This is my first post from Safari in OS X (10.5.4) “Leopard”.  

Sure, I thought there was a good reason to get a Mac laptop, but if you are an old Microsoft hound, there is a steep learning curve.  Things just do not work the same on the Mac.

I have had several problems, but they are mainly dealing with my use of Windows on the Mac.  You can dual-boot.  That is, boot into either Windows XP Pro or into OS X.  However, Since I do not normally reboot more than every other week or so, because I normally just hibernate or use “Stand By” when I am in XP, this does not give me much occasion to use the Mac OS, and this was not acceptable because I wanted to be able to also use and learn the Mac OS and its applications.  

So I started using Parallels.  I have 3 days left on my “free trial” before I have to actually make the purchase. 

The real issue though is that I would like to actually use 4 operating systems on this machine.  I just got the Windows 7 64-bit release a couple of days ago.  However, the Mac only allows so many partitions and I am having to do a lot of online studying to try to figure out how to be able to run Windows 7 and Linux, while still running XP Pro and OS X.  

I have heard that Windows 7 has an XP mode where you can run Windows XP inside a virtual machine that is built into Windows 7.  In that event, it might be that I need to uninstall my XP Pro and install W7 instead and then re-install XP Pro inside of the Windows 7 virtual machine.  I could theoretically then launch OX S, launch Parallels Windows 7, and then launch XP Pro (if I needed it). It might be that Windows 7 will satisfy me and I won’t need to run XP Pro inside of it, but I’ve heard some applications will not run in Windows 7.

Then there’s the issue of running Linux.  I know several years ago Linux required 4 separate partitions.  I am not sure how the Ubuntu 9.04 64-bit version I have will run, or what file system it will use.  I have already installed Ubuntu but it is now unresponsive and Parallels tells me “This virtual machine is not available”. 

Last night after installing Partition Magic 8.0 inside the XP Pro virtual machine and then shutting down XP Pro and then rebooting into XP Pro the Mac blue screened on me and immediately rebooted again.  I tried safe mode, but it would not work either.  I then launched OX S and tried to open XP Pro as a virtual machine and it was a no-go also.  

So, fortunately, I had my XP Pro CD with me and I booted from it and was able to repair my XP Pro installation via the recovery console, I think using “chkdsk \r”.  It took a couple of hours to run and did have to re-write some things, but XP worked like a champ after that in both dual boot mode and in the Parallels Virtual Machine.

However, now Ubuntu Linux will not run, and I think that is a consequence of my installing Partition Magic 8.0 and then having to fix my XP Pro installation using the recovery console.  

I did launch Ubuntu once after installing it, as a virtual machine.  I have no idea where it is installed as I only have two partitions on this Mac hard drive, the HFS+ (native Mac file system, which I had actually never heard of before buying this Mac, showing you how Maclueless I was.  The HFS+ is a 100 GB partition.  The other partition is NTFS (200 GB), which I created using Apple’s “Boot Camp” application, allowing dual booting.

However, after installing XP Pro I found out that OS X could not read files on the NTFS partition.  I was feeling pretty stupid at this point for ever buying a Mac.  I have recently installed MacFUSE, which is a backwards engineered NTFS file read/write open source app (because Microsoft would not release the up-front code for NFTS).  So, now I can read my NTFS partition from OS X without XP Pro even running.  

I also installed NTFS-3G which is a driver that works with virtually all types of file systems, and MacFUSE comes with NTFS-3G, even though I had previously installed MacFUSE. 

Last night I tried to open a movie.avi in OS X and it gave me 3 choices of how to run the file, Windows Media Player, Real Player, or Power DVD, all installed on XP Pro.  I selected Real Player and this launched XP as a virtual machine and started Real Player and the movie started automatically.  I was a bit impressed with that, but I was hoping to watch the movie in OS X.  So, that’s something I’ll have to figure out later, how to run DivX and AVI and MPEG files in OS X.  QuickTime Player does not seem to support these formats, but maybe I just need some plugins for it.

