All The Stupid Things

Hi Tad,

I'm with you on the MS Calc thing. What I don't like is that I can't make it come up in Sci mode when I open it.

Sometimes when I am watching TV, I'll want to use my HP calculator for a quick check of something I've seen, and can't do it until I turn a light on. I looked all over the net to find a handheld with an LED display, or even a backlit LCD one - no luck, unless I could find an old used HP35 on ebay or something. Has nobody ever needed to use a calculator in dim light before? The focus in electronic technology seems to be always lower and lower power mobile devices to save battery life, that a balanced view of functionality has been forgotten.

There was another thread here recently concerning drippy coffee pots. Both at home and at work, we've had them. Weren't they tested? I'ts irritating being ribbed about the plant engineer not being able to pour a damn cup of coffee without spilling, grrrr!

Can't think of any more right now.

I think it helps to vent sometimes.

Mike

Mine opens in sci-mode??

You know what? I just found out that my home computer will open in whatever mode I last set it, but my work computer doesn't. They are both XP Pro. I'm going to confront Chad (out IT guy) about why tomorrow.

Whatever calculator closes in, it will open in the next time. Stupid? or just lacking in persistency?

Before coming along and calling people stupid, perhaps you should take the time to read the post to which you're replying.

" ... my home computer will open in whatever mode I last set it, but my work computer doesn't ... "

What part of that don't you understand?

Thanks,

but look carefully and note that the "stupid" was the topic's reference to things, such as Calculator application; persistence was in reference to requisite qualities needed to resolve what oftentimes seems stupid at first glance. Resoluteness of purpose, on the other hand can be a quality both of stupid as well a non-stupid people, an attribution, however, never given in the post. Ready syntax recognition can be somewhat like that stupid ol' Windows calculator at times: best grasped on latter, rather than on first, glances.

Looking at how my post indentured, it seems to me that either my perhaps over quick submission was inadvertently "replied" under the wrong item; or that the antecedent post was published almost simultaneously with my submission; or both. I do not recall it being that post under which I published (or at least intended to publish) my own. Thus I can be faulted for over hastiness and for lack of due care submitting the post, but lack of understanding does not follow.

I don't envy his position approaching his company's IT guy...lest the IT guy finds that computer's Windows calculator functioning (opening) as it should. He might want to run a test on "his" company computer a few times first (making sure no intervening users...) before bringing the "problem" to SysAd.

I don't envy his position approaching his company's IT guy...lest the IT guy finds that computer's Windows calculator functioning (opening) as it should. He might want to run a test on "his" company computer a few times first (making sure no intervening users...) before bringing the "problem" to SysAd.

It's people like you that give "Guest" a bad name. I don't care how cleverly literate you think you are. It seems to me that all you want to do is try to show how "smart" you are and prove everyone else wrong. That attitude really sucks, especially considering that, if you would lose it, you might really learn something. Arrogance is one of the most reprehensible qualities a person can have. Instead of thinking that person intelligent, most people will overlook that and think them an a##h*le instead.

By the way, I did show the issue to our senior IT guy and he had no answer. Instead of berating him for his "stupidity" or "incompetence", I told him it wasn't that big of a deal, as infrequently as I use it. Why? Because he is a friend.

Mike

In sci mode, use the F-E button to switch any input entry to exponential mode...really much the same as any hand held scientific calculator. Results of certain magnitude display in exponential (sci/eng notation) format; inputs display normally unless specifically input in sci... notation. The Windows calculator emulates scientific handheld calculators pretty darn well. The input process, however, can be comparatively tedious and error prone. Best is to have a 10-key built-in (enhanced, 19"-up keyboad/laptop); otherwise, connect a standalone 10-key to lap top...and leave off using mouse or touchpad for calculator entry work.

Probably the biggest "downfall" of the onscreen keyboard has more to do with users; these days they lack the patience to fiddle with the calculator in order to master it. This new cultural aspect could be improved, perhaps, with a return to use of a manual (in the classic sense) giving comprehensive explanation of calculator features and operation. So much of online "help" these days has, indeed, devolved to a kind of "hand holding" service. We plod along until confronting a (hopefully very simple) problem, whereupon HELP is expected to give us one sentence "answer" among a list of many many one sentence answers. But the answer writers too often don't seem to know how to ask the questions to which their answers apply.

