"It's Not A Competition But I'm Winning"

     Ahh, art.  Paper, 25 cents.  Ink, a dime, more if he bought the good stuff, which is likely.  Coming up with the idea and the design-- See, that's why you have to pay artists. 

The Men Who Learned How To Sell To Engineers

     Yesterday was interesting--

     People in my trade are notoriously difficult to sell to; we poke around at the machinery, ask difficult questions and generally behave as if we could build a better version of the widget ourselves. (Indeed, some of us do; I could point to a half-dozen little companies started when some boffin looked at the available options in disgust and made his own answer to whatever the problem may have been.)

     Tradionally, sales weasels (so-called) solved this by either wining/dining and being best pals, or by bypassing the techies and pitching his widgets to management and creative personnel.  It worked but tended to inculcate resentment.

     These days, woe betide the General Manager or non-technical department head who buys Something Wonderful based on the blinky lights and fast talk: unless it really is wonderful down to the last penny paid and beyond, heads roll. Once bitten (clean off!), thrice shy; they've largely stopped buying on their own.

     That leaves the salepeople back sellin' to my lot, cranky, suspicious, technically-conservative geeks and nerds.  Meanwhile, sales careers are foundering on the rocks of a down economy, a hugely accelerating rate-of-change in hardware and consumer usage, and ever-greater use of software-defined devices.  With that kind of pressure on the genome, something had to give--

     "I'm a salesman and I probably won't be able to help going into a little bit of a pitch here, but the application of (non-exclusive) technology X to task Z  is making huge improvements in quality and cost, and here's an overview of how and why."

     "All our competitors (names a half-dozen) make a good product too, which this box can work as the 'home' end for; it'll talk to all of them."

     "Here's a white paper on the New Widget," handing out a multi-page print-out, walls of text and no glossy pictures, "and you might want a brochure, too." (point to stack of traditional shiny ads).

     "I'm just up here to introduce our design engineers--" (Who proceed to give an informative talk; sure, there's a stack of sales-contact business cards available, too.)

     Yeah.  They're starting to figure it out.  It sure beats the fast-talking but oblivious salesmen I had to deal with way back when, including the guy who made a high-pressure pitch for a particular technology (unflanged rigid coaxial transmission line for high-power RF) he thought was new and amazing to Us Rubes, while standing in the middle of a room where all the high-power widgetry was interconnected with the stuff!  Those days are fading.  I don't miss 'em.

     (On another front, a general-line supplier I otherwise like has continued their trend of sending personable young women to work their table at such events.  I'd like to tell you it's because they're such an unbiased metritocracy; I'd like to, but given the evidence, I suspect it's because they know they're working a crowd 95% male and overwhelmingly geeky.)

(Nature's Bounty) Harvest-Time Beef Stew

     It would only confuse you to admit I started with a little sweet Italian sausage; but it was only by seconds.  A bitta that gets joined by a pound of stew beef, cut small; brown, add  fresh mushrooms as it happens, cover with beef stock once it looks right to you.  Now cover the pot and go do something like chopping half an onion (saute and add), a few stalks of celery (likewise), a couple-three fresh  carrots (do you see a saute-pan pattern developing? You do) and a couple of potatoes (Stop!  Nobody sautes potatoes for stew, you barbarian! Don't peel them, either, that's the best part).  Cut up the potatoes in large spoon-sized chunks and chuck 'em into the hot and bubblin'. Let it cook for ten or twenty minutes, simmering, adding liquid as needed.  Toss in a can of whatever kind of beans look good, draining most but not all of the liquid.  Dice up an Anaheim or other appealing pepper, saute (ha!  Fooled ya!) briefly and add it to the pot; slice six or seven (or more) cherry or grape tomatoes and throw them in, too. Give it another ten minutes or longer after adding the tomatoes.  (I also sliced up a tiny little crabapple, sauted it and pitched it in with the carrots, skin-on.  It turned out well; I should've done two or  three.)

