I've been house hunting lately, and I came across a beautiful little house in a great neighborhood that fits my needs (and my wallet) perfectly.  I contacted a realtor and found out that the house was owned by the County and was being sold via a federal program called, "Neighborhood Stability Program" or "NSP".  I was informed that you had to qualify to purchase the home and one of the qualifications was to make under a certain salary.   As it turns out, to my surprise, I'm really rich!  At least the NSP program thinks so.  Just once, ONCE, I want to get a break from the government.  I guess the mayor of Orange County saw me driving around in my 2009 Rabbit with the 15 inch steel rims and guessed that a guy with a whip like that must be a player!  Maybe it was my Wal-Mart shirt or my Sketchers that really clued him in on my gansta bankroll.  I know, it was when he saw me at Olive Garden eating all the salad and bread sticks that gave him the impression that I lived so large, but the salad and bread sticks at the Garden are unlimited damn it.  UNLIMITED!

There was a time when jetBlue was a special airline.   Unlike Southwest Airlines (aka the 'flying bus') with their festival seating, jetBlue was affordable, the staff was friendly, and there was a TV set at every seat.  An egalitarian airline, jetBlue has but one class.  I'm telling you, flying jetBlue was a real pleasure, but all good things must come to an end.

In 2007,  jetBlue let an airplane full of passengers sit on the tarmac for over  8 hours, and as a result, suffered their first real negative publicity to date.  Not long after this incident, jetBlue created a passenger bill of rights and promised to do better.  Well isn't that just super?!  Eager to show the world that they had mended their ways, jetBlue overcompensated during the next snow storm, and canceled way more flights than their competitors.  I know this to be true because every person flying into New York to attend my parent's 75th birthday party (their birthdays are very close, so they decided to hold one big party) never made it there, including me!  Every other airline found a way to get guests to my parent's party, but jetBlue had its head up its fuselage that day.

So, the airline decided to err on the side of caution and cancel a bunch of flights, and I missed my parent's 75th (I'll catch the next one, don't worry), but what REALLY made me angry was that on the day in question you couldn't get through to jetBlue on the phone OR the web!  I had no idea, at the time, if my flight was canceled or still on time.  Unacceptable.  I know a little bit about the web, and even if their site went down, they could have posted a static html page with flight info updated every 20 minutes.  Regardless, a company the size of jetBlue should have web infrastructure contingency plans, especially if they are not going to answer the phone.

Time heals all wounds, anger subsides, and I gave jetBlue another chance.  They seemed to back on track with customer service, and once again I was flying the jetBlue skies.  Flash forward to present day.  I tried to book a flight on jetBlue.com tonight using the jetBlue gift card my brother and sister-in-law gave me for Christmas.  After searching for flights, choosing seats, and entering my contact info, I tried to pay with said gift card only to be informed that gift cards cannot be processed online "at this time."  I was instructed to call customer service to place my reservation and pay with the gift card.  I spoke with an jetBlue rep who informed me that you can't use gift cards online at all, not just "at this time", and she transfered me to the gift card department.  After waiting on hold listening to static filled elevator music for 15 minutes, my cell phone's battery ran out of juice and died!

What is up with jetBlue?  For such a 'hip' airline, they haven't quite mastered the web (or the phone for that matter).  Hopefully, the same rates will still be available tomorrow when I try once again to give jetBlue my money.  Come to think of it, they already have my money!  Even worse, they have my Christmas present money!!  jetBlue stole my Christmas present!!!  What's next?  I bet jetBlue goes to baseball games and steals foul balls from little children.  I heard a rumor that jetBlue hates puppies an kittens.  jetBlue goes to the movies and gives away the ending.  jetBlue's favorite software is classic AOL with dial-up.  jetBlue has two small German children in a cage, fattening them up with delicious food with plans to cook and eat them!  OK, so that last one was from Hansel and Gretel, and I'm pretty sure I did see jetBlue petting a puppy once, but the AOL thing is true.

Today, the Olympic Games are no different than any other big sporting event.  Professional athletes, corporate sponsorship, and massive marketing campaigns are the norm now.  And far from promoting a sense of global fraternity, the only thing that people truly seem interested in is the ‘medal count.’  Did you know that cold climate countries do better at the winter Olympics than warm weather nations?!  What about this shocking fact: countries with huge economies and populations tend to win more medals than small, poor ones!!  I feel such a sense of pride when I check the medal count each morning and the US is kicking Kazakhstan’s butt.  U-S-A!  U-S-A!  U-S-A!

