Last week I saw an old car as I crosssed the intersection. I looked to see what it was and it said Honda.

The licence plate said “STUKN85″ which, I guess is, “stuck in ‘85.”

I was searching around for stories about this car and I found this, which refers to a couple of recessions ago.

But a lingering recession and deep job cuts in the U.S. auto industry fueled a growing antagonism toward Japanese vehicles in some quarters.

Critics charged that Honda and other Japanese brands with “dumping” cars, thus stealing sales from American manufacturers and forcing them to layoff workers. It was in this heated political atmosphere that Honda became the first Japanese automaker to build cars in the U.S.
– How the Honda Accord Works

It is interesting now how the “domestic” car companies in the U.S. are the ones feeling the heat now, but also that protectionism is still rearing its ugly head. Just yesterday GM announced that it would build its new Spark subcompact car in the U.S. rather than China as a concession to the union.

I just read a tweet from a biz & trep student and friend, which referred to NFC payments. I didn’t know the term — near field communication payment — but I did know the concept.

Not least of all was it illustrated in an IBM ad years ago where a person was in Italy standing in front of a vending machine talking on his mobile phone. He hits a button on his phone and, without any physical interaction with the machine, a cool beverage pops out. Actually, maybe it was a Coca Cola commercial.

The mobile device has a link to an account and also it has a wireless connection with the vendor. The device is the middle man-object in the transaction.

It is interesting to me because it shows the growing ease of transactions and because mobile devices are quickly becoming a common means of digesting content, like news stories.

It may not take that form, but it is not hard to see how the smart-phone-handheld-computer could become the link between the account and the pay-per-view content and thence the link between the news publishers and much needed revenue.

One of the challenges to any micropayment for news scheme is getting a system that will be adopted. A generalized payment device for transactions of all kinds eliminates that barrier. Its development could also drive down transaction costs.

Once there is a way to pay for news you can bet that publishers will jump at the chance to charge for it. Right now we are the era of Napster for news and some day soon we will enter the era of iTunes for news.

• Isaacson advocates reader micropayments for news in Time Working Title project blog 18 Feb 2009

Since sophomoric is a word, I think freshmanic should be a word, but I need to develop a denotation.

Sophomoric means:

1. of or pertaining to a sophomore or sophomores.
2. suggestive of or resembling the traditional sophomore; intellectually pretentious, overconfident, conceited, etc., but immature: sophomoric questions.
– Sophomoric definition Dictionary.com

1. of, relating to, or characteristic of a sophomore
2. conceited and overconfident of knowledge but poorly informed and immature
– Sophomoric definition Wiktionary

Now these definitions may not have as much to do with the American practice or referring to years of high school or college as freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior. It may be more from the etymology of “likely influenced by ? (sophos) + ? (moros), “‘wise fool’”).” I don’t really know.

I think freshmanic is a great word because it seems to combine “freshman” and “manic.”

But what would it mean?

Ooms pointed out an article to me from her alumni magazine, Torch the University of Victoria Alumni Magazine. She pointed out an article about the CEO of VanCity Tamara Vrooman who is a Viking alumna.

Ooms thought it would appeal to me because of my latent and lately rekindled curiosity about credit unions. It also interested me because it recounted her time studying history, which is part of my current studies. Further it talked about the applicability of her major to her vocation, and I relish the thought of relating studies to application.
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My niece and his or her parents, sib ooms and fiancpouse macd, moved to town this month. Now that I have family in town, it is time to resume a tradition of family dinner. We started last week Thursday with a meal that consisted of one of my favourite ingredients. That is correct — sourdough.

We made whole wheat sourdough pasta with tomatoes, basil, chicken, aglio e olio, and ricotta cheese.
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We were coming off a win; they had two losses. We beat them in the bronze match last post-season; they lost to us in that game. This team was beatable, but they beat us.

We played Eden Homes in TMSL soccer action tonight. They had good speed, but lesser ball skills. We tried too many long balls and high balls in, which bounced off the hard, dry pitch and right to their feet.

They were good at snagging the ball and repelling our attacks.

The match was close, but it shouldn’t have been. We played poorly. It was scoreless at the half and all the goals were scored within a few minutes.

We opened the scoring in the second when Habs headed the ball in right by the far post. He could barely missed colliding with the post. Our lead lasted seconds. They scored almost right after the restart.