     Season to taste.  I salt and peppered the beef as it went in, plus some sesame-garlic stuff, and added "pot herbs" (too much thyme, but it worked.  YMMV) with the broth.

     Serves several, or a few for several days.

     You can push this stuff in a tomato-y direction with crushed or diced, you can make it spicy (maybe some of those canned green chilies?), you can thicken the broth with flour (simplest if you shake up the beef with flour in a bag before browning, for a roux-without-rue), cornstarch or arrowroot (those two, mix with cold, cold water, then stir slowly into a simmering-not-boiling pot of broth and goodies. It doesn't take much and they're fairly flavor-neutral), substitute rice for the potatoes (ending up with a sort of farmer's pilaf) or whatever else might appeal. Various other kinds of meat could be used, alone or together.  It's really more of an attitude than a recipe and will accomodate leftovers.  (A really quick version might be turned out with leftover meatloaf, for example.)

     An overnight stay in the fridge or freezer often makes the whole thing better.  Simmering the meat longer would be better, too, if you have that kind of time.  You'd want to leave it in larger pieces, I think.

     Tam went back for a second bowl, which is usually a good sign.

     Update: I had to rename it, based on the very first comment.   Man, we can't have nothin' nice!

I'm Off To See The Wizards....

     Off to an Engineering Conference of the offsite/professional-networking variety, at which Salesmen will entice me and my peers in the hopes we might buy stuff and Certified Professional Engineers will lecture, hoping against hope we might learn stuff.  There's some overlap between the two.  Which means minimal blog for you this morning, sorry!

     Here's a thought: you'd think if "that government which governs least, governs best" is correct and the closer it gets to zero the better, then a snarled-up mess of a government that can't do much of anything -- a negative value -- might be better still; but the reality is that it's as least as bad as a big, caring Nanny-state, if not worse.   (This explains places like Somalia, where there's actually too many "governments" -- warlord fiefdoms, etc. -- than too much government.)  "Zero" is still a thing approached but never reached; too many people want to make sure their neighbors color inside the lines all the time (and never make the giraffes green or the grass purple), and that's before you address the irreducible minimum of criminally-inclined individuals.

"Gentlemen Do Not Read One Another's Mail"

     It was sententious nonsense when Harry Stinson said it in 1929, when he yanked the State Department's share of funding for the U. S. Government's first official cryptographic effort (and arguably, one of the first super-secret Bureaus: the Cipher Bureau operated behind a front as a legitimate commercial-code business.  The NSA got those sneaky-pete genes more-or-less legitimately).

     Stinson was quick to recant in deed if not word when the U. S. got kicked into WW II; the military had never given up.

     In the real world, "gentlemen" have been verifiably reading one another's mail since the late 1500s.

     You'll excuse me if I find the current flap about NSA peering over the shoulders of world leaders -- even ones with whom our government is pinky-swear BFFs -- a few centuries late and staggeringly naive.

      In the eyes of the jaded spooks of Britain and the Continent, the intelligence services of the United States have long had a reputation for unsubtlety despite super-1337 electronic-spying skills; their latest missteps have been something of a return-to-standard, as Elint merges with Humint as the smartphone in your pocket turns into an untrustworthy constant companion and their need for ever-better geekery outstrips the number of men and women who will keep even the most dire of secrets.

Chilly-Morning Fare

     There's something comforting about an egg fried with a small slice of prosciutto on top, then flipped over and finished with a slice of cheese on the new top, the whole thing being served on a slice of toast (cheese side down) when done. It'll warm you right up.  (The tiny one-egg frying pan helps it cook quickly, too.)

     Before adding the egg, I gave the pan a couple of twists from a "Montreal Steakhouse" spice weasel, little more than pepper, salt and a hint of garlic.  YMMV.

Beans, Beans, Beans...

     Indianapolis dried-bean packaging icon (and lone holdout in the vast land-holdings of Lucas Oil Stadium) N. K. Hurst is 75 years old this month!

     Happy Birthday, Hurst -- and here's some bean soup recipes for the rest of us.

