Squirrel Rant #1

Some days we just gotta blow off some steam.

– Why does Outlook assume I’m two days late for a meeting at the end of Friday? Did it ever occur to it that I closed Outlook before I went to the meeting, and haven’t had a chance to open it back up until Monday morning? Even if I was two days late, isn’t it a little too late to tell me? Why depress me with things I cannot change, and why assume that I haven’t done something just because I didn’t tell you? Outlook is like a girlfriend who has to know where you are every minute. We need to talk.

– If President Obama and candidate Romney are really worried about the economy, why not instead of airing attack ads, use that money to pay for more advertising to get me to buy products. Obama thinks you should go get a delicious Papa John’s pizza, better ingredients for a better candidate. Romney brand dog biscuits. You’ll like the way you look in Obama’s suits, I guarantee it. All their current ads are accomplishing is depressing or angering me, which I guess causes most people to eat, so maybe in their way they are helping the economy. Yes I want two pints of ice cream. It’s a harsh world out there!

– I’ll join the ranks of people complaining about the new Facebook e-mail, particularly my inability to delete or rename it. Even if I had to get stuck with a default name, couldn’t they have done bentrube3@facebook.com (my name and then a number in ascending order of when people with my name joined). I realize this would create johnsmith9567@facebook.com, but it’s still better than 92357929@facebook.com. “I am not a number, I am a free man!”

– My one major complaint with the power outage was the traffic signals, particularly those at big intersections like Henderson and Olentangy River Road. We’re already switching them to LED, which takes fairly small amounts of energy. Why couldn’t we set up some sort of solar powered battery backup system for at least major intersections? The technology is there, in the garden lights you can pick up at Menards for less than $20. These lights sit out in the sun all day, and can stay lit for up to 6 hours! Get a bigger battery, and a bigger collector, and those traffic lights would never have to go out. I know it might be a little expensive, but if I can light my house cheap with similar technology, couldn’t you at least figure it out for one of Columbus’ most dangerous intersections. (4-way stop doesn’t quite cut it with 12 directions).

– Why can’t my computer figure out that if I plug in my headphones I want it to turn the speakers off? For some reason my Win 7 machine is handling these as separate channels that don’t auto switch (no problem with this on my Win 7 machine at work). I’m half annoyed, and have pleased to have another problem to solve.

Ah, I feel better. So fresh and so clean.