Paul Kimbrel's Musing

Never have I been so nervous about posting something in my life. But given the lack of discussion around the water cooler about this, it needs to be known.

It’s amazing that something so significant can get so little press. And yet, it’s something that’s happening right under our nose. The “Amero”. What is the Amero? It’s a (as such) hypothetical currency that would be common between the United States, Canada, and Mexico. It’s similar to the “Euro” in Europe, with the Union to boot (the “North American Union,” that is).

Stomach turned yet?

When I first heard about this, I was skeptical. However, the more I research, the more I find. A simple Google search turns up a wealth of information. The more credible sources still herald the North American Union and the Amero as theoretical. The less-than-credible-but-no-reason-they-would-be-wrong sources are claiming that the currency is already being printed and stamped and the North American Union will be in place by 2010.

The main reason major news sources don’t give much credence to the Union coming to pass beyond the theoretical is the fact that the US Dollar is so much stronger than the other currencies in this new Union. The imbalance would be of little incentive to the non-US countries.

However, if one examines the value the US Dollar has in the global economy over the last 5-10 years, it’s very easy to see some alarming trends.

The US Dollar’s value has tumbled. Tremendously. It’s worth less than the Euro and the British Pound (GBP) by quite a bit. It used to be you needed two British pounds to get a US Dollar. The reverse is now true. The GBP is worth over twice as much as the US Dollar.

Who cares?

Well, let me put it this way. Imagine if you had a million dollars. You’d feel rich! Imagine, now, that you had a million pesos instead. Whoopee! That’s about 90,000 US Dollars. Not chump change, but you certainly couldn’t retire with that.

Bottom line, whatever value you place on the money in your savings account, your 401k, your IRA or any other retirement plan today will mean squat in 4-8 years if the US Dollar’s value drops off the face of the planet. The Amero would do just that.

So what can we do?

Unless Congress puts the brakes on the whole North American Union, I’d say the Amero’s pretty much going to happen. We can prepare ourselves, though. The purists will tell you to invest in silver or gold, or other non-currency based investments. That’s a bit much for Joe Shmoe to swallow, I imagine. However, there are far simpler things you can do.

If you have a substantial amount of debt… get rid of it. Do what it takes to pay off your car, your house, that home equity loan you got when rates were low. And please, please get those credit cards paid off. The less you owe when this all goes down, the less it will effect you. And if I’m wrong, and this whole NAU stuff turns out to just be rhetoric… well, hey, you’ll be debt free.

And don’t think you can’t do it. The only barrier between you and being debt free is your own willingness to cut back on the crap you don’t need. Living in servitude to the monthly payment is merely a mindset. Imagine what you could do if you didn’t owe money. The idea that we have to live in debt is the biggest lie in the “American Dream,” and almost all of us have fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.

Amero Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amero - Wiki Article
http://www.amerocurrency.com - Anti-Amero Website
http://www.spp.gov - The US office pushing the Union
http://www.nsi-ins.ca/english/news_views/oped19.asp - Op Ed on the Amero
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=14965 (Warning - Conservatives on steroids)

Video Links:
Not much, but this is as close as the mainstream media has come to mentioning the Amero: You Tube Video about Amero

It’s only taken about 6 years, but we’re finally whipping the place into shape! I finished painting the carport today! It actually looks half way decent (if you ignore the major dip in the roof). It only took a month or so to paint. It’s fun trying to get painting in between kids, work, and rain.

That’s a major item off the ‘ole to-do list. Now if I can just get the fence painted…

I’ve been searching high and low for a great way to sync my work, home, and Google calendars, using my Google calendar as the “central repository” of information. That way my wife can add events to my calendar without too much hassle - using my Google calendar. All the sync processes I’ve tried have failed for one reason or another. Here at work, we have a pretty hairy proxy/firewall and I got fed up with trying to work with it, so I pretty much gave up.

Well, I just noticed the Google allows you to import CSV (comma separated values) files from Outlook. I simply exported my Outlook calendar here at work and at home and imported them into Google. I could even color code things so I know the difference between work and home calendars. Just that easy…

Now if I can just find a way of automating this!

