Is marriage a survival trait in the North?

I am thinking that marriage is a survival trait. If nothing else, back before the days of central heating (which really wasn't so long ago in America and Europe), having another body next to you at night kept you warm! (this also explains a predilection for large families)

Single people freeze to death more often than couples.

I've been sleeping under 3 sets of blankets, which I left in disarray last night so lots of heat escaped.

This morning I woke up and put on a hat, two extra layers of shirt, long pants and two pairs of socks - and if I could type with gloves on, I would. And it's only 60F in the house this morning. I'd be completely non-functional below 50F, I'm sure.

The heat is out, the fireplace is faux (is there a law against real fireplaces in Colorado?), and I'm still freezing... I've been eating at least 50% more calories than usual, not exercising, and have actually dropped a half pound in weight. The 35 degrees difference between here and Nicaragua seems to make a real difference in my personal heat engine....

Labels: colorado, nicaragua

  ¶ 5:56 AM 0 comments

  Carlos Canales plays LA, SF, Vegas in May

I am freshly out of nicaragua and visiting the states for a while.

My friend and one of the best guitarists I've ever had the pleasure of listening to, Carlos "24" Canales, of Nicaragua, where I've lived for nearly 4 years - is touring the USA briefly May 28-30, as part of a pretty famous band (in Nicaragua, at least) in SF, LA, and Vegas. They're called Las Nuevos Panzers - and, man! are they great!

If you are in any of these towns and want to hear (and dance to) some totally unique music, well, here's the posters. Please pass 'em around. I hope to make the SF show myself.







I think there's also youtube video available too.

Check it out!

Labels: music, nicaragua

  ¶ 9:48 PM 1 comments

  Beach calm #1

The day I published my last blog, I'd made my top priority finding a new house to live in.

I got up early to go to La Playa Yanqui. There, I met Alan, the proprietor of a B&B there, and we had a lovely discussion about just about everything... just him, me, and his dog, on that beach, by ourselves, shortly after dawn.

He mentioned that his neighbor's house was up for rent in September.

I got a nice surfing session in. The water was clear and warm. The waves were small and otherwise empty of other people. There were a few jellyfish, but they didn't sting that bad.

I got back to the car and broke the key off in the lock. Disaster, right? You're at an empty beach, all alone, on the wrong side of a mountain, and your cell phone is on the other side of a glass window and wouldn't work anyway, even if you could get at it. You're tired and hungry, in the middle of nowhere, you've spent twenty minutes with exactly one person who lives somewhere nearby but you don't know where that is and you have places to be and things to do and your key is broken and there is nobody around and you have to get out of there somehow as soon as you can so you can go deal with life itself...

I tried a variety of ways to get into the truck, and failed at all of them.

I sat down to calm down, and then walked over to some rocks, dangled my feet in the water, looked at Costa Rica, only 18 or so miles away... and I realized that I really didn't have to be anywhere, or do anything at all. Somebody would come along... or I'd walk over the mountain... and it was a damn beautiful day. The sun was shining, there was that early morning stillness, birdsong, and waves lapping gently on the beach... and I was getting some energy back...

And, after a while, I realized that I really wouldn't mind at all if I had a string of days with nothing to do and nowhere to be, just like this one.

I was more trapped by my need to be elsewhere than by where I was.

The answer to getting the door unlocked finally came to me, and in a few short minutes I was "free" to go home and do whatever it was I thought was so important I get at earlier. I couldn't for the life of me remember what it was.

Just as I finished packing up the car, another solitary surfer showed up.

I wished him the best of all possible days.

...

On my way home, I went up and visited Alan and his wife at their lovely, calm, wonderful B&B that they have spent 9 years building with its fabulous view of the ocean and Costa Rica. (I'm totally embarrassed to have forgotten the name of it, and it is completely off the intertubes)

They offered to show me their neighbor's house, but I deferred - I had places to go, things to do - and I couldn't let myself hope, too much - maybe it was a shack with holes in the roof, deep in the forest - I mean, that was sort of what I wanted, something that Henry Miller would have dug, but I kind of needed lots of electric power....

But by 11AM. I'd maybe solved the biggest problem I had, a problem I'd had for over 10 months, without even trying, totally by accident. It was magical.

When I got back to the chaos and confusion of life in town... my main computer - all 900 watts of quad core and and triple screen technological powerhouse, had died.

I can't honestly remember when it died, actually, it was kind of traumatic and I wasn't coping with it well. Maybe it heard I was thinking of going off the grid and euthanized itself? I'd gotten very dependent on having three screens available for my work, in portrait mode. That power-sucking howling technological mass of terabytes was always on, full of things I needed to be working on... but I didn't need to be working on them that day. I got on my decrepit laptop instead.. and had dozens of birthday wishes in my mailbox. It was awesome... I got too many wishes to reply to them all and was done with the computer long before 1...

Later on I played a whole lot of music - and had a lovely lunch and dinner with some friends.

I can't remember what else happened that day, but it was a perfect b-day.

The death of my main machine actually opened up a whole new realm of possibilities for me, but I'll get to that in my next blog.

(my apologies to Alan, I will rewrite this piece with the name of his B&B as soon as I remember it)

Labels: meme shift, nicaragua

  ¶ 8:02 PM 0 comments

  More Honduras (and Nicaragua) updates

Alexis Argüello, the mayor of the capital of Nicaragua, Managua, is dead.

The front page of La Prensa, the chief opposition newspaper in Nicaragua, has been offline since at least 8AM this morning. However, you can do deep linking (eg, http://www.laprensa.com.ni/archivo/2009/julio/01/noticias/portada/) to some pages, for some things. For example, clicking on http://www.laprensa.com.ni/archivo/2009/julio/01/noticias/ultimahora/335994.shtml works, while http://www.laprensa.com.ni/archivo/2009/julio/01/noticias/ultimahora/335991.shtml returns an error in even connecting to the website.

This, to me, is a sure sign of clumsy censorship or a DoS attack against La Prensa within Nicaragua that is taking place as I write.

The subject of that apparently blocked article and precís are:

Asesor no notó nada extraño en Argüello

Un asesor del alcalde de Managua, Alexis Argüello, aseguró esta mañana que estuvo anoche con él y que no percibió que éste tuviera algún problema emocional. Según los primeros informes extraoficiales, el tres veces campeón mundial de boxeo, se suicidó de un disparo en el pecho poco antes de la dos de la madrugada. "

which, translated, is:

Adviser did not notice anything strange about Argüello

An adviser to the mayor of Managua, Alexis Arguello, said this morning that last night was with him and that he had not felt any emotional problems. According to early unofficial reports, the three times world boxing champion, committed suicide by a shot in the chest shortly before the two in the morning.

The current article, also about Argüello, http://www.laprensa.com.ni/archivo/2009/julio/01/noticias/ultimahora/336012.shtml, is also blocked.

News of Alexis Argüello's death has not made the other major newspaper El Nuevo Diario, as yet.

Update: 12:17 PM OK, Nuevo Diario just ran the story (google translation here)

More on this and the Honduran situation in a bit.... this is what I wrote about the crisis over the last few days.


Update 2:15 PM OK, whatever was blocking parts of La Prensa appears to have been lifted.

Labels: honduras, nicaragua

  ¶ 11:06 AM 0 comments

  Truth about Nicaragua is hard to come by

I recently almost convinced an old friend to come visit me in Nicaragua. Then she read the report of the US state department and wrote me:

Holy sh*t. I think you left a few things out......

At one level, I'm happy. It seems likely that my adopted home will stay untrammeled by American tourists for quite some time more, yet. It will remain a common destination for Canadians, Swiss, Australians, Chinese, Germans, and Frenchmen, all of whom are more interesting and adventurous than Americans are these days... All the same... I would have liked to have seen her.

This report is from the same state department that built Nicaragua up to being a communist threat to the entire western hemisphere in the 80s. The same department that calls what happened in the 80s a "civil war" and ignores what happened in the 150 years prior to that or even the previous 2 decades.

The truth is a great deal more nuanced. It's why I came here. I wanted not to learn about the war, but how Nicaragua achieved peace, and how it was struggling towards a better (or worse) future, after the horrors of most of the 20th century. My answer - at least thus far - is that it is better in some ways, after two years spent here, and worse in others.

The state dept makes generalizations about the entire country that only apply to specific parts...

