The Friday Compost - all the news that's fit to rot

Let it rot. That's our motto. We even rot some of the newspapers that we peel our root veggies onto. The newspaper may not be organic, but in the overall scheme of things, they probably add less to soil contamination than the fallout of the car exhausts from the 900,000 people living in my county.

This morning's Friday Compost before turning it over

Composting is very simple. I've done this for years. You only need four things - nitrogen, carbon, water, and heat. Nature will do the rest. Nitrogen is basically anything green, and comes from the various vegetable scraps we accumulate during food preparation, the few times I catch our grass clippings, and from the occasional refrigerator reject. Carbon is brown - or dead, like yesterday's news - and is primarily tree branches, leaves, or any other items that aren't green. Water is crucial to the rotting process. Keeping your compost wet will keep it rotting. Keeping the compost hot will help it rot faster.

There are several ways to generate heat. One time I dumped our fireplace ash into the compost, and didn't realize it had hot embers in it. The ensuing smoke and fire was exciting, but NOT the way to generate heat. A good way to generate heat is to dump some of your grass clippings on top, but you are better off leaving the clippings on the lawn. Last year we purchased a plastic composting bin with a lid, and this black container generates heat from the solar gain of being exposed to the sun. After years of open composting, I am sold on the value of a good plastic bin with a lid.

We keep a small container on our counter, and when we prepare food, we toss the scraps in it. Every morning before work, I empty the container into the compost bin. I do this year-round. I have yet to run out of space, and we eat lots of vegetables and fruit. We also add egg shells, coffee grinds, tea leaves, and of course, the fireplace ash. After I confirm there are no hot embers remaining.

There seems to be a common myth that compost smells bad. Trust me, it doesn't smell bad. Through a new Google feature called "Rub and Sniff", if you rub your monitor where the compost picture is (below), and then smell your finger, you will experience what compost smells like from 3 feet away. Then wipe the finger smudge from your monitor. Placing the compost by your property boundary closest to your least desirable neighbor is a waste of effort. Place it close enough to make it convenient to use, and far enough away to not trip over it.

Friday Compost turned over

There are a few things you must do to keep your compost healthy. You must turn it a few times a week. I use a spading fork for this. You must also ensure that the contents of your compost bin is making contact with the ground. This allows for worms, and beneficial bacteria to migrate into the pile and speed the composting process. I use the handle from a broken garden tool to open gaps in the muck, and this lets the compost fall to the bottom after I remove compost from the access door at the bottom. I have taken about 5 shovels of great compost from the pile so far this year, and this is what was produced over the winter. I expect to get loads more as the weather warms and I start to turn the gardens.

Some items are not for the compost bin - meat, including chicken should never be added. Fish scraps are great, but be sure to bury it in the center of the bin to avoid any odors. Don't add any dairy, fats, or plastic.

Our town used to pick up garbage twice a week. Due to cost increases, they have cut back on pickups to once a week. Due to the type of items that end up in the garbage, our trash can doesn't smell, and the volume of garbage we generate is so low that a once a week pickup is just fine for us. Think of how much less would go to the landfill if everyone ate local, organic foods, and composted the scraps. This would also keep the farmers near us in business. The volume of compost we generate isn't huge, but there is great satisfaction in seeing our waste turned into an organic and clean soil amendment and fertilizer.

So give it a try! You will get addicted to it. Most counties sell discounted composting bins, so before purchasing one at a store, check with your local and county government. If you are already composting, did I miss anything? Is it working for you?

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Life lessons from an Erector Set - knowing when to start over

I remember playing with Lincoln Logs, Erector Sets, and Legos as a kid. There was a lot to be learned from these activities. Never mind the little lessons - the pieces never fit back in the box, some pieces will be found under the couch in a month or two, or you can really hurt yourself getting poked with a thin piece of metal. Those are the easy lessons.

One of the best lessons I learned, is that many times, regardless of how well I thought out the foundation, I would get to the point where adding more pieces made no sense. Adding pieces would make the pending failure even larger. When I got to this point, I would pull the product apart, put it back in a pile, and start from scratch. I'd apply the lessons I learned in my first attempt to my next iteration.

Other times, I would try to reinvent what I was building into something different. "I started with a house... where did that pointy side come from? Oh, who cares, I'll turn it into a boat. A big ugly boat. At least it won't feel like I wasted my time...".

Frequently we allow ourselves to become too deeply involved in what we are building, and as a result we are unable to see that we can't achieve our original objective using what we presently have. We can't continue to try and add on, tweak, or modify it, because all of this will just add to the costs when we fail, and be that much harder to start over. In fact it seems like the larger the scale, the harder it is to see how bad things are, and we continue to apply effort thinking that if we just do a little more, all will be well. If we stay the course, it will all work out.

I started to think of what I learned from an Erector Set as I looked at the challenges in our public school system, entitlement programs, bloated government bureaucracies, sickening levels of deficit spending, and ballooning national debt. The investment may be in emotion, time, money, effort, paycheck, fat union benefits, or voting block payoffs. This crosses party lines, and impacts the taxpayers the same.

Many of our government agencies have morphed into something different from what they were envisioned to provide, and have grown at a rate much faster than the general population has increased. They often do this as a self preservation tactic, to show value where maybe they would have a hard time measuring against their original mission. Our government is full of these. I won't mention any specific examples, since I am not writing this to be partisan.

When is it time to pull it apart and start over? How can we convince the people who are invested so heavily in their own large-scale, real-life Erector Set failures that it's time to start building from scratch? I don't have the answer, I was hoping you did.

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Bike commuting - all you need is a bike!

I'm back to my bike commute now that the snow has melted, and am loving it. I was thinking about how much has changed since I started what was an occasional bike commute several years ago. My commute from Pomona, NY to Woodcliff Lake, NJ had some scary stretches, and I'd stop riding once the school buses took to the roads. Since our move to Oradell, NJ, I have been bike commuting much more frequently. The ride is primarily suburban, with a few small downtowns to keep it interesting.

When I first started my 24 mile round-trip bike commute from Pomona, I rode my Trek 4300 "hard tail" mountain bike (no suspension front or back), with knobby tires. After a couple of rides, I replaced the knobbies with a smooth and skinny tire. This decreased noise and resistance, and my ride speed increased.

In 2009, I purchased a Surly Long Haul Trucker, which is made for fully loaded touring. I began to commute more frequently, and my ride time decreased due to the better riding position, and more efficient geometry. It's long wheel base and steel frame smoothed out the bumps in the road. 

I would ride to the gym near work, where my employer pays for memberships, and shower. This would add a level of logistics to my ride that sometimes left me in a bad way. Once I forgot my business casual shoes, and ended up having to wear my SPD riding shoes at work. Not many people noticed. I'd also forget little things like deodorant, or a t-shirt. And yes, sometimes I'd forget the underwear. I'd shower at the gym, and my body would still be sweating when I arrived at the office in my business casual clothes. I'd then hang my ride clothes on clips stuck to my cubicle wall under my desk. Needless to say, this was not always good for air quality.

