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Obituary: 173 Big Bay Point Road

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- jim Young “You can’t go home again.” - Thomas Wolfe. There isn’t much that is more exciting to a 7 year old boy than hanging around a construction site. Once the vivid imagination of a young boy begins to stir, the excavation for the basement will take him on a journey to China, the cement blocks of the foundation transform the hole in the ground into a formidable castle, scrap pieces of wood cut at a 45° angle become the bulky sails of a sailboat, the studded walls, as they are erected become prison bars that the young lad can escape through and rafters, when hung, will serve as monkey bars. At least that’s how it was for me. Most children are denied this experience today for the sake of safety. But in 1960 these opportunities were more readily available. And when your grandfather was building the house, even more so. That your grandfather might be building that house for you, well, that was the icing on the cake. I remember my grandfather letting me help him “build” our house. Und
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Uncle Sam Saves Cuba Money

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- jim Young    “Every morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most.” - Buddha From 1994 to 2020, tourists had to exchange their home country’s currency into Cuban Convertible Pesos (CUC) to spend when visiting Cuba. The exchange rate for the CUC was usually valued pretty close to the U.S. dollar. As of January 21, 2021 the CUC has been discontinued. Tourists typically now exchange their home country’s currency into U.S. dollars prior to visiting Cuba. Manufacturing money that is difficult to counterfeit is a costly process to say the least. In addition to the initial costs of printing currency, the average lifespan of paper currency is 4.5 to 8.5 years depending on the denomination, after which it needs to be replaced. While I could find no data to indicate how much Cuba actually spent on manufacturing the CUC for the past 25 plus years, the U.S. 2023 annual budget, has allowed $265.5 million for variable printing costs such as paper, ink, labour and direct overhead
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