Originally published at . You can comment here or there.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2499b/if_it_aint_broke_dont_fix_it_ancient_computers_in_use_today.html

Garry Ward, an old pal, used to make a living at keeping antique mainframe-ish things going; I gasped that they’d *do* that and not get something newer and better, but…he was also the guy who was my introduction into PCs back around 1982; when I was going to law school, my utter lack of speed typing skills choked me when it came to preparing one brief or long report after another, and he did so for a fee…and I was utterly hooked on this thing called a Word Processor, and not having to do all sorts of retyping and hope it all came out error-free.  Not long after, with money from my first wedding, my then-wife and I bought an Osborne 1 CP/M PC, and not long after, a Kaypro 10.  Since then (1983) I have been essentially made my career by being good with PCs, switching from CP/M to DOS to Windows in 1991.

Originally published at . You can comment here or there.

http://digital.udayton.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/yrbooks/id/1370/show/1289/rec/12

Every so great often, I do a search for people that I’m curious about, 99.99% of them being people from my past.  This includes my mom, whose name (Dr. Jacquelinn A Randolph VMD) shows up in this and that from time to time.  The link above is to the University of Dayton 1947 yearbook, showing my very musical mother in a musical student play…which (even though they made a common error on how her name is spelled) is hilarious to me, because she never said a word to me about acting; I had the notion that she was a total grind in school.  I’ve done all sort of acting, but it was in high school – the college thespians were in it for a career, and were not interested in a non-theater major’s participation, so I gave it up way back when.

Originally published at . You can comment here or there.

Meredith showed me a neat trick for my iPhone and iPad, which shows all of the programs that remain loaded and sucking up battery juice on my devices.  HUGE list.  It also allows you to shut the things off – which I promptly did on both.

Originally published at . You can comment here or there.

From TV Line:

**Stephen Fry will play sidekick to fellow Brit Rupert Grint in Super Clyde, CBS’ single-camera comedy about a fast food worker who decides to become a super hero. Specifically, Fry will play a butler who is “the Alfred to Clyde’s Bruce Wayne.”**

This will either be fantastically good or god-awful; it’s weird on a stick, for sure!

This is about what I had figured.

Interesting article in The Diplomat about the inability of the Congress Party of India to give up the idea of (wait-for-it) a decendant of Jawaharlal Nehru / Indira Gandhi to come along and be the Chosen-One Golden-Child to lead them.

Never mind that they don’t seem to avoid sudden violent death at an early age, or that they have to be dragged into being a political figure due to who their grandma was.

In the weird and goofy world of South Asian politics, dynastic followings seem to trump actual political ability a lot, which is silly.

I thought it was silly here in America with Tafts, Browns (c.f. Ohio politics), Kennedys, Bushes and whatnot, because regardless of connections, real political ability is vanishingly rare.

That, of course, goes as well for Monarchies and ruthless dictatorships that dance around with ‘democratic / republican’ trappings like North Korea, Syria, Duvalierist Haiti, und so weiter. (Only my Canadian friends can say if Justin Trudeau is any real bargain, or if the Liberals are just as desperate as they were last election to pull something or someone out of a leadership hat.)

Originally published at . You can comment here or there.

Actually, doing relatively well, all things considered.  The Hyperbaric Oxygen treatments I’ve been taking since right after Thanksgiving ended three weeks ago, and it’s marvelous to not have to trot over there every weekday and kill 3-4 hours of my day with that.  The result is a tiny slit less than 1 millimeter in size; I can now take showers and wash my foot for the first time in a while.  But the treatments worked pretty well, and I should show how big things were and how small they are now.

Also in a new brace-shoe for my chopped up left foot that looks like it was designed by the house of Munster, but it works and it supports my foot well, so no complaints.

The residual myopia (nearsightedness) and tired-drowsy side effects of the treatment are supposed to go away within 2 months, but it can’t come fast enough for me.  My vision is slowly coming back – for a while I couldn’t see a PC monitor or drive a car.  The former is still a problem and the latter works better IF it’s a non-busy street and full daytime.

This has also screwed up my work, because it’s difficult to see my work laptop, and I have a note from the doctor to my boss about it, so I’m off for a bit more time with that.

Meredith and Susan seem to be out of the house all the time on training, errands, you name it, and that got old with my driving kiboshed,

Also got unhooked from my IV machine on Monday, and that means I’m free of worrying about water getting into bandages.   Very nice.

Originally published at . You can comment here or there.

I wouldn’t kick Sazerac 6 or Rittenhouse out of bed for eating crackers, though.
–Rachel Maddow in her Reddit Ask-Me-Anything session this week

Why, thank you, Rachel!