Finished with Blackberry

My Blackberry is becoming a huge source of frustration.  It started with constantly getting a "wheel of death" only to be followed by a battery life of right at (no kidding) five hours.  I spend good portions of my day making sure my phone has enough battery.  It seems apparent that it's not the battery either, the Blackberry is looking for something and using massive amounts of power to do so.  I am told the problem may be that I have third party applications installed on it.  It's a good thing every other device is equipped to handle third party applications. So, I'm done with it.  The plan is to get a data-only package for the device for work purposes and then get another device that I will serve as a "smart phone" for personal use.

For that reason, I thought I would open it up to you to give me any input you have on what I should get.  I had always assumed iPhone would be my choice, but since I'm making big jump, I figured I would shop my options.  I will say that I am already familiar with Apple products as I already use a Macbook Pro, iPad, and iPod.  That said, I'm open to your suggestions.  Finally, I will leave you with this video my brother sent me a couple years ago (that seems to have been updated and the original version deleted) that makes me laugh, a lot (not work-safe, for language).

Dealing with Electronic Cords/Manuals

We've been slowly working our way through getting our office/spare room in shape over the last few months, so this response to a reader's question at Unclutter about storing materials/cords of electronic equipment is helpful.  I especially like their idea about user manuals:

All manuals for items we plan to sell or donate go inside a plastic sheet protector of a three-ring binder. If we don’t plan to get rid of the item and simply keep it until it breaks, we go online, find a .PDF of the manual, and link it to a spreadsheet. If the manual isn’t online, we’ll scan it, save it as a .pdf, and link the file to the spreadsheet. Once we have access to a digital copy, we recycle the print version. Learn more about the spreadsheet method in our 2007 article “Organizing digitally scanned data.”

Comments have been made recently, expressing a desire to get my ("ugly") file cabinet out of the office/second bedroom.  I have objected on the grounds that some stuff in there would be a hassle to go down to the basement (the proposed new location for the file cabinet) to get every time we need it.  The idea about the owner's manuals brings up an interesting point though; we need very little of this in actual hard copy at our fingertips. Investing in an inexpensive feed scanner would probably be a great way to allow for a lot of stuff to get out of our way and into the basement, yet readily at our fingertips whenever (and wherever) we need it.  

Carmody on Amazon Prime vs. Netflix

Tim Carmody, in a really good post at Wired, reviews prospects for Amazon Prime vs. Netflix, suggesting that 18 months from now he believes Amazon will have more subscribers than Netflix for their streaming video service.

Further, he pushes against the idea that Apple may have hit a wall based on the "law of large numbers" (the idea that the greater the sample size, a company's performance will return to their actual potential), quoting CEO Tim Cook's keynote address at last week's Goldman Sach's Technology Conference:

It was 37 million — more than we’d ever done before. We were pretty happy with that, but let me give you the way I look at the numbers. As I see it, that 37 million for last quarter represented 24% of the smartphone market. There’s 3 out of 4 people buying something else. 9 out of 10 phone buyers are buying something else. 

Handset market is projected to go from 1.5 to 2 billion units. Take it in the context of these numbers, the truth is that this is a jaw-dropping industry with enormous opportunity. Up against those numbers, the numbers don’t seem so large anymore. What seems so large to me is the opportunity. 

Goldstein on Second-Term Supreme Court Nominees

Tom Goldstein had a great post earlier this week about potential Supreme Court nominees under a second-term President Obama should he win reelection in November.  Goldstein anticipates Justice Ginsberg and possibly Justice Breyer will retire around 2015, leaving President Obama with his third and (possibly) fourth appointment.  Presidents Reagan and Nixon both had four Justices confirmed during their Presidencies.  Since then, no President has had even three (Carter 0; GHW Bush 2; Clinton 2; GW Bush 2).