When we moved to Oradell, my commute changed to a 17 mile round trip. So I decided to try something new. I shopped for an urban bike, which would provide a more upright riding position, allowing me to see and be seen better. I had also been reading about cycling chic, which is basically riding in Dutch style. My honey and I did a bike trip there years ago, and no one rides dressed as Lance Armstrong. They all ride in their regular street clothes. The common consensus is that drivers are more tolerant of a bike rider who is headed to work on their bike than they are of a racer out slowing traffic. I would agree based on my experience. 

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After a bunch of research, I was having a hard time finding the right bike. I stopped at many bike shops, and the common recommendation was to purchase a tri-cross bike, which has the geometry of a road bike, but the components of a mountain bike. I wasn't impressed with the answers I received, all of which were focused on the bikes that were in stock. My honey ended up finding the perfect solution - a Gary Fisher Simple City 8. I will write a review of the bike as a separate post (as well as one about the death of local bicycle shop customer service), so I won't get into too much detail here. But it was perfect for what I wanted. It had an internal 8-speed hub with a chain guard, drum brakes on the rear, internally routed cables, a big basket in the front for my stuff, classic good looks, and an upright ride. 

I now have around 800 miles on the bike, and it is my primary ride. I use it for my bike commute, for heading to town for a haircut, to the library, post office, and to get warm croissants or bagels on weekends. When I bike commute, I ride to work in my business casual clothes, which are now all wash and wear. I roll up my shirt and place it in the top of one of my panniers. I carry my lunch, and often my computer. I have lights mounted, and lots of reflective tape. 

I love to bike. I experience everything around me much differently on the bike than I do in a car. A car propels you from one place to another, with all of the distractions of home. You can listen to music, talk on the phone, and do many things that keep you from noticing what is around you. The bike allows you to hear, see, and smell your environment. It provides you the opportunity to say hello to pedestrians, and other riders. It keeps your mind focused, and provides a nice low impact workout, which is right in the fat burning zone.

With rising fuel costs, and increased interest in fighting obesity, I am seeing more people riding their bikes during commuting hours. I often get asked by colleagues what they need to do to ride to work. I tell them to get out their bike, make sure it is working, and just ride in. People who live farther away can do a bi-modal  commute, where they park the car less than 10 miles from work, and pedal the last distance. No matter what happens at work, they will have a bike ride to remember from the day. 

Here are some resources to help you get started bike commuting:

League of American Bicyclists is an advocacy organization that has a Smart Cycling program, which provides education for road users, as well as certification for cycling instructors. 

Bike to Work is a Web site that was recently launched, and it contains great information related to bike commuting.

People for Bikes is an advocacy group which provides tools and communications around making bicyclists voices heard in our policy makers' offices. 

Bicycle laws vary by state, so I am linking NJ laws. The basic premise is the same from state to state. 

Bike Commuters Blog contains lots of inspiration for us bike commuters.

There are also some links on the right to assist you, and the Twitter feed on the right shows bike commute posts. I'll write more specific posts about bike commuting as time passes, but if you have any specific questions, please ask in the comments below.

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A simple way to have more money

My dad's brain was full of verbal quips, probably from Reader's Digest. He'd feel the need to share them with the family whenever he felt like it. "The early bird gets the worm", was one of his favorites. As I grew up, I'd ask him what the worm got for rising early. He never responded. Another of his favorites was "It's not what you make, it's what you keep", referring to money. It took me a few years to understand that one.

When I got out on my own, I was able to apply many of the lessons I learned about money, as well as gain my own experience through making mistakes. These mistakes are referred to as "stupid tax" by Dave Ramsey. I met my honey along the way, and before we married, we talked about money. We both agreed that it sucks to owe money, and we vowed to get out of debt, and stay out of debt. We focused on this goal right away, and quickly got on top of the expenses, and stayed there.

It's not what you make, it's what you keep. A person with a large income, can be poor from large expenses. A person with a low income, can be rich due to low expenses. The premise is based on financial wealth, but in reality richness is defined by our life, not the stuff we accumulate.

I hate getting rid of stuff, so I know the best way to combat this is to not get stuff in the first place. When I do get rid of stuff, I have a process I use to do this. We generate some cash offloading the unwanted stuff, and it starts to feel good to purge. Try it, you will find it liberating.

There are many ways to increase the amount of money you keep without having to skip meals or not pay your electric bill. In fact, saving money can even make you healthier. The following are some we use, and you can pick the ones you like.

Pack a lunch - Every week my honey makes a batch of something yummy, and we take it to work for most of the week. We also prepare small containers of veggie servings to accompany our main course. I like yogurt, so I buy plain low fat yogurt in a big container, and make 5 small containers containing a spoon of jam (or fresh fruit), and add a 1/2 cup of the yogurt to the top. Buy in bulk, and be creative. I eat the same portions every day, and just vary what goes in the container. A typical lunch for me is a container of yogurt with jam, a 1/4 cup of nuts, a main course from the big container, a hard boiled egg, and about 3-4 servings of fruit and veggies. This is how I maintain my boyish figure. Eating lunch out can easily cost $75 a week.

Buy generic brands - When I was growing up, generic food was in a white box with black letters, and the contents usually tasted like sawdust. Times have changed. Many of generics are from the same processor as the brand name.

Don't buy bottled drinks - It takes 1 liter of water to fill a 1 liter steel bottle. A steel bottle costs about as much as one trip to the movies, and you can drink from the same bottle your whole life, and bequeath it to your favorite child when you depart the planet. Drinking soda is just bad.


Bring a thermos, or suck it up until you get somewhere - There's a reason why "Price Sucks" and "Starbucks" rhyme. Purchase your favorite gourmet coffee for home, and fill a thermos before a road trip. Fill a travel mug for your commute. Wait until you get to a free/cheap coffee source if you must have it. If you are unemployed and stopping at Starbucks, please stop it. Now.

Get on the wagon - If you have to eat out, don't drink alcohol. The conversation is better, the food tastes better, and you will find the bill to be about half what you used to spend. Okay, you won't be nearly as funny, but you can handle that. If you have to drink, have an appetizer at home along with your nip before you go out. Or have a nightcap when you get home. Even Groupon can't match these savings.

Avoid using your car - It's great to ride your bike for exercise, but the real savings comes in when you use the bike to replace the car. Many trips you take in your car can just as easily be made by bike or mass transit. It's real easy to find parking for a bike, and you will experience the neighborhood in new ways. There's no reason to dress up like a superhero to ride, just get on the bike with what you have on. Unless of course you are in pajamas, then please change first. Walking is highly underrated. Try it, you will love it. I walk between buildings at work, and had people I work with, going in the opposite direction, stop and offer to drive me to the other building - on sunny days. The picture on the right of this blog's home page is from walking to another building, and finding out too late that the concrete on the sidewalk was still wet. Let's keep this our secret.

