Sleepless Serf

Chest Fridge

2007-04-01T07:31:00.001-07:00

Here is the proper link to the Mt. Best post: Chest Fridge.

Buying online freezer-to-fridge conversion thermostat.

An update on the way-cool 0.1kWh/day chest fridge: It seems you can achieve the same super-efficiency in about 30 seconds by using one of these.

Via Hoptech a pre-fab external thermostat, for only US$59.95.

Pump & Seal Food Saver Vacuum Sealer

The Pump-N-Seal food saver vacuum sealer uses ordinary zipper-locking bags and glass jars as food storage containers. The Pump-N-Seal food saver vacuum sealer works by permanently vacuum packing food in a commercial strength vacuum, using the same jar and lid hundreds of times.

The Pump-N-Seal permanently seals many food storage containers, including ordinary jars, mason jars, wine bottles and coffee cups. It is also a vacuum bag sealer. This vacuum food sealer preserves freshness of coffee, cookies, fruit, meat, etc. Pump-N-Seal vacuum food saver prevents rancidity of cooking oils, prevents distasteful freezer burn, prevents colour and nutrient loss, and prolongs the quality and taste of refrigerated foods.

The Pump-N-Seal accessory, called the Bowl-Seal, is a set of two lids that can be used to vacuum seal your own pots, pans, and bowls (up to 8 and 11 inch diameters respectively) or for marinating steak and other foods in just minutes, not hours or days.

Black Twilight

2007-04-01T06:13:00.000-07:00

Peabody Energy Corporation (NYSE: BTU - News) is the world’s largest private coal mining company, supplying about 10% of the fuel for US electrical power production.

BTU’s proven and probable reserves are about 10 billion tons – equivalent to 243 trillion cubic feet of natural gas (10 times the annual U.S. natural gas consumption).

The three largest U.S. coal producers are:

• Peabody Energy (NYSE: BTU - News)
• Arch Coal (NYSE: ACI - News)
• CONSOL Energy (NYSE: CNX - News)

Only BTU has free cash flow and it has the lowest dividend payout ratio. BTU also has a lower PEG ratio, but is more expensive than ACI and CNX in terms of P/E, P/B, P/S and EV/EBITDA.

Hot summers and increasing population in Sunbelt areas drives up demand and prices for coal. Coal assets have a place in a portfolio oriented toward energy.

Burning The Furniture

Total World Coal Reserves (2002)
Bituminous coal + Anthracite 479 billion tons
Sub-bituminous coal 272 billion tons
Lignite 158 billion tons

Each coal class has a different energy content:

Anthracite 30 MJ/kg
Bituminous coal 18.8–29.3 MJ/kg
Sub-bitiminous coal 8.3–25 MJ/kg
Lignite 5.5–14.3 MJ/kg

Only coal with a high heating value is suited for long-distance transport and in metallurgical processes. From the standpoints of size of reserves, energy content, and suitability for a range of significant uses, bituminous coal and anthracite are the most important.

90% of coal reserves are concentrated in 6 countries: USA, Russia, India, China, Australia and South Africa. The USA alone holds 30% and China 15%. The development of these two countries is a key for future coal production.

China will experience peak coal production within the next 5–15 years (2010-2020), followed by a steep decline. Once China cannot increase its production anymore, world coal production will peak. It is very likely that bituminous coal production in the US already has peaked, and total coal production will peak between 2020-2030.

If global coal peak occurs around a decade after the petroleum/gas peak (2010), this implies a 10-year interval, of relatively slow fall-off in total energy from fossil fuels, followed by a gradually accelerating decline.

Twilight (2005-2020)

2007-04-01T05:56:00.001-07:00

Life Without Oil
New Oil Confederation

Matthew Simmons, Chairman, Simmons & Company International and Author of "Twilight in the Desert" warns that global oil supply peaked in Dec 2005.

http://www.netcastdaily.com/broadcast/fsn2006-0930-2.mp3

http://www.simmonsco-intl.com/files/Houston%20Bar%20Association.pdf

http://www.simmonsco-intl.com/files/Sandia%20Labs.pdf

He also expects Peak Oil to surpass Global Warming as the No. #1 issue between Sep 2007 to March 2008.

Inconvenient Truths

2007-04-01T05:45:00.000-07:00

Peak To-Do-List

2007-04-01T05:37:00.000-07:00

Peak Oil To-Do List

1. Recite this daily: "Today is better than tomorrow."

Healthy peak oil psychology starts here. This phrase has become a common mantra among Iraqi people to remind themselves not to put their hope in a miraculously brighter future. It is a remarkably honest and pragmatic way to face dark times.

Start thinking about life with less, not more. Seize the opportunity to act now with the resources that remain at our disposal. When we cling to hope that things will "turn around" we miss today's opportunities to prepare. What we have today is the most we will ever have. It will never get easier to act than it is today.

2. Forget your "little house on the prairie."

Start preparing to weather the storm where you are. Take inventory. Be creative. Use your hands. Evaluate your liabilities and do everything you can to turn them into assets. Your situation might not be ideal, but it's what you've got. Make the most of it and resist the fantasy that a sustainable life can be bought. It can only be built where you are, one choice at a time.

3. Grow some food.

Just grow something - anything - you can eat. It's a start.

4. Stop being a consumer.

Buy only what you must have. If possible, buy it at the thrift store. Peak oil guarantees that the ship of consumerism is going down. Be the first to get in the life boat by altering your lifestyle, and you'll do it on your own terms. Everyone else will follow eventually, but as an angry, frightened mob.

5. Host monthly peak oil potluck suppers.

Make an effort to get to know other crazies like yourself. You need them, but don't forget that they need you as well. Now, here's the important part: as a group, do more than talk about what's coming. Find out what you can do for each other - and then DO it.

People tend to overestimate what we can get done in the short-term, but underestimate what we can accomplish in the long-run. If we start now and do every day what we can do, then we have a good chance of making it - changed, but still here.

True Survivalist

2007-04-01T05:17:00.000-07:00

Survivalists are individuals who have lost faith in society’s ability to protect its own, and who have taken steps to lessen their dependence upon society for aid in an emergency situation. Survivalists also realise that modern society is a long and twisted chain of interdependency and that each link of this societal chain is dependent upon every other link to maintain its integrity. Should enough of these links be broken, the entire chain may collapse.

They attempt to reinforce the chain of society by strengthening their own links. Many do this by actively learning and practicing the necessary skills to provide or obtain the basic necessities of life. And yes, they learn to defend themselves from aggressors when there is no one else there to protect them.

A true survivalist hopes deep in their heart that the good life never ends for anybody. They just know that trouble sometimes does happen, and want to be as well situated as they can be if bad things do come to be. A fireman is a fireman, not because he believes everything will burn, but because he believes much can be saved. Doctors don't believe in death, they believe in life, and a survivalist is not a survivalist because he believes everything must be destroyed and everyone must die, he believes that life and freedom can be saved, if people of good-will are prepared. A fireman does not start fires, a doctor does not make disease and a survivalist does not make disaster.

We survivalists have loved ones we don't want to see hurt or killed, we have homes we don't want to see destroyed, we are not fools to think that just because we are survivalists a world cataclysm would be fun for us or that we would not experience danger, loss, hunger, injury, cold or even despair and death. No, we will not be disappointed if there is no disaster to survive, anymore than the the man who buys an insurance policy is disappointed when his house fails to burn down.

Every person who has not made provisions for surviving without food, water, fuel and other essential needs from the outside is a mortal danger to his neighbours. What will a man do when he and his family are freezing, hungry, thirsty, sick and starving? Will he just go back home to die with his wife and kids?

We survivalists who stock up, which is not the same as hoarding, on food and other supplies now do a favour to society because what we now buy is replaced on the shelves, so there will be that much more available in an emergency. We survivalists won't be looting and killing for food. We won't be as much a burden on the medical facilities or a danger to the police. Since we will not need to turn on anyone, we may even be able to help at least some others.

Survival preparation should be regarded as a social obligation, one that every individual owes to his family and community and his nation. Survivalists are generally self-reliant individuals, who cannot help but see the imperative of preparing for the worst possible events, while hoping sincerely that they won't happen. Today's survivalist is an asset, to his community and to the world and should be proud to be called survivalist.

Doom Tis Me

2007-04-01T05:12:00.001-07:00

Rational To Be Over-Prepared

I would like to respond to the annoying suggestion that we doomers are crazy, psychologically off, unhappy, irrational, all generally desirous of the world's destruction. We’re not. We are your neighbors and friends and colleagues. We are just as sane as you, and likely we do not want to see a collapse.

A basic rule of emergency preparedness, whether it is for a flat tire or a hurricane: prepare for the worst-case scenario, not for what you believe likely. I have never had a flat, but I certainly have a jack in my car, as well as flares and a small medical kit. One cannot go to extremes – I cannot carry in my car a new engine, all the tools necessary to change it, as well as an emergency ham radio. One has to balance out the diversion of energy, time, and other resources, and there is no clear formula.

I do not believe in a “hard crash.” A long-term, ever-deepening depression seems like the most likely scenario. I am not, however, preparing for the scenario I believe most likely. I am preparing for the what I do not expect will happen, the worst-case scenario, because that is logically what makes the most sense.

We have been distracted by the debate about why some of us believe in a possible crash. This debate cannot be resolved and is only marginally useful. Much more important is the quite rational and eminently resolvable debate on the logic of various preparations, or their value in different situations. It is better to be over-prepared, instead of under-prepared.

Flu Pandemic

2007-04-01T04:45:00.001-07:00

During the 1918 pandemic, 675,000 Americans died. A comparable figure today is 1.7 million. Cities were hardest hit with the mortality rate at approximately 2.5%.

People are highly contagious for 2 or 3 days before they have symptoms and 7 days after symptoms end. A general rule is to stay at least 6 feet from someone to avoid contagion. Avoiding crowds or close contact is essential including public transportation, even elevators.

Flu pandemics tend to spread in three waves. In 1918, each wave lasted 6-8 weeks with several months between waves. There can be up to 12 months between waves. A highly contagious and deadly flu pandemic will cause major disruptions in government, communities, businesses, transportation, distributions systems. In 1918, most retail stores, restaurants, and many businesses closed and employees refused to work. In cities, it became very difficult to obtain food.

Preparations for 2-3 Months Self-Quarantining

- Purchase latex or vinyl gloves and N-95 paper facemasks. The NIOSH rated N-95 mask protected people from the SARs virus and is the best protection available. 3M brand N-95 masks costs US$80-$90 for 20. Masks need to be disposed of after each use.

- Prepare for possible electrical and water supply problems by stocking: working flashlights, portable radio, and extra batteries, potable water containers (1 gallon per person per day), oil lamps, long-burning candles, and kerosene heaters.

- Stock non-perishable food supplies to last 2-3 months: foods that you enjoy and would use over time anyway. Examples include: canned meat, dried beans and rice, salt, sugar, cooking oil, vitamins, powdered milk, toilet paper, light bulbs, candles, matches, cash.

Hyper-Nightmare

2007-04-01T04:08:00.000-07:00

Episodes of Hyperinflation

If history teaches anything, it is that government cannot be trusted to manage money. When currency is not redeemable in gold, its value depends entirely on the judgment and the conscience of the politicians. Especially in an economic crisis or a war, the pressure to inflate becomes overwhelming. A government in financial straits finds its easiest recourse is to issue more and more money until the money loses its value.

In World War I, Germany borrowed heavily to pay its war costs. This led to inflation. By 1923, the wildest inflation in history was raging. Often prices doubled in a few hours. A wild stampede developed to buy goods and get rid of money. By late 1923, it took 200 billion marks to buy a loaf of bread.

In May 1921, price inflation started and by July 1922 prices had risen 700%. The Reichsbank continued printing new currency, although more slowly than the rate at which prices were rising. The issue of currency proceeded at a fairly smooth steady rate, while the price index moved up in great surges, interspersed by periods of stability. After July 1922, the phase of hyperinflation began. All confidence in money vanished and the price index rose faster and faster for 15 months, outpacing the printing presses which could not run out money as fast as it was depreciating.

From Mid-1922 to November 1923 hyperinflation raged. The real wages of workers dropped badly. Unions obtained frequent increases, but these could not keep pace. Businessmen began to abandon their legitimate occupations to speculate in stocks and in goods. Thousands of small businessmen tried to eke out a living by speculating in fabrics, shoes, meat, soap, clothing - in any produce they could obtain. Each fall in the mark brought a rush to the shops. People bought dozens of hats or sweaters.

By mid-1923 workers were being paid as often as three times a day. Their wives would meet them, take the money and rush to the shops to exchange it for goods. However, by this time, more and more often, shops were empty. Storekeepers could not obtain goods or could not do business fast enough to protect their cash receipts. Farmers refused to bring produce into the city in return for worthless paper. Food riots broke out. Businesses started to close down and unemployment suddenly soared. The economy was collapsing.

