Reading regrets

Whenever I am asked to list my hobbies, or interests, I typically include "reading" on the list. I mean, I like to read. At least I think I do. I don't recall an instance when I sat back, cracked open a book and had a miserable time reading it. However, earlier this year I started inputting the books I read into a Facebook application that lets you review and recommend books - and I immediately realized that my list was very short for someone who claims to enjoy reading.

After scanning my bookshelf for awhile, and brainstorming for awhile, I realized that most of the books I own are not real books. I mostly seem to purchase informational, or reference type, books related to computer stuff, poker, home improvement, or investing. While these types of books are valuable to me, reading a reference book is not the same as reading a good biography.

When I trimmed my book list down to the real books that I have read - the list was shockingly short. Coincidentally (or not so much so), a significant number of the real books I read this year. It was at this point that I realized I have done myself a great disservice by not reading more for the first 32 and a half years of my life.

I should point out that I do indeed spend large portions of my day reading. But most of my reading comes from internet forums, blogs, news sites, etc. Regardless, nothing really compares to reading a dynamic, well-written biography, memoir or narrative history book.

I admit that I am not a big fan of fiction. While I do enjoy and occasional work of fiction, I feel like I am using up valuable reading time that I could be spending on a book that would have more meaning to me. So for now, I tend to fulfill any of my fiction cravings with movies (although I probably average less than 6 movies per year).

Call them goals, resolutions, or whatever - but one of mine in 2009 is to read more real books!

PBS Update

Just a quick update on the web site PaperBackSwap.com...

 

I initially listed, and mailed off, around 15 of my books that I was no longer interested in keeping.  This gained me an equivalent amount of "book credits" to spend on book that I wanted to request from other members.  The problem was that none of the "good books" were available and had very long waiting lists.  I was a bit put off because I unknowingly listed some of my very "good" books, which got snatched up immediately.  Apparently, in order to actually receive a book that was a best seller in the past 10 years, you need to be very patient (to the tune of 6 to 12 months it seems).  Considering the only best sellers that people actually seem to list are from people like me who are new to the site and don't know any better.

 

Of course I have since added more books to my request list and have received about 6 or 7 to date.  These are books that are older best sellers, or simply useful guide type books that are 5+ years from their copyright date.  To be fair, I am satisfied with the site - though not enough to push it on anyone.

 

Here's the problem with PaperBackSwap.com (though none of the member community will admit it)... their self-made book economy is flawed because they allow the purchase of book credits.  I firmly believe that without the option to purchase credits, the site would work wonderfully.  Instead, anyone can purchase a book credit for very cheap (around $3).  This means that you can sign up as a new member and put hundreds of nice hardback best sellers on your wish list, and wait.  When your name comes up and the book is available it will hold the book for you while you purchase a cheap book credit, then let you complete the request.  So you can basically end up getting the best book on the site, without having to list a single book of your own.

 

The problem this creates is an enormous balance skew of demand vs. supply.  There is a huge demand for the books that are in least supply.  If there was no option to purchase book credits, then the only way that people could generate a credit would be when another member requests a book that you have listed.  This would maintain a balance of supply vs. demand since you basically receive no credits unless you list books that there is at least some demand for.

 

I understand that the creators of the site need to make money to keep the site going.  However, by selling book credits they have put the site into a tailspin that is probably irreversible.  Despite this fact, the site has been around quite awhile.  Although I do not know when they stated selling book credits.  While PBS is the biggest site of this type currently out there, others exist and they seem to be growing pretty fast.  The problem for me is that I already dumped most of my expendable books.  Guess I'll have to hit the yard sales this spring!

I just realized I have to dust...

Apparently the cleaning crew at my office doesn't dust.  I suppose that deep down I knew this already, but it didn't consciously occur to me until I started cleaning up my office for the 2nd time in 2.5 years.  Apparently they do vacuum though, which leads me to my proposed solution below. 

 

I know you aren't supposed to use those fluffy dusters-on-a-stick because they mostly just deploy the dust particles into the air, only to re-settle a few minutes later.  However, statistically, if I repeatedly dust off the elevated surfaces, I will be dust free (or close enough).  This works for the same reason that road debris ends up on the shoulder or in between two lanes.  Cars basically keep hitting it until it lands in a spot that is out of the way. 

 

The same goes for the dust.  I will continuously dust it off of the elevated surfaces and let it re-settle.  However, each time some of the dust will re-settle on the elevated surfaces and some will fall to the floor.  The more I do this the closer I will get to 0 dust particles on the elevated surfaces.  I suspect, however, that this is asymptotic and I will never reach zero.  But it doesn't really matter because "close" is definitely good enough in this case.

 

 

My Kindle Quest

The Amazon Kindle is an "e-reader" that was released about a year ago by Amazon.com.  While there have been many eBook readers offered by various electronics companies in the past, none have caught on quite like the Kindle has.  Since the day I learned about the Kindle I was intrigued.  Now that it has been out for months and I have seen the number of sales and the read all of the positive reviews, I feel inclined to push forward with my plan for purchase justification. 

 

The Kindle uses a relatively new display technology referred to as "e ink".  The display is not backlit like an LCD so that it is much easier on the eyes.  According to all of the reviews, its very cool technology and you can read for hours without getting eye strain like you do when looking at a computer monitor. 

 

There are well over one hundred thousand titles for the Kindle and more being released daily.  In addition to Kindle books you can get various newspaper, magazine, and blog subscriptions.  You can also send PDFs or Word files to your Kindle - which get converted to display on the Kindle.  It has enough built-in memory to store hundreds of books.  Additionally, you can add an SD memory chip (up to 2 GB) to increase its capacity to thousands of books.

 

Perhaps the biggest upside of the Kindle is the free cellular internet access.  You can connect anywhere that you would normally get a Sprint cell signal.  This allows you to connect to the Amazon bookstore and order books for downloading to the Kindle anywhere, anytime.  This service is built into the Kindle and there is no additional monthly fee or anything like that.  You also have access to Wikipedia through the Kindle.

 

Another seemingly neat future of the Kindle is the built in dictionary.  Anytime you see a work that you want to look up you simply scroll up to the line that the word is on and press a button and it shows you the definition.

 

The only two problems I have with it is 1. the price and 2. the availability.  Its nearly $400 and its been on backorder since its release.  The Kindle site says that it currently takes 11 to 13 weeks to receive your Kindle upon placing an order.  Prices on eBay are going for nearly $600 due to the limited supply on Amazon (and presumably needing them before Christmas)

 

Oh yea, there is apparently a Kindle 2 coming out in the near future.  It primarily addresses some of the ergonomic concerns that people had with the Kindle (accidentally pushing the 'turn page' buttons).  I hear it will have more built-in memory, but no expansion slot for a memory card (hmmm...).

 

I guess it might make sense to wait and see what happens with the Kindle 2.  Even if it's not substantially better than the Kindle, at a minimum there should be a significant price drop on the original Kindle.

 

Here's the link to the Kindle if you are interested in reading more (theres a short video too): http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Amazons-Wireless-Reading-Device/dp/B000FI73MA

New Style

Reading back through blog entries this fall, I realized that I became a little cynical and abrasive.  While its good to express your views on the world, that's not really what I wanted this blog to be used for.  So I will get back to using this blog for much milder topics and keep away from criticisms of economic theories and such.

