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New to the iPhone: Google Earth

2008-10-27T21:41:05-06:00

Just a few days after posting about smart phones comes a nice addition to the iPhone’s line-up of applications: Google Earth.

I’ve never played with Google Earth on my desktop/laptop, so this has been a first for me and, I have to admit, a lot of fun. First up, I looked up and zoomed in on the buildings in which Phillip works (apparently) in Cupertino, Calif., and was amazed at the resolution. It seems some parts of the country and world have higher resolution photos associated with them than other areas. Paris, for instance, is pretty low-resolution. But in Cupertino I can recognize the handicapped markers on parking spaces.

Next, of course, came Rimbach. While the resolution wasn’t as great as that in Cupertino, it still appeared better than that of Paris. And it’s great to get a good look at Rimbach any time you wish.

(Hey, Charlie, I see your house.)

The Hill is well represented, with the sites in clear view and linked to nice photos of each. A quick tap of a blue square, and the user is presented a photo and a title.

Not sure Google Earth is, as yet, anything but a nice time-waster for me. But be that as it may, it’s a very cool time-waster.

“Smart phones” really aren’t — they’re more

2008-10-25T13:31:09-06:00

A few years ago I was in the minority: I didn’t have a cell phone and really didn’t want one because, I felt, I didn’t need one. I made few calls, and few people actually called me — or even needed to.

But Hermie had expressed an interest in one, and since she often drove late at night I thought it a good idea. I got her a cell phone — a pretty nice one for the time — for Christmas one year.

Some time later I borrowed it for a couple of trips, mini-reunions with Rimbachers, as I recall. Not long after, I broke down and got a phone of my own, thinking it would be good for those types of trips since the cost was really low. I think I paid $49 for a cheap Sanyo flip-phone.

I used it, sparingly, for about three years. I still didn’t need it often, and few people called me. But it served the purpose I bought it for.

Then came the iPhone, and that changed everything.

It also caused me to reflect as to why, and the reason is surprisingly simple: it’s more than just a phone.

The iPhone and other so-called “smart phones,” no matter the make or operating system, really aren’t. They’re small, but powerful computers that perform many functions, telephony being just one.

Even now, probably less than 5 percent of my phone use is actually as a phone. The remainder of the time I’m sending e-mail, browsing the Web, reading news online, listening to music or finding my way with maps.

Obviously, my experience isn’t unusual. I’ve read reports about the growing popularity of smart phones and their increasing use, and it dawned on me that they’re likely something like the Internet itself, and indeed the first cell phones: a neat bit of technology that’s growing from ubiquitous to indispensable. Smart phones are game changers, to use an overworked political phrase.

About the only calls we receive on our home phone now are from automated machines with recordings urging us to buy something or vote for some yahoo seeking public office. I can’t hang up fast enough. We’re on every no-call list there is, but there are just too many loopholes, it seems. Lately, I’ve been unplugging blasted thing every afternoon.

There’s a growing number of folks in this nation who have dropped their land lines in favor of a cell-phone-only life. The phone companies hate that because land lines are still a significant hunk of revenue. We’re not ready to do that yet, but I see the trend continuing to grow, and “smart phones” will play a part in that.

A bit of this, a bit of that

2008-10-10T21:18:07-06:00

Lions Club Burger Update

The Lions Club’s annual hamburger stand at the Red River Valley Fair has come and gone, and it looks as if we did well again this year. The costs haven’t been tabulated, so our net is a moving target as yet. But it looks to be in the neighborhood of $6,000, or about what we did the last couple of years.

We’ll take it without complaint.

Pretentious Stuff

Like everyone else, I make fun of lots of things — sometimes to myself, sometimes in front friends or family — but I noticed recently that the butt of many a derision is really pretentiousness. To be clear: “attempting to impress by affecting greater importance, talent, culture, etc., than is actually possessed.”

