And how was your Thanksgiving? No knock-down, drag-out family arguements, I hope? Lesley and I spent a simple but pleasant day together. We didn’t even cook–we ate out! Scandalous. It’s the first time I’d ever done that, and it was actually fun. Leaving the kitchen duties to someone else allowed us time to relax, laugh, and think about what were… Read more →
A Modest Proposal for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
My pal Rich Manning has some serious concerns about who is–and isn’t–being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. After looking at this year’s list of honorees (George Harrison, ZZ Top, Prince, Jackson Browne, and Bob Seger), your humble host joins him in weeping for the future. I hate to bring up the obvious, but shouldn’t there be… Read more →
Hartzell vs. McCauley
More than one person has had to decide between Hartzell and McCauley when selecting a prop for their aircraft. To make a long story short: Hartzell, hands down. Here’s my reasoning. Read more →
Grocery Strike
I’ve held off publishing this for a while because I’ve been angry about some things I’ve witnessed. But a few weeks have passed, and despite the fact that the picketers have moved on to another store, I realize I’m not going to feel any better about it. I have never been terribly supportive of the union in this pathetic grocery… Read more →
The Frenzied Housing Market Redux
A few days ago I wrote about the growing imbalance in many residential real estate markets and theorized that housing prices were going to have to decline sooner or later. But I couldn’t figure out exactly what would cause this “irrational exuberance” to snap. Obviously a huge spike in interest rates would do it, but how would such a thing… Read more →
Luck and the Wright Flyer
The media is focusing more and more on the upcoming 100th anniversary of powered flight. In case you’ve been living in a hermetically sealed bubble, that date is December 17, 2003. That’ll mark one hundred years since the Wright Brothers achieved powered flight on the windswept expanse of North Carolina’s Outer Banks with an aircraft that I still can’t believe… Read more →
The Frenzied Housing Market
Mathew Emmert’s commentary Housing Still Frenzied is a good read. I agree with most of what he says, but there were two glaring omissions. First, in the “Equity Schmequity” section, he misses the point of people’s argument when they say owning is superior to renting because you build equity. There are two ways to build equity in a home. One… Read more →
New Tool: URL Shortener
As if the world needed another “make a shorter link” tool. https://www.rapp.org/url/ I prefer not to use 3rd party services for this kind of stuff because you never know when makeashorterlink.com or tinyurl.com will go down for the count. Or when the service will go to hell. Or, more realistically, when they’ll start charging for their services. I suppose URL… Read more →
Jumbolair
When a 50 year old zooms down the road in a flashy red sports car, we think “midlife crisisâ€. When a young punk does the same thing, he’s “compensatingâ€. So what are we to think when a guy buys a 250,000 lb, 600 mph Boeing 707 jetliner? Read more →
The Concorde and the Starship
It’s painful to watch an airplane die. They have a spirit, much like people. It’s tough to describe, but if you fly planes or work on them, you’ll know what I mean. There’s a connection there. It’s a combination of the quirks, smells, dings, and history of a particular aircraft. The most interesting thing about it is that this “heartbeat”… Read more →