There are a lot of factors that go into choosing a nominee.  Goldstein suggests he believes President Obama will rely on the following:

In sum, here are the criteria I think the President will be using.  The person must of course be highly qualified intellectually.  Beyond that, the candidate must be (a) female, (b) a Democrat, (c) reasonably well known to the President’s advisors, (d) between the age of forty-two and fifty-two, (e) a lawyer (so no Susan Rice), (f) have substantial interest and experience in the kinds of issues that the Supreme Court decides (so noSamantha Power), and (g) have sufficient credentials.  Those credentials would be (i) a federal appellate judgeship, (ii) federal or statewide electoral office, or (iii) a senior federal executive position.  There also is a substantial preference that the nominee be African American or Asian American.

I'd encourage you to read the entire article and see Goldstein's list of potential nominees, but to skip to the end, Goldstein believes Obama's ideal nominee based on those factors is the current Attorney General of California, Kamala Harris.

Gluten-Free Roundup: February 15, 2012

Every Wednesday I plan to bring you a roundup of interesting news stories from the world of Celiac and gluten-free living.  Please feel free to email me if you have any stories you think are worthy of including in the next week's edition.  Enjoy!

• Foodprocessing.com has an article passing along the obvious story that that there is a major financial opportunity for food manufacturers/distributors to jump on board the gluten-free train.  Despite this, consumers may be reluctant to try new brands and instead look to the gluten-free versions of brands they already trust. The article also examines the cost-benefit analysis companies undergo when deciding whether to enter the gluten-free marketplace.
• The Boston Globe reports that Norwood, Massachusetts is now carrying gluten-free products.  
• NPR suggests that Baking Without Flour Brings Sweet Results.
•  According to a new American Gastroenterological Association study, individuals with Celiac disease increase in risk of GI cancers for the first year after diagnosis, but no increased risk thereafter (via Celiac Central). 

Douthat on "Coming Apart"

Ross Douthat continues the banter among moderate conservative pundits (which includes his own column on Sunday) over Charles Murray's new book "Coming Apart."  In a blog post titled "What Charles Murray Gets Right" Douthat calls the book, despite his criticism of the 15% of the book that offers overly-libertarian conclusions, "one of the strongest and most lucid explorations of the existing data on the long-simmering social crisis in working-class life, and the extent to which American society’s recovery from the dislocations of the 1960s and 1970s has been a recovery primarily for the upper middle class."  Sounds good, it's ordered on my Kindle and I'm looking forward to getting to it later this week.  

Weissmann on Class Based Educational Achievement Gap

The Atlantic's Jordan Weissmann reports a widening education achievement gap between affluent and underprivileged students that is, according to a new Stanford University study, nearly double that of the gap between caucasian and African-American students.  According to Weissmann:  

One reason for the growing gap in achievement, researchers say, could be that wealthy parents invest more time and money than ever before in their children (in weekend sports, ballet, music lessons, math tutors, and in overall involvement in their children’s schools), while lower-income families, which are now more likely than ever to be headed by a single parent, are increasingly stretched for time and resources. This has been particularly true as more parents try to position their children for college, which has become ever more essential for success in today’s economy.

Additionally, Sabino Kornrich (Juan March Institute) and Frank Furstenburg (University of Pennsylvania) suggest that Americans at the upper end of the income spectrum continue to increase the amount by which they out-spend low-income families. By 2007 that gap had grown to nine to one.

President Obama's 2013 Budget

President Obama's proposed 2013 budget was released today and Ezra Klein has a nice chart at WonkBlog summarizing what your tax bill would look like under President Obama vs. a President Romney:



According to the article, which is worth reading in its entirety:

Obama’s plan would raise revenues to 19.2 percent of GDP. Most of that would come from people making more than $250,000 a year. Back in September, the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center ran the numbers on his proposal — which is unchanged in the budget — and they estimated that taxpayers in the bottom 20 percent would pay an average federal tax rate of 1.8 percent, those in the middle 20 percent would pay 15.2 percent, and the top 1 percent would pay 36.3 percent. 

