This is a bill of materials for a METAR sectional map project
You will need a raspberry pi. If you are going to do some experimentation with the pi for fun, I recommend a cana kit with the container, OS pre-loaded, cables, etc. that you need:

If you want to experiment with other pi stuff, I highly recommend the Freenove kit, which comes with all kinds of goodies:

For the project itself, I think a pi zero will work fine, but I would still get the cana kit for the other accessories:

You will need a power supply, or possibly two. The Pi is powered by USB-C, or USB-micro for the pi zero. This device will work with a Pi 4B:

The reason you want the above power supply is that you will also want a string of lights to work with, which has 4" separation between lights. You can get 25, 50, 100, or chain them together. These run on 12 volts, which will help with longer runs of lights.

You will want the code from github:
https://github.com/hfahle/METARmap
Note that this requires the ws2811 c library too:
https://github.com/jgarff/rpi_ws281x
You will also want this 12 volt power supply to tie into both the lights and the USB power converter:

This will allow you to plug and unplug your map once it's complete. You will wire the konnected USB converter and the lights to this output, and ground it all together.
Finally, you will want a sectional map, and some kind of frame for it. You will also need a soldering iron and some 18-gauge wire to extend the distance between airports as needed.

We are also looking at an add-on for the map that we haven't finished the code for yet, so it's preliminary, but if you want to go ahead and order we'll get straightened out before the workshop:


If you'd rather work in Python completely, here's a link to some instructions for where to get that code:
https://slingtsi.rueker.com/making-a-led-powered-metar-map-for-your-wall
Setting up a Pi headlessly:
https://www.brewpiremix.com/headless-raspberry-pi

Old-school computer gets new school update

This may turn out to be the most on-topic post ever posted on this very infrequently updated blog. Or whatever they're calling them these days. You see, the blog is named restlessobsessive after my obsessiveness with certain hobbies or even occupations, combined with the fact that the particular hobby I'm obsessed with at the moment changes at least once a year. I do go back and revisit old hobbies now, because the learning curve is a little less steep, but still steep enough (partly because I've forgotten a lot of details since the last time I visited that hobby). As it turns out, I like a steep learning curve. I tend to attack a hobby with relish for that first year or so, and quickly pick up skills and measurable accomplishments (I like wallpaper of various sorts), and then I encounter a sort of wall. That wall consists of people who are just as obsessive as me, but not as restless. They will take up, say, sailing, and stick with it for their entire lives. I will never be as good a sailor as they are. And I'm somewhat competitive in my obsessions, because that's how you get wallpaper.

So that's where this story comes in. I used to be pretty obsessed with computers. So much so that I turned it into a profession. I tinkered and hacked, like everyone who is any good at computers, and eventually went on to get a doctorate in theoretical computer science. I also helped found a company, which is doing quite well and serves about 5 million unique users on any given week. I dare say on that score, I didn't stop at the wall. Despite what some pundits without them say, a PhD is a very fine bit of wallpaper that is non-trivial to obtain. Company stock is another fine leaf. Anyway, nonetheless, about 10 years ago, I stopped being such a hardware nut with computers. To some extent the juice became not worth the squeeze. For $600 bucks you could pick up a dual-core 2.6 ghz processor with 6 gigs of ram and 320 gig of hard drive. The HP Pavilion p6000. Maybe you want a terabyte backup drive, but that's about it. I never got much of a monitor for it because I was happy with EVGA. I never so much as cracked the case on it because it came with everything built into the motherboard except possibly wifi, which you can set up through USB anyway. You can do just about any add-on through USB, so it sat on the floor collecting dust in its fans and drives until last week.

My wife is just as much of a hobby collector as I am. She has 1000 jumps from an airplane. She has a pilot's license, as do I. We bonded over how we don't fly anymore when we first met. We even played "Come Fly With Me" as our song at our wedding. She got her ham radio license before I did. She's a programmer and entrepreneur also. She didn't know how to sail when we met, but we went on my dad's boat once and she wondered aloud why we didn't have one. Now we do. Now we race sailboats, but we've kind of reached that 80% level where all the lifers beat us in the races and we smoke the rest of them. Anyway, this is relevant to the story, because I recently renewed my bicycling hobby with a bit of a vengeance.

Ok, now I have to tangent again to talk about the bicycling. Around the time I turned 40, my dad was a big cycling enthusiast, as was my sister and niece. I was starting into running, but I also had a friend who wanted to do triathlons. So I borrowed an old bike from my dad for a while, then picked up a used one that fit me better when I learned what I was doing. This was a mid-level Trek 1200, which was about 10 years old when I bought it. It's now 28 years old and still my main road bike. I've revamped a few things on it, learning about bike maintenance on the way. It sat idle in the garage for the most part since about 2006 when I did a 70.2 ironman. I actually rented a bike for that because it was far away and my bike is crappy anyway, so I figured a rental wouldn't be worse.

Back to the story. So this spring of 2018, I had a friend approach me about a bicycle ride. He had been talking about riding with me all the time for years, because he's a cycling lifer. I knew enough about the subject to be interested enough in his obsessive details about various wheelsets and chainrings and whatnot to listen. So I knew that he had been planning obsessively for a trip to Utah for about a year. His plan was to ride the White Rim Trail, and then some other rides around Moab after that, with lots of hill climbs and whatnot. The problem was, the outfitter he was signed up with only had two other people signed up for that week. They normally require four to make the trip go. He was talking to me about this problem, and how they might cancel the trip, but were giving it a couple more days. I joked that maybe they were just giving him more time to recruit his friends. He said, "do you want to go?" I said, "sure".

Let me back up a little bit here. Just kidding, I just need to explain that the fitness level required for the White Rim Trail in Utah is above average, and that I'd been off the bike for quite some time by now. However, for the last two years I have been obsessed with fitness, so I am in good general shape. Over that time I lost 50 pounds and worked out a lot with Camp Gladiator. So the three weeks left before the trip was plenty of time to buy a mountain bike, get whatever camping gear I needed together, and put in 100 miles a week or more on the bike.

The trip was somewhat uneventful for me. My friend not so much, as he broke his hip, but that's a whole other story. There were two additional people who joined us on the trip who had signed up at the last minute, so there were 6 of us in the end. The two were dairy farmers, but did pretty well at it I guess, because they flew their own twin engine airplane into Moab for the trip. They were also in good shape having just come off a Grand Canyon hike. As for me, I was able to ride the 25+ miles per day on mountain bike trails and pretty much hang up front with the cool kids. In this case, the lifers were the outfitters. They could ride circles around all of us, uphill, with 50 pounds of gear in a backpack. They lived the lifestyle, because they were out on 3-day or more wilderness rides on a regular basis. It was pretty cool. If I were younger and not otherwise occupied...

When I got back from the trip, my wife was somewhat annoyed with me. Partly, I think, because she thought the whole thing was a bad idea, and I went anyway. I think I made a believer out of her as far as when I say I can do something, I can pretty well do it. I don't go around bragging about things without the ability to back it up, and really bragging and jealousy don't enter my vocabulary much. I'm only competitive for my own ends, not because I care much what others think of me. I set my own goals and try to reach those. If I see other people who are better than me, my response is to try to improve to what I now know is possible, not to break their kneecaps like a Harding. So anyway, She did eventually get out on her own bike and figured out that she hadn't been using the gears right which was the main reason she didn't enjoy riding in the first place. And if you haven't been using your gears right, check out this bike blog here.

Anyway, so after I got back, I was riding a good bit more, because I had discovered bike trails and mountain biking in general (the Utah trip was my first time ever on a mountain bike trail). There are some good trails around Dallas and it's a lot of fun. It's like being a kid again. I also got back on the road bike because I enjoy the camaraderie of going out and riding in a big group. It's also a lot safer. When you're trying to rack up miles it's a good way to do it.

So this new obsession led to my wife's annoyance which led to a long discussion. She's not one to just let stuff like that go and just be annoyed, she wants us to find solutions. I'm all about that. In this case, she decided she needed to take up her own hobby that she could do while I'm out riding. I should probably mention that my prior obsession, ham radio, had previously led to me going on a DXpedition the previous year. This was a boys trip where we basically geeked out on ham radio for 10 days in Nicaragua. Naturally I was the CW guy on that trip, because that's an obsession within an obsession in the nerdiest hobby ever known to man. So this was two years in a row with trips where my wife didn't come. I get a lot of vacation and we own a travel agency so together vacations wasn't the problem so much, just the inherent separation and her stuck at home while I'm out having fun thing. It needed a solution.

