Hamster Huey and Pinewood Derby lessons.

This time last year I was diligently blogging pretty much once a week. Life gets in the way and interest can wain, so it seems now I'm registering once a month lately give-or-take. I'd like to use the excuse that it was the holidays, but given that it's now February that ship ain't gonna sail no more.

 

 

 

I've got a few things to discuss this time around, and, as always, will include Kim K at the end for your entertainment. She's kind of like a bad reality TV show - hard to fathom why it captures our attention but oh-so-hard to ignore. Oh wait...didn't she have a bad reality TV show that we actually DID ignore? So much for analogies.

 

Let's dive right in to the Middle Class Money Muddle. I've given this a bit more thought and decided instead of talking about this or that money-saving tip (which can be found all over the place online), I'd instead take a recent bit of financial/economic news and analyze it's impact on the daily life of the average guy. Disclaimer!! - I'm not a financial advisor or Nobel Laureate in economics, however I do follow the financial and economic news closely and have an MBA in finance and BA in economics (although my career choice of real estate development means my financial/economic analysis skills are a bit rusty). That being said, my analysis could be way off base and have about as much relevance to your life as the price of tea in China (although in today's global economy and the rise of China, this expression may be losing some of its former steam as the price of tea in China probably does have an impact on your life.)

 

 The big decision is choosing what to pull apart with all that going on in Egypt, the new Congress coming into office, the ongoing housing crisis, and on and on...

So how about this? The first possible "whiff of inflation" in the economy. Yikes! Inflation? That's rising prices and that's bad! right? Well, yes and no. For much of the past 2+ years, inflation has been so low as to cause concern of possible "deflation" or a drop in prices. But wait - that's good right? Again - yes and no. Good for your wallet in the short term, bad for the economy and your financial well-being in the long term. When expectations are that prices will drop in the future, both people and businesses stop spending now on the expectation of paying less later. This means money stops flowing in the economy. Bad. When businesses and people stop spending...well, we've been down that path the last few years and we know where that leads us and it's certainly not Nirvana.

 

There is a "healthy level of inflation"* What? How, you ask, can inflation be healthy? For one, people will spend now instead of later if they expect prices to rise. That gets money flowing in the economy which in turn keeps the economy growing, companies hiring and people working. It's a virtuous cycle. However, its a tricky business keeping to that healthy level. Too much inflation (called hyperinflation) and the economy overheats, prices keep rising ridiculously fast causing people to spend even more now to try and stay ahead of the curve. General craziness ensues until everything goes kablooie.

 

It's also important to separate out different kinds of inflation (to over-simplify it). As a consumer, your primary interest should be in the CPI or Consumer Price Index. Very briefly, this shows a rise (or fall) over time in the price of a pre-selected "basket of goods" the typical household buys. From the perspective of a business, they are concerned with the PPI or Producer Price Index or the change in cost of the materials, good and services they must buy to produce their products. On a day-to-day basis, you don't need to be overly concerned about the PPI if you hear it's rising. The reason is that as a general rule of thumb, most producers will absorb small rises in costs without passing them along to the customer so as not to affect sales in the short to mid-term (remember - a company lays out an annual business plan with sales projections so any monkey wrench in that is a big no-no unless absolutely necessary). If however, the PPI is consistently rising or suddenly rises, then you can probably expect price increases at the store in the not-too-distant future. And to bring it full circle, the "whiff of inflation" article linked above is about producer costs. The very question of if those costs will be passed along to the consumer is central to the discussion especially given the fragile nature of the economic recovery. My guess is "not yet".

 

A rise in energy prices has one of the biggest overall effects on general pricing. It takes energy to make everything, energy to transport it, energy to light and heat the stores where stuff is sold. So the price of oil is one thing to watch if you're concerned about your wallet. No doubt you've felt the pain in recent months as the price at the pump has gone back above $3/gal. This is also one of the driving factors (pun intended) behind trying to reduce our dependence on oil. It's not just the price of gas or global warming. If we can develop a reliable, cheaper alternative, the cost of nearly everything will go down (but this would be different than deflation as this overall drop would be more akin to an increase in efficiency as monetary resources could be reallocated toward uses other than energy).

 

*What level that is, is somewhat debatable but the Fed likes it to be somewhere around 2% per year give-or-take. Here's a more detailed explanation from Investopedia and a table showing the annual inflation rates at each month during the year. Note: you can't add the months up for an annual rate! The rate for each month was the overall calculated annual rate at that point in time. The primary source of information about the economy is the Bureau of Labor Statistics website. Lots of analysis and data. 

 

OK...so you got all that? Good. Let's move on to some more easily digestible fare.

How about the every-exciting, sexy and highly charged world of refurbishing old tools? Yes? Good. So a friend of mine is a carpenter and when I was over at his shop a short while back I saw a rusty old handplane sitting off to the side. I asked him about it and he said he got it from his uncle when he'd done work for him. A couple weeks later I asked him if I could take a stab at bringing it back to life. Needless to say, he got back a nice, very serviceable 85-year-old Stanley #5c jack plane that is good to go for another 85 years with proper care. He was quite amazed because he didn't think it could ever work again. Let me just say it took a lot of elbow grease and sandpaper. Probably not collector quality (yes, people collect old tools and often pay quite a bit for them!), but it's very functional.