Use the free fitness center - It is a proven fact that gravity works pretty much the same all over the dry parts of our planet. So a 15 pound weight will weigh 15 pounds at the gym, as well as at home. With minor creativity, and a schedule, you can work out wherever you are. Avoiding the car helps you get your cardio in.

Have someone else pay the depreciation on your next car - A car is not an investment. An investment has an expectation that it will appreciate. A new car loses between 25-40% of it's value as soon as you purchase it. Car leases are the biggest ripoff out there. Your total life cycle costs are astronomical when you look at the total real costs associated with them. So buy used, and only a make and model that has a high reliability rating.

Install Compact Flourescent Light (CFL) bulbs - Don't laugh, we swapped out a few rooms in our old home, and our electric bill dropped dramatically. These bulbs are a little slow to get bright, but this works great for the mornings, you can turn the kitchen lights on and they wake up with you.

Accept your lawn for what it is - Stop spending money to create more work.

Decrease consumption - Make do with less. Eat 10% less than normal. Drive 10% less. Turn the thermostat in the money saving direction. It all adds up.

Buying stuff leads to buyer's remorse. Read the book Buyology, and you will see you are just a tool for the benefit of the marketers. Break the the chains that bind you. Change your focus, and you will be rich. The kind of rich that can't be taken from you.

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Shedding the clutter from our lives

Now to pick the veggies 

One of my weekend projects was to construct a cold frame to start our vegetable seeds in. The goal was to use what I already had around the house, without having to spend money. Being pedantic is a sport I find lots of pleasure in. Luckily, I had replaced 11 of our first floor windows, and kept some of the storm window sets for cold frames. This combined with leftover plywood and scrap lumber from the garage repairs I did last summer provided me all I needed. I had the project completed within about 2 hours. 

I was surprised that I was able to sell the old wood windows to someone who wanted them for a garden center he was opening. I had them for sale at $10 each, and I ended up selling them for $150 for the whole stack. I also sold several of the old aluminum storm window sets for $10 each, but kept enough of them for our cold frames. I was just about to throw them out when the buyer contacted me. 

Sold on Craigslist, $150

My normal order of activities in getting rid of stuff is to see if it will sell on eBay at a reasonable price. If it is too large, or a niche item, I use Craigslist. I can say I have sold more stuff on Craigslist than I have on eBay. Here's a phone set I am selling, I use a Google Voice number so I can control communications with the potential crazies out there. When we escaped the tyranny of NY last summer, I was posting items on Craigslist, using PayPal for financial transactions, and shipping items across the country. It was like running an online store. One buyer came to our home to purchase our kitchen set, and logged in to our computer and paid me via PayPal. I then logged in and confirmed the payment was received, and helped them load the items.   

If the items I was getting rid of were not worth much, I'd use Freecycle. This organization has local groups where people post and look for free items. The idea is to help someone out, and at the same time keep the items out of the landfills. One person's junk is another person's treasure. I had mixed success with Freecycle, finding that when something is free, the people who commit to picking up the items aren't real motivated to actually show up. Much of the free stuff ended up in front of our home, labeled "free". Unwanted household items get dropped off at a local charity, where they can sell it flea market-style to raise funds. Any items remaining end up in the garbage. The garbage pile is small.

The astute reader will notice that yard sales are not part of the mix. About 12 years ago, my honey and I had set up our yard for a sale. It was a gorgeous day, clear skies, perfect weather, and a light and arid breeze. Our tables were set up, all items priced, and we were about an hour from starting the sale. I looked at her and  asked "how much is all of this stuff going to make for us?". We did the calculations, and determined that we'd net about $200. The next question was "would you pay $200 to do whatever you want on a day like this?". We grabbed some cardboard, wrote "FREE" on it, stuck it to a tree, and went hiking. At the end of the day, we put the few items left in the garbage, and basked in the satisfaction of having been able to enjoy such a great day together. We haven't had a yard sale since then. 

So attack the clutter! A home is much easier to clean without so much stuff. And don't replace the clutter. We often ask each other how much an item will sell for online after we are tired of looking at it. This keeps us from purchasing many items. 

Friday afternoon blog round-up

There are two posts today, so don't miss the Decisions that should make themselves, a post about taking back my life from the four-pronged instrument of destruction, and how your life will benefit by making some simple choices.

Originally, I was planning on doing a weekly round up of this blog, highlighting additional information about previous blog posts. I figured it'd be a way to come up with content at least once a week that I didn't have to think too hard about. But so far, I haven't run out of topics. I have about 15 blogs in process at any given time, and finish them when the topic interests me. I then publish the post, and use Hootsuite to set a schedule for pushing out the promotional posts to Facebook and Twitter. Some of the blogs I also push to LinkedIn. I schedule the release to coincide with the times of day that seem to get the most readers.

I started the blog just for fun. I have opinions and wanted to share them. As I began to write, I realized that I could write on a broad range of topics, and focus on solutions. My intentions for 2011 changed the direction I was taking this blog, and so far am satisfied with the feedback and traffic this site generates.

Business topics
LinkedIn has been a surprisingly good source of traffic, especially business related topics such as the post on performance management. If you are interested in republishing this blog as an article or on another blog, please contact me. I won't charge anything, but would like the professional development units this will generate for meI will eventually submit it for a magazine or two, but have too many other items on my plate right now. I am still noodling on how to increase the value of comments for feedback, which in my opinion is the greatest challenge, and weakest link in the performance management process. Look for a future post on this topic. I have been intrigued by a service named Rypple, where a person can get Twitter-like feedback anonymously from colleagues. We are all on the human journey, and if you aren't working to continuously improve, you are just using oxygen.

Life Planning
In regards to the blog titled Luck would have it, Wired Magazine has a great article about how the scratch off lottery tickets aren't as much about luck, as identifiable patterns. Organized crime (not our government, they already take their share of the money) have identified how to beat the patterns, and use this knowledge to launder money.

Health and Fitness
I was surprised to see how quickly the page views increased on When we sweat diet soda, we should drink diet soda. It is now my second most read blog after only a few days online, trailing Economics - the dismal science, my post about my experience with Junior Achievement. If you are inclined to be part of the solution in our educational system, you should consider volunteering to assist this awesome program.

Resources
Water Wars is still drawing readers, many people love a good conspiracy story, especially ones where governments and corporations collude to take away our rights. This post has a shelf-life, and keeps the traffic coming.

Food (actually, food ignorance) is still a topic I want to dig deeper into. The rising food prices across the globe are driven by many factors, and there are some solutions we must implement to ensure each of us can weather any issues that come up.

