Category Archives: “Real” things

Real things: news, environment, politics, science, sociology, etc.

What’s valuable

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So, things have changed around me a little. Life throwing sort of curveballs. But it’s good. Changes begets change. Hopefully for the better.

“The Beatles were trying to be the Everly Brothers, and they couldn’t quite pull it off. Elvis really wanted to sound like Dean Martin. But, you know, by failing …” He stops and starts again. “You have an image in your head of this iconic person. For me, it might have been Johnny Carson, where you grow up with him, and you think, ‘Well, that’s who I need to be’ — to realize that feeling I had when I was 8, sitting in my parents’ house and watching him. And then things happen, and you think, ‘Oh, my God, I didn’t — that fell apart.’ But it’s the failure to be that person or to completely follow through on what he did that leads you to something that’s much better.”
– Conan O’Brien (http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2011/02/10/conan-2-0/)

So hopefully what I thought, that’s no longer, leads to something different and better.

This also ties into something else I’ve been thinking about lately. What’s valuable to me? Granted, until very recently, I was thinking about this in more superficial terms, such as “is watching tv that valuable to me? Are there other things I want to do that I’m sacrificing for television?” Not everything I want to do or actually do can be valuable to me. So I think it’s time for some reflection on choices.

This is rambling and I’m not going to edit it. Just had some thoughts and wanted to get back to blogging. Perhaps this post would be better if I was better at typing on my iPad. Maybe.

My final shopping cart of Iraq money stuff

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Call me greedy, but I kept $8.6 billion in walking around money.

Every NFL Franchise
$8,600,000,000

4 Race Track
$340,000,000

15 Manhattan Townhouse
$18,000,000

12 Hollywood movie
$150,000,000

4 Casino
$770,000,000

10 South Pacific Island
$38,900,000

Levees That Can Do the Job
$40,000,000,000

2 Porsche 911 Turbo
$126,200

Honolulu estate
$7,999,000

10 Winery in Napa Valley
$34,000,000

5 Air Force One
$325,595,000

4 Your Own Airport
$4,822,000,000

4 Oil Company
$16,400,000,000

3997 Feed a Starving Child
$2,160

4496 House a family
$60,000

4096 Protect Tropical Forests
$1,500

Help Prevent the Next Katrina
$14,000,000,000

3549 Cure the Sick, Heal the Injured
$41,300,000

4006 Get On Board With Mass Transit
$150,000,000

5994 Feed the Poor
$1

Dracula’s Castle
$140,000,000

4 Lear Jet
$11,595,000

3 Yacht
$100,000,000

6 Buy the World a Coke
$6,500,000,000

Chewing Gum
$23,000,000,000

4 Bentley Azure Convertible Mulliner
$376,485

11 Jewlery
$8,500,000

Something to wear
$1,200,000,000

3996 Help Disabled Veterans
$10,000

1999 Buy a Goat
$150

3996 Women’s Small Business Kit
$40

2997 Adopt a Polar Bear
$100

3996 The Gift of Sight.
$33

4 Saleen S7
$395,000

5 Mansion in Beverly Hills
$165,000,000

20 Jackson Pollack painting
$142,700,000

20 Picasso painting
$113,400,000

5 Theme Park
$3,500,000,000

10 Super Bowl ad
$2,600,000

Wow, a real life post! What the Iraq war bought me

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So a guy wrote a book about what the $1 TRILLION dollars spent on the Iraq war could’ve purchased (recent estimates have escalated that to $3 trillion apparently).  There were noble things like fund Social Security, pay off all college students’ credit card debt, double the cops on the street for 32 years, 1.9 million more teachers.  Crazy things like line all the highways of the US in 23.5c gold leaf, buy everyone on the planet an iPod (did not specify type in the article I read).  There was a link to a site where you could go on your own noble and crazy shopping spree.  Here’s what I bought before I got bored:

Every NFL Franchise
$8,600,000,000

4 Race Tracks
$340,000,000

5 Manhattan Townhouses
$18,000,000

6 Hollywood movies
$150,000,000

4 Casinos
$770,000,000

4 South Pacific Islands
$38,900,000

Levees That Can Do the Job
$40,000,000,000

2 Porsche 911 Turbos
$126,200

Honolulu estate
$7,999,000

5 Winerys in Napa Valley
$34,000,000

2 Air Force Ones
$325,595,000

2 Your Own Airports
$4,822,000,000

2 Oil Companies
$16,400,000,000

1000 Feed a Starving Child
$2,160

500 House a family
$60,000

100 Protect Tropical Forests
$1,500

Help Prevent the Next Katrina
$14,000,000,000

500 Cure the Sick, Heal the Injured
$41,300,000

999 Get On Board With Mass Transit
$150,000,000

1998 Feed the Poor
$1

Dracula’s Castle
$140,000,000

2 Lear Jet
$11,595,000

3 Yacht
$100,000,000

Buy the World a Coke
$6,500,000,000

Chewing Gum
$23,000,000,000

4 Bentley Azure Convertible Mulliner
$376,485

6 Jewlery
$8,500,000

Something to wear
$1,200,000,000

OKAY OKAY, so not the most altruistic of spending.  But it’s annoying to put 500 homes in and see no difference essentially in your balance.  I haven’t closed my cart yet, so maybe I’ll keep tossing in homes for the less fortunate, feeding of starving kids, protecting of rain forests, etc etc etc til I’m zeroed out.  It might take all day.  I’ll post an update later.

