RV_

Memorial Day Begun in 1866 to honor Civil War Combatants, it was later expanded to honor all brave men and women who served this country in all wars, and paid the ultimate price. Between cookouts, picnics, vacations and sales, Memorial Day may be losing its meaning! Please take one minute, at 3 PM local time on Memorial Day to Remember and honor those brave men and women, who paid the piper that we may dance. A Day to Remember By Derek Gore They gave their all, their lives, and the futures they held dear, They left behind a legacy of sadness and of tears. A folded flag, the sound of Taps, the pride mixed in their leaving, With heads held high, and tears in eye, the loved ones still are grieving. Remember them. Went in harm's way, so young, and they never will grow older, Leaving memories, and pictures, citations in a folder. They left their sons, their little girls, to grow up wondering why, Their daddy that they loved so well, went off to war to die. Remember them. For some it changed, and mother, was the casualty of war, The arms that hugged them never would again, forevermore. Yet all were sons and daughters, and left behind an ache, In the hearts of those, whose turn should come, before their children's wake. Remember them. They rest in peace, some say, and who am I to doubt it? The higher purpose it was served, the enemy was routed. Some came home, some never went, some only watched the news, But they will never hold their child, or argue current views. Remember them It wasn't meant, in leaving, when they all marched off to war, That we'd be left without them, from the cannon's deadly roar. I'm sure that they, would rather, have been here for all of us, But someone had to fight those wars, someone pay the cost. Remember them At 3 PM, this Monday, my flag will fly half mast, As all across the nation, floats the somber sound of Taps. It's only for one minute, or maybe three or four, In tears, I will remember, those who died in every war. © RV Roadie / Derek Gore 2002 Taps and Amazing Grace can be downloaded here to play at 3PM on Memorial Day local time for a national moment of remembrance: http://www.mymorninglight.org/taps/ How to observe Memorial Day http://www.usmemorialday.org/observe.htm

What do you mean by ELO? If you mean Elon's model 3 no reservations are transferable. You can reserve a maximum of 2 https://www.tesla.com/support/model-3-reservations-faq If you mean Elio motors, that ship's sailed, I own a $100 T-Shirt and the City of Shreveport is angry. The Sheriff is on the news and tonight as well as this week it will be all over the news. I believe they are about to charge them 7 million dollars or some such for defrauding the city promising jobs three years ago. I lost one $100 reservation, my only investment loss. My funds, single stock and real properties are profitable. But it would be great to see anyone deliver something close to that Elio. I will be present live at the meeting with the Elio backer and Elio himself to answer to the city planning commission they misled for four years. If I remember correctly Elio sold all the manufacturing equipment for several million and he may owe that back to the city as well. If you are talking about ELO, well the owner of that catalog, Jeff Lynn, is still very much alive and working. https://jefflynneselo.com/ Ramble on ................

Shorts need to stay away from Tesla: "Tesla is most painful stock for short sellers in 2017" Traders short selling Tesla's (TSLA.O) soaring stock have lost $3.7 billion this year, eclipsing the combined losses of traders shorting Apple (AAPL.O), Amazon.com (AMZN.O) and Netflix (NFLX.O). The Palo Alto, California, company's stock has become a battleground between investors betting Chief Executive Elon Musk will revolutionize the automobile industry and skeptics who question his aggressive production targets. Those conflicting views of the electric-car maker have deepened in recent weeks, with short sellers increasing their exposure even as paper losses mount and Tesla's stock hits new highs. Short bets against Tesla have grown to $10.1 billion from $8.7 billion at the start of April, and during that time short sellers have racked up paper losses of $1.4 billion, according to S3 Partners, a financial analytics firm. Tesla's stock has climbed 15 percent in the same period and has surged 50 percent so far in 2017. "You have your momentum guys riding this stock up and making a fantastic return, and the fundamental guys holding onto their shorts and building them and saying 'this can't continue' and waiting for the shoe to drop," said Ihor Dusaniwsky, S3 Partners' head of research. "It's one of your classic yin and yangs on Wall Street." Read the rest here: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-stocks-idUSKBN17Y29O

Tesla was trading at $327 earlier and now is still up $8.76 and trading at $322.83. Not bad for a $17 and $22.50 large block buy over five buys and only one share at $300 because I wanted a nice round number of shares and was at one share shy of a nice four figure number of shares. Somewhere between 1000 and 9999! WE are happy campers today.

Barb, Good luck! I already took my original money off the table, and a token $5k profit, leaving me 80% of my original shares when it hit high $90s. Our retirement is more than sufficient and medical becomes TriCare For Life in six days. Then all copay's are covered by TriCare as secondary to Medicare. However, they will take $115 a month out of my SS for part B! Lynn has a decent 401k account from which she will soon have to start taking the mandatory withdrawals. So all of that goes into other investments. She will be 65 in two years. We have been very fortunate in not having to gamble our retirement for investments. My Tesla investment was to me like the cost of $45k fishing boats, and another $10k of equipment for tournament fishermen. Tesla was our fun hobby, not our future at stake. But it has since grown to become "real money." On top of all that and our liquid assets, we are soon liquidating two properties, our 5 acres and the inherited five acres both with new and recent house. One has a 3 or 6kw grid connected Standalone solar system. (I haven't pulled that paperwork in a while) We don't show off, or wear gold or other conspicuous consumption. We prefer to eat home, and have a state of the art Home theater like now, and wherever we move. Might be Costa Rica or Colombia. Failing to like them,after visiting and house/tax/medical/costs investigating, we might move to the Denver area. I hope everyone can find their own amazing earner investment. My back appears to be getting even better, despite a setback, when I thought I'd over stressed it, so neither health or money are obstacles. We love our home but it's time to feather a new nest. Worst case we move back, from Central or South America, to Denver.