My tongue-in-cheek post about DADT generated a very large and fast spike of readers, then dropped to obscurity.

If you are interested in a follow up of a blog, or my brain droppings on a specific topic, please feel free to comment and I will do my best to meet your request. 

Head Start or Pisanki? Opportunity costs are lost in the government's process

Most activities in life are projects. Project management is the art and science of getting things done. A project is defined as having a beginning and an end, not to be confused with entitlement payments, which are by definition operations management, thus never ending.  Project management applies to so many areas of life. Vacations, home improvements, planting your garden, protesting our childish government, or updating your Facebook page are all projects.

Before project management was defined, organizations would have a thought (sometimes a whim, which is a little below a thought, but a higher level stimulation than a reaction) and apply resources to make an attempt for the thought to become reality. It would be supported by a big plan, and everyone would organize around it. Some organizations would have many thoughts, and pursue them all, straining their resources, running people into the ground, and burning up their resources. Sometimes an effort paid off, and the organization would reap the benefit of their effort. Many times the organization lost focus, didn't put their money into smart initiatives, and they ended up going out of business, or becoming insolvent and ineffectual. These concepts also apply to government.

Then along came project portfolio management. Some person came up with the crazy idea that if resources are limited, maybe the organization should determine what was most important, and apply their resources to the important stuff first. As the resources were depleted, less effort would be put into lower priority ideas, and some ideas would be abandoned completely. This way the organization wouldn't have to decrease peoples' pay, deprive them of food, or buy inferior toilet paper for the bathrooms to save money for funding projects.

In order to accomplish this, all of the efforts the organization was thinking about investing in had to be evaluated as a portfolio. Decision criteria had to be developed, and all proposed projects would need to be "normalized" by consistently applying the same criteria to all of them. In this way, an organization could make sure that the important stuff was identified, and got done first.

The way federal funding of programs and projects is completed now is some Congressman, the President, or someone at a town hall meeting speaking for millions of people comes up with an idea. The idea gains traction, and as a stand alone project, it looks like a great thing to do. Some examples of great things that were looked at individually are when our government gives a private museum that has assets in the millions of dollars a couple of hundred thousand dollars to restore their building.  The following items are from the 2010 budget, as reported on the Citizens Against Government Waste Web site:

$194,800 by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) for completion of the historic restoration project at the Historic Slater Mill in Pawtucket, Rhode Island.  According to Slater Mill’s website, it is “one of the most visited sites in Rhode Island with 30,000 visitors per year, 80 years of preservation experience and long-term partnerships with major universities, public school systems, cultural heritage organizations, tourism agencies, museums, guilds, artists, the business community and many others.”  The website also discloses that the admission fees are $10 for adults, $9 for seniors and $8 for children.  Besides being a popular destination, the organization does not appear to be on shaky financial footing.  According to the Old Slater’s Mill Association 2008 IRS Form 990, it has net assets of $2,573,254. 


Another example is providing a museum a couple of hundred thousand of the taxpayers' dollars so visitors can leave with a Pisanki egg. At $30 for the class, you'd think the cost of the paint would be covered, and they'd not need our money.

"...$250,000 for the Wistariahurst Museum, Holyoke, for renovation and expansion.  The museum charges for a number of events, including, “a hands-on demonstration in Pisanki - the tradition of decorating eggs and one of the most cherished cultural expressions of Polish heritage around the Easter holiday. Participants will leave with their own designed and hand-dyed Easter eggs. Fee is $30 per person”, and a “Trash to Treasure” in which “scouts and youths will use their creativity to turn castaways into fun and functional stuff, letting their imagination run wild in this hands-on session! $8 per person.”


Taken as a single item, neither of these gifts of our tax dollars seem like much, and many of the rare readers of this blog may think "good, I like that we fund the arts". But what is missing in the decisions to fund these two items is the analysis of opportunity cost, which is what a good project portfolio management system takes into consideration. 

When we look at opportunity cost, and use a prioritization process, we will see why maybe spending $200,000 on something different may be a better choice for us. With $200,000, we can have more than 20 inner city kids participate in a Head Start program. There's a choice I'd like to see a Congressman make - Pisanki eggs for museum visitors, or a positive lifetime impact on 20 inner city kids. Or how about choosing between Pisanki, or 40 miles of bike paths to combat obesity? How about $300 million to PBS or 6,000 miles of bike paths - per year - to combat obesity and protect the environment? The choices are never simple, but if they were simple, someone else could make them.

Should everything that is good be funded, or should we only fund what we can afford to fund?

The secret to happiness is - nothing

As Americans (or part of the connected civilization), we are constantly bombarded with marketing images telling us how to find happiness from purchasing products. A new car, cold soda, salted snack, or vacation on a cruise ship holds the key to our happiness. They want you to believe that happiness is only found in a tangible item, something we can see and touch.

There's a very interesting book I read recently titled "Buyology", where the author justified his manipulation of consumers' minds with the position that he was only unlocking our hidden desires  for useless junk. I recommend reading this book, so you will be forewarned to the dangers of the constant bombardment you are subjected to, and the subtle ways the marketers go for your neurological triggers. After reading this book, you may unplug the box.

In the early '80s a friend and I noticed that roads connected Alaska to NJ. Over the course of two months, this friend and I decided to drive to Alaska to see what it was like. We made the drive, and I stayed there a couple of years. He stayed longer.

There's no place like home

I lived in a cabin on the outskirts of Wasilla, and worked for a construction company. (No, I never met Sarah Palin.) For about 8 months I lived in the tiny village of Holy Cross. There were 470 people living in the village, with a mix of people with Yupik and Athabascan ancestries. There were also a few non-indigenous residents, and about 15 of us building houses. The houses we built were on "Housing Road", and "New Housing Road". "Housing Road" was built first, and "New Housing Road" was built second. If they expand the village, the new road will be named "New New Housing Road", or 'Newest Housing Road". Relativism is so simple, yet so difficult to keep going over time.

The only way in was the gravel runway
welcome to Holy Cross

During my time working there, I had the opportunity to interact with many of the locals. They were for the most part hardworking and decent people, with a few of the lowly types every town is afflicted with. On my rare days off,  I hunted duck and bear, and explored the mazes of the Yukon River with a couple friends of mine - Beanie and Walter. I provided the fuel, they provided the boat, engine, and buckets for bailing the water out of the leaky boat. Crossing the Yukon in bad weather, with a heavy chop was pretty exciting. We'd be in construction coveralls, with our pockets loaded with shotgun shells, and no flotation in site. Walter would have to vary the speed of the boat to keep us in the middle of the 4 foot troughs of glacial silt-filled water that rolled against the wind. Beanie and I would bail to keep the boat afloat. I shudder when I think back to these dangerous days.