It was a good day today. I was a bit worried about how things would pan out, but the rain ended early in the morning and we had a good sunny day. A bit humid, but not too bad. We got a picnic table which I assembled this morning. We also got some really nice tiki torches and really spruced up the back yard for evening events.

I spent the entire evening last night getting the yard cleaned up, mowed, and trimmed for the 4th, I was scared the rain would hamper things, so I was glad when it didn’t rain any more.

We took the boys over to Towanda to see the parade over there. Quite an event for such a small town. Clayton freaks out over the firetruck horns. I’m not surprised. They’re pretty loud. I finally got him convinced that the trucks were past and that he could takes hands off his ears. No sooner did he do it, one of the Shriners honked is horn right in front of him. I guess my word is no longer gold (like it ever was).

Later in the day, Tonya’s cousin, Mathew, and his wife Kim stopped by from California. It was good to see them. Then our friends Korey and Dusty and their son Evan came over. We had a blast cooking out and playing with the boys.

Then Clayton and I went to the fireworks over at the ISU track. It was pretty cool. Not as varied as it has been in the past, but it sure beats the dinky fireworks we had in Havana. I glanced back and found that we were sitting in just the right place to see the fireworks reflect off the windows of Watterson Towers. It was spectacular. I’ll have to get some movie shots next year.

All in all… it was a very good day.

Okay, okay… I forgot to get a picture up here. Having three boys is tough business!

We’ve been busy beavers in our back yard. A few weeks ago, my mother-in-law brought over a few (actually, several) plants from her yard to put in ours. I hadn’t really planned on working on the yard to any major extent just yet, but with plants in need of some soil, my plans changed.

We got the plants (mostly hastas, some ferns, butter-and-eggs, etc.) in the ground and I decided it was time to do some mulching around the plants. I bought tons of mulch and started putting up some edging. My mother-in-law also started bring over geodes she had gotten from Indiana and we started using them as edging. I was a bit skeptical at first, but they actually look pretty good.

I also got some brick edging for the front and put together a small flower bed in the front of the porch and planted some impatiens up there to add some color to the front of the house. It turned out rather well.

Joe and I got the roof of the carport done today. That’s a huge item off the “to-do” list.

I’ve been up late the last several nights with Ben (and, yes, I’ll get some pictures up here soon), so I decided to break out the ‘ole Star Trek movie series my family got me a year or so back. There’s some seriously cool stuff in there, but I have to note…

Star Trek V is the worst movie I’ve ever seen.

Ugh. Cliches out the yin-yang. Almost makes Jar Jar tolerable. To its credit, though, it does have one fantastic line…

What does God need with a starship? - Captain Kirk

It’s been a crazy few days, but we final got home with our new little guy, Benjamin. Once I have a chance, I’ll get a picture up here…

I’ve been considering replacing our incandescent light bulbs with CFL’s (compact fluorescent light bulbs) for quite a while, now. After looking at the whole CFL vs. Incandescent light bulb debate on the internet, I’ve noticed there’s a lot of neigh-sayers against CFL’s.

Here’s the problems some people have noted about CFL’s:

1) CFL’s aren’t as bright.

Not true.

Yes, there are probably some brands that are not as bright, but in general, I’ve found CFL’s to be brighter. The manufacturers mark the CFL’s with their incandescent equivalent. In most cases, the CFL’s I’ve purchased have been much brighter than I expected (based on their incandescent rating). In fact, some have been too bright. One case, however, (the 20w equivalents) I noticed the bulbs were not as bright.

I’ve been using bulbs made by “Feit Electronics” (from Menard’s) and “n:Vision” (from Home Depot) mostly, as well as a few from “Sylvania” (also from Menard’s). They have all been much brighter than I expected (except for the candelabra bulbs).

Also, take note of what category of bulb you’re looking at.

- Soft White: This is the closest thing to a warm incandescent that I’ve found. I like these and they represent 95% of my bulbs.

- Bright White: The Sylvania bulbs are the only bright white bulbs I bought (since they were on sale). VERY bright. MUCH brighter than the incandescent equivalent. I actually don’t like these much. They remind me of traditional fluorescent bulbs.

- Daylight: These are supposed to mimic sunlight. They’re more expensive. I have one, and it’s nothing to write home about.