That link is a much more scary advisory than the one I read just two years ago, and strikes me as politically motivated in several parts. I would love to write one about the USA that used some of the same phrasing... NYC can be described using exactly the same terminology throughout and even worse statistics (NYC has Wall Street! Noooo criminals to be found there, nooo)

Let me make a few generalizations in return.

Managua is like Washington DC, only hotter, and poorer. More people are armed with machetes than handguns, however, and there aren't actually a whole lot of machetes in the capital, and most of those there are actually in use, trimming hedges, unlike the handguns. Yes there is a lot of petty theft everywhere. It's a poor country. I'm told violence is on the upswing. So is civilization. Being white and going out after dark in parts of Manauga is a bad idea, just like it is in Harlem, but it does have a thriving nightclub scene all the same. I don't think the state department guys ever get out of Managua. Or out to nightclubs.

I know over a half dozen people that have been robbed. In most cases it was avoidable or an inside job. When I lived in cities in the US I knew more people that had been robbed, in less time. When I lived deep in the woods, in Felton, Ca, for 5 years, I felt comfortable leaving the doors unlocked, so comfortable I would actually lose my keys for months at a time. Until I got robbed.

The economy is mostly on an upswing in Managua. There's a lot of outsourced work, particularly in voip and textiles. Lately, tourism where I live, San Juan Del Sur (SJDS) has been down, however.

Let's take apart some sentences of the above state department report:

"In 2008, a U.S. citizen was critically injured in a gang-motivated drive-by shooting that occurred in the San Judas area. Another U.S. citizen was kidnapped and left for dead in the Villa Fontana area of Managua."

* In the entire state of Nicaragua, about the size of New York, with about the population of New York City, *two* US citizens in one year had a gang related problem. And New York City had? Per day?

Several U.S. citizens traveling by bus from San Juan del Sur to Managua have reported being victimized by fellow women travelers who offered to assist them in locating and/or sharing a taxi upon arrival in Managua. In all cases, upon entering the taxi, the U.S. citizens have been held at knife-point, robbed of their valuables, and driven around to ATM machines to withdraw funds from their accounts.

Most taxi drivers are actually darn friendly and most shared trips are fun and end without incident. Everybody that plays fair is very annoyed at those that hurt the country. I've met a few taxi drivers that threatened violence - against those that robbed or abused their fares - if they could just catch them. People here are proud of their country and at the same time discouraged by all the bad things that do happen. A lot of people are extra nice, not just because of compensating for that, but because they are nice to start with.

Let me give you a story - a 5-6 months back pair of german tourists left their luggage behind on a bus, and assumed it had been stolen. They reported it to the police (I got involved because they stopped at my house all upset, and needing someone that spoke English. I helped them find the police station) - who called the bus company - who found the luggage still on the bus, although it was 100km away by then. They returned it to the bus stop in Rivas... and the Police picked up and returned the luggage to their hotel!

"The climate is hot and humid, with the “summer” dry season running mid-November through mid-May and the “winter” rainy season running from mid-May through mid-November."

* This is more true of the East coast than the West, in the West the biggest part of the rainy season stars in late august and continues through late november. Humidity here never gets as high as florida or nj, except right before a storm. Also they have winter and summer kind of mistranslated. Nica's on this side of the equator, so summer and winter have similar (tho milder and lacking snow) temperature variations as US summer and winter. The seasons here are described as either invierno o verano. (rainy or dry)

"Nicaragua lacks tourist infrastructure. Except in the cities and major thoroughfares, most roads are unpaved. Public transportation is unsafe and there are no sidewalks"

Mostly true. Ortega has fixed the roads between SJDS and Managua, however. I'll give him that. With increased mobility has come better food supplies, better transport, and increased crime along the highways. SJDS, where I live, is the closest thing to a tourist town there is in Nicaragua and is much nicer than Tamerindo, just across the border in Costa Rica. I like to imagine it is like Sea Isle City, NJ in the 1920s, only with internet, good waves and cars with slightly better suspensions.

The rest of the roads are unpaved. That's what a 4WD is for. People actually NEED SUVs here, a snorkle is a good idea, too. There are sidewalks in SJDS and in most cities except portions of Managua - but I strongly point out sidewalks are kind of unimportant when the primary mode of transport is foot or horse. It usually is pretty safe to walk right in the middle of a street here, and stop there to have a conversation. It gets to be a habit, even. That habit is a dangerous one to take to the states.

Public transportation is unsafe everywhere I've ever lived. Here however most of the mortal dangers lie in the Expresso buses which drive at insanely fast speeds and have a tendency to roll over.

"U.S. citizens are cautioned that strong currents and undertows off sections of Nicaragua's Pacific coast have resulted in a number of incidents of drowning. Powerful waves have also resulted in broken bones, and injuries caused by sting rays are not uncommon in popular resort bathing areas. Warning signs are not posted, and lifeguards and rescue equipment are not readily available. U.S. citizens contemplating beach activities in Nicaragua's Pacific waters should exercise appropriate caution."

Hazard a guess at how many people drowned in California last year? With all that gear available? How about New Jersey?

(Actually, two people drowned on the pacific coast (try to remember, this country is the size of New York State) here last month. I was lucky to not have been one of them. Them waves were Biiiggg. I had a lot of fun.)

"Hiking in volcanic or other remote areas can be dangerous and travelers should take appropriate precautions. Hikers should have appropriate dress, footwear, and sufficient consumables for any trek undertaken. Individuals who travel to remote tourist or other areas for hiking activities are encouraged to hire a local guide familiar with the terrain and area. In particular, there have been instances of hikers perishing or losing their way on the volcanoes at Ometepe Island. While they may look like easy climbs, the terrain is treacherous and heavily overgrown. "

* Well, duh. Darwin was here. Ometepe is a bitch of a climb. A guide is always a good idea. I love the placement of the "or" there. Thousands have probably lost their way. Died? No Sé.

"Earthquakes are common, but the last major earthquake, which destroyed the city of Managua, occurred in 1972. "

* How one can hold in your head "common", and "1972" and "Managua" all at the same time and parse out the fear is a good question. Gawd. One major earthquake in 47 years is "common"? Building your capital city right on top of a major fault line (and not moving it afterwards) is "common"?

"Although extensive de-mining operations have been conducted to clear rural areas of northern Nicaragua of landmines left from the civil war in the 1980s, visitors venturing off the main roads in these areas are cautioned that the possibility of encountering landmines still exists."

* Thanks for all the help... USA and USSR - The USSR at least has an excuse for not cleaning up all the mess - that country collapsed before Nicaragua found peace. The article is very true in that the northernmost, easternmost part of Nicaragua is a gawdawful mess of humidity, poverty, multiple hurricanes, and the remnants of a war never cleaned up. It's on the opposite end of the country from where I live. I wouldn't live there - not because of the landmines, but because of the hurricanes. I hate hurricanes. Where I live the hurricanes never cross. Nor are there earthquakes.

"The U.S. Embassy warns U.S. citizens to exercise extreme caution when driving at night from Managua’s International Airport and to avoid traveling the Tipitapa-Masaya Highway at night."

I completely agree with this comment. It's not the potential stoppages by random criminal elements that worry me - there are no lights on the highway and driving at night you are likely to run into an errant ox, major pothole, or a drunken bicyclist, all of which are more dangerous to you than the criminals.

"U.S. citizens should exercise particular caution when visiting the following beaches: Maderas, Marsella, Yankee, Coco, and Remanso. "

* this happens to be all the local beaches. 1) The criminals making Marsella and Madaras a problem were arrested several months ago. So far as I know there have been no incidents since. Remanso remains a problem... I haven't been to yankee recently, except by boat... In all but a very few cases it's just someone's camera getting taken. The problem at remanso does include guys with machetes...

Sure... notice to ALL TOURISTS - stay away from the beaches... especially Remanso! More waves for the locals, that way, methinks, for a while longer.

"Police coverage is extremely sparse outside major urban areas, particularly in Nicaragua’s Atlantic coast autonomous regions."

The east coast has great diving but that is about it. I've never been there and don't intend to go unless with a group....

"Municipal elections took place across Nicaragua on November 9, 2008. Violent demonstrations followed as opposition groups questioned the authenticity of the results. Activities observed during protests included but were not limited to tear gas, rubber bullets, setting off fireworks, rock-throwing, tire burning, road blocks, bus and vehicle burning, and physical violence between law enforcement and protestors and between political rivals. "

And this differed from the American election, how? Oh, yea, America limits demonstrators to "free speech zones"... but I was talking to a cab driver in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and he said people were shooting off AK-47s in parts of that city in celebration of Obama's victory...

