The Not-So Great American Chocolate Bar

The layoffs continue at American companies, and the workers pay the price. Yesterday, it was Daimler-Chrysler announcing 13,000 workers at the Chrysler division will lose their jobs. Today, a less than sweet announcement from Hershey, Pennsylvania.

Hershey Foods, maker of what they once called “The Great American Chocolate Bar”, as well as a number of other confectionary treats they have absorbed over the years, is cutting 1,500 jobs from the payroll. Their market share has dropped, while the fortunes of rival Mars, Inc., maker of M&Ms and Snickers, have risen. This amounts to approximately a 12% reduction in staff for the Pennsylvania-based chocolatier. Interesting that it is announced on the day after Valentine's Day, one of the biggest chocolate-giving days on the calendar.

Hershey says it will also open a new, “cost-efficient” production plant in Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico. By cost-efficient, they certainly mean “cheaper labor”, with which the American worker cannot compete and maintain a middle-class lifestyle. The plan is to move ten percent of their U.S. production to the new plant, but I would look for that number to increase over time, perhaps even by the time the facility comes on line.

I understand we live in a global economy, and labor is one of the factors of production that are important to international trade. I even favor doing things to pump up the Mexican economy by creating opportunities within our southern neighbor's borders. Only when there is not such a disparity between the two country's economies will the rate of people entering the country illegally slow down. Still, we need to keep some good jobs here, as I really don't want the only jobs left to be the executives making millions for sending our jobs away; leaving the rest of us limited to employment where the only requisite skill is the ability to say, "Welcome to Wal-Mart!".

I suspect part of Hershey’s problems have less to do with competition than with quality. My wife and I both have noticed the taste and consistency of Hershey’s chocolate has changed over the years, and not for the better. It has a more waxy consistency than what I remember in years past, and the flavor is just not the same. I don’t think it is just my taster either, as the products from M&M / Mars still taste the same as they always did, and today, outshine the Hershey product.

Perhaps that is fitting that Hershey will be making more of its product in Monterrey, as chocolate was originally created by the Mayans and Aztecs of pre-Columbian times in the area now known as Mexico.

Frosted Trees

Just as we finally get a few days of melting, along comes another snow. Still, as long as it is not a blizzard, snow creates scenes that are very pleasing to the eye. Not much to say in this post, mainly just showing a couple of photos from this morning. The light flakes clinging to the bare branches of trees, giving them the appearance of being painted white; as well as gracing the evergreens with a icy frosting as well. Even though I am eager for Spring to arrive, I try to enjoy the beauty of each day, regardless of what conditions it brings. So for these scenes, thank you Jack Frost!

NASCAR, Sports, and a Geek!

I have to start this entry by stating that I am not, nor have I ever been, a fan of NASCAR. The idea of cars going around and around a track just doesn’t get me excited. In fact, the only reason I might ever consider going to a NASCAR race would be for any photographic opportunities that may occur. I am sure there would be chances for some interesting pictures, but other than that, the thought frankly bores me.

All that said, today I got an up close look at an actual car that will be used in the NASCAR circuit this year. This is because my employer is sponsoring a racing team, and to build excitement, they brought one of the cars to our building during the lunch break so that employees could get a closer look.

One thing that I found out is that even though NASCAR is an acronym for National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, there seems to be little that is stock about these vehicles. They are basically built in a private shop by a racing team for competition on the circuit. In fact, if you look closely at the photo below, you will notice something fishy:



Did you catch it? The grille and lights are fake! They are all part of a full body wrap that is printed and placed on the car. There are not headlights on this car at all!

Also, being a bit picky here, but shouldn’t the organization be called either “National Association for Stock Car Racing” or “National Association for Stock Auto Racing”? Isn’t “Car Auto” a bit redundant?

So, I admit, I just don’t get it? I see pickups around town with Dale Earnhardt #3 decals placed there by fans. It seems that the late race car driver has been elevated to demigod status by his admirers. I still don’t get it. I mean, I am sorry that Mr. Earnhardt died in a horrible accident, but that is the risk of this “sport”. And I still don’t get it? What am I missing? I have nothing against NASCAR or its fans, but I gotta ask “WHY??”

Maybe I am just not the macho, into cars, Tim Allen tool man, OOOHHH OOOHHH, kind of guy who really gets a kick out of this. In fact, I know I am not. Tools? Not my thing. Machinery? I couldn’t care less. Memorizing the statistics of sports figures? Not unless I was in a fantasy league, and I have never done that. In fact, I have always loved reading the newspaper, but have always skipped the sports section. I never read it.

