As a very opinionated person, I dislike a lot of things. The key word there is dislike. I hate relatively few things. My one reader will note that I have already declared my public hatred of spiders in this very blog. Other things I hate include: people who drive slower than traffic in the left lane on the freeway, HSBC, telemarketers cold calling at dinnertime, men who don't lift the lid before peeing all over the seat, my neighbor's dogs, door-to-door salesmen who ignore my 'no soliciting' sign and mosquitoes.
Comcast was a long time resident on my hate list because of the horrible, rotten & abominable service we got from them while we were customers and because of "The Mountian" - the abortion of a sports network created by the Mountain West Conference and Comcast for the sole purpose of getting all BYU & Utah football & basketball fans to drop their satellite dishes and come running back to the cold, cold embrace of cable. Those of us who refused found our ability to watch the games we love held hostage to evil corporate overlords, and many of us just didn't watch football for two years.
Comcast came off the list last year more out of apathy than any rational decision. They came to an agreement with DirecTV, and I could once again watch my beloved Cougar Football.
Aaaaannnnd they're back.
Comcast also owns a channel called "Versus". Aside from broadcasting hockey, hunting shows & infomercials, they have contracts to broadcast some pretty major college football games. Including an upcoming game between BYU and Florida State.
Comcast has once again gotten into a disagreement with DirecTV over just how much end customers should be gouged for the privilege of watching shows about Archery Deer Hunting at 3 in the morning, with the predictable result being Versus is no longer available on DirecTV.
Just like that, I am again looking at not being able to see what will probably be the best game of the season, all because of the corporate greed mongers at Comcast. And it is almost worse that eventually Comcast will concede & charge a reasonable price, and Versus will be back, albeit far too late for me to enjoy my game.
I hate you, Comcast!
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Carp Golf & the Rubber Raft
The summer between my junior and senior years of high school was packed with adventure. Although we were all working, my friends & I spent countless days doing things that were on the far side of reckless. Among things for which the statute of limitations have run out are playing golf from a moving vehicle (shattering a car window in the process), sneaking into golf courses to collect golf balls we could then lose in the daytime, 4 wheeling on the beaches of Utah Lake whilst avoiding the park rangers, riding off road vehicles all over southwest Provo (mostly my unlicensed motorcycle), and many incidents involving my million candlepower spotlight and people in remote parking lots engaged in various activities while in states of undress. As you may have noticed, many of our activities involved golf. Josh had inherited a set of golf clubs from his dad, and we incorporated them into our adventures wherever possible.
One of those activities was a creation called "Carp Golf".*(See note below about animal rights)
While many of our peers went "gigging carp", we wanted something more challenging. So we would take golf irons out into the shallows of the lake & hunt the carp. It was very challenging, because you often had to run to catch the carp, then swing hard enough to hit them.
We also played golf around the neighborhood, substituting a tennis ball for the golf balls. Nothing like calling the "hole" to be a birdhouse directly over a car parked in the driveway.
These memories were brought back into focus for me because my Dad recently came across an old rubber raft we used extensively that summer. He had purchased it used from the raft rental place near Flaming Gorge, which rents rafts to float the Green River just below the dam. We put that raft in more bodies of water than I can count. Dad had offered to let us take it for our weekend getaway at Yuba Lake. Surprisingly, it is still in really good shape. We inflated it, and my sons spent hours rowing that thing around.
Hopefully my sons can have some similar memories, although maybe they should try something other than carp golf.
*Animal Rights Concerns: Now before I get a bunch of people upset about the profligate and senseless violence towards helpless creatures, I need to point out something about Carp. Carp are a non-native species of fish introduced illegally to Utah Lake many decades ago. These fish have crowded out the natural species of fish, threatening one in particular to near extinction. They also destroy the natural habitat for many wildlife and plant species by constantly churning the bottom of the lake, creating the murky conditions present today. The problem is so bad that the federal government has contracted with commercial fishermen to remove over 1 million pounds of carp each year for the next 7 years from the lake. Since there was no viable commercial use for these fish, they will be trucked off to the desert and buried. That being said, do I feel a little bad about the amount of violence involved in this 'sport'? Yes. Do I have any long standing regret about this past activity? No. At the time of these activities, "Carp Gigging" was an accepted sport which involved stabbing carp with a long spear.
