The word “times” is not used all that often anymore. It’s one of those words that really sounds strange, the more you say it to yourself…times, times, times. We use it to denote multiplication, like the times table or 2 times 4 equals 8. There’s that old phrase, “Keeping up with the times.” Way back, I think it had a more “timely” connotation, like being modern and up-to-date. We still see great newspapers that imply being current, like the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, etc. Locally, there’s still the Times Supermarket; which I guess, meant that it was a modern supermarket, part of a new trend replacing the old Mom and Pop grocery stores. As a kid, playing “Chase Master”, we’d yell out “times!” when we were tired or winded, to indicate a time-out. But, as usual, I digress – since I actually wanted to discuss the changing times and how I have come to realize that I’m getting older and seem to be a bit behind the times. Time is a personal thing, time is a relative thing. It means different things to people at different times in their lives. When we talk about it, we all [...]

When I was a kid growing up in Pearl City, folks used to say that PC had some of the best drinking water, straight from the tap. I don’t know if that’s true, but my usual way of slaking thirst was to go up to the faucet, cup my hand, and drink my fill of cool water, standing at the kitchen sink. Guess what? I never do that anymore. That was years before we worried about “stuff” in the tap water, decades before the advent of drinking from water bottles or having a high-tech filter affixed right onto the faucet. Nowadays, I fill my glass with chilled water straight from – my refrigerator dispenser (I change the filter cartridge every 6 months). My, how things have changed over the years, even the simple act of drinking water. Ironically, nowadays, beer drinkers would rather have their brew come straight from the “tap” versus from a bottle, haha. In a smooth segueway from slaking a parched, dry throat to quenching a thirsty karate mind, I now shift to the striking image of having a nice sip of water from…the fire hydrant! );0…I’m talking about the incredibly large body of “stuff” there is [...]

Way back in 1977, I was a brand new sales representative trainee for IBM Corp (International Business Machines), synonymous with computers and selectric typewriters. Back then, we also made a line of copiers, including our top of the line, the high-speed Series III Copier. One of the first tasks I was ever assigned as a trainee was to “babysit” a problematic Series III that we had recently installed at the local headquarters of a large international airline. My job was to sit near the machine and ensure that any problems or questions that arose were quickly addressed. In addition, it was a nice marketing technique and show of customer support to actually dedicate one of IBM’s representatives (yes, I wore a suit back then) to ensure client satisfaction. Actually, the copier worked with few jams or problems that day, but due to its speed and newness, much of the time, there would be a line of curious users who wanted to try out the new technology. For me, the most impressive event of a rather boring day was watching a tall, well dressed blond gentleman deftly and subtly work his way from the back of the line (some 7 or [...]