The inflation was caused by the government issuing a flood of new money, causing prices to rise. As inflation gained momentum, events seemed to demand the printing of larger and larger issues of currency. It would be wrong to think that everyone was opposed to inflation. Many big business leaders accepted it cheerfully. It wiped out their debts. They knew how to protect themselves and even profit - by speculating in foreign exchange, by converting money into goods and fixed plant, by borrowing money from the bank and using it to buy up cheap stocks and competing companies. Their wage costs, in true value, decreased, swelling their profits. Businessmen found it very profitable to borrow money from the bank and buy up goods, shares and companies. Their debt was wiped out within weeks by the rapid inflation, and the businessman remained holding the valuable assets he had bought.

Once people lose confidence in a currency, they try to get rid of it. This makes circulation speed up enormously, and hence prices rise faster than the government can print new money. After the Russian revolution, the Bolsheviks introduced a new currency. They printed huge amounts of it and soon it became almost worthless. At the same time, some of the older Czarist currency still circulated and maintained its value in terms of goods. It appreciated enormously in terms of the new money. Why did this currency hold up? "Because there was nobody to print any more of it."

Effects of Inflation on Business

As inflation proceeded, people rushed to buy goods and get rid of their depreciated money. For similar reasons, businessmen hastened to buy machinery, to build new factories, to buy huge stocks of coal, steel and other raw materials. Those who had access to credit borrowed heavily for these purposes, and inflation wiped out their debt. There was a tremendous conversion of working capital into fixed investments. Business was booming and unemployment virtually vanished until the last stages of the inflation.

Farmers got rid of currency by heavy purchases of equipment, and later many were left holding large supplies of useless machinery. Shipbuilding was expanded beyond all market needs. Marginal mines were opened leading to serious overproduction later on. But while basic industries prospered, there was a severe depression in consumer goods industries such as textiles, meat, beer, sugar and tobacco. Too many workers and persons on fixed incomes had lost their purchasing power.

There was a tremendous move toward concentration of industry. Large firms or combinations found it much easier to raise prices, to obtain raw materials and above all to obtain bank credit. The rising stars were those of shrewd speculators and manipulators geared to quick trading and to jumping from deal to deal and from company to company. The most successful were those who saw the trend of events early, borrowed to the hilt and bought up goods, shares and companies at bargain prices. Most of these new mushroom combinations and conglomerates were speculative bubbles which were only able to survive as long as they benefited from ongoing inflation.

Finally, however, in the last stages of the inflation, the economy began to collapse. Retailers could not get goods or else could not sell at a profit. The money they received was depreciating too fast. More and more stores became empty. Now unemployment began to soar. On the whole, much energy and wealth was wasted in unproductive channels - speculation, paperwork and unprofitable equipment.

How Investments Fared

It is important to understand how hard it was to obtain real income during the inflation. Professionals, skilled workers and others used to enjoying good income found their real salaries disastrously cut. Those who depended on savings, pensions or investment income for a living faced a terrible situation. Interest from bonds or savings deposits soon depreciated to where they had no real value. Stocks paid meager dividends or none at all; corporate managements needed the money for working capital, or used it for capital building and speculation. Owners of rental property fared no better; the government froze rents, which soon meant that tenants were occupying premises virtually rent-free. The urgent need for income had important effects on the true prices of various types of property and investments.

Cash & Bank Deposits: Money held in cash lost value rapidly and soon became completely worthless. Of all investment forms, this was the most disastrous.

Bonds, Mortgages: As usual in an inflation, bonds and mortgages fell in value even faster than cash.

Real Estate: Farmers and holders of urban property seemed to benefit if their property was mortgaged; the inflation soon wiped out the mortgage debt. However, they received no income since rents were frozen. After the stabilization, heavy new taxes and the urgent need for cash forced most holders to remortgage their property, often more heavily than originally, so that their gains were illusory. Still, those who held real estate throughout managed to save the capital thus invested. However, those who sold during the inflation (often through desperate need for cash) fared poorly. Because it brought no income, real estate sold at extremely low real price levels during inflation.

Foreign Exchange: Those who held funds in dollars, pounds or other stable currencies, or in gold, saved their capital. The government set up rigid exchange controls as the inflation proceeded. As usual under such conditions, a black market flourished. The ones who fared best were the small minority who had the foresight to exchange marks into foreign money or gold very early, before new laws made this difficult and before the mark lost too much value.

Personal Property: Capital was preserved by those who early changed it into objects of lasting value - rare coins, stamps, jewelry, works of art, antiques - or into merchandise such as clothing, fabrics, etc. Of course, most people did not understand the advantage of accumulating such property until the inflation was well along. By that time the prices of all goods had risen so much that they seemed outrageously bad bargains. Cash proved an even worse bargain.

Common Stocks: In an inflation, common stocks are generally considered a desirable hedge to protect against or even to profit from the rise in prices. In practice, it is not so simple. Market fluctuations - the rise of exciting new speculative stocks, waves of fear or greed - all make it much too easy to buy or to sell at the wrong time or to go into the wrong stocks.

Those who bought a well-diversified list of stocks in solid, well-established companies quite early in the inflation and who held on throughout the period and also through the stabilization crisis saved much or all of their capital.

However, there were many pitfalls along the wayside for the greedy, the fearful and the over-clever. Those who did best were investors with a certain unemotional, stolid character, a basic confidence that strong, well-managed companies would come through, and an immunity to excitement, anxiety and speculative temptations.

Survivor Story

2007-04-01T04:02:00.000-07:00

Since food prices went up about 200%-300%, people would cut expenses wherever they could so they could buy food. Some ate whatever they could; they hunted birds or ate street dogs and cats, others starved. When it comes to food, cities suck in a crisis. It is usually the lack of food or the impossibility to acquire it that starts the rioting and looting when TSHTF (Sh*t Hitting The Fan).

Whatever sort of scenario you are dealing with, services are more than likely to either suffer in quality or disappear all together. Think ahead of time; analyze possible SHTF scenarios and which service should be affected by it in your area. Think about the supplies you would need for these tasks before you actually need them. You have a complete guide on how to prepare the meat on you computer… how will you get it out of there if there is no power? Print everything that you consider important.

If you can build a well, set it as your top of the priority list. Water comes before firearms, medicines and even food. Save as much water as you can. Use plastic bottles and place them in a cool place, preferably inside a black garbage bag to protect it from sunlight. Estimate that you need approximately one gallon per person per day. Try to have at least 2-4 weeks worth of water.

Have two or three LED lights. They are not expensive and are worth their weight in gold. A powerful flashlight is necessary, something like a big Maglite or better yet a SureFire, especially when you have to check your property for intruders. A little-known fact is that only yellow and red LED bulbs last 120hrs in mini-flashlights while all the other colours (including white) only last 12hrs per battery.

Rechargeable batteries are a must or else you’ll end up broke if lights go out often. Have a healthy amount of spare quality batteries and try to standardize as much as you can.

I have 12 NiHM 2500Mh AA and 8 AAA. Rechargeable NiHM batteries have the disadvantage of loosing power after a period of time, so keep about 2 or 3 packs of regular Duracell batteries and check the rechargeable ones every once in a while.

Once the SHTF, black markets will take no time to appear all around you. What can be found at a local market? Mostly food and clothing, but canned food, spices, honey, eggs, fruits, vegetables, beer, and cured meat are generally available. Clothes are also popular and you can find copies of brand name clothes, imitations, or even original stolen new clothes, shoes and snickers. Children clothes, underwear, socks, sheets and towels are all very popular. Some offer their services and repair stuff or offer work as handyman.

Everyone wants to buy gold! “I buy gold. Pay cash” signs are everywhere! They deal with junk gold, like jewelry, either stolen or sold because they need the money. No one pays for the true value of the stuff, so big WARNING! Since it is impossible to determine the true mineral percentage of gold, small shops and dealers will pay for it as regular jewelry gold. Besides gold coins, buy a lot of small gold rings. They should be less expensive than gold coins, and if the SHTF bad, you’ll not be loosing money, selling premium quality gold coins for the price of junk gold. Buy a small bag worth of gold rings.

The primary weapon for a urban survivalist who has to function in a society even after the SHTF, is his HANDGUN. It’s the weapon that stays with him when he is doing his business around town of working on the field. Buy body armor! Get the concealable kind (Class II). I ordered it from USA through bulletproofme.com.

Always have a survival kit with you. The kit I carry is very small (metal Bandaide box) with great thought to the contents:

1. A good quality Swiss Army Knife
2. Condoms for water storage, unlubricated.
3. LED flashlight, ligher and strike-anywhere matches
4. Water purification tables
5. Long strip of heavy duty aluminum foil to cook with
6. One small pack of hard candy for emergency energy
7. Small and light survival pamphlet

Having a survival kit aids in your sense of well-being. With the kit, you have the minimum to survive. It helps you realize the situation is not hopeless. Practice using your survival items before you need them.

Any kind of emergency Bug-Out-Bag (BOB) must be calibrated to weigh no more than you can comfortably carry the whole day. A jar of peanut butter for an all-round survival food. Nice to put some hard candy that won't melt but will provide emergency energy.
Compass is necessary, even if you don't know how to read a map. At a minimum, it keeps you moving in the same direction and avoid walking in circles.

Money (total amount divided in 4 equal parts and hidden in different places). Consider tucking in $500 or so in ten and twenty dollar bills, along with a a couple of small gold coins.

No need to reinvent the wheel here just look what the homeless guys are using to transport all their belongings - a shopping cart.

Bao Cap (1975-86)

2007-04-01T03:50:00.000-07:00

Once Upon A Time, Amazing Hanoi (Part 1)

"Bao Cap, a period that Hanoi experienced State subsidies between 1975 and 1986. Every family had a food registration book and coupons used to buy subsided goods. My family of six got enough coupons to buy 60kg of rice, 3kg of pork, 1kg of fish, liquefied fat (used as cooking oil,) fish sauce... a month. Other commodities such as soap, handkerchiefs, fabric, singlet, bicycle spare parts… annually. Everything was always in short."

Once Upon A Time, Amazing Hanoi (Part 2)

"During Bao Cap, having Tem Phieu (food coupon) means you have food to eat. But loosing them means you starve. We improved our protein nutrition with eggs from home raised chickens. A meal with a boiled egg was a real fancy one. MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) was a precious and rare additive to dull tasted dish."

Post-Abundance

2007-04-01T03:43:00.000-07:00

Post-Abundance Era

If there is one thing that most inhabitants of the late 20th century shared in common, it was a perception of rising global abundance in virtually all fields. Most people in most places around the world saw a rise in their personal income and an increase in the number of things in their possession, along with the supply of energy to move or power their many personal goods.

The sense of abundance that characterized the late 20th century is likely to evaporate for the great majority of us. Now-affordable luxuries such as overseas vacations and meals out will become unattainable, and basic necessities such as energy, electricity, water and food are likely to become less plentiful and more expensive. This global austerity will produce great hardship for the poor and will force even lower-middle-class families to choose from among long car trips, restaurant meals, air-conditioning, etc.

This historic shift in global fortunes is a fundamental reversal in the balance between resource supply and demand. Many of the world's most promising sources of supply have been located and exploited, and exploration and discovery are producing increasingly meager results. We are increasingly relying on deposits found in previous decades to slake our insatiable thirst for petroleum - a pattern that cannot continue for much longer before we will begin to experience an irreversible and traumatic decline in the global supply of oil. The same is true of other vital resources, including natural gas, uranium, copper, and many minerals. There is not enough new deposits of these commodities to replace what we're consuming. So future shortages are inevitable.

This contraction in the global supply of vital resources will affect our lives in myriad ways. It will force us to consume less. These cutbacks will be minor inconveniences for some, but significant hardships for the poor, the elderly, and others on a fixed income.

The end of abundance is not the same thing as outright scarcity. Some commodities, such as oil, may become truly scarce but they will not disappear altogether. But the end of abundance will create a new gestalt in which expectations are lowered and struggles over what remains become more violent.

Collapse Gaps

2007-04-01T03:39:00.000-07:00

Closing The Collapse Gap

Skilling Up for Powerdown

Humanure

2007-04-01T02:53:00.000-07:00

Google Videos on Organic Gardening

According to the humanure ‘philosophy’, urine is an essential ingredient in the compost process. Human urine contains nitrogen roughly equivalent to the amount used in agriculture to grow our food. The humanure approach says put it in the heap with everything else, it is the vital ingredient to the hot compost needed to render human manure safe, it being a great ‘activator’.

There is another school of thought which argues that urine is such wonderful stuff on its own that you should separate it and use it on plants. This then would mean that you can only cold compost the poo, which means it will not be safe on food plants.

There’s no reason why you couldn’t do both. Keep a bit of pee on one side by peeing into a plastic bottle which you can mix 1-10 with water when you are watering your plants, and the rest of your doings go into the compost heap. Urine usually contains 90% of the nitrogen in your excreta.

Green Thumbs

2007-04-01T02:39:00.000-07:00

There are a number of ways you can grow your own food. You should probably start with fruits and veggies. Give some thought to herbs and spices. If you have a balcony, you can grow tomatoes in a plastic garbage can, carrots in a tub, green onions in a shallow wood box. Tomatoes can make it without full sun all day. Once it gets big, you will have to water a tomato plant every day.