The solution she finally hit upon was to get back into flying. When she thought of it, her face lit up with a look I know well, usually in the mirror or in MarathonFoto pictures from some event I was in like the Hotter'n'Hell Hundred. I did 100k. Lifers do 100 miles. Anyway, so about a month ago she got her Class III medical up to date and started taking lessons. She took a "Rusty Pilot" seminar in Fort Worth. She joined the AOPA. We're going to the AOPA Fly-in in New Mexico next week. Like I said, we're perfect for each other. She hasn't quite gotten signed off on her BFR yet, but that will be soon, and she'll be back soloing. Or bringing me along as a passenger. Nothing like a lapsed pilot for a passenger. Actually I am trying to get current my own self because I don't want to pipe up with old information or half-remembered maxims while she's flying, because she tends to give my confident pronouncements some weight, deserved or not.

All this activity around flying eventually led her to think that it might be worthwhile to look into a flight simulator for the computer. See, we're back on topic now. Finally. So I looked into it a bit and said yes, Microsoft Flight Simulator is still very good, and they still make yokes and pedals and such that provide force-feedback and can up the realism. If you're going to do it, do it right. She was a bit confused by the options, because no one seemed to sell the actual game, though several stock the yokes and stuff. We held off for a day while I investigated, and I confidently announced that she should "sign up for steam" as if I knew what that was, and "get the steam version of Flight Simulator X" as if I knew how to do that. She figured out the details, such that I still don't know how to do that or what it means, and was met with a big fat pffft.

The software claimed that we need a minimal graphics card of a geforce3/Radeon 8100. Mind you, this is software that hasn't been meaningfully updated in 10 years, and it was calling for graphics cards that are 2000's technology. So I figured if I could find anything that old, I would be good to go. I went to Best Buy because I figured it would be easier to return and exchange near home if the Big Fancy GeForce GTX 1050 ti with the fans and the double-board slot didn't fit in the case and I had to return it and go for the GeForce 710. The performance on the 710 is several orders of magnitude worse so that was a last resort. So anyway, I brought the thing home along with the yoke and pedals, which came with the throttle too which is all enormous by the way, and began what I thought might take until the wee hours.

It did take until the wee hours. What I found online was that the card was not compatible with my computer. This was due to what was being called the Legacy Bios problem. I needed a card that supported the Legacy Bios rather than the new UEFI standard. I still don't know what any of that means, because about 10 years ago, computer hardware got good enough that I stopped paying attention and bought my Pavilion from the store like everybody else. For gaming I generally used XBox and whatnot, and the computer was mostly for taxes. Nonetheless, one of the things I tried was upgrading the bios. You can download a new bios installer from the manufacturers website and flash the BIOS. I did that, but it turned out I already had the latest, and it was rejected anyway. There were lots of hoops and boots I had to go through to get to that stage, and it was nearing midnight by that time. When I initially popped the card in, there were two blank monitors (oh yeah, I had to buy a new monitor because the new card didn't support VGA, just HDMI and DVI). So I had to pop the card back out to get to the bios in the first place. You hold down F10 while it boots and the BIOS screen comes up. You have to let off the key before the screen comes up I think. Anyway, on the second screen was a setting for graphics card. I changed it from whatever it was, to PCI-E type card (there were two similar choices, I picked the fancier one), popped the card back in, and up came the HDMI monitor on the next boot. I almost didn't realise it happened.

I had uninstalled the prior graphics card driver from Windows 10 by this point, as you are supposed to do. I then downloaded the NVidia drivers and began to install them. It crashed. I tried again without the extras and it still crashed. It was nearing 1:00 am by this point. A good, old-school computer hack session. I hadn't been up past 9pm for years. Kids these days don't know how to do this kind of troubleshooting, and just report on the internets that it can't be done. So anyway, I googled how to boot in safe mode for Windows 10, did that, installed the drivers, rebooted in normal mode, and Bob's yer uncle.

Mary Fahle and the Civil Rights movement (strong language)

This was written by my father, Bill Fahle, about his mother, Mary Fahle

I'm sure that most people think of the heroes of the Civil Rights movement in the sixties and seventies as the product of strong men, determined preachers, women willing to drink from the forbidden water fountain or ride in the front of the bus. I also admire those heroes. But I wonder how many know of the heroic things done by people just because they knew it was the right thing to do. These don't have a day named for them; there have no statues erected; they are the common people who could see injustice and did their part to correct it. One such person was Mary Beatrice Fahle, my mother. This is a story that took place in 1947, if I can recall the dates correctly. I was 12. My mother was about 52.

First a little background is in order. My mother was a devout Catholic. She attended Mass most days, walking the mile to Holy Name church in Beech Grove, Indiana. She was quite active in the church. The town of Beech Grove is a fairly large suburb of Indianapolis. The dirty little secret of Beech Grove is that it was a KKK stronghold during the Thirties. My family did not live there in that era, but the remnants were there. In fact, when I was over 21, while out walking, I remember seeing a Beech Grove policeman questioning a black man who was walking on the sidewalk in front of our house. The policeman passed me and said: "I just wanted to make sure he was getting his black ass out of town". That is the environment we lived in.

My mother was such a devout Catholic that she decided to do some missionary work in an all black neighborhood in Indianapolis proper, about two miles out of Beech Grove. The neighborhood was on the poor side, but the people were not destitute. Yards were mostly well kept, and the houses were neat and clean. I don't know exactly how my mother set up the mission in this one story building that may have formerly been a gas station. She would go there once or twice a week and talk to the people. She was trying to get some to convert to Catholicism. After a few months she succeeded. There was a couple with two children, and one other couple with one as I recall. If you were Catholic and lived in or near a large city with a good sized Catholic population in that era, you were expected to send your children to a Catholic school. I'm not sure but I think it was a mortal sin - you go to hell for those - not to do so. Problem is, there were no Catholic schools or churches in range of the neighborhood we are talking about.

So my mother goes to the pastor of Holy Name, the Catholic church in Beech Grove, and says: "What are we going to do about these children? Where will they go to Catholic school?" To the pastor's credit, he said without hesitation: "I guess they can come to Holy Name." Wow! We who now live in an era where we have a black president and many esteemed black men probably can't relate to the heroism in that conversation. There was no place in Beech Grove where a black man could get a drink of water, much less an education.

Well in a small town it doesn't take long for the word to get out. I'm reminded of the scene in Blazing Saddles where Gabby Johnson is on the roof shouting; "The sheriff is a ni_ ..." and the church bell drowns out the rest of the word. After that there is this meeting in the town hall, where the little old town librarian reads a letter to the townspeople that she will be sending to the governor. The letter is full of pejoratives and expletive-deleted words. Well, a similar meeting actually took place in the basement of Holy Name school, though it was not near as funny. I think they were actually trying to petition the Archbishop of Indianapolis to stop those nigger kids from coming to our school. If they did get their petition sent, the Archbishop decided to leave matters up to the pastor. I remember my father getting up and saying: "I don't like 'em any more than you do, but this is the way it has to be."

The parish decided - not the whole parish so much as the pastor and my mother - to go ahead and admit the children. There was talk of cross burnings, though I don't think it ever actually came to that. A few of the parents said that they would pull their children out of the school. Imagine, you are risking going to hell rather than have your child in school with some nigger boy!

I only recall one actual incident. I do recall it vividly since I was very much involved. My mother and I attended some church service one night. We were walking home (I'm sure that some of you readers are more shocked by the amount of walking we did back then than by the events). A car, with a young man on the running board, pulled up next to us going at a fairly fast rate of speed. The running board guy pushed my mother into a ditch and yelled "Nigger lover"!

My God! This guy's brother was in my grade at school. I used to lust after their sister. He lived on my street. The families had visited with each other many times before this incident. When an eighteen year old boy pushes a sixty-something woman into a ditch, you have got think of the hatred in the climate that brought this about.

The story ends pretty well. The boy's parents brought him to our house where he apologized in tears over what he had done. The black children did enter Holy Name and graduated from there. Children did get pulled from school, but they were back in about three weeks. I made friends with one of the black children, who was a boy my age. My mother kept in touch with him for many years. He became a Catholic priest and communicated with me and my mother until her death.

How can you not be proud of such a heritage?

Removing Spam Comments on Blogger

This is mostly a post to remind myself, but others may also find it helpful. I get a spam comment on my posts every now and then, and as soon as I do, I get an e-mail from blogger on having gotten a new comment. I don't get that many comments, so I choose to allow all comments and manually remove them. If this is ever abused, I will immediately begin moderating comments, which is a setting under dashboard. If you prefer to be laissez-faire like me, you can just delete the spam comments as they come. The procedure is a little weird though, so I'm posting it her as a reminder.

