Because he used to work 70 hours at a stretch -- like many computer programmers I know.

Except for just about all uses of power till home electronic equipment was invented in the 80's. In 1960 just about everything in the home was powered directly by AC (as in incandescent and florescent lights) or by an AC motor very similar to the one invented by Tesla. Only the radio needed a transformer to use AC power. Even today probably 90% of your actual power usage is of direct AC power (air conditioning and lights). So I would say that it is wrong to say Tesla was wrong.

EXCEPT for the AC electric motor and the florescent light bulb -- two of the most common uses of power even today (and certainly before about 1960). In 1960 the refrigerator, the record player, the kitchen mixer and also various household pumps were powered by what was essentially a slightly improved version of Tesla's motor. The incandescent lights were also being run off his power too. Only really the radio needed a coil to convert to DC.

What the article does not note is that Tesla didn't really claim to have invented alternating current, but he did claim (probably validly) to having invented the a working, practical AC induction motor (while a student in Europe), which made AC practical for industry. He also claimed to have invented a practical AC generator (at least he had a patent on it that he sold to Westinghouse). Additionally he did invent and patent a working system for radio and wireless signal transmission that was essentially copied by Marconi later. Add to that the Tesla coil and the working florescent light bulb, and you have a pretty impressive set of inventions. Compared to Edison (who I admire very much also) Tesla with just a couple of assistants revolutionized a great deal of the world. Edison's real claim to fame, on the other hand, was in inventing the modern invention research team system. His actual inventions were relatively few, but with teams of some dozens of inventors he spewed out patents that made him much richer and successful than Tesla (though not as rich as he wanted - he was essentially defeated in business by J.P. Morgan). Tesla unfortunately subsided into partial insanity after his attempt at power transmission in the teens, and almost every invention after that was essentially in his head.

This is not really a theory at this point. It has been demonstrated clearly in the geologic record that the earth's polarity has completely reversed at least hundreds of times (as wikipedia notes, "at an average interval of approximately 250,000 years").