Comic-strip anachronisms

Henry, who lives in a world in which children shoot marbles and dress like Buster Brown, is about to learn the Twist.

And in Beetle Bailey’s world, electric razors still work the old-fashioned way.


[Beetle Bailey, June 5, 2010.]

Related posts
Betty Boop with Henry
Today’s Beetle Bailey

Mozy :(

I’ve long been an enthusiastic user of the online backup service Mozy. I’ve recommended Mozy to family and friends, and I’ve offered my referral code — get your free megabytes! — to interested readers. In 2008, I wrote a post that told two tales of tech support, contrasting dismal Technorati (since grown only more dismal) and smart, speedy Mozy.

But now Mozy seems to be a mess. A server problem has made it impossible for many users to back up their data — which, after all, is the whole point. I’m on the tenth day without backup. The company now says it has “a fix” and that all users should soon find Mozy working. I hope so. But these two threads from Mozy’s “community” pages suggest a company that’s largely indifferent to the concerns and frustrations of its customers. Moreover, I’ve discovered that I now have no way to e-mail Mozy to report a problem. Here’s what the website says about Mozy’s “My Cases” option: “This tab is not shown to everybody. If you can see this tab, you can click on it and see all of your open Support Tickets.” What’s left unsaid here is that only paying customers can open tickets. As a user of Mozy’s free service (that’s all I need), I’m stuck with the “community.” In other words: discuss among yourselves. Users who have opened tickets report general disappointment anyway.

Worse still: Mozy’s front page and blog make no mention of a general problem or an effort to solve it. The most recent post, from May 18, is about a Twitter contest. Sheesh.

Word up, Mozy: when one has a problem backing up, one immediately assumes that there’s something wrong with one’s computer or connection. If the problem is on your end, and you know that, let your users know and save them some trouble. If you would prefer not to announce the problem on your site, an e-mail would suffice: “Many users are currently experiencing problems,” &c.

If, reader, you’ve read this far, you can guess what the final sentence of this post is about to say: I can no longer recommend Mozy.

[June 6, 2010: As I learned last night, long-time users of Mozy’s free service can open Support Tickets. The trick is to log in here, not here, and then go the Support page. The story continues, and I hope to be able to recommend Mozy again.]

[June 9, 2010: It’s now fifteen days with no backup.]

[June 11, 2010: Happy ending.]

Decaf-tea taste-tests

Elaine and I traveled to our test-kitchens yesterday afternoon to sample and score the six decaffeinated black teas we have on hand. We prepared all teas in the same way: five minutes steeping before removing the bag, then another five minutes to cool. All tasting was as blind as we could make it: after putting numbered Post-it Notes on cups and writing names and numbers on index cards, we soon lost track of which cup held which tea. Elaine used a cup of non-decaffeinated PG Tips in her judging. We tasted, made notes, and ranked each tea. No peeking. When we compared notes, we were surprised by the ways in which our tastes diverged and converged. Here are the overall results, from least favored to most favored:

6: Red Rose. Elaine doesn’t like regular Red Rose, so her low mark here is no surprise. I’ve always liked regular Red Rose and found something to like in the decaffeinated version. Elaine ranked this tea last. I had it in third place.

5, 4: A tie between Twinings English Breakfast and Twinings Irish Breakfast. We were in agreement that these teas were undistinguished. To our tastes, Twinings decaf teas have very little of the flavor that makes regular Twinings teas so pleasurable. Elaine ranked these teas third (Irish) and fourth (English). I ranked them fourth (English) and fifth (Irish). I was surprised to find myself preferring English Breakfast to Irish Breakfast.

3, 2: A tie between Lipton and Trader Joe’s Irish Breakfast. Here our tastes were at odds. Lipton was Elaine’s most favored tea. She found in it “a bit of an edge” and “tea aftertaste, or finish, if you will.” (Yes, she was kidding around.) I on the other hand had Lipton dead last. “Tastes like hot water,” I wrote. We diverged a little less dramatically on Trader Joe’s: Elaine had it in fifth place; I had it in second. What struck Elaine’s taste buds as “pale” and “weak” struck mine as somewhat hearty. Then again, I didn’t have a cup of PG Tips for comparison.

1: Tetley British Blend. The surprise champ: Elaine had it in second place; I had it in first. “Deeper — more minty, but no finish,” said Elaine. “More tannins, aroma, more flavor, much better,” said I. I suspect that removing caffeine from tea leaves removes some of the tannins that give tea its pleasantly astringent quality. The Tetley package notes that British Blend tea bags contain more tea (2.5 g) than “standard” tea bags (2.0 g): perhaps that accounts for Tetley’s stronger flavor.

Nothing fancy here: aside from Trader Joe’s Irish Breakfast, these teas may all be had in most American supermarkets. As I do more hunting and gathering, I’ll share more taste-test results.

While writing this post, I remembered listening to a story on NPR about tea-auctions and tea-tastings in Kenya. You might want to listen.