1. Log in to blogger and go to the dashboard.
2. Find the offending post, and scroll down to the bottom of the comments.
3. The spam comment should be the last one, but it doesn't matter if it is not.
4. Choose POST COMMENT at the bottom of the comments. This takes you to the screen with the delete icon next to each comment.
5. Choose the trash can icon next to the spam post, and check Remove Forever.

R&B Horn Section

This is the final post in a series of informational reviews of some Hal Leonard saxophone, trombone, and trumpet transcription books. These books give note-by-note and correct-instrumentation transcriptions of some famous recordings, categorized as R&B, Rock/Pop, and Funk/Disco.
R&B Horn Section.

Cut the Cake by Average White Band: vocals in D, Tenor Sax 1,2,3,4, Bari Sax

Dancing in the Street by Martha Reeves&Vandellas: vocals in E, Trumpet, Tenor, Bari Sax, Trombone

Gimme Some Lovin' by Sam & Dave: vocals in E, Trumpet 1,2 Tenor 1,2 Trombone 1,2

Hallelujah, I Love Her So by Ray Charles: vocals in Bb, Trumpet 1,2 Tenor 1,2 Bari Sax

Hard To Handle by Otis Redding: vocals in Bb, Trumpet, Tenor 1,2


I Got You (I Feel Good) by James Brown: vocals in D, Trumpet, Alto, Tenor 1,2, Bari Sax, Trombone

In The Midnight Hour by Wilson Pickett: vocals in E, Trumpet, Tenor 1,2, Bari Sax

It's Your Thing by The Isley Brothers: vocals in F, Trumpet 1,2 Alto, Tenor, Bari Sax, Trombone

Knock on Wood by Eddie Floyd: vocals in E, Trumpet, Tenor 1,2, Bari Sax

Mustang Sally by Wilson Pickett: vocals in C, Trumpet, Tenor 1,2 Bari Sax

September by Earth, Wind, and Fire: vocals in A, Trumpet 1,2, Alto 1,2, Tenor 1,2, Trombone 1,2

Sir Duke by Stevie Wonder: vocals in B, Trumpet 1,2 in Db, Alto 1,2 in Ab

Soul Finger by The Bar-Kays: vocals in B, Trumpet in C#, Tenor in C#

Soul Man by Sam & Dave: vocals in F (ending in Ab), Trumpet, Tenor 1,2. Note that the Blues Brothers version would end in G instead of Ab and has a more drawn out instrumental break, and a definite ending instead of fading out.


You've Made Me So Very Happy by Blood, Sweat & Tears: vocals in Db, Trumpet/Flugelhorn 1,2, in Eb, Alto 1,2/Flute cues in Bb, Trombone 1,2 in Db.

Pop/Rock horn section transcriptions

I previously posted about a book of note-by-note horn section transcriptions available through Hal Leonard that has full charts for Trumpet, Saxophone, Trombone, etc. for some popular Funk/Disco tunes. This is great for cover bands that are adding a sax player, because it matches the guitar-friendly keys and such for the recorded version of the tune.
Here's the skinny on the pop/rock horn section book:



Bright Side of the Road by Van Morrison: vocals in C, Trumpet 1,2 Tenor 1,2

Higher Love by Steve Winwood: vocals in F, Trumpet, Alto, Trombone

Hot Hot Hot by Buster Poindexter: vocals in F, Trumpet, Alto, Tenor, Trombone

The Impression That I Get by Mighty Mighty Bosstones: Vocals in E, Tenor 1, 2, Trombone

Jump, Jive An' Wail by The Brian Setzer Orchestra: vocals in Bb, Trumpet 1,2,3 Alto 1,2 Tenor 1,2 Bari Sax, Trombone 1,2,3,4 - they're not kidding about "orchestra", but most of this tune is carried by the tenors. There's a long section of call and response by the trumpets, but that could be done by a single horn if needed.

Livin' La Vida Loca by Ricky Martin: vocals in E (C# minor), Trumpet 1,2 Alto 1,2 Trombone 1,2


Magical Mystery Tour by The Beatles: vocals in E, Trumpet 1,2,3,4

Peg by Steely Dan: vocals in G, Soprano Sax (sub for synth), Tenor

Smooth by Santana Featuring Rob Thomas: Vocals in C (A minor), Trumpet 1,2,3 Trombone 1,2,3

Spinning Wheel by Blood, Sweat, and Tears: vocals in G, Trumpet 1,2 Alto 1,2 Trombone 1,2

Sussudio by Phil Collins: vocals in C, Trumpet 1,2, Alto, Trombone(with extra horns overdubbed: Trumpet 3,4,5,6 Alto 2,3, Trombone 2,3)

25 or 6 to 4 by Chicago: vocals in C, Trumpet, Tenor, Trombone 1,2

Vehicle by Ides of March: vocals in Gb (Bb minor) Trumpet 1,2 Tenor 1,2 (all in 4 flats)

Will It Go Round in Circles by Billy Preston: vocals in Ab, Trumpet, Alto, Tenor, Trombone, Bari Sax

Zoot Suit Riot by Cherry Poppin' Daddies: vocals in Cb, Trumpet, Alto, Tenor, Trombone

Funk/Disco Horn Chart transcriptions

Here's a review of the first horn chart transcriptions book that I got (Funk/Disco). Watch this space for others.
Funk/Disco is a collection of 15 horn charts, transcribed from the original recordings in their original keys. Very high-quality for cover bands. I don't see how they will sell more than 10 or 20 of these unless they start a horn-section revolution, but anyway, it's a great resource for players.
The rhythms are readable, but with only 4-9 measures per page, each song is laid out over about 16 pages. This means memorization or other additional work to be able to play this in any situation. Also, if you're going to play just a single sax, you may have to borrow from the other parts to have it sound right. Having the vocals lined up with the other tracks is very helpful for being able to figure out exactly when to play if your counting skills aren't the best. And of course, you can play right along to the recorded versions, which is the same key most cover bands will play the tunes in, so it is a quick way to get up to speed. Chord progressions appear above the vocal lines, so Bass and Guitar should be able to pick it up from that.

Web ads seem not to even list all the songs in each of these books, so as far as I know, this post is the only source on the web for this information:
1. Brick House by the Commodores: vocals in C (A minor?), Trumpet 1,2, Alto, Tenor, and Trombone parts.
2. Disco Inferno by The Trammps: vocals in Eb (ending in C), Trumpet 1,2,3, TBone 1,2,3
3. Dr. Funkenstein by Parliament: vocals (spoken, song in D), Trumpet, Alto, Tenor, TBone - but solo not transcribed
4. Fire by The Ohio Players: vocals in C (to Db), Trumpet 1,2, Tenor
5. Give It To Me Baby by Rick James: vocals in E, Trumpet 1,2, Tenor 1,2, TBone 1,2
6. Hold On I'm Comin' by Sam and Dave: vocals in Ab, Trumpet, Tenor 1,2
7. Lucretia Mac Evil by Blood, Sweat and Tears: vocals in G (then F, then Gb), Trumpet 1,2, Alto, TBone
8. Papa's Got a Brand New Bag by James Brown: vocals in E, Trumpet 1,2, Alto, Tenor, Baritone sax
9. Pick Up The Pieces by Average White Band: vocals in Ab, Tenor 1,2
10. Serpentine Fire by Earth Wind & Fire: vocals in C, Trumpet 1,2,3,4, Alto, Trombone, Baritone sax
11. Superstition by Stevie Wonder: vocals in Gb (Bb minor?), Trumpet 1, 2, Tenor 1, 2
12. That's The Way (I Like It) by KC & the Sunshine Band: vocals in Eb, Trumpet 1,2 Tenor, Baritone sax
13. What Is Hip? by Tower of Power: vocals in E, Trumpet 1,2 Tenor 1,2, Baritone sax
14. Y.M.C.A by Village People: vocals in Gb, Trumpet 1,2,3, Tenor 1,2 Tbone 1,2, Baritone sax
15. You Should Be Dancing by Bee Gees: vocals in Bb, Trumpet 1,2,3,4, Tenor 1,2,3,4

Dead horse day

This is from an e-mail from my father to the extended family, inlaws, outlaws, etc. Yes, it's a true story, and yes, I was one of the herein mentioned teenagers. Here it is in all its [NAMES REDACTED] glory:

Dies equi mortui

(Dead horse day)

The Winter of 78

It was a harsh winter in Dayton Ohio in 1978. The driveway always seemed to need shoveling. There were snowflakes at the bottom of the pile that had fallen the previous October One morning my son came to my room and said: “Pop, I can’t deliver my paper route today. It’s too cold.” I said: “Nonsense, you have to deliver your papers. Go! Be responsible! A bit later he comes back to the room and says: “Pop, I tried, will you drive me?” Trying to teach my son self-reliance, I replied: “OK, I will go with you, but we are not taking the car. I will walk with you.” We get about a block from the house and I find that self-reliance doesn’t keep your nose from freezing. We did complete the route, and later that day we hear on the radio that the temperature is 25 degrees below zero. That’s almost –32C mind you!

