Last year a coworker was planning to buy a bag of high-quality raw coffee beans from the San Cristobal Coffee Company. Although he drinks impressive quantities of coffee, he didn’t want all 95+ pounds. He offered to let some of us get in on the deal. I ended up with ten pounds’ worth of raw peaberry beans. (Raw coffee beans look a lot like pistachios) Score! Acceptance into the Pacific Northwe’t Coffee Cabal would finally be attained! ...
(See my update on this topic.) We have a 529K college savings program set up for my kids through the State of Missouri program administered by TIAA-CREF, soon-to-be Vanguard. Its investment options are turnkey bundles based on age ranges. In the initial years, the investment selection is aggressive. As college-time nears, the portfolio’s mix shifts from stocks to bonds. The program’s return has varied. From 2000 through 2003, it did poorly, like everything else I owned. The last two years have been very strong, negating those losses and then some. Overall, I’d estimate its average return has been about 6.5% over the period we’ve had it. While not bad for a retirment portfolio (especially during that time period), it is less than college tuition. I really need a way to invest into “tuition futures.” ...
There was an interesting discussion on the Cascade Bulletin Board speculating whether a ticket received for a bicycling infraction would cause your auto insurance rates go up? Short answer… no. A close personal friend with my good looks and rapier-like wit received a citation from motorycle Officer Tomlinson of the City of Bellevue PD last May for a violation falling under the very generic RCW 46.61.755. Said friend, happy that the officer toned it down a bit, was concerned more about the blemish on his respectable Permanent Record than the $58 contribution to the city general fund, called both the DMV and his insurance company. ...
I’m coining a new term, fomplicated, to describe a product that requires deliberate intervention and expertise from a customer beyond what any sane human being would consider reasonable. The word is a contraction of a well-known English expletive rhyming with firetrucking and the word “complicated.” Although it’s applicable to a variety of things, I’ve been seeing it a lot related to my computer. For example, this morning I had a minor fomplication. While poring through some mailing-list email, I saw that KMTT 103.7FM has an online stream. The Mountain Music Lounge is great stuff, but I don’t get good reception indoors. I had an unsatisfactory experience with a pay-for service that claimed to have the station, but really only played a pre-selected “best of” 20 songs. (Cancelling that service was unnecessarily fomplicated, too.) KMTT’s option would not only serve it live, but would also be free. And it claimed to run on my Linux and Windows machines. Score! ...
Last December I was lamenting the industry analyst forecasts were all over the map. One particular analyst, Analyst Bravo, had unbelievabily optimistic numbers. Here’s a better chart depicting the market predictions of four analysts for hard-boiled eggs (HBE), soft-boiled eggs (SBE) and Jewel-encrusted eggs. Everyone acknowledges the hard- and soft-boiled eggs market is declining while deluxe, jewel-encrusted eggs are the future: You don’t have to be an analyst to see that Analyst Bravo thinks the hard- and soft-boiled egg market is going to remain strong. Last month Analyst Alpha, who only reports on total boiled eggs, adjusted their 2004 and future “forecast” down about 20% from where they were last year. Their estimates are similar to Analysts Charlie and Delta. I’ve also manually corroborated the estimates with the third quarter financial reports. Much like the dry Pancake Mix market, four major players serve 90% of the market. In the next two weeks, I’ll have another set of annual reports to pore through and I don’t expect a miraculous upswing in the market: after trying jewel-encrusted eggs, no one goes back to mere boiled. Switching among boiled egg suppliers is very easy as there’s little practical differentiation. (Sure, some paint letters on the eggs or dye the shells or even use paper cartons. Customers see these features as gravy.) ...
One motivation for the exercise last week in reviewing 10-Q/Ks was to come up with some forecasts on the marketplace. We also use an array of industry analysts who are ostensibly better connected and do this stuff all day, but the numbers I’ve seen are all over the place. Consider the following chart: Dozens of Hard-Boiled Eggs Consumed per Year (I know this is busy, but I had to take out the PII because I don’t like talking about specifics of my employment. If it helps, assume that I’m just a simple data farmer.) ...