Boot Camp cannot handle triple booting without some modifications, so I am still contemplating some options, but I am considering my options now.  It may be that I will simply install some OSes on an external drive and see if that works.  However, from what I am reading on the ‘net now, it seems I have to install Linux before installing Windows and I also have to uninstall XP Pro before installing Windows 7.

Also, it seems I cannot use Partition Magic 8 to do any of this, but that I will need to install rEFIt and iPartition as well

Hopefully, at this end of this arduous path I will have found some degree of enlightenment and become a better and more useful person, but right now, the road is still very steep and rough. Â

Having a powerful laptop, for me, is essential.  And it has to be reliable too.

My Dell XPS Gen2 that I bought back in August 2005 was the most smoking-hot laptop on the market at the time I got her, bless her little heart, and she did me well for about 3.7 years, more than half a year beyond her 3-year full-deal complete package warranty ran out.  The only thing wrong with it is the IDE hard drive started going bad and I can only run it in safe mode now and virtually every application I try to launch tells me I have to re-install it.  Still, even with it’s single core cpu, it’s still probably as fast as many of the laptops in the Philippines that sell for PHP 25,000 to 35,000.  Once I find a replacement hard drive for it, I will pass it on to someone else.  It was and still is one cool laptop, and it probably still has a good 3 more years left in it.  (I know of some people that are still using Pentium II’s, like 400 and 600 mhz models.)

However, I am beginning to get used to my new MacBook Pro and she is turning out to be suprisingly cool.  She’s got the same footprint size as my XPS, but she’s more than 1/2 inch slimmer and about half the weight.

I was running this baby in dual-boot mode, where I had Windows XP (SP3) running on a separate partition, but it was bothering me that I could not suspend or hibernate XP and then boot into the Mac OS and try to learn how to use it.  I would have to totally shut down Windows to boot into the Mac OS.

So, I have this one client who has always used a Mac and as soon as I saw her ICQ ID come online I hit her up, asking her how was I ever going to learn the Mac OS and the software it runs, if I am always running XP, and I also asked her, without stopping to catch my breath, how did she run some of the SEO tools that are only made for Windows machines.

“Parallels”, she tell me.

So, I check it out, Parallels and I am impressed.  I tried VMware a few years ago and was not able to make good use of it, and while they have improved a lot since then, in comparing them to Parallels, well, VMware is in 2nd place.

I didn’t know much about how to install it, so I just followed the instructions, thinking I would have to do a complete re-install of my XP Pro, but lo and behold, Parallels just went ahead and found my XP installation and integrated it.  Now I’m running XP as a virtual machine while booted into the Apple OS.

I can also install Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Linux.  I have not been impressed with Vista, although I have it running on a couple of desktops in my house (for other people to use), I am seriously thinking of buying a legitimate copy and trying it out.  After all, I do run a high-tech company and many clients and clients’s clients and their users as well use Vista, so I should probably at least get more familiar with it than I already am.  That kind of falls under my job description

Right now I am downloading the 64-bit version of Ubuntu 9.04, a free Linux distribution, which I intend to install.  Ubuntu will fit on a CD, it is less than 700 MB, however, they say you need 4 GB of free space to install it.

And I am also downloading the 64-bit version of Windows 7, which is 3 GB.  It will take me days to download that.

The nice thing about all this is that I could run all these OS’s at the same time running Parallels in the Mac OS.

I have installed several versions of Linux over the past few years (not in the last 3 years) and I just could never quite get the hang of it.  There was always some need to run some command line to get some software or device driver installed, and while I can still run some DOS command  lines (thanks Mom for helping me in those early days), I just never got the hang of it in Linux, and I don’t want to.

Oh, and I heard Windows 7 (final) will be out before the end of October.  Yeah, this year.  That’s 5 months from now.  And it is supposed to be EXPENSIVE.

The World economy is tanking and is not expected to recover for years.  Windows 7 is the best thing on the “Windows” horizon, but no one is going to be able to afford it.  That’s one good reason to try a Mac and to try Linux.

So, I have a 320 GB hard drive on this Mac:
Mac OS X
Windows XP
Windows Vista
Windows 7
Ubunto Linux

I am going to have to run multiple partitions.  Windows will only boot if it is one of the first three partitions, so I am wondering if Parallels will be able to handle that, since I’ll have 5 OS’s running on this machine at the same time.

