My father keeps his radio tuned to an oldies radio station with a really short playlist. In my limited listening (maybe two hours the entire trip, probably closer to half that), I head three songs twice* and this one three times. Dad and I were both familiar with the song**, though neither of us knew who sang it. I looked it up on my phone (Dad was driving) and saw it was Tanya Tucker. I’ve heard of Tucker, of course, but didn’t know much of anything about her. So I went to YouTube to see if there were any videos and was surprised by what she looked like. Then I saw that she was 14 when the video was recorded. So, less weird. You don’t expect the gap in the teeth, though.

* – “King of the Road”, “Seven Year Ache”, and “Ruby (Don’t Take Your Love To Town)” being the other three.

** – It’s covered quite a bit. It has that catchy refrain that’s a favorite of artists that like to switch songs in between the second and third verse of whatever their song is, or include at the end of a show where they are switching songs constantly.

As many of you know, Netflix is raising its rates:

Whereas subscribers could formerly stream an unlimited amount of content and have one DVD out at a time for $9.99 per month, the cost would now be $15.98 per month. Each option would be charged at a rate of $7.99 individually.

If subscribers wish to have a second DVD out simultaneously, the rate increases to $11.99 per month, or $19.98 when combined with streaming. Current members would see the increase beginning on September 1 unless they take action, while new members would pay the increased price immediately.

Their explanation is eminently reasonable. Indeed, I am seeing a lot of people on Twitter and the like defending Netflix to the hilt on this. “It’s still a great deal!”

And it is a great deal. And Netflix is not being unreasonable here. And I still question whether or not this is a good move. Why? Because the customers this is most likely to turn off are the high-margin ones. The people for whom this is a great deal are the ones most likely to utilize the service the most and cut into the profits. In the past, Netflix has been known to throttle heavy users on this basis. This was particularly true when it came to DVDs, where each disc transaction cost a lot. But it’s also true, to an extent, to streaming.

My father is on Netflix’s cheapest plan. He watches maybe one or two movies a month on disc, tops (some months he watches none). Then, maybe, a handful online. He is costing Netflix very, very little. And he is precisely the type of customer that this is going to turn off. My father is not a dramatic man. He may pay the piper, but it’s more likely that he will go without the discs or without service altogether. This, I’m pretty sure, will pass the “trivial expense” threshold where he has to start asking how much he’s using this service. This is precisely what Netflix does not want him asking. And the argument that “it’s cheaper than cable” holds no sway, because sports are on cable. And trying to explain Hulu+Netflix to Mom is not worth the effort.

So while Netflix remains a great deal for people that love entertainment (but not sports), and are computer-savvy (but don’t use BitTorrent), there are a lot of people that this does not describe. I doubt that it’s the case that 41% of customers are really going to drop Netflix, but it will be a non-trivial number. And some of their least expensive customers, at that.

On a humorous note, Blockbuster is reaching out to Netflix customers. Dissatisfied with Netflix’s prices? We’ll match them! Except we won’t offer streaming if you ever want to try it again, and if you ever cancel membership for a month, you’ll be back to our more expensive pricing.

The only non-school related aspect to this post: Most of the places I’ve lived, the fridge door is weighted to close with only moderate pressure. I’m not used to having to close the fridge door all the way. Just give it a shove and it closes itself. My parents’ fridge isn’t that way at all. I’m not sure why. It’s been a struggle to remember to close it.

I drove by my old middle and high school the other day. The high school apparently built a free-standing basketball gymnasium. I wonder if the old one is still there. Probably. It makes me angry, though not for the waste or anything like that. Rather, they took away what was already very limited parking to build that thing. Grumble. Understandable in its own way. Despite being in the football-mad south, I went to a “basketball school.” We cycled through football coaches all the time because they would come in expecting to be a Big Deal only to find that they were the #2 behind our legendary basketball coach (who the new gym, as well as the street in front of the school, is named for). The high school’s current coach is the son of a Division I basketball coach who made The Tourney last year.

Back when I was in middle school, I would occasionally miss the bus. The intermediate school forced you out within a half-hour of the bell and Mom wouldn’t come and pick me up until Jeopardy was over. So I’d have to go to the library, which I remember as being a long walk. It’s like right next door. Long walk? No wonder I was so fat.

A part of me would like to go inside and tour the facilities of both schools. And my elementary school, now that I think about it. But security and all that prevents anyone who is not a parent or a student from so much as using the parking lot to turn around. When I was in high school, I wanted to go to West Oak Elementary’s Open House in order to see the school again. But they wouldn’t let anyone who wasn’t a parent in. What the hell? Are they worried that I would kidnap and sexually abuse a parent? I find John Walsh’s America to be extremely aggravating.

