Mistakes Were Made

There are times in life when you suddenly realize that you have done something wrong. At those times, I think it is human nature to throw blame all around, scattering it as you would scatter seeds in a field, but it is often unhealthy to do so. Personally, I find it especially damaging to relive all my mistakes asking myself what I could have done better and then wallowing in my lost opportunities. While it is good to learn from our mistakes and overcome them to be better, anything that tells you that you are not a valuable human being is just wrong. Instead it can often be helpful to accept that mistakes were made, learn from them, and move on making better decisions in the present and future. No decision you make can undo the past, but perhaps your decisions in the future just might bring you the joy you so earnestly seek in life. Go forward with positivity and you can accomplish anything you want and desire!

Shared Google Calendars on iPhone

I recently was researching how to get shared google calendars (or other personal calendars) to show up on the iPhone. The solution is to go to the google calendar iphone select website and check the boxes of the calendars you would like to have show up. You're welcome!

To birth or not to birth?

I've spending much of my time lately thinking about things. Among those things are the trends in the educated world towards lower levels of fertility among women. Why is it that the best way to prevent women from reproducing is to help them move up through education? Do those women somehow forget their own mother and how much they love and respect her? Or is it the case that once educated, these women feel that they must spend their time pursuing a career based on the education they attained in order to not waste the time and money that they and their parents spent in order to achieve that education? Perhaps part of the issue is that, once a woman is educated, she becomes more unapproachable to many potential mates.

Though I don't cite them here, studies have shown that some number greater than 50% of all college graduates over the last 10 years are women. While I have no problem with women receiving an education, or pursuing a career in their chosen field, I do find the trend in our country (and the world) towards lower birth rates alarming. Obviously high birth rates have been problematic in parts of the world where there is not enough food, but those are not the people I am talking about. Wouldn't the educated women who keep well paying jobs (regardless of pay differences) be better equipped to afford the expenses that come with raising children? Why then do studies show that these same "successful" women are the least fertile? Not being a woman myself, maybe my opinion and ideas don't really matter.

I would like to say what I think about women. In my life, the two people who had the most influence on me were my mother and father. Both of them together encouraged me to follow noble pursuits, especially in obtaining as much education as I desired. If I had stopped after High School with a plan for what I wanted to do, then they would have been very pleased with me. In my current situation where I have spent about 10 years of my time in post-secondary studies, they are also very happy with me. However, none of my achievements would have been possible if my mother had decided that it would be more important for her to follow her dreams to (and I'm making this part up) become a political leader even if it meant she could not find time to have children. I honestly believe my mother would make a great legislator, definitely better than the majority of legislators in our national government, however she decided that she would do better to have a few children, and focus her time on ensuring they would be prepared for their futures. The number of advanced degrees her children have achieved is currently 6 with 3, soon to be 4 more in progress. While my mother has not yet been able to complete her own Bachelor's degree, she has been personally involved and responsible for what will likely be at least 10 college degrees. Each of those degrees will end up bringing so much more value to the world and to our country than her "lost" career in politics may have done. And here's the best part, she still has the opportunity to serve in politics, or in just about any other way she wants even while raising these children. She has spent years in service to her kids schools in parent organizations. She has spent years tending to those in need and being a good friend to so many people. I am really grateful to my mother for everything she has done for me, and I know a large number of other people in many parts of the world are also grateful for the service she has done.

I guess my point is that, if you are a woman, try to spend some time thinking about how you decide to spend your life. There are many noble pursuits out there that could take your time, and you could personally get credit and glory for. However, if you decide to leave a little of yourself and your desire for recognition on the side, imagine how many great things your potential children will be able to accomplish! You could birth the person who finds the cure to cancer!

Now you might be saying to yourself that I am just some guy who is all focused in my own career and my ability as a male to advance higher and more quicker than women in professional organizations. Well, I think that my only real option to leave any impact on the world is to do everything I can professionally. I realize that I can still have children, and that is a goal of mine, but I still believe that when my children end up doing good things, the one that will carry the majority of the credit for those success, will be my wife. Biologically, she will be the only one in the family designed to be able to carry those children for the 9 months prior to birth. Regardless of what disagreements may enter the family later in life, mother and child will always have a special bond due to that literally physical attachment that they shared for that time. I wish that I could fill the role of a mother, but the lot I have been given in life is different. If ever you see me reaching for professional aspirations in my life, know that it is only in order to bring greater glory and achievement to my own mother, and is but a feeble attempt to make something that I know will never approach the greatness of motherhood.

