Huh?

I read way too many blogs.  OK, it's a lousy habit but recently some of the blogs are just going crazy about the end of civilization; demonizing President Obaba, just going completely off the tracks.  Get a grip folks!  He's a dummy but that's about it.  I'm sorry that there are people who believe the Pres is a POS non-American commie nigger.  Well, I don't think he is doing a very good job but Mr. Cruz is bringing up a much more interesting slant on being American born.  As for the rest, if you understand the definition of communism, you know Mr. Obama isn't one.  And for his color; who really gives a shit?  If you do, you're an idiot.  I expect he would agree that he's not meeting his own standards as a President.  But he's not the anti-Christ. 

Come on folks, he's just some twit who isn't very good at politics.  Not many remember but Kennedy was cruising for a really lousy presidency when he was killed.  VP Johnson stepped in and in spite of f*&king up Vietnam did a really stellar job of changing civil rights law. He isn't given much credit but in 100 years he'll be seen as a real deal changer.  Obama is like Kennedy; a newbie who can't get things done.  His VP, Biden, should be in charge of getting things done but Obama isn't capable of letting go that much.  It's a shame.

Anyway, the end of America as we know it isn't around the corner.  The economic collapse isn't either.  So stop prepping and start living.  My folks made it through the great depression and mom (20 in 1932) didn't even have to sell her self to the highest bidder.  Neither did my wife's mom.  Hard times, yes.  But not the end of the world and it isn't coming now either.  Take a big salt pill and wake up to smell the roses.  They really are nice.  Just like forever.

Thanks for checking in.  Have a good one.

Sore loser - to put it kindly

We went out to breakfast this a.m. and I spotted this.

I can't tell you how offended I am.  I'm not offended if some dumb ass in Iran or somewhere wants to disrespect our flag.  But to do this to your own country's flag just pisses me off.  This asshole probably thinks he/she is a great patriot or something.  I’m not going to say any more what I think of him/her, it would just be profanity.  I've read a good argument that the only place the flag should be flown is on government buildings.  But there are a lot of folks, especially around here it seems, who want to fly the flag.  MOST of them don't follow proper etiquette but do at least give it a try.  

If you have the time, you might try reading a few articles from this compilation of articles written by Charlie Reese, a newspaper man who is now retired.  I think he has some pretty good thoughts.  A warning however:  if you like Ron Paul you probably won't like Charlie; if you like Mr. Romney you probably won't like Charlie; if you like Mr. Obama you probably won't like Charlie.  If you think G. W. Bush was a good president, you certainly won't like Charlie.  Damn, I miss Charlie's writing.

Anyway, have a good one.

Have you heard of this?

Found a link to this story in my internet wanderings.  It's from something called the 'Canada Free Press".  It is about a planned test of the U.S. government's Emergency Alert System (EAS) on November 9 at 14:00 EST.  The test will be nation-wide including radio, television and satellite radio.  The writer tries her hardest to make this sound like some sort of plot.  Come on folks, get a fu*king life!  Testing this system has been going on forever but, as the writer points out, it's never been done on a nation-wide scale.  Well, my question isn't 'gee is this a plot of some kind' rather it's why the hell haven't they tested this damn thing before?

One of the things she points out is that millions of drivers will be going along and their radio's will go silent.  She's worried that everyone will get all worried and lose control of their cars because the radio went off.  Of course in the next paragraph she writes about how everyone is familiar with the beep-beep-beep that precedes the test.  Grrr!  Dumber and dumber by the minute! 

This idiot actually points out that the date of the test is 9/11/11 if you reverse the day and month as is done in Europe and by the U.S. military.  Like that's supposed to mean something.  Jeez, I thought that shit went out of style with playing the Beatle's records backwards!  AND she adds this special note "As commenters to various news sites point out, Nov. 9, 1938 is also the anniversary of Hitler’s Kristallnacht and Nov. 9, 1923 the date of Hitler’s failed Munich coup." 

Well, at least I can hope that this idiot is from Canada; that would be proof that all the fools aren't 'born in the U.S.A."!  Have a good one.

Leftovers

Does anyone else NEED leftovers?  I may be strange (aside from all that other stuff!) but I am actually uncomfortable if there isn't some sort of leftover in the fridge.  Maybe that's why I'm such a soup and stew guy.  I made the cajun roast the other day, yum!  Leftovers!  I'm always making soup enough for about 10, yep, leftovers.  My wife and I could easily share a steak but no, I have to cook two.  I guess I'm just strange.