 

 

Survey Assumptions

"When you assume, you make an ass our of u and me" - or something like that. 

 

Anyway, I was reading a article about home economics and consumer spending.  The author referenced a study that showed how sales of LCD TV's had dropped off significantly at Best Buy, yet how sales of the same product type had increased at Wal-Mart during the same time period.

 

The author subsequently assumed that this phenomena was due to consumers cutting back spending.  The point was that most consumers are missing the big picture when it comes to personal economics.  They feel that somehow they are being financially responsible by shopping at Wal-Mart for a product that represented irresponsible spending regardless of where it was purchased from.  The author went on to elaborate how people psychologically justify purchases, etc.

 

The reason I am bringing this up is because I find it interesting that they spend a lot of effort to perform this study, yet it seems like 30 seconds was spent on interpreting the results.  Why would they blindly assume that the study (decreased sales at Best Buy and increased sales at Wal-Mart) meant that the average consumer was trying to be more frugal than they used to be?  They are saying that the same people who would normally purchase a TV at Best Buy is now choosing to purchase at Wal-Mart.

 

I offer a different interpretation of the results of that study.  Perhaps the frugal (cheap) people like myself, were just waiting for prices on LCD TV's to drop, or at least stabilize at a low point, before purchasing.  This group of frugal consumers were going to purchase their LCD TV's at Wal-Mart regardless.  It just so happens that prices on LCD TV's have come down to a point where the frugal shoppers have determined that this is a good time to purchase a TV.  Perhaps Best Buy's sales have dropped because their average customer is not fiscally responsible and most of them are now in over their heads - and those consumers are no longer purchasing LCD TV's anywhere.  Not at Best Buy.  Not at Wal-Mart.  They will continue to consume their giant lcd or plasma TV that was purchased 7 months, or 5 years, ago until they get their next stimulus "rebate" check in the mail - at which time Best Buy will be happy to cash it for them.

Spreading the Wealth

I'm getting a little tired of the term "spreading the wealth" being thrown around in the media.  Somehow they have convinced most of the voters that this means "steal from the rich, give to the poor".  I understand the sentiment - I really do.  People are scared to death of the idea that someone who works hard and makes money will have it taken from them and given to someone who is lazy.  Fortunately, this is not what is going on, nor what is proposed by anyone.

 

Every economy has a wealth and income distribution curve associated with it.  While the income distribution can easily be calculated, the wealth distribution is nearly impossible to calculate.  This is because most wealth is in the form of unrealized capital gains.  The income distribution is traditionally put into perspective using the Lorenz curve.  Plotting the income distribution using the Lorenz curve method allows you to calculate a ratio called the Gini ratio. 

 

A Gini ratio of 0 would represent total income equality where everyone in the country had the same amount of income.  A Gini ratio of 1 would represent the other extreme where all of the income in the entire country went to 1 person.  Other industrialized nations like Canada, England, Germany, Japan and Sweden have an Gini ratio between .25 and .35.  This range is typically considered to represent a healthy economy.  Non-industrialized nations like Nigeria and Brazil have Gini ratios between .51 and .59.

 

So what is the Gini ratio of the US?  It is currently about .46 and even got as high as .47 in 2006.  We have the highest Gini ratio of any industrialized nation and are much much closer to countries like Nigeria than we are to some of the healthiest economies in the world like Sweden (.25).

 

By the way, some people have calculated the curve based on an estimation of wealth instead of income and the United States was close to 0.90.

 

Anyway, when you hear the term "spreading the wealth" or "income redistribution" this is referring to the idea that we need to get our income distribution back to a health number or we will end up in dire straights eventually.  There are many theories as to why the current income distribution is reaching such dangerous levels - though none of them give a complete explanation.  We do know one thing though, is that when 99% of the money in the country is in the hands of a few powerful people, bad things start happening. 

 

No one is proposing to steal money from hard working Americans and give it to lazy bums.  The tax adjustments are a temporary fix to a bigger problem.  Do you really think that CEO's earning 120 million a year, who are performing illegal manipulative accounting schemes to boost stock values and their pay (which is always tied to stock price), and getting tens of millions in the form of a golden parachute when they get fired - do you really think these people are "working hard" and "earning" their 250 million dollar pay days?  These people at the top are being handed tons of money at the expense of us.  They are paying lobbyist to block bills that give the SEC the power to regulate their shady accounting practices.  They are donating millions to campaigns in return for getting riders on bills passed that allow them to hide their money and avoid hundreds of millions in taxes.  They are getting bills passed as favors that allow them to setup "mailbox" satellite offices in Bermuda and claiming it their headquarters thus qualifying as an international company any saving hundreds of millions in taxes.  These are some of the corrupt things that are going on and are just a few examples of "behind the scenes" crap that the Bush administration has done. 

 

Who do you think shoulders the brunt of this when tax revenue mysteriously falls short tens of billions of dollars?  Why is no one uneasy about the fact that we are borrowing nearly 400 billion dollars a year from China?  Why does no one care that we are more than 10 trillion in debt and going in the hole 500 billion per year more - year after year (ever since the bush tax cuts went into effect). 

 

Which reminds me... the bulk of the proposed Obama tax plan is merely cancelling the irresponsible '01 and '03 tax cuts that the Bush administration implemented and put us into this deficit block hole that we are spiraling deeper into currently.  He will extend the Bush tax cuts for people making under $250,000 and cancel it for people making over $250,000.  He will also fix the Alternative Minimum Tax - and if you do not know what that is, you may want to read up on it because if it is not fixed it will end up costing middle class Americans thousands of extra dollars in taxes (per year) within a couple of years.  Imagine doing your taxes and seeing a $3000 refund, only to find out that you are now subjected to the AMT and end up owing $2000 instead.

 

Anyway back to the income distribution topic.  Above are some of the reasons that the Gini ratio is getting dangerously unhealthy.  Granted there are other reasons too that are almost beyond our control (like baby-boomer and the technology shift).  But tinkering with rates to help offset some of these things temporarily will help stabilize the economy.  This isn't socialism, or communism, or robin hood economics.  The Obama tax proposals are the result of intelligent discussions with economists who have researched this stuff for decades and are making informed decisions on how to keep the economy from crashing, and maybe even make it healthy again.

 

People should really quit trying to use cries of "socialism" and "communism" as a scare tactic because the average voter is a lot smarter than you think.  I mean, that type of stuff worked when I was in the 5th grade and would typically get a fight started, but people today a little bit more informed and know what's really going on.  So it may be worth it for people to save their breath and their dignity and come up with a better scare tactic.

 

 

Krugman on the Economy

More good stuff from Krugman. I found this video clip at http://www.charlierose.com/shows/2007/12/26/1/a-conversation-with-paul-krugman

The Rules...

For those of you who have been redirected to this wonderful blog, but perhaps were expecting to find a different document, click here for that which you seek.

Debate gripes

Why does the moderator feel so compelled to cut off the candidates after 2 minutes?  Ok, why even set those guidelines going in?  I want to hear what they have to say, yet every time they get going good, they are cut-off.  Aren't we missing the point of the debate? 

