How hard is it to get a cow to back up? I asked Rufus.
“They’ll do it,” he said. “But they don’t like it.”
The question came up when I was out for my morning walk. One of my neighbors was walking her dog. The dog got into a corner and couldn’t get out. The. Dog. Would. Not. Back. Up.
That’s obviously a problem in search of a modern solution.
Most modern cars have MP3 players, in-dash GPS, and rear view cameras on the option or standard equipment list. I was in a Ford recently. The Ford SYNC system is a “factory-installed, integrated in-vehicle communications and entertainment system that allows users to make hands-free telephone calls, control music and perform other functions with the use of voice commands.” Ford and other third-party developers developed a laundry list of applications and user interfaces that include a pretty slick backup camera. The SYNC (Powered by Microsoft™) in that particular car required rebooting the car every now and then and the radio never did the same thing twice but that’s another story.
The backup camera assists drivers in several ways. It can eliminate blind spots like the one right under your bumper and, if it operates while your car is in drive, you can see more about the cars around you on the freeway which means that airhead who cut you off this morning could have actually looked before changing lanes. It may swivel so you can see to parallel park. And it’s invaluable in big pickups, motor homes, and camping trailers.
I had occasion to back a pickup onto the boat trailer alone the other day. No need to figure out those conflicting hand signals Rufus was giving me. I just swivelled the eye down a little so I could bring the ball right in under the coupler.
If your car doesn’t have one already, you can add it.
Liz Arden is doing that now.
She already has a radio with the big LED display screen and an auxiliary input for a camera, so wiring one from the license plate bracket to the dash is a (relative) breeze.
She bought the camera with the widest viewing angle she could get. It’s high resolution and sharp. She hopes it is weather resistant.
I propose we mount backup cameras on dogs and horses because they obviously don’t like going where they can’t see. Cows are on their own. Further, it should be a government program. After all, Sen. Tom Coburn found that we spent $175,587 to study the connections between cocaine and risky sex habits of quail.
Liz Arden and I were discussing using off-the-shelf widgets in product design. We mostly do that all the time. A conveyor builder, for example, would no more design a proprietary chain or sprocket for the electric motor than build a fiberglass cow to straddle the conveyor belt in a book factory. See, someone else has already invented the 