The only OS that will be 32-bit will be my XP Pro installation.  Oh, and I have had to re-activate my XP Pro three times now since instaling it on the Mac.  Once it went through online, no problem.  The 2nd two times I had to do it via the telephone, talking to a freaking robot.

I simply can hardly stand the wait to get a 8-core CPU running at 3.2 Ghz (or higher) with a pair of terabyte hard drives running in a RAID 0 stripe.  Maybe by Christmas 2010 I’ll be able to buy a Mac with those specs.

Now, am I the coolest guy you ever met?  That you’ve yet to meet?  That you’ve never met?  That you want to meet?

I would say Jil used to have “the best ex-pat blog in CdO”, but Jil recently and permanently moved to Jasaan and only makes it into CdO once a week or so, so he’s really not perfectly qualified to be called the best ex-pat blogger in CdO.  Perhaps that title still belongs to me despite the fact that my Alexa ranking went from 175,000 or so to 1.3 M since I haven’t posted much of anything original since last year.

I know Jil because while he’s from New York, he’s been living in Asia for the past six years or so with the first five of those years in Thailand.  He heard that Filipinas were much more caring and ended up making contact with a beautiful lass from Jasaan.  In trying to research the Philippines, Jasaan, and Cagayan de Oro (the closest city with anything like a movie theater or McDonalds) he happened upon my own blog and we began corresponding.

My blog has taken a nose-dive, mostly because I have failed to keep it updated on a regular basis, and because of that I would like to turn my readers attention to the best authored ex-pat blog in Northern Mindanao, Jil Wrinkle’s Blog itelf.  I find I spend more time reading his blog then even contemplating new posts for my own.

Jil tells it like it is, and I’m proud to see someone, a foreigner, speak out as he does, even if I don’t agree with everything he says.  However, his English is outstanding and his blog is a delight to read even if I don’t care to hear about birds knocking themselves out on the windows of his jungle perch.

Keep it up, Jil! Welcome to the Philippines and don’t let anyone scare you.  I got your back.

Last August 2008 my 3-year warranty expired on my Dell XPS Gen2 laptop with a 2 Ghz Centrino CPU and 2 GBs of RAM. At the time I bought it it was the hottest machine on the market, and I thought for sure in 3 years I would be able to replace it, but last August the World economy was still tanking (and I suppose still is for most people), and I was hesitant to spend for a new laptop when my old one was still getting me by. Besides it still looked like a model from next year.

Yet, a couple of weeks ago it took a nose dive on me and if it wasn’t for CTO Rex Cortez I wouldn’t be anywhere close to having my head back on straight.

After the 100 GB XPS’s hard drive crashed I began scouring Cagayan de Oro for the highest spec laptop in town. There were only two places in town that had a laptop valued at more than 50,000 pesos, the Sony Store in Limketkai Mall, which didn’t have quite the specs I would settle for, and the Digital Hub, upstairs at Limketkai, that specializes in Apple computers and Ipods. They had one MacBook Pro that had 2 GB of RAM and a max screen resolution of 1440 x 900, that they wanted 153,000 pesos for. The Sony I had looked at had a max screen resolution of 1920 x 1080 (HDTV standard) and I had walked away from it, and it was for only 129,000 pesos. I wanted at least 1920 x 1200 like my old XPS had.

As I was about to walk out, wondering where I would go next, the sales-guy tells me he has one MacBook Pro in the back at a special price and perhaps I would like to take a look at it. Since I had no idea where to go next, I told him “okay” expecting to be disappointed yet again, but he walked out and put in my hands a brand new MacBook Pro, dual-core 2.5 Mhz, 4 GB RAM (DDR2 and I was really hoping for DDR3), and wait, it has WUXGA screen resolution, that’s 1920 x 1200 pixels of perfection.
He whispers “122,000 pesos”.

I did the one eye- brow lift Spock intrigue look for him and asked “what’s wrong with it?”

“It has never been out of the box”, he said.