If you’re interested in growing your own food, you will have to provide the necessary nutrients. One way is to compost. The key to successful composting is to make it clean and easy. Have a separate holding can for the organic materials you use and want to compost. This will reduce the number of trips outside to dump your compost material. Any vegetable pieces or skins, stale bread, coffee grinds, tea leaves, banana peels - almost anything that’s made primarily from plant products can be safely and easily composted. In addition, egg shells and shrimp shells can be included. It’s not an especially good idea to compost meats or animal waste as these items can attract unwanted critters to your compost pile.

My solution is a small, stainless steel can. It includes a removal bucket I carry out to the compost pile. It has a lid that stays closed until I step on the pedal allowing me to dump in my scraps without touching anything. It’s small enough to hold several days’ worth of kitchen scraps and contain any odor. After I dump the contents, I use a hose to rinse out any scraps that stick to the bucket and I scrub it out with an old dish brush every few months. A simple solution for slight smells is to add a bit of citrus - a squeeze of lemon juice or a few orange peels just after empting the bucket. The acid keeps the anaerobic bacteria from getting established and causing a stink.

In addition to using kitchen scraps, you can compost fallen leaves and grass clippings. The leaves are mostly carbon and the grass clippings and kitchen scraps are mostly nitrogen. Both are necessary to promote a healthy compost pile. You’re looking for a ratio of about 25 to 1 or 25 times as much carbon as nitrogen. It’s easier to think in terms of brown and green. Most compostable material that is brown in color is made up of carbon. Most of the compostable material that is green in color is made up of nitrogen. Think more brown and less green.

There is another option for recycling your food scraps into compost. You can use worms to eat your leftover food and quickly turn it into worm castings, a wonderful compost for your garden. The term is called vermiculture - link

A system like this can be used indoors with almost no odor. You place food scraps in the top and the worms eat them turning the waste into castings that fall through into the lower chamber for your use in the garden. Vermicomposting is done with "redworms" (Eisenia Fetida), "tigers" (Lumbricus Rubellus) and Indian Blues (Perionyx Excavatus). The composting worms are placed in a box or bin along with "bedding" of shredded cardboard and /or paper moistened to about 75% water content. Worms need a moist environment in order to breathe. The bedding should be suitably dampened but not wet (like a wet sponge with the water squeezed out). Add a couple of handfuls of sand or soil to provide necessary grit for the worm's digestion of food. The pH of the bedding is very important. If it becomes either too acidic or too alkaline this will upset and possibly kill the worms. As a preventive measure, sprinkle 1 teaspoon of dolomite lime onto the food or bedding once a week.

Having a mixture of the 3 different species gives the group a wider range of suitable conditions. These species eat fast and breed fast. They will double their populations in 3-4 months under the right conditions. Worms reach adulthood in about 6 weeks and can reproduce up to 3 times a week for their lifespan (2-3 years). The worm population will be controlled by the size of their environment so you will never end up with too many worms.

Redworms can tolerate a temperature range of around 10 degrees C to 28 degrees C, although they will be most active at about 25 degrees C. Worms are sensitive to light and when they become exposed to it, they will burrow into their bedding. This is useful when you want to harvest your worms. You should have a damp cover (gunny sack or old carpet) over the worms to keep them dark and moist.

The ratio of worms to food waste should be: one pound per day of food waste, use two pounds of worms (roughly 2000). If you are unable to get this many worms to start with, reduce the amount of food waste accordingly while the population steadily increases. If you have the correct ratio, there is little to do other than adding food, until about 2.5 months have passed. There should be little or no original bedding visible in the bin, and the contents will be brown and earthy looking worm castings.

It is important to separate the worms from the finished compost, otherwise the worms will begin to die. The quickest way is to simply move the finished compost over to one side of the bin, place new bedding in the space created, and put food waste in the new bedding. The worms will gradually move over and the finished compost can be skimmed off as needed.

By the way, chickens love meal worms as a treat. Chickens can also be used to process kitchen scraps. I previously discussed chickens as a way to create compost here. Feed the chickens your leftover food and rake up their manure. You must allow the chicken manure to sit or cure for a while or it will burn your plants.

The only animal whose manure you can use immediately is the rabbit. Rabbits eat greens and produce round droppings that can be put directly into the garden to nourish your plants. Too many meals of straight greens may cause problems with the digestive tracts of rabbits.

Diaso Earth

2007-04-01T00:27:00.000-07:00

Diatomaceous earth is fossilized bodies of diatoms (primitive ocean creatures). The fine powder cuts and dries the waxy coating on an insect’s body; such as beetles, slugs, snails, fleas.

Known You Seeds is a Taiwanese seed distributor, and they sell it in a 1-kg bag. Each bag cost about $16. Address: No. 5, Lorong Bakar Batu, #05-03 Macpherson Industrial Complx, Singapore 348742. Tel : 67468213

You can get big pots at Daiso, IMM Level 3. Daiso is a Japanese departmental store that sells things from kitchen items to bathroom items, hardware tools, stationaries, tibits/drinks, gardening supplies and many more.

There are many nurseries that sell big pots. I buy my pots & soil at a nursery in Kovan (just next to Kovan MRT). The nursery name is 1-800 flowers P.L. (subsidary of FarEastFlora).Tel: 62852239

FarEastFlora
565 Thomson Road, Singapore 298184
(located within Goodwood Florist)
Tel: 62512323
Come to World Farm... got all type and sizes of pots there... even got one big enough to bath inside. From Ang Mo Kio MRT, there is a straight bus ride of just about 30min that will bring you to WF. Or take Bus 17 from Yishun interchange. Alight after Khatib Camp. 5min walk to WF.

Walk along Bah Soon Pah Road (there is no shelter - do bring an umbrella) and you will reach World Farm somewhere in the middle.

Zeer Cooler

2007-04-01T00:26:00.001-07:00

The world’s cheapest refrigerator runs completely without electricity. The zeer pot, or the pot-in-pot, is basically 2 large earthenware pots, one pot smaller than the other. The smaller pot is put inside the bigger pot, and the space in-between them is filled with sand. The sand is made wet with water (twice a day) and a wet towel is put on top of the 2 pots to keep warm air from entering the interior. As water in the sand evaporates, it carries heat away from the inner core, thus cooling the inner pot which can be filled with fresh fruit, vegetables or meat.

The zeer can keep tomatoes edible for 20 days, as opposed to 2, and meat will last up to 2 weeks. The zeer will keep water at about 15 degrees Celsius.

The key however, is a certain degree of aridness, for at a certain amount of humidity, the benefit of evaporative cooling disappears. Techniques which rely on water-based evaporation work great in the mountains and desert... and not at all in humid areas.

The pot-in-pot is one of several ingenious applications of cooling by evaporation. The city of Qena in Upper Egypt is renowned for its porous-clay cooling vessels. In Burkina Faso, the Jula people’s traditional jars are sometimes soaked in water before goods are stored in them, so that they stay cool by evaporation. In India, a rectangular enclosure of wet bricks is used to preserve foodstuffs from heat. Water seeps slowly through the porous bricks, evaporating from the surface and keeping the entire structure cool. An improved version uses double-brick walls with wet sand between them. Fruit and vegetables inside the chamber are maintained at temperatures below 20° C.

A similar low-tech way of keeping food cool is a tin box (6 or so cubic feet) covered with 2-3 wraps of burlap (old potato sacks). The box is filled with food and placed at the edge of a creek. The burlap surrounding the box is well-soaked. The end of the long piece of burlap that surround the box is placed in the creek so the box will be continually kept wet through capillary action. If the weather is extremely hot, every couple of hours, soak the burlap on the box with water. The evapouration of the water keeps the food good for several days.

Solar Cooker

2007-04-01T00:25:00.001-07:00

HotPot Simple Solar Cooker

Solar cookers require direct sunlight to function properly. Shadows, clouds and inclement weather limit their effectiveness. In general, you can solar cook when the length of your shadow on the ground is shorter than your height. This is an indicator that the sun is high enough in the sky to cook.

You can typically solar cook two meals per day — a noontime meal and an evening meal. The sun is most intense between 10am and 2pm, which is when breads and pastries should be baked.

Global Sun Cooker

Light-Weight, Easy-To-Carry: The Global Sun Oven weighs 9.5 kg, folds up like a suitcase, and is equipped with a handle for easy transport.

One-Piece Collapsible Reflectors: Set up for use or taken down for storage in a matter of seconds. The reflectors literally fall into place at an angle that allows you to maximize the power of the sun. The reflectors are made of highly polished, mirror-like anodized aluminum that can be cleaned quickly and easily with glass cleaner, and they will never oxidize or rust.

Spill-proof Levelator: There is never any need to worry about your food spilling in a Global Sun Oven. While cooking, your food rests on a shelf that self-adjusts to always stay level as you refocus.

Self-Contained Leveling Leg: As the sun is at different points on the horizon the Global Sun Oven can readily be adjusted to follow it. A simple adjusting leg allows you to choose from 9 angled positions. All that is required is to watch the shadows created by the oven. When the shadows are even on all sides, the cooker is directly focused. A good rule of thumb is to plan to readjust every 30mins to maintain maximum heat.

At noon, the sun is high in the sky and moves quickly past the maximum focus point, creating the need to refocus more often. Later in the day, you will not need to refocus as often. Many meals can be cooked without refocusing. Global Sun Oven users often will put their ovens outside, focused for the mid-day sun, with their dinner in it when they leave for work in the morning.

Dark, thin-walled pots with lids work best. Dark pots change the light from the sun into heat energy. Lids are important because they hold steam in the pot. Shiny aluminum pots and pans cause light to be reflected out, thereby reducing the oven's temperature. Add 10-15mins of cooking time for each time the oven door is opened.

Alcohol Stove

2007-04-01T00:24:00.000-07:00

Common Choices for Alcohol Stove Fuel

Here's a quick list of the most common alcohol stove fuels:

- Denatured Alcohol (hardware store, paint department)
- Pure Methanol (hardware store, paint department)
- Pure Ethanol (Everclear, liquor store)
- Fuel-Line Antifreeze (gas station or convenience store)
- Rubbing Alcohol (drug store)

Denatured alcohol is recommended as the best all-around fuel for any stove that burns alcohol. It is quite cheap and usually available in hardware stores. Denatured alcohol is mostly ethanol with some methyl alcohol added to render it unfit for human consumption. This form of fuel has anywhere from 1% to 80% methanol. One trick to test the suitability of a particular brand of denatured is to burn a small amount in a dish and reject it if there is any residue.

Pure Ethanol also makes a good stove fuel, but it is much more expensive than denatured because it is potable. You can find it in liquor stores as "grain alcohol"; Graves Grain Alcohol and Everclear are some brand names.

Pure Methanol (wood alcohol) burns very well in a stove. It can be found in the same sorts of places as denatured alcohol (hardware stores). Methanol is toxic. It is readily absorbed through the skin or mucus membranes.

Fuel-line Antifreezes are usually pure isopropanol or pure methanol. Look at the ingredients of the bottle to find out which is which. You can usually find these in gas stations or convenience stores. A popular brand is HEET; the red bottle is isopropyl and the yellow bottle is methanol. Isopropyl alcohol burns with yellow, sooty flames, indicating that it is not combusting completely.

Rubbing Alcohol (not recommended) is 70% isopropanol and 30% water. It won't work in many alcohol stoves. Alcohol with 91% or greater alcohol content will work, but will leave a sooty residue on your pot and brown water in your stove.

General rules to get the most shelf-life out of stored cooking oils:

#1 Exposure to oxygen, light and heat are the greatest factors to rancidity. If you can, refrigerate your stored oil esp after it's been opened. Buy your oils in opaque, airtight containers. If you purchase it in clear plastic, transfer it to a gas impermeable glass or metal container that can be sealed airtight. Transparent glass and plastic containers should be stored in the dark, such as in a box, at as cool a temperature as possible and rotate as fast as is practical.

#2 Try to not buy your fats in large containers. This way you won't be exposing a large quantity to the air after the you've opened it, to grow old and possibly rancid, before you can use it all up. Once opened, refrigerate cooking fats. If it turns cloudy or solid, the fat is still perfectly usable and will return to it normal after it has warmed to room temperature.

DIY Solar Power

2007-04-01T00:23:00.001-07:00

How To Make A Solar Power Generator

Using parts easily available from your local stores, you can make a solar power generator. Great for power failures and life outside the power grid. Have one in the office store-room in case of power failures in your highrise.

1. Buy yourself a small solar panel (25W or 40W).

2. Get the biggest deep-cycle 12-volt sealed gel-battery.

3. Get a battery box to put it in. (This is good for covering up the exposed terminals.)

4. To run AC appliances, invest in an inverter. This will convert the stored DC power in the battery into AC power for your household appliances. Count up the number of watts you'll be using (Eg. a small color television = 60 watts with a VCR = 22 watts, you'll need 82 watts).

5. Use insulated wire to attach the meter to the wingnut terminals on the battery. Connect the negative (-) pole first. Only handle one wire at a time.

6. Put the solar panel in the sun. It takes 5-8 hours to charge a dead battery; 1-3 hours to top-off a weak one. It will run radios, fans, and small wattage lights all night, or give you about 5 hours of continuous use at 115 volt AC.

