Who is John Galt?(And would he beokay if I resold this book?) I’ve been in the Amazon Associates program for several years. It’s a no-brainer: sign up, and if someone buys books you happen to mention, you get a small credit towards a future purchase. Linking books and other products has always been about showing […]
Associates and Adsense Read More »
Beware of the Venus Cowtrap! While I was buying an electric trimmer a couple of weeks ago, Meryl, my oldest, bumped into the Venus Flytrap display. She was excited at the prospect of owning a flesh-eating plant. Who wouldn’t be? The pictures of the plants focus on the outerworldly, clamshell-like leaves that snap shut on
Death of a Venus Flytrap Read More »
While reading Fran’s fitness blog, I started to think about why counting calories doesn’t work as well as it should. Even with a diet diary, tracking calories, carbohydrates, fats, and fibre is not as scientific as it should be. One problem is the serving sizes on the label don’t necessarily correspond to what we actually
Why You Won’t Lose 95lbs by September Read More »
The July 12th New York Times wrote about book publishers concerned that online, used book sales are cannibalizing new book sales. There were a few points made that I’d like to argue about because, you know, that’s what I feel like doing. “Used books are to consumer books as Napster was to the music industry,”
Used book sales != Napster Read More »
Ryobi Trimmer I am finally rid of my Ryobi 720R trimmer. For nine years I’ve owned this pathetic excuse of a lawn maintenance tool. I didn’t think asking for occasional lawn edging and trimming was too much to expect, but it was always hard to get started. When it finally did acquiesce, it’s 2-cycle engine
Ding dong, the trimmer is dead Read More »
I had originally written this piece because I wanted to vent about why I won’t donate to my undergraduate institution. It’s an okay rant, as far as rants go, but I find it serves as an excellent example of how corporate goodwill can be successfully sabotaged by a bad customer experience. There are really two
Bad customer service goes a long way Read More »
I’m playing with Dragon NaturallySpeaking again because I want a more efficient means of getting ideas into a more permanent form. When I get excited, I can talk about 5x faster than I type, and I can type 10x faster than I can handwrite. Handwriting doesn’t work very well, especially on a blog (though it
Voice recognition software Read More »
What is the game of “Chicken?” In the movies, two hooligans with something to prove settle their differences by racing their cars towards each other. The first one to turn away, averting certain collision, is the “chicken” and loses face among his cohorts. The other player, referred to as the “winner,” gets bragging rights and