 

If you force them to explain their policy in 120 seconds there is no possible way that we can know which one is better.  They are better off using their sliver of time to give us a web site address that explains their policy in more detail. 

 

I guess its just style over substance and we are expected to expect it to be that way (try saying that three times real fast). 

Rained out

So it doesn't rain for two months, then drops two inches of rain on the morning of national "walk-to-school day".  I chuckled at the sight of wet, overburdened baloons lining the sidewalks near the schools.  I don't know if that makes me an ass, or if I just see the lighter side of things.  Either way, I can't help it.  Perhaps we can walk Caroline to school on Friday after the front has passed and the weather is 68 and sunny :)

 

 

Cutting Taxes??

Am I the only one that thinks that proposed tax cuts are a horrible idea right now?  This is obviously vote-getting propaganda by both parties.  I mean, think about a scenario where one of the candidates would come out and say, "My plan does not involve cutting taxes".  Their poll rating would drop 20% over night.  Yet they both propose cutting taxes at a time when the national deficit is increasing at a staggering rate. 

 

You're going to swing a multi-trillion dollar a year deficit by cutting taxes and cutting some spending?  Trillions of dollars!  C'mon, we aren't THAT dumb, are we?  All while ramping up war efforts?  Who cuts taxes during a war, anway??!!! How is that even possible??  Nothing adds up anymore.  We even have calculators. And computers!  Why won't they use them?  There are no excuses for ignorance at that level.  You don't go to war and cut taxes at the same time unless you are trying to win a popularity contest.  Oh yea. Its like quitting your job and buying a house in the same week.  Sure, you get what you want - but the piper is on his way, he's pissed, and he is bi-lingual!

 

The trickle-down theory is so elementary that people feel like they can understand it - at least when its presented to them by the media heads.  I guess if you can't understand something you won't vote for it.  Makes sense, right?  Which is exactly why it's a horrible idea to even bother explaining this crap to people. 

 

The reason we use a representative democracy is to avoid situations where you have uneducated citizens making complicated decisions regarding the nations economic policies, for example.  You wouldn't want a pie maker making decisions on how to design your vehicle, right? 

 

Unfortunately, the representative democracy plan falls apart when the voters are fed bogus one-liners - and for the most part base their opinions on them.  Does it really make any sense for the candidates to get into grave detail about the intricacies of their proposed plans and policies?  As a whole, we are not smart enough to know which ones work better.  You can tell me that you plan on abolishing the mark-to-market account method, but that doesn't mean anything to me without taking several courses and economics and accounting.  That is, until I turn on the radio and hear Rush Limbaugh preaching about how this plan would save the country and that Obama is an evil, terrorist, un-American moron.  Now I have become a well-informed, empowered voter...

 

It makes much more sense to vote on a candidate's overall goals, ideals and leadership ability.  Sadly, with the games that are being played and the media feeling the need to heavily influence people's decisions - it takes a lot of effort to determine these things.  Perhaps it should be a requirement that you have to have written at least one auto biography no less than 8 years prior to running for president.  At least this way, we would have a fighting chance at learning something real about the candidates.  Of course, only a tiny fraction of the population would actually read the books; I guess for the same reasons that more people vote on american idol, than for the president of the united states.

 

Work-to-Pay

Perhaps I use this concept to justify laziness. Or, I am on to something! Fine, I know this is not uncommon knowledge - but surely it is deserving of a diggigy dan blog entry... especially considering there are no qualifications for diggity dan blog entries.

So many variables. It behooves me to generalize. But generalizing is efficient, so screw it.

Generalizations:

• We work for money
• We use money to buy happiness (health, time, friends)
• All work is not equal in terms of effort

Ok, so my point is that when choosing a job, career, or new position take the above points into consideration. Consider the work you will be doing and the effort involved. My current job requires roughly half the effort of my previous job but pays the same. Effort can refer to the comfort level of the tasks that you have to perform, or it can refer to the amount of time you have to spend doing your job. This would include things like travelling or working at home.

For the sake of discussion, lets say you have a job making $50k/yr but it is a difficult job. You commute an hour each way, you spend 9 hours at the office, you have to deal with a bad boss, and you have to get dirty doing "field work'. Then you get offered a job for $40k/yr but the work place is 5 minutes from your house and you have a nice office. On top of that you get more vacation time, more holidays, nicer work vehicle, phone, pda, computer, etc and you get to work on things that are somewhat interesting most of the time.

So to estimate the overall work/pay ratio you need to estimate the "effort" variable. Since there is no standard way to quantify this, we can make something up (its ok, I do this all the time!). I propose taking the total number of hours worked the multiply that number by various "correction factors" in order to take into account everything that matters. For the $50k/yr job we had a 2 hour commute and a 9 hour work day, so we start with a base of 11 hours. Since the work involved a bad environment (boss, labor, etc) we can multiply it by a factor of 1.5 (this is actually several correction factors lumped into one for simplicity). This gives us the equivalent of 11(1.5) = 16.5 hours. Multiply this by the number of days worked in a typical week. In this case I will use 5.3 to account for some Saturday work...

16.5 x 5.3 = 87.45

Multiply this by 52 weeks = 52x87.45 = 4547.4 hours
Subtract vacation and holiday hours (8x10 + 5x8 = 120)
so, 4547.4 - 120 = 4427.4

Now divide this number by your annual salary in thousands = 4427.4 hrs / $50k = 88.55
This is sort of like the number of "effort" hours worked for $1000.

Now lets do this same thing for the $40k/yr job.

8.2 hours of work times a factor for a job that's easier than normal 0.7 = 5.74
Times the number of work days in a week 5.74 x 5 = 28.7 hrs
Times 52 weeks = 28.7 x 52 = 1492.4 hrs
Subtract holidays and vacation (168 hrs) 1492.4 - 168 = 1324.4 hrs
Divided by the salary = 1324.4 / 40 = 33.11

So the first job paid more but took the equivalent of 88.5 "effort" hours to earn each $1000 of pay.
The second job paid less but ended up only taking 33.11 "effort" hours to earn each $1000 of pay.

This should mean, in real terms, that the second job is more than 2.5 times better than the first job. It's quite amazing how all of these factors can really affect the value of a job.

Now obviously there is ambiguity in assigning "correction factors" to adjust the actually work hours into "equivalent effort hours" - but the adjustment needs to be done. How much you value a good boss, or easy/interesting work, etc is up to you. But it truly does benefit you to be honest in the assessment since the outcome of this exercise can tell you a lot.

Anyway, if you take away all of the numbers from the analysis all I have really said is that there is a lot more to a job than the pay. It behooves you as an individual, spouse, and/or parent to keep yourself in a position to make this assessment and act on it. In other words, it may not be best idea to get your first job out of school, then jam yourself up with so many bills and expenses that you are stuck having to make a certain salary at the expense of so many other things.

That's all for today.
War Eagle!

