We have a local Super Target store very close to where we live and because of the convenience I visit the store probably two or three times in a week. It’s commonplace for me to receive a message on my iPhone from my wife, by the time I’ve left the office and begun my trip home, to pickup milk, butter, soda pop, that sort of thing, on the way home. Since I have to drive past the store to get home, and since they always have good prices and selection, I shop there.

To be perfectly clear, I really like Target stores. They are attractive, have good products, competitive prices and often carry exactly what I’m seeking.

Thursday evening this week I had an interesting experience at my local Super Target store. In case you do not know, a Super Target is a regular Target department store with a groceries section added on. The groceries section is about a third the size of the overall store and always appears to be busy with customers. As described above, I got a request to stop in and pick up butter and some soda pop for the family on the way home Thursday. I remembered I needed cereal and mentally added that to the list of what I was going to purchase. When I purchase soda pop for the family I usually get 3 or more cartons at a time, especially if they are on sale, so I grabbed a shopping cart when entering the store. Since I go to this particular store quite frequently I knew exactly which aisles and locations to head towards to pick up the needed items.

Quite impulsively, after picking up the groceries, I decided it might be nice to purchase a new dress shirt. So I pushed the cart over to the other end of the store, towards the back, where the Men’s Clothing section can be found. And I picked up a few shirts, looked them over, put them back on the racks or hangers. After browsing shirts for around 10 minutes I decided there really was not anything that particularly interested me, and decided to abandon the idea of purchasing a new men’s shirt. In the past I’d only ever purchased socks, underwear, and that sort of thing; I had yet to purchase an actual shirt at Target.

When I arrived back at the front of the store with my shopping cart I could see that since I was shopping at a time when most people were likely home preparing or having dinner, the store was not very busy. There were a few open cashier checkout lines available to choose from and I grabbed the nearest one.

In the past I’ve written about the checkout process at Target and how they do a very good job at selective marketing with on-demand coupons during the checkout. So after I loaded the few groceries on the conveyor belt and swiped my debit card across the electronic reader (and at that point identifying myself to the computers belonging to the store), sure enough some coupons immediately printed out.

And one of them was a 15% off coupon on Men’s Shirts.

The coincidence really surprised me.

Okay, what the heck was that all about? I figure there are several possible explanations and it made for entertaining discussion amongst my friends as we thought about what may have happened. Here are the possibilities, no matter how creepy they may seem.

1. Just a coincidence? This would be the simplest.
2. My purchasing habits are really predictable by some clever shopping algorithm that Target has developed?
3. It’s the season when people in my demographics evidently think about buying a shirt?
4. Subliminal messages inside the store triggered an interest in buying a new shirt?
5. Some well-meaning employee watching security cameras watched me browsing and decided to send me a coupon when they saw which checkout line I picked?
6. Facial recognition software monitoring the security cameras (not too far-fetched since that’s how shoplifters get “black-listed” in some department stores) had advanced software that noticed I was shopping in the Men’s Clothing department and triggered the automatic on-demand coupon when it detected my face in a checkout line?

Stop me before I get too carried away with this…

I’m good with targeted marketing in practice. It is much better to get coupons or notices of sales for items you regularly buy. The Target stores do a pretty good job at this. Invariably, when I buy groceries at my friendly local Super Target store, during the checkout process, their computer system prints out coupons just for me to be used next time shopping. Targeted marketing done right. They track me by the credit/debit card I use and on-the-spot create coupons for things I have either just purchased or have purchased in the past. As a Systems Architect, I admire how the design is working and respect it.

There is a clever little marketing game I’ve noticed however. This has to do with those smaller 14 Oz. containers of ice cream made by Häagen-Dazs and others. It’s great ice cream and I quite enjoy the quality and the size of the container. It’s not meant to be a “single serving” container. But it often is.

Now here’s the pattern, no, conspiracy I’ve picked up on. Months ago I purchased one container of
Häagen-Dazs ice cream. Just one. During the checkout Target prints out a little coupon for me to use on a future shopping trip. I’m sure I’ve forgotten the exact coupon discount, but it said something like “Buy two Häagen-Dazs next time and get $1.00 off”.

The next time I go shopping I remember the coupon and purchase two. Targeted marketing worked. And when I got to the checkout a new coupon prints out. It says something like “Buy three and get $1.00 off”. I probably have the amount remembered incorrectly, but I’m certain the count on the coupon was three.

You can see where this is heading. Sure enough, next time I buy three little cups, remembering the coupon, and at checkout time I get an automated coupon printed out that says something like “Buy four and get $1.50 off”.

Next trip I buy four, using my coupon, and I’m not kidding, I get a coupon that says “Buy five for $2.00 off”.

They’re on to me.

So I wait a while. I didn’t buy five. It takes a while to consume four! A few weeks pass and I decide to do a little experiment. I buy just one.

At checkout I get a coupon that says “Buy two and get $1.00 off”. They got me figured out. It’s an ice cream conspiracy between Häagen-Dazs and Target.

