1 Patent. 2 Pending. Cool!

First, select the Style that you want to use. I usually use MLA.

Then, put your cursor where you want to insert a citation, and click the following:

The next step is pretty simple – just fill out the resulting dialog with the source information. Be sure to look through the entire list of types of sources – there’s quite a few!

For this example, I’ll just use a basic book. First click edit to enter all the author names:

Then, fill in the rest of the template. Note that at the bottom, there’s example text to help you figure out what to type. (This is a lot more useful for more obscure formats like web pages.)

Ok. That’s it! Now when you get back to your prose, you can customize your citation. For example, you might need to add a page number:

To add more citations of this source, just go back to the Insert button:

Now that you’ve added all of these citations, this is how you generate a Works Cited list automatically:

Once the Works Cited list is entered into your document, you will need to “update” it periodically by clicking on update:

At a minimum, you should click update before you print/submit the document. Personally, I click update every time I add a citation. Note that new citations will not be listed unless you click update!

Finally, a lot of the power lies here:

When you click on that, you get this:

As you continue to add citations, a library of sources will appear here. You can also import sources from other documents. For example, you can open an existing Word document, copy the sources into your Word’s “Master List”, and then use them moving forwards.

I hope this helps!

A few years ago ago, I bough this flashlight (this is actually v2):

Amazon.com: Fenix L2T 2 Level High Performance Cree LED Flashlight: Sports & Outdoors
Fenix L2T 2 Level High Performance Cree LED Flashlight

This light quality from this flashlight is pretty stunning. While the beam size cannot be changed like a maglite, the distance is pretty awesome. Also, the light temperature (color, not “ouch this is hot”) is far higher allowing you to see more.

There are flashlights that have even brighter beams, but they tend to require hard to find batteries. This uses standard AA batteries. I use Energizer Lithium batteries, which last forever, and more importantly, have an incredibly slow discharge rate. I think the batteries I have in this flashlight are from 2007 – and there’s still plenty of juice (and they haven’t leaked out like some Duracells recently did in one my remote controls. Yuck.)

When I first bought mine in 2006, they were pretty hard to find. They were only on specialty sites. It’s cool to see that these now available even on amazon – and at a pretty good price.

Highly recommend.

Today, I went back to Costco to talk to an Assistant Manager. Unfortunately, he had to talk to the Optical Manager first, who had just left for lunch. So I waited. I talked to her, and her manager and in the end, at my insistence, they agreed to refund the lenses and the frames.

Wow.

Even though I won’t buy lenses from them (while I was there, I talked to someone else who said they had to have lenses redone!), I certainly am glad that Costco did right by me.

Thanks Costco.

I bought frames for glasses online, and decided to try getting lenses from Costco. Generally I’ve had very positive experiences with things Costco, but at this point, I would not recommend buying lenses.

Here’s what I got when I picked up the glasses today at the Costco in Mountain View:

When I dropped off the $171 frames, I paid $132.97 for the lenses. I was pleasantly surprised at the price – but I was rather surprised when I picked up the glasses and instantly noticed these damages on the perfectly new frames. The large chip is especially noticable!

I complained to the Optical Manager. And then when things went down hill. All paraphrased:

Manager: Costco’s policy is that we’re not responsible for damages to frames that you bring in.

Me: No one ever told me that.

Manager: Yes they did.

Me: No they didn’t. If I did, would I be this surprised?

Manager: <Shows me a paper saying that Costco’s policy is to not be responsible – with a marked area at the bottom for “Customer’s Acknowledgement”>

Me: I never signed that. I was never informed of this policy.

Manager: Let me look.

Manager: <spend the next 3 minutes looking. Customer next to me tells me that she usually buys frames from Costco, and gets lenses elsewhere because they tend to cut corners and make mistakes>

Manager: Yours isn’t back from audit yet. (???)

Me: I’d like you to replace this frame.

Manager: We can’t. We don’t carry it.

Me: Ok, I’d like you to pay me for this frame. That’s $171.

Manager: I can’t do that. Let me give you a 10% service credit.

Me: Uh, 10% of $133 is $13. Are you kidding? That’s not even close.

