wow

there is actually a christmas song called "please daddy don't get drunk on christmas." that is hilarious. john denver covered it.

i stop thinking about a family sitting around a fire singing christmas songs and then this one comes up and everyone is singing with a slight grin towards daddy and he's looking back smiling with this awww shucks grin as if to say, "i know, i know. i probably shouldn't get drunk again this christmas." and it's all a big joke.

that is some funny stuff.

school's out, pt. 2

i am done. i have the possibility of graduating summa cum laude, but if not, then i will definitely be graduating magna cum laude.

i can't believe i'm finally done. i'm done with step 1.

step 2 is acquiring my cpa license. this will probably take another few years.

step 3 is an amalgamation of differing scenarios. they all involve public action. we'll see.

but for now, i'll concentrate on celebrating finishing step 1.

school's out

in 12 hours, three years of busting my ass will be over.

war is over

we have a little more than a week to go until christmas. it feels different this year. people are hurting financially, but amazingly, it seems to have helped them rediscover the real joy of christmas. not gifts and fancy gadgets, but family, friends and miracles.

my favorite christmas song is "happy xmas" by john lennon. if you hear it this holiday season, turn it up and think about it. then call your family and tell them you love them. here are the lyrics:

So this is Xmas

And what have you done

Another year over

And a new one just begun

And so this is Xmas

I hope you have fun

The near and the dear one

The old and the young

A very Merry Xmas

And a happy New Year

Let's hope it's a good one

Without any fear

And so this is Xmas (war is over)

For weak and for strong (if you want it)

For rich and the poor ones (war is over)

The world is so wrong (if you want it)

And so happy Xmas (war is over)

For black and for white (if you want it)

For yellow and red ones (war is over)

Let's stop all the fight (now)

A very Merry Xmas

And a happy New Year

Let's hope it's a good one

Without any fear

And so this is Xmas (war is over)

And what have we done (if you want it)

Another year over (war is over)

A new one just begun (if you want it)

And so happy Xmas (war is over)

We hope you have fun (if you want it)

The near and the dear one (war is over)

The old and the young (now)

A very Merry Xmas

And a happy New Year

Let's hope it's a good one

Without any fear

War is over, if you want it

War is over now

Happy Xmas

favorite waste of time

as you can tell, i'm in a picture mood.

here is paul kedrosky's list of best financial books of 2008.

the u.s. was positioned as low-risk, high-return. that's not really the case.

list of industries with strong hiring potential. accounting is listed. i think my move was a smart move. my next move will be ever better.

people, big people, are losing big on madoff.

have you seen jennifer aniston on the cover of some magazine wearing a tie? wow.

the money hole part II

the actual onion link for the money hole.

the money hole

"if you love america, you throw money in its hole."

christmas on mars

wowie zowie

ex-nasdaq chairman arrested on what might be biggest scam in history. bigger than the federal reserve.

the street knew he was cheating, and that's why they invested with him. smart.

various people sound off on madoff scam.

this guy says a trillion dollar deficit is a good thing.

some reading material for the weekend.

i don't really like mates of state. i saw them in concert and found them cute, not kind of lame. but i do like the fact they're husband and wife who play together.

obama is a smoker. he's trying to quit, but until he's totally quit, no one here and there, he's a smoker. we should let him smoke.

white winter hymnal

here are some lists of best albums of 2008 from various websites:

-the onion avclub

-rolling stone

-time

-paste magazine

-pitchforkmedia (site is down right now)

