A Seattle weekend. Because I need to find that short on the Honda, it’s been pouring rain since before dawn. The good news is I may have inspired Alaine to learn spreadsheets. She called to say she’s taking a course, I think she said at the community college. That’s a great place to network. Mind you, private tutorials are still the best avenue for most grown-ups. I think it is because we all learn to imitate what we perceive as useful.
Different topic. Here’s a reminder that I taught continuing ed for years. So in addition to the standard issues of adult back to school trauma, I have a few less common observations. Adults are fussier over teacher personality, so class time has to be devoted to “making friends”, often at the expense of the other students. I have seen adults repeat a course they already know to appear smarter the second time around. It would seem to me that school makes all adults more intelligent simply because they are “out there”.
Back to Alaine, she is learning the Apple spreadsheet called “Numbers”. I don’t know that one but back in 1981 I studied Visi-calc on my ][e. Because I’m such a nice guy, I’m going to supply you with the greatest formula I have ever developed, and it was very long ago. If you are really a programmer, you can easily read this left-to-right. If you are not, see if you can grasp the implications (of why this is useful). If it doesn’t make sense at all, are you sure you are even reading the right blog? Hint: it has to do with running totals and how I learned spreadsheets long before there were click-buttons for tricky things like zero suppression. Here is the formula:
"=SUMIF(TNX!C:C,"=1225",TNX!E:E)-(SUMIF(TNX!C:C,"=1225",TNX!F:F))"
I spent an hour in the book store. Prices have skyrocketed. My cheap magazine, “Nuts & Volts” is $7.00 a copy and they’ve been steadily running out of interesting articles for years. The ads are more informative than the content, often the ads are the first place I learn of something new. Ordinary paperback textbooks now cost $40.00, a doubling in price for the type I used to buy. Instead, I decided to power-read my existing material on nanotechnology. I already own a quarter ton of books that are difficult enough to understand.
Many of those books concern the ocean. Here’s trivia, did you know that blind cormorants have been found in perfect health? How can this be? Life in the sunlit areas of water is constrained by the available supply of nutrients, of which there is a constant drain as life dies and slowly sinks to the bottom. But wherever that deep sea mush is disturbed enough to rise, you get what is called an upwelling. The most famous is the Humbolt, off the west coast of South America. The seabed nutrients are swirled back to the surface by prevailing ocean currents.
That’s probably good, because the seashore nearby is practically devoid of life. The sea produces untold tons of krill, I’m told the water where they best thrive is a muddy brown from the mingling of benthic particulates. Whales eat this krill, but so do seabirds, including the cormorants. Some studies say the birds can hunt by sound alone. Either way the water is so full of food that blind birds get enough to eat.
Snipers, there’s an odd topic. There is a special unit of snipers in the US forces that don’t shoot at enemy soldiers. They use a brute of a rifle that fires 50 caliber slugs at “high cost” structures. That would include the other side’s fuel trucks, radar dishes, and missiles. Since these targets are larger, they can be hit from a mile away. The identity of the snipers is a secret but I saw a video of one of them plugging hit after hit right on target. That has implications.
I called a lady for a late Friday date. This may seem last-minute, but I learned long ago that women who are really single can drop everything on a date night. (Guys, this only works if she is actually home alone on a Friday, so use sparingly or you’ll be dealing with social outcasts.) Any hesitation tells you there is someone they have to consult. This works both ways, but if I answer the phone on Friday night, I’m available. Sadly, this lady made all the wrong moves.
Another fact of bachelorhood is you meet so many women who have predetermined notions. I know at a glance it appears I drive a motorcycle and play guitar. Fallacy: I am a teenager who never matured. Fact: I’m so mature I can get out there and do what most men only talk about. In the vernacular, “maturity” stops people from doing what they want, in my book it spurs them on.
Trivia. The Confederate flag was not the flag of the Confederacy. It represents the constellation of the Southern Cross, and was only used as a battle flag. It never flew in any state capitol or government buildings. You might say it belonged only to the Confederate Army, technically the bravest and best force the USA has ever seen, including today. And the vast majority of the “rebels” never owned a slave.
ADDENDUM
Following is a marginally advanced concept on the money supply, which I read up on in connection with silver. I was intrigued by how most people want money to pay off their debt. Presumably once their loans are repaid, their income is now free to enjoy. They actually view repaying a loan as somehow different than spending. That’s not very bright of them. Plus, most of them never get that far.
Here’s an unusual perspective on debt. If you borrow, it is understood you owe the interest plus the principle. But, in the long term, the interest becomes more than the principle. Do the math on a thirty-year mortgage. Today I read that only the principle actually exists, that is, if you could count all the money in the world, it comes out to exactly the principle. How can this be? It turns out nobody really knows for sure, but the effect of this contradiction is very well understood: Interest must come from a vicious circle of other debt.
In other words, interest must ultimately come from the principle of others who cannot pay back their debts. Ah, I can think of a recent crisis that does exactly that. The part of the house the bankrupt loses is his principle in the property, not the future interest he cannot pay. Nobody notices the problem much as long as the economy keeps expanding.
This always struck me as wrong. I’ve traveled enough to know that America is unique in this aspect. Other nations are poor, but the man in the street doesn’t owe anything. Yet here, where the country is enormously rich, the average person spends his life owing money to the banks? I believe I am the only working man I know who hasn’t made a payment to a bank in twenty-five years. (I know of some self-employed who’ve managed the same, but even that is rare.)
As said, I was actually studying about silver metal. Metal (not coins) is inconvenient as currency because you have to count it. (One does not count a twenty-dollar bill, one “reads” it.) The very concept of paper money arose from the difficulty of carrying and exchanging metal, a well-studied connection. Keep the metal safe in a vault and trade the receipts. Those that own the vault soon learn the real meaning of temptation.
What I was trying to determine is the saturation point for silver ownership. You see, speculating is the same everywhere—it only works when very few people do it. I’m not watching for silver to appreciate across the board. I’m calculating there will be a massive panic when some currency collapses, shooting prices up to $500 per ounce or more. Just for a day or two. I can’t justify it, but I think maybe one person in a thousand will make any money on that event.