Manager: I’ll give you a refund on the lenses.

Me: Ok now we’re getting somewhere.

Manager: <takes out screw drivers>

Me: Wait a minute. I expected you to give me a refund and for me to keep the lenses.

Manager: I can’t do that. Costco’s policy is that we’re not responsible for damage.

Me: Ok, try putting yourself in my shoes. I drop off these frames. They’re perfectly new. You put a big scratch in them. You don’t tell me your policy. You don’t even have me sign it like you’re supposed to. And now you’re telling me you’re not responsible? How is this fair? You really can’t order them to a supplier?

Manager: <spends 2 minutes looking through the computer to see if they carry it. Nope.>

Me: I would like a credit of $171.

<Award silence as I count 20 mississippi>

Manager: I’ll meet you half way. I’ll refund half your money.

Me: <I’ve been at costco for over 30 minutes now and need to get back to work for a meeting>. Fine.

Manager refunds $66.50

Frankly I’m not sure if I got “justice” or not. And to the manager’s credit, she didn’t accuse me of bringing in chipped frames to begin with. The fact that there’s this giant chip on my new frames irks me. What would you have done?

I would’ve been content to let this drop… until I got home tonight and under some bright lights looked more closely. This is what I found:

Apparently they didn’t manufacture left lens correctly. I’ve had a lot of glasses in my lifetime, and I’ve never seen so much lens overflow the frame on the outside – especially since the right side was done correctly and I have nearly the same prescription in both eyes.

And I think that it is because the lens wasn’t manufactured correctly that the screw won’t join the two parts together anymore. It’s only a matter before the screw falls out and the lens falls out. Won’t that be a fun while driving!

It’s clear that someone was pretty frustrated with this before me, since they left a pretty big scratch while trying to screw it in.

So it appears that I will be returning to Costco to kvetch about this issue tomorrow. I don’t understand how someone could say their job was complete, when they couldn’t even screw the frames back together.

This is incredibly disappointing.

I thought this quote was pretty interesting:

Wealth-Less Effect: Earning Well, Feeling Otherwise – WSJ.com
San Jose, Calif., Mayor Chuck Reed calls a family living in Silicon Valley earning $250,000 “upper working class.” That is about what two engineers working at a technology firm can expect to make, but “a family earning $250,000 a year can’t buy a home in Silicon Valley,” he said.

James Duran owns a human-resources company in Silicon Valley and is president of the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce in California. He supported Mr. Obama, but is worried about the tax proposals. He has laid off some employees in recent months and has been wondering how he can fund an extension of those workers’ health-care benefits.

Mr. Duran said he and his wife earn about $400,000 annually, but “I’m barely getting by.” They have high property and state taxes, as well as college tuition and savings to cover. “I’m an Obama man, but this side of him is a difficult pill for me,” he said.

To put things in further perspective, here are the guidelines from the City of Mountain View (a fairly “middle class” city) on who qualifies for Below Market Rate housing assistance:

Affordable Housing

BMR ownership housing is targeted to median income households earning between 80 percent and 100 percent of the median household income. BMR rental housing is targeted to low income households earning between 50 percent and 80 percent of the median household income. In 2008, the median household income for a one-person household was $73,850 annually and, for a four-person household, it was $105,500 annually.

Yep… so if your family of 4 makes $84,400, you could still qualify for housing assistance.

It seems that perhaps the tax code should take into account local conditions, but that would only make things even more complicated. But then again, since most people in Silicon Valley spend 40% of their gross income on mortgage interest, their actual taxable income is dramatically lowered. Perhaps an optimal solution would be to repeal the mortgage interest tax deduction, and move the tax bar back to $300,000.

Complicated stuff!

This is not an April Fool’s Day joke, though the healthcare systems, policies, and frameworks in our nation might be considered to be one. Every election cycle, I hear a lot of silly “silver bullets” – For example: “If only we got rid of trial lawyers! Healthcare would be cheap and affordable!” (not really) or “Let’s copy France!” (wouldn’t work for us)

I’ll probably blog about this a bit more in the next few months, but I’d like to start by recommending this episode of Frontline. Personally I think it’s best viewed online.

