This is Lindy in her favorite spot on my bed. That spot puts her just at my knee when I’m sleeping. When I’m on my back, she’s snug against my calf. When I’m on my side, my knee still touches her. She will spend most of the night there.
I Have Absolutely No Idea What Is Going On In The World
Today is my last day of staycation. In the last two weeks, I have pretty much avoided all news. This has been partially by choice and partially by not wanting to read tens of thousands of words about the “fiscal cliff”. It was tempting, at times, to visit my favorite blogs and read about the latest stupid coming out of D.C., but every time I got that urge I watched an episode of “Deep Space Nine” instead.
That all ends Monday, though. It’s back to to the salt mines. Back to making money. Back to being informed on current events. Back to blogging about stuff that actually matters. In my mind, anyway.
It was a good vacation while it lasted. As all vacations are. With a few tweaks, I wouldn’t mind doing it full time. Real jobs are sooooo overrated.
How Not To Get Out Of Debt
The above graphic is from the facebook page of some “financial guru” named Dave Ramsey. If anyone ever gives you financial advice like this, you should back away from him as quickly as possible and never take advice from him again.
Getting out of debt IS about math. It’s about learning the math and recognizing how much you’re saving by paying off your debts the right way. If you know the math, you will feel good about what you’re doing no matter how long it takes you to pay off an individual debt. Dave Ramsey is basically telling you that you’re too stupid to learn the math so you might as well feel good about yourself even though you’re likely throwing away money by doing so.
What’s the right way to pay off your debts? It’s simple. Which of your debts has the largest interest rate? Pay that one off first. Which of your debts has the second largest interest rate? Pay that one off next. And so on. With very few exceptions, this is the fastest way to pay off your debts while making sure as much of your money stays yours.
Why do it this way? Because it’s the interest that kills you. If you buy a house for $250,000 with a 30 year mortgage at 5%, you will be paying close to $500,000 for that house if you pay off the minimum amount every year. Yes, you pay double for the house because of interest costs. If your loan was at 7%, you’d be paying nearly $600,000 for the house. Interest adds up quickly.
That is an extreme example, though. Most people who are trying to get out of debt aren’t terribly worried about their mortgage and it is likely that the interest rate on the mortgage is the lowest of their debts if they have one. When we’re talking about debts, we’re almost assuredly talking about credit cards. Credit cards commonly have interest rates as high as 30%.
Let’s take a simple example. Say you have two debts. One, a credit card with a $10,000 balance and a 30% interest rate and the other a credit card with a $5,000 balance and a 15% interest rate. Say the minimum payment for each is $50 to avoid paying penalties. Also say that you have $500 a month dedicated to paying off your debts.
Dave Ramsey’s advice is to pay off the $5,000 one first. Let’s see how that goes. We always want to avoid paying penalties (Something Dave Ramsey completely glosses over with his graphic) so we will be paying $450 a month to the 15% card and $50 a month to the 30% card. It will take you 13 months to pay off the 15% card. At that time, the balance on the 30% card will then be $12,200. It will then take another 39 months to pay that off. That’s a total of 52 months.
Now, let’s do things the correct way and pay off the 30% one first. Again, we always want to avoid paying penalties so we will be paying $450 a month to the 30% card and $50 a month to the 15% card. It will take you 33 months to pay off the 30% card. At that time, the balance on the 15% card will be $5,400. It will then take another 13 months to pay that off. That’s a total of 46 months. 6 months sooner than Dave Ramsey’s way. Congratulations! You just saved $3,000 by paying off your debts the right way!
Movie Review: Django Unchained
Ratings for reviews will appear above the fold, while the review itself will appear below the fold to avoid spoilers for anyone that wants to go into it with a blank slate.
Jean-Paul’s rating: 4/5 stars
Quentin Tarantino proves himself, once again, to be a masterful movie maker and 165 minutes flies by even though the theater seats were uncomfortable. The first hour of “Django Unchained” is an absolute masterpiece. I can not recall ever being so entertained by a movie in my life.
Have You Ever Written A Song?
I have. Quite a few actually. Including one magnum opus. Alas, it was only in my dreams, though. It is a very strange sensation writing a song in one’s sleep. There is this clarity to those dreams that goes well beyond the clarity one normally feels in dream time.
Last night, I wrote a catchy pop song. The refrain was a refrain that people would find themselves humming as they go about their day. The verses were poignant and moving. And the bridge, oh, the bridge! It was a soaring homage to hope and remembrance. Ok, there actually wasn’t a bridge that I recall, but since I was getting all melodramatic I thought I’d continue for a while.
Like all dreams, there was this moment of absolute recall as I transitioned from asleep to awake. And like all dreams, as I bit down into that most succulent looking dish, it turns to ashes in my mouth and all is forgotten.
I have a love/hate relationship with dreams. Mostly love. But I hate the losing of the dream. The greatest invention of all time will be the device that can translate dreams into words and images and sound. Get cracking neurophysicists! I have dreams to recall!
