From Politics to Hollywood to Technology. The Coots are Eclectic.

 Posted by at 18:17  Coot Smirk, Technology
Jul 072014
 

Do you ever have this post written in your head and even mostly edited, it just takes too much time to get it written?  Yea.  Turns out there is not a plugin to allow people access to your wonderfully crafted posts in your head.  You still must write them out!

So this week has been interesting for Coots subject matter.  Bob’s wonderfully snarky post about bin Laden, Ralph’s lament over old movie theaters, well, today, I wan’t to talk about a very special birthday.  And then you go and do some more research and find that there is a “(the quotes are important here, think air quotes to get the sarcasm implied)”WEBSITE” that has a different date than the other 47 sites that you look at.  Imagine that, something on the internet is wrong.

So I searched for something else that happened on this day in history and came up with the first H bomb test or a patent for wireless radio broadcasting.  I don’t really feel like writing about nuclear warheads so I am going to go with wireless broadcasting.

Back in 1908 Nathan B. Stubblefield created a primitive cell phone type device that transmitted via electromagnetic induction.  Didn’t work very well and would never be real “radio” broadcasting like Marconi came up with, but it was something to send information over space without wires.  Think of what we do now without wires.  I am writing this post on my laptop that is connected to the internet over a wireless network.  If I wan’t to print, the printer is in the basement hooked to my other computer, but I can connect.

I have wireless headphones, wireless phones, wireless keyboards and mice, heck even my new MP3 player can connect to the internet wirelessly.  Think how much easier losing wires has made our lives.  How many electronic things actually have to be connected anymore?

Now I am not saying Nathan Stubblefield is the cause of this wireless revolution, because his inventions are not actually radio waves.  For instance, his inventions could never reach the International Space Station, yet with other technology we can.  (just an aside, I think that the ISS is the freaking coolest thing that mankind has ever invented.  That is another post though.)  But Mr. Stubblefield was a thinker.  He saw potential in holding a device and talking with someone far away.

Even if his tech isn’t used today, the same thinking and desire to do the next biggest and greatest thing still pushes people.  The entrepreneurial spirit still makes people bust their humps to invent things that they can use on the ISS. (did I say that is the coolest thing ever?)

Now, my question to you all is, what have you invented?  By invented I mean written or created.  Will your idea spark millions of others?  Will it inspire people?  Will your name end up on a “this day in history” search because of your invention?  If not, get out there and create.  Quit following the pack and create your own spot in history.  Now if you will excuse me, my Stay at Home Dad site needs some work.

Thanks for reading.

-Justin

Justin

Justin is the young Coot with a Cantankerous Soul who continues to be educated by older, more cootish Ralph and Bob. His Cantankerosity is his own.

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The 2011 Daytona 500-water in the retro desert

 Posted by at 10:29  Coot Comedy, Plain 'ol Cantankerous, Technology
Mar 092014
 
1934 Ford Stock-Car Racer

Image via Wikipedia

As anyone who has read much of what I write knows, I am more than just a little bit retro.  The fact is I could easily be described as rather Luddite-ish.  I have often been heard to say (only partly jokingly) that I am one of less than 10 people in the country who actually wishes Y2K had been as bad as advertised.

One thing I have enjoyed since I was a teenager is cars.  Real cars.  Not the sissified crap cranked out by automobile manufacturers these days, but serious cars, cars with large bore Detroit iron.

I use to watch the NASCAR races, or as they were called colloquially in the south “stock car racin’.  You could spend a Sunday afternoon watching the likes of Cale Yarborough, Fireball Roberts, and Coo Coo Marlin banging on each other’s doors, and then go down to your local Ford, Chevrolet, or Dodge dealer on Monday and pretty much buy the car that won the day before.  Except for stripping out the interior and adding a roll bar, there wasn’t much difference.

But times change.  The original crowd retired (or died in wrecks, like Fireball Roberts, RIP), and the next generation turned out to be a bunch of pansies.  Instead of getting their start runnin’ moonshine and being chased by the revenuers, a lot of them got their start up in Yankee land, drivin’ those things with a big ass motor, four wheels, and a wing on top big enough for a 747.  And when they got to NASCAR?  Hell, they all had PR people and couldn’t get out of their car after a race without combing their hair first.  Pussies.

Another change, the most disappointing really, was the cars.  Except for a very faint resemblance, Detroit never saw iron that’s on the track today.  Sure, they put a model name on ‘em, but I defy you to go down to your local Chevrolet dealership tomorrow and find anything that really looks like what Dale, Jr. climbed out of on Sunday.

Then came the final straw.  NASCAR, which like baseball is as American as apple pie, let furriners in.

Toyota.

That’s when I quit watchin’ stock car racin’, except at the local dirt track.