One of those activities was a creation called "Carp Golf".*(See note below about animal rights)
While many of our peers went "gigging carp", we wanted something more challenging. So we would take golf irons out into the shallows of the lake & hunt the carp. It was very challenging, because you often had to run to catch the carp, then swing hard enough to hit them.
We also played golf around the neighborhood, substituting a tennis ball for the golf balls. Nothing like calling the "hole" to be a birdhouse directly over a car parked in the driveway.
These memories were brought back into focus for me because my Dad recently came across an old rubber raft we used extensively that summer. He had purchased it used from the raft rental place near Flaming Gorge, which rents rafts to float the Green River just below the dam. We put that raft in more bodies of water than I can count. Dad had offered to let us take it for our weekend getaway at Yuba Lake. Surprisingly, it is still in really good shape. We inflated it, and my sons spent hours rowing that thing around.
Hopefully my sons can have some similar memories, although maybe they should try something other than carp golf.
*Animal Rights Concerns: Now before I get a bunch of people upset about the profligate and senseless violence towards helpless creatures, I need to point out something about Carp. Carp are a non-native species of fish introduced illegally to Utah Lake many decades ago. These fish have crowded out the natural species of fish, threatening one in particular to near extinction. They also destroy the natural habitat for many wildlife and plant species by constantly churning the bottom of the lake, creating the murky conditions present today. The problem is so bad that the federal government has contracted with commercial fishermen to remove over 1 million pounds of carp each year for the next 7 years from the lake. Since there was no viable commercial use for these fish, they will be trucked off to the desert and buried. That being said, do I feel a little bad about the amount of violence involved in this 'sport'? Yes. Do I have any long standing regret about this past activity? No. At the time of these activities, "Carp Gigging" was an accepted sport which involved stabbing carp with a long spear.
Monday, July 20, 2009
How Source Control Drove Me Insane
I'll be right up front about it, this is a geek post. I'll try to explain in regular english as much as possible, but some things you just have to have a deep understanding of computers to appreciate.
For the last two and a half weeks, I have been in the middle of a conflict taking place on my work laptop between development tools and their corresponding features which allow access to the central repository for all of the code we develop. This central repository is called a 'source control' system and allows large projects to keep track of who is working on what, and allegedly ensures that what one developer writes does not get deleted or otherwise broken by another developer.
There are many source control tools out there, but prior to working for GE, I had only used CVS and Subversion. GE only uses one source control tool, and it is called ClearCase. ClearCase is a tool from a company named Rational, which was purchased by IBM not too long ago. The old saying goes "no one was ever fired for buying IBM", and so the thinking goes at GE.
My problem has its roots in my abilites to develop in multiple languages. I can comfortably write code in Java and C#. Java is the open-source darling which is very popular right now. Anyone can download freely available tools, write code in Java, and (also allegedly) run that code on any operating system which supports Java, which at this point includes the major operating systems (Windows, Mac, and Linux). C# is a 'Java-like' language from Microsoft, with excellent (albeit expensive) tools to develop with, and a deeper native relationship with Microsoft Windows.
There are many advantages and disadvantages to both languages, far too many to go into a debate in this post.
My employer, GE Healthcare, uses both in the project which I am working on. On the surface, this makes people such as myself who can write comfortably in either language even more valuable. (Although people can make the switch between them pretty easily - I compare it to learning local slang and accents. The underlying principals are very similar.) However, I have had to set up development environments for both on my work laptop. The real problem is when both of those environments attempt to utilize the source control system, ClearCase. There are some deep 'under-the-hood' conflicts between them which have made me completely unable to develop and compile Java code for the last couple of weeks. I have tried uninstalling & reinstalling everything, using different tools for Java, changing the way my account accesses ClearCase, nothing works. I have been absolutely useless for the last two and a half weeks.
Today I got to my wit's end. I am currenly waiting for my laptop to be returned after having it completely re-imaged. (That means that they erase everything and return it to a state as if it had just been delivered to me) This will cause me to be very busy reinstalling all of my necessary applications for the next couple of days, but it's better than the alternatives of going up to the roof and throwing my laptop as far as I can and/or looking for a new job.