Around here, the Broncos are a religion. I am happy for them when they win, but it really doesn’t affect my life. Yet I know people who are in a deep, dark funk if they don’t win a game. I just don’t care that much. The players get paid megabucks to play a game, the owners get taxpayer funding to support their business, and yet normal people can’t afford to attend the games at the stadium they are paying for.

I’d rather pass the time looking at the world around me, taking photos, listening to music, playing my guitar, messing around on the computer, or even working crossword or sudoku puzzles.

Guess I am a geek. At least I know it!

A Notable Date in History

This date in 1809 saw the birth of two great men of history. In the still fledgling United States of America, Abraham Lincoln was born; while across the sea in England, Charles Darwin made his debut.

In a cabin near Hodgenville, Kentucky, the man who would lead the U.S. through its most divisive era, and ultimately pay with his life at the hands of an assassin, was born to Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks. A self-made man, Lincoln grew up in what was considered the frontier, along the Ohio River areas of Kentucky, Illinois and Indiana. Lincoln’s tenacity to see that this nation “of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth”, insured the reality of “united” states, setting the stage for the later ascension of the country to a position of world leadership. It is highly possible that America as a fractured group of smaller nations, could not have achieved the things that have occurred since.

The day that Nancy Hanks Lincoln was giving birth in Kentucky, Susanna Darwin was delivering the fifth of her six children in Shrewsbury, England. Unlike the humble parentage of Lincoln, young Charles was born into privilege, as his father Robert was a doctor and financier. Robert, although a freethinker, acquiesced to social custom, having Charles baptized into the Anglican faith.
As an adult, Charles would sail the world on the H.M.S. Beagle, and made copious notes and observations about fossils and life forms on various islands along the way. Ultimately, Charles Darwin would craft his theory of natural selection and the evolution of life on this planet, greatly increasing our understanding of biology in his book, The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. The religious found Darwin’s ideas to be an affront to God, and blasphemy. This struggle of scientific thought led to the famed Monkey Trial in Dayton, Tennessee; as well as the ongoing opposition by the fundamentalist Christians to the present. Old gods die hard, but just as the god of geocentrism was laid to rest by Copernicus, so Darwin has driven one of the first nails into the coffin of the concept of special creation.

Today we celebrate the lives and contributions of a great American statesman, and the Englishman who revolutionized how we understand the evolution of life on earth.

Happy 198th Birthday to President Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin!

A Sunday Stroll Around DU

This afternoon, my wife needed to visit the Sturm Law Library at the University of Denver. I took the opportunity to accompany her so that I could take a stroll around campus with my camera and take a few photos of the architecture there. The DU campus is home to a number of older buildings, but also has seen an explosion of new construction in recent years.

The photo to the left is the spire and tower at the Daniel L. Ritchie Center for Sports & Wellness. This tower is quite striking, with its gold roof that is visible for miles around. It is particularly noticeable at night, when floodlights illuminate it. Even though it is a couple of blocks off of Interstate Highway 25, it is quite visible from that thoroughfare.

The view of the sky behind the building portends the changing weather. Today's temperatures have reached into the 50s, giving much needed opportunity for snow to melt. But the clouds in the distance are the leading edge of a line of weather that has promised to bring more snow to the Denver metropolitan area for the next three days.

The next photo gives an altogether different view of the Ritchie Center. This is a window in a building on campus that lies across Evans Avenue to the south. Visible in the reflection in the window are the building for the Sturm School of Law which was built in 2003, along with the golden tower of the Ritchie Center. Just to the right of the gap between the panes of glass, you can see the right edge of the clock tower of the Sturm Law School.

The final picture I will show today was interesting, in that not only is it a beautifully designed building, but there is a jet flying above and behind the tower, leaving its contrail to mark its path through the azure Colorado sky. There is much more to see around DU, but this will at least give you an idea of the campus of this well-known and respected institution of higher learning.

Vermont, Pies, and Politics

Maybe it's the New England air, the green mountains, or just something in the water, but the state of Vermont seems to me like a progressive place. A state that elected people like Jim Jeffords and Howard Dean, and legalized same-sex civil unions back in 2000, is certainly not a red state.

The progressive attitude goes beyond pure politics, as it overlaps into the way Vermonters do business. Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben & Jerry's has started True Majority at www.truemajority.com, to promote progressive causes at a grassroots level. His animated short showing how to fund a better society is at http://www.truemajority.org/oreos/.

