $7,000? Yes you read that correctly... audiophiles have been convinced that spending </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/AudioQuest-NRG-WEL-Signature-Series/dp/B0055OM9WS" style="background-color: white;" target="_blank">$6,900 for a power cable</a><span style="background-color: white;"> will improve the sound quality flowing out of their speakers.</span><br />
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Yes seriously. I'm not making this up... I'm just not cynical enough to fabricate a story like this.<br />
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Spending thousands of dollars on cables which perform no better and produce a sound no different than those which can cost less than $10 is bad enough, but these self-proclaimed experts will go so far as to claim they can actually hear the difference. The problem is, aside from the fact they are willfully displaying their ignorance as to how traditional AC power works, they aren't able to hear any differences when subjected to double-blind testing. Whether the testing is done <a href="http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm#gordongow">by people involved in the audio equipment industry</a>, or done in magazines such as Stereo Review in the 1980s, or even tests where <a href="http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/15412-post28.html">name brand speaker wire was compared to ordinary disposable wire coat hangers</a>, it seems even the most ardent supporter of this woo is unable to support their beliefs (and their own ears) with hard, replicable data.<br />
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In fact, notorious skeptic James Randi went so far as <a href="http://www.randi.org/jr/2007-09/092807reply.html#i4">to offer $1 million to an audiophile</a> if he could prove that a pair of $7,250 speaker cables sounded any better than a pair of off-the-shelf cables from Monster cable that cost around $80. However when push came to shove, even the company that sells the $7,250 speaker cables wasn't willing to put their reputation on the line, so <a href="http://gizmodo.com/315250/pear-cable-chickens-out-of-1000000-challenge-we-search-for-answers">they backed out from the challenge</a>. It seems there just aren't any audiophiles willing to put their reputations on the line in order to support the very claims they make on a daily basis.<br />
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This is why I hate audiophiles - because they cannot support their beliefs with any type of legitimate data or science. It is almost as if they are begging to be openly mocked and yet they don't care, because they assume if they have tens of thousands of dollars worth of audio equipment then their ears must be able to tell the difference as if having a bigger bank account somehow suggests your ears are more sensitive than the average person.<br />
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There are so many flaws in their logic I'm not even sure where to begin, but I wonder if these people ever stop to realize that their high end $150 receptacles are connected to the rest of their household wiring with the same traditional unshielded copper wire everyone else uses. This wire runs back to a breaker panel and through a meter which is fed power from the same source as everyone else, through the same transformers, the same substations, and from the same grid. Do they really feel a silver plated or gold plated or rhodium plated electrical receptacle is going to improve the sound quality? What is next... sucking the oxygen out of the air and replacing it with helium to allow the sound waves a cleaner path from the speaker to the listener's ear? Granted the listener will be forced to wear an oxygen mask when they want to listen to music... but hey - anything to get the cleanest sound possible right?<br />
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When it comes to speakers, things get even worse. It is not unheard of for an audiophile to have speakers that weigh hundreds of pounds each and which measure over seven feet in height. These speakers are often hand built with exotic materials like rare hardwoods and carbon fiber, and they can cost more than $50,000 for a single pair.<br />
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I'm not naive here and I do admit there can and is a difference between a cheap speaker and an expensive speaker, however there comes a point of diminishing returns. I'll go on record and openly state I'm convinced if you take a quality set of speakers priced in the range of $2,000 and you perform blind testing against a set of speakers costing ten times as much, that most people (audiophiles included) will not be able to state which is the more expensive set of speakers with any consistency.<br />
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In fact, I recall years ago reading an article about a blind test that involved several sets of speakers behind an acoustically transparent curtain. A sample of music was played using each set of speakers in random order enough times to eliminate selection biases. In the end, a set of inexpensive speakers was selected as being the "best" although none of the speakers in the test was statistically superior to the remainder. So in essence, when the supposed experts can't see what they are listening to, and when they no longer see the expensive name brand cables or the dim glow of a tube amplifier or the movement of a turntable these minor nuances they claim to be able to hear seem to disappear. I find the irony that audiophiles who are often seen listening to music with their eyes closed seem to rely so heavily upon their vision when they are performing comparison tests.<br />
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The entire concept reminds me of a professor who acts smart and seems to know so much about the material, but at the end of the semester you realize the only reason they knew more than you was because they had the book with all the answers printed in it. Take away the book and the notes you are left with nothing more than a nice tweed jacket and a laser pointer.<br />
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Now I realize it probably seems a bit harsh to say I hate audiophiles. I should clarify I don't actually hate the people, but rather I hate their (lack of) logic, their reasoning, their biases, and their tactics. In truth I probably hate the companies and snakeoil salesman who fool audiophiles into believing that they need a $7,000 power cable or a $150 audio grade receptacle much more than I hate the audiophiles themselves, however for the sake of simplicity I'm focusing on the audiophiles since they seem to be so vocal about their superiority.<br />
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Part of the reason I feel this way is because of how audiophiles can be presented with evidence proving their equipment is simply overpriced, and yet they make claims about how they can tell a difference. As mentioned previously we know they can't prove it, but that doesn't wipe the smug looks off of their faces nor does it remove the undertones of superiority from their voices.<br />
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Take for instance Michael Fremer who just happens to be senior contributing editor at Stereophile magazine along with contributing to a number of other audio publications. Needless to say he is heavily involved in the audiophile community and could perhaps be one of the most influential or well-known audiophiles on the planet. Fremer has hundreds of thousand of dollars worth of audio equipment in his listening room and he will even make claims that he can tell the difference between a $2,600 power cable and a $4,000 power cable claiming the more expensive cable produces a "warmer, fuller sound".<br />
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In some cases, audiophiles like Fremer will <a href="http://gizmodo.com/5213042/why-we-need-audiophiles">even go so far as to make excuses for the hisses and pops coming from their tube amplifiers and turntables as if to suggest they don't matter</a>. Really? The very same people who will spend tens of thousands, or perhaps even hundreds of thousands of dollars on audio equipment and cables and even little pucks to prevent their precious turntables from having to sit on a hard surface claim it doesn't matter? If these annoyances don't matter... then what does matter? If the sound itself isn't a priority, and if the faithfulness of the sound is secondary, then what is the point? Frankly aside from talking around the issue with fancy words and cliched phrases I'm not sure most audiophiles have any idea.<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Kaz0knopwJ4/T-3ZI-WFUMI/AAAAAAAAASI/r1TV8y3g5L4/s1600/fremer+listening+room.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Kaz0knopwJ4/T-3ZI-WFUMI/AAAAAAAAASI/r1TV8y3g5L4/s200/fremer+listening+room.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
In Fremer's case, I have to admit the man annoys me a bit because I've seen pictures of his actual listening room and it<span style="background-color: white;"> boggles my mind how someone can claim to care about sound quality when he has a room full of junk surrounding him. He has stacks of records leaned up against the walls and on the floor. He has pictures hanging on the wall that are covered in sound-reflecting glass. He has hard surface walls and furniture and</span> stacks of equipment with wires running every which way. Does this sound like a place someone could detect minor subtleties in an audio track? Not likely.<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Lb8a4aU3dGM/T-3ZPz2SjTI/AAAAAAAAASQ/VHhrK3hIrOc/s1600/kessler_listening+room.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="130" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Lb8a4aU3dGM/T-3ZPz2SjTI/AAAAAAAAASQ/VHhrK3hIrOc/s200/kessler_listening+room.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
If someone was really concerned with the ultimate listening room, I have to imagine it would start with covering the walls and ceiling with sound absorbing materials. The equipment and hard surface objects other than the speakers themselves would be isolated in a closet or another room, and obviously there would not be shelving unit after shelving unit of vinyl records sitting along the walls. This is why recording studios isolate the booth from the actual room where the music is being played and why they take so much time to soundproof the rooms as much as possible.<br />
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Better yet, if the ultimate audio clarity is really what they are after, a quality set of headphones will outperform practically every set of speakers known to man. Headphones all but eliminate reflected sound and outside interference, and you don't need a padded room to be able to get the best possible sound. Aside from John Cusack's character in <i>High Fidelity</i>, I can't say as I've seen many audiophiles sitting alone in their listening rooms or dens with a set of headphones atop their heads.<br />
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The fact is, in the real world people don't really have rooms with ideal acoustics. In the real world most music is listened to in a room with windows and doors and hard walls and furniture where acoustics are an afterthought. Most home audio systems - even those owned and operated by au<span style="background-color: white;">diophiles - reside in less than acoustically ideal rooms. Speaker wires are often laid next to or routed on top of power wires which could create inductive coupling (electromagnetic interference) and a slight buzz or hum, HVAC systems blow air through ductwork, and dust finds its way onto vinyl records.</span><br />
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Yet to an audiophile, they likely will ignore the rushing sound of conditioned air or the fact that their patch cables are incapable of transmitting a signal with as much accuracy as a $5 optical cable purchased from Amazon or Monoprice... not because they haven't thought about it, but because they simply don't appear to care. The excess noises produced by a record needle are just part of the experience apparently. As Michael Fremer says, "It's like when you go to the symphony, and the old men are coughing—same thing". For an audiophile to use this logic is probably what tends to frustrate me, because it is almost as if they don't even try to hide the flaws in their reasoning.<br />
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Another aspect of audiophiles that tends to annoy me is the way they speak when talking about sound. They use phrases like "a dimensional and rich presentation" or a "euphonic sound experience". They speak about the color of music and the flavor of the sound. They talk about a sense of openness or space and how dark or bright the sound is and they make comments about the dynamic envelope, the ambience, or the subtlety of the tones. It seems they try to rely heavily upon personification as if the sound can reach out and touch someone or that it embraces the listener.<br />
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Even worse they rely so heavily upon cliches such as "jaw-dropping" and "tonal texture" that you can swap out the product names in most of the equipment reviews and nobody would notice. The entire concept reminds me of a hipster who turns a simple three line Haiku into a 40 minute discussion about what the poet was thinking when they chose to use the word "crimson" as opposed to just saying "red".<br />
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Try as they might, all the fancy wordsmithing and pretentiousness used by these audiophiles doesn't change the fact that the man behind the curtain is far from a real wizard... and in this case the wizard not only refuses to admit he has been outed, but he claims removing his curtain doesn't really matter in the first place.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com30tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-29191031949026540852012-06-18T11:30:00.001-05:002012-06-18T11:32:55.735-05:00Used Car Feature Translator<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-nVnJR5bdC1o/T99XqjPhunI/AAAAAAAAARs/yW12_CRwL9s/s1600/used+cars.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-nVnJR5bdC1o/T99XqjPhunI/AAAAAAAAARs/yW12_CRwL9s/s200/used+cars.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
If you have ever shopped for a used car, you know there is a lot of wordsmithing that goes on for the advertisements. I've purchased more than my fair share of cars in my day, and I've spent countless hours browsing for cars, speaking to salespeople, driving through car lots, and researching cars on the Internet. <br />
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During this time, I have come to realize that much of is written in car advertisements takes a bit of knowledge to interpret, and here are a few of the more egregious examples of terms used to describe a vehicle along with what that term actually means:<br />
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<b>Well maintained: </b>This means if something broke and the car wouldn't start it was taken to the dealership and it was fixed. The oil has probably been changed at least once or twice a year, but only after the car started "making funny noises". The car was washed at least once a month though, so that qualifies as maintenance.<br />
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Chances are this car will need to have the transmission serviced, the power steering and brake fluid replaced, the radiator flushed, the air filter, cabin air filter, and spark plugs replaced, and pretty much an entire tune up. The suspension components need lubrication, and the alignment hasn't been checked since the Clinton administration.<br />
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<b>Glossy paint: </b> The fact is, any car that has been washed on a regular basis and that isn't more than 15 years old probably has glossy paint (or will have after a good wax job) so if you see this written in an ad, it probably means there isn't much else to brag about. The tires will be shot, the seats will be torn and faded, the stereo probably only plays music from the front passenger side speaker, and the windshield looks like it lost a battle against a gravel truck.<br />
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<b>New tires: </b> This can mean a few different things. If the car is less than three years old, this probably means the previous owner did a few burn outs and ruined the tires. If the car has 40,000 miles or more the tires are probably new but they will be from some random tire manufacturer in China or Korea that you have never heard of, and they will probably sound like you are driving on a washboard at speeds in excess of 50mph. The chances of finding a car with a set of new Yokohamas or Bridgestones is highly unlikely. <br />
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Also, when a dealer brags about their used car having brand new tires, it can often be simply a way to cover up the uneven wear on the tires due to camber or toe-in issues. Trust me... they aren't doing you any favors by putting $300 worth of cheap import tires on a used car.<br />
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<b>Always garaged: </b> This probably means the owner of the car parked in the garage when at home, so those scratches on the door are from when their eight year old slammed against the car as they tried to ride their bike out into the driveway. It also may mean the car was in pieces for several years and wasn't running so they used the back seat to store lumber and aluminum cans. Let's just say if you open a car door and catch a strong cedar-like odor... you might want to start asking questions.<br />
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<b>A classic barn find: </b> If you are in the market for a 60s muscle car or unmolested numbers-matching sports car, the idea of an old barn find is very appealing. However, most cars that are pushed into a barn and left there for a few decades were put there because they didn't run - not because the previous owner thought it might be worth restoring one day. The reality is, if someone advertises a car as a barn find, the engine will be seized and there won't be a battery in the car to see if it would even be possible to turn it over. The oil in the crankcase will essentially be the consistency of road tar, the transmission fluid will look like honey, the tires will be flat and cracked from dry rot, the headliner and interior will be ripped, faded, and stained, and the driver's seat foam will be chewed up from the family of mice who has been making the car their home for the past few decades.<br />
