My big ol' head.

The Indiana Jones School of Management

Tue 28 Feb 2006

Taxes Filed

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 15:39

The loud crash you just heard was the world hitting its brakes when it realized I filed my 2005 tax return on 28 Feb 2006. Yep, I’m 2-for-2.

That refund is going to be nice, too.

Hem and Over the Rhine … TOGETHER?!?!

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 12:48
Tagged with:

I might sell body parts to make one of these shows!

Thanks, Lara, for bringing that up. I’d missed it.

The Moral Hazard Myth of Health Care

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 12:02

Jon Armstrong points to a Malcolm Gladwell essay on American healthcare:

One of the great mysteries of political life in the United States is why Americans are so devoted to their health-care system. Six times in the past century—during the First World War, during the Depression, during the Truman and Johnson Administrations, in the Senate in the nineteen-seventies, and during the Clinton years—efforts have been made to introduce some kind of universal health insurance, and each time the efforts have been rejected. Instead, the United States has opted for a makeshift system of increasing complexity and dysfunction.

Americans spend $5,267 per capita on health care every year, almost two and half times the industrialized world’s median of $2,193; the extra spending comes to hundreds of billions of dollars a year. What does that extra spending buy us? Americans have fewer doctors per capita than most Western countries. We go to the doctor less than people in other Western countries. We get admitted to the hospital less frequently than people in other Western countries. We are less satisfied with our health care than our counterparts in other countries. American life expectancy is lower than the Western average. Childhood-immunization rates in the United States are lower than average. Infant-mortality rates are in the nineteenth percentile of industrialized nations. Doctors here perform more high-end medical procedures, such as coronary angioplasties, than in other countries, but most of the wealthier Western countries have more CT scanners than the United States does, and Switzerland, Japan, Austria, and Finland all have more MRI machines per capita.

Nor is our system more efficient. The United States spends more than a thousand dollars per capita per year–or close to four hundred billion dollars–on health-care-related paperwork and administration, whereas Canada, for example, spends only about three hundred dollars per capita. And, of course, every other country in the industrialized world insures all its citizens; despite those extra hundreds of billions of dollars we spend each year, we leave forty-five million people without any insurance. A country that displays an almost ruthless commitment to efficiency and performance in every aspect of its economy—a country that switched to Japanese cars the moment they were more reliable, and to Chinese T-shirts the moment they were five cents cheaper—has loyally stuck with a health-care system that leaves its citizenry pulling out their teeth with pliers.

[Emphasis mine.]

You can come up with plenty of anecdotal evidence why socialized medicine doesn’t work. I counter with the anecdotal evidence of my youth, where I was covered by military medical care. It’s inconceivable to me that we have military health care—which, on the whole, is pretty damn good at the basics—and see folks arguing that the government shouldn’t get involved with health care.

Depending on how one reads the Constitution, one can make the argument that the whole health care system could be publicized. One could also argue for a bipartite system where part of it is public and part is private. Just don’t use public funds to pay for private services; if people choose to use private health care for their own reasons, let them do it, but don’t give a dime of taxpayer money for the system.

That would truly let the market decide.

Geof’s New Music: 26 Feb-4 Mar 2006

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 10:47

I put this off yesterday because I didn’t bring my case full of bootlegs—no, I’m not kidding—in to the office. This morning, I got my BMG order out of the mailbox, so I’m going to put off the bootlegs a while longer and go after the new stuff.

This week, I’m fleshing out my Fountains of Wayne discography:

[Mom always said that BMG never would work for me. I have worked for years proving her wrong.]

Last week was:

Now to finish processing the FoW so I can listen to it here at the office …

links for 2006-02-28

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 03:18

Mon 27 Feb 2006

PersonalDNA: A Twist on Myers-Briggs

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 19:02

My Personal DNA Report

The old engineering management student in me loves personality quizzes! I’m not gonna lie about that. I’m all about dissecting myself.