New high today closing at $313.79 Anybody else riding this long bull market? Anyone with new investment ideas?

Tesla closed at 308.03 today. There are many new markets and technologies to look into with high risk high reward like Tesla. I am looking forward to the unveiling of the Pickup and semi starting in September. Not in production then, but the main R&D done and first testing prototypes. It is only a matter of time before the first waves of model 3 cars come out this year.

Tesla just announced the next two models will be a semi big rig, and a pickup truck. Read about it here: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4062425-tesla-semi-truck-unveiled-september?auth_param=ee6s6:1cf0h9f:7e914e0fcbb42f3fd6232f0484fd4aa6&uprof=46&utoken=39f3b592412733ed04865ae67b96d2a2405ad5b4 Looks like RVrs will soon be able to go electric I can't imagine the cost however. I bet one with unlimited resources will show up pulling a top of the line fiver.

WooHoo! $307.07 after closing today in after hours trading.

Thanks Smitty, As a beginner investor I learned a lot here. I always looked at investing like piloting an aircraft. I don't know how to pilot an aircraft. My rule is to never ride in any aircraft in which the pilot is me? I let others, in our USAA funds, manage them for me. The only individual stock I ever bought was TSLA. And I started with all I had in my liquid savings, which included my petty cash/payroll account from my LLC selling and designing steel buildings, when I retired for my last time. Remember when I thought it was a decent profit at $90, but not significant money? Lol boy is it significant money now. Good article on the control patent. Thanks. It is nice that I now understood 99% if your comments. I've been interacting with Seeking Alpha and am AreV there. Here is an article I agree with, and commented on when the shorts got their Alternate facts mixed up. Check this Tesla prognosis for the next three years. https://seekingalpha.com/article/4061142-can-tesla-rev-revenues-significantly-next-year?auth_param=ee6s6:1cefqnj:49d2217412dd4a66142113682e8b3408&uprof=46&utoken=39f3b592412733ed04865ae67b96d2a2405ad5b4 I'm letting it ride long. It finally broke and set $300 as the stable new high. I expect it to go to $600 a share. What amazes me are how many folks are anti anything they perceive as politically opposite them. Using personal egos to invest is like blogging while drunk. Nothing good can come of it. The shorts are angry people now with the second big Tesla squeeze in three years on them. When they say the sky is falling every day for the last nIne years within a few weeks or months, and nothing continually happens as they predict. They can't seem to recall last night/week/month/year. They seem to think that if the say enough negatives that everyone will forget what they know and stampede. I'm glad you have had luck with Tesla too. Wait until the model 3 is out and in full production! It isn't just Musk and his industries, there are emerging technologies and medical breakthroughs in numbers too overwhelming in sheer magnitude to be able to grasp. We just have to pick and learn. So excited that Tesla finally broke 300. Now on to $400 by mid 2018!

Well, Today was a refrain from the past in this thread since I first posted about Tesla here. Today Tesla finally broke $300 a share. My initial investment which I took back, when Tesla was ~90, and with a profit, let me actually have a token $5k gain and retain most of my original shares. Since then my initial investment, even after deducting my taking my principal back with profit, than adding in our recent inheritance of the shares we advised Lynn's parents to buy when Tesla was at $70, left us today in a position to say that we are comfortably in the low five figures in number of shares, and yes, I will finally admit this is significant money. Remember we already took out our initial investment plus a small profit so I can say today we made money with our investment. But until I cash in my shares for the rest, we can't say we made or lost money yet. Why let it ride? Isn't that being greedy? Nahh. See Tesla will debut its consumer priced Model 3 at the end of this year, and begin mass production and filling of the 400k $1000 deposits made to reserve a place in line for one. All refundable of course. Tesla is going to make it or break it on the Model 3. Then close on its heels will be the model "Y." Models S3XY. Tesla makes the number 3 like an e. I recommended all along to buy it and hold and only a couple of folks jumped in and out and made some nice change with them. Smitty, it has become a significant amount at this point. For the newcomers, I invested in Tesla after writing about them here since Musk joined them in 2003. As well as writing about Space X. One of our old but gone members called it a typical pump and dump. Another pyramid or other scam. I bought in on IPO at $17 and $22.50. then twice more when it crashed to 22.5 again after missing a few times because I am not a stressed out trader and missed the one day bounce down then back up. I invested money I could afford to lose not from all our savings but mostly from my leftover company payroll account when we decided to retire again in December 2009. I was tired of the post 2007/8/9, and to today, .5 % interest maxing out today at about 1.5%. I had invested in our funds heavily during 2007-2009 while the funds were rock bottom prices. See, our house and land were bought short term loan and then paid off the smallish balance cash. So we only had utilities/food/fuel/Cable Internet to pay. I also buy all our cars from a few months old to three years old cash too, and we pay our credit cards off monthly or more often. So before you ask, yes, I could afford to use all my substantial income for investing as my military retirement and medical covered all our living expenses with a chunk left over. Now I will let it ride and re-evaluate after the Model 3 is in full production in late 2018/2019. Then again in 2020, and monthly or so after that. My wife recently said we can't take it with us, and she will not go fulltiming again. <sigh> But she will move to Colombia South America, or Costa Rica to try expat living for a while. We wanted to move to Canada but they don't want retirees even with enough funds to cover everything. Vancouver is close enough to US military health care under Tricare for life which I get next month at 65. But Canada has no desire for a bunch of American immigrants as they are seeing now. I see their problem with others. And we may just move near our newest grandchild in the Denver area. We still have to finish a freshening of her parent's house (Paint and carpet) and sell it and the property, then sell our stuff and then our property. I South America I can afford a full time housekeeper and groundskeeper couple, and live very well away from city compression. We will likely be traveling to both countries and Denver for a final sanity check. Our kids want us in South America because they have been there with Doctors Without Borders trips for a month twice. They are both BSRNs and she is long time surgical ICU nurse. My son put her through Nursing school when he owned the local Outback Steakhouse. Then he decided the 24/7 of the restaurant biz was burning him out, and he did not want to start using his own degree, so he decided she would return the favor and put him through nursing school. See she was working 12 on 12 off and 12 hour shifts. He wanted that. Now they are at the same hospital and five on five off and can ski, travel, and visit friends all over the world for vacation weeks. They want to have us there for them to visit as much as they want. So Tesla is good, and this was a catch up for my friends. The back is not as good as I hoped, but serviceable for the basics, no heavy lifting. The eye surgeries went well. We may have an additional lens slipped in to give me the near vision I had before. All bills are paid and we are not much interested in making more money. Our kids don't need it and we keep making more than we spend. Maybe I'll cash in a few shares in late 2017 to buy a Model E ourselves for me. And I don't see any no better ways to park my money with more satisfaction, in addition to already making money on it. Model 3 page: https://www.tesla.com/model3

