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| Did you get it? |
| 08.26.05 (4:22 pm) [edit] |
There used to be a sign on a coworkers desk that said:If you always do what you always did, You’ll always get what you always got. Computers are kinds like that, in that if they fail if you run a particular program, you should not be surprised to see it fail if you run the program again. Repeatability, that is the key! Now speaking of repeatability… Enter Hurricane Katrina hitting Florida as I speak. I’m reading a news article where someone has been quoted as saying: "I'm so sick of this. It seems like every other week or month another one comes.” To which my reply is, “So why did you move into an area populated by hurricanes if all you are going to do is complain about them?” This reminds me of living near Dulles Airport in Virginia. They began building developments just outside the airport and people moved in, primarily because land was cheap. THEN as more people moved in they started complaining that the planes made so much noise. HUH? They moved next to an existing airport, and then complained that there was noise. I have never heard a quiet airport. Did I miss something? So I guess I still can’t figure out why someone complains when they purposely move to a small sliver of land sticking out in the middle of hurricane alley. Granted, I moved to Atlanta and did not check what the tornado situation was beforehand, but then again, how many people know that Atlanta has a higher incidence of tornados than other cities? There are some things worth checking in advance. When I bought a house in Maryland, it was in a development with only 1 road leading out. I visited the neighborhood on workdays and weekends to see what traffic was like before buying the house. I wanted to know what the traffic patterns were at various times of the day. So, people ask me about Hawaii. I moved here with my eyes wide open. I know that my island has pretty consistent weather. Some weeks the high and lows don’t change at all. For the next 10 days, here are the highs: 89, 88, 87, 88, 88, 89, 88, 89, 88, 87. We like our consistency! J Also, I knew moving here that the island is large (well, this one is at least). That said, I did not (and have not) gone island happy. Oh it’s nice to take a trip to the mainland to do some shopping, but I have no longing to “get back” there. I’m content here. Also, I know the dangers. We have earthquakes here (sometimes daily) but most of the time we never notice. This island is still growing and a bit of island settles all the time. We do NOT expect any kind of major earthquake, and this area is monitored more closely than most other areas of the globe. Why is that? Well, let’s see, it is easy to monitor here, and heck, if I have to monitor earthquakes, THIS is the place I would want to do it from. We might get a lava flow, but most of the times lava flows from the volcanoes slowly and is not a source of worry. In fact the best way to determine if I am in danger is to ask my insurance company. I happen to live in a ZONE 3 area (on a scale of 1 to 5). I have lava insurance and it is pretty cheap, so the insurance company, with all of their charts and graphs, is NOT worried! ‘Nuff said! Tsunamis? Well, yes we might get one and have had them in the past, but we are well prepared for them. Only a locally generated tsunami might cause loss of life, because the Pacific Ocean is littered with buoys and data to notify us hours in advance. This was not the case for those in Indonesia. Hurricanes are another concern, but we have only had 1 really bad one in recent times, Iniki, and we saw it coming long in advance. In Florida there can be massive problems with hurricanes and standing water. Here we are on a slope and the water drains away. Not to take away from mainlanders and their preparation for disaster, but even with a prolonged power outage, most people here would do just fine. Ancient Hawaiian used to cook outdoors in an imu (underground oven) and anyone who has attended a luau here can attest, almost everyone here could create an imu if the need arose. Thus we would not stave, well, at least not soon. Most of the plants and fruits here are edible and so are the fish. So when you live in the “middle of nowhere” you tend to be prepared. If there is a problem on your property your neighbors automatically help. I think here we know and treat our neighbors better because we realize that they may save our life someday. In Georgia I was there over 10 years and knew 3 of my neighbors in my development. Here I have been in Hawaii a year or two and know 20 of my close neighbors. So in closing, I guess I am saying, “look before you leap”, “investigate” and “don’t complain if get what you got!” J |
| A Taxing Problem - Slight of Hand |
| 08.19.05 (2:34 am) [edit] |
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The phrase "a taxing problem" refers to a problem about a burdensome or excessive demand; a strain. When our politicians talk about taxes, oftentimes they use statements that the public does not understand. Sometimes that is on purpose because if you knew what was really going on, you would not like it. Politicians often talk about tax credits or tax rebates and the public starts salivating. "Free money" is what they think. The rebate is nothing more than returning to you unused money collected from you already. It does nothing to lower your taxes. Imagine the following. The cost to run a particular Government project is $30 billion. A perfect world would be for the entity to collect say $28 billion from the public, place it in an interest bearing account until needed and at the moment it was needed, interest would have raised the amount to $30 billion. Instead, the government entity collects $35 billion from the public, perhaps invests it, perhaps uses much of it to fund other projects, then when the project is done and people start asking what's up with the money, the entity returns what is left to you as a "refund" or "surplus". You have given them a free ride! The public sees the refund or surplus as a windfall for themselves and