Posted inHome life Web/Tech

Yes, the new Apple Maps sucks. It led me astray.

I'm glad I still have Navigon on my iPhone 5, because I can't trust Apple Maps after what happened yesterday.  I've been playing around with Apple Maps since I got my new iPhone last Friday. Some reviewers have called it the worst Apple product ever. Don't know if I'd go that far, since when it works, Apple Maps handles turn by turn directions well. But when it doesn't... you're not going to get to where you want to go. Fortunately, I knew where Silver Falls Dermatology is in south Salem. I had a 1:45 pm appointment for a check-up and…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Election seems to be slipping away from Romney

As of today... Gallup says Obama's job approval is 51% positive, 43% negative. Gallup says Obama is favored over Romney among registered voters by 50% to 44%. Five Thirty Eight says Obama has an 82% chance of winning the presidency, Romney 18%. Obama doesn't have a lock on the election. Romney could make a comeback. It's just increasingly difficult to see what could markedly change in Romney's favor between now and November. The debates? Good luck with that, Romney and Ryan. Obama and Biden are much more likely to extend their lead after the first few debates, in my decidedly optimistic progressive…
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Posted inSustainability

Killing fewer cougars means less livestock losses. Surprising but true.

There goes another cougar management myth, the mistaken notion that the more cougars are killed, the fewer livestock are lost, and fewer encounters between cougars and humans occur.  A study conducted by Washington State University's Large Carnivore Conservation Lab brought some welcome facts to counter the often-hysterical kill them! cries from fearful ranchers and homeowners (who frequently mistake a large kitty cat for a cougar). Here's some quotes from a press release about the study. Overharvest of cougars can increase negative encounters between the predator and humans, livestock and game, according to a 13-year Washington State University research project. Based on this,…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Good reasons to support Measure 80, Oregon marijuana legalization

If you're an Oregonian who is unsure about how to vote on Measure 80, which would regulate, tax, and manage marijuana sales/use for adults 21 and over in our state, have a listen to this segment of OPB's "Think Out Loud." (click on the MP3 file link below)  Oregon Marijuana Legalization Yesterday Roy Kaufmann (spokesman for Measure 80) and John Trumbo (Umatilla County Sheriff) had an intelligent, respectful, thoughtful discussion about marijuana legalization. Kudos also to the moderator, Dave Miller. Great job educating the public by all three, plus those who phoned in with cogent comments. I support Measure 80.…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Marijuana tourism coming to Washington state?

There's a good chance Washington state will legalize the sale and use of marijuana this November. A few weeks ago a poll showed Initiative I-502 with 57% "yes" and 34% "no" among likely voters. Measure 80 here in Oregon looks less likely to pass.  It takes a more liberal approach to marijuana legalization, which seems to be one reason large donors haven't chipped in money to support the measure as they have in Washington and Colorado. This November, voters in Oregon and Washington will decide whether to legalize marijuana. The Washington effort is backed by some deep-pocketed national donors. But…
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Posted inHome life Web/Tech

After some awkwardness, iPhone 5 and me become friends

Being a long-time user of Apple'ish things (iPods, MacBooks, iPhones), I have reasonable expectations of a new product: It will work perfectly and make me ecstatically happy!  Most of the time this happens, more or less. Getting my iPhone 5 order via FedEx yesterday and firing up this long-awaited replacement for my iPhone 4 was right in line with previous Apple experience. After a few glitches, bliss. What threw me off at first was iTunes, which strikes me as disturbingly un-Apple. iTunes looks and acts like something a Microsoft programmer would produce. Functional, yet rather difficult to use and understand.…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Romney gets a “pants on fire” for his redistribution lie

Mitt Romney's chance of being elected president is steadily declining. Couldn't happen to a more deserving guy. Not only do Romney's policies make no sense (insofar as they've been explained), but he's a habitual shader of the truth. More bluntly put, a liar. So says PolitiFact about his newest falsehood: a claim that "redistribution" has "never been a characteristic of America." That lie gets him a Pants on Fire ruling. We wondered whether Romney was correct to say that "redistribution" has "never been a characteristic of America." So we checked with historians and economists. Most agreed that Romney was ignoring the…
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Posted inHome life

Global warming makes me buy “snow tires”

I'm not kidding, despite the title of this blog post. This year I really am strongly leaning toward getting snow tires for my 2011 Mini Cooper S, and part of the reason is global warming.  Yes, the world is getting warmer. But this doesn't mean that winter weather everywhere is going to be milder. Actually, it's going to be weirder.  Does it seem as though your weather has become increasingly “stuck” lately? Day after day of cold, rain, heat, or blue skies may not be a figment of your imagination. While various oceanic and atmospheric patterns such as El Niño,…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Romney video reveals his heartlessness

For a supposedly religious guy, Mitt Romney is remarkably uncaring and uncompassionate. This has been evident throughout his public campaigning, but it became super obvious when remarks to a bunch of rich donors he thought would be private popped up on You Tube.   This is the heart of Romney's heartlessness: There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who…
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Posted inSkateboarding

Senior citizen skateboarding: I get a Kahuna Big Stick. Love it!

Have you thought about longboarding (riding on a longer, more stable skateboard suitable for geezers like me), but are turned off by the difficulty of balancing on one foot while you push the damn thing to get it going, and then to stop it? Turn off that turned off. This senior citizen longboarder has found the solution to your worry. And also mine, because after starting longboarding I realized that pushing and stopping were what I enjoyed the least.  Until the Kahuna Big Stick entered my life. It basically makes longboarding on land a lot like stand up paddling on…
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Posted inHome life Web/Tech

I’m one of the first to order the iPhone 5. Am I gloating?