A related post
Caffeine-free

Stephen Colbert, Vampire Weekend, and the Oxford comma

Stephen Colbert and Vampire Weekend debate the Oxford comma. With a special guest appearance by The Elements of Style.

Related posts
How to punctuate a sentence (Includes the Oxford comma)
How to punctuate more sentences

Mug shot

[Pantone orange mug. Photograph by Michael Leddy.]

Coming soon, decaf-tea taste-tests. Stay tuned. Stay hyphenated.

Other posts with orange
Crate art, orange : Orange art, no crate : Orange crate art : Orange crate art (Encyclopedia Brown) : Orange flag art : Orange notebook art : Orange soda art : Orange timer art : Orange toothbrush art : Orange train art

Review: The Checklist Manifesto

Atul Gawande. The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right. New York. Metropolitan Books. 2009. $24.50.

This book’s argument can be stated in six words: In complex situations, checklists prevent mistakes.

Or to raise the stakes: In complex situations, checklists save lives.

Gawande (MacArthur Fellow, surgeon, med school professor) tells stories from the worlds of aviation, construction, and medicine that make these points. Alas, The Checklist Manifesto offers little evidence of how checklists are designed and improved, of how they are made useful and more useful — in short, of what they look like. There’s not a single photograph, not a single list. I wouldn’t expect Gawande to be Edward Tufte, but the subject seems to call for at least a modest array of sample documents. (And now I’m thinking about what Tufte could do with this subject matter.)

For a reader outside medicine, the value of The Checklist Manifesto might be loosely inspirational, prompting thought about what practices in life and work might be improved with the use of a checklist. Worth reading, but best borrowed from a library. (That’s how I read it, following the advice in this note to self.) Or just read Gawande’s New Yorker piece “The Checklist.”

Related posts
Blue crayon (Checklist for an imaginary camping trip)
Whose list? (A found checklist)

The iPad and dolphins (for real)

[June 3, 2010: This story is now everywhere. I’m thrilled to have been the guy who got the story out, by following up on the comment that Jack Kassewitz left on my post about the Onion story.]

Back in March, in the pages of The Onion, Beepo the Dolphin wondered whether the iPad and other tablet devices owned up to the hype. Now a May 23, 2010 press release from Jack Kassewitz at SpeakDolphin describes a non-fictional dolphin, Merlin, using — really using — the iPad:

Last week, a young bottlenose dolphin named Merlin became the first of his species to join the growing number of enthusiasts using the Apple iPad. Dolphin research scientist, Jack Kassewitz of SpeakDolphin.com, introduced the iPad to the dolphin in early steps towards building a language interface.

“The use of the iPad is part of our continuing search to find a suitable touch screen technology which the dolphins can activate with the tip of their rostrums or beaks. After extensive searching and product review, it looks like our choice is between the Panasonic Toughbook and the Apple iPad,” Kassewitz explained. “We think that once the dolphins get the hang of the touch screen, we can let them choose from a wide assortment of symbols to represent objects, actions and even emotions.”

Kassewitz explained the requirements of the technology. “Waterproofing, processor speed, touch-sensitivity, anti-glare screens, and dolphin-friendly programs are essential. As this database of dolphin symbols grows — we’ll need fast technology to help us respond appropriately and quickly to the dolphins.”

The research was being conducted at Dolphin Discovery’s dolphin swim facility in Puerto Aventuras, Mexico, along the picturesque coast now referred to as the Riviera Maya. The dolphin, Merlin, is a juvenile, born at the facility only two years ago. “Merlin is quite curious, like most dolphins, and he showed complete willingness to examine the iPad,” said Kassewitz.

For now, the researchers are getting Merlin used to the touch screen by showing him real objects, such as a ball, cube or plastic duck, then asking the dolphin to touch photos of those same objects on the screen. “This is an easy task for a dolphin, but it is a necessary building block towards our goal of a complete language interface between humans and dolphins,” Kassewitz said.



[Merlin, iPad 3G, and Jack Kassewitz in Mexico. JK notes that when this photograph was taken, the iPad was not yet available in Mexico. It was thus an object of human as well as dolphin curiosity. Thanks to Jack Kassewitz, who sent me the press release after seeing my post about the Onion spoof.]

The dash

Marie Murray considers the dash:

Taking time out to consider the dash is therapeutic. It is an indulgence that is available and free. For the dash is a positive signal. It is going somewhere — a mark on the move — not something that arrests development of the sentence, but something that elaborates and expands, deviates and delights, in one stroke.

Read more:

When times are tough, we need to dash (Irish Times)

Overheard

“And Chris is gonna be unemployed, which is gonna be awesome!”

[In the words of Peter Wheatstraw in Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man (1952), “You kinda young, daddy-o.”]

Related reading
All “Overheard” posts

Memorial Day

One hundred years ago. From “Taft Coming Here for Memorial Day; Parade of Regulars, Guardsmen and War Veterans Will Pass in Review Before Him,” New York Times, May 29, 1910.