As a Bank of America customer who spends a lot of time outside the United States, I have struggled to confirm my transactions due to (a) defects in the Bank of America SafePass card, and (b) being unable to receive a Bank of America SMS on a foreign phone number. This article describes a solution for getting a US mobile number that’s compatible with Bank of America systems, and that can forward SMS messages to a foreign number. Although originally written in 2014, the solution still works today, in 2020.

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Rego 2—a major update to our popular location booking app—has just been approved by Apple and is available for sale or update in the App Store.

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On each of the six Macintosh computers that I manage, I have a number of tools and utilities running which perform regular duties. Carbon Copy Cloner keeps attached bootable backup drives current. Arq keeps cloud backups current. ChronoSync periodically updates some specific archives, etc. etc.

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A decade ago, as an amateur competitive cyclist I became interested in the topic of optimal training methods. Through research and personal experience, I learned that while nearly everyone followed the same general approach to training, specific methodologies within that general approach could have profound impact on results. Today, I’m interested in learning whether parallels might exist in the area of chess training.

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Last Sunday we left Marbella for a week of vacation in Andorra. Our travel plans included a flight to Barcelona, from where we'd pick up a rental car and drive the remaining three hours to Andorra. I've had such a bad experience with car rentals, that I almost expected something would happen, and it did.

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At the beginning of this month, the 2014 Spanish National Kids Chess Championship kicked off at the Best Western hotel in Salobreña, Spain. For five consecutive weeks, children from all over the country in the Sub-10, Sub-12, Sub-14, Sub-16 and Sub-18 age categories gather to compete for the title of national champion in classical and rapid chess. This past week the Sub-12 event took place, with my 11 year-old son Lance participating for first time in this category.

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Yesterday evening, I parked my scooter at the entrance to the Marbella boardwalk in order to meet up with my colleague Alex for dinner. Later that evening, we walked back to the boardwalk entrance and Alex jumped on his scooter and headed home. I did the same, but upon turning the ignition key — nothing. Second try — nothing. Great, just what I needed — a dead battery.

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Using software like Quicken or iBank, I’ve always budgeted, tracked and monitored our family’s expenditures by category. In this area, the internet age has delivered both improvements and setbacks.

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