I incidentally wrote about this here. The election was intense, people really got into both the sandinistas (FSLN) and ALN - emotions ran high, there were many fierce debates - and there was much evidence of fraud afterwards - and the outcome was unresolved but gradually faded to a dull sense of discontent among the lost. Perhaps next election, everyone thinks, and resume their discussions of the more important things in life - music, sports, sex, and food.

I stayed on after the election because, well, freedom of speech remains far more sacrosanct than, say, in China. People really do say what they think of Ortega, and say it loudly. The newspapers are remarkably biased in multiple directions and seem without censorship... or rigorous fact checking. It's entertaining, and I look forward to seeing how the next election turns out.

...

I am really rather scared to read the state dept's report on Mexico... or anywhere in Central America... hell, New York City...

Labels: nicaragua

  ¶ 9:58 PM 2 comments

  Earthship Pitaya Festival Feb 9th

Tired of coping with the rain and snow up north?

The Earth Ship Pitaya Festival is on February 9th, in warm sunny Nicaragua, next to an Earthship just outside of San Juan Del Sur (SJDS).

Featuring Matty Powell, Sam & the Harlequins, DJ Johnny G, Son De Oriente, and a horde of bands to be named later.

Cya there!

Labels: music, nicaragua, sjds

  ¶ 1:27 PM 0 comments

  Klaatu barada nikto

Two years ago, after struggling for several years with my health, outsourcing, battling with insane laws, lawyers, and greedy corporations, and coping with the bile accumulated from eight years of hatred for my country's politics (this includes Clinton's last two years), I got fed up.

I finally threw in the towel on my profession, and lost hope for my country.

I found a place to live cheap, and decided to enjoy what time I/we had left with all the gusto I could muster. I was awfully tired and ill. It was a good time to go on strike rest.

I surfed one hell of a lot. Studied Spanish. Traveled. I tried to get married (twice), and ultimately settled on embracing bachelorhood to its fullest. I wrote a lot. I learned a lot of music. I helped create a live music scene that continues to expand... I saw that Ron Paul had correctly foreseen the coming calamity, and followed him for a while...

And I didn't write a single line of code. (well, I did tune a few bits with david rowe)

For a while, all that worked for me. Yet I kept remembering that "despair is a sin", and "for evil to triumph all that is required is for good men to do nothing". I played mind games with myself, rendering the latter comment as "For good to triumph all that is required is that evil men be rendered powerless" - which ties better back into my overall philosophy - but ultimately...

I found myself compelled to create software once again.

Slowly, on my own time, at my own pace, I have been doing work of the quality I desire, at the pace that I need to work at. I'm perhaps 1/20th as productive as I used to be, and half as competent, and probably too perfectionist to be employable at it. Yet - some of the results of my work just made the Linux kernel, and some more will end up in ardour soon, and others stand alone. It has been a worthwhile struggle. I do retain hope that I can find an engineering niche again due to the cost differential between me in California and me here, and a non-native english speaker in China... but I don't really care - it's a rewarding hobby - and I'd rather pursue Quality - as Rob Persig would define it - than profit, any day. I think I can keep the lights on and the bills paid pretty easily now.

Today, Barack Obama is president of the United States.

I am impressed. Obama, by his mere existence, can clear up some of the most terrible cracks in the American conciousness and ideals in a way no one else can.

I pray that he can also reduce the stucked-ness that America has been plagued with for the last decade.

I didn't vote for him, but, weirdly, I can date my returned urge to code back to the day he was elected. I wasn't planning on coding again, I was (still am) working towards making a modest living in another field entirely....

I think it will take a decade or more to reverse the changes the last three decades has wrought. Certainly the next two years are going to be pretty bad. I still feel that it is probable, however, that America's decline is unstoppable - the decline in quality jobs, living standards, ethics, education, and morality, will not halt, but accelerate, and the Far East take the center stage. Maybe they will do a better job with their day in the sun.


Hyperinflation may well set in next year - or at least, strain the currencies still slaved to the dollar.

I think housing prices will continue to plunge for another year too. (and this is a good thing, housing had become unaffordable for too many, including myself - houses are also too big, according to our current demographics, but that's a tale for yet another unpublished article)

There's no sign that Obama is capable of chopping away the deadwood, or setting fire to it. It does look possible he can plant a new forest or two. Governments can create markets. Look at the market for war-making, for example...

I still have issues with resuming my profession - Terry Childs is still in jail - and his incompetent management isn't.

Fear of the competent man still reigns, in scenes that remind me very much of the final parts of Atlas Shrugged.

I was reminded of that particular novel a lot in the last few years. I was spending most of my time being tasked with avoiding copyright and patent laws and seemingly spending endless days with lawyers, and not doing what I loved, engineering. More than once, I quit because what I was doing was ethically or legally challenging. In part, I came to Nicaragua because I hoped CAFTA wouldn't pass (it did, but remains mostly unimplemented), so I could be left alone to create once again.

Last year, I struggled with writing a piece about why I was not a libertarian, but believed they pulled in the right direction. Recently I found part of the answer in something Jerry Pournelle wrote:

Atlas Shrugged shows capitalists overwhelmed by government regulators who don't understand how things work and eventually, which trying to assure fair play, make it impossible for the market to work.

Alas, a slave market shows where unregulated capitalism will go if left to itself.

For two thousand years political philosophers have known that good government consists of a mix, and that maximum freedom can only be obtained through mechanisms to assure that freedom. 'That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed'

Apparently no one remembers any of this. Miss Rand didn't; her unregulated capitalists were still decent men and women.

I am glad to have escaped the slave market.

Some things cheer me up, a lot.

Take, for example, the resurgence of Philadelphia sports - the Phillies winning the world series - and the plucky Eagles first, crushing the Cowboys a few weeks back, and then almost making the Superbowl with comeback after comeback in every game since - the last quarter of the last game was seemingly designed to make a Rocky fan weep every two minutes.

Or, SpaceX building the Falcon 9 rocket from scratch before NASA could even demonstrate a prototype of their own - and getting a contract for it. It's on the pad now. I get choked up about how it represents the America I once believed in every time I look at it. And I remember that Elon Musk is actually from South Africa, yet still believes in the American dream.

Or, Microsoft and Novell engineers slaving - together! - over the Silverlight code over the last few days so that people running on a PowerPC or under x86/x86_64 Linux could watch the inaugural.

People working towards being united, rather than divided.

One of the most galling things about the Bush regime was that, after election on the thinnest of margins, he then proceeded to rule as if he had an absolute majority.

I'm comforted by the idea of a new president that reaches for a cigarette, rather than a bible, when he needs contemplation - a president that might reach for technology, rather than weaponry, to achieve his goals. A uniter, rather than a divider, that actually may be one.

It is a nice thing to hope for, and although I can't gush over him like many of my friends, or Andrew Sullivan, or Doc Searls... Barack Obama does give me hope for a better tomorrow - or at least, a slightly less worse one. I'm willing to give him his shot, for now.

I intend to hang up this blog - and the prolefeed - and blogging in general - completely for a few months while I work on some code and some spanish. Maybe when I come back things will truly have changed.

"If nothing else, we are committed to failing in a new way." - Elon Musk

I didn't actually manage to see Obama's inaugural speech, though I read it. It didn't say a whole heck of a lot, really, that hasn't been said before... but it said it well.

However, in seeing pictures of the Mall today, I couldn't help but be reminded of the following:



not this part of the movie, in particular, but the sense of imminent doom, removed by the words,
Klaatu Barada Nikto...

(didn't they remake that movie recently?)

Labels: america, Barack Obama, election 2008, nicaragua, Ron Paul

  ¶ 4:44 AM 3 comments

  Feliz Año Nuevo

to everyone... and all that.

While the rest of the world struggled, this was a very good year for me. Arguably the best I've had a very long time...

Last year at this time, I was flying to New Zealand. I spent a few weeks there (loved it) and then a few months traveling Australia (highlight - hacking with David Rowe and linux.conf.au), Malaysia and Hong Kong, then a brief stop to visit my friends in California, and then back to Nicaragua, where I surfed every other day and lost weight and gained friends and a deep tan...

In the coming year... I don't plan to go anywhere but to the beach. Well, maybe, come September, I'll go somewhere.

Workwise, I have some audio code here and there to finish, (an odd Christmas present was hearing my tranzport and alphatrack drivers went into the linux-staging tree), and some stuff I can't talk about...