Fred Wilson pointed me over to PersonalDNA.com, which does a far more intuitive approach to M-B style testing than anything I’ve ever seen online. [If you ever took the Keirsey Temperament Sorter, you'll be nodding your head on the second page in agreement with me.]

As Fred notes, the coolest thing is the Psych You / Psych Me feature, which allows people who know you to assess you on the same criteria you just completed. I would be really interested for all of you who regularly read this Weblog to take a few minutes and see how you see me. Most importantly, I’m curious to see how my local friends see me. [In other words, Rick, please take a few moments on this, won't you? You know me better than anyone outside my family.] My receipt number is: 7663bbaca6c0.

[The only bad thing about this is that they don't give you the standard tools to claim things. I know that people are worried about privacy, but man ... let me give you my email address so I can claim my stuff!]

Parallels?

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 18:20

I’m sure that this is an unoriginal thought, but … am I the only person who sees parallels between the Sunnis and Sh’ia in Iraq and the Catholics and Protestants in Ireland? We all know how that turned out—it involved splitting off Northern Island and going through decades of The Troubles.

Maybe we need to start looking to our British friends for lessons learned…

Rescue Me Season 2 DVD Release Date

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 16:59
Tagged with:

Lots of folks have been asking in the comments section of my Rescue Me Season Three News entry when the second season of Rescue Me would be coming out on DVD. Prompted by a comment from Mike, I went and did some looking: Rescue Me - The Complete Second Season shows up on Amazon with a release date of 9 May 2006. Mike says he hears it’s coming out a week earlier; I’ve emailed him with a request to let me know his source.

Either way, it looks like the goodness that is Rescue Me will be out for all to see on DVD soon!

Mail Act-On

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 15:54
Tagged with:

I think the true test of whether software is worth me writing about it is when it reaches the point of ubiquity. For me, that happens in the Mac world when I find myself sub-consciously keying the strokes I’d use on a Mac here at my office PC.

Need an example? Let me provide it: Mail Act-On. I subscribe to the Getting Things Done modus operandi of dealing with email: either respond/act on it right away, or do one of three things:

  • File it in an @Actions folder so you can process the action later.
  • File it in an @Archives folder for later reference.
  • File it in an @Responses folder so you can respond at your leisure.

Now, I don’t do this on all platforms and in all situations; here at the office, I pretty well have to file by project—partly beacuse I work so many projects at once, and partly because I stink at working the ability to edit Outlook subject lines into my daily workflow. But with my personal email, save for very few exceptions, I have stuff in those three folders.

Because I use those folders almost exclusively, it was a natural for me to start using Mail Act-On by setting up filtering rules for those three folders. Unfortunately, it was hard to do, because … what keystrokes do you use? The first letter is out, as you have Actions and Archives. The second letter is out, because you’d have Archives, and wouldn’t that make you think of Responses? Yeah, me, too.

I finally adopted the following:

  • `c pushes me into @Actions.
  • `v pushes me into @Archives.
  • `r pushes me into @Responses.

I tried to come up with the letter that was “most representative” of the word. I finally got the system when I realized that c, r, and v were near on the keyboard. It works for me; you might use some other mnemonic, and I’m not going to fault you for it.

That said, I’ve come to use Mail Act-on for this seemingly trivial task so much that I now grouse that I have no analog here in the PC/Thunderbird world of my office touching of my personal email. It’s almost as hard on me as it is to transition between Alt and Ctrl keying of things in browsers. I have to do mental shifting every time, and it’s as jarring as going from driving a manual transmission to an automatic. [I'll make do, though.]

In any regard, if you use Mail.app, are good about filing your email, and are looking for keyboard shortcuts, I consider Mail Act-On to be essential.

I’m Corrupting Eli

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 12:15

I really am …

Geof was over visiting one night last week and was down on the floor with Eli. Something had gone under the couch, and Eli and Geof were trying to fetch it out with one of Eli’s drum stick. Eli waved the stick around. “Don’t stick that up my nose or anything,” Geof joked. Immediately Eli jabbed at Geof’s face with his stick, earning him some couch time.