 

 

Two weekends ago my two younger sons' Cub Scout Pack had its annual Pinewood Derby. For those of you not familiar with Scouting, this is one of the highlights of the year. Parents and boys spend many hours on their cars (let's call it what it is - dad spends a lot of time on the car), fine tuning them for maximum speed as I did. Being the somewhat handy type, I volunteered to work the "tune up table" which is supposed to be to help make those final adjustments to the cars - a little extra weight, make sure the wheels are straight, etc. Then there are the parents who either don't have either the time, interest or skills necessary. These are the ones who show up at the weigh-in the night before with a half-built car. No joke, cars still smelling of fresh paint and no wheels or weight were handed over to me by hopeless-looking parents. The line backed up 5 or 6 deep. I resorted to quickly sticking the wheels on, pushing the axles (nails) into the pre-cut slots with my thumb, then crudely hot-gluing weight to the bottom of the car. Given the fact I was  working with cars the parents had clearly done little work on, you'd think some would be a bit less particular about ensuring I got it exactly to the legal limit of 5 oz. Needless to say I managed the evening with a smile...which turned to a grimace the next day at the races when, sonofabit ch, my sons' two cars only did mediocre and several of the cars I jammed the wheels on at the last minute wound up with trophies...next year my boys will race a plain wooden block.

 

How often do you spend time playing? Probably not enough. Well, there's growing evidence that adults need to make more time for it in order to remain happy and healthy. Not only that, but while knowledge may be gained from working, real wisdom most likely comes from play when you are able to deeply dive into who you truly are, be happy and build self-esteem. You then bring those qualities with you into the workplace, making you more effective.

Finally, we at last get to Kim. Seems she's upset over a recent photo spread.  So here's the deal - she poses for W Magazine then is upset because of "full-on nipple" showing. This from a woman who has a sex tape, posed for Playboy and puts herself in the public spotlight at every opportunity?  So here's one of the pics from the spread...but somewhat censored from its original version via "strategic" stars. I think that given the lifestyle she's chosen she needs to, as the pic references at the bottom, face her reality. As Harry Truman said "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen."

 

I must be deranged and the Middle-Class Money Muddle

I've completely slacked on this thing the last month over the holidays...below the single line is a bit I started but completely bagged on while I was off work after Christmas. Meh. Below the double line is something I wrote this week. Having trouble finding anything worth writing about. No. Scratch that. Having trouble being inspired enough to write.

So I offer this completely sub-par installment for your laughter and enjoyment (no...not laugh with me, but AT me for how lame this is, and enjoyment in the fact that you'll feel far superior to me and better about yourself for being such after reading.)

Oh...I'm reading this book about Poland right now. Pretty interesting.
























And this one about Wall Street was pretty boring. Now I've read quite a few about the financial crisis and enjoyed most but just couldn't get into this one and never finished it before I returned it to the library.

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We (you, me and all of us) are collectively awash in the Holiday tidal wave. For some reason there were more desserts at our house this year than I can ever recall. A self-induced food coma was only partly achieved two days after Christmas when my mother and my sister and her family came to visit.

Thank God I'm on a fitness mission after officially signing up for the Tough Mudder on April 9 in Allentown, PA. While I followed an agressive cardio regime between Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve thanks to Concept2, today I did my first Tough Mudder workout. All I can say is "Ouch." The past few years I've stuck pretty much to cardio and have done very little strength training despite many years of weight lifting in the past. All I can say is I could feel it! Actually it's a fantastic workout you can do in your family room with just a few low-weight dumbbells. Even if you aren't tackling the Tough Mudder, I highly recommend it!

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This recession has affected me personally in many ways, job loss among them along with a short sale of our home in Florida (if you're wondering, I worked in the homebuilding industry in SW FL, one of the epicenters of the housing crisis. The Ft Myers area was recently ranked by the non-profit Brookings Institution as the second-worst regional economy in the country.) Yet I also have a professional/academic interest in the economy due to my MBA-Finance and BA-Economics education. It seems there is a never-ending litany of stories about how the business world is doing, the job market, the growing income gap in the US, ad nauseam. There are great websites like CNBC, Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal for mainstream business news, and there are plenty of news stories (and even whole sections of news sites) about how bad it is for the shrinking middle class and below.

I find this all to be troublesome.

Look. The chances of me ever becoming part of the so-called "global elite" or "über-rich" are slim-to-none and so reading about them is akin to becoming a medieval flagellant or beating myself about the head with a brick. And really, for most of us (unless you're in finance for a living) knowing the results of the latest Treasury Bond auction or how many units of widgets the Very Big Corporation sold last quarter may be intellectually interesting, but it really has very little impact on our daily lives (and I'm not going to get into a discussion of how the health of the economy affects us personally....believe me, I know firsthand). 

 

At the same time, after all the BS I've been through the last few years, I've emerged a more patient and hopefully wiser person who is also aware that despite the challenges my family and I have faced, there are still people in a lot more dire straights than we are. And so I chose to be a bit more, respectively, realistic and optimistic while not putting on blinders.

With this in mind, I ask "where are the blogs, article and websites geared for the middle class"? Not that I'm not trying to achieve a level of wealth such that I can afford to give it away, but in the meantime I'm also trying to get the monthly bills paid and wondering how I'm going to afford college for my kids. I think this is most of you as well and it's what I call the "Middle-Class Money Muddle". We're (fortunately) employed but not rich. We still have to carefully manage our monthly budgets. The future is somewhat uncertain (we aren't wearing shades unlike that 1986 song by Timbuk3). In short, we're doing the best we can and muddling through the times we find ourselves in, making the most of them. I don't seem to see a whole lot about this in the news. It's either about how well the rich seem to be doing or about how dismal those are that have gone past 99 weeks of unemployment benefits. As an aside, there's a funny (very funny, but not for young ears) video which states "when God hands you lemons, FIND. A. NEW. GOD!!" as opposed to the trite "make lemonade".