What We Could Have Done With The Money – Rob Simpson (site)

I know it’s terrible, but I’m not going to lie

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I want to try it.  The Hardee’s Prime Rib Thickburger, the latest in the line of Thickburgers.

The St. Louis-based fast-food chain’s latest menu addition, available as of Wednesday, is the Prime Rib Thickburger. The sandwich – 780 calories and 48 grams of fat – will have a suggested price of $4.49, or $6.49 with fries and a drink.

“We’ve never been ones to follow the fast-food herd mentality,” said Brad Haley, vice president of marketing for Hardee’s.

The Prime Rib Thickburger is almost health food compared to some Hardee’s offerings – the chain offers four sandwiches with more than 1,000 calories, most famously the Monster Thickburger with 1,420 calories and 108 grams of fat.

That’s right!  F the herd.  Even if the herd is going toward health.  Bring on the 2k calorie burger!

MS should’ve given them a cut rate on Office 2008 and/or Access

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The Federal government can’t afford Excel 2007?  And, umm, Excel’s considered a more powerful database application?  I mean I guess versus earlier versions or something.

FEC, media can’t handle Obama jackpot – Kenneth P. Vogel – Politico.com

If you want to comb through Obama or Clinton’s cash, you either need to divide and import their reports section-by-section a time-consuming and mind-numbing process or purchase a more powerful database application, such as Microsoft Access or Microsoft Excel 2007, both of which retail for $229.

I know MS has deals in place to give some colleges/universities MS software for $5/disc, maybe the government cuts them a break on antitrust fines or something and MS gives them a newer office suite.

I wonder in what format/program Obama sent the information to the FEC.

I really dislike Olbermann a little

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He’s good.  He’s the left’s Bill O’Reilly, though in no way as ridiculous.  And I like his rants and whatnot.  He’s gone off on Hillary a few times.  The latest was after the whole RFK assassination stuff.

 

But I have to say, and I have no idea how long he’s done it, hell maybe since day one (I don’t watch regularly), I find Olbermann’s use of “good night and good luck”, aping of Edward R. Murrow a little off-putting. As much as he might be a hero/idol/etc., it just seems a little pretentious.

Early daily photo project

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I found this via alltop.  Jamie Livingston took a Polaroid daily from March 31, 1979 to October 25, 1997 (his 41st birthday and also the day he died).

The actual site of the photographs and some other links about it:

Mental Floss (with some of the photos)

Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn has a lot of information about the pictures and the accompanying exhibit.

Jamie Livingston’s wiki page.

 

McCain is loved and hated by me

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Did McCain screw himself when he promoted speedy adoption of HDTV? – By Timothy Noah – Slate Magazine

McCain as the cause of HD penetration is a reason I’d like him.  Though I’d just as likely have HD now without him.  And due to SDV and TiVo I don’t get many of the HD channels.

But funny that HD might be downfall.  And I could totally see it doing so.

Advice for parents

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Awhile back I wrote a post on the challenges of raising kids if you’re wealthy.  Well here’s a list of 10 things kids should receive from their parents from the WSJ by Peter White, a rich guy who counsels rich people.  This list was presented to rich people on how to raise their kids.

1. Necessaries
2. Affection
3. Affirmation and Support
4. Boundaries
5. Guidance
6. Respect
7. Trust
8. Forgiveness
9. Religion or Spirituality
10. Letting Go

Yeah so it doesn’t so much seem like a list for rich people as it is a list for parents in general.

The list isn’t just for rich parents. But as Peter told me, it’s helpful for wealthy parents to learn that “the first thing to be concerned with is loving children in a way that enables them to take charge of their lives as adults, so they can use wealth to enhance, not diminish, their lives.”

Rich people need to learn these 10 things?  I’d be annoyed if I was rich and someone told me these 10 things were necessary to not raise some dilletante, like I didn’t know these basic kinds of parenting principles.

Warren Buffett, as usual, has a pretty good handle on it:

“[The perfect amount of money to leave children is] enough money so that they would feel they could do anything, but not so much that they could do nothing.”

Of course that doesn’t address a rich kid getting spoiled by having all the best things and thinking that he/she somehow is entitled to all of that.  But for tips on that the first link (my original post) has stuff about that.  Not from me, but from whatever I linked to in that piece.  I’m poor, so I wouldn’t know about these things.