Thanks! It's a poor day when you don't learn something.

Tad

Thanks for your kind answer. GA's don't mean so much to me when compared to compliments expressed...such as your own.

You are welcome. And I suspect many of us, including Del, who has probably more GA's than Methuselah had years, feel the same. There are, however, those who most willingly learn from the "GA Earners", rather than the more unknown "Guest". In fact, I can state categorically that there are many who feel "Guest"'s should not even be allowed to post, due, unfortunately, to those "Guests" who, unlike yourself, have never learned to comport oneself carefully while visiting another's home. But, equally unfortunately, though understandably, the title "Guest" usually recieves less than no respect, in fact garnering active disrespect, and active dislike, on CR4. Unfortunate, but true, and understandable.

Because of all the forgoing, I would like to offer to you, who have shown yourself most thoughtful, an open invitation to join us. There is no fee, no charge, and it is not difficult. There is also no coercion, so I will stop at this point.

Thank you for your careful, and thoughtful, commentary.

Ever try to install Windows XP or 98SE to a RAID drive?

About the first thing the install process does is ask you to "press F6 if you need to install third party RAID drivers". So you press F6.

Then it says "Insert disk with drivers into drive A:".

No option for the CD/DVD drive. No option for another hard drive. No option for USB. Nooooooooo it must be A: and it must be a floppy drive. So you rip apart another old computer to get the floppy drive, find the drivers and put them on, hook up the disk, reboot and try again.

Guess what, to add insult to injury the drivers must be in the root directory of the floppy. The installer doesn't bother to look in subdirectories.

This and Kilowatt0's avatar : "Keyboard not found, press any key to continue" are sadly what I've come to expect from Microsoft. (That is an actual error message.)

Thank God most modern SATA-capable motherboards have BIOS level RAID! The only luck I've ever had with RAID systems is to load the OS and program files onto a small, fast system drive and then set the RAID up after the install as data only. Took me a lot of banging my head against the wall to figure that out, too.

But, to me, the stupidest thing in the entire world is a PhD, pontificating on a subject he knows absolutely nothing about. And sometimes on what he's supposed to know about!

Simpler to embed the RAID install into the XP disc...

Finding Microsoft issues that fall into the stupid category could be a whole separate string. Your error message is great. My favorites:

If you have automatic updates from Microsoft set, it updates whenever it wants, and demands that you reboot right now. The screen pops up and says "restarting computer in X seconds" and starts counting down. There is no option to reboot when you want to. You can close it, but it just pops up again in 5 minutes. Great when you are giving a presentation, watching a movie, working on anything etc. Microsoft doesn't care, it's just going to reboot whether you like it or not.

I had Windows ME. I had to reformat the hard drive and reinstall. The installation goes fine until the end, when I get to the screen where I have to accept the license agreement. It is a check box. As the page loads, the check box appears for about 1 second, before some graphics covers it up, and you cannot click on it. I try being quick, but it is impossible to get the mouse on the box fast enough to click on it. I become furious, scream, curse, and beat on the keyboard with open hand, hitting almost all the keys at the same time repeatedly. After a few seconds, a screen comes up and says "thanks for accepting the agreement" and Windows is installed. It's almost like they intentionally pissed you off, and when you are sufficiently enraged their work is done. Who else makes you go through a 2 hour install before they present the license agreement? I had the computer for awhile, so I had to go through this a couple of times

I had an old version of Word, and updated to a new version. Only it doesn't overwrite the old version or prompt you to delete it. It just installs it as a new program. When you click on the Word icon on the desktop it opens one version or the other, but is confused by the conflict between the two version. So I work on a document for about an hour and it just locks up, losing the document. I try to uninstall or delete the old version, but it won't let me. It tells me I must insert the original installation disk to uninstall (WTF!). I'm out of town, so I have to wait until I get home to find the disk. You guessed it, there is no option on the disk to delete Word.