So let's turn this into a source of information for the rest of us. Henceforth, be it declared that The Balanced Guy will try to incorporate a section on the Middle-Class Money Muddle with each installment of the blog. While I can't promise anything, it'll be mostly about managing your daily money, not about investing, the stock market, foreclosures, unemployment benefits or food stamps. In short, we'll avoid the tails and stick to the middle of the bell curve. Boring to be sure, but applicable.

So let's start with the basics. Really basic. Like having a monthly budget. Do you have one? If you do, more importantly - do you stick to it? For years I battled my wife over this as I used Quicken and tried to account for every penny and to what category of spending it went to. She fought it tooth and nail, mostly because I couldn't communicate what I was trying to do well enough. Finally I just got to the point of saying "Look. We have X dollars left over each month after our recurring, mandatory expenses are paid (savings, rent, groceries, insurance, gas, utilities, etc). That's all we have to spend on things like clothes, gifts, activities, unexpected expenses, etc. I don't care how you spend it but just mark it down on this dry-erase board to ensure we don't go over-budget. Voila! It was like a light-bulb went on. Now she's on-board with it and I've more-or-less given up on tracking how much is spent on groceries vs utilities, etc. As the person who pays the bills each month I have very good working knowledge of what goes out the door and it makes little difference if we spent $1,186 on groceries this month or $1,204. As long as we don't make dramatic changes in how we live our lives, those expenses stay relatively constant. Now a couple-few times a year I go through and make sure expenses really are what I think they are.

Keeping track of how you spend that "left over" money each month is actually a great way to NOT spend it. I've already mentioned the dry-erase board. It's inside the door in the kitchen that leads down to the basement. Since our laundry room is down there, it reminds us every day. As spending is tracked and the monthly "left over" money balance goes down, you can't but help say to yourself when you're in the store "Do I REALLY need that $10 DVD?" because you know it'll have to go up on the board and drop the balance. And now I'll let you in on a little secret - at the end of each month we actually have more, not much, but definitely more than I've let on. In this way, if we do go over-budget for some reason there's a bit of a buffer and in the meantime we're building up a bit of a reserve.

OK - extra money-saving tip for this entry: For many of the activities you and your kids do there is a participation fee which can range from a few to hundreds of dollars. Depending on how much spare time and gumption you have, you might be able to trade your time for that money (remember, Time = $). See if volunteering to help out with the organization or event gets you a discount or even makes it free. Think of it this way: if it's an activity for your child, there's a good chance you're going to be sitting there watching, reading, talking with other parents or messing with your smartphone...AND paying for your kid to participate. Since you'll be there anyway, if you volunteer there's a chance you won't have to pay, probably meet some nice people and provide always-needed assistance.

For a change I thought I'd post an unflattering pic of Kim K...

And here's an interesting (to say the least) article about raising children...

Snooze Fest

So I'm thinking my blog is pretty dry stuff. Seriously. I mean I can't compete with the likes of People Who. And I have no intention of turning this into some self-written autobiography or memoir. I think the problem is that I try to be too middle of the road and non-controversial and while I can be fairly funny in person (I hope), being funny in writing is hard! And honestly, I'm not looking to do some deep investigative reporting or analysis of the stock market for people to rely on.

So anyway, in keeping with really f'ing boring - I fixed the oven tonight. The igniter had died (it's a gas oven) and I ordered the part from Amazon (a LOT cheaper than directly from GE...$25 vs $99...go figure). This was a surprisingly easy repair to make taking all of about 20 mins plus time to get out tools and clean up. Here's a pic I asked my wife to take for the blog. At first she thought I wanted the pic for Facebook so I could post (like some people) every frickin' thing I do. No. I was merely thinking of you gentle reader (quick - where does that expression come from?). Point being that the vast majority of repairs we pay repairmen to do for a LOT more really cost very little both in time and money if we buck up and do it ourselves (plus I'm a cheap bastard). Now I didn't get an estimate for the repair, but I'm going to take a wild swing in the dark and guess it would have run me between $250-$300 to have a repairman come to the house and do it for me.

I've done a lot of repairs lately come to think of it. I had to replace the igniter in the wood pellet stove earlier this fall before it got cold out (it actually died last April and I hemmed and hawed about doing it all summer). That part was about $125 or so and admittedly a MAJOR pain in the ass to replace. Even if I had hands the size of a 6 year old it would've been difficult. Sheesh. And I rebuilt the walls in the downstairs shower after it was evident that there was a "problem" (to say the least). When I took the tile down, the greenboard someone had put up about 30 years ago was brown and black from water intrusion. Needless to say I used cement board when I rebuilt it. Tile work is actually pretty easy to do.

OK. So this IS turning into "story of my life". Sorry....sorry. My mistake. Apply brakes...HARD.

So let's take a look at what the rest of the world finds interesting...the envelope please...