I often read blogs and websites of preppers - those folks who think something apocalyptic is going to happen at any time and they want to be prepared.  I don't really agree but maybe having leftovers is my level of preparation.  Who knows.  Living where I do water is the only thing that really concerns me.  Occasionally I think about buying a couple 55 gal. drums (208 liters) and filling them with water.  Then you have the storage issue so I don't bother.  (No I haven't forgotten the 60 gallons (225 l) or so in the hot water heater.)  There is a company in Utah that sells a huge drum for storing water; I wish they made a flow-through version so it was constantly used & replentished.  Then you wouldn't have a storage issue but you would have some water available for use if the system went out.  Hmmm, maybe I need to start a new business! 

Here's hoping you have something good in the fridge as well.  Have a good one.

Silly market

There is an old saw about getting out of the market in April and returning in September.  Isn't working well this year!  Dow is down over 300 points today.  Up a hundred one day, down a hundred the next, makes you seasick watching the darned thing.  Oh well.  Not much I can do about that!

We've spent the morning cleaning the house.  At least that's productive!  A friend mentioned cleaning their deck with a pressure washer.  I don't know why we hadn't thought of getting one before but we did and it sure makes short work of the deck.  It looks a 1,000% better in half an hour and the pressure washer uses less water than we'd use with just a hose and a brush.  Life is good!

I was reading Random Roger (as usual!) and he commented that it seems many people of retirement age still have a lot of mortgage debt.  Well, why not?  Having EXCESSIVE debt is always bad regardless of the origin of the debt but the key word is 'excessive' not 'debt'.  We owe $10K or so on our car as well but Toyota offered us a 0% loan.  We get to keep our money invested and pay off the car over several years.  What's wrong with that?  It's not like we trade vehicles every year.  Our cars last us a while:  Mazda 626 (10 years); BMW 325 (15 years); Bronco II (10 years); GMC pickup (9 years).  Aside from this 0% deal we haven't had a car payment since about 1995.  Well, that's not quite true.  When we bought our current Ford F250 they had a deal where if you financed the truck you got an additional $1000 or so off the truck.  We financed it for something like three months then paid it off.  The things we'll do for a grand!

Gotta go.  Keep your head.  The sky isn't falling quite yet!

Well, I warned you!

Hope everyone is ok with the DOW falling by 512 points.  I told you I can't foretell the future. Guess we'll just have to stick around and see what happens. 

JoeinVegas suggested that the two parties will just bicker and blockade each others ideas all next year.  I'm hoping he's wrong but he's probably right.  Especially since it seems as if both parties are out of rational ideas.  In our travels this summer we saw a lot of road repair; at least those guys & gals are working.

We saw a number of things that had been created by the CCC during the Great Depression.  Maybe we need some of those socialistic 'make work' projects to get things going.  Yeah, I can see that passing the congress!  The Tea Party folks wouldn't be the only ones coming unhinged. 

Gotta go.  Have a good one!

Hmmm......

Well, we ended up moving to Verizon and getting DROID phones.  No photos because I'm facing a large learning curve!  Maybe I'll manage something later today.  My 'real' excuse is that the phone needed to be charged before I could use it.  We really wanted to stay with AT&T because we worked for them for a long time back in the day but they just would not offer us unlimited internet access.  It's HIGHLY unlikely that we would ever use much internet via that tiny screen but they wouldn't match Verizon's offer so we bailed.  Sorry but it's still the dumb company that used to be known by their unofficial slogan:  we don't care, we don't have to.  Of course Verizon is what used to be GTE & they were so bad they made AT&T look good so we'll see what happens here.  Actually I'm hoping Virgin grows into a real competitor.

On to another equally inspiring tale.  Woke up this a.m. to see our neighbor inspecting their prone mailbox.  Someone knocked it over in the night.  The first thought is a drunk with a car but there are zero tire tracks.  Then we saw something down the road.  Yep, TWO more mailboxes beat up.  Vandals apparently; why they didn't knock ours over we'll probably never know.  Maybe the fact that it is so 'normal'?  Who knows what kids think!  Maybe they heard me snoring in my recliner and thought I might come out and kick their asses.  Humph, it would take more that a little twerpy teen to wake me!  LOL

Apparently the 'end of the world' thing didn't come off; or maybe I'm contacting you from the 'other side' but anyway I feel pretty much the same.  I'm still chilly; my foot is still bruised from the other day; the dog is still a whiny beast.  No, I've got to think it's business as usual.  Works for me!  Actually, I love this world.  There are blots on the landscape, like the little twerps who knocked over the mailboxes, but they are just annoying.  We walked around the pond over at Terrible's Lakeside last night.  It's an rv park that has won awards for it's beauty.  It IS very nice and they had a ton of birds.  Ducks begging for food and many smaller birds that I couldn't name.  They even had hummingbirds going for insects in the air.  It was really cool to see them darting around. 

Quiet day planned for today:  visit from our daughter, a meal, maybe a vid.  Life in the slow lane if I've ever heard it.  Have a good one!