For the last two and a half weeks, I have been in the middle of a conflict taking place on my work laptop between development tools and their corresponding features which allow access to the central repository for all of the code we develop. This central repository is called a 'source control' system and allows large projects to keep track of who is working on what, and allegedly ensures that what one developer writes does not get deleted or otherwise broken by another developer.
There are many source control tools out there, but prior to working for GE, I had only used CVS and Subversion. GE only uses one source control tool, and it is called ClearCase. ClearCase is a tool from a company named Rational, which was purchased by IBM not too long ago. The old saying goes "no one was ever fired for buying IBM", and so the thinking goes at GE.
My problem has its roots in my abilites to develop in multiple languages. I can comfortably write code in Java and C#. Java is the open-source darling which is very popular right now. Anyone can download freely available tools, write code in Java, and (also allegedly) run that code on any operating system which supports Java, which at this point includes the major operating systems (Windows, Mac, and Linux). C# is a 'Java-like' language from Microsoft, with excellent (albeit expensive) tools to develop with, and a deeper native relationship with Microsoft Windows.
There are many advantages and disadvantages to both languages, far too many to go into a debate in this post.
My employer, GE Healthcare, uses both in the project which I am working on. On the surface, this makes people such as myself who can write comfortably in either language even more valuable. (Although people can make the switch between them pretty easily - I compare it to learning local slang and accents. The underlying principals are very similar.) However, I have had to set up development environments for both on my work laptop. The real problem is when both of those environments attempt to utilize the source control system, ClearCase. There are some deep 'under-the-hood' conflicts between them which have made me completely unable to develop and compile Java code for the last couple of weeks. I have tried uninstalling & reinstalling everything, using different tools for Java, changing the way my account accesses ClearCase, nothing works. I have been absolutely useless for the last two and a half weeks.
Today I got to my wit's end. I am currenly waiting for my laptop to be returned after having it completely re-imaged. (That means that they erase everything and return it to a state as if it had just been delivered to me) This will cause me to be very busy reinstalling all of my necessary applications for the next couple of days, but it's better than the alternatives of going up to the roof and throwing my laptop as far as I can and/or looking for a new job.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Infrequent posting problem
I realized today that I haven't posted anything of consequence in quite a while. This isn't because I haven't been writing. On the contrary, I have been writing quite a bit. However, I had started writing stories about adventures I had with my best friends as teenagers. That path led me to the dilemma of whether or not to publish stories that may end up being seen as implicit permission for my own sons and the children of my friends to imitate, replicate, or impersonate the remarkable, often dangerous and just as often illegal adventures I had as a teen-age idiot.
As such, I sadly inform my one reader that I have decided not to post stories such as "Carp Golf", "4 Wheeling and Pop-Tarts", "Night-ops Golf", and "Spotlighting". Maybe when my kids have gotten past the 'immortal' stage of adolescence I can share those often humorous stories with a larger audience.
As such, I sadly inform my one reader that I have decided not to post stories such as "Carp Golf", "4 Wheeling and Pop-Tarts", "Night-ops Golf", and "Spotlighting". Maybe when my kids have gotten past the 'immortal' stage of adolescence I can share those often humorous stories with a larger audience.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Tazed and Confused
The whole Tazer controversy has been building for some time, and came to a head this week when the son of a prominent newsman died after being Tazed. I find myself being asked by many who know me what I think of the situation.
I think it is as much a travesty as a tragedy.
Don't get me wrong, I think that the Tazer is an indispensable tool to police officers which has saved many more lives than it has taken. However, some officers have begun to reach for it as the first option in their arsenal.
I'm sure there will be officers out there critical of me for speaking out & crossing the blue line, but I've never been a big fan of the blue line anyway. Incidents like these are a black eye for anyone with a badge, and an ever larger number of people are taking notice at just how often they take place.
I may be a bit skewed in my assessment of this last event because I have received vastly greater amounts of training on dealing with mental illness, both in and out of a law enforcement perspective, than most officers will ever get. The responding officers to the above referenced incident likely have never dealt with someone truly mentally ill, and were far out of their depth.
In my opinion, the problem goes back to police training, or in some cases a lack thereof.