I never could grow a 'stache

Carpenters and plumbers
waiting for flight 

As the construction project approached the winter, we could see that we'd be out of work in a few weeks, and would have to wait until the spring thaw to install more pilings into the permafrost. As my colleagues finished their work, they'd fly out of the gravel runway on one of our company planes, and our numbers would decrease. As our end date approached, an elderly woman in the village invited me to her home for coffee. She lived outside of the village, close to the river. I accepted the offer, and headed out.

When I arrived, she was a gracious hostess, kept my coffee cup filled, and served me some homemade cake. Her husband headed outside to get some wood, and the hostess quickly made me an offer. She had no money, but was wondering if I would be willing to trade my Mossberg 12 gauge shotgun for a Marten hat. Marten are valued for their gorgeous fur, and it was considered very stylish to have a Marten hat with multiple tails off of the back. I accepted the offer, and we made the trade. I still have the hat, and often take it out of the box to admire the fur.

After her husband returned with the wood, our conversation was around his memories of growing up. He remembered the white traders who came down the river, and that his father and uncles would take pot shots at them as they made their way past the village. One family name in the village was "Whitemankiller". This wasn't some ghetto rap name invented to look cool, it was history in a name.

Holy Cross, AK, 1984

As always, I get off topic as I open up the memories my mind is filled with. Now back to the story. One of the things he said to me was something I never really understood until much later in my life. He said that the people in the village didn't know they were poor until the white man arrived. Until then, the village was isolated, and lived off the land. Your hunting and fishing were your currency, and life was active and fulfilling. People worked together, and there was little jealousy or greed.

Looking around the village, I could see the two stores with all the junk food you'd need to destroy your health, a. gas station to fuel up your car to drive in endless circles around the village, satellite dishes to bring in the endless infotainment of television, and the regularly scheduled boat with the contraband alcohol loaded in the lock box. Alcohol was illegal in most Alaskan villages, and the smugglers would lock the booze up on their boat, requiring the State Police to get a search warrant to open the box. Getting a search warrant rarely happened when the nearest judge was hundreds of miles away. .

The day after the alcohol boat left, a gambler would show up on one of the small planes, organize some card games, and leave with all the money before the drunken villagers woke up from their drunken stupor. We had many of our locally hired craftsmen who came back to work broke, asking for advances or loans to feed their families.

I remembered the old man's story last week, as my honey and I relaxed on a Caribbean island. We were in a cottage without television, phone, cell signal, or any technical diversions. We lived to the rhythm of the day, enjoying books, time together, the view of the ocean and stars, the hikes along the ocean cliffs and in the forests, and walking barefoot on secluded beaches, as well as swimming in the clear and refreshing waters. We were happy and relaxed. We talked about our past, the present, and the future. We wondered if we could spend the rest of (our hopefully long) life in this rhythm. We acknowledged that a year or more ago, we couldn't do this. But now life is different, and we can envision a life at a slower pace, enjoying the simple pleasures.

Our daily happiness should be based on simple criteria, and not on stuff we accumulate. Health, love, shelter, food, and warmth are pretty simple areas that we should look to for our happiness. Everything else is just a potential distraction. Happiness comes from the intangibles in life, the things we can't touch physically. "When you've got nothing, you've got nothing to lose", Mick Jagger may have sang the secret to happiness long ago.

What makes you happy? Is it things you can touch, or is it things you can only experience?

Super size, or stupor size?

Bigger is better. Big stores bring us big savings by driving down production costs, buying in volume, and passing on the savings to us consumers. Big cars make us safer, and help us merge in traffic. 

Big cruise ships and big airlines provide us with cheaper vacation options, and many destinations. Big fuel provides us with a reliable flow of gas for our automobiles. Big trees provide us shade, protect us from the winter winds, and yield lots of lumber.

There is safety in numbers. In the animal world, we see herds of four legged game staying together. They travel, eat, and sleep with their herd. When predators come, they often defend themselves as a group, or when faced with overwhelming fear, will run in a group to escape the danger. As I often say when I am hiking with friends, I don't have to out run the bear, I just have to out run you. 

Big companies are often thought of as a safe employment option. With so many employees, it is less likely you will be singled out to be downsized. It's the herd mentality, without the bear. If you can make sure you aren't in the back of the pack, you can feel safer in your job. 

When my honey and I raced sailboats, we preferred larger fleets. The same herd mentality applies here. With a large fleet, we could expect a certain number of boats to have equipment failures, make tactical errors, mess up a tack or jibe, or not be hearty in bad weather. We improved our place in the regattas by just showing up and crossing the finish line. In a small fleet, finishing 3rd out of 4 boats sounds bad. Finishing 15th out of 20 sounds much better. 

But is bigger better? Safety in numbers is statistically accurate. You're less likely to be the loser when there are more players. But I've never seen a hungry hawk after it chased a flock of birds. 

Terrorists don't attack sparsely populated areas, they look for density to perpetrate their crimes. They have more targets there.

Large ships have become the favorite target of the pirates. Their size makes them hard to hide and not very maneuverable. 

Big cars are only safe when they are light. Big heavy cars are dangerous not only to the occupant of the car, but also to those around it. 

Big trees fall and crush homes. When was the last time you had a sapling cause heavy damage to your home? 

When big businesses fail, whole divisions of "safe jobs" are sent to the streets for the reporters to take pictures of. Think of Enron, Global Crossing, Merril Lynch, and we saw the Big Three Automakers downsie, along with companies that supported them. 

We've also seen large investment funds disappear. People must have felt very safe adding a hundred thousand dollars to a fund worth $50 billion. Safety in numbers. A small player on a big field. One in a large herd. A small fish in a big pond. This equates to less you have to worry about. 

In a large fund, every investor is represented by numbers. There is an account number, and a balance number. Humanity is removed. No longer is the hundred thousand dollar investment associated with your neighbor Joe, it is a number in a large pool of numbers. A faceless victim, "they should have known better", and "better them than me". 

Look at our government. Approximately 10% of the American workforce is employed by our tax dollars. This represents a tremendous voting bloc, and the dollar amounts are huge. 

How else would a group of people think that spending a trillion and a half dollars for a short term bailout is a good idea? This equated to 10% of our entire economy, and coincidentally, 10% of our existing national debt. 

As the numbers get bigger, the numbers mean less. A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon you're talking about real money. How can we not fund a billion dollar program when our numeric reference is so big? Trillions? What is that?

The bigger they are, the harder they fall. That was one of my Dad's favorite sayings. He usually threw that one out there over the top of the Daily News when a politician took a hit. 

Maybe bigger isn't better? Throw a small rock into a lake. The splash is small, the ripples are low, and they don't last long. Now throw a big rock into the same lake. Note the difference in splash size, the height of the ripples, and how far they travel - they often reverberate, bouncing back and forth across the surface.

