SWCAMBORNE

Yesterday morning there was snow on the mountains behind our house.

And the Maple tree with the spikey seeds had turned autumnal.

Two seasons in one day.  Can spring be far behind? Another reason to love Southern California.

A few months ago I read The Call of the Mall by Paco Underhill.  I’d had the book around for several years but had never gotten to it.  My interest in shopping is mostly intellectual.  Finding a bargain or the perfect thing does not thrill me, although I can see that it has that effect on many people.  I have spent plenty of time in malls with my family while they shop and sometimes when I can get into an anthropological mind set I quite enjoy it.

Back to the book.  Underhill is a retail consultant and he has strong opinions about how shopping works.  It appeared to me that he had an urban persons sense of superiority to suburban shoppers.  What pleased me was the book’s collection of good ideas about how to improve the mall.  I’ve listed a few below:

• Improve the public restrooms.  have companies like P & G sponsor them.
• Abercrombie and PacSun represent tribes.  At the mall the adult male tribes have no place.
• Stores need to work hard on “jogging the mental shopping list of every passerby.
• One of the purposes of kiosks is to create “laudable crowding.”  The kind that gets the bargain hunters juices flowing.  “Impenetrable crowding” is to be avoided.
• “Back in the days before cars the perfume counter was a bulwark against the stench of horse manure in the street.”  Why is it still at the entrance to a department store?
• Make the outside look more appealing.  Malls are built by real estate developers who think there customers are retailers not consumers.

Jason Gonella a writer for California Freedom a Libertarian newspaper wrote a list of what he thought libertarians should do “now that the socialist and reluctant warmonger has beaten the warmonger and reluctant socialist.” The list he provides is not that important but his succinct description of the election result is wonderful.

“Intellect and achievement are far from perfectly correlated”

Malcolm Gladwell

Outliers

I just read the book American Buffalo by Steve Rinella and reviewed it on Amazon.  It is very rare that I read an entire book in one day but this book was filled with interesting information about the relationship between people and buffalo.  It even explains the difference between buffalo and bison.  I highly recommend it for people who read nonfiction history.

An American Buffalo in Yellowstone National Park

I took this picture of a trash barrel in Eaton Canyon Park about a half mile from my house.

I’m pretty sure that coyotes and raccoons can’t tip over a 55 gallon drum.  So by a process of elimination we have to presume that there are bears in the neighborhood.  It is very nice that we are leaving them food.  Without it they might starve.

This is pretty simple. The Dression of 2009 will start because people act in there own best interests based on the trends that they see.  So far since the crisis started they have seen that:

• The government stepped in and “saved” the banks.
• The government stepped and “saved” the insurance companies.
• The government stepped and saved investment firms.
• The government is stepping in to save the US auto makers.
• The government says it will save the homes of people who are three months behind on their mortgages.

People who pay rent will see this trend line, rumors will fly and many of them will stop paying their rent in expectation that the trend shown above will continue.  Then the Depression of 2009 will start.  Actions have consequences.

A tree being air tortured and humiliated on top of a Smart Car

10 million trees will be sacrificed this year to celebrate Christmas.
It is not acceptable to kill trees to celebrate a god.
-We no longer sacrifice humans to the gods
-We no longer sacrifice animals to the gods
- And yet we still sacrifice trees.
And we don’t just kill the trees we actually torture them. We hang things on them and keep them barely alive as if to humiliate them.
-It is time to stop the torture and slaughter of trees.

I have started a Facebook Group called People for the Ethical Treatment of Trees

If this has crossed the line into insulting PETA members or Christians I apologize.  All I can say is I’m doing it for the young trees.

“If men were angels no government would be necessary.”

James Madison

I saw these Ficus trees with matching haircuts along Foothill Boulevard in Duarte, CA.

They may be the worlds largest topiary.  They are certainly one of the wonders of the San Gabriel Valley.  Yes they are near yesterdays story the Bradbury Vista Mobile Home Park.