 

So on Dec 2, 2010 the Hot Topics and Hot Searches as listed by Google Trends are proudly displayed for you in my shameless screen capture. Look, I'll admit to not exactly being a pop culture aficionado, but except for Chuck Norris, Natalie Portman and Linda Evans (really...a "Hot Search"...really?), I hadn't the faintest clue who any of the other people were until I clicked on the links. Felisa Wolfe-Simon discovered microbes that use arsenic instead of phosphorous in their metabolic cycle (which was thought impossible and thus opens a whole new realm of possibilities for life beyond earth); Ronnie Chasen, a murder suspect, killed himself, and poor Zahra Baker is the little handicapped NC girl whose remains were discovered recently after she'd gone missing (whose sad story will no doubt be exploited by the likes of People or Us magazines). And a lot of people looking for info on the Heat-Cavs game tonight as LeBron James goes back to Cleveland for the 1st time. He'll without question get a warm reception from his loving hometown fans. But seriously...Linda Evans? She was a looker back in the day (and for a woman of 68 she looks pretty ok), but what the heck is she doing as a Hot Search in Google?

 And we'll close with my long-running joke/obsession: Kim Kardashian. Seems she and her sisters (who, by the way AREN'T that good-looking...eh Kourtney is ok but Klohe looks like a horse) started and then quickly backed out of a pre-paid debit card deal called the (wait for it...) "Kardashian Kard" (how klassy). It was about as well-received as a clown at a funeral as it was loaded with front-end, back-end and in-between charges. Until next time, stay balanced.

 

And I just threw in this link to buy typewriter ribbon for the hell of it. Never know when your laptop/i-Pad and printer are going to go belly up and you'll have to drag the old tappity-tap out of your parents' attic.

Avoid that Holiday Ass Fat....

So there's a lot going on in the next few weeks as we enter the Holiday Season. I'm mostly going to focus on keeping off those extra holiday pounds that seem to easily creep up on you as you have "just one more cookie".

Speaking of food, I met up with a bunch of my buddies the other night for beers and dinner at The Yardley Inn in (appropriately) Yardley, PA. I hadn't been there in years (my wife and I had our wedding dress rehearsal dinner there) and all five of us that met up were shocked at how packed the place was on a Monday night! If you've never been, I highly suggest it. Food is very good, reasonably priced, atmosphere is great although it's not really a place to bring your kids. Anyway, if you go when the weather is nice, be sure to arrive early to take a stroll down Main Street, along the Delaware River or D&R Canal - Yardley is simply a great small town.

On to other things.

If you have nothing better to do at 8 AM Thanksgiving morning and you want to have a guilt-free extra piece of pumpkin pie and raise money for a good cause, you can still sign up for the Trinity Church 3rd Annual 5k Turkey Trot through historic Princeton, NJ. For those of you that are USATF members, it's a USATF-certified run. If you want a quick video tour of the route take a look below. Enjoy the run and see you there, although don't look for me at the front of the pack...a gazelle I ain't.

 

 What else? It's that time of year when I undertake the annual Concept2 Holiday Challenge - that is, row 200,000 cumulative meters on the Concept2 ergometer from Thanksgiving to Christmas Eve. At first thought it may not seem like much, but then you realize it's 200 kilometers or about 125 miles (a little over 4 miles a day). This is the 6th or 7th year I've done this since it was started 10 years ago. If you have access to an erg, create an account on Concept2's website and start entering your workouts into your online logbook. Complete the Holiday Challenge and you'll receive a nice enameled pin in the mail in Jan/Feb and be eligible to buy a t-shirt. More than anything, it's a great way to ward off excess holiday weight. And lest I forget, for every meter you row, Concept2 will donate $0.02 to water protection efforts; row more than 100,000 m and each meter is worth $0.04! Lose weight and protect water at the same time...what could be better?

This past weekend was the Tough Mudder event here in NJ. If you've not heard of it before, let me say this: It's not for the faint of heart. a 7-12 mile run/obstacle course involving mud, water, and fire among other things. This is something right up my alley and I'm planning on attempting it next year and dragging a few of my friends along for the ride as well. Fingers crossed.

Now a shameless plug for one of the guys I had dinner with - if you want to get into shape or reach your maximum potential for next year's Turkey Trot, Holiday Challenge or Tough Mudder, visit Bob's website, Coach Kaehler. Bob is a 3x Olympian and 4x World Champion rower. Combined with his Masters in Physical Therapy from Columbia University, he has the first-hand, world-class practical experience and education to set you on the right path toward fitness.

If you're not brave enough to tear them away from their new toys and bundle the kids up Christmas morning to watch the annual re-enactment of Washington Crossing the Delaware, you can get a jump on it by attending the dress rehearsal Sunday December 12 from 11-3 at Washington Crossing State Park in PA with the crossing at approximately 1 PM. I've wanted to see this for a number of years and I'm finally getting around to it.

Oh...a couple more items. Do you know any guys (maybe yourself even?....nah) that takes his Fantasy Football League a little to seriously? If so, check out this very funny computer-generated douchebag extraordinaire video posted on my buddy Dave's blog The Savage Truth. But Dave, you need to get out more if she's a comely vixen. Dude...she's a computer cartoon even if she's supposed to be hot!

My idea of a comely vixen or something along those lines but not sure the word is meant for polite company is here in this pic of Kim bent over (let your imagination run wild).

Happy 1st Birthday!!!

Happy 1st Birthday! The Balanced Guy is now 1 year old...the blog that is, not the writer. On occasion of it's first birthday I thought I'd reflect on a bit of the past year as well as look ahead a bit. First some statistics for you: over the past year there have been 7,703 visits, 7,148 of them unique visitors hailing from 123 countries and all 50 states. There has been a steady increase in daily visitors and while TBG doesn't get the volume of traffic of say...Google...it does ok for a very small blog. Even manage to have a fair number of repeat visitors so at least there are a few intelligent people in the world that realize what I have to say is worthwhile; groundbreaking if I do so say so myself. Of course, a large number of visits have been prompted by having pics of and using as a key search word "Kim Kardashian". Very funny. Hey, whatever works to get 'em in the door, right? (and guess what? I'll use it again for this post since I mentioned her!...GOOOOAAAALLLLL!!!)