So pay attention, everyone: DON’T TELL HIM THINGS LIKE THAT.

Or if you’re going to do it anyway, make sure it’ll be entertaining for the rest of us to watch.

I thought it was really funny for a second, and then I realized that Eli was going to get in trouble for what he’d just done. Poor guy!

How I Spent My Weekend

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 11:23
Tagged with:



DSCN3246

Originally uploaded by jholland444.

I had a bunch of friends in town for the weekend. The plan was to get together, hang out, and catch a couple UAH hockey games. Well, the plan went by the wayside as soon as Mike’s wife started having heart problems last week—by the way, she’s been home for a few days, and she’s doing well :)—as UAH’s normal Public Address announcer had some outstanding committments.

Enter me, your ever-crazy correspondent, always willing to stick a microphone in his face and make a complete ass of himself. I had one HELL of a fun time working those two games. I would be happy to fill in as needed in the future.

In other news, Mike and I will be back together—after almost three years!—broadcasting from the CHA tournament in Detroit next weekend. I can’t wait!

Sat 25 Feb 2006

links for 2006-02-25

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 03:24

Fri 24 Feb 2006

links for 2006-02-24

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 03:25

Thu 23 Feb 2006

links for 2006-02-23

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 03:23

Wed 22 Feb 2006

TrackBack Specification?

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 13:20

Is it just me, or is Six Apart’s push for TrackBack as a specification about, oh, two years late in coming? Oh well, better late than never!

I think Matt’s got many good points about pingback being a more mature technology, as it has long had a specification, but … I’m a total lemming and use TrackBack almost exclusively.

How Sportswriters Reinforce the “Locker Room Mentality”

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 10:47

Joe Clark wrote an excellent essay on how it’s silly that sportswriters seem to push obviously homosexual athletes into the closet, playing the don’t-ask, don’t-tell game:

Straight sports reporters telling everybody to keep quiet about gays in sports is the problem. These are mostly guys; even the leading Canadian women in sportswriting, of the Rosie DiManno/Crusty Blatchford ilk, are flat-out male apologists. Sportswriter guys are, on the whole, dumpy or aging and look with great fondness at the physical capabilities and the actual bodies of the male athletes they cover.

When sportswriters talk about the fact that the locker room culture makes it awfully difficult for an athlete to be open about his sexual orientation—which is to say, to publicly admit that he’s homosexual and not part of the mainstream macho stereotype, which is overtly [and sometimes borderline predatory] heterosexual—they are, in fact, highlighting a cultural problem that they themselves buttress. Consider all of Joe’s examples, then add the salacious reporting of marital infidelity and sexual misconduct allegations—Kobe Bryant, Shawn Kemp, Isiah Thomas, et al—and realize that all this reporting simply amplifies the false expectation that all our athletes are heterosexual.

Of course, then there’s the whole Out magazine controversy from a few years ago that had everyone speculating as to Mike Piazza’s orientation.

Now, some of my friends argue that this doesn’t matter, and they look at me disdainfully when I broach the subject. But I think Joe nails it here:

Sexual behaviour can be private but sexual orientation isn’t and can’t. If you think that’s too broad, apply it solely to public figures, which Olympic athletes surely are. In the 21st century, they don’t get to hide in the closet or be coy. What you call outing we call reporting. When do journalists report that straight athletes are straight? All the time.

In an era where athletes are celebrities, subject to all the privacy invasions that celebrity brings, it’s interesting to note how the coverage of the celebrity nature reinforce the very stereotypes that the more editorially-minded commentators among us seem willing to decry. It’s frustrating to me, since we’re just delaying the inevitable … I’m ready for this to just not be a problem anymore.