Though it requires illegal parking (in an empty lot), I stop by the Southern Tech University campus just about every time I come to town. At least there I’m not a threat to anybody. I also stop by the book store to see if there’s anything new that I want. The jerseys were on sale for every size except mine.

Southern Tech’s expansion is pretty impressive. They almost have a livable area where you don’t have to drive through Scarytown in every direction to go somewhere to eat or hang out.

They’ve redistricted the schools, so my elementary school and my high school aren’t mine anymore. Or rather wouldn’t be my children’s if I moved into town. The elementary school is an upgrade, though the high school isn’t (from five stars to four). Really, though, most of my friends who went to Mayne High were miserable. Most of those who went to Southfield were content. The new Eastfield school (which is somehow west of Westfield – a story for another day) is more like Southfield. Wealthy enough to avoid being unpleasant, but not so wealthy as to be aggravating.

Aggravating, it would seem, is my word for the day. I’ve also been fighting off a headache.

China’s high speed rail is hitting some road bumps. I don’t have an ideological problem with high speed rail, but the more I thought about it during this discussion, the more it seemed to me that there is little that rail can do that something else can’t do better, as far as the US is concerned. And high speed rail does not just have to be better than air/bus/car, it has to be sufficiently better to rework our infrastructure.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission screwed up and it forced an innocent company out of business. That’s unfortunate, but it’s actually heartening to see the CPSC take some responsibility rather than whine about how they just want to protect us and all. There are things to be balanced here, and there seems to be some acknowledgement of that.

Adventures in what we still don’t know about successful dieting: Pretty much everything will make you overeat.

Introducing, the Playboy Prison. They can do whatever they want but leave. Maybe they’ll find democracy like Australia. Honestly, as long as they’re out of society’s hair, I don’t really care all that much. Within reason.

This can’t surprise any dog owner, but it’s always helpful to be reminded.

The welfare effects of channel bundling {PDF!} in cable.

Freakonomics: Does Privatizing Retail Alcohol Sales Increase or Decrease Consumption?

When I saw the title “Exposing India’s Blood Farmers“, I was thinking it was like blood diamonds. Meant figuratively. Well, it’s not agriculture, but it’s blood.

Medical school decreases empathy.

I was extended, and have accepted, an invitation to join Burt Likko, aka Transplanted Lawyer, at Not a Potted Plant. NaPP is a more pointedly political blog, so there will be some more directly political stuff there than here. It shouldn’t be affecting Hit Coffee too much. There will be a little cross-posting. I plan to recycle and refresh some of my posts here for over there. But mostly, my wonky thoughts there, and other commentary here.

On a sidenote, the commenting rules that apply here do not apply there. We do fall under The League’s Civility Code, however. And, I should add, the commentariat over there is not going to be more hostile to certain points of view involving immigration and multiculturalism as you might find elsewhere in our blogging region.

Well, it’s not in English, but it’s not all that hard to understand.

The always-great Chuck Klosterman writes about time-shifting and sports events. I tried to timeshift some of the Southern Tech football and basketball games I watched last year. It’s nice to be able to skip through the commercials. But it means that I can’t find out the scores on any other games, lest I find out how the Pack is doing.

The notion that modern medicine has failed us in the areas of heart disease and cancer is wrong. Well, at least on heart disease. But even on cancer, we’re improving a little. That might say something about how everything might not be giving us cancer after all.

Nothing garners appreciation of Windows like using something else (that isn’t Apple, anyway). I’ve more or less stopped my annual experiments with Linux. Windows does what I need it to do. OSX and Linux do not. At least not easily. I still don’t see the appeal of Chrome.

In the past we have discussed interracial dating as it pertains to black women and white men. Basically, asking if the rarity of these matches are due to the preferences of white men or black women. This article looks at interracial dating on the Internet and spits out all kinds of statistics except that. It does imply that black women are more likely to reach out than whites are, and also that men reach out more than women. But it doesn’t compare the two. {comment with care}

Life expectancy by county, sex, and race (US), 1987-2007

Somehow, Utah is not on the ten scariest states to be an atheist. I guess it’s because Utah is the only place in America where the atheists have fundamentalists to make common cause with.

Why the Blackberry is screwed. It wasn’t that long ago that I scoffed at the notion. It’s amazing how the top of the heap were Nokia/Symbian, Blackberry, and Windows Mobile. Now all are headed towards irrelevancy (and two of those three had to join forces just to stick around).

