Think in Parallel, Not Sequentially

So after a few days in Houston last week, I was ready to get home to Edwardsville. I arrive at Hobby airport and see that my plane is on time. It pulls into the gate an hour before departure, so I'm thinking this is good news. We board right on schedule, everyone is seated and it's time to close the door for an on-time departure, and I'm starting to relax.
Just then, the captain takes the microphone to announce to us all that there will be a slight delay. He says something like "the system that keeps your luggage from burning up in the cargo hold isn't working". He says it will take thirty minutes for Maintenance to correct it. Sigh.
After thirty minutes, the captain comes back and tells us he's back as promised to give us an update. No, captain, you said it would be done in thirty minutes. Whatever. His update is that the noise we are hearing (lots of banging below our feet) is the luggage being removed. He says the luggage has to be removed to test the repaired system. I'm thinking to myself, why couldn't someone have started removing the luggage the moment they knew there would be a repair/test cycle? Is this their first rodeo?
Then, fifteen minutes later, the captain is back. He says the repair worked, but now they have to "do the paperwork". I get that, it's important to document repairs, but couldn't someone have been doing the paperwork as the repair and test were progressing, so that by the time the test was complete, it would just be a matter of a signature or two and we could be on our way? It took fifteen minutes to do the paperwork and get the door closed so we could push back.
It just seemed like once they knew they had a delay, all that famous Southwest on-time teamwork stopped, and everyone started thinking sequentially, one step at a time, no reason to hurry now.
But hey--they did offer us all a free bag of crackers for the hour delay. And my bags didn't burn up.

Backpacks, Waterbottles, and other Bad Things

Approximately one million years ago, I was desperate to earn money so that I could serve a mission. I took a position as a guard, working at the Tennessee State Prison. It was the only job I could find. I was barely 18 years old, but the state had recently dropped the age requirement from 21 to 18, as there had been a riot at the prison, which hurt the recruiting, I guess. We got a couple of weeks of training on the duties of being a prison guard and how to shoot various types of guns, and then were taken to the prison for our first day on the job.
I will never forget what happened that first day. As we entered the prison, we were required to pass through a security station, just like all the visitors coming to see the inmates. One of my fellow guards, part of the new graduating class, was arrested. He was caught trying to smuggle in bullets he had hidden on his person.

I reflected on that incident as I passed through security last week at the St. Louis airport. I noticed a young man wearing a TSA jacket walk past security without going through the metal detector. His backpack wasn't run through the scanner.
I thought to myself, "I wonder what makes the TSA think their staff is above the law?"
As I stood there pondering that question, I saw the pilots, going through security, just like me. Now the logic gets really convoluted.
Those pilots go through security to make sure they don't have a bottle of water in their briefcases (and I guess they would also have to surrender any guns or knives or explosives), but in just a few minutes, they will literally have the lives of hundreds of passengers in their hands. Aren't we straining at a gnat?

I guess I shouldn't question the system, these things have a way of working themselves out over time. For instance, I heard just this past week that later this year, the TSA will have enough sophisticated equipment in place to be able to declare that water purchased at the airport before going through security is no more hazardous than the water purchased after going through, and will stop taking away my water bottles. Progress!

Why You Don't Understand the Theory of Relativity

Einstein's theory of relativity has baffled me since I first read about it. You too? I think I know why.
Relativity has been explained in many ways and has many implications, but the thing I could never get past is that time speeds up or slows down, depending on how fast something is moving, relative to other objects and to the speed of light. Huh?
This is saying that time is a "thing", an object, something tangible, but that is not correct. Rather, time is a measurement. It is like length, or temperature, or speed, all measurements of something else. What does time measure? Existence.
Time is a measurement of the duration of existence, of being. So whether something travels fast or slow, relative to anything or nothing, its existence isn't changing. Time, the measurement of existence, may get altered, but not the existence itself.
Consider the measurement of length. How do we know how long something is? We pull out a ruler, or perhaps a tape measure. Every introductory physics class teaches how steel expands and contracts as temperature changes. So if you want to measure how wide your yard is, using a steel tape measure, you have to do it at "standard conditions" temperature. Otherwise, the tape will be shorter or longer than an agreed upon standard for length measurement, and you come up with an inaccurate measurement.
So it is with existence measurement. Einstein's theory of relativity, though perhaps difficult to apply in practical applications, is telling us not that existence changes with speed and relationships to other objects, but rather that the measurement we make of that existence can get distorted. So sorry, time travel isn't going to happen any time soon.