...AND a steady gig two-three nights a week. I hope a (couple) record(s) come out of it.


I plan to work much more heavily on my Spanish... and turn off the prolefeed,

There were times in my life where I would have sneered at such a plan - so unambitious! - but to hell with that, I hope to sit out the troubles that the world will have next year - with style - and that's all I'm aiming for.

I hope that next year isn't going to be as bad for everyone else as I fear, and for now

Happy New Year

Labels: nicaragua

  ¶ 3:55 PM 2 comments

  2:30 AM wake up call

It's 2:30AM.

And there is a brass band on the corner.

And a parade.

The advance men set off fireworks on my doorstep. They must have saved up all year for the first one. The KA lifted me off the bed 6 inches and the BOOM plastered me against the wall. My ears are still ringing. As are numerous car alarms.

I am trying to relax and get into a Nicaraguan Christmas. I went to bed immediately after seeing the "Grinch who stole Christmas" with a pair of friends (who made cookies, and a Christmas tree out of a surfboard)

Oh, man, they are shooting rockets off every few blocks! I'm told the whole purpose of this exercise is to wake people up for church (it succeeds with vigor), but the paraders don't look like they've been to bed yet...

Right now, I rather emphasize with the Grinch. His sudden conversion to sainthood at the end was unbelievable. Music make someone's heart 3 times bigger? Hah. Maybe 2 times, max... briefly. I keep reflecting on all the (delightfully) bad things he did earlier in the movie... can't help but think he couldn't reform overnight...

Another string of explosions, more distant, blast out.

I envision the movie:

GRINCH II - The Day After
where the Grinch slogs up to his mountain abode with a brutal hangover from too much egg-nog, and remembers the real reason he hated the noise and confusion and jocularity of Christmas... he comes back down the hill, this time, armed with an AK-47, and only...

... Rambo, home on leave, can stop him.

... Rambo crouches behind a chimney, taking potshots at the Grinch's sleigh while it careens around a snowman... his machine gun bullets explode up the snowman's front, leaving a decapitated white mess behind...

... the Grinch fires back with his AK-47, stitching a line of bullets up someones' Christmas tree, exploding the balls and blasting away the cute gingerbread ornaments in the blink of an eye.

Rambo leaps from one house to another, slipping on a tin roof and dragging down a string of lights as the Grinch's wild firing through a window turns little Annie Who, all of two years old, into fertilizer. Her sister Blu Who, takes a shot through the chest, and she wakes up both screaming and spitting blood. She faints, holding her hands agonizingly between her breasts in supplication...

The town is quiet now... Is Rambo gone? Is the Grinch gone? Will Blu Who survive? Will a Who avenge her splintered sister?

Silence settles in. Even the dogs and chickens are mute. Off in the distance, Howler monkeys resume howling...

[... to be continued... maybe... after the fireworks stop. Maybe I'll go to church. I am, for sure, wide awake now, and have a few sins to confess, starting with this one ]

Labels: nicaragua, sjds

  ¶ 12:36 AM 2 comments

  Boombas in Managua

I visited Managua last Sunday. It was - as my friends were telling me - a disturbing scene, particularly to someone unused to seeing gunpowder outside the hands of professionals.

The polarized election had nearly every telephone pole painted in some variant of each party's colors and many campaign signs were defaced.

There was a FSLN (Sandinista) rally on nearly every traffic circle I passed - two that I passed (near the galleria and metro central) had people equipped with what looked like hand made rocket launchers - short tubes, about 18 to 24 inches in size, with handles. They were shooting off fireworks that mostly went boom rather than had pretty colors. I mean, whooooosh - BOOM. whooosh - BOOOOOOOOOM! whoooosh - KA-BOOOOM!

No mortars, as some reported. But it was early. I didn't stick around after dark.

There were people, young and old, celebrating - lots of flag waving of both the Nicaraguan (blue and white) flag and the FSLN flag (red and black), and music, powered by generator trucks. Members of the opposing parties were notable by their absence, but all those present seemed enthusiastic, and only a very few drunk.

"Big Booms" occurred every few seconds at times. I mean, explosions to rival the best of a July 4th celebration - head-aching booms. As I noted in a previous blog entry, this sort of thing happens all the time in Nicaragua, firecrackers and fireworks are set off on nearly every occasion... but, man, there was an awful lot of it, everywhere, in Managua.

It was disturbing to see the rockets being fired off from within the crowd, and also obvious that the same devices could do a lot of damage if used horizontally rather than vertically. They weren't - but then again, the policia weren't bothering anyone celebrating, just sealing off the streets around the area and re-routing traffic.

I've always wondered: where does all that gunpowder come from? Some latent regulatory sense within me asks: "why does the government let the non-professionals have it?" - and my engineering side then asks "why don't I?" I have plenty of uses for the stuff. I could fix a few roads.

For all that, inside those malls, it was business as usual, no stores closed, no taped entrances. As I left Metro Central around 4 o'clock (I spent a few hours there getting my visa renewed), the front side parking had emptied of cars save my own, and mall guards - in bulletproof vests - were closing off the exits to the main road, where a much bigger rally was assembling just a block away.

We drove out of the mall up to the rally but had to turn around due to the sheer masses of people partying down.

The rest of the day was peaceful. I was amazed at how much the road network between San Juan Del Sur and Managua had improved - aside from a few bumps inside of busy towns, I encountered 0 - zero - potholes - in over 100km of driving - a huge improvement over my first visit 18 months ago, and accounting for a major increase of speed between those two destinations (with a detour in Caterina for pottery).

The airport - business as usual - the hotel - business as usual - otherwise just a normal day - well, one with explosions overhead every few minutes no matter where you went.

On my way out of Managua, I got stopped by some cops expecting a bribe. I had done nothing wrong, but I had broken the speed limit all day - and until a few minutes before was effectively in the country illegally - so it was kind of karmic.

400 cordobas (about $20 US) later my buddy and I were on our way. Having to bribe your way out of an unjustified ticket is just one price you have to pay for living in the third world, but I have to admit those cops made me pretty nervous before settling on an appropriate amount - I was already kind of disturbed and deaf from the day - AND had I not just freshly renewed my (late) visa I might have been in major trouble.

I am trying very hard here to document what I'd witnessed or done vs what I've heard. There are so many rumors swirling around, and the only place I've found approximations of the truth has been on the comment sections of websites such as Nica Living, and the on-going dialog over an economist article.

Several sources claim that Tuesday grew ugly, as Eduardo Montealegre (the losing PLC candidate for Mayor of Managua) staged marches in multiple municipalities and had planned a major march in Managua itself before being stopped by a rock-throwing counter-demonstration. He plans to appeal the election results to every authority he can find - and with good reason, among many other signs of election fraud was a multitude of ballots found thrown in a ditch. (still looking for backing urls for the above - the latter came from La Prensa a few days ago)

Update: The recount came back today, with the same results as before, a massive Sandinista win across much of the country. No credible observers, however, Montealegre called off a march in Estelí.

I hope my reporting comes across as a little more factual and correct than what appears in the Pimes.

Labels: election 2008, nicaragua

  ¶ 12:08 PM 8 comments

  Nicaragua's election aftermath

Listening to rumors and hearsay, I hear all sorts of things... but Time, however, posted the most inflammatory piece, lacking almost entirely in substantive detail, but containing gems like:

"This week, the streets of Managua were once again aflame amid the boom of mortar rounds, as the Sandinistas and their rivals battled for control..."

Um, I haven't heard that from any local I know. I think the journalist is mistaking the common practice of lighting off large firecrackers ("bombas") for mortar rounds. You hear bombas all the time, day or night, anywhere you go in Nicaragua, on even the most trivial occasion. After a week or two you stop jumping under your desk for safety.

Yes, there are problems. Other news organizations, such as the Latin American Herald Tribune, have posted that At least two people were killed and several other injured in clashes Monday. Accusations of vote-buying and a miscount are rampant, and the losing party (PLC) is demanding a recount with international observers. Since the entire election process lacked international observers, and had two parties banned from taking part, somehow I doubt this will happen...

Update: The comment section of this economist article has a pointer to Citizen's Crusade Watch's accounts of the vote totals in Managua, which show some rather major discrepancies.

For my part, as an accidental international observer, the voting process in San Juan Del Sur seemed orderly and peaceful. It was a foregone conclusion that SJDS would go FSLN - it has for 27 years, after all. One image from the day sticks with me: As a victory parade stalled out in front of my house, one truck containing at least thirty men, women and children stopped, and one of those walking reached up to hand the driver a beer.