In a word: cold!

The Family

Five teenagers or might as well be teenagers - a Mom and a Pop rounded out the family. The teenagers were all smart but not all in the straight-A-at-school sense. All had active imaginations and self-confidence. In other words: trouble.

In April of that year the family was getting ready to move to a small town in Texas. Pop, that’s me, decided to leave his job for a new one. The family had moved a lot over the years so the trauma was not great, but pulling up stakes is always heart-rending and nerve-wracking. The family was busy getting kids out of school, preparing to get kids in school, packing clothes, shoveling snow – oh I already mentioned that – and generally making preparations and figuring out what preparations to make.

In a word: activity!

The dead horse

Frankie. She was a slender mare, gentle yet spunky under saddle, a perfect match for teenagers. She stood about 14 hands on her tippy-hooves. It was about a mile from the house to the stable where Frankie was boarded. A short walk if you are a teenager, but a long walk for that harsh winter.

Finally on a day in the middle of March, the temperature was above freezing; so the teenagers could stop getting on everyone’s nerves and go outside. After being cooped up all winter one of the boys decided to go give Frankie a little romp. Though it was not obvious, Frankie had not wintered well. While the boy was riding her, she fell over. My son tried to recover. He tried to pull the horse to its feet. But it was for naught. Frankie had not only not wintered well; she was unable to survive. She went to that great corral in the sky.

In a word: dead!

The fortnight of confusion

Life goes on. Well, maybe not for Frankie, but the family had to keep preparing for the move. That year, the groundhog must have had a very good look at his shadow, because the cold returned for another week and a half. This was not all bad because Frankie was lying dead in a field and the cold retarded decomposition.

What was to be done about Frankie? If you look in the Yellow pages under several topics, you will eventually come across animal-rendering plants. It seems that an animal renderer would be the perfect solution. Gentle reader, if you have ever talked on the phone to the spokesperson for an animal rendering plant, you will find that the experience is a bit surreal. The conversation will go something like:

Renderer: “Yeah.”

You: “I have this horse that died in the field.”

Renderer: “Yeah.”

You: “I was wondering if you could come and get him.”

Renderer: “Yeah.”

You: “Fine, when can you do it?”

Renderer: ‘Do what?”

You: “Come and get the dead horse in the field.”

Renderer: “I can’t.”

You: “Why?”

Renderer. “My truck is broke down. I can’t come till after I fix it.”

You: “When will you fix it?”

Renderer: “I don’t know and anyway there are a lot of dead animals to get this time of year, with the bad winter we had.”

You: “So will you be picking them up soon?”

Renderer: “I told you my truck was broke. I guess I’d take ‘em if you could bring ‘em by.”

This conversation seemed to happen with every animal-rendering plant I contacted. Now mind you a hard winter is always hard on vehicles, apparently more so on animal-carrying vehicles.

Of course moving preparations were going on. We packed up for the trip. Mom was going to stay home and try to sell the house. No, the house hadn’t been sold yet, partly because the bad weather kept the lookers away and partly because the lookers that did come, well, we had five teenagers.

When moving is in the near future, the only thing that seems to move is the calendar. The final week is upon us. Days go by. I need to start my job in Greenville, Texas the next Monday. Frankie is still in the field. Saturday arrives.

In a word: Shit!

Dies irae – the preparation

The casual observer - that is, a person who observes dead horse day casually, of whom there are few – might think that dead horse day commemorates the day the horse died.

Wrong! I am often asked the exact date of dead horse day, to which question I always reply: “Dead horse day is not an exact date; it is rather a state of mind.” But, if pressed into setting an exact date it would be that fateful Saturday before the big move to Greenville.

Saturday was a nice sunny day. The temperature had risen from the freezing state. The October snowflakes were beginning to melt. All seemed bright and clear and right with the world. Wait! The horse was still lying in the field and was still dead. There seemed to be nothing else to do. I had to find a way to get the horse to a rendering plant. Let us think of the tools at my disposal. I had a pickup truck, not a common thing to have in suburban Dayton. I had a good rope. I had three healthy, if lightweight, teenage boys.

I knew I would have to pull the horse into the truck somehow and to do this I would need some tool. So I went to the hardware store. In modern times people don’t understand what a hardware store is. It’s like a Home-Depot only with people to wait on you. They know you by name if you’ve been there more than twice. You can explain about the dead horse in the field and they will go get you a pulley that will hold a horse. We got your pulley right here. With these state-of-the-art tools in tow, we can now attack the problem at hand.

In a word: ready!

Dies irae – high-noon at the not so OK corral

The loading of the horse is a sight to behold. In fact, other people arrived at the stable on that day in April prepared to enjoy a Spring day of horseback riding. As soon as they beheld the sight of teenagers and Pop pulling on a dead horse, they seemed to go back to their homes. Maybe they forgot something.

We had to first get the horse under a nearby tree. About 500 pounds of people trying to pull 600 pound of smelly, beginning to rot horse. The truck can get no traction because the thaw has settled in and the ground is mush. We finally pull the horse by hand to the tree and attach the pulley to a sturdy branch. The pulley of course breaks - OK sometimes you can’t trust these hardware guys anymore than the guy that you had to chase down at Home Depot - we have now draped the rope over a branch of the tree. I’m not sure how, in fact, my physics teachers would deny the possibility, but the 500 finally countered the 600 until the horse was hanging like a bovine in a slaughterhouse, only with its head still on the ground bent looking like a cat about to lick its coat – I’m talking an upside down cat here. Sometimes we are pushing the horse into the truck bed, sometimes we are pushing the truck to aid its traction, sometimes we are wishing we were anywhere else. Hair is coming off the horse as we are pushing. We are not certain that the horse will hold together. Did I mention the eyeball? Maybe I better not. Oh well if you, gentle reader haven’t hurled by now, I guess you can take it. Yes, Frankie’s eyeball was hanging out of its socket; but the good news is its only one of her eyeballs.

In a word: grossmongous!

Dies irae – in transit

Gentle yet grossed out reader, I want you to imagine a scene. You are sitting at a stoplight on the way to the market to do your grocery shopping. You are taking your little girl Beatrice. You have to remember to get a relish tray for the church social tomorrow evening. You are a prim and proper suburbanite with a nice home with three bedrooms and two and one-half baths; you are feeling a bit anxious about the relish tray but all else is right with the world. Then, up on you left pulls a pickup truck. First you notice teenagers piled in the front seat. There is something odd about the look on the faces of these teenagers. In fact, you are having a hard time seeing the faces of the teenagers because of the sweat and grime. Wait! Is that horsehair growing from that boy’s neck? Now the rear of the pickup comes into view. What is that sticking up in the air? It looks like piano legs. No. There is fur. Hair! There are four legs sticking straight up in the air! My god it’s a… “Don’t look Beatrice!” Too late. “Mommy is that pony sleeping on its back? What is wrong with the pony, Mommy? Mommy what is that hanging from its eye?” Trust me, gentle yet giggling reader, this is not an everyday occurrence in peaceful, quiet, suburban Dayton Ohio.

In a word: outrageous!

Dies irae – the finding

I don’t know if you, gentle yet outraged reader, have ever received directions from an animal rendering plant spokesperson, but they go something like: “After you get off the highway onto Reefer Lane – Reefer lane doesn’t have a signpost cause Billy Ledbetter hit it with his pickup truck but it’s the second road after the Texaco – turn left at the second Y-turn to the right. Go on past the Perkin’s place; you’ll think your supposed to stop there but don’t. About a mile later you will see the barn. You can’t miss it ‘cause it is gray.” We found that the real directions to an animal rendering plant should be quite simple: “Get off at the Texaco and follow your nose!” You don’t exactly follow your nose, you more go the direction it doesn’t want to. Ah, the sweet pungent odor of the animal rendering plant on a warm day after the worst winter in half a century.

