It's time to build a word: I-R-O-N-Y

I'm a parent, and as such I have a genetic obligation to my daughter to be as biased in her favor I can possibly be. That being said, when I tell you that she's the smartest kid that's ever walked the planet you can take that as fact and not just opinion. Everyone says so, you can ask them!

My wife and I can claim some credit for that. We both spend a lot of time with her, exposing her to as many new things as possible and reading to her every night before bed (and afternoon before naps!) We don't push her like some parents do, we strive to make learning fun and to capitalize on her innate curiosity.

We also made the decision before she was born to eliminate cable from our household. Partially it was a financial thing. My wife & I each watch about 3-4 hours/week of TV regularly, but then had it on babbling in the background as we did other things. We certainly weren't getting $100+/month worth of value out of it! With Hulu, Netflix and other online services streaming programming into our house via the Internet, we decided to just cut the cable cold turkey and have not regretted it one bit.

Okay, I'll be honest. I desperately miss the Science & History Channels, but that's about it. The rest of it...meh.

Without cable, it's been really easy for us to manage what our daughter watches on TV and to eliminate all of the "adver-programming" that's normally directed at young pre-consumers...sorry, I meant kids. Sure, she got mass market stuff for a while. "Yo Gabba Gabba" remains a staple on our list, and we have actually spoiled her by booking a 5-day weekend trip to Toronto where she got to attend a YGG concert AND get to go back stage to meet them all. (Which was followed up by a second concert here in Rochester where she got to do the same. We're suckers, what can I say?)

But, while there might be a lot of mass marketing associated with YGG, we're convinced it's still a reasonably good educational show. They do teach a lot of value lessons and basic skills, but they really get the kids excited about music, not to mention getting them up and dancing.

She's also a huge fan of "Kipper" and "Charlie & Lola" which is why she often speaks with a British accent ("But, Dahddy...I cahn't!"). These two don't provide much in the way of edutainment, sure, but they also don't typically go out of their way to insult her intelligence either. Probably has to do with not being from Hollywood or something...

As she (quickly) approaches three, her tastes have expanded some and so we've also expanded what she gets to watch. We found "Sid the Science Kid" first. How many two and a half year old do you know that can talk to you about "reversible change"? It's a great little show that covers the basics of scientific inquiry in a way that's really accessible even to someone as young as her.

But, her new favorite: "Word World". A great little show in which all of the characters and most physical objects are made up of the words that represent them. So, Duck is actually made up of the words D-U-C-K. Meant for kids 3-5, it introduces the concepts of letter-sound connections in a fun way that she's hooked on.



Which brings us, finally, to the point of the article as it was this Saturday, February 19th, 2011 that we realized she was starting to "get it". When I asked her "What sound does an 'A' make?" she responded appropriately. As I quizzed her on 8-10 other letters, she got all of them correct! She's not even three yet! Yes, I know, being able to read at a young age isn't a guarantee of future success, but it don't hurt none, either!

And the irony? That was the same day the "fiscal conservatives" decided to slash funding for PBS. Did I mention "Sid the Science Kid" and "Word World" are products of PBS? Did I really need to?

Sigh...I get it, I really do; spending is out of control. I'd love to ignore the fact it's these same "fiscal conservatives" that do most of the spending. I'd love to ignore they're the ones behind all of the debt they seem to be so angry about. I'd also really love to ignore that they've reduced the tax revenue by making sure the very rich and corporations no longer have to pay their fair share of taxes.

I'd love to ignore all of these things, but that's the right's job: downplaying their failures and shenanigans or blaming them on others. Because, that's what this is all about. It's not about reducing spending, it's about eliminating those broadcasters that really DO provide a "fair and balanced" view of the news. The problem with reporting news in that way, though; it makes the right look bad.

Actually, I should clarify...the right does a great job on their own of looking bad, the "liberal media" just reports it.

My daughter will suffer if this budget is allowed to pass. Not just because of PBS, but due to the cuts in science, research and education that have gone along with it. It's all part of the right's 30-year plan to "starve the beast" of socialism. The socialism, that is, that benefits only those filthy, stinking poor people. They not only left the military's budget alone, the increased it by a billion dollars! (The cuts to PBS were about $420 million.) It now amounts to over 50% of the Federal budget, but not one member of the right will even discuss the possibility of slashing that bit o' socialism at all.