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If someone claims their car is a barn find, chances are you are looking at at least 30 years of neglect on top of whatever forced the owner to push the car into a barn that many years ago. You can also bet that at least a few of the parts that are meant to be installed on the engine (carburetor, valve covers, radiator, distributor etc) will be contained in cardboard boxes stored in either the back seat or the trunk. At some point the owner will probably utter the phrase that "it just needs to be cleaned up and tuned up", but unless you are prepared for a complete frame-off restoration that could very well take three to five years of your life... this is probably a bad idea.<br />
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<b>Adult driven: </b>This is a classic, and at first glance you think that means the car was probably treated with respect and that the oil was changed every 3,000 miles. The best thing to do in this case is to examine the owner's garage when you go to look at the car. If the garage is full of NASCAR memorabilia or the owner is wearing a t-shirt featuring their favorite race driver... you may want to reconsider. Another good tactic is to check all the radio presets. If they are set to the classic music, talk radio, or oldies stations you are probably in the clear, but if they are set to the hard rock, metal, and hip/hop stations chances are this "adult" is still suffering from a mid-life crisis, and the transmission, rear tires, and suspension are all shot.<br />
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<b>One owner: </b>This one has always baffled me. Why should I care if a car was owned by one person or three people? I could see a red flag popping up if the car had been owned by five different people in the past two years, but for the most part the own owner thing is meaningless. The one owner line can sometimes be used when a parent buys a car but every kid in the family has driven it at one point or another. <br />
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<b>Mechanic's Special: </b> This means they couldn't afford to have someone fix it for them since the cost of the necessary repairs are at least 20% greater than the blue book value of the car itself. For every problem the car displays while it is sitting in the owner's driveway, you can easily assume there are at least five or six more that will present themselves within 45 minutes of signing a bill of sale.<br />
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<b>Dependable: </b> Chances are everything that can typically go wrong with a car has probably been fixed in the past three years or so, thus the owner feels the car should be dependable from this point forward. This is no way suggests the car has been dependable up to this point, and if you decide to take a chance you may later determine your chances of getting home on any given night <strong>depend</strong> if you are <strong>able</strong> to fix it yourself when it breaks down on the side of the road.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-83537850002373861182012-04-25T07:50:00.000-05:002012-04-25T09:55:16.243-05:00Missed Opportunities (An Original Short Story)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dZrVRFHZRps/T5gNTOoc53I/AAAAAAAAARg/5LsoznwToCM/s1600/puddle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" oda="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dZrVRFHZRps/T5gNTOoc53I/AAAAAAAAARg/5LsoznwToCM/s1600/puddle.jpg" /></a></div>
Standing in the window, Kimber noticed the glow from the streetlight fading in and out as the fog passed by. She could barely make out the car parked in the driveway across the street but the low pitched growl of the engine as it sat idling gave her all the information she required to determine it was Trey, the on-again, off-again boyfriend of Lisa – who just happened to live across the street. <br />
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Kimber didn’t know the exact model of the car, she was a girl after all, but she knew it was Trey because of the engine coupled with the muted sound of the horn… almost as if it was the car’s voice and personality, and much like a stray cat searching for a free bowl of milk, Kimber found herself becoming more familiar with it each time it visited the neighborhood.<br />
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After a few minutes of watching, Kimber could see the silhouette of Lisa climbing into the car and with a quick slam of the door, she was once again hidden from sight. As the car rolled away and the red blaze of the taillights faded into the fog, Kimber once again realized she wasn’t part of the story – she was only an observer. She didn’t have her name on the marquee, she didn’t even have a cameo, she was just another spectator who paid their $12 to watch from the cheap seats… remaining anonymous in the darkness.<br />
<br />
It was already twenty minutes beyond ten on this Saturday night, but for Kimber it felt as if it could have just as well been five in the morning. She knew her schedule for this and any other Saturday evening, and it didn’t include a boy picking her up so they could head to a party. For Kimber a Saturday night was just another night for her to stay home, watch some television in her bedroom or perhaps read one of the old romance novels her mother had been collecting since she was in her 20s. Kimber would often times find herself reading into the night, and would only climb into bed after hearing the singing of the birds as the sun began to skulk between the curtains and reflect off of the almond color walls of her bedroom.<br />
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Her parents never questioned why Kimber seemed to sleep in on Sundays – they felt it was normal teenage behavior, but they had no idea their daughter only averaged a few hours sleep on any given night. Kimber’s room was littered with the half-read romance novels, their paper covers torn and faded from neglect, the images on the covers all blending together as if they were identical copies of the same book. Sometimes Kimber would finish two or even three books in a single day, but more often than not she would start five or six, and with none of them grasping her interest, she would simply set them aside and reach for the next.<br />
<br />
Romance novels weren’t exactly Kimber’s favorite genre of reading material, but considering they were free, were readily available at all hours of the night, and didn’t require a lot of thought to discern their meanings, they suited her purposes just fine. She read other books as well, but it wasn’t nearly as convenient for her to have to visit a bookstore three times a week or have her father drive her across town to the library knowing full well any number of books she would check out would only quell her appetite for a day or two.<br />
<br />
On occasion, she would spend her evenings in her father’s study, watching old home movies or his old videocassettes of sitcoms. It didn’t much matter what was on the screen, it was merely a way to pass the time and keep her mind occupied so she wouldn’t have to think about herself anymore. She found she didn’t watch movies or read books to be entertained, but rather did so to ensure her brain wasn’t in a neutral position where it would only serve to ask questions that she didn’t feel were worth finding answers for.<br />
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In the end, Kimber found numerous ways to throw away the hours she had to herself which didn’t include any human interaction… and that was essentially the goal all along. She wished to remain alone, not because she didn’t like other people, but more so because she didn’t like herself with other people. She was never comfortable around others whether that be family, friends or schoolmates. Besides, she was never a popular girl, she never was part of the crowd that produced prom queens and football stars, and she never seemed to find her niche within the whole high school popularity contest. Perhaps she didn’t fit that image of the popular girl, or perhaps it was just that she didn’t care… either way, she didn’t let herself become concerned about the situation.<br />
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It wasn’t that Kimber wasn’t an attractive girl, it wasn’t that she wasn’t a nice girl, or an intelligent girl, or a girl with a nice personality. In fact, Kimber was a very attractive girl in more than just the physical sense. During her Freshman year in high school she was even voted as the girl with the most natural beauty – so in theory that meant something. Actually, boys would regularly express interest in Kimber, but even the most devoted admirer would give up after investing weeks or even months of attention only to find out it did no good.<br />
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It seemed Kimber just wasn’t interested in boys… she never had a boyfriend throughout her entire life, and if you don’t count the time that her older sister Lana duped her into meeting William, a somewhat quirky friend of a friend, she hadn’t even had a single date. Even that night turned out to be odious, as William wound up spilling a beer all over Kimber’s jeans in some futile attempt to get into them. When it was obvious that Kimber wasn’t into random sexual encounters, (as a matter of fact Kimber had never even kissed a boy) the young man decided she wasn’t worth his time and vanished… moving on to the next victim, and forcing Kimber to call Lana for a ride home from the party where she was abandoned. <br />
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Quite simply, Kimber wasn’t the type to get involved with men, she wasn’t the type that lived her life around what party was happening Saturday night, and she wasn’t the type who worried about her reputation at high school. In all actuality, it bothered Lana much more that Kimber wasn’t a socialite like herself, and Lana took every available opportunity to “fix” her sister’s image. <br />
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Because of Lana’s status in school, the fact she was a member of the “in” crowd and the fact her parents had a fair amount of money allowed her to protect Kimber from the harshness of high school. Surely no one would dare to pick on the sister of one of the most popular girls in school and therefore, for the most part, Kimber was safe… at least for the remainder of the year while she shared the halls of school with Lana. Once Lana left next year for whatever college her friends decided was best, Kimber would be on her own, although that didn’t really concern Kimber as much as one might expect.<br />
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As Kimber sat in her living room with the lights out, she wondered why she rarely felt good inside. She knew she was smart enough, she knew she was pretty enough, and she knew she had practically everything she would ever need, but something was missing from her life. Her family cared for her a great deal and expressed interest in her lack of a social life, but somehow Kimber always had a way of diminishing the topic as if to make her parents feel as if she was normal and there wasn’t any reason for alarm.<br />
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Deep down, Kimber knew she wasn’t like everyone else. She would stare into a mirror for hours wondering what was so different about her and after a while she found she couldn’t recognize her face. She would often daydream about being someone else, yet when asked, she wouldn’t have any desire to change herself. Instead, she watched others and learned from them, trying to figure out what made their lives so seemingly interesting, while her life wasn’t worth so much as five full pages of text in a spiral bound notebook she purchased over a year ago in an attempt to document her life in some sort of a daily journal.<br />
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In truth, although Kimber knew she was different, she didn’t necessarily feel anything was wrong with her. She was actually more curious about others than concerned for herself, and she would study others to find out what made them unique from one another. She would peer from the gap between the curtains hanging in her bedroom – watching Lisa as she came and went – wondering what it would be like to live her life, questioning how one person would be comfortable interacting with so many others, while Kimber herself found it to be quite numbing and monotonous.<br />
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So the days blended together, and with time Kimber grew more distant from everyone, yet in some strange way, became closer to herself. She began to feel that she didn’t belong in her body, as if she was trapped inside of a coffin even though she was in perfect health. She knew something had to change, but she questioned what, and she didn’t feel she would be able to explain her feelings to anyone because for the most part Kimber was more intelligent that anyone she came into contact with in her daily life.<br />
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Weeks passed, and the gloomy weather caused by the spring rains actually made Kimber feel more at home with herself. She always loved the rain, and would sit in her bedroom listening to the droplets strike against the panes of glass as if they were knocking and asking for permission to enter. The wind would gust against the side of the house and force the rain to press against the windows in waves, sounding like a keyed up crowd at a basketball game. In the distance, Kimber could recognize some muted thunder and some brief flashes of lightning – if anything she was only disappointed the thunder wasn’t louder as it always seemed to comfort her.<br />
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As pleasant as the sound of the rain was, it served to remind Kimber than summer was almost here – and that meant she would have to find a way to spend her days…some way to keep her mind occupied for the time she otherwise would have been in school. There was always the idea of getting a job, but her father would have no part of it, he didn’t see why either of his daughters should ever have to work while in school. “Work comes later” he would always say…. “have fun while you can and let me worry about paying for things”. Most kids her age would probably be extremely grateful, but Kimber didn’t feel it was that big of a deal.<br />
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Now she was faced with an additional seven or eight hours a day with nothing to do, and she figured she only had a few more boxes of romance novels left - although she feely admitted she could re-read any of them… it wasn’t as if their plotlines were all that unique and she probably wouldn’t remember most of the books anyway. However, perhaps this was a summer to try something new. Perhaps this was a summer to just take a few chances and do what she wanted to do, instead of what was expected. Kimber was never the type to disobey her parents, but she didn’t feel she needed to be treated like a child either. It was time for them to start taking her seriously, and it was time for her to ensure others knew who she was. This was going to be an experiment of sorts to see how her family would react to a totally different Kimber.<br />
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Almost as if the rain served to excite her, she found herself digging through the drawer of her nightstand for her notebook. She read the first few pages of her attempt at a journal and after a few minutes of silence she proceeded to create a new entry. It was a simple entry but that is all it was intended to be. Something that served to remind her what her goals were, something that signified a beginning without forgetting the end. It read: <br />
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<em>May 8 – Today I am discovering I am not who I want to be. I will change – I will not fail. People will know me – I will know myself.</em><br />
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She stared at the words for a few minutes, and a very muted smile appeared in the corner of her mouth. She finally understood what she had to do but she didn’t understand how to do it. “Fine” she said, “I’ll just start small”. With that, she stood up from her bed, walked over to the curtains and proceeded to pull them apart – letting the dimmed sunlight enter the room for the first time in months. She could see that car in Lisa’s driveway again….but this time something was different – the engine wasn’t running, the horn wasn’t honking. <br />
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Kimber thought to herself that was a bit odd, since other than the exception of Prom night a month ago or so when Trey brought Lisa some flowers and attempted to feel comfortable with a $80 rented tuxedo, Kimber couldn’t recall ever seeing Trey actually enter Lisa’s house. Even then he was in the house less that 15 minutes…just long enough to say a few words to Lisa’s parents no doubt, and long enough to see Lisa come down the stairway in her gown, as if it was that old stereotypical scene from a movie where all eyes are on the daughter and the father proclaims how beautiful she is.<br />
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But then again, Kimber didn’t really know… she could only see what was happening outside, everything else had to be envisioned in her head – thoughts and possibilities darting in and out like a fly bouncing against a window. That didn’t change what was happening now though, so it served to catch her curiosity. Just then she saw some movement in the house… it was brightly lit inside and that made it all the easier for Kimber to watch. She saw what looked like three people, but she couldn’t be certain as they seemed to come and go from her view. She could see the flicker of a television in the living room area, catching the light reflecting off of the back wall where it projected towards the couch…..it was funny to think that Kimber had never been in Lisa’s house, but knew practically every room, every piece of furniture, and even some of the paintings hanging on the walls.<br />
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Kimber actually felt guilty spending so much time watching Lisa and her family, but she took solace in the fact that she never used a telescope or anything that would seem too invasive. She wasn’t asking to infect their lives, but only serving as a spectator from across the street, surely she couldn’t be mistaken for a stalker in any way. She knew she was walking a fine line, but she perceived a difference between watching and spying and she clearly didn’t feel this was spying. As she drew her curtains closed to prevent anyone from seeing her, she thought to herself how her first step forward had already failed. She wasn’t even able to keep her curtains open for fear of being caught spying – almost as if she suffered from some sort of addiction.<br />