Sick Around America
As the worsening economy leads to massive job losses—potentially forcing millions more Americans to go without health insurance—FRONTLINE travels the country examining the nation’s broken health care system and explores the need for a fundamental overhaul. Veteran FRONTLINE producer Jon Palfreman dissects the private insurance system, a system that not only fails to cover 46 million Americans but also leaves millions more underinsured and at risk of bankruptcy.

The first act (out of 5) features something I can relate to:

At its best, American health care can be very good. For Microsoft employee Mark Murray and his wife, Melinda, their employee health plan paid for eight years of fertility treatments and covered all the costs of a very complicated pregnancy. "If it wasn’t for our health insurance," Murray says, "we wouldn’t have a baby boy right now." The Murrays’ medical bills totaled between $500,000 and $1 million, and their plan covered every penny.

But beyond large, high-wage employers like Microsoft, FRONTLINE learns that available, affordable, adequate insurance is becoming hard to find. Small businesses face a very bleak outlook for finding and keeping coverage. Coverage is becoming more expensive and less comprehensive, with high deductibles, co-pays and coverage limits. Georgetown University Research Professor Karen Pollitz explains that for many people, the current system is "like having an airbag in your car that’s made out of tissue paper: I’m so glad that it’s there, but if I ever get in a crash, it’s not going to protect me."

The first act covers the best possible scenario – working for Microsoft. Where there are practically never any co-pays. (Pharmacies tend to do a double-take.) I call the Microsoft health Insurance plan, the “gold plated, c-level exec plan”. I feel very fortunate that my family receives coverage through this plan.

From there, the episode goes downhill. Fast.

Let’s be clear – there are no easy or cheap answers to solving our nation’s healthcare woes. There’s no silver bullet. And I hope we as a nation have the will and resolve to make improvements. But there’s not a lot of hope:

But consultant Laszewski wonders if Americans have the will to make it happen. "Every doctor I meet says he’s underpaid. I’ve yet to meet a hospital executive who thinks he or she can operate on less. I have yet to meet a patient who is willing to sacrifice care. So we have this $2.2 trillion system, and I haven’t met anybody in any of the stakeholders that’s willing to take less. And until we’re willing to have that conversation, we’re just sort of nibbling around the edges."

What I noticed tonight is that TurboTax seems to change the number of shares behind the scenes in the Original Purchase Lots of the Capital Gains Worksheet.

Here’s an example. Let’s say you sell 1000 shares of Test.

Now, let’s say you enter the purchase information as such:

You enter the purchase transaction using the “price per share” method, entering 500 shares at 10 each. If you click continue, then view the Capital Gains Worksheet, you will see this:

Ok. That makes sense. But let’s say you go and enter your purchase information in a different way:

You enter the purchase transaction using the “total purchase price” method, entering 500 shares for a total of 5000. If you click continue, then view the Capital Gains Worksheet, you will see this:

Observe that the number of shares is now 1,000. Why is that the case?

You might say “Big deal! The Total Cost” is the same!”

Unfortunately, because the number of shares purchased is the same as the number of shares sold, any information you add about reinvested dividends will be ignore, leading to an incorrect cost basis – both in dollar amount, and in break down of Long Term vs Short Term.

Perhaps I’m mistaken – I’m just bleary eyed from doing too much lately. That said, I was able to repro this using a clean TurboTax 2008 return – twice. Could someone double check my work?

Eagle Creek UnderCoverTM Leg Stash

Usually people wear money belts, but it gets somewhat uncomfortable after a while – especially if you end up working up a sweat. Plus, it’s kind of awkward taking things out of there as you need to lift up your shirt.

The UnderCover Leg Stash has 2 elastic bands that velcro’s around your leg. Nothing around your middle. Hurray! It’s very discrete and retreiving things isn’t a big deal.

There are two downsides though:

1. If you don’t secure the velcro properly and tightly, it tends to slide down. But that’s easily remedial.

2. It only works if you travel to places that are cold – after all, you need to wear long pants to cover it.

To me, hands down this is the far better choice.