The blog itself has changed over the course of the year as I've searched for "my voice" (as it's called; or at least am in the process of finding it). I've definitely been posting less often the last few months as I found it too demanding with my other life commitments to get something out once a week. Although I'll admit that if I was generating significant revenue from advertising it would be a different story. but alas I'm not. For better-or-worse there's nothing dramatically exciting about a blog written by yet another middle-age guy about his life. I really need to come up with a better angle; maybe I'm not controversial enough.  Or maybe my writing essentially sucks and is boring. If nothing else, it's cathartic for me, so you'll just have to endure it. However, I like to think my readers (fans???) find solace in knowing there are actually other common-sense guys out there like themselves who take the time to write about it. For sure I know there are far more entertaining blogs out there, such as Dave Sheridan over at The Savage Truth.

Enough contemplating my navel.

The mid-term elections have come and gone. Really, quite a bunch of silliness this time around (but yes, I voted). I'll never understand politicians, their grandstanding, saying things they know to be patently untrue or bending the truth until it screams "Uncle!", and ripping apart their opponents instead of giving an honest accounting of themselves and specifics of what they intend to do if elected. More often than not it seems they see themselves as akin to the genie in the bottle - rub the bottle (elect them) and they'll grant your every wish. And they wonder why the average man-on-the-street doesn't trust politicians no matter if they are a donkey or an elephant? And at times I wonder about the electorate. If the average voter was on the board of a large company needing to hire a CEO or other senior executive, they'd be looking for the best people - hopefully even smarter and more competent than themselves. So why in the world do voters of all stripes often elect candidates who try so very hard to present themselves as "an average guy"? Look, call me crazy, but I don't want "an average guy" running this country or representing me in Congress or the Statehouse. I want better-than-average...a lot better. What is with our national obsession with demonizing experience, education and intelligence? Blows my mind.

In a crazy, complex world things aren't always black and white, right and wrong. There are always nuances. Yet this seems to escape the notice of many people...except you, gentle reader (as Ms. Manners would say). Take the age-old paradox about lying. Let me begin by stating that it's generally wrong to lie. Unfortunately there isn't exactly a bright line in even this most seemingly simply of matters. Here's the scenario to demonstrate: You are sitting in a restaurant when a man comes in with a gun and asks where your brother is because he is going to kill him. Now, you know that your brother happens to be in the back room having a private dinner with some business clients. So here's the dilemma: do you tell the truth and let the man know where your brother is thus getting him killed, or do you lie and say you don't know where he is at which point the armed man will walk out of the restaurant and your brother's life is spared? Only by lying does your brother live. Of course this is an extreme example but in a black and white world, extremes are irrelevant. It's yes or no. You might argue "well, it's only a white lie and it saved my brother's life" or "the end justified the means". True enough, but at that point you've opened wide the door to shades of grey and dimmed that bright line. If it holds true here, it then holds true in any just about any other situation.

I've mentioned the site before but it's worth mentioning again. If you want a pretty non-partisan, straight-dope analysis of world events, I highly suggest you take a peek at Stratfor. George Friedman and his staff do a fantastic job of pulling apart geopolitical issues and examining them in a no-nonsense manner. It's definitely a 50,000 foot view of things but in many cases it's helped me to understand the larger picture of world events and make sense of why the US or some other country did something without all the right/left, political BS muddying the waters. This week's free Geopolitical Weekly, The World Looks at Obama After the U.S. Midterm Election, is a great analysis of what Obama faces going forward with respect to the rest of the world. We also hear a lot in the news about Iran which is now increasingly important in light of Obama losing domestic policy power after the elections. Why important? While Congress can control domestic policy, foreign policy always lays firmly in presidential hands. Between the Aug 31 article, Rethinking American Options on Iran and September 14th's Elections and Obama's Foreign Policy Choices, Stratfor lays out a convincing argument for Obama looking to regain power by dealing with Iran. Let's watch and see what happens.

OK. On to more important things. What is Kim doing this week? Who cares?!! (As an aside - what a hell of a blog! Only here can you go from deep, philosophical questions regarding politics and ethics straight into gossip about it-girl Kim K. You're definitely getting your money's worth; and considering you're here for free...)

So here are the Top Ten Reasons I'm not Kim's latest boyfriend:

1. I'm not rich
2. I'm pretty sure she mostly dates black guys
3. I'm not an NFL player
4. I don't live in LA
5. I'm not rich
6. I've got three kids and don't think she's ready for that
7. I'm not rich
8. I might be a tad old for her
9. I forgot to get in line for a number
10. Most important - I'm already married.

I'm in the middle of rebuilding the shower in our downstairs bathroom. Actually not that bad of a job. While it's certainly not the first tiling job I've done, it is the first shower. Truth be told, I was a bit nervous since there is water involved, but after visiting a few websites to get the skinny, I came away with the one value to hold true to with showers: silicone caulk EVERYTHING. Oh yeah, and don't use greenboard. Only go with cement board. There is some professional disagreement online about whether to use a mastic or thinset for the tiles. Old school guys say only thinset since mastic softens when exposed to water. However, there are a number of newer mastics out there that purport to perform just fine as long as they are not submerged in water, thus shower walls are just fine.

