E-mails Exchanged Between Ron and Greenwood

2000

Greenwood's old friend, Ron living in Manhattan Beach and Greenwood living in Seven Mile Beach has been exchanging their views on various aspects of the world through email over more than 5 years. With the permission of Ron, a record of  mails exchanged in 2000 was compiled in chronological order. Some were lost.  The same records of 2001 and 2002 will follow when available.

E-Mails in 1999

2000/1/2

Y2K

Dear Ron,

Number has no meaning. But still the fact that we are going to enter a new Millennium put me to rethink the meaning. About 1,000 year ago Japan had just entered the feudal age. There have been a lot of changes since then. What will be the next 1,000 years?

There have been no serious consequences caused by Y2K. At the final moment, I purchased a dozen LPG bottles, many caned foods, filled up water containers and saved data of my PC. It seemed that I contributed Japanese economy.

Prof. Krugman finally showed up in Japanese TV. He pointed three main reasons of success of American economy. They are:

1) Early adoption of IT technology

2) Relatively young generation due to immigration and higher birth rate

3) Mr. Greenspan

He also added that US economy continue this status more 10 years.

We are taking long holiday from December 29 to January 3. During this holiday, I visited your "Strand Brewers Club" and read your technical report "Blind Beer Taste Recognition". It is understandable that only 4 out of 12 were correct answers.

My daughter and her friends who all have editorial expertise started up a venture which publish Internet magazine for women. Los Angeles venture capitalist supplied necessary fund. For the time being, targets are Japanese speaking women. The company is registered in US. Background story is reported in Newsweek's Japanese edition etc. Please read my article in Seven Mile Beach.

Regards,

Greenwood

00/01/06 11:46:49

Millennium

Dear Greenwood,

There have been so many commentaries about the millennium, that I have overloaded. Last year I received a book called "The Experts Speak - expanded and updated", 1998. I find it fascinating - mostly because the experts were so often wrong. Highly recommended as an antidote to predictions.

The US stock market "bubble" continues to wobble. Yesterday the NASDAQ index suffered its largest ever drop in points (but not %). It's down again today.

Naturally, the paper is now full of experts seeing doom and gloom, when last week all was optimistic! I notice that Prof, Krugman is increasingly reluctant to predict - very wise of him. I hope his visit to Japan was helpful, although the stock market seems to have decided the long stall is over (one Japanese-stock fund more than tripled here last year). He's certainly right about reasons for US success - note Pres. Clinton reappointed Alan Greenspan even though there was no need for another 6 months or so. (The market promptly crashed! - they felt he now has a mandate to raise interest rates).

I agree with his reasons, but would add the very strong corporate culture of "Shareholder Value", as I've commented before. That continues to thrive.

I hope you found our web site interesting. We now have a completely new set of club officers (except for me, who continues). No doubt the web site will get a comprehensive update soon.

The new entries to your home page continue to impress me - you add so many interesting items I am just astonished. I especially enjoyed the photos of shops in 7 mile beach. They would mostly fit right in here.

Wind powered generators are a very popular item here in CA. In mountain passes, where the ocean breezes are concentrated, you can see "farms" with hundreds of generators. It seems to be one of Green Technology's more competitive options.

Its also a high priority here to preserve the threatened remaining open space - as it is in Japan. Southern CA now has more than twice the population of Switzerland and we are expecting many millions of immigrants over the next decade or so. Therefore, the pressures will be extreme (the flip side of Krugman's population growth). We are currently way behind in building houses, highways and other infrastructure to handle this influx.

One of our most controversial items is expansion of airports. Most people are agreed that there has to be some expansion at LAX (We are very nervous about that - especially the extra traffic it'll generate). The arguments are over what other fields should be expanded or converted from other use. There is a huge ex-marine air base in Orange County (El Toro) that has just been closed. Most people who don't live nearby agree it should be converted to a new International Airport (much of the traffic at other airports originates in Orange County). The local residents are attempting to block this thought. I foresee many long battles over this.

Today's LATimes had an interesting article, throwing light on the ability of women to get venture capital here. Women Still Battle to Get Venture Funds By MYLENE MANGALINDAN, Bloomberg News It makes me realize that your daughter and her colleagues are even more remarkable than I felt before. I'll print it below.

With best regards for the new year,

Ron

2000/1/10

Turbulence in stock market

Dear Ron,

Turbulence in US stock market did affect Japanese and Asian market. But US market recorded historical highest after turbulence. It is reported here that   Market is unpredictable even for professional speculator like George Soros.

URS seems very busy in designing infrastructure such as airport, road, bridges, and railway. Because of this, they lost interest in foreign market including us. Increasing population in US may be one reason of high investment in infrastructure. They said that demolishing old bridges are another business area of high margin.

Responsibility of my daughter and colleagues is providing contents for narrow interest of intelligent women. Human network that established during editing magazine is the sources of power. US partner provides web technology. Venture capitalist may hesitate to provide fund for women engineers who claims that they have new technology.

Greenwood

00/01/24 7:58:47

Re: Turbulence in stock market

Dear Greenwood,

The world stock markets' increasing volatility is making more and more people here concerned about an impending "crash" or "correction", depending on philosophical position. Increasing parallels are being drawn to the 1920's. On Wednesday the Federal Reserve published a survey underlining the distortions which are threatening the US boom.

While previous studies have shown that all income groups in the United States are better off in real terms than in 1990, these have been looking at income. Conventional thinking is that during the last few years the income gap has become narrower. (However, while the top 20% of incomes have increased 15% after inflation, the bottom 20% have only gone up 1%). The latest survey from the Fed. shows that actual wealth, as measured by net worth or accumulated wealth, has changed differently. Americans without high school diplomas actually saw a decline in net worth of about 1/6 from 1995 to 1998. Those with high

school diplomas, but without college degrees also declined by a smaller amount. Families where the main breadwinner was less that 35 years old had a decline of almost 30%. On the other hand, the median family had an increase in net worth from $K61 to $K72, about plus 17%. Thus, while the income disparity MAY have been slightly less, the wealth disparity has increased very steeply in just 3 years while unemployment was dropping rapidly to record lows.

There could be many reasons for the change, but most seems to be due to increasing indebtedness. In just those three years median indebtedness grew from $K23 to &K33 - up 40%. The same family now spends 14.5% if its income on debt service. One family in 8 now spends more than 40% of income on debt payments. Obviously this means that any economic

downturn will bankrupt many people and correspondingly increase the severity of the downturn - instability indeed!

Then, on Friday, a study was published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland which looked at the real state of the US government budgets and future burdens, including Social Security and Medicare. The main conclusion is that, to keep SS solvent under realistic scenarios, taxes here would have to be raised as much as 20% RIGHT NOW! This is so startling that I'll print it below.

Our politicians and many economic commentators are studiously ignoring these growing threats to the economy, and the stock indices continue to set records. It seems that, while the sun is still shining on our economies, our governments are completely incapable of correcting underlying distortions. Finally, the G7 finance ministers issue bland generalizations about world economies so as to not risk world economic health by puncturing the US bubble which seems to depend on a few dot-com stocks! The assumption seems to be that the Europeans are still unable to replace the US market if it stumbles, while Japan is still struggling with an expensive Yen. I guess politics will guarantee we just keep on muddling through in the best English tradition.

Pretty gloomy, I'm afraid.

On a happier note, my brother and his youngest son have just been here for a week's visit on the way back from a New York visit to his daughter. I heard last night they arrived safely back in Melbourne.

I may get to do Route 66 first. A good friend in Chicago has always wanted a 1970 Porsche 911. He's found one on the Internet. Its here near LA. Yesterday I looked at it and told him it looks worth buying.

He's planning to come here by air and drive it back home. I'll probably go with him to share the driving chores and for the enjoyment of the trip. He'll probably go only as far as Kentucky, where his family lives, to keep the car out of the Chicago salt until spring. If it goes as planned I'll give you an up to date road report.

Perhaps 2000 is the year of route 66. All my best wishes,

Ron

Here's the SS commentary Living High at Our Children's Peril

2000/1/25

Bubble economy

Dear Ron,

No one knows when the bubble punctures. But when concerns in every man's mind accumulate and reach unknown saturation point, it will happen. Any thing may be a trigger.

Increased wealth disparity is a kind of driving force for higher productivity, and good US economy. Low unemployment is covering up wealth disparity. In this sense, US economy is running very well. But once it crashes, every thing may be reversed.

Here in Japan, it is reported that total amount of government bond exceeded that of US for saving Japan out of low spending.

Income of dot-com companies is relying on PR spending of traditional companies. Those PR spending is large but still limited. Due to twisted stock market, AOL could merge with Time-Warner. But actually Time-Warner is earning more money. Dot-com companies are selling just future dreams.

It may be nice reunion for you to meet your brother and his son. It seems that Australia is running very well. If they continue accepting immigrant from surrounding area, Australia may be next generation super power. English is a hegemonial language in global market. In this regard, Australia has a good starting point. Here in Japan, advisory committee for Prime Minister highlighted the importance of English education as a gate to international community. Asian student use English textbooks, but in Japan our student learn from Japanese textbook. All technical terms are in Japanese. When they are out of Japan, they soon face Language problem and could not take leader's position.

It is nice to hear that you are about set out to Route 66 in Porsche 911. A drive down to Kentucky in this season seems enjoyable. I never thought of salt in Chicago. In Japan, water spray facility is provided in snow area where average ambient temperature is above freezing point.

On our trip to Route66, we had several meetings. General opinions are that they could not take long vacation. All of them are owner and CEO of small business firms. In recent bad economical environment, they say that their company could not survive without key person in charge. We started thinking round trip in Oahu Island in Hawaii instead.

I have to rethink a separate trip to Route66 after my retirement sometime in next year.

I am looking forward your report on the trip.

Regards,

Greenwood

00/01/30 10:22:26

Route 66 trip

Dear Greenwood,

The Route 66 trip is off, but everything else worked well. I inspected the Porsche and found it worth my friend's inspection. He flew here on Wednesday and we drove to see the car that evening. (In Northridge by the way, scene of our last big earthquake and full of rebuilt structures). He was almost, but not quite, inclined to buy it. Finally, the fact that he'd not seen it in daylight and, because of the seller's work schedule, could not see it on Thursday before leaving led him to decide not to buy.

However, there was another, more expensive, car also available, about 90 miles south of here. He called them, found the car was still available and we drove down to Lake Elsinore early Thursday morning. This was the quality of car my friend was looking for. After driving and a thorough inspection, he bought it on the spot, arranged for the shippers to pick up the car at Lake Elsinore, and we drove back just in time to catch his plane for Chicago at 3:15 PM. So, he's got the car he wanted and didn't waste his trip here. (He also used frequent flier miles, so his cost was minimal).

The only thing left out was our trip on Route 66. The car shipping cost was reasonable, probably less than the trip cost when taking the days missing from work into account. Normally a trip from LA to Kentucky would be practical at this time of year, but there is always the chance of bad weather. Another factor was the risk to the car. This one is in really good condition and my friend intends to make it even better (another engineer perfectionist). So, sensible thought overcame the slightly romantic idea. It seems you may yet do the first trip.

The US climate, east of the Rocky mountains and everywhere outside the southern states is well below freezing from about December through March. (In the mountain states temperatures are too low for salt to be effective). The feeling is that, without using salt, very many severe accidents would occur and traffic would be very impeded. Thus, even though salt literally dissolves cars in a few years, costing billions of $, most people think the cost of not using it would be far higher and many deaths would result. (Modern cars are much better than those of a few decades ago, especially old, small volume sports cars where development was concentrated on performance). No economical but effective alternative compounds have been found either. Where are all those chemical engineers when they are really needed?

No doubt you saw the big US stock market decline on Friday. It came about when new government statistics indicated more inflation and a continuing boom in the economy. Now many expect at least 0.5% boost in interest rates from the Fed.

Perhaps Greenspan can pull off another soft landing. If he does, his genius will be permanently established in the Economics Hall of Fame! Another effect was the strengthening of the dollar, not only against the yen, but also vs. the Euro which is now well below $1.00. This is probably good news for the Japanese and other Asian economies. I wouldn't be surprised if the US market goes down another 10 or even 20%. That would bring more realistic stock values and, perhaps, avoid a real crash. I have my fingers crossed.

An interesting world where a big market drop is encouraging.

Best wishes,

Ron

Ron

(English Joke Serial No.50)

2000/4/4 3:35

PRIME MINISTER OBUCHI

Dear Greenwood,

People here are stunned at the news of Prime Minister Obuchi's stroke. Rumors are circulating that he is already dead - I trust that is not true and hope he recovers.

In any case, Americans are deeply concerned for your country's well being and wish to be of what help we can.

With great sympathy,

Ron

2000/4/7 11:03

SEDONA#1 - ROUTE 66

Greenwood-san,

My photos have finally arrived. There are far too many to send at one time, so I'm sending them in batches. Pardon my early stage skill in adjusting color balance, etc. These are my status to date. I'd appreciate how they come out on your equipment. I've adjusted them to about 50K.

Unfortunately most of our trip was in cloudy weather, so the scenes are not too bright. Some of the later ones are better. The first batch were from route 66 or motorcycle pictures. #1 and #3 are route 66 in Arizona, #2 is on the parallel interstate, approaching Flagstaff at sunset. #4 is of two riders who I thought were on Harleys. No so. Look closely and you may be able to make out that they are, in fact, "Vulcan"s. They told me that they were competitors of H-D, similar bikes with the significant difference that they cost "1/2 as much". For many years H-D's have fetched premium prices here and are back-ordered from the factory (used ones often fetch more than the new price). Finally, I caught up with a club who we saw on the highway. The photo is in the Sedona airport parking lot (#5).

In future installments I'll send "Sedona" and "Indian ruins".

A few other matters.

Most commentary here seems relieved by the appointment of Premier Mori, at least in the short term. They feel he will not greatly change what Premier Obuchi had started - as he has stated. In the longer term, many wonder whether he will press on with major restructuring of the economy. Of course, Mr. Obuchi was also greatly underestimated when he became Premier - most commentary on him has been very complimentary. I feel sure the high level of stress he was under contributed to his illness.

Many thanks for your kind offer to guide us through Japan. I certainly hope to be able to take you up, but don't know when. (The sweepstakes offer was in the fine print which I cut off the bottom of the picture).

I expressed myself poorly about AgBr. I meant to say that constructing a image sensitive plane with enough wired connections to intercept every 3 photons was hard to think of. However, with the incredible shrinking size of ever-bigger circuits, you cannot say what the technology could develop. Recently Epson has been advertising here their technology which includes a 1.2 MB picture, a 3:1 optical plus 2:1 electronic zoom on a $800 camera. (The record card only had 4 MB - I think that means only 3 pictures per "roll").

Like you I occasionally think of recapturing old photos, but the size of the effort defeats the idea. I have a big backlog of filing records on my current films! Taking pictures is much more fun than recording or retrieving them.

The biggest document transfer to CD I've seen was some of the RFQ of an oil company in Middle East. You may have seen them. They copied several shelves worth of files onto many CD's. We were absolutely blown away by the amount of detail they included and wanted us to respond to. Overkill!!! I think the actual quality of the bids was diminished by the detail they insisted on. Once you get beyond a certain level of detail all you get are increased chances to take legal advantage of bid-winning contractors later in the project.