I better keep it short.  I’ve been away from the TV for far too long.  I hope I didn’t miss skeleton or freestyle skiing.

Google will really blow the wind out of Motorola’s sales with the Nexus One.  The Nexus One is thinner, faster, and has a better screen than the Droid (and the iPhone!).  Nexus also has specific hardware and software features like 3D and voice to text for all input fields.  Not to mention, that when people think about the iPhone’s biggest competition from now on, it will be the Nexus One.

This always happens to me.  I purchased a 2009 Volkswagen Rabbit (AKA Golf). I really wanted a Mazda3, but Mazda was going to release a new generation Mazda3 in 2010, and I didn’t what to have an ‘old’ car after just a year.  I read on car blogs that Volkswagen takes a long time between introducing new models, and the next Rabbit wasn’t due for at least a couple of years.  I even asked the dealer (after I bought the car), and he said we wouldn’t see the next generation Rabbit for a few years.  Eight months after I purchased the Rabbit, VW introduced the next generation 2010 Golf (they  dropped the Rabbit name and went back to Golf).  It isn’t so bad.  The new version looks pretty much like mine, but it gets better mileage, and the interior noise has been reduced.

I’m not buying a new car, but maybe I can upgrade somehow to the Verizon version of the Nexus One that’s due in the Spring.  I could just learn to live with it and enjoy what I have…naaaaah!  That’s not going to happen.

I have a love/hate relationship with Apple, Inc.  It's more hate than love, and the fact that I can feel hate or love for a corporation disturbs me.  Years ago, during an animated discussion with my brother about Microsoft and Apple he gave me some advice.  He said, "You shouldn't love or hate something that can't love or hate you back."  This is not to be confused with loving somebody who doesn't love you back. Unrequited love is a whole different concept.  My brother was referring to my ongoing angst over the Windows/Mac 'war' that was raging.  That bit of advice really struck a chord with me, and I tried to follow my brother's advice from then on with varying amounts of success.

I tried to not care about the ridiculous war of words being fought in tech magazines, the web, and around the water cooler about the virtues and demerits of Apple and Microsoft, and for a while, I was successful. It was then that those infuriating, and sometimes misleading, Mac/PC ads started to air.  In the ads a young and hip guy plays the 'Mac.'  An older, fatter, nerdier, dumber man portrays 'PC.'  In the commercials, the 'PC' would invariably be made the fool, and the 'Mac' would be shown to be the smarter and cooler choice.  I get it.  It's a commercial for Apple, it is going to promote their products.  What got to me was that Apple was comparing all Windows users to dumb, fat, losers.  Why should I support a company that views me as such?  Switching to a Mac would make me feel like I let the school yard bully take my lunch money.  That ad campaign is the perfect example of Apple's smug attitude that makes me hate it.  There are many other reasons for my disgust.  The 'Genius Bar', fanatics at MacWord hanging on Steve Job's every word as if  it was a revival meeting, and the general 'fancy pants' design of Apple store...and so much more.

Take the iPhone for example.  For years now, the computer industry has been migrating from the desktop to the 'cloud'.  Data and applications hosted on servers and accessed via the internet is rapidly becoming more common, freeing users from being tied to their hardware.  Apple comes along with the iPhone and reverses the 'cloud computing' trend by forcing all iPhone users to download applications, or as Apple calls them 'apps.'  The iPhone does support Adobe Flash.  If it did, developers would be able to build Flash applications formatted to fit the iPhone screen (or any smart phone screen) and deliver them via the Web, thus bypassing Apples' control.  According to an article on Wikipedia, Apple charges developers $99 per year and takes a 30% commission on every app sold through the App Store.  Apple markets and  makes money on the fact that the iPhone has tens of thousands of available applications, third party developers build them, and Apple takes 30 percent!  Quite a good racket.  Imagine if Microsoft tried to use this method of application distribution with Windows 7?  The DOJ would get an injunction to halt its release.  Now that Apple has had so much success with this model, Microsoft, Blackberry, Palm, etc. are following suit.  I own a Motorola Droid with the Google developed Android operating system.  There is an Android 'app store', but you can also develop and distribute apps outside of the Android Market.