Finally, am I reading or have I recently read anything worth hawking and putting up an Amazon ad for? Not really, but I did recently get a cool little weather station that our family really enjoys. Pretty nifty.

Until next time.

Going old school and musing about online cr@p

Lately I've not been writing new posts very often; and when I do, they've tended to be on one topic and - for better or worse - slightly moralistic and definitely opinionated. But I guess given that this is MY blog, I can opine on whatever I damn well please. However, I think maybe I've gotten somewhat afield from where I started this blog nearly a year ago. However, writing like I originally started doing where I touched on a broad range of topics each go, was time-consuming and created a lot of self-imposed pressure to produce. However, it's been a while since I did the shotgun approach to topics so I'll go a bit old school this go around.

So. Um. Now I have to figure out sh*t to write. Damn. Chalk it up to writer's block or apathy. Name it what you will. I think part of my problem is that I've been purposefully staying offline and away from the web. It's a morass of brain-numbing crapola in large part. To be sure there is a tremendous amount of helpful and wonderful stuff online, but mostly I think the garbage far outweighs the gold (on which side of that equation this blog falls is entirely up to you). The other hard part is that it seems people spend a lot of time making the crap look really good and enticing while truly useful info tends to be pretty visually boring. For example: the website for People is fairly visually appealing; however I'm not sure how useful the info is other than pure entertainment (although we need to mentally relax from time-to-time). On the other hand, The Economist website, is clean looking but certainly not going to win a Webby Award for eye candy. And it seems the more base instincts a site appeals to, the easier they are to navigate...but then again, maybe there are other reasons why a porn site is easy to navigate one-handed.

Speaking of eye candy, I'm going back to one of my personal memes very early and dropping in the cover of the most recent copy of W Magazine with Kim K on it.   How does a photographer get a photo shoot like this?

Now where was I? What else is going on in the world? Oh. While I'm not a big fan of what has been going on at my alma mater the last few years with respect to Schiano and McCormick running roughshod over the rest of the athletic programs to the benefit of the football program, I still support the athletes. They don't make the politics. That being said, I'm saying my prayers for Rutgers defensive tackle Eric LeGrand, who was paralyzed from the neck down while making a tackle in a game against Army this past Saturday.

Oh hey, if you're looking for some easy reading with battle, guns, swords, good guys, bad guys, damsels in distress and the like, then look no further than the Sharpe Series by Bernard Cornwell. Set during the Napoleonic Wars, Richard Sharpe comes up from the ranks (and the gutter) to become an officer in His Majesty's Army. Utterly predictable, they are nevertheless good clean fun...although with 21 books in the series, I'm wondering at the end of it all how many people Sharpe, ever the soldier, will have ended up killing. If you do undertake to read them, do so in the chronological order of the books, not the order in which they were published (Mr. Cornwell jumped around a bit as he decided to write about this battle or that one). Thus you'll want to start with Sharpe's Tiger. Enjoy!

One other book you should read if you have the chance is The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis. Just be prepared to keep picking your jaw up off the floor as you wonder why a bunch of Wall St types aren't in jail being someone's bee-otch.

OK, at this point I'm wrapping it up. Just not feeling terribly inspired and I do need to get something posted.

Getting UN-wired

After a few billion years (give-or-take a half a billion), life has evolved on this planet sans digital technology. It's only been in the last 20 years computers have become ubiquitous and even far fewer that we've been carrying smartphones and Blackberries. So let me ask you - do you think our brains are more designed to deal with the pace of nature or electrons traveling at the speed of light? It seems more and more scientists are looking into what digital technology is doing to our brains and our attention spans, and what nature can do to bring us back into focus.

I'd already written a number of moons ago about the apparent benefits of getting children out into nature, as more and more children are growing up in front of screen and shunning the outdoors. But even those of us for whom childhood was largely electronic gadget-free are now showing symptoms of computer fatigue.

Call it serendipity, call it chance but just as I've taken to reading The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brain by Nicholas Carr, I came across the following NYT article discussing pretty much the same thing. Is our current 24/7 flood of information overloading a system crafted by Mother Nature and fine-tuned over countless generations to deal with a much slower pace and subtle clues? Sure, we have our fight-or-flight instincts to process and deal with sudden emergencies, but we are now having to handle a constant flood of new information, each touted as more important than the last keeping our stress levels unnaturally high. Is it any wonder then that in this day and age, there is a preponderance of drugs to treat problems like constipation, erectile dysfunction, and difficulty urinating, all conditions exacerbated by the fight-or-flight reaction? (in short - in an emergency our bodies shut down our digestive and reproductive systems in order to divert all resources to dealing with the immediate situation)

Wading back into The Shallows; it asks if our brains are literally wiring themselves differently (and in children, developing differently) in this age of sound bites, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook status updates, and clicking from one Web page to another after just a few seconds. Are we losing our ability to think deeply about important topics? I’ll admit, I’ve noticed my skills of concentration don’t seem to be what they used to be and I sometimes find myself skimming even short online articles so I can click through to the next link. And let’s be honest: You don’t become good at anything by doing it for 30 seconds at a clip.

I highly recommend you read Mr. Carr's book; it will make you rethink how much time you allow yourself and your kids to spend online (even if it means reading The Balanced Guy less often!)

In closing this thought, I've taken longer than usual to add to this blog while I've been taking a needed hiatus from the Net (mainly social networking). After more than two weeks away from Facebook and working to limit my other time online, I can honestly say I feel less stressed and less "needing" to check email et al. Why don't you give it a try and get unwired?