German scientists test 'artificial sun' in quest to make climate-friendly fuel I just found out about a German project that I misunderstood as solar, until I read the whole article. For those thinking that oil will prevail, this article is a must read for investors to watch develop. It is a large array that focuses xenon short-arc lamp light onto an eight inch by eight inch square area making temps so high that they can split water into oxygen and hydrogen. This breakthrough concept is completely different from using fossil based fuels to make electricity by solar concentration to make steam or heat up salt or oil solutions to run turbines. This project will develop the most efficient way to do the same thing with sunlight concentrators which we already know how to build. I see a lot of the reasoning of Germans because they don't get the sunlight our US solar arrays in the deserts and Southern areas of the US. Like these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentrated_solar_power If done with solar concentrators it eliminates the fossil fuel to power the lights, and the hydrogen can be stored much easier and cheaply than electricity for night. Instead of fossil fuels to electricity to splitting water and then getting hydrogen, it will eliminate the electricity and use high temps to split water using only concentrated solar power. But those are just my first thoughts. I need to absorb this and see what yields they get, and how they mean to store and distribute it. They say they will have the R&D done and be up and running in a decade. Excerpt: "Scientists in Germany flipped the switch Thursday on what's being described as "the world's largest artificial sun," a device they hope will help shed light on new ways of making climate-friendly fuels. The giant honeycomb-like setup of 149 spotlights -- officially known as "Synlight" -- in Juelich, about 30 kilometers (19 miles) west of Cologne, uses xenon short-arc lamps normally found in cinemas to simulate natural sunlight that's often in short supply in Germany at this time of year. By focusing the entire array on a single 20-by-20 centimeter (8x8 inch) spot, scientists from the German Aerospace Center, or DLR , will be able to produce the equivalent of 10,000 times the amount of solar radiation that would normally shine on the same surface. Creating such furnace-like conditions -- with temperatures of up to 3,000 degrees Celsius (5,432 Fahrenheit) -- is key to testing novel ways of making hydrogen, according to Bernhard Hoffschmidt, the director of DLR's Institute for Solar Research. Many consider hydrogen to be the fuel of the future because it produces no carbon emissions when burned, meaning it doesn't add to global warming. But since hydrogen doesn't occur naturally, it first has to be made by splitting water into its two components -- the other being oxygen -- in a process that currently requires large amounts of electricity. Researchers hope to bypass the electricity stage by tapping into the enormous amount of energy that reaches Earth in the form of light from the sun. Hoffschmidt said the dazzling display is designed to take experiments done in smaller labs to the next level, adding that once researchers have mastered hydrogen-making techniques with Synlight's 350-kilowatt array, the process could be scaled up ten-fold on the way to reaching a level fit for industry in about a decade. The goal is to eventually use actual sunlight rather than the artificial light produced at the Juelich experiment, which cost 3.5 million euros ($3.8 million) to build and requires as much electricity in four hours as a four-person household would use in a year." That from an AP feed here: http://www.mlive.com/news/us-world/index.ssf/2017/03/german_scientists_test_artific.html

OK. Here are my visions of the near future for investing in tech that may do as well as Telsa has. I already wrote these over in Connecting on the road today and also a related post in Beginning RVing. Here is the one showing, to me, almost guaranteed returns. Picking the right horse is easy for me. Space X and Telsa. Here are more to consider in current investments while some are still cheap: http://www.rvnetwork.com/index.php?showtopic=126430&hl= This I posted in Beginning RVing in the thread Antenna, Satellite, or both? http://www.rvnetwork.com/index.php?showtopic=126416&p=882740 Any thoughts? New info?