I Have the Solution

Governments do NOT create wealth.
Governments can create conditions which allow individuals and companies to create wealth. For instance, a government can allow an oil company to buy or lease government-controlled land, and then that oil company can explore for, discover, drill for, and produce oil. That "creates" wealth, in the sense that the raw material has value, and can be sold, creating wealth for that oil company and the people who own it. The same scenario can be imagined for a gold mining company, a lumber company, or any other company that produces natural resources from the bounty of the earth. Farmers can create wealth by growing crops. The list goes on and on.
However, taking money from one individual and giving it to another does not in any sense create wealth. No, this activity is simply re-distributing it. Taking from one entity and giving it to another, no matter what the principle or formula or methodology, creates nothing.
Here's the point: Liberals in our country have the strong desire to tax the rich and give to the poor. This strategy doesn't create wealth, it just redistributes it. No wealth is created because nothing exists that didn't exist before.
Someone has the idea that by taxing the rich and redistributing it to the poor(er) folk, the country is better off. I say, no way! Not only was no wealth created in that activity, who's to say that the people who benefit from this redistribution will spend that windfall money in a way that's any better than those from whom it was taken? I would guess that in fact, they will spend it in a worse way. Who buys all the lottery tickets--rich industrialists? Nope. Who buys most of the cigarettes--the highly educated, high income earners? Nooooo. Who capitalizes companies that employ large numbers of others--the poor and uneducated? Generally not. Re-distributionism does not improve our country, it just improves the circumstances of some at the expense of others.
Not only does wealth re-distribution not on the whole make us better off, it upsets a lot of people--all those from whom money is taken. But I have the solution.
Now that liberals rule the country, they clearly outnumber the conservatives. Up till now, liberals have had a great influence in the country, but still have had to compromise, over and over with the conservatives. They never totally got their way. But now they rule. They're in charge. They control the White House, the Congress, and the Judiciary, not to mention the press. No more compromises: they make the rules, and they can enforce them. However, liberals hate to force anything on anyone; they believe in free agency and "if it feels good, do it" morality. So I say, let the government create a voluntary tax collection program. Instead of forcing everyone to contribute, let only those who want to participate in this noble endeavor volunteer their funds. Liberals can contribute to their heart's content. The government can continue to perform its excellent redistribution function, the libs will be happy, and poor will get wealthier and the conservatives and industrialists will be ecstatic.

How to Grill a Great Steak

I landed on a really good method for grilling steaks last fall. It won’t be long until Spring is here and everyone will be firing up the ol’ grill, and hopefully this will just add to the anticipation. We had an unusually warm day in Edwardsville today, and so just to keep in practice I made dinner this evening. Here's how it's done.

I start with a good cut of beef. I like New York strip, Lisa tends to like sirloin, and we both love filet mignon but almost always go with the cheaper cuts. Using the right seasoning can turn a good steak into a great steak. There are any number of steak seasoning rubs on the market, but I have my own homemade mix that I like best. You can vary this to suit your own taste, but the basic ingredients are 8 parts onion powder, 4 parts garlic powder, 2 parts celery salt, and 1 part Hungarian paprika, plus salt and pepper to taste. Just mix them up and sprinkle on the steak at least 10 minutes prior to grilling.
After seasoning the meat, get the grill hot--really hot! I shoot for 500° F, and keep it at that temperature for at least 10 minutes to get the grate evenly heated. Toss the steaks on and keep the heat up for two minutes per side, then turn down the heat to about 325° F and keep an eye on things. Good steaks have enough marbelling to flavor the meat, but melting fat dripping onto the burners can cause a flame-up, so stay nearby and be ready to move the steaks to a different part of the grill at the first sign of lapping flames. Cooking at such a low temperature can take a while, so once you’re sure the risk of flame-up is past, there’s no need to stand at the grill. It is at this point I often go inside to make sure the veggies and salads and fresh-baked garlic bread are coming along so that everything is ready to serve at the same time.

If you've followed directions perfectly, you have now burned your steaks on the bottom to the consistency of Illinois coal; here are my favorite tips for removing the carbon layer (yes, you’ll be very tempted to just serve them burned-side down, but don’t do it. I have found much less humiliation by just running inside with the meat and muttering epitaphs under my breath about the man who would design a grill with such uneven temperature distribution. If you think it will help, throw in a comment about how no one should be expected to grill in the dark since you can't really see what's going on with the meat.)
Lisa likes to cut her steak into bite-sized pieces, and then, using her best sewing scissors (the ones only she is allowed to use), she cuts off the bottom of each bite. Me, I like to vigorously scrape the meat like a piece of burned toast over the trash can (a serrated knife works best), returning the intact steak to my plate, where the top side still looks simply marvelous, with those spices adding a wonderful color. Oh, and Lisa always fully dips each bite into her favorite béarnaise sauce, hiding any hint of remaining black stuff. This little trick totally masks the flavor of the meat.
Happy grilling!