-thatbirdhouse

open letter to cc sabathia

mr. sabathia,

i hear you are going to sign with the new york yankees for seven years, $170 million dollars. maybe you didn't notice because you had your head buried in a bucket of nachos, but the yankees are dying. they're as good as dead. your presence will not resurrect them. the franchise, blinded by success and adulation, maneuvered itself into obscurity by doing precisely what you and the franchise engaged in, signing free agents to hilarious deals before they actually pitch in new york. carl pavano comes to mind. so does kei igawa. so does jaret wright. so does randy johnson. the yankee model is a relic of bloated baseball inventory. if you didn't notice, the tampa bay rays won the division with youth, speed and team chemistry. you have jeter as your captain, but with every new free agent signed, his influence is diminished. your team is a bunch of a-rods. high paid, hollywood stars that wilt when the time comes to produce. when the "team" needs a leader, there is no leader to found.

and those of us with a memory do remember you started horribly in 2008 with the cleveland indians before being dealt to the inferior national league and racking up big wins, mr. sabathia. that did not go unnoticed. now you've signed into a division that bleeds rivalry. you will have to stand tall against the red sox. can you do it? you did not in 2007 championship series. you will have to stand tall against the entire american league. we'll see if you can handle the pressure. the pressure of new york. the pressure of this contract. the pressure of being the ace of the staff because that's what you signed to do.

you might wonder why i would have such a visceral response to what is a common occurannce during the baseball offseason, the signing of free agents. it's because baseball players don't get it. the world series featured the tampa bay rays versus the philadelphia phillies. both teams featured highly paid players, but both teams had exactly zero big name free agent pickups. they grew their players from within. then they filled holes through free agency. the yankees did not even make the playoffs last year. it's amazing to see that baseball's "greatest" team still does not know how to succeed after being as dominant as they were from 1996 to 2001. during that period, they grew their players from within and signed guys like paul o'neil and scott brosius to fill holes. then they started signing guys like jason giambi and alex rodriguez and they got worse.

but they're stuck in this holding pattern. it makes me smile. because i love watching people/teams who think they are entitled to succeed fail. they think all they have to do is show up and they'll win because the other team will vanish into oblivion out of fear. it doesn't work that way. every team wants to win. and every team will fight to win. so good luck this year yankees. i'll see you when you finish in third place.

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remember, that just because certain people are filmed and recorded and beamed out to thousands/millions of people, it does not mean they have any idea what they are talking about. draw your own conclusions. 10 worst predictions from 2008.

here are fortune's top 25 companies.

did coldplay steal joe satriani's melody? you be the judge.

the title of this entry is a song title from jim o'rourke's album eureka. it's a great freaking album. check it out.

the race

it's that time people. time for me to assign a numerical ranking to the top ten best albums of 2008. and just for fun, i will also rank the 19th best album of 2008. so, without further ado, here they are:

1. fleet foxes- fleet foxes
2. kelley stoltz- circular sounds
3. magnetic fields- distortion
4. dr. dog- fate
5. the walkmen- you and me
6. langhorne slim- langhorne slim
7. blitzen trapper- furr
8. brian wilson- that lucky old sun
9. cut copy- in ghost colour
10. my morning jacket- evil urges

19. travis- ode to j. smith

and those are the top ten, w/number 19, best albums of 2008. it was a pretty good year for music. some honorable mentions include coldplay, sigur ros, elbow, nick cave, m83, the black keys, the last shadow puppets, beach house, the dodos, spiritualized, phantom planet and department of eagles.

this weekend i watched a movie that left me with such massive disappointment that only my eventual children will be able to succeed. "the darjeeling limited" directed by wes anderson was so bad, i thought several times about turning it off in the middle of the movie. "rushmore" is one of my favorite movies of all time. "the royal tennebaums" is stylistically gorgeous, with an awesome soundtrack and beautiful framing. "the aquatic life w/ steve zissou" is quirky and cute. "the darjeeling limited" is tedious, uninteresting, frustrating and completely lacking of direction and character interest. these guys are boring. they are lame. they are totally devoid of human connection. i was harshly disappointed. so disappointed it needed to be documented and read by a couple of people.

i took a quiz this weekend. i now have two finals left and i'm finally done. three years baby. i will continue the countdown until i'm finally done with collegio. that's college for the anglos.