Works was a nice little Microsoft office suite, sort of a stripped down version of Office that came with 2 different computers that I have gotten. Only it's a totally different program, and neither Works nor Office recognizes documents created in the other suite. Nice. The first computer I had it on was a 486 with 8 Meg of memory, and it worked fine. The second computer was a Pentium with 512 Meg of memory. On the second machine, it took forever to open a Works document, and if you had any other programs open, it would give an "insufficient memory" error and crash.

Yeah, I can't begin to imagine how much time I've wasted pulling my hair out trying to figure out these stupid little quirks. I mean do they even bother using the product before they ship it?

Here's a myth that drives me crazy.

Here in the U.S. it's universally agreed that the Great Depression lasted ten years and only ended when World War II pulled us out of it.

An economic recession is defined as two or more consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. An economic depression is defined as a prolonged recession. Below is a chart of the GDP of the US during the 1930s:

As you can see, negative GDP lasted only until 1932, followed by tremendous growth from 1933 to 1940 (with a blip in 1937).

Ok, you may say, but the stock market was mired in a bear market for 10 years, right? Actually nope. Here's a graph of the Dow Jones Industrial Average:

You can see above that the market clearly bottomed in 1932. How about unemployment?

You can see it peaked in 1933 and then started to decline.

So from 1933 onwards, GDP increased, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (Stock Market) increased, and unemployment decreased, all by significant percentages. Yet the depression supposedly lasted 5 more years.

Had you invested in the stock market in 1932, less than half way through "The Great Depression", you would have made a fortune before The Great Depression ended (1938) and WWII had even started (1939).

All WWII did was accelerate the already growing reduction in unemployment and spur and already accelerated GDP and Stock Market.

But why let facts get in the way of a great story, right?

Oh, by the way, it's not even the first Great Depression. There was a longer period of negative GDP growth in 1873-1879 (65 months) that at the time was called "The Great Depression". It's now called "The Long Depression", since the 1930s depression stole its name.

My point is, common knowledge, often, is completely and utterly wrong. Watch how many will disagree with this post, despite the fact that all of this data is easily available online.

Roger,

First off your (and probably the most common) definition of a recession is not the only definition of a recession. It just happens to be one that is easy to identify after the fact.
From Wikipedia - "In economics, a recession is a general slowdown in economic activity over a long period of time, or a business cycle contraction." and also " Some economists prefer a definition of a 1.5% rise in unemployment within 12 months" and " In the United States the Business Cycle Dating Committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) is generally seen as the authority for dating US recessions. The NBER defines an economic recession as: "a significant decline in [the] economic activity spread across the country, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP growth, real personal income, employment (non-farm payrolls), industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales."

From www.dictionary.com's financial dictionary - "An extended decline in general business activity. The National Bureau of Economic Research formally defines a recession as three consecutive quarters of falling real gross domestic product."

It seems even Wikipedia and dictionary.com disagree on what NBER's definition is.

Secondly, the end of a recession/depression is even more vaguely defined. According to economist Richard Posner, the media define it as when GDP stops falling, economist when GDP begins to rise. So in that regard, one could argue FDR did nothing to pull us out of the Great Depression as it was over about the time he took office. Since there is no rigorous definition should it be when economic growth begins (+GDP growth)? When GDP is back to where it was at the beginning of the recession or depression (r/d)? should it be when the stock market begins to have positive gains? or back to where it was at the beginning of the r/d? should it be when unemployment has turned around and begins to decrease or get back to where it was at the beginning of the r/d?

One economist (Richard Posner) addresses this subject(http://correspondents.theatlantic.com/richard_posner/2009/08/when_does_a_depression_or_a_recession_end.php#). He states that GDP grows at an inflation-adjusted rate of about 3 %/year on average. And that a better way to determine the end of a r/d is when GDP makes it back to the trend line. If we apply that to the Great Depression what do we have? According to the chart you supplied, GDP was just a bit over 800 at its peak so let's use 800 for simplicity and also the 3%/year average. GDP should have followed:
1929 800.0
1930 824.0
1931 848.7
1932 874.2
1933 900.4
1934 927.4
1935 955.2
1936 983.9
1937 1013.4
1938 1043.8
1939 1075.1
1940 1107.4

Instead, by 1933 it was down in the low 600s and didn't make it back to 800 until around 1936 which is almost 19% below where it should have been. And by 1939 was just breaking 1000. That seems to correlate pretty well with the widely accepted notion that the great depression lasted until the end of the 30s.

