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| In the middle |
| 01.28.04 (7:43 pm) [edit] |
This blog could have been titled "Decisions, Decisions" or even "A Quandary", but let's leave it at "In the Middle" for now.I got a great deal on some hard candy and enjoyed it for a week or so, until I bit down the wrong way and (wait, are you ahead of me already?) broke a tooth. I asked around and had a couple recommendations on the same dentist and called him. He could not fit me in and suggested another dentist. After an x-ray and some poking around, it was determined that to save the tooth (of which there was precious little left) an ONPLANT would be the best choice. Of course, what a surprise, the dentist had equipment to do it, but at least it would be cheaper and faster than a crown. They clean what is left of the tooth and spray a reflective coating on it. Then a small instrument (or camera) is pointed there and they take a 3-d picture. Then on the computer, the dentist makes some 3-d adjustments and a final tooth design is completed. He then sends the info to a machine in the back room. That machine has a small porcelain cube and tiny drills take off the parts that will not be part of the final tooth. The automatic shaping takes all of about 15 to 20 minutes. Within an hour to an hour and a half, you have a new tooth surface on top of the old tooth. The bad part is the $600 bill! As I was sitting in the chair, I was wondering if I should have quickly joined a dental plan, paid the first payment and THEN "discovered" my broken tooth.... Even though I am a bit too honest for that, I didn't really have the money to invest in this, but I was afraid that the remaining tooth would quickly begin to break off and/or I might get other problems. This might have delayed any root canal work the dentist hinted at... A week or so ago I got my high speed Internet in and have been quite happy with it. It is faster than the fiber connection I had in the Atlanta area and the cost will be a bit less. Today I got the bill and found that they were c haring me for cable tv also (which I didn't sign up for). I have been in the house here for a month or so without TV and figured I would save the money for now. I did hook up a TV to the cable to ensure there is no signal, and sure enough, only about 3 channels are clear enough to watch. None were things I would have watched though. SO I called and they will send someone out to verify I don't have TV and stop the billing. Of course, NOW I'm thinking that in a few months I may WANT TV again and they may charge to come out and hook it up... I don't know, it is something like $15 a month (.50 a day), but I still think I'll get the business running faster if I don't have that distraction around. I have plenty of videotapes (from many years ago) that I can watch in the meantime. As an aside, I think I saw a whale breach the other day. A splash that big could have only been a whale. I was 2 miles up the mountain so I can't be sure, but it IS that time of year :-) I have also had two separate visitors from my konaweb.com group stop by to see the farm and a third person arrives on the 4th (the same day the cable company checks my line). For someone out in the boonies, I sure seem to be a stop on the tour, don't I? :-) AS you know if you have been following along the many months, I took an early retirement and my savings are getting quite low. My house in Georgia FINALLY went on the market and I hope to have my two cars up for sale back there in a few days. In the meantime I'm pinching pennies. I also am pushing to get the website ready to sell coffee and make a few dollars. Along those lines, I have an opportunity to continue what I was doing years ago, supporting PC's office technology like LAN's and printers, etc. I can actually get paid for that! Of course, that is the LAST THING that I wanted to do here in Hawaii, but the money will help tide me over. It also means that I'll have to buy another pair of long dress pants (something that goes well with a nice dress Hawaiian shirt :-). Sigh, I guess it could be worse, I could be getting dressed up somewhere OTHER that Paradise... I've completed a few minor repairs around the farm here, but the big repairs will wait for me to actually own it. I'm making great progress on the website and just installed the code to handle all of the "discount coupons) I handed out over the past year. If I want I can implement gift certificates and vouchers, but will probably hold off for now. The new Printer is contacting another Printer to get higher resolution artwork and I'm in the middle of all of the emails. I'm trying to get them to contact each other. I need a scale and some shipping cartons, the credit card interface and a few other things and I'm off and running. Stay tuned..... (as if you could tear yourself away from another THRILL-PACKED adventure???) |
| Not Spiderman... |
| 01.25.04 (1:33 pm) [edit] |