I visited your home page again. The pictures of London and the Thames brought back many memories. I especially remembered places like Worthing and Arundel - we often spent summer holidays there. Most of you travels seem to be in the South of England, which is where we lived and spent most of our time too. The quality of the pictures was very good. I feel I'll not be able to come close with my present equipment.

Still, I hope they are of interest and will continue to experiment.

Best regards,

Ron

2000/4/10

Re: SEDONA#1 - ROUTE 66

Dear Ron,

Thank you for many photos and report about route66 and Arizona. It is useful for coming meeting among riders to determine where we should go this year.

After editing, I uploaded part of it to my home page. I will print it and distribute it in the meeting. Your additional photo of  "Sedona" and "Indian ruins" will upgrade my report.

I also uploaded many jokes, which you have mailed to me on April 1^st. I enjoyed them very much.  I don't know who is a producer of "Vulcan"?

At last, H-D has competitor. For a long time, I wondered why there is no competitor to H-D? I presumed that a bad memory of loosing against Japanese motorcycle during their invasion to US market in 1970s might be a reason for US producer side. Or Japanese manufactures tried to avoid direct collision with H-D. In any case, many Japanese love the distinct exhaust noise.

After another century, all those natural placed like Sodena may be lost. This is a consequence of human explosion on the earth.

I found a book, "At Home in the Universe: The Search for Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity" written by Stuart Kaufman. (Oxford University press. Inc. 1995) the book is about new hypothesis on the origin of life and it's evolution. I am reading it in Japanese translation.

Mr. Obuchi's illness is giving a good excuse among us of minimizing mental stress or refusing hard work.

Now people are discussing single electron device. As you mentioned, wired AgBr or photon sensitive device may be a possible target of research.

I remember of RFQ's from ADNOC. We couldn't start cost estimation work until we print all of the documents. Any way, we were looser of that project. I wonder who took advantage in later stage.

I enjoyed southern part of England very much. I didn't upload the picture of Arundel, because of fading image but challenged again. Northern England was beyond reach for weekend traveler.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/4/18 10:00

SEDONA PICTURES

Dear Greenwood,

Here are 6 pictures of the Sedona area. Most of them are regular size, a couple are bigger. One of those is 90KB - is that too much? Is the extra visibility worth the larger file size? Incidentally, most of these pictures were taken with a wide angle, 28mm lens on a 35mm camera. The mesas are so close to town that longer lenses could not accommodate the whole thing.

Sedona's airport is on a large mesa, south of town. It gives great views of the town and valley. The first two pictures are from there. The first is looking down the valley, across the western part of town. As you can see they can sprawl without restriction in that direction. The town is at about 1500m elevation, where the pine forest is just giving up to the desert. The airport is, perhaps at 1700m. There are quite a few pine trees there.

Some of the building is also spreading up the airport road. These are very high priced developments, and the second picture shows some large houses. Some of these go for more than $1M. Of course the views are astounding.

The third picture was taken from Doe mountain, outside town. There was a moderate difficulty hiking trail up the mountain to an elevation of almost 2000m. The view is of another valley, north of Sedona. As you can see, the desert soon takes over as the elevation declines.

One of the best views was from Rachel's Knoll, also north of Sedona. The fourth picture is from there and shows several fine mesas with shower clouds breaking up around them. I wish photographs could do justice to the actual sights. This is the sort of setting that Hollywood used for many of the old western movies.

You can get some idea of the way the mountains surround the town from picture five, taken in our motel, across the swimming pool. Just about every place in the town has this sort of view.

Finally the sixth picture shows Oak Creek Canyon. The site is about 30 km north of Sedona, which is beyond the end of the canyon, just over the horizon. The creek flowed down a crack in the edge of the plateau and gradually widened its valley into the mini-grand canyon you see in the picture. Sedona's site is where the river got down to the desert base elevation and started to widen out. Its beauty is a direct consequence of the Oak Creek erosion. Elevation here at the top of the canyon is about 2100m. Note, there are no leaves on the trees here as there were in Sedona 600m lower down. (Pictures from last week of March).

In my notes to the Harley pictures I forgot to comment on one Vulcan bike's license plate "COW". The rider told me he was tired ofexplaining that it wasn't a Hog!

I had dinner recently with a group of Fluor Process managers (my recent colleagues). They are basically looking forward to retirement in a few years time, and didn't seem to have any worries that they would be laid off, because they are still getting work, mostly in Latin America, Australia and even the Pacific Basin, such as Indonesia. They were very critical of Fluor management, feeling that they didn't know anything about the engineering business. (I was put into the weird position of having to defend Fluor's management! I explained that they shouldn't complain since the corporation was still profitable and in better shape than many similar companies inside and outside the US).

Their feeling is very widespread in this country. I keep seeing many reports of the same lack of faith in management from many sources. When a group of middle management personnel are so bitter, one can just imagine what lower level engineers feel. Fluor's office in Aliso Viejo is being turned into a Front End Engineering only office. Almost all the detail design people at all levels have been either laid off or persuaded to take early retirement.

Listening to them, I felt very contented with my choosing to retire when I did. I don't think I missed anything other that a lot of stress and worry. As the phrase goes "It just isn't any fun, anymore". I recently read that Japan, the US and Europe suffer from the same weariness in different degrees, with the Europeans being least affected and the US in between. I did find the sheer level of effort and the number of hours put into every working day to be very high when I was in Japan over several projects over several years. Each time, when we came back to the US it seemed we were gradually reaching the same levels, until I revisited Japan, only to find that you had again pushed on ahead of us. It seems, for all their troubles with unemployment, the Europeans have found some better solutions to the work stress problem. Perhaps its time for everybody to reconsider their work in a lifetime context.

The book you describe, At Home...., sounds very interesting. I'll certainly look for it. Did you ever finish Guns, Germs and Steel? There are one or two parts, dealing with Asia and Japan, I'd like to ask you about when you do. I think what Diamond says is plausible, but would like to get a more informed opinion.

Best regards,

Ron

2000/4/23 14:02

Re: SEDONA PICTURES

Dear Ron,

Thank you for beautiful pictures of Sodena. Now I can understand why you have visited the place.

I added your new pictures to my HP with your explanation. By preparing this page, I could grab the general idea of the place.

We had the meeting for the coming ride in USA. There are split of preferences between visiting Hawaii or West Coast of US main land. Final decision will be made early in May.

The idea of visiting West Coast of US main land is also limited because of the time and age of the eldest member of our group whose age is reaching 72. We may start from Las Vegas and head to Los Angeles. Final destination is San Francisco. I presented your photos and suggested visiting Sodena, but the old age prohibited the idea.

Complete coverage of Route 66 may be a separate issue.

The phrase "It just isn't any fun, anymore" fit me very much too. May be its time for me to retire. But I enjoyed last week very much. Chiyoda suddenly requested us to prepare 5 years plan within the week by preparing cash flow, profit loss statement and balance sheet over coming 5 years period. With out clear vision of how to manage the company you cannot prepare such tables. It was a good exercise for me to grab whole image of the company.

I know you are waiting me to finish reading “Guns, Germs and Steel” but new book are piling up faster than I could read them. Any way, I will report you when I finish reading it.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/4/23 13:59

INDIAN RUINS

Greenwood-san,

Finally , here are the last pictures from our Arizona trip.

Indian ruins

Thank you for the kind credit you give my pictures in your homepage. I'm slowly getting the hang of adjusting the color balance, etc. However, my simple scanner is not capable of the high quality becoming possible on the latest equipment. You may be interested in an article in the latest issue of Popular Photography. This surveys the current state of the art photo printing computer equipment. They scanned high quality photo negatives with 4 machines and printed them. They were compared with standard high quality photo processing. All were on 8" x 11" prints on photo quality paper.

Surprisingly, the standard photo came in third! Best of all was Epson's new Stylus Photo 1270, followed by Canon's BJC-8200. HP's PhotoSmart P1100 and Sony's UP-10 were 4th & 5th.

Even more surprising to me were the well documented claims of image permanence. Kodak claims 18 years of display life for its top of the line Royal 7 (AgBr) paper, Epson claims 25 years for its latest Heavyweight Matte paper. Of course, one can scan negatives and save the digital file on CD (600 MB for $2) with a claimed life of 100 years. It seems that with the new 3 MB cameras, the competition with AgBr is really heating up. My son Bill has just bought Epson's second level printer and has already produced some very good pictures from a scanned 35mm film negative. They don't look quite as good as AgBr prints, but are very close. As his skill improves, perhaps they will equal the conventional process. I'm watching carefully.

If you'd like a copy of the article I can scan it into a file and send it. Perhaps a Japanese version of the magazine is available in Japan.

I've managed to get a copy of "At Home in the Universe". It certainly looks interesting - I'll let you know how I get on with it. Thank you for suggesting it. I, too, have a great interest in such cosmological speculation.

Best Regards,

Ron

2000/4/24

Re: INDIAN RUINS

Dear Ron,

Thank you for many photos and story about the places. Quality of the image was enhanced and descriptions are more precise. I felt as if I was there. I would like to add a new page titled "Indian Ruins in Arizona".

Thank you for you offer of sending me scanned image of the "Popular Photography". I think I can find Japanese version of the magazine here.

CD-R claims 100 years life. But I am afraid new format or media may come out and expel it out quickly. Most dramatic effect is it's low cost. Most of the book may soon on CD. Magazine and newspaper are already distributed through Internet.

Last night, I found an Italian singer Andrea Bocelli is a marvelous singer. Today, I have acquired his CD "SOGNO" and ordered "ROMANZA" in nearest CD shop.

"At Home in the Universe" is not a cosmological speculation. It is biological speculation.

Regarding cosmological speculation, I have another book, “The Inflationary Universe” written by Alan H. Guth on my desk waiting for me to read.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/4/28

Route 66

Dear Ron,

Thank you for your post cards showing the Route 66 in California. I checked it with our plan presented in the previous meeting.

We will start from Las Vegas and stop at Kingston, Barstow (overnight), Los Angeles, Santa Monica (overnight), San Luis Obispo (Overnight). Final destination is San Francisco.

We miss most of Route 66 in Majave Desert such as Needles, Amboy and Ludlow shown in your post card. I would ask our planner whether we could go south from Las Vegas to Needles. Only hurdle may be 72 years old gentleman's physical condition. Finalization of our plan will be made in May 6 meeting.

By the way, I was very impressed by the strength of US economy in contrast with Japanese one. In those days, I am carefully reading articles presented by many Japanese economists and found that Most of economists graduated Tokyo University are supporting the policy of Bank of Japan, but economists educated in MIT and Harvard support Krugman's strategy. It seems that Japanese old system including Academia needs restructuring.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/5/5 4:08

Fwd: Route 66 in CA

Dear Greenwood,

Although I have many things to talk to you about, I'll concentrate on your trip - hopefully to reach you before your final planning meeting on the sixth.

I checked out some mileages for you. Las Vegas is about 240 km from Barstow, Interstate #15 is really the only road. (Interstates these days have most drivers going above 80 mph (130 km/hr), even though the speed limits are 65 or 70 mph. Las Vegas to Barstow via Needles is about 420 km. From Las Vegas to Needles most of the route is on US #95, a secondary highway. From Needles most of the route is Interstate #40, although

one could detour south on two-lane old Route #66 through Amboy to Ludlow. That would add another 15 km and average speed would be lower (perhaps more comfortable for motor cycling). In a car the trip from LV to Barstow via #15 would be only about 2 hours; I'm not sure what speed you'd go on your bikes, but the cars will be moving fast! Scenery is pretty limited - desert or semi-desert with occasional mountain ranges like the dry ones you can see from LV.

Another factor is heat and sun. Expect no clouds at all, with very strong sunlight through the middle part of the day up to about 6 PM. Current temperatures between LV and Barstow have been about 35 - 40 C, with Needles a few degrees hotter. Early mornings are much colder, running currently about 20 C lows. Early morning will also put the sun behind you. Later in the year these temperatures will rise by about 5 C.

Once on the coast, temperatures are very different. Current lows in S. Calif. (Santa Monica) are running about 15 C, highs are about 20 - 25 C. San Francisco is running about 10 C lows, highs about 15 - 20 C. All these may rise a few degrees (< 5 C) after June. Most mornings are cloudy until about 10 - 11 AM. After June such cloudy days will be less frequent, but still to be expected, especially north of Point Conception / Santa Barbara.

I hope these notes are helpful and look forward to seeing you on your way through LA.

I'm most honored by the prominent display of my photos and notes on you web site, thank you. I also enjoyed your report on Odaiba. It looks like a very well planned and executed development.

I'll follow this with comments on many other matters.

Best regards to you and your riders.

Ron

2000/5/5 6:03

OTHER MATTERS

Dear Greenwood,

I hope you received my email about your trip.

Here are some other comments.

The apparent strength of the US economy is becoming a bit feverish. Many statistics are warning that inflation is reappearing. Volatility in Wall Street is reaching levels far above anything seen in the past - so much so that many learned observers feel the bubble is ready to burst (including Krugman and the famous investors George Soros and Warren Buffet, who are retrenching). The big debate seems to be just how far the Tech. stocks will fall (many are already down 30 - 50%).

I believe that world events have allowed to US to have a unique and non sustainable boom. The various economic crises and weaknesses in many other pats of the world, especially Asia and Europe, prevented price rises here and actually reduced the price of imports in dollar terms. Even the price of energy reached record lows thanks to weakness in OPEC and weak demand outside the US.

Its true that adoption of computer technology has allowed for large increases in output per man-hour, although I also credit a cost cutting philosophy in corporate management (which has increased the level of personal distress at the working level, especially in the US and Japan). Part of this philosophy was that prices could not rise or profits would fall due to lost sales. That iron discipline is rusting away. Many anecdotal stories report companies making price increases "stick" and actually increase profits.

On another front, the poorly paid janitors union in Los Angeles managed to get a very well deserved raise recently (they were paid little above the minimum wage). However, others will see their 10% PER YEAR increase as a new target. All-in-all I can feel a resurgence of inflationary thinking here that has been absent for 15 years or so.

Its broadly expected that Greenspan will bump interest rates 1/2% later this month. Most debate is whether that will be enough! In the mean time the US economy continues to actually accelerate. Consumers here seem completely oblivious to these gathering storm clouds.

On the other hand, Japanese news seems much more positive. I'm especially glad to hear about Chiyoda's long term planning. I get the impression that the commercial sector in Japan is beginning to regain confidence, which should result in a reinvigorated economy. As in the discussion Krugman reported, it seems very possible the crisis may fade away without the radical restructuring feared by the BOJ, government and, perhaps Academia.

Perhaps the US and Japan are once again going to reverse roles? A big question in my mind is about Europe. There are many stories from official sources claiming all is well, but judging by the price of the Euro, the markets are not buying it. As I recall, Krugman was skeptical of the whole united currency concept. Perhaps he'll follow up now the Euro is 25% below its high against the US$.

I take your point about the irrelevancy of 100 year CD life if the medium becomes obsolete. However, one of the great advantages of the digital medium is that of translation. There is so much commercial video material being stored digitally that I cannot believe the software systems would not be translatable to the new medium. And, while its practically impossible to "re-record" old negatives that is not the case with CD's, since they can be copied easily now and probably even faster in the future. Editing/selecting is also much easier. The cost/quality equation still favors the AgBr medium at the moment, but I feel it'll be different not too many years from now.

