I’m sitting in the Philly airport yawning, waiting for Sam and Guin to show up. I’ve been up since 3:45am and paid $60.00 for my cab this morning, OUTCH!
I’m really excited to see the girls. I have a sock monkey hanging out of the pocket in my cargo shorts, I think it is going to get Guin’s attention. My flight arrived about 25 minutes early, so i decided to write a log with new found time.
I’ve decided to launch a store front at Project BlueSphere. We are going to focus on proven, tested, and practical equipment for the cruising sailor with a spin of green power. It feels really good to live off of the grid while producing clean power. I’m going to try and make equipment choices clear-cut, and backed with instillation and maintenance videos. I’d like my clients to feel comfortable with their equipment decisions as outfitting a boat for cruising is such an important process. I’m going to focus on critical systems such as safety gear, clean fuel, dependable ground tackle, sound rigging choices, refrigeration, R/O systems, solar and wind power, and so on. I’m amazed at how much crap is out there, and more so, how often I see it on cruising boats. A cruising boat is no place to waste money on faulty gear that you depend on! Your neighborhood marine store is not a good place to get advice. They are in the business of selling and making as much profit as possible.
I’m also planning on taking the newsletter monthly. I will start taking on a boat project each month that I hope other people will follow with their own boats. I think this is a good idea for a number of reasons. Most importantly I think it will motivate people to get their boats ready to cruise while making sound decisions. Secondly, if we have 10 or 20 people tackling the same project at the same time, we could save money by buying equipment together. It will also make a good venue to share ideas. It will take a few months to roll out though.
I’m really psyched about attending the Annapolis boat show on Sunday :)
To get off the subject of boats I must say I’m very proud to be an American today. I cant believe Obama won the Nobel prize for peace. That is such an amazing award and it feels good that my president is looked upon so positively by our world community. It’s about time!
Peace, Love, and more Peace. Man I’m all about it!
Sail far and live slowly.
– Alex
Published in Alex Dorsey
can’t wait to see the store. Ive been wondering what works best, when it comes to green power.
Can’t wait to buy my boat and outfit it using your suggestions and store. Have a good flight
Alex, long-time lurker here. If you need a ride to or from the Jacksonville airport in the future please feel free to send me note and I would be happy to give you a lift wherever you need to go. Hopefully save you a few bucks in cab fares! I live 15-20 minutes from the marina.
Chris
i am also elated by the honor given to Obama–iiit will heip get the bad taste of the murdere BUSH OUT OF MY SYSTEM ALTHOUGH WHEN I THINK OF THE FALLEN YOUNG MEN HE STILL MAKES ME SICK—HOPE TO MEET YOU
Bubby ,
This is why I don’t like to talk about politics. Don’t focus on the negative, the past is the past, it is time to be constructive and move forward. It doesn’t do anyone any good to be hostel about things we can not control, and we cant change the past!
I think we are having dinner tonight, it will be nice to meet you.
Cheers
Alex, long-time lurker here too with a dream/GOAL in west Jacksonville, Hi Chris… Put me down for taxi service.E-me for phone #. Speaking of green, my taxi is a ’91 geo metro averaging over 50mpg’s. not bad without a mast.Love your Show.
..and yes, Peace and Love for all, Jeffrey
I’m proud to be an American every day!
Well I just met Bubby (Sam’s Grandmother) and what an amazing lady 86. Her husband was at Normandy and won the purple heart which he gave to her. It’s good to have a face with the name.
Sam’s parents are watching Guin and we are going out to Philly for a few drinks. It will be an early morning tomorrow as we have a 3 hour drive to the boat show.
i have one suggestion for your store. sell PARTS of wind generators! i fabricated a hub to make the KISS blades fit on the ferris generator and….. wow… she kicks out the amps now!
i love philly. have fun
Can anybody tell me what Obama has actually done to get the award? I’m confused……
I’m not sure that question has anything to do with this Log post.
Alex, a bit of advice. Leave your political opinions at the door. Darrin, his question is legitimate. Last I checked, Obama a.k.a. Bush Lite is getting ready to send 40k more troops to Afghanistan and is preparing to attack Iran with the 4 new bunker-busters the pentagon just purchased. 30,000 lbs. a piece to be delivered by B-2 attack bombers.
Peace Prize…? LOL btw-how is that Iraqi pull-out thing working so far?
Pffffffffffff. Politics ……….
Politics? It’s like the tooth fairy, I don’t believe in it. I can get just as worked up watching basketball with the added benefit that I get to drink while I’m doing it. I’ve tried drinking and watching FOX and MSNBC but I just end up shoving two pencils in my ears to make the pain stop.
Anyway, on a serious note. When you launch your store front I seriously advise against tacking on a shopping cart module to your existing CMS software, (BTW, how on earth did you end up going with ASP instead of PHP?! Free, robust, with a huge support community behind it. What’s not to love?,) and just use a dedicated e-commerce package. Magento has a free version that is pretty beefy–if you’re really tight on cash it’s good.
