cheap affordable makeshift housing(unfinished)

The homeless can't help being mentally ill, so why not care for them in a small meager way by giving them relatively comfortable shelter. This may keep them off the streets from bothering people if you also gave them land to garden on.

Have it made of pvc pipe structure that has mylar and scrim layers. Mimicking "multi layer insulation". This protects from all radiated heat and some conducted heat from air spacing between layers because of scrim cloth(air is a poor conductor of heat). Also this structure would be cube shaped, and only be big enough to hold an adult standing up or laying down. Because of the small size of space, it would hold any body heat released by the person inside, and eliminate the need for heating. Of course you'd also be wearing warm clothes. But they could also warm up rocks in the fire and put them into the small structure. The multi-layer insulation may be stored inside of the pvc pipes for easy transport.

Then may put additional spray foam insulation inside of the structure for less conduction of heat.

Or tube shaped with mylar shingled over the dome.

This is a concept that we can test on the homeless and get funding for the cost of the materials by getting feedback on the functionality by the homeless living in them.

I have homeless living in the woods next to where I work and they live in the rain and the cold and the heat. The homeless are people who usually have mental problems and cannot hold a normal job because of the mental problems interfering with social life. Therefor they ask for money on the street or trick people into giving them money or pressure people into giving them money instead of working. And if they are addicted to drugs then they sometimes turn to crime to pay for the addictions. But they may still be an asset to us if they would test out new types of housing and then giving feedback on comfort level of the new structures. They'd have somewhere comfortable to dwell and we would get feedback. This wouldn't solve the problem of begging though, or crime.

Atomic Battery

I just added a new idea to whynot.net, called "Atomic Battery" under "mobile services" you can see it here.

Relaxation/Adventure Ideas

I plan on getting an inflatable canoe($200) and life vests and ores and paddle around the area seeing the rich houses and experiencing the peace and quiet.
Then when I've gotten bored with that I will buy an inflatable dinghy($1,300) with a motor and go to private islands and camp out and do fishing and just fun.
The I will finally buy a sale boat($?) to go as far as I want and quit my job and go to maybe the osa peninsula Costa Rica or an equivalent paradise.

I might also get an electric bike that goes 50 miles/hour and 50 miles per charge because it's lithium ion, which I can use as a second vehicle that requires no maintenance except for bad batteries, and requires little insurance. I'd use it for fun and for a backup plan f my car dies and I don't want to use the bus.

I now only buy on craigs list and other internet places like ebay, because they're better deals than retail. And can then sell them back for what bought them at.

Lava House

I just added an idea to whynot.net called "lava house" under "home" you can see it here.
Later added,6/11/09: With powerful enough lasers you would be able to melt rock into magma in a constant stream. But that's decades away. For now you can use a blow torch, maybe one that uses hydrogen if you need to create the fuel from scratch because of rising energy prices in the future. In fact you may just elect to melt slabs of rock together at the seems to make them water tight, like on the roof.

EEStor Will Succeed!

I now am almost totally certain that EEStor will succeed because the only reason that any scientist has for the ultra-capacitor not working is because the perfection needed for permittivity to be achieved is not possible with todays technology. But where I agree that we cannot make things perfect on the molecular level yet with semiconductor technology, I also know that we will be able to make things that perfect some day, and that it is only a matter of time. We used to only have flash memory of 1 gig, but now with the same sized device it has become more "perfect" or smaller so that the same sized device has 16 gig. Moores law is what investors relied on in the past when investing in IBM and other semiconductor companies. And moores law still holds true for EEStor. It is possible in the future and it will happen, as we make the semiconductor printing process smaller and smaller and therefor more and more perfect we will see EEStor succeed eventually. So I think in the same way that the genome was mapped at faster and faster rates until it was finally done before funding was cut, I think you will also see the predicted unveiling of EEStor's EESU sooner rather than later, and maybe even at the end of 2009 as expected.