Hitting Stride

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 06:00

I’m almost a little afraid of myself at this point. Both of the last two nights, I’ve been up past 0030; both of the last two morning, I’ve been awake and ready to go at 0530. Cheerful, happy, and eager to attack life long before the sun comes up. I’m used to roughly this amount of sleep, but … wow, the “I’m ready to wake up and run through a wall” bit is a bit new…

links for 2006-02-22

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 03:19

Tue 21 Feb 2006

Geof’s New Music: 19-25 Feb 2006

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 15:13

I spent time this weekend getting my bootleg situation in order—I now have a ridiculously-detailed conversion process that I’ll post sometime later this week—and I came to the conclusion that I have an insane backlog of bootlegs to process. [Did I stop downloading new stuff? Of course not. At this rate, I'll need a 12-step program.]

Anyway, here’s what I’ve got that’s new this week:

Last week was a lot more mellow, but still very good:

  • Birds, Beasts, & Flowers by Hem and Autumn Defense. This gets four stars; it’d probably be higher if this wasn’t my first exposure to AD.
  • Hem’s No Word From Tom. This is the first of anything I’ve put in the Musiclogging entries here that gets five stars from me. Just consistently awesome. If you made me choose between listening to Sally Ellyson and Karin Bergquist, well … I’m going to shoot you for making me choose.
  • The Andrew Osenga “official” bootleg from Champaign, IL, USA. This gets a solid four stars. I’ve heard Andrew do better shows, which isn’t a knock on him—but maybe it’s just me, because I’ve seen him a lot and have high standards for him rocking my face off. He’s really funny in the stage banter, which makes it worth it for me.

links for 2006-02-21

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 03:24

Mon 20 Feb 2006

Refreshed

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 23:35

Teledyne gives us all of four three-day weekends a year:

  1. Presidents’ Day in February.
  2. Memorial Day in May.
  3. Independence Day in July.
  4. Labor Day in September.

Other than that, it’s two days off at Thanksgiving, Christmas Day [or the day before|after if that falls on a weekend], and New Year’s Day [see Christmas Day for timing]. Employees that are on-site at NASA get Martin Luther King Day off; we get a floating holiday in its place, largely because corporate prefers to give us a day off in February rather than another one in January. Yeah, that leaves me a little frustrated every year—not for the no-day-off, but because I’d rather celebrate King than Washington and Lincoln. You may say that my sense of history is skewed, but I’ll just argue that I’m a lot closer to King’s ripple in the ocean.

As such, you’d be right in thinking that I treasure my three-day weekends. Last year, I spent two of the four at weddings—first my brother’s [Memorial Day] and then Brandon and Sarah’s [Independence Day]. This year, I hope to spend the other three doing exactly what I did this weekend: puttering around the house, catching up on things, and generally chilling out.

Maybe all that ice and stuff wasn’t so bad after all.

Tax Filing SNAFU

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 18:59

I found out from Scott and confirmed it myself just now: TurboTax.com is having a glitch with getting charitable deductions filed for 2005 federal income taxes. :sigh: I guess I’m going to miss my deadline for filing, but with this much done, I’ll get it done by the end of the month, no sweat.

Anderson Family Concerns

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 16:30

There are a few of you who read this Weblog that know my friend Mike Anderson, fellow UAH alumnus and my former partner in the Charger Hockey radio booth. If you do know him, you know that he and his wife were happy to bring their first son into the world last week. Unfortunately, Lillian has been hospitalized with post-partum cardiomyopathy today. Mike’s understandably worried and exhausted; right now, Jake is unable to be with his mother in that part of the hospital. Obviously, we all want Lil to get the care she needs, but it would be great if she could be getting it in a private room so that her boy could be with her at what is definitely a crucial bonding time.

I’ve talked with Mike, and he knows that I’m prayin’ for ‘em. I’d appreciate it if you would, too. Thanks.

Reason 32 That Living Alone Ain’t All It’s Cracked Up to Be

Filed under: — Geof F. Morris @ 11:10

When you live alone, you get to shag the 100-lb.+ filing cabinet you just bought at Staples up the stairs by yourself. Nice workout, though.

links for 2006-02-20

Filed under: