Troubles in Getting My Voice Heard by My MacBook

Reported Incident Severity Level: MINOR

I am using an early version of Intel-based MacBook. It has a built-in microphone and a webcam suitable for video chat. It also has a headphone jack and an audio input port.

At the online course of the university I took last year required a Skype interview as part of its end of the course test. The lecturer recommended to use a headset instead of the built-in mic and speaker while communication over Skype and I purchased one. During the interview, the lecturer told me that the mic of headset didn't seem working so well but we managed to complete it. I have not been used the headset since then. So I forgot about it.

Recently, I found something was wrong when I tried to record my song in DTM software using the mic of the headset. When I looked into the screen the sound level bar responded but once I sit back in the chair and started singing the bar didn't pick up any signal.

I believed the mic input should be switched from built-in one to headset one, but it was not true. After searched around over the net, I learned that my MacBook's audio input port can't supply power to the headset mic. It is a plain line-in audio port. What I had been thinking as the voice through the headset mic was actually the sound picked by the built-in mic.

I have an old small battery powered mixer which has a plug-in power mic port. So I connected it between the mic jack of the headset and the Mac's line-in port. Then I tested. Still the headset mic didn't work. I thought the mixer was broken and purchased a tiny USB headset adaptor.

It was after I connected the headset to the adopter, I noticed the mic switch of the headset had not turned on. I still need the mixer anyway as MacBook doesn't have a plug-in power mic port but I didn't have to buy the USB headset adaptor.

Actual Incident Severity Level: MODERATE
Root Cause: lack of knowledge/insufficient prior check

The First Fire Drill in the New Office Location

Reported Incident Severity Level: MINOR

Yesterday, we had the first fire drill since our department was moved into the current building. I have been the unit fire warden for the department for years. So I had been familiar with the procedures of fire evacuation processes.

But, as it turned out, it was with the previous building, but not with the current one.

Of course, I went though the emergency information kit on the day we moved. However, the familiarity with the same procedures in old situations somehow prevented me from fully understanding those in the new circumstances.

Fortunately, I could pick up what I had missed out through physically moving about and identifying every bits and pieces of the procedures in the first drill. We are now better prepared, I hope. I thought such an on-site practice is vital to shake off the false assumption that everything would be the same as the situations we had been accustomed to but actually already changed in some ways.

Actual Incident Severity Level: SERIOUS
Root Cause: inappropriate application of old experience to new circumstances

Blog Title Changed

Reported Incident Severity Level: SERIOUS

As a job, I am dealing with medical errors by maintaining records of them and reporting to the people concerned. My own personality is quite fit for this job, not because I am a perfect person without errors, but because I have learned in a very hard way that human errors are inevitable - including mine.

After some inactive blogging months, it came to my mind that it would be useful for me, and maybe for some of the people out there, if I record my funny mistakes in the daily life and the lessons learned from them.

That is why now this blog has the new title, description and address with a new format.

Actual Incident Severity Level: MINOR
Root Cause: a change of minds

No nuke Japan - for the moment

Last weekend, the only nuclear reactor that had been operating in Japan was shut down for inspections. For the first time in 42 years, the electricity generated in Japan went nuclear free.

From the fear of the impact on already fragile Japanese economy and the soaring demand in the scorching summer soon coming, quite a few people are crying for immediate reboot of at least some of 50 reactors remaining after the 4 severely damaged ones were finally written off last month.

However, general public in Japan does not seem to be far from convinced. The disastrous accident in Fukushima including the triple melt throughs was the kind of incident they had been announced as once in tens of thousands years, virtually means "the never case."

Who would listen to the same mouthes warning "what if"s of the coming summer possibly without nuclear power? They should have warned the very one, that happened in March 2011.

Ray

Is man really a thinking reed?

I was looking for the topic of my speech at the local Toastmasters club when I came across the TED presentation "The real reason for brains" by Daniel Wolpert.

His argument that the brain is not an organ to think, but one for controlling complicated movements of body was gripping. It was also relevant for my assignment at that speech, effective use of body language.

I constructed my speech around the episode he introduced in the presentation, that the chess computer Deep Blue beat the human grandmaster, Mr Kasparov in 1997, but the computer would be no match for a five-year-old kid in physically moving chess pieces.

In the opening of my own speech, I challenged the audience if man is really a thinking reed. In the end of it, I concluded that man is more like a dancing straw as the brain is a controller of complicated movements. Fortunately, I managed to make it interesting enough and received good feedback.

I included the following question in my speech, "Is it actually easier said than done, if a brain is not to think but to control complicated actions?" I mean by "said", all the details required to reproduce the exact actions involved are explicitly expressed.

I found that it is rather easier done than said, as I am writing about what I had done in my speech ;-)

Ray

New Year's Resolution

A bit late to say happy new year, but this is my first post for 2012. So I would like to share my new year's resolution here.

Last year's one was "Make time work for me." It worked to some extent as I started many things which might work for me in the future. Some of them are now getting traction.

However, the catastrophic earthquake in Japan on 11th March and the following nuclear disaster remind me of the Buddhism doctrine that nothing in the world is under complete control of a human, the cause of every pain in human life.

So, I have chosen "Benefit from the unexpected" for this year's resolution. Contrary to what it may sound, it actually means "leave nothing to chance." To benefit from the unexpected, you need to be ready for them even though you don't know what they will exactly be. In other words, "Preparedness with Flexibility" is my policy for 2012.

Ray

Sheer competitions behind "invented" traditions in Japan

Last evening, my family enjoyed one of "traditional" Christmas foods in Japan, Kentucky Fried Chickens (KFC).

We never did so, however, while we were living in Japan. You can search YouTube to learn how spectacular it can be there. You would need to reserve a Christmas bucket weeks before and line up in long queue to be served even if you present yourself at specified date and time.

Here in Auckland, New Zealand, it is quite easy. No booking, no queues. You can just pop in a shop and order as usual. Even faster than ordinary time, you can get a family meal from friendly staff in Christmas T-shirt. Unfortunately no Christmas wrappings are available, though.

It is interesting if you take it into account that KFC is one of few restaurant chains operates as usual all the way through Christmas time in New Zealand. Most shops in Japan operate on normal hours around Christmas as it is not a holiday there. All the fuss about KFC in Japan is not the result of absence of competition.

In the opposite, it is actually the result of sheer competition among businesses. KFC in Christmas is just an example of such "invented" traditions. Some have become truly traditions with about 200 years of history. Japanese have a custom to eat eels on the mid summer day called 'Doyo no Ushi no Hi" which is specified each year by an oriental calendar. It is said to be originally promoted by a Japanese inventor, Hiraga Gennai.

Others are more recent, Giving chocolate from female to male in St Valentine Day, Eating long sushi rolls without a word towards a certain direction on the day before Chinese New Year Day and so on.

You may see an evil of commercialism here, but I think, it comes from, at least in part, the desire of general public in Japan to be entertained. They are always seeking new excitements and inspirations. If you are doing a business with Japanese it may be you who creates the next Japanese tradition.

Thank you for reading my blog this year. I wish you all a happy new year.

Ray