Shiny Things

Last week went by very quickly and very well. I was a good bit busier at work than I have been and as a result I didn't get the time to write this post a day early. So, here I am typing away on Monday morning after having gotten my Worlds of Magic work done for the moment. It's almost 10AM and I feel half asleep. Sadly I've had trouble sleeping for the last few nights. The reasons have ranged from indigestion to Titus waking me up again and again. I'm burned down, half asleep, and draining pots of coffee in an attempt to keep up with everything, lol.

First, I'll share a few pictures of the kids:


The first two are of Felicity and Issac playing “trains” (or something) with cardboard boxes. The third is the “bed” I found Caleb in one morning. (I really need a better camera. The one I have needs just the right amount of light to take a good picture.)

As I said earlier I had more Worlds of Magic work than normal last week. The fact is that the game is supposed to be finished by July and that I'm trying to finish almost all of my design work by the middle of next month. I've taken my time up to this point because there was plenty of space between me and the release date. That gap is closing, however, and I want to be done well in advance.

I ask you to keep us in your prayers. Several publishers are looking at us now and Leszek is certain that we'll do better with a publisher than without one. Wastelands Interactive (the company producing Worlds of Magic) also gets its first game on Steam this week. Good sales could give us additional funding to dump into WoM. So, feel free to pray about that as well :)

In other news, the weather has been fairly nice. Spring is certainly on its way. However, it's not here yet. Today and tomorrow are supposed to be cold and wet. Either way, I took some pictures that show off the impending Spring.


That's most of the news around here. Joey Miller's new laptop screen did come in and we got it replaced. I meant to take some pictures of that, but I forgot about it... It wasn't exactly a perfect fit, but it works. Of course, I have e-mailed the seller to see what they can do about it (if anything).

Anyways, that's the news. Now it's time to discuss what's been on my mind. As you can imagine it's basically a continuation of what I was talking about last week, that being wealth. Now, I do want to say before I go any further that I'm not really wealth obsessed. I mention that fact because the subject of my recent posts may make it look like I am. What I'm obsessed with is happiness. True, eternal happiness. That comes from the Lord.

However, as the bible says in James 2:15-17: “If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” I put a focus on wealth because I want others to have it. (Although I freely admit that I would like a good bit of it as well, lol.) I want to be able to help people become more wealthy, while explaining at the same time that true and lasting wealth comes from the Lord. I think we all have our own talents that can be used to further the Kingdom. I strive to make wealth creation one of mine.

So, “Shiny Things” is the title of my post because what I've been thinking about is the next step of wealth. We've already discussed necessities. Now we can talk about luxuries. Now, for the purposes of this post “luxuries” aren't just fur coats and diamond rings (although those things certainly apply), but are anything that aren't one of the necessities of life. Now, with such a general definition the luxuries category may seem huge, but the fact is that it's actually a lot bigger than that. (At least in a modern country it is.) Luxury goods are what make up a vast majority of the total market. How? Well, let me explain.

First, we have the necessities of life: Food, Water, and Shelter. Anything that goes beyond that falls into our luxury category. What about gasoline? Well, if it's used to produce food or shelter it can be looked at as a necessity because it's a tool. However, when it's used to drive to a job where you make soda or pencils or paper plates then it becomes a luxury. We could survive without soda, pencils, or paper plates. So, gasoline burned up in order to aid in their production is a luxury, not a necessity. Tires worn out for the same purpose are also luxuries. So are the cars that take people to work to do those jobs, in fact.

Now, as you can imagine a lot more gas is burned up in the manufacturing of luxuries than of necessities. A lot more tires are worn out and a lot more cars manufactured for luxury. Of course, this fuels itself. You see, the guy that makes gas sells a little of it to farmers. Then he buys food with the money he makes. Plus he wants a car with tires on it so he doesn't have to live at a fuel distillery. So, he buys a car and tires for himself. The guy that makes tires buys food, gas and a car. I'm sure you get the idea.

The point is that even in such a limited example three fourths of the labor goes into producing luxuries, not necessities. Consider your own job (or the job you retired from), how much of it produces (or produced) the necessities of life? For my part I'm a computer repair man, network engineer, and game designer. Believe it or not most of the computer work I've done was for luxury items. My Dad worked at a company that made vending machines for almost twenty years. A vast majority of his efforts went into getting people cold soda where and when they wanted it.

All this may seem pointless, but it's not. The fact is that it's good to look at just how unnecessary most wealth really is. The reason being that it helps you spot places where wealth can be generated. And it helps you see where things that might be considered luxuries (like gasoline) may become considered necessities in time.

For instance, a lot of my thoughts are currently centered around Dominica. It's a country with a lot of people and a lot of natural resources (for it's size). However, there's a general feeling of “just making ends meet” all over the island. I certainly wouldn't call the people poor, but they could unquestionably generate more wealth than they do. So, what's the problem? In my opinion, it's mainly just a lack of knowledge. (I mean no insult Josian, this is just how I see it, lol). The general populace doesn't know what they can do to generate wealth.

That's why it's so important to reflect on just what wealth is. Once you know that you can look around and see opportunities. For instance, if you go to the Save-A-Lot in Roseau you can buy bags of frozen chicken... from Florida... So, on an tropical island almost 1,500 miles from Miami, that is COVERED in chickens, they import chicken.... No really, I want you to reflect on that for a moment. Dominica is an independent country with it's own president, legal system, foreign policy, etc, and yet they have frozen chicken shipped in when many, many people raise their own chickens.

Now, at first, one might think that the local farmers meet demand so well that there's no need for a local chicken industry. Of course, that argument looses weight when you think about the fact that they ship in frozen chicken from Florida. That underlines the fact that frozen chicken is a luxury that the Dominicans want. The want it bad enough to have it shipped in and pay extra for it. However, they don't produce it locally. That raises one simple question: Why not?

Well, it's not because chickens are hard to raise in Dominica. Nope. They're not. They have almost no natural enemies and can forage enough to survive in many places on the island. As a matter of fact Rachel and I got a dozen chickens just because a hen decided to lay and hatch a clutch of eggs under a house we were renting. They lived off bread scraps we threw out and whatever they could find. In all the places in the world where you could raise chickens, Dominica rates amongst the best.

In fact, in order to supply chicken for Save-A-Lot you wouldn't even need to raise chickens. There are more than enough small time farmers raising chickens on the island already. Someone could buy them in bulk from the locals, kill, clean, bag, and freeze them. Once that was done Save-A-Lot could sell Dominican chicken to Dominicans. This would keep more money in Dominica. The farmer, the butcher, and the market would all be Dominican. They would go from importing a luxury item to producing one.

And really that's just the beginning. And I don't mean “the beginning of what you can do in Dominica”, but “the beginning of what you could do just with chickens in Dominica”. In fact, there's enough to talk about that I'll save it for my next post. I'll just title it “Dominican Chicken” or “The Chicken That Could Be In Dominica” or “The Dominican Chicken Barons” or something...

Either way, this post has run long enough. I'll try to flesh this concept out for you next week. For now, however, goodnight from South Carolina!