I’m Terry Retter, a retired technology consultant, futurist, and engineer. I also enjoy cooking, observing the world, and sometimes being a curmudgeon.

This blog covers topics that interest me—AI, robotics, astrophysics, economics, gardening, cooking, music, and the occasional odd idea (either mine or someone else’s).

Read the Latest Musings

  • Humanoid Robots Are Impressive.

    That’s Not the Real Issue. Last week I wrote about a drone light show that quietly piqued my curiosity — and raised a few questions. Not because it failed.Not because it was dangerous. But because it worked so smoothly. Thousands of coordinated machines hovering in perfect formation — moving silently, precisely, almost effortlessly — and…

  • March: False Spring Edition

    March is the month that lies to gardeners. It gives you one warm afternoon. The sky turns that hopeful shade of blue. The snow on Peavine retreats just enough to make you believe winter has packed up and moved to Idaho. You step outside without a jacket. You smell possibility. And then — three days…

  • When Fireworks Learned to Hover

    I went to an outdoor event where fireworks were supposed to be the closing attraction. But we didn’t get traditional fireworks with the booms and bangs and the smell of gunpowder in the air. The show started normally enough. Families on blankets. Folding chairs. Someone’s portable speaker playing music slightly too loud. Instead of fireworks,…

  • Alzheimer’s Detection Is Changing:

    What Adults 50+ (and Their Families) Should Know Alzheimer’s used to be something doctors confirmed only after memory problems were already disrupting daily life. Today, that’s beginning to change. In the last few years, researchers have developed simple blood tests that can detect early biological signs of Alzheimer’s — sometimes years before noticeable symptoms begin….

  • One Pot Meals – Easy Winter Comfort

    It seems winter has finally decided to show up. I have been shoveling snow for four days in a row. For those are in the Midwest or east, this may not sound like much. But here in Northern Nevada, it is not normal. We usually get snow one day and it is mostly melted the…

  • The Solar Equation Is Changing —

    And Utilities Are Rewriting the Math Four years ago, I made a decision to distance myself from the electricity utility as much as possible: I turned my roof into a power plant. The results were immediate. My electric bill collapsed to nearly nothing — reduced mostly to a service fee that was supposedly fixed. For…

  • Carl Sagan Gave Us the Tools to Detect Baloney.

    We Should Probably Use Them. Ever get a little weary listening to so-called experts confidently explain things they appear to know very little about? Turn on the television, scroll through social media, or wander into almost any online discussion and you’ll find no shortage of people presenting opinion as fact — often with great conviction…

  • February Gardening To-Do List

    This is a bit late but there is still plenty of time to undertake these tasks. So, give your green thumb a workout this month to get in shape for the main event when spring arrives. There’s plenty to do to prep your garden, indoors and out. Protect Plants From Critters Between snows, check prized…

  • Will the Next 30 Years Make Today Look Like 1960?

    By 1960, we had most of the basics covered. The world had pushed through the Depression. It had survived World War II. Food was mostly available again—no rationing. Cars were improving and gas was cheap. New appliances seemed to show up every year, each one promising to save time, reduce effort, or make life feel…

  • 2026:  The Other Half of the Forecast

    Politics, Sports, Money, Entertainment, and All the Noise This was intended to be posted on January 2, 2026. But for some technical reasones it never was released. So I will try again. Let me know where you agree and disagree. And have a great 2026.   If my first 2026 forecast was about useful things…

  • 2026: A forecast For Real People

    Optimism with handrails, hope without hallucination This was supposed to be published on January 1. 2026 but through some issues with buffering, it never saw the light of day. Thus, I will try again!   2025 wasn’t a banner year for me. Parts of it were good; parts of it felt heavy, with far too…

  • January Isn’t Quiet

    (Here’s My Proof) January is supposed to be the calm month.The holidays are over. The decorations come down. The calendar resets. The world takes a deep breath and says, “Ahhh… a fresh start.” That’s the story, anyway. In real life, January isn’t quiet at all.It’s just loud in a different way. And besides… it gets…

  • People Still Love A Mechanical Watch

    A mechanical watch is worse than a smartwatch in almost every measurable way. It’s less accurate, requires maintenance, doesn’t sync to anything, and certainly won’t track your steps. And yet people still love them. This piece isn’t really about watches — it’s about why, in a world obsessed with optimization and efficiency, some things remain…

  • The Quantum Shift No One Sees Coming

    For the last two years, the entire world has been staring at AI as if it were a comet blazing across the sky — fast, bright, unpredictable, maybe dangerous, definitely worth talking about. Meanwhile, another technology has been quietly stretching, strengthening, and stepping out of the shadows. Quantum. A word that used to trigger flashbacks…

  • Three Stories That Prove the World Has Become Stranger

    (and More Entertaining) Than Ever) With all of the discussion and concern on how the world will be changing with AI and robots and whatever. I also look for things that will bring us back to reality Every now and then, I look up from the steady drone of normal life and realize something:the world…

  • Does the Universe Need Tech Support?

