General

The limits of nostalgia

Nostalgia is one of those inevitable things you get pulled into as you get older. Some give into it entirely, refusing to embrace anything new in favor of yelling at clouds and acting as if everything from their youth was better.

The reality is some things were better. Prices were lower. I can remember candy bars costing as little as 10 cents each. They cost more than ten times that now. Is that progress? Yes, if you sell candy bars. But they’re bad for you, so it’s difficult to get overly upset about that bit of inflation.

The reality is also that some things were bad. They are not worth remembering fondly. They are maybe not worth remembering at all, except as cautionary tales to warn future generations.

Fashion comprises almost all of the things in this category. Every decade has its fashion tragedies. Big hair. Acid wash jeans. Parachute pants. Running gear from 1975. You’d think it would be hard to screw up something as basic as a shirt and shorts. Then you see this:

Image courtesy of Up and Humming – A Running Blog

This looks like a publicity still from a 1977 gay porn film. Marathon Men. And what was the deal with tucking in your shirt? At least they’re not wearing those socks. Which socks? These socks:

Yes, I had socks just like these.

But what I’m here to talk about now is music.

I was not an experimental type when it came to listening to music in my teens (time-wise this was around 1977-84). While friends grooved to Dylan, Bowie and Lou Reed, I listened to The Beatles, The Beach Boys, The Bee Gees and Blondie. Pretty much any band that started with the letter “b.” Now, all of the groups I’ve mentioned are fine and I still enjoy listening to them today. And The Beatles (and even to an extent Blondie) pushed the boundaries on rock music. But for the most part these were safe, mainstream choices.

Below these bands were choices that were perhaps less likely to win armfuls of Grammys, like Boney M. Still, I eventually repurchased Boney M’s seminal Nightflight to Venus on iTunes. It even embraces its retro-ness by including album art that is literally a photo of the CD cover. And I’ve repurchased other albums of yore that were not exactly showered with critical acclaim but that I enjoyed too much to resist–Queen’s The Game, Duran Duran’s Seven and the Ragged Tiger and so on.

But there’s a line I won’t cross, where I have to admit the music I liked way back then was actually pretty bad.

So while I happily reacquainted myself with The Police’s Synchronicity, I could not do the same with Styx.

Sorry, Styx.

I bought two of their albums, 1981’s Paradise Theater and 1983’s Kilroy Was Here.

Paradise Theater is actually a pretty decent album and I loved the concept and even the album art. I liked the album enough to pick up their next, Kilroy Was Here. This was another concept album, about a fascist government (one in the future, not the one the US has now) that outlaws rock music. There was a mini-film and most people who were around back then probably remember the oddball hit “Mr. Roboto.” But here’s the thing. It’s a terrible album.

There are some good songs, like Tommy Shaw’s shimmering “Haven’t We Been Here Before?” but “Mr. Roboto” is cringe-inducing and the concept, which seems to be mocking the Moral Majority, is played completely straight, which makes it all the more ridiculous.

Nostalgia can’t bring me to buy either of these albums, and I played both quite a bit when they were new. I can still quote the (awful) lyrics from “Mr. Roboto.” But there are lines that cannot be crossed, so while Duran Duran, Boney M and the soundtrack for Grease get a pass, Styx does not.

National Not Pumpkin Spice Day

A few days ago I was grocery shopping and one of the end caps was festooned with boxes of Cheerios. I am a big Cheerios fan and was sad when my favorite kind, Multi-Grain with Ancient Grains, was apparently dropped from my local store. The addition of the ancient grains was just the right zany compliment to the regular multigrain. So now I settle for regular multigrain and am a little sad.

But this end cap did not feature Multi-Grain Cheerios. Or Honey Nut Cheerios. Or Apple Cinnamon Cheerios. Or even the decadent Chocolate Cheerios.

No, it featured Pumpkin Spice Cheerios.

Let me say two things:

  1. Pumpkins are not spicy.
  2. Barf.

Really, it’s bad enough that we get eggnog in September, now “pumpkin spice” is being added to, apparently, everything.

Let me ask you: Is “spice” an ingredient you have always hankered for in a breakfast cereal? I’m betting that you would be more inclined to pick nuts or grains or big heaps of sugar if you want a real pick-me-up in the morning. But you would not want spice. Or pumpkins.

In response to this gastronomical travesty, I am declaring today National Not Pumpkin Spice Day and vow not to buy any pumpkin spice-flavored whatevers, which is pretty easy since all of them gross me out.

Also, all future days will be National Not Pumpkin Spice Day. I say to you: enjoy!

The evolution of the smartphone (more smart, less phone)

My current phone is an iPhone 6 and I’ve had it for a little under three years, which is something like 20 in phone years.

