Today, I spent 12 hours at a Los Angeles FLL Robots competition.    My wife coached a group of “Bad News Bears” and they managed to win a couple of trophies.   She won a trophy for “Rookie Coach of the Year”.     I won nothing but I built up my muscles and I carried around heavy robots and followed logistical orders.  What happened to just playing Atari pong all day?

I spent much of last week in Honolulu.  I had never been there before  and I just naively assumed that it would be like San Francisco but sunnier.   To my surprise, it is only a tourist town.  While my hotel was located in the city center 2 blocks from the beach, I couldn’t find any office towers. Nobody appears to be working except to help tourists have fun.  I had assumed that Hawaii’s location would make it an epicenter of Asia-U.S trade and interaction but perhaps information technology has chipped away at the need for a physical location that solves a logistical issue.   I did learn at least one important lesson. One can overeat at an “all you can eat” buffet.