Another Vermont venture has a similar comparison on its website and on its product packaging. Vermont Mystic Pie Company (www.vermontmysticpie.com) not only makes a wonderful product, but has a pie chart on its boxes showing how the Pentagon takes about half of the budget of the United States. By reclaiming just 15% of the defense budget, we could do ALL of the following:

• Rebuild our public schools
• Retrain laid-off workers
• Begin to reduce the national debt
• Provide both health care and Head Start for every child in the U.S. that needs it
• Feed every starving child in the world's poorest nations
• Decrease our dependence on foreign oil

The company gives 10% of its profits to causes that support these goals. The Ben Cohen feature at the link higher up in this article, lays it out very clearly. I recommend you take a look.

All politics aside, the Vermont Mystic Pie Company makes a fantastic pie. Their products are Apple Pie, Blueberry with Apples Pie, and pie crusts. Their pies use wild Maine blueberries, apples from an ecologically-friendly orchard on Lake Champlain, and their wonderful flaky crust uses Grade AA butter from a farmer-owned cooperative. Best of all, not only are these the tastiest pre-made pies I have ever had, they are free of heart-clogging trans fats.

Let me add that I am in no way affiliated with Vermont Mystic Pie, but am pleased to recommend them, both for their pies and their activism. Check their website for a store that sells them near you. I got mine at Whole Foods.

Cool Slide Rules

When I took college physics back in 1971, we had to master the ways of the slipstick, the good old reliable slide rule. I grew up around these interesting devices, as my dad's profession was that of a mechanical engineer. These logarithmically-scaled tools of mathematicians, engineers and physicists are quite interesting once you understand what is going on, and how logarithms allow you to perform a variety of calculations.

No, the precision of a modern calculator isn't there; you had a limited number of decimal places for precision, and often had to derive numbers as scientific notation. You also had to keep up with where the decimal place was so as to get the correct mantissa. This resulted in two types of professors: those who gave partial credit for answers derived using the slide rule, but with the decimal misplaced; and those who counted the entire answer wrong, even if you had the right digits.

At first, many schools and testing centers were slow to embrace new technology, eschewing the use of electronic calculators, and requiring proficiency with the slide rule. Eventually, the precision and ease of calculators won out, and the slide rule quickly exited the scene, both in academia and in the business world.

Back in my college days, a simple four function calculator was still a novelty, and sold for around one hundred U.S. dollars. Today, you can get them for 99¢ at Wal-Mart, and they don't even need batteries, running instead on light.

If you want to try your hand as a slide rule and don't have one, don't worry. Just CLICK HERE to find links to seven different virtual slide rules, along with instructions and tricks you can do with these remarkable little marvels. Or just CLICK HERE to go directly to one of them. This is about the coolest web application I have seen! Just drag your mouse to move the sliding part or the glass cursor, and you are computing.

Happy Sliding!

Can the News Get Any Weirder?

You know, you really can't make up things any more weird than the stories in the news. We have a married female astronaut putting on a diaper, driving from Houston to Florida to allegedly kill a rival for the affections of another astronaut. I have heard of compulsive gamblers wearing diapers so they don't have to get up from their “lucky” slot machine, and as crazy as that sounds, this one is even more odd. Obviously, this is a person who has no business at the controls of a space shuttle. She must have been very good at giving all the right answers on her personality profiles at NASA, or she has just recently gone off the deep end.

Then we have the sad tale of Ted Haggard, the former president of the National Association of Evangelicals, the founding pastor of the huge New Life Church in Colorado Springs, and confidant of President Bush. Haggard, as has been widely reported, was exposed for carrying on a homosexual affair with a male prostitute, buying drugs from him, and in general, living a double life. I can only imagine the cognitive dissonance Haggard must have been living with, but what made it even more bizarre is that he was a vocal opponent of equal rights for gays.

Now, after three weeks of a restoration ministry, Haggard has declared the process has convinced him he is “completely heterosexual”. Somehow, if he were completely heterosexual, I doubt he would have carried on a gay affair for several years. While I don't believe being gay is something someone chooses, preaching one thing and doing another is absolutely wrong. I also find it incredible that someone would make a crusade of denying equal rights to homosexuals, all the while maintaining a gay relationship.

Obviously, the former pastor has been wrestling with his own set of issues, but I hope that his exposure as a hypocrite will serve to teach people that those to whom we look for guidance are often not at all qualified to give advice. Sometimes, such gurus are far less qualified counsel than if we just develop and use our own critical thinking skills.