Smitty, Here is one future investment I think if adopted by Musk may well lead to surprising changes for the Solar City division of Telsa. MIT just made a significant breakthrough in highly efficient solar panels. The problem has always been the cost to get to the 50% efficiency rates and the other end is the usual panels used at 18-22% efficient. They are forming a private company to actually bring these to market. THe ones doing that on the team have done other startups with success. I am optimistic on this one. Excerpt: "The cost of solar power is beginning to reach price parity with cheaper fossil fuel-based electricity in many parts of the world, yet the clean energy source still accounts for just slightly more than 1 percent of the world’s electricity mix. Solar, or photovoltaic (PV), cells, which convert sunlight into electrical energy, have a large role to play in boosting solar power generation globally, but researchers still face limitations to scaling up this technology. For example, developing very high-efficiency solar cells that can convert a significant amount of sunlight into usable electrical energy at very low costs remains a significant challenge. A team of researchers from MIT and the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology may have found a way around this seemingly intractable tradeoff between efficiency and cost. The team has developed a new solar cell that combines two different layers of sunlight-absorbing material to harvest a broader range of the sun’s energy. The researchers call the device a “step cell,” because the two layers are arranged in a stepwise fashion, with the lower layer jutting out beneath the upper layer, in order to expose both layers to incoming sunlight. Such layered, or “multijunction,” solar cells are typically expensive to manufacture, but the researchers also used a novel, low-cost manufacturing process for their step cell. The problem with the silicon germanium under the GaAsP layer is that SiGe absorbs the lower-energy light waves before it reaches the bottom silicon layer, and SiGe does not convert these low-energy light waves into current. “To get around the optical problem posed by the silicon germanium, we developed the idea of the step cell, which allows us to leverage the different energy absorption bands of gallium arsenide phosphate and silicon,” says Nayfeh. The step cell concept led to an improved cell in which the SiGe template is removed and re-used, creating a solar cell in which GaAsP cell tiles are directly on top of a silicon cell. The step-cell allows for SiGe reuse since the GaAsP cell tiles can be under-cut during the transfer process. Explaining the future low-cost fabrication process, Fitzgerald says: “We grew the gallium arsenide phosphide on top of the silicon germanium, patterned it in the optimized geometric configuration, and bonded it to a silicon cell. Then we etched through the patterned channels and lifted off the silicon germanium alloys on silicon. What remains then, is a high-efficiency tandem solar cell and a silicon germanium template, ready to be reused.” Because the tandem cell is bonded together, rather than created as a monolithic solar cell (where all layers are grown onto a single substrate), the SiGe can be removed and reused repeatedly, which significantly reduces the manufacturing costs. “Adding that one layer of the gallium arsenide phosphide can really boost efficiency of the solar cell but because of the unique ability to etch away the silicon germanium and reuse it, the cost is kept low because you can amortize that silicon germanium cost over the course of manufacturing many cells,” Fitzgerald adds. Filling a market gap Fitzgerald believes the step cell fits well in the existing gap of the solar PV market, between the super high-efficiency and low-efficiency industrial applications. And as volume increases in this market gap, the manufacturing costs should be driven down even further over time. This project began as one of nine Masdar Institute-MIT Flagship Research Projects, which are high-potential projects involving faculty and students from both universities. The MIT and Masdar Institute Cooperative Program helped launch the Masdar Institute in 2007. Research collaborations between the two institutes address global energy and sustainability issues, and seek to develop research and development capabilities in Abu Dhabi. “This research project highlights the valuable role that research and international collaboration plays in developing a commercially-relevant technology-based innovation, and it is a perfect demonstration of how a research idea can transform into an entrepreneurial reality,” says Nayfeh." The rest of the MIT News article with links is here: http://news.mit.edu/2016/new-solar-cell-more-efficient-costs-less-its-counterparts-0829