Andrea Bocelli has a truly beautiful voice. In some ways even better than Pavarotti in his best, earlier days. He is very popular here, too and has given many concerts, some shown on TV. No doubt you will see them there. I'd be surprised if he doesn't tour Japan.

In the CA brewing circle we are approaching our big annual event - the Home brewing festival at Temecula on 6 May. Our club has brewed over 250 liters of beer and our members are expected to be bringing another 200 plus from their own efforts. Many other clubs will participate, although, historically, none have had as much available as we have. If its as well attended as last year there will be almost 1500 home brewers and guests. My sons are bringing 9 guests alone. Many of our members get there on Friday for a big "potluck" party the night before the festival on Saturday. That'd be just too much boozing for me, in spite of my English heritage, so I'll just go on Saturday, camp out that night and return on Sunday.

Our club has just established a new web site. The old one will be dropped. The URL is:

http://www.strandbrewers.org

I've not checked it completely, but there are many photos, especially a good series of one of our club brewing events held earlier this year. After the festival there will be many pictures. We'd be very happy to have you link it to your site. If you'd like me to ask the club to set up a link to your site I'd be very glad to do so. With all this activity, I've also been slow getting to the books stacked up for my reading, but have managed to start At Home in the Universe.

Kauffman is a fascinating person; in many ways he illustrates the sort of thinking that Santa Fe is famous for - the ability to "Think out of the Box" in which so many of us imprison ourselves. The book is not always easy going and many of his illustrations do not match the text in my edition. Nevertheless, it is really giving new insights into the origin of life, chemistry and even mathematics. Thank you very much for the mention of it. It certainly balances the more mundane interests like brewing.

With best regards,

Ron

2000/5/9

Re: OTHER MATTERS

Dear Ron,

Thank you for your information on Route 66. Your resent mail has just arrived before my departure to the meeting held in 6^th May, 450 km from my home by bike. Your first one has arrived to my vacant office. We had a very long vacation from April 29^th to 7^th of May.

Conclusion of the meeting was to make a ride from October 28^th to November 5^th, 2000.

Overnight stay will be:

October 28^th, Las Vegas

October 29^th, Needles

October 30^th, Barstow

October 31^st, Santa Monica

November 1^st, San Luis Obispo

November 2^nd, San Francisco

As you can see, your mail and post cards were very effective to persuade our members to go through old Route 66 from Needles to Barstow.

We can meet in Santa Monica. I will inform you the name of the Hotel when it become available.

It seems that George Soros was a looser and Warren Buffet was not in recent turbulent stock market. The difference comes from whether they have invested in High-tech stock or not.

I suspect the true reason of Chiyoda's long term planning is to evaluate the value of Chiyoda and to decide whether to continue financial support or not by Mitsubishi Bank.

I agree your point that digital data do not degrade by copying or conversion of format.

Andrea Bocelli is now in Japan. I have just seen him in TV receiving interview. To my surprise, it is a second visit to Japan. But first time to sing here. In commuter train, I am enjoying his voice by Sony’s CD Walkman.

I have visited your new web site. It is a professional editing work and the speed was improved. I have updated my link. I hesitate to ask you to proved link to my page, because my page does not have any content relating to home brewing. In a future, when I add some page on home brewing, I would like to ask you to make a link to my page. A month ago when I invited my high school mates to my home, I asked nearest beer dealer to deliver 7-liter draft beer container, carbon dioxide pressuriser and cooler. We enjoyed same quality draft beer at home after 6 hours hiking. The trick of the good taste is attributable to carbon dioxide pressuriser. I presumed that fine bubbles enhanced the taste of the draft beer.

My best regards,

Greenwood

2000/5/15 3:46

PREMIER OBUCHI

Dear Greenwood,

I just heard the sad, but expected news that Premier Obuchi died today.

There was one beautiful quotation in a story here.

He once reportedly compared himself to a noodle shop between two skyscrapers, referring to two of his  former prime ministers Yasuhiro Nakasone and the late Takeo Fukuda.

I think, on the contrary, that he was one of the most able Prime Ministers in the world, and we will all miss his low-key but effective way of governing.

My heartfelt condolences to you and all Japanese.

Ron

2002/5/18 9:03

ROUTE 66

Dear Greenwood,

I'm very glad my info. was in time to be helpful. The news is great that your club will be coming here in the Fall; both Connie & I are really looking forward to seeing (& photographing) all of you . You have some spectacular things too see as well as three of the US's most contrasting cities.

In October the temperatures will be much more comfortable, although there could be rain, especially as you go north. Most likely it will not be serious. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

As expected the Fed raised interest 0.5%. Debate now is about how much further he'll have to go (US economic growth has actually been accelerating during his 0.25% raises) and how high the Fed rate could go before producing a stock market or an economic crash, or both.

If we were looking at a process control system, I'd say Greenspan still needs more throttling. The problem is that there is a very significant lag in the system which could very easily lead to over correction. In process terms we'd need to eliminate the lag, perhaps by some sort of cascade control. Unfortunately, here the analogy breaks down. I'm afraid we are in for a rough ride and am considering cashing in some funds.

An article recently suggested a variation on your ominous comment about Mitsubishi Bank. I read that the overhaul of the Japanese accounting system is causing companies to reveal more information about bad debts, etc. (Mitsui Real Estate Co. is expected to write down almost $900 million). This could be another reason to estimate the true value of Chiyoda.

I happened to see an article in a computer magazine about the new 3-megapixel cameras. While they raved about the picture quality, the example they presented showed the AgBr picture to be FAR superior. It seems the computer mags have very different standards from the photo mags. Another problem was memory. One camera had only 8-MB - not enough to store even ONE high resolution picture. Another camera had a more promising approach - a 100 MB hard disk (Maybe 10 pictures?).

There could be no better preparation for beer than a 6 hour hike! Almost everybody agrees with the superior taste of Draft Beer. Much of the good quality comes from not having the very rigorous Pasteurization/Micro Filtration needed to make bottled beer last indefinitely "on the shelf". Of course, this is one of the great advantages of homebrew - its never Pasteurized.

Carbonization of beer is hard to grapple with. Many schools of thought contend. The big recent debate is whether to use nitrogen along with CO2. Guinness and many British brewers now package beers with N2 pressurizing capsules. This produces a very dense head of microscopic bubbles and certainly gives a very different and nice taste. At the other extreme are the (mostly British) "Real Ale" advocates who believe beer should be "Cask Conditioned" with almost no pressurization - The famous British "flat" beer - served with a hand pump or "Beer Engine".

These can also be delicious. Both types were present at the recent Southern CA homebrew festival - I enjoyed good examples of all schools of thought.

Thank you for your kind comments on our web site and for updating your link. It makes sense to delay a reverse link.

Looking forward to October.

Ron

2000/5/27

Re: ROUTE 66

Dear Ron,

Visiting Los Angeles by bike and meeting you again are delightful for me.

As you are expecting general erection, Mr. Greenspan may be in dilemma. But he should not stand on politician’s viewpoint. As you have said, mass is so enormous, what we need is feed-forward control to overcome lag caused mass effect. Your cashing in some funds seems right decision.

After Obuch, Mr. Mori succeeded Prime Minister’s position. His success in political arena depends on flattering around every body. He made a big mistake of saying that Japan is devine nation in the meeting of supporting group of traditional Shinto religion. His true intention was just flattering to such parties, but his speech reminded all of us of bad memory of past war. Japanese military power lead Japan into such war. They used Emperor and concept of devine nation as a tool for accomplishing their ambition.

One of the reasons of the rise of military power is attributable to the world recession started in 1929. All of us still respect finance minister, Mr. Korekiyo Takahasi of overcoming difficult time by increasing government spending. He did it in 1932, 4 year before John Maynard Keynes publish famous “Employment, Interest and General Theory of Money” in 1936.

Unfortunately, Mr. Korekiyo Takahasi was assassinated by a group of young army officers in February 26, 1936, because he was against increasing budget for military spending. After this incident, no one could stop Japanese military forces to do what they want. After Takahasi’s death, high inflation occurred due to unlimited military spending and unlimited national bond issue. This is one of the reasons our Bank of Japan does not like the idea of Prof. Krugman. But what Obuch did was what Korekiyo Takahasi did in 1932.

Probably most embarrassed person may be Emperor Akihito himself who is now visiting Europe.

Considering all of those historical events, I hope Mr. Greenspan do the right decision.

By the way, Korekiyo Takahasi had a dramatic carrier. When he went to US in 1867 for learning, a bad man sold him as a slave. But kind person freed him and given him proper education. After coming back to Japan, he worked as government officer in various offices and finally settled in Bank of Japan.

His most brilliant success was raising necessary fund for the war against Russia. Most of the funds were prepared in England. Due to his success, he was given the name of Baron.

Yes, overhaul of the Japanese accounting system is now going on. Already Chiyoda group companies are following world standard. We are very transparent now. It became apparent that Chiyoda couldn’t survive until next year without assistance from outside. Fortunately, Mitsubishi group has extra capacity and committed to support us.

I think digital camera manufactures ultimately find economical mega storage device.

N2 pressurizing seems interesting. I speculate that good taste comes from physical characteristic of micro bubbles because nitrogen has no taste.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/6/4 4:30

LAKERS

Now we know why all the Lakers live in Manhattan Beach.

Ron

The Los Angeles Lakers sign a six-foot-eleven basketball player from war-torn Sierra Leone to a $60 million contract, and he telephones his mother to tell her the good news.

"Never mind!" she says angrily, "Don't you know your father's been stabbed and wounded, your sister has been assaulted, and our house has been razed by machine gun fire!"

"That's terrible, Mom," he answers, "but we're rich now! We can survive anything! Why blame me?"

She replies, "This wouldn't have happened if you hadn't brought us to

L.A.!"

2000/6/4

Re : Lakers

Dear Ron,

I understand US cities are safer and cleaner in the last few years.

In the last week end, I have enjoyed a film titled “Julia Roberts is Erin Bronckovich” The film is based on true story. It is about well water contamination by Chromium 6, (Hexa-Valence) which was used by Pacific Gas and Electric as cooling water additive. The factory is located in small town called Hinkley in Mojave Desert. Former Miss Wichita, Erin Bronckovich and Lawyer Ed Masry had won 333million$ in arbitration with the company. I was exited because about 30 years ago, I have visited pipeline peak shaving facilities of Pacific Gas and Electric in south LA. I checked the map and found out that Hinkley is close to Barstow. Now I can imagine what Barstow look like.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/6/9 9:49

HOME IN THE UNIVERSE

Dear Greenwood,

I've just finished with this book, "Home in the Universe" - fascinating! Stuart Kauffman is certainly an original thinker and a wonderfully clear writer (I think this probably was also true in the translated version). The application is to biology, but it seems his approach is dominated by mathematics and, especially computer applications. In the US book some of the chapters had problems with the diagrams not matching the text, but the meaning came clear after some reflection.

Most interesting to me were the parts where he dealt with switching networks and Boolean algebra to construct his fixed / changing lattices (Chapter 4, Order for Free). Unfortunately, his application of this discovery to biological evolution struck me as something like arguing from analogy - most interesting, but not conclusive. However, his disarming and witty discussion was always a joy. In particular I appreciated remarks such as his disclaimer in Chapter 8, (High Country Adventures) -- "And you, reading the ideas of a biologist who holds renegade views, must be forewarned. Renegade views are not correct merely because they are renegade, written in a book, and even interesting." I'd love to meet him one day.

On the other hand I've just seen a review of an almost contrary book. "Rare Earth: Why Complex Life is Uncommon in the Universe" by Peter D. Ward and Donald Brownlee. While not directly contradicting Kauffman, because they are dealing with the cosmological, planetary aspects of the evolution of earth, they certainly give one an idea of how little we can know about these matters. They basically feel that a number of infrequent circumstances resulted in the formation of our planet which made it possible to evolve life; such as the Sun's location in the galaxy, the presence of the Moon, size of other planets, etc. They conclude that such planets are very, very rare!

All good stuff to keep the gray matter from rotting in my skull now I don't have the stimulus of trying to survive in the Engineering business. I visited Fluor again, last week, and found gloom and doom widespread. Layoffs are continuing, although slowly. Most people are hoping to hang on until the US Government legislates cleaner-burning gasoline for states which don't have rules like California (most of them). If the laws are ever decided on and schedules set it should result in many refinery modification projects. Fluor, which had a very large share of the California work a few years ago, should be in a very good position to get quite a bit of the national work.

On a personal note, I've just had minor shoulder surgery - it may be of interest to you. For a number of years (5 - 10 or so) I'd been experiencing minor pain in my right arm. For most of that time I found stretching and flexing exercises which eliminated the pains. This year it became apparent that the condition was still worsening, I could no longer eliminate the pains completely. I had a check-up, hoping that some simple remedy could be found, or simply the conclusion that it was all part of the aging process.

No so. It turned out that a bone spur had developed on my clavicle, which was tearing a muscle called the "Rotator Cuff". Unless it was removed, it would eventually cut right through the cuff, resulting in major problems. As it happens, Manhattan Beach has become a major residence city for many of Los Angeles' biggest sports figures - Basketball, Baseball, Volleyball, etc. Injuries to the rotator cuff are very common in these sports, so I could not be in a better place to find surgeons skilled in the operation needed. Anyway, I had the surgery done last month and am happy to report that all is mending well even though it seems slow to me. I've now started physical therapy and am getting used to seeing all sorts of gigantic sportsmen when I go to the therapist.

I trust all is well with you,

Best regards,

Ron

2000/6/24

Enterprise Project Management

Dear Ron,

Please allow me not responding quickly. In the last few weeks I was fully engaged in various things. I have to finalize company new organization, compensation of employees. Outside company, I had to manage EPM (Enterprise Project Management) seminar held in fashionable town, Odaiba, Tokyo calling famous American consultant Mr. Paul Dinsmore and planning coming international PM congress to be held in November 2001 in Tokyo. At home, I had to cope with AOL server trouble and consequential access problems. Finally I found index page was lost during server trouble. When you pass over 60 year old, you have to either attend or make plan for various meeting of alumni association for primary school, middle school, high school and Universities. All rush in the same time.

Having done all those daily business now I can relax.

Thank you telling me your shoulder surgery. It sounds like a very physical phenomena. I would consider such case, when such pain comes back in future. 10 years ago, I suffered arm pain and numb, but after inserting plywood on to soft mattress, my pain was dramatically healed.

By the way, Los Angeles Lakers had won. Was this guy from Sierra Leone a key person?

When I opened your last mail about the Smithsonian reply to a man in Newport called Scott Williams in my office I couldn’t stop laughing in loud.   The way Smithsonian replied is quite elegant. You may need a talent to write such kind of letters. I added it into my collections together story about Lakes.

I think I have mailed a story about hydrogen beer and law suite some time ago. But recently, I have interesting article about it in Japanese Paper.

According to Asahi Shin bun of June 10 2000, this lawsuit was reported in Washington Post in September 1999. The story of hydrogen beer was spread by e-mail. The oldest one has a date of January 1, 1994. It was first reported by New York Times in March 1996. New York Times reporter, Andrew Pollak sent it. Even distinguished Physical Review, October 1997 of American Society of Physics reported the same story.

Most of Japanese think this is a fake story because, Asaka is unfamiliar name. Asaka is a name for Japanese rice wine made by Nakatani Shyuzou in Nara.