Romney’s plan cuts taxes to about 17 percent of GDP. Most of those cuts would accrue to upper-income Americans. According to the Tax Policy Center, under Romney’s plan, taxpayers in the bottom 20 percent would pay a rate of 3.4 percent, those in the middle 20 percent would pay a rate of 15.6 percent, and the top 1 percent would pay 25.9 percent.

Meanwhile, Buzzfeed links to two charts below from Whitehouse.gov showing National Debt will break 25 Trillion by 2021 under this Budget proposal even though it is a decrease in National Debt as a percentage of GDP (via @joenbc):

Who Really Shouldn't Eat Gluten

The Wall Street Journal had a great article last week about non-Celiac gluten insensitivities.  According to the article, some gastroenterologists say that for every patient with celiac disease, they see six to eight who have the same symptoms, but without biopsy results and intestinal imagaes needed to confirm celiac.

You would be amazed how many people have come to me since my Celiac diagnosis in October to ask what my symptoms were because they think they might want to be tested but are concerned about the tests that are required.  It seems like the best way to do this is to simply cut out gluten and see how your body reacts, but I give the same advice given by Dr. Murray of the Mayo Clinic:

Experts urge people who suspect they have problems with gluten to be tested for celiac disease before going gluten-free on their own. Otherwise, with no gluten to react to, their blood tests will show false negatives. 

"This is the single biggest problem I see, and I see it every day in practice," says Joseph Murray, a celiac expert at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

Yes, it's expensive (I think I paid about $1500 out of my HSA for all of the tests/office visits), but the article rightly reminds of the importance of finding out for sure as "those with celiac disease need to be on a strict gluten-free diet for the rest of their lives, or risk long-term complications including osteoporosis, infertility and some cancers." 

Wired on Applications to Demo at iPad 3 Release

Christina Bonnington at Wired suggests four applications Apple should demo at their unveiling of the iPad 3 in March to show off its new HD retina display: photography, games, textbooks, and video.  Nothing too shocking.

I'm still operating with an original iPad (that I, for some reason or another bought two months before the release of the iPad 2) and am perfectly happy with it for my use, which is mainly keeping PDF files handy for work while traveling and surfing the web for news stories when I don't want to lug my laptop around.  I don't have an iPhone 4 (actually have never had any iteration of the iPhone, still chugging along with a Blackberry Torch) so the greatness of the retina display may be lost on me at this point.  That said, a use like that of the MLB app as mentioned in the article might just be enough to get me on board with an upgrade down the road.  Until then, I feel like I should at least get a couple years use out of my device.

Gluten-Free Chronicles: Maggiano's

Gluten-Free Taylor Street Baked Ziti

About four months ago I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease, meaning I can no longer eat any foods that contain gluten.  It has been an adjustment, but thanks to an extremely supportive wife (who has completely removed gluten from our house), it has been extremely manageable.  Really, the worst part of it is eating out, which has led to us saving a lot of money on entertainment.  Still, I travel for work so dealing with it is a necessary part of life.  Realizing there are others in this situation, I plan to start keeping track of how I eat on the road in an effort to share ideas with others who have this disease and would welcome any ideas you'd like to pass along.  

With that in mind, I will begin this feature of The Ayes Have It with Maggiano's in Tampa, Florida. I live about 10 minutes away from a location in St. Louis, but haven't been since my third year of law school when my parents were in town for a Trial Advocacy Competition.  St. Louis is known (at least in St. Louis) for their Italian cuisine in a neighborhood in the south part of town called "The Hill" (though my preference is a pair of restaurants (Trattoria Marcella and Stellina Pasta) in a nearby neighborhood.  Whatever the case, Maggiano's just never made the cut when we decided we were in the mood for Italian food.  When I received my diagnosis however, several people who have either Celiac Disease or gluten intolerance told us how friendly Maggiano's is to people who do not consume gluten.  I was not disappointed.    