praises the government for giving them their own money back. If you think about it, you keep getting CREDITS and REFUNDS when you really should be having to pay less money up front. Even your income tax works this way. You pay in $500 to IRS and then have to justify every which way to get some of your own money back. There is a CREDIT for this and a DEDUCTION for that. Wouldn't it be better for governments to figure out what they need, stick to the budget and only collect what is needed? Speaking of taxes, I am hours away from attending a meeting with a representative of Govenor Lingle's office. Well, I say "I" yet it will really be "WE". We the coffee farmers and macadamia nut farmers, some co-op members and perhaps even representatives of Fedex and the Post Office. It should be a large but hopefully well-behaved meeting. That is, unless I have too much caffeine before the meeting. The short story is that a bill came before the legislature that proposed a $25 million dollar bond for a group of 3 people to build a coffee and macadamia nut processing plant near the airport in Kona. This bill went largely unnoticed and when we farmers heard about it it was almost too late. We called the Govenor who agreed to Veto the bill. Then, it mysteriously passed without her signature. The processing plant will contain a very large visitors center and preliminary business records show that they will be processing tremendous amounts of product. We cannot believe that a processing plant is needed and it will only serve those who are floating the bond. We farmers and processors are not having any problems with our production and processing and based upon the size of this proposal, cannot figure out not one of us knew about this in advance. It was kept very low under the radar and even public records only show a paragrah of the proposal. The gigantic showroom near the airport may draw lots of visitors. Visitors who will end up buying product there instead of at the smaller stores and flea markets on the island. Small farms have a hard enough job getting stores to carry product as it is without the expensive barcodes. The other "gotcha" in this is not whether the company doing this is going to make money (none of the farmers I spoke with will use this plant) but that the company gets a TAX FREE ride! What could be going on with this deal? We think we know as it is very similar to something that happened on the mainland concerning wine.. Right now we market products as created and processed in the islands. However, "Made in Hawaii" does not convey that same idea. It would be possible to import products from elsewhere, process it here and call it "Made in Hawaii". The public would not differenciate between a 100% Hawaiian product and "Made in Hawaii". If you think this is not true, consider the coffee marketed as KONA BLEND. A coffee blend is a mix of coffees. Generally, these are 10% blends which means that only 10% of the coffee is Kona coffee (and not award winning Kona at that) and 90% coffee from elsewhare. If the coffee is only 10% Kona and let's say 90% Columbian, should it not be called a COLUMBIAN BLEND? The name Kona is used on the label to fool the consumer. As you can see with both taxes and coffee, convince the public that the lesser of two options is the best for them; and make them feel good about it. |
| How Sweet It Is! |
| 08.17.05 (9:26 pm) [edit] |
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Mainlanders or people overseas can only imagine how sweet it is here in Hawaii. I'm not talking about the wonderful weather, the friendly people or the beautiful landscape. I'm talking pineapples! Maui Hawaiian Gold Extra Sweet Pineapples. http://mauipineapple.com/prod... This pineapple (which I get at COSTCO here in Kona) is so delicious that I usually eat the whole thing at one sitting. It is difficult to describe except that there is no bitterness, nothing to offset the great taste. If you can imagine perhaps, pineapple candy where they have spent years perfecting the taste; that is what this tastes like. Should you make it to Hawaii, you must try one. |
| HP and LP |
| 08.17.05 (10:24 am) [edit] |
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It’s a month filled with HP’s and LP’s. The first HP is Hewlett Packard, the computer/printer company. As careful readers may note, I used to work for HP; that is until they decided that I needed to take an early retirement. It was their way of cutting costs. I took the package for a couple of reasons. First, they were paying me a bonus based upon my years of service and also an extra amount if I signed an agreement not to speak out against the company for like 1 year. Ever notice that many people leave a company and it takes a while to bad-mouth them? Now in my case, I won’t bad-mouth HP because I was well paid and treated great. I just wish I could have stayed longer. HOWEVER, the company is no longer the place it used to be! This bonus was placed into my retirement account and I could not touch it until I’m 57 or older. However, this money is also tax-deferred, which means that when I am 57 or older and start taking the money out, I will be taxed at my then current tax rate. If I am not earning much at that age, the money may be close to free. It also forces me to save. The second and perhaps better reason to have taken the package was that HP offered me a medical package that while not fully subsidized, certainly was cheaper than if I had to get medical on my own. Staying with the company meant that they might let me go instead and I would have to accept COBRA for 6 months of medical and then be on my own. I opted for the guarantee of cheap medical rather than the possibility I would be jobless and medically challenged! It turns out that many people got placed into that position when their department was eliminated soon thereafter. The reason this is mentioned now is that HP is again offering an early retirement to some employees and a coworker of mine who made it past the last round of layoffs is now being offered early retirement. Since it sounds as though she is being offered the same