2) CFL’s can’t be dimmed.

Actually, there are some that can. However, they’re more expensive.

Look, if this is the only reason you don’t change to CFL’s, then you don’t get the point behind the switch. Really. Have a dimmer? Fine. Put CFL’s everywhere else if you can and keep the incandescent on the dimmer circuit. You can still save money.

3) CFL’s have mercury in them.

If you don’t have a recycling center that will take CFL’s in your town, don’t change. You do not want to throw these things away in the regular trash. I’m not a big environmentalist, but even I don’t want to put this kind of stuff in the landfills. But if you do, you can’t really use that as a reason not to switch. An extra trip to the recycling center is worth the savings on your electric bill.

4) CFL’s don’t come on right away and they take a while to warm up.

Yea, so? Again, it depends on the manufacturer. Mine come on in about 1/4 seconds. Whoopie. I can live with that. If that’s too long for you, you might need to lay off the caffeine.

These are not like those old circular fluorescent bulbs. Those things took, like, 3 seconds to come on. And they flickered something fierce. CFL’s do take a while to come to full brightness when they’ve been off for a while, but you can still see from the initial light.

And frankly, lights don’t get turned off nearly enough around my house to count warm-up time. That’s why I went with CFL’s in the first place. I figure if I can’t get people to turn the lights off, I can at least cut down on their power consumption.

And as an added bonus, the CFL’s in my bathroom don’t shock my system in the middle of the night. Consequently, the 60W equivalent CFL’s in my bathroom are waaaay brighter than the 60W incandescents I had in there.

5) CFL’s don’t last as long as advertised.

The jury’s out on that one for me. I just got started. If they only last a year, I won’t be happy (when they advertise a 5-7 year lifespan). But even if they last 2-3 years, I’m still ahead of the game - assuming that I pay less for power. Shoot, I was changing my incandescents (especially the candelabra bulbs) every month! Granted - not all at the same time, but bulbs were only lasting about 8 months.

6) CFL’s cause seizures.

If this is an issue for you… then don’t buy them. And avoid malls and business offices, too. I’m pretty sure they use fluorescent bulbs, too, and they’re flashing is much worse than any of the CFL’s I’ve seen.

7) CFL’s give me headaches.

When was the last time you used one? The CFL’s you can buy today are not like the ones coming out even a few years ago. And they are certainly not like the old standard fluorescent bulbs with standard light sockets from the last couple of decades. You know… those circular deals. Those even gave me headaches.

8) CFL’s don’t work well in cold weather.

Very true.

That’s why I don’t have any CFL’s outside. CFL’s are great, but not the perfect choice for every light socket. Outside - CFL’s just don’t cut the mustard (unless you live in the South).

9) CFL’s interfere with radio and hi-fi equipment.

If you listen to short wave radios, sure. But I’m guessing you listen to FM radio or watch TV. They don’t mess with signals that high in the spectrum. They might mess with AM radio, but Rush is on in the daytime, so I’m guessing it won’t matter much (no, I don’t listen to Rush).

As an amateur radio operator and a studio engineer, I can say that I’ve not experienced interference on my radio or studio equipment. But I’ve also left my radio station and my recording studio with incandescents.

Again… CFL’s are great, but not the perfect choice for every light socket.

Summary
CFL’s are not going to replace every incandescent light bulb. They’re not perfect. But with electric rates going sky-high, it’s making more financial sense to switch.

My electric bill runs about $200 a month on the budget plan (where they average out the last 12 months) and Illinois’ electric rates are practically doubling, so I had to do something. I just wish I didn’t have to wait another 12 months to see a difference, but I should get a pretty healthy credit balance on my bill if this pans out.

I’m also vehemently opposed to the government actually banning incandescents. I have enough places in my house where I don’t want any CFL’s (studio, radio shack, outdoors), that it doesn’t make practical sense to ban them out right.

But it also doesn’t make sense to write off CFL’s based on their short-comings. They certainly have their place in our homes. If we all changed the light bulbs in the fixtures we overuse, we could not only reduce our electric rates, but reduce the demand we’re placing the electric grid. I’m not exactly “Mr. Green,” but consuming less certainly won’t hurt anyone.