Life As I See It

I don't know when or if it will ever stop! General Motors has announced that it will invest one billion dollars in it's Brazil operations. How can they do this in their precarious financial situation? that's an easy one; they are going to use part of the bailout money they got from the American taxpayers. I'm still trying to figure out how this is going to help America's jobs situation.

http://www.laht.com/article.asp?CategoryId=12396&ArticleId=320909

Today there was a report that the US post Office is considering stopping Saturday deliveries because of billions in losses. Kudos to you Post Office! This is an effective way to reduce costs. I do not feel that our nation's economy will be adversely affected by this measure. I cannot think of any situation that would cause me irreparable harm because i didn't get my mail on Saturday. Should I absolutely require Saturday delivery I should have to pay extra for it.

There are other measures that I feel are necessary. Many of these would be at an additional cost to postal customers. It's time to realize that we should have to pay for benefits that we demand.

Today I received a solicitation from the Cancer Society with address labels. (I have so many address labels from organizations that I'd have to live to be 4000 years old to use them all and the glue on them makes them harder to recycle.) The postage on this solicitation is 6 cents as compared with the 42 cents required for first class postage. Bulk mailing from commercial enterprises get a similar break though the rate is higher. Post cards, although lighter in weight, require almost the same handling as a first class letter. The postage on a post card is 27 cents. More realistic postage rates should be applied to non-profit and commercial mailings. This would decrease the junk mail and help the environment.

Another way to save money for the Post Office should be to require magazines that have mail in cards and thick pages to pay additional postage. Few people use these and many people are turned off by these cards and thick pages that make the magazine harder to read. (The next magazine you receive, pull out all of the mail in cards and thick pages and see how much more enjoyable it is to read the magazine.) All of these mail in cards and thick pages add additional weight that the postal vehicle has to carry thereby costing additional fuel. Magazines should be required to keep the magazine sealed with a breakaway tab to keep the magazine closed during shipment. This would decrease the damage to the magazine and also make the handling of the magazines by the Post Office more effective. Many bulk mailings now use these breakaway tabs and they are applied by machine.

The blog, www.theconsumerist.com, often has instances that show a very small item shipped by a company in a large carton. The Post Office should have rigid, non-negotiable standards on shipping and should charge for unnecessary packing. If eggs can be shipped in a recycled paper packing and survive I feel that a book could benefit from the similar packing.

My next suggestion will be unacceptable to some. If you require home or office delivery there should be a nominal charge of say 5 dollars a year per site. This could be controlled by placing a holographic sticker on mail boxes or office doors. For business reasons, I receive my mail at a Post Office box and I have never experienced any inconvenience using a post office box. Having a Post Office box also insures that large packages are always delivered the day they arrive and the package is never left on my front porch nor do I receive a card telling me that the package was too large for home delivery and that I have to go to the Post Office to pick it up. Additional hours to allow citizens access to Post Office boxes will have to be made available but this would be at a minimal additional cost to the post office.

Think of the costs of delivering the mail to each home in the United States. By it's very nature home delivery of the mail is very ineffective. The area that one postal worker can cover is limited. For that limited area a postal worker and a delivery vehicle and the postal worker's support staff, with the cost of the vehicle and the fuel cost, are required.

Exercise, eat well, don't smoke, meditate daily, set realistic goals, assist others and reduce stress in your life. Live a healthy, well balanced life. Believe me; you cannot afford the medical bills that you will have later in life if you don't.

There is a new book out by Thomas L. Friedman, a Pulitzer Prize winning Foreign Affairs columnist with the New York Times, entitled "Hot, Flat and Crowded." The sub-title is "Why We Need A Green Revolution-And How It Can Renew America." The book is well-written and is packed with facts about our planet that are hard to argue with. Some of the chapters are downright scary.


Mr. Friedman characterizes America's blind approach to our energy crisis as "dumb as we want to be." We know that we have an energy crisis and that oil is becoming harder to find and much more costly but we keep waiting for someone to come up with something better. Until that something better comes along we just keep using our energy as if it will last forever. Mr. Friedman also reminds us that our children and grandchildren are going to have to pay for our insane energy usage.

In the first chapter Mr. Friedman sites the progress on energy that Denmark has made. In 1973 Denmark imported 99% of their oil from the Middle East. Today they import 0%. Premium gasoline is $9 a gallon and there is a CO2 tax. Because of this high (TRUE) cost of energy the country has made great strides in energy creation and energy efficiency. 16% of Denmark's energy comes from Solar and wind. Denmark has become a leader in the manufacture of wind turbines. 1/3 of all of the world's terrestrial wind turbines are manufactured in Denmark. Denmark is also one of the leaders in bio-mass innovation and production.

You might think that this high energy cost has hindered Denmark's growth but that is not the case. Since 1981 the economy of Denmark has grown by 70% and unemployment is about 2%.

Mr. Friedman's thoughts on the political and social costs of oil are insightful and are scary to say the least. Mr. Friedman is a world traveler and has seen what other countries are doing about the energy crisis and what they are not doing. He has witnessed the effects of the world' addiction to oil and the impact it has on the environment and the people of the world.

Hot, Flat and Crowded is well-written and should be required reading for all of the world's energy users. You cannot read this book without being affected by it.

I've been writing about how to save money on your food bills and how to stretch your dollars. There are a couple of things I will never try to save money on and I'm sure that most of us have items that we just wouldn't give up to save a few pennies.

I'm a bit of a coffee snob. For me, there is only one coffee; Peets. I'm addicted to Peets French Roast blend; whole bean naturally. I like to grind my own. The Peets French Roast is a bold blend of coffee and might be a bit too strong for the average coffee drinker. The beans are as black as coal and slightly oily. I'm lucky in that, in my area, Peets coffee is available at my local Giant Food Stores. Peets also has a complete line of teas that are super top quality. Go to the Peets website to order if it is not available in your local grocery store. The Peets website is a wealth of information about coffee and tea and well worth your time.

www.peets.com










Another item, actually a complete line of items, is the line of whole grain products from Bob's Red Mill. Bob's Red Mill makes over 400 different super top quality, mostly whole grain products. In my kitchen right now, I have the following Bob's Red Mill products; Wheat Bran, Oat Bran, Ginger Bread Mix, 10 Grain Pancake Mix, Flax Seed Meal, Irish Soda Bread Mix, Bulgar Wheat and Steel Cut Oats. The amazing thing about Bob's Red Mill products is that if you put a bit of any other national brand product in your hand and the Bob's Red Mill product in your other hand you can immediately see that Bob's has the better quality. If you are on a gluten free diet Bob's has a complete line of products for you. If you are into making your own bread, Bob's has many different types of flours so that your family will never get bored. They even have an excellent sour dough starter for those of you that like sour dough bread (I love a good sour dough bread.) Bob's Red Mill website is well worth your time; it even has a video of the processing of their products. The recipe section is first class and I doubt that you could go through all of the recipes in your lifetime. Naturally, the recipes favor healthy whole grain ingredients. I have a very good feeling about Bob's Red Mill products. I really believe that they would go out of business rather than make a second rate product.

The web site is www.bobsredmill.com