The problem of the government getting rid of this technology in some way someday stems from the fact that it's an energy technology. Now they use oil to control people but with this capacitor technology the people in power will now be supplying electricity instead of oil as power. They will either have a monopoly on solar panels or a monopoly on their new NIF fusion energy source. Either way the people in power want to always keep their control over the masses in some way.

So when the stock is doing good and in the news the government starts saying something about the technology being a matter of national security, that's when you want to sell the stock and run for the hills because that's when eminent domain takes it over and the stock will be worthless.

Lost Paradise

The problem with paradise the getting to it. Paradise being an undeveloped lush place where you can sit on the beach and drink special drinks and do nothing but be alone. This usually only exists in undeveloped countries. A candidate is Osa Peninsula Costa Rica. I saw it on an episode of survivor man.
So to get there would be an extreme endeavor of travel and paperwork and risks and expenses, but if you could get there in your own boat somehow and live out of the boat and afford to not work, then you could just stay there and experience paradise for as long as you wanted.
So the hardest part about paradise is just getting there.

• Bring infinite source of obtaining food and water. Spear fish using a "Hawaiian sling" with paralyzer tip. But using nets is more efficient use of time and energy. Sweat from heat necessitates water source. You can get all the nutrition you need off of coco nuts alone, but you still need variety to stay sane.
  
• Bring tape and alcohol for wounds to not get infected(it's not the cut that kills you, it's the infection).
• Only beaches have coco nuts.
• Leaf rub test: Rub types of leaves on parts of arms and wait a few hours for a rash to break out, if they don't, then you have your new source of tp.
• To cool down be next to a stream that has cool mountain water.
• Move boat if there's a storm
• Just leave if you ever get bored with this type of paradise and instead visit another paradise that you saw on another episode of survivor man.

It's risky to get to paradise, like the saying "People are just dieing to get into heaven!"

When I quit my job that's where I'm going, someday!

Now is the time to buy gold

My dad just gave me a quick economics lesson.
Now is the time to get a hedge against inflation such as gold or real estate.
The reasons for this can be found in this quick economics lesson:

When the government wants to get more taxes but doesn't want you to know you're being taxed, what do they do?
Well one thing they do is they tax someone other than the nice people that voted for them, like lets say... the energy companies! So they say, "We won't tax you, instead we'll tax those evil energy companies in order to cut down on emissions because it's the green thing to do". But what do the energy companies do? They still need to make their percentage, so they just raise energy prices and pass the buck onto the consumer... that means you! So now through this third party you are being taxed by the government.
But some people can figure out this shell game, so what's another way they can tax you without you knowing? Well they can print money and basically borrow from themselves which is called monetizing the debt, the definition in short is "printing more money, which causes inflation". But this also means that if there is more money but the same amount of goods and services then you just do the math and the same goods and services will now cost more in dollars. But it won't hit the entire economy right away which is good because you have time to buy hedges against inflation before the effects actually hit. People say "But how will we pay off all of this debt?" Oh they don't pay it off, they just print more of what passes for money these days(lets say t-bills), so the debt will always be there.
The fact is that most people are just too stupid to know when they're being taxed. And they think that the government is stupid but, they aren't and they know exactly what they're doing and what's going on.
They had to have known about the housing bubble. Here's why. When the house lending industry was deregulated(actually meaning regulations mandating that unqualified buyers be accepted for loans. Yes this is backwards but correct). This made it so that there were now more people bidding on the same house, when there used to be only 2 qualified buyers there are now 2 qualified buyers and 8 unqualified buyers, all bidding on the same house which because of supply and demand means that the house prices went up. And when the bubble burst this was called a housing "market correction". Where all of the unqualified buyers are now not buying houses the demand went way down and so did the prices.
But houses are always a good investment even if the dollar becomes worthless because even then your renters will just pay in whatever currency is around then. And as they say, "They aren't making land anymore".
But in short whenever they say "We're monetizing the debt" you should run out and buy gold or real estate, because those are hedges against inflation. But with real estate you have leverage so that should be the main thing to buy now especially right after a market correction like this in Florida.
But the one thing I'm not sure of is that if one bar of gold now will buy the same number of loaves of bread per ounce as in the future then you're not actually making money, unless maybe you have the power of leveraging, like with houses. At least you want to retain any money you have already by converting your cash into hedges.

