Juggling Dynamite

In the interests of disclosure, I admit that I have never been a fan of Starbucks. To me it has always been over-hyped, over-marketed, over-priced coffee and a lot of other high fat stuff helping to make people chubby. More importantly, I saw the prolific rise of Starbucks over the past few years as a mascot for a global consumption bubble that inevitably ushered in our present era of pain.
Through mindless access to ridiculous credit, over the past few years, regular working people became like masses of the nouveau riche. Intoxicated by “lifestyle” and the things they could buy, people bought their brains out. The question was no longer “should we?” We could, so we did. High-priced-lattes that no one could live without, were a daily reminder of the madness that overtook us.
In 1999 Starbucks had 2,000 stores. By 2007 it had close to 10,000 company-owned stores. In 1999 Starbucks opened 447 stores – 1.8 stores per working day; in 2007 that number more than tripled to 1,403 stores a year – 5.5 stores per working day. Suddenly maintaining this unsustainable rate of growth became their primary focus. In an all too familiar pattern of human behaviour, poor business decisions soared, as compromises of quality and location became the natural product of growth at all cost. Now over-levered and over-grown, Starbucks is suffering the thump of the consumer spending slow-down. They have recently announced their need to close hundreds of stores; and counting.
This story bears great insight into the present economic contraction in the world. As the world’s largest economies teeter into recession, export dependent nations are at greatest risk.
Today we learn that Japan’s economy shrank last quarter, leaving the country on the edge of its first recession in six years, as exports tumbled and shoppers spent less. China is now learning the hard lessons of Starbucks on an epic scale. See this excellent article: A Value Investor Looks at China, by Vitaliy Katsenelson.
This contraction bodes poorly for the commodity bulls over the coming weeks and possibly months. And as I have said many times over the past year, the present contraction in growth and asset prices was inevitable. Those who have been taken unaware and are losing precious capital have been blinded by greed and hope or were simply ignorant. We still live on planet earth. Gravity still does apply, and trees still cannot grow to the sky. Neither could Starbucks, neither can China.

Our new Camry Hybrid arrived from Japan last week. Wow! I am madly in love.
At a base price of 30K, it’s about half the cost of most hybrid SUV's and it is the smoothest, quietest, smartest car I have ever owned. As I cruise around town with the gas engine completely off most of the time, I have the stealth sensation of canoeing more than driving. At 50 miles to the gallon I must admit that every so often a devilish voice inside of my head wants to scream out explicatives like “bleep.. bleep… George Bush!”
I still like walking, biking and bussing every chance I get, but for those times when we do need a car, driving electric is liberating and good for the soul.
For anyone that has not yet seen the documentary “Who killed the electric car?”, watch it and realize that GM’s EV-1 was among the fastest, most efficient production cars ever built. It ran on electricity, produced no emissions and catapulted American technology to the forefront of the automotive industry. The lucky few who drove it never wanted to give it up. And yet, it was as recent as 2005 that GM ripped all its EV-1 electric cars out of the hands of adoring owners to crush them on the wrecker’s lot.
It makes you appreciate that stubborn allegiance to the status quo has made GM truly earn its recent demise. But it also makes it clear that armed with this awesome battery technology, North American car manufacturers now have the opportunity to turn themselves around and become genius innovators and world leaders once again.
Honestly, if you have not yet driven an electric car, take one for a test drive. They are one of the smartest things we humans have made in a long time.

Sorry to pose an impolite question, but why are 70% of North Americans over-weight? Yes, Canadians this is us too.
Actually it is easy to see why we are over-weight, the question is more what the hell are we thinking? Why do even some relatively fit parents have chubby kids?
I am going to float my opinion here: it is not cute that our kids are overweight. It is not healthy for our society to keep pretending this elephant is not in the room. It is our failure as parents. It is our fault. We are in charge of buying and preparing the food. We are in charge of leading our kids in physical activity. It is our fault when our kids look like round little balls. We are literally killing them with our “kindness”.
No one has a waist anymore. No one tucks in shirts or wears belts. It is no longer a compliment to tell a 40-year old they have the body of a 20-year-old. Most 20-year-olds are already physical wrecks! Watch a movie from any time before the last 10 years, over-weight people used to be rare. Circuses used to present the fat man or lady as a bizarre exhibit. Now it is fit people that are rare and attracting stares. Regular body people are now considered “skinny”, and over-weight bodies are considered “regular”. We have lost all sense of natural order and balance. This is a path to self-destruction not liberation.
It is not considered acceptable to help our kids smoke or booze it up, so why is it acceptable to assist them in eating their health into oblivion. Allowing and assisting kids to be overweight in childhood, increases their risks for health problems and disease for the rest of their lives.
Talk about economic hurdles for the future! We are poisoning our tomorrow. We have to wake up!!!! It does take more effort and thought to eat slow, healthy, food and get out for exercise daily. But it is the only hope and we adults have to lead our kids through example. There is nothing more important than our health and the health of our kids.
We have to go through our cupboards and fridge and trash the packaged-processed-refined-carb-junk-marketing-driven food in the house. Get rid of it. Buy fresh, local. If we want to be really wild, we can consider starting a garden. Show the kids where real food comes from. Community gardens are becoming popular around the world. Community gardens get people off their couch and working together, young and old, to exert their own energy and grow fresh, healthy food. Community gardens have become an attractive option in today's economy. Most of our grandparents did it. Growing our own food is an idea that has come back around. It represents everything that can be right again in our world.