Bag of Randomness for Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Somebody named Keith forgot to publish this post this morning, sorry for the delay . . .

  • I’m not sure how many people still have landline at home and only use their mobile phones, but I still have one because I work from home and stuck on conference calls all the live long day, and Ooma makes it super convenient and affordable. With Ooma, you get free VoIP, you just need to buy the box, and I think I got a refurbished model a decade ago for fifty bucks. On my office desk is  a cordless phone and a base unit with a speakerphone. Sometimes I take cordless phone around the house and will use the speakerphone option, but recently the speakerphone speaker broke. For the heck of it, I took apart the phone and found a tear in the speaker. The speaker itself is a little of an inch in diameter, and the cheapest replacement I could find was eight bucks. However, I had a pair of old headphones I never used and broke it apart and found the speaker was almost perfect. I did the switcheroo and a small bit of soldering and it was as good as new. Heck, it’s even louder and clearer than the old speaker. And I believe yesterday was the first time I ever soldered something.
  • In Peter King’s MMQB, Brett Musburger shared a great story about Vince Lombardi and how times have changed regarding game day:
    • On Saturdays before Green Bay home games in the sixties, Red Smith and some of the New York columnists, and some of the rest of us coming in for the game from out of town, we would all go to Lombardi’s house for cocktails and hors d’ouevres. And he’d be there with a drink, as jovial and engaging and as wonderful a personality as you could imagine. Vince Lombardi! Entertaining the media the day before the game! Somebody would ask him about his preparation, and he’d say, ‘Hay’s in the barn, young man. Nothing I can do.’
  • For some reason yesterday, I got really interested in the baseball attendance records for U.S. presidents.
  • It’s “silly” presidential tidbits like this that I enjoy – Trump sticks with tradition for presidential pen choice
    • When he signs executive orders, Trump is using a Century II black lacquer and gold roller ball pen, made by manufacturer A. T. Cross. The Trump White House put in an initial order for 150 of the pens.
    • Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton also used the Cross Townsend pen, although Obama later switched to the Century II. Presidents Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush were also known to use Cross pens, however, the official Cross-White House program began under Clinton.
    • Trump, Obama and Bush use the medium felt tip refills — Bush in blue, Obama and Trump in black.
    • The Century II in black lacquer is available for purchase for the general public with an MSRP of $110 for the rollerball pen, plus the $6.50 felt tip refill.
      Cross sells the pen to the White House through a distributor in the Washington area, the spokesperson said. The distributor gets a discount, paying less than $50 per pen, although it was not immediately clear how much they charge the White House.
  • This is an impressive young man – Va. student appointed to all 4 main US military academies
    • Being appointed to the United States Coast Guard Academy, the United States Naval Academy, the Air Force Academy and the United States Military Academy is a rare achievement. The Trinity Christian High School student told us that the accomplishment is “almost surreal.” But it is something this 18-year-old has been working toward since he was very young. “I would say when I was about 8 years old, there was a documentary on the History Channel talking about these four service academies and I thought to myself that day, I want to do that,” he recalled.
  • I’ve been looking at some virtual reality apps on the Google Play store, but some of them are quite expensive. I recently discovered, and I guess iTunes has something similar, but if you don’t like the game, you can get a refund within 48-hours.
    • You may request a refund within 48 hours of the transaction if something you bought isn’t working, isn’t what you expected, was bought by accident, or you changed your mind about the purchase.
  • Eleanor Roosevelt would have been a force on Twitter.

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6 Responses to Bag of Randomness for Tuesday, January 31, 2017

  1. Mott says:

    Please make it a habit to avoid the use speakerphone when you are actually talking. I understand you might be on a call or training where you don't have to talk; use speakerphone. Talking back and forth with someone on speakerphone usually has a few issues – the person talks too loud, typing and other background noises, and the cut-out and missed words. It always seems lazy and unprofessional to me. If you want hands free, get a headset.

    • Geeding says:

      I'm in agreement with ya, Mott. Most of the time I don't have a speaking role in these meetings, so that's what I use the speakerphone for, and I always have it on mute. My keyboard almost sounds like a mechanical keyboard, so I've got in the habit of muting my speakerphone long ago. Not to mention, when the kids were too young for school, I definitely had to mute it at all time.

  2. Nathan says:

    Today's image reminds me of this: Donald Trump or Raw Chicken? http://oi68.tinypic.com/2q3qdt3.jpg

  3. John Mackovic says:

    – I've got an Ooma too, it's great, but I am annoyed that you need to subscribe to some premium service in order to block spam calls.

    – The first time I ever soldered something, it was to put a mod chip on a Playstation so I could play "backups".

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