Part 1 – Debit, Credit, or Cash? Small merchants (a cafe, and a small grocery store) on my street will not take debit or credit cards if you buy for less than $5. That’s because they’ll loose money on the transaction (i.e. what they have to pay the bank is well above their profit margin). This morning I asked the man at the cafe what the transaction cost was. He said it was $0.65 or thereabout, which surprised me because it was higher than I thought. It’s higher than, say, Paypal, because they have to set up the devices there at the register. So my recommendation here is: avoid using cards whenever you can, especially at small independent merchants. Help them survive. That is less the case for big chain stores that just want you to be hooked, and set their prices to afford a higher margin. They may even be more concerned about taking cash because they’re easily the target for robberies and petty thefts. In that way, airlines stopped taking cash just because …

Today I went to the vigil preceding the execution of Troy Davis. This was the first time I attended such a vigil, and this one in San Francisco was across the continent from Georgia. I must say it was very sad. A few came to speak into the megaphone, two sang beautifully. Ten minutes before four o’clock, we moved from a loose pack to a huge circle there on Justin Herman Plaza, held hands, in silence. Even the zip line above us was silent for that time, as they had eerily sent a few tourists down before, shouting their joy above somber statements. It was city silence, the sirens and the street noises in the background. The Ferry Building’s clock rang at four, waking me from meditation. Actually, it startled me, knocked me out of meditation. Many people checked their smart phones for several minutes. Then someone announced there had been no execution. There were cheers and tears, but the Amnesty person then announced it hadn’t been a stay, just the Supreme Court asking for …

few years ago, I left the world of technology to study English Literature, read more fiction, and write.  I got rid of the old Sears TV with its rabbit ear antenna, and after moving to Berkeley, no longer saw the need to shop in the electronics stores.  This year, I tried to update myself with an iPod, but found that I actually liked to hear what was going on around me on the street and on BART.  So I don’t really qualify as a technologist, if the prerequisite is to also be a consumer of technology.  There are plenty of guys who will talk to you about the latest and greatest this and that, and to prove their point they’ll grab a device hanging on their belt. I buy books, and take pleasure in finding them at a used bookstore or among remainder stacks of unsold first editions.  I think I qualify as a scavenger of sorts, letting items cross my path rather than running after them.  I think that’s why I prefer the local, …

In every major town of France and most of Europe, the pharmacists take turns at staying open all night and on holidays.  In a similar way, Berkeley Espresso is the de facto café on guard on holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I discovered that this morning, as I looked out the window this morning of Christmas, the street at its quietest, but the purple neon sign lit, and the only possible destination of walkers. Not one minute after I arrived, a long line of people formed behind me, as if I had attracted them like a magnet on my short wandering.  Perhaps we were all mysteriously synchronized, but for a minute I didn’t know whether to take my coffee to go, because a couple had entered and decided to reserve the counter stools for their own sense of security.  Fortunately, the man grabbed a table as soon as its current occupant showed signs of liberating it, and I could continue my plan of sitting in a corner of the counter to write this. This café …