My amigos and amigas in Managua have told me that it IS tense there, that the police are doing nothing, and gangs of supporters of all factions are messing up the place.

One conversation (with a native Managuan) went like this:

S: Are you happy with your new president?
Dave: Um, er, not really. I hate the existing president with a passion I can barely express.
S: Wow.
Dave: Problem is, all the power that Bush gathered to himself is going to Obama next and I'd prefer that all that power... dissipate... vanish... so that no president ever again, has that much power. Obama is going to try to use his power for "good" and absolute power corrupts absolutely. U happy with your new Boxer mayor?
S: Not at all. To be honest, i didnt like McCain nor Obama. I think they are 2 extreme persons. One is too liberal. The other is too conservative when it comes to helping people from another race. But I do share McCain's values - I'm pro-life - and I can be a little conservative when it comes to values. I'm totally against war, though.
Dave: Yea, someone having a consistent pro-life position would be nice - no abortion, no war.
S: Yep. So those 2 guys are the extreme position.
Dave: Hmm. I regarded McCain as middle of the road... for the current crop of Republicans. I was going to vote for him until he selected Palin.
S: That too.
Dave: Ah, well, she was good for a laugh.
S: haha. managua is crazy today. Sandinistas are fighting against liberales.
Dave: I heard there was violence, is it still going on?
S: Horrible. Yes.
Dave: Well, I heard there was a lot of allegations of fraud - property for a vote, money for a vote, food for a vote - but I took that as "normal" for Nicaragua... not enough to account for a 51% vs 45% vote difference.
S: Yes i think it was like that. I think authorities are acting in a very irresponsible way
Dave: How so? In America, there are now "free speech zones" - one of the many reasons why I left, for here. Here strikes me as saner than America... or did, until a few days ago. You don't need a permit for a parade.
S: Yea.
Dave: How are the authorities acting irresponsibly? rubber bullets? gas?
S: They should stop people from acting the way they are acting. The police are not doing anything and the president doesn't care. I don't care what party is causing what... that's not the proper way to protest.
Dave: How can they manage better? Persuasion? Passing out good dope?
S: Increasing violence, killing people... each party should talk with its people and tell them to calm down. they haven't done that.
Dave: Police are killing people?
S: No, Sandinistas and Liberales are killing each other. Police are not doing anything. It is just sad.
Dave: Well, mass insurrection does not seem to be be happening (yet). People kill one another all the time - over relationships, over politics, over money or stuff... it's a fact of life.
S: I know, but Nicaragua is not ready for more wars. We have gone through a lot.
Dave: I'm essentially conservative (in the old fashioned, 1950s, American sense) that in case of doubt, the government should do nothing. I came here because I wanted to understand peace. No lessons to be had in Iraq, or the Balkans, or many other places in the world. Somehow, post-Chammorro, Nicaragua has retained a strong semblance of peace. It's amazing. I'd hate to see it go to hell.
S: I know. We need people who love Nicaragua with passion, people with good values and morality and people ready to make a change in this country without violence, using values,and discipline and morality as the weapon. That's what I think.
Dave: So get out there and BE peaceful!
S: We need a new face. People are getting tired of Ortega and Arnoldo.
Dave: Not enough tired, this time.
S: We'll see.

Outside my window, children play. Four came up, this morning, to ask for water. We talked - or rather, they talked while I tried to translate what they said - the most voluble among them was growing in a new set of front teeth, which made that doubly difficult - about baseball, television, and games.

Kid stuff, nothing important.

I wish politics wasn't important.

Labels: election 2008, nicaragua

  ¶ 8:38 AM 2 comments

  Nicaragua's elections today

After all my coverage of America's election, writing something on Nicaragua's election today would be appropriate...

I'd write something about it, if I understood it, but I don't. Where I spend most of my time - San Juan Del Sur - is very much a tourist town, half its bars and restaurants run by Canadians, Italians, and Swedes... and a very few Americans, the other half locals, and the pulperias, mechanical, and plumbing shops run by locals almost exclusively. I don't think it is representative of the rest of Nicaragua, or perhaps it is: despite - or because of - the foreign business class - the town has voted Sandinista (FSLN) for 27 years, straight.

Understanding this place may take a lifetime, or more. I desperately need to speak spanish better, and get out more. Sorting out just the current political parties would take more paragraphs than I care to expend today.

I have snippets and impressions... like...

The election is held on a Sunday. Selling or serving alcohol is banned the day prior and the day of - last night was the most sober and empty I've ever seen San Juan Del Sur... yet I saw a storekeeper slip a favored customer a beer, with a mutually conspiratorial grin... and outside my window this morning, a good hundred+ gathered to vote before dawn...

A happy, drunken crowd had gathered near the beach. I was walking my guitar home, and they welcomed me into their group. One poured me a drink of 7 year Flor de Cana from their cooler, and another asked if I knew anything about Sandino. I waved off the question, saying in my bad spanish "tengo no entiendo de politicos", and he didn't persist. They applauded politely for my song, then I passed my guitar off to a local musician who leaned up against a car and started to play. One of the members of the group kept pushing his cell phone with a recording of someone screaming "Sandino" against his ear, until he shrugged it away so he could concentrate on his singing... a few more musicians showed up, and we sat, perched between two cars and the beach, for hours, and passed the bottle and guitars around.

Despite having read dozens of books on this place, I'm no better off than I was when I started. On my bookshelf are "Why Nicaragua Vanished", "Coffee and Power", "Where is Nicaragua", "Nicaragua - Revolution in the Family", "At War in Nicaragua", and "The Sandinista Revolution", and I've misplaced or loaned out Chamorro's biography as well as Somosa's, as well as a book of translated speeches from 1983...

There is very little written about Nicaragua since the end of the war, aside from real estate blurbs. This is a shame, because I find peace far more interesting than war. It's partially why I'm here... Somehow, Nicaragua achieved peace after that bitter war, and is groping towards prosperity now. What lessons were learnt in that time would be good to apply to places like Iraq and the Balkans.

I struggle, still, in trying to figure out how to explain what I do not understand. The FSLN is running a former member of the National Guard (and Contra), a famous boxer named Alexis Arguello, as their candidate for Mayor of Managua. The ALN/PLC is running Eduardo Montealegre, a Brown and Harvard educated economist. How either of these choices makes sense is beyond me, the closest analogy I could make would be as if Arnold Schwarzenegger was running against Joe Lieberman in the US.

One Nicaraguan wrote me:

No se tengo familia liberal, y tengo familia Sandinista. pero no se todavia por quien votar. Montealegre en un tiempo atras robo mucho dinero, dinero que era para los pobres el los robo y sobre el boxeador no se porque es primera vez que se esta tirando para alcalde. No se mucho de eso, pero montealegre desde ase 4 anos quiere ganar y no ha podido ganar, primero para presidente de Nicaragua y no gano ahora para alcalde de managua y no se si ira a ganar. La verdad es que esos politicos mierda, solamente quieren dinero para ellos ellos quieren ganar no para ayudar a los pobres si no para aserse ellos mas ricos y mas poderosos.

I'll write more later.

Labels: election 2008, nicaragua

  ¶ 4:28 AM 0 comments

  What I did on election day

I managed to avoid the election almost entirely, although, here, I'm nearly getting mowed down by Jessica “La Capitana”, on her longboard. She's good. Too good, sometimes, she catches everything she even looks at.

I have been riding a longer board myself, as a compensation for for my age and inertial problems. The board's appropriately named "Tombstone". On this day, however, Tombstone was in need of maintenance, and I was on a shorter board, that not only was less stable but had laminar flow problems. I managed to stand up once all day... so spent the rest of my time admiring Jessica's, Trev's, and Ben's moves.

Speaking of moving... I moved from my air conditioned apt/office, 30 meters from the beach, to sharing a house with a couple buddies further inland. The positives are - lots more room - I can set up the music studio far better - our own internet (and a real IP address so I hopefully can get back into IPv6 land), a small backyard, a great front porch....

The downsides - too many ninos & ninas during the day, and no air conditioning. I am not sure if me or my gear can survive the lack of air conditioning. I've been moved for 2 days now and my fingers have swollen to 30% bigger than normal, and my super-computer - the water cooled one - refused to boot when I got here. I also liked having an office in the center of town, it gave me hope one day that I'd build a viable business there.

Ah, well, change is good. I like the added space a lot, and I'll be immersed in more spanish on a daily basis, and get closer to achieving my goals for this past year, by next year.

