From the Doghouse
A look at dogs having fun
Poser Gallery
My gallery of pictures I’ve created in Poser
My Science Fiction and Fantasy stories
Stories I’ve written
Nature by Carol
A look at the less technical side of life
Why is An Engineer So Brutally Honest But Still Can’t Read A Schedule?
For a marketing person, introducing a potential customer to an engineer is the stuff nightmares are made from. Engineers can be brutally honest about technology. Note I said technology. We're perfectly capable of lying. Ask us about schedule, percent complete, does...
Cooped Up With An Engineer For A While? Maybe This Will Help.
In these times of uncertainty and outright panic, it seems almost irresponsible to publish a post on living with an engineer. I certainly can’t argue the logic behind that line of thinking. On the other hand, the prospect of being cooped up with an engineer for an...
The Eternal Conflict Between Human Behavior And Engineering Logic
The popularity of my Married to an Engineer posts tells me that most of you have difficulty understanding how engineers think. As an engineer, I can tell you that difficulty is mutual. We try to design based on rational human beings and the truth is most of you are...
Time Travel As Viewed By Einstein. A Simplified Discussion
Time travel, I don’t know of any other concept so used and misused in Science Fiction. Although judging from Avengers Endgame, a lot of writers have problems with the concept. Still, despite the inherent paradoxes, from the time I was first introduced to the concept,...
Companies Not Reading Your Complaints? You’re Probably Dealing With A Chatbot
Ever write to a company about a problem and their response made it obvious they weren't reading your message? No, it's not your spouse moonlighting as customer support. Odds are, you've just encountered a chatbot. Chatbots have been around as long as I've been...
Closing Out 2019 In Bits And Pieces
I admit it. Sometimes very logical conclusions completely escape me. I started Opinionbypen because I realized I was too isolated. At the time it never occurred to me that nobody cared. In order to people to take time out of their life and read my blog, they have to...
Random Posts
Email Scam or Luckiest Man Alive?I must be the luckiest man alive. Three weeks ago when I was looking at my bills and wondering how I was going to pay them, I got an email from an attorney in England. Some wealthy relative I didn’t even know about had died and left me his fortune. I immediately sent them all […]
Musings On A The Existence Of Parallel UniversesThe concept of parallel universes has always fascinated us. Think about worlds identical in every respect to ours except for a single difference. Somewhere out there we took that job in California or married our childhood sweetheart or won the lottery. Roger Zelazny envisioned worlds separated from ours in terms of probability. The higher the […]
Congress, Too Focused on Being Politicians?My previous post on Congress made me wonder, how is it possible that the people in Congress don’t see themselves in the same light we do? How can you have a 10% approval rating and honestly feel like you are doing the job you were elected for? All the evidence says that there are some […]
Random Posts
An Attempt To Make Sense Of The Rules Of WritingOver the last 3 months I’ve been trying to improve the content of my blog, both the pictures I use to illustrate my articles and the quality of my writing. As I expected, Poser has helped me to improve my pictures. I’m starting to understand the shortcuts and tricks that make a picture look real. […]
Why Can’t I Find A Good Book, The Evolving Nature Of LiteratureThere’s nothing as wonderful as starting a new book and finding yourself totally immersed within the first chapter. Sadly, such books are becoming scarcer than finding a worthy political candidate. I find myself reading more books and enjoying far fewer of them. I used to think that this was caused by self-publishing but this has […]
Communication As Seen By An EngineerCommunication, the human race has been attempting it for thousands of years. Whither it’s art, music, writing, movies, even this website, it’s all a form of communication. With that much practice, you would think we’d be better at it. Honestly, I don’t know why we aren’t better at it but I think the problem exists […]
Random Posts
Half Full or Half Empty, An Engineer’s ViewpointMy wife will confirm that living with an engineer is different. It’s not just that we tend to be socially inept or even standoffish. We see the world differently and until you spend time with one of us you can’t comprehend how differently. All my life I’ve listened to people describe personalities as, “a glass half […]
Whimsy, This Engineer’s Stress ReliefSuch a funny word, whimsy. It’s almost self-defining, although that could be because I’ve known what it meant for so long. For the rest of you, it’s defined as a capricious humor and I think there’s far too little of it in today’s life. Most people tend to think of engineers as boring people with […]
Opinionbypen 2016 Goals in Review, How Well Did I Do?I force my wife to read the first draft of all my posts. I’ve found that this keeps me out of trouble with her and gives me some insight on how people will feel when they read it. I mention that because after reading this post she said I always seemed sad when summarizing my […]
From the Doghouse -It’s all about them
A look at dogs having fun!
Short Stories
With posts like these, ever wonder what kind of fiction I would write?
Random Posts
The Up Mini 3D Printer RevisitedThe 3D printer testing this week by Make magazine inspired me to do this follow-up post on my Up Mini 3D printer. I’ll answer the most obvious question first. Then again, maybe not, I still have no rational reason for why I bought the printer but I can enthusiastically say …
Ego, It Doesn’t Improve Your Homelife EitherA very long time ago I was a manager of the small group of electronic designers. Like many engineering managers I had been a very good designer and I’d been promoted to the position of manager without knowing what it took to become a manager. The way I saw it, …
Making Decisions Based On Website DataIf there’s an engineer in your life, you know how utterly fascinated we are by data. We use data to make purchases, to troubleshoot and to make important decisions. In How to Argue with an Engineer, I told you how engineers use data to support our arguments. It should come as …
Using Data To Influence My Content, How Opinionbypen.com ChangesIn the design and maintenance of Opinionbypen.com, there are two guiding principles I always consider. When it comes to technology, resisting change is the best way to become forgotten. Then again maybe you’re still using a rotary telephone as you watch your VHS tapes on that black and white television. …
A Mother’s Day Post On Political ChangeI should explain why I’m doing a political post for Mother’s Day. Last year I explained that I have to consider both my Mother and my Mother-in-law. When it comes to this blog both of them have given me strong encouragement to continue writing. They’ve only expressed one minor disappointment, …