voiceofsandiego.org: Broke San Diego

This paragraph pretty much says it all, and how we're going to deal with a $43 million deficit.  And that our city is apparently set up to always have a budget deficit, where we're completely designed to always spend more than we take in (not just stupid, but actually set up wrong).  Works great in bull markets...

"Taxes. The city's two main sources of revenue are sales taxes and property taxes. The third is hotel-room taxes. Sales taxes hit the poorest residents hardest. And in order for increases in sales taxes to work, there have to be, you know, sales. With retail activity dropping precipitously, an increase in sales taxes might do little more than cushion the fall and it might even accelerate it. An increase in property taxes too might only provide a feather bed for our falling revenues as thousands of San Diegans scurry to have the tax assessors revalue their property downward."

http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2008/11/28/opinion/lewis112708.txt

voiceofsandiego.org: News... Go Walk, Young Man

WalkSanDiego interview, about walkable communities.

"San Diego has one of the country's highest rates of pedestrian-related car crashes"

I'm not surprised, I sometimes feel like it's dangerous to cross the street at an intersection, even with a crosswalk and walk signal. Especially at night when walking the dog.

http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2008/11/27/news/grimes112708.txt

A New Role for Community Foundation | Tactical Philanthropy

Community Foundations have to change.  They can't continue to be passive, they have to start getting active in their communities.  Which means they are going to have to stick their neck out and take positions, a terrifying prospect for them - but a great prospect for the rest of us in philanthropy!

http://tacticalphilanthropy.com/2008/11/a-new-role-for-community-foundation

Bark Beetles Kill Millions of Acres of Trees in West - NYTimes.com

We've seen tons of dying trees when out hiking.  The beetles attack pines, but around here we've seen mysterious killers of oaks and eucalyptus, too.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/18/science/18trees.html?_r=1

Teenagers’ Internet Socializing Not a Bad Thing - NYTimes.com

So spending time on the net is good for literacy and technical skills and even is considered healthy socially, so says the MacArthur Foundation.  Does that mean reading this blog is a good thing?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/20/us/20internet.html?_r=1&th&emc=th

Small Business CRM | BatchBook

Is this actually as small and easy and efficient as it sounds?  And cheap?  Hope so, going to try it with a local non-profit...

http://www.batchblue.com/index.html

Excel Sum with Errors

How to do a sum in Microsoft Excel when there is a #N/A field or other such error in the values to be totaled?  There seems to be a ton of posts on the net, but only a few had the simple solution:

SUMIF Function

For example: =SUMIF("A1:A20","<>#N/A")

You can get more complicated with your earlier formulas using ISERROR to avoid the error in the first place, but that's probably more trouble.  If you want to re-produce, you can generate the error value with =NA().

GM is Largest Buyer of Viagra

I'm not a fan of the bail-out, and here's one example... I knew they liked muscle cars, but still...

Ockham Research finds an amusing parallel: "You cannot help but laugh when you hear that GM is the world's leading purchaser of Viagra. The Detroit News reported in 2006 that GM spent $17 million dollars on the 'little blue pill'. Admittedly, this is a relatively small portion of the more than $5.6 billion per year that GM spends on health care for their employees... but the Viagra problem is a symptom of an overall cost management illness."

Raw Material Prices and Recycling

So it really just comes down to the money... recycling only works when stuff costs enough.  Does that mean inflation is good for the environment?

"Thousands of tons of recyclables in the United Kingdom -- including bottles, cans, and newspapers -- are sitting un-recycled following the sudden collapse of materials prices a few weeks ago. Recycling companies are asking the government to ease regulations temporarily to allow them to store the mountains of rubbish in secured warehouses and former military bases until prices rise again."

http://www.grist.org/news/2008/11/06/rcycl/?source=daily#comments

Marriage Makes you Fat

"Many of us gain 15 or more pounds in our early adult years, but people who live with a partner often gain more. Within five years, newly married women gain an average of 24 pounds, and men gain an average of 30 pounds, according to a study presented at the Obesity Society annual scientific meeting."

Are gays sure they want the right to marry?

-- UHC

Green PC Of The Future - LawnPC

The LawnPC will probably never make it to production, but interesting to think you might actually be able to power a computer with solar cells embedded in fake blades of grass.  And cool the cpu with a nice design aesthetic, as well.

http://devicedaily.com/desktops/green-pc-of-the-future-lawnpc.html