Reasons to buy a house

1. Rent it out for 100$ less than the mortgage payment and in a year you can raise it as it appreciates. But the 100$/mo you pay out of pocket will be worth any built up equity.
2. There is always demand for rental property, and if you are 100$ less/mo than the competition, then they will always come to you first and you can choose who you rent to.
3. Fix it up to flip it if you have left over monthly income you can fix it up while living in it. Mostly you just want a house that could just use a good updating and TLC and is in a up and coming good neighborhood, next to a hospital or something. And if you can't sell the house to flip it then just rent it out and wait.
4. If you buy a house in your 20's and somehow never miss a payment over 20 years because you have a secure income, then the appreciation from when you first bought it to 20 years later will be huge. Also rich neighborhoods only turn into richer neighborhoods over time if you're lucky enough to get there before they're a rich neighborhood. Buy multiple houses with the equity from the first, all in different neighborhoods then rent them out, and one is bound to be in a rich neighborhood sooner or later.
5. May just live in the house in the end anyway.
6. Best to start early in the rental business because you will have more profit on the rental price ever year as rental rates go up but your monthly mortgage payment stays the same.
7. $500 per month on a $50,000 house is 12% per year return on investment.
8. I like money more than people now anyway. Think up any evil thing and people have done it, but money buys stuff that can make you happy.
9. They're monetizing the debt which means that it is an absolute certainty that house prices will rise. And as inflation sets in, your mortgage will stay the same price which means you can rent it out cheaply in a year and still make a profit. And because of leverage you will have more equity on money you never spent. Gold has no leverage, so it's not as good of a hedge against inflation.
   

Reasons to not buy a house:

1. Hidden structural flaws that you find out about after buying the house, when you open up the walls.
2. Won't be able to sell the house in this economy(just rent it out)
3. Will be foreclosed upon if you loose your job.
4. Perpetually have to buy stuff for the house.
5. Tenants ruin the house and you can't get the money out of them for repairs.

Here's a good landlord video.

What is a house worth?

I was thinking about how we will all be working for the rest of our lives to pay for the monthly bill of rent or mortgage just to have simple shelter. So then I wondered, what are we really paying for?
And using a house boat as a reference, you can get an idea of what that monthly bill is actually paying for.
If you bought a large 2br 2 ba. houseboat, and then bought an equally sized house. The differences are:

1. The land is free on a boat, because nobody wants water, but the land on a house is expensive because of supply and demand.
2. The boat depreciates with age while a house appreciates over time.
3. The boat requires maintenance but no less than a house.
4. The taxes are less on a boat(half that of a car).
5. There is skilled labor involved in constructing a house or a boat, but boats loose that value while houses add that value.

So in the end you are paying for exclusive rights to a particular 3-dimensional space when living on land, and so you are paying mostly just to exist in a high demand area, because otherwise the houses material value, and skilled labor value, would depreciate in the same way that boats do.

So if you're smart you should construct your own house using free or self bought materials, in an area where there is high supply and no demand for the land(water or mountains or cold). And also go to where you don't have to pay taxes and live under building codes(Alaska or water or in a landlocked/unvisited area). You can make a house better than code easier anyway. This way you won't get stuck paying that 800$ monthly bill for the rest of your life, like the rest of us, and instead spend that money on actual products and services instead of paying forever for the imaginary worth of 3-d space.

Why not work for yourself 8 hours a day building your own house, instead of working to pay the bank that actually owns your house.