Another very important factor is unemployment. Per the chart you supplied, unemployment didn't return to pre-depression levels until well after 1940. As a matter of fact, they were still above 15% until 1940. Regardless of how well GDP is growing year to year and how well the stock market is doing (especially at that time when most individuals didn't have much of their wealth in the stock market, unlike today), what affects the average person the most is if they are working. Just because the trends are in the right direction (GDP and Stock Market rising and unemployment falling) doesn't mean that the bad times are over.

A correction to my previous post....Richard Posner is an judge on the US Court of Appeals, not an economist. He is, however, an influential figure in the law and economics movement.

First of all, I never mentioned FDR, I'm only concerned with the length of the Great Depression, not what got us out of it.

Second of all you can't just pick and choose your definition of a recession. The most accepted definition is 2 or more quarters of negative GDP growth.

Thirdly, quoting an appeals judge's definition of a recession is questionable, especially when his claim is a joke. No country could grow at the rate he suggests for any sustained amount of time. Consider the US GDP in 1900 in 2005 dollars (Inflation adjusted). GDP was 422 Billion (source). If the U.S. economy grew at 3% for the last 109 years, as your man is suggesting is the "average" (god I hate people who use math but don't understand it), the U.S. GDP in 2005 dollars would be 156 trillion dollars. Our GDP is actually less than a tenth of that (13 trillion). His definition of "average" growth is absurd and of course the conclusion he draws with regard to recessions base on it.

Finally, if you're suggesting that a recession or depression doesn't end until unemployment reaches levels before the recession, then we've been in a depression since 1970.

The graphs of GDP, Unemployment, and the Stock Market all show that the turn around occurred before 1934. Now if your political ideology wont allow you to accept what is right in front of your eyes, that's fine. Just because it turned around when it did doesn't prove it was FDR's policies. Harding's interventions mostly likely played some role.

Roger,

1. I never claimed you said anything about FDR. However, many credit him with pulling us out.

2. I agree 50%, many words have more than one meaning. And words change their meaning over time. I think that the definition has changed over time to become more specific and therefore more helpful. But regardless of what you claim the most accepted definition is, there are in fact more than one definition, a few I mentioned. I was not trying to define it specifically or choosing one to fit what I want to believe. I was pointing out that it's not so clear cut. And the beginning is not what is in question anyway....it's the end.

3. Using a judge may be somewhat questionable. I came across his write up as I was researching the topic and thought he offered a reasonable and rational explanation as to why the the depression is not considered to have ended until late 30s or the start of WWII. I did not know his credentials until after I posted by comment. The site I posted had no mention of his background so I looked him up and discovered in fact he was not an economist. That being said, it's not as if he has no understanding or background relating to economics either; Wikipedia indicates he is an influential figure in the law and economics movement. I would say that gives him better credentials than you or I in the economics realm (I'm not claiming he is without fault, just that it's probably not fair to dismiss him because he is not specifically an economist). As to his claim being a joke, I don't think he pulled the claim out of his @ss. According to your sited source (http://www.measuringworth.com/growth/growth_resultf.php?begin%5B%5D=1900&end%5B%5D=1903&beginP%5B%5D=&endP%5B%5D=&US%5B%5D=REALGDP) annualized growth of real GDP from 1900 to 2007 was 3.27%. What am I missing? By the way how do you arrive at $156T? I get just over $10T.

4. I am not suggesting that unemployment is the sole defining metric signalling the end of a recession or depression, only that it should/could be a factor. If in 1934 unemployment was down within a few points of pre-1929 levels...that would be different....but it wasn't anywhere near it. The recession of 1970 only resulted in a 2% increase in unemployment, hardly worth mentioning in regards to the great depression.