Spain

• Why Spain in January? First of all, It wouldn’t be 100 degrees. The thought of schlepping around in such heat is not much fun in my book – I remember struggling to see the reclining Buddha and other sites in Bangkok because of the weather. Also, it’s off peak – it’s great never having to make reservations, wait in lines, or be stuck in crowds. Finally, prices for hotels were pretty awesome.
• Bring an Ethernet cable. At our hotel in Barcelona, my PC wouldn’t work with the wireless. At the Madrid Iberia Lounge, they have a lot of stations for you to plug an ethernet cable into.
• High speed train from Barcelona to Madrid was great – but here’s a tip, don’t try booking your tickets on http://www.renfe.es/. It’s great to find information about trains and their schedule, but it is impossible to book a ticket from America. Just look for the phone number there and call them directly. You’ll even get the fares that are on sale.

Barcelona

• Did you know that they speak/write/read Catalan first, then Spanish, in Barcelona? Some signs can be confusing – “Why can’t I understand what it is saying? Oh! It’s in Catalan, not Spanish.”
• We purchased the 4 day Barcelona Tourism Card. I would not recommend it as it’s incredibly hard to get the maximum benefit from it – though I suppose if we had picked it up at the airport and used it on the bush that would’ve helped recover some value. But with luggage that’s no fun either.
• Most guide books warn about crime and sketchiness in La Rambla. A few people I spoke to were victims of crime in Spain. Maybe it was because it was January, but things weren’t particularly sketchy to me. But then again I grew up walking by 1980’s Columbus Park in Chinatown (it was a lot like today’s SF Tenderloin.)
• http://www.calpep.com/ is a great restaurant.

Figueres

• As a side trip from Barcelona, we went to Figueres to the Dali museum. A pretty surreal place. It was very easy to go there by train, and following the street signs through the town to the museum was manageable. We did not bring a map. Note that there are no signs that tell you how to get back to the train station – so pay attention as you go to the museum. It’s about a mile walk, and rather pleasant.
• The Dali museum is rather surreal.

Madrid

• A great guide for Madrid that’s free: Mariblel’s Guide to Madrid.
• Learning from Barcelona, we wisely did not purchase the Madrid Tourism card.
• We did purchase 5 day unlimited ride metro tickets, and I’m not sure that was a great value either. Actually, I’m not sure we even cleared 10 rides per person in the time we were there, as things in central Madrid are fairly compact! In retrospect, I would’ve just purchased 10 ride tickets and refilled as necessary.
• We stayed at the Best Western Atlantico. Great location – very convenient to the Metro. We were able to walk to the various museums, Plaza Major, the Royal Palace, and more. (Hence the above bullet point about buying a 10 ride metro card instead!) The hotel offers free transfer from MAD airport (we did not take them up on this as we came via train) and charges 6€ per person for rides to the airport, which was handy.
• Note that this hotel may not be for everyone. There’s two things I can think of: it is basically on Broadway (NY)/Market St (SF) – so if you’re not into the “when I step out of my hotel, I step into a giant crowd of people walking” this may not be for you. Also, the first room we got (416) had two beds and was very small. So small that you really couldn’t lay open two 26” suitcases. I managed to do it by balancing one on top of the minifridge. Personally, I don’t have a problem with small hotel rooms since after all this is a European city. But that some Americans go to the supermarket in vehicles larger than this room – again, not for everyone. That’s an exaggeration, but now that I think about it, the only time I had stayed in a room smaller than this was at the Sheraton NY (or was it the Sheraton Manhattan? I always get them mixed up). Other Manhattan hotels had larger rooms. Eventually we were able to switch to another room, which turned out to be accessible and was far larger. Note that noise was not a problem in either room as the windows opened up into interior areas. Also, perhaps this was just because it was Winter – but in both rooms the air conditioning system was pretty much inoperative. (It got really warm.)
• Botin restaurant, which is the World’s Oldest Restaurant was great. I would strongly recommend their suckling pig. The skin was amazingly crunchy. We also ate at a chain called Museo de Jamon – which roughly translates to “Museum of Ham”. It’s actually a deli with an restaurant area – so you can watch the action. Fun.
• We had a churro with hot chocolate at Chocolateria San Gines near Puerta del Sol. I think the place opened in 1894. You go, pay 3.50, get a receipt, give the receipt, then get this a small stack of churros and hot chocolate. The hot chocolate is basically molten chocolate – kind of like the goo inside a chocolate lava cake if you’ve ever had one. The churros are very greasy. Together, it’s a great combination:

• I enjoyed the Reina Sofia art museum the most, followed by the Thyssen, and then the Prado. Personally, I felt that the Prado had one too many instances of different takes of “La Sagrada Familia” (The Sacred Family).
• Restaurants at the museums are very, very good. We were quite shocked and surprised.
• The locations of the El Cortes Ingles are surprisingly close together.