In a word: putrice!

Dies irae – the final resting place

Driving into an animal-rendering place is not the grimy, dismal, distressing, disgusting, grotesque, gut-wrenching experience you might think. No, it is much worse than that. There are dead goats, dead cows, dead dogs, road-kill, and many unrecognizable creatures in various stages of decay. Did I mention the stench? You would think the place would attract vultures, but they can’t stand it either.

We honked our horn, we pounded on the barn but no one was there. Thank God! Didn’t really want to meet the guy whose job it was to tend that place. His name had to be Igor. What to do? We certainly didn’t come this far to go searching for another animal-rendering place with a drive-in window, so yes, gentle yet vomiting reader, we did what we had to do. We took our faithful rope, whose story is inexorably tied to that of the dead horse, and tied one end to the dead horse’s legs and the other to a nearby tree. All teenagers aboard, we drove like the stinking wind. We did not look back; we did not even think about retrieving the rope, we did not leave a thank you note for Igor.

In a word: done!

Post mortem

You, gentle and better informed yet thinking you could have done without the information reader, may be wondering if there is a point to this story, or if its sole purpose was gratuitous repugnance. Say you are having this day where the kid is running a fever and the garbage disposal is disposing the garbage back into your sink and spewing forth onto your shirt which you would be washing except that the washing machine has been on the fritz needing a part which you could not get at Home Depot ‘cause the guy couldn’t find it and besides you got that washer from the hardware store that Home Depot put out of business and you can’t pay him anyway because you forgot to make a credit card payment which you generally make on-line but your hard disk crashed. And you sense that the day is only going to get worse. Remember that day? But when it happens to a member of the Order of the Dead Horse, a wry grin begins to break across his face. In fact, he begins to giggle. Then he laughs out loud. Why this strange behavior from this certainly frazzled and drained person? Is he crazed, deranged, out of his ever-loving gourd? What is he thinking?

In a word: ThereAin’tNoDayWorseThanDeadHorseDay.

Stop forwarding me those stupid e-mails

Forwarding Emails
This post addresses the age-old question of "what you have to lose" when you forward one of those e-mails that asks that question, as in "Maybe Bill Gates will share his fortune. What do you have to lose?" My brother really really is an attorney too, but even he knows better than to forward these emails. As a matter of fact, this post will describe why you shouldn't forward ANY e-mails "to all of your friends", even at the threat of instant death for breaking the curse or instant millions for doing Bill Gates some unspecified favor.

Old news
First, let me say that this should be old news to anyone who has been on the internet for more than a week. It surprises me that people still don't know to go to snopes and check whether the story they are spreading is even true. Generally, the answer is no. Nevertheless, we all still have that one aunt or cousin who just now got the internet, and they will forward these things until they are given a compelling reason not to. Here is that compelling reason.

All spam is spam
So, the risk of forwarding any compelling e-mail is that you are essentially participating willingly as a human part of a very effective spam operation. As you may know, sometimes spammers create viruses which download to your machine and secretly take it over to attack other machines or send commercial e-mails on behalf of the spammer. This allows the spammer to get around certain restrictions that might be imposed by their ISP against sending bulk e-mails. Instead the e-mails are from everyone, to everyone.

Exponential growth
One reason not to forward any e-mail, no matter how compelling, is that we've all already seen it. This is a mathematical certainty when you think about it. Let's take a compelling factor, call it x. If you are compelled to x degree to forward an e-mail, then you will forward it to x people, let's say. However, those x people will presumably find it just as compelling, and each x people will forward it to x people. That's x*x people so far. Now if that goes to a third generation, it is x to the third, and even if x is just 4, the message has been forwarded to a million people in ten generations. So, we've all seen it by the time you are sending it. The problem is even worse with more compelling e-mails. There is an easy test to see if an e-mail is subject to this problem. If you are thinking of forwarding it to more than two people, it is too compelling, and we have already seen it. This applies to virus warnings, gold speculation, "secret" recipes, free money, etc.

But I didn't forward any commercial e-mail
You may think that you can filter out commercial messages yourself, and just pare your forward list to those who do not complain about it, and those who have already seen it will just ignore it. You may be able to do that, though I question whether your e-mail was just a covert advertisement for MicroSoft and AOL, because after all, these are good impressions of those companies if they are being all charitable to you, the customer. None of this matters. The real, valuable content of those e-mails is not the "compelling" message. It is the forwarding lists of validated e-mail addresses. These lists are gold to a spammer. After a number of generations of sending one of these e-mails, it will have hundreds of e-mail addresses in it. At some point, someone will forward it to one of their active online friends, who is really a spammer. Now that spammer has MY e-mail address, and I didn't even want the mail in the first place, never mind forward it. I'm just on it because you sent it to me at some point. So stop it. Thanks for your time.

Driving on the wrong side - settled at last

Driving on the Right side
As an American, I have long been of the opinion that we drive on the correct (right-hand) side of the road and that the Brits and their influences have it wrong. Up to now, my opinion has mainly been based on obscure tenets of maritime law, but I have discovered a far better and more important reason, which I will detail below. But first some history, etc. You would expect no less from a geek.

U.S. "Wrongies"
My personal history with this phenomenon comes from having visited England and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Because the virgin islands were once mainly British territory, they drive on the incorrect side of the road, even on the islands of St. Croix, St. Thomas, and St. John, which are now U.S. territories. The most befuddling aspect of this is that the most plentiful cars by far are those made in the U.S.A., because they are cheaper to ship to the islands, and many people who live there are poor and so end up with the lowest-cost option. So, on a recent trip to the U.S. Virgin Islands, I found myself hurtling down the single-lane roads keeping to the left, but sitting in the left-hand driver seat as far as possible from the parts of the cars which are nearest each other. This might sound safe, but it really isn't because it's really hard to see the line in the middle of the road.

World Driving History
The phenomenon of standard driving sides far predates cars. Originally, it was the swordsmen gentlemen of England who decided to ride horses on the left, so that their scabbards wouldn't clank together and so that their strong right arm could pull the sword out and oppose enemies riding at them on the same road. Why they thought their enemies would be so orderly is partly explained by the way they fought wars back then. Anyway, Europe under Napoleon decided they wanted to ride on the left side of wagons so they could whip the team with their right hand, and for similar reasons described above, wanted to pass on the right. Britain whipped Napoleon, so his driving habits never spread there, and neither did Hitler's.

Maritime Law
This is all well and good, but long before Napoleon and long before other driving habits were established stateside, England herself had already decided the question in the 1100's. Admiralty law, also known as Maritime Law, has always called for seagoing vessels to pass one another on the right. And no one had more stake in creating Admiralty Law than the British. Now, the British can claim one side or the other all they like, but as long as they are not consistent, I don't see any point in following them at all. Of course, to most people, this is a kind of esoteric argument and doesn't hold much water, so to speak. Why should we listen to the British at all, maritime or otherwise? This is America, damn it, and we won our independence from the crown hundreds of years ago (in fact that is around the time that it was settled once and for all that Americans would pass on the right). It is only by a stroke of luck that we and Napoleon got it right. We were also on more or less the same side in the war, so what the heck, we're also on the same side of the road. Besides, we invented the car, so we get to choose. Or at least we invented the assembly line to make enough of them that it mattered which side you drove on.

But... But... I don't drive
The real reason you should drive on the right is far more practical, and affects you every day, even if you don't drive at all. Namely, when a people drive on a certain side of the road, they tend to pass one another on walkways on that same side. This makes sense, because it is useful to have a side to pass on, after all. In England, they would take this back to the "orderly enemies" argument above, and say that in walking we should keep our weapon hands on the side of the "enemy" on the other side of the road. Well, if your a warmonger that is all well and good, but most of us just walk up a couple of flights of stairs every day and go to work, not to war. And that is where we need our right hand, to hold onto the railing, whether we are ascending or descending, and thus the practical reason to drive on the right.

For the record, I'm left-handed.

Perfect mix of art and science

September 19, 2007
Singer/Songwriter Jonathon Coulton came through Dallas last night as part of his nationwide tour. He's built his audience as an independent, largely through the internet, and thus tends to play to geeks like me, with geek-friendly songs such as "Code Monkey", "The Future Soon", and "Mandelbrot Set". Just about all his songs have a wry, intelligent sense of humor, but as we experienced at the live show, there is a sort of hidden thread of emotion to the songs that resonates even deeper. After you get past the unusual lyrics, universal themes of love and loneliness are revealed.