Night owls that we are, my wife and I were watching a recorded The Daily Show episode as midnight approached yesterday. Her attention was on the TV. Mine was on my watch, as I waited for the hour to strike twelve, when preorders for the iPhone 5 were scheduled to begin. I'd already decided that Verizon would replace AT&T, now that our two-year iPhone 4 contract had expired. The remaining challenge was to get my ordering underway as soon as possible given the obvious pent-up demand for an updated iPhone with a new digit after its name. The iPhone 4S…
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Posted inWeb/Tech

Goodbye AT&T. Hello Verizon and my new iPhone 5.

Since I have an ancient iPhone 4 (a hundred years old in smartphone years), and my two-year AT&T contract is up, I knew that I'd be getting an iPhone 5 once it was released. Which it was, today! I watched the unveiling via Engadget's liveblog. The main info I was waiting for: when an iPhone 5 could be ordered. This coming Friday, September 14, apparently. I've been going back and forth about whether to stick with AT&T or jump to Verizon. We have shitty AT&T reception at our house, but last year AT&T sent me a free 3G Microcell device that…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Romney lies about Obama’s Libya response. Unfit to be president.

If there ever was any doubt that Mitt Romney is unfit to lead this nation, his ham-handed, lying, insensitive attempt to discredit Obama's response to the attacks on our consulates in Libya and Egypt proves it.  The gunfire at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, had barely ceased when Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney seriously mischaracterized what had happened in a statement accusing President Barack Obama of "disgraceful" handling of violence there and at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo. "The Obama administration's first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Romney misleads about his pre-existing conditions policy

Another day, another Mitt Romney falsehood. It turns out that, contrary to what he said on yesterday's Meet the Press interview, Romney doesn't want to preserve the Obamacare prohibition on denying people health insurance coverage for pre-existing conditions.  This is what Romney said: “Well, I’m not getting rid of all of health care reform,” Romney said on NBC’s  ”Meet the Press.”  ”Of course, there are a number of things that I like in health care reform that I’m going to put in place.  One is to make sure that those with pre-existing conditions can get coverage.  But this isn't true. His campaign staff…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Sustainability

Romney doubles down on wrecking the environment

Mitt Romney had an opportunity to reverse course on a crazy policy position: let the Earth get sicker and allow the oceans to keep rising (from global warming).  But yesterday he repeated his mocking of Obama's goal to do the opposite: heal the planet and slow the oceans' rise. Environmental activists condemned Romney's remarks on "Meet the Press." Climate scientist Michael Mann, author of "The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars," wrote in an e-mail to The Huffington Post, "It is disconcerting that a major party presidential candidate would show such wanton disregard for the health of our environment. Mr. Romney…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

GM doesn’t lose $49,000 on each Chevy Volt

Falsehoods about the Chevy Volt just keep on coming. Earlier this year Fox News and Charles Krauthamer lied about non-existent fires in Volts. Now renewable energy haters, global warming deniers, and the anti-Obama crowd are crowing about a Reuters story that claims GM loses as much as $49,000 on each Chevy Volt it builds. Problem is, this isn't true. Reuters admits that it divided the billion dollars or so in development costs by the number of Volts sold through August. That's crazy. After someone sent me an email about this supposedly shocking news, I replied to him with: Somebody makes…
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Posted inHealth

To lose weight, eat enough to keep your willpower strong

Willpower, I read in a January 2012 New Scientist article by psychologist Roy Baumeister ("Weak will comes from tired mental muscles"), is more like a muscle than an ethical attribute.  So rather than seeing willpower as a moral quality, the scientific view is that it is like a muscle that tires. After you exert self-control, you have less willpower so you are less able to resist a new demand. Self-control is only temporarily weakened and can recharge after a rest. Willpower resembles a muscle also in that it can be strengthened by exercise. Thus just as muscles need rejuvenation after…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Obama generated a post-convention bounce… in my mood

Oh, yeah, my progressive psyche is feeling much better now -- after watching the Republicans stumble through their convention while the Democrats soared in theirs.  Beforehand I'd worried that the G.O.P. could pull off a miracle: make Romney-Ryan appear both likable and sensible. Didn't happen. On Friday, a day after the Dem convention closed, a poll was released showing Obama crushing Romney on likability. Asked who was the more likable candidate, 52 percent of registered voters surveyed favored Obama compared to 29 percent for Romney. Among independents, Obama enjoyed a likability advantage of 50 percent to 22 percent for Romney. Obama…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Neuroscience agrees with Obama: “You didn’t build that”

This won't change many (if any) Republican minds, because mistrust of science has become a foundational G.O.P. position. Facts, after all, are inconvenient when unsupported assertions are the central presidential campaign strategy. Nonetheless, here's a passage that I came across this morning in Iain McGilchrist's fascinating book, "The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World." McGilchrist is a psychiatrist, philosopher, and expert in how the human brain functions. Here he alludes to the impossibility of any man or woman being an island sufficient to him/herself. Or of building anything unaided, including a business. "You…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Sustainability

Romney wants our planet to get sicker and oceans to rise

There are countless reasons to vote for Barack Obama rather than Mitt Romney this November. Here's one of the great reasons: Romney wants our planet to get sicker and for the world's oceans to rise -- inundating highly populated areas, including Florida.  That's insane, but it's what he said when he mocked President Obama: President Obama promised to slow the rise of the oceans and to heal the planet. My promise is to help you and your family. How anybody could be for a diseased planet and coastal flooding is beyond me. Also, beyond Stephen Colbert, who had a great…
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