In your June 9^th mail, you have given extensive remarks on Stuart Kauffman’s book. I share same view with you. Richard Dawkins is insisting that Darwinian theory can explain origin of life and evolution in his book The Blind Watchmaker. But both books are enjoyable. I would check whether "Rare Earth: Why Complex Life is Uncommon in the Universe" is translated in Japanese.

I still could not return to Diamond’s book, because still I couldn’t finish Alan Guth book. Instead I finished AOL.COM by Kara Swisher.

Recently, my friend who is business manager of Bechtel Singapore call me frequently because he is idle now. He says there are few projects to follow.

Probably, we have enough fuel production capacity all over the world. Investment are now rushing into improvement of energy efficiency and IT network construction.

Today is a national erection day. See what will happen.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/6/27 5:09

MANY TOPICS

Dear Greenwood,

I guessed you were busy, but didn't realize just how busy. It seems you have enough things to do for three people. One thing I am spared, of course, is the school reunion business. I'm afraid I've quite lost touch with my English schools - I left England in 1957 - that seems like a very long time ago!

There has only been muted discussion of the Japanese election here. Most commentary seems to feel that things will continue without much change, except that prime minister Mori will be quietly dropped after the Group of 8 nations meeting in Okinawa. I understand the weather cooperated with the government by raining torrentially resulting in a low voter turnout.

The big news here today is about the decoding of the human genome. Most feel it is of fundamental importance, whose impact we can hardly imagine. While the beneficial results are expected to be immense, very serious ethical questions are raised, to which there are no answers. I think we will just muddle on in humanity's usual way - let us hope the future catastrophes are not as bad as some think they will be.

Incidentally, there is a strong and increasingly bitter debate here about global warming, with both sides getting progressively stronger in their statements. No doubt this will get increasing play as the Presidential Election gets under way this fall, since Bush and Gore are on fundamentally different sides of the issue. Its hard to think of an election here which will have such an environmental impact.

Your comments on energy make all too much sense. Not much prospect for the sort of work Chiyoda and Fluor do. There is a push here for great reductions in sulfur in both gasoline and, more significantly, in diesel. The US automobile companies hope to make much greater use of advanced diesel engines to meet upcoming Federal fuel efficiency standards. In order to also meet pollution requirements they are pushing for only 15 ppm S in diesel. So they are now, strangely, allied with the environmental groups against the oil companies. We have a short term price bubble on gasoline, especially in the midwest. Therefore the oil companies are once again everybody's whipping boy. With George Bush hailing from Texas, look for this too to be an election issue.

Unfortunately, the Sierra Leone player was absent from the playoffs - he went home to avoid the violence.

The San Francisco joke (Serial No.65) was for you, but I wondered if you'd find it obscure. Even to us the situation in the Bay Area is very strange. They have what amounts to an industrial monoculture. The income of the educated, computer professionals has been driven to astronomical heights by the scramble for scarce skills and this has resulted in equally high housing prices. Now everybody in an ordinary job is priced out of the market. Half the homeless people in that area have full-time jobs.

Other high tech regions, such as Dallas/Fort Worth, Washington, DC and Los Angeles and with the partial exception of the route #128 strip near Boston, have much more diversity and less cramped geography. (San Francisco bay, like the Tokyo region, is cramped between ocean, the bay itself and mountains, so access is very difficult). Public transport, while better than the rest of California, is poor by world standards.

Note, several of the jokes are about commuting. The topic is widely debated, but nobody has any solution.

Your hydrogen beer story went down very well here, especially in the Strand Brewers. I was surprised to hear how long it has been circulating. The back ground on the name Asaka was very interesting - I'd assumed it was a modification of Asahi. Did the ASP review take the Smithsonian route? I felt the skill in that letter was of a very high order; perhaps there are many useful phrases which could be used for other reports. Perhaps it will serve as a model for serious reviews.

Connie and I are finally getting down to planning our European trip. Tentative plan is for a 2 week visit to Paris towards the end of September. Connie's been there extensively before, but I've only passed through once. We'll not try to do other things, I'm sure Paris will easily occupy 2 weeks. (In the past we've made the error of trying to crowd in too many activities, so that we need a vacation after our vacation). Even though retired, its amazing how hard it is to crowd an item into our schedule.

The shoulder is progressing nicely. We too suffered from too soft bedding. Now we have a Scandinavian bed with stiff mattress support under the hardest available mattress. That has completely removed the miscellaneous back pains, etc. which used to affect us.

Over 50% of US households now have a computer and many now have more than one. As a result many home networking products are appearing here. Your home network was very impressive, it'll be interesting to see how alternates tackle the problem. I've heard other complaints about AOL from several of my friends here. As a result many alternative server companies are appearing. in fact looking over my email address book I've counted over 30 alternates. AOL is the most popular, but less than 25% by a quick "eyeball" count. I've had very good results from earthlink; their email system seems to be pretty robust and allows things which I believe are not available on AOL. The new fad here is "free" service - paid for by advertising. Its too early to say how they will catch on. (Of course, the fact that local calls here are free and unlimited, encourages people to use the Internet - I literally can stay on the internet all day without charge. I don't, however, because it ties up our phone line, so calls cannot reach us.)

Best regards,

Ron

2000/6/27

Re: MANY TOPICS

Dear Ron,

Probably your San Francisco joke mailed to Peter Cooper was mailed to me using BCC. As my name was not found, I miss-understood that it might be mailing error.

In that collection of jokes, "You can name four different programming languages and you're not a programmer" reminds me an ordinary boy reading a special feature article on various high speed chips in a train here in Japan.

Any way, I also challenged using new programming language " Java Script" in my home page. Top page has new feature of snake letters and pop up small windows now have correct size. (Not all of them)

Your assumption that Asaka is a modification of Asahi may be right. I would like to add San Francisco joke and NASA joke to my Archive.

2-week visit to Paris sounds fascinating. I would reserve it as a final place to visit.

As I am using ISDN, Internet and phone could be used in parallel. But I have to pay 18$ for the ISDN connection, 12$ for Internet connection and 18$ for provider. In total 58$ per month. For above price, I can only use up to 15hrs. I have to pay double for unlimited connection. This is why Japan is behind Internet society. NTT monopoly is dragging us. High speed DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) is only available in some area of Tokyo. Again NTT is causing problem for this service. Yong generation started using e-mail system direct from cellular phone. Because, most of them already have their own phone. (Now total number of cellular phone is bigger than the number of conventional wired phone) They even use home page designed specially for small window of cellular phone.

Japanese election resulted in no change of power. Same old-fashioned Mori continues his old policy.

I think that if Gore succeeds, more projects in non fossil fuel utilization may start.

Best Regards,

Greenwood

2000/07/04  5:59

DVD AND OTHER TOPICS

Dear Greenwood,

The Economist had a very interesting article about DVD home recorders. Apparently Matsushita is now selling home DVD-RAM recorders in Japan (supposedly at about Y250,000). However, Sony and other companies are developing an alternative technology, called DVD-RW, which is supposed to be much easier to use - more like a conventional recorder. This is due out later this year or soon in 2001.

BUT - they also expect to introduce blue-green laser technology by 2002 which should allow up to 24 hours of recording time. Conclusion seems to be to avoid purchase for a while until the technology and the market settle down.

I continue to use my VCR to record Audio tapes. The other day I made a composite audio cassette tape for a relative of a famous Jazz musician who was a cousin of his. I drew material from CD, 33 RPM record and an old 7-1/2 IPS audio tape I recorded in 1973. In other words I drew on 4 different audio media for the project. This is my third VCR - they don't last as long as my faithful Sony Reel-to-reel recorder, which is at least 20 years old.

The following are from the newsletter of the Boston Audio Society.

2. The price of video is plummeting. The recent network television fantasy miniseries "The 10th Kingdom" has appeared on DVD, all 8 hours of it, for $30 list. The opera Tannhauser was $70 on laser, just released on DVD for $30.

3. NYT Apr18, 2000 has an informative feature on the two new critically   acclaimed concert halls in Tokyo designed from acoustical principles. Leo

Beranek was the principal acoustic consultant on the project. "If you make  a copy of the old great halls, you'll have a great hall. But the Tokyo   halls, he said, "are different in appearance and they have the sound of the   great halls." This is seen as a vindication of the principles of   architectural acoustics.

Have you heard the sound in either of these halls? I've been so often disappointed by the sound in modern halls it would be really good news if the audio architects have finally re-learned what every 19th century architect seemed to know.

I'm not sure if you are familiar with The Conference Board, a group which includes more than 3000 companies in 67 countries. They study issues related to how economic wealth is distributed. Recently, they published a report entitled "Does a Rising Tide Lift All Boats?" They concluded that the long term success of the US economy has NOT helped most economic groups in this country. In fact the percentage of "the working poor" has actually increased over the last 30 years. Technology has helped some, while also making changes in the structure of the workplace which actually have eliminated many high and medium-paying jobs. Employment in middle paying industries has "declined dramatically".

In our industry the trend seems to be that improved tools allow work to be done by much less skillful technicians. Certainly Fluor employs only a fraction of the skilled designers it used to do. Their work is now done, either by a much smaller group, or is subcontracted - as we have discussed.

It also reports that, while the US has wider income inequality than other countries, that is offset by American workers being more "economically mobile", having more opportunity to improve their circumstances and move from poor to rich. (Unfortunately, since the percentage of poor seems to have increased here, I conclude that downward mobility is even greater).

This week we will get a number of government reports about the economy, including the most recent employment figures. Last month unemployment rose slightly to 4.1%; it'll be interesting to see what happened last month and also to see Wall Street's response. Most people are hoping for further slowing in the economy so that the Fed. doesn't raise interest rates in August.

So far Alan Greenspan seems to be on track to achieve his soft landing. I certainly hope so.

Best regards,

Ron

2000/7/9

Re: DVD AND OTHER TOPICS

Dear Ron,

As my 10 years old Sony audio system became unreliable, I studied Bose 5.1 channel system for next generation home system. Because, I thought DVD audio media may become more popular. But suddenly I changed my mind and purchased Bose CD player instead. It is a small rectangular box having 7 small speakers and folded acoustic wave cannon system in it. You cannot hear any sound when you are close enough to this box but when you are away from the box you can hear stereo sound coming from virtual speakers. I presumed that independent amplifiers, which deliver different phase of wave, drive those 7 speakers. They call it Virtual Imaging Array. It is not sold through conventional route. If my daughter didn’t tell me about it, I wouldn’t realize that there is such system. It will be shipped from US factory direct to my home soon.

My second generation VHS recorder has just died. I wonder whether I should buy 3-rd generation VHS or wait until the war between DVD-RAM and DVD-RW give us an answer. I don’t know how to use VCR to record Audio. I thought the quality of VCR audio is low.

My daughter has Laser player and dozen discs but they are now obsolete. If player goes those discs have no means to play. Any way they are huge.

Tokyo has several good music halls. I only have been to Santory hall more than 10 year ago when Sarah Brightman was here. I don’t know any new one.

I think that the report of the Conference Board is general understanding about what is happening in US. But the US system, which eliminated many high and medium-paying jobs, is so strong, that we may have to adopt such system to survive in the world economy. Here in Japan, downward mobility may increase too.

Japanese economy showed slight sign of improvement. Our company is busy now in assessing real estate properties for unseen environmental risks. Our clients are US banks buying bad asset from Japanese Banks.

Like most of Japanese companies, who are busy reducing big debt, I was also busy reducing my personal debt inherited from my father. Like most of Japanese companies, I will be released from big debt in next year just in time of my retirement. Debt is always a nuisance. But it was made for investment. The investment creates some positive cash flow after repayment of debt. Probably, it may help me for sound life to go.

Do you have any knowledge about Amateur radio in US? I have a license in Japan. My point is whether we could use it during our Harley ride among our selves. In Japan, unlicensed person couldn’t use it.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/7/22

Amateur radio

Dear Ron,

After careful reading, I have collected enough information from my textbook used for obtaining amateur radio license. I can use my transceiver in US. Because both county have bilateral agreement on amateur radio. I am afraid my question raised in previous mail wasted your time.

Now I am studying what band range I can use through ARRL’s (American Radio Relay League, Inc.) web site.

We have to be careful not to use repeater band. Other wise our private communication will be broadcasted all over US.

Summit meeting in Okinawa is in progress. President Clinton is very quiet this time. It seems that he is fully occupied by Middle East issue.

BOSE CD system was delivered to my home. It is compact yet produce superior sound than old SONY system. Technical break through may be its unique design of voice coil.

I am dreaming of coastal sailing after retirement. But I am not sure enough of safe landing.

Web magazine published my daughter started English version on top of Japanese and Chinese. I wonder whether she will succeed in obtaining enough reader in world market place.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/7/23 7:25

ENGAGEMENT, OTHER TOPICS

Dear Greenwood,

We have had great news. My eldest son, Bill (the one who works for Toyota) has asked his long-term girlfriend to marry. She was waiting for him with some impatience! They expect to have a wedding next year, so everyone will have a long time to prepare. Connie is very happy, as am I, and busy making plans (even though as parents of the groom, our formal responsibilities are not great). We know and like her family very well and will, no doubt, help them quite a bit.

We are also deep into organizing our trip to Paris. Once our airline tickets were set (largely using my old frequent-flier miles for Fluor travels), we searched the internet for hotels. We are now booked and have offers from two more. So, we have the luxury of making our choice. Paris is surprisingly cheap, perhaps 50 - 75% of London or N.Y. hotel prices. No doubt we'll find plenty to spend on when we are there. It turns out there is a Fashion Convention while we are there; Connie is already excited.

I've just read an article about brewpubs in Japan. In Ryogoku there is a place called Popeye owned by a Mr. Aoki  They serve both Japanese and Western food and they have a wide selection of both Japanese micro-brews and imported beers. In Tennozu is the TY Harbor Brewery. This is a California-style brewery restaurant on the waterfront. Master chef David Chiddo specializes in highly recommended California fusion cuisine with Italian touches. They have a good Pale Ale and other beers. The best beers recommended by the article are at Coral House in Hakkeijima in Yokohama. They say the Golden Ale is "a work of art". Another brewpub is Bulls, in Machida, supposedly a Tokyo suburb. They feature more lager-style beers, including pilsener and weizen, along with moderately priced American brewpub and Japanese food. I don't know if any of these is within range of you, but hope you find them interesting.

Your Bose purchase is very interesting and parallels many audio hobbyists' experience. The performance of economical and compact systems has become so good that the difference in sound from the most elaborate systems is much less than it used to be. On the other hand, there are far more distractions now; examples are the rise of many complex video-audio systems and the lure of the computer. I find my interest in audio very much reduced also. In my case, video is of little interest, but the computer occupies much of the time I used to spend in Hi Fi pursuits. Another factor is that my interest in music has grown. Paradoxically this also dilutes my audio interest, because I spend more time listening to both live and recorded music. Also my solid-state system is adequate and reliable; and much of the music I seek out was recorded long ago - even back to the time before we were born - so fidelity is a relative matter.

I know of only one person among my acquaintances or those of my sons who bought a Laser Disc Player. They never really caught on here. The video rental stores have now replaced all their video discs with DVD's.

Ordinary VCR recorders have very poor sound (I think 15/16"/second). I use the HiFi variety. They record the sound from the rotating video head along with the video signal. In addition they use a very sophisticated compression/decompression system. The result is a very high fidelity recording - far better than my trusty Sony reel-to-reel. The only problem I've encountered is occasional mistracking when I've mistakenly used second rate tape (false economy!).