To my mom, I love you. To every mother in the world, I envy you and respect you for your selflessness. Mothers make the world go on.

Verizon Wireless Share Everything Plans

I once again hate cell phone companies. Today, Verizon Wireless Unveils New Share Everything Plans For Basic Phones, Smartphones, Tablets And More, which is a long winded way of saying that Verizon is about to charge everyone an arm and a leg for their wireless data plans while making the traditional phone costs almost a non-issue. A basic phone plan ends up costing only $40 for unlimited talk and texting. Where was this plan before I got my smartphone? Honestly, I am seriously considering dropping my smart phone plan from here on out and only using basic phones since they are finally getting everything for a respectable price. At the same time, data costs are going way up. For my current 2GB plan that costs me $30, I'll have to pay $60 under the new plan, with more and more costs as I continue to increase my data usage.

No thank you Verizon. I'll stick with paying way too much for my home internet. At least that internet connection isn't terrible all the time. Also, an iPod Touch is way cheaper than an iPhone, so I'll just go back to only having data at certain locations.

'via Blog this'

iPhone message and phone contacts names switching to numbers

I've had an iPhone for a little while and today while I was on a trip, my phone decided to stop working perfectly. After I woke my phone up from being off in airplane mode, all of the contact names in my messages app disappeared and were replaced with just the phone numbers of the contacts. This wouldn't be a big deal except that I don't have everyone's number memorized and associated with the person in my mind. The same problem existed in the call history, while my favorites list still showed the names. After some searching, I found a solution from Marwan1981 on the apple discussion forums. I've copied the steps here so you don't have to look it up yourself (This is probably a Verizon only solution):

From your VZW iPhone:

1. Open the Phone and dial *228. This is a Verizon over-the-air programming number.
2. When the system answers press 1 for "Program or activate your phone"
3. You should get a prompt stating something like "Settings updated." Wait for the call to disconnect.
4. Open the Task Manager and kill the Phone, Message, and Contacts Applications
5. Wait a few minutes.
6. Open the Message App to verify the fix.

I hope this helps out someone else like it's helped me.

A fun function

In my internet viewing yesterday, I discovered an interesting function that I thought was worth writing down. You can easily put it in to google to see what is interesting about it: (sqrt(cos(x))*cos(400*x)+sqrt (abs(x))-0.4)*(4-x*x)^0.1

Another good one is the following curve: 2*​sqrt(​(‑abs(​abs(​x)-​1))*​abs(​3-​abs(​x))/​((abs(​x)-​1)*​(3-​abs(​x))))*​(1+​abs(​abs(​x)-​3)/​(abs(​x)-​3))*​sqrt(​1-​(x/​7)^​2)+​(5+​0.97*​(abs(​x-​0.5)+​abs(​x+​0.5))-​3*​(abs(​x-​0.75)+​abs(​x+​0.75)))*​(1+​abs(​1-​abs(​x))/​(1-​abs(​x))), (‑3)*​sqrt(​1-​(x/​7)^​2)*​sqrt(​abs(​abs(​x)-​4)/​(abs(​x)-​4)), abs(​x/​2)-​0.0913722*​x^​2-​3+​sqrt(​1-​(abs(​abs(​x)-​2)-​1)^​2), (2.71052+​1.5-​0.5*​abs(​x)-​1.35526*​sqrt(​4-​(abs(​x)-​1)^​2))*​sqrt(​abs(​abs(​x)-​1)/​(abs(​x)-​1))+​0.9

Google is pretty amazing.

American Internet Concerns

Today I read the following post: It's Time to Break Up AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner and the Rest of the Telecoms | | AlterNet and it got me to thinking about a subject that I've often thought about quite a bit because it's important to me. In case you can't tell from the link, the subject has to do with home internet from the telecom providers in the US that provide broadband internet. According to that report, America is 15th in broadband speed in the world behind countries like Hong Kong and South Korea. It's sad to me to find out that the average service in America is only 5 Mbps.

Obviously, the current average is better than it was in the 90's, but we shouldn't settle for what we have when we know that better things exist. Another problem with the service has to do with the prices we pay for broadband internet. A very small number of companies, usually as high as 2 in a given area, own all of the infrastructure and can set high rates because consumers don't really have a choice of anything else. Ideally, there would be more than a couple service providers competing for our business, which would help reduce the cost of service for consumers, and encourage service providers to invest in infrastructure to keep up with their competition. The end result would be faster internet at lower prices, making it possible for the United States to catch up with other countries. If we don't keep our abilities in this area, the US is likely to fall behind other countries in innovation and eventually lose our position as a world power.