5. I'm not sure what my political ideology has to do with this discussion. I did not claim that the charts you presented were incorrect, or even that they did not show growth. The discussion is about how to determine the end of a recession or depression. As near as I can tell, there is no general consensus on such a definition. Based on your post, I assume your definition would be when GDP begins to increase, stock market begins to increase and unemployment decrease, the recession and depression are over. That seems seems reasonable to me. However, just because there is growth, doesn't mean the negative impact is over. Isn't that really the more important aspect? Per your definition, yes, the great depression was over by 1934. But the country had at least 6 more years to go before digging their way out of the effects of that depression. In the end recession and depression are just words used to describe an economic situation. It's nice if those terms are quantifiable. But that's not always the case. As a matter of fact, it didn't used to be the case at all. Recession used to be defined much more vaguely. It's great that now we have a definition that's more specific and is commonly accepted for the start of a recession. I have seen nothing defining the end. Not everything is black or white. Unemployment is an example. If 3 million people earning 6 figure incomes loose their jobs for 2 months and then get re-employed but at 50% of their previous salaries, the unemployment statistics would show employment back to the previous levels. But those 3 million people would most likely not think the economy was better (though they may be happy they are employed).

Your original statement was that you didn't understand why the myth about the end of the depression continues. I claim simply it is that there is no clear definition as to what parameters signal the end. While your definition is reasonable, I certainly think it's reasonable to use the fact that unemployment was still extremely high until 1940 that kept us in the depression or the fact that it took some time to get back to GDP levels should have been without the down turn.

Interesting. I had no idea this discussion was going on. Anyway, for what it's worth, here's my 2¢...

While the great depression may have technically ended by 1934, the effect of the depression was still a great burden on the rank-and-file and the landless poor. While FDR implemented economic changes that helped, these changes did not have a significant affect on the plight of the working-class. What seems to have turned America's fortune around was WWII - a foreign war (someone else's war), which mobilized workers all over the US. The stimulus to our economy was enormous or so many historians agree.

Finally, the best advice regarding politics and the economy that I ever received was "Forget Wall Street. Forget the economics strategies be flogged on Capitol Hill. Forget all that stuff. The only true gauge of economic health is how much you have in your wallet." I'm sure you realize that this is a metaphor

It only became a discussion recently (the past 24 hours). I noticed Roger's comment (#3) that he posted earlier in the week, but didn't have time to respond and also wanted to clarify things for myself before responding. After which I wrote up my comment to Roger who replied...hence becoming a conversation.

I agree with your 2 cents. Although by the end of the week it may only be worth 1 cent at the rate the dollar is falling. Oh wait, your opinion may have a fixed real value so it most likely will be worth 4 or 5 cents by the end of the week. From now on you may ought to offer less opinion for 2 cents.

I've also heard (not just from the judge I referenced in a previous post, but heard many moons ago) that it's a recession if your neighbor loses his job and a depression if you lose your job.

I understand that this is what you believe, and it is what we are all taught, but what evidence do you have for this?

You see, my point is, sometimes something becomes accepted history, even though it never really happened the way it's portrayed.

WWII - a foreign war (someone else's war),

WTF !

Pearl ?

You didn't pony-up and come save our rear ends - the USA made it's own (belated) decision to join that party for it's own reasons. Don't spill me none of that conspiracy theory **** about Pearl.

Apart from that little rant, I agree with you. WWII changed Britland forever. The 'class' system that had seemed to rule the country was busted for good. Women had been employed in heavy industry (and although not widely recognized at the time had been a vital part of the fighting forces), returning troops needed jobs, and the whole damn country needed rebuilding. After 1945 the days of doffing your cap to the local laird were gone. Equality had finally begun to appear. Check out Brit history of 1947 for an example year - National Health Service founded, Coal Industry nationalized (which might appall Republicans, but it sure as heck pushed up safety). A mass of stuff happened in that year which created jobs and got the economy moving. Rationing went on for a long time after. Shame we had to keep paying you guys money until just a couple of years back - people who sacrificed here did so just as much as you guys.

While we sacrificed, we didn't sacrifice all that much. But we did make tons of cash.

ROFL

You Wrote:"annualized growth of real GDP from 1900 to 2007 was 3.27%. What am I missing? By the way how do you arrive at $156T? I get just over $10T. "

I apologize, I recalculated and your right. Compounding 440 billion at 3.27% interest annually does give around 14 trillion, which is roughly correct and thus shouldn't be called a "joke" of an approach.