It’s been paid off for nine months so I’m free to get a new phone anytime. I’ve resisted until now because there’s nothing wrong with it, though of late it has been a little more sluggish and battery life seems worse. It’s still perfectly usable.

But with the iPhone 8 and 8 Plus out and the iPhone X (10) due out in a little over a month, I’m mulling a replacement.

The weird thing is the phone part–where you make calls and take calls–is probably the aspect I’m least interested in. I’m a lot more interested in the rear-facing camera as my iPhone has replaced my Canon point-and-shoot camera. I’m also more interested in getting a newer device that would be snappier when running apps, retrieving information and other non-phone tasks. I mean, yes, I expect it to handle phone calls, too, but I actually don’t really talk much on the phone anymore and I kind of like it that way.

The other thing I’m mulling is moving to a larger phone. When I am on a call it’s often via ear buds, so I’m not holding a giant glass and aluminum slab next to my ear, anyway. The benefits are better battery life and a larger display for all those non-phone things.

The downside to this contemplation is Apple evolving back to ludicrous pricing territory (last seen prior to Jobs returning in 1997), which, combined with the Canadian dollar, means the 8 Plus and X sell for between $1,000-$1,300.

Or maybe I could just get a new sim for the $40 Samsung flip phone I still have tucked away in a drawer. Granted, it could really only do the phone part, but I could use the leftover $1,000 on, I don’t know, $1,000 worth of apple fritters or something.

Anyway, smartphones are expensive, which sucks, but they do all kinds of nifty things now, which is neat. The end!

Keyboards are hard

A month after posting about getting a new keyboard, I do not have a new keyboard.

But I did break out two of the three (!) mechanical keyboards I already have to test them again.

Playing around with the Filco with brown switches convinced me of two things:

  1. The form factor without numeric keypad is the way to go.
  2. Brown switches are not the way to go.

Playing around with the Das with blue switches left me more uncertain. First, the Das specifically is big and heavy and I’m not really into big and heavy for my keyboards anymore. It also has a glossy finish. Note to keyboard manufacturers: NEVER DO THIS. The gloss attracts fingerprints and reflects light like crazy. It doesn’t look good, it just looks distracting.

I still like the feel of blue switches but having used a Logitech K750 for a good long while now, it’s a big shift to go from a low-travel soft touch laptop-style keyboard to one that CLACKS with great force.

So it’s made me wonder if my other choice from the above-linked post, red switches, might be the way to go. You get the reliability of a mechanical switch but without the CLACK, you get the handy non-keypad form factor, and you get keys that actuate without requiring a lot of force.

I’m still undecided.

I’ll pledge to make a decision before National Novel Writing Month starts. That means I have one month. If it goes like my attempts to come up with ideas for NaNoWriMo, I will not be announcing the recently-placed keyboard order I’ve made on October 31. But we’ll see.

I kind of wish Logitech made a version of the K750 without the numeric keypad. I’d grab that in an instant. They do have smaller keyboards, but they all either connect via Bluetooth (yuck) or don’t have full-size navigation keys or both. Why is there no Goldilocks keyboard? Or why can’t I find it?

The answer in one month!*

UPDATE, April 29, 2018: I just ordered the Cooler Master MasterKeys S, a tenkeyless mechanical keyboard with red switches. It’s significantly cheaper than the customizable WASD keyobards I’ve considered, so it will serve as a (still pricey) test drive of red switches. I will make a new post to describe how it goes. And how clicky it is.

*answer may or may not be included.

The first day of fall 2017: Not too shabby

The first day of fall was nicer than the last day of summer, with pleasant, mild conditions, some sun and all that stuff.

Because it was nice out and I suddenly did not feel like sitting around again for my lunch break, I went for a noon-hour walk for the first time since pulling the muscle in my upper left leg. The leg seems to have survived intact, even after I picked up to a more typical pace by the end (I walked a little over 4 km in total).

After work I hung out with a few guys from work and a former guy from work (that is, someone who formerly worked at Langara, not someone formerly a guy) at a pub on False Creek and it was quite nice by the water, though it got a bit chilly once the sun ducked behind a cloud.

I got home shortly after 7:30 p.m. and it was already dark. I was sad. It still seems bizarre that there are times in the past when I would start a run as late as 8 p.m. to beat the heat. I’d need night vision goggles for that right now. Plus I’d probably barf if I actually tried running in the dark wearing night vision goggles.

Anyway, I must come to grips with the change of season. It’s official now, there’s no going back unless time travel becomes a thing (but if it was a thing, wouldn’t I already have gone back? Wouldn’t I in fact be living in a perpetual summer, constantly skipping back to the warm days and long nights? Now I am sad again.)