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You may be a neophyte or love pain, but I am not and do not! Over the years 2 things really irk me. I am about ready to take action! The first is X10 ads. I know, they sell great stuff and I have purchased hundreds of dollars worth of stuff from them, and will continue to buy from them. HOWEVER, those constant ads that pop up are quite annoying. YES, there is a way to visit their site and disable the popups for a month, but after 60 times of doing that, it gets to be a pain. I want a permanent solution. If I want their product, I'll go get it. I know better than they do when I'm ready to buy! The second irritation is damn FLASH popups. I do not have flash enabled. I don't want flash enabled, most flash stuff is ads. Some are X10 ads. If a site can only be seen with flash, I won't see it. Simple! The popups that I am speaking of are the "download flash" VARIETY. There are a few REALLY DIFFICULT WAYS of stopping the download message, but it is NOT the way to stop this crap! The best way is to have these companies STOP trying to FORCE me every few minutes to see their crap. They have Freedom of Speech, but I have the Freedom NOT TO LISTEN! This strongarm treatment of "you will do things our way or not at all" is gonna have to stop! Macromedia doesn't care. They will tell you that you just need to install their software and then disable it or live with it. I don't care tyo have their software on my system, PERIOD. They will tell you that THEY are not the people doing the popups, but they also do not offer any way to keep from loading the software. If you don't believe me, go to GOOGLE.COM or METACRAWLER.COM and do a search on "diasble flash" and see how long people have been fighting with this. The government has created a "DO NOT CALL LIST" to address unwanted telephone calls. The Direct Marketing Association has created a "DO NOT MAIL and DO NOT PHONE" listfor their members, because there were reegulations in the wings to force them to do something. My opinion? It is Macromedia's fault that you cannot set a permanent bit to disable the request to download their software (regardless of who does the popup ad). They MUST do this, or the next step is a class acrtion suit against Macromedia, citing their strongarm tactics, our lost time clicking "NO DON'T DOWNLOAD" buttons, and annoyance. I'm sure that a lawyer could word it better but I want something done, and done in a FLASH! |
| This and that |
| 01.22.04 (2:18 am) [edit] |
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Aloha! Thimgs are picking up a bit. I needed a printer and mine had not come in yet, so I borrowed one. Got it home, only to find that I didn't have a cable for it. Today (as usually happens) my printer arrived, so the borrowed printer can go back. Just bringing it home was enough of a threat to make my own printer show up! Then, I have been wanting to borrow a drill so I can relocate my telephone line to a more convenient place by the computer. I have been on dialup for weeks. True to form, my high speed internet got hooked up today. Minutes later, my drill showed up in the mail... I was listening to "Daves Diner" a simulcast rock/oldies show on the radio when I heard a trivia question. I knew the answer, emailed Dave, then promptly went on to other things in another room, only to remember an hour later that I forgot to listen if he mentioned my answer and email. I called my agent yesterday but did not reach her. I sent her email telling her that it is time to list my house in Georgia. That listing will be a "worldwind" one I believe. They will be featuring it on the website, in the magazine, etc. The faster it sells, the faster I can plow down the macnut trees and get the new coffee plants in the ground. Here in paradise (a registered trademark of the Hawaiian Islands), I have yet to hear that the closing date for this farm has ben set. Now that I mentioned it, I fully expect that they will camm me in the morning with the date. This has been a year so far in planning and waiting! Today begins the "Year of the Monkey", but I have already had my hand full chasing other animals around. I have gotten quite good chasing geckos out of the house. Then there are those turkeys, chickens, roosters and quails in the yard. The past week or so has been spent getting my website and shopping cart ready. I told the printer to go ahead and print the front and back labels and await dlivery. I also have decided on my first few website offerings and need to set prices. I got a call two days ago from someone I know whose wife wants to create some gift baskets with my coffee. Now I have to determine how much coffee they want in a bag and whether the bags I have will suffice. Whatever bag I use will have to fit the darn labels. I'll have 5,000 of them and have no plans anytime soon in getting other sizes :-) As you might suspect, the sunsets past the lanai ahve been fantastic! I went down to give them notice that I will be vacating the storage unit at the end of the month and had a nice chat with the resident manager there about computers and LAn, etc. I also am considering a part-time position which will bring in a bit of cash. That would be nice because I have not had a job in quite some time and I am using quite a bit of savings on things like repairing the transmission in the Honda passport, taking care of house repairs and so on. Although I enjoy sitting home doing nothing, extra cash would also be enjoyable. Let's see how that project works out. Until next time... |
| The UPC Scam and trivia question |
| 01.12.04 (12:06 am) [edit] |
|
Before I get on to other things, let me tell you about the scam of UPC codes. You know, UPC codes, those scanable things on everthing you buy. In themselves, they are quite useful. But they also can be big problems. Most stores use scanners to scan the barcoded items. This allows the manufactorers to tag each and every product they have with a seperate number. Each item can then have a different price at any store at any time. The store could chance the price in the computer and hopefully on the shelf, and the items now costs a different price. The cost savings are great. The reduction in manpower to reprice items is significant. The tracking by the manufactorer is great too. Consider now the small businessman, let's say, a coffee farmer, who wants to bag his own coffee and sell it in a store. To do so, he must apply to the ONLY company that issues UPC codes. All of these big stores buy into having just one company issue the numbers, because they are saving money using the system. You can't blame them. Also, the stores don't want to play around with johnny-come-lately companies every week touting their own style of barcodes. So we have this one company issuing codes. Let's say this farm is only expecting to sell a few products. Remember that each product must have its own code. Thus to offer both an 8 oz and a 16 oz bag of two types of coffee woudl take 4 UPC codes. Every size, color and type of item should have it's own code. If you offer 3 gift baskets, add another 3 codes to the total. If you stop selling an item, you are supposed to rfetire that code. So you take this farmer. He starts adding up what he thinks he may need for the total numbers to be assigned. Then he estimates his 1st years sales for the UPC company. They round up the number of UPC codes to issue to 100 and issue their decree. 