I do not know the legal aspects of your using your Amateur radios here. It may well be legal - the rules of "ham radio" are very internationally minded. I suspect that, even if it is not legal, there would be no way in which you'd be noticed. Still less would anybody want to do anything about it if they did find out. Another, often used, method is the use of mobile (cellular) phones. I have no idea if your 'phones would work here; perhaps your service provider could answer the question. Another alternative for short range communications is the newly established "Walkie-Talkie" system. This uses a specially defined block of high frequencies. I believe Motorola now sells these fairly reasonably. Perhaps they could give you detailed information.

The news reports here also suggest that, little by little, the Japanese economy seems to be getting better. I hope this is a true and sustained trend. From informal sources I believe there should be a very strong market for environmental work in Japan IF public opinion creates the climate for it. Most US commercial companies pay lip service to environmental protection, but only spend real money on projects when forced to act by law. Is that the case there too?

Debt reduction seems to be the big topic throughout east Asia. Even countries as closely held as S. Korea now seem to be opening their capital markets and companies to foreign buyers. Perhaps this is the back door through which some reform and transparency can be introduced.

I trust that your own program executes smoothly, as you say "just in time". The Japanese rule of debt inheritance seems very strict from our viewpoint. Is it unique to Japan, or is it also the case in other Asian countries?

Regards,

Ron

2000/7/24

Re: ENGAGEMENT, OTHER TOPICS

Dear Ron,

After sending my mail, I found your mail in my mailbox.

Congratulation for your son's forth coming wedding. I envy you on your   luck. I couldn't expect such situation in the near future. My daughter is still devoting her full time in business and my son is still too young.

Euro currencies are now low. Probably, it is the best time visiting Europe.

During my study of sailing boat, I found that European (French and Belgian)  made boats are cheapest. Japanese, British and US made boats are no longer cost competitive.

I wonder whether Mr. Aoki, owner of Popeye is famous restaurant owner of Benihana in N.Y. and San Francisco.

Tennozu is a new waterfront development in Tokyo. This is the nearest place from my office in Tokyo. Access to this place is relatively easy by monorail. Both Hakkeijima and Machida are nearest places from my home. I would remember them and report to you when I visit one of those.

From your explanation, now I understand the secret of VCR recorders. After BOSE system, I realized difference of quality in CD. From now on, I have to be careful in selecting CD.

NTT cellular phone could not be used in US, but CDMA-one phone could be used in US. But during ride, only amateur radio is useful because of build-in earphone and microphone in helmet.

Japanese rule of inheritance is almost same as US. Only difference is high tax rate. Because of high inflation rate in the late 70s our tax rate became extremely high but supported by public opinion, nobody changed the rate. Now, we have extremely high tax rate in the world. The reason I inherited the real estate, having heavy debt is that I thought after debt repayment it would turn out to be a source of positive cash flow. Once, I regretted such decision but now I think it was a wise decision. From the income of the real estate, probably I can enjoy sailing after retirement.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/7/24 4:23

Re: Re: ENGAGEMENT, OTHER TOPICS

Dear Greenwood,

Yes, Greenwood, the same thing has occurred to me (although not with you so far). We would say our letters crossed in the mail.

I visited cafeglobe's English site. It is excellent. I hope she soon has the Paris page up - I'm very interested in her comments. It seems to be a very interesting site for women - when she has time I'm going to ask Connie to visit and will pass along her comments. There are also interesting items for men - e.g. the travel guide portions. I suppose success will come when she gets enough "hits" to attract advertising, so I'll also encourage friends here to visit.

I'm glad you have worked out the use of your radios here. For once, two countries have sensible rules together. The good thing about non-profit-making hobbies is that there are no commercial pressures on rule making so that hobbyists instead of lobbyists write the rules.

I agree that Clinton is focussed on the Middle East. In domestic politics he is already phasing out to make better conditions for Gore to compete in the election. So, if he is to make a mark on history, the ME is probably his best chance.

Your comment on boat costs made no mention of southeast Asia. A while back I heard that countries like Thailand and Taiwan were the most competitive. Perhaps they have a quality problem?

Your comments on taxes are most interesting, especially the differences in public opinion about tax cuts between Japan and the US. (If "supply side" US economists hear about your high tax rate they'd immediately blame the stagnant economy on high taxes!

A theory I consider quite bogus, by the way, as does Krugman and most respectable economists). You probably heard that the Congress passed a repeal of the inheritance tax law by wide margins, with both Republican and Democratic members voting for it. Clinton, however, will veto it. This tax currently only applies to estates with value over about $700,000 per parent (e.g. for most families only to estates worth more than about $1.4 million). Those targets are scheduled to rise gradually to over 1 and 2 million, respectively. I oppose the repeal, even though it will benefit Bill and Peter - for two reasons, one conservative and one liberal.

The repeal basically removes a tax on unearned income. To me this involves something of a "moral hazard", since the beneficiaries did nothing to earn their tax-free income.

The second reason is that it overwhelmingly favors the wealthy. As you know, I am deeply concerned about the rising income and wealth disparity in the US; this would only increase that.

I think your reasoning about real estate income is accurate. For many years now, investment in RE has been popular with engineers and other professionals in the US. I know a number of engineers at Fluor who have become quite wealthy by this route. Some retire early, others keep on working out of interest, but without any financial need.

One friend of mine was laid off in the mid-60's and had difficulty finding a new job. Instead he concentrated on completing the repair of a house he'd bought (a "fixer-upper"). He sold it at a good profit and then bought another. Now he has several apartment complexes and only works a few days a month. Whenever we visit him, he is always able to meet us any day of the week. Finally, now I'm retired, I can at last enjoy the same freedom.

Ron

2000/7/30

Capitalism

Dear Ron,

Thank you for your kind evaluation on cafeglobe.com. Soon I conveyed your comments to my daughter. As my daughter is visiting London now, I didn't receive any reply yet. But I presume that French version may not be cost effective. Probably, Japanese, Chinese and English may cover substantial portion of Asia.

My wife lost interest in cafeglobe because of generation gap. I felt great difficulty of explaining to my mother what Internet magazine looks like.

Instead, I proposed to give my old Macintosh. Finally, my sister who is taking care of my mother installed new machine.

I found that 144MHz band has many subband for repeaters. Probably, without repeater station, 144MHZ band is useless in US.

I understand Southeast Asian boat builders are famous for it's wooden   construction using expensive teakwood. Only rich people can afford such luxury. Once Japan exported many boats. Now they lost cost competitiveness.

After adding shipping cost, still European modern design boat are 20% cheaper.

In Japan, most of the natural harbors are occupied by fishing boats. Therefore, marina for pleasure boat has to be constructed in more difficult place. As a result, high marina cost is restricting size of boat market and killed most of boat builders in Japan. Now US and European builders are very cost competitive. Recent low Euro is also helping European builder.

Regarding Japanese inheritance tax, taxable amount is real estate value minus 0.5 million $ minus 0.1 million $ per heir. For 4 heir case, estate value over 0.9 million $ is taxable. In addition, tax rate is very high. Highest rate reach 75%.

I understand US system is in favor of rich. Old fashion capitalism is the current dogma of US system. Probably this mistaken dogma may dominate the world for a while and eventually may lead us to difficulty in future.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/8/3

The Lexus and The Olive Tree

Dear Ron,

As my home computer suddenly stopped receiving mails by unknown reason, I have read your mail in my office. I was lucky to set my mail system to automatically reroute all mails to my office.

Tonight, I have to continue investigation on the cause of the troubles of my Outlook.

I hope your trip to Paris turn out to be an enjoyable event. In the next trip to France, I would like to visit old villages and alike.

I have just started reading a book titled "The Lexus and The Olive Tree" written by Thomas L. Friedman. According to him, fall of the wall of Berlin is the starting point of current globalization and return of laissez-faire capitalism. Once we have experienced similar laissez-faire capitalism in the end of last century. But widening gap between rich and poor stopped it. It is very interesting what will happen in our time.

Lower voting tendency is also a natural trend in Japan. This tendency is very apparent in urban area. Therefore, Japanese politicians are always hearing voices from voters in countryside. Now metropolitan area has very poor road system, but you can find excellent highways running in remote countryside, having very low traffic.

Regards,

Greenwood

00/08/03 5:55

Re: Capitalism

Dear Greenwood,

My wife, also, has little interest in computing and the internet. However, she does send and receive emails and worked with me in sorting through Paris hotels on the net recently. We have now made our arrangements and booked both the air flights and the hotel. Since I am able to use most of my remaining Frequent Flier miles and Paris hotels are not too expensive (in dollars) those parts of our trip are reasonable. We expect expenses there to soon catch up and pass our budget!

Your story of the history of boat building is a really interesting example of the benefits of international trade. I'm amazed that the Europeans are so competitive. There seems to be quite a bit of good news from there. Recently, I noticed that unemployment has been steadily dropping for three years. Its still high by Japanese or current US standards at 9.1%, but has come down from 11.7% in 1997. Inflation too, seems muted; only 1.9% in the last 12 months, in spite of the weakening of the Euro.

Its early yet to see a really robust economy there, but they do seem to be making progress. If they are successful, there will, at last, be an example of an alternative, less cut-throat economic model.

This is encouraging for those of us who see the many problems with a US-style laissez-faire capitalism. Senator McCain, who bitterly competed with Republican candidate Bush over the question of political contribution reform, yesterday gave him a ringing endorsement, with no mention of reform. Our politicians seem to be divided between those who talk reform, but then quietly drop it, and those who ignore it altogether. As a result the "Big" money rules. The net result is increasing voter apathy due to the feeling that either party will just represent the rich corporations. Over the years voter turnout has steadily dropped. This year I expect less than 50% of Americans will vote for President.

Regards,

Ron

2000/8/8

Power shortage in CA

Dear Ron,

Recently, I have learned that there is a theory called Kenneth Arrow's "Impossibility Rule". (I don't know what is original English wording) This rule says that current voting system under democracy cannot satisfy voters. Probably this is the reason of declining voter's ratio. As Thomas L. Friedman suggested in his book, daily decision on what to by goods or stocks may be the substitute of voting. In Japan, politicians are changing their policy depending on sock market trend.

It is reported that in California, power shortage is anticipated because of low investment in power generation plant in the last few years. This low investment was caused by low power cost, which was derived by deregulation and subsequent free competition. Now power price has risen. I think this type of instability is a logical consequence of free market.

Fluor may have a chance to recover again.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/8/9 12:32

LEXUS & OTHER THINGS

Dear Greenwood,

My local library has the Lexus & Olive Tree, but it is checked out until the 16th. I've ordered it and hope to see it later this month. I assume it discusses the problems of voter dissatisfaction you mentioned under the "Impossibility Rule". There certainly are growing problems of apathy and low turnouts - seemingly in most democratic countries.

I cam across another example of "Impossibility" today. This one was the old perpetual motion machine - this time disguised as the "Entropy Engine". I've printed the text below. Its amazing how credulous investors and some professors are. Many years ago at Fluor we were working on an LNG import terminal contract for the Southern California Gas Co. Suddenly, one day they told us that their chairman had been impressed with a super-efficient engine developed by an ex-nuclear engineer. They said his invention was sound and only needed some detail development to become reality.

We were extremely reluctant to be involved because past experience made us fear that, after we had looked at his invention, he'd claim rights to anything else we invented, saying we'd stolen his ideas. We finally agreed to look at parts he said were public domain. It took us about half an hour to discover he had a thermal efficiency of 139%. Back to the Gas Co. Their engineers were very unhappy since it now fell to them to explain to their chairman that he'd been taken in!

Reading this article reveals much of the same nonsense - perhaps a little more transparently false than the better hoaxes.

Yes, California has lagged badly in power plant building. The government blames the industry and industry blames the government for taking so long to de-regulate electric power. Now they are building rapidly with the first of four stations coming on line mid-2001. Fluor is quite busy with power projects (although not in CA); its really the only thing propping up the Aliso Viejo office these days.

I think that some sort of supply and demand imbalances are inevitable when de-regulating such a hide bound industry. With luck the instability will gradually dampen out. So far we've had no power cuts. The worst hit area has been in the San Diego area. (For many years the San Diego Power company was very badly run as a public utility. They rushed into the full implementation of the de-regulation law and apparently still maintain their old management skill level!)

I  hope you enjoy the article and I'll look forward to seeing the book in a week or two.

Incidentally, I've been sending my emails to both your addresses. Replying to your letters does not work - perhaps an AOL / Translation problem.

Best Regards,

Ron

2000/8/10

Re: LEXUS & OTHER THINGS

Dear Ron,

"Impossibility Rule" may be "Principles of Impossibility" or "Law of Impossibility". Anyway it is not cited in "Lexus & Olive Tree". I found it in Japanese paper. The word reminded me one concept written in the book. "Lexus & Olive Tree" is a good summary of what had happened after fall of the wall in Berlin.

It seems that story of old perpetual motion machine continues forever. As I was responsible for technical evaluation of new technologies in Chiyoda, I had encountered many similar stories. Most of the story carries same fundamental structure, i.e. big or famous name from academia and industry, fancy scientific terminology and secrecy.

I have found one reason of your difficulty of returning email. I wrongly set Outlook in my office. I hope this time is OK. It is not AOL browser. They don't give us much freedom anyway. Outlook has so many parameters to set and gives us pitfalls.

By the way, I found CD R/RW is extremely useful. As my floppy drive of my office computer (Gateway) had failed 2 times, I started using CD R/RW as if it were floppy drive. All of my data at office and home were housed in a rewritable disk costing only 3$. I addition, I can copy musical CD for private use. (Favorite musical CD can stay in my BOSE system, Jeep and in my Sony CD Walkman) I can even make my own CD after editing in HD. Quality does not degrade. Cost for a recordable media is only 1$.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/8/11 6:44

HARLEY RIDER'S DEATH

Dear Greenwood,

I thought your club might be interested in the accompanying article which appeared in our local newspaper. It sent a chill down my back when I recalled our discussion about crossing the California desert in summertime. Baker is about 60 km north of route 66, half way between Las Vegas and Barstow.

I'm attaching it as a word file, in case its useful. Here's the text.

Regards,

Ron

Manhattan Beach: Former councilman's many contributions to city recalled

2000/8/14

Re: HARLEY RIDER'S DEATH

Dear Ron,

Thank you for a news article about a gentleman's death in the desert. As we are following your advice to make our ride in cooler season, probably we may pass it without serious problem. Any way, we will make a meeting before departure and discuss about possible danger in our trip.

Our plan was almost finalized. It is uploaded in my HP. Air line tickets, hotels, bikes are all reserved. T-shirts design was completed. It was displayed in my HP. I made it with MS PowerPoint. I have obtained necessary permit and license and insurance. I have ordered several latest maps. Amozan.com has shipped them already. Other ex-Chiyoda man and myself will share the same bike. One of us will make a route guide via radio from accompanying car.

I whish to meet you by secure method. Best way may be to meet either at Best western Desert Villa Inn, Barstow in October 30 morning or at Best Western Gateway, Santa Monica, LA in the evening of October 31 or in the morning of November 1st.

Probably some local Harley riders may join us. They are friends of long time acquaintances of our leader, Mr. Ishihara.