When I went through the academies, both corrections and police, there was a great deal of emphasis placed on the Force Continuum, which dictates the use of force. I learned the "one plus" theory: in a given situation, you use up to the level of force one step higher than the subject is using. In order to do that, you have to learn the Force Continuum:
From a cop's perspective, he (or she) has his own priority tree to follow:
In the above referenced situation, obviously the rural cops had little to no experience in dealing with someone having a mental health incident. A man running and screaming butt naked down the highway is probably more than a little disconcerting for an officer who doesn't see something like that often. In addition, the Tazer is completely safe (although painful) on the overwhelming majority of healthy people. Nearly every instance of someone dying after being Tazed involves a prior health condition on the part of the arrested. However, if those officers had had better training in dealing with a person in mental crisis, or if they had had better verbal skills, a young family would probably not be without a father and husband today.
I also wonder if it shouldn't be a requirement for all new officers to work for 6 months in a correctional or mental health facility. I know from personal experience from working on the Maximum Security Forensics Unit of the Utah State Hospital that having to go in and talk down a 6'4" 300 pound naked man who thinks he is Jesus without any weapons does wonders for both your verbal communication skills and your physical control skills. In those situations, you gain a respect for the ability to verbally gain compliance in the vast majority of incidents, and the confidence in your physical abilities to successfully take care of the situation physically without any weapons in the few times verbal skills don't work.
The Tazer is a fantastic tool available in situations where the other alternative without it would be the likely use of deadly force. There are a large number of people alive today thanks to the fact that officers who cannot gain control of the situation with lesser uses of force have an option short of pulling their gun and ending a life. I for one hope that officers learn, and learn soon, that they should use those other skills and tools before falling back on the Tazer, before legislative action takes that otherwise life-saving tool away from them.
I think it is as much a travesty as a tragedy.
Don't get me wrong, I think that the Tazer is an indispensable tool to police officers which has saved many more lives than it has taken. However, some officers have begun to reach for it as the first option in their arsenal.
I'm sure there will be officers out there critical of me for speaking out & crossing the blue line, but I've never been a big fan of the blue line anyway. Incidents like these are a black eye for anyone with a badge, and an ever larger number of people are taking notice at just how often they take place.
I may be a bit skewed in my assessment of this last event because I have received vastly greater amounts of training on dealing with mental illness, both in and out of a law enforcement perspective, than most officers will ever get. The responding officers to the above referenced incident likely have never dealt with someone truly mentally ill, and were far out of their depth.
In my opinion, the problem goes back to police training, or in some cases a lack thereof.
When I went through the academies, both corrections and police, there was a great deal of emphasis placed on the Force Continuum, which dictates the use of force. I learned the "one plus" theory: in a given situation, you use up to the level of force one step higher than the subject is using. In order to do that, you have to learn the Force Continuum:
- Verbal Action
- Physical Action
- Less than Lethal Weapons:
- Pepper Spray
- Tazer
- Baton/Asp
- Lethal Weapons/Deadly Force
From a cop's perspective, he (or she) has his own priority tree to follow:
- I (and all the members of my team) go home uninjured at the end of this shift.
- Anyone else's safety.
- Anyone else's property.
In the above referenced situation, obviously the rural cops had little to no experience in dealing with someone having a mental health incident. A man running and screaming butt naked down the highway is probably more than a little disconcerting for an officer who doesn't see something like that often. In addition, the Tazer is completely safe (although painful) on the overwhelming majority of healthy people. Nearly every instance of someone dying after being Tazed involves a prior health condition on the part of the arrested. However, if those officers had had better training in dealing with a person in mental crisis, or if they had had better verbal skills, a young family would probably not be without a father and husband today.
I also wonder if it shouldn't be a requirement for all new officers to work for 6 months in a correctional or mental health facility. I know from personal experience from working on the Maximum Security Forensics Unit of the Utah State Hospital that having to go in and talk down a 6'4" 300 pound naked man who thinks he is Jesus without any weapons does wonders for both your verbal communication skills and your physical control skills. In those situations, you gain a respect for the ability to verbally gain compliance in the vast majority of incidents, and the confidence in your physical abilities to successfully take care of the situation physically without any weapons in the few times verbal skills don't work.
The Tazer is a fantastic tool available in situations where the other alternative without it would be the likely use of deadly force. There are a large number of people alive today thanks to the fact that officers who cannot gain control of the situation with lesser uses of force have an option short of pulling their gun and ending a life. I for one hope that officers learn, and learn soon, that they should use those other skills and tools before falling back on the Tazer, before legislative action takes that otherwise life-saving tool away from them.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Beefcake
Despite the title of this post, it is not about muscular men without shirts.