Wow! That is one customer oriented power company! They also point up one of the main fallacies in talking about ROI for it. I bought one of these: http://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_200646636_200646636?cm_mmc=Bing-pla&utm_source=Bing_PLA&utm_medium=Generators%20%3E%20Residential%20Standby%20Generators&utm_campaign=Generac&utm_content=48907 Mine cost more than the smaller Powerwall. I had a smaller 15kw air-cooled back up system that used Propane as my thinking was if the Natural gas went offline I would have a two week supply of power if I conserved use. The tank was ugly and our house has gas cooking, furnace, and water heater, on city Natural gas. So when we realized it was not going to handle the A/C system as well as the house I decided to trade it in for a water cooled 25kw that does not bog down with the A/C running. My wife and I have many times smiled at each other during the long outages here that last from a few minutes to overnight or all day after a storm. Our ROI is having our modem and router, freezer and fridge, TV and computers all running as if from the power company. So as far as storm and outage back up the ROI is all lifestyle. MY computers and other expensive systems are protected by UPS' appropriately sized so only our lights go off for the ten seconds it takes for the generator to take over. The auto switch on the outside wall is enormous. I found another article from yours Jim. Here is more about that utility: "Specifically, GMP is offering its customers three options to get their hands on one of the 500 Powerwalls the utility has ordered from Tesla. They can buy it outright for $6,500, and use it for emergency backup power during the state’s weather-related, multi-hour power outages. Or they can get much less expensive installment or bill credit deals, if they agree to “share access” to the battery with the utility. The first of these options involves the customer buying the $6,500 Powerwall, and then getting monthly bill credits of $31.76 -- a figure that would take 17 years to pay back the battery’s cost. The other, and seemingly more attractive, option is to get the battery free of charge, and then pay a monthly fee of $37.50 -- what amounts to an interest-free 14-year Powerwall installment plan. This is less than half the costs of $86 per month that Green Mountain Power has calculated for the 7-kilowatt-hour systems it’s deploying in its “Energy City of the Future” project in Rutland, by the way. But according to its filing with the Vermont Public Service Board, the utility is also expecting to achieve a net present value (NPV) of about $50 per month over 10 years from each system, based on the grid services they can provide. Subtract that from its $86 in costs, and you’re left with the $37.50 monthly fee the utility’s asking its customers to pay -- a fairly transparent sharing of costs. As for what it intends to do with these batteries to earn $50 per month, here’s the plan: During normal (i.e., non-outage) conditions, GMP will have the ability to control the charging and discharging cycles of the batteries. For customers who agree, this will enable GMP to discharge batteries during (1) times of high market prices to help lower its energy costs and (2) times of peak load to help reduce significant capacity and transmission expenses. Those savings will directly benefit customers." The biggest and most predictable benefits will come from reducing capacity and transmission expenses from grid operator New England ISO, which can add up to 20 percent to 30 percent of the cost of energy for utilities in the region. The first is the forward capacity market (FCM), which sets the price of future grid capacity for the region’s utilities, based on their share of peak power consumption on the days when the ISO reaches its own system peaks. The second is the regional network service (RNS) charge, meant to cover a utility’s share of transmission infrastructure costs and based on monthly peaks. Green Mountain Power intends to use its Tesla batteries to meet 100 percent of the FCM peaks, and 75 percent of the RNS peaks, for customers who’ve chosen the $37.50-per-month installment plan. For customers who decide to receive a $31.76-per-month credit instead, the utility assumes the batteries will hit 75 percent of the FCM peaks, and half of the RNS peaks. Energy arbitrage is a third value stream, with an eye toward storing energy to ride through cold snaps, when regional energy prices can spike, Josh Castonguay, GMP’s director of generation and renewable innovation, said in Friday’s interview. All together, these values can be calculated down to the individual customer, using the real-time broadband or cellular-connected SolarEdge inverters it’s installing with each solar-battery project, he said. “For every kilowatt we can knock off that peak, there’s a dollar-figure savings for our customers,” Castonguay said. This assumes, of course, that the utility doesn’t tap the batteries when they’re going to be needed for emergency backup. GMP CEO Mary Powell noted that the typical winter outage in Vermont lasts about 2.5 hours, which could require most of a Powerwall’s capacity -- or a lot less, if people minimize their electricity use through the downtime. That’s a key focus of the Rutland project, which is combining Powerwalls with rooftop solar, smart thermostats, energy-efficiency improvements, and real-time connectivity to its distribution grid and customer data systems, according to Castonguay. But it will also apply to the direct-to-customer batteries it’s selling, under the state’s relaxed regulatory regime that allows vertically integrated utilities to move novel projects, like behind-the-meter battery financing, into action far more quickly than usual. “Our whole goal is to take the dispatch of the battery out of the customers’ hands, and use our microgrid controls,” Castonguay said. “There are times we can say, we’d like to have every Powerwall we have out there to hit our peak.” But when the weather starts to turn, or storms approach, “we can leave those alone, to provide customers that emergency backup.” For now, backup power remains the primary reason for a homeowner or small business to install a Powerwall, Powell said -- essentially, a cleaner, if more expensive, alternative to the backup generators available today. But solar integration brings further benefits, including the potential for long-range energy balancing, and “as we deploy these, I’d like to work in more sophisticated ways with solar customers,” she said." That here with even more: https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/green-mountain-powers-bet-on-tesla-powerwall-value-50-per-month Those of us with a whole house backup generator would buy ir for the same reason I bought mine. However, I can't hook my Natural gas powered up to solar and save money. And the cost of the gas is too expensive to share with the grid. Every utility should be offering this to their customers to manage their own peak loads and save the customer the cost of fuel as I have to pay when I use the generator. I will go battery soon. Right now we do not know whether we will stay here, or move, possibly to another country. I am trying to move to Canada but it is not as easy as I thought it would be. Costa Rica is a possibility as is Colombia. My SH is willing to learn Spanish and I could use immersion to bring mine back up to conversational speed. Money is not the issue, it is filling the squares to emigrate as a permanent resident. Wherever we land we will have a Telsa Model 3, a solar system, and a Powerwall. Especially in the rural settings we prefer. If no fast broadband it is out. I see the steps that utility is taking, embracing the Powerwalls and solar as something they can control for their use too, rather than fear and taxing the solar owners, is like the German companies that went along and helped renewables prevail and become cheaper to the end users than coal or other power sources. Some very progressive thinkers there at that utility. (Progressive as in making progress not politics) Thanks again Jim.

Jim, I agree. I believe that Tesla just gained a big advantage in that they just fired their last foreign part supplier and manufacture all their parts in house or with US suppliers. While some dinosaurs think that electric will never gain traction they need to read the press from overseas. I believe once the model 3 is in full production as well as the Gigafactory, between end of this year and 2020, we will see the sure demise of the ICE vehicles as a surety, even the diehards. I see Canada taking a more active role in world economics along with, surprisingly,Mexico and several other countries. Colombia's drug wars are over and I see their re-entry into the emerald, coffee, and tech markets as well. I am still trying to see where the odds fall in the next year or two than all the emerging solar and renewable power should take off, but not because of climate change. Simply because once the storage is resolved there are no more expenses for renewables as in train cars full of coal and oil and Natural gas. Cheap energy to produce and sell. The rest of the world took a cue from Telsa. Much more later as I get recovered from my recent surgical adventures.