     When I was growing up, thick, gray 15-bean soup, simmered all day with chunks of ham and served with fresh chopped onions, sliced celery and home-baked corn bread* was a cold-weather treat above all others.  It's getting to be about bean soup time already, in fact.  Do you suppose Tam will agree to drive the crockpot while I'm at work?

     (The "classic" version I grew up with is just the bean mix simmered with ham.  Use the spice packet and add tomato, etc. for a more traditional 15-bean soup.  Either way, it's great!)
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* Does your boxed-mix cornbread fall apart?  Try doubling the number of eggs you add!  It works for me.

One-Sided Conversation, AKA "The Monkey Rules"

     Rannie the cat leaps onto the pulled-out typewriter shelf on the right side of my big oak desk, cooing ingratiatingly: "Woo-Ooooo."

     I'm enjoying a bowl of fried rice, eggs, a few veggies and three kinds of fancy Italian lunchmeat (because fusion breakfasts are goood), which she promptly homes in on.  I hold it back out of the way and lean right in, eye-to-eye with the cat:  "Rannie, you know how they say, 'What's mine is yours?'  This doesn't work that way," going forehead to forehead on the last line and delivering it in my best whiskey-contralto growl.

     Rannie:  "Eee, arnghk..." and she leaps down, passing parlously close to my half-full coffee cup in the process.

     She went off and sulked a bit but came back, going floor-to-desktop in a single smooth levitation, singing "Waaarrngh!" as she landed.  Now she's doing her best impression of a well-behaved Pharonic cat, sitting tail-over-toes with a butter-won't-melt expression.  I'm not fooled.  She's just biding her time.

     Grow thumbs and get a job, cat, and I'll talk to you about sharing my food.  You already had yours and a tablespoon of olive oil, too.

     (Huck, noticing something was up, jumped to the shelf on the other side of my desk when I scolded Rannie.  He's more direct -- a gentle shove and he was back on the floor with no hard feelings.)

A Halloween Bot? Why Not!

     A new, seasonal story at I Work On A Starship: The Halloween Bot.

     It came lurching and clanking down the road, trailing a thin streamer of smoke in the twilight, two heavy feet scuffing aside the red, brown and yellow-gold fallen leaves along the pale mauve line that delineated the pedestrian, bicycle and small/slow autonomous vehicle lane from the main road.
     Jackson Jones was the first of the kids to notice it.

     Read the rest!

Two-Way Radio, Again

     Headed for lunch Saturday, friends noticed my Baofeng UV-5R handheld HT and asked about it.  "There's an article on my blog," I told 'em, promising to put up a link.

     So far, so good with mine, though I have worn the print off the button that switches between preset tuning and continuously-variable mode.  Still works, and the little magic person inside announces the new mode when you push it.  For what amounts to a disposable radio, that's pretty good.

And So It Begins....

     When goods can't cross borders, ideas will.  Also 3-D printer files:

     UK police seize parts from 3D-printed gun.

      ...Apparently a trigger and a magazine.  Last time I looked, you didn't need either one of of those to make a gun (see zip gun, fire lance, handgonne). ...Hey, actual Bad Guys in possession of actual Means To Do Harm is a bad thing, but let's make sure we can tell baddies from posers and the "means" from toys.

     Bonus: in the body of the story, AP serves up the "invisible to metal detectors" canard.  Drink!  (Also, call me back when J. Random Hijacker manages to get the bullets through a metal detector.)

     You can't unring a bell.

     Update, via Jed and Bear in comments: Or not even gun parts at all.  Or a gang member.

     Associated Press, straining at gnats and swallowing camels whole, especially where firearms are involved; Agence France-Presse, skeptically methodical;  J. Random Police Constable, UK edition: hysterical.  In both senses.

"If You Smell Something, Say Something."

     No, really.

     Not the worst idea I've seen -- who wants to get blown up? Who wants gas rates to go up because the utility is losing the stuff?-- and a pity it's only around Boston so far.