Personally I recommend CS Cart far above everything else, it’s under $300 and it is super robust. Not as pretty as other packages out there, you’ll be stuck with a few standard visual themes, but I’ve deployed for several industrial manufacturers who swear by them. These are guys that can afford to spend big $$$ and they go with this package because it does everything they need it to. Only down side to it is A) lack of available visual themes and B) Code is a little chunky so it loads slower than the ultra-lean sites. Probably because it has so many nifty reporting and SEO gizmos in it.
Oh, and BTW, both solutions are PHP based so you’ll probably have to set up another domain and route to it with a link from your site. With domain masking users won’t even know that they’re on another site.
Just my 2 cents. Good luck bud!
Politics? It’s like the tooth fairy, I don’t believe in it. I can get just as worked up watching basketball with the added benefit that I get to drink while I’m doing it. I’ve tried drinking and watching FOX and MSNBC but I just end up shoving two pencils in my ears to make the pain stop.
Anyway, on a serious note. When you launch your store front I seriously advise against tacking on a shopping cart module to your existing CMS software, (BTW, how on earth did you end up going with ASP instead of PHP?! Free, robust, with a huge support community behind it. What’s not to love?,) and just use a dedicated e-commerce package. Magento has a free version that is pretty beefy–if you’re really tight on cash it’s good.
Personally I recommend CS Cart far above everything else, it’s under $300 and it is super robust. Not as pretty as other packages out there, you’ll be stuck with a few standard visual themes, but I’ve deployed for several industrial manufacturers who swear by them. These are guys that can afford to spend big $$$ and they go with this package because it does everything they need it to. Only down side to it is A) lack of available visual themes and B) Code is a little chunky so it loads slower than the ultra-lean sites. Probably because it has so many nifty reporting and SEO gizmos in it.
Oh, and BTW, both solutions are PHP based so you’ll probably have to set up another domain and route to it with a link from your site. With domain masking users won’t even know that they’re on another site.
Just my 2 cents. Good luck bud!
Oops. Double post. Sorry. My bad.
I should design and manufacter some of these, and sell them in your store :P
Alex,
Please, please keep politics out of this website. All you will do is create acrimony. Those who agree with you will be happy. Those who don’t will be turned off.
cephalopod,
I agree with you. What I find interesting is that I don’t watch CNN or Fox news, or even television for that matter. I find it hard to believe people actually think of these as credible news sources. I have friends in Australia, Tokyo, all through South America and Europe and get my news from various sources around the world. I do find it offensive when I just hear people just regurgitating what they here on Fox or CNN. Actually it scares the hell out of me that they have so much control over people. Remember news in the 70’s, The bodies from Vietnam? We had real non-bias coverage, news prided itself on getting real stories and wasn’t governed by the 2 party system.
My mother had a Doctorate in Greek mythology and most of our friends were philosophers, writers and great minds. I grew up in a very intellectual community. The Nobel prizes are the brass ring, and a great gift judged by our international peers. I find it offensive that these news sources are attacking their credibility to skew our political views, I find it shameful.
I do agree that the majority of people that watch CNN or FOX as their only or main news sources are indoctrinated. It’s very irritating to talk to people who only spout what they’ve heard on TV and really believe that they know the TRUTH. I mean really how much can you understand about the complex issues facing us from a 3 minute news bite. And you are right to be scared about the amount of influence the MSM has on people. I lived in Egypt for 3 1/2 years. With almost 100% accuracy I could tell you what virtually every person’s opinion would be on various topics. Why? Because they all got their “news” from the TV.
Unfortunately I see this same phenomenon to a lesser degree right here in the USA. The news media is a problem but where do I find the most predictable ideology? From the kids coming out of college. With too few exceptions all of them are blazing liberals that blame Whites, or Capitalism, or Bush, or Republicans for all the problems and injustices facing the world.
We have a young man from Red Lake Indian Reservation living with us. He is a super senior at the largest high school in Minneapolis. We often get into discussions about what happened at school that day. I told him if he really wants to be a rebel go to school and announce that he is a conservative. Liberals don’t understand they have become “the MAN” that they fought so valiantly against in the 1960s. In school everybody loves Obama. Obama is going to save the world. Obama is going to save the poor. We can have little school children singing songs to our wonderful president Obama. But when Bush was president I saw a calendar POSTED IN A CLASSROOM counting down the days until Bush was out of office. It was so disrespectful with stupid pictures of him.
You are very lucky to have grown up in a home with philosophers. I love, love, love philosophers. If there is one thing I would like to do to reform public education it would be to start teaching formal logic and how to recognize weak, illogical arguments starting in 9th grade. I despair at the current conditions of public discourse. I despair that so few people seem willing, or able, to think deeply, logically, independently. I despair at being excited about rewarding someone with a Nobel Prize for their intentions and not their achievements. Awarding this Nobel Prize prematurely was not a great gift from our international peers. It cheapened the Nobel Prize.
And for anyone that wants to criticize me for being a hated conservative, let me share a few things with you. We live in our house with seven people. We took in a homeless boy that was living in a shelter trying to finish high school. We have two people from Egypt living with us, one Muslim, one Christian. We are caring for an alcoholic street person. And we have a guy that has lived with us for 3+ years who recently finished his master’s degree in architecture. We are seven, but only one of us has a job. How many want jobs? Six of us!!
Politics aside, I love your website. I love your passion for green energy and being off the grid. I check for your latest updates every day first thing in the morning.