07:57 – My life is now all about building and shipping kits. We shipped eight kits yesterday and have three lined up to ship so far today. And that’s fine. I knew it’d be this way in August and September, and even into October. We’re still shipping kits immediately, the same day the order is received or the following day for orders received late in the day, At this point, we have about 120 total kits either in stock and ready to ship or a-building, but once that reserve runs dry it’ll take us longer to build more new kits from scratch. But all we can do is the best we can.
Tuesday, 14 August 2012
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We finally have some relief from the super-hot, record-breaking summer. Most of the last week I have had the central air off (and partially disassembled, trying to find the source of a moldy smell that I cannot locate), and even when temps crept into the 80’s F, the breeze was cool. This being the hottest summer in Indiana on record, I still managed to keep the central air electric bill within a few dollars of $100/mo, thanks to the programmable thermostat I installed a couple years ago. Before the central air, my parents had 3 window air-conditioners, and the house was never evenly cool, while the electric bill for that was regularly $350/mo. With a regular thermostat, bills were $150-200/mo. It really makes a difference to cut back at night and when no one is home.
After more than a month, the jetstream is finally coming down from the North Pole. No wonder ice is melting up there when Gulf air reaches all the way to it. We are -13 inches of rain off normal for the year, and the year is still not over. Which is why anything you buy in the next year that involves corn or soybeans is going to skyrocket in price. Much of the corn is a complete loss, same for beans. What corn survived is small-eared, and usually lacking kernels at one or the other end; some is rotten.
Meanwhile, the very popular local weather gal at the Indy TV station I used to work for, is moving over to one of the other major network stations to replace the chief weather guy, who is retiring. She has to sit out for a year, due to a non-compete clause, and speculation is that the retiring guy will hold off for another year, until his replacement is free to start.
I am dead-set against non-competes. The Chicago market found them unenforceable decades ago, and both DJ’s and TV anchors sign off one day on one station, and go on-air at a competitor’s the next. Just like copyrights and patents, non-competes are nothing more than a monopoly acting as a subsidy to the owner. Even in the situation of a business buyout, the new owner should not be protected from the seller entering the business again. If the buyer cannot compete if the seller starts a new business head-to-head with the old one, then the buyer should not make the purchase of the business.
I wish we could ship some of our rain and cool temps to the Midwest, as we have more than we can use. Two record floods in the past two years, as well. Corn is looking real good. And local farmers are trying rice now, having already been successful with wheat.
If we move, ironically, to the Banana Belt 65 miles to our northwest this next month or so, I will be able to grow tomatoes and peppers much more easily, along with eggplants. We will be about 100 feet from the sixth-largest lake in the U.S.
Well, it’s official. Australia has the most liveable city in the world, and three others in the top ten.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-08-14/melbourne-remains-worlds-most-liveable-city/4198294
Melbourne is first, quite a nice place really. My home town, Adelaide is =fifth, along with some city in the wilds of Cannukistan, Sydney is seventh and Perth, which is a long way from anywhere else, is ninth. A couple of other villages from Cannukistan made it into the top ten as well.
Well, what do you expect from an organization based in the UK? They still resent the fact that we revolted.
Too bloody hot, venomous sea snakes off the coast, a commie for head of what passes for the usual librul/commie gummint, lotsa sand, bloody crocs, and various mammals who were apparently deposited on Earth by alien spacecraft aeons ago. Crappy piss-wottuh lager in a giant can, and the whole bloody lot talk funny, some kinda 18th-C English variant, bloody incomprehensible.
But other than that, us Yanks have a soft spot for Aussies and Kiwis, who stood bravely with us in all our lousy modern wars. Never to be forgotten.
I view the downunderish poisonous critters (the fauna, that is, not the politicians) as a pro, not a con. I wish the whole world were covered with similar. The world has too many people. In particular, it has too many stupid people. If man-eating wombats and poisonous spiders the size of a grain of rice and fucking fire-breathing caterpillars were found everywhere, then the stupid humans would tend to die off.
The lovely Julia isn’t a commie, she’s just a lapsed Baptist, and she’s drifted a long way to the right since her student days.
Yeah, we have croccs. They sure taste good, really lean meat. Mucho better than the fatty beef served in US steakhouses.
We have very nice sand on our beaches, adorned with the most wonderful eye candy. Some f those girls are too poor to be able to afford bikini tops. Tsk Tsk. We’ll have to lift our GDP so that they can afford them. NOT.
Having cities in third, fourth and fifth isn’t too shabby. It’s a shame that Montréal didn’t make the list but the PartiQuébécois is too busy trying to turn Québec into a third world country.
My brother lived in Perth for a while. I think he found living in Australia like living in a small town, with the usual small town attitudes. Living in Perth, he said that the nearest cultural centre was Tokyo. He lives in Ottawa now,
He’s going in the wrong direction. Next stop will be Whitehorse.
Perth’s okay, but I wouldn’t like to live there. It’s too far from anywhere else and the mining boom makes housing expensive.
I just looked at Amazon’s list of the top 100 selling titles in Science Experiments and Projects and found that all three of Bob’s books are on the list. The Chemistry book is in 10th place, the Biology book is in 25th place and the Forensics book is in 77th place.
It will be interesting to see how much the sales of the Forensic book pick up after the release date. I have pre-ordered a copy of the Forensics book, but I probably won’t pick up a kit until such time as I’m ready to buy a microscope as well.
Good luck getting some forensic kits ready in the near future. Amazon says the release date for the book is only a week away.
Robert,
An idea sprung into my head just now, for when you have made your first M$10, to get past the prohibition of shipping hazardous chemical stuff internationally – get agents in the foreign countries to assemble kits there from local suppliers.
I know there is a ton of problems – quality control, keeping price down, getting the right people (i.e. with the right qualifications to assemble the kits), etc. – but with enough determination and work they could be overcome.
If you are worried about the US’s state of education, you should see that of 3rd world countries, of which I regard the RSA as a member now.
Just my 0.5c
Chris
All of our stuff is basically open-source, so there’s nothing to prevent someone in another country from just doing it. I really couldn’t contribute anything to the effort, because a lot of it is just getting the local knowledge needed–laws and regulations, business issues, suppliers, and so on. None of what I know really translates, other than the science-related stuff, and again that’s all freely available.
I’m really surprised that apparently no one is providing serious science kits in Canada or Australia. There’s a market for them in both countries. I decided to take on Canada because they’re such close cousins and shipping is doable, but anything beyond that is more than I could handle.
When I was around eight or 10 I got a chemistry kit for Christmas or birthday. My brother wasn’t interested in his so I got that too. I was interested but not *that* interested. My heart was in a Philips electronics kit I’d been given. Nowadays I’d be surprised if chemistry kits could be found anywhere – just from the liability point of view. If I was going to study chemistry I’d probably do it at a uni after I retire.