Human Power Generator

The Human Power Generator is small, portable, and can be pedaled or cranked by hand to charge 12-volt batteries. The typical average continuous power that can be generated by pedaling the Human Power Generator is up to about 80 watts. The maximum power obtainable through hand cranking typically is about 50 watts. The pedals and optional hand-cranks are interchangeable.

The MkIII Human Power Generator has a durable powder coated steel frame, large rubber feet, and vibration isolated generator. It is the tool for self-reliant electrical production.

Portable Power Pack

The Human Power Combo comes with the Mk III Human Power Generator and a stand-alone Portable Power Pack which includes: storage battery, 300 watt inverter (with 800 watt peak power), LED battery voltage readout, connection cables, and a 120-volt outlet.

Solar Charger

2007-04-01T00:22:00.002-07:00

Petzl Tikka Plus LED Headlamp

The Petzl Tikka Plus is an incredible headlamp. There are three intensity modes, plus blinking, all controlled by a single button. The ‘low’ setting is easily bright enough for any indoor task. The lamp will operate for 150 hours in the low intensity mode on a single set of three AAA batteries. The build quality is excellent and weather resistant.

It’s simple to stockpile batteries, or, better yet, get yourself a solar battery charger and a few sets of rechargeable AAA batteries.

4 Watt 250 MA 12V Mono-Crystalline Solar Battery Charger Kit

This solar charger has one 12V cigarette lighter outlet to attach any car adapter to recharge cell phones, I-Pod, MP3 Players, and other electronics devices. It even can recharge a 12V car battery. It recharges the 10 built-in rechargeable AA NIMH batteries in 4hrs.

All our Solar chargers are using the best Mono-Crystalline Solar Cells. Amorphous or Dual Junction Solar Glass - cheapest but only 7% energy efficiency and 5 years service life. Poly-Crystalline - 25 plus years service life and 13% efficiency. Mono-Crystalline - 25 plus years service life and up to 20% efficiency.

NiMH Batteries

2007-04-01T00:22:00.001-07:00

"I have some rechargable AA batteries from over 10 years ago. They have never been charged. Will they go bad over time, or will they still be good when I decide to charge them?"

10 years is really pushing it for rechargeable battery storeage. General rule of thumb, 3 years for NiMH, 5 years for NiCD. Beyond that you will likely encounter decreasing capacity and cycle life. Rechargeable NiHM batteries have the disadvantage of loosing power after a period of time, so keep regular batteries as well.

NiMH Battery Care & Tips

* Charge your new battery overnight (14-16 hours) before using it. This is referred to as initializing and will enable you to obtain maxium battery capacity.

* New batteries can be stored up to 2 years without cycle loss.

* Store new batteries, at room temperature, in cool dry area.

* Batteries which have been in storage should be charged overnight.

* When using a rapid charger, leave battery in charger for an additional 1-2 hours after the green light appears.

* Do not leave battery in the charger when not charging. Continuous charging will shorten battery life.

* Only charge batteries when they need it. If it isn't fully discharged, don't recharge it. Use a second battery for multiple/longer duty cycle applications.

* Do not return fully charged batteries to the charger for an extra boost. This action will significantly reduce cycle life.

* Stabilize battery to room temperature (22º C) before charging. Charging below 4.4º C or above 40º C will decrease cycle life.

NiMH Q&A

First Time Usage - Do I need to charge my NiMH batteries. prior to using them for the first time?

Yes, before you use your new NiMH batteries for the first time you must charge them fully. For new NiMH batteries, it is often necessary to cycle them at least 3-5 times or more before they reach peak performance and capacity.

Holding A Charge (Shelf-Life) - How long can the batteries hold their charge if I leave them on the shelf?

At normal room temperature, NiMH batteries can generally retain 70% of their charge after 30 days. Normal self-discharge of NiMH batteries is about 1 percent per day at normal room temperature. Lower temperatures will cause NiMH Batteries to hold their charge longer. Use them within 5-10 days of their initial charge.

Not Holding A Charge - I have not used my NiMH batteries in several months and they are not holding their charge. How can I fix this?

NiMH batteries - like any rechargeable battery - will self-discharge if left unused. Generally, within 30-60 days, batteries will become almost completely drained. When using them, you will need to first recharge them. After extended storage, you may need to cycle them several times to regain normal performance. Conditioning can be performed using the conditioning feature on chargers such as the Maha PowerEx MH-C204F.

Long Term Storage - Are there any special precautions I need to know about if I store my NiMH batteries for several months?

- Always store your NiMH batteries in a discharged state.

- Do not expose your batteries to direct sunlight or temperatures above 35 degrees C during storage.

Care for Maximum LIfe - What can I do to maximize the life of my NiMH batteries?

- Never drop NiMH batteries on a floor or hard surface. If you do drop them, we recommend replacement even if no damage is apparent.

- Be sure to use a well-designed charger that will prevent overcharging. Fastest is not always the best.

- Never carry NiMH batteries loosely in your pocket. Coins , or other metal items could cause them to short, thus causing severe burns, or even a fire.

Rabbit Meat

2007-04-01T00:21:00.002-07:00

Colony-style rabbit raising is a meat rabbit management method that, at its most basic, is simply putting a group of doe rabbits and a buck or two in an escape-proof area and allowing them to do as nature intended. Keep 4 to 6 breeding does and 1 or 2 bucks on hand at any given time, plus their litters.

To the upside, the amount of work for the keeper is efficiently minimized - keeping the communal feeders and waters filled is about it. Another plus is that production of offspring can be maximized. To the downside: It can be very rough on the does. They are capable of getting pregnant again the day they give birth. With no breaks, their bodies are under a tremendous amount of strain.

Butchering Time (About 8 weeks of age)

Modified Colony-style: Cycle the buck (or bucks) through the colony on a periodic basis but keep them separate (but adjacent) the rest of the time. This dramatically cuts down on the wear and tear on the does. It also allows us to regulate the number of litters and frequency of butcher days.

With just 4 does and one buck, it is possible to harvest 25-40 rabbits once a month. If kept frozen continuously, rabbit's meat will be safe indefinitely. For best quality, use frozen whole rabbit within a year; pieces within 9 months.

DIY Pemmican

2007-04-01T00:21:00.001-07:00

The North American Indians invented pemmican as a condensed food for long overland journeys and winters. The lean meat of animals such as buffalo, elk and deer, was cut in thin slices and dried over a slow fire, or by the hot sun. Then it was pounded to shreds between two stones. The pounded meat was mixed with an equal quantity of boiling fat from the suet (inside fat), and packed in bags or baskets. Eaten cold, it is nearly tasteless at first but the flavor develops as it is chewed.

Some Indians added berries or wild cherries. Admiral Peary and his men ate it cold - one-half pound twice a day. He wrote that it was the only food for Eskimo dogs on a long Polar journey and: "Of all foods I am acquainted with, pemmican is the only one that a man can eat twice a day for 365 days and have the last mouthful taste as good as the first."

Men forced to live solely on salted meats, bread and cereals, suffered and died from scurvy: a disease which results from the lack of Vitamin C. Men who live on pemmican have no scurvy. It is unequaled for compactness, lightness, wholesomeness, palatability and sustaining power.

Home-Made Pemmican

Pemmican may be one of the world's perfect food. It is pure protein, fat, and carbohydrate in perfect ratio. It gives the body the densest nutritional value in a simple, hand-feeding manner. Its high energy ingredients keeps one from being hungry yet feeds the body everything it needs.

Meatless Pemmican
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup dried pumpkin or squash
1/2 cup peanuts
1/2 cup acorn or cornmeal
1/2 cup hickory nuts
1/3 cup honey or maple syrup
1/2 cup dried apples

In order to make sure that the acorn or cornmeal is bone-dry, spread it in a thin layer on a cookie sheet and place it in a warm oven (on the lowest setting) for 15-30 minutes. Then combine the dry ingredients and either chop them with a knife or grind them coarsely through a food grinder. Add the honey or maple syrup and blend thoroughly. Divide the mixture into 1/4-cup portions, press into cakes, and store in the refrigerator.

Suet-Less Pemmican
1 cup beef
1 cup dried berries
1 cup crushed nuts of any kind
2 tea-spoons honey
1/4 cup peanut butter

Grind (or pound) the dried meat to a mealy powder. Add the dried berries or nuts. Heat the honey and peanut butter until softened. Blend. When cooled, store in a plastic bag in a cool, dry place.

MRE Information

2007-04-01T00:20:00.000-07:00

Meal, Ready-to-Eat

MRE stands for Meal, Ready-to-Eat. MREs are meant to be completely self-contained meals that provide all the nutrition to sustain oneself. Typical contents include entree, side dish, crackers, peanut butter/cheese spread, desert, instant coffee/tea, matches, toilet paper, spoon, and a heater to heat the main entree. While everything in an MRE can be eaten cold, it usually tastes better warm.

How long MREs last depends on how long they are stored and at what temperatures they are stored. At the least, they'll last 1 month at 50 degrees Celsius. Or they could last 130+ months at 15 degrees Celsius. The average number for MRE freshness is 3 years at 26.67 degrees Celsius.

One major difference between the military MRE and civilian MRE is that civilian MREs have around 800-900 calories per meal. Military MREs have 1300 calories per meal.

If you want to buy civilian MREs, one place that has great customer service is Myers Custom Supply (US$57 per case of Sopakco MREs). Another place to check out is The Epicenter. Choose Sopakco Sure-Pak II - the best, most food.

Sopakco Sure-Pak 12 - this is the one civilian MRE that is most comparable to the military MRE. All food components are exactly the same as those in the military MREs. Each Sure-Pak 12 meal containts: 12 main entrees, 12 side dishes, 12 desserts, 12 crackers, 12 spreads, 12 beverage poweders, and 12 coffees.

One-Year Meals

2007-04-01T00:19:00.002-07:00

Mountain House Year's Supply Entrees

36 #10 size cans of Mountain House's premium quality freeze-dried foods (25-years shelf-life) packed into 6 cases for easy storage at US$850.

For those desiring a year's worth of dinner entrees for one person. Enjoy fast, delicious tasting meals anytime with no preparation hassles or cooking. Just add water and eat.

Mountain House® freeze-dried foods are packed in airtight nitrogen packed #10 cans. The canning process uses both vacuum oxygen removal and nitrogen flushing. The food has the longest shelf life available, up to 30 years.

Each can is coated with a protective enamel inside and out for double protection, including the lid. The can contents are protected until ready to open and use. After opening, it is recommended to use the content within 2 to 3 weeks for best results and taste.

The freeze-dried foods are easy to prepare - just add hot water, wait 10 minutes and eat. If a heat source is not available, room temperature or cold water can be used. Because no cooking is needed, these foods require much less water and fuel than most fresh, frozen or dehydrated foods.

Milk, Dairy Premium Instant Non-Fat

Key Information:
* Estimated Shelf-Life: 8-10 years
* Weight per can: 3 lb, 12 oz.
* Approximate Servings: 76
* Suggested Retail: US$23.99

Food & Barter

2007-04-01T00:19:00.001-07:00

Suggested food amount per adult for one year:

- Rice is 180 kg
- Sugar or Honey is 30kg
- Iodized Salt is 4.5kg
- Legumes (Dry Beans) is 36kg
- Instant Non-Fat Dry-Milk Powder is 27kg
- Cooking Oil is 10 liters (shelf-life of 2 years)
- Water (2 weeks) 14 gallons or 53 liters

Label your food items with the date you purchased it. Rotate as many items as you can by using your food storage twice a week. This will allow complete rotation of a year's supply every 3 years.

Be sure the dry milk you are buying has been fortified with Vitamins A and D. Buy your dried milk in containers of a size that makes sense for the level of consumption. Once opened, powdered milk has a short shelf-life (1-month) before undesirable changes occurs. If buy large packages and do not use much at one time, repackage into smaller containers.

Dry milk products are especially sensitive to storage conditions, particularly temperature and light. Vitamins A and D are photo-sensitive and will break down rapidly if exposed to light. The area where your dry milk is stored should be kept as cool as possible.

Store non-food items: medicine, toiletries, soap, cleaning supplies, paper products, laundry detergent.

Barter Trade

Sarajevo War Survivor: "After a while, even gold can lose its luster. No luxury in war like toilet paper. Canned foods are awesome, especially if their contents are tasty without heating. Many would trade a much needed meal for just a little bit of soap or toothpaste."

Investment Advice:

- Invest in things you will be able to trade for things you will need

- Think of consumer necessities that require high technology and have a long shelf-life

- Suggestions to get started: condoms, razor blades, cigarettes and medicine

- Rechargeable batteries (and solar chargers) are sure to become a prized item

- Toiletries, such as good soap/shampoo, will be luxury items

- Salt (becomes critical in the absence of processed foods)

- Pepper (It was used as a substitute currency amongst the poor Europe for centuries. Many times, the price of pepper per-ounce went higher than gold.)