Chipping the ball over our defensive line, in what clearly looked like an offside play and then chipping it over our keeper, they used their speed and didn’t need much skill. We let them take it. They scored again soon after and that score would stand. We lost 2-1.

Next week we play last year’s league champ and cup winner. We are going in with two losses in three matches. We need to do better.

• Beat Raiders in second of the season 19 May 2009

When I was buying the course notes for the economics course I am taking this term, the cashier saw the professors name on the cover. “He’s my favourite prof,” she gushed. She had taken economic history from him.

He is a good teacher. He takes a relaxed and friendly attitude in the lecture hall as I saw again last Thursday on the topic of Giffen Goods.

I thought that a Giffen Good was when the price of something goes up and — contrary to the law of demand — people buy more of it. The prof defines it as the demand curve having a negative slope, which includes buying less when the price goes down.

Basically Giffen Goods are contrary to our simplistic models and occur when under certain conditions, such as the consumers have to have little income in relation to the cost of the good, there are no substitutions. The good also has to be an inferior good, which I didn’t remember.

A common example in textbooks is during the Irish potato famine. People ate potatoes and meat. Potatoes became scarce and cost more. In order to feed themselves enough people spent less on more the expensive meat and spent almost all their money on increased-price but still cheapest potatoes.

Anyway, last Thursday in class some guy suggested that they were common. He said imagine I need to consume ten units of ice cream and I can only afford the inferior ice cream, if the price of that inferior ice cream goes down I can afford to buy two units of Haagen Das and still have 10 units.

At first the prof didn’t understand. He said that the consumption of the inferior ice cream has to go down.

“He means x + y is still ten,” I chimed in using terms featured in the class.

Some other guy gave another example, “When I get my CS club membership I get pop for cheap, which means I can afford to get some drinks from Feds Xpress.”

I question whether these are real situations. Essentially they are creating artificial hypotheticals. There are plenty of substitutes for ice cream and pop and I doubt either of them are scrapign their pennies to get that beverage or dessert, come on.

The prof was more easy going about it. He said that he had never gotten a comment like that. He joked that it tells them that tuition fees have gone up too high.

It reminds me of the inane questions some people asked when the deputy governor of the bank of Canada came to talk at Hagey Hall.

Inflation targeting talk

I read a piece by John Chen of Sybase about how tight immigrations rules that send talented and U.S.-educated graduates back to where they came from only hurts the U.S.

As an aside, Sybase is connected to Waterloo, because it merged in 1995 with the 1994 merge PowerSoft-WatCom. Sybase also was the first tenant in the UW R+T park.

John Chen spoke at Waterloo in 2002. I have photos from back then. Including this one of David BlackBerrying while Al facilitate a Q&A with Chen.

Chen makes the point that restrictive immigration policy can actually hurt job creation.
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For the Victoria Day long weekend I went to Ottawa. Here is a record of the things I did there along with a few photos.

• On my way east, I stopped at the Big Apple in Colburne.
  

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Hiro and Mariano have developed a health and fitness system as a business: Team Jacked. They are recruiting for their summer program.

In March and April, I participated in their pilot program and I lost 15 pounds in six weeks.

The basic program is to combine a nutritious diet — at a specific kilocalorie level and macronutrient content based on your goals — a tailored exercise program, and support in a team context to help you meet your goals.

We are a growing health and fitness company whose mission is to get you jacked. Jacked is whatever jacked means to you. Whether your goal is to shed unwanted fat, to gain lean muscle, or to achieve greater overall health, we will help you get there.

Our approach is a gradual and reliable method that is both healthy and sustainable. We are here to teach you how to establish healthy new habits and continue to enjoy them long after your transformation is complete.
[...]
Over 12 weeks you and your teammates will build a foundation of healthy nutrition, hard training, and the desire to be better than ever before. You will be given complete nutrition and training programs and our unwavering support to keep you on the path to getting jacked.
— TeamJacked.com

I already lived an athletic lifestyle and ate a nutritious diet, but I did learn some good things from being in the TeamJacked program. I have already blogged about some parts of my program, but I still have more to write.

• Basal metabolic rate and my meal plan 25 Apr 2009
• My day in meals 14 Mar 2009
• Meal plan begins tomorrow 8 Mar 2009