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She continued to watch Lisa’s house, and the hypnotic tapping of the raindrops against the glass seemed to push Kimber in and out of a never-ending daydream. As she used what felt like the remainder of her energy to focus her eyes on the house yet again, she found it was slowly getting darker….which was a good thing since it was now even easier to see inside of the house. There was no doubt now, there were 3 separate people in the house – one of which was probably Lisa, one is obviously Trey, but the other was anyone’s guess. She had to know who it was - it suddenly became almost an obsession, and as the minutes went by and she wasn’t any closer to discovery, she became increasingly frustrated.<br />
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Finally, Kimber knew she would have to cross the street if she intended to find out for herself. Perhaps she could peer into the lower level windows and see who it was, and then disappear back into her own home without being seen. She thought to herself how odd it was that she was willing to take that much of a chance just to find out who the third shadow belonged to, but it was almost as if it was calling to her and she didn’t know how else to react.<br />
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As she threw on her jacket, she continued to peer though the front door, wondering if maybe the mystery would solve itself if Trey were to leave for some reason… wondering if the third person was there with him or if it was someone who was there with Lisa. Now there were even more questions to be answered, but Kimber didn’t know how she could ever figure that out. She slipped out of the front door and immediately was greeted by the rain against her face. She turned away for a second so she could react to it, but then turned her head again back forward and welcomed the stinging of the drops against her face. She didn’t know why, but the rain almost seemed to be breaking into her… making her feel more normal and leveled.<br />
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As she slowly stepped down the sidewalk she thought to herself how crazy this was. Why would someone get soaking wet simply to know who was in the neighbor’s house? Why would someone risk being labeled as being nosey or digging into someone else’s business just to answer a mystery? She couldn’t say exactly, but she knew this was going to be done, so there didn’t seem to be any use fighting it anymore.<br />
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Just as she reached the opposite curb it hit her – what would she do if they were looking out of the windows just as she was looking in… how could she react to that? How could she attempt and look like a “normal” person while staring through someone’s windows? Even with these thoughts, Kimber never stopped advancing on the house. It was almost as if she had the mentality of a soldier with orders to capture an objective, there simply was no option to quit, there was no option to stop. <br />
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It was then that her plan actually fell apart, just as she was half way up Lisa’s sidewalk the front door opened and there stood Lisa – staring directly into Kimber’s eyes, leaning forward slightly as if she was ready to address her. Kimber reacted almost instantly with a sense of fear – she stopped walking forward and just stood there in the rain. She didn’t know what to say, and didn’t know how to act… but she felt perhaps she would be best to just turn around and run back to her house. <br />
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Luckily for Kimber, her body didn’t react to her insane thoughts before Lisa could offer a suggestion… “get in here before you get soaked more than you already are!” she yelled – and even without hesitation Kimber darted towards the door. Not because she wanted to get out of the rain, but because she wanted to get inside of the house she had been watching for so many years. It was only after she entered and Lisa closed the door behind her than she realized she didn’t know what to say or how to explain what she was doing on her sidewalk. <br />
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“I thought you were the pizza guy” said Lisa, looking surprised, but not disgusted in any way. She continued… “so, what’s going on?”. Kimber stood there for a second and responded in an almost stuttering tone “I… I was wondering if I could use your phone… ours seems to be out or something and I left my cell phone in my locker at school”. Even she was surprised she could come up with a line like that under pressure, but it must have worked because Lisa never even questioned it. Lisa stated they just ordered pizza so it must be working, and she picked up the cordless phone to verify… “yea, it’s still working” she said. “Maybe the storm knocked yours out… Do you need to use ours?”<br />
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Kimber responded with a yes, but while Lisa was handing her the phone she suddenly realized she didn’t know who to call. Would her entire little game fall apart because she didn’t have a number handy? She thought to herself all the numbers she could remember, who could she call that wouldn’t seem odd or that wouldn’t draw attention to herself. Suddenly she began dialing… her fingernails against the keys never expressed any hesitation. She held the phone up to her ear awaiting an answer, but after 5 or 6 rings she pulled the phone away and clicked it off answering to Lisa that nobody was home. “No matter” she said… “I can wait until my dad is home and try again later with his cell”. Of course Lisa didn’t know that Kimber just called the library… at least she knew nobody would answer at this hour and it was one of the few numbers she could recall at the moment. As Kimber thanked Lisa for the phone, she turned once again towards the door, but Lisa stopped her saying that maybe she would like to stay for pizza.<br />
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Although Kimber had never thought about what might happen if she were inside, this seemed even better than anything she could have imagined. She didn’t want to seem pushy though, so she said she had better not since she didn’t want to intrude. “Oh come on” Lisa responded “it was a buy one - get one day and we will have way more than enough”. Kimber thought it best to play innocent as to not give away her real motives, so she asked “we?… so there are other people here too?”. Just then, Trey entered from the living room and said hi – and Lisa introduced them. “Trey – this is my neighbor Kimber… Kimber, this is my boyfriend Trey”. Trey responded with the standard “hey” line you might expect from a teenage boy, but it was what he said next that surprised Kimber. He said he knew her from school, and then proceeded to mention that they had two classes together last semester.<br />
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Of course Kimber knew that, but she never expected Trey to realize it – she thought she was invisible to people like him. For some reason finding out that wasn’t the case made her feel remarkable. She also was a bit shocked that Lisa knew her name, because even though they had been neighbors for several years, they never before had spoken face to face.<br />
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“Yea – I remember seeing you in a few classes too” Kimber responded…..as not wanting to sound too excited, but just then another boy entered the room – as Kimber thought to herself that this was finally and mystery person she was trying to unmask.<br />
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Lisa continued “oh yea and this is Mike… he’s Trey’s cousin, he goes to school at Lincoln… you know, over on the West side?” Mike and Kimber said hi almost simultaneously to one another, and Mike smiled as he looked into her eyes just as Kimber shifter her gaze towards the floor in a slight bout of embarrassment. Lisa told Kimber to hang up her coat and they could all go into the living room – so she unzipped her coat and hung it on the hook next to the door, leaving puddles of water to form on the tile floor underneath as it slowly drip dried – and then followed Lisa into the living room.<br />
<br />
Kimber was very nervous, but she did her best to prevent it from showing. Lisa asked some questions about school, mutual people they would both know, and they just chatted about anything and everything. As the minutes passed, the tension melted away from Kimber’s body and she started to open up. She spoke about how she didn’t feel comfortable in high school and how she didn’t really have any friends. She spoke about how she didn’t fit in and how she had never dated anyone. She spoke about her fears, her regrets, her goals, and her dreams… all the while Lisa, Trey, and Mike asked questions, listened, and discussed every aspect of Kimber’s personality without ever sounding condescending, demeaning, or cold hearted.<br />
<br />
Lisa apologized for not ever stopping by to say hi or for not introducing herself after she moved in, and Kimber apologized for not making herself more visible. Trey said how different Kimber was than he had imagined, and how “normal” of a person she is. Mike did his best to keep in the conversation as well, cleverly dropping a few key phrases to let Kimber know he was attracted to her and that he would like to get to know her more. A conversation that seemed to take hours actually occurred in only about 20 minutes, but it was a huge step for Kimber… and she knew it.<br />
<br />
Just then as Kimber glanced through the slight fog that was forming in the picture window, she noticed her father’s car entering the garage across the street, and having successfully begun her process of changing herself, she felt it was a fine point to make an exit. She could use her father’s cell phone now she said, and she wanted to talk to him about some other things… in reality it was just an excuse, but she wasn’t totally relaxed around others quite yet, so she didn’t wish to push her luck on the first night. She apologized for not being able to stay for pizza, but the others understood, and Lisa even said they need to get together again sometime soon.<br />
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As she zipped up her coat for the return trip through the rain, she thanked Lisa for the use of the phone and said she would talk to her on Monday at school. Only after saying it did she even understand what she said, but it didn’t change anything because she actually meant it. Mike asked if she would be interested in going to a movie with them next weekend, and even without hesitation she said she would very much enjoy that – “it would be cool” were the words coming from her lips, even though she didn’t recognize the phrase as being one she would use. Lisa offered to set up the details when they spoke at school, and Kimber replied that she would be sure and remind her… because Kimber wasn’t about to forget.<br />
<br />
So it began… where Kimber took a small risk and resulted in a big step she found herself in an area she had never been before. She was surrounded by people who she was comfortable with and as she said her final goodbyes and stepped into the rain, she whispered to herself how things are going to be so different from now on and how this is a day she would never forget.<br />
<br />
As she slowly paced back across the street, she thought to herself how odd it was that Lisa was so nice, how all of them treated her like a real person, and how even though she had never said more than a few sentences to Lisa the entire time they lived directly across the street from one another – that none of them treated her like the freak she thought she was perceived as. She thought back to all of the old 80’s movies she had watched over the past few years and expected the cliché about the popular girl being so mean to actually be based on fact. She expected the boyfriend to treat her as an interruption or the friend to start badmouthing her… but none of that happened.<br />
<br />
She wondered if all of her perceptions were that far off base. She suddenly felt this urge to find out what else she was wrong about and what else she could experience. Her mind filled with possibilities and once again a small smile appeared on her face – just as the headlights from the car appeared out of the corner of her eye and reminded her that she was still in the middle of the street. She turned to verify what she already knew and she began to process what her body needed to do to get out of the way… but it was too late. The vehicle was traveling far too fast for her to respond. The car struck her legs and threw her into the windshield – only then did the driver realize what had happened as he pressed his foot into the brake pedal in some vain attempt at stopping in time. <br />
<br />
Kimber’s limp body slid back off of the car and onto the asphalt, striking it with just enough force to slide across the wet pavement into the curb where she struck her head against the wet and muddy concrete. Watching from her window, Lisa screamed and ran outside in a panic as Trey immediately reached for the phone and dialed 911 while Mike stood silently against the fogging glass with his mouth hanging open in disbelief almost as if he was unable to react.<br />
<br />
As Lisa reached the curb and as she crouched down to look at the motionless body, water rolled off of her face and onto Kimber’s. If it were not for the look in Lisa’s eyes it might have been easy to confuse the tears with raindrops, but as she sat looking at Kimber’s lifeless shell, she was overcome by emotion… only to be somewhat calmed by the rigid smile on Kimber’s face – almost as if the impact from the car locked the expression on her mouth never to be removed.<br />
<br />
As Lisa looked up at the car, the glow from a pizza delivery light sat atop the roof, with the driver motionless behind the wheel with a look of fear in his eyes. He knew the fate of Kimber even without getting out of the car to look at her and even though he may have thought he just hit a young girl he could have no idea how true those thoughts were. As it was, this particular young girl’s life had just begun… less than 30 minutes ago.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-59708312936561528842012-03-20T21:21:00.002-05:002012-03-20T21:21:00.635-05:00Musical Memories<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-qHr2b34dxbY/T2iv9ZmtZCI/AAAAAAAAARM/d64713jM4sA/s1600/sheet-music.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img aea="true" border="0" height="213" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-qHr2b34dxbY/T2iv9ZmtZCI/AAAAAAAAARM/d64713jM4sA/s320/sheet-music.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>I play this imaginary game where I pretend I had a house fire and lose every single CD I own and then I ask myself which ones I would replace. I suppose these days I'd just download the tracks from iTunes... but I've had this little game in my head for years so I still think in terms of physical CDs.<br />
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My obvious choices are always "greatest hits" albums because they tend to have a lot of great songs. I own a ton of greatest hits albums from various bands that were big in the 80's like Foreigner, Toto, Chicago, and Journey. Most of them I would likely replace because they are the CDs I listen to most often. Then there are a few other CDs where I actually like every song on the album. Keep in mind this is rare for me since most of my CDs probably only contain one or two "good songs", but there are a few where I like the whole album and would replace it. <br />
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These albums include Journey - <em>Escape</em>, Fiona Apple - <em>Tidal</em>, Crash Test Dummies - <em>God Shuffled His Feet</em>, Peter Cetera - <em>World Falling Down</em>, and a handful of others including Tom Petty, Patty Symth... I can't remember off the top of my head, but basically out of the 250 CDs I own (give or take) and not counting greatest hits CDs, I would probably only replace about ten of them. I sometimes think I should probably replace Michael Jackson - <em>Thriller</em> just for the importance of the album, but to be honest I'm not even sure I still have it so it probably isn't all that important.<br />
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The thing is, I have a lot of memories tied to these albums which may have more to do with why I would want to replace them than the actual music. As I think about why I pick certain albums over others, it often has less to do with the music but more to do with the memories associated with a specific album. Of course it goes without saying that I do actually like this music... but it is much more than merely enjoying a melody or thinking the lyrics were clever. Often the memory makes the difference - case in point:<br />
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<strong>Fiona Apple</strong> - I have her first album (<em>Tidal</em>) which I think almost everyone had back in the 90s. Love it. I lost the CD once but still had the case so I went out and downloaded all of the songs and burned myself a new copy. I was too cheap to actually buy it again so I thought this was fair. Then I found the original in another CD case a few years later. I kept the burned copy just in case - and therefore I've had two copies of this CD for over a decade. <br />
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The strange thing is even though I like EVERY. SINGLE. SONG. on that first album, I never bought any of her newer albums. I'm so guilty of that... I find an artist I really like and I don't follow their careers. I will admit there was a period where I basically shelved her album and didn't listen to it for perhaps a year, and then a girl I was dating at the time made a comment about liking her so I brought out the album and listened to it from start to finish. I'm not sure why I ever stopped listening to it because the music was as good as it ever was. Oddly enough that girl re-introducing me to Fiona Apple was probably the one good thing that ever came from that relationship.<br />
