Heinlein Readers Discussion Group Saturday 07-26-2003 05:00 P.M. EDT Heinlein’s Non-Fiction

Heinlein Readers Discussion Group

Saturday 07-26-2003 05:00 P.M. EDT

Heinlein’s Non-Fiction

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Here Begin The Postings

From: Howard Berkowitz

Subject: Re: REMINDER: RAH-AIM Readers Group chat meeting–“Heinlein’s Non-Fiction”

Date: Saturday, July 26, 2003 9:08 AM

In article , “bookman”

wrote:

> “Jackie” wrote in message
> news:bfsu7r$it7bf$
>
> > Why should they spend the money on *useful* stuff? How dare you expect them
> > to spend more money on discipline and academics? It would take away from…
> > sports! After all, a better football field is just so much more useful than
> > teachers. And there’s certainly no need for enough textbooks, when your
> > school can spend all its money on a football field for one of the worst
> > teams in the state.
>
> And what about the “Arts”? there are those that advocate
> continued spending there, too. But is learning to draw or
> do scales inherently superior to learning to run a Draw or
> do an Escape? if so, why? Is it better to play an instrument
> than to play a sport?

Both in sports and academics, I first point out one size does not fit all. I love music, but I can’t play to any extent. I am, however, competent in drama and various visual arts. Visual limitations affect my playing any sport that requires depth perception on a ball, but I can run and wrestle. Any programs need diversity, and not to force failure on someone that doesn’t have a particular talent.

As a member of the real-world high-tech force, I found my dramatics courses to be immensely valuable throughout life. I found fine arts (but not musical) a good mental outlet, and it sometimes is of practical value to be able to do a freehand sketch.

You’ve hit a key word when you describe “Physical Education.” Is it about playing a sport (emphasizing the athletically talented) or is it about general physical fitness and healthy lifestyle? I went to several schools through grades 8-12, and there were only two years where physical fitness was stressed. In the others, a ball appropriate to the season was tossed to teams and they were told to go play (without instruction), while the gym teacher hung out with the varsity.

In later life, the fitness taught lessons, some of which I am only now realizing I learned. As far as sports, I can’t really remember anything useful. Now, I did have visual problems, but I never could hit a baseball and was routinely ridiculed for that. Could a competent teacher have diagnosed my problem and taught me to hit? I don’t know — but I never had the opportunity to find out. As part of the fitness-oriented programs, however, concentrating on fundamentals got me to a more-or-less JV level in medium- and long-distance running.

>
> I rather suspect than one of the reasons our daughter is
> considered to be one of the “brighter” students in her class
> is that we encouraged her reading and enunciation.
>
> Sure, schools have problems today. But in my profession,
> correctly identifying the problem is more than 3/4 of the job.
> And even there, the average customer is happier paying
> $500.00 for a component, than $500 for my expertise.

Agreed. I’ve found it amazing that the market for network design books has largely dried up, in preference to certification cram and “cookbooks”. Some people brush this off saying the old components and technologies are now commodities, but they forget that new technologies (and threats) constantly enter the field. Good designs are extensible and robust.

>
> The social dynamics of the current system/society do not
> compare to the “golden age” of education’s, any more than
> the schools do.
>
> But that is a much more difficult discussion.
>
> Regards,
>
> Rusty the bookman
>
>

From: Howard Berkowitz

Subject: Re: REMINDER: RAH-AIM Readers Group chat meeting–“Heinlein’s Non-Fiction”

Date: Saturday, July 26, 2003 9:12 AM

In article , “David
M. Silver” wrote:

> Didn’t say anything about the football field, Jackie. Daughter’s school
> was still playing football on the same lousey field my school’s team
> (which played on an even lousier one) used to visit to stomp the snot
> out of them on, once every fall. That was one of the makeweight excuses
> I didn’t hear that evening. You don’t think the “modern and progressive”
> set in graduate education supports wasting money on frills such as
> athletics where someone might have to teach or learn a little control or
> self-discipline, do you?

As long as physical self-discipline and control are generally available to students, as an educational experience, fine. If the bulk of resources go into extramural competitive sports, not fine.

At a very academic high school, my football team distinguished itself in such things as most safeties scored per season. There was an early initiative to coed footballs, because there was a widespread belief that many of the cheerleaders were better natural athletes than the football players.

OTOH, the school routinely won its division in basketball, with an ex-NBA coach. Unfortunately, he had only ridicule for people who weren’t on basketball teams.

From: David M. Silver

Subject: Re: REMINDER: RAH-AIM Readers Group chat meeting–“Heinlein’s Non-Fiction”

Date: Saturday, July 26, 2003 4:48 PM

In article ,
Howard Berkowitz wrote:

> In article , “David
> M. Silver” wrote:
>
>
> > Didn’t say anything about the football field, Jackie. Daughter’s school
> > was still playing football on the same lousy field my school’s team
> > (which played on an even lousier one) used to visit to stomp the snot
> > out of them on, once every fall. That was one of the makeweight excuses
> > I didn’t hear that evening. You don’t think the “modern and progressive”
> > set in graduate education supports wasting money on frills such as
> > athletics where someone might have to teach or learn a little control or
> > self-discipline, do you?
>
>
> As long as physical self-discipline and control are generally available
> to students, as an educational experience, fine.

In California, when I was in junior and senior high in the 1950s, a mandatory one-period daily physcial education class was required of all students, save those actually too physically disabled to benefit — and I can’t remember what or whether they did something else under the supervision of the full-time registered nurse we had in all schools — they probably did. If you participated in extramural competitive sports, you took the PE class the last period of the day (seventh) and were assigned to a PE class under the coach or coaches in the sport you played. If you got kicked off the team, you went to a regular PE class.

I don’t think the daily one-hour mandatory PE class exists anymore, but I could be wrong.

I played extramural football and for conditioning took track off season — never lettered in track, legs too short for hurdles, and too slow after the first thirty yards or so in track for sprints and, as the mile was then the longest distance high school athletes were allowed to run, a bit shorter than where my endurance would make a difference, my abilities never would allow me to score the points necessary for a track letter. I got one third in Bee low hurdles one year — practically everyone else in the race blew out, lost their steps, fell down and I just kept hitting my seven steps as I went by the mess, but that wasn’t enough.

So, by my senior year I simply took a regular PE class to fill in the last [spring] semester of high school. The PE classes were a rounded intermural series of activity in all the usual playground sports (softball, volleyball, touch football, outside “handball” using inflated rubber balls), plus a few repetitions of simple warm up exercises, they still threw medicine balls around and juggled those pins, back in that stone age, rounded off by jogging a quarter mile at the beginning of each class, plus the normal advice you’d expect a coach to impart about health, proper warming up, posture, safety, heat or sunstroke, etc., and self-discipline and control in competitive activities was taught [and I observed it was needed by some and taught to — or perhaps in some cases: speedily imposed upon those who needed it]. No squash, racketball, court handball, etc. was available as facilities for those activities were few and far between in the area I lived. Sports such as lacrosse and soccer were virtually unplayed and unknown in that part of the country at the time. A passing introdution of such activities as golf or bowling or tennis was included — we’d watch an introductional movie, swing a racket and hit balls at a backstop, pick up a bowling ball to learn a proper placement of the thumb and fingers in the holes, swing a driver, an iron, and a putter, pile into buses and visit the local lanes and pitch-and-putt for what could be done in a fifty-five minute class session. Not much.