“Let’s fire it up!” I said, and we did.

Now I was really hoping to get an Asus G71 with 64-bit Vista and 8 GB or DDR3 RAM and a quad-core 2 Ghz or 2.2 Ghz CPU, but realizing it would take a month to get one, this Apple notebook began to look pretty precious to me.

It didn’t take long for Daddy to scoop this one up and take it home. (Actually, I went straight to the office to unmask it before Rex, hoping to get his approval.)

I didn’t realize it would take over a week to get XP installed on it, with email up and running and to have it be able to Hibernate. When you run as many applications as I do use your laptop in 3 or 4 places per day, you really do not have time to do a fresh boot every time. Either Standby or Hibernate has to work.

I even got Halo 1 to run on it, uh, just to make sure the video drivers in XP were working properly.
More, probably much more, later.

Farewell, beloved Country, treasured region of the sun,
Pearl of the sea of the Orient, our lost Eden!
To you eagerly I surrender this sad and gloomy life;
And were it brighter, fresher, more florid,
Even then I’d give it to you, for your sake alone.

In fields of battle, deliriously fighting,
Others give you their lives, without doubt, without regret;
The place matters not: where there’s cypress, laurel or lily,
On a plank or open field, in combat or cruel martyrdom,
It’s all the same if the home or country asks.

I die when I see the sky has unfurled its colors
And at last after a cloak of darkness announces the day;
If you need scarlet to tint your dawn,
Shed my blood, pour it as the moment comes,
And may it be gilded by a reflection of the heaven’s newly-born light.

My dreams, when scarcely an adolescent,
My dreams, when a young man already full of life,
Were to see you one day, jewel of the sea of the Orient,
Dry those eyes of black, that forehead high,
Without frown, without wrinkles, without stains of shame.

My lifelong dream, my deep burning desire,
This soul that will soon depart cries out: Salud!
To your health! Oh how beautiful to fall to give you flight,
To die to give you life, to die under your sky,
And in your enchanted land eternally sleep.

If upon my grave one day you see appear,
Amidst the dense grass, a simple humble flower,
Place it near your lips and my soul you’ll kiss,
And on my brow may I feel, under the cold tomb,
The gentle blow of your tenderness, the warmth of your breath.

Let the moon see me in a soft and tranquil light,
Let the dawn send its fleeting radiance,
Let the wind moan with its low murmur,
And should a bird descend and rest on my cross,
Let it sing its canticle of peace.

Let the burning sun evaporate the rains,
And with my clamor behind, towards the sky may they turn pure;
Let a friend mourn my early demise,
And in the serene afternoons, when someone prays for me,
O Country, pray to God also for my rest!

Pray for all the unfortunate ones who died,
For all who suffered torments unequaled,
For our poor mothers who in their grief and bitterness cry,
For orphans and widows, for prisoners in torture,
And for yourself pray that your final redemption you’ll see.

And when the cemetery is enveloped in dark night,
And there, alone, only those who have gone remain in vigil,
Disturb not their rest, nor the mystery,
And should you hear chords from a zither or psaltery,
It is I, beloved Country, singing to you.

And when my grave, then by all forgotten,
has not a cross nor stone to mark its place,
Let men plow and with a spade scatter it,
And before my ashes return to nothing,
May they be the dust that carpets your fields.

Then nothing matters, cast me in oblivion.
Your atmosphere, your space and valleys I’ll cross.
I will be a vibrant and clear note to your ears,
Aroma, light, colors, murmur, moan, and song,
Constantly repeating the essence of my faith.

My idolized country, sorrow of my sorrows,
Beloved Filipinas, hear my last good-bye.
There I leave you all, my parents, my loves.
I’ll go where there are no slaves, hangmen nor oppressors,
Where faith doesn’t kill, where the one who reigns is God.

Goodbye, dear parents, brother and sisters, fragments of my soul,
Childhood friends in the home now lost,
Give thanks that I rest from this wearisome day;
Goodbye, sweet foreigner, my friend, my joy;
Farewell, loved ones, to die is to rest.