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I've had a lot of time with this album. I've listened to it alone and continually copied several of the songs to the various portable music players I've owned over the years including to my phone and most recently my iPad. I can't say what it is about this album, but I can say that the song "Never Is A Promise" is simply amazing to me... I'd put that song in my top 20 songs of all time.<br />
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<strong>Crash Test Dummies</strong> - I believe I bought their <em>God Shuffled His Feet </em>album because of their hit song "Mmmm, Mmmm, Mmmm, Mmmm", but I'd have to say "Afternoons and Coffeespoons" quickly became my favorite song. I like the entire album as well as a few of their other songs that have been on movie soundtracks etc, but I never bought any of their follow-up albums so I suppose I might like them if I ever heard them. I'm not sure what it is about their music, but it just has a signature sound that I find appealing. It also reminds me of my freshmen year in college yet I have no idea why. I can't say as I have any specific memories tied to the album itself, but it just seems that it has been with me for so long I feel a connection. Like an old pair of jeans that have a few paint stains on them but you can't bring yourself to throw them away. Sure you might not wear them in public, but they sure feel comfortable around the house.<br />
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<strong>Peter Cetera</strong> - This goes back to a memory I have from 1992 or so where I was working at Shopko and a guy called to ask if we had the new Peter Cetera album. I had no idea who Peter Cetera was at the time, so I had to read off the song list to this guy over the phone so he could tell me if it was the right CD. He asked me to hold a copy of it for him which I did, and he came in an hour or two later to pick it up. The guy was so happy we had the album - he acted like it meant the world to him, and I just couldn't help but be interested based upon his reaction. So I listened to the CD and was hooked from that point. <br />
<br />
It might have had something to do with the duet he did with Chaka Khan since it was getting some radio play at the time, but I think part of it stems from a memory I had when I was young and my brothers were tossing a bunch of cassette tapes they didn't want. I went through a cardboard box of their old tapes and found "Chicago <em>16</em>". That album was released in 1982 so this was probably a few years later... I was probably 9 or 10 at the time. When I listened to that tape I just loved it... I remember playing it over and over and over again. Of course back when tapes were the pinnacle of music technology fast-forwarding or rewinding was a huge hassle so I just played the tape from start to finish time and time again. Maybe had I grown up with CDs I would have skipped around and never appreciate the songs that were never heard on the radio.<br />
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It was some time later that I finally figured out the band was actually called Chicago - I originally thought they were Chicago 16 and had no idea the "<em>16</em>" was their sixteenth album. I'm not sure what happened to that original tape - and for years I've told myself I was going to buy Chicago 16 on CD but I never have. I suppose now I may not even remember most of the songs on that album, but when I think back I can still remember exactly where I was in our basement as I pulled that tape from the bottom of that cardboard box as if it was covered in gold. That memory is more vivid that most of what I did last week, and I dare say unless I'm a victim of serious head trauma at some point, that memory will be with me until the day I die.<br />
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So with that memory of Chicago I clearly liked their sound, and the biggest influence upon their sound in my view was the lead singer which was Peter Cetera at that point. When I heard his solo stuff years later all those memories flooded back and there I was. I bought the album in 1992 and a full 20 years later I still play it all the time. In fact that CD has been in every car I have owned for years. It is CD number one in the disc changer in my current vehicle at this very moment. Back in 2003 or so I bought a VW Jetta and I put that CD in the CD changer and never took it out until I sold the car. It is just one of those CDs I really love and I wish I could get Peter Cetera to sign it because there are so many memories tied to his music and his voice.<br />
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<strong>Avril Lavigne</strong> - This is probably guilty pleasure of mine. I remember liking her first album (<em>Let Go</em>) because a few of her songs were unconventional. You would listen to the song and think she was going to drop down a key or slow down and she would do the exact opposite. It wasn't predictable pop... yet it was still pop. I still like a lot of her stuff although I only own her first album (a trend of mine I guess). I think she is one of those artists that I was able to watch grow because she was so young when she released that album, and to some degree I grew with her.<br />
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I fully understand most guys won't admit to liking that style of music, but I guess I'm not ashamed to admit it. She is a talented artist and she has a unique sound. The fact she writes or co-writes all of her own music is amazing to me and the music is that much more credible because it is her singing her own story as opposed to an artist who just picks songs to sing from a catalog.<br />
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<strong>Gin Blossoms</strong> - I have two of their albums I really like (<em>Hey Jealousy </em>and <em>Congratulations, I'm Sorry</em>), but I don't like every song on them. Although I tend to like their hits, I sometimes wonder if I like their music because of the time I was listening to it. There are a lot of memories tied to them, and I was upset when they broke up. I was really pissed. I felt like I missed an opportunity to see them live even though I rarely go to live concerts, and I thought it was horrible that they would never produce any more music.<br />
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Yet when they got back together a few years later I didn't really care and have never listened to any of their newer stuff. As far as I'm concerned they are still a 1990s band with a 1990s sound and that is all they ever need to be. I know a lot of my feelings towards them surround my time in Vermillion and my time with certain friends etc, so part of me likes to pretend they are still the same band they were in the mid 90s because there is a point in time that I'd like to keep as is. If there was a soundtrack to my life... it is safe to say Gin Blossoms would be playing as soon as I hit the Vermillion city limits.<br />
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<strong>Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies</strong> - I don't think I have ever listened to a complete album by them, but I do know I like several of their songs. They are one of those bands I associate with college-aged kids in a college town because that is where I heard of them and nobody outside of that lifestyle had any clue. To this day when I mention them most people have never heard of them, so I guess they were never all that commercially successful. I can still remember when my brother and I were living in Vermillion and he bought a new stereo system... Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies were one of the first CDs he put in and to this day when I hear that song played all I can think about is standing in the basement of a run-down house in a college town listening to a stereo that sounded amazing all the while being unaware that on paper that room probably had the worst acoustics humanly possible. <br />
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It didn't matter. The music overshadowed everything else. It was just that strong that the walls and floor just seemed to blur away into the distance as the music surrounded me. Part of it was the timing, part of it was the experience of that entire house and the good times we had while there. Part of it was just the moment and how no matter how hard I try I could never relive it. The genie was out of the bottle, yet I wonder if that memory would be just as powerful had it been any other CD.<br />
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I'm not a musician. I can't carry a tune if you handed it to me in a brown paper sack. Yet music - perhaps more than anything else - has specific feelings, emotions, and memories tied to it deep within me. I wonder if this is true for everyone or if this is just something music lovers feel. <br />
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I guess I'll never know, but I do know there are times when I would like nothing better than to sit in a recliner with a nice set of over-the-ear headphones on and listen to some incredible music. Let it seep into me and just think about everything it means whether it be trying to interpret the words, remember an event tied to that particular song, album, or artist... or just appreciating a moment for what it is without the need to be actively engaged outside of my brain.<br />
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I doubt any two people can ever share the same feeling when it comes to music, and to be quite honest I have never really known anyone who is the type of person to sit at a record store and have conversations about music for hours. I have had lengthy discussions about equipment such as tube amplifiers, record players, the inflated price of some high-end equipment, and the snakeoil that is ultra high end speaker cables... but that comes with the territory when you are an "electronics guy" and when you work with technology and with technical people. <br />
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I wonder if I'm alone in this regard. Do most people just like music because of what it means right now, or do others form relationships with the tracks as I do? Can someone have a deep love of music if they aren't a true music snob, or is this one of those things that each person has to determine for themselves? Maybe to some degree (almost) everyone feels they love music but merely in varying degrees.<br />
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As a wise man once said... "turn up the radio, I need some music, gimme some more". Well ok technically that was the band Autograph, but you get the point.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-89939990281675002832012-03-12T02:15:00.002-05:002012-03-12T09:32:24.680-05:00The Climate Change "Debate"<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8ID135WgnBQ/T14Fy3nex2I/AAAAAAAAARA/cDtN42Svcmo/s1600/Climate-Change.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="186" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8ID135WgnBQ/T14Fy3nex2I/AAAAAAAAARA/cDtN42Svcmo/s200/Climate-Change.jpg" width="200" yda="true" /></a></div>There are a lot of political hot-button issues that never seem to get resolved. If we are speaking of an issue like abortion, it is safe to say people will never agree on whether life begins at conception, or whether it begins sometime later. If we are speaking of politics, it is safe to say a large number of people will always believe their respective political party is right while all other political parties are wrong. If speaking of religion, people will often try to convince others that their religion or dogma is the only proper belief system and that anyone who follows a differing religion (or perhaps someone who follows no religion at all) is simply ignorant or misinformed.<br />
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I understand these debates, and although I may hold an opinion of my own, I can respect someone who disagrees with me because for the most part it is impossible to "prove" either side of these issues. <br />
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Even the best doctors and scientists and religious leaders can't really "prove" when life beings and there surely is no consensus on the issue. <br />
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Nobody will ever be able to prove that one political party is always right or is infallible - because history shows us the exact opposite.<br />
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We can't prove a religion to be correct without resorting to the concept of faith, and we can't prove or disprove the existence of a higher power because any evidence we have can be interpreted any number of ways.<br />
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I get it. These are debates that have existed for hundreds or in some cases thousands upon thousands of years, and they are all debates that will most likely continue to rage on for thousands of years after we are all gone. I may feel my opinion on these matters is "right", but I'm not naive enough to believe any of these debates will be settled in my lifetime nor am I unwavering in my belief that these matters will continue to be debated for generations to come.<br />
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However, there are other subjects which I simply cannot understand why people still consider them to be debatable. I feel it is fairly safe to say the Earth revolves around the Sun because it is accepted science. Very few of us have the knowledge or equipment to verify this personally, but we have accepted what the scientific community at large has told us, and that data has been verified by countless others.<br />
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The same can be true for subjects such as whether the Earth is round or flat. I personally have never been around the world nor have I been an astronaut looking at the Earth from afar, but I accept that our planet is round because there is more than enough evidence to prove it to be the case. I also accept that a single atom is comprised of three types of particles (protons, neutrons, and electrons). I do not have the ability of verifying this fact myself, but I understand the body of scientific knowledge that exists on our planet has proven this to be factual.<br />
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One could say there is never going to be 100% consensus on any one particular issue and I agree with that. In truth we know there are people among us who may believe the Earth is flat, or they may doubt not only the particles contained within atoms, but the actual existence of atoms. No amount of logic or reason or research or science will ever convince everyone, but for all intents and purposes dissenting voices are ignored when it comes to matters of settled science.<br />
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It is because of this that I am often baffled when I hear an otherwise intelligent person proclaim that there is such a thing as a debate as to whether or not man-made climate change (aka man-made global warming, aka anthropogenic climate change) is real. To some degree I don't fault the layperson who doesn't wish to take the time to actually review the data or read the reports put out by the scientific community because in most cases people really don't have any interest... and honestly this subject matter is less than exciting to most members of the human race. <br />
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I also acknowledge that the vast majority of the public obtains information from the media who may or may not present the data in a unbiased or non-partisan manner, not to mention the journalist writing the article or presenting the news may not be well versed on the subject matter in the first place.<br />
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In addition, in our overly-politically charged climate, many people wish to avoid the controversy with issues that appear to fall across political parties. Thus, instead of actually noting what the scientific community believes in respect to a particular scientific issue, a journalist or talk radio host may try to appease a larger audience by trying to remain neutral and by avoiding making a statement which seems to confirm or deny the existence of man-made climate change.<br />
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So it stands to reason why so many people would believe that the subject of man-made climate change is a debate. This also explains why in many cases we hear people utter the phrase "the jury is still out" or "scientists simply cannot agree". It also contributes to why there is so much confusion on the issue and why public opinion polls seem to show a clear difference in political affiliation between those who do believe in climate change and those who do not even though leaders of both parties have stated publicly climate change is at least partly attributable to human activity.<br />
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I recently read a comment from someone that said for every scientist who "knows" climate change is caused by human activity there is a scientist who "knows" climate change has nothing to do with human activity, and this is a prime exactly of how misinformed people really are on this issue.<br />
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The reality is, that statement is nowhere near reality. In fact, the trend of climatologists and scientists who actually study this phenomenon has been consisting in support of the concept of man-made climate change and the trend has been increasing in support rather than the opposite as some would suggest. One of the most recent reports on the subject indicates that between <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/06/04/1003187107.full.pdf" target="_blank">97–98% of the climate researchers most actively publishing in the field support the tenets of [climate change] outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change</a>.<br />
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So you may be asking yourself... what are those tenets outlined by the <a href="http://www.ipcc.ch/index.htm" target="_blank">IPCC</a>? Well, in summary they boil down to three distinct points.<br />
<ol><li>The global average surface temperature has been on the rise since the late 19th century (including a distinct rise observed over the past 30 years). </li>
<li>There is evidence that <u>most</u> of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities.</li>
<li>If greenhouse gas emissions continue the warming will also continue. Accompanying this temperature increase will be increases in some types of extreme weather and a projected sea level rise. On balance the impacts of global warming will be significantly negative, especially for larger values of warming.</li>