100 codes for a business which will be expected to make less than $500 from selling these products in stores will have to pay... {LOUD DRUMM ROLL....} $750 for the first year and $150 a year thereafter as a "membership fee"!!!! Can you believe that? All for the chance to sell a few products at a store. How many ways can we screw little businesses? If this was a government regulated item, I'd complain to my elected officials, but the UPC organization is a private organization. By the way, to add insult to injury, let's say that you pony up the dough. To send your kit to a non PO box and have it in less than a few weeks, will cost you another $75 or so! Then to further rub salt in the wound, if you decide not to use the UPC codes, once sent to you, the fees are refundable (minus a $250 administration/restocking fee!!!!!!) This could very well explain why few small companies sell products in a store. So back to my tale... I stopped hearing from the printer who was working on my labels. I had hoped to have them and start shipping coffee BEFORE Christmas. Last week I contacted a new printer and within a week had prices and an assurance the labels could be printed and shipped in 1 week. Friday, the 1st printer sent me a proof, almost a month late! I sent him a nice letter saying "Thanks, but no thanks". Now I have to decide if I want to get the UPC codes, figure out how to get the company identifier number to the printer and get the labels printed and sent to me. THEN I can start shipping coffee. Meanwhile, I'm finishing up my shopping cart and trying to get it installed where my current website is located. Then it is a short detour to get the credit card account set up and linked in. At that point I can start advertising and pray I get orders without getting so overloaded that I have to hire people to help If this makes it to the triva games, remember that since I still don't own the farm, the 1st set of labels will not say "Estate Grown" on them. To stimulate sales and start shipping, I guess I'll have to offer some discounts. I'd hate to think that people would have to pay "full price" for my coffee. :-) As Paul Harvey would say "Now, you know the REST of the story..." |
| COSTCO |
| 01.07.04 (1:34 am) [edit] |
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When I moved I decided not to bring my big tube computer monitor. It was very large and easy on the eyes, but the weight was a problem both in shipping and deciding where to put it. I decided that when I got here, I would buy a LCD monitor, having gotten used to the one on the laptop. I looked at the 17 and 19 inch models and opted for the 17 inch at $400. I could not see paying another $200 for a 2" increase as they both had the same resolution. Back in Georgia I might have been able to find a better deal, but this is cheap enough. Actually, after mentioning that, I logged onto MicroCenter.Com (a favorite store) and found that I did quite good on price. My real estate agent was at COSTCO and had just been snowboarding all morning up on Mauna Kea. Remember I said it had been snowing up there the other day :) I drove down to Kealakekua Bay today and looked tolwards Captain Cook's Monument. No dolphin were seen but there were lots of Kayakers in the water. As mentioned in a previous "episode", I have talked myself into propogating my new coffee plants rather than buying them. The cost for them will drop by 2/3 that way. Gotta love it! It also appears I have plenty of time to get the new plants ready. In the meantime I continue to work on the shopping cart and website. I was going to have someone create the site for me, but I still have time due to the constant wait for a closing date. In my quest for cost savings, I found a cart for free. The credit card link and billing system is about the same cost as COSTCO's and I think I will be ready to sell things soon. |
| Hawaii Trivia |
| 01.04.04 (9:49 am) [edit] |
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Hawai’i is the longest chain of islands in the world, stretching for more than 1000 miles northwest of Kaua’i to Kure Island, beyond Midway. Of this area, there are 137 islands and atols. Only 7 of them are inhabited. A new island called Lo`ihi about 20 miles off the Big Island, is being formed and will crest sea leven in a mere 60,000 years. It is already designated to be a park. The Reefs of the Hawaiian Islands make up about 70% of all the reefs in the United States. The Big Island (the one actually called Hawaii) has almost every kind of weather in the world except artic. The top of Mauna Kea often gets snow and sometimes has 6' drifts at the observatories. It has a rainforest, desert, freezing temperatures, tropical temperatures, tundra, lava fields, all within a few hours drive. The Big Island has 5 volcanoes, one has been active for over 20 yearsw. Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa are both over 13,000 feet in height and extend another 130,000 below sea level to the ocean floor. The state is the most geographically isolated population center on earth (we're 2,000 miles from the Marshall Islands, 2,390 miles from California, 2,500 miles from Tahiti, 3,850 miles from Japan, 4,900 miles from China, and 5,280 miles from the Philippines) Hawaii is the only state whoch hosts all branches of the US Military. The Hawaii Volcanoes National Park has a "drive up" volcano. Drive up and take a short walk from your car to see actual lava flowing! You could be within 6 feet of 2000 degree lava if you wish. South Point on the Big Island is the southern most point of the US. Key West Florida is the southern most point on the CONTINENTIAL US. Kauai hosts the wettest spot on earth, but a few miles away is a spot which could be considered a desert. Hawaii is the only US state which had a King, Queen and a royal palace. That palace was seen at the opening of every Hawaii-50 episode. Steve McGarrett's office (upper right corner) was really where the Queen was imprisoned while US business interests took over the country and overthrew the government. Speaking of Hawaii-50, the "50" was NOT a street address, rather it refers to Hawaii being the US's 50th state. Hawaii has no state police (which "5 Oh" was supposed to represent). Hawaii is the only US state that commercially grows coffee. Hawaii has no snakes in the wild. It has no rabies. Hawaii has 2 official languages, Hawaiian and English. "Aloha" is actually mandated by state law. Hawaii boasts a number of firsts and interesting facts, too numerous to post here. It truely is an amazing place. |
| The weather outside is frightful |
| 01.04.04 (8:41 am) [edit] |
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The weather outside is frightful, as the song goes. Up until last night, each night has dropped down to about 60 degrees F. I close the windows at 4pm and retain the heat until moring. I am at 700-foot elevation but people further up the mountain get it a lot colder at night. Speaking of cold, I was up in Waikaloa and on my way back to the farm, actually saw the snow on Mauna Kea for myself. Snowcapped mountains in Hawaii... gotta love it! As for weather at my place, due to a storm in the Pacific, it has rained here for over a week! A storm will dump rain for hours, then move off and it starts to clear, then wham!, another one. No lightning that I can detect, although occasional static on the AM radio leads me to believe there are a few strikes nearby. I spent a quiet New Years here at the house with a glass of my favorite beverage and a comfy chair and the internet. They had fireworks in Kona, but because there would be no room in the inn (so to speak) up there, I didn't want to celebrate, then try to maneuver the windy and narrow roads back home. On the old home front (back in Georgia), I had to have a transmission repaired in my Honda Passport. It went bad weeks after I left and before I could sell it. That was about $1900! Now I have to have a bit of roof and some shingles repaired back there; another $1000 or so. This is all driving me crazy, because the cars are STILL not sold and house is not yet on the market!!! grrrrrrr I can't do much to the house here until I own it, so I still live out of a microwave and a very small refrigerator. Lowes Home Improvement store opened the other day. It is a "soft opening", meaning no fanfare yet. The "Grand Opening" will be soon. It is a very large store with nice prices, but there is still controversy about one access road they built which also serves a private community. That side of the parking lot is still closed awaiting court decisions. I hear there have been whale sighting in Kailua Bay (near the hotel I used to occupy). It appears we get whales year round but it is the humpback whales we only host during aprt of the year. I believe they migrate from Alaska for the winter. All indications I see are that many, many, many people are relocating to this island and this side of it in particular. Housing costs are going up in yet another cycle and some places appear to be grossly overpriced. My original idea was to build my own website, host the server here and run my business from it. Because of time issues, I approached someone to build me one. However, the cost was going to be more than I wanted to spend and since I now have free time, I'm probably going to build my own site again. I found a good (and free) shopping cart system, which I am testing. I also found a relatively inexpensive credit card gateway and billing system to take orders. It has the capability of doing newsletters and showing monthly specials and so on. Since it is Open Source, many people are writing modules for it. I started reading the support discussion groups and was amazed at the things people want to add to the software. You can propose a module to do something and soon there may be someone to write it for you. I contacted a second printer and am waiting fro him to review my coffee labels and give me a price. The first email to him was rejected as SPAM. I'm guessing the word PASSION that appeared all over the message was a trigger. Unfortunately, since the name of the coffee is Pele's Passion, it kinda goes with the territory. As I write this (6:30 am), a heavy rain has started again. I have no flooding here as the lava rocks pass that water right past them and into the ground. These people with catchment systems must be happy and wishing they had two systems to fill up. I have an appointment to get the cable modem installed and for the house appraisal in a few days. With months to go before I can clear the ground for plkanting, I may start to propogate my own coffee plants. That could save me thousands of dollars if I do it right. I'll need some expert assistance though. Other than that, not much else new. |