José Rizal, 1896

(Modern English translation by Edwin Agustín Lozada)

¡Adiós, Patria adorada, región del sol querida,
Perla del mar de oriente, nuestro perdido Edén!
A darte voy alegre la triste mustia vida,
Y fuera más brillante, más fresca, más florida,
También por ti la diera, la diera por tu bien.

En campos de batalla, luchando con delirio,
Otros te dan sus vidas sin dudas, sin pesar;
El sitio nada importa, ciprés, laurel o lirio,
Cadalso o campo abierto, combate o cruel martirio,
Lo mismo es si lo piden la patria y el hogar.

Yo muero cuando veo que el cielo se colora
Y al fin anuncia el día tras lóbrego capuz;
si grana necesitas para teñir tu aurora,
Vierte la sangre mía, derrámala en buen hora
Y dórela un reflejo de su naciente luz.

Mis sueños cuando apenas muchacho adolescente,
Mis sueños cuando joven ya lleno de vigor,
Fueron el verte un día, joya del mar de oriente,
Secos los negros ojos, alta la tersa frente,
Sin ceño, sin arrugas, sin manchas de rubor

Ensueño de mi vida, mi ardiente vivo anhelo,
¡Salud te grita el alma que pronto va a partir!
¡Salud! Ah, que es hermoso caer por darte vuelo,
Morir por darte vida, morir bajo tu cielo,
Y en tu encantada tierra la eternidad dormir.

Si sobre mi sepulcro vieres brotar un día
Entre la espesa yerba sencilla, humilde flor,
Acércala a tus labios y besa al alma mía,
Y sienta yo en mi frente bajo la tumba fría,
De tu ternura el soplo, de tu hálito el calor.

Deja a la luna verme con luz tranquila y suave,
Deja que el alba envíe su resplandor fugaz,
Deja gemir al viento con su murmullo grave,
Y si desciende y posa sobre mi cruz un ave,
Deja que el ave entone su cántico de paz.

Deja que el sol, ardiendo, las lluvias evapore
Y al cielo tornen puras, con mi clamor en pos;
Deja que un ser amigo mi fin temprano llore
Y en las serenas tardes cuando por mí alguien ore,
¡Ora también, oh Patria, por mi descanso a Dios!

Ora por todos cuantos murieron sin ventura,
Por cuantos padecieron tormentos sin igual,
Por nuestras pobres madres que gimen su amargura;
Por huérfanos y viudas, por presos en tortura
Y ora por ti que veas tu redención final.

Y cuando en noche oscura se envuelva el cementerio
Y solos sólo muertos queden velando allí,
No turbes su reposo, no turbes el misterio,
Tal vez acordes oigas de cítara o salterio,
Soy yo, querida Patria, yo que te canto a ti.

Y cuando ya mi tumba de todos olvidada
No tenga cruz ni piedra que marquen su lugar,
Deja que la are el hombre, la esparza con la azada,
Y mis cenizas, antes que vuelvan a la nada,
El polvo de tu alfombra que vayan a formar.

Entonces nada importa me pongas en olvido.
Tu atmósfera, tu espacio, tus valles cruzaré.
Vibrante y limpia nota seré para tu oído,
Aroma, luz, colores, rumor, canto, gemido,
Constante repitiendo la esencia de mi fe.

Mi patria idolatrada, dolor de mis dolores,
Querida Filipinas, oye el postrer adiós.
Ahí te dejo todo, mis padres, mis amores.
Voy donde no hay esclavos, verdugos ni opresores,
Donde la fe no mata, donde el que reina es Dios.

Adiós, padres y hermanos, trozos del alma mía,
Amigos de la infancia en el perdido hogar,
Dad gracias que descanso del fatigoso día;
Adiós, dulce extranjera, mi amiga, mi alegría,
Adiós, queridos seres, morir es descansar.

José Rizal, 1896

So, some people are asking my why I haven’t posted a new blog post in two months now.

Good question, and not one easily answered.

I would recommend Jungle Jil’s Blog for updates about ex-pat life in the CdO area and Northern Mindanao. I found a great link on his blog to a terrible Baseline Economic Scenario prediction. The article is great, but unsettling.