</ol>Granted they tend to be a little more specific and add detail surrounding the actual temperature fluctuations, but in effect these three points are supported by 97-98% of climate researchers. <br />
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Does that seem like a 50/50 mix to you? No. <br />
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Does it even remotely suggest there is widespread debate on this subject? No. <br />
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This clearly shows scientific consensus and is why man-made climate change is considered to be the mainstream scientific assessment. <br />
<div></div>It should also be noted that aside from individual scientists, every major organization on the planet that studies climatology, geology, or earth related sciences agrees with the man-made theory regarding climate change. There was one organization (the American Association of Petroleum Geologists) who used to disagree, but sometime in 2007 even they had to finally admit the evidence is overwhelming so they basically had to stop denying it. They won’t come out in full support (and based upon who provides them funding you can hardly blame them), but they no longer deny it and rather try to remain neutral (like some journalists who still try to convince the public there is a debate about climate change).<br />
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So who are these organizations you might ask? Here is a partial list: <br />
<ul><li>The International Council of Academies of Engineering and Technological Sciences</li>
<li>The American Association for the Advancement of Science</li>
<li>The National Research Council</li>
<li>The National Academy of Sciences</li>
<li>The American Chemical Society</li>
<li>The American Meteorological Society</li>
<li>The Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society</li>
<li>The Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences</li>
<li>The Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society</li>
<li>The Royal Meteorological Society</li>
<li>World Meteorological Organization</li>
<li>The World Health Organization</li>
<li>The American Institute of Physics</li>
<li>The American Physical Society</li>
<li>The Australian Institute of Physics</li>
<li>The European Physical Society</li>
<li>The European Science Foundation</li>
<li>The Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies</li>
<li>The Network of African Science Academies</li>
<li>The National Science Academies of over 30 nations including all G8 nations, China, India, and many others.</li>
<li>The European Academy of Sciences and Arts</li>
<li>The Polish Academy of Sciences</li>
<li>The Royal Society of the United Kingdom</li>
<li>The Royal Society of New Zealand</li>
<li>The American Geophysical Union</li>
<li>The American Society of Agronomy</li>
<li>The Crop Science Society of America</li>
<li>The Soil Science Society of America</li>
<li>The European Geosciences Union</li>
<li>The European Federation of Geologists</li>
<li>The Geological Society of America</li>
<li>The Geological Society of London</li>
<li>The International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics</li>
<li>The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration</li>
<li>NASA Goddard Institute of Space Studies</li>
<li>The Environmental Protection Agency</li>
<li>The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change </li>
</ul> And many, many more.<br />
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<div></div><div>The bottom line is this... climate change is a political debate, not a scientific debate. Some politicians and talk radio pundits have done a fabulous job of convincing the uninformed that there is still some debate on whether or not man-made climate change is real and whether or not man is one of the primary contributors, but the truth is the scientific community has no such debate. They consider it to be settled science, just as they consider vaccines to be beneficial regardless of what Jenny McCarthy might say.</div><div></div><div><br />
The only true debate within the scientific community is what we can do about climate change, how quickly we can act, what actions we can take in a short term vs. long term time frame, and what the impact of alternative energy sources will be. Rest assured the scientific community is not suffering some deep fracture within as a result of those who may be considered climate change deniers, primarily because they are so few and far between.</div><div></div><div><br />
Lets be clear - skepticism is good, but outright denialism is not. It is well past time we stopped trying to blur the lines between a political debate and a scientific one.</div>Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-70859563765244857912012-02-15T13:31:00.000-06:002012-02-15T13:31:31.998-06:00Things You Hear When You Are Moving<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PAUXAVMFcwA/TzwGweNWXqI/AAAAAAAAAQ0/0A6PmQMpPss/s1600/moving+boxes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PAUXAVMFcwA/TzwGweNWXqI/AAAAAAAAAQ0/0A6PmQMpPss/s1600/moving+boxes.jpg" yda="true" /></a></div>I've moved many, many times in my life, and I've helped countless friends and family members move as well. Moving is not something that many people enjoy, and in fact I would argue it is probably just below a visit to the dentist on the list of things most people hate.<br />
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The thing is, I learn something each and every time I move, and I learn even more when I help someone else move. This is a list of things I have heard while moving... and what those things actually mean.<br />
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<strong>"Here... I just need you to balance it".</strong> This really means.... "get ready... I'm going to drop this on your head or somehow cause you to tear some cartilage in your left knee".<br />
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<strong>"It's not heavy... it's just awkward to carry".</strong> This actually means it is really super heavy and would probably be best if at least four grown men helped to carry it, but chances are you will be stuck moving it with the guy who is trying to save face in front of his girlfriend and who would never admit that an item is above his lifting capacity.<br />
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<strong>"Hold on a second while I adjust my grip".</strong> This is a tricky one, because it can mean one of two things. The most common translation tells us that the person who said this is probably a weakling and is having trouble lifting their portion of the item, however it is also possible that they are just looking for a clever way to shift the bulk of the weight onto others via clever hand placement. Either way when you hear this you had better prepare for the worst.<br />
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<strong>"We are moving from a small one room apartment into a house across town".</strong> This means the one room apartment will probably be on the third floor of the building and there is no chance of an elevator. There is also a good chance that they will have half of their belongings in a storage facility elsewhere... which they conveniently forgot to mention.<br />
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<strong>"The kids will help".</strong> This one really depends upon the age of the kids. If they are toddler age up through around age five, they will do a great job of unpacking the boxes that were just packed, and if you decide to lift a heavy item they will probably be underfoot. If the kids are teenagers, you can expect they will move about as fast as a Three-Toed Sloth and they will never carry more than one box at a time, no matter how small that box may be. If the kids are teenage girls, you can expect to see them carrying a makeup bag in one arm and a Abercrombie sweatshirt in the other as they pack it into the car... then they will need to spend at least 10-15 minutes in order to catch up on their texting between trips.<br />
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<strong>"Bring your truck just in case we need it". </strong>This is a classic. Often times they will mention that they already have several other friends with trucks or trailers and in some cases they may even claim they have arranged for a moving truck, but chances are you will show up to find their idea of a moving truck is their uncle's Chevy Astro Van so anything that doesn't fit will likely find its way into the back of your truck. You can pretty much assume you're paying for your own gas on this one too... even if it is an out-of-town move.<br />
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<strong>"The only heavy items are a couch, a bed, and a television."</strong> What this really means is the couch is a hideabed their grandmother gave them in 1982 and it weighs approximately the same as a small Volkswagen. The couch is also spring loaded so every time you try to adjust it while carrying it, the mattress will start to pop open which will force you to stop and close it again. <br />
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The bed they mentioned is a king size bed located in the second floor of the house, but nobody can figure out how it got up there in the first place because it doesn't seem like will fit down the stairs, and the television is a rear projection model that was the pinnacle of home entertainment technology in 1994 and happens to weigh somewhere just above 300lbs. It is also located in the basement rec room and the only way out of the basement is via a staircase that is nowhere near current building code and that would make a Sherpa proclaim "wow... that's steep".<br />
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Did I mention if you show up three hours late you will notice that all of the light items have already been loaded and that they have saved the heavy stuff for you? Yea... that's standard practice right there.<br />
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<strong>"There will be a ton of people to help".</strong> This typically means the person you are helping will be there along with his 90lb cousin who has trouble carrying the ironing board. It is highly likely that approximately 20 minutes before you are done, three other friends or family members will show up and each carry two items out to the vehicle. These same three people will probably be asking about the free pizza they were promised within an hour.<br />
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<strong>"It's supposed to be a nice day".</strong> If you hear this one and it is between the months of April and September, you can assume it will either be above 90 degrees or that it will be raining. Possibly both. If you hear this between October and March, chances are it will either be snowing or sleeting, and the temperature will be somewhere South of 15 degrees. No matter what time of year it is, there is a high probability the wind will be blowing at least 25mph.<br />
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<strong>"I'm ready to move so just show up when you can".</strong> This actually means they are half packed and don't have enough boxes to hold all of their stuff. They are also running short of packing tape, and they only rented the truck for three hours so you need to get going before they get charged extra. Chances are if you aren't onsite by 7:45AM they will be calling you every five minutes on your cell phone wondering what is taking you so long... and they will ask you to stop by Walmart on the way to pick up some packing tape and then see if you can find some boxes behind the store. You won't be reimbursed for the tape.<br />
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<strong>"If you help, I'll give you all of the pizza and beer you can handle".</strong> This is a common ploy to convince friends and family members that they should help, but when you show up you soon realize the only beer is a six pack of Coors Light that expired four months ago, and the only pizza is a frozen Totino's Party Pizza that is sitting in the freezer. <br />
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<strong>"I didn't realize it would take this long".</strong> This usually means they thought it would take all day, but they didn't anticipate you would still be carrying boxes at 11:30PM. With that being said, they will ask you to follow them so they can drop off the rental truck and then you can give them a ride back across town.<br />
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<strong>"Thanks for all of your help... I'll return the favor the next time you need to move".</strong> Chances are when you do need to move sometime in the future, the person who said this to you will have to attend a funeral for their girlfriend's aunt somewhere in Wisconsin that weekend. Count on it.<br />
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<strong>"I'm never moving again"</strong> and/or <strong>"I tell you what... I'm not moving for a long, long time". </strong>This means they will break their lease early or find their dream home across town in approximately five months. If you're smart you will schedule something every weekend for that entire month well in advance... just to be safe.<br />
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Like it or not, moving stinks. It is examples like these that have taught me there are times in life when having a bad back might actually be a good thing, but if nothing else it has taught me no matter how much a professional moving crew costs... it is probably well worth it. Always remember, professional movers charge a lot less per hour than a therapist, and the movers won't make you come back every week for six months.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-55091005117167148372012-02-08T18:46:00.001-06:002012-02-08T18:46:00.245-06:00The Art of Precrastinating<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_ecMo7-IycU/TzL7El_iizI/AAAAAAAAAQs/L8oxG6fyVno/s1600/procrastination.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="156" sda="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_ecMo7-IycU/TzL7El_iizI/AAAAAAAAAQs/L8oxG6fyVno/s200/procrastination.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>Some have said procrastinating is an artform, but what those people fail to understand is there is a select group among the human race who actually plan ahead to ensure their procrastination is as effective as possible. I have decided this incredible planning shall be called "Precrastinating". I thought about "pre-procrastinating", but that is just confusing, so I'm sticking with precrastinating. Try to keep up.<br />
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It takes a special kind of person to precrastinate. Anyone can keep putting things off for as long as possible so that really isn't all that impressive. Congress has been procrastinating about how to deal with our exploding national debt for decades while they convince us it is one of the most significant issues impacting the future of our nation, so should I really feel bad if I postpone doing laundry for a week or so?<br />
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Hell, Hugh Hefner has been putting off death for at least ten years and he does it is his pajamas so how hard could it be to procrastinate? My three year old daughter has discovered it is much easier to simply say we will take a bath later than it is to actually take the bath, so it seems clear that almost anyone from the very young to the very old is capable of procrastination and it doesn't even require practice to be good at it.<br />
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The real visionary actually plans ahead when it is time to procrastinate. They don't get backed into a corner and then grasp for some excuse on how to put something off but rather they prepare well in advance to have ample excuses at the ready. In effect you could say they plan to fail rather than fail to plan, and even though that seems like the exact opposite of what you would expect, it just happens to work.<br />
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If procrastination is considered an art, then precrastination is considered a science. A well-versed precrastinator will make sure everything is in play long before the big moment. If the task at hand involves painting a house, the precrastinator will check weather reports to determine if the days ahead are suitable for painting, and when they discover the forecast involves sunshine and warm weather, they will suddenly determine it is a perfect opportunity to visit uncle Ralph over in Toledo for a few days. Only a novice would dare wait until the day in question to put something off that could be put off much sooner. This requires forethought. This requires skill. This requires the energy to develop a plan which can then be put into place ahead of the task or event which is to be pushed off. Perhaps most importantly, this requires the foresight to anticipate any potential problems and have additional backup plans in place to counter them.<br />
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It surely isn't a one-dimensional problem. The skilled precrastinator sees everything on levels. They are like a grandmaster chess player who sees three, four or five moves ahead. They aren't shocked at the events that occur because they have already planned for them, and as such a true precrastinator is both a planner as well as a procrastinator... something very uncommon with the community of lazy people.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-79428909496399699492012-01-19T22:21:00.000-06:002012-01-19T22:21:51.648-06:00What Was Once Old... Is New Again<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QDKQnZ1c3JQ/Txjq4ci4pkI/AAAAAAAAAQc/rSZVYUFiQ5E/s1600/circular.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="260" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QDKQnZ1c3JQ/Txjq4ci4pkI/AAAAAAAAAQc/rSZVYUFiQ5E/s320/circular.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Have you ever heard the phrase "what was once old is new again"? I'm here to tell you that that particular phrase is idiotic. Just think about it... whoever started using that phrase is trying to suggest if you wait long enough that an old item will somehow become new, and I have to tell you based upon what I know of time travel and basic laws of physics that just isn't possible.<br />