Rich, That is being pursued by more than just Musk and Tesla today. That is what makes these exciting times. We have seen our science fiction of just 16 years ago become reality. We have giant view screens, Tricorders and communicators. http://io9.gizmodo.com/all-the-times-science-fiction-became-science-fact-in-on-1570282491 https://www.buzzfeed.com/kasiagalazka/science-fiction-things-that-actually-exist-now?utm_term=.iukRV3rWR#.yhjkKNG9k Thank goodness I no longer need to go sit in a booth and use a giant book to find the numbers for things I did not already have memorized. Or worry about my long distance bill. Or complain that we don't have video calling. Or be frustrated when I can't remember the name of an actor or fact and wake up in the middle of the night worrying about it until I can get to the library and look it up by going through a bunch of books. Forget appointments or set the alarm. Or wait for an answer a week later to mail sent out today. Or wonder who is at the door with video Ring doorbells or other cameras. There is research on quantum electro mechanics, Zero point energy and dark energy, as well as nano medicine and genetic therapies. I'm looking for the company that has the breakthrough catalyst for highly efficient electrolysis production of hydrogen. Or the stable fast charge battery chemistry and substrates. Lots happening out there.

I am with you as Cortana is getting better the voice recognition program, a totally different program under "All Apps - Windows Ease Of Access - Windows Speech Recognition" seems in the dark ages. I heard Dragon Naturally Speaking got to 99% accuracy or some such, but like you, I only use "Hey Cortana" on my desktop to get addresses and business locations and info. I too will ignore all texts while driving with hands free except very important ones because of the pain in auto correct and the definite distraction if it gets it wrong. I usually just cancel and pull over and grab my phone if it is an emergency. I have no problems with taking calls hands free. It comes through my stereo and is actually a Visor device with Bluetooth and FM transmitter by Jabra. The Jabra Cruiser and we have three of the Cruiser 2's. Funny thing, the cruiser understands my commands as well as the computer. My next car will have bluetooth built in.

Chalky sorry to hear that bud. I have Dupuytren's contracture on my left middle finger, documented from a military injury in the 80's http://www.bing.com/search?q=dupuytren's+contracture&src=IE-SearchBox&FORM=IESR02&pc=EUPP_ which will eventually lock into a curled position and not be able to be straightened out again. I can type fine for now and later as long as my other fingers are not involved. However I played guitar from age 12 and write music as well as lyrics. My left hand is my fret hand and I can no longer play with any dexterity so I put my git fiddle aside. I was lucky enough to play for 52 years and entertain with bands, solo at weddings as the singer and accompaniment, and even a washtub bass jug band we met RVing fulltime. No complaints there, many never had the talent to play gifted. I am missing my skiing and diving and hope some upcoming surgeries to my spine will improve my mobility enough to be able to walk and exercise off some of these 50 pounds I gained since I quit smoking six years ago and got more limited by my spinal injuries and stenosis. Maybe even be able to ride a bike without worry about bending or back stress. If not oh well I tried and had many years of sports and activities around the world. I am sure glad we went fulltime when I was 45! I could not do 90% of the climbs and hikes and fishing we did then, now. Chalkie, you know you can use voice on Android, Windows, and Amazon OS's right? https://www.bing.com/search?q=How+do+I+change+speech+to+text%3f&input=2&nclid=4D34BFD87795F1669F627D3EE550B1AC&FORM=WNSSSV&cc=US&setlang=en-US It is a learning curve but one that may be worth the time. Have a good evening!

I may try Chrome again some time but I do know that if you uninstall Chrome without making another browser the default it can leave the HTML, HTM, SHTML and a few other entries in your registry screwed up. Then it says you don't have permission to open a link in your other email program in the new browser. I just had that happen with Aviator which I tried and uninstalled without making IE or Opera or Edge my default. Took a while but I figured it out and fixed the registry. Now I just keep IE and Edge on my systems. I agree on bandwidth. Today, with ubiquitous broadband, folks on data limited diets are becoming more and more imposed upon. It is not the fault of the OS no matter which. It is progress and change. Fiber nationwide is becoming as important as our national Interstate systems. I have unlimited bandwidth for an extra 10 bucks a month. My cable Internet service is 200mbps down and 2-25 up. That is why I champion Net neutrality and rejecting the state legislation that allows no competition for the cable companies for actual broadband. We could already have had very fast GB broadband municipal services like Lafayette Louisiana and Austin Texas.