Captain America, Ice Cream, and Tools...how Red-Blooded is that?

So the first images of Captain America (aka "Cap", "Wing Head") for the upcoming movie "Captain America: The First Avenger" (in theaters July 22, 2011) have been released at Comic-Con . I have to say for the most part I like it. A bit rougher and raw than his comic book costume (and a bit like the leather get-up worn by Daredevil in the 2003 film). However one thing I've always liked about Cap's gear are the wings on his head and they're missing here. No idea why I like them, but without them it just doesn't quite look like Cap. We'll see what happens when Cap shows up in the Avengers movie; maybe he'll get his wings back - given the that this happens a number of decades after his "creation" during WWII it's possible he'll have a different look (long story but he was injected with a "super soldier" serum and bombarded with "vitarays" which transformed him into a perfect human specimen...thus he doesn't age.)

The only "odd" thing about the casting of the movie is that Chris Evans has been cast in the part. Why odd? Because he also played the Human Torch in the Fantastic Four movies...if you're not in the know, Cap and the Fantastic Four are both part of the Marvel Comics universe. This caused a bit of a stir in the Marvel fan base. Such is life, and I think Chris will do the role justice. Honestly, if I were an actor it would be the one super hero role I'd want the most and be the most afraid to play - the character has literally been around since WWII, is pretty much universally loved by comic book fans, and is the embodiment of all that is good about America - those are some big shoes to fill.

I'm a self-admitted DIY kind of guy and have a workshop full of tools to back that claim up. Power tools and hand tools. No doubt power tools make a lot of mundane jobs quick and easy - I'd be lost without my cordless drill; I use it more as a screw gun than a drill and it makes putting in an taking out screws and bolts a cinch...I remember (not too fondly) helping my father put in and take out screws by hand when I was a kid. Ugh. However, there is a lot to be said about hand tools in certain situations and I've come to see them in a whole new light. I recently bought my first bench plane - not a high quality one as I simply wanted to explore what I can do with it. I'm already hooked and ready to spend some money on a better one. This past Christmas I received a high-end dovetail saw (and wrote about it in an earlier posting). I'd also love to have a set of wood carving tools.

The short of it is that hand tools are a pleasure to use, especially when they are high quality ones. That's the key. I've discussed this before - buying cheap tools is never worth the savings. You can find a fantastic selection of high-end tools at Lee Valley. Check it out.

If you’ve ever been a tinkerer, or you’re some kind of mechanical-electronics whiz kid, or you just like neat-o gadgets, you definitely need to check out kipkay.com.

In a nutshell, hacker-modifier extraordinaire Kip Kedersha takes fairly common household items (often electronics) then shows you how to, via a short video clip, modify, hack, and combine them in unique ways that result in cool stuff. Like a Bic lighter turned into a laser lighter that lights fireworks and cigars. Kip also can save you a load of money by, for example, modifying a $5 flashlight to outperform a $95 high-end model. With a little bit of knowledge and some extra parts readily available at places like RadioShack, Kip does some pretty remarkable things. He’s also got a few pranks up his sleeve, of course. How about a calculator that talks to the user when they hit the = button? Or a stapler that squirts blood? Brilliant.

Two of the cooler hack-tricks? Jimmying a “single-use” digital camera so that you can use it again and again … for free (instead of paying the fee to retrieve your pictures only to toss it out). And the night-vision headset was sort of bad-ass, too, with the quality far better than most commercially available models.

Granted, most of the hacks require that you have some more-than-basic tools at your disposal and at least a rudimentary knowledge of electronics. For most of the projects, he provides parts lists (and links for where to get them) in addition to the videos, along with detailed directions. Personally, I think they it’s a great way to figure out how things work, and since the projects all result in fun gadgets, it’s also the perfect way to spend time with your kids while you both learn.

I’m thinking my first attempt will be the modified flashlight. I’ll let you know how it goes.

It’s summer and it’s been hot, hot, HOT here in New Jersey. Like record-breaking hot. What’s a person to do to cool off other than languish in front of the air conditioner or soak in a pool till your fingers and toes become prune-like? I’ve got a sweet idea—ice cream! And not just grocery store schlock, but some of the best darn ice cream in the country. You heard me: Not just the best in the area or the state but…

The. Best. In. The. Country.

A recent ranking of the top ten best ice cream purveyors in the country gives Jersey not one but two of the coveted spots on the list (the only state with two on the list, in fact). And guess what else? One of those places is practically in our backyard, in Princeton right on Nassau Street. If you haven’t guessed by now it’s (drumroll, please) none other than Thomas Sweet, home of the blend-in and various other frozen confections.

Now, I’ve been going to Thomas Sweet since I was in college, so I’ve always known how good it is; but it gives me great pleasure that others beyond Central Jersey will find out soon, too. And with this nationally published ranking, I’m going to guess that it might get a tad busy over there on Nassau Street, especially on Friday and Saturday nights in the summer. So, you might think about heading out to the Thomas Sweet Café in Montgomery off of Route 206 North, or if you don’t mind a bit of a drive, there’s a Thomas Sweet on Easton Avenue in New Brunswick, about a block from the Old Queens building at Rutgers College (yeah, I know; technically there’s no longer a Rutgers College, per se; just a Rutgers University, but old habits die hard and I haven’t completely bought into that whole name-switch thing).

And what about that other top-ten New Jersey ice cream parlor? It’s Springer’s Homemade Ice Cream in Stone Harbor.

Regardless of your current locale, grab the family one of these hot nights and head on over for a sweet treat to beat the heat.