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I understand why people use this phrase, but I just disagree with the premise. For example someone might comment that teenage girls are now starting to wear leg warmers with their skirts, which as we all know was as style that was very popular in the 1980s. So, it isn't surprising when someone utters the cliche that what was once old is new again, but in reality legwarmers aren't new. The style of wearing legwarmers isn't new either, so really there is nothing new about it. <br />
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This is just a matter of people revisiting an old style, but simply revisiting something does not in any way make it new. If that were true, I'd be driving a new car every morning when I head to work. So are we to believe if you do a specific act each day it becomes old, but if you wait a few months or a few years and then do that same thing again that it is new? Hogwash.<br />
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Listen... things can only be new once. Anything after that point is old. I know this will pain many 40-something women out there who are starting to see gray hair and wrinkles when they look in the mirror, but it isn't meant to be mean. It doesn't matter if we are talking about items, people, or styles... old is old, and new is new. There is no such thing as old becoming new just as new cannot be old, so adapt and get over it.<br />
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Another thing that bothers me is this stupid word "renew". You cannot re-new something. It was once new... and now it is old. If it was new yesterday you might argue it is almost new today (which holds up a lot better if you are talking about a car as opposed to a ham sandwich), but you can't just "renew" everything and pretend it is new once again. It might be new to you, you might find a new way of looking at things, but if something existed or was done at any time in the past, it just isn't new anymore. <br />
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I renew magazine subscriptions... does that mean the magazine is entirely new? Of course not! Although that particular issue of the magazine might be new, the magazine itself, and the subscription to said magazine is not new... so is it really possible to re-new something? Not really. The term re-new is just a fancy way of selling us something again without letting us know we aren't really getting anything new.<br />
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It all comes down to the fact that we as humans have a desire to have new things. Whether they are really, truly "new", or just "new to us" doesn't seem to matter. In fact many people collect antiques that they know are old, but they don't refer to them as old things or used things because that doesn't sound as nice as the terms vintage, antique, historic, or whatever label they choose to use instead of simply saying they are old. So, we somehow are tricking ourselves into thinking these old things are actually new, and we use colorful language to make the differentiation in order to appease our own minds.<br />
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So now it all makes sense. I realize not everyone feels the same way, but I have a new way of thinking about things. Or is that an old way of thinking about things?Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-25826475292571421642012-01-05T19:09:00.003-06:002012-01-05T22:20:14.273-06:00Why I Hate Best Buy<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3WOb00w9CXI/TwYMh47TpLI/AAAAAAAAAQM/X6WEEH10uLU/s1600/bb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" rea="true" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3WOb00w9CXI/TwYMh47TpLI/AAAAAAAAAQM/X6WEEH10uLU/s200/bb.jpg" width="200" /></a>I like technology. At one point I was a Certified Electronics Technician and a member of the Society of Broadcast Engineers. I spent a full year of my higher education studying electronics and building things like AM/FM radios, wireless transmitters, and even my own Digital Multimeter. I've built my own circuit boards from scratch including using acid to etch the circuit traces, I've built my own computers, wired numerous vehicles with audio systems, worked in the IT industry for over a decade, held the title of "Engineer" at more than one point in my career, and am the guy who friends and family members call when they need someone to wire their home theater or troubleshoot a PC problem. I'm what you might call a geek. I admit this and don't feel it is a derogatory term.</div><br />
With all of that said... I hate Best Buy. In fact, of all of the techie (or dare I say geeky) people I know... none of them like Best Buy. People like me tend to treat Best Buy as nothing more than a showroom for Amazon, Newegg, or Monoprice because we know enough to prevent us from actually buying anything from Best Buy.<br />
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It isn't that Best Buy doesn't have what I want - because they often do. One of their primary problems is their prices are outrageous and even their sale prices are above what I can find the same product for elsewhere. When it comes to accessories like cables and television mounts they are often times 500% to 1000% more expensive than their online counterparts.<br />
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However prices alone aren't even the reason I hate Best Buy. I hate them because of the atmosphere they have created. I hate them because of their policies. I hate them because of their high-pressure sales tactics, continual desire to upsell everything, and sales staff that act as if they are well versed in electronics and that the customer could not possibly know more than they do. I hate that they go out of their way to manipulate customers by using shady tactics to make less expensive televisions look worse than the more expensive alternatives or how they have product displays meant to convince people that products from Monster Cable or Bose are somehow superior than anything else.<br />
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Most of all however, I just hate that Best Buy makes you feel like you need to take a shower after you visit one of their stores. Their customer service is horrid. They push extended service contracts on EVERYTHING even when it makes no sense, and their salespeople are always trying to push add-ons or accessories to items that the customer simply doesn't need.<br />
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The last time I was at Best Buy I overheard one of their salespeople brag about how he was actually an employee of Apple and not of Best Buy. Whether that is true I have no idea, but he spent the next ten minutes name dropping other Apple Employees in the area and calling himself an Engineer while customers who were looking at Apple products were ignored.<br />
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Over in the television department I had a salesman try to push me to DirecTV and bragging about their new channel lineups and how they had the NFL Sunday Ticket package before he actually knew what I had for television service or before he could be bothered to ask if I was a football fan. He then went on to talk about the new 3D televisions as he rattled off specifications as if I should be impressed. After I responded and informed him that I felt passive 3D technology was superior to the active system he was pushing (and I provided him reasons to support my viewpoint), he suddenly realized I wasn't just another ignorant consumer before he said in a passive-aggressive manner <em>"maybe you should work here"</em>.<br />
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Yea right. That would be a great career move. Thanks, but no thanks.<br />
<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">I also noticed during my recent visit that a six foot HDMI cable was selling for $49.99. Over in the videogame department, a different brand of HDMI cable was selling for $59.99. I would love to hear the logic behind why they feel a HDMI cable for a videogame system is worth $10 more than an overpriced HDMI cable for a television, but frankly I didn't have the patience to ask one of the salesman for an explanation. It is a digital signal - there is no need to go crazy for name brand expensive ultra high-end cables because every comparison test I have ever seen says they aren't worth the price, yet do you think Best Buy would offer a bargain cable that might appeal to the consumer? Of course not.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">The saddest part is another customer was in the process of buying one of those $50 cables and I didn't have the heart to tell them they could buy a cable that works just as well as is just as good of quality over at Monoprice for under $5. In fact you can even get your choice of color and the cable will run $3.50 (or about 93% less cost). </div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div>Then I noticed the price of their flat panel television mounts. For the larger televisions, the price ranged from $129.99 to $199.99! Are you serious.... $200 for a television mount? I bought one a few years back from Monoprice and it ran under $25... including shipping. That mount that Best Buy wants $200 for was a low profile mount - a generic version of that same style mount costs under $12 at Monoprice.<br />
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I understand brick and mortar stores need to charge a bit more. I get it. What I don't understand is why Best Buy often charges 10, 15, or 20 times as much for a nearly identical product. Obviously nobody who is "in the know" would ever buy these types of items from Best Buy, so the only thing I can assume is that they are selling cables and wall mounts and speaker wire to people who simply don't know any better. Is this a good business model? Rely upon uneducated consumers as your target market?<br />
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As I said price is not the only reason I hate Best Buy. I also hate the fact that they feel the need to "optimize" computers via their in-house Geek Squad technicians (and I use the term technician loosely here). I've actually heard of experiences where people have tried to buy laptops from Best Buy but they have been unable to because Best Buy refuses to sell one without them adding unnecessary fees to it for their optimization service.<br />
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When it comes to LCD or Plasma calibration services it is even more idiotic. Best Buy charges ignorant consumers $200 to "calibrate" their television which could be done by any owner within 10 or 15 minutes simply by searching for their specific model of television on a website like <a href="http://www.avsforum.com/" target="_blank">AVSForum</a> and following the suggested settings. The worse (and shadiest) part of this is that Best Buy has been caught on several occasions showing calibrated and non-calibrated televisions side by side in an effort to convince people to spend the extra money, but it has been discovered that they show a High Definition (HD) signal on the calibrated set while they show a Standard Definition (SD) signal on the non-calibrated set. Some people have no shame.<br />
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I have also noticed that they can charge anywhere from $39.99 to $99.99 to perform basic tasks on a PC such as installing anti-virus software or applying OS patches and updates. In many cases if they install software all they do is insert the disk, click next, next, next, finish... and charge the customer $40. I fail to see how this is at all reasonable - especially when they rely upon consumers not knowing any better.<br />
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Of course if you do end up purchasing something from Best Buy, be prepared to be bombarded at the checkout as the clerk makes one final push to convince you that the service plan is a great idea. Then of course there is a rewards program that you should be a member of, there is a great deal on their on-demand video service or a discount on DirecTV that you need to be aware of. Do you need any batteries or a gift card to go along with that? Fifteen minutes later you might be able to head for the exit only to have the "Security" guard ask to see your receipt because you happen to walk a total of 20 feet from the cash register to the door and obviously that suggests you must have been trying to steal something.<br />
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When it comes to returns, things don't get any better. I was once near their service desk when a rather angry customer was trying to return a dishwasher. He had paid for one model, but after driving home and installing the dishwasher, it was discovered Best Buy had given him the wrong model. He apparently tried to resolve the issue over the phone, but since Best Buy didn't believe him he had no choice but to uninstall the dishwasher, drive all the way back to Best Buy, and then argue with a manager about how their screwup was their fault and he should be compensated.<br />
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Did I mention the guy had a two hour drive to his home? Yea... I imagine I would be slightly upset as well, yet the part of the conversation I was hearing involved the manager trying to blame the customer for not checking the model number on the box against his receipt. This is the mentality at Best Buy - when in doubt, just blame the customer.<br />
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I could go on for hours. I have at least a half dozen similar stories about Best Buy customer service, and at least a half dozen examples of how they have either gone out of their way to lose a sale, or they have not delivered on promises made during the time of sale... but rather than start adding chapter numbers to this post I'll just summarize by saying there are many good reasons why I don't buy things at Best Buy and why I do my best to convince others to avoid them as well.<br />
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The reality is I don't know many people in my circle of friends who actually buy things at Best Buy. Those that do shop there are generally not the type of people who are well informed about technology, or they are merely going there to buy gift cards for kids or grandkids. I realize my experiences are not reflective of the community as a whole, but I can't help but feel that Best Buy exists in spite of themselves.<br />
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I never hear positive news about Best Buy. I never hear people brag about how they love the store. I don't hear about how someone got an amazing deal or how they were treated so well. I also don't read good news about Best Buy, their stock price, their finances, or their prospects. This all has convinced me that if Best Buy continues doing the same things as they have been doing - they will continue to lose customers and they will continue circling the drain as they follow in the footsteps of other electronics retailers like Ultimate Electronics or Circuit City.<br />
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The funny thing is - I'm not the only person saying these types of things about Best Buy. I recently read an <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrydownes/2012/01/02/why-best-buy-is-going-out-of-business-gradually/print/" target="_blank">article on the Forbes website written by Larry Downes</a> that makes many of the same points as I have made here. Downes has his own real-world examples of why Best Buy is a failure, but he also cites specific data about their financial condition, their declining revenue, and some of their recent missteps. <br />
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Mr. Downes actually suggests that Best Buy is actually going out of business - even if they don't know it yet. I felt it was a great read, and surely worth a few minutes of your time if you are at all interested in the subject matter.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-7089953602709781482011-12-23T16:53:00.000-06:002011-12-23T16:53:41.974-06:00Cliché of the Day: You Get What You Pay For<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PLzjX0JrX_M/TvUFkC7GFaI/AAAAAAAAAQA/SMypmpI2nqk/s1600/Paid-Stamp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="252" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PLzjX0JrX_M/TvUFkC7GFaI/AAAAAAAAAQA/SMypmpI2nqk/s320/Paid-Stamp.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Have you ever heard someone say "you get what you pay for"? I may be naive, but for the most part when I pay for something... I do actually get something in return. Thus if I paid for it, I would get it - and this phrase is essentially worthless.<br />
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I understand what people are getting at. They are suggesting that if you spend a few bucks more, you will probably get a much better product, but does that really need explaining? You mean to tell me if you spend MORE you get MORE? You are also telling me if I buy the cheapest possible version of a product I will get the cheapest possible version? Alert the media!<br />
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The whole idea of a tired cliché such as "you get what you pay for" is that it is used so often people fail to even take the time to really discern what the words actually mean. Taken at face value it is mere common sense... you may as well hear people running around yelling "gravity exists" or "rain is wet". <br />
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Of course when you start debating the merits of a cliché there is always that one guy who has to proclaim "there is an exception to every rule". I will admit there is an exception to "you get what you pay for" because in some cases you might actually get something for nothing, and therefore you actually got much more than you paid for. In other cases you might pay for something and never actually get it... as is the case if you sent a check to a Nigerian Prince who promised you untold riches for a small fee to cover the import taxes.<br />
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However for the most part, the "exception to every rule" cliché is no better than the "you get what you pay for" cliché. Frankly, there is an exception to the exception to every rule, which creates a double exception. Does that mean they cancel each other out and create a positive exception? What exactly is the opposite of exception in the first place.... is that an inception? I suppose it could be a parcel (integral part) but that isn't nearly as interesting.<br />