Should have some good waves next week....

So anyway, I managed to avoid the election entirely up until 7PM when I wandered into a bar that was showing the horserace with a bunch of talking heads hovering over the early returns.

I showed up just in time for the hologram. While this might be gee-whiz technology, all I could flash on was a few of the holographic characters from an old British SF show whose name I struggle to recall. SMEG!

So, I started arguing with people - a McCain supporter on the one side, who felt that somebody else should fix his road - or if he did, he should charge an exorbitant toll - and an Obama supporter on the other who spouted so much optimism about the two (now one) party system that I started calling him "Comrade" - and before I got entirely POed and left I told the McCain guy to build his own damn road and charge whatever toll he could get away with, and quoted PJ O'Roarke and H.L. Mencken at the Obama guy...

... and stomped home and finished plugging more stuff in.

For the record, the quotes were:

"Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."- O'Roarke

and

"Democracy is the theory that the people know what they want, and deserve to get it, good and hard."- Mencken

I am really glad the election is over. I have a backlog of far more interesting things to deal with....

Labels: election 2008, nicaragua, surfing

  ¶ 4:49 AM 5 comments

  Tres, nada, in chess

I just got my arse handed to me 3 times in playing chess with the owner of San Juan Pizza (which is incidentally the best pizza place in all of San Juan Del Sur). I've watched him play - two, sometimes three, games of speed chess, and last week I was admiring a problem he'd had mailed (not emailed! Mailed!) to him from a friend from his home country. We had a nice discussion about it....

Today, drunk - stupid - I decided, finally, after a year of watching him decimate all opponents, to take him on.

He creamed me in less than 20 moves, twice, with barely a pause for thought. By the third game I was ready to resign after going two pawns down, after opening as white. I held on for a while just for the sake of honor but the writing was on the wall by move 24 and I resigned again.

It hurt - not so much as if I'd been sober - because I used to play chess at the 1300+ level before computers got so good as to take all the fun out of the game unless you were in the 1800s or higher. Games.yahoo.com was a comforting friend for a while, but there is no way I can play at the level he plays at.

He was gracious in victory. And he makes pizza for a living.

I am in awe. Perhaps I can take on some of his defeated opponents after my ego recovers... in another year or so.

Labels: chess, games, nicaragua

  ¶ 8:32 PM 0 comments

  Best. Resignation. Letter. Ever.

Andrew Lahde has got his f-you money and, tired of the stress and worry of operating a hedge fund, gone home.

May meritocracy be part of a new form of government, which needs to be established.

Hey, Andrew? Play an instrument? I could use a different drummer down here.

Labels: Andrew Lahde, banking, music, nicaragua

  ¶ 8:29 AM 6 comments

  Waiting for another shoe to drop

Q- Why did God create economists?
A- So meteorologists would not look quite so bad.

There has been a lot of doom and gloom lately. A whole bunch of bankers and economists are now in Washington, trying to fix it. By Wednesday last week I had concluded that the Paulson plan had created more uncertainty than it resolved, and world governments were all competing now to offer the best deals for international capital for fear they would go the way of Iceland. Perhaps this weekend the uncertainty will end, although the gross distortion of the markets created by all this government activity will remain for years or decades.

"Who will get a handout? Who won't?" - has become the dominant economic thought.

Thursday's stock market took out those fears on the regional banks.

I have long advocated decentralization, local government, local ownership, and local responsibility for your actions. It's hard to look the guy you are screwing over in the eye at the behest of your faceless masters.

The course the world governments and corporations are on is the precise opposite, and when those efforts fail... ordinary people will have to pull together again for mutual support.

Some are calling for the G7 to incorporate the more successful economies of the third world. Gee, thanks for the invite to clean up the party mess....

I still believe that hyperinflation, at least in the conventional sense (1000s of percent) is impossible for the dollar. All the naysayers quote from both the Great Depression and the Weimar inflation, and in neither case were the markets so globally linked, and in the Weimar Republic case, the Mark was not backed by 12 aircraft carriers, a multitude of nuclear submarines, an uncountable number of ICBMs, and the best (if currently overstretched) air force and army in the world. Fiat currencies, backed by force, can hold up for a while.

Note that I find it depressing to have to say that. I would prefer to be saying that there was some strong sector in the US economy that would save us all, but the online advertising bubble has run its course, and nothing has shown up so far to replace it. Nanotech and solar? Maybe...

Nothing has appeared to stop this endless flow of fake money after bad. Over the past few years all the core statistics have been jiggered as to make objective evaluations of what to do invalid, much as they were in the Soviet Union before its collapse. Why not give up on GDP, and substitute some index of more use than the CPI? An orgasm index for men, and a "feelin-fine" index for women, perhaps, and a quality of life index, which would also factor in man's impact on the planet.

I desperately would like to see fish populations stop imploding for one thing, and to get better than 0 cents a word for what I write, for another. I have no idea on how to accomplish either.

Protecting house prices? What long term good does that do for those that don't own? Or, take, for example, the auto industry bailout incorporated (without fanfare) in the budget passed recently...

GM and Chrysler, due for a 25 billion dollar handout/bailout, are in merger talks.

These businesses are too big to fail? They are too big not to fail. When a corporation - or government - reaches a certain age and size, much like a person, it gets blocked arteries and mental problems. It's best that they die, or divest, and make room for something new to rise from the ashes.

Take a moral dilemma like this one, and smoke it for a while. Tesla Motors has developed a breakthrough electric sportscar and is building a 250 million dollar facility to produce an all electric sedan, heavily subsidized by two local governments, without help from the feds. What makes that investment less valid than the bailout from congress? Why should California be competing with the Federal Reserve? The Fed can print money, California can't. Who is making better investment decisions?

California's still in line for a 7 billion dollar bailout, because they can't get anyone to buy their bonds, perhaps due to their irresponsible spending? Debt, debt, and more Debt. When will adding on debt seem like an unsound option to anyone in power? High rates of inflation seem inevitable for the foreseeable future. Why buy poorly paying bonds from a bankrupt state with no worthwhile industrial outputs save movies and online advertising?

There is no sign of anyone finding a way to pay for anything except by printing money. I'd really like to know where the money for all this is going to come from... some change in government policies... some cutbacks... legal changes... somewhere....

Perhaps the Guvernator will legalize pot, like Mexico is trying to - tax it - and send the tax money to the schools and Tesla? That would almost make sense in this environment. It would mellow everybody out, and boost sales of chocolate and twinkies, and cut down on the pesticides in use in the national forests.

Regarding higher rates of inflation, there seems to be no valid hedge left (besides put options). I view the now global guarantee of banks by governments (australia
just joined the club), as the ultimate gun to the heads of lenders that would rather choose to be prudent, and raise interest rates and lend only to those creditworthy.

I would have liked it if McCain hadn't show up for the first presidential debate, and the other presidential candidates had. I still remember that the last time they tried, in 2004, the Libertarian and Green candidates were arrested, which I guess was disincentive enough for them not to even try this year.

It sure would be nice to see some more options on the national debate stage than a choice between fascism or socialism.

It's astonishing how hard you have to work to hear these other points of view in the tumult, even with an RSS news feed. Here's Ralph Nader, running independently and now on the ballot of 45 states, Ron Paul, running nowhere but behind the scenes, the Green Party, and Chuck Baldwin, of the Constitution Party, and Bob Barr, of the Libertarian Party....

But, noo... A or B, A or B, A or B, crieth the MSM!

I'd like to hear from more real bankers, brick and mortar bankers, regional bankers, someone like Jimmy Stewart in "It's a wonderful life", to get the straight dope. The only one I know (retired, father of a friend), just stuffed his savings into a coffee can.

According to wikipedia, U.S. Treasury statistics indicate that, at the end of 2006, foreigners held 44% of federal debt. The statistics that I trust (shadowstats) are saying that the monetary base jumped 16.8% over the past year (and roughly the same the previous year) and according to the M3, that almost all of that expansion, up to august, came from international sources.

This indicates, strongly, that foreigners now hold well over 50% of the US debt. (I await confirmation from other sources)

What we have is an untenable situation. Governments have piled up so much debt that even a modest increase of interest rates would break their budgets, so out come the guns and tanks.

The independent evaluators of risk are scared silly. That includes me.

Yet, I also think that the size of the gold market - physical gold - is now so small as to be a hedge only for the most lucky and connected of individuals. Gold, despite its cachet among gold bugs, is just another commodity now, its glory days are long past, and, still, getting hold of physical gold is harder than buying liquor, which has more intrinsic value.