Maybe smaller is better. Small is manageable. Small is agile, it can change as needed.  Small is easy to understand, we can get our arms around it. Smaller food servings, smaller waists, smaller health bills.

Small banks, where we know the employees and they know us. Loans would be written based on our ability to pay, not some big algorithm crushing numbers in a big data pool. 

Small is green. Over half of our workforce works for a small company. Small homes, small obligations, and most importantly, small government. This will mean small tax bills.

Small must be the status symbol of our future. We must get back to being small. Smaller is better. 

Measuring the distance from the average person to their food source

I mentioned in a previous post about my being perplexed at how human omnivores react when they see pictures of deer being butchered by the hunters who killed them. I am able to observe these reactions whenever my nephew posts a picture of his hunting conquests on Facebook. How can someone eat meat, yet be repulsed by seeing where it comes from? These people must think that their meat is grown in a white foam tray, and is covered in plastic at the meat factory, and shipped to the supermarket.

Last week I was talking to someone who had taken a pre-teen boy to a raptor (hawks, vultures, etc.) presentation. The presenter took a small fluffy chick (a baby chicken... I almost forgot that many readers may think chicken is grown in a cardboard box at fast food chains), and after all the audience "oohs" and "ahs", he fed it to an owl. The owl flipped it in the air, and gulped it down. The chick was already dead, but the collective gasp of the audience at this sight was startling to the person I was speaking with. She knew what was going to happen, and understood where chicken comes from. The presenter then asked who would be eating chicken this week. There's no difference between us eating chicken, and an owl eating chicken. I'm sure the image will be blocked from the audience's minds, and they will eat chicken.

So our civilization is now perfectly content to have their meat on the bone, and at a ranch far from sight until the barbecue is planned. They don't want to ponder the process of butchering, and how their meat finds its way to the foam pack at the supermarket. I used to have my clothes tailored by someone who lived next to a butcher. The stench is indescribable, and I had to have my clothes dry-cleaned after each alteration. I used to plan my pick ups so I didn't have to eat right after my visit.

At least people know where their vegetables come from, and the process a farm goes through to grow a vegetable. So in a pinch, we can each grow food to supplement our diets. Or at least that was my thought. Until yesterday's e-mail. Now I'm not so sure.

So here goes - how do we start a plant? It's okay to comment on this blog, I am curious as to who knows about this secret. It's okay if you think vegetables come from trees, we can help you correct your understanding of the food chain.

Okay, so you are probably wondering why I would assume that people don't know where vegetables come from. Stonecrop Gardens in Cold Spring, NY is offering a seed sowing seminar. For the princely sum of $50, the seminar will provide you with 3 hours of training:

• Learn the basic principles of seed propagation.
• Demonstration of seed sowing techniques.
• Apply your newfound knowledge to sow a variety of annuals.

On the second day of the seminar, weeks later, you will:

• Learn the critical skill of “pricking out.” 
• “Prick out” your newly germinated propagules into larger flats for “growing on.”

I have worked for many years in horticulture, and can say that I have never utilized the skill of "pricking out". I am not sure what this is, but generally take care of voiding liquids in the designated human waste area. I may attend just to satisfy my curiosity. Or not.

What is missing in this seminar is how to take the stuff that is done "growing on" (not to be done while "prick out" I would guess, since there may be other attendees who are bashful), and putting the plants in the ground. Maybe that will be one of those extras at the seminar. If you take the seminar, please don't wear your Sunday heels, there may be dirt on the ground.

So all of you who don't know how to plant seeds, this seminar is for you. If you want to save $50, and actually have the experience of not only sticking the seed in the ground and pricking them out, you can start seeds at home and have the experience of watering, obsessing, and have the joy of watching the plants push through the soil and start to grow. My favorite part of gardening is watching the squirrels eat the green tomatoes while perched on a branch, staring at me through my home office window. Brazen things they are. I wonder if the squirrels understand how differently the tomato would taste if they'd been through the joy of "pricking out" after they plant the seeds.

How far are you from your food source? Do you know where your food came from?

Friday round-up - drinking water, gasoline, and a little economics thrown in

In a previous post, Water Wars, real of imagined?, I wrote about how water sources are being grabbed up by large corporations. This water grab has contributed to states passing laws to ban the capture of roof run off from a rain storm, lest this act deprive the water company of the profit from selling it back to you. Colorado has finally seen the stupidity of this law, and is now allowing residents to capture the water that falls on their roof.

A couple of towns in NJ are trying to take back their water systems from American Water Company. The lease expired 7 years ago, but the corporation refuses to relinquish the system to the towns, claiming they have a perpetual right to the water system. Just so you understand this, pretend you hired a landscaper on a one year contract. At the end of the year, the landscaper claims that even though the contract is for a year, he has a perpetual right to provide you this service, and you must pay him for it.

In Brisbane, Australia, the recent severe flooding is causing fears that the water treatment facilities may be damaged. It seems ironic to have your town destroyed by water, and have none to drink. This is the risk when we hook up to the centralized water distribution system - if the system goes down, or is tainted with carcinogens like many US cities, you are stuck.

Stephen Horncastle, via Wikimedia Commons

Even living by a reservoir won't help you in many areas. We commoners are kept away from the water by fences. In some areas, reservoirs are being completed capped, and the cover is used for football fields and recreation. I wonder how this impacts the birds, fish and other plants and animals that rely on the water? Do you know where your drinking water comes from?

In Los Angeles, the bromate and chlorine used to treat the reservoir water was experiencing a chemical reaction when exposed to sunlight... yes sunlight, and elevating bromide levels which causes cancer. The solution was to dump 400,000 plastic balls onto the reservoir, blocking the sun and preventing the chemical reaction. Maybe they should figure out how to treat the water AFTER it is taken from the reservoir. I do plead ignorance as a scientist though, so maybe killing everything in the reservoir with chlorine, and making it undrinkable by most animals is the best option.

Other valuable liquids on our planet are becoming harder to purchase. Oil prices are now at $100 a barrel, which oil producing countries think is the fair market price. The pundits are saying that gasoline will hit as much as $5 a gallon by summer. You may want to pump up the tires on your bicycle. Here's a little tip for anyone who skipped economics in school. If prices rise, and demand stays the same or increases, the price is reset at the new higher price. When was the last time you saw prices come down on a commodity?


Maybe Tunisia should drill for oil, their citizens are rioting due to the sharp rise in food prices. The cited causes are increased demand, floods in Australia, Al Gore's mistaken support for corn-based ethanol subsidies, and poor leadership (which fled, how much poorer can a leader be than that?).  We can only hope other oppressed people step up to shed their rulers. 


Tomorrow is Saturday... such a gorgeous snow here in North Jersey. Maybe I can get a great ski in before all the snow melts. 