I was expecting an economic downturn beginning in 2010 to 2011 as a result of baby-boomers going into retirement (If you were born in 1946, you would turn 65 in 2011), but this economic crisis has nothing to do with that, and that’s what worries me. Because I still think the baby-boomers going into retirement is going to create some sluggishness in the World economy (not just the U.S.).

So, what’s that got to do with me not blogging as much as I used to?

Well, my clients are mainly from 1st World, industrialized nations. Late last year we lost two clients who’s loss is directly attributable to the economic downturn. We lost another client to a traffic accident fatality and the resultant probate status of his estate, which meant we probably wouldn’t get paid for a long time.

However, I saw the economic downturn as a chance for growth in my industry. “My industry” is a fairly specialized niche market. I have a Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) that specializes in Search Engine Otimization (SEO), it might be better described as Search Engine Marketing (SEM), but I really prefer the term SEO, and all the meaning that differentiates it from SEM, but we do SEM also. SEO is a subset of SEM.

Indeed, we have grown as a result of the economic crisis. Business still need to do business. They just need to do it cheaper than they did before, which at least in some cases means outsourcing to places where labor is cheaper, and The Philippines is the perfect place. The country is 85% Catholic, is the most “westernized” country in all of Asia, and English is widely spoken here.

So, I have been quite busy trying to capture some of that market, and we have, but at the same time that means my intellectual overhead goes through the roof and one of the first things I have to do is stop blogging so much, because I do not blog for fame or profit. It’s more of an escape valve. It is a way to keep my State-side family current on my affairs, and it is a way to dump personal and digital data so that I do not have to keep it in my head or on my PC.

I do have a lot of stuff I would like to post. I yearn for the opportunity. I have been involved with so many great things recently I would really like to tell the World about it, but at the same time I have a personal and professional obligation to make the most of things while the opportunity is at hand.

On the other hand, I also believe there is an Asian bubble that is going to burst and one of those results will be Philippines real estate values. The prices in some places here are just unbelievably high.

That being said, I will probably, at some future date, and as time allows, back-fill some blog posts back into December, January, February, and March, just to keep events chronological.

Also, I would like to say thank you to me few regular readers who have complained and led me to take the time to write this post. I will be back, but right now, I have a to-do list that has to be seen to.

Let Free Enterprise Work Its Course!
Something to think about

GM supplier answers GM President Troy Clarke’s “plea” with a great response.

This is one of the greatest responses to the requests for bailout money I have seen thus far. As a supplier for the Big 3 this man received a letter from the President of GM North America requesting support for the bailout program.His response is classic, and has to make you proud of a local guy who tells it like it is. Let the United States Nationalize? Please, God, help us all!

Dear Employees & Suppliers,

Congress and the current Administration will soon determine whether to provide immediate support to the domestic auto industry to help it through one of the most difficult economic times in our nation’s history. Your elected officials must hear from all of us now on why this support is critical to our continuing the progress we began prior to the global financial crisis………As an employee or supplier, you have a lot at stake and continue to be one of our most effective and passionate voices. I know GM can count on you to have your voice heard. Thank you for your urgent action and ongoing support.

Troy Clarke President General Motors North America

Response from:

Gregory Knox, Pres.
Knox Machinery Company
Franklin, Ohio

Gentlemen:

In response to your request to contact legislators and ask for a bailout for the Big Three automakers please consider the following, and please pass my thoughts on to Troy Clark, President of General Motors North America.

Politicians and Management of the Big 3 are both infected with the same entitlement mentality that has spread like cancerous germs in UAW halls for the last countless decades, and whose plague is now sweeping this nation, awaiting our new “messiah”, Pres-elect Obama, to wave his magic wand and make all our problems go away, while at the same time allowing our once great nation to keep “living the dream”… Believe me folks, the dream is over!

This dream where we can ignore the consumer for years while management myopically focuses on its personal rewards packages at the same time that our factories have been filled with the world’s most overpaid, arrogant, ignorant and laziest entitlement minded “laborers” without paying the price for these atrocities… this dream where you still think the masses will line up to buy our products forever and ever.