I'm stocking up on scotch. I don't think wuffie will pay for anything any time soon.

If I had a trillion dollars

(apologies to the Bare Naked Ladies for appropriating their song)

If I had a trillion dollars (instead of the Treasury)
If I had a trillion dollars, I'd buy an RV (and tow a Tesla off the back)
If I had a trillion dollars, I'd fix the roads and bridges (but I might focus more on trains)
If I had a trillion dollars, I'd walk away from my house
If I had a trillion dollars, I'd build a whole bunch of nuclear plants (and a lot of solar panels too)
If I had a trillion dollars, I'd buy everyone, absolutely everyone a beer (one of those nice micro-brews)

I still have a few more lyrics to add to that.

---

I still plan to fiddle while Rome burns, knowing full well what Nero accomplished on his return to Rome. There's absolutely nothing I can do to affect whatever happens next, so I plan to keep my head down, write no long term contracts, keep my own house in order and contribute to my local (Nicaraguan) economy as much as possible. I don't really want to participate in an economy where terry childs is still in jail and his management isn't. There seems to be a long way left to go before that happens.

Jamie Johnson was so inspired by his stay in San Juan Del Sur to have gone right into the studio, and lay down 5 songs. My favorite is Rainstorm, because it accidentally ties into a lot of my own story. Have a listen, on headphones.

Labels: banking, Barack Obama, chuck baldwin, economy, gold, John Mccain, msm, music, nicaragua, Ron Paul

  ¶ 6:50 AM 6 comments

  Monday grabbag

Eric Raymond is back, and blogging with the best of them - taking on the collapse of the entitlement system, admiring the yippie elements of Palinomania, tackling identity politics and describing the the vanishing consumption gap. I found that last article there, quite interesting, in light of the economic statistics I believe in.

Two interesting bits on obesity and antibiotics: Why on earth does the US subsidize corn syrup?

The economist has a great article on the issues with obliterating Helicobacter pylori from the human stomach.

Pity poor Helicobacter - a casualty of the war against common aliments.I've always tried to avoid being pumped full of whatever magic antibiotic is trendy (or rather, after having been pumped full of various trendy drugs multiple times in the past, prefer to avoid them in the future). The problem with antibiotics is that they are, well, anti-biotic - they kill a lot of innocent bystander micro-organisms in addition to what's targeted. Also some of the side-effects of modern antibiotics like levofloxicin are scary as hell.

(I prefer to struggle through the flu and dysentery without chemical aid, anything non-life threatening, actually. This strategy has a flaw in that I don't have a GP, and for all I know am about collapse from some easily preventable disease or cancer. I get by on wikipedia. At least I live in a country where most drugs are available without prescription and requisite middlemen)

Down here in San Juan Del Sur, the wind has been consistently onshore and the surf correspondingly terrible. This week, starting Tuesday, looks great, though. It's too bad I have to work. I had basically planned to bust my hump during the slack/rainy season (Sept-November) so I could take off for the rest of the year. September is nearly over... Mmmm... magicseaweed predicts 6+ foot waves... maybe I'll take off Wednesday and Thursday... I gotta keep my weight down....

I got a chance to do some art this weekend, after doing a photo shoot with a local model and photographer. My goal was to produce a series of sexy line cards and posters for promoting the open mic nights at Coquito. I think I like this one the best, although it's not bright enough for the intended purpose, maybe it would work as a cd cover. Now I just need some music to go with it (two of the regular musicians are leaving town this week), and maybe another shoot....

Saturday was the start of a 4 day holiday here, celebrating Nicaragua's independence from Spain (Costa Rica, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras all have the same holiday, for the same reason). The town filled up with cars from Managuans, stereos blared from every street corner, multiple discos rocked out, gorgeous girls wandered around hawking Pall Malls, there was a parade seemingly every other hour, and never has so much been drunk by so many, so early. There were loud, drunk, happy people passing by my door all day and night long. It's 7AM, and they are still passing by....

Good magazine has a good human interest story on the decline of fishing since 1988....

And lastly, CERN now has a live webcam on the large hadron collider! It's pretty neat that with all that advanced technology for safely making mini-black holes and odd particles, that they've also let the public watch the thing in action.

ah, well, back to work... might as well get some done in the time we have left.

Labels: antibiotics, independence day, nicaragua, obesity, sjds, work

  ¶ 5:11 AM 0 comments

  I'll play anywhere, even the floor

James (the guy on the stool with the Zepata guitar) did this killer intro to a song that the rest of the people on the stand should have known immediately, and they just stared at him. He stared back in disbelief for what seemed like forever. I slid in - safe! - as he kicked into Redemption Song...

Old Pirates, yes, they rob I.
Sold I to the merchant ships
minutes after they took I from the bottomless pit.
But my hand was made strong
By the hand of the Almighty.
We forward in this generation triumphantly.

... And, then, everybody knew the words.

Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery,
None but ourselves can free our minds.
Have no fear for atomic energy,
'Cause none of them can stop the time.
How long shall they kill our prophets
While we stand aside and look?
Yes, some say it's just a part of it.
We've got to fulfill the book.
Won't you help to sing these songs of freedom?
'Cause all I ever had, redemption songs,
These songs of freedom, songs of freedom.

Labels: coquito, music, nicaragua

  ¶ 8:12 PM 0 comments

  Research Sailboat daydream

When I was a kid, I daydreamed of living on a research submarine straight out of Jules Verne's 20,000 leagues under the sea. I remember the Disneyworld ride on that vividly, it was a cheezy ride, but still it fired my imagination. My mental version of the sub, updated for the 1970s - when I was 7 or 8 years old - had a piano rather than an organ, the waterbed was transparent like in one of the James Bond movies, and it had ship to ship missiles - no dangerous ramming of the bad guys for me! I built the ship out of General Products #3 hull, which was as transparent as the waterbed. The whole ship was lit by the eery glow of jellyfish. I had scribbled down some stories about the adventures my protagonist had in this ship (in the vein of Indiana Jones, Jr. and Tom Swift, Jr. - Call him, "Nemo, Jr.") but lost them in 1993.

I memorized some lines of the neo-Shakespearean dialog in 20,000 leagues:

"Strike, mad vessel! Shower your useless shot! And then, you will not escape the spur of the Nautilus. But it is not here that you shall perish! I would not have your ruins mingle with those of the Avenger!" - Jules Verne

I would, oddly, recite this while heading into a heavy sea, all the way up til I was 17 or so.

I thought we'd be living in space, and under the sea by now. We aren't.

I take flack for being skeptical about anthropogenic global warming, but the decline of the sea itself is well documented. We've hit "Peak Fishing". Edible un-farmed fish supplies and sizes are way down. And the dead zones, the parts of the ocean that are hypoxic and deadly to most life - are expanding.



Look at all those black spots! These are anthropogenic! These are humanity's fault! We can't fix them with missiles!

Every salt water ecosystem I've ever lived near on the East coast is in decline, in part because of the rush of people to the coasts has sapped the strength of the ecosystem to cope. People need better reasons to live inland, or to at least live in better harmony with oceans, but it isn't happening yet.

The sad part about these hypoxic trends is that is IS possible to reverse them. It may take decades to repair what we've done but "the trend is reversible", as the study, linked above, said.

"From 1970 to 1990, the hypoxic zone on the northwestern continental shelf of the Black Sea had expanded to 40,000 square kilometers (15,500 square miles)," the study noted.

"However, since 1989, the loss of fertilizer subsidies from the former Soviet Union reduced nutrient loading by a factor of two to four, with the result that by 1995 the hypoxic zone had gone."

There's still plenty of reserve left in the system. Certain things, like lowering nitrate runoff, make economic sense for both farmers and fishers, but it is hard to connect the dots. For example, I worry about hypoxic conditions in the harbor here in San Juan Del Sur and have no means to test for them. Similarly I note the differences in fish catch up and down the coast and wonder if it was possible to improve the quality of it. Although I love lobster, the lobsters they serve here tend towards the small side, and I've stopped eating them. I've wondered how big lobster here were 10 and 20 years ago, but have found no records.

(Although I do dig the beauty of the sea, I also love eating fish. The way things are going, in 20-30 years we'll be reduced to eating plankton and jellyfish)

Being that nuclear powered submarines fitted with advanced weaponry and pianos are kind of hard for even an angry individual to get...