I’ve mentioned it before, but somehow I never came across this website about Pensacola Christian College, the school that makes BYU look like LSU.

Definitions: Values, Directions, & Optimums.

I thought I had figured it out perfectly. When Mom asked what I would like for dinner, I would say “beef enchiladas.” I like her beef enchiladas, but not as much as I like her chicken enchiladas. The problem is that when I ask for the chicken enchiladas, I can’t then get the King Ranch Casserole. They both have torn chicken, you see. But the beef enchiladas have beef. So no problem! Until we get to what’s for dinner the next night.

Mom: What would you like for dinner tomorrow night?

Trumwill: How about King Ranch Casserole?

Mom: Can’t.

Trumwill: Why not?

Mom: Can’t have Mexican two nights in a row.

Trumwill: King Ranch Casserole isn’t Mexican. King and Ranch are English words. Casserole is… I don’t now, English or French, but not Mexican.

Mom: Corn tortillas.

Trumwill: Okay, fine. What about lasagne?

Mom: Ground beef. You had that tonight.

Trumwill: Well yes, but… we’re going from Mexican to Italian.

Mom: Ground beef. What about meat loaf?

Trumwill: I do like your meat loaf, but I’m not sure I want to use it for one of my few meals while I’m here. What if we went to Oysterland?

Mom: Can’t.

Trumwill: Why not? Oysters aren’t ground beef. No corn tortillas.

Mom: We always get one dish of regular and one of picante, right?

Trumwill: Yes?

Mom: That’s Mexican two nights in a row. Picante is definitely a Mexican word.

Trumwill: What if we just got the regular? I can live without the picante.

Mom: Would you want the regular or would you want the picante?

Trumwill: Well I like both, but…

Mom: I can’t take you to Oysterland and not let you order what you would want to order.

Trumwill: Then we’ll get the usual!

Mom: Can’t. Mexican two nights in a row. Can’t do that.

Trumwill: So it’s meat loaf?

Mom: Unless you can give me something you want that you haven’t just already eaten.

Trumwill: What would you do if I listened to a Meat Loaf record?

Mom: Have you?

Trumwill: No, but I will.

Mom: I think you can listen to and then eat meat loaf.

Trumwill: But I can’t eat enchiladas and then oysters.

Mom: Can’t. Mexican.

Trumwill: Damn.

{The sad thing is, if I’d just gotten the chicken enchiladas I wanted, I would have been able to get the oysters or the lasagne.}

Zoey {Lapsed Catholic}: What are you, Will?

Trumwill {Episcopalian}: Episcopalian.

Zoey: Oh! Catholic but with gay priests!

Hiram {Catholic}: No, no, Catholic with openly gay priests. We have our fair share…

Zoey: True.

Hiram: And with Jim McGreevey.

Trumwill: Not a priest!

Hiram Jr. {Catholic?}: Yet!

Trumwill: No, he was denied! Even we have our standards.

Hiram: Anyway, so Catholicism with divorce, openly gay preachers, and a disregard for tradition.

Trumwill: Tradition tempered by reason. We like to say that God gave us the ability to reason for a reason.

Betsy {Baptist}: So you can ignore what the Bible actually says?

Trumwill: Scripture also tempered by reason.

Hiram: You’re a very tempered bunch.

Trumwill: It’s our trademark.

India’s testing regime. From an American perspective, it’s all quite familiar. {comment carefully on this one, please.}

Former GM vice chairman of product development Bob Lutz writes an article about how GM lost its edge because it focused so much on the bottom line that they didn’t concern themselves with satisfaction. The talk of metrics is interesting. But he overlooks a key component: they aren’t a good deal! It’s one thing to be cheap and unpleasant. But they’re unpleasant and unreliable without a significant price break.

Meanwhile, Ford rapidly losing its improved reputation, and Mickey Kaus is wondering if their recent untick in quality and reliability ought to instead be attributed to recently-spun-off Mazda.

The UAW is having trouble getting the Hyundai workers in the south to organize. On the one hand, why should they organize and potentially wreck such a good deal. On the other hand, it’s helpful to have the threat of unionization in order to keep the automakers on their feet.

And lastly, a look at Chinese cars.

One of the few weapons that the record industry has against piracy is by making legitimate ownership of the product more convenient. Make piracy redundant. I still think that the best way of going about it is through subscriptions and rentals, but iTunes Match gives it a go. I have a lot of issues with Apple, but their handling of copyright issues and art has helped even us non-Applytes out considerably.

Resolved. We need to just get over the criminal Ferris Bueller.

Bakadesuyo: Should we study to take tests or should we take tests to study?

The safety of food.