I'm not even sure that I object to it as a measure anymore, it does seem to have merit.

It actually supports what I was saying about the great depression, since GDP was growing at much larger than 3% by 1934.

You Wrote:"I claim simply it is that there is no clear definition as to what parameters signal the end."

There are very clear parameters that have existed for a long time. The point is, history found a convenient story and ignored that the facts didn't support it, that WWII pulled us out of the great depression.

At the end of the 1920s there was a financial bubble. This bubble occurred because there was no restrictions on purchasing on margin, meaning you could use your current stock holdings to buy new stock, borrowing the money for the new stock based on the value of the old stock. This inflated the market and created a lot of money out of thin air. Eventually this bubble popped, margin calls were made, and a terrible deflationary spiral occurred where margin calls forced selling, which in turn drove down prices, which in turn led to more margin calls.

Historians justified a "ten year" Great Depression because that's how long it took to get back to the bubble levels, but this is a bad method to define a depression since a bubble by definition is too many standard deviations from the norm.

You may be correct in saying this is a bad method to define the end of a depression. But pre-1929 employment was not unusual even if pre-1929 stock prices and GDP were. Perhaps historians are using the fact that 15% unemployment is quite unusual (for the US) and therefore have some validity in their claim.

I have no problem with defining the end of a depression or recession as when growth occurs in major aspects of the economy. I would also not object to some other definition for that matter. Hopefully a quantifiable method will evolve. Who knows, perhaps 100 years from now some will still be discussing when the end of the "Great Recession of 2007 (or 2008)" occured...was it 2009 or 2017?

After downloading, installing, and doing the inevitable reboot from a M$ update, you have to go back to the update site to get the security updates for the updates you just downloaded!

You only really needed the title and one word for your post.
'Microsoft'
Say no more...nod's as good as a wink.
Del

To a blind bat.

Ever notice in track homes and most homes in general, the contractor places the toilet paper holder behind the toilet. You have to be a contortionist to reach it.

Why not just stand up and turn around?

'Cos it will spread the sh*t ?
Del

Surely you would be finished by the time you needed the paper?

How about the hand held calculators that exhibit "key bounce" or "no contact". After entering a long string of numbers, the answer comes out ....NO WAY. I wonder if the accountant who enters numbers without looking at the display can be sure he has the correct answer. Maybe that's where bank errors come in.

Had a similar situation in an intro calculus class. My calculator only showed the value being inputted (couldn't see, nor edit, complex formulas, as entered) and I was too poor (I thought) to buy a new one. Failed the exam because I couldn't tell my answers were impossibly far off. Bought a new calculator (glad the lights were still on) and passed anyway.

Stupid scientific calculators that you can't see the formula, or edit it, on. What a waste. That display was only good for a "4-banger", and a 4-banger user.

Get a bigger wide screen monitor so you can see the calculator

Re-gift that GPS

How about the TV ads for TV sets that lets the viewer "see" the difference in image quality between the set being advertised and a competitor's set? If you could see the difference on your own (presumably not the one being advertised) set, then logically any difference in quality must be negligible.

"It's not so much the big things in life that wear you down, it's all the little really stupid things."

I came up with my own saying on this: "The sharks we can deal with; the real problem is being nibbled to death by goldfish." [This, after a series of complete blunder decisions by middle management at the company I the worked for. The straightforward demands by upper management, while not actually achievable, were at least clear and we could have come up with an acceptable result, but after three or so layers of "interpretation", the restrictions killed any hope.]

I agree completely. I do see it all around and especially in the mirror while shaving. Most aggravating.

free scientific calculator download

Great Thread Tad, Very nice OP post. Nicely written. "Is it just me?" is the category I put this sort of thing into.

I am reminded of a report concerning the mental health of astronauts being partly enhanced by iratating distractions. Supposedly without the bother of bugs or neighbor noise, traffic and what not, the astronaut will begin to hallucinate.

Then I think of The Emperors New Clothes, and Candide by Voltaire, and Catch 22.

The phrase, "The Fog of War" applies if you only change it to "The Fog of Life."

- What "Peace" really means is that only the spies are fighting and sometimes killing each other.