Book Review: Some Remarks: Essays and Other Writings by Neal Stephenson
Ratings for reviews will appear above the fold, while the review itself will appear below the fold to avoid spoilers for anyone that wants to go into it with a blank slate.
Jean-Paul’s rating: 2/5 stars
In which Neal Stephenson all but apologizes for compiling this book.
Movie Review: Les Miserables
Ratings for reviews will appear above the fold, while the review itself will appear below the fold to avoid spoilers for anyone that wants to go into it with a blank slate.
Jean-Paul’s rating: 2/5 stars
“Les Miserables”? This movie should have been called “More Miserables”! And in which I learn that I have as much talent as Russel Crow for being in a musical.
The World Has Gone Crazy
Say there was a mass shooting in which scores of children were killed. What would be your immediate reaction? Go out and buy as many assault weapons as possible, of course!
There is such a demand for assault weapons and bullets right now that almost every store in the U.S. is sold out of them. This is not entirely surprising given that there is a decent portion of the population that is of a certain mindset that the government is going to come get them.
There are a few other things in play here, though. First, Obama was just re-elected. Gun sales skyrocketed the first time he was elected because everyone thought he would take away their guns. And he totally did if you consider expanding gun rights taking away guns. Now, with his re-election, gun sales were already climbing before Sandy Hook happened. And he’s totally going to take away guns this time. He was just waiting for a massacre like Sandy Hook to happen to give him an excuse to take away our guns.
At least there’s real talk this time about doing SOMETHING about guns to fuel this Black Friday-like mad dash to get guns. Even though all it is is talk. So at least it’s somewhat understandable this time around.
What absolutely baffles me, though, is that people are rushing to buy body armor as well. Is that the way that people actually think the country is headed? You must wear body armor at all times to avoid being shot? Or is this more a “the government is going to come get us any moment now” purchase?
And if that wasn’t bad enough, guess what else is being sold in larger quantities than ever. Bulletproof backpacks for children. Here, Johnny, take your bulletproof backpack to school. You can use it to rush the shooter and take him out! Of course, I don’t think that’s what the purchasers of said backpacks have in mind. They think the backpacks will protect the kid as he flees the shooter. Because kids always have their backpacks with them in school and they’re totally not stored in their lockers during the day. Oh, wait, it’s the opposite of that, isn’t it?
Posession
Last night, I had one of my recurring dreams. Well, nightmare really. I don’t have this dream very often and I have no idea if it actually means anything, but it’s a really interesting experience. I am probably the only person in the world that enjoys nightmares.
I’m not sure, but there may be a sleep paralysis component to this nightmare. In it, I am always sleeping in bed when I feel a force holding me down. When I try to get up, I can only move so much. I can raise my hands, but only so far before they hit an invisible barrier. I can push against that barrier with all my might, but it does not budge. It doesn’t really feel like a barrier, though. It feels more like a presence. My cat, Lindy, tries to help me, but she runs into the barrier as well. I get to see her in some very strange poses in mid air as she fights against the presence. When I had a dog, he would try and fail to help me against the presence. The dream continues like this until I wake up.
I also had a dream last night that my mom was part of some elaborate “Ocean’s Eleven” type heist. I happened to run into her in a parking garage just as she was trying to escape from said heist. For no good reason, I started running away with her until we ran into the SWAT team at the entrance to the garage. We then ran back to my car and hid in there. A SWAT guy with a shotgun noticed us in the car and pushed the car back into a steeply sloping pit that was, for whatever reason, located in the parking garage. The rest of the dream was me trying to gain control of the car as we’re descending quite quickly down into this pit of the unknown. Then I wake up.
What Is Your Dream Job?
No, not the job you wish you had instead of your boring, dead end job. When you dream at night, do you ever dream that you have a strange job?
Last night, I was a buyer for a convenience store in a very trendy location across the street from some really weird looking art deco high rises. I was instructed to go to the warehouse and purchase some unique items that would sell well for this area. When I asked for further instructions on what I should buy and how much, I was told that it’s my job to know this and to get out there and do it.
So I head out to the warehouse which is both really close by and incredibly far away in a way that is only possible in dreams and it’s this huge building surrounded by similar huge buildings. Inside, it’s like the warehouse at the end of “Raiders of the Lost Ark” with giant shelving units stretching to the ceiling and disappearing into the fog in the distance. The shelves are almost exclusively filled with these weird crystalline statues of various shapes and sizes. I decide to buy a few different versions of the crystalline statues and bring them back to the store.
It was at this time that a song came into my head and I started singing it. I can’t remember what the song was anymore, but it was a pretty popular one. It was just the refrain over and over again. The dream switched gears after that to things that I can only capture wisps of. For instance, I’m pretty sure that at one point I was being led into battle by some famous actor.
I need to find a better dream job.