The worst things about cars are some of the drivers. Here in my car I feel safest of all I can lock all my doors It’s the only way to live in cars Electronic Music impresario Gary Numan remains a one-hit wonder in the U.S. with “Cars,” his Top Ten hit from 1979 quoted above. That song is already a relic as I contemplate the future of the American automobile. The automobile itself is drastically changing. Instead [...] READ MORE
How much plastic are you ingesting? I’ve been doing a lot of research the past couple of weeks on quackery and consumer scams, mainly because there has been such a tremendous increase of such chicanery and it is keeping state attorneys general busy across the country. This outbreak has been triggered by the pandemic that as already changed our lives and will recast our future as a country and, sadly I think, hastening our exit from the [...] READ MORE
Your child’s access to bringing school into your home? I confess. I was one of the old cranks who pooh-poohed modern parents who bowed to arming their tweens and teens with smart phones, tablets and other devices that allowed them to inhabit the virtual realm. I reasoned, unreasonably I suppose, that they: 1. were afraid of being branded bad parents by their adult peers; 2. didn’t have the backbone to just say no their kids’ materialistic demands, [...] READ MORE
I know a little something about fake news. I manufactured a news article years ago in an April 1st issue of another newspaper and stirred up a storm of controversy. Anyone who read beyond the headline and the introductory paragraphs would recognize that it was not on the up and up. That’s on the up and up, as in factual and legitimate, and the article had become so outrageous by the final sentence, concluding, of course, with “April Fool!” [...] READ MORE
If it sometimes seems that life is spiraling out of control— or, for others, getting remarkably easier to control— due to technology. Nothing tells the story better than the cell phone. It’s as if science fiction is playing out in real time. I have seen this phenomenon a number of times in restaurants. Couples, even groups of three or four in a booth, absorbed in virtual reality and absolutely oblivious to each other. In one Florida establishment where you [...] READ MORE