And then, on Sunday February 20, 2011, it was Déjà vu all over again.

First, let me give you just a little bit of back story.  In the 1970’s I was a teenager, I loved stock car racin’, and David Pearson was my hero.  Pearson drove the Woods Brother’s Mercury, red top, white bottom, and the number 21 on the side.  At the time, the biggest rivalry in stock car racin’ was between Cale Yarborough, Richard Petty, and Pearson.

One of the few NASCAR races I ever personally attended was the 1976 Daytona 500, a race that will go down in history as having the most exciting finish NASCAR ever had, or ever will, see.

David Pearson won that race.  Driving the Woods Brothers Mercury number 21.  Despite numerous wins in other races, Woods Brothers Racing has never won another Daytona 500, the Super Bowl of NASCAR.

Until yesterday.

I didn’t watch the race.  I gave up on NASCAR several years back when Toyota joined Ford, Chevrolet, and Dodge on the track.  I just never got used to the idea of watching little Japanese sewing machines trying to run with the big dawgs.

I was trying to get some writing done and had the TV on mute several hours after the race ended, when I glanced up at the screen.  To use an old southernism, I didn’t know whether to “shit or go blind”.

There, in living color, was a sight I had not seen in 35 years…  A Woods Brothers Racing Mercury(well, Ford), red on top, white on bottom, and the number 21 painted the side, crossing the finish line in the Daytona 500 in first place.

I can sleep well.  Retro ruled the day.

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Bob@HayleStorm Interactive

Bob comes to us with a skeptical attitude and a full cup of Cantankerousness. He also writes about homesteading and yurts over at JuicyMaters.com and rants about politics at Common-Sense-Conversation.com Most of the time, though, you'll find him at HayleStorm.net, cranking out great websites for clients OR writing tutorials teaching them to build their own sites.

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The best laid plans….

 Posted by at 10:53  Podcast, Technology
Nov 212012
 

Hello Folks, well first off, the bad news, there will be no podcast today.  Sick kids are not conducive to a decent recording session!  Unless you want to hear a lot of crying and screaming.  I could record that.  I am still going to shoot for a podcast this week though, look for it on Saturday.

Thanks, Justin

Justin

Justin is the young Coot with a Cantankerous Soul who continues to be educated by older, more cootish Ralph and Bob. His Cantankerosity is his own.

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Technology That Drives Me Nuts…

 Posted by at 04:01  Technology
Mar 212012
 

Of course I am using technology to rant.  I used technology to come up with this post.  I used real life to get mad about it.  I was reading Dave Doolin’s Website In A Weekend and he had an article about using the WPTouch plugin and how it makes your blog readable on your fancy internet connected cell phone.

Of course we have this plugin on our blog, it may drive me nuts but people read blogs on cell phones.  I am not sure about the Constitutionality of this but…

Here is what else drives me nuts.  Cell phones in general.  I have been against cell phones in many ways for a long time.  I don’t like the constant availability, or the dependence people place on them.  Right now I have a phone that is pre-paid and doesn’t do anything but make and receive calls.  There is a calculator that I use to do gas mileage in the car at fill ups but other than that, there is no camera, touch screen or internet.

It is good to have around when I go to the store for my wife and she needs something else that was not on the list.  It may be good to have around in an emergency but I have not needed it because I carry tools in my car and can fix most things with a set of open end wrenches, channel lock pliers a screwdriver, duct tape, and my personal favorite, zip ties.  If it were not for the fact that I needed to be constantly available while waiting for my daughters kidney transplant I may have gotten rid of the phone altogether.

It bugs the living hell out of me when my dad calls from his house on his cell phone to my cell phone at my house.  I don’t even answer anymore.  I call him back on the house phone.

I am not necessarily against having a phone to communicate but the whole prestige and snottiness of these iPhone users, Blackberry etc. bothers the hell out of me.  Take this for example.  My daughter is 9 years old and in 3rd grade.  There are several, read again, SEVERAL kids that have cell phones.  Their parents allow them to have the phone.  They are the higher end phones.  It is a bunch of bull.  They pretend that they are better than the other kids and hold it over their heads.

I will not be giving my 9 year old a cell phone that works.  There is no way that she needs it.  There is no reason for anyone in elementary school to need a cell phone.  They Cause problems, Texting is the devils new tool of destruction.  I do not have the ability to text message.  I don’t want it.

I am not so sure that I even like you reading this on your iPhone or android enabled device.  I like my computer.  The big one.  I am tired of people being able to be in constant communication or on the internet.  Screw it all, I am going fishing.

Got a comment? The comment section is open at the bottom, be aware you may get a guest post out of it!

-Justin

Justin

Justin is the young Coot with a Cantankerous Soul who continues to be educated by older, more cootish Ralph and Bob. His Cantankerosity is his own.

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