There’d be a graded physical test, or series of tests, certain exercises, run a quarter mile against a clock, etc., during the semester, at the beginning of the semester and a couple or three times thereafter. [Not exactly the armed forces PT qualifications series, but close enough in a minor way for the coaches to try to remedy gross inabilities and weaknesses by programmed individual exercises during the rest of the semester’s classes.]

Something similar went on over in the girls’ gym classes, including archery, some of the old rhythmic (ribbon, ball) gymnastics, dancing, a drill team, and so on. They played varieties of volleyball, softball, and basketball as well. There was no extramural competitions for girls at the time that I know of. 1950s. Heh. Biggest problem for some girls, and a few boys, was getting them to understand they had to buy and bring their gym uniforms to school and wear them, and take a shower after class. Demerits and conferences with some parents took care of that. Unless you had a physician certify you couldn’t physically take PE, and ought to be in a wheelchair instead, you took it.

The school had no swimming pool, nor tennis courts (nor baseball or regular softball fields — before seventh period and off season some movable backstops were set up on the “practice” and football field); but public facilities nearby in Griffith Park were used, by busing which cut down on class time. The “practice” field was a little square with a steep hill on the edge of it — not even large enough for a regulation softball field, and a YMCA-YWCA building used after school on the back edge, that was used by one of the football teams to work on blocking, tackling and running, and “short” passes, while the other ‘practiced’ on the regular game field — which never had much grass except at the beginning of the fall. Smallest high school in Los Angeles, shoehorned into a residential and very hilly neighborhood. Today, the NIMBYs wouldn’t let it be built. Pretty place though. You’ve seen it on TVs “Room 222” if you’re old enough to remember that one in which Richard Chamberlain played a teacher, and in parts of the original “Grease.”

> If the bulk of
> resources go into extramural competitive sports, not fine.
>

Resources: there were about eight full-time PE teachers. Six of the seven classes they taught were regular PE classes for the five men, and except for the head female coach, who ‘coached’ the drill team and cheerleaders her seventh class, all three women PE coaches taught seven regular classes.

Uniforms and equipment for the extramural athletic teams were purchased out of a budget — a very small budget. In 1957, my sophomore year, the Bee football team was still wearing old leather helmets, which were slowly replaced by about a dozen plastic suspension helmets each new season, you played first or second string, you got a plastic helmet — hand-me-down uniforms from varsity and god knows where. You wanted a face mask, you bought your own, put it on in woodshop during a recess if the intructor would let you use the tools, and left it on the helmet when you graduated. I think the fifth string was wearing plastic helmets when I graduated. You bought your own shoes, replaced your own cleats, bought your cup, etc. They provided mouthpieces. New ones each year. Our Bee coach used to show up with a set of old worn UCLA game jerseys at the beginning of each year he scrounged from the equipment managers at that university. We could use them because the UCLA powder blue was one of our school colors. They were moth ridden wool, worn. I once had an opposing tackle try to block me in a game and left all the jersey behind in his hands when I moved by to put the runner in bye-bye land. We had to use a time out before the next play to find me another jersey to wear. I wound up wearing a quarterback’s number at linebacker and offensive guard the rest of the game. The referees didn’t mind. We hadn’t adopted the “rules-are-rules” mindset back then. You took your uniform home each weekend for your mother, or you, to wash. She looked at the grass and other unidentiable stains and said, “Scrub brush and cleanser if they need it,” and handed it back to me. “Cold water, David. Bleach those white trousers. Lots of bleach.” Occasionally someone ran his wool jersey through on hot water, and looked stupid when he brought it back the next Monday, size “teeny.” Maybe ten new sets of shoulder pads, hip pads, etc. each year as well. The stuff both varsity and Bees used was ancient. When I cracked a couple ribs senior year, coach went out and bought specially, outside his budget, rib pads for me to wear — I hope that money came out of the school budget, not his pocket. Some schools, we heard, had parents’ clubs who supplemented their equipment budget — we didn’t, although for all I know, Winfield was shaking down who knows — lot of guys had played for him in years gone by — there were about eight hundred of us at his funeral ten years later.

Generally, the stuff we used was at about the same level as that used by other schools: those rich kids up in Verdugo Hills and Eagle Rock had newer stuff, but their schools were newer — less time for it to get really worn. The stuff the Eastern League teams, Wilson, Roosevelt, Garfield, etc., we played preseason early in the year (over in East Los Angeles) was more worn than ours. E.g., when I knocked Mike Garrett down on his butt one time his sophomore, my senior, year, I commented on how crummy the paint job on his helmet looked before I got off him, layers and layers of cracked red lacquer. [Ours were white, no paint, except for paint that came off the other teams’ helments when we collided. You could tell who played in the games — all the different little streaks of different colored paint. Blue, green, red, black, etc.]

On balance, Howard, I don’t think our school administration spent an inordinate amount on extramural sports. We used the same field the PE classes used, same teachers (note, Howard: I said teachers, the head coach was qualified and did replace absent algebra and geometry teachers — tossing his whistle to the assistant head PE coach when it happened and putting on his white shirt, suit and tie he wore to and from school to do it, and the line coach was the biology teacher, and probably the best science teacher in the school).

OTOH, John Irving Winfield, the head coach, had lettered two years as a guard for Howard Jones’ Thundering Herd at USC in the late 1920s, early 1930s, and Jim Bogle, the line coach, was Little All-American at tackle at Los Angeles State College [the old L.A. Normal on Vermont Avenue, where LACC is now] in 1954 [the Rams offered Bogle a try-out, but they didn’t pay anyone anything for pre-season then, and Bogle, a veteran of two wars — he caught the end of II, got out in ’47, went to college on the GI Bill and then was called up for Korea, released from active duty when the cease fire came in time to play out his senior year in ’54, was married with children, so he took a teaching credential and taught biology].

> At a very academic high school, my football team distinguished itself in
> such things as most safeties scored per season. There was an early
> initiative to coed footballs, because there was a widespread belief that
> many of the cheerleaders were better natural athletes than the football
> players.
>
> OTOH, the school routinely won its division in basketball, with an
> ex-NBA coach. Unfortunately, he had only ridicule for people who weren’t
> on basketball teams.

I cannot imagine a coach at my school ridiculing a student because the student was not trying out for an athlete team. Maybe a little nudging, “You know, son, we could work off all that baby fat and clumsiness of yours in about half a season,” once or twice, and ” . . . we might do something about teaching you to keep your temper and emotions under control.” Ridicule is in the mind of the beholder, however. “Self-Esteem” in adolescents is overrated. It isn’t stamped on the kid’s butt by the pediatrician on the way down the chute. They earn it the old fashioned way.

The principal who would have fired the coach for “nothing but ridicule,” ex-NBA or not. It wouldn’t, however, have gotten to the principal: Winfield, the PE department head, would have invited the ‘coach’ down to the boiler room under the boys’ gym for a cuppa coffee and ‘instructed’ him how to mind his manners. Old “Chromedome” had a rather forceful and persuasive way with “words,” you might say, when he choose to employ them that way. He’d have understood Zim quite well. We had very strong and well chosen department heads at that school — Winfield wasn’t the senior PE instructor; but he *was* the department head. The principal, who had been the school’s only principal since it was built in the early 1930s, wanted it that way; and what he wanted at that school, he got, until he retired.

I’m constantly amazed at how out-of-control some high school extramural teams or athletes reportedly seem to get, occasionally; and also how ill-disciplined. I also think instances of it are vastly over-reported and sadly am not surprised at how some so-called ‘teachers’ seem to encourage a view that ‘dumb jocks’ deserve derision. I think it’s the comic books they are assigned to read in graduate schools of education that causes it.

We had a little catch-all demerit subject at my school: “citizenship.” You got demerits for lack of it. An athlete throwing his weight around would have been nailed in spades, not by the teacher who complained, although he or she could have, but by his own coach (if one or a couple of his own teammates didn’t get him first — “What are you doing embarrassing us?”); and Winfield, who, you’ll recall, had that paddle he used on those sent him. And if Winfield’s arm got tired, there was always Jim Bogle, all 260 pounds of former Little All American — this was the ’50s, remember, before steroids and weight training. An unruly athlete handed one of the blue slips any teacher could write up, saying “Lack of citizenship — recommend three,” and to “see Mr. Bogle, after seeing Mr. Kirkpatrick [the principal, who had to approve each imposition]” would have fainted on the way out of W. Bruce Kirkpatrick’s office. Bogle used to regularly demonstrate to the linemen how to fight off triple team blocks — without putting on pads. Usually all three wound up flat on their backs, frequently upsidedown.


David M. Silver www.heinleinsociety.org
“The Lieutenant expects your names to shine!”
Robert Anson Heinlein, USNA ’29, Lt.(jg), USN, R’td, 1907-88

From: David M. Silver

Subject: Re: REMINDER: RAH-AIM Readers Group chat meeting–“Heinlein’s Non-Fiction”

Date: Saturday, July 26, 2003 5:01 PM

In article ,
Howard Berkowitz wrote:

> You’ve hit a key word when you describe “Physical Education.” Is it
> about playing a sport (emphasizing the athletically talented) or is it
> about general physical fitness and healthy lifestyle? I went to several
> schools through grades 8-12, and there were only two years where
> physical fitness was stressed. In the others, a ball appropriate to the
> season was tossed to teams and they were told to go play (without
> instruction), while the gym teacher hung out with the varsity.
>
> In later life, the fitness taught lessons, some of which I am only now
> realizing I learned. As far as sports, I can’t really remember anything
> useful. Now, I did have visual problems, but I never could hit a
> baseball and was routinely ridiculed for that. Could a competent
> teacher have diagnosed my problem and taught me to hit? I don’t know —
> but I never had the opportunity to find out. As part of the
> fitness-oriented programs, however, concentrating on fundamentals got me
> to a more-or-less JV level in medium- and long-distance running.

Howard, you had a real piss-poor bunch of PE instructors. They should have all been fired. Sorry that happened to you. The ones I had treated their jobs as jobs to be done, not something to waste time upon until the teams started practicing. I missed a three or four weeks of track one season. Real bad sprain, bruises, cuts and scrapes going over a hurdle not exactly the right way. Winfield said to me, “You can walk. Go help Mr. Margucci with his PE class. Stay out of trouble. Stretch a little more each day. Get a haircut tomorrow.” So I held Margucci’s clipboard, passed out towels and balls, and called roll for him for a couple weeks. Led exercises when I got a little better. Margucci paid attention to each kid, did everything he could to improve their abilities, and I never saw him ridicule anyone. And there were some that at age fifteen I had a hard time keeping my face straight watching. It wasn’t football practice I was watching, and few of the ones I watched were likely candidates for the team, but it was useful, helpful instruction. Most of them actually enjoyed it.


David M. Silver www.heinleinsociety.org
“The Lieutenant expects your names to shine!”
Robert Anson Heinlein, USNA ’29, Lt.(jg), USN, R’td, 1907-88

From: David M. Silver

Subject: Re: REMINDER: RAH-AIM Readers Group chat meeting–“Heinlein’s Non-Fiction”

Date: Saturday, July 26, 2003 5:08 PM

In article ,
Howard Berkowitz wrote:

> Help welcome on my problems with AIM, which have never happened before
> and I really haven’t made system changes since last time.
>
> I’m running Mac OS 9.2 with IE 5.1/NS 6.2 (same problem both ways).
> Reached AIM with Pix’s portal.
>
> Basically, AIM wouldn’t tolerate any other activity. The only way I was
> able to get it not to freeze (or crash the entire system) was to get
> into the Lanai, NOT log out of it, get invited, and then do NOTHING else
> than the Readers’ Group window. No mail checking, no new IE windows,
> etc.
>
> If I logged in to the Lanai, closed it, and then was invited into the
> readers’ chat, I could read messages, but as soon as I typed anything, I
> got either an application or system freeze.
>
> Ah, I long for the old mainframe days where I could get a dump and
> actually diagnose…

How much ram? How much ram when you start using AIM is used up? Does it bloat in size the longer you’re in. [Same questions for Internet Exploader. Betcha it does. It used to when I used it.] Why bother using Pixel’s portal? Or using IE. Simply start AIM, with nothing else running. When it’s running, hit Cmd-T, and you’ll get an invitation into a room window pop up. Change the name of the room into either “The Lanai,” or “Heinlein Readers Group chat” and type your own screenname “LanaiHoward,” iirc, into the name buffer replacing whatever showed when it popped up. Hit return or click the appropriate button with your mouse. You should find yourself in the room, appropriately running.

What version of AIM are you running? Is it the latest non-OS X version?


David M. Silver www.heinleinsociety.org
“The Lieutenant expects your names to shine!”
Robert Anson Heinlein, USNA ’29, Lt.(jg), USN, R’td, 1907-88

From: Howard Berkowitz

Subject: Re: REMINDER: RAH-AIM Readers Group chat meeting–“Heinlein’s Non-Fiction”

Date: Saturday, July 26, 2003 6:06 PM

In article , “David
M. Silver” wrote:

> In article ,
> Howard Berkowitz wrote:
>
> > Help welcome on my problems with AIM, which have never happened before
> > and I really haven’t made system changes since last time.
> >
> > I’m running Mac OS 9.2 with IE 5.1/NS 6.2 (same problem both ways).
> > Reached AIM with Pix’s portal.
> >
> > Basically, AIM wouldn’t tolerate any other activity. The only way I
> > was
> > able to get it not to freeze (or crash the entire system) was to get
> > into the Lanai, NOT log out of it, get invited, and then do NOTHING
> > else
> > than the Readers’ Group window. No mail checking, no new IE windows,
> > etc.
> >
> > If I logged in to the Lanai, closed it, and then was invited into the
> > readers’ chat, I could read messages, but as soon as I typed anything,
> > I
> > got either an application or system freeze.
> >
> > Ah, I long for the old mainframe days where I could get a dump and
> > actually diagnose…
>
> How much ram? How much ram when you start using AIM is used up? Does it
> bloat in size the longer you’re in. [Same questions for Internet
> Exploader. Betcha it does. It used to when I used it.] Why bother using
> Pixel’s portal? Or using IE. Simply start AIM, with nothing else
> running. When it’s running, hit Cmd-T, and you’ll get an invitation into
> a room window pop up. Change the name of the room into either “The
> Lanai,” or “Heinlein Readers Group chat” and type your own screenname
> “LanaiHoward,” iirc, into the name buffer replacing whatever showed when
> it popped up. Hit return or click the appropriate button with your
> mouse. You should find yourself in the room, appropriately running.
>
> What version of AIM are you running? Is it the latest non-OS X version?

Latest version, 4.6, seems to have solved the problem.
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Here Begins the Discussion Log

You have just entered room “Heinlein Readers Group chat.”

aggirlj has entered the room.

OscagneTX has entered the room.

OscagneTX: howdy

aggirlj: Hi Joe.

aggirlj: David’s afk I believe.

OscagneTX: Okay

aggirlj: Read the transcript. Boy it looked like ya’ll had fun.

OscagneTX: It wasn’t as structured as a HRG chat usually is. Probaly because I didn’t do my homeword.

OscagneTX: erk

OscagneTX: homeword

OscagneTX: damn

aggirlj: Nah. It’s hard to control this group.

OscagneTX: KKKKKKKKKK

OscagneTX: homeworK

OscagneTX: My fingers weren’t cooperating.

aggirlj: I’m currently reading To Said Beyond the Sunset. So I send another dunning letter in the style of Maureen according to David.

aggirlj: Sail

OscagneTX: hehe

OscagneTX: to David?

aggirlj: For

OscagneTX: who were you dunning?

aggirlj: Some of the mems

aggirlj: I’m Member chair in THS

OscagneTX: oh, I get it. Heinlein society.

OscagneTX: You know… I just remember people, not so much titles or job descriptions.

aggirlj: Me too, only said that so you would unnerstan

OscagneTX: ‘s Ok.

aggirlj: I’ve tried to invite Kultsi in but he’s unavailable. I think he will be coming by thought.

aggirlj: though

OscagneTX: I don’t usually make the Saturday chats. How late do they usually last?

Kultsi KN has entered the room.

OscagneTX: Speak of the devil.

Kultsi KN: Hello, all!

aggirlj: Ditto

aggirlj: Hi Kultsi!!!1

OscagneTX: Jane just finished telling me you weren’t coming, Kultsi.

Kultsi KN: Hmmm… Spill!

Kultsi KN: Why is that, Janie girl?

aggirlj: I tried an invite it said you were unavailable.

aggirlj: But I knew you would be here.

OscagneTX: oops. I read it wrong.

OscagneTX: I parsed “I think he will be coming by though.” as “I think he will be coming by tonight.” (implying not here now, but maybe later.

OscagneTX: )

Kultsi KN: My adsl’s been acting up, may break the connection suddenly.

OscagneTX: eiw

aggirlj: New?

Kultsi KN: No, just developed a glitch.

Kultsi KN: My ISP are gonna check their stuff some of these days.

aggirlj: That was being snide the question, your fav expression is AOL Hell!

Kultsi KN: Sure! Ain’t it that?

aggirlj: How’s the blood drive organizing going?

OscagneTX: K: your ADSL is AOL?

OscagneTX: blech.

Kultsi KN: NO, I don’t know anybody in FI using AOHell.

aggirlj: Or did it went.

OscagneTX: It coulda been… there’s UKers who use AOL for some reason.

Kultsi KN: Organizing is going great, and is gonna cost me a bunch.

aggirlj: Keep receipts.

Kultsi KN: I shall.

aggirlj: For possible reimbursement.

Kultsi KN: The handouts (~1,000) cost all of $3.

OscagneTX: If I suddenly go deaf, its becaue I’ve got a pizza coming and won’t have time to say AFK when the door knocks.

Kultsi KN: You’ve got funny doors 😎

aggirlj: Gee, I need the # of your printer. May use him, hehehe.

OscagneTX: How big/organized a blood drive are you doing, K?

DenvToday has entered the room.

OscagneTX: Howdy!

DenvToday: Greetings to one and all

aggirlj: Hi ron.

DenvToday: Good to see you!

aggirlj: Been ages.

DenvToday: Yes, it has.

Kultsi KN: Well, if we get 100 out of the 4,000 attending…

LanaiHoward has entered the room.

aggirlj:

aggirlj: I keep good notes.

OscagneTX: walk gently, Howard.

aggirlj: Hi Howard.

LanaiHoward: Hi all. Upgraded to AIM 4.6 and think this might work

DenvToday:

Kultsi KN: Hello, Howard!

DenvToday: Hi Howard

Kultsi KN: Hi, Ron!

DenvToday: Hiya Kult

DenvToday: It seems Ouday and Kusay couldn’t make it today. How disappointing.

Kultsi KN: I’m used to being Cutie, but being a cult is totally new! 😉

aggirlj: LOL

DenvToday: lol Kult

DenvToday: I’d call you darling, but you’re not my type. lol

Kultsi KN: My nick IS used in that meaning in Finnish.

DenvToday: My name means “One who eats Cheetos”

aggirlj: Just called David S, should be here soon.

aggirlj: Kultsi, I’m currently reading To Sail Beyond the Sunset.

aggirlj: Interesting woman that Maureen.

DenvToday: Jane, RAH went out strong. His last and one of his most interesting.

Kultsi KN: Ron, have you blocked me; can’t see you on my buddy list?

DenvToday: I don’t know. I’ll check.

Kultsi KN: She is one strong gal, Jane.

aggirlj: Definately. Gosh is the story intersting.

LanaiHoward: There were obvious relationships between Maureen and Ginny. Do we know anything about RAH’s mother?

Kultsi KN: Somewhat jumpy, IMO.

aggirlj: I’m at about page 124, she’s in jail and the exposition is very intersting.

aggirlj: This Howard Foundation hmmmm.

Kultsi KN: It’s also a somewhat dark book, with all the trouble with the kids.

OscagneTX: The exposition is unusual. Kind of a multiple exposition for multiple plots.

DenvToday: I’m not sure what’s happening with my buddy list. Strange…

aggirlj: Well references to incest and other stuff. Lazarus Long was just mentioned.

Kultsi KN: Reading TEFL first is almost mandatory.

aggirlj: I know, introducing those references.

AGplusone has entered the room.

OscagneTX: Actually, I read Sail before Time. I didn’t get too twisted up.

LanaiHoward: as well as Cat. Mind you, my Ding is The Cat Who Pauses for Invisible Walls

OscagneTX: howdy!

AGplusone: [wave]

aggirlj: Hi David. LH, yeah Pixel.

BPRAL22169 has entered the room.

AGplusone: Howard, I made a post in reply to your question. It may help later.

aggirlj: Hi Bill.

DenvToday: Hello David. Good to see you.

Kultsi KN: Hello David, Bill1

AGplusone: Hi, Ron. Nice to see you.

OscagneTX: Howdy!

BPRAL22169: Yo

DenvToday: Hi Bill. ltns

aggirlj: brb

BPRAL22169: I thought maybe nobody was here because only David Wright was on my AOL buddy list.

Kultsi KN: So you have the same prob I have with Ron…

BPRAL22169: Everybody has problems with Ron! He’s a real wild child

Kultsi KN: Now he appeared on my buddy list!

DenvToday: So very true.

BPRAL22169: I notice my buddy list isn’t picking up people from some of the newer isp, at all.

OscagneTX: Okay. So… does anyone want to talk about Heinlein’s nonfiction? We covered mostly Heinlein’s comments on education in EU, Thurday. Is anyone interested in any other particular peice?

BPRAL22169: Well — we could always talk about “Where To.”

BPRAL22169: I know, I know: it’s been done.

aggirlj: b

OscagneTX: Remind me about that, please?

LanaiHoward: By where to, you refer to the predictions for future technology?

BPRAL22169: That’s his predictions, written originally for COSMO in 1950, about what the world of 2000 would be like.

aggirlj: For instance?

OscagneTX: Ah… then followed up in 1965 and 198something?

BPRAL22169: Yes, 1980, for the publication of Expanded Universe.

DenvToday: If he’d only patented the water bed…

DenvToday: That’s the version I have. 1980.

BPRAL22169: We’ve been giving this as a panel at large conventions for the last 3-4 years — despite the fact that it really doesn’t lend itself to panel discussion format.

OscagneTX: The inventor offered him a peice of that action, didn’t he? Even sent him the first one?

OscagneTX: It’s tickling my mind that either he or Ginny mentioned that they had it in the garage, never assembled. Maybe in Grumbles?

LanaiHoward: *sigh* on the robotic predictions…we have managed to pass the Reverse Turing Test. Ever noticed how customer service reps…

LanaiHoward: are indistinguishable from fairly poorly programmed computers?

BPRAL22169: I don’t think it made it to Monterey in 1987; wasn’t in Ginny’s place in Florida.

DenvToday: Howard, good point.

Kultsi KN:Howard, that was _bad_

AGplusone: It’s in Expanded Universe. He got it and kept it boxed because he never had a floor strong enough to support it. If you’re talking about the water bed, Howard.

aggirlj: Well if he predicted robotic responses, try calling anywhere thesedays and you have to wade through so many selections and then more when youmake one.

OscagneTX: I don’t know why that should be suprising. First level cust service is just reading a text from a computer screen. Going down the checklist.

DenvToday: Jane, it does give you a sense of accomplishment if you finally get to talk to a human being.

BPRAL22169: — which wouldn’t be so bad if ANY of them had anything to do with what you were calling about…

aggirlj: I usually hit zero first off.

BPRAL22169: Tch, Tch. The purpose of those machines is to prevent you from ever talking to a human.

OscagneTX: I always try to use the “If you have a rotary phone… ” function.

DenvToday: Same here.

DenvToday: My favorite is “if you’re having problems connecting to the internet, check out web site for solutions.”

AGplusone: Except they tell you to ‘just hang on’ for some ‘rotary phone’ options. Which meant 28 minutes last time I did that.

LanaiHoward: he predicted we would NOT have a “manlike robot with manlike reactions,and clarified that not to include a chess-playing machine.”

BPRAL22169: Phyrric victory

LanaiHoward: I have a presentation online on how NOT to design a customer service script for ISPs.

AGplusone: Yeah, it was. they want $625 per night for a one-bedroom suite, at the Royal York.

BPRAL22169: The oddest predictions are “state lines will be abolished by 1990” and “intelligent life will be foudn on Mars.”

Kultsi KN: 1 hour, 46 minutes 14 secs is my record — then I gave up.

AGplusone: Canadian

AGplusone: Works out to around $500/night US.

BPRAL22169: That’s what, about $500

BPRAL22169: GMTA

AGplusone: yep

DenvToday: For me to cough up five hundred bucks, Halle Berry would have to be part of the deal.

aggirlj: Better be at least 1,000 sq. ft.!

LanaiHoward: hmmm…the state line fits better (although not ideally) for the EU

Kultsi KN: I just reserved two “mini-suites” for $80 each.

BPRAL22169: It always gets a laugh to point out we’re still working on the “intelligent life” problem on this planet.

LanaiHoward: I stayed (expense account) at the Scottsdale Resort at actually higher prices — the “room” was the size of the first floor of my house, with, IIRC, a 5 room bathroom suite

DenvToday: The EU can’t last. The stronger economies (those marginally less socialist) are supporting the others. It will crash and burn within a decade.

LanaiHoward: Just save the cheese. They ARE good at that.

DenvToday: lol

BPRAL22169: Er — how is that different from the US and the individual states?

AGplusone: If they give us that, we can all “room together next semester”

BPRAL22169: How do you think Arkansas gets along? Clinton’s chicken farms? I don’t think so.

LanaiHoward: Fair is fair…I also tend to prefer French kitchen knives

LanaiHoward: Is it axiomatic that Arkansas does get along?

DenvToday: I suppose the difference is that our states have no sense of national indentity. And we don’t have the thousand-year history of hating other states.

DenvToday: Or being jealous of them.

OscagneTX: They had that sense before 1860.

BPRAL22169: I love the debate in the last couple episodes of the West Wing. The Florida governor wants his tax money back, so the president demands the grants-in-aid back.

BPRAL22169: He’ll take a check. This is in a presidential election debate.

OscagneTX: Of course, without the 1000 year history… %^)

LanaiHoward: “How many Virginians does it take to change a light bulb?” “Three. One to replace the bulb and two to discuss how good the old bulb was”

BPRAL22169: Now that the creator has left the show, I don’t think it will be back.

DenvToday: lol

aggirlj: Nice fantasy show, if only the gov were run a little more like that and the pres had some brains.

BPRAL22169: You forgot the black mammy to nurse the new bulb.

aggirlj: lol

OscagneTX: hehe

BPRAL22169: So that’s three and 3/4 Virginians.

aggirlj: Baaaaaaaaaad.

DenvToday: Kentucky: five million people, four last names

OscagneTX: iew. snark.

BPRAL22169: Yeah. I’d vote for Bartlet. I’d even register.

AGplusone: Sorry about that “Great State of Texas, Yippee!” crack, Joe, but “Bad Man’s Blunder” does still echo in my mind occasionally.

Kultsi KN: Ron, are Fried and Chicken two of them?

OscagneTX: Is that a movie? A book?

DenvToday: lol hmmmm…..very possibly

AGplusone: An old Kingston Trio song.

LanaiHoward: While I’m in lust with Allison Janney, I find I’ve been watching it less and less…I am amazed at how well the Law & Order shows work, with often dark plots

aggirlj: Me 3

OscagneTX: I actually used to listen to Kingston Trio, but I don’t recongise that one.

DavidWrightSr: Hi everyone. Just got back from supper. How’s it going?

DenvToday: I can’t abide fictional shows about politicians. The reality is more than I can take.

aggirlj: That guy on one of those spin offs was the alien in the sci-fi Black suits or some such.

DenvToday: Hello David

BPRAL22169: Anybody who can get a line like “for 200 years this country has been a beacon to the world” on TV these days gets my unqualified approval.

OscagneTX: Howdy!

BPRAL22169: Go Aaron!

Kultsi KN: Hi, DaveSR; not much topicality…

aggirlj: meandering.

DenvToday: Meandering, you Jane

AGplusone: http://users2.ev1.net/~smyth/linernotes/thesongs/BadMansBlundr.htm

LanaiHoward: David, while I was bouncing in and out Thursday, did the discussion about credentials finish?

AGplusone: Teaching credentials?

LanaiHoward: Seriously, on political shows — I’ve spent enough time in DC, on the Hill, etc., to know there is a very mixed bag.

LanaiHoward: Degrees as requirements for hiring.

OscagneTX: okay, NOW I remember it.

BPRAL22169: Yes — I’ve a very good friend in the Beltway. Unfortunately the mixed bag IRL doesn’t include ANY of those people.

DavidWrightSr: I don’t recall. I actually have read the log very closely myself yet and I was doing some bouncing of my own8-)

AGplusone: “’cause the Great State of Texas, Yippee! gonna pay your rent!”

AGplusone: We could say more about it.

OscagneTX: “I’m mighty grateful.”

AGplusone: “If coulda been life!”

LanaiHoward: IN the Beltway? We have a saying here that there was a nuclear warning…the Ivy League execs jumped onto route 66 heading for their Front Royal places….

LanaiHoward: the Big 8 types headed down 95 South to Fredericksburg…

LanaiHoward: and the Aggies got on the Beltway

OscagneTX: Here one I saw somewhere recently, “If Charlie’s wife could hand him a sandwich every day, why couldn’t she hand him a nickle with it?”

BPRAL22169: LOL. I’ll pass that along to Tim. The Beltway mentality is . . . gruesome.

BPRAL22169: cliche passing as a way of life.

LanaiHoward: Apropos of the degree argument, at what point does demonstrable experience, in a learned profession, balance it?

BPRAL22169: First time it’s demonstrated.

LanaiHoward: Now — try to get that into many large corporations or government contracting. I tend to find academia like government, except without the efficiency…

Kultsi KN: Demonstration usually means tests and stuff; does not include a track record.

LanaiHoward: For example, there are several graduate programs that use texts that I’ve written….but officially I’m undereducated.

LanaiHoward: OK Kultsi, change that to track record…major projects verifiably completed, peer-reviewed publications, industry recognition

DavidWrightSr: Yeah. I’m a Novell CNE, but it looks like I’m going to lose my certification if I can’t get in some study time and experience on version 6 before the end of August. Too much work actually doing things.

DavidWrightSr: And we haven’t upgraded to 6 yet.

AGplusone: At that stage, unless the HR department that does the firing is ossified as most are, experience will qualify.

AGplusone: meant hiring

AGplusone: But it’s really not the HR doing the hiring, it’s someone who wants the ability you demonstrate that calls the shots, and has to power to do so.

AGplusone: So the only way to avoid the ‘ticket punch’ school of hiring is to use a network or old boys network

Kultsi KN: And if that someone’s a young guy just off the college, as is often the case, no way to get in.

LanaiHoward: and the problem is that if you don’t have a back door, you may not reach them. It’s been 10-15 years since I got a job that even had a prewritten job description — but things are tough now

AGplusone: have to play the ‘networking’ game. go to prof assoc meetings, seminars, etc.

AGplusone: be cordial, volunteer to serve on committees

AGplusone: all that

AGplusone: offer to teach the panels

AGplusone: pretend you’re a “consultant” … all that.

BPRAL22169: Yeah. Professional publications, too.

LanaiHoward: and, at higher levels, learn diplomacy. On Wednesday, I have to go explain to an Army group why we are highly qualified to do what they want — except they are ”

LanaiHoward: “program managers” rather than experts in either military medicine or communications networks. My challenge is to show them the contradictions in their specs without offending them

AGplusone: Always a problem … diplomacy is the toughest thing to learn

LanaiHoward: as in “has it occurred to you that the surgeon in the next tent might want to see the X-ray of the patient, the one you just transmitted to higher headquarters?”

AGplusone: Sometimes working for a headhunting company allows you to network

AGplusone: into a good job yourself, if you do it right

OscagneTX: “We’d like 2000 handheld devices that can do auto-diagnosis, all wireless linked together, and able to hold 14 terabytes of info each.”

AGplusone: If nothing else you learn the market

AGplusone: and pay a couple bills

LanaiHoward: Osc, if you don’t limit me to a PDA (as opposed to a handheld), and allow me access to that 14 terabytes on a server, I can do some of that now.

OscagneTX: You have medical tricorder, Howard? (ObStarTrek)

DenvToday: “Captain, I have life-form readings on the other side of the planet.”

OscagneTX: That’s what I meant by autodiagnose. %^)

LanaiHoward: mmm….diagnostic and prescribing advisor, that can run on a LINUX handheld — but it has to access things on servers

LanaiHoward: Under the same architecture, I can get realtime bedside sensor data, view echocardiograms, etc.

LanaiHoward: In other words, think of a distributed tricorder.

Kultsi KN: …That worked just fine until that big radar took a sweep…

OscagneTX: cool. You also have the bone-knitting device? Just run a pretty light over the leg and it heals right up?

DenvToday: As malpractice insurance continues to rise, and more doctors leave the profession, this technology should become more important for people outside of big cities.

LanaiHoward: No OSC, I don’t even have the ability to make Seven of Nine.

DenvToday: My brother’s a dentist. I get this stuff second-hand. lol

BPRAL22169: Take away two

Kultsi KN: LOL

LanaiHoward: Denv, absolutely. One of the things I like about the military medical stuff, when they are running well, is they don’t have the same malpractice and other constraints

DenvToday: Heck with that other stuff. I want the food synthesizer.

Kultsi KN: I read ‘food’ as ‘good’

DenvToday: I’m old enough to remember when malpractice actually meant malpractice, not any bad outcome for which you can sue for millions.

LanaiHoward: We have a prototype of a mobile surgical center that also can be part of disaster response — but none of the Homeland Security appropriations are for medicine beyond first responder…

LanaiHoward: the idea was to have the vans serve rural populations, prisons, etc, but be on call for disasters.

Kultsi KN: A country doc in new clothes, IOW?

DenvToday: If you get the mobile centers, they’ll soon become a “right” of rural areas.

DenvToday: Perhaps they could combine them with bookmobiles and Good Humor.

LanaiHoward: It just occurs to me that RAH rarely dealt with medicine as he did with other sciences — more “the therapist did what therapists do”

AGplusone: That’s interesting too. He had an awful lot of time around doctors and nurses.

OscagneTX: You counting the Howard Clinic in that, Howard?

DenvToday: It was his pioneer mindset. Set the leg, have the baby, be back at work that afternoon.

AGplusone: Clear he admired most of them

LanaiHoward: Denv, you aren’t quite so far off on the bookmobile — another van is normally used for telemedicine and education, but can do dual duty as an incident command post for disasters.

AGplusone: And thought the ‘wet washcloth in the face technique’ a little overdoing of it.