This being Silly Season top to bottom, there has been no shortage of victims of my little inquisition. But I try to stick to those that are around all the time and tend to permeate our culture.

Like books with two titles, as in, “Squishy Red: The High Art & Science of Smashing Tomatoes.” Yeah, I made that up, but you get the idea.

I just checked five titles, randomly, on the New York Times’ non-fiction bestseller list, and four boasted double titles like: “Hot, Flat and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution — and How It Can Renew America.” You can always find double titles in the non-fiction section, far less often in the fiction section.

Double titles are just pretentious. Generally, I don’t read books with double titles. (I make exceptions, of course, for books that really interest me, despite the pretentious silliness. Hey, I’m human.) If the publisher can’t explain to me what the book is about with a simple title, you could probably chop 30 percent of the text and never miss it. I say choose one or the other, whichever is better. Can’t they make up their minds?

Or maybe they can charge more if it’s so important it has to have two titles.

Then there are other kinds of titles, like in the workplace. A favorite of mine is “fellow,” as in: “John Doe, Senior Fellow at the Minnow Institute for Advanced Fishing Techniques, joins us tonight to ...”

An announcement like that is usually my cue to change the channel. I’d love a look at such a job description. Somehow I see it as the kind of job that qualifies as retirement without actually being retired. You sit around and think, occasionally getting up to talk a bit, and folks send you money in the mail.

Heck, I guess I could be pretentious for the right money.

It’s hamburger time for Lions

2008-09-29T21:08:12-06:00

It’s the time of year that members of my Lions Club love to hate. Or, depending on how deeply they think about it, hate to love. It’s a time of hard work, but work that brings rewards money cant really buy.

It’s fair time in Lamar County, and our club has for the past several decades operated a huge hamburger stand at the fair. It’s our biggest fundraiser of the year, so we go all-out for it. And since our membership is increasingly older, the all-out part gets increasingly tiring.

From about 5 p.m. until midnight, beginning Tuesday and running through Saturday, we’ll be taking turns manning the stand, doling out really good hamburgers, great fries, ice cream, popcorn and soft drinks to hungry fair-goers.

But we don’t manage it without help. Troop 2 of the local Boy Scouts shows up nightly to lend a hand, as do some of the Scouts’ parents and friends and associates of our membership. (Naturally, Troop 2 is the recipient of a nice annual donation from our club. They always do a bang-up job for us.)

The money we raise from this and other activities goes in too many different directions to mention here. But I will point to one place that deserves particular attention: the Texas Lions Camp for crippled and diabetic children near Kerrville, Texas.

It’s a fabulous camp that offers kids experiences they might otherwise never have, due to their myriad disabilities. And that, as we know, can shape futures.

Lions International is the world’s largest service club, so the next time you see a Lions Club emblem somewhere (as I did last year in a hotel in Plzeň), you can know that group of concerned men and women in your community is doing something special.

Welcome to the new site

2008-09-28T13:08:22-06:00

Welcome to the Rimbach Vets Web site.

I hope everyone who visits finds something about it they like, if nothing more than perhaps a photo, article or comment that tickles a long-dormant memory of youthful good times.

A first-time visitor to this site who is unfamiliar with Rimbach, the Cold War or even military service in general might wonder what all the hubbub is about. I direct the newcomer (“weed” in our parlance) to this article by Harry Wallace. It’s probably the best description I’ve seen of our experiences. For obvious reasons, it does not go into detail about our work, nor does it explain why we treasure our memories of those times.

To understand more, visit our forums area, and you’ll eventually get a taste of what it was like and why we remain so close after all these years. At least we hope you do.

As for you old-timers, you Rimbach veterans, I hope you like our new Web site. I urge everyone to read this forum entry about how best to use the forums. GIven more time and fewer distractions, I know I could have given you better results on this site, and I’ll be tweaking and changing as time goes by. Any typos, mistakes or other problems are purely my own, so don’t hesitate to let me know about them.

So go forth and explore, Rimbachers.