Being above average, and how this costs us all more money

We humans delude ourselves frequently. A 1981 study in the US showed that 93% of drivers thought their driving skills were above average. We know this can't be a fact. Look at Billy Joel, and the number of times he crashed his car. We all wish to be above average in all things, and in a cursory examination of this concept, we'd think this is a good thing. But think again...

Insurance can be explained very simply. Everyone pays a premium based on their plan rate. The insurance company pays against claims, and after paying the claims, compensating their staff, and covering operating expenses such as marketing and customer service, they log the rest as profit (income - expenses = profit). If their claims payments and operating expenses exceed the premiums collected, they lose money. Companies can't lose money and survive.

Well, actually, some companies can operate for years losing money, since they have a stranglehold on the taxpayers, such as  the US Postal Service, and their $3.5 billion loss in the last quarter alone. They can count on our inept Congress to just raid the Social Security Trust Fund, or add another tax to cover the losses by taking more money out of our pockets.

As consumers of health care, we want to be above average, since this means we get out more than we put in. This is basic human nature. If we are paying a premium, and the total of my premiums is less than what our medical care cost, then we would be better off self-insuring. We are provided an incentive to consume more than our premiums.

Health insurance benefits were originally focused on major medical expenses. Most people fear the loss of their wealth trying to treat a life-threatening illness. Routine care was paid for out-of-pocket by the consumer, and the costs were way cheaper as a result. A doctor wouldn't turn a patient away, unless they couldn't take new patients. I remember my parents would work out a payment plan with our family doctor. He delivered me and my 8 siblings, and treated all of us until he passed away.

After World War II, the inept and well-meaning federal government instituted wage freezes in a booming economy to keep employees from jumping to higher paying jobs. If employers couldn't entice employees by using cash on the open market, they started to offer health insurance plans, which also covered routine care. As a result, many companies offered gold-plated insurance plans for life for their employees. As humans, once we start getting something for free, we don't want to give it up. Starting in 2011, our health insurance values will be put on our tax forms... why? A tax on our health insurance, which originally started out as a non-cash incentive. So who pays for health insurance - employer or employee?

Everyone wants cheap insurance. What they should want is market driven health pricing. If doctors didn't have to submit claims to dozens of different insurance companies, each with different forms, while conforming to the limitations of each, they could decrease office staff. The 15 billing codes they have to fill out for your office visit to treat the cold you have, where you only pay $15 co-pay with the rest of your risk pool (the below average) kicking in to cover your costs, would become an office visit that may cost you $30-$50, but would go directly to the doctor. All of the administrative load would be removed from the relationship with your doctor. A solution to all of this overhead is concierge service, where a doctor won't accept insurance, patients pay for their own services, and patients agree not to sue the doctor. If I were a doctor, this would be my business model.

Think of insurance in terms of a car. New cars come with a warranty, where certain components are covered for a specific period of time. When you buy a new car, the cost of this "free" warranty is built into the purchase cost. The peace of mind allows us to drive off the lot and feel confident that if our engine dies, the automaker will fix it free or cheaply. Think of this as major medical insurance. If the big "C" hits us, we likely won't go broke in the process of fixing our "engine", and living longer.

If our car insurance also covered oil changes brake pads, and other routine care, our car insurance costs would soar to out of control levels. This routine care extends the life of the car, and we can expect many more years from it, or a higher resale value for a well-maintained car, so it should be encouraged, right? So we would get all the oil changes, new tires, new brakes, and replace anything that shows any wear. And there'd be no incentive to be thoughtful about how or where we drove. We could overload the car with cinder blocks, run it at high RPMs, skid, peel out, and bang into stuff. The insurance would cover it. It wouldn't cost us, at least not in the sense of having to lay money out for routine maintenance. None of the routine care would be our fault, the repair is an entitlement we paid for. Do you think you'd see $14.95 oil change specials in a routine car care insurance world? No, the cost would probably be about $80, with you paying $5 at the counter after waiting 3 months to get an appointment.

Health insurance for routine issues are the same. I am fit, watch my weight, have a fitness lifestyle, am an educated eater, and as a result live a very fulfilling life. We all know people who are overweight, with failing joints, poor diets, sedentary lifestyles, and failing health. They need medicine to treat the symptoms of their poor lifestyle - diabetes, weight control, sleep disorders, joint pains, and all the rest of the pains of not taking responsibility for their lives. This excess weight can sometimes cause death when the person dies during a surgical procedure to remove a leather couch the person's body attached itself to.

We all pay more for routine care insurance where 70% of our health care costs are lifestyle related. These controllable health issues need more medicine, more care, and more doctors. I am against government regulating what people can and can't eat, and in what quantities. The government keeps regulating ingredients in food, using the "common good" as a motive. If we removed the routine care insurance, it wouldn't attract bureaucrats to find a solution, and we could get people to pay their own way. This is more likely to get people to become responsible for themselves. If we want smaller government, we need bigger people - not fat unhealthy people.

Right after we eliminate routine health insurance, we need to address airline baggage limits. If I am 165 pounds, and have 40 pounds of luggage, why should I pay more than a 300 pound person with 20 pounds of luggage? Please explain that one to me.

Disclaimer: I know many overweight people, and I have lots of compassion for them, and know how hard they try to lose weight. They are bombarded with messages on food, subjected to all you can eat buffets, and see their problems as medical for the most part. I am not in any way trying to make overweight people feel bad. I am using this as an example of how insurance becomes an enabler for this national crisis of obesity.

Friday blog round-up, and weekend project buffet menu

Fridays will be light on the blog, mostly round out comments related to previous blogs, and when I have a home project lined up for the weekend, I will preview it for the rare readers. If there are topics you are interested in hearing about, please leave a comment and I will come up with something to meet your request.


The most read and commented on blog so far is Economics, the dismal science - Junior Achievement class, which was about my experience with a high school class as part of a Junior Achievement program. From speaking with acquaintances, I realize that not many of us are schooled in economics. In my opinion, this is why the banks can prey on people, and automobile marketers can convince consumers that a fleece... or was that lease... is a good idea. So get involved, and make sure you learn economics, and then teach others. There is a great organization The Foundation for Economic Education that is addressing this need for economic literacy, and has some great resources, as well as a Facebook presence.


My book review of Carjacked was fun to write, and also had a decent number of visitors. It will be interesting to see how rising fuel prices will impact our love affair with the automobile in the coming months. Maybe a bike commute won't look so bad to many people.


I am not a big fan of big companies running our utilities, and especially not to manage our water. It appears that some nice employees of United Water have been arrested for "fudging" tests. The indictment "lists 68 times that 12 unnamed superintendents and employees lowered chlorine levels". These people must be great neighbors. I wonder if they drink the tap water, or if they opt for the bottled water from another big company?


The weekend project is to replace the expansion tank and air release valve on our boiler. It should be easy to do once I have the parts. I will also be finishing our second floor storage area, and be preparing the basement floor for painting. Watch for the post about this over the weekend.