Front Range Tornado

Tornadoes are powerful and fascinating storms. I have had several close encounters with them, and while I have a healthy respect for these phenomena, I also am drawn to them. When I was in high school, a waterspout (tornado over water) chased our deep-sea fishing trip further out into the Gulf of Mexico. That one was created by the approaching Hurricane Camille. When I lived in Houston, a tornado ripped the roofs off of houses across the street from mine, but left my side of the street intact. Then in Tulsa, I have had several close encounters, including a funnel cloud that passed over our house, sucking the air up the chimney and taking your breath away, and tearing down the fence in my backyard.

In the last decade, the Oklahoma City area has been hit by F-5 tornadoes that did tremendous damage, especially to the suburb of Moore. That outbreak on May 3, 1999, destroyed an outlet mall I used to shop at when I lived in Tulsa. Halfway between Oklahoma City and Tulsa is the town of Stroud, which was home to the Tanger Outlet Mall along I-44, the Turner Turnpike. It was taken down by a tornado on the same day as a wide area across Moore and Midwest City were swept away.

The eastern plains of Colorado get quite a few powerful tornadoes as you get closer to Kansas. One example was the 1990 tornado that destroyed much of the town of Limon. Closer to the Rocky Mountains, we tend to have less powerful tornadoes, but they are interesting nonetheless. This picture is one I took as a funnel cloud was forming between Parker and Franktown. This shot is looking toward the south from Stroh Road near its intersection with Parker Road (Colorado Highway 83). It was a stormy, late afternoon a couple of summers ago, and the clouds were moving very fast and displaying great amounts of turbulence. Several of these had formed, and a couple had touched down. This was just a case of being in the right place at the right time to capture the picture.

I have found out that there are storm chasing vacations you can take, going along on tornado chases and getting up close and personal with these monsters of nature. Sounds like more fun than a Caribbean Cruise, don't you think?

Pictures on a Foggy Day

Robert Frost said that "Good fences make good neighbors", and while he was undoubtedly right, fences can also make for interesting pictures. This is one from the end of last winter, taken a couple of days before the vernal equinox. It is not uncommon in Colorado to get snow in March & April, but the snowy days come between beautiful, springlike days.

This fence along a pasture just outside of Parker was interesting to me, because of the lines and angles created by the wood, along with the rails moving toward convergence as they get further away from the point of the viewer.

On the morning I took this picture, I went out fairly early and found quite a few good subjects. There was a dense fog in the air and a very light snow coming down. The fog made distant objects in some of the pictures take on a diffused look; a type of natural photo filter. This effect can be seen in the picture to the right of Douglas County Road 103. The posts on the other side of the road look very diffused by the fog, and the road quickly disappears into the fog as well.

Sometimes people think you can't take pictures because it isn't a pretty day with sunny skies and good conditions. Actually, some really interesting shots can be had on those days that you would never consider for a picnic. Keep your eyes and imagination active. You could find a picture whose mood and tone would be impossible to capture on a sunny day.

Clouds, Sunset, and a Great Little Camera

Digital SLR camera's are hard to beat, but they are not always the easiest thing to carry. That is why I am glad I have my little 5 megapixel point and shoot digital camera. It is small enough to always be at hand when a good photo opportunity presents itself.

This picture was taken with that camera, a 3-year-old Gateway DC-T50. It was one of those rare moments of serendipity where you see something and think, "That would make a good photo." If I hadn't had this little camera with me, the picture would have been missed.

I enjoy the sky and clouds, because there are so many different cloud types, and so many colors depending on time of day and weather conditions. This one was taken last March in Douglas County, Colorado.

Bitter Cold on Groundhog Day!

Well, this is what they mean by bitter cold. So far, we have had seven straight weeks with snowfall, two of them blizzards. We have had ups and downs in temperature. Yet last night set a new record. Denver officially recorded a new record low of 18 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, with a windchill factor of 30 below! Now the forecasters are claiming tonight could be colder and windier.

What do temperatures like this do? Well, for one thing, the power lines for Denver's light rail train snapped yesterday because of the cold, causing train passengers to be shuttled by bus to a different station. It is so cold that the dog doesn't want to go outside. You know, if I had to do my business outside in this, I think I'd rather hold it in also!

We are predicted to creep above the freezing point sometime next week. Till then, dress in layers and bundle up. Today is Groundhog Day, and Punxsutawney Phil has prognosticated an early arrival of spring. At least the groundhog is optimistic about it.