[](https://cdn.wt8p.com/i/issaquahtotofino.jpg) Map During Labour Day week, we took a rare vacation, spending four days in Tofino and two days in Victoria. Tofino’s on the west coast of Vancouver Island, just north of Pacific Rim National Park, where we’d be making day trips. It’s not very far as the crow flies, but the trip takes all day because of the uncertainties associated with crossing the border, catching the ferry, and riding with small children who need frequent potty and snack breaks. We decided to do the outbound portion in one long day. ...
I had a weird dream last night. In the dream, I made a gazillion dollars because I wrote a program that automatically generated wholly truthful and accurate status reports. (This is especially funny if you ponder the irony of designing software pointing out software ironies.) It was based on MadLibs, rendered in a template like this: This project is adjective ( doomed; not dead yet, but coughing up blood; dead). Important Person (VP, CIO, customer) verb phrase (is still withholding information, has been meddling/changing requirements again, won’t make up their mind), marketing verb phrase (hasn’t finished the specification, is too busy playing golf/doing field research, doesn’t have any use cases, gives us specifications relying on 23rd-century Star Trek technology), the developers are excuse (pulling dates from their imaginations, playing Doom III, still trying to work out the answer to the moving Mt. Fuji interview question), ...
[](http://www.hoteldouglas.com) We took a vacation last week to Tofino, BC, last week. The Tofino part was great, and I’ll write about that later this week when I scan in some photos. On the way back, we spent two days in Victoria, BC. The city rocks; however our room at the Hotel Douglas had some unique undocumented bonus features that made it a memorable part of our stay. Automatic intruder detection — thanks to the highly squeaky floor, everybody in the hotel knew when someone got up in the middle of the night to attend to a vital bodily function. Designer windows — the bathroom had curtains covering full-length windows right next to the toilet. The windows overlooked the null tubule encircled by other rooms. I’m not sure what the intention was. (I hope Debbie can help speculate.) Self-spraying floor — another curiosity of the bathroom was the lack of any barrier between the “shower” and the rest of the bathroom. In fact, the shower head was one of those nifty movable wand thingies, affixed to the wall such that it would initially spray outward, usually on dry clothes. I availed myself of washroom down the hall. Surround sound — there was a lounge downstairs that had nightly concerts beginning around 9pm. As the alcohol flowed, the music became loud enough to prevent me from falling asleep, but not loud enough to discern lyrics. I think I heard at least one Neil Diamond song where the crowd joined in. The main room windows overlooked an open area behind above and behind buildings on the block. One of these buildings was a club emanating weird, rhythmic music interrupted by the occasional shattering glass bottle. The two sound sources were incompatible. Energy conserving lighting — the central room light, one of those awful office-style recessed, fluorescent fixtures, flickered briefly when turned on. We had to play with the switch for a few minutes before it juiced itself up. Speaking of which… Child-proof light switches — as in “wired so down was on and up was off.” I had my oldest going for a while when I said “Canada uses the metric system, so electricity works differently.” Satellite parking — the official parking option was a “parkade” about three blocks away. (Although this was a lot closer than the parking I initially found, the signage implied very bad things would happen to my vehicle if left after closing. Thankfully nothing did.) The Wonkavator — The elevator had that “built in 1912″ feel to it as it grudgingly carried us to within 1.5” of our floor, each time ending its journey with a defiant lurch. The doors’ sensor had a 92-year-old’s vision as it tried to take out my kids. Laundry conservation — We spent the day exploring Victoria. When we returned at 5pm, our room was still uncleaned, but the maid cart was in the hallway. When we returned after dinner, the maid cart was gone, but the room was still skanky. They had also neglected to clean the washroom down the hall. The lobby staff shrugged it off, but was able to procure another set of towels. There was no attempt to comp us. It’s possible we had a confluence of bad experiences, but I cannot recommend The Hotel Douglas.
This may seem far-fetched, but I got a paper cut from picking up a cardboard box. The box slipped, and when I grabbed it, my finger brushed against the edge, leaving a large gash in my finger. Okay, maybe not “large,” but it hurt a lot and the cut was big enough that it needed to be covered. However, it was right on the joint such that a conventional bandage would overly restrict movement. ...