The apple notebook computer I use for developing iOS software had some kind of graphics and network failure a few days ago. I was just in the process of installing the latest iOS SDK beta when the display changed to a repeating pattern of tiny splats of color. And for some reason the network capability, at least the wireless 802.11n, also failed. The system thinks there is no more wireless hardware installed. Very strange.

I shouldn’t complain much. The computer was one of the first Intel MacBook Pro models and is about 6 years old. There’s consistently been an issue where the computer ran unreasonably hot and I guess that is what eventually led to failure. The hard drive in the computer was upgraded to a 750GB capacity internal drive about 18 months ago and I will obviously want to extract the drive and install it in an external enclosure. But I’ve tried a number of troubleshooting techniques and diagnostic runs and it appears to be a pretty messy problem to resolve. It also appears to be a real hardware problem, not software.

I’ve looked, using my trusty iPad, at used models and it looks like the least expensive resolution is to purchase an identical 6-year old model for between $350 and $600. It may also be possible to get it repaired and I need to write to one of those Mac repair sites for an estimate.

It’s weird. When your “daily driver” computer fails, it can be really disruptive in your life. I never realized how much the use of the computer, especially programming activities, are part of my regular day. The only thing that has kept this issue from being a high priority for me right now, I think, is that that I’m currently on vacation from work and enjoying playing board games with my friends and family for quite a bit these past few days.

My usual routine of getting up early and coding some iOS software before everyone else gets up has been disrupted. I seem to get this unbalanced feeling for most of the morning these past few days and I think it is my mind being confused about not doing any coding in the morning.

Oh well. I do seem to have more time for reading and writing Blog posts right now.

I saw the new science fiction film from Ridley Scott, Prometheus this week.

From when I first heard about it and after watching every trailer and reading every interview I could find about the film, I was pretty excited to go see it. My expectations were pretty high. I knew Ridley Scott would do a great science fiction film, the Alien movie series is still one of my favorites, and when I heard Damon Lindeloff was writing for the movie, those were all very positive signs for me.

Let me just get this said. I really liked the movie.

Now, I also admit that there were high points and low points. The way the movie began was a very interesting story line and I thought quite creative and full of mystery and questions. A great start for the film. There were numerous places in the movie when I found myself wondering where they were going with the story. There were also a few places where it felt very formulaic — as if the studio paying the bills pushed to have certain parts thrown in. And there were a few spots in the film where I thought, “What the hell?”

A few days after seeing the film I wanted more. More story. More movie. More answers and I had even more questions. Thinking back over the film I realize now I want to see it again. I was originally a little disappointed when leaving the theater. But now with reflection I began to realize that I really dig what Ridley and Damon are doing with this idea. The movie has an interesting story to tell which hopefully will lead to more sequels. The one thing I will say is that it was not a scary movie, the way Alien was. And I expected that. But it’s real science fiction with some of that “suspension of disbelief”.

Today, someone sent me a note that made me laugh out loud.

About 12 years ago, when I was a technical manager in a fairly large software development shop, I became pretty close friends with a number of other managers there. We still keep in touch. Well today, one of my former co-worker wrote to me that he was just talking about me. Here is what he wrote…

I was just talking about you yesterday! Had a VP yelling at me and was replying back with clear, logical answers. I learned that from watching you

Yea. I remember those days. Evidently I had gained a reputation of staying pretty cool in the storm.

And what’s the deal with managers yelling at their fellow employees? I have little respect for that kind of behavior. Surely there are more creative ways to motivate or express frustration. I can remember raising my voice to emphasize a point a few times when I was a manager. But it was a rare event. And the team members knew it. Yelling at co-workers was never an option.

Melissa ended up in the Emergency Room yesterday. I took this picture of her while she was in the recovery room.

After tests and an MRI they let us leave, about 7 hours later. Rough times for my sweetie lately.

Had to have a medical procedure done today. Here’s how I look today

We celebrated our 14th-year Wedding Anniversary having dinner at our favorite steak house on Valentine’s Day. And of course we had to pull out Carcassonne (the travel edition, because it has slightly smaller tiles) and played a game right there while eating our meal.

I lost, of course. But it doesn’t matter. We had a lot of fun and it was quite a memorable meal too.

At least 2 of the restaurant staff stopped over to ask questions about this interesting game we were playing.

It was also nice to get out. Melissa hasn’t been well for quite a while now and this was our first time out together for months. A good time and celebration indeed.

Melissa has an app installed on her iPhone that, after taking your portrait, uses aging algorithms to predict how you will look when you are much older.

Here’s my result.

I kinda like it. Though I think I’ll have a lot less hair.

Someone wiser than me once said “People decide how you must feel about something by what you do, not what you say.”

This evening I was reflecting over a workshop I once participated in on work-place behaviors. It was one of those workshops where you wondered why someone actually has to tell you some of this stuff. As is often the case, personal behaviors and styles are the key in any relationship — personal ones and work-place ones. So we included personal topics.

We were asked the question “How does your husband or wife know you love them?”

The usual responses where people talked about remembering flowers on a birthday or chocolates on some other occasion were mentioned. I never much cared for these typical answers.

I raised my hand and said, “I make sure there’s fresh fruit in the refrigerator.”