Every month, buy an extra bar of soap, roll of toilet paper, 3 big boxes of strike-anywhere matches. Every 3 months, buy a package of disposable razors, multi-vitamins (jar of 133), tube of toothpaste, toothbrush, and a box of 10 large plastic garbage bags.

I Will Survive...

2007-04-01T00:18:00.000-07:00

To prepare for peak oil, I must...

- Live debt free (Done).
- Stock up at least one year of food supply (by end-2007).
- Buy backup solar-power and water-maker (Hyflux Dragon-fly).

My thanks to Simon Tay for the below advice:

"Solar Panels can be purchased in Sim Lim Tower. The solar panels vary in wattages (10W, 20W, 25W, 40W) which the store keeper will ask you… made-in China types (Aluminum Frames) or European type (more expensive but higher efficiency). DC 12V battery - I recommend the biggest (Sealed) battery around $55 which is 28Ah and 12V as it gives you highest power output... If you are under budget, do your solar panels one at a time but don’t waste money on 10W type as it’s too small to charge your battery sufficiently."

TELOZ - Income Bond

2007-03-22T02:32:00.001-07:00

TELOZ is a Trust that derives all of it's revenues from CVX, thus the importance of the financial stability of CVX. CVX has a strong balance sheet and solid cashflow. There are reserve issues, but there are always reserve issues with oil stocks. Having said that, they do not seem threatening to the company's solvency.

Think of TELOZ as an Income Bond. TELOZ trades as a common stock, and has a payout ratio of 100%. Currently selling for $10 and with a payout ratio that yields 24%

If you feel that oil will trade in a range of $30-$40, you will accrue a 24% yield as long as you hold the stock. If oil rises, the dividend and yield will rise with the added bonus of possible capital appreciation in the stock.

Imperfect Profits

2007-03-22T02:31:00.004-07:00

No Matter What You Do, You're Wrong

If:

You buy on the way down, and it keeps going down (should have waited), or

You sell on the way up and it keeps going up (should have waited), or

You buy on the way up and it keeps going up (you should have bought earlier), or

You sell on the way down to stop losses and it turns around, or

You don't buy at all (opportunity loss), or

You don't sell at all and hold those losses, or...

You can always view whatever action you take (profitable or not) as poor. The perfect is the enemy of the good. Remember that one must somehow escape any inherent negativity as one can't optimize perfectly. Go for profits without perfection.

Gila Girls

2007-03-22T02:30:00.004-07:00

PICO - Blue Gold

2007-03-22T02:30:00.003-07:00

T. Boone Pickens Invests in Water - Should You?

on Jan 17th, 2007 by Tate Dwinnell

PICO Holdings (PICO) owns 134,130 acre feet of water rights in Nevada and Arizona, plus a small amount in Colorado. The company is constantly looking to acquire new water rights

Nevada and Arizona have among the highest population growth rates in the country and, subsequently, also have among the highest new home construction - both are incredibly bullish for the value of water rights.

Water rights closer to end-users are worth more than water rights that are far away. Also, senior water rights are the most valuable kind. In some cases, there are several water rights on the same water resource. In these cases, the most senior right is the most valuable - because in the event of drought, it’s the last water right to go.

Look for the stock to return closer to $36-$37 before buying.

Rules For Happiness

2007-03-22T02:30:00.001-07:00

Exercise regularly.

Give your body the sleep it needs.

Devote time and effort to close relationships.

Have sex (preferably with someone you love).

Take control of your life, set yourself achievable goals.

Pause for reflection, meditate on the good things in life.

Don’t pursue happiness for its own sake, enjoy the moment.

Don’t equate happiness with money.

Gold/XAU Ratio

2007-03-22T02:29:00.000-07:00

When the Gold/XAU ratio moves toward 5.0, it’s an excellent time to buy large-cap gold miners. If the ratio gets anywhere near the 3.0 level, it's time to cash out. During the next correction, when the ratio spikes above 5.0 again, get ready to buy back those shares at a lower level.

Caution: When the 50-day moving average of the Gold/XAU ratio cross over the 200-day moving average, the crossing of these moving averages has meant that the ratio has further room to the upside and stocks have further room to run to the downside (relative to gold).

Since 1974, the Gold/XAU ratio has been above 5.0 about 15% of the time. At these levels, the XAU has followed with average annualized gains of 89.6%. When the ratio has been above 4.0, the XAU has obtain average annualized gains of 27.4%. But, when the ratio is below 3.0, the XAU has declined at an annualized rate of -36.6%.

Energy Volatility

2007-03-21T04:24:00.000-07:00

There is a stupendous proliferation of trading financial instruments (derivatives and futures) which are based on the actual commodities (oil and natural gas). There are trillions in derivatives being written which carry vast amounts of risk. This financialisation is just in the first inning. The current energy derivative market at $3 trillion could expand up to an $80 trillion market -20 times the market for physical oil and gas. This kind of speculative trading is now heavily influencing the price movements of oil.

To illustrate this, I've marked up a chart of a major energy ETF (XLE). There have only been two crises which had the potential to affect markets: the Iraq War starting in early 2003 and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in late 2005. The rest of the time, there was a background noise of "geopolitical tensions". Note how oil moved up with modest volatility until 2005, at which point wild swings in price became the norm. Yet other than the hurricanes - which affected perhaps 2% of global oil production - there were no events in the physical world to explain or trigger such wide swings in price.

I also drew some green lines on the chart to show the long-term uptrend in price, and the diverging downtrends in MACD and RSI. This should give us pause about the sustainability of the uptrend.

Matt Simmon - Is The World’s Energy Supply Sustainable?

Beneath all the price swings lies the issue of Peak Oil. Production is peaking, creating the inevitability that supply will not meet demand in the near future, causing massive price increases.

Gold-Shares (1931-1934)

2007-03-20T04:44:00.000-07:00

The US does not rule the world - then or now. A free market for gold existed then in OTC dealings in London and on the Continent.

Yes, in 1930 the official price of gold and the free market price of gold was for all practical purposes the same. However, in 1931 (on a yearly average) the free market for gold appreciated. In 1932, the free market average was 4% above the official price. In 1933, the free market average was $26.47 against an official price of $20.66. That was 28% higher, causing a rise in 1934 of the official price from 20.66 to $35. There was not one day between 1931 and 1934 that the official price and free market price was the same.

Today, gold shares are a proxy for inflation which along with geopolitical events impact currency valuations and gold's price.

Valero Energy (VLO)

2007-03-19T05:00:00.000-07:00

Crude Oil ($WTIC) will stay in a trading range between 55 and 65 for the near future. A serious recession could take the price below that trading range, but not for more than 1-2 quarters.

The Oil Refiners still look interesting, relatively speaking, particularly when oil trades at the low end of its trading range. One name that Citi likes is Valero Energy (VLO) for reasons of (1) margin dynamics and (2) multiple new projects coming on-stream in 2007.

VLO ($60) hit cycle lows in Sep 2006 and Jan 2007 with RSI-7’s down at 30. But the next cycle low, where the Weekly-Daily RSI-7 is down to about 30 for VLO, be a buyer. VLO might be down to $48.

Citi has 12-month Price Target (PT) of $71 for VLO. If you catch the $48 price, and sell at the PT that would mean a Return (excluding dividends) of +48 pct respectively.

In the previous Bear, XOM dropped from a peak of about $50 to a low of about $30, which is a drop of -40 pct. If, in the next Bear, XOM drops from a high of $79 to $50, that would be a drop of -36.7 pct from peak to trough.

Where do you think the M-W-D RSI-7 values are likely to be when XOM hits a multi-year cycle low of $50? Yes, those RSI-7’s will be under 30 across the board. Buy stocks of sound companies when at attractive prices (ie. Accumulation Zone), and to sell when they are over-bought (ie. Distribution Zone).

Blue Note (BN.V)

2007-03-17T22:02:00.001-07:00

Blue Note (BN.V)

Blue Note is a little known near-term producer. It is building a new mill to commence operations in June and will start mining the ore for the mill in April. The metals are zinc, lead, copper and silver.

Blue Note will be a commodity winner due to their choice to develop their mine and cash in on the commodity prices rather than to drill their property. An educated look at the property told them they have these metals at depth. An existing mine in the area has been mining for over 20 years and has mined to incredible depth. The geology of the area is similar.

Blue Note has put the resource to work by building a mine and earning money sooner rather than later and also tying up capital to establish a reserve that won't be used for 20 years.

They are most price sensitive to zinc, then lead, then silver. Copper has little influence on their cash flow as it will only contribute perhaps 2% of the total.

The number get impressive for 2008. They have adjusted their prices way down, $1.17 for Zinc, $0.44 for lead, $2.29 for copper, and $11.65 for silver. The costs also decline, to $0.55 net of by product credit, and it gives them about $58 million in pre-tax cash flow. After taxes I calculate 2008 EPS of about $0.14, exceptionally impressive for stock currently trading at $0.47-$0.48, and those earnings strongly take into consideration the price of commodities coming down. The IRR on the mine is 126.3%.

As a near-term producer, Blue Note is one that will win big time for its investors.

Mining Valuation

2007-03-17T20:02:00.000-07:00

Near Term Producers Will Win

Grade is king when it comes to mining. The cost of milling a ton of ore has a fairly fixed cost regardless of the grade of ore, so a higher grade will always mean far more profitable.

Valuation strictly on what is in the ground is the most speculative and risky way to value a stock. Where will the price be in months or years when this property is finally developed? How many share dilutions to finally develop this property? How much will the relative capital cost be to develop the property? Being close power and roads, rail and/or shipping can make an enormous difference in capital costs. What is the value of the metals per ton and how much will that change with price? What would the production costs be?

Commodity prices are high now, but the numbers can change quickly. How can any one possibly predict where those commodity prices will be in 2-5 years when this undervalued property will be a producer? The further out possible production is, the more likely that property will lose.

Near term producers will win as they will have the benefit of cashing in on the commodity boom and paying back those capital costs quickly.

Target Price Analysis

- Estimate the sales in the target year
- Estimate the profit margin
- Calculate the earnings and convert to earnings per share
- Compute target prices based on likely P/E ratios

Can You Profit from a Falling US$
by Buying Resource Shares on Non-US Exchanges?

The key to profiting from exchange rate moves when investing in resource stocks isn't to buy the stocks whose prices are denominated in a strong currency, but, instead, to buy the stocks of mining companies whose COSTS are denominated in a WEAK currency. A company that sells gold in US dollars and incurs most of its costs in terms of a currency that is weakening relative to the US$ will get a dual boost to its profit margins in a rising metal price environment.

The bottom-line is that a stock's performance over the long-term will be determined by its actual and/or projected profits, and not by the performance of the currency in which its shares happen to change hands. When traders feel very optimistic about natural resources most resource-oriented shares will surge, even those hampered by having their costs denominated in a strong currency.

Nanotech Saviour

2007-03-16T06:37:00.000-07:00

Nanotech Stocks Outperform In 2007-2008

London-based nanotech analyst company Cientifica has published a report asserting that nanotech is actually just greentech in disguise.

The report specifically points to six major ways in which nanotechnology is contributing to the reduction of carbon emissions. The six technologies discussed are all available now or within the next two years, and some have been making stealthy inroads into global industry for as long as a decade. The six areas mentioned in the report are: aerogels, thin film solar, fuel borne catalysts, fuel cells, supercapacitors, and nanocompsite materials.

I've said many times that nanotech (and genetic engineering) will play an enormous role in our energy future, and obviously that extends to environmental issues. Keep in mind the timing of this: We're approaching peak oil and getting serious about emissions of greenhouse gases, even as we're taking our first tiny steps with nanotechnology. Expect to see some spectacular breakthroughs in the coming years, as well as technology and business failures.

Katrina Deja Vu

2007-03-16T06:19:00.001-07:00

Katrina Deja Vu

Pacific is going to be cold and have a La Niña. What we can expect are the winds are going to be ideal for creating hurricanes and aiming them at the East Coast. I wouldn't be surprised if we have at least two hits in the Gulf oil producing area. I'm not saying two hits both in the American area because Mexico has a lot of production in the Gulf, but I expect at least two hurricanes in the Gulf oil production area. La Niña winds are also ideal for aiming hurricanes into North Carolina. So I would say that the gulf and North Carolina are at quite a bit of risk.

This summer, a lot of it depends on when the La Niña occurs. If the La Niña has not appeared during the summer, then we can expect a hot summer. If we have an La Niña starting in the middle of summer, then instead we're going to see that blast of heat throughout the Midwest and the grain belt.

If the heat wave blasts in July when the corn is silking, then it really destroys the quality of the corn crop. If it hits in July, it’s going to really affect our corn production, and that’s bad news because our ethanol demand is very high.

One of the things people don't think of but coal-burning plants, and nuclear plants need water to cool off their equipment, and if the water gets warm; they can't cool off the equipment. And they end up having to cut back electrical production. So you have the heat raising electrical demand, and yet the heat makes it, so they have to cut back production – and that really creates tension.

Hurricane

In May and August, the CPC posts the Hurricane Outlook Discussion, which analyzes climate influences on and expected hurricane activity for the Atlantic and Caribbean basins during June to November.