Apple holds all the cards.  In an effort to keep the iPhone system from being filled with malicious and resource draining apps (a noble cause) they have exerted full censorship on content while taking a hefty sum from every developer.  All this and Apple's image is as shinny as, well, an apple.  I against government control over the technology industry, and I believe Apple has every right to conduct business any way they want, but, Apple fanatics, just wait until the Department of Justice antitrust division comes knocking on Apple's door in a few years.  Ask Microsoft, there is a price to pay for market dominance.

So, where is the 'love' in this 'love/hate' relationship.  The love is for the technology.  I love computers and gadgets, and Apple makes some cool stuff.  Also, Apple is an American computer and consumer electronics company.  Apple's success benefits the American economy and thus benefits me.  Some Apple users (and I must emphasize SOME) are so insular in their view of technology.  If it doesn't have an Apple logo on it, they don't want to know from it.  When I go to the mall, I stop in the Apple store, but I also browse around the SonyStyle store.  I am a Microsoft enthusiast, but I just installed Ubuntu Linux on my computer, dual booting with Windows 7, to check it out.  I really like Microsoft's Bing search engine, but Google still has the best search algorithm.  Why would anybody limit their access to technology to one company?

I guess I'm not doing very well following my brother's advice about not loving or hating something that can't love or hate you back, but I'm gong to try harder to follow his example in 2010.  I think I can do it.  Now, I just need some way to stop hating the Yankees and getting my heart broken by the Mets every year.

Gene Roddenberry's vision of the future was a positive one.  He imagined a future where human beings settled their conflicts peacefully. In Gene Roddenberry's future racism, war, poverty, etc. did not exist.  With varying levels of success, over 5 TV shows, an animated series, and 10 feature films, Star Trek extolled the virtues of diversity and tolerance.   There were episodes and portions of films that succumbed to the pressure to make money over creative integrity, but taken as whole, the Star Trek franchise stood for something. Star Trek was intellectual.  It challenged the viewer to contemplate the human condition through complex storytelling and simple morality plays.   In other words, Star Trek is not just the name of a science fiction franchise, it defines a rigid set of rules for story telling.

But, how do you continue to write compelling and entertaining stories in such a confined framework?  Well, maybe you don't. In addition to ten motion pictures, over 725 episodes of Star Trek have been produced.   Maybe enough is enough.  Instead of sullying the meaning of Star Trek by producing a violent action/adventure...just let it die!  It is OK for TV shows to go off the air, for a series of books to end, a band to break up, and a film franchise to hang it up.   Isn't it better to have less quantity and more quality of your favorite art?  Don't you hate that that band recorded an album with a replacement singer, and that TV show went an extra season when the show was spent 3 seasons ago?  Wouldn't it have been better to just let it die?   Here's a radical idea: create a new film franchise based in space with the familiar Star Trek and Star Wars technology, and do whatever you want with it:  Jason Bourne meets Twilight meets The Hangover!  Genius!

So, what was so bad with the 2009 Star Trek?  Let me count the ways:

1. The film creates an alternate reality.  Other Star Trek episodes and films have employed the alternate timeline/reality vehicle, but the original timeline was always reestablished by the conclusion of the story.  By creating an alternate reality, the producers of the film gave themselves a cheap excuse to do whatever they so choose with Star Trek.  Without restoring the timeline back to the original Star Trek 'universe', every thing that you loved about Star Trek is changed.  It's done.  Over.  Screw you Gene Roddenberry.
2. It is very violent.  Star Trek was never about excessive violence, but in once scene a Starfleet cadet pummels a young Kirk mercilessly!
3. The plot is almost incomprehensible.
4. The acting is sub-par.
5. The dialog is clumsy.
6. And so on...

Star Trek was never perfect, and the two films preceding the 2009 release made it pretty clear that it was time to end the franchise.  It is a shame and a pity that young fans and future fans will only know Star Trek as a slick action/adventure shoot-em-up.  Lastly, please don't tell me to 'get a life' and 'it's just a TV show'.  Television and movies are art, and I will never apologize for my love and passion for Star Trek.