Don’t even think about telling me I’m wrong. Don’t accuse me of not knowing of what I speak. I have called on Ford, GM, Chrysler, TRW, Delphi, KelseyHayes, American Axle and countless other automotive OEM’s throughout the Midwest during the past 30 years and what I’ve seen over those years in these union shops can only be described as disgusting.

Troy Clarke, President of General Motors North America, states: “There is widespread sentiment throughout this country, and our government, and especially via the news media, that the current crisis is completely the result of bad management which it certainly is not.”

You’re right Mr. Clarke, it’s not JUST management… how about the electricians who walk around the plants like lords in feudal times, making people wait on them for countless hours while they drag ass… so they can come in on the weekend and make double and triple time… for a job they easily could have done within their normal 40 hour work week. How about the line workers who threaten newbies with all kinds of scare tactics for putting out too many parts on a shift… and for being too productive. (We certainly must not expose those lazy bums who have been getting overpaid for decades for their horrific underproduction, must we?!?)

Do you folks really not know about this stuff?!? How about this great sentiment abridged from Mr. Clarke’s sad plea: “over the last few years…we have closed the quality and efficiency gaps with our competitors.” What the hell has Detroit been doing for the last 40 years?!? Did we really JUST wake up to the gaps in quality and efficiency between us and them? The K car vs. the Accord? The Pinto vs. the Civic?!? Do I need to go on? What a joke!

We are living through the inevitable outcome of the actions of the United States auto industry for decades. It’s time to pay for your sins, Detroit.

I attended an economic summit last week where brilliant economist, Alan Beaulieu, from the Institute of Trend Research, surprised the crowd when he said he would not have given the banks a penny of “bailout money”.”Yes, he said, this would cause short term problems,” but despite what people like politicians and corporate magnates would have us believe, the sun would in fact rise the next day… and the following very important thing would happen…where there had been greedy and sloppy banks, new efficient ones would pop up… that is how a free market system works… it does work… if we would only let it work…”

But for some nondescript reason we are now deciding that the rest of the world is right and that capitalism doesn’t work - that we need the government to step in and “save us”… Save us my ass, Hell - we’re nationalizing…and unfortunately too many of our once fine nation’s citizens don’t even have a clue that this is what is really happening… But, they sure can tell you the stats on their favorite sports teams… yeah - THAT’S really important, isn’t it…

Does it ever occur to ANYONE that the “competition” has been producing vehicles, EXTREMELY PROFITABLY, for decades in this country? How can that be??? Let’s see… Fuel efficient… Listening to customers… Investing in the proper tooling and automation for the long haul…

Not being too complacent or arrogant to listen to Dr. W. Edwards Deming four decades ago when he taught that by adopting appropriate principles of management, organizations could increase quality and simultaneously reduce costs. Ever increased productivity through quality and intelligent planning…Treating vendors like strategic partners, rather than like “the enemy”… Efficient front and back offices… Non union environment…

Again, I could go on and on, but I really wouldn’t be telling anyone anything they really don’t already know down deep in their hearts.

I have six children, so I am not unfamiliar with the concept of wanting someone to bail you out of a mess that you have gotten yourself into - my children do this on a weekly, if not daily basis, as I did when I was their age. I do for them what my parents did for me (one of their greatest gifts, by the way) - I make them stand on their own two feet and accept the consequences of their actions and work through it. Radical concept, huh… Am I there for them in the wings? Of course - but only until such time as they need to be fully on their own as adults.

I don’t want to oversimplify a complex situation, but there certainly are unmistakable parallels here between the proper role of parenting and government. Detroit and the United States need to pay for their sins. Bad news people - its coming whether we like it or not. The newly elected Messiah really doesn’t have a magic wand big enough to “make it all go away.” I laughed as I heard Obama “reeling it back in” almost immediately after the final vote count was tallied…”we really might not do it in ayear…or in four…” Where the Hell was that kind of talk when he was RUNNING for office.

