SWCAMBORNE

“Silence is golden.

Duct tape is silver.”

From someones home site on Travian

We went to Mama’s Fish House near Paia on Maui and a nice lady took this classic photo of the Nurit Rebecca and I.

This is where we are staying.  The house doesn’t have A/C or Wifi.  I miss the Wifi more than the A/C.  More posts about this very good Hawaian trip to follow.

Life is Good!

The fourth of July is coming up and it is important to find things about America we can be proud of.

This is one:

A recent study conducted by Harvard University found that the average American walks about 900 miles a year.
Another study by the American Medical Association found that Americans drink, on average, 22 gallons of alcohol a year.

This means, on average

Americans get about 41 miles to the gallon.

Kind of makes you proud to be an American.

Thanks to Paul D. for this important information.

We (The Men of Stone) finally finished the installation of the fountain in the David’s garden

It looks good.  This is our fifth permanent installation and both the product and the installation technique are continuing to improve.  We now have only two more stones in stock available for experimental installation.

The stone in place before the fountain.

The first installation attempt

successfully using the hoist

Before the landscaping

Simon shows his pride in the the new stone by giving it a hug

“If Al Gore didn’t invent the Internet, who did?”

Robert W. Harris

Author 101 Things NOT to Do Before you Die

In Southern California there are about a million swimming pools that are rarely used. Many were installed as a way to keep cool before central air conditioning was common. Some were built for “the kids’ who are now grown and gone. And some were built as a fashion statement. It is time to rethink this costly environmental burden on our urban landscape and create new and more acceptable uses for this installed base. This is a huge opportunity to do good and make a lot of money.

I have spent the last week or so talking to people about his opportunity and have come up with a list of ideas for converting the unused private pool into at least usable space and at best an environmental positive.

• Spa Grotto. Empty the pool cut a walkway down to the deep end install a spa and a fern garden with a small waterfall. Very romantic. The pool would be restorable if the next owner of the house had children
• Pond. Lower maintenance and chemical cost by changing the pool into a ecologically balanced mini-lake. Create wildlife habitat and a beautiful visual in the yard
• Reservoir. Lease some of the million unused swimming pools to the MWD (Metropolitan Water District) to use as a part of the reservoir system. With water shortages looming more storage capacity would be a big help.
• Grey Water System. Use the pool as a biological filter to clean up the non-toilet waste water from a home. The naturally purified waste water would be used to water the homes landscaping.
• Basement. Most home in the west don’t have a basement. Empty the swimming pool install a sump pump in the bottom of it and a deck over the top and create a couple of rooms of storage space and increase the size of the yard at the same time.
• Energy Farm. Any swimming pool owner knows that without chemicals the pool will fill with algae in a very short time. This process is a natural conversion of the suns energy into bio-mass. Install collectors for the algae and a small still for converting it into backyard ethanol and you could be making your own gasoline.
• Pump Storage. Find a neighbor with a pool that is a hundred feet different in elevation from yours. Make a deal with the electric company. Use cheap electricity at night to pump the water up the hill and run a generator with the water flowing down the hill during the high demand part of the day to power your air conditioner.

I don’t know which of these ideas will work. But I do know that swimming pools that aren’t used are a cost and they will be converted to more economically and ecologically sensible uses. Brilliant.

About 30 years ago the US stopped building nuclear power plants because protesters from the left were so vocal and agressive that politicians and businessmen gave up trying to build them.  Now we want to build them again because we need power from non fossil fuel sources and besides the French have been doing it so it must be ok.

About 20 years ago Congressman Henry Waxman got federal legislation passed to ban the construction of a subway line to Santa Monica, CA.  At the time many of the rich people in his liberal West Los Angeles district opposed the subway and he gave them what they wanted.  Last year Waxman changed his mind and now that traffic congestion and high gasoline prices have happened just as they were predicted 20 years ago he wants to build the subway.  He never did admit he was wrong he just changed his mind.

Twenty five years ago, after the Santa Barbara oil spill we also stopped drilling for oil on the continental shelf of the US.  There is no question that if we had drilled then; today the supply of oil would be greater and the price would be lower.

Fast forward to the current political debate about drilling for oil offshore and in Alaska.  Now I don’t know what the correct course of action is.  But I do know that the people who oppose drilling now are the same ones who opposed building nuclear plants, who opposed building subways  and who opposed drilling 20 years ago.  They were wrong on every one of these issues in the past and I suspect that they are wrong on this one.

Drilling for more oil is not the only answer to getting enough energy to keep our standard of living improving.  There are lots of things we should do but pumping more oil is an important part of the medium term solution.  Henry Waxman and the limousine liberals he represents should not be allowed to make another political policy mistake.  They were wrong then and they are wrong now.

Here is a picture of our garden last week.

We are already being overwhelmed by zucchini. The sunflowers which were planted from seeds saved from the 2007 and 2006 crops were badly attacked by snails and are doing poorly. The tomatoes are starting to take over as usual.

Here is the garden back in early May when we planted it.

Life is good!

Sometime the pictures say it all:

These decorated cacti are in the front of a house in Sierra Madre.

What a great country! England has garden gnomes but we have sartorially splendid cacti!

After my tirade against mandating the use of fluorescent light bulbs back in January you will be surprised to learn that we are starting to install some energy saving light bulbs at home as an attempt to lower our electricity bill.

They claim to use a lot less electricity but I have found that they also put out less light. I hope that in a few year we aren’t all going blind.

My other objection is that Congress by mandating the usage of these light bulbs has infringed on my personal freedom to choose. Here is a link to Texas Republican Congressman Ted Poe giving a floor speech on the subject. Thanks to David B for the link. My experience is that the marketplace and the town square are better places than Congress for deciding what type of light bulbs I should choose.

It is ironic that the same people who want to preserve a “woman’s right to choose” about abortion are willing to take away a persons “right to choose” about light bulbs. In my January blog I proposed that congress mandate using night vision goggles and eliminate the need for electric bulbs completely. Please don’t tell Congressman Henry Waxman this idea.