Regards,

Greenwood

PS: I hope my mail from my office is better. As I found that MS Outlook Express was set at HTML mail. Now I changed it to Text, MIME Base 64. Even if you set Microsoft Outlook correctly it does not reflect the setting of Outlook Express.

2000/8/16

End of The ZIRP

Dear Ron,

I have received three mails. Two have arrived at my office titled "DUPLICATE OF REPLY TO CDM" and "Re: HARLEY RIDER'S DEATH" and one at home.

I stopped rerouting my private mail to my office because I found that if I continue? I couldn't receive my mail sent from my office to my home. I need to receive my document sent from my office because my floppy drive is no longer working and CD-RW is heavy for everyday use.

Thank you for your offer of some assistance. I may need your help for obtaining detail local map around hotel if I couldn't find it. Major road is easy but minor road is normally difficult to find here.

OK, we will follow highway #10 until we reach pacific coast.

I subscribed NY times and read Krugman's latest articles. Among them, "End of The ZIRP" was very interesting. It is about recent decision of the raise of interest rate by B.O.J. This was what I wanted to know. Probably you can find an answer on your question on this matter. I also found that Friedman is also a columnist. Both gentlemen seem not happy with candidate Mr. Bush. In signing NY times, what you have to accept is cookies. They need it for income from advertisement. I refused all offers from NY times to send me mail.

The problem of CD-RW is that old CD-ROM drive having speed below 20 couldn't read CD-RW and unless you close CD-RW (This close operation add special program for ordinary CD-ROM driver to control sensitivity of their optical system and bridge different protocol), even new CD-ROM drive couldn't read CD-RW. Advantage is that you can use CD-RW exactly same as ordinary floppy or HD media. What you have to do is just drag files on to the icon of CD-RW. Maker says that you can rewrite over 1000 time and can keep it over 100 years.

In the case of CD-R, any CD-ROM drive can read it but you couldn't use it as if it were floppy or HD media. You can record only one time. You can add new files on to empty space but once it is filled up, you couldn't overwrite. If you whish to make your own CD, your HD space shall be bigger than 600Mb which is the size of CD.

I used ZIP drive having parallel port. But Window98 does not allow to use this drive.

In the last month, I enjoyed writing a paper titled "Chaos of Projects" and submitted it to coming meeting of PM Society Japan. My summary of the paper says: "Author is proposing a project mimic model by modifying logistic model of Pierre Verhulst. He demonstrated that this simple model could describe real project. Then he has conducted extensive numerical experiments on a discrete-time model derived from the proposed project mimic model and studied whole area by making bifurcation plot. Based on the results of the study, he stipulates the cause and avoidance of chaos phenomena in real projects."

I whish to translate it in English and present it in the coming PM Congress 2001 Tokyo.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/8/16

Re: End of The ZIRP

Dear Greenwood,

This is a trial of a reply to CDM. I'll also send the text by ordinary email to both addresses. With a bit of luck you'll get three.

I agree there should be no problem with heat when you are coming. It may be cool on the way up the coast, but nothing very troublesome. It sounds as though you are very well prepared, with most arrangements in hand. Please let me know if there are any California organizations, companies, hotel or tourist agencies which I can contact on your behalf. Sometimes the ability to make 'phone calls to the right people is very handy.

Connie and I are looking forward very much to seeing you again and also meeting your companions. The best time/place for us is the evening of 31 Oct. The trip from Barstow is quite short, on good roads, so there should be plenty of time after you arrive.

If you have the time & inclination I recommend following Interstate highway #10 (replacement of Route 66) to the very end at the beach. The road goes through a short tunnel and, very suddenly, you are at the beach. A very symbolic moment for many travelers. Depending on the time you arrive, it may be near sunset - even more impact looking westward.

Lexus and Olive.... has arrived. It seems very readable, so I'll hope to get through it quickly. (Although my nephew from Australia is here this and last week). Friedman writes clearly and has an interesting, journalistic point of view. It'll be interesting to read an economics-minded journalist in comparison with Paul Krugman, who I consider to be a journalist-minded economist. Incidentally, I miss his frequent web site articles since he started writing for the NY Times. I could read his articles there, but the NYT wants all sorts of personal information before they'll let you onto their site. I'm increasingly concerned with the mis-use of such information through the Internet and so don't want to "subscribe".

I've also been considering getting a CD-RW. There is no question about the economics of storing large files in that medium. My two sons, however, point out

that the storage medium is NOT the same as regular music CD's, or even the same as the CD-R.

I've not seen any comparisons of the reliability of the medium in really long storage. One son uses only CD-R for his archives.

Another medium, favored by my other son is the ubiquitous Zip Drive.

Apparently the newer, 250 MB discs are now well established and convenient. Although discs are much more expensive than CD-RW's, let alone the CD-R's, the Drive itself is much cheaper. I calculate

I'd get about 5 GB of storage in Zip discs before the CD-RW became cheaper. That is much greater than all my data files to date.

The question of long term durability still exists, however. Have you seen any comparisons between Zip Drives, CD-RW, CD-R, and Music CD's? I'd guess that is the order of increasing durability. How difficult have you found using CD-RW's as floppy drives? I understand that they are much less flexible. I note you do your music editing in the HD. Opinion here is very confused about the rise in the BOJ interest rate. Some make it seem that the bank is just stubborn and their action likely to stifle the economic recovery, but others see it as hastening the restructuring of companies with high levels of debt which should help the economy in the longer term. The implication of the latter view is that the economy is now strong enough to withstand the higher rate.

So far, all seems well with Greenspan's soft landing. Recent economic news here has been uniformly good. Many experts see no rise in the discount rate from now until after the election in November. The Fed. meeting next week will be very closely watched. US bond prices have finally begun to rise. Our stock market continues to bounce around with wide swings.

Looking forward to meeting you in October.

Best regards,

Ron

2000/8/18

BOJ

Dear Ron,

Despite Krugman's strong comments, market is calm.

Under new law governing BOJ's legal power, BOJ's decision was accepted as right decision by most of the people here. Because BOJ is still partially independent from the government compared to full independence of FRB and DBB.

I am very interested whether Prof. Krugman was right or not on a long-range basis. I would like to watch carefully in coming year.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/8/25

CD-R/RW

Dear Ron,

Thank you for your advice on obtaining detail street map around hotel. Except Best Western Colorado River hotel in Needles, I have acquired necessary maps from Yahoo.

I think Yahoo is very smart providing necessary data at zero cost.

I am using note PC made by Sharp called Mebius MN-530-X16. It has 260MHz Pentium CPU, 32Mb RAM, and 1.9Gb HD. It takes 75 minutes to copy one music CD with portable CD-R/RW (RICOH MP8040SE)having recording speed of x4. Normally I start backingup just before going to bed and let computer do it overnight. Softwares bundled to RICOH MP8040SE were Adaptec's Direct CD and Easy CD Creator. I used Direct CD for backingup my HD contents to rewritable media and Easy CD Creator for backingup my music CD to recordable media. Speed of backingup contents of HD to rewritable media is faster than ZIP.

ZIP drive having parallel port could not be used for Windows98SE. Because of bugs in Windows98SE, registry relating floppy drive is unexpectedly rewritten and after use of ZIP drive, floppy drive becomes dumb. To recover from this condition, you have to use registry editor, which is very risky operation. Microsoft knows this bug but they have no plan to remedy it. ZIP drive with SCSI or UBS connector has no such problem.

Edward J. Lincolin of Brucklings Lab. is supporting Prof. Krugman's opinion. He says that, because of small increment, the adverse effect on Japanese economy is marginal. Question is when BOJ will take next action for further increase. Their capability to make right decision on right timing is now on trial.

After your comments on Krugman's "Notes on Social Security" I also read it and remembered what happening in Japan. Fairly large portion of young people stopped paying social insurance. Main reason is declining population. They think that their current effort may not be rewarded when they retire. Instead they started their own investment for retirement. This is a big problem for the government. By the way Mr. Gore gained recently. Is Prof. Krugman's argument helping him?

Last night, I heard surprising news that Sony is planning to acquire Cafeglobe.com. I thought that this is a normal procedure of venture capital to sell Startup Company to established company. But what surprised me was that one of our relatives who is working in legal department of Sonny HQ was nominated as a chief of the acquisition operation. Both sides were a little bit embarrassed. I don't know what will be the outcome.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/8/28

Map of CA Auto club

Dear Ron,

Yesterday, when I returned from a short trip to Japan Alps, I found a thick airmail from you. I appreciate very much of your special effort to collect all of those maps which are difficult to obtain here. Now I understand what you have told me, quote "I recommend following Interstate highway #10 to the very end at the beach. The road goes through a short tunnel and, very suddenly, you are at the beach. A very symbolic moment for many travelers." One of the maps showed the detail of the short tunnel. I presume that just after passing the tunnel it is possible to make a right turn and go up to Santa Monica Municipal Pier. Or may be it is better to keep going to the mid point of the Santa Monica State Beach and turn right and come back to the Pier through Ocean Avenue. As I selected surface mail, The map, which I ordered, have not yet at my hand. If I find difficulty in future I may come back to you for your assistance.

When you use CD-R/RW for backing up of your hard disk, you can use RW media as if it is Floppy or ZIP media. When the drive is connected to the PC and Adaptec's Direct CD is installed on to your HD and when you place formatted RW media in the drive it shows up in your screen as D drive icon. (When you have only one HD called C) Formatting should be done by Adaptec's Direct CD to ensure packet writing exactly same as HD packet writing. What you have to do is just drag your file and drop it on to the icon of D drive. You can make mirror image of your HD contents. At the end of the day, or after finishing your work, you can drag your newly made document or revised one on to the dedicated file and drop on to it. Operation is exactly same as floppy or ZIP drive. If your purpose is backing up, you shouldn't close the RW media. You can add and add new data on it until it become full. When the media is not closed, it cannot be read by conventional CD drive. If you want to give your file to some one who only has conventional CD drive, you should use R media and should close it and add small software to give means of translation of you file to the one who don't know how to read it. It is cheapest way of distributing you data.

How is your plan of visiting Paris. Are all fixed?

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/9/5

Re: Map of CA Auto club

Dear Ron,

Thank you for your detailed description about road around the pier. With the help of AAA maps and your comment now I can lead the convoy. However, one of the local employees of a company owned by one of member of the convoy may assist us in Los Angeles area.

I felt that Freedman's reference to Japan, as the most successful "Communist" economy is right. I also introduced his comments to several of my friends. All of them nodded with smile approvingly. I think Russia is a model of failed "Communist" economy. I remember a comment of one of Board member of Chiyoda during conversation with top management of GASPROM after collapse of Soviet. When gentlemen from GASPROM criticized Communist, he said that he is a graduate of faculty of Economics of Tokyo University. His major was Marx theory. Majority of the graduate of the faculty is leading government and public sector of Japan. Gentlemen from GASPROM lost word. I enjoyed former part of Freedman's book. Later part became a little bit dull.

I have enjoyed very much a movie "The Remains of the Day" written by Kazuo Ishiguro and played by Anthony Hopkins. Kazuo Ishiguro was born in Japan but he went to England at the age of six in 1960. Many of his books are translated into Japanese including "An Artist of the Floating World". His carrier is under strong influence of England. I wonder how he recaptured Japan. I will try to find his book in bookstore and comment later.

By the way, Chiyoda and Fluor Daniel Holland are jointly awarded Project Specification (PS) Work for Sakhalin LNG Project.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/9/5 7:55

SANTA MONICA, BOOKS

Dear Greenwood,

I'm glad the maps got there safely. As I remember, after the Santa Monica tunnel it is necessary to drive north for just over a kilometer before its possible to turn right and go up the steep bluffs to reach Ocean Avenue. You go up the "California Incline" and turn right at the top onto Ocean Avenue. The pier is about one km south on Ocean. Parking is tricky, depending on when you arrive (worse later in the day). The next way off the beach is about 3 km from the end of the tunnel (West Channel Road/Chautauqua Blvd).

Topics have been appearing faster than I'm able to follow up, so I'll get back to CD-RW and other topics later. I've finished Freedman's book. He has a newspaperman's ability to write vividly. In many of his comments I am in full agreement, but the book is uneven - probably started life as a collection of columns. His 6 dimensions are quite important, but he implies too strongly that others haven't noticed yet. However he is certainly right in identifying lack of corruption, openness and transparency as essential for a fully functioning economy. Unfortunately he's also right in describing America's problems (and then some!). The makeup of Fluor's engineering and other technical departments certainly reflects his comments on the importance of immigrant technical personnel here. I've had many discussions over the years there - in the most technical areas the majority of personnel are immigrants.

In other areas he is strangely inconsistent. His very pessimistic comments on general anarchy, especially in Russia, contrast with his normally overly optimistic tone. I was most interested in his tongue in cheek reference to Japan as the most successful "Communist" economy. I'd be interested in your comments on that section (Chapter 17).

All-in-all he expresses an idealistic liberal view that is typical of opinion in the northeast part of the country. For better or worse, this is very much a minority view here, as is seen by the fact that the Democratic Party has shifted very much to the political right in the Clinton era and dare not move leftwards without opening the election to the Republicans. The latter correctly complain that the Democrats have "stolen" many of their ideas.

Incidentally, I've signed on to the NY Times web site, like you without accepting cookies, etc. Its good to have a regular source of Paul Krugman's commentary (as well as Friedman's). Krugman is rightly concerned by the irresponsible tone of the present campaign rhetoric.

I've recently started a very different book. It's "An Artist of the Floating World" by Kazuo Ishiguro. I believe it was written in 1986. It is a very powerful and dramatic story, set soon after World War II, about the difficulties encountered by an older Japanese artist who was involved with the imperialist movement that led to Japan's involvement in the war. I cannot judge how valid is the picture he paints, but certain parts reflect my own experiences during and just after the war.

This must be my month for exposure to aspects of Japan. The other night Public Television showed a documentary film about Hokkaido. The scenes were incredibly beautiful, especially the many birds which spend time there - Swans, Cranes, Eagles, Owls, etc. Inland parts reminded me of Alaska - even Bears fishing for Salmon. The climate appears similar, although perhaps not quite as cold.

Thank you, our plans for Paris are well advanced. Air tickets and Hotel are booked; now we are planning where to go / what our priorities are. This time we are deliberately not trying to included too many things - it is a vacation after all. We're also brushing up our elementary and rusty French. We leave on the 27th of Sept and return on 11th October. Then we're looking forward to seeing you again the evening of the 31st in Santa Monica.

Best regards,

Ron

p.s. This is from my Australian nephew. "Olympic Advice for Visitors to Sydney" Tell any friends who are going to Sydney!

2000/9/6

Re: SANTA MONICA, BOOKS

Dear Ron,

Followings are additional comments on your previous mail.

Hokkaido is quite cold. Shore facing Sea of Ohotsk freezes up in winter. When I visited Kusiro, atmospheric temperature was below minus 15 degree C. In the City of Asahikawa, lowest temperature may be below minus 30 degree C. Hokkaido is a place where I would like to visit on horse back Harley Davidson. It may be possible after retirement.

Mountain area in Honshu is also attractive. In this summer, I climbed Mt. Senjyou-dake (3,032m) with my schoolmates. It was a beautiful mountain. I uploaded some of the photographs to my HP.