ECU Silver (ECU.V)

2007-03-16T06:00:00.000-07:00

With the inventories of nickel, lead and zinc down to historical lows and the world populace hoarding gold and silver as currency hedges, certain PM equities will certainly benefit.

One of my picks is ECU Silver (ECU.V)
ECU is a "producer" and not just an explorer.
Don't be fooled by the word "Silver" in the name.
They also have quite respectable "gold" assays as well.

Also byproducts of silver are lead, zinc and nickel, all rising in price due to extremely low worldwide inventories.

Western Goldfields

2007-03-16T05:43:00.000-07:00

Why do you buy the shares of a goldminer? It's because of (1) the resource (2) management, and (3) the price of gold. Western Goldfields (WGI.TO) is a winner on all counts.

* Projected 9.5 years annual production of 165,000 oz. gold
* Starting full production by April 2008
* Cost of sales of $335/oz, all-in costs of $414/oz
* After-tax IRR +25 pct @600 gold; and +35 pct @$700 gold
* Completed resource estimate of 3.61 million oz gold
* Completed feasibility study for mining 2.36 million oz gold reserves.
* Low $286 million market cap capable of expanding by a factor of three after the expected analyst rating upgrades

Western Goldfields will be a solid producer / profit-maker starting in 2008. But there are 142.5 million shares fully-diluted, so traders looking for a 10-bagger are not going to find it here.

I set a 12-month Price Target (PT) of C$4.
Should gold prices move higher, I will not hesitate to set a higher PT.

Goldcorp Bubble

2007-03-16T05:32:00.000-07:00

Gold Rush - Higher Cost, Better EPS Leverage

A company with higher production costs will experience more leverage in the growth of earnings at the beginning of a gold rush.

Gold Bubble - Gold Up, Leverage Falls

The leverage of earnings declines rapidly as the price of gold increases when bubble valuations of 25 times earnings remain constant.

Gold Trouble - Bubble In The Making

Increasing gold costs means that gold price must go up in an amount equal to the increasing costs, or, the level of bubble valuation will increase.

Gold Gone - End Game

Leverage of the growth of earnings is dependent on production costs. The leverage of the growth of earnings gave stellar returns at the beginning of the bull market, but decline rapidly. The leverage of earns can no longer keep up or justify paying bubble valuation prices for gold stocks. Production costs increase during the life cycle of a mine, further reducing profitability. Gold stocks that sell other metals that have dramatically increased in price have had highly leveraged earnings of those metals (eg. copper) hide the declining leverage and profitability of the gold sales.

Over-Valuation of Goldcorp

The fundamentals of the mature gold stocks as a business have so vastly changed, increasing gold price won't save them, and won't have the same effect on profitability as it did in the past. Where bullion underperformed relative to stock in the past, I see a reversal happening because of the changes in market conditions.

All face increasing cost for replacement acquisitions, reduced quality of replacement properties, reduction of leverage of earnings, and indeed, if gold doesn't go up enough to cover those replacement costs, leverage works negatively.

The other key points are:

The leverage of earnings of both copper and gold.
The price elasticity of gold bullion to gold stocks, ie, market cap.
The increasing cost of acquisitions.
The roll of the life of a mine - increasing rates of depletion.
The roll of lower quality gold properties.
The roll of depreciating mines.
The level of reserves to market cap.

Conclusions on Goldcorp:
Gold prices must increase $230/oz to maintain earnings for Goldcorp.
Assets are depleting at a much higher rate than earnings.
Goldcorp is trading at about 3 times its value.
I wouldn't buy Goldcorp at US$10.
I don't see growth potential at that price.

Under Valuation of Northern Orion

The value of what's expected to be sold at half of today's market prices is $17 billion, 22 times the diluted market cap, and using a value of market cap being 10 times bearish price estimates give a today value for Northern Orion of $7.40. Northern Orion is grossly undervalued. It is a strong buy to $7 based of property holdings alone.

Earnings per share can be expected to increase to about $2/share even if copper is US$2/lb. With a target P/E of 10, once production is in full swing, target price can be US$20/share. With a target P/E of 8, target price can be $16.00.

Bearish Price Target: $12.40 (by 2015)
The Middle Road: $18.90 (by 2012)
Today's Prices: $28.60 (by 2011)

Cara Gold-Seer

2007-03-16T05:26:00.000-07:00

Following the termination of the present bullish phase in Precious Metals within 1-4 months (Apr-Jul 2007), there ought to be a severe shake-out. The senior and intermediate producers are going to be priced very high. The place to have capital invested is in the small (and riskier) ventures that have well-funded exploration and resource development programs.

Buying precious metals today is the biggest no-brainer trade for the next two years. Every time there is a dip, buy it. And when the daily RSI-7 gets over 70-75, sell some (say half), and after the next Fed intervention, buy even more.

Buy the shares of the small miners and development companies that are expected to commission new mines within 3 years. Western Goldfields is my value choice. For the senior miners, on the basis of resource expansion in 2007 and 2008, Kinross. Silver Wheaton (SLW) is the best pure silver play.

Guyana Goldfields (GUY.TO) is developing a world-class ore-body in Guyana. Sprott has a C$16 12-month Price Target. Buy the dips.

Plan the trade and trade the plan. Think in If-Then terms (add to a position, take profits, cut loss). Define your investment time frame and accept the gyrations within the price/time range.

It is in our DNA to associate gold and silver with stores of value. Fund managers are human beings too with the same DNA, so we can expect their speculative spirits to work into gold in a huge scale that will drive gold into 4-digits since the gold market is so small.

We are in a Secular Bull market for commodities, including metals and precious metals. The spike top in gold within 1-4 months (Apr-Jul 2007) is more than an intermediate-term cycle. After the break, it will take another 2-3 years to recover to this cycle's highs. In the interim (after the break), the better place for capital would be in the technology and telecom companies, and in the rapid growth small and mid-caps.

So, if gold does attract a world of interest as it reaches $700-750 and possibly $800, traders ought to take profits and seek long-term opportunities in small and mid-cap tech companies.

If gold ran higher than $800-$900 in 2007, there would be an avalanche of recovered supply and new small mines coming on-stream, and the major miners would be selling forward again. All that opposition would be sufficient to terminate the gold Bull.

Gold Wave-Cycle

2007-03-16T04:21:00.000-07:00

Precious Metals Timing (14 March 2007)

Gold completed its Major Wave One at $728 in May 2006.
Gold needs one more leg down in order to complete this correction.
A 50% correction of the entire move up would bottom at $492.
However, if the [C] leg equals the [A] leg, the bottom may be $526.

The [A] leg down was $166.50
The [B] leg high was $692.50
$692.50 minus $166.50 equals $526

The [A] leg down bottomed at $563.50
The bottom should appear somewhere between $492 and $526.
When the bottom is reached, that will complete Major Wave Two.

Silver is in a position similar to gold.
The [A] leg gave back 50% of the entire bull move.
The [C] leg will most likely bottom lower than the [A] leg.
There is a good probability that silver will bottom in $9.11

If wave [C] equals wave [A], $9.11 will be the target.
The high was $15.20. The wave [A] low was $9.60
That represents a $5.60 decline. The wave [B] high was $14.71
$14.71 minus $5.60 equals the bottom of $9.11

HUI correction will NOT go lower than the 270 low.

Ami Tokito

2007-03-15T02:50:00.000-07:00

Eye Candy

2007-03-09T02:41:00.000-08:00

Most Honest Money

2007-03-09T02:13:00.000-08:00

Gold Is Honest Money

Gold itself is honest money. It's just that we are so brainwashed by paper money that we think that paper money is money. It is not... they are just paper backed by nothing.

Sound money is an asset. Something physical that you can exchange for something else. When you receive it, you know you’re receiving a tangible good. So it isn’t scraps of paper. In the absence of it being convertible to something physical, paper is merely an unbacked promise on the part of the government. Promises can be broken.

The Real Silver Deficit

1. Silver is not rarer than Gold.

2. The gold to silver rarity ratio is about 1 to 5, not 5 to 1.

3. There is nothing factual about the statement that silver is rarer than gold, unless you qualify it with the condition that you are only referring to market accessible silver in the form of bullion. But this is an unfair comparison, because you are including all gold in jewelry form while excluding all silver.

Silver Versus Gold

One of the most reliable relationships in the financial world since the early 1970s can be expressed as follows: silver outperforms gold when confidence in financial assets is rising and under-performs gold when confidence in financial assets is falling.

Gold's proven ability to out-perform silver when confidence is in a downward trend has a logical basis in that gold's price is almost totally driven by changes in investment demand whereas industrial demand is a very important factor in the silver market. When confidence is falling, there will be a flight toward money that should logically benefit the more monetary metal relative to the more industrial one.

Silver will out-perform gold over the long-term precious metals bull market, mainly because the US is not the global growth engine it once was and the long-term outlook for non-US economic growth remains bullish. However, silver is much riskier than gold because there are more things that could go wrong with a silver investment than with a gold investment. Gold-related exposure should have a significantly greater weighting than silver-related exposure in an investment portfolio.

Portfolio Diversification With Precious Metals

Ibbotson Associates did a comprehensive study regarding the effects of portfolio diversification with Gold, Silver and Platinum bullion.

“The three metals were chosen because gold and silver are often viewed as a safe harbor in times of crisis. Conversely, during economic expansion demand for silver and platinum is thought to increase.”

Precious metals performed best when they were needed the most by providing positive returns during the years that traditional asset classes had negative returns. Ibbotson determined that investors can potentially improve the risk-to-reward ratio in conservative, moderate and aggressive portfolios by including precious metals bullion with allocations of 7.1%, 12.5% and 15.7% respectively.

Gold Determinants

2007-03-08T05:29:00.000-08:00

Long-Run Determinants of the Price of Gold

Whether investors in any particular country gain or lose by holding gold depends on the start date when gold is purchased and the length of the holding period. More specifically, it is far more likely to be profitable to invest in gold when the nominal price of gold is below its inflation hedge price. Conversely, it more likely to be unprofitable to invest in gold when the nominal gold price is above its inflation hedge price.

The dollar depreciation will lower the price of gold to investors outside of the USA, and this will raise their demand for gold and raise the US dollar price of gold. That is in addition to the long-run relationship between the US price level and the price of gold. The dollar depreciation will likely raise US inflation rates, and gold would act as an inflation hedge during this period.”

While gold is/will be an important anti-inflation hedge and against US-dollar devaluation, if the investor is from a country whose currency is expected to appreciated strongly against the dollar than gold may not be that great a buy.

Storm Watch

2007-03-07T05:49:00.000-08:00

Predicting a major correction is actually very simple. Just watch the aunties, uncles and students. Once they start discussing them with deep interest, or boasting of sure win stock picks or big earnings in the market, its a sure sign the storm is around the corner. The question is when you want to find shelter before the rain starts falling.

Just look around the news. There are still talk that this is just a small blip and recovery will be soon. People just don't get it. As long there are still such talk, market will continue to tank. Wait until such talk has disappear and people have resigned to the fact that this correction will be here for quite awhile, only then the market will recover.

In doing TA, we cannot use our belief to forecast on where it is going. Just because there is a support somewhere does not mean it must be heading there. So need to establish the evidence first that it has to either head up or head down, and then use support and resistance to forecast where it might be reaching.

Rebounce is expected. Nothing will go down in a straight line. With so many down days, rebounce is just a natural event. Market always open based on the perceptions of amateurs. Market always close based on the perceptions of professionals. It pays more to follow the professionals. People need to remember that the professional managers trade against the retail investors. If they are trading against you, do you think they will tell you exactly what they are doing?

On the bounce that often occurs following a drop: after the bounce, the market drops again, making those who bought the bounce unhappy, and those who got left out happy. Then a counter-rally ensues, which often exceeds the high of the first bounce. This succeeds in bringing in buyers on the sidelines, and followed by a resumption of the downtrend.

In 1929, the Dow peaked around 380. On week 2, there was a chance to cash out at 370 (before a drop to about 325). On week 6, the average had rebounded to 355, before a huge drop to 235 and ultimately about 50! In 1987, the Dow reached just over 2700. On week 3, it reached about 2600. On week 6, it bounced up to about 2650. After that, it was bombs away to around 1750.

Is the Bear fair... YES. It always gives you a second and sometimes a third chance to exit at reasonable levels. If the top has been reached, then the 50 day M.A. should be our first chance. The 50MA seems like a good exit point.

Do a proper asset allocation plan and just do your DCA. That's the best I can recommend without knowing exactly the profile and strategy of each investor.

My Precious...

2007-02-26T04:27:00.001-08:00

Here's my Precious Fund:

P - Precious Metals (Gold 15%, Silver 5%, Platinum 5%}
R - Resources (Hard metals, Copper 5%, Zinc 5%, Nickel 5%)
E - EURO (5%)
C - Cash (10%)
I - I.T. (specifically Google, 5%)
O - Oil (10%)
U - Uranium (20%)
S - Soft Commodities (like Sugar, Corn, Rice) @ 10%

Economic Pi-Cycles

2007-02-26T04:26:00.001-08:00

The Economic Confidence Cycle (8.6 years) and its subsets have been very reliable in the gold market. We established trading rules in the 1980's that identified important highs around the date and lows in the weeks following the cycle date.

