The calculator app on the new iPhone OS is a wee bit flawed…When you quickly type 1+2+3 on the iOS 11 calculator app, you most likely wouldn’t get six as the answer. You might get 23, or 24, or 16, or 32, or something else, depending on what buttons you tap and in what order, and, obviously, none of which is the right answer.
– Boy Genius Report (BGR)
Don’t get me wrong.
I like Daylight Saving Time as much as the next guy, and every time the clocks fall back in fall or spring forward in spring, I like what happens: We get extra daylight in summer and, then, in winter when we don’t really need it anymore, it puts daylight back in its place.
But what I distinctly don’t like is the fact that they make the time change at 2 a.m., which, if you don’t know, is in the middle of the night. So, two times each year, everyone all across the country has to stay up until 2 a.m. just to set the clocks back.
But what choice do you have? One time I accidently nodded off to sleep and missed the time to change the clocks and then for the next six months I was running an hour behind everyone else.
The people I really feel sorry for on weekends like this past one are the people who have to come out to schools and office buildings in the middle of the night and change those clocks at 2 a.m. There are a lot of people who want to do away with Daylight Saving Time and I imagine a lot of that opposition simply has to do with the fact that people have to stay up until 2.
So I say, let’s keep Daylight Saving Time but change the rule so that you change the clocks at 2 in the afternoon rather than in the middle of the night when most decent people are asleep.
OK, so that’s my only political advocacy this week; now for the column …
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I was walking down the street the other day and I found this bike just sitting there that didn’t seem to be owned by anyone. The next couple of days when I was walking I noticed it in the same spot and, since it had just been sitting around on the street corner near my house for days, I realized it was abandoned. I’ve been wanting a bike for a while, and I said to myself, “Well, this is fortunate.”
So, on my way home the next day, I put the bike in the back of my SUV and took it home and I’ve been using it for a few days now. I like it a lot, but I do have a couple of complaints about it.
For one thing, I’m not crazy about the color – it’s a very bright lime green – but it’ll do for now and, when I get time, I’m going to paint it.
The other problem is that it is VERY, VERY hard to pedal. In fact right now, I can only get a few feet at a time before I have to rest. I’m hoping it’s something a good oiling of the gears will fix.
So, it’s not a perfect bike, but, hey, when something is free, you can’t complain too much.
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It’s crazy to hear this story about film producer Harvey Weinstein and other movie moguls and the sexual harassment accusations from all of these Hollywood actresses.
I think that, these days, with so many rich and powerful movie directors and producers being brought down by revelations of sexual harassment in the business, you are going to see pretty much of a sudden and abrupt halt to this kind of activity; and, in the future, film producers and directors are probably going to always even have someone else in the room every time there’s an audition or a hiring discussion with a prospective actress.
That’s all well and good, and it should help reduce the problem of sexual harassment in Hollywood, but the people I feel sorry for are those young and budding actresses who were sincerely trying to advance their careers by sleeping their way to the top.
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In the “Well, That Didn’t Last Long At All” category, MoviePass subscribers got an alarming notice in their email box the other day.
MoviePass, if you’ve been under a rock pile, is the service where you pay them $9.99 a month and then they give you a MoviePass card that lets you see one movie a day for free. Frankly, it is kind of like this strange wonderful magic; they pay the theater for you so you don’t have to.
Now, as you can imagine, it’s utterly amazing to be able to walk into any theater at any time and just pull out your magic card and go in like you are king of the land.
But the times they are a changing I fear: Last week, every MoviePass user got a change of terms and services statement in their email that said this …
MoviePass reserves the right to change the rules of movie-going attendance and ticket availability to members in connection with the Service at anytime. MoviePass reserves the right to change from time to time the number of eligible movies a member can see per month. MoviePass reserves the right to offer members a new price option if they exceed watching a certain amount of movies per month.
What?? Huh? Whaaaaa? What are you talking about? What have you done with my MoviePass? This is not what I signed up for. We had a deal. Noooooooooooo!
Myself and many other MoviePass users were kind of upset to say the least when it became clear that MoviePass could completely change the game on us.
Now, I know what you’re going to say: That I knew this was coming. I fully recognize that. In fact, you might even point out to me that I wrote in my column in September, “It has of course a completely untenable business model that cannot possibly ever work for any length of time, but my goal in joining was just to enjoy it while it lasts.”
So, yes, I did see this coming but what I am upset about is that it is not fair that it might happen right away.
It’s like, you know how, once you get married, your wife gets real mean to and stops having you know what with you if you know what I mean. Well, that’s fine, and everyone knows it’s going to happen eventually – but it’s really not fair for her to start being mean, like, the day you get home from the honeymoon.
That’s really not right if you think about it. It’s not OK if you are saying to her, “Honey I just wanted to tell you that I had the best time with you in Jamaica –”
And she cuts you off and yells, “Stop trying to sweet talk me, you jerk! You can forget about that tonight if that’s what you’re thinking!”
And then she walks out of the room in a huff. That’s not fair right after the honeymoon. That’s not what you signed up for. When you get married, you should always get at least six months to a year of happiness before things turn ugly.
Likewise, I just started this wonderful passionate relationship with MoviePass and here she is, three weeks in, telling me not to get too excited because things are changing buddy.
It turns out there’s some mystery number of movies and if you “exceed watching a certain amount of movies per month,” they might give you a “new price option.”
So basically I am on double secret probation and I better not go over my secret mystery limit or I may lose my card or pay $1,000 a month for it. The whole joy of MoviePass is supposed to be that you can go to the movies without having to think about things like that. Now, they are like: How dare you spend so much on movies you lazy sloth. Now they have you paranoid so you don’t even enjoy the movie. You spend the whole time thinking: Did this put me over my limit? Are the MoviePass bean counters disowning me right now?
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I feel sorry for young adults today. Back in my day, we just had to worry about keeping up with the Joneses. Now, they have to worry about keeping up with the Kardashians.
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Apple’s new iPhone X cost about $1,200 for the nice version and it can’t even add up 1 + 2 + 3 right like most 4-year-olds can. The new “high tech” phone to end all phones literally doesn’t know what 1 + 2 + 3 is. (If you work for Apple, by the way, the correct answer is 6.)
This is crazy that the new $1,200 smartest invention of all time can’t add 1, 2 and 3 but I have an abacus in my attic that was invented 2,000 years ago, has a combined materials cost of 59 cents, and it can add 1 + 2 + 3 perfectly every time. It also, by the way, has infinite battery power. But if you have a $1,200 fancy-schmancy iPhone – well, good luck figuring out what 1 + 2 + 3 is.
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Speaking of oversights by the great Apple core of engineers, there’s another problem with the new iPhone that Apple hasn’t even thought of. Apple says that the new face ID is perfectly safe and should do a great job of keeping malicious actors from gaining access to your smartphone. Yeah, that’s just great except I have two words for them that apparently the world’s greatest company overlooked: Uh, hello. Apple!? Do you not know about the huge problem in the world of evil twins?