Visiting Paris over two weeks doing nothing sound fascinating. Relaxed like Bohemian in Paris and watching people from Cafe alongside street and sipping coffee is something.

Regards,

Greenwood

Ron

2000/9/12 6:20

LNG WORK

Dear Greenwood,

The joint award of the Sakhalin PS work to Chiyoda and FD is interesting. Too late for the two of us to work together again, unfortunately. No doubt DMC will be keeping you away from the work too except, perhaps, as a consultant.

Some years ago those of us at Irvine who had been active in LNG, were very disappointed when FD decided to do LNG work only in Holland and, to a smaller degree, in Houston. We felt that Irvine was just as qualified. The decision turned partly on a new hire from Bectel, who quit them, joined FD for a few years and then went back to Bectel when they had a good opportunity. Not one of FD's most successful strategic moves!

Its much easier to look back on that from today's perspective, but it was very troubling to us at the time. However, almost all those who had worked all those years ago in the LNG area have either retired or left for other companies.

I don't know how well you remember a Supervising Process Engineer who was resident in Tokyo for quite a while on the Kalingas project, or if you maintain contact at all. He quit Fluor about 5 years ago with a handful of other FD Process Engineers to form an independent firm called "The Process Group". I hear from them occasionally - He says he's "as busy as I want to be". Naturally, being a small outfit, they are far more competitive than FD. I believe most of their work is Refinery-related, but they are probably able to take on work in many other fields due to their great breadth of experience.

News from Japan seems to indicate that consumer spending is slowly re-awakening. If so, then it appears that the economy's long sleep is nearing an end. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Best regards,

Ron

2000/9/12

Re: CD-R/RW

Dear Ron,

When you buy CD-RW, It is important to check bundled software. Your scanned image of advertisement only mention that it contains bundled software, but it does not mention the name and function of software.

Your observation on Ishiguro's interest in "restrained in speaking one's mind" is what I saw in "The Remains of the Day". Old Japanese has same tendency. Probably this may be a natural tendency of island dwellers. As nearest bookstore had not in hand, I asked them to obtain it. Anyway, what I ordered is translation; I can compare it with original you have mailed me.

Story about a Supervising Process Engineer may be a hint on new business model of engineering firm. I learned from a professor of London Economics that after Mrs. Thatcher, big construction firm in England disappeared and now same functions are beard by 2,000 small consulting firms providing various services to a party who needs construction of any kind.

I still doubt on consumer spending in Japan is recovering. Problem is the lack of new products, goods or services, which attract people's interest.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/9/15?

Sense and Sensibility

Dear Ron,

Recently, I have seen a film in TV, "Sense and Sensibility" originally written by Jane Austen 200 years ago and played by Emma Thompson. I thought that the Elinor Dashwood's role played by Emma Thompson represent traditional English and her sister Marianne looks like modern Yankee girl. The word spoken in this play reminded me that of Ishiguro's novel.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/9/17

Re: FLOATING WORLD

Dear Ron,

The book has arrived at 13^th. I soon started reading the book. Nextday, Japanese translation has arrived. Naturally, I switched to Japanese. I completed reading in 17^th. I read it without big incongruity except the word used by Setsuko. She often used the words” Forgive me”. First I felt some strange feeling with it but when I compared it with Japanese translation “gomenasai”, I felt it natural. It is a word often used by women.

As the subject of the book was very general which tells about one’s glory and regret. I think any one experience similar emotion in his lifetime and whish to write similar book if he has a talent. Anyway, I enjoyed it very much. Thank you for mentioning it and kindly sending me original book. My wife found his first book “A pale View of Hills” in her bookshelf. She purchased it in 1980’s but never read it through.

As you pointed out, most Japanese prefer to use indirect conversation, miss understanding often cause unnecessary tension. One evening, a gentleman from URS Australia, who came from England to Australia, agreed with my view that English and Japanese tend to speak less to keep human relation smoothly. He said that narrow country and dense population created such behavior, and that American and Australian do not need such care. Never the less, when I returned from England after 1-year stay there, I found that our society causes much stress than England. My wife often criticizes me that I don’t understand Japanese delicacy. She says that I was lucky to work in Chiyoda and especially in International business.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/9/18 6:49

FLOATING WORLD, TAXES

Dear Greenwood,

I'm glad you got the book and enjoyed it. We would say that "Murphy" guaranteed that you'd get the Japanese version as soon as you got the English one!

When we were in Japan on business trips we also had difficulty with misunderstandings due to different ways of speaking. At first, before we had realized how different the cultures were, this caused many problems. We soon learned that many Japanese executives were so indirect that we were unable to follow what they were meaning. Fortunately, there were some, such as yourself, who understood our difficulty and, in effect, "translated" each side's comments for the others.

The greatest culture clash I experienced was in negotiations with ADNOC in the middle '90's. As you probably know that is a very international company with only a small minority of Abu Dhabi nationals or even Arabs. Their staff are literally from every country in the world, and their only common language is English. I'd place them at the most "Direct" end of the communication spectrum. We were there as Engineering subcontractor to Mitsubishi together with representatives from Hyundai, the construction subcontractor. Our meetings started with the Mitsubishi personnel leading our side, with Hyundai and FD speaking when called upon. Most of the Mitsubishi personnel, especially the senior ones, had great difficulties with ADNOC's style of confrontational discussion.

Gradually the focus in our group shifted. Eventually our member who dominated the discussion was FD's second in command! He was Korean, but very much an American, culturally. At one point I saw him really being very blunt with ADNOC personnel who were bluffing and, at the same time, keeping the Mitsubishi group informed in Japanese and holding side conversations in Korean with Hyundai. The most amazing thing as this went on was the expression on the faces of some of the ADNOC personnel - they were thoroughly enjoying the show, even though other ADNOC people were suffering at his hands.

I worked in Fluor's office in England for a few months in the middle '80's. The situation was not so difficult as in Japan in the '70's, but there were many of the same communications problems with some of the English (even employees of the American Co., Fluor). I came to jokingly refer to myself as "bilingual" and would often intervene where I saw two people misunderstanding each other.

The Australian's comment about narrow countries and dense population has much appeal from a Japan / England perspective. On the other hand there are contrary examples. Probably the most outspoken people in the US live in Manhattan, one of the most constricted and densely populated parts of the country. Americans from the Prairie states with very low populations and low densities are famous for not speaking much - as are the Yankees from New England which is in between in density.

From recent commentary I believe that the English have continued to evolve towards the US style. This seems very much a generational thing. Our generation seem to have been in the middle between the older, pre-war generation and today's. I suspect the same thing is going on all over the industrial world. My sons take routinely a level of turbulence and rapid change that shakes me. We are really at the end of a century and can hardly realize the nature of the new one.

Today, the LA Times had a very interesting column about inheritance taxes. It maintained that the chief reason for keeping a tough tax is to prevent the sort of inherited wealth which dominates much of Europe. This produces an inefficient economic situation where the inheritances are put into less efficient hands - the infamous "Idle Rich".

In our earlier discussion we concluded the Japanese situation is close to the US, however, re-reading your letters raises a question. In the US, estate taxes are levied against all assets, not just real estate. What taxes are levied on non-real estate assets in Japan? In the US there is a large exemption, which currently is $675,000 per parent ($1.35 MM for most families). Its scheduled to rise to $1 MM each by 2005. After that the tax rate is about 55%. If appreciated assets are involved, additional taxes are leveled as capital gains tax as if they had been sold, so the effective tax is more than 60%.

I still have to check the column's claims, but this excludes the great majority of taxpayers. The column claims only 3000 families pay 50% of the estate taxes.

This seems to me to be an even more important effect of the estate tax compared with the two I'd thought of as reasons to oppose it.

Thanks for you comments on CD-RW. I've decided to put off purchase until after our vacation, but will certainly use them as a guide - software is crucial.

I'll append the article. With my best regards,

Ron

What Makes America Exceptional   By GREGG EASTERBROOK

Thursday, September 21, 2000 5:42 AM

MORE FROM SYDNEY

Dear Greenwood,

Another Bulletin from the Australian Olympics

Ron

2000/9/28

Japanese culture

Dear Ron,

I agree with your observation about Japanese culture. I presume that major parts of losses of three engineering firm's i.e. Chiyoda, JGC and TEC in international business are attributable to this culture. Not only engineering firm, but also other Japanese companies lost unnecessary money because of this.

As you have pointed out, this cultural difference may not be created only by population density. I could not imagine what is the driving force of this difference.

In Japan, estate taxes are levied against all assets, not just real estate. It is same as US. Parallel discussion is now underway in Japan. Japanese government is also considering increase of exemption like in US. But increase amount is marginal. It is still filling the gap created by the past inflation. Compared to US, it is difficult to find super rich in Japan. It is very interesting to see which side may win the erection. Mr. Gore should appeal on this point.

Australian Olympic game is almost near to end. An Australian staying in our office said that he could enjoy the game without any obstacle here in Japan. Because, program of NHK has no interruption by advertisement.

All are set for our trip to US. We could find a person called Mr. Michael Cathy as a driver and guide for entire route from Las Vegas to SF. My role is to act as an interpreter between him and our member.

I think you are about to depart to Paris. I would like to hear from you when we meet in Santa Monica.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/10/20

Meme

Dear Ron,

Many years ago, I was very much impressed by the book "Selfish Gene" written by Richard Dawkins. In it, he introduced an idea of Meme. According to his definition it is a self-copying entity (I don't know exact wording he used, because I read it by translation) resembling gene itself. Now Susan Blackmore wrote a very interesting book titled "The Meme Machine". I enjoyed it very much. The title implies that we are Gene Machine as well as Meme Machine.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/10/23 10:04

MEME MACHINE & PHOTOS

Dear Greenwood,

This may be a bit big because it contains the first of my Paris photos. They deal mainly with architecture. My impression is that the most impressive French architecture was many centuries ago. To me Notre Dame is quite incredible. After that it seems all downhill.

I've enclosed one picture of the exterior of the Louvre, which is about 300 years ago (except for Pei's pyramid). By then I feel the decoration has become over-done. Also I include a picture of Napoleon's apartment (Note, AFTER the revolution). Versailles, the pictures of which have not come back yet, strikes me as worse. Finally there are two recent buildings. The first, the Pompidou Center, has been described as looking like an oil refinery. I've seen much better-looking refineries! Finally there is the gigantic Defense arch in the only real skyscraper area near Paris (actually outside central Paris). Its hard to scale from pictures, but I understand its big enough so that Notre Dame could be easily passed through it. The arch and the surrounding skyscraper area left me completely cold.

I'll have more pictures in days to come.

Dawkins is a very intelligent and, even, brilliant man. In some ways he reminds me of Stuart Kauffman. Also he is very English. In the original English text he characterized Memes as replicators/transmitters of units of cultural items found in human culture. Examples included ideas, clothes, ways to build arches, etc. (I feel he gave short weight to political and social development, but he probably would include them if asked).

I'm afraid that I don't feel too enthusiastic about his book and his focus on gene's as THE evolutionary agent, now added to by the "meme". To a great degree his book reminded me of the old joke that "a chicken is the egg's way of perpetuating eggs". To me any successful organism has to have the qualities he lists, so we can conclude that successful organism's are examples of ways to meet Darwin's criteria. Most importantly he strives mightily to explain apparent altruistic behavior in animals while excluding the idea of survival of the species (i.e. why any animal would endanger its own progeny for the sake of its companions). If he'd only admit that animal "memes" exist and that a well organized society, such as an ant hill or bee hive, is simply a highly efficient way for ants ar bees to survive. In other words, I believe that what he calls Memes are commonplace, non-genetic ways of improving the organism's chances of surviving and are not confined to human culture.

It'll be interesting seeing what Susan Blackmore makes of the Meme. I'll try to find her book and read it.

A very English characteristic, which I have had to fight off in my own work, is the almost malicious use of phrases which are very easy tomisunderstand, knowing that many people will do just that. Dawkins' most notable is his use of personal characteristics for the gene - especially the word "selfish". He clearly states that this is only a convenient figure of speech to describe ways in which successful genes operate, but many people miss this and much wasted discussion ensues. This was one of the hardest to lose of the bad English habits I learned in England and which I had to "unlearn" in order to avoid being misunderstood in engineering and business discussions. Academic English culture is all to fond of this usage. Perhaps it helps them feel superior.

Sorry for the lecture, but it has long been one of my complaints about my country of origin.

I'm not sure if I'll get another batch of pictures to you before you go. In any case I'll be able to let you see more of them at the end of the month.

Best regards,

Ron

Re: MEME MACHINE & PHOTOS

Dear Ron,

It seems that your were quite busy visiting various places in Paris. Although I never visited Pompidou center and Napoleon's apartment, I share your observation on architectural design. I found several mini Defense arch in Japan. Architectures in Medieval Period have something, which impress us. Basilica di San Francesco and Basilica di San Chiara in Assigi are good example of those.

Last part of Susan Blackmore's book was what I never thought of. But It was very understandable. As you pointed out, Susan Blackmore is also playing bad English habits. You have to hide such habit in actual life but still enjoyable.

Recently, I have read a summary of report written by a committee lead by a professor in London Economics claiming that decline of British Empire was caused by a behavior of successful businessmen who had lead Industrial revolution. Instead of creating a new school for technology and business, they just sent their children to Public school which was not appropriate for reproduction of leaders in business and industry. Whereas, US developed such practical schools and took over Britain. Our business leaders are now doing the same in Japan.

I am departing to US tomorrow.

Wishing to meet you in Santa Monica.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/10/28 8:41

SAD NEWS ITEM

Dear Greenwood,

Its probably too late to reach you before you leave, but it'll be waiting for you on your return. I couldn't resist sending you this sad tale; the sort of thing we expect in the USA rather than in Asia.

Ron

Last Ming Dynasty - Era Home Razed

2000/11/3 11:45

SANTA MONICA PHOTOS

Greenwood-san,

Here are a few pictures from our evening together. Some of them (Mr. Oshikawa and Mr. Iizuka) are quite big files since I scanned at 300 resolution as I was using only a small part of the frame. Perhaps your image processor can enlarge them.

Last night (Wed) my younger son also announced his engagement to his girlfriend of the last two years. Naturally Connie and I are very happy, although she now is worrying about two weddings! It seems that next year will be a festive one.

I've noticed that Paul Krugman has become very outspoken about Bush. His column "Bait and Switch" of Nov 1 is especially blunt. I'm afraid he's all too correct and expect we'll go right back into "Reaganomics" if he wins next week. (Of course Gore's budget plans are almost as unrealistic).

I'll send the photos in three separate emails to keep the size manageable. This has one of the two of us and two pictures of your accomplished artist.

Trust the rest of your trip is going well and that you all arrived safely in San Francisco today.

It was great to see you again and to meet all your colleagues.

Ron

2000/11/6

Re: SANTA MONICA PHOTOS

Dear Ron,

We have arrived safely to Japan as planned.

It was a great pleasure to be able to meet in Los Angeles. Thank you for your sending pictures of us. I have resent a part of your photos to corresponding person.

In this trip, I found that US land is huge. Big Sur was 10 times longer than Izu's West Coast. We run over 1,112 miles in 7 days.

During our trip, many things had happened. Among them, stolen bike was the biggest event. A gentleman who lost the bike had to compensate the remaining value of the car ($13,500). Because, insurance company only compensate when the car was secured by chain attached to the bike. We used the chain in night times but we didn't secure it in lunchtime. It was my regret I couldn't mention it to our colleagues before the incident, because I read the contract document after we lost the bike. It took 2 hours until I fully understand the 6 pages document.

