If something unfair, unjust, or evil happens, should we simply pray for the power to forgive the evildoer or should we take action against the evil? This is the question I was in sudden need of exploring after a friend of mine called into question the motives behind where I was spending some of my time and whether or not…
The Secrets of Pipe Smoking
It was hard to come up with a title for this. Here are some ideas I toyed with: Why Smoking a Pipe Makes You Cooler Why Losers Don’t Smoke Pipes If You Want to be 79% More Classy, Smoke a Pipe. Why your Grandpa Smoked a Pipe and Why He was Cooler Than You Why Pipe Smoke Smells Awesome and…
Sound problem with Qtel (open source Echolink) in Ubuntu 14.04
If you are looking to get set up Echolink on your shiny new Ubuntu 14.04 machine, be sure to read the how to article I wrote before. However, even after having such a formidable victory and feeling waves of joy when the repeater list finally populated Qtel on my Trusty Tahr, I had a less-than-raring experience of not being able…
Audible for Ubuntu: Epic Fail
Trying to listen to an audio book from Audible.com on your Ubuntu machine? Spare yourself the pain, and just ask to cancel and get your money back. They have no plans to help you. I hope I can one day edit this post with some good news, but until they they are in bed with proprietary operating systems of the…
How to Use Echolink (QTEL) on Ubuntu 14.04
Thanks to Joe for actually searching the solution(s) and emailing me. I figured we should publish this for others. I figured worst case scenario, I would probably need to log these solutions for later when I forget, ha. First of all, you can apparently use the native Echolink windows app using Wine in Ubuntu. But that’s kind of like praying…
Amateur (Ham) Radio: No, Officer, I won’t Pay That ‘Use of Electronic Device Ticket’ This Time
I’m sick of it. I have gotten 2 violation tickets for allegedly using an electronic device while driving. The first time I was at a red light and I moved my cell phone from my dash (it was sliding around), checked the time on the phone’s clock, and put it on my passenger seat. The officer behind not only pulls…
Awesome Coffee Interview: Get Coffee Educated
I have already watched this twice. For me, watching something *once* is rare. If you like coffee, if you are interested in learning interesting things about coffee, then this is the 1 hour video to watch. The cool thing is that it has a detailed breakdown of the topics covered so you can skip through to what you like. My…
Why the Past Stays in the Past
Once in a while… just once in a while, I get a forwarded email that I read all the way through. 98% of the time this happens it’s because it’s funny. The other 2% are probably educational to some level. This one was so emotion-stirring that I felt I needed to actually give it an online shout-out. Since no one…
Realtors Who Use Gmail are In Breach of Their Fiduciary Duty to Clients
It’s time to call a spade a spade. The Real Estate Council of BC talks about the responsibility of real estate agents here. Scanning down the page there is a section dedicated to ‘fiduciary duty’. This term sound big but it’s pretty simple. Lawyers have it, too. They have to look out for the best interests of their clients and…
Typoglycemia and Speed Reading
Today I was thinking about the mind and how typos can be easily read and understood by people of the same mother tongue. I finally found the example by searching the keywords ‘ESL, typos, understand, native,”. Here is a good summary of what’s up with typoglycemia What jumped out at me was the explanation of why ‘they’ think it happens.…