DenvToday: Take two fudgsicles and call me in the morning.

AGplusone: He had a grandfather in the profession who may have influenced his viewpoint as well.

AGplusone: Country doctor.

LanaiHoward: ironically, we are just now getting the first glimmerings of what could become the “Howard secret.” Theoretical still.

OscagneTX: He got pretty medical describing rejuvenation, didn’t he? (at least for a layman like me.)

BPRAL22169 has left the room.

DenvToday: I think Ira Howard was his ideal. The country doctor.

AGplusone: And I wonder what he would have to say about Health Care Insurance techniques today.

LanaiHoward: As far as the country doctor — an unforgettable scene for me comes from one of the James Herriott books, set around WWII…when he first realized he had drugs that DID SOMETHING.

AGplusone: Plain fact is, I doubt he ever had to worry about medical care.

AGplusone: getting it, that is …

DenvToday: He had veteren’s benefits, right?

AGplusone: As retired on disability, probably.

DenvToday: veteran’s

AGplusone: and he had the wherewithal to get good treatment ($) later.

OscagneTX: He was 100% disabled according to the military. Don’t you get basically everything when that happens?

AGplusone: He never was in a convalescent home. they paid for a fulltime nurse when the time came and there was Ginny, of course

AGplusone: But Ginny herself, later, got some fairly shitty ‘nursing’ help.

AGplusone: She got old and was locked in to what the retirement people gave her.

DenvToday: Sad. That happens to so many.

AGplusone: Well, they gave her the standard minimum wage minders …

AGplusone: as she called them.

AGplusone: A couple were okay, the rest were disasters.

AGplusone: then she went into the convalescent hospital post surgery when she broke her hip and got bedsores until Amy came down and gave her ‘care providers’ a full ration of hell

OscagneTX: She couldn’t have been hurting for money… why didn’t she choose some other place? Was she deemed incompetent or something? (Blasphemy)

DenvToday: I had to have a pcp (personal care provider) for several months last year. Back surgery. I used an agency that hires Russian immigrants. My pcp working for not much above minimum wage had been a anestesiologist in Moscow.

AGplusone: I think she was insistent that they provide the care they’d contracted to provide, and not really able to give up her insistency ….

AGplusone: so instead of ordering herself out, hiring her own, and suing, she suffered it. there were a lot of ‘pain medication’ used on her which may have affected her mindset, and the people who did visit got a lot of ‘bury them in bullshit

Kultsi KN: I’ve heard many of those places are legalized robbery…

OscagneTX: Hrm. I think I’d have left there and either sued or instructed the estate to sue to get back whatever she traded for retirement on that contract.

AGplusone: when they complained on her behalf, until Amy came down and started giving orders to people.

DenvToday: Most home care workers don’t earn much money, consequently you’re not going to get great people.

AGplusone: Exactly how the system is set up and why it fails.

AGplusone: You give money to a ‘retirement’ community, then they’re in charge, and they’re out to make a profit …

AGplusone: they complain, ‘well, that’s the best the agencies provide’ and we can’t find better nurses.

AGplusone: buck passing

DenvToday: It’s an unintended consequence of Medicare and Social Security. The elderly used to be cared for by their families. Now they live alone and get government care.

AGplusone: Or they get private provider care, which is brought down to the same level by profit motive or insurance companies.

AGplusone: The convalescent hospital industry made me sick, and I saw a lot of it when I worked for the Labor Board, because they were always fighting with the unions to keep them out, so they could keep paying $3.95 or whatever the min wage

AGplusone: was then.

Merfilly27 has entered the room.

Merfilly27: good eve

DenvToday: Hello filly

AGplusone: hi, Steph

Kultsi KN: Hi, Steph!

DenvToday: Sorry, Steph

OscagneTX: Howdy, Steph.

Merfilly27: Filly is fine

Kultsi KN: D’ya feel like one? 😎

Merfilly27: lol

DenvToday: Filly’s a dilly, unless your name is Billy. Then it’s just silly.

Merfilly27: not today, I’m the nag that got put away wet

OscagneTX: Need currying?

aggirlj: Hi Steph, thank god another woman.

Merfilly27: poor dear, all alone in here with these wolves 🙂

Kultsi KN: Is it full moon?

aggirlj: Kinda nice for a while.

DenvToday: I used to be a wolf. Now I’m a harmless gerbil.

LanaiHoward: Oh dear….as filly arrives, so does Mr. Clark….ah…he’s lying down next to the keyboard. But don’t worrky, Steph and Jane, he’s a sensitive New Age former tomcat

Merfilly27: I see you have defeated the revolving door this eve, Howard

aggirlj: I have two male kittys and a dog. The males are very friendly.

LanaiHoward: upgraded the AIM software….that seemed to do it

Kultsi KN: Did I ever tell about the old maid and her former tom?

aggirlj: ga

Kultsi KN: No. Mixed company.

aggirlj: So’s the dog by the way, Daphne, Wellington, and Nigel. There’s a theme.

DenvToday: Ladies, put your hands over your ears.

LanaiHoward: Mr. Clark put up with the then-kittens nursing on him, groomed them, and even let Ding ride horsie on his back

OscagneTX: I think it says something about my wife (who is in charge of animal decisions) that of the six cats, only the two males are fixed. %^)

aggirlj: Sounds about right. ala Maureen and all.

DenvToday: Oscagne, if I were you, I’d sleep wearing protection.

aggirlj: lol

DenvToday: Stainless steel, preferably.

aggirlj: rofl

LanaiHoward: Variant on Robin Hood, Men in Tights?

DenvToday: Be suspicious if she lures you into the car with a treat, then doesn’t tell you where you’re going.

aggirlj: 😀

aggirlj: So back to topic perhaps.

OscagneTX: Luckily she doens’t drive. She’d have to tell me where we’re going.

aggirlj: Or did we establish one.

aggirlj: Not to throw wet blanket or anything. I’m all agog and wondering about RAH’s fiction.

OscagneTX: Ok… On the back of _Take Back Your Government_ Pournelle is quoted as saying, “I would hope that every Perot supporter would read this book prior to the fall campaign.”

OscagneTX: How much more entertaining would that election have been?

DenvToday: TBYG is still very relevant to local elections. Less so for major elections.

AGplusone: Perot lost the next primary and wound up dead in the water before the book really got on the shelves.

OscagneTX: This is almost Turtledovian in its “what if” possiblities.

LanaiHoward: I’m not sure this is an observation or a confession, but I’m a graduate of the national Republican senior campaign management school. The same kind of techniques were taught there.

aggirlj: Can you elucidate on techniques. All I know is that Perot took votes away.

DenvToday: Howard, being Republican is allowed. Except on the eastern seaboard. Or on the left coast.

LanaiHoward: Incidentally, I now consider myself a recovering Republican. Being a moderate Republican, I realized, was like being moderately pregnant

AGplusone: I’d like to talk to you about that Howard, in detail. James and I are writing an introduction and notes for a new edition of HTBaP.

LanaiHoward: sure.

AGplusone: Can you send me a telephone by email?

LanaiHoward: as soon as I dig up your email!

