10/11/08 08:54 - 60ºF - ID#46067

The Wrongest Thing Ever

You can take a class field trip to an Apple store:

This sucks so much. They must have had actual requests from schools that caused them to set up an official program. Yuck.

Permalink: The_Wrongest_Thing_Ever.html
Words: 41
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: buffalo

10/11/08 08:29 - 45ºF - ID#46056

HAPPY OCTOBER STORMIVERSARY!

Tomorrow, October 12th, is the second anniversary of the October Storm.

Hard to believe, hard to forget! Here's my yearly look back in photos, to October 12-13, 2006:

Permalink: HAPPY_OCTOBER_STORMIVERSARY_.html
Words: 94
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: trekkies

10/10/08 12:10 - 59ºF - ID#46042

CAPTAIN PICARD

OF THE U S S ENTERPRISE

This video is made of awesome.

Permalink: CAPTAIN_PICARD.html
Words: 22
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: dreams

10/10/08 09:45 - 50ºF - ID#46037

Strange Dream

I had a dream last night that I was a run away child of a Yakuza mobster. Drew and Janelle took me in as a foster child.

Then, it started getting even weirder. They kept finding other kids hidden in their house that I'd took pity on and invited over. Like, we'd be in the living room and all of a sudden we'd notice some kid hidding under the couch. Or in closets, just everywhere.

Drew and Janelle were very sympathetic and didn't want to force these kids to go back out on the streets, but by the end of the dream there were like 30 of us kids in their house and they were starting to panic about how to take care of us. They were very aggravated with me for putting them in the position of having to take in all these kids, but were too nice to say anything.

Then I woke up.

Permalink: Strange_Dream.html
Words: 155
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: humor

10/09/08 08:41 - 56ºF - ID#46011

Obama Debate Prep

Permalink: Obama_Debate_Prep.html
Words: 8
Location: Buffalo, NY

10/07/08 09:01 - 38ºF - ID#45973

E:Strip Holiday Dinner

I'll be planning an (e:strip) holiday dinner, for sometime in early December (between Thanksgiving and Christmas).

This post is just a heads up, I'll make another post in a month to nail down availability and the best times for everyone.

JJ's and India Gate have both worked out OK in the past. If the group is big enough I'll reserve a banquet room somewhere to make sure we have enough space. Any ideas along these lines, please comment!

Cheers,

Jim

Permalink: E_Strip_Holiday_Dinner.html
Words: 81
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: culture

10/02/08 08:30 - 51ºF - ID#45903

Yak Shaving

An awesome term, for when you find yourself doing some task at 8 removes from what you meant to be doing, each step along the way seemingly utterly necessary...

You start out deciding to tidy your room and you realize that in order to do that you'll need some more trash bags, so you need to go to the shops, which will involve you getting out the car, but the car needs gas, so you'll need to go to the gas station first, which means you should probably find your gas discount card, which involves finding your keys, which are in the room somewhere... ( )

And ultimately, in order to tidy your room, you somehow end up shaving a yak.

You know it's happened to you too!

Permalink: Yak_Shaving.html
Words: 134
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: work

10/02/08 07:43 - 45ºF - ID#45886

First!

I like being the first one in at work. No interruptions, a nice start to the morning.

That's all :)

Permalink: First_.html
Words: 19
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: economics

09/30/08 09:38 - 55ºF - ID#45858

ZOMG DOOOOMED

Actually, I am glad that the bailout failed. We'll now get a smaller, more incremental bailout. Rough ride for the next year though, no matter what.

Japan in the 90's went through a crisis very similar to ours, a huge asset bubble and then a giant markdown.

I get what the crisis is about - liquidity - but there's more then one way to solve it. If we prop up existing institutions no questions asked, we'll end up like Japan in the 90's, where zombie banks were technically fine but actually not able to loan much money anyways, thus dragging the crisis out into stagnation for a decade.

The current failed plan was to buy the bad assets at their original inflated values, sell them back to the market at a reduced rate, and use the funds from selling them to buy additional bad assets and repeat the process until all the money was totally gone. That is, if you believe the conference call that was held between the government representatives and Wall Street insiders ( mp3 torrent

), instead of what was said publicly.

Banks operate on the velocity of money. They take money in, send it out again. Don't think of them as repositories, but instead as intermediaries between those who need to hold cash and those who need to spend cash. The banking system is not set up for stasis.

The proposed plan would've increased the velocity of money. Something does need to be done, but jumping to the most drastic expensive plan doesn't sit right with me. I'm totally up for $500 billion worth of no interest loans, something along those lines.

But not recapitalization of the largest banks via burning down $700 billion. Plenty of smaller banks are doing fine. Those are the ones that should be getting help, to replace the large burdened banks. A new day on Wallstreet, slaughter of the behemoths is what sounds good to me.

If 10 years from now there are no familiar old names on Wallstreet, and a new crop of giants risen from the ashes of this meltdown, I'll be a happy camper.

tinypliny writes at 09:59:07 10/01/08 - Comment #39486: Again, a very interesting post and comments! Can you do a common-lingo post on what you think might be the repercussions of the 700bn bailout failing?

hodown writes at 02:17:27 09/30/08 - Comment #39387: I'm ok with the revamping of wall street just as long as I can keep my finance job (and all it's perks).

joshua writes at 01:26:53 09/30/08 - Comment #39382: With regard to your last paragraph - that is exactly what is going to happen, one way or another. After all, three of the five big banks in NY are already a part of history and the niche players are picking up the slack.

Most Americans are queasy about the bailout as is, so I agree that if it were structured via the implementation of loans it would be a better deal, zero-interest or not. Providing such a large amount of currency to flush the "illiquid" debt should be reward enough for these jackals. Regular folks have to eat a **** sandwich over this, so even if they decided to charge a modest interest rate loans are a reasonable idea. Where in the world could somebody possibly borrow that kind of money interest free anyway? If anybody can find out I would like them to point the US Government in that direction.

Many people are selling this plan as a bulwark against potential erosion of lending capability on the part of holding banks. What happens when we get put on the hook for this money and the banks lend to themselves but not the people? Paulson et. al. have been criticized for not being able to phrase this bailout in plain English, explaining the scenario and how it may affect life at home. People want to know if they will be able to get a car loan, and small businesses want to know if they can get bridge loans to meet payroll. We are being told that yes, this will loosen the chokehold on the credit market, but I am still skeptical about how that will shake out for regular people.

Interesting article today from a Harvard egghead, advocating for bankruptcy rather than a bailout. :::link:::

Permalink: ZOMG_DOOOOMED.html
Words: 355
Location: Buffalo, NY

Category: politics

09/29/08 09:35 - 55ºF - ID#45835

I Can See It From My House

Well OK, I just posted that other thing but this is too good to not also make a journal.

Original CBS interview w/ transcript:

I can't wait for the VP debate this week! It's going to be a disaster. That is, unless they manage to take back all the nonsense they've been force-feeding her for a month now. She would've been better off just being her own person instead of programmed to spout talking points.

I was afraid of her for a long time, but they wasted her.

--- UPDATE ---

Check out this bingo score card:

play along from home!