Ok, there’s plenty more, but I’ve gotta go back to work and school.

For the last 8 years, I had been using a Eureka that was kind of like a Dyson in that it didn’t use a bag and had a visible dirt compartment that can be emptied out. I thought it was doing a pretty good job based on the stuff I saw it collecting. I vacuum about once a month, so I thought our apartment was pretty clean.

Well, like everyone else, and like all those cliche stories, I was thoroughly surprised when I used the Dyson for the first time and saw how much it collected. What was most significant was the fact that it was sucking up some of the new carpet fuzz that I thought I was done vacuuming up about a year and a half ago. Wowsers!

So why did I pick the DC-17 versus the DC-14? Mostly because it came with a few more attachments, and the price delta wasn’t all that large (especially after the coupon!). Also, I had heard it does a better job of scrubbing carpets.

The things I like the best about the Dyson?

• It empties a lot cleaner than the Eureka I had.
• There are no filters to replace.
• It vacuums a lot better.

I highly recommend it!

The Year in Review

By Dave Barry Sunday, December 28, 2008; W10

In case you haven’t read it already, you should. It truly is the best summary of 2008.

Have a happy new year!

Needy Schools Turn to Parents For Funding – WSJ.com

A survey by California PTA, a statewide group, of about 500 PTA presidents in the state showed that nearly two-thirds of the groups have been asked by schools this year to pitch in more money for basic supplies and programs, from pencils and books to arts programs.

“One of the things we’ve always said to our members is, ‘Your purpose is not to be a cash cow’” to cover regular school expenses, says Jan Harp Domene, president of the National Parent Teacher Association, an umbrella organization. “But we know they are playing a critical part in making sure children still have services that were once part of the budget, from music programs to adequate custodial supplies. These are not frills.”

This is probably one of the biggest surprises I’ve encountered since moving to California – basically all Californian schools are needy. Frankly, I’m quite surprised at how much parents have to donate to schools, even in Cupertino and Palo Alto (some would argue that it is because of the amount that parents donate, that the schools are among the best in the Bay Area [though some get confused and note that they are the best in the nation - which is not quite the case]).

But then again, perhaps I have skewed expectations. Where I come from, 25%-32% of teachers make $100k+. In Great Neck, where I went to school, the median salary is $85k. The NYTimes had an article on this phenomenon in 2005. In Mountain View, it’s possible to make $100k+ ($118,684 to be precise), but just eyeballing the salary guide it seems rather challenging – not to mention this is for teaching high school. This is especially ironic considering the fact that houses apparently run for $382 per square foot in Great Neck, versus $622 in Mountain View. Property tax policies, and the priorities of the citizens are the only explanation for this.

Where I came from in Long Island, the citizens generally supposed the school district budgets and the tax burden was shared equally. On the other hand, Proposition 13 has resulted in oddities like this:

8XX Arroyo Road, Los Altos, CA

2008 Property Tax: $1,586

8YY Arroyo Road, Los Altos, CA (next door to 8xx)

2008 Property Tax: $20,166

In California’s future, I see an ever increasing burden on the cost of public education placed on families who have children. Effectively, California will have three tiers of schools: private schools, public schools which are funded partially like private schools, and very poor public schools in very poor communities. Parents who move to California and have children will be expected to pay for their children’s education – unlike the community based approach in the years before. And that’s just K-12 – a recent interview I heard with the Chancellor of Berkeley pointed out that public funding for the UCs is also at an all time low.

I suspect that won’t help this problem very much:

California is suffering a “brain drain,” they said, losing educated residents to other states. With expensive housing making it difficult to attract and retained skilled workers, the state should not rely on college graduates from other places, they said.