It's not just my daughter, though. For some of the more remote and rural areas, PBS is the closest thing to an early education a lot of kids will get. My heart aches that there are parents who won't get to experience the joy of their three year old reciting her phonics. It sickens me that the one media outlet that doesn't exist solely to generate revenue for shareholders is the one that's slashed. Where are kids supposed to get programming that isn't designed as, well...programming? Because that's all kids programs on the commercial networks are: advertising vehicles for merchandising.

It needs to stop. And, if you think the solution is the spineless cowards in the Democrat party, you're out of your mind. There is no easy solution, but to quote Einstein "you cannot solve a problem using the same thinking that created it in the first place." We cannot get this sinking ship we call a country afloat by voting in the same yahoos over and over again. It's time for a real change, and quickly.

For now, there's not much we can do. The budget moves on to the Senate where the Dems do hold the majority, so it should stop there. But, we can't just assume it will. The Dems had control of the House and Senate for two years and failed to deliver on a single thing they promised. We can no longer assume those on either side are on OUR side.

You can head to 170MillionAmericans.org and get info on contacting your Senators and reminding them of their duty to the American people, not the American corporations. I recommend printing out the suggested letter to your Senator and mailing it in (dropping it off in person would go a long way to making sure they know you mean business, too!) At the very least, get an e-mail to their office. The more responses they get, in theory, the more likely they are to lean in favor of what the people want.

Yeah, I know...but we have to try. Right?

Too much automation? Ain't no such thing!

As I blogged previously, I have fallen in love with the app Tasker on my Android phone. One day I'll get around to cleaning up my profiles, exporting them and posting them here for the benefit of others, but for now I want to talk about an interesting comment a coworker said to me the other day.

I've been playing around with Tasker's Orientation context. Basically, it's Tasker's interface to the accelerometer. You can trigger events to occur based on what position the phone finds itself in. When I told him about some of the things I'd been playing around with, he responded, "Just so we're clear, there IS such a thing as TOO MUCH automation, you know!"

Sorry, Kevin, I've never seen it.

The experiment started, ironically, as a way to minimize the annoyance of those I work with. Last week I got a text while sitting at my desk. My phone was on the desk next to me, and the volume was set to max. I'm getting old, I keep the volume up most of the time so I can hear it. My coworkers would always comment because the notification tone for SMS on my phone sounds like it should be followed by some ancient wisdom from Mr. Miyagi (for my Android brethren and sistren, it's "Chiff"). I took it onto myself to try to always turn down the volume when at my desk so I didn't disturb the others, but then I thought "why am I doing this all myself!?"

So, I started looking at how I use my Evo and how I could further tailor it to my immediate needs. Solving the problem at the office was easy...I setup a task that says "If the phone is face down, turn all of the volumes (Ringer, Notification and Media) down to '3'." Since getting my first smart phone, I've gotten into the habit of always putting it down face down to protect the screen. The habit's already in place, and now the phone responds to it!

This wasn't a perfect solution off the bat, and did need a little bit of tweaking. For example, if I put my phone down at home, it's usually in the living room. I don't want the volume all the way down in that case so I can actually hear the thing! So, I put in the condition "If you're connected to the home wifi, ignore this task". Done! Now, when I'm at the office and put the phone down, it's quiet, but audible. At home, it's fully up.

Great, but now when I pick up my phone and put it into my pocket, it's quiet again...easily solved. Similar to my habit of putting the phone face down, I always put it into my pocket upside down with the screen against my leg. Again, this protects the screen, but makes it easy for me to hit the power button if I need to (I've found that when the phone's right side up, the power button's a little difficult for me to maneuver my fat fingers into place properly.) Since I have this other habit, I just needed to tap into that. Again, a simple task: "If the phone's upside down, set all volumes to max".

Now, I'm also a dork, so I couldn't leave them to be THAT simple, could I? Tasker also has the ability to use the speech synthesis capabilities built into Android. So, when I put my phone down, it lowers the volumes and then says "Face Down Mode" to confirm that action's happened. Similarly, dropping into the pocket prompts it to say "Walking Mode".

Sorry, ladies, I'm married.

Yes, I consider myself to be VERY lucky my wife married me before she found out what she was in for.

There is one little gotcha, though: Tasker will only check the orientation of the phone if the screen is on. I can't just take my phone out of my pocket and plop it on the table, I do need to hit the power button. But, I used to have to hit the power button, slide, unlock and reset volumes every time I got back to my desk. Fair trade off, I'll take it.

I know, it sounds silly. I also know it sounds "lazy", but if you haven't used something like this you really have no idea how annoying little things like this can be. You deal with them now, but once they're gone and the phone's doing the work, you really start to appreciate how much easier these kinds of little things make your day.