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So let's discuss what is a rule and what isn't. In the simplest example possible, we can look at the rule that states during a baseball game if the runner is tagged with the ball before they reach the base then they are out. Is there really an exception to that rule? Maybe some baseball expert will correct me, but I surely can't think of one. If the defensive player doesn't have the ball or doesn't make the tag obviously it won't be an out, but that isn't the question being posed here. Of course this is where someone will nitpick and suggest that if the umpire doesn't see the action properly they could make the wrong call and in that case the runner might be safe by mistake... but that is a stretch. First of all what the umpire sees is a separate issue and we are merely focusing upon what the rule says, so for the sake of discussion we must admit the rule has no exception. The rule itself is clear - the runner is out if the proper conditions are met, but there is no exception to that rule and allows the runner to be safe if some other condition is met.<br />
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Then again if there is an exception to it, is it really a rule or more of a suggestion? Is a rule a fact, or just a general guideline? It seems a rule should be clearly defined and not be open to interpretation... so then we start wondering who is doing the interpreting. Clearly we need an expert opinion and we can't just take the word of anyone walking down the street... because most people offer their opinions for free and we all know you get what you pay for.<br />
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Right?Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-27854905001560723202011-11-30T14:07:00.000-06:002011-11-30T14:07:51.828-06:00The Silver Briefcase<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6akATNmQosI/TtaMvYMqZ9I/AAAAAAAAAPQ/B84S_EO56Zo/s1600/case.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" dda="true" height="176" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6akATNmQosI/TtaMvYMqZ9I/AAAAAAAAAPQ/B84S_EO56Zo/s200/case.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>For some reason I've always wanted to own a briefcase. Not just any briefcase mind you, but one of those silver metal briefcases used in countless TV shows and movies. It was often seen holding piles of cash (used for ransoms, bribes, or black market arms deals), various forms of illegal drugs, or in some cases a bomb with a visual countdown timer comprised of large red digits.<br />
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This all reminds me of something I've noticed about these briefcases though. Did you ever notice when the "bad guys" passed a load of cash or drugs they always sent the case along with? I guess when you are exchanging a few hundred grand perhaps it doesn't matter that you are giving up a $400 briefcase, but what if the drug dealer had a sentimental attachment to the case? Can they just dump the cash or the drugs into a brown paper sack and send them on their way? Would they feel shortchanged if they gave up their nice shiny briefcase but in return they were given a hello kitty messenger bag? What are the rules for bag exchanges during drug deals... this is information I just can't figure out via Wikipedia.<br />
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Also, why don't drug dealers ever use cheap duffel bags? I have to tell you if I know I'm going to walk away from a deal with either a pile of cocaine or a pile of cash... I'm thinking I would rather have it in a backpack or something. Because if a cop sees a guy walking down the street with a metal briefcase he might start asking questions. On the other hand, if a cop sees someone walking around with a backpack... well that is just another guy with a backpack. He blends in - that is the entire point right?<br />
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Ok so clearly I'm never going to actually own a silver metal briefcase, because I don't wish to be confused with a drug dealer and I don't want to deal with the hassles of the TSA if I ever decide to fly somewhere. Plus, I'm more a function over form type of guy... so I'd much rather have something with a shoulder strap and something that I can easily stow a laptop in without needing to remember a random three digit combination.<br />
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You have to admit though... walking around with a silver briefcase would probably turn some heads. Maybe not because people think it is cool, but people wondering if they were sucked into a time vortex and arrived back in 1987... you know - back when people actually used briefcases.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-64539413690490179122011-11-28T12:54:00.000-06:002011-11-28T12:54:39.823-06:00An Open Letter To Sears<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YHpkC8h1OiA/TtPFWAhvkAI/AAAAAAAAAPI/J1Z2XSAKDx4/s1600/Sears.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" dda="true" height="198" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YHpkC8h1OiA/TtPFWAhvkAI/AAAAAAAAAPI/J1Z2XSAKDx4/s320/Sears.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Dear Sears Executive Management Team, Board of Directors, and any other employees who actually care:<br />
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I have a major problem with Sears, but I also have hopes and dreams that Sears can once again become a store in which customers actually seek it out rather than simply ending up there as a last resort. Sears has so much potential, but it seems leadership lacks the ability of tapping that potential and in fact it seems they stomp it to the ground as often as possible in order to prevent customers from thinking Sears might be a great place to spend money. <br />
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Sears is simply out of touch and yet it appears the management team doesn't even realize it. Watching this sad implosion is much like watching someone walk into a glass door and hit their head. Rather than realizing the door is closed and they can't walk right through, they just keep pounding their head against the door again and again expecting a different result.<br />
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I'm sympathetic Sears... but my sympathy is short lived to people (or businesses) which don't learn from their mistakes.<br />
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One major issue with Sears is that you are trying to be all things to all people. You sell appliances, you sell electronics, you sell home furnishings, you sell baby items, you sell clothing for the entire family, you sell lawn and garden equipment, power machinery, tools, exercise equipment, vacuum cleaners, garage door openers, pool tables, grills, tires, car batteries, jewelry, shoes, kitchen gadgets, housewares, eyeglasses, photography sessions, and much, much more. <br />
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In my local store, you just added beds which required a sizable portion of the store to be removed in order to make way for a product which most likely will not do any better than the housewares it has supplanted. How do I know this you ask? Well for starters, within 1000 yards of my local Sears store you can find no less than FIVE other stores that sell mattresses. I'm not talking about furniture stores here - I'm merely talking about stores that focus on beds and beds alone.<br />
Don't believe me? Here is a short list of the stores I'm referring to:<br />
<br />
Beds and Beds<br />
Klocker's Mattress World<br />
Beds by Design<br />
Select Comfort Sleep Systems<br />
Comfort King Mattress Factory<br />
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One of these stores is in the same mall as Sears, and another one is about 100 yards away just across the parking lot.<br />
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In addition to the above, there are several furniture stores close by as well. These include HOM Furniture as well as Slumberland Furniture. There are also other big box retailers that offer beds including Sam's Club, Menards, Macys, JCPenny, and Big Lots. The saddest part is that I'm listing these stores from memory which suggests there are probably a few others I'm not even aware of at the moment.<br />
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How about a little market research Sears? How about instead of trying to be all things to all people you define who your target customer is and what market you are trying to enter? How about you define who your competition really is? Are you trying to complete with Best Buy and Home Depot, or are you trying to compete with Montgomery Ward and Woolworths? Sadly... it appears you are trying to compete with them all and you failed to get the memo that a few of them no longer exist.<br />
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Find something you do well, and stick with it. Even Walmart doesn't sell everything (you will notice they don't have a stellar tool selection, and they tend to shy away from most major appliances aside from the occasional dorm sized fridge or chest freezer). The fact is, Sears still has a reputation built around brands like Craftsman and Kenmore, so why is it so hard to focus on what people actually want? <br />
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Most people don't go to Sears to buy clothing... they go to Sears to buy something else and just happened to find a pair of jeans on the way out. People also aren't looking for fine jewelry or perfume at Sears, nor do they want to buy a mattress from a store that stocks string trimmers two aisles away nor do they want to be assisted from a guy who was selling shoes ten minutes ago, and who will probably be talking to someone about a cordless drill an hour later. <br />
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The average Sears store is a relic, and sadly is probably twice the size it would need to be. Many are located in malls which are underperforming, and those that are truly standalone stores just aren't destinations any longer. What Sears should do is focus upon appliances (both large and small if you must), lawn and garden, and tools. Drop "the softer side of Sears" because it isn't working. Kick the mattresses and the shoes to the curb, remove the glass cases full of gold plated Timex watches, and let someone else take the cheesy family photos and sell bargain eyeglasses to the kids.<br />
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It is time to understand that Sears hasn't been relevant for 20 years. It is time to acknowledge your idea of what is trendy or what is hip really isn't. Nobody wants to spend a premium for something that has Ty Pennington's name on it nor do people want the Kardashian name printed on the front of their shirt. The average person who shops at Sears is not a designer nor a fan of People magazine... they don't care about the people you seem to think they care about. For every piece of Kardashian clothing you sell, someone else is shaking their heads as they turn around and head towards Macys or Kohls. <br />
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It is probably also worth noting that nobody under the age of 40 even knows who Jaclyn Smith is, so while your competition is snapping up celebrity names like Martha Stewart, Sean Comes, and Gwen Stefani, you are still trying to convince the world that trendy clothing should somehow be synonymous with a former 70s television star. If that isn't a prime example of how Sears is no longer relevant I'm not sure what is.<br />
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Finally, when you start acknowledging that you can't be the best at everything and that you can't be all things to all people, perhaps you will also acknowledge that when someone else offers a better product, it is probably a good idea to sell it rather than try to make it. Sorry, but slapping the Craftsman or Kenmore name on an otherwise inferior product is no way to build brand loyalty. In fact it has the opposite effect. <br />
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This is why so many other premium brands restrict where the brand can be used. Audi doesn't put their logo on a Volkswagen. Banana Republic doesn't stock Old Navy sweatshirts in their stores. DeWalt has distanced themselves from Black & Decker. Ralph Lauren sells his lower priced items under the Chaps brand. <br />
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Kenmore and Craftsman <u>should</u> be premium brands. They <u>should not</u> be diluted to the point where they can be tossed on grill accessories or cheap garage cabinetry made out of MDF, or cheap imported tools. Extending the brand does not necessarily improve the brand, and until you realize that you will continue to lose millions of dollars each and every quarter. Or, as is the case with your most recent quarter... you will lose HUNDREDS of millions of dollars. I won't claim to be an economist or long-term business strategist, but I somehow don't feel that business model is sustainable.<br />
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Oh and by the way... the 1980s called and asked if they could have their Sears logo back. This is the modern world, and it requires a modern look. Hire a new marketing firm and step one should be a logo redesign. Retro styling would serve it well, and a shift to "Sears and Roebuck" and or a shift straight to the "Roebuck" name with a premium twist might serve you well. Sadly, taking your company backwards 100 years would actually result in modernizing the entire concept. However please don't insult your customers by slapping up a new sign and pretending everything has changed. You need to start from the ground up. Modernize the stores, improve the customer experience, remove the high pressure sale tactics that make customers feel like they are walking the Midway at a carnival, focus on what you can do well, and maybe you will see your beloved customers return.<br />
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Sincerely,<br />
CraigCraighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-56818220698260071402011-09-08T21:34:00.001-05:002011-09-08T21:34:00.559-05:00Worth a Thousand Words<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-v6OQ-2nV_Og/TmjeYu5M8eI/AAAAAAAAAOE/YmRDjVHijIM/s1600/Frame.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" nba="true" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-v6OQ-2nV_Og/TmjeYu5M8eI/AAAAAAAAAOE/YmRDjVHijIM/s320/Frame.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>A few years ago when I became a father, I received a gift of a metal picture frame that says "Dad" on the bottom. Inside the frame is a photograph of me holding my infant daughter while she sleeps. It is a nice photo, and I understand the meaning behind it, but there is some confusion at work here.<br />
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The thing is, these types of picture frames always bother me because of the whole built-in purpose. Since the frame says "Dad" I can't exactly just put a newer photo of my daughter in it without me being in the photo... because that would be odd. Also, shouldn't the photo really be a photo of my dad rather than a picture of me as a dad? Would it be weird to have a photo of me alone in it? I mean I'm the dad... so isn't that what the frame is for?<br />
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If I had a frame that said daughter, I wouldn't expect me to be in the photo, but I would expect it to be a photo of my daughter. Same is true if the frame said "Best Friend"... that wouldn't be a photo of me, but rather a photo of a best friend right? Of course if the frame said "Best Friends" then I would expect to see an image of two people... one of which could be me. If I saw a photo of just one person the context is just wrong and it wouldn't make sense unless that person happened to suffer from Dissociative Identity Disorder.<br />
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So what about those frames that say "I Love You" on the bottom. I would seem rather conceited if I put a photo of myself in one of those frames wouldn't I? Even if I was in the photo with someone else it still would border on being a bit too vain. So in that case I suspect it would be best to insert a photo of a loved one that I actually did love.<br />
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It gets even more confusing when the frame has a name on it. So if I had a frame that said "Tom" on the bottom, I assume that means I would have a photo of Tom in the frame. Of course this means I would need to know a Tom, but I suppose if worse came to worse I could just print out an image of that MySpace guy.<br />
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So if a picture frame with a name on it is designed to have a photo of that person in it, it seems that any frame that says "Dad" should have a picture of Dad in it... but not necessarily me, but rather it seems to make more sense to have a photo of my dad - or I should just put in a photo of me and then give the frame to my daughter. She is only 2 1/2 years old... so I'm guessing she probably wouldn't put nearly as much thought into this as I do... so that would probably work.<br />
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On second thought... maybe the picture frame companies need to start including directions on these things to make it easier. They do of course give you stock images in the frames most of the time (see photo above), but even those are confusing because in some dad frames it just shows one guy while in others it shows a man and child. I even saw one that had two girls in it which is even more confusing, and one had a girl with a dog which suggests either they are being very liberal with the meaning of the term "dad" or they are from the deep South where that type of thing is considered normal.<br />
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I suppose I could be the only person on the planet who has ever given this subject much thought, but hey... if we allow people to just start putting random photos in random frames with no structure behind it before you know it the poles of the Earth could reverse, dogs will be sleeping with cats, and we might actually see a Republican say something positive about President Obama.<br />