if i had a dog, i'd name it buckley. or arrow.

we all love nixon. here's a list of nixon media.

cool waves

i had my last class last night. the presentation went fine. i sped through my part, as i always due when i'm nervous. the worst part was, i had prepared note cards. but i had the first few memorized. so i was speaking very conversationally at first. then i'd get past the information from those first few cards, and have no idea what i was supposed to say. i took a jim rome pause (which is probably between 5 and 10) seconds to flip through and find my place in my note cards. that was the worst of it, so it wasn't so bad. but i have three assignments (quiz, final, final) until i can say i'm done.

when i first started back to school, my wife was my girlfriend, the astros were the defending national league champions and i had yet to discover my love of oatmeal.

there's not really anything in the news today except that over 500,000 jobs were cut in november. so if you have a job, be grateful.

have a good weekend.

blonde over blue

today, my friends, (can i start saying this again without visions of old, tired republicans?) is the last class day for the fall 2008 semester. tonight is my last class, not counting finals. i will have three assignments to do after tonight that will satisfy the requirements for graduation for the university of houston- downtown. it's so close, i can feel it.

great article from the economist. is saving money really coming into fashion, or is it like conversation when oil prices shot up this summer?

great list of reading material from infectious greed.

college tuition is quickly becoming a hit in the nuts. when i started in spring of 2006, the tuition increased some $600 dollars a semester by fall of 2008. that's incredible.

market volatility explained. we'll see about that.

uncorrected personality traits

i do not understand credit cards. i have never encountered anything like them in business. you sign a contract with them, and if the terms of the contract no longer favor the credit card company, they will change the terms of the contract and there is nothing you can do. they will also stagger billings so that it's more likely you'll miss a payment. then they charge you with a fee and jack up your interest rate. also, if you miss a payment on one, they report it and the other credit card companies will raise your rates as well. now with the current economic climate, credit card companies are raising your rates as much as 15% above your current rate. that is unacceptable.

i don't know about you, but i'm sick of it. i call for a complete and total boycott on credit cards. they have screwed me/us for the last time. use your debit card. use a check. don't use a credit card. use cash. use gold. barter if you have to, but don't use a credit card. this is bullshit. these companies who are "too big to fail" need to be kicked in the ass. they're poorly run. they practice deceiving business practices. they are of no good use. just because we've done it this way for so long doesn't mean we have to continue. live within your means and don't let these companies screw you.

on another note, langhorne slim's self titled album is pretty freakin' good. buy it with a debit card. or cash.

i haven't done a recipe in a while. but i'm sure everyone is tired of turkey and dressing. here is a recipe for garlic soup with potatoes and broccoli.

funny little frog

when i was younger, i would go to the mall with my mother. for whatever reason, she always chose to enter the mall through mervyns. maybe it was because no one else parked there, i don't know. but she rarely bought anything there. i didn't get any clothes from mervyns, but i always hated that place because it was the first we would look every time we went to the mall. well, mervyns is no more and here's how it happened.

oil prices only get attention when they're high. for some reason our elected officials are only willing to watch over oil speculation when prices are high. they should be watching all the time.

the recession is official. i'm so glad we're finally official.

the dow is down over 600 points today. stocks i've been tracking ticked up last week over the past month. i sure have a gut feeling though the holidays will be brutal and obama cannot make announcements everyday to appease wall street. once this thing is down around january, that will be the time to buy. if we get another week or two of upticks, i might be singing a different tune though.

i remember when i got back from my first european trip, i commented that florence was more beautiful than paris. take a look for yourself.

apparently U2 has a new album due out in february. i actually liked their last album quite a bit.

the tourist

hope everyone had a great thanksgiving or giving of thanks, as i like to call it. i went out and bought two books today as a means to congratulate myself on having one week of school left, which means i'll be able to read whatever i want, whenever i want.

i bought "the origins of financial crises" by george cooper