Government Bailouts

I don't see the benefits of complete deregulation. It has been researched and shown over and over that a complex market can not survive if only left to its own forces. If you care to know, there is a pretty interesting book called "Reinventing the Bazaar", and it is basically a brief history of markets. It is a good book (a tad on the academic side) that illustrates by real example why certain markets have failed throughout history. Some were over-regulated, but most were lacking proper regulation. Also, the concept of a "failed market" varies, but I digress.

Why would we allow these financial institutions to dig a hole so deep that we are now in a position that we either have to bail them out, or suffer an economic collapse? I understand that we don't want to regulate so many things that it hinders the success of corporations and small businesses. But do you understand what was happening? Without proper regulation in place each person or company was doing what was in their best interest, despite the effects it would have on the next person on company in the chain.

The entire process was profitable from top to bottom AND at the same time nearly everyone involved could pass along the risk to someone else. The mortgage brokers were pushing these insane, high-risk loans because they were being paid on commission. The banks were offering the loans because the underwriters were allowing them. The underwriters were allowing these high risk loans because they were passing them along by bundling them up and selling them. Fund managers taking on these risky "assets" because their pay structures were based on short-term performance. Investors were buying into these funds because of the phony ratings that were given to the packages.

So when it all fell apart, the brokers had made tons of money, some banks got out unscathed, and the fund managers retired wealthy (after 3 yrs of work). The cat is out of the bag and the investors are trying cutting their losses now but the financial brokerage firms are out of cash, thus insolvent - and the underwriters are experiencing a large spike in foreclosures to go with all of this. So the government steps in and puts nearly a trillion dollars on the line to try to keep the country from imploding into the next great depression.

A few simple regulations in place would have put restrictions on lending practices and none of this would have happened. Everything can't be left to the market unless we are willing to take the bad with the good. Unfortunately the bad could mean collapse.

And by the way, from a more broad perspective, the economic boom we had wasn't real. Sure we all got bigger houses, bigger cars, and nicer toys - but it was all on borrowed cash. There was no real prosperity as we now know. It's not like our country was actually producing anything. In fact, we are producing far less than we were 60 years ago. We have converted into a services economy... and that's bad because services are expendable (as we see when jobs get exported). So where did all the cash come from, then? Take a look at the national deficit. We borrowed it from other countries by selling billions and billions worth of bonds. Oh yea, we went ahead and printed a lot of it too.

Why print more money? Seems foolish right? After all, it obviously will create tons of inflation if you just crank up the presses every time you need some windfall cash. Well think about what inflation does to debt. If the value of the dollar plummets to near nothing it becomes pretty damn easy to payoff your outstanding debts. This is why it is considered common knowledge among economists that the federal government secretly likes as much inflation as we can handle. One of the worst things that could happen is to be gravely in debt and experience massive deflation of our currency.

All we have to do is put a little regulation in place that doesn't allow people to act so irresponsibly that they crash the entire economy. If we get back to financial responsibility and build a mature economy, we can get back to being prosperous. I understand that McCain wants to keep people calm and give the impression that the economy is "still fundamentally sound", but it's not. I hope he understands the real issues and is simply playing a political game - surely this is the case. We need to produce things again, we need to quit borrowing money and we need to regulate some things, otherwise we will continue to dig the hole until it reaches China.

New cars & number crunching

Do you ever wonder if your getting the most out of your money? If you are like me at all, then you are probably well aware of the fact that you waste lots of money, but have intentions of tightening up your personal finances in the near future. The problem is that the "the near future" never arrives. Once you dig a hole, no matter how small, there will be some amount of pain associated with climbing out of it. In my opinion, one of the worst holes you can dig is financing a vehicle.

When did it become normal to finance automobiles? Didn't most people used to pay cash for cars, or at least put up a respectable amount of money as a down payment? Not only do most middle class people finance their vehicles now, but they finance them with nothing down. Talk about your all-time horrible ideas - this one tops the list. You are purchasing an item on credit that loses value extremely fast. To be blunt, you are paying thousands (if not tens of thousands) of dollars for the gratification of having a new car, right here, right now.

Consider a new car that costs $30,000. Its shiny, clean and has that new car smell. Oh, it also gets your from point A to point B. You finance the car for 72 months at 6% interest (if you have decent credit). You make payments of $497/mo for 6 years and end up paying $35,797 for the car. You spent an extra $5797 in interest for the privilege of not having to wait and save up your money.

Now consider the alternative. Instead of financing a $30,000 new car, you do your research and find a nice used car for about $10,000 with under 50,000 miles on it. This is easy to find because I have done it. This car isn't quite as shiny and doesn't have that new car smell, but it does get you from point A to point B reliably. Instead of financing this car you spent the past 20 months (less than 2 years) saving $497/mo in your savings account. You simply pull out the $10,000 in cash and pay for the car.

So you still have a car, but you just freed up about $500 per month for the next 6 years. If you continue to put this money into an online savings account yielding about 3.5% interest (ING Direct, HSBC, etc) you will have about $40,000 in your savings account after 72 months.

With $40,000 in your savings account, now you can buy another used car (perhaps even nicer if you want to treat yourself) and pay $20,000 cash. For $20k cash you could purchase a pretty nice used car with under 50,000 miles on it. Now you still have $20,000 in your savings account and you can still afford to put away $500 per month. Another 6 years goes by and now you have over $65,000 in savings.

So after only 12 years (seems long, but its not like you are suffering in your $20,000 used Tahoe) you have $65,000 just sitting in a savings account and all you had to do was not finance brand new vehicles that you didn't even need to begin with.

The problem for most people is, of course, that they either already have car payments - or they don't have car payments but need to buy a vehicle soon and don't have time to save up to pay cash for one. Unfortunately the solution is one that involves some pain. Not physical pain, but the pain that comes with driving a vehicle that you can actually afford. Reassess your situation and realistically determine if you truly "need" a new vehicle right now, or you just "want" a new vehicle right now. What your peers think of your vehicle and what you think your peers think of your vehicle are drastically different. Suck it up and start saving today. Get your vehicle serviced or repaired or cleaned up - and keep on driving it for a couple more years.

The thing is, once you break the cycle you will forever be ahead of the curve, it will be a simple plan to follow and you will surely be happy you did it.

The crashing "market"

I put the word "market" in quotation marks because it is being used very loosely lately. But enough about that.

Discussions involving the current state of the economy can be pretty complex, but they don't have to be. Sure you can get down to the nitty gritty and discuss the intricacies of mortgage-backed securities or sub-prime lending standards or discuss the finer points of the effects of commodities speculators. Or, you can simply discuss some of the things that you observed on a regular basis over the past 10 years and have an equally significant discussion on the state of the economy.

I sort of pat myself on the back for acknowledging at least a couple of things that were going wrong. A question I used to regularly ask myself is, "How can I be told house appreciation is 4 or 5% when I am also being told that inflation is around 2.5 to 3%?" Assuming that wages increased with inflation (which is a bold assumption considering data showing they have not kept up at all), then appreciation rates exceeding inflation rates is a recipe for disaster, right? I mean, at some point no one in the world would be able to afford a house. This is simple 9th grade math at worst. So all things being equal - if appreciation is 5% and inflation is 3% then the increase in the cost of housing will exceed the increase in the cost of goods (and wages) by 2% per year. This may sound like no big deal, but it turns out to be pretty significant when compounded.