Ckalkie, Well said, and I was not trying to turn anything into anything. I agree that all collect data just as I said. Amazon does with their version of Android. And since they sell something they aren't going to give it to third parties because they want our purchases. Windows sells the computers and the OS for revenues as well as other hardware and their sales of Windows to all the manufacturers of Windows Desktops, laptops, tablets, and their enterprise security Endpoint solutions etc. with thousands of other sales items. Apple sells computers and their OS goes with it. They created an ecosystem with their proprietary OS they do not let others use despite the fact that they sell computers using the same hardware as Windows. As well as Tablets using the same OS as their iPhones iOS. And their desktops that and laptops that use OSX. And with Apple's music and App stores, as well as their proprietary connectors. they change and have all new sales. They also have no SD card slots because they wanted all to use iTunes and iPods. iPods are all but off the market now but I think Apple is painting themselves in a corner because they aren't innovating like before and it shows in Androids taking over the cellphone market and the tablet markets taking a large share of the new customers. Google sells cloud storage and some professional services that never quite got off the ground. Most of their products are free and the main source of revenues is the data they accrue in selling our shopping and communication histories. An example. If you use Gmail and write about looking for a new car you will see ads about new cars in greater percentage if you are using Google software and online services. Because the machine readers saw the Gmail mention of shopping+new+car and noted it. Then they sell that lead to local folks to not contact them because that would be too obvious. They also read your location from the software. So they can sell advertising to local dealers or the manufacturers like Ford to place their ads in your banners and popups and advertising before a YouTube video. The difference between Google and all others is that Google has nothing to sell really. Their phones and tablets have done worse than Windows has done and they have blown it. So they sell our data for the use of third parties. The others keep it for themselves. They do not want another to get the sale they can have. That is what they sell. My data without paying me for it. I don't mind MS or Amazon having my data because I shop with them, not some local third party I did not shop. I have no issues with one OS over another and used all of them except OSX as my Apple Mac experience was using their first Macs in the mid 80s with college when I went back to school with SIU. But I would trust Apple if I were an Apple user. I trust MS as a Windows user. I trusted Linux as a Linux User back when I tried it several times. I trust Amazon OS and use it on my Kindle Fires now. Google is not allowed on any of my computers, neither is iTunes, or Google PlayStore other than Windows store and Amazon App store. But to answer the basic question, if I understand it correctly, is that it is just as easy to listen or read or watch on Android as a Windows or Apple laptop. Security for all are dependent on patching when needed. For performance and security. Regardless of the folks who say they have never patched Windows/Linux/Android/OSX/iOS and never had malware problems, there are folks in each who were hoodwinked, spearfished, Phished, clicked on the wrong thing and got ransomware, let kids or others use their systems unattended and got infections and changes to their systems as a result. Windows has a lot of updates because they are now proactive. All of the major OS' have vulnerabilities that they doubt will eve be exploited and may have not patched for years. Linux just had one in the core but it required the attacker to be sitting at the computer. Safer for home users for it to exist but for corporate or libraries, any public network where they can get access in a classroom or office, a disgruntled employee or student can do some horrendous malware damage. They are all vulnerable for one thing or another. I have run my computers with no infections but one I got from an infected computer I stupidly plugged into my network before I ran malware checks ten years ago. Since my systems were up to date the ,malware could not run and was removed with several passes of Norton power eraser, Malwarebytes premium, and Windows own built in anti malware program back then Microsoft Security Essentials, MSE. I have had a few pages try to get me to panic with scareware and try to get me to call a number, as if . . . Windows was the wild wild west back from Millennium Edition through XP SP1 and 2. SP3 really made it hard to crack with patches as I went. For the newbies SP stood for Service Pack and was the same as the free Windows 10 upgrade. They essentially were complete versions of Windows that were distributed via Windows updates. So anecdotally I can say Windows is not as vulnerable as others because I have never been infected or fell for social engineering or spearphishing. I read about an Apple Mac botnet (truth) and a that does not make Macs more vulnerable because I said so. But for each who thought they were invulnerable, and had no protection, and got pwned, suddenly not doing the Apple patches and updates wasn't such a good idea. It is the same for each OS. Not getting consistent update for Android is where Android is broken. All a bad guy has to do is monitor the vulnerability patches given by Google to their own tablets, then backwards engineer it, and then attack the Samsung and or Verizon devices that are not done yet like the nexus line, easy pickings. The bad guys will own both to catch the slower companies customers with the vulnerability.that you also have to check and until they are patched it is free looting everyone. Not getting patches is as bad as not doing them when they are available. Windows is not superior to Android in vulnerabilities nor is Android superior because you don't see updates. I am going to say all of them are pretty much hardened and I am not sure I like the amount of bandwidth the Windows telemetry is using without my leave either. Use what you like, and keep it patched when offered.