AGplusone: ag,

AGplusone: period, not the comma I typed

aggirlj:

Kultsi KN: Missing periods at your age!

DenvToday: lol

aggirlj: (seems to be only comment I can make) lol

AGplusone: Missed them all my life, so far … so good.

Kultsi KN: ROTFL

AGplusone: Yeah, well, bloody hemoroids aren’t funny, nor prostrate cancer

OscagneTX: Is prostrate cancer when it’s laid you out on the floor?

AGplusone: prolly

LanaiHoward: Also can discuss effective lobbying. Ironically, I spent time on a list about the political use of the net, but it was overtaken by radicals that mostly wanted to use it for protests that didn’t affect anything

OscagneTX: Sorry… I should be above spelling jokes.

DenvToday: To change the topic completely, I have friends who just returned from New Zealand. They had a wonderful time, found the people friendly and helpful. I couldn’t help but thing about Tramp Royale.

DenvToday: think

DenvToday: lol Oscagne. I just scrolled up.

Kultsi KN: Ron, that’s my experience about NZ as well…

Kultsi KN: All of them.

LanaiHoward: NZ was critical in the world Y2K effort (I was the external network architect for the US Y2K center)…they were the first industrialized country to be hit with the millenium…

AGplusone: Folk in NZ were pretty insular before the War. Took them a while to join the TV experience

LanaiHoward: so they served as the “warning canary,” but we also backed them up.

DenvToday: I still have extra batteries I bought for Y2K. lol

Kultsi KN: Throw them. They’re gonna leak soon.

DenvToday: Yeah, I should.

OscagneTX: I read somewhere that China forced their airline executives to be in the air as Y2K turned over, as a method of insuring the planes were Y2K compliant. Probably apocraphyl, but funny.

DenvToday: Incentives work.

OscagneTX: I’m spelling like the Aggie Cop, today.

LanaiHoward: Let’s put it this way…LOTS of things had to get fixed. If there hadn’t been a remediation effort, there would have been lots of problems. Next big challenge, IIRC, is about 2034…

Kultsi KN: We just simulated y2k a bit in advance. No prob.

LanaiHoward: The hinary clock flips over in Microsoft operating systems.

DenvToday: I’ll be 80 by then. I doubt I’ll worry about it.

Kultsi KN: Anything from Mickey$oft is hiney…

LanaiHoward: Well, it’s been my contention that the Y1K problem caused the Dark Ages.

DenvToday: lol

DenvToday: Yep, those sundials caused it all.

LanaiHoward: Ah, if they only had modern technological insight to light the sundial with a candle.

Kultsi KN: Needless to say I _did_ convert quite a few COBOL programs.

DenvToday: As my father often said, if Edison hadn’t invented the light bulb, we’d all be watching television by candlelight.

Kultsi KN: You beat me on that, Ron.

DenvToday: lol

LanaiHoward: Osc, the US FAA Administrator deliberately was on a flight, but also left word discouraging airline execs from doing so — if something went wrong, command & control needed to be in place

DavidWrightSr: I was fortunate. There was a minor problem in the SCO Unix we used and Informix, both of which were fixed fairly early. None of my programs stored dates in any fashion that was affected.

LanaiHoward: Luckily, routers and such don’t tremendously care about the date. Where we did have a big surprise, that was a big push toward IP telephony, is that a great many PBX were not compliant–and thus couldn’t do billing.

LanaiHoward: Trying to think of where Slipstick Libby would have been best used in Y2K problems!

Kultsi KN: Sean hasn’t appeared, after all…

OscagneTX: Did anyone do any specific reading for the discussion?

BPRAL22169 has entered the room.

OscagneTX: WB

BPRAL22169: Thanks. I just had a full-scale melt-down. Scary

OscagneTX: You let the magic smoke out?

LanaiHoward: Osc, you realize that with optical networking, you also have to worry about the magic mirrors breaking?

Kultsi KN: I got notice of the chat from Dave Sr’s e-mail about the log — means I haven’t been reading afh for ages.

BPRAL22169: Yup.

OscagneTX: Well… not inside the box, huh? Just in between them?

Merfilly27: I recently had read Requiem, but have not had time to read the others

LanaiHoward: Actually, there are tunable mirrors in the optical chips. Some of the constraints on optical routing include minimizing mirror movement.

OscagneTX: Did you cry, Steph? I came ->

DavidWrightSr: I do whenever I read that speech by that Japanese fellow.

OscagneTX: I basically started reading Heinlein a couple years after he died. And didn’t know he had passed until I read Requiem.

OscagneTX: Requiem is also how I got turned on tu Spider Robinson.

Merfilly27: I did cry, on some of the stories and the speeches

DavidWrightSr: What is Robinson’s real name. Anyone know?

OscagneTX: I had thought it was Spider. It’d fit. Kind of like Moon-Unit Zappa.

aggirlj: I have to leave now and do some book work. Was fun, talk to you guys later.

LanaiHoward: Ah yes. Moon Unit. The Daughter of the Father of the Mothers of Invention

OscagneTX: g’night, Jane.

LanaiHoward: night Jane

Kultsi KN: Nite, Jane!

aggirlj: g’day to you all.

aggirlj has left the room.

DenvToday: Well, I must be going. Time to put on the feedbag.

DenvToday: Thanks to you all for a great discussion as always. See you next time.

Merfilly27: nite

DenvToday: Night

Kultsi KN: Don’t drown. G’night!

OscagneTX: g’night

DenvToday: lol

DenvToday has left the room.

Merfilly27: I think I should be leaving

Merfilly27: not feeling quite up to snuff

OscagneTX: Feel Better!

Merfilly27: or in a different spot?

Merfilly27: 🙂

OscagneTX: %^)

Merfilly27: good night my friends

Merfilly27 has left the room.

Kultsi KN: Fast gal, she is.

BPRAL22169: I think I’ll leave, too — having trouble keeping my eyes open.

BPRAL22169: Enjoy, all.

BPRAL22169 has left the room.

Kultsi KN: Anutter fast 1.

LanaiHoward: think it’s feedbag time here as well. May return.

LanaiHoward: Haven’t been grocery shopping in a while so must get creative

Kultsi KN: I’ve tried to get info on Spider — only found out he’s one year older than me, the same age as Terry Pratchett

OscagneTX: g’night.

AGplusone: It’s getting to be barbeque time

OscagneTX: perhaps we should just call it a night?

LanaiHoward has left the room.

AGplusone: We can, Kultsi?

AGplusone: How’s the blood drive going? Get pins and artwork yet?

Kultsi KN has left the room.

AGplusone: They’re having a Heinlein Blood drive at the Con in Finland.

AGplusone: Wait to see if he got booted, then end it.

OscagneTX: okay.

AGplusone: You can close log, copy, Dave and Joe. I’ll stick around in case he comes back.

AGplusone: Or copy and mail one to Dave, please, Joe.

DavidWrightSr: Ok. Log officially closed at 7:02 P.M. EDT

Kultsi KN has entered the room.

OscagneTX: Okay. My wife is watching “Gay Eye for the Straight Guy” It’s actually pertty funny.

DavidWrightSr: I’ve got the full log.
Final End of Discussion Log

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