For example,

If I recall correctly the future worth equation is something like F = P(1 + i)^n

Where, F = future worth, P = present worth, i = interest rate, n = number of terms

Lets pretend that someone making $80k per year can afford a $200,000 house...

So if you take a $200,000 house and assume 5% appreciation over 25 years it would be worth $677,270

If you take an income of $75,000 and assume a 3% increase in wages based it grow to $157,033 in 25 years.

So in 25 years the same house went up in value almost 3.5 times its original price, but the job that paid $75k now only pays just over double what it did 25 yrs ago. Talk about a drop in living standards.

Obviously this is not sustainable. A correction HAS to happen assuming all other variables remain constant. HOWEVER, all things did not remain constant. What changed was the demand. All of a sudden lending standards went out of the window and arrays of teaser loan options became commonly available. Couple that with the most aggressive rate cuts we have ever seen (thanks Greensapn) - so instead of having to make $75k to "afford" a $200k house - now you could pretty much get in one with an income of about $40k with no money down. How many new potential buyers did this add to the demand pool? At the bottom end you have people buying houses that couldn't afford to buy at all previously, and at the top end you have people buying houses worth twice as much as they could afford a few years prior. The overall demand skyrocketed across the board, which artificially inflated appreciation even more. Enter the house speculators (aka flippers) and it gets exacerbated.

Now you have appreciation pushing double digits and little to no income growth. Its obviously going to bust at this point. It's just a question of when. As a person living in this country you are either witnessing (or ignoring), obliviously involved, or playing the game. Either way it all boiled down to timing. If you got caught with the hot potato, you lost. If you tossed it in time, you won. If you had the lead but didn't cut and run - you are currently losing one day at a time.

I'm out of time but I'd like to continue this in a part 2 post....

Charter Phone Service

About 5 months ago I began noticing an advertisement campaign from Charter that was pushing their new cable phone service.  Being a former dissatisfied Vonage customer, I was cautiously optimistic when I found out that Charter was offering this service (presumably using some form of voice over IP technology).  I didn't swap over immediately for two reasons, 1. I wanted to let some other people be the guinea pigs, but more significantly 2. It wasn't yet offered in my area.

 

After a couple of months the Charter phone service became available in my area.  I waited another few months and had not become aware of any major complaints with the service from people who had signed up early.  Then, out of nowhere, our AT&T phone lines go dead.  After going several days with no phone service an AT&T technician services the line but says that the main lines across the street from my house are rotten (whatever that means... phone lines are not organic as far as I know) and the service will continue to have problems.  He even admitted that he may have knocked out some of my neighbors service when he tried to repair mine.  In fact, his tone and demeanor seemed to indicate that he wasn't confident that AT&T would have the line replaced completely any time soon.  So for the time being, my phone was working but it had a loud background hum and was apparently susceptible to going out again at any given time.

 

At this point I figured that there was no better time than now to try out the Charter phone service.  After all, the only physical phone lines that would be utilized for the Charter service are the lines that are physically located within my house.  All data transmission outside of my house occurs via the Charter coaxial cable.  So I setup a bundled package including cable tv, internet and phone.  My savings will be on the order of $60 per month for the first year, then it will bump up to ultimately be about a $35 per months savings (over my charter + AT&T combo I had previously).

 

My cable tv package remained the same.  My internet package includes their basic service, which bumps me up from 1.5 Mbps to 5 Mbps download bandwidth and doubles my upload bandwidth (these speeds are theoretical - I have not tested them).  The Charter phone package includes all the usual stuff like call waiting and caller ID, but also includes unlimited long distance within the country as well as some unlimited and/or cheap international rates. 

 

They scheduled a technician to come out about 4 days from the time I placed the order.  The installation went smoothly.  I will explain briefly how the phone setup works in layman's terms (because I really don't know how it works in technical terms). 

• They locate a cable outlet that is located near a phone jack (or install a new cable jack). 
• A cable comes out of the cable jack and is plugged into a small box that presumably handles the conversion of data so that the phones can understand it. 
• A phone line comes out of this box and plugs into a phone jack on the wall.  This sends the phone "signal" to all of the other phone jacks in your house. 
• Now you simply plug your phones into your existing phone jacks and they all work just like they did before. 

In my case, I had a cable and phone jack in close proximity to my computer desk, so they simply used a splitter on the cable outlet.  Once line went to the phone box and the other went to the cable modem.

 

The service was installed on September 4th, the opening day of the NFL season.  This is irrelevant to most people, but happened to be a much anticipated event for me personally.  That night I was enjoying the game midway through the second quarter when the screen went blank.  I panicked and went to the other room.  Sure enough, it was out in there too.  So I immediately went to get online to check Charters web site and also pull up the NFL.com site to follow the game.  Of course the internet is also not functional.  I'm pretty annoyed at this point so I pick up the phone to call Charter... oh yea, my phone now through Charter too, thus broken at the moment. 

 

It turns out that there just happened to be a brief outage in the area.  My services were restored in about 45 minutes, but it was a blatant reminder that when you bundle several services that rely on a single provider - when their service has a failure you get shut down on all fronts.  Luckily, these days the phone component is not that big of an issue since most people have cell phones readily available.  However, admittedly, losing cable television and internet at the same time is somewhat of a downer.  Just be sure to keep a few good books on the shelf and you'll be fine during the few outages that are inherent with cable service.

 

Other than that single temporary outage, I have been very satisfied so far.  Bundled service with a single bill, cheaper cost, and faster internet seems to outweigh the risk of downtime (assuming that risk remains relatively low).  I am recommending this service to people at this point with the understanding that I have only had the service for only a couple of weeks.  If things were to take a turn for the worse, I will certainly provide an update.

 

 

 

 

Book Swap Update

A couple of weeks ago I posted about a web site called http://www.paperbackswap.com/. I have since mailed off 14 books, which the "buyers" received successfully and my book credits were applied to my account. So that aspect of the process ended up going pretty smoothly. Admittedly, wrapping the books was an interesting process using printer paper - but it's not as bad as it sounds.

The problem I'm having at this point is lack of "good" books to choose from. Any book that was a best seller in the past few years has a waiting list a mile long. Reference type books are non existent. I am, of course, on many waiting lists now but it will likely be half a year or more before I get moved up in the queue. However, there are some older books, many of which are good classics, that are immediately available. If you are not a picky reader like I am, then you can probably find ample books to request that can be shipped immediately.

The perceived lack of good quality books somewhat perplexed me since the system, as I understood it, should work better than it does. In theory, the only way someone could request a book is if they had a book credit available. And since the way to get book credits is to ship one of your books to someone (when they request it), then the supply vs. demand for good books should be relatively equal. The only factor that may skew it slightly is that you get 2 free credits when you initially open your account.

Then I realized what was going on... the site actually allows you to purchase book credits with real money. As if that wasn't bad enough, the credits are priced very cheap. If you add up the cost of shipping on a book plus the wrapping material you are almost spending as much to ship a book as it costs to buy a credit. When you factor in gas money and the value of your time you spend packaging and driving to the post office - you are better off just buying the credits. What's the obvious problem with this? If everyone is buying credits and putting in requests for popular books, there is no one listing popular book. Thus the wait list for popular books grows and grows.

