Interesting weekend (part 2/2)

ok so you cut him some slack thinking he is a car enthusiast (I talk about Toyota prius a lot, but then I do that with a sense of civic duty) the only thing this guy was interested in was himself! and I thought teens ends at nineteen but 'Mr. Super 40s' was kicking and screaming '18 till I die'.

Now comes the next morning, all of us went to listen to Adil Najam speak on Sustainable development and climate change (which is a subject dear to me and I will blog in detail on this) this guy decides to skip this event (he is too busy sustaining himself) has no interest in it and decides to meet us for lunch after the event.

The rest of us decide to go for halwa puri at a Pakistani restaurant, now all of us are at this restaurant and 'Mr. Valley Girl' decides that he cannot eat halwa puri now if you don't like halwa puri thats fine I can respect your taste in food, but to make it sound as if its beneath you because 'ALL PAKISTANIS like it ' is frankly intolerable, he has a knack of saying all the wrong words at the right time, I bet he keeps his mouth shut during board meeting and does most communication in writing just to avoid having the taste of foot in his mouth too often.

Interesting weekend (part 1/2)

living in Washington DC is like having front seats to a live comedy show where you see all kinds of characters zipping in and out, trying to stand out in one way or the other, especially now that the overall US economy is taking a hit people from all over the country can be seen flaunting there credentials in the town that holds the keys to 20% of the US economy.

This week was interesting for many reasons, on Saturday we met a Pakistani technology executive now working in California, people who know CresSoft may know him too, CresSoft, in the good old days use to be one of the more prominent software development shops in Pakistan, but then due to there inability to pull through a few key projects and a string of some very bad management decisions lost its prominence.

Nevertheless, meeting this guy was quite the disappointment. One would expect to have an intellectual discussion about technology or hear anecdotes of a experienced past from someone like him. Yet, this guy made every attempt to sell himself through his posessions. I think conversation starters shouldn't include going down one's list of assets but instead a hearty discussion on world politics, civic issues, current events, etc. I think this type of an approach exhibits qualities of someone with an inflated ego coupled with a severe inferiority complex seemingly rooted in their ancestry. A decent chap would usually come and introduce himself by telling you a little about himself and then perhaps soliciting introductions from others, but 'Mr. Desi Inferiority Complex' had his own agenda, the conversation went from cars, to health care to taxes and the guy never disappointed once, he goes from establishing BMW ownership to how he is in a high income tax bracket to basically how he is so much better then everyone else.

Anyways, by the time the evening ended, even a dog in the room would have puked, for crying out loud he was in the city to see colleges with his teenage son (who sounded so even keeled), but 'Mr. Shallow' was so busy talking about himself we didn't hear much about anything else.

you would think the torture would end there but nope it gets even more interesting read on :) ...

Food and Energy Crisis

Recently had a few email exchanges with a couple of friends on food/energy crisis (and possible solutions) thought it might interest some of the blog community so here are the emails:

me:
food crisis is directly related to energy crisis:

1-In today's world farming is energy intensive, farmers use huge trackers/tillers to work the land, all of it requires lots of energy

2-since in a capitalist economy production is driven by demand therefore farmers are responding to the energy demand by moving from food crops to energy crops

3-even if that trend is reversed, farmers would not be able to work there fields as there would be no energy available to do so

One existing solution to both the problems is in Cuba's collective farming (small farms with in communities where every one pitches in) though most of us capitalist would denounce it vehemently as it would mean a fundamental shift in how we use growth as the main measure of corporate success, part of the shift would also require us reducing consumption by a great degree

Another solution (which I don't think is yet proven in the field on a large scale) would be micro power (wind mills, solar panels) as suggested by Amory Lovins, where the grid would serve to carry energy from houses to other houses and industrial complexes/agricultural farms (though given the astronomical power requirements of these complexes, I wonder if it will ever be feasible.

I think the only other option left is to use BTUs from human embryos (matrix :)), think about it, since the whole human life will be simulated in a capsule no need for energy hogging SUVs, or mass farming, heck you don't even need food diversity as all you would need is glucose to keep the brain alive ;)

John:
Ethanol is a scam! Unless it comes from fields that do not require tilling (CO2 emissions from farm equipment), enormous fertilizer inputs (mostly manufactured from natural gas Haber process) and water inputs etc...

It's CO2 neutral as long as the plants absorb the same amount of CO2 emitted by the manufacturing and final use of the ethanol. But it's a total scam if the entire process requires massive fossil fuel, water inputs and gov farmer subsidies (US style industrial agriculture). And don't even start me with top-soil erosion issues.

US: Let's use massive amounts of the cleanest burning fossil fuel (natural gas) to make fertilizer, subsidize farmers since they cannot break even because they have to buy expensive GMO seeds and accompanying expensive toxic pesticides from criminal companies like Monsanto, and destroy our fertile top-soil in the process. Now we can drive inefficient SUVs on ethanol that costs us more than just burning the natural gas we started with!

Brazil: Let's cultivate/harvest (no till, little inputs) endless seas of sugarcane which is much more efficient than maize/corn, and instead of burning the plants every year lets make ethanol to offset ~ 40% of our gasoline usage in our relatively few lightweight cars.

Still, after all that, Brazil has to import oil although it's a major oil producer!!!

Biofuels: Green energy or grim reaper?
Biofuels 'crime against humanity'
The Ethanol Scam: One of America's Biggest Political Boondoggles
Ethanol fuel in Brazil

Salman:
The Ethanol Scam: One of America's Biggest Political Boondoggles

Insightful to know who else is drinking the kool-aid:

As former CIA director James Woolsey, an outspoken ethanol evangelist, puts it, "American farmers, by making the commitment to grow more corn for ethanol, are at the top of the spear on the war against terrorism."
If you love America, how can you not love ethanol?

Anyway, today's WSJ reports Soybean is becoming a more lucrative crop so US farmers will plant more of that and 20% less corn. Also, prices of milk, eggs and other staples have jumped 20-30% over the past year.


me:
people like James Woolsey have genuine interest in making US energy independent (some of there drive may be based on patriotism rather then science but that's ok) a lot of the people when talking about ethanol think about ethanol production from algae or other future crops where the return might be 1:30 or something crazy like that, in any case if a real solution doesn't arrive soon, we may actually become the first generation shopping for matrix style pods, imagine being the bunny in the Energizer commercial :)

Opera meets Rock

What do you get when you mix classic Opera with rock music? This fusion is best described by the music of the East Village Opera Company. This group performed at the George Washington Lisner Auditorium this past Saturday, performing all time Opera hits with a touch of rock. Opera is normally an acquired taste which may be difficult for some to digest, but this five-piece band has taken some of the most complex works of Puccini and Mozart and given them an upbeat funk. This transformation of classical works to new age rock makes the music more approachable for the average listener. The East Village Opera Company has taken great musical hits like “La donna è mobile” from Rigoletto, “Habanera” from Carmen, and “Nessun dorma” from Turandot and given them a new color. Although the band tries to maintain the originality of these master pieces by performing in the native language, the meaning is literally lost for a greater part of their English-speaking audience. Including on-stage sub-titles or captions would perhaps help them in overcoming this language barrier. All in all, the East Village Opera Company is a good place to start for someone new to the world of Opera. Who knows, this group may turn one into a Mozart junkie.