Two Boys from Indiana

There are now two boys from Indiana on the national stage: Pete Buttigieg, and Mike Pence.  One of them believes that no one is really gay, it's just a lifestyle decision.  The other believes it's not just a decision, and is open about it.  Both of them claim to serve the Lord, because, well, that's a popular stance in Indiana, but one of them seems to be a bit in the closet when it comes to who his real boss is.

Storm run-off

What I find interesting about this article is Washington DC's approach, but also, that someone recently suggested a similar concept not for raw sewage leakage, but for Sydney Australia's water shortage.  The person suggested that Sydney's run-off should be captured by a system such as this and that would help reduce the water shortage problem.  I might add, the City Council in which I reside has program incentives for building permits to reduce hard spaces and create spaces where storm water will be more slowly released.  To my knowledge, Australians don't use wells for water as much as the US does - it seems in many locations the water is unsuitable for drinking.  The storm water reduction effort is largely to keep water at the beaches cleaner.

E.P.A. Is Letting Cities Dump More Raw Sewage Into Rivers for Years to Come

Difficult goodbyes

This post is about leaving Facebook, which I intend to do in the near future.  My two strongest beliefs in this moment are 1. that the current President of the United States is not fit for that office and 2. the management of Facebook is not fit for the level of access to personal data that they have.  I don't believe that either of those entities will ever be capable of the level of responsibility they should have.  They may have earned their position, and taking it away from them may be difficult, but it's past time, and damage has been done.

Six ways to Sunday

The man who works in government complains about the government in his life. There's a simple way to get the government out of your life Barnaby - get your life out of the government! And as for your cattle, two wives, and ten children... If I were a praying man I'd say "Dear God, could you send Barnaby a more explicit sign? Because he has interpreted every message you've sent as being for someone else." Barnaby's Rant

Mail order, trust

In the US, I made numerous purchases through the internet; delivered to home.  The biggest headache, which has been much parodied on YouTube, is that you're never home for a package that requires a signature.  They've made attempts to remedy that problem by adding drop-boxes or convenient pick-up locations.  There are extra layers of trust required over just buying something at brick-and-mortar. 

Now in Australia, I've made a few purchases; not as many.  And already, I've run into the nightmare - the missing package.  For a couple of weeks, the internet tracking said it was enroute.  Considering I made two purchases from the same retailer on the same day, both were in stock and one was delivered, the several week delay started seeming suspicious.  So I called the Australian Postal Service. At 4:30 pm, and after 17 minutes I started getting concerned that I was going to be on hold until after 5 pm and everyone had gone home.  Fortunately, it was holiday overload keeping them busy, aaaaand...  most peculiarly... although the web site was showing that the package was still enroute, a courier somewhere in the system (but not visible through the web interface), had recorded that they dropped off the package and got a signature.  So why wasn't that recorded in the web interface?  And so now they are investigating.  Australian Post has a pretty good reputation, but when the courier dropped off the other package, they were running away as I opened the door, and when I said something about signature required, they waved me off.  Did the other package go to the wrong address?  If it's lost forever will I be able to purchase another item at the sale price?  I am supposed to get more information within five business days.

Plutocracy - Anand Giridharadas and Preet Bharara

Some may know that I spent three years working in an office that gave away $5 million per year to nonprofits.  Though the duration of that time was short, it had a disproportionate influence on my philosophy.  That $5 million given away was the dividend from a $100 million investment.  Today's ultra-wealthy are worth more than ten times that much. 

Related to my own experiences, there's a valuable discussion in Preet Bharara's podcast conversation with Anand Giridharadas, related to Giridharadas' latest book Winners Take All.  I'll advise that some of the best commentary is towards the end. At the beginning, most of Bharara's hypothetical scenarios are inadequate, but the challenge of inventing a suitable hypothetical scenario, and the answers to those hypothetical scenarios give you a glimpse of the magnitude of the problem. 

Bharara is not just playing devil's advocate. The American Dream is part of what keeps the US economy going, but it's also created a hollowness to the economy that has led to major and minor collapses.  I agree with Bharara that motivation is an extremely valuable thing.  I disagree with some of Giridharadas' solutions or ideas that eliminating motivation might be good.  My take is that the goal is not to eliminate motivation, but to make the motivation realistic - a stable economy cannot be based on the notion that everyone is going to win the lottery in the near future.  And the point of the book is that the goal is to promote democracy; not plutocracy.*

*democracy itself is showing some of its weaknesses lately, but part of the problem is the influence which has risen as in the book's title Winners Take All.  There is never perfection, but there are goals worth working towards; a better democracy being preferable to plutocracy, monarchy, or dictatorship.

Kiteboarding - update

Yesterday one of my fears was realized... I lost my board out in the bay.  I am still learning - not up on the board yet.  But I saw another guy taking lessons, and they were having him body drag while holding the board.  I decided that would be a good thing to do.  Except...  obstacles...

The beach has a few swimming areas with shark nets (sharks are rare in that area, but they do travel up the river on the other side).  There was also rock jetty just south of the net.  I was out maybe three times the length of the jetty.  As I was playing with the kite and turning around to head back in - ideally towards the place where I first left the beach - I did a kite loop that threw me a bit off, and I dropped the board as I regained control. I surveyed the situation, thinking about how to maneuver back to my board, while also checking out how much distance I had before I would get too close to the net.  I felt like I probably could have gotten the board, but if I started getting too close, I could always head away from shore and leave the board.  But then a guy on a board whizzed by and yelled, "Go back!"   

This made me reassess.  I think he thought I wasn't paying attention to the net that I was drifting towards, or that I wouldn't be able to move away from it if necessary.  So in that moment, I decided to head back to shore - BUT - go around the net and jetty to the next open strip of beach downwind rather than trying to cut back in and risk having my kite drift into the netted area.

So it takes me awhile to get past the net and jetty.  In hindsight, I probably could have used the kite to power downwind a lot faster, but since I was unnerved about dropping my board, decided to go gently.  I actually enjoyed being out in the water, though I didn't want to do any loops with the kite and risk losing control and wearing myself out.  By the time I get back to shore, get my kite landed, and walk back around, the instructor who was standing on shore motioned that the other guy had brought my board to shore.  I hadn't walked past it, so I thought maybe he put it with all the other equipment.  I looked everywhere, then ran into the guy who had brought it in.  He said he dropped it on the shore by the shark net.  I walk back twice.  I ask a few people on the beach.  Nothing.  Later, I run into him again and he says "there were some people looking at it when I put it on the shore; they could have picked it up."  

The board had a sticker on it with my phone number, and since I bought it used, the previous owner's number, though pretty faded.  So I was hoping maybe when I got home to my phone, there might be a message.  Nope.  Now my conundrum...  That board was $650 USED - not cheap!   I'd love to get a split board - would be easier to carry on my motorcycle.  But a split board is twice that price.  Until I get up to speed, I should probably just get a cheap board.  But even a cheap board is a lot of money to lose. Sigh.

Also of note... I don't feel like I need more lessons at this point - I feel like I just need more practice.  When I do something wrong, I feel like I know what I did wrong, and it seems silly to pay someone a lot of money to tell me what I'm doing wrong.  If I don't feel like I'm making progress, sure, then I'll consider more lessons.  But for now, I just need more time on the water.