What makes is even worse is that you can be on the wait list without even buying a credit. When you finally make it to the top you are notified and have the option to buy a cheap credit and the book will be shipped to you.

So until I receive my first book, or figure out a better genre of books to search for - I'm giving the site a pretty mediocre rating. There was enormous possibility here and I personally think they screwed it up. That being said, the site is young and growing still and there is a chance they will make it better. But for now, I don't recommend signing up and listing your good books. They will be immediately snatched up and you will be lucky to find any book to replace them with unless you are willing to wait for a very long time. That being said, it makes perfect sense to sign up and get on a ton of wait lists for pre-releases and simply purchase cheap credits when your book becomes available (just know that you are making it worse for me :)

"They don't design them like they used to"

Everyone is familiar with the phrase "they just don't build them like they used to". Typically, this comment is made after something breaks or falls apart - apparently due to poor construction. The frustrated owner recalls a time when things were built to a much higher standard. They seem to remember that things used to be built with stronger materials, more bolts, more welds, and bigger beams and columns.

Well, are they right? For whatever reason I was thinking about this the other day and realized that it is most likely a fallacy to say that things used to be "built" better. The likely reality is that things used to be "overbuilt". What I mean by that, is that there was no real design going on when great grandpa built his house. In order to compensate for lack of design, you basically end up overbuilding.

These days, there is engineering behind everything that is built or manufactured. If it falls apart or breaks much sooner than it is supposed to, then it may be much more accurate to blame it on the designer rather than the builders. After all, it is the designer that calculates the size of the beams and the number of bolts that are needed to build something. They calculate how much strength something needs to have, then they use just enough materials to build it. Without these calculations, the builder would have to take a much more conservative approach and use more and bigger materials. The end result, of course, is that the final product would be much sturdier.

I guess we can't blame it all on the designers. Surely there are other factors at play. When a television set is designed it may be designed to handle "normal use" for a predetermined life span. Ideally (for the business) the product lasts just long enough so that it is not considered defective when it breaks. If you design for a life much longer than this, then you are just wasting money on materials and possibly labor.

So its not that great grandpa intentionally built the house to stand up for 150 years, rather he just built it so that it was obviously sturdy and moved on. Today, when questioned about the scrawny beams being used to construct a building, the engineer is likely to respond by saying that the beams have been sized to adequately support the calculated dead and live loads using a standard-of-the-practice factor of safety and a deflection within the specified tolerance. Yay for engineering and houses that sway when the wind blows.

Some Politics Stuff

Why do people appear to care so much? I mean, no one is even arguing about specific issues anymore. If you aren't arguing about issues, then what are you arguing about? Experience? Intelligence? Money? The closer this election gets, the more abstract the arguments are becoming. And for some reason, the more abstract the arguments get, the more people get emotionally vested.

And what's with all of the assumptions? OK fine, maybe they aren't assumptions. Just know that when you forward a politically biased email out to 50 of your friends, this will be interpreted as an act of unsolicited propaganda. If you don't mind being perceived as "that person", then by all means, continue to forward those emails. The same goes for unsolicited political jokes, unsolicited political "rants", and [fill in the blank with other social faux pas' that have nothing to do with politics].

My own assumption (perhaps incorrect) was that these people were too stupid to realize that not everyone around them was hit with collateral damage from the brainwashing they experienced. After all it has to be brainwashing right? Why else would you blindly assume that everyone you know has the EXACT same opinions as you on EVERYTHING? The answer is, you would not make that assumption if you had actually come up with any of these opinions on your own. Why? Because after putting legitimate thought and research into a particular issue you would realize that there are so many variables as play, and so many unique and valid points to consider, that there is no possible way you could predict another person's opinion on an issue... much less an entire group of friends and acquaintances.

Which brings me to my next point. How can people align themselves blindly to one particular party and then preach to the world how spectacular their candidate is, and how rotten the other candidate is? I was cautiously surprised to find out that there are more independents than usual this year. I strongly hope that these people evaluate each issue that they deem worthy of consideration and choose a candidate who most strongly agrees with their opinion on each issue. Pretty basic right?

Instead it seems that the vast majority of the voting population is swayed by one-liners.

"McCain is a war monger"
"Democrats are communists"
"Palin has no experience"
"Obama is un-American"
"McCain is more Bush politics"
etc

I'm so sick of hearing these (and other) lines over and over again. Those things don't even mean anything. The entire political environment has turned into a giant pep rally. Literally, its like walking through campus on a Saturday during football season and trying to guess the winner of the game based on who has the best spirit banners and cheer leaders. Never mind who has the more skilled athletes, the better coaching staff and a better game plan.

I'm going to touch on a few of these non-issues...

The War

McCain doesn't want to go to war just for the sake of going to war. The man didn't get to where he is by being a dumb ass. Bush has us in the middle of a war with the worst approval rating in history and McCain might inherit it. The last thing he, or any rational human being, wants is to continue the war any longer than he has to. Would Obama end the war faster than McCain? Maybe, but we don't know if he would be successful. If it was that easy wouldn't McCain do the same thing? Do we want the war ended immediately if it meant hundreds or thousands of innocent Iraqi people (including children) would die? No, obviously.

Would McCain be more likely to get us involved in another war chasing down Bin Laden? Perhaps. Will this put us in another Iraq type scenario? Possibly. No one knows. Could it possibly prevent future terrorist attacks? Possibly. No one knows. Would Bin Ladin ever strike again if we just ignored him, or beefed up intelligence instead of pursuing with force? Possibly. We don't know.

If you don't know the answer to any of the above questions (and you don't), then how can you be so certain the one candidate's war/diplomacy policies will be better than another?

Communism

Seriously, are we all 8 yrs old again? Grow up and read a book or two. Anytime I hear someone mention communism in the same sentence with democrats or Obama, I immediately subtract 75 points from that persons probable IQ. These are the same people that hold Sarah Palin's convention speech in higher regard than Nelson Mandela's 1964 speech.

Anyway, the tax code is flawed to the point of being nearly broken. I'd guess that over 90% of Americans agree with that statement. Each candidate has a preliminary tax plan that calls for adjusting the tax code in some way, shape or form. A tax is a tax, ok. Don't read between the lines. The government takes money from you so that they can use it pay for things that we the people) want as a society.

There are always going to be differing opinions on how much money is needed by the government, who they take it from, and how they spend it. This is a very dynamic system. It is also a system that involves enormous amounts of money and enormous numbers of people. This means that inevitably some corruption is involved (not matter who is in office). By corruption all I mean is the wrong people getting the money or people not paying their fair share. This doesn't make it ok, nor does it make it a system that can not work. What it means is that we should demand that the system be fixed so that corruption is as least likely as possible. Once the money is being collected and handled without corruption, we can move on to debating how much to collect and what to spend it on.

So yea, as far as how "much" to tax and "where" to spend the money... well those are examples of some of the real issues people should be evaluating and using to help themselves decide on a candidate. After all, these are the types of things that a president really will have an effect on and they will affect your life (admittedly a lot less than people would like you to think).