Stop trying to put off the inevitable folks… That house in Florida really isn’t worth $750,000… People who jump across a border really don’t deserve free health care benefits… That job driving that forklift for the Big 3 really isn’t worth $85,000 a year… We really shouldn’t allow WalMart to stock their shelves with products acquired from a country that unfairly manipulates their currency and has the most atrocious human rights infractions on the face of the globe…

That couple whose combined income is less than $50,000 really shouldn’t beliving in that $485,000 home… Let the market correct itself folks - it will. Yes it will be painful, but it’s gonna be painful either way, and the bright side of my proposal is that on the other side of it all, is a nation that appreciates what it has…and doesn’t live beyond its means…and gets back to basics…and redevelops the patriotic work ethic that made it the greatest nation in the history of the world…and probably turns back to God.

Sorry - don’t cut my head off, I’m just the messenger sharing with you the”bad news”. I hope you take it to heart.

Gregory J. Knox, President
Knox Machinery, Inc.
Franklin, Ohio 45005

I don’t think I have ever been to a birthday party for a one-year-old child in America. I can’t even ever remember having heard of one before. It’s not that I have declined to attend, or that I’ve never been invited (for I haven’t), but I’ve never even heard of one.

Here in The Philippines the biggest birthday party is for one-year-olds. I have been to several. Christenings are relatively large events, but not quite as big as birthday parties for one-year-olds. Of course, it’s all relative to what one can afford.

After seeing a few of these birthday parties I was determined that we (my wife, myself and my son) would not succumb to squandering money on a birthday party the baby would never remember. It just didn’t make sense to me, but Marissa insisted. And, in the same way my wedding cost me twice as much as I thought it would, this party also cost me about twice what I thought it would.

I really didn’t have to do much in the way of party preparations except hand over money to Marissa, but doing so made me really think about what such a large birthday party is all about. It is a cultural phenomenon. Scientifically minded, and interested in culteral anthropology, I set about thinking about the cause of this phenomena…and ding, it came to me.

It is all about infant mortality and survival. It is an introduction of a child who is likely to survive to maturity to the community he will live in.

I couldn’t find any World statistics on infant mortality that went back further than 1960, but in 1850, in the United States, 15% of babies did not survive their first year. That’s as lethal as being a Civil War soldier.

Now imagine The Philippines. There are only two known examples of written language previous to the Spanish colonization of this archipelago less than 500 years ago. There was no ice, no refrigeration, and no air conditioning here before the 1940’s, and of course very little modern medicine. The country was by a wide margin culturally tribal. Malaria, Polio, Tetanus. Diarrhea, Typhoid, Tuberculosis, Cholera, Measles, Flu, Dengue, Malnutrition, and Pneumonia,had their way with the populace, and killed most people before they survived their first year.

Three of Abraham Lincoln’s four sons died young,as did four of Karl Marx’s seven sons, and three of the five children of Louis and Marie Pasteur. Can you imagine then what the infant mortality rate in The Philippines was on an archeological scale? It is only in modern times, in the past 50 to 60 years that sewage systems and safe drinking water practices have been put into effect, and vaccinations as well, even though such practices have not been fully disseminated throughout the Philippines. There are still tribal regions without such modern necessities.

I would bet that at least half the children of the Philippines did not survive their first year as far back as one hundred years and more. Probably less. Thus, my realization of why there is a cultural practice of having large celebrations for a child’s first birthday was a saddening and sobering thought. Children probably have a higher chance of reaching reproductive age if they survive their first year than surviving their first year.

My child has probably never had a drink of anything that did not come from distilled water, or some other decontaminating pasteurization process. He’s been bitten by maybe five mosquitos and always sleeps under a mosquito net. I think he has bumped his head one time. Diaper rash and diarrhea has been virtually non-existent.

It is little surprise my son survived his first year, so why all the hoopla?
Because it’s tradition. Welcome to the tribe my son.

I wanted to be able to fully strip and replace parts of a Colt 45 Mark IV .45 caliber and found this remarkable video of how to fully disassemble the sidearm. (On a side note, use an outside workbench or put a few sheets of newspaper on your desk before beginning this process. I also noted it was nice to use a Sharpie and circle and number the parts in the order they came off and group them similar to that shown in the video.