Sometimes I know I simply bought the wrong car, or the wrong machine, and ought to have spent more time reading Consumer Reports, and its my fault.

It is my fault to a point that I don't really know all I need to know about computer language, but I really did luck out getting these MACs, for instance.

Still in either realm I wish more people understood how to write instructions.

The good news is that little crazy stupid things keeps you sane.

The bad news is that little crazy stupid things make you crazy.

P.S. Aint life Grand!

Some folks don't trust debit card point of service transactions and write a check instead, which the cashier scans then asks them to sign the tablet and hands them the debited check along with a receipt.

A dialogue box which tells you something hasn't worked; doesn't give you any other clues, and, and this is what really annoys me, gives you only the option to click on "<OK>" when clearly things are about as far from OK as they could be.

Add to that any Windows error message, they give no clues at all.

When re-registering a vehicle, if done early electronically is excepted if close to anniversary date you have to wait in line.

Where there is no electronic, you always have to wait in line.

My wife has a really fine in dash GPS in her Honda Accord EX; mostly. A great picture, good instructions and has never gotten us lost. You can search for businesses, hotels, eatery, whatever but the given results are usually a lot to be desired. So for instance, we're in south Florida and are looking for a Wal-Mart gas station; you key in......Wal-Mart..........up pops a llist for a Wal-Mart in Minnesota and other far away places. It must think we are in a freaking flying saucer or something. It's a GPS, you'd think it would know where it is. There is no option for entering a max distance. Honda techs have no idea. Plus the car won't talk to me; doesn't like my voice I guess and sometimes misunderstands my wife's voice. It's an Alpine system and no one has a clue at the dealer.

Alltel voice mail, when listening you can't delete a message until its finished yada yada yada...

How about the announcement "there has been an earthquake, 6.3 magnitude on THE RICHTER SCALE". Is there any other scale I don't know about?

Vista

All of this whining, mincing, and poncing is based on the fact that they're all ignorant of the fourth law of thermodynamics - specifically, "the conservation of problems..."

Problem: Horses suck! Not only are they messy but you have to to deal with the psychology of your power source!!! Solution: The internal combustion engine! Don't have to reason with it, but it f%#ks-up so often, you have to pay wads of money to guys to keep it going (not to mention smog).

Problem: Using a typewriter is a killer! Make one mistake and it's "start-all-over!" Solution: The PC!!!! I can make all the mistakes I want, because I'm working on a word-porcessor... Hey! What the hell just happened to all my files?! And what's up with this blue-screen thing???

These guys must have all been sleeping when the Prof. explained the fourth law. Try to stay awake next time.

The deeply held beliefs of those who still have hope that the status quo can be maintained. (We're just going through a rough patch, right, people?) Axiomatically, to have hope, you must have faith. (And if your hope turns out to be false, there is always charity.) Hast thou yet hope, please genuflect, direct your gaze heavenward, and repeat:

I believe in worldwide Ponzi schemes and universal gullibility. I believe that reckless lending can be cured by reckless borrowing and that fraudulent borrowing can be healed by fraudulent lending. I believe that a housing bubble fueled by loose credit can be corrected by easing credit. I believe that each trillion of hallucinated dollars that disappears in a puff of Wall Street smoke then always reappears magically from behind a Treasury Department mirror.

I believe in America's almighty financial geniuses and monetary officials, who destroy wealth indiscriminately and indefinitely, and whose kingdom shall have no end. It is divine justice that those who cause financial catastrophes are rewarded with public money, while innocent bystanders are punished in their stead. I believe that central banks can print all the money anyone will ever need. I believe that if one stimulus package does not work, the next one surely will.

I believe in the redeeming power of financial complexity. I believe that hedge funds and sovereign wealth funds are righteous to enter into incomprehensible contracts having convoluted ownership and no inherent value. And I believe that opaque, secretive companies which pretend to insure those investments are offering a valuable service, even if this requires the use of public money.

I believe that economic stability and confidence will return when every failing business is bailed out, with no failure too small to be left behind. I believe that all dying institutions shall be consolidated, merging the smaller basket cases with the larger ones. The lion and the lamb shall lie down together in a new spirit of national competitiveness.