It is in fact about a real Beef Cake.
One was presented to me by friends at a previous job on my last day there.
It was actually made of meatloaf, with mashed potatos colored for the 'frosting'.
It was quite delicious.
I've told this story lots of time, but people have a hard time believing it, so here is photographic proof:
I decided to take out some of my pent up frustrations on the cake:
One of the people responsible was Kyle (on the right):
The person primarily responsible, Brandon (on the left):
One of the other responsible parties, Sarah (along with a real cake):
It is in fact about a real Beef Cake.
One was presented to me by friends at a previous job on my last day there.
It was actually made of meatloaf, with mashed potatos colored for the 'frosting'.
It was quite delicious.
I've told this story lots of time, but people have a hard time believing it, so here is photographic proof:
I decided to take out some of my pent up frustrations on the cake:
One of the people responsible was Kyle (on the right):
The person primarily responsible, Brandon (on the left):
One of the other responsible parties, Sarah (along with a real cake):
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Amusing things at work
I had two things happen last night that were mildly amusing.
First, when I was working up in Alpine, a very affluent community in north Utah County, I had parked my truck across the street from a house I needed to visit. Usually, I leave the truck running on stops because I am only out of the truck for 2-3 minutes, and I feel like the wear on the starting motor caused by using it 30+ times an evening is much worse than just idling for a few minutes.
As I was approaching the door of the house, two guys were walking down the street on the other side, next to my truck. One of them called out to me "Hey! I'm going to steal your truck because you left it running! That makes it legal, right?" I responded "If you want to take your chances, go ahead!" (I left off the other part that went through my mind: "If you think you can outrun a bullet...") He called back "You shouldn't trust a guy walking down the street with a gallon of liquor!" while holding up his gallon jug of what looked like water.
I turned around to face them so they could see my uniform and replied "You shouldn't ever threaten to steal a cop's truck!" I could see both of them turn pale from all the way across the street, and they hurried off without another word.
The second thing was right at the end of the night, on my last stop.
I pulled up to a house, and again I found myself parking across the street from the house I needed to visit. I noticed some people in the house I had just parked in front of glancing out the window as I got out. Next thing I know there are people in EVERY window watching me. To put it delicately, they appeared to be afraid I was with the border patrol. I had to spend a few minutes across the street talking to the person I had come to reach, and the whole time, up to 10 people would come out on the porch, go out & watch over the fence from the back yard, or peek out between blinds in the windows. They were very afraid.
As I got back in my truck to leave, I briefly considered yelling out "INS! INS!", but even I'm not that big of a jackass.
First, when I was working up in Alpine, a very affluent community in north Utah County, I had parked my truck across the street from a house I needed to visit. Usually, I leave the truck running on stops because I am only out of the truck for 2-3 minutes, and I feel like the wear on the starting motor caused by using it 30+ times an evening is much worse than just idling for a few minutes.
As I was approaching the door of the house, two guys were walking down the street on the other side, next to my truck. One of them called out to me "Hey! I'm going to steal your truck because you left it running! That makes it legal, right?" I responded "If you want to take your chances, go ahead!" (I left off the other part that went through my mind: "If you think you can outrun a bullet...") He called back "You shouldn't trust a guy walking down the street with a gallon of liquor!" while holding up his gallon jug of what looked like water.
I turned around to face them so they could see my uniform and replied "You shouldn't ever threaten to steal a cop's truck!" I could see both of them turn pale from all the way across the street, and they hurried off without another word.
The second thing was right at the end of the night, on my last stop.
I pulled up to a house, and again I found myself parking across the street from the house I needed to visit. I noticed some people in the house I had just parked in front of glancing out the window as I got out. Next thing I know there are people in EVERY window watching me. To put it delicately, they appeared to be afraid I was with the border patrol. I had to spend a few minutes across the street talking to the person I had come to reach, and the whole time, up to 10 people would come out on the porch, go out & watch over the fence from the back yard, or peek out between blinds in the windows. They were very afraid.
As I got back in my truck to leave, I briefly considered yelling out "INS! INS!", but even I'm not that big of a jackass.
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