Upon being seated, I was brought a basket of bread that I immediately asked to exchange for a gluten-free menu.  I was surprised to learn they do not actually have a gluten-free menu but instead just list off the things you are not able to have (which was really only a few things, though it did include the lasagna).  The waitress was moderately knowledgeable, but could tell I wasn't completely comfortable with what I could order so happily called the executive chef out to talk with me.  She explained that all of their stocks and sauces are gluten free.  I asked about the chicken parmesean, and they told me that the bread crumbs would be problematic, but they could do a grilled chicken breast with cheese and marinara.  I was also told up front lasagna was a no-go due to the meatballs and a lack of acceptable replacement for the layered noodles.  The chef eventually told me a lot of people really like the Taylor Street Baked Ziti and the Baked Rigatoni Pomodoro.

I started with a spinach salad without croutons.  There was some discussion about what cheeses I could have and the waitress promised she would check with the chef about the Gorgonzola and simply leave it off if it was not gluten-free.  My salad showed up with Gorgonzola and I did not get sick, so it seems like this was safe.  As for the entree, I opted for the Ziti because I was more in the mood for Italian sausage than chicken (see picture above).  The restaurant uses corn pasta for the majority of of their gluten-free pastas, including this one.  It is never going to taste exactly like regular pasta, but it was a very nice substitute that held its form well and didn't get squishy like other gluten free pastas I've tried.  After I finished I was told I could have another plate to-go and was free to try any other kind of the Classic Pastas.  I chose the Baked Rigatoni Pomodoro and ate it the next morning for breakfast at my hotel.  It was also very good, though I think I preferred the Taylor Street Ziti.

Now, I was under the impression that some locations of Maggiano's have a dedicated kitchen for gluten free dishes and they make a big fuss about serving such dishes on special colored plates (which in all honesty seems like a little much to me).  Tampa's location did not have this, but they did assure me they took very serious precautions to avoid cross-contaimination.  Good enough for me, I prefer attention not be drawn to me by the color of my plate anyway.

As a side note, Gluten Free Frenzy reports that the Scottsdale, Arizona location serves gluten free bread that is very good and the chef hosts two gluten-free wine dinners per year. 

Adolescent Financial Dependence

Catherine Rampell reports on a new Pew Research study suggesting a number of interesting (though mostly unsurprising) things about Young Adults Coming of Age in a Tough Economy.  For example, parents today with children age 16 or older are more likely to respond that adulthood begins after age 22 now than they did in 1993.


  

Meanwhile, while older adults and those with children age 18 or older seem willing to let financial independence be pushed off beyond age 22, it is younger adults (age 18-35) who believe financial independence should be secured prior to age 22.



Rampell seems surprised by these numbers, but I think it likely is a reflection of the fact that it is easy to say in isolation that "kids should be independent by age 22," but it's a lot harder to say "my child needs to be independent by age 22" when that possibility could be just around the corner.  I would be curious to hear your thoughts on this.    

Finally, Pew confirms what we already knew: that young women have their act together and are preparing for their futures far more than their male counterparts

Will Ferrell Announces Starting Lineups

Will Ferrell introduced the starting lineups before the Bulls vs. Hornets game earlier this week. It was awesome.





"He majored in Econ, but minored in love." Nice.

Garthwaite on Backyard Chickens

A few months into our marriage last Spring, my wife mentioned how much she would like to have chickens in our backyard.  She had recently begun planning a backyard garden and I wrote it off more or less an excitement about all the possibilities that awaited us over the next six or seven decades. I was surprised when she came home one day and told me the City of St. Louis would allow us to have up to four chickens (but no roosters) and had figured out how much we could save by having free organic eggs.  Earlier this week, Josie Garthwaite weighed the pros and cons in a post that also highlighted the different laws around the country related to urban chicken ownership:   

Urbanites who like the idea of collecting breakfast from the coop each morning may not be aware of the work that goes into raising the birds and keeping them healthy, Ms. Geisel warned. “The poop just doesn’t go away — it’s a constant daily cleanup,” she said. “They get sick, they get parasites. For many people it’s just not worth the effort.” 