And...at this point the joke has been going on so long I have to continue with it so here she is...

Larissa vs. Kim, Trends and Bread Clips...

Well, 50% of the world's population is breathing a sigh of relief as Larissa Riquelme, the lingerie model from Paraguay, has announced she will run nude through the streets of Asuncion despite her home country being knocked out of the World Cup. She made this decision to give "a present" to those hard-working players who brought pride and recognition to her country. Umm...honestly, I think Ms. Riquelme brought more recognition to her country than the national futball team.

For those of you not in the know, she had pledged to run clad only in body paint the colors of the Paraguayan flag if the team won the World Cup. Upon that announcement, in addition to a world-wide drop in Viagra sales, Paraguay suddenly had pretty much the support of any man from any country knocked out of contention...and probably quite a bit of support (even if in secret) from fans whose team was still in the hunt. I can guarantee this will be a historic run, thoroughly documented by the media with the particular photo assignment being eagerly sought after by sports photographers the world over...and just about any other guy even remotely involved in media. Suddenly the lowly photographer at Sports Illustrated who has covered South American sports in backwater towns for years while suffering the teasing of his colleagues assigned to "more prestigious" assignments like the NFL Combine now has most coveted job in sports.

As usual, visit Dave over at The Savage Truth for better sports analysis and better jokes.

Your Ride: Using that amazing thing called Google, I saved at least $500 if not closer to $1000 on car repair bills. Here's the deal - the AC in my Volvo would stop blowing cold air after 15 minutes or so. If I turned if off for about 10 minutes or more, it would blow cold again for a while before stopping again. Puzzling. When I had the car in the shop for routine maintenance, I asked them to look into it but they couldn't duplicate the problem (and pretty much treated me like I was an idiot with questions like "Did you have the AC turned on?"). 

By visiting a few online forums like Volvospeed and Volvoforum I determined this was actually not an uncommon problem. After reading through a number of the postings, I narrowed my problem down to being that the AC compressor clutch was starting to wear down and the gap to engage too big. Solution: shim it. Recommended method to shim it? Use bread bag plastic clips and Super Glue...no joke!! It took about 10 minutes to fix and now my car AC works perfectly...critically important since it's been over 100 degrees these past few days here in Jersey! Lesson learned? Before taking your car in for potentially expensive repairs, poke around on the web to learn what you can about the problem (especially on owner-forums), and determine if there is an easy and inexpensive way to DIY.

Trends: Speaking of Google, if for no other reason than being bored check out Google Trends. You can type in search words or terms to see how often they are being looked for, even comparing them against other words. There's also a listing of the Top Ten Trends and Searches on Google - some interesting stuff sometimes! For example, type in aforementioned model, "Larissa Riquelme" a comma and then "Kim Kardashian" and you can see that the very attractive Ms. Riquelme was not on the radar until June 14 of this year then suddenly shot up on June 28 (while Kim has held relatively steady for about 3 years), out-stripping (pun definitely intended) searches for Kim due to her announcement of a clothing-free run. The letters indicate news stories about the topic in question, listed to the right of the graph. Below there is additional info on the search term - what country, city and language for which the term was most popular. For Ms. Riquelme, not surprisingly the highest number of searches come from her home country of Paraguay, but oddly enough the language with the most searchers was not Spanish but Korean! For more mundane topics, there is often seasonality such as "Tour de France" in July, "pie" around Thanksgiving and, oddly enough, the searches for "weddings" literally spikes the day after Christmas year-after-year (guess what she got for Christmas).

Le Tour: It's been an exciting first few days of le Tour de France thus far with a seemingly excessive amount of crashes and riders out of the race already (note: anyone who thinks bike racing is for wimps should check out the crashes and the resulting blood and broken bones). On the second day of racing, after nearly 223 km (138 miles) of riding there were three major crashes inside the last 3 km, one of which blocked the narrow road entirely and brought the peleton (the main body of riders) to a complete stop! In the GC (General Classification aka Yellow Jersey aka Maillot Jaune) standings there are a few surprises at this point although Contador looks well-placed going into the Alps in a few days when Stage 7 begins. Lance is a bit further back after suffering from two punctures on the tricky cobblestone stage. Probably the biggest shocker thus far is the Manx Missile, Mark Cavendish, being in 36th place in the Points Standings for the best sprinter. He's figured as a major factor for the Maillot Vert (Green Jersey) but has so far been rendered impotent while his main competition, Thor Hushovd, leads in Points with 80 total to Cavendish's 15. Stay tuned!

Guy Books - Are you guys looking for good beach-reading material this summer? I've got some for you. Normally my wife (and sometimes the kids too!) likes to gently tease me about my usual reading selections and their general lack of excitement...such as Understanding Wood, The Intelligent Investor, The Handplane Book, and other such non-fiction fare. However I do have one favorite fiction author who writes action-packed historical fiction. Meet (if you aren't already familiar with him) Bernard Cornwell, one of the most prolific writers out there. For the most part he writes series - which is great since I have always enjoyed his books so much I want more of the characters - with my favorite to date being The Saxon Stories. Five books (and counting) written in the first person, the series follows the life of Uhtred, a warrior in 9th century Saxon Britain/England (or what will one day become England). Many of the characters portrayed are figures known to history and the larger framework of the books follows historical events. So if you're up for page-turning adventures back and forth across the landscape, mighty battles, definite bad guys (more often-than-not a demonic member of the clergy), switching allegiances as necessary, comely women, drunken victory feasts...it's all there.