"I am the law, and I am the judge! I am the oppressed, and there is the oppressor! Through him I have lost all that I loved, cherished, and venerated—country, wife, children, father, and mother. I saw all perish! All that I hate is there! Say no more!"

...I've daydreamed more recently about a research sailboat.

It would be like Calypso, only greener.

It would be equipped with solar panels, dive gear, side-scan sonar, etc, and wander around less explored areas of the world, not only tagging fish, but setting down (webcam) observation posts along major reefs and fisheries, observing the number of fish, over time and season, in their natural habitat.

I'd use my software and hardware engineering skills to develop new kinds of tools to not only monitor the seabed but introduce ways to coax reefs back to life...

Perhaps it would be possible to take action sooner, and reverse trends like hypoxia and starfish encroachment and stuff like that, in places that are not as affected as America's East coast.

Something like this boat, would be a good start.

I can see sailboats coming back, like in Waterworld, in a future where gas is exceedingly scarce, and the cost of living on land includes having to cope with plague and warfare.

Regrettably reality sets in and the rigor with which I live squashes daydreams like that down to something that will fit in my budget this year... which is basically a 21 foot daysailer. Maybe I can at least tag a few fish.

For years I've gone to sleep with an opening line that starts off with "He fired two missiles" and a fuzzy made up story built around the events of the month that rapidly slipped into dreams. Most often it is an assault on two sides, an attempt not to chart a middle course, but a different one.

Update: I re-read the e-book version of 20,000 leagues today, and discovered my memories of it jumbled up hopelessly with Disney's version, the two underwater tv shows I barely remember, Tom Swift, Jr, and my own scribbled fantasies.

Still, I remembered the end of the story correctly:

I hope that his powerful vessel has conquered the sea at its most terrible gulf, and that the Nautilus has survived where so many other vessels have been lost! If it be so—if Captain Nemo still inhabits the ocean, his adopted country, may hatred be appeased in that savage heart! May the contemplation of so many wonders extinguish for ever the spirit of vengeance! May the judge disappear, and the philosopher continue the peaceful exploration of the sea! If his destiny be strange, it is also sublime.

Labels: diving, global warming, nicaragua, oceans, sailboats

  ¶ 1:21 AM 0 comments

  I'm 43, and it's a monday

It's the Mayan Day 0, again. And I'm 43 years old, too. And it's a monday. No woman no cry runs through my head in "G". I can't sing it in its native key, "C". I learned how to play it on bass, last week, in the native key. It's stuck in my head, but not in the order it's sung.

"Said I remember, when we used to sit"...

I wish I'd kept a log of how I felt on every birthday over the course of my life. I suspect that up until age 8 or so it was a plainly joyful occasion, but I can't remember them. In fact, I can't remember a single birthday prior to my 16th, and that one only because my gf made it memorable.


The only parties I remember from my youth were from the Night in Venice boat parade - after that, how could a birthday party compare? As far as I was concerned Night in Venice WAS my birthday party (and my brother's, too). 100,000 people flooding a not-so-dry town, boats festooned with lights, pool parties every few feet.

What could top that?

The people that have big celebrations for their birthdays - well, most of their friends were nearby - mine have always been spread all around the world - and unable to travel. I was never one for small parties, either. I have figured that one out - I spent most of my life consuming compressed experience - reading books in 2 hours that took 2 years to write - living on what became the internet - and a real time anything smaller than 100k people tended to not hold my attention.

Not until I started blogging the birthdays in 2002(Belize), 2003 (Cursing the Moon's pull on the space program), 2004 (the same gf I had at 16 made my 39th quite memorable), 2005 (I'd just as soon not talk about it), 2006 (solving global warming), 2007 (taking off for a trip around the world), and now 2008 (reflecting)- has my state of mind stuck with me.

I remember how my dad, flush with the memories of visiting "the shore" with his mom and dad, when he was a kid back in the 1940s and 1950s, resolved to live there when he grew up - and he achieved that goal. He even changed his name from "Ron" to "Mike" along that journey, how or why or when I haven't figured out.

I remember fishing with him, I guess I was 12, one summer when we found an enormous school of bluefish, birds working everywhere. We went through it again and again - 3,4 lines on the boat hitting at once - we'd leap from fishing pole to fishing pole and pull in enormous fish after enormous fish...

He told me, decades later, that ultimately he got tired of it and steered away from the birds working... He caught a lot of fish when I was growing up. We could count on a meal, often fill a freezer, and/or share the extras with our neighbors. Somebody was always catching fish.

And we were sailing hobie cats, and jetskis... yet always I remember the sadness's of summer - how, as Bob Marley would say it:

"Good friends we've had, and good friends we've lost... Along the way"

Summer would end, and everybody new I'd met would go home, wherever that was - whether it was to Pennsylvania or Ireland.

Donal O'Rearden - where are you now? Al? Christine?

As I got older, the goodbyes got harder.

"In this bright future, you can't forget your past"

These emotions are especially sharp now, as every friend I had growing up - and almost every friend I've made this year - and every friend I made in between adolescence and retirement - is now far, far away.

My birthday, to me, more than anything else, signifies the end of summer. People start going home in the middle of august, taking seashells and other souvenirs, promising to be back again.

The whole town would close up by early fall, and then winter would settle in, school start, the theaters close, and the surf run wild and cold. My dad was always kind of annoyed with my winter malaise - this is paradise - he would say - But there's nothing to do!?

"So dry your tears, I say"

I can't go home anymore - the house I grew up in sells for 7 figures now - a week's rent by the beach is $1600 - and every time I've been "home" in the last decade all the good memories about the place that come to mind are quickly outweighed by the bad - there's still no jobs year round, and all the people that stayed have all been forced onto the mainland.

The bluefish no longer school - you are lucky to catch a croaker noawadays - and a small flounder - woo-hoo! It's not worth expending the gas to fish there anymore. The last time I went out, I got boarded by cop boats, twice.

The only bookstore... still only sells discount books.

"Everything's gonna be alright"
"Everything's gonna be alright"
"Everything's gonna be alright"
"Everything's gonna be alright"

There was no way I could stay in Ocean City after I turned 18, there were no jobs for a computer geek that didn't involve a mainframe and security cameras, and my only other real choice was to become a dealer of one sort or another. So, after 7 years of misadventures, I left, with the sea still embedded in my veins, for another beach town, Santa Cruz, California. That was the happiest time in my life - high technology, with sand and surf 13 blocks away. I got on the waiting list for a slip in the harbor when I arrived, and was still on it, 17 years later, when I left.

I can vaguely remember a few birthdays in my 20s and 30s, but not my state of mind. I remember endless hours at Natural Bridges, watching the Perseids meteor shower - or, at least trying to - in nights of rain, fog, or clouds. If I can remember any general mode it was:

How could you be, on one day, special - when beaten into you the rest of the year you weren't? Why do small groups of friends gather to celebrate your birthday with you when, if absolutely everybody with a birthday got together and introduced themselves, you could have a huge celebration?

Fast forward to today. The writing I do now...

"Ob... Observing, the hypocrites"

I am thinking of giving up for painting, and I can't go home anymore (I crave a sub from Joe's), but I did find a place much like it - San Juan Del Sur, Nicaragua.

Moving to central america was a heavily deferred, but now realized dream. I live, now 50 meters from the beach, 30 meters from a pulperia, in a place that I can afford without strain.

"Mingle with the good people we meet"

It's better than my birthplace, which mostly got visitors from the states - here, an endless stream of tourists come visit from all over the world. Maybe it's like the paradise that my dad moved to that's now lost, that was lost before I finished growing up.

I wish I'd come here ten years ago, when women under 25 were still interesting, and skipped the internet boom entirely. What a fork in my life that would have been! What a musician I could be now!

There is no high tech except what I brought with me. I rarely turn most of it on. And no jobs, either - but I can telecommute now. I'm saving up for a small sailboat, and I'll be able to anchor it in this harbor anytime I damn well please.

Perhaps next year I'll be able to remember more of my lost youth, while sitting offshore, fishing lines snapping inside some flock of birds, working...

and change my name from "Mike" to "David"

while playing...

"My feet is my only carriage
So I've got to push on through

Here little darlin
Don't shed no tears
No woman, no cry"

...under the Milky Way, watching the Perseids fall.

Yea,

"Everything's gonna be alright"

Happy Birthday to the other 1/365th of humanity!

Hope your monday goes well!

Labels: nicaragua

  ¶ 1:00 AM 9 comments