Opening Set
Thinking that a) a geek might actually start a show on time, and b) it was a weeknight after all, we arrived promptly at 8:00 so as not to miss a single morsel. Paul and Storm, the openers, took the stage around 9:15, to a packed house at Club Dada. I was previously unfamiliar with this act, but apparently they have had some success on the Bob and Tom show, which doesn't play in Dallas except perhaps over the internet. Though I'm sure they have been at this much longer than Coulton, they were the perfect warm-up for him, as they got us all in the laughing mood starting with their opening meta-song, "Opening Band." They played several other humorous songs, and didn't fail to celebrate the holiday with audience participation.

Main Act
After a brief recess, Johnathon Coulton took the stage solo. Early on, he played "IKEA" (yes, a song about a furniture store). He went on to play "I crush everything," about a giant sea creature and his search for love with his all-too-powerful tentacles. He soon satisfied the über-geeks with "The Future Now," a song about how he is going to be enhanced in the future, and woo the girl to whom he sings with all his imperfections removed. He followed up with "SkullCrusher Mountain," a song about an evil genius showing his new girlfriend around the lair.
Somewhere in there was "I Feel Fantastic," a song about the perfection of pharmaceuticals in the future, with some really funny lines, and "Tom Cruise Crazy" and "Code Monkey". He also played "You Ruined Everything," about having a new baby, "Creepy Doll," and "Mr. Fancy Pants," for which he had purchased a key-tar beat box to play live. He closed with "Mandelbrot Set" about fractals, and "Re: Your Brains" about your local office-mate turned zombie, though again the metaphorical undertones were apparent, and resonant to cube-dwellers everywhere.

Encore
Though it was a weekday, and though it had all started way later than I expected, and though it was nearing midnight and I was tired, it ended all too soon. Encores were "First of May" (nsfw), and "Sweet Caroline". Jonathon stayed around afterward to sign albums and such, though I prefer to buy online the songs I like.

Security Exploit for your Car

Car security
I have talked a bit about cars and technology here before, particularly security. I think this is an issue which deserves some attention, but nonetheless I will post about it here rather than forward an e-mail to everyone I know telling them to forward it in turn. That has its own security risks, which I will explain in a later post. This article explains how I discovered a security hole for the automatic remote for some cars, and how to avoid it. This is on a slightly older car, but this exploit can be gleaned from a simple reading of the car owner's manual without any special technical knowledge or equipment, just a sneaky mind like mine, and one's own keyless entry. Your mileage may vary, as they say. You should read your own owner's manual with a mind toward something similar. More on that later.

Security attempts
Over time, car manufacturers have taken on the issue of keyless entry security. Early transmitters simply sent a digital sequence to the receiver in the car, matched to that receiver. The problem with this was that criminals could simply sit in a parking lot and record the sequences on their own receiver, and play them back to open the doors. This particular exploit required special equipment, and so was a specialized type of threat, but a real one nonetheless. To correct for this, manufacturers began coding the transmitters to the receivers but with special encryption algorithms built into both, with two-way communication, so that a different code was sent each time.

The exploit
In the particular case of my car, a Chrysler Sebring, this fix for a relatively rare problem created a much more common and exploitable problem. The transmitter is matched to the car at the factory, but it has some kind of internal limitation on how many new unique codes can be generated without communication. According to the owner's manual, if the keyless entry is keyed "more than 250 times" when not within range of the car, this pairing is lost. I suspect they really mean more than 255 times, but that's a nit. Anyway, since there is a way the customer can lose the pairing, there has to be a way to resync. The way to resync, on my car, is simply this: Lock the doors (using the door-lock switch on the door, of course, because your remote doesn't work), then press the buttons on the remote in a particular way (which I will skip here to maintain a little security through obscurity). The remote resyncs and then can be used to unlock the door again.

Oops
If you haven't figured out the exploit by now, it is simply that if the owner of the car has locked his doors with the door-lock switch, any schmoe with the same remote can then press the appropriate sequence on his remote and get into the car. The key will still not fit, so they can't steal your car, but at least they can steal all your CD's and sunglasses. Up until I realized this, I locked my door this way all the time, because it's easier to flip the lever on the door than to fiddle around with the remote. Luckily, I discovered this exploit not by being victimized but because I had a remote that didn't work even after replacing the batteries, and it said on the remote "consult the owner's manual." I tried it on my dad's car, which is the same but a newer year, and sure enough it works.

Keeping out interlopers
The solution is simple, of course. Just lock your doors with the keyless remote always. This will also ensure that you don't lock your keys in the car, which is good.

Other cars
Your car may differ in the way that it resets the keyless entry. For example, some require that the key is in the ignition to initiate the sequence. In this case you are safe from this exploit, but there may be other ones depending on your car. Read your owner's manual, and if you find another exploit for your car, post it below.

Why doesn't my guitar rock?

Distortion
When you finally upgrade your acoustic to a brand new electric guitar, and you plug it into the practice amp that came with it, the first thing you expect is to sound like Jimi Hendrix on acid. Oh, wait, Jimi Hendrix was on acid. Anyway, what you may be wondering is, why does this guitar sound more or less like my acoustic guitar, only louder. The answer, my friend, is distortion. The one guitar effect that is emblematic of Rock and/or Roll is quite simply distortion, also known as overdrive. If you are fortunate, your amp comes with an overdrive button, like the Fender 15G Frontman does. Distortion is just an effect which makes the signal sound like it has been overdriven through a tube amp. This gives it that edgy rock sound.

Compression
However, even if the amp supports some form of distortion, what you really lack, especially with a whammy bar, is sustain. That gives you the ability to really rock out while you shake your guitar around and wave it in front of the amp, and slam the whammy bar down for that signature Jimi Hendrix growl. I know, by now you've cursed yourself for buying a cheap guitar with no sustain, or perhaps cursed the dealer who sold you this expensive guitar with no sustain. But none of that matters. All you need to get the long rockin' sustain is a little bit of compression. Compression works by cutting down the dynamic range of your signal, making the soft sounds louder and the loud sounds (relatively) softer. This makes your notes seem to last longer, because the louder sound right after the attack is dampened a bit, and as the vibrations fade, the volume is raised to compensate. Of course, all of this is subject to parameters controlling the compressor.

Pedals
To accomplish these effects, especially if they are not built into your amp, you need some kind of guitar pedal. This could be a chain of pedals, or it could be a single multi-effect pedal. Purists will say you need the chain of pedals going into your tube amp, but that can get, you know, expensive. And heavy. In this era of digital simulation, maybe close enough is good enough for you. I know it is for me; and it has the added advantage of being more portable. A small practice amp can go just about anywhere, and if you're just practicing for yourself, a multi-effects pedal with a headphone plug-in is all you need.

Ready to play
With just these two effects, you can go a long way by adjusting various parameters, such as how much gain to apply for distortion, or various envelope factors for compression. However, if you do pick up a multi-effects pedal, you can go way beyond this to add all kinds of effects like wah, ya-ya, crunch, etc., which are all just ways of writing in English that which can really only be experienced aurally.

FIRE HAZARD: Do not read!

I wanted everyone to know that I received this IMPORTANT and ALARMING e-mail from my brother in San Antonio:

FIRE HAZARD: Don't open conspiracy or panic e-mails! Forward to everyone you know

This isn't one of those panic e mails like you've seen floating around the internet; this is REAL! A friend of mine who works for the San Antonio fire marshal in the arson investigation squad warned me about this, after having investigated several fires caused by this DANGEROUS NEW TREND!

We've all seen them: the panic or conspiracy theory e mails: Boy's corneas burned out by Mr. Clean Magic Eraser, warn your friends! Glade Plug-Ins cause house fires, forward to everyone you know! God isn't on the new dollar coin, refuse to accept them! I've always wondered who has time to sit around and come up with these crazy e mails, and now I finally know.

My friend told me that these panic headlines are nothing more than a way to get you to open the e mail, so that it can implant a (literally) deadly virus in your computer. Then it preys on your good nature and your natural desire to protect your friends and loved ones, by getting you to unknowingly forward this virus on to them. I wasn't sure if my friend had his facts straight, so I called Dr. David P. Snopes, the director of the Snopes Computer Virus Protection Project at MIT, and he confirmed that it was true! The evil plot then unfolds as follows: One night while you are sleeping, your computer will turn itself on. Dr. Snopes said that some of the viruses are rigged like a time bomb, to go off at a certain time, while others key off of your word processor, so that the first time you use a certain word or combination of words in a letter or document (like "Sincerely yours," or "Dear Sirs" or some other combination that the hacker knows you will eventually use) the virus is activated at 3:35 a.m. the next morning. The virus then causes your computer to generate an algorithm that tries to solve the infamous Zeno's Paradox. For those of you unfamiliar with this PRE-CHRISTIAN (!!!) conundrum, it says that moving from one place to another is impossible, because to travel any distance, you have to travel half that distance first. And in order to travel half the distance, you have to travel half THAT distance, and so on ad infinitum.