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Yea I know - it will never happen.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-74597944045105372512011-08-12T00:21:00.001-05:002011-08-12T00:23:44.485-05:00Repairing a Samsung LCD TV With Clicking Relays (LNT4661F)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-TqPhVDz4UGw/TkS2XoVbbGI/AAAAAAAAAN8/rLJ_7NTdD1A/s1600/31X2BIli2mL.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="229" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-TqPhVDz4UGw/TkS2XoVbbGI/AAAAAAAAAN8/rLJ_7NTdD1A/s320/31X2BIli2mL.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">This is a write-up on how to repair a Samsung TV that experiences problems powering up. The most common symptoms of this failure include the sound of clicking relays when the TV is powered up, and the red LED indicator on the front of the TV may flash on and off.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Typically after the relays click a few times, the TV will eventually come on. However in time the relays will need to click on and off more and more times before the TV will come on... and eventually the TV will likely just cycle the relays over and over and it will never come on.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">If you just want the instructions on how to do this repair, skip to step 1 below. If you want my personal saga explaining why I decided to perform this repair myself... read on.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">In my case, I have experienced this failure on two separate occasions. I originally bought this TV back in 2008, and sometime within the first year I began to hear the dreaded clicking relays suggesting there was a problem. About a week after this started I was watching TV one evening and all of the sudden it sounded like a firecracker went off inside of the TV. From experience I knew this meant a capacitor most likely blew up... however since the TV was still under warranty I wasn't about to crack it open to investigate.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">I placed a call to Samsung and started the saga of getting the TV repaired. Long story short the process involved at least half a dozen calls, several weeks of waiting for parts and a technician, and having to take a day off of work to be around when the service tech actually showed up. Did I mention that the TV failed about a week before the Superbowl and there was no way to get it fixed before the game? Yea... perfect timing.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Eventually the technician showed up and as soon as he opened the back of the TV and removed the shield from the circuit board it was very obvious which capacitors had blown. The technician removed and replaced the power supply board with an updated version, and then closed the TV up at which time we tested it and verified it was working as good as new.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">That was early 2009... and up until a few weeks ago the TV worked fine. However around two weeks ago I noticed when the TV was powered up the red LED on the front seemed to blink several times before it would power up. Then a few days after that, the dreaded clicking relays started. As the days progressed it took longer and longer for the TV to power up and it became obvious it was only days away from another total failure.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">I did a bit of research and discovered I wasn't alone. In fact many users of this particular model of television (the Samsung LNT4661F 46 inch LCD HDTV) had experienced the same symptoms, and it all boiled down to bad capacitors. It seemed there were a few ways to fix it... the easiest of which is to simply replace the power supply board. However with a little bit of electronics knowledge and some replacement capacitors... it is much less expensive to simply replace the bad capacitors rather than bearing the expense of the entire circuit board.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Therefore in order to verify the issue I removed the back of the TV along with the metal shielding that covers the power supply board and with a little inspection it was very obvious which capacitors were failing. As you can see from the image below, two of the capacitors show signs of failure and are bulging. One of them was even showing a crack on the top which means it was probably days before a total failure.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Q7_y9dwM93o/TkSdoU-VqBI/AAAAAAAAANQ/D4aRKBUCSm8/s1600/IMG_1158.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Q7_y9dwM93o/TkSdoU-VqBI/AAAAAAAAANQ/D4aRKBUCSm8/s400/IMG_1158.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Reading the specs from the side of the capacitors showed that they were 10V caps rated at 2200uF and had a max operating temperature specification of 105°C. In my case it was only these two capacitors that were failing, however others have reported that the 1000uF capacitors directly beside the 2200uF caps had also failed.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">In any case, now that I knew what the source of the issue was, I decided it was time to order some replacements. However based upon markings on the board as well as information I had found online, it seems 10V capacitors are simply too small which is what contributed to the premature failure. It appears this particular circuit was designed for 12V capacitors yet Samsung decided to use 10V caps instead. It stands to reason why they wouldn't last. Therefore, in order to prevent this from happening again I opted to replace the caps with 16V capacitors, but others have used 24V or even 50V replacements... it is just a matter of what is available. A higher voltage capacitor doesn't mean it will run at a higher voltage... merely that it is capable of handling that voltage. In this case, having a little extra buffer was a good thing as the caps would be running at a voltage well under spec.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">It just so happens a friend of mine was in the process ordering some parts for himself, so he just added a few of the capacitors to his order and they were on the way. In the meantime, it was time to get started removing the old capacitors and prepping the board for the replacements.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><b>Step 1:</b> Remove the power supply board. Ok so technically step 1 would be remove the back of the TV and then remove the shield covering the board itself... but if you can't figure that part out on your own you probably shouldn't even attempt to replace the capacitors yourself. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">To remove the board, you will want to disconnect all of the various connectors that run into the board and then remove the six screws that hold the board down to the mounting plate / chassis. It isn't a bad idea to take a photo to ensure you get all of the connectors in the right places upon re-installation (or just use my photo as a guide). The capacitors being replaced are shown at the upper right hand corner of this board.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9iMZ2JvnmGA/TkSd5HKVFfI/AAAAAAAAANo/qSypYu2YsR8/s1600/IMG_1166.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9iMZ2JvnmGA/TkSd5HKVFfI/AAAAAAAAANo/qSypYu2YsR8/s400/IMG_1166.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><b>Step 2: </b>Desolder the old capacitors. In my case, this involved CM852 and CM853. You can see from the image below what the top of the board looks like after the capacitors have been removed. I won't go into great detail here about how to actually desolder these since it is assumed if you are attempting this you have some basic knowledge on how to use a soldering iron, but it is helpful to have some desoldering braid and/or a solder sucker (desoldering pump) to remove the old solder as you heat up the leads. </span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-IvhFwUSMJiQ/TkSdtYsMKHI/AAAAAAAAANY/D601zBSvnWo/s1600/IMG_1160.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-IvhFwUSMJiQ/TkSdtYsMKHI/AAAAAAAAANY/D601zBSvnWo/s400/IMG_1160.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">And this is what the bottom of the board looks like after the capacitors have been removed. Note that there are polarity markings on both sides of the board. Try not to apply too much heat to the board as you don't want to inadvertently harm the solder traces on the board.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2fjC15qRcws/TkSdrEaYFSI/AAAAAAAAANU/lr1nUHZj5yM/s1600/IMG_1159.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2fjC15qRcws/TkSdrEaYFSI/AAAAAAAAANU/lr1nUHZj5yM/s400/IMG_1159.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b style="line-height: 17px;">Step 3: </b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"> Paying attention to the polarity of the capacitors (the shaded area of the board corresponds to the negative lead of the capacitor), insert the leads of the replacement capacitors through the holes in the circuit board and bend them outward to hold the capacitors tight against the board. Apply heat to each lead and solder them in place.</span></span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-a2vRFejgrLE/TkSdy0v7dUI/AAAAAAAAANg/wOOZYjZlq9s/s1600/IMG_1163.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-a2vRFejgrLE/TkSdy0v7dUI/AAAAAAAAANg/wOOZYjZlq9s/s400/IMG_1163.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><b>Step 4: </b>Using a side cutters, trim the leads of the capacitors. Some may prefer to cut the leads prior to soldering, but I prefer to do so after they are soldered in place just in case I need to make any adjustments. After trimming, verify the solder joints are intact and are solid. The image below shows the end result from the bottom of the board.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PABkdfdjsEI/TkSd1xYDzHI/AAAAAAAAANk/k3lq7XJ7XWI/s1600/IMG_1165.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PABkdfdjsEI/TkSd1xYDzHI/AAAAAAAAANk/k3lq7XJ7XWI/s400/IMG_1165.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">And this is what the new capacitors look like from the top of the board. The new caps were slightly larger than the originals, but they fit just fine.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-v9hcPaZeZ2s/TkSdv0kPLbI/AAAAAAAAANc/Z28EdxNtE38/s1600/IMG_1162.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-v9hcPaZeZ2s/TkSdv0kPLbI/AAAAAAAAANc/Z28EdxNtE38/s400/IMG_1162.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Here is another side angle showing the new capacitors in place. Several of the other original caps (the lighter blue caps in the image) may also need to be replaced if they show signs of failure, but in my case they all appear ok.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-oALZu3_rqpU/TkSd7mZbnII/AAAAAAAAANs/MepOCqpZrNE/s1600/IMG_1167.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-oALZu3_rqpU/TkSd7mZbnII/AAAAAAAAANs/MepOCqpZrNE/s400/IMG_1167.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
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</b></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><b>Step 5: </b>Reinstall the power supply board back into the TV chassis. Tighten all six mounting screws, and ensure all of the various connectors are reconnected properly. Once everything looks ok, reinstall the metal shield that covers the power supply board as shown in the image below.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;"><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b style="line-height: 17px;">Step 6: </b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;">Reattach the back of the TV, install the stand and/or wall mount cover plate... connect the TV to a video source, plug it in, power it up and enjoy!</span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fycmeulIIao/TkSeAg-9S8I/AAAAAAAAAN0/XzvxDcXtOJU/s1600/IMG_1169.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fycmeulIIao/TkSeAg-9S8I/AAAAAAAAAN0/XzvxDcXtOJU/s400/IMG_1169.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Step-Brothers Anyone?</span></td></tr>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">The replacement capacitors cost under a buck each plus a few bucks for shipping, so the end result was a repair for around $5. I had the soldering iron, soldering braid, and solder on hand already so there was no additional cost there. Total time from start to finish (not counting the time I was awaiting parts delivery) was approximately 20 minutes.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Considering the cost for a technician to come out and replace the board could easily top $300... I think this repair is more than worth it. With a little luck the third time will be a charm so hopefully I won't need to do this again!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">If you found this post helpful, or if you have any questions about the process, please leave a comment and let me know.</span>Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com54tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8216107257175200947.post-85891134777134000602011-07-08T19:02:00.003-05:002011-07-08T19:02:00.148-05:00The Voice.... That Carries<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-FRgJMejV3zE/ThcZBbiLv_I/AAAAAAAAALw/K_9otF6RGAM/s1600/Wave.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" m$="true" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-FRgJMejV3zE/ThcZBbiLv_I/AAAAAAAAALw/K_9otF6RGAM/s200/Wave.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>Recently I was speaking with a group of co-workers and the topic of "noisy people" came up. Anyone who has ever worked in an office environment with more than three people probably understands there is always that one person who is much louder than everyone else, and where I work (due to the number of people who share the space) we have more than a handful.<br />
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There are quite a few different types of noisy people ranging from the person who has no concept of their own volume when speaking a phone, to the type of person who feels a laugh needs to be at least 90 dB to be effective, to the type of person who likes to watch ESPN clips on their computer with the volume cranked. My personal favorite however is the person who wears headphones while listening to music and doesn't realize that when they decide to talk they are now about three times louder than they need to be. That's always a crowd pleaser especially when they decide to drop an f-bomb in a professional environment (and even worse is when you sit near them and are on a conference call with a sensitive mic).<br />
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The thing is, in this particular group of co-workers that I was speaking with, everyone pretty much mentioned the same person as being noisy, so it isn't like I'm the only one who has recognized it. Actually, rather than mince words I'll just call her loud, because in essence that is what she is. The best part is everyone knows she is loud. She has been told she is loud. People have been known to sneak up to her desk and turn up the volume on her phone in the hopes it might help to reduce her speaking volume (since in theory she would hear her own voice being fed back into the earpiece on her phone and adjust volume accordingly), but basically there isn't much that has worked. <br />
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Now I don't want to make it seem like this is a huge annoyance or that it is disturbing, because for the most part it is just one of those things you deal with in life. Some people are loud, some are quiet just as some people are friendly and some are bitter at everyone and everything around them. Whether someone is loud or not just isn't that big of a deal because it is fairly easy to tune them out if you aren't directly engaged in a conversation with them, and frankly this particular person is friendly and outgoing and the type of person who I am happy to have as a colleague, so the fact she is a tad louder than those around her is a relatively minor point.<br />
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The interesting thing about this particular woman however is that she knows and acknowledges that she is loud and that her voice is typically at a volume level in excess of what is considered normal. This is where I tend to hear the oh-so-common excuse when the conversation of loud people comes up where she openly stated she is loud because she has "<em>one of those voices that carry so well</em>". Really? You just magically have a voice that carries better than the voices of other human beings? I find that interesting.<br />
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There is a lot of science behind sound and I don't want to get off on a tangent here, but basically a sound wave is comprised of characteristics such as the frequency (the pitch of the sound itself), amplitude (think of that as volume), wavelength (which is inversely proportional to frequency), intensity, and pressure. Now although it is true that different frequencies of sound are detected by the human ear at various volume levels (the human ear does not have a flat spectral response), for the most part the difference between volume levels within the frequency range of human speech is not all that significant.<br />
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This is a long way of saying that person A's voice does not differ dramatically from person B's voice when looked at in terms of a sound wave. There is no physics magic that allow the sound waves of one person to travel farther than the other given the same volume level and (approximate) frequency, and for all intents and purposes a voice is a voice in terms of how far it can go. There may be differences on who can hear that voice of course, but as a whole that isn't really an issue when speaking about a group who is all listening to the same person unless they were all hard of hearing or if they all had better-than-average hearing (which I somehow doubt is the case in my example).<br />
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So when someone says they have a voice that travels so well or a voice that carries so well... they are basically just repeating something they heard once with no understanding of how silly they actually sound (no pun intended). The fact is, for all intents and purposes if someone has a voice that "carries well" it is likely due to the fact that they talk louder than everyone around them. Thus a distance X, person A with amplitude Y they will obviously be heard better than person B with amplitude Z assuming a comparable frequency and Y being greater than Z.<br />
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So yea... sometimes a loud person is just a loud person, and an excuse is just an excuse. Chances are if someone has a voice that carries better than those around them... it has less to do with physics and a whole lot more to do with them just being loud (and in some cases annoying as well).<br />
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The more you know.Craighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11207315813982483195noreply@blogger.com0