I believe that the end of days shall come when there is only one institution left, comprehensively unified, far too big to fail, owning everything and controlling nothing. All shall come and supplicate before its holy ATM machines, for they are subtle and quick to anger. It is in this one true financial institution that I put my faith, truly gigantic, truly bankrupt, amen. Economic collapse has a way of turning economic negatives into positives. It is not necessary for the United States to embrace the tenets of command economy and central planning to match the Soviet lackluster performance in this area. We have our own methods that are working almost as well. I call them "boondoggles." They are solutions to problems that result in more severe problems than those they attempt to solve.

Just look around and you will see boondoggles sprouting up everywhere, in every field of endeavor: we have military boondoggles like Iraq, financial boondoggles like the doomed retirement system, medical boondoggles like private health insurance and legal boondoggles like the intellectual property system. At some point, creating another boondoggle becomes the preferred course of action: since the outcome can be predicted with complete accuracy, there is little risk. Proposing a solution that might work runs the risk of it not working.

So why not, as a matter of policy, only propose solutions that are guaranteed to simply create more problems, for which further solutions can then be proposed? At some point, a boondoggle event horizon is reached, like the light event horizon that exists at the surface of a black hole. Beyond that horizon, the only possible course of action is to create more boondoggles.

The combined weight of all these boondoggles is slowly but surely pushing us all down. If it pushes us down far enough, then economic collapse, when it arrives, will be like falling out of a ground-floor window. We just have to help this process along, or at least not interfere with it. So if somebody comes to you and says, "I want to make a boondoggle that runs on hydrogen" — by all means encourage him! It's not as good as a boondoggle that burns money directly, but it's a step in the right direction.

Once you understand the principles involved, boondoggling will come naturally. Let us work through a sample problem: there is no longer enough gasoline to go around. A simple but effective solution is to ban the sale of new cars, with the exception of certain fleet vehicles used by public services. First, older cars are overall more energy-efficient than new cars, because the massive amount of energy that went into manufacturing them is more highly amortized. Second, large energy savings accrue from the shutdown of an entire industry devoted to designing, building, marketing and financing new cars. Third, older cars require more maintenance, reinvigorating the local economy at the expense of mainly foreign car manufacturers, and helping reduce the trade deficit. Fourth, this will create a shortage of cars, translating automatically into fewer, shorter car trips, a higher passenger occupancy per trip and more bicycling and use of public transportation, saving even more energy. Lastly, this would allow the car to be made obsolete on about the same time line as the oil industry that made it possible.

Of course, this solution does not qualify as a boondoggle, so it will not be seriously considered. The problems it creates are too small, and they offer too little scope for creating further boondoggles. Moreover, if this solution worked, then everyone would be happily driving their slightly older cars, completely unprepared for some inevitable, cataclysmic, economy-collapsing event. It is better to introduce some boondoggles, such as corn-based ethanol and coal-to-liquids conversion. Ethanol production creates very little additional energy but it does create some fantastic problems for further boondoggling: a shortage of food and higher food prices, malnutrition among the poor and inflation. It also reinforces a large existing boondoggle: by funneling resources to petrochemical-based agribusiness, which depletes and poisons the soil and has no future in an age when petrochemicals are scarce, it helps undermine future food security. Coal-to-liquids conversion offers similarly excellent opportunities. By attempting to alleviate a shortage of gasoline, it will cause a shortage of coal, resulting in power outages and dramatically higher electricity rates. It will add more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, accelerating global warming. It will probably call for some coal imports, inefficiently moving a very bulky fuel from far away, and fostering energy dependence on suppliers such as China and Russia, further enhancing the trade deficit. Along with corn-based ethanol, this excellent boondoggle reinforces the erroneous notion that Americans will be able to continue to drive cars into the indefinite future, conditioning them to clamor for more boondoggles in place of any real solutions.

With a bit of practice, you should be able to come up with some excellent boondoggles of your own in your own field of endeavor. If your boondoggle works, it will create more problems for you to solve in the next round, as long as there is time for one more round. And if there is not, then you will be where you want to be: at a ground-floor window, staring into an abyss of only a couple of feet. Although by then it may feel unnatural, at that point you must resist the temptation to create yet another boondoggle by jumping down head-first.