Experience

I think this experience thing is extremely overrated. It started with Obama being called out for lack of experience and now it has shifted to Palin. Obviously, none of the candidates have experience running the country. Hell, George W. bush had the most experience (indirectly) of any president in recent history (since his dad was the president and all...), yet managed to suffer some of the worst approval ratings in history.

Where do people get this concept of comparing other jobs to running the united states of America? If someone is the CEO of a giant corporation, this means that they will know how to structure an equitable tax plan, excel at diplomacy, or restructure an entire healthcare system? I don't get it. I personally am looking for someone who is an effective leader with a vision that matches mine as closely as possible. That's it.

Lets go back to the football analogy. Who would you rather have as your running back last year, the experienced Warrick Dunn, or the inexperienced rookie Adrian Peterson? Pretty easy answer. The difference is that Adrian Peterson is obviously bigger, faster and more skilled than Warrick Dunn. In fact, his lack of "experience" made him even more productive because he wasn't "pre programmed" to react certain ways in certain situations thus allowing him to take advantage of unique opportunities as they presented themselves.

Un-American

I have to be quite honest - I don't know what this word means in relation to Obama. I mean, he is American according to the records I have been made aware of. I can only assume that when people use this word, what they really mean to be saying is unpatriotic. After all, if un-American means that your ancestors were born in a different country - then I guess we are all un-American.

Anyway, each person has their own level of patriotism. Some people apparently feel that there is some sort of "patriotism threshold" qualifier that has to be met in order for a candidate to receive their vote. While I respect that opinion, I only share it to a certain extent. Obviously, it would be a bad idea to vote for someone who wanted to see the demise of America. In some limited capacity they could actually do some things that could set us back a tad before getting impeached. However, to somehow try to extrapolate this concept to Barack Obama really makes you look like a moron. Of course, these days I honestly think that people don't care that they are perceived as morons, as long as their peers are also perceived as morons with them. Each to their own.


This is getting long, so I will wrap it up. I like a lot of Obama's characteristics and I like some of the concepts on his platform. I also like McCain's personality when he is being himself and not trying to rally the troops. I really don't give a rats ass about the VP because that's not what we are voting for. You don't bet on a football team because you think the backup QB has charisma. You pick the person who has the best chance to win the game.

I know things aren't going to get any better. The debates will start soon and we will have to bear an increase the blind hypocrisy, the distorted statistics, the name calling, the pep rally antics, and all the other shenanigans that apparently goes along with it. And no media is unbiased. My 7 yr old could tell you which party each media outlet supports within 10 seconds of watching, or reading any publication from any of them. We all know how blatantly obvious it is, so quit pretending that your party is not favored in the media. All media outlets have their favorite, but again, who cares anyway? Republicans watch Fox and listen to Rush and Democrats watch Letterman and read the NY Times...etc. There's enough to go around. If you are offended by the bias, then change the channel. I personally like the bias becuase it gives me something to talk about. Its too bad these are the only sources of information for some people.

Enough for today. I'm sure I'll have more of these rants as we move toward election day.

Lazy blogger

I discovered that it's pretty easy to stop blogging, especially when you feel confident that no one is reading it.  Not that I really expected anyone to read it other than a few friends and a few family people.  The real purpose of this blog was for me to get a feel for the whole blogging thing in general.  Here's what I learned so far:

 

1.  Lot's of people have blogs.

2.  There are a couple of "blogging sites" out there that provide an easy, customizable interface and do all the hosting for you (like this one).

3.  Many successful blogs host their site using their own domain and their own private or paid-for hosting service.

4.  It's apparently not easy to have a successful blog.

5.  Many people out there have excellent writing skills, but very few people out there can provide a continuous stream of useful or intriguing content.

 

So what are my blogging plans for the future?  I may begin to search for a niche topic - something that I'm interested in and could provide a unique angle on.  I have some ideas, but they need further exploration before I can make a final determination.

 

I have been tinkering with WordPress (open source blogging web software in php).  It is a useful tool and has all the features I would need or want to host my own blogging site.  I am a little bit lacking in knowledge on CSS and other techniques used to customize the software.  However, I have learned a lot and I think with a bit more time I can make it useful.

 

I'll update again with possible blog ideas as I get them.

Book Trading

I had a great idea for a web site awhile back.  I wanted to make a site where people could trade books.  I thought about it for awhile and eventually came up with a system where you would list the books you had to trade.  The other members would search for books and if they wanted one of your book, they could request it and you had to ship it to them (cheap, media rate shipping).  In doing this, you received a "book credit".  This credit would allow you to request a book from someone else.  So for each book you shipped off to someone, you received a credit and for each book you requested from someone, you were deducted a credit.  I figured the system could be "seeded" by provided a credit or two initially when someone signed up and listed a certain number of books.

 

I got pretty excited and was ready to get to work on this idea... then I did a few quick google searches and found out that my idea already existed pretty much exactly how I envisioned it.  The primary site is called www.paperbackswap.com

 

So I recently decided to sign up and at least try it out.  I immediately uploaded my 10 books to get 2 free credits.  Surprisingly, 7 of the books I uploaded were immediately snatched up.  Apparently you can search for books not listed on their web site and add them to your wish list.  Then you can setup the books on your wish list to automatically request the book as soon as anyone lists it.

 

I immediately realized that this site is probably loaded with not-so-great books with many more people requesting good books than providing good books.  It's too soon to draw hard conclusions, but I will continue to evaluate.  As for now, I have wrapped up 7 books to ship off.  This will give me 9 credits, so I will have to spend some time loading up my wish list to automatically request the books I'm interested in.  Hopefully some decent books show up within a reasonable timeframe. 

 

Tip from Dan:  If you are signing up for this site and listing book for the first time, don't list any books that may belong to your spouse.  If this book happens to be on someone's wish list it will automatically get requested and you will not have the option to easily remove it from your list - then your spouse will realize you 'gave away' her precious book and demand that it be replaced for an outrageous price on Amazon.com, thus defeating the entire purpose of the book swap concept.

 

 

 

Olympics or pre-season NFL?

Part of me feels guilty for having no desire to watch the olympics. My initial excuse was lack of time, but then I found myself with time to watch NFL preseason football. I was listening to one of the local sports stations the other day and they put up a poll asking people which sporting event they preferred to watch, the olympics or pre-season NFL football. The results at the time I heard about it was over 85% voting for pre-season football over the olympics.

So what makes the olympics so incredibly boring to watch? I think it's because you have no vested interest in the athletes or the team. The large majority of the time we are rooting for people we never even heard of until the start of the event. Sure, there's valid reason to feel compelled to root for your country's team... but when this only comes around once every 4 years and the team members are different every year, you just sort of lose any connection to the team that you may have developed during the previous olympics.

To contrast, a professional sports team maintains a consistent identity with a city for a very long time. The team owners, coaches, and players remain relatively consistent from year to year as well. Sure you get a few changes every year but the majority of the team remains in tact. Additionally, you get to see your team perform repeatedly over the course of an entire season. And when the season if over, the longest you have to wait is about 8 months (for nfl football) before the next season begins.

