Geezer

There are 384 posts filed in Geezer (this is page 26 of 39).

Ides of March

It was mid-March when I first arrived in North Carolina 29 years ago. Charlotte was still small town and a New Yorker named Jimmy Valvano had just coached his team to the national championship. I was a 14 year old kid moving from Columbia, South Carolina and North Carolina seemed to be an exciting place, a great place to grow.

I attended Quail Hollow Junior High School, where I was one of the AV kids who worked the camera during homeroom for principal Charlie Daniels’s morning broadcast throughout the school. I also got elected to the student council during my junior year at South Meck High School.
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How to survive the daylight saving time switch – Calgary – CBC News

Today, the original purpose of daylight saving time — maximizing the amount of light during waking hours —still holds true. But more studies are popping up suggesting that people who are already susceptible to certain health problems, such as high blood pressure and depression, will feel the effects even more when the clocks move forward.

A Swedish study published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2008 found the risk of a heart attack increases in the days right after the daylight saving time change.

via How to survive the daylight saving time switch – Calgary – CBC News.

Cheap Thoughts: phone numbers

Alex didn't need no numbers


This week’s reminder that 10-digit dialing is coming to the Triangle made me wonder why we even use phone numbers anymore. With all the smartphones, voice dialing, and Voice-Over-IP (VoIP) systems in place, having to remember a 10-digit number to call someone seems … quaint.

The VoIP system I have at home can easily handle phone numbers made of digits, of course, but it can also handle calling using a SIP address that looks more like an email address (sip:phone@pbx.markturner.net). In fact, my phone calls can be routed entirely over the Internet, never touching a traditional phone switch (or as they’re known by phone geeks, the “public switched telephone network”).

Imagine having to remember the “dotted quad” IP addresses of all the Internet sites you want to surf. It would be pretty futile, wouldn’t it? Smart people like Jon Postel and Paul Mockapetris dreamed up the Domain Name System (DNS) years ago so humans could remember words (www.markturner.net) instead of numbers (67.217.170.39). Why haven’t we applied the same thinking to phones by now?

Back in the day, one “dialed” phones by picking up and telling the human operator at your local phone company office who you wanted to talk to (“Ruth, get me Pennsylvania 65000“). There’s no reason now why one couldn’t simply do the same now, only talking to a computer operator. In fact, AT&T actually has some of the best voice-recognition technology of anyone.

It is 2012, almost a hundred and forty years since Alexander Graham Bell patented the first telephone. In this day and age we should be creating fewer phone numbers, not more!

The joys of blogging

A neighbor approached me after school yesterday and began the conversation with “I was reading your blog…” I can’t help but cringe when I hear this, thinking okay, what did I write that pissed someone off? Lately, though, the feedback is positive and I’m pleasantly surprised at how many folks agree with what I’ve written. In my neighbor’s case, she was excited to read about the Little Raleigh Radio project and wanted to find out more.

This morning I discovered the budding blog of an old friend of mine, Deidre Armstrong. Deidre and I were pals in our high school journalism class. Our lockers were also near each other’s. I even took her out on a date once, though we mutually agreed that staying friends was best.
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Two years ago

Gerry Reid

Gerry Reid


It was two years ago today my close friend Gerry was severely injured in a wreck on I-40, passing away three days later. The days and weeks following the wreck were full of pain and tears though I managed to keep busy helping pull his friends together to celebrate his life.

Two weeks ago Kelly and I met with our financial advisor, who happens to have been a mutual friend of Gerry’s. Since Gerry’s death we trade hugs when we see each other, even two years later.

You gotta look out for those you love, and live life to the fullest. All we ever have is today.

Twenty years a civilian

Dress blues, winter 1991.


Today marks the 20th anniversary of the end of my active duty service in the Navy. I actually was separated a few weeks prior to this due to the amount of leave I had accumulated but it was 15 Feb 1992 when my active duty was up (known as EAOS).

It would be another four years before I would be a true civilian as my inactive duty took place directly afterward. Had America decided to invade Iraq before 1996, I could have been reactivated and been obligated to serve.

It wasn’t just a life, it was an adventure!

Highlights of 2011: the tornado

Worn out but happy!


In a year full of big events, the biggest one for me was the tornado of April 16th, 2011. While the damage to our home was a 6-inch shingle, the damage to our neighborhood was significant. It also gave me a chance to really help my neighbors when they needed it.

I vividly remember growing up in Atlanta and my siblings and I being awakened by my parents and piled under a mattress in our home’s hallway as a tornado warning. The winds would howl, the rain would pound, but the tornado would remain more of an idea – an after-bedtime reason to play with my brothers and sister in the hallway – rather than a real threat. That is, until April’s tornado rolled around.

I’ve already blogged about the tornado and the cleanup efforts I participated in. Looking around the neighborhood now I see only a few homes still covered with blue tarps. Some damaged trees still abruptly end 30 feet from the ground. A ride on the Millbank section of the Crabtree Creek greenway still shocks me when I reach the path of the tornado. I dubbed that portion “Tornado Trail” and it will likely live up to that name for many years.
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Highlights of 2011: job changes

Last August ended with a bang as Kelly and my job situations changed dramatically. I was let go from my job at Monolith the very same day Kelly accepted a position with Leadership North Carolina.

How things happened for me is still a mystery. I received a favorable performance evaluation in June and completed the personal objectives which would’ve qualified me for a bonus. It was at this point where things got murky and other executives took issue. Rather than being paid my bonus, I was told I was no longer performing to standards even while my manager reassured me that he had always been happy with my work. But whatever . . .
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Another trip around the sun

Today I complete my 43rd trip around the sun. Watching my kids remind me how slowly time seemed to pass when I was their age. Now time seems to pass far too quickly.

I spent a little time yesterday afternoon visiting Travis’s classroom for his class’s “publishing party.” The various cards on the wall with the words “second grade” on them caught my eye. It hit me that this was the last year I’d be the parent of a second grader.

I took a moment to soak up the scene. I looked around the roomful of squirming kids, up at the decorations on the wall, and finally over at my son of whom I am so proud. I wanted to capture the moment in my memory forever, knowing it would soon be gone.

Life is short. We have precious few days together and then they’re gone for good. I hope to make the most of the ones I have left.

Every day is a good one.