Your computer's CPU usually only works a fraction of the time. You can verify this right now by hitting the CTRL + ALT + DELETE keys all at once. This will bring up your Windows Task Manager. At the bottom of that dialog box is a little message reading "CPU Usage: xx%", where the xx fluctuates anywhere from 5% to 50%, sometimes a little higher. Dr. Snopes assures me that this is crucial, because your computer needs the "rest time" to allow the built-in fan to cool down the CPU. The problem with this Zeno algorithm is that it is impossible to solve, but your computer doesn't know that, so it keeps dividing and dividing by half ALL THE TIME! Within seconds, the CPU usage is up to 100%, sometimes even higher! The resulting heat causes the computer's internal fan to break down, and then the virus reaches what scientists call the tipping point. Because the fan no longer works, and the CPU is still working overtime, the heat levels inside your computer get higher and higher, faster and faster. Before you know it, the thing catches fire, and can KILL YOUR FAMILY, not to mention your PETS, or burn down your whole office building while you sleep!

This virus is so insidious that Dr. Snopes brought it to the attention of his congressman, who immediately started congressional hearings to determine how dangerous the virus is, how many fires have already been caused by it, and whether Congress should pass a law outlawing a computer program FOR THE FIRST TIME IN HISTORY. You can check out the transcripts of the congressional hearings here:

http://www.house.gov/daily/comlist.html

Dr. Snopes says there are three things you can do to protect yourself, your family, and your friends: 1. Don't open ANY conspiracy theory or alarmist e mails. It doesn't matter if you download anything from the e mail or follow any links; simply opening it will cause the virus to infect your computer.

2. Call or write your Congressman to encourage them to pass a bill banning this DANGEROUS virus. Let those slackers in Washington know that we're tired of them sitting around bickering about things like the war in Iraq or whether the Attorney General of the United States perjured himself, WHILE OUR HOUSES ARE BURNING DOWN and our FAMILIES ARE IN DANGER! You can find your congressman's e-mail here:

http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml

3. Most importantly, forward this to everyone you know! Especially if you have ever sent on a panic or conspiracy theory e mail. I know, it will take a few minutes of your precious time, but imagine how you'll feel if you don't do it, and then you get the call at 4:00 one morning telling you that a friend or loved one's house just burned down, killing all their family and PETS, and knowing that YOU MAY HAVE BEEN RESPONSIBLE FOR SENDING THEM THE VIRUS IN THE FIRST PLACE! I'll be keeping tabs on Dr. Snopes website to see how many hits this thing gets, but remember, folks, you heard it here first.

I don't know who these evil people are sitting around concocting conspiracy theories and alarmist e mails just so that they can burn down our houses, but I for one am MAD AS HELL AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE!

I wanted to know if it was true, so I called my local post office in Dallas. They verified that not only is it TRUE, but that it has now spread to Blog posts. Do not, whatever you do, read any ALARMING blog posts on the internet, particularly if they have to do with FIRE or 9/11!!!!11!OnEONE! Please, for your own safety. Tell all your friends, and please tell them to post a copy of this to their blogs, for the love of God (who is not on the new dollar)!

After Guitar Hero II

In June of 2002, the Motley Fool wrote an article about Guitar Center warning investors of potential problems with its $18-per share price being too high for that stock at the time. They were concerned about P/E ratios and whatnot. By June of 2007, they were singing a different tune, claiming that $63 per share was too cheap for them to sell out. What is responsible for the turnaround? In my mind, and as mentioned in the latter article, it has a lot to do with Guitar Hero (which Guitar Center sponsored). This game has reignited interest in real guitar playing, and at the same time, for me at least, it expanded my tastes in rock music to a whole set of metal bands to which I had never given much of a listen.

Like many others, I dusted off my old acoustic and resumed strumming away. However, this time around, mere rhythm-guitar open-string chords and basic strum patterns were not enough. Having finished hard mode in GHII, I felt confident, or at least compelled, to try to play lead lines, shred some frets, bend some strings, and slide up and down the fretboard with full distortion. I need to rock, and to do that, a trip to the aforementioned Guitar Center where I plunked down $250 for the Strat Pack. p.s., if you just splurged your life savings into GTRC stock based on the last paragraph, don't worry, Musician's Friend is a wholly owned subsidiary. As a disclosure, I don't own any GTRC or Activision stock.

So now that you have your shiny new electric, the trick is, how do you play it? Many people recommend guitar lessons, and I certainly agree. I intend to take some myself any time now. But if you and ornery, intelligent, adventurous, introverted, independent person like me, you will want to do some self-teaching on your own. In any event, it is useful to have more than one source of information about guitar learning, so even if you do take lessons, the instructor should encourage you to learn on your own. If they do not, find a different instructor.

Here, then, are my recommendations for free online learning. Firstly, fire up iTunes or otherwise tune in to 1.fm and listen to some blues. If you live in the D/FW area, you are in luck, because the new station called Lonestar 92.5 is a commercial-free radio station that plays a lot of blues, country, rock, and other music with great instrumental solos, mainly guitar. It might as well be called the guitar hero station. Incidentally, Lonestar are also sponsored by Guitar Center. While you are soaking up some good blues, go learn the easy blues scale. This scale can be played anywhere on the fret, and then you can play just about any notes up and down this scale in a swing beat, and it will sound great. For rank beginners, I suggest first checking out these excellent absolute beginner guitar articles. Be sure to look around on that site and this one even if you are a little more advanced. For geeks like me, the information is offered in a very digestible format. If you get really serious about this stuff, you can go to this solo guitar site which has information about practice schedules, etc.

However, whenever you get to the point of learning about modes, go to this modes theory page. It is all laid out very logically and clearly, with no mystical mumbo-jumbo. Did you know, for example, that minor A is just a mode of major C? I didn't. Including that one, there are seven modes in all, but the CAGED method only teaches you five, and treats minor keys as a separate topic. Granted, two of the modes overlap so much that they use the same exact fingerings, but still, the theory is incomplete without knowing about all seven modes, and it seems kind of random.

So, did you dust off your old guitar/buy a new one after you picked up GHII? Did you start listening to different music, and/or gain an appreciation for guitar solos?

Car buried in vault in Tulsa, OK in 1957, opened in 2007 - rusted junk(pic)

There was a contest in 1957 to guess what the population of Tulsa would be by 2007, its centennial. The winner gets an unused 1957 Belvedere plus the contents of the car, which included a ladies purse with typical items, including Valium and bobby pins. However, when they finally dug up the mess last week, it turned out the vault was full of water.



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Squier Fender Strat switches and knobs

I just got a new Fender Strat made by Squier, from Guitar Center. It was part of the Strat Pack. This is a standard Fender Stratocaster design, but it is made in Indonesia to encourage fair labor standards. Just kidding, it's for the low cost. A decent American-made Fender will set you back over $1000, but a Hecho en Mexico model is somewhat less, and then these are an entry-level option for essentially the same design, but made in Indonesia. I am just getting started in electric guitar, so I opted for the low-priced model. The Strat Pack, for $250, included the guitar, 15-watt practice amp, strap, bag, picks, whammy, tuner, and an extra set of strings, along with an ultra-beginner "fender method" guitar-playing book. What it did not include, however, was instructions on how to use the dang thing. I don't mean play it, because coming from an acoustic guitar I was familiar with the concept of frets, chords, and strumming. What I mean is, what do all those damn knobs and buttons do? There was no instruction along those lines in the Strat Pack. So, after literally hours of searching the internet, I was able to find the answer, and have reproduced it here. The Squier Strat mimics the Standard Stratocaster found here, which site also has wiring diagrams and whatnot in case you need those.

Pickups
Starting with the basics, the standard strat design has three single-coil pickups. These are labeled number 6 in the diagram. The topmost one is the neck pickup, the middle one is just called the middle one, and the bottom one is the bridge pickup. The switch, labeled 5 in the diagram, has five positions available. By switching it to the top position (closest to the neck), this activates the neck pickup only, so that any sound picked up by the other two pickups is not sent to the amp. The next click on the switch turns on both the neck pickup and the middle pickup. The third position activates just the middle pickup. The fourth position activates the middle and bridge pickups, and finally the fifth position activates just the bridge pickup.