deal as I got, I suggested she “take the money and run”! I do realize that this is a very difficult decision for most of the people involved and I had second thought right up to the last hour when I had to fax my paperwork in. The main question was, do you take a sure thing or do you pass it by and hope that you can continue to pass by unnoticed while collecting a great paycheck? A friend and coworker was offered the same deal as I and also took the package. Within 6 months his department had been outsourced overseas. Speaking of overseas, this current coworker who must make the decision may have help. It appears that accidentally a spreadsheet was sent around with names and departments on it. Her name had a few pieces of information by it. They included the following two questions: “Must this persons job remain in the US” and also the question “Does the customer require this job remain in the US?” The answer to both questions was NO. So it appears someone overseas could do this job (and probably cheaper). Years ago this woman worked on an operating system, which was proprietary to HP. Now she works with unix or Windows products. I reminded here that there are experts in these operating systems being turned out every day. That does not bode well for staying at HP and not taking the package. The downside is that she must now look for a job and that is not easy after working for a single company for a decade or two. So I want to wish all these people good luck and hope that things go well for them. It is a very difficult decision, which I also made. I think I really made the right decision to leave when I did. I recently attended a Farm Bureau gathering and learned how to calibrate and use a moisture meter for determining the moisture content of both parchment and green coffee. Parchment as you may know is what is taken out of the cherry and green is milled parchment. I’ll be posting some photos of this and the farm soon so stay tuned. In other items, Our Cream of the Crop competition went very well and we had many hundreds of people attend. We got nice coverage in the paper and this event will continue to grow in popularity each year. My coffee is being displayed and sold this weekend in Honolulu at the “Made in Hawaii” event. Our coffee council has a booth. I bought some canopies to use for my coffee plant nursery. I set them up in the clearing beside my garage. After the plants start to grow I can remove the canopy to allow them to mature in full sun. I bought a water timer and controller and valves to attach to the PVC pipes. This will allow me to automatically water the plants, even if I am away. I have to be careful hooking up the pipes to the water supply lines. All pipes for the house are connected on the output side of a water pressure reducer. This keeps massive pressures in the lines from breaking pipes. However, all the pipes on the outside of the house and for farm use, are on the water main side of the reducer, thus at full pressure. That pressure may be 125 pounds per square inch; which is considerably higher than many water products like these watering valves are designed to work with. Thus I need to label the High Pressure (HP) and Low Pressure (LP) pipes so I can easily tell them apart. Another issue is that all farm use of the water from the county must be separated from household use by use of a backflow regulator. This backflow unit keeps water from draining back into the county water supply from a farm. This is very important because some farms use fertigation on the farms. Fertigation is the process whereby you inject a liquid fertilizer into a water flow destined for crops. The water/fertilizer mix cannot be allowed to backflow into the drinking water. Thus everything other than the house will also be segregated from the other water lines. I have been approved for catchement tanks and may not be needing country water for everyday farm use, but in a drought, I may need to still rely upon some county water and must have the equipment in place. So today I have been mounting the water controller on the wall and figuring out how to program it. I need to get some PVC and run that to the canopies and decide what type of sprinklers to use. I need to conserve water but also need to effectively water the plants. I am thinking either sprinklers like are used in yards around shrubs, or perhaps the same type of sprayers used in many fresh vegetable areas of supermarkets. I also have to get some skids to keep the plants up off the ground. Some people build tables so they don’t have to bend over. Hmmm. I may be too cheap to spend that kind of money J I am working on a couple of deals, which may have me supplying hundreds of pounds of roasted coffee each month to customers. That certainly will help cash flow. There is a growing concern about a group who was able to slip a bond through the state legislature and we are holding a very large meeting this Friday. Many of us feel that this could very horribly affect the Kona Coffee industry. A representative of the Governor will be there and surprisingly, I am hearing the company involved is NOT sending anyone… It will be interesting to see what Fridays meeting will uncover. Don’t forget to visit http://ItsKOna.Com10% discount on anything in the Roasted Coffee category. Until later, I remain you blogger, Mark. |
| Win Some, Lose Some |
| 08.10.05 (10:50 pm) [edit] |