For others, the work pays off. “I love my chickens. They’re my pets,” Ms. Geisel said. “They come when I call them, they make great noises.” The birds also lay often enough for her family of three to eat eggs every day.

“And homegrown eggs,” she added, “are so much better and tastier than store-bought.”

Of course I was not aware of all of this, and before I knew it I had agreed a few months later that, yeah, it would indeed be fun to have chickens in our backyard.  Books were purchased (my wife's favorite is linked below) and at this point the coop is in the process of being constructed and chickens are expected to occupy our backyard starting in a little over a month.  Plan to hear updates on both Spring Training and chicken rearing in about a month.     

Low-Risk Security Lines

The Tampa Tribune reported yesterday that Tampa International Airport will soon join a few airports that currently allow "low hassle" screening for those who provide additional personal information ahead of time to the TSA.  According to the article, passengers will be given a dedicated lane in airport security and they will be allowed to keep on belts, shoes, and jackets while not being required to removed laptops or liquids.

St. Louis Lambert Airport is expected to be among those airports that use this program by the end of 2012.

Heart of College Basketball Season

It's time to start watching.  I'm sorry I missed this game.

Starwood 2012 Q1 Promotion

For almost four and a half years I have traveled to various parts of the county for work and pleasure (43 states and Washington DC).  Only during the last two years did I find out hotel chains (and sometimes airlines) have some very good special deals that can significantly boost your frequent traveler perks.  The Ayes Have It will attempt to keep you up to date on any of these deals and encourage you to pass along any you hear about to us so we can pass them along to others.

Though the program has been in effect for a little over a month, SPG emailed this morning to remind me to sign up for their current promotion offering double points for every stay of two nights and triple points for every three night stay.  Users are required to register for March 15th, 2012 and the program runs through April 8, 2012.

Puppy Tweets

There is a good chance this is the worst idea I've ever heard.  According to Amazon's product description:

Find out what your dog is really up to with Mattel's Puppy Tweets. This fun electronic device attaches to your dog's collar and transmits tweets about her physical activity during the day. Barking, sleeping, and running all trigger humorous tweets corresponding to the activity, such as "I've got a new leash on life!" or "L'il help! Nose stuck in bird feeder!" This fun accessory is perfect for any adult dog owner who wants to know what Fido does while home alone.

While 13 out of 20 reviews on Amazon are either one or two stars, this presumably means at least 20 people have bought and used this product.   

Cost of Single Cup Coffee

The New York Times had a story yesterday about the costliness of using single-serve coffee makers.  While Americans over 40 tend to think of coffee in terms of how much it cost per pound, those of us in our 20's and 30's tend to think of it in terms of how much it costs per cup.  Enter the emerging multi-million dollar market for single serve coffee.  If we think of coffee as costing $2-3 dollars per cup, the ability to have it in the comfort of our home for mere quarters begins to seem like a pretty good deal.  The article does the math though and these single use cups/pods amount to paying a price of around $50/pound of coffee.

Of course, products are available that allow you to use your own coffee in these single cup machines.  How efficient are these though? According to AOL's Daily Finance Savings Experiment Blog, two tablespoons of coffee grounds are needed for every six ounces of water when brewing in a drip machine or French press.  My best estimate is that my K-Cup requires 3 tablespoons to make approximately 9 ounces of coffee.  While it intuitively seemed like we were using more coffee grounds per cup with the K-Cup, it actually is exactly the same amount, proportionally.  This means that if you use your own coffee you actually are not paying anything for the convenience of making your coffee by the cup rather than brewing an entire pot.    

So go crazy, buy yourself some nice coffee and make it by the cup, just remember to BYOC.