The vegetables are in the bag

In a previous post I mentioned how we have been participating in Purple Dragon Co-Op for years. Today was our biweekly share pick-up, and I decided to give you an idea of how it works, and what you receive.

A food co-op is a pretty simple concept. Purple Dragon has "pods" across New Jersey, parts of NYC, and Rockland County, NY. These pods are part of a collective, where all products are purchased in bulk, and distributed to each pod. All food is selected in a mindful manner. Local, organic, ecological growers are part of the supply network. The preference is always local, but in the off season, the co-op will buy from as far away as New Zealand, still being mindful shoppers. By being mindful in their purchase, Purple Dragon supports sustainable agriculture - environmental stewardship, farm profitability, and prosperous farming communities. In return, the members get high quality, healthy food. 

By mindful, I mean they don't buy from big agri-business, where the produce is "nurtured" with pesticides, and the soil is destroyed by monoculture. Monoculture is when a single crop, usually genetically modified, is planted as the only crop on a piece of land. This practice sounds good on the surface, but since each type of plant has specific needs for nourishment, eventually the soil will experience loss of specific micro-nutrients and crucial organisms, and the crops will suffer. Also, if a pest or disease gets started in the field, it now has a huge supply of the food they like. Think of what would happen if you love chocolate, and have a very big box of it. Getting rid of these over eaters requires more chemicals on the plants and soil. Which you ingest as you eat your perfect, unblemished, symmetrical vegetables.


Members of the pod have a share to pick up every two weeks. Different pods have different distribution days, ours is Thursday. The person leading the pod sends out an e-mail to let us know what is coming, and if there are any considerations related to the current delivery. This week the broccoli is prime, so we are cautioned to eat it very soon.

Earth Machine

I usually go pick up our share. I bring an empty Ikea bag and the payment for the next delivery, and leave with the full Ikea bag that we left the last time we were there. This week the bag contained Fuji apples, beets, carrots, delicota squash, avocados, red leaf lettuce, Valencia oranges, Bosc pears, Peruvian bananas, yellow onions, Hakurei salad turnips, grape tomatoes, bok choi, and the broccoli. There are always special order items available, such as local honey, seed starter kits, and many vegetables and fruit.

Have you ever compared the flavors of an organic and chemical banana? Trust me, it is totally different. The same for organic avocados that are used for guacamole. Go ahead, give it a try. Buy some produce at the same time, and take the test. I guarantee that you will like the flavor of the organic produce a lot more than the chemical produce.

Secondary fence composter

There are times when we can't eat all the food. This is rare, but it does happen. When it happens, we put it in our Earth Machine Composter, along with any of the peels and leaves, sunflower husks from under the bird feeders, and any yard debris we accumulate. The composter turns it into nice organic soil for our garden. Many counties have these composters available for a deep discount, so before you buy one direct, check around. We also maintain an open compost pile for leaves and branches that are around after the town finishes the leaf pick-ups. To answer the question you are thinking, no, composting does not smell, at least not if you manage it correctly. I am sure this will be a topic for a post as we get into the spring.

Now get out there and be mindful! Buy organic, the birds are depending on us!

Economics, the dismal science - Junior Achievement class

"How come rich people like Donald Trump get richer in a recession?", followed by "how come the government doesn't tell companies they have to charge less for their products so people who are struggling can pay their bills?" were two of the questions that came up today in the high school class where I am teaching Economics through Junior Achievement. I put on my screen saver face and formulated my answer in my head... but first a little aside.

I don't remember anyone explaining economics to me as a kid, at least not in a structured sort of way. Economics was taught in real-time, with instant feedback for wrong answers. If I wanted to purchase something, I wasn't able to go to the governing entity (my parents), and get a bail out (allowance). I had to come up with ideas on how to make money. This environment forced me to become an entrepreneur at an early age.

My first few businesses were started when I was around 9 or 10, and revolved around filling a need in our household. My older brother didn't want to feed the family dog, which was his job. So he paid me $1 a week. He also hated to put his clothes in the laundry, so I would load the hamper in return for any loose change in his pockets, or from the floor. This business soon grew into cleaning cars in our driveway, and getting to keep the change. After a time, the money was not so good, since it takes months for change to fall out of a pocket at a rate I could justify doing the work for, so I started charging for car washes. As the youngest of 9 kids, there were lots of cars in the driveway.

Tom Finnegan was a nice guy on our street who was friends with my father. Tom asked my dad if he could pay me to cut his grass, and my dad agreed. So at about 12 years old I started to cut grass, which grew into 40 lawns spread across Pompton Plains and Pequannock Township, and was my primary income until I was in my early twenties. During that time, I worked regular jobs, such as at a local nursery where I started out planting mums, and stayed on for a couple of years picking vegetables and working in the greenhouses.

When I started to work, my parents made me buy my own work clothes, such as jeans, work boots, and whatever I'd wear to work. They covered school and church clothes. When I turned 16, 1/3^rd of my income was taken to cover my home expenses, plus I covered my own work clothes costs. At 18, the third was capped at $20 a week, and if I didn't work, they ran me a tab.

We learned early about economics. So back to the class today. In one of the first classes I taught, I asked who had a job that paid money. About 25% of the students raised their hand. I then asked who received a weekly allowance from their parents, with no strings attached - meaning they just received it, no chores required. Over half of the hands went up. Things have changed since I was a kid, and it is bad.

So my answer to the questions at the start of this blog were real simple, and derived by asking questions of the students. First, smart people make money in a recession. Having money going into a recession allows you to purchase at a deep discount. So don't waste your money buying stuff in a good economy, at least not on credit. Cash is king in a recession. But this recession has not been an opportunity for everyone. By taking money from the taxpayers and using it to prop up poorly managed banks, the government artificially kept home prices high, eliminating the opportunity for the average person to take advantage of the cheaper homes in the recession. As low as the home prices are, they are still artificially high because the banks don't have to sell the homes the foreclose on, since they now have our money to keep their business running. So Donald Trump got rich because he is smart, not because he is rich.

I also asked who pays for employees' health insurance - "employers". Does the company consider the cost of health insurance when determining how much to pay an employee? - "yes". So who pays for health insurance? - "the employee". So is government forcing insurance good for small business? We'll leave it there...

We covered many topics, mostly around entrepreneurship, risk and reward, taxes (including hidden taxes), regulations, and how much a company must to do comply that costs them money and time, without revenue for them. My last comment was that I talk economics with many people, and few understand it in even a basic way. Learning economics will act as insurance against being poor. The market cycles, and they are in school in a down cycle, and knowing about cycles, and not getting into debt will give them a much better chance at a good life.

It is very fulfilling being involved with Junior Achievement. If you haven't been involved yet, you should contact your local school and see if they participate, and how you can help.