The other issue is that you never really know what sport your are going to get to watch when you tune in to the olympics. If I knew (without doing excessive research) when the mens open 100m and the 4x100m were going to be, I would sit down, tune in, crack a beer and watch the 10 second race. Instead, what acutally happens is that I see the olymics is on... I change to the channel, and I get two tiny sweaty guys in funny shirts in a vigorous badminton match. While I respect their passion for the sport of badminton, the world should respect my choice not to spend my time watching it.

No matter how much they ramp up the marketing efforts I really don't think the above obstacles can be overcome. I will be resigned to watching pre-season football over the summer olympics every 4 years. The only suggestion that I can give to the networks is to perhaps hire John Madden to cover a few events. It wouldn't change the sport, but I would certainly be inclined to watch Madden break down the replay of a winning curling toss.

Mosquitos

One of the worst things about living in New Orleans was the mosquitoes.  There were probably only 2 months out of the year when they weren't a big problem.  When I left New Orleans in 1994 I left behind the mosquitoes for good... or so I thought.

 

For some reason, in Auburn, when I am outside in the summer afternoons the mosquitoes are abound.  I don't know if they are just everywhere, or if there is something about my yard or my neighbors yards, or near by water features causing the problem. 

 

We noticed that there was a good bit of standing water after relocating some rocks to the landscape bed along the back of the house.  Apparently the condensation drain from the a/c was dripping in this areas and the rocks were preventing the water from immediately evaporating.  Thus over time it grew into a quasi, miniature marsh.  I'm exaggerating a little bit, but there was definitely some standing water at all times back there.

 

Being urged by Trina to take action, I came up with a plan involving PVC and Gorilla glue to take care of the problem.  Being the super intelligent engineer that I am, I happen to know things that the average person doesn't - like the first rule of civil engineering:  Water flows down hill.  Unfortunately, the discharge for the condensation pipe was at a relative low point in our entire back yard.  Not to be deterred, I surveyed the grades (using my highly-calibrated eyeball) and decided that I could route it around the north side of the house with enough fall keep the water moving. 

 

Two trips to home depot, two brief sessions of trenching and pipe laying, two days of procrastination, and the project is almost done.  Actually, I just need to cover the pipe back up.  It appears to be functioning as intended.  I guess I won't know if its truly working until enough head builds up to start overflowing from the condensation tray inside of our house.  But so far, so good.  The standing water is gone at least.

 

The mosquitoes haven't immediately disappeared.  I did some quick research online and realized that they really only need a moist environment and some tall grass to breed like crazy.  My ailing vegetable garden is now suspect number two.  I'll have to address this in the coming week.  The solution may be a god mowing and removal of the squash and zucchini plants (which seem to be past their productive stages).  I was tempted to use a healthy dose of one of those non discriminatory insecticides.  Allegedly some of them work very well for ridding mosquitoes.  However, apparently if I use those products I will kill all of the 'good' insects, I will destroy the local streams and lakes, my pets will have skin rashes and respiratory issues, and my entire family will get cancer.  I don't know if that is the exact working on the product label, but the critics on the internet forums seemed to be very educated on this...

 

 

 

 

 

Slow Week

I haven't put up a blog entry in almost a week.  I think this is mostly due to lack of things to say.  The only topic worthy of noting is the weather... man is it hot.  I'm so happy that I work inside on days like this.  At my prior job I would be out visiting construction sites all over Atlanta on a day like this... 108 degree heat index, noise, dirt, sweat... only to sit in traffic for 90 minutes after each day was finally over.  Wake up at 6:30am, get home at 7:30pm...ugh!

 

Now I get up close to 7am and get home at about 4:40pm.  My commute is 6 minutes (5 if I don't catch the light at Dean Rd).  And as luck would have it, my office is on the "cold" wing of the building.  The HVAC system in this building is on its last leg, and the temperatures are inconsistent throughout the building.  The south end stays very warm and the north end stays cold all day.  We proposed a new HVAC system for this building, but I hear it got put on the budget for 2014.... oh well.

 

We received our new Flip Video camera.  Its very tiny and fun to use so far.  I'm still learning how to dump the video and get it archived.  Soon I should be able to post little video clips.  I opened a YouTube account and that may be the most practical way to share video for now.  As for archiving the video... I need to figure out how to get them on to DVD's in a format that most DVD players can understand.  It takes video natively in am MPEG-4 format.  I don't know if current model DVD players come equipped to decode mpeg-4 video.  I'll get it figured out soon enough.

 

 

 

 

How to communicate with Dan

I went to a little seminar on Tuesday on "Dynamic Communication".  It turned out to be a little different than what I expected.  I had hoped to learn better ways to communicate effectively in general since I am not necessarily known to be the best communicator; and I definitely see the merits of fine-tuning such a skill.

 

It turns out that we primarily focused on an intricate system for profiling people's behaviors and personalities.  We started off by answering a series of questions.  The questions were somewhat vague and a little bit repetitive.  They would be things like, "Which of the following best describes you, and which of the following least describes you:  a) You prefer to lead the group  b) You prefer to work alone c) You value other peoples opinions on issues d) Your emotions affect your decisions, etc... "

 

When you are done you get a profile that ranks you in four categories by assigning you a number between 1 and 100 for each category.  It actually gives you two profiles.  One is your 'natural' profile and the other is your 'adapted' profile.  Apparently when you are around other people (like at work) you put on your adapted profile, but when you are home relaxed, you put on your natural profile.  The further apart these two profiles are, then more energy you expend while wearing your adapted profile.  Kind of like taking someone who naturally loves doing accounting work all day, and putting them into an HR job.  They would be a disaster and would probably quit or go postal.

 

Apparently a lot of big companies will use this system to determine what type of person they need to best fill a specific job opening.  They will have potential candidates take this brief quiz to help determine if they would be a good fit.  If you choose someone who has the opposite behavior/personality then both the employee and the employer will end up in a bad situation.  Apparently this happens often.

 

So anyway, what you are really dying to know is:  How can I best communicate with Dan?  Lucky for you, I now have a list of Do's and Don't when attempting to communicate with me.

 

When speaking to Dan DO the following:

• Keep at least 3 feet away from him.
• Listen to him.
• Give him time to be thorough, when appropriate.
• Respect his quiet demeanor.
• Provide details in writing.
• Make an organized presentation of your position, if you disagree.
• Use expert testimonials.
• Minimize risk by providing guarantees over a period of time.
• Use the proper buzz words that are appropriate to his expertise.
• Follow through, if you agree.
• Be prepared with facts and figures.
• Approach him in a straightforward, direct way; stick to business.

When speaking to Dan do NOT do the following:

• Use testimonies of unreliable resources; don't be haphazard.
• Threaten, cajole, wheedle, coax or whimper.
• Leave things to chance or luck.
• Pretend to be an expert if you are not.
• Make statements you can not prove.
• Be redundant.
• Dillydally or waste time.
• Be superficial.
• Use gimmicks or clever, quick manipulations.
• Make conflicting statements.
• Be disorganized or messy.

 

There you have it.  I spent 10 minutes answering a series of questions on their laptop and I now have instructions for how to communicate with myself.  I will not comment on whether or not I feel these lists are accurate.  Feel free to experiment.