In a rising market the cycle date offers an opportunity to lighten-up on long gold related positions and re-establish them on a hard break.

http://www.contrahour.com/contrahour/2007/03/free_martin_arm.html

http://princetoneconomics.blogspot.com/2006/06/economic-confidence-model.html

HIGH mid-date is 2007/2/27
LOW -3/8 date is 2008/3/27
HIGH -1/4 date is 2009/4/23
The -1/8 date is 2010/5/21
LOW cycle date is 2011/6/18

Peak in gold and commodities between 2007 and 2012 (2010)

The 1/8 date is 2012/7/15
HIGH 1/4 date is 2013/8/12
LOW 3/8 date is 2014/9/9
HIGH mid-date is 2015/10/6
LOW -3/8 date is 2016/11/3
HIGH -1/4 date is 2017/12/1
The -1/8 date is 2018/12/28
LOW cycle date is 2020/1/25

The 1/8 date is 2021/2/22
HIGH 1/4 date is 2022/3/22
LOW 3/8 date is 2023/4/19
HIGH mid-date is 2024/5/16
LOW -3/8 date is 2025/6/13
HIGH -1/4 date is 2026/7/10
The -1/8 date is 2027/8/7
LOW cycle date is 2028/9/4

The 1/8 date is 2029/10/1
HIGH 1/4 date is 2030/10/29
LOW 3/8 date is 2031/11/26
HIGH mid-date is 2032/12/23
LOW -3/8 date is 2034/1/20
HIGH -1/4 date is 2035/2/17
The -1/8 date is 2036/3/16
LOW cycle date is 2037/4/13

The 1/8 date is 2038/5/11
HIGH 1/4 date is 2039/6/8
LOW 3/8 date is 2040/7/6
HIGH mid-date is 2041/8/2
LOW -3/8 date is 2042/8/30
HIGH -1/4 date is 2043/9/26
The -1/8 date is 2044/10/24
LOW cycle date is 2045/11/21

The Pi model is global, not just US. And it means that for every significant date, the peak/bottom can be anywhere in the world in any type of market. Obviously, it won’t be a tiny stock market in an isolated island country. For example, it can be Asia as a whole.

Not every peak/bottom in the Pi model will generate a peak/bottom in some markets. Only with more likelihood, especially for mid-cycle and cycle dates.

Gold & Oil Bull-Seasons

2007-02-26T04:25:00.000-08:00

If you want to add gold or related positions to your portfolios, the best time seasonally is when gold is languishing near its seasonal support. This tends to happen in late March / early April, late July, and early November. Off of each of these three major seasonal buying points marked above, gold’s trio of seasonal rallies tend to launch.

If you want to buy gold, the weakest months are very close to the annual weakest spots. Mid-March, late July, and mid-October tend to be the worst spots for gold seasonally when indexed monthly.

On average gold rallies from early Nov to early Feb, a big 3-month span. This rally is exceptionally strong too. It is the only rally of the year that breaks out well above gold’s seasonal resistance.

Crude Oil has a seasonal tendency to:
- Bottom in late June to early July
- Rally in mid-Sep to early Oct
- Decline into Nov to Dec

In May, XOI tends to correct to its seasonal support for the first time since early Feb rally. Mid-May is a high-probability-for-success time to add new long-positions in oil stocks.

Oil stocks tend to have their sharpest and biggest seasonal surge of the year at the end of August. XOI summer rally climaxes at the end of Sep. Late Sep is likely to be the best time seasonally to realise your profits.

Long-Life Oil-Reserves

2007-02-26T04:23:00.000-08:00

Barron’s : Did Somebody Say Energy Crisis?
- Interview with Charley Maxwell

Q: Where are oil prices headed?

We are now getting a reaction to the higher oil prices. It is translating into slower economic growth and, of course, it is allied with a rise in interest rates. Don’t think that it is just that rising oil prices equal lower economic growth. It is a question of rising oil prices and less liquidity and higher rates that’s a triple threat. The bottom could be in the high 40s, though that wouldn’t be sustainable. On a yearly average, we will stay in the 60s, but we’ll spend a lot of time in the 50s. Then they’ll start up again in 2008-2009 and go up for some time. When we get to 130 or 150 there will be another pullback.

Q: How are you advising people when it comes to the oil stocks?

You want to buy companies that have long-life reserves and are developing them, it’s as simple as that. The average oil company, because they are all in the non-OPEC world, will by definition peak around 2010 or thereabouts. I estimate Exxon will peak in 2011. BP will peak in 2012. Total (TOT) in 2012. ConocoPhillips (COP) in 2013. Marathon Oil (MRO) in 2009. Royal Dutch (RDS-B) in 2009 and Hess (HES) in 2010. But a company like Suncor Energy (SU), which operates in the Canadian tar sands, will peak around 2045. It is a completely different world. EnCana (ECA), the big Canadian gas and tar sands producer, will peak around 2020. Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ) is another. I also like Nexen (NXY), another Canadian tar sands producer, and Lukoil (LUKOY) of Russia. The only one I’m recommending at the moment is EnCana because it has a large component of natural gas. The gas market is at a bottom now, whereas I see the oil market bottoming in the spring or summer of 2007 (Apr-June or July-Sep), or even early 2008 if we have a recession.

In the recession of 2001, oil prices dropped from roughly $40 (inflation adjusted) to around $23, or -42%. In 1990, they dropped from roughly $56 to around $33, or -41%.

So, let's see... $78 - (78 * .41) = $46

Margin Of Safety

2007-02-23T03:23:00.000-08:00

Benjamin Graham: "When the general market is high, there are always a number of individual issues that appear definitely undervalued by objective standards, and consequently even more attractive in contrast to the inflated level of other stocks. But that is a time that calls for especial caution. Not only may the 'neglected security' continue neglected for the remainder of the bull market, but when the downturn comes it is likely to decline in price along with the general market. In a word, beware of 'bargains' when most stocks seem very high.

The chief losses to investors come from the purchase of low quality securities at times of favorable business conditions. These securities do not offer an adequate margin of safety in any admissible sense of the term. Most of the fair weather investments, acquired at fair weather prices, are destined to suffer disturbing price declines when the horizon clouds over."

P/E Fair Valuations

2007-02-19T21:30:00.000-08:00

Stocks are great long-term bargains when P/E ratios are low.

14x earnings is the long-term base fair-market valuation. It provides a stable central reference point off of which we can define cheap and expensive. Half of fair-value, or 7x earnings, is cheap and a great bargain.

Conversely 21x earnings is moving into the realm of expensive valuations. And double fair value, or 28x earnings, is bubble territory. Try to keep dwelling on the fact that $1 of earnings is $1 of earnings, totally fungible. So paying only $7 for that dollar of earnings is vastly superior than paying $28 for that same dollar. For long-term investors, the valuations at which they choose to buy is the single most important factor guiding the long-term success of their investments.

If I had to pick one metric for longer holding periods, it would be a low Price to Book. Beat the broader market by buying a diversified portfolio of low PB stocks (below the market median and average) and rotating them as need be after holding +/- a year.

What Is Fair Value Price?

1) First check if that company is worth valuating. A company worth valuating should have consistent shareholders' equity growth, EPS growth, sales growth, cash growth and better still, if you can find its ROC growth. All these figures should have more than 10% every year.

2) Once you found such company, get the average growth rate in shareholders' equity of the past 5 years or more.

3) Once you got the figure in step (2), use that figure to project it's EPS for the next 5 years (or whatever years you use in step 2).

4) Once you get the EPS in step (3), multiply that by the average PE of the last 5 years. Now, you get the estimated fair price of the stock in 5 years time.

5) Now let's say you want 15% returns/year for this stock from now to the next 5 years. Use the price obtained from step (4) and work backwards using 15%/year. Now you get the true price of the stock today.

6) Throw in a discount of 50% (margin of error) to the price you obtained in step (5). What is this price compare to the price of the stock that is trading now? If they are close, then you know that this stock is undervalued by 50%. Good bargain! Buy it!

Great Secular Bears

Great Bears start at high P/E ratios and low dividend yields. Then these key valuation metrics gradually declined throughout the bears. The problem with Great Bears is that they do not just drive stocks from overvalued to fair-valued, but they ultimately drive stocks all the way down to deeply undervalued levels. In valuation terms, the late 1974 cyclical-bear bottom happened near 8.3x earnings.

Great Bears last for 17 years and do a masterful job of stringing the bulls along. They are not an endless grind lower, but instead a series of periodic multi-year downlegs (cyclical bears) punctuated by spectacular multi-year cyclical bulls. This pattern gradually turns the screws to the bulls, continually providing them with just enough hope so they stay fully invested until the very end.

Secular bears are really long periods of time when the markets trade sideways on balance, huge cyclical bulls followed by devastating cyclical bears. This cycle continued over and over again. It is this sideways trading that slaughters even the bravest buy-and-hold investors in the end.

Know-Nothing Portfolio

2007-02-19T21:17:00.000-08:00

Sgfunds 2007 Funds Portfolio

Here's the $100,000 portfolio:

$40k Infinity US 500 Stock Index (ER 0.99%)
$24k Infinity European Stock Index (ER 1.06%)
$16k UOB United Regional Growth Fund (ER 1.26%)
$15k Legg Mason Global Bond Trust (ER 0.91%)
$5k DBS Enhanced Income SGD (ER 0.47%)

80% equity (50% US, 30% Europe, 20% Asia incl Japan)

20% fixed income (75% global investment grade medium-term bond, 25% local short-term bond)

This portfolio is for people in their 20s who do not want to spend too much time investing and not interested in knowing investment details. The investor of this portfolio admits that he knows nothing about market direction and predicting stock market is not practical. Hence, it covers major stock markets and does not overweigh any sector or country.

The 20% fixed income allocation derives from the simple rule of thumb that uses age as fixed income %. The choice of bond fund invests only in investment grade bonds (rated BBB to AAA), no emerging market bond or junk bonds. It also captures the medium-term bond, while DBS Enhanced Income SGD captures the short-term bond.

It can be implemented in FSM and enjoy the free switch between the two equity funds (Infinity funds) and the global bond fund (Legg Mason glbal bond) because they belong to the same tier in sales charge (1.0-1.5%). This is something you don't get between normal equity funds and bond funds.

Guru's Portfolio

2007-02-19T20:28:00.000-08:00

ghchua's Investment Strategy

I always stress that one should adopt a portfolio view when constructing a diversified portfolio. If your portfolio is overvalued, you should seek to add more undervalued stocks to bring it back to fully valued or under-valued levels.

How do I manage to keep track of so many stocks? My answer is that there is no need to keep track at all. Since I hold a diversified portfolio, any one stock that tanks will have little impact on my portfolio. So, no worries if there is a profit warning on one of my holdings. I just collect dividends every month and seek to re-invest those dividends or use them to pay for my monthly expenses.

Do I go in and out of the market? No, I strive to be 100% invested at all times - be it bull, bear or range market. The opportunity cost of not being invested is higher than trying to get into the market at the right time. Some people might think that they do not want to be in the market when it is going down. But remember that not all stocks go down in a bear market. If your portfolio is well-constructed, it should not go down as much as the STI. Also, you collect dividends and add more holdings in your portfolio when stocks are down.

For yield, look for sustainable earnings and low price. For capital gains, look for explosive growth, a good story, or if the stock is irrationally undervalued. There are quite a number of gems in the market that are both dividend and growth stocks.

If you look at yield alone, these large-cap stocks offer good yields - SPC (6%), Cerebos (7.5%). There are smaller-caps that offer better yield - MIIF (7.6%), Kim Eng (5.8%), UOB KH (7.8%) and GK Goh (7.7%).

Dividend Portfolio

2007-02-18T18:53:00.000-08:00

Creating Wealth With Dividend Growth

Blue-Clip Stocks That Raise Dividend

Dividend portfolio investment philosophy to hold "forever".

So, if a recession comes, the portfolio will be undervalued due to the fall in prices, and the right thing to do, is to hold, collect the dividends, and pick-up the undervalued shares to move it back to fairly valued or fully-valued levels. Conversely, during surging markets, and the portfolio is over-valued due to the rise in prices, the right thing to do is buy more dividend and/or undervalued stocks using the dividends you have been collecting, and bring back the portfolio to fairly/fully-valued levels.

Dividend-paying stocks act as "bear-market protectors" and "return accelerators" during down markets. When stock prices fall, yields rise as long as companies don't cut their dividends at a greater rate than the price drop. When those dividends are reinvested, they purchase more shares at lower prices and these extra shares act as a bear-market protector. When share prices reverse, the extra shares act as a return accelerator and rocket total returns higher.

The traditional retirement strategy for stocks is to live off dividends alone. This is an excellent approach. Typically, dividend payments continue far into the future and keep up with inflation. By living off dividends alone, a retiree avoids the most serious danger to portfolio survival: being forced to sell stocks at low prices.

What happens if you live only on dividends during the first decade of your retirement? Answer: you extend your portfolio's lifetime by ten years. Withdrawing all of the dividends for a decade did not impair portfolio survival. If you have concerns about long-term portfolio survival, consider living off dividends alone.