Hum
Since they are single-coil pickups, there is a natural 60hz hum that will occur whenever any single pickup is selected. Special humbucker coils are available which are wound in two different directions and cancel out each others' hum. Short of that, most Stratocasters have the middle pickup wired in the reverse direction from the other two, and whenever you select position two or four, the hum is cancelled out.

Tone
Meanwhile, the tone knobs also work in conjunction with the pickups, and consequently are affected by the pickup selector switch. The tone knob labeled 3 in the diagram works with the neck pickup only, so it is only active when the switch is in the first or second position. The other tone knob labeled 2 in the diagram will adjust the tone for the middle and bridge pickups. Having the tone turned up to 10 will bring out all the rich, clean tones from the pickups, but turning them down will mute the sounds somewhat. Experiment with these knobs to get the sound you are looking for. Naturally when the pickup selector switch is not selecting the appropriate pickup, the corresponding tone knob does nothing.

Volume
The knob labeled 4 in the diagram is for volume. Set this in the middle and adjust the amp accordingly, so that you can turn volume up or down directly from the Strat body.

Whammy
Screw the whammy bar into the hole in the bridge, labeled 11 in the diagram, made for that purpose. Don't screw it in too tight or it will damage the bridge. Leave it one turn from tight, so it will fall by itself when you let go of it. To use the whammy, press down or pull up on it. This will bend all notes that are currently ringing out either down or up, respectively.

Amp
The FrontMan 15 amp which comes with the upgraded strat pack is suitable for a practice amp, which means it's plenty loud for old fogies like me. The cord connects from the output jack, labeled 1 in the diagram, to the input jack on the amp. The amp has two main modes, selectable by a pushbutton on the front. It has treble and bass adjustments, too, but the dirty/clean sound is the most radical difference. Out, you get a clean sound; in you get something like the effect of a distortion pedal, great for that "Iron Man" powerchord sound. When out, the volume control works, when in, the gain and dirty volume work together for varying levels of distortion/loudness. The highest gain is the dirtiest sound, and of course the regular volume does not work in this mode, but the other volume controls that.

Rounding out the diagram
The remaining parts of the diagram are: 7, frets, 8, neck, 9, keys, and 10, headstock. Number 1 is where you connect the amp to the guitar, by plugging in the included cord. To adjust the tuning of each string, turn the keys in one direction or the other to get a higher or lower pitch until it is in tune. The included tuner helps with this for standard tuning. To play a note, strum the string(s) you want to sound, with your fingers in between the appropriate fret bars. Rarely, you will actually want to put your finger on the fret bar. Now go take some lessons.

Evesham NAV-CAM

On woot.com, I took advantage of the low low price of $159.99 for the Evesham NAV-Cam 7700 GPS system. I wouldn't count on getting this price again any time soon (I wish I'd bought a dozen at this price), but even for 200 bucks it's a bargain. This particular GPS is one of those that gives you street-by-street verbal guidance as you drive. On the main screen, which is a touch-screen, it lets you choose from an "easy" mode, which in my mind is worthless, or a more feature-rich mode. The easy mode just gives you a few features, but the full navigation lets you browse the map, pick points of interest such as restaurants or gas stations, or find specific streets within a zip-code. You can also have it display gas stations live on the map.

You can choose a 3D or 2D map depending on which you are more comfortable with, and it will highlight the major streets but it will also track all the neighborhood streets as you drive. When you approach your turning spot, it will say something like "in 100 yards, turn right," up until "arriving at destination." If you take a wrong turn, it will quickly re-calculate your route to let you know where to turn next. If you want, you can look at the route it has chosen and tell it to avoid specific roads, or, for example, all highways. You can optimize for speed or distance. All of this is done through a simple touch-screen interface. A few times, it has told me "turn left, then turn left again" when it can't quite figure out where I am (such as if I'm in a parking lot), but once I get on the road it figures it out and calculates a proper route.

If you're someone like me, who gets lost a lot, I highly recommend this device, or one like it. It has a few other features that might be useful for travellers, such as picture storage/viewing and mp3 player, and it is overall very small, but I find the built-in US maps/GPS to be the main use. The experience of driving with this thing is almost like having a sense of direction.

Call 811! Call 811! (before you Dig)

There's a new number in town (811 to call before you dig), and it's reachable starting today. If you go to the www.call811.com website, you can see how many times it has already been called. This new nationwide (US) number can be used to have the appropriate utilities and other agencies come out and mark the area where you are going to dig. The need for this should be obvious to most people, but every year some 10000 still insist on digging their way through gas lines, electric lines, and other underground lines which will flat kill you. This included people who are simply trying to install posts for a fence.

The release of this number rounds out the N-11 numbers in the U.S. So if you were planning to lobby your local government to provide a dog-watering emergency service, you'll just have to use a longer number.

The Common Ground Alliance is a non-profit organization which attempts to educate the public about these risks. In addition to public safety, they also protect the infrastructure and the environment. There are many advantages to having all those unsightly cables and pipes underground, so please, people, call before you dig.

If you need 811 logo items for you business, you can find them here.

Amtrak Trains - a cruise on land beats flying

Planning
Over Christmas, we went from Dallas, Texas (Union Station) to Austin, Texas, via train. We have grown tired of the hassle of flight security, and since we were just going overnight, we felt that if we drove, most of our time would be spent driving in stop and go traffic, which is annoying for at least one person in the car. So, I went to the Amtrak website and looked at the schedule. Unfortunately, because the run from Chicago to San Antonio is not well-travelled, there is only one train going each direction per day, so you don't get a lot of choice on schedule. I hear that other parts of the country are better.

Cost
The price of the trip was only $90 for the four of us each way, which seemed like a great value. In fact, it was so good that I looked for other options that I could now afford to make it a more pleasant trip. Each train consists of about six cars. There is a dining car with full service, a snack car with booth tables, an engine, a crew car, a couple of coach-seating cars, and a sleeper car, along with a lounge car.

Dining car
Dining is easy on a train; there are no seat-belt lights so you can just make an appointment for the dining car or go into the snack bar anytime. In the dining car, you are seated by a hostess and your order is taken and brought to your table. It is a fairly limited menu, but the food is decent. If you're staying in a sleeper room, the meals are included, so that makes it a no-brainer to do the sleeper if you're going to be on the train for any length of time.

Lounge car
Most cars on the train are two stories. The Lounge car is one big room with individual seats and huge picture windows. The seats face diagonally toward the windows, so you can sight-see with your friends and still chat with them. The route taken by the train from Dallas to Austin is not the same old route you've seen from I-35. Travelling by train takes you out into the boondocks for some interesting terrain.

Sleeper cars
The sleeper cars have a variety of rooms, depending on what train you are on. We had two two-person roomettes, which consist of two seats that can be folded into two beds, one bed above the other. There was a slightly bigger room available too, but it wouldn't accomodate two adults and two teens, only smaller children would have worked out. Each sleeper was a $40 upgrade, but well worth it since meals are included. Coach seating isn't bad, though; it's like a first-class seat on an airplane.

Cell Service
Since I write about cell phones a bit, I feel I should report on the usability on the train. Amtrak claims that you can get service along most lines, which makes sense because they kind of parallel major highways, at least close enough to get service. I never had trouble getting service anywhere along the line, and unlike planes you are not made to turn off your phone ever. Secondly, if you get games for your phone, you can play those on your phone too, as you will probably have some time on your hands.

Time
A lot of people don't take the train because they are concerned how long it takes to get there. This is definitely one of those journey-not-the-destination situations. Even though it was 6-7 hours each direction, we all felt that it wasn't long enough and want to do it again. It's not just 6 hours chained to a seat, you can walk around the cabin, eat, play board games, and so on, and no one has to drive. They'll even rent you a media device if you want. If you've never done it before, I highly recommend it.

Security
Overall, a train is fairly secure just by itself. It is rare anymore that someone will ride down a train on horseback and loot the vault. It would be hard to hijack a train to make it go somewhere else, too. We purchased tickets online, then showed our ID at the train station and got tickets. The conductor showed us to our rooms without eve looking at our tickets; he already knew which rooms were booked. We stowed our luggage downstairs from the room on a luggage rack, and had the run of the place after that. We could still get to our luggage during the trip. I think it will be obvious to frequent fliers how much less of a hassle all this was.