Monthly Archives: February 2021

Joe Coffee Company

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February’s Trade Coffee brings beans from Burundi. If you’re like me, I had to look that up. It’s a land locked country in the middle of Africa bordered by Congo, Rwanda and Tanzania. Joe Coffee Company is such great branding name. Most Americans should be familiar with term “cup of joe” which is a nickname for a cup of coffee. Apparently, the origins of this term is shrouded in mystery! Snopes, Readers Digest and the Roasterie offer some potential theories. I digress…. getting back to what matters, these beans are from Burundi’s Kayanza Province.

Opening the bag, I’m smell roasted nuts, fruits and floral aromas. Making my latte, the initial sip contains an explosion of citrus (pomelo?) flavors. After each sip, I also taste this subtle roasted grain/barley flavor that rounds the sip. This “roastedness” remains with each sip. It doesn’t quite become milk chocolate like either. It’s a little hard to describe as these beans are subtly different from Ethiopian beans. It has that familiarity of Ethiopian beans yet at the same time has it’s own unique taste differences.

Black Stallion Coffee Company

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Today, the coffee beans I’m writing about are not from Angels Cup nor Trade Coffee — surprise surprise~! These beans are Black Stallion Cofee Company which also happen to be a local black and veteran owned business. #SupportLocalBusiness. To be honest, someone told me about this local coffee roaster. And like all coffee chasers, I went to visit the roaster expecting to get a latte. Unfortunately, they are still just roasting coffee beans on site with plans of opening up a future cafe. (Thanks Coronavirus!) On impulse since I was already at the cafe, I bought a bag of the Majestic. I look forward to a day I can sip a latte.

These coffee beans are actually a blend from 3 regions: Ethiopia, Brazil and one other South American country (Colombia?). I am greeted with floral, citrus and toffee aromas upon opening the bag. Making my latte, I initially taste berries and this wonderful rich dark chocolate flavor. I also get a familiar dark roasted barley/roasted grain taste reminiscent of the lattes made from Kona coffee beans. For randomly buying and trying the beans, these are very delicious.

Reference Guide to Vanguard Domestic Mutual Funds

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DISCLAIMER: I’m not a financial planner. The opinions stated in this blog post are my opinions based on my current financial portfolio. I suggest to also do your own research as your financial portfolio may be different from mine. If you are interested reassessing your finances, please seek professional advice from a Certified Financial Advisor that charges based on a flat fee (not commission based).

A few weeks ago, I talked about a 2021 financial portfolio re-assessment. As a result of that post, I looked into the various domestic Vanguard mutual funds that would be good long term investment. This table below lists these mutual funds divided by market capitalization and stock types. I included a dividend option for those investors that are looking for companies that consistently pay dividends to shareholders. In addition, I found this “Total Market” fund which exposes investors to the market including large, mid and small cap stocks. Even though these are Vanguard stocks, other financial institutions like Fidelity/Schwab/Etrade will also offer similar mutual funds. As an investor, more research is needed to find the equivalent non-Vanguard fund at these intuitions.

Here’s the table:

Market CapGrowthValueBlendDividendTotal Market
Large CapVIGAX (Admiral)
VUG (ETF)		VVIAX (Admiral)
VTV (ETF)		VFIAX (Admiral)
VOO (ETF)		VHYAX (Admiral)
VEIPX (Admiral)
VYM (ETF)		VTSAX (Admiral)
VTI (ETF)
Mid CapVMGMX (Admiral)
VOT (ETF)		VMVAX (Admiral)
VOE (ETF)		VIMAX (Admiral)
VO (ETF)		VEXEX (Admiral)
VXF (ETF)
*No S&P 500 stocks
Small CapVSGAX (Admiral)
VBK (ETF)		VSIAX (Admiral)
VBR (ETF)		VSMAX (Admiral)
VB (ETF)

After making this table, the distribution of my retirement accounts are much clearer to me now. I have adjusted my portfolio to invest in large, mid and small cap mutual funds focused around growth, blend and dividend.

Hey (Republican) Senators!

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So if Republican Senators listening to the impeachment trial do not believe Trump is responsible for causing the 06JAN2021 Capitol Insurrection, who do they think should be held responsible? Have the Senators asked themselves why these Trump insurrectionist supporters decided to storm the building?

Since these Senators are very keen on “interpreting” the Constitution narrowly, they should be very clear to mention the fact that Trump was impeached in his final days as President. Thus claiming it is “unconstitutional to impeach a former president” is obviously a lie. Furthermore, claiming to follow the Constitution, these Republican Senators failed to follow the Constitution when the Articles of Impeachment were delivered. The Republican controlled Senate slowed any discussion of a trial until AFTER they lost their power 20JAN2021. Furthermore, if the Senators are going to interpret the Constitution, they should also remember that 14th Amendment also has language related to a President who took the oath to “PRESERVE, PROTECT and DEFEND the Constitution.” Didn’t Trump encourage Pence to disregard the Constitution and the Electoral College so that the election will be cast in Trump’s favor? How is that “PRESERVING the Constitution”? Reports about how Trump watched with glee the insurrectionist storm the Capitol Building…. How is that DEFENDING the constitution? Trump proclaimed himself to be the “law and order” President… yet allowed his supporters to storm and damage the Capitol Building.