Maid For Sex

2007-02-18T17:49:00.000-08:00

I was half-asleep when Lita slipped into the quilt. I felt her lying on my chest and I opened my eyes. Lita kissed my lips and shifted her naked body over mine. I felt my dick rubbing her pussy when she crossed her legs over my groin.

Our bodies were in a warm embrace, our lips interlocked passionately, and our desire to copulate was building up. There was no conversation, just kissing and hugging. My dick swelled as though it was my first time.

The feeling of my swollen head grinding with Lita’s shaven pussy has made my dick ooze with pre-cum. I could feel Lita’s juices flowing out of her cunt and my dick head was soon wet. Lita and I just knew what to do and when to do. The urge to enjoy every second of our love making made us control the urge to fuck.

The grinding continued as we began to lick one another. Lita pressed her body up for me to lick her nipples. It must have been a long time since she felt so loved. She was moaning as I suckled on one nipple and rubbing the other. She was enjoying the attention.

The intensity was gearing up and both of us were about to lose all control. With perfect synchronization, Lita lowered her body for my dick to enter as I lifted my ass to punch hard into her. Her hands gripped tightly onto the bed sheet as my prick filled up her love hole. Our flesh now rubbing and grinding wildly, our senses lost in the depths of our desire.

Lita was wriggling her ass as I lifted mine to increase my rhythm. I could feel Lita panting getting heavier and heavier, I knew she would be worn out soon. I sat up and now she was in a squatting position, sitting on my prick. We kissed and continued wriggling; it was such a heavenly feeling when my prick is fully engulfed in a wet and juicy pussy. I could just die in this position.

I turned Lita on her back and I began to fuck her. Lita was gripping so tightly that I thought my dick head would be ripped off if I tried to pull too hard. I carried on ridding Lita like a stud while she shook her head wildly. I could feel my balls tightening and my dick swell even thicker. Lita gripped on my shoulders as we cummed together.

I kissed her to prevent ourselves from moaning too loudly. The fucking hadn't stopped. Our bodies begin to rock again; Lita stretched her hand to hold on the bed head to receive my thrusts. I spread her legs and increased the thrusts; Lita was moaning and shaking her head. Then suddenly, she stopped moaning, her body cramped and her cunt tightened again before she released everything. My Lita just had another orgasm.

Lita and I had just gone through one of our most intense session of love-making ever.

I Do Not Love You

2007-02-18T17:37:00.000-08:00

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how,
or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly,
without complexities or pride;

so I love you because I know no other way
where I does not exist, nor you,

so close that your hand on my chest
is my hand,
so close that when you close your eyes
I fall asleep.

Goddess Venus

2007-02-18T17:27:00.000-08:00

Dream Babes

2006-12-01T21:21:00.000-08:00

Memories...

2006-11-27T05:59:00.000-08:00

Photograph
by Gilbert Koh

Smile, I commanded
you obeyed
and I caught forever
that moment
when something
on your face
disguised itself
so well as happiness.

Quiet fears
and other troubles
have marred this day
yet the years will pass
and in time this image
will be enough
to make us believe
that in this instant
we had been so much happier
than we really were.

How kind and skilful,
the way time deceives memory,
fills us with warm
nostalgia for things
that never really happened.

Three Seasons

2006-11-27T04:18:00.000-08:00

"Longing is the feminine side of love, the cup that wants to be filled." It is a state of being open to possibility and to the future. It is a quest that animates us and carries us into our most strenuous endeavors. Three Seasons, written and directed by Tony Bui, is an extraordinary cross-cultural masterpiece shining with incredible images, a keen sense of place, and a reverence for the incredible yearning of ordinary people.

Hai (Don Duong) is the placid, thoughtful cyclo driver, who falls for one of his customers, the prostitute Lan (Zoe Bui). He waits outside the hotels where she plies her trade, always there to offer her a ride when she is finished for the night. The detachment necessary to maintain her peace of mind is threatened by his honest affection, which she would return if she were not a prostitute, and she tries to fend him off.

Duong's role, as the hard-working laborer who has to live on the hot streets and hustle to maintain any semblance of dignity, possesses a tender, romantic heart. You find yourself rooting for him when he starts falling in love with one of his customers, the beautiful prostitute Lan. Driving her home at night, he yearns to give her the love he believes she deserves. Lan is a walking example of Vietnamese grit and determination coupled with the American concepts of capitalism and aggressive sexuality. To the director's credit, she doesn't turn out to be your basic hooker with a heart of gold.

Lan is fascinated by the rich businessmen she charges $50 for sex, and vows, with a kind of wounded arrogance, that she will escape from her world into theirs: "They have a different talk, a different walk. The sun rises for them, not for us." Yet despite her fantasies about king-size beds and air conditioning, she won't spend the night in her clients' luxurious hotel rooms. Hai, along with the audience, sees right away that beneath Lan's hauteur is a wounded, hungry girl; if the fable of the good-hearted working man and the lonely hooker is a familiar one, it's told here with exquisite sweetness.

She realizes pretty quickly that the rickshaw driver who waits for hours outside the hotel in which she's visiting johns is infatuated with her. One day she says her dream is to spend the whole night in an air-conditioned room. He asks her price ($50), wins that much in a race for cyclo drivers and treats her to her dream. But she only opens the door to his affections after he pays her not for sex, but simply to watch her sleep. She is grateful, but resists his further advances: She somehow feels she is not entitled to ordinary human emotion. His tenderness unleashes the deep emotions hidden in her hardened heart.

The culmination of this fragile, awkward relationship is a sweet stroll down an avenue covered with red flowers, the kind of carefully considered visual you find throughout the film. But this one possesses true emotional resonance rather than simply looking gorgeous.

"Three Seasons" is extravagantly beautiful, so full of love, so rich with genuine artistic sympathy, a flight into fantasy of a land of memory and imagination, it has attained a kind of poetic immortality.

Midnight My Love

2006-11-27T04:12:00.000-08:00

Sombat (Petchtai Wongamiao) is a Bangkok cab driver, whose only two passions are the radio soap operas and Thai pop ballads that accompany him on his lonely night shifts. A loner, Bati has no cell phone, no TV, and no real friends. He does the late shift on the empty streets of Bangkok and prefers it that way – when he can drive and listen to a radio station that plays old fashioned ballads, radio soap operas and reads letters from the lovelorn and lost in the big city. His days pass one like every other one as he isolates himself from all.

One evening he sees a young woman being mistreated by a man, but minds his own business and drives away – but a few nights later he picks her up along with her co-workers in front of a large massage parlor. Three of them tease him for listening to the old radio station, but the fourth, Nual, sits quietly, which catches Sombat's attention. He begins to make a point of being there at the closing hour every night and soon Nual (played by the beautiful Woranut Wongsawan) begins to hire him to take her home every night and slowly tries to bring him out of his shell by treating him to McDonalds and shopping in the mall.

As lovely as she is, she is just as empty in her own way – losing a bit of her soul to every client that chooses her behind the glass fisgbowl. Sombat writes to the radio DJ “Our jobs are similar. Once I’ve delivered my passenger I don’t know where to go because the destination was not mine. It is the same with her.” Nual, in her job, takes men to their destinations, but never to where she needs to be. She's stuck there, working to send money home to her family in the rural province.

But just as you begin to lie back in comfort waiting for the inevitable romance to take place, the film suddenly takes a startling dark turn that throws many of these expectations into a drainage ditch.

Nual is being pushed by her pimp to become the mistress for a gangster, but Sombat remains a loyal friend and continues to ferry her home each night. The story starts to take a strange turn when Sombat is held by the police for questioning, and he misses his appointment pick-up time with Nual. Sombat has a dark past that he's never let on about, and he grows distant from Nual, which pushes her closer to the gangster...

Wedding Water-Torture

2006-11-27T04:04:00.000-08:00

Spare Me The Fake-Cake Wedding
by Tan Dawn Wei

Weddings used to be fun affairs. You get to dress up, gossip with the girls and check out the boys. And you also get to unleash elaborately conceived sabotage plans on the happy couple - hopefully without wrecking the hotel bridal suite and getting billed for the damage.

But after giving away more hongbao than I want to remember, weddings have become a bigger drag than any bride's trailing, carpet-dusting train. The problem isn't that I've been to too many weddings. I've just been going to too many of the same weddings.

Anyone who's been to at least five Chinese wedding dinners has earned herself enough stripes to be an authority on What Goes On At A Chinese Wedding Dinner. Hotel wedding coordinators have honed it into a science. Even friends who have helped execute many of these dos readily pass around their trusty notes with a blow-by-blow description of what to do when, where and how.

That's the problem: Weddings have become become nothing more than just a big, elaborate show that not many of us actually enjoy watching. Spare us the cheesy dry-ice effect, half-hearted yam sengs, styrofoam-cake 'cutting' (please, everyone knows it's just knife to the slit) and DIY slide shows done to pop ditties from boybands that no longer exist.

We don't need a picture of ourselves at our table with the toothy couple either. Save your stamps and don't send it over. And what's the point of popping a champagne bottle and making a big display out of pouring it down a glass pyramid when none of us will actually get to drink it? And where's the cake you just cut? How come we don't get to eat that too?
Another pointless exercise at Chinese wedding dinners: multiple gown changes. Hate to break this to you, oh beautiful brides. But honestly, no one's keeping score and no one cares. Besides, being absent from your own wedding for half the night to change into your assorted costumes - that's not the trait of a good host.

Couples should get it into their heads that a cookie-cutter wedding that proceeds like clockwork and follows the rule book down to the letter doesn't a memorable event make. Nobody remembers the run-of-the-mill hotel banquets and standard menus of cold dish/shark's fin soup/roast chicken/steamed fish/braised mushrooms/fried rice/red bean soup. But everybody remembers that one unusual wedding that dared to be different.

The wedding banquet conventions of today may have come from a long tradition that dates back 50 years or more, but that doesn't mean you can't throw tradition out the window. Customs like the tea ceremony have great significance and should be preserved and practised, but meaningless routines like fake-cake cutting and champagne-pouring do nothing to make a wedding momentous or heartfelt.

While we're being egged on by the people who govern this country to be more creative and entrepreneurial, we should apply a little imagination to our nuptial dinners.

I know I'll want mine to be festive, personal, surprising and, most importantly, fun. Oh, and champagne and real cake for everyone.

Worst Bear Markets

2006-11-14T04:02:00.000-08:00

Worst Stock Market Crash: 1930-1932
This is the grand daddy of them all. Investors lost 86% of their money over this 813 day beast. This market crash combined with the 1929 crash, makes up the Great Depression.

If you had $1000 on 9/3/1929 (beginning of the 4th worst crash, it would have gone down to a whopping $108.14 by July 8th, 1932 (end of the worst crash) or an 89.2% loss. To recover from a loss like that, you would have to watch your portfolio go up 825%! The full recovery didn't take place until 1954, 22 years later!

Date Started: 4/17/1930
Date Ended: 7/8/1932
Total Days: 813
Starting DJIA: 294.07
Ending DJIA: 41.22
Total Loss: -86.0%

7th Worst Stock Market Crash: 1973-1974
Key events: Vietnam war, Watergate scandal

Date Started: 1/11/1973
Date Ended: 12/06/1974
Total Days: 694
Starting DJIA: 1051.70
Ending DJIA: 577.60
Total Loss: -45.1%

10th Worst Stock Market Crash: 2000-2002
Key events: Tech bubble bursting, September 11th terrorist attack

Date Started: 1/15/2000
Date Ended: 10/9/2002
Total Days: 999
Starting DJIA: 11,792.98
Ending DJIA: 7,286.27
Total Loss: -37.8%

This chart shows the cycle of emotions people go through when investing in the markets. Investing can be a highly emotional experience. This outline of market emotions can help you take a rational approach to maximizing market fluctuations. In the end, by anticipating and understanding the series of emotions that you may experience, you’ll be better equipped to tolerate and benefit from market fluctuations.

Bao Cap (1975-1986)

2006-10-01T01:49:00.000-07:00

Once Upon A Time, Amazing Hanoi (Part 1)

"Bao Cap, a period that Hanoi experienced State subsidies between 1975 and 1986. At those days, everything, I mean EVERYTHING, was distributed to people based on their ranks in the society. Every family had a food registration book and coupons used to buy subsided goods.

My family of 6 members got enough coupons to buy 60kg of rice, 3kg of pork, 1kg of fish, liquefied fat (used as cooking oil,) fish sauce... a month. Other commodities such as toothpaste, soap, handkerchiefs, fabric, singlet, bicycle spare parts… were couponed annually. Food, always needed but it was not always we could have enough time and patience to queue for those. Everything was always in short."

Once Upon A Time, Amazing Hanoi (Part 2)

"During Bao Cap, having Tem Phieu (food coupon) means you have food to eat (don't say enough and full.) But loosing them means you starve.

We improved our protein nutrition with eggs from home raised chickens. A meal with a boiled egg was a real fancy one.

MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) was a precious and rare additive to dull tasted dish."