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Our coffee tasting event was a big success, even if I didn’t win this year. Looks like I will have to rest some on my laurels from last year! We got a nice write-up in the West Hawaii Today newspaper: http://westhawaiitoday.com/ar... I also took photos of the event; however, they are not edited. I have no idea of the total attendees, but suffice it to say there were many hundred people there. I went through 2 pump pots of coffee and many people were only taking small samples of coffee (sips really) and many of us still ran out early. The other day I sprayed a bit of Roundup in the water causeway at the end of my property. As I did that I noticed 2 papaya trees there with ripening papaya. I had never seen them before and the papayas were almost ready to pick. I left them there. Hours later it rained, Well, “rain” may not be the best description. It was torrents of water cascading down the countryside. The reports from neighbors and the National Weather Center was 3 inches of water per hour was falling. The rain seemed to last many hours. I really wish bought a weather center and installed it when I first got here. Some of the data would be truly amazing. Oh and we had an earthquake here, but it was only a 2.5 about 30 miles away, so no big deal. Yesterday I finished and submitted the ad copy for this Sunday’s thank you ad for our coffee tasting. Today I attended the Farm Bureaus meeting where we calibrated moisture meters. These meters are used for measuring moisture content of green or parchment coffee. Too much moisture and the coffee can mildew in storage while waiting to be roasted. On the way back from the meeting a neighbor and I went to another farm to discuss having her coffee pulped and dried and then sent back to her farm. Some farms do all the work themselves, others “farm” out some of the work. At the meeting, someone brought fresh bananas from their farm and of course, we had coffee served. However when I finally made it home I stopped at the papaya tree. I discovered that the almost ripe fruit had been washed down the ravine. I grabbed 4 fruit from the ground and will see if I can get some seeds from the pods as they are not ripe enough to eat and I would not trust any fruit that had been under all that water in the ravine anyway. However, the second tree seems to still have its fruit on it and I’ll watch it as see how it does. Papaya grows pretty fast here so I think I’ll plant these seeds and see just how fast it takes to get fruit. I think I’ll make a concerted effort to sell what coffee I have left so I can close up shop and take a vacation on the mainland. Delta is starting direct Atlanta to Kona service with a stop in Salt Lake City. Well, that is if Delta does better in the industry. I see today where their stock took a major plunge. I guess everybody wins some and they lose some. |
| Whew! |
| 08.04.05 (1:41 am) [edit] |
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Talk about having lots to do… THIS will be a very full week. It makes me tired just organizing the items for the blog. On Monday I cut down some trees and carted the logs off. I also dropped off a fireproof safe to a neighbor. I then scoured the shops for a table draping for my display. On Tuesday I met some Council members at the Four Seasons to go over the details for Saturday’s event. The event is out doors this year and we are juggling who sits where. This is particularly important as one group is bringing orchids, which are not tolerant of the sun, and some others are bringing desserts, which contain chocolate. I found out that the resort will be partially dressing the tables and I won’t need quite as much cloth as I had planned. I also looked in many stores for a metal cream pitcher. Unless I wanted silver, I would have to make do with something completely different from what I wanted. I cooked up some fresh sweet corn and a large steak. I’ll be eating steak for days now… Wednesday found me making many of the signs for the event. I’m creating tent cards to identify each of the 21 farms and the display participants such as Starbucks and Borders Books. I am also creating two nametags for each participant, ones for registration and even the volunteers. I expect to have 80 to 100 printed by Saturday. I also am pulling the cards apart and placing them in the plastic holders. Thursday I’ll take some green coffee beans to a neighboring farm where we will roast them in a Full City Plus style. This will help me fulfill some orders I have been receiving. Once I get home I’ll bag them up and also bag up some Medium to be sold at the event. I also need to separate out some medium specifically to be brewed for the judging. I am considering also making some iced coffee to offer at my table, so I will need to get ice and cream before Saturday. I also need to do some laundry and have a nicely pressed shirt and pants to wear. At 3pm I need to be in front of the Aloha Theatre for a last-minute event meeting. I’ll clarify a few items prior to finishing up the nametags. After that meeting it is across the street for the Kona Coffee Council meeting. At about 5:30 it is back to the house to get some work done! I’ll finish working on the table dressing and start packing the boxes I’ll need for Saturday. At 3pm or so I need to head up into Kona for the KonaWeb picnic. This is held the 1st Friday of the month at the old airport and is a welcome to visitors and newcomers to the island. Somewhere along the way I’ll come up with a main dish. I also may take some brewed coffee. I also have to take a few bags of the full-city as it will be delivered at the picnic. After the picnic it is back home to pack the truck and complete any last minute items. I hope to get to bed early. At about 6:30am I’ll get up and start making coffee and iced coffee. These will go into the truck and about 8am I should be on the road to the resort; arriving at 8:45. I’ll find my table and drop things off. After dropping off the tent cards and helping get a few things started, I can start dressing my table. I hope it looks good, as I really don’t have that kind of expertise. Then just before noon I need to have some coffee ready to be judged. At that same time we begin letting the public in and I spend the next 4 hours chatting about coffee and farming (as it were). At 4pm the winners should be announced and I will pack up and head home. I HOPE that at around 5pm I should be able to nap. I’ll worry about unpacking the truck later. It will be too late to call the east coast to tell friends and family the results and whether I won or lost. That will have to wait. If I won, I will probably create a special discount code and send out a newsletter offering a discount in celebration. I think on Sunday I will be back to chopping up trees and carting them away. What a week! |