Everything the Republicans are doing infuriates me. In fact, it should infuriate anyone who believes in the Constitution and in America.

Little Amps Coffee Roasters

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January’s Angels Cup comes from Little Amps Coffee Roasters. The Ethiopian coffee beans come from coffee collective Daanisa in the Guji zone. Ethiopian beans have been consistently delicious with floral and fruity flavors.

Opening the bag, I’m greeted with a wonderful floral and fruity aroma. This aroma fades into the nutty familiar smell of coffee beans. Making my latte, I mainly taste berries that morphs into a nutty chocolaty aftertaste. Interestingly, if I extract with more water, I get a more citrus flavor. This latte has a great mouthfeel that coats the tongue hours after finishing the drink. It’s amazing how consistently fruity Ethiopian beans have been regardless of the roaster.

Social Media’s Ultimate Dilemma

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With social media blocking Trump after the 06JAN2021 insurrection, my initial reaction was “wow… finally!” But after reflecting a bit more, I had two follow up questions… 1) why now? and 2) what will happen in the future? Specifically, the 2nd question is really about the precedence these companies are setting. Throughout the 4+ years of Trump tweets, discussions about how much of the false, provocative, agitative tweets only really came to the forefront during the 2020 elections where misinformation had to be addressed (USA Today in 2020, CNN in 2016). Clearly there’s been discussion and pushback on how best to handle the information. Let’s also be clear here… the 1st amendment “free speech” allows free and public expression without any censorship by the government but there are exceptions to this. Most people will say private companies are excluded from the 1st amendment because they are not government. Although true, I think though many companies will try to follow the spirit of the 1st amendment to allow the speech. I think that’s why Twitter and Facebook allowed Trump tweets and posts for so long.

So why now? I think it’s a matter of convenience. First… Biden defeated Trump in the 2020 election. Second… Twitter and Facebook had been slowly escalating the method of how to censure Trump’s false posts. Third… If it were not for the insurrection on 06JAN2021, I don’t think Twitter/Facebook would have blocked Trump. But because the language in Trump’s tweets potentially caused the violence, he “broke” the EULA regulations and thus de-platformed. Let’s be honest here. This de-platforming was a long time in the making. Trump has consistently spread false information during his 4 years in office (over 30,000 claims!!).

What will happen in the future? I’m not sure. I think the social media companies need to establish a clear transparent system of governance and punishment related to the spreading of false information. Trump’s actions has exposed a huge weakness in the idea of balancing social media virality, factual information, and speech. This is what I think social media companies should do:

  • Social media companies should donate to an independent fact checking service. This service can be an internal company service or a 3rd party like factcheck.org
  • When any user makes a claim, that claim should be fact checked.
  • If the claim is proven false, then the user is tagged and also educated about why this claim is false.
    • The claim will not be shared and any subsequent shares also cannot be shared again to minimize the virality of false information.
    • The user is also warned about continuing to post false information.
  • If the user makes another false claim, the user’s post will be marked as false similar to what Twitter did by flagging Trump’s false tweets.
    • This user is again warned and educated.
    • The post will not be able to be shared minimizing any virality.
    • The user will then receive a demerit. Demerits “expire” after a week of good behavior (aka no false posts).
  • If the user again posts a false claim, the post is flagged as false.
    • The user is warned and educated.
    • The post will not be able to be shared minimizing any virality.
    • The user gains another demerit.
    • The user is also banned from posting for 1 hr. Every demerit the user gains adds 30 minutes to the ban.

This should allow social media companies to limit the spread of false information while attempting to balance the “free speech” doctrine. I also think that social media companies should also define what they deem to be hate speech or speech that leads to violence or speech that have threats of violence. Then the same demerit based system should also be used for those types of posts. Can social media companies implement this?

Anodyne Coffee Roasting Company

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Trade Coffee sent me this wonderful bag of beans from Anodyne Coffee Roasting Company for January. The single origin beans are from Guatamala’s Sacatepequez region. Through google maps, it appears to be right outside the capital city of Guatemala City.

Immediately an amazing floral aroma greets me when I open the bag. Every time I go in to scoop out beans, the floral aromas linger long enough that the beans start smelling like honey. As I make my latte, I’m very surprised at how thick the crema layer is. Normally, I get about a quarter inch of crema with other roasters. However, with these beans, it’s at least half an inch. With such a think layer, it makes scooping the crema out relatively easy. What is crema? Crema is the result of released CO2 from hot water mixing with ground espresso. Generally the oils and fats from the beans are extracted out as well in the crema so it adds to the flavor profile. My experience is that you really need a lot of crema to significantly change the taste. I usually try to scoop out some crema out of the inverted aeropress before I press down to extract the espresso syrup.

Making my latte, the first sip contained an explosion of flavors. It was sweet, fruity and nutty at the same time. With each sip, the sweet nutty flavor tends to dominate the flavor. Usually by the end of the cup, I get a rich chocolatey flavor that ends up with me making a 2nd cup sometime later in the day because how delicious the latte was.