I very much enjoyed our finish ride through Golden Gate Bridge and climbing up and down

hilly residential area of San Francisco and slalomed Rombard street under flashlight of tourists.

An article about Last Ming Dynasty remind me what has happened in Japan and other places where big social value changes were undergoing. Some day, Chinese people realize the fault, but too late to come back.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/11/11 3:17

WEB LANGUAGES

Greenwood - san,

I saw this story on the internet today. It sounds like a very logical development, although only extensions .com, .net and .org are included at the moment.

One very interesting claim is that estimated 25 percent of Internet users nowadays surf only in Chinese.  That seems hard to believe. What do you think?

Here's the article, best regards.

Ron

Major language barrier on Web about to fall

2000/11/13

Re:WEB LANGUAGES

Dear Ron,

Probably, "25 percent of Internet users nowadays surf only in Chinese," means that 75% can also surf on web site using only English. Most Japanese nowadays surf only in Japanese. There are millions of useful web sites written only in Japanese. Only professional peoples who whish to contact foreign information surf also English pages. Famous i-mode pages run by NTT contain only Japanese. Young people are using this web site through cellular phoned during idle time in commuter trains.

Using Kanji in URL is not so useful because you have to switch from Roman mode to Janji mode during typing in URL. But for corporation seeking trade name, it might help.

Last night, I hastily uploaded a report of our recent trip to US. It requires brushing up anyway. I also uploaded your photos in Paris together with your comments. Please advise me any corrections.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/11/15 7:18

TRIP COMMENTS

Dear Greenwood,

What a trip you had! The pictures really bring home how many things you did along the way. I especially enjoyed the one from Northern California.

I have very few comments on your write-up but will list them to help you "polish" it.

Your scan of my photos was certainly better than my machine can do. Thank you for displaying them so prominently - it seems my face is all over your site. I do hope they bring back memories to you and other friends who've been there. There were no corrections.

I'll have other topics later, but want to get this to you asap.

Best regards,

Ron

2000/11/16 8:41

Fwd: Official Florida Election Ballot

Ho Ho.

Official Florida Election Ballot

2000/11/16 8:43

Fwd: HRH Proclamation - British response to US election

About time.

Ron

(English Joke serial No.66)

2000/11/16 8:43

Fwd: Voting ballot for dummies

One more. Is this enough?

Ron

2000/11/22 4:28

ECHNOLOGY MARCHES ON

Its good to see the technical community keeps on coming up with better solutions.

Ron

2000/11/24 6:29

Re: MEME MACHINE & PHOTOS

Dear Greenwood,

The English school system was certainly part of the problem. However, it is part of a broader context. Previously, and to some degree still today, the country has been very class-conscious. Englishmen saw themselves as firmly in one of three social classes (Upper, Middle and Lower) and were not only antagonistic to the other two, but also didn't think of trying to join them.

The result was a calcification of society; epitomized by the notorious "Upper Class Twit" - meaning someone completely stupid, but protected in a position of authority by the class system. This system began breaking down after World War #1 when the blunders of the generals caused unprecedented casualties for no good cause.

There are a number of reasons why this system persists. One interesting one that has come up for discussion in the US is the question of inheritance taxes. While European countries theoretically have severe inheritance taxes, in practice they can be easily avoided. This has resulted in the perpetuation of rich families in control of national assets, regardless of the abilities of the later generations. The move to repeal the present tax in the US (which affects only families with over $1 million assets) would tend to create the same asset distribution here with consequent rise in incompetent ownership, as in Europe.

I've finally dug out the article on photo film we discussed. It deals with the discovery by Jacqueline Belloni, a French chemist that Formate Ions would reduce the wastage of photons striking an emulsion. Apparently present films "waste" 60% of the photons because that percentage of electrons displaced from the Ag halide crystals by the photons fall back into the "holes" in the crystal structure. She discovered that doping the film with HCO2- not only scavenges the holes produced by the photons, but also releases a second electron that can attach to a second Ag atom in a sort of chain reaction.

The result is to reduce the number of photons required to darken a crystal from the present theoretical 3 or 4 to less than 2. (They state that modern emulsions need about 10 actual photons instead of the theoretical number due to this reabsorption of electrons). Agfa-Gevaert, who are funding the research, have yet to produce a proven product (e.g. with an adequate shelf life, etc.) but hope to have one on the market in 4 years. This should permit something of a quantum jump in the speed/graininess ratio of films. So, the target for the digital camera keeps moving. Its amazing what development occurs when competition demands it.

There has been more news on the son front. Peter, who became engaged recently, is now married. The reason for the haste was that his girlfriend, Rita, who is Brazilian, was here on a work visa which expired when she lost her job recently. She would have had to return to Brazil if they didn't marry. Peter, who had been going out with her for well over two years, was faced with the need to make a decision. So, last week they got married in a simple civil ceremony. There will be a more formal wedding next year. Bill (the older son) will be marrying on July 14, Peter and Rita have to choose a date which doesn't clash; probably later in the year. With her family wanting to come for the wedding, there are many schedule conflicts to be handled.

So, not too long ago, Connie and I were wondering if they'd ever get married. Now it seems that they are!

Best regards,

Ron

2000/11/28 4:51

BUMPER STICKER

Now the election's been "certified' for some, here is the new sticker for Democrats:

DON'T BLAME ME

I VOTED FOR GORE (I think)

The there's another multi-president one 6 Presidents on a sinking ship:- (English Joke Serial No.68)

Ron

2000/11/28

Re: Official Florida Election Ballot

Dear Ron,

I enjoyed very much four different ballots you have mailed to me. I especially found the last one is most entertaining. I resent all of them to my friend. Mr. Gore seems loosing people's support.

Long time ago Japan had several classes called Samurai, Farmer, Industrial, and Merchant. On top of them a small group of royal family and aristocratic class and at the bottom, unclassified class existed. It was destroyed about 150 years ago during Meiji Revolution. And second major impact attached Japan when Japan surrendered allied forces. For example, my wife's parent came from a very rich landlord who owned almost equal size of Takasaki City. But they lost most of them at that time. But still they are biggest landowner in Takasaki City. This story has no relation to the wealth of my wife.

Relaxation of inheritance tax is also discussed in Japan.

I have mailed your story of Formate Ions found by French chemist to my friend who retired Fuji Film Corporation. His response was that filmmakers are already using several molecules having the same function. Formate Ions may be effective but when it is added to existing mixtures its effectiveness may be greatly reduced.

By the way, I have found that combination of recent 3m million pixel camera, latest model of inkjet color printer and special paper for photo print will give us a fine photo having equal quality to chemical photo.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/12/7

7th fleet

Dear Ron,

I think I didn't thank you for your photos mailed to me. They had definitely been delivered to me and I have given some of them to appropriate person. Thank you.

Congratulations for your son's marriage. In your son's case, legal system pushed them forward.

I uploaded some of your jokes about recent presidential election to my HP. I hope there would be no copyright infringement.

In the coming Sunday, I am going to meet a young American naval officer of 7th fleet stationed in Yokosuka. She is a sister of Michael Cathy. I have great curiosity why she wished to be a naval officer.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/12/8

Cellular phone

Dear Ron,

Recently, I decided to carry cellular phone. Main purpose is to use it when meeting people and use it for asking rescue when my boat (coming next April) is in danger. But I found hidden advantage of it is instantaneous receipt of e-mail even in train. But disadvantage is unnecessary advertising e-mail; for example a mail from MP3.com wakes me up in midnight. I started to cut off all those ad e-mails to me.

It seems President Greenspan is maneuvering US.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/12/9 7:50

TURBULENT TIMES

Greenwood-san,

The interest in our election outcome is at fever pitch here. The Florida Supreme Court has just ruled in favor of Vice President Gore, albeit by only a 4 - 3 majority. Its expected that Governor Bush's attorneys will immediately ask the United States Supreme court to "Stay" (or put on hold) that decision while Bush appeals to the US Supreme court.

In the meantime, politicians in the Florida government and the US Congress are getting ready to take various actions open to them under their personal interpretations of the law. Needless to say all these actions are intensely political - with opinions on each side completely self-serving. It is a real test of the US Constitution and all three branches of government. I hope we get through it without permanent harm to the rule of law and to our ability to govern and be governed.

All of this, plus news that the US economy is finally slowing down, has the stock market very agitated. Earlier this week the market zoomed upward after Greenspan's statement (>10% one day gain on the Nasdaq). The next two days that gain was reversed; now, today, it's up again.

We have a simple cell phone - just a telephone, no internet connection. We use it as you described, for safety and convenience when traveling, or just when going out in the car - in case of breakdowns. In your business situation I can see the advantage of having access to your email at all times. This must be especially the case in Japan (or Europe) where many professional people spend so much time commuting by train. Here, where almost everybody commutes by car, we also see all too many drivers using their cell phones while driving (voice, I hope not email!). It is quite a safety issue - some communities have made it illegal to use a cell phone while driving.

The "spam" problem you mentioned is a big annoyance here too. My service provider has introduced a spam filter which keeps my spam messages down to perhaps one per day. Some Japanese providers may have a similar option. Can your phone not be shut off - for example, when you sleep? Perhaps its just easy to leave it switched on by accident?

I'm glad the photos reached you safely and you've passed them out. I hope they give you and your club some good memories. It will indeed be interesting to hear the motivation of Michael's sister. Our armed services have been very scrupulous to recruit women and to allow them to advance their careers without discrimination. Women's liberation has advanced very well here. It is no longer surprising that two members of the US Supreme Court are women and that one of the judges deciding the election issues in Florida is a woman. This principle has penetrated throughout almost all parts of the US culture.

It is always easy to second-guess decisions from the past. Peter and Rita seem to be very much in love and things are very harmonious. Connie and I hope they continue. Of course, these days relatives such as parents and grandmothers have far less say in these matters.

Bill, Peter and I talked again about digital images. Peter, who is in the graphics business, says they still use at least 30 megabytes for digital images of the best photo quality. With 3 million pixels he feels that in enlargements you can still see the regular pattern of the digital image which is much less acceptable than the random AgBr graininess. Another factor is the number of colors and darkness levels. Without a very large number, the boundaries of color gradation steps are quite crude in critical areas, such as faces.

However, its clear that the gap is still closing rapidly. Both sons now use scanners and good digital printers to copy their AgBr pictures onto photo-type paper. Apparently the paper itself is enormously important. They "threaten" to give me few sheets to try on my simple printer. One day I'll be pulled (perhaps kicking and screaming) into digital photography.

Of course, there is no question of copyright infringement on my jokes (I got the great majority over the net, too). One of the great strengths and weaknesses of the internet is its freedom. As you know the music and film industries are desperately trying to counter piracy, but they seem to have a very hard time ahead of them. The most disturbing possibility is that piracy will "kill" off the whole artistic industry. Not only would that devastate the Southern California area and many others worldwide, but it could result in great damage to artists and all the arts. I certainly hope a way to balance different rights is found.

Best regards,

Ron

2000/12/11

Re: 7th fleet

Dear Ron,

I checked New York Times and CNN.com now. I t seems that final Supreme Court's decision was not yet done.

Your view that Internet usage through cellular phone while you are moving is unlikely in US because most people are commuting in their car was a good point to understand why it became popular in Japan. Probably NTT's effort to spread their i-mode system in US may fail because of this.

As my provider does not provide spam filter, I contacted each source and pushed button to stop such mail. It is working well now. Of course, every night I decided to switch off the phone.

I asked Emily, a young officer of 7th fleet in Yokosuka, why she went Annapolis. Her answer was because there was a chance and she wished to challenge it. Simple! She is directly commanding 30 men under her. Just after her first assignment in this August in Yokosuka, she called her man and attached "sir" after her word as she always did. The man said you shouldn't do that again. I am here for feeding my family. She said Russian officers were very curious how women stay in a battle ship. After 1-year assignment in Japan, she is going back to school and learn nuclear power for aircraft carrier, her mother ship. I am looking for visiting her ship in early next year.

Regarding digital image I agree with your son's opinion on regular pattern of the digital image, the number of colors and darkness levels.

I have removed doubtful copy from my pages.

My daughter sent me a Christmas joke that she had received from her friend in England. (English Joke Serial No.69)

I remembered when they were child they believe that Santa really exist.

I wish you and your wife have a nice Christmas Holidays. My wife and her friend may visit Paris in this season.

Greenwood

2000/12/14 5:14

MERRY CHRISTMAS

After the cavorting around over the Presidential election, I've decided the only safe greeting to you all is as follows:

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all . . .. . and a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2001, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make this country, (not to imply that this country is necessarily greater than any other country or is the only "country" on this planet), and without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith, choice of computer platform, or sexual preference of the wishee.

(By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her/himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year, or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.)

Ron

2000/12/19

Dubya

Dear Ron,

I exploded laughter when I reached the word "PC platform" in your mail on 14th. I circulated it to my daughter and son. I will add it to my collection of jokes.(English Joke Serial No.71)

Trying to find who is Dubya in Yahoo, I found a funny web site called "Dubya's World" http://www.dubyasworld.com/home.html

Recently, I found a Japanese translation of "Guns, Germs and Steel" and started reading the latter half of the book. Even in Japanese, my reading speed is still slow. Probably because I can foresee what he is going to tell us. His thought is what I vaguely considered previously. But it is worth reading because of its huge backup data. I think I can read through the book within this century. Then I am ready to answer your question. If you still have.

Regards,

Greenwood

2000/12/30 5:39

JAZZ - BOOK AND DOCUMENTARY

Greenwood-san,

I've just been reading from a book produced in connection with a new documentary produced by the Public Broadcasting System here. Its a truly encyclopedic look at Jazz, made by the famous documentary producer, Ken Burns. (He made the great programs on the US Civil War, Baseball and many others).

The program will be broadcast on public television here starting early in January. I'm sure it will be exported and shown in Japan too. Ken Burns has earned a front rank placing among documentary producers and I have enjoyed all the shows of his that I've watched. I'll certainly tape his shows (10 in total, about 18 hours). Judging by his previous shows this one will be very thorough and full of insights. I cannot think of a better introduction to Jazz; you may want to watch out for its showing in Japan.

The book, which probably includes much of the text from the shows is huge, almost 500 pages with hundreds of illustrations. I've only dipped into it so far (it was a Christmas present) but have found it full of interesting data and very accurate. As I read further, I'll comment more.

Our holiday has been great this year. Now we are practically a family of 6 - we had a great dinner on the 25th December with friends as well. Some of them are coming over tonight to enjoy Connie's cooking again as a sort of early new year's celebration. I am so happy that both our sons live close by; so many friends only see their children infrequently sine they live thousands of miles apart.

Yes, the ideas in Guns, Germs (ggs?) have been widely spread sine it was written. I also had the experience of familiarity with many of his thoughts before I read them. Perhaps the main impact of the book is finding the voluminous documentation and clear logic by which he derives his conclusions from the data and experiences. I'll certainly look forward to discussing it with you later.

I hope and trust that your holiday season is going well, no doubt the new year is also an occasion for partying in Japan too. I also trust that your company will continue successfully, even though there seems to be continuing difficulty getting the Japanese economy to reflate.

Best regards,

Ron

October 14,  2002

Rev. November 25, 2002