Bigjim, Besides with Android comes Google and their: "We can read all your mail and listen in with machines and not take any personally identifiable information in order to give you a better online experience - tailored to you!" If the data they collect is not personally identifiable then how can they tailor it to me?? I get some blank screens online because I added the "Block Google Tracking" tracking protection Add-On to my IE. If I may make a distinction. We bought Amazon Fire HDX used tablets cheap for our kindle replacements and they are terrific tablets for resolution and features if you are a big Amazon user with Prime. They are Android based but Amazon has its own version as their own OS, and their own App store. You can in some cases use the Google Play store for apps, but many times not, which is a great thing to me. I am not a big App user but am learning lately with the Windows phone and the tablets. Let me give you my opinions on the facts of this. I know Microsoft has a product to sell as does Apple and they want us to buy products from them like computers and their OS'. I trust Apple and Microsoft to not sell my data to other third parties for revenue because they already have a revenue stream. Amazon sells everything thus they took Android, and modified it for use in their tablets and failed phones, but not on Google play because they want us to buy their products. Well I already did when I became a Prime member more than ten years ago. The two day delivery and ease of changing the address made Prime ideal for me fulltiming. Since Amazon has had my credit card info and my addresses for as long as there has been a Prime, and no breaches, with great service I trust them. Google (Alphabet) several years ago changed their EULA (End User License Agreement) across all of their products. Now if you have any of their software on your phones or home computers, from Windows or Apple or Amazon, they sell your data for advertising. See Google has no products for sale to generate revenue save some cloud space. Many think Google Earth or Picasa, or their cloud based free office and other free software worth the trade. I prefer to pay for my software or use open source software like Libre Office in place of MS Office, and my website email address, or my Internet provider's supplied email address, or Outlook.com rather than Gmail. I prefer Skype to Google voice. All OS' access the satellite mapping online today not just Google. So I am on Amazon but nothing made by Google, or running Android, because all report my data to Google Alphabet. So as an alternative, if you want Android tablets, not Windows, I would suggest an Amazon Fire HD tablet. The Fire HDX tablets had great resolution, but lack only one thing, a micro SD card slot, and they were expensive. I strongly urge you to get 32GB minimum if you want to use it for movies and books. An HD download can take 4-7 GB of space. My ripped movies I own take 2 or 3GB each at most in HD. Here is the New Kindle Fire HD tablet ,32 GB version for $119.99: https://www.amazon.com/All-New-Fire-Tablet-Display-Wi-Fi/dp/B01ACEKAJY/ref=sr_1_5?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1477250268&sr=1-5&keywords=Fire+HD+tablet The great thing about the new Fire HD tablets is that aside from being inexpensive, they finally have micro SD card slots and can take up to 200 GB SD cards. I just bought a 128GB micros SD card that was tested and benchmarked above the rest of the brands by users for $34.99 from Newegg: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820178997 yesterday for my Lumia phone that just has a 64GB micro SD card at the moment that is full with music. My 64GB cards and 32GB cards are for swapping now. I have a pocket SD Card case that holds 17 SD cards in their full size adapters. The Amazon ecosphere is great if you already are an Amazon Prime member. But I use Amazon from my Windows tablets too. So they aren't necessary but are exactly compatible and easy to use with Amazon. And they replace the Kindle readers just fine unless you read in direct sunlight a lot. We kept an old Kindle Paperwhite touch for that (https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Kindle-Paperwhite-6-Inch-4GB-eReader/dp/B00OQVZDJM/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1477254226&sr=8-2&keywords=Paperwhite ), as we both share the same family Prime account our books are available from each separate account on our Kindles, Fire tablets, and other devices like our Windows tablet computers and desktop devices. Now not fulltiming, but living off road, when I go out, it is not to read. I read before sleep daily indoors in bed for an hour or two. So you can choose Android and have it all reported to Google regardless of the manufacturer. Amazon's fork of Android that doesn't phone Google unless you load Google software on it, and won't violate our privacy by sharing with third parties, Apple won't share, Windows won't either. So it is very doable to have your Android and no Google too! Many don't care and I have lost the privacy battle to them years ago. I have a locked down private FaceCrook account just to be able to log in with it and to be able to read articles and go to reviews you must be a member to access. I have 0 FaceCrook Friends save one of my sons, and no friend requests as they are blocked as are all my info other than that I am there. I did post a message and got hundreds of friend requests. Locked it down again and will not put anything on it or comment on others pages. What little privacy is left can be had with Apple, Windows, and Amazon. They keep our privacy for obvious reasons. That help or muddy the waters for ya? There are two kinds of computer users you know.

Chalkie, It works in similar fashion when you have all Windows tablets, desktops, and Windows phones as we have here. All appointments and Cortana reminders pop up on all my devices within a minute or so. We have Kindle fire HDX tablets 7" and 8.9" for reading mostly.

With Android you will have to learn new browsers and a lot of other things like where a file is saved and how to retrieve it. It is fairly easy in hindsight but daunting for some up front. As Duke already said, but I will make clearer is that today's Windows8-10 tablets are the same as the computers in that they use the same programs and can be used with a bluetooth or in the case of hybrids, their own keyboards to work just like a laptop. The only difference is you can separate them from the keyboard and choose to not use them. Tablets that run Windows RT, a limited OS that is more suited to cell phones than computers have been dropped so avoid any used Windows tablets running RT like the Surface and the Surface 2. The surface 3 tablets and all the Pro Surface tablets run regular Windows 10 the same as the desktops and laptops. BigJIm, Depends on what you are reading. Just read here for Android: https://threatpost.com/?s=Android And here for iOS, the OS for iPhones and iPads: https://threatpost.com/?s=iOS And here for general mobile security issues: https://threatpost.com/category/mobile-security/ Like Apple, when they had security by obscurity, I now have almost zero possibility of infection because Windows 10 mobile is inherently secure. (That was said tongue in cheek as that is what the Apple folks said about OSX and iOS until they got more market share and infected and found botnets controlling thousands of them etc..) There are relatively few Windows phones out here so we are not worth hacking! I have not had even one attempted intrusion on my Microsoft Lumia 735 Windows 10 phone. However I much prefer my active performance updates as well as security patches for Windows to few updates, or patches too late resulting in what you read above. All OS can be hacked or users tricked into clicking on the wrong thing, which is how most attacks on all OS' occur today.

Today's news about Hydrogen fuel has me exited as we already know Toyota is producing the Mirai a hydrogen fuel cell powered EV. This is another investment opportunity coming full circle thanks to Tesla's resurrection of the EV as a primary vehicle with range. See my stand alone article about it here.