It “is extremely unlikely that the projected need for highly skilled workers will be met mainly through the increased migration of college-educated workers,” wrote researchers Hans Johnson and Deborah Reed. “However, increases in college participation and graduation among California’s residents could help meet these future demands.”

The researchers found that California would need to attract nearly 160,000 college graduates from other states and countries by 2025 to meet economic demands.

One of my colleagues in Redmond once observed about California: “What happened to children being the future?”

I’m not quite sure.

First, some key snippets from “How India Avoided a Crisis”:

Unlike Alan Greenspan, who didn’t believe it was his job to even point out bubbles, much less try to deflate them, Mr. Reddy saw his job as making sure Indian banks did not get too caught up in the bubble mentality. About two years ago, he started sensing that real estate, in particular, had entered bubble territory. One of the first moves he made was to ban the use of bank loans for the purchase of raw land, which was skyrocketing. Only when the developer was about to commence building could the bank get involved — and then only to make construction loans. (Guess who wound up financing the land purchases? United States private equity and hedge funds, of course!)

Then, as securitizations and derivatives gained increasing prominence in the world’s financial system, the Reserve Bank of India sharply curtailed their use in the country. When Mr. Reddy saw American banks setting up off-balance-sheet vehicles to hide debt, he essentially banned them in India. As a result, banks in India wound up holding onto the loans they made to customers. On the one hand, this meant they made fewer loans than their American counterparts because they couldn’t sell off the loans to Wall Street in securitizations. On the other hand, it meant they still had the incentive — as American banks did not — to see those loans paid back.

Seeing inflation on the horizon, Mr. Reddy pushed interest rates up to more than 20 percent, which of course dampened the housing frenzy. He increased risk weightings on commercial buildings and shopping mall construction, doubling the amount of capital banks were required to hold in reserve in case things went awry. He made banks put aside extra capital for every loan they made. In effect, Mr. Reddy was creating liquidity even before there was a global liquidity crisis.

Did India’s bankers stand up to applaud Mr. Reddy as he was making these moves? Of course not. They were naturally furious, just as American bankers would have been if Mr. Greenspan had been more active. Their regulator was holding them back, constraining their growth! Mr. Parekh told me that while he had been saying for some time that Indian real estate was in bubble territory, he was still unhappy with the rules imposed by Mr. Reddy. “We were critical of the central bank,” he said. “We thought these were harsh measures.”

“For a while we were wondering if we were missing out on something,” said Ms. Kochhar of Icici. Banks in the United States seemed to have come up with some magical new formula for making money: make loans that required no down payment and little in the way of verification — and post instant, short-term, profits.

As Luis Miranda, who runs a private equity firm devoted to developing India’s infrastructure, put it: “We kept wondering if they had figured out something that we were too dense to figure out. It looked like they were smart and we were stupid.” Instead, India was the smart one, and we were the stupid ones.

That must’ve been a hard call, but that’s what leaders are supposed to do – make the difficult decisions so as to lead your people in the right direction. You can’t change the world around you without changing yourself first.

And now, some key snippets from “Chinese Savings Helped Inflate American Bubble”:

WASHINGTON — In March 2005, a low-key Princeton economist who had become a Federal Reserve governor coined a novel theory to explain the growing tendency of Americans to borrow from foreigners, particularly the Chinese, to finance their heavy spending.

The problem, he said, was not that Americans spend too much, but that foreigners save too much. The Chinese have piled up so much excess savings that they lend money to the United States at low rates, underwriting American consumption.

…

But American officials eased the pressure. They decided to put more emphasis on urging Chinese consumers to spend more of their savings, which they hoped would eventually bring the two economies into better balance. On a tour of China, John W. Snow, the Treasury secretary at the time, even urged the Chinese to start using credit cards.

This plan does not seem to be working so well.

steve clayton: geek in disguise : Vista: poor man’s NetStumbler
Nice tip from Josh on doing a bit of war driving with Vista. Go to a command prompt, type netsh and then

wlan show networks mode=bssid

I found this helpful in improving the performance of my wireless network.