Pops from Classics.
When I was a kid about 6, my mother’s favorite pop song was Connee Boswell singing Ah So Pure with Bob Crosby and the Bobcats. Several years later, my grandfather, who lived with us, was listening to the Metropolitan Opera one Saturday. The opera was Martha by Frederich von Flotow. The tenor was singing the […]
Telephone Evil for Kids
The behavior of kids today is very strange to me. I also was a kid once, despite what one might think at my age. I almost appear to be a being from another age. But memory doesn’t fail me. Remembering my childhood, I think I would have gone nuts if I were a child in […]
The Generation Gap
I saw a cartoon the other day showing a nursery class where the teacher is holding the telephone for one of the 4 year olds with the comment, “Your father needs some computer help.” Once upon a time I would have thought that was just a satirical joke. No more. I have been trying to […]
Revisiting the Year 2000 Non-Problem
Back in the 1990s, I wrote a PC primer, primarily because I owned a PC training company. It was a pretty good seller. When the millenium approached, the publisher asked me to write a Y2K book, the so-called Year 2000 Problem. I had no interest in doing it, but I researched it anyway out of curiosity.
Some Words About AI (Artificial Intelligence)
I have been listening to talking heads, reading news articles, politicians and even the Pope, all worried about AI. My opinion is relatively simple in concept.
Lunacy in the Computer Room
In my early computer days, right out of the Air Force, I worked nights at Service Bureau Corporation, a wholly owned IBM subsidiary. We programmers had to use the mainframe IBM 704 after normal business hours, so nights in the computer room were always interesting. The face of the computer console was pointed toward Madison Avenue through a […]
Italian Adventure — Luck With the Travel Gods
Here was the plan. Fly to Italy on Tuesday. Return Friday afternoon and land at Newark Airport at 1:00 pm. Then somehow get to LaGuardia Airport in time for a 4:30 pm flight to Chicago. At my age, that might sound a little ambitious. My wife and I already had tickets to Chicago to spend […]
Trying to Outsmart the Weather
This record-setting blizzard we just had reminded me. Back in the 1950s, when I was working professionally as a meteorologist, we didn’t have computers, satellites, or any of the incredible tools that forecasters rely on today. What we had instead were surface maps, upper-air charts, a good deal of training, and experience. If I’m being […]
The Fear of AI
Back when I worked for IBM in 1959, the mainframe in use was the new IBM 704. To give you some perspective, the 704 was in a gymnasium sized store front on the corner of 59th street and Madison Avenue. The console amused passers-by in the huge picture window with its multi-colored blinking lights. In […]
My Take on Greenland
I try not to exercise my political ideas in these brief articles and I have no intention of starting now. However, having spent time in Greenland in winter and summer, I might just clarify what can only be either false impressions or lack of interest. First, Greenland became important in the early days of the […]