The End of the World?

Give me a break!  Plus we got a  couple Jehovah's Witnesses at the door this morning to talk about it.  Jeez!

Well, if it's happening, bye.  It's been fun. 

If not, I've just wasted a few more electrons. 

We are continuing our search for smart phones today.  It's a giant pain; my wife who is a meticulous shopper at any time goes into hyper mode when we are talking about something we'll be stuck with for a couple years.  I'm just way more impulsive.  I've got to admit though, she doesn't make many purchasing errors!  Hopefully I'll be able to post a cell phone photo here by tonight.  I'll try. 

Have a good one!

Oops!

Woke up this morning about 06:00 by the light of our emergency lights.  They only come on when the electricity is off so something was up.  Ok, it's my job to crawl into my clothes and go outside to check the fuse.  So I go out there and there is our neighbor walking out into the middle of the road to see if he is the only one without power.  Hmmm.  I gave him a shout to let him know he's not alone and went inside to call the electric utility.

About an hour later we headed off to the casino for breakfast.  What should we see but an electric utility truck wandering around the neighborhood.  I was tempted to follow them because they went right past our street but figured maybe they know what they are doing.  I'm not too sure but at least when we returned home from breakfast (and me losing my $5 at video poker) the electricity was back.

We are pretty dependent on the power company - heating, cooling, cooking, pumping water - yep, all electric.  Solar and wind power are each possible alternatives but would be really expensive if sized large enough to run a house.  Running the a/c, electric stove and electric water heater would be out of the question.  The pump might be possible simply because it isn't used a lot but it would really pull power as it is 240V.  Our actual alternatives are go out to eat or buy a really big generator.  Having a generator like that would bring a whole new set of problems so it's out to eat we go.

Here's to investing a bit into the electric grid infrastructure.  Have a good one!

I'm not happy but....

Here's the title of an email that I received today from someone trying to give me investment advice:

Demise of America: What income investors should do

Give me a break folks! Ok, I agree that the US isn't going to always be the be-all and end-all of the world.  But isn't that just reality?  Have you ever read any history at all?  Are you over 15?  THERE is an investment adviser that just got an un-subscribe message!

Granted we have a huge deficit that is going to be difficult to pay.  Granted we have some social problems that are tough to deal with.  Granted this isn't entirely heaven on earth.  Get over it!  This is still a wonderful country where people have more wealth and freedom than most places.  That isn't going to change for a very long time.  I read a blog by an investment adviser who advocates increasing investments in other countries because he believes their rate of growth will exceed that of the U.S.  Ok, I suspect he is probably right (and the headline I'm quoting is NOT his!).  But it doesn't mean that we are looking at the 'demise of America'.  There is a very rich Mexican by the name of Carlos Slim.  Who in the world would think that Mexico would be the basis for the world's richest man?  He's not rich because he is a dictator stealing from the people.  He's rich because he brought the Mexican people things they wanted to buy.  It doesn't matter if the U.S. is the richest country in the world or the poorest; you can still make good investments and make money. 

Ok, sorry about the rant.  When I took the dog out this a.m. we had mostly blue sky but the clouds are filling the valley and we may yet get rain.  Not lots but the odd .001 inch - it ain't much in centimeters either!  Loved the look of the clouds and the mountains though!  Have a good one!

Just a last thought

I'm not a 'prepper' who is expecting The World As We Know It to end at any moment.  I do, however, think that preparation for normal inconveniences is appropriate.  Here's an example of what I'm talking about.

Since our household consists of two reasonably careful adults, we don't have a lot of minor injuries in our lives.  Today, while my wife is away, I've been the victim of two accidents!  In it's own way, it's kind of a vote in favor of marriage and joint vacations!  Hmmmm.  Anyway, injury number 1 was when I was burning a nylon rope; the rope separated and one of the hot ends landed on my hand.  This is basically melting nylon so it stuck to my finger.  Not life threatening but definitely better when bathed in cold water!  Point is; you need to know what to do.  I was home and had access to all kinds of books plus the internet.  Out in the wilderness; you'd need to just know.

The second accident was just a few minutes ago.  I was lubricating the garage door and managed to scrape my hand.  It's only a small wound (about a quarter of an inch) but I wanted to put a little anti-bacterial ointment on it.  Well, we don't have any in the house since my wife took it with her on her cruise.  (She had a mole removed and the spot requires daily medication.)  Ok, so what's my backup?  Well, actually there was some in the first aid kit I"d put together for the car.  So that was another problem avoided. 

The lesson is simple:  having some knowledge and a few extras of simple but important items can make a big difference in your life.  I don't know about you but I"m off to the drugstore tomorrow to stock on extras of a few staples.  Oh, and I need to find time to go to the airport to get my other half!  Have a good one!