Archive for June, 2008

The Sway of the Fake Restaurant

Saturday, June 28th, 2008

I recently finished reading “Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior.” It shows how people frequently base a lot of their decision making on irrational ideas. Stock investors chase a loss, consumers value a more expensive product just because it’s more expensive, and students stick with their first impressions of teachers despite contrary evidence.
Carl’s Jr.’s [...]

Dan & Heather Visiting

Saturday, June 28th, 2008

This weekend our good friends Dan & Heather came to visit. Dan used to live here before they got married. Last night we invited some people over for dinner. Here are some pictures:

Lindsay and Heather. They were in each other’s weddings.

Joel, Jennifer, and Rick. Joel and Rick used to live here.

Brent, Dan, and Matt. Brent [...]

Heard the voice of Google

Wednesday, June 25th, 2008

The other day while I was driving, I called 1-800-GOOG-411, Google’s free telephone search engine (more info). A computer answers, not a real person. It answered, asked me which city and the name of the business. I said it, and it got it right, then offered to connect me for free. Pretty cool.
I’ve used Google’s [...]

Four ways to watch TV

Tuesday, June 17th, 2008

At our house, we have recently experienced two new ways to watch TV shows on a TV set in the living room. Here’s the list, starting with the oldest way:
(1) Standard Definition broadcast. This is the way people have been watching TV for 50+ years. Nothing much has changed since the advent of color broadcasting [...]