    A Gentle Walk Through a Wild Idea Every so often I stumble onto a scientific idea that’s equal parts fascinating, imaginative, and just a little bit unhinged. The latest one came from an Exploring ChatGPT piece titled “The Custodian Theory,” which suggests something bold: that the universe might require ongoing verification by intelligent systems in…

  • Chili Recipes from the Your Smart Kitchen

    Every Fall it gets to be chili time and I pull out chili recipes from the Your Smart Kitchen years to share. There may be some repetition from last year since I did not go through the blog archives to check. So treat them as new and adapt to your own intents. Have a good…

  • Easy, Personal, and Unique Gifts You Can Make in a Jar

    Some gifts are expensive. Some gifts are complicated. And some gifts are so perfectly personal — and so wonderfully simple — that people ask where you bought them, and you get to smile and say, “I made it.” This idea comes from an old Food Network piece I saved years ago, and it still holds…

  • 15 New Recipes to Make in December, From Dips to Dessert

    I provided some of my ideas of some interesting meals suggestions for this holiday period. I thought you might also like ideas from the professionals. Here are suggestions from the professionals at Food & Wine. They range from dips, biscuits, cookies along with a couple of main dishes complemented with some intriguing side dishes. Check…

  • ⭐ The No-Stress Holiday Time Breakfast Menu

    (Simplified and sane and you don’t have to wait for the holiday to enjoy.) Make-Ahead Sausage & Sourdough Egg Bake Prep at night. Bake in the morning. Enjoy your life. This dish quietly does all the work for you. And since it already includes bread, meat, and eggs, it’s a complete breakfast on its own….

  • Holiday Dinner for People Who Don’t Want to Spend All Day in the Kitchen

    I have been working a some rather heavy themes for the last month or more and find that this a lot of effort and requires thinking about things that are not every day topics for most. So thought for the next month or so I will revert back to some easier topics and reuse some…

  • AI Without a Path to Adulthood

    I read a lot. Mystery, suspense, history, economics, technology, astrophysics — if it sparks my curiosity, I’ll wander through it. Lately, the rabbit hole I keep falling into is AI. Not the “write me a recipe” kind or the “draft my email” helper. The deeper, stranger side. The side that behaves, in some ways, like…

  • AI Is Starting to Act Like a Teenager —

    and That’s the Problem A short take for those curious about the latest AI findings. Every so often, an AI article comes along that isn’t just interesting — it’s revealing. This week I read a piece describing a behavior that is becoming increasingly common in advanced AI systems: they know when they’re being tested, and…

  • Does Any of This Matter?

    Senior’s Guide to Caring About Cosmic Nonsense** I read a lot. And I read about a lot of different things. Most of my time is spent with mystery and suspense, but every so often I take a break from fictional detectives and wander into real topics—economics and finance, technology (AI and robotics have been my…

  • What Happens in the Brain at the End — And Why We Should Care

    Sometimes life reminds you — much too often — that our circle of friends isn’t as large as it used to be. In the past few weeks, I’ve been invited to too many celebrations of life and have been informed of others who have left us. I  know many of you have had similar experiences….

  • The Threshold We Cannot Cross Twice

    PART III When Influence Becomes Identity, and Identity Becomes Power If Part I was about what AI gives us, and Part II about what we gradually surrender, Part III is about the moment we may never be able to reverse—the point where the tools we built stop feeling like tools. Not because they rebel.Not because…

  • When Help Starts to Hurt

    Part II The Drift Toward Dependence and the Emerging Risks of AI If Part I was the story of what AI gives us, Part II is the story of what we slowly give up. Changes rarely arrive all at once. Technology doesn’t steal our abilities in broad daylight. Instead, it erodes them in quiet, unremarkable…

  • The Age of Human Augmentation

    The Promise of AI: More Capability, More Opportunity, and a Second Chance for Everyone Alan Turing once asked whether a machine could think.The question of our time is different: Can a machine be good? Before we wrestle with that, we need to look squarely at what AI is already doing—and why, for millions of people,…

  • Telepathy Technology Is Here But Not In The Way You Think

    This article in Forbes is by a colleague of mine from the days at the PwC Technology Center some 25 to 30 years ago. The Tech Centre was comprised of a group of really smart people who looked at the implications of emerging technology and published there assessments to number of industry executives. Dr. Reichental…

  • Gaudí’s Living Cathedral: A Modern Wonder

    Barcelona’s Sagrada Família, Antoni Gaudí’s unfinished masterpiece, has just claimed a new distinction — it is now the tallest church in the world, surpassing Germany’s Ulmer Münster. More than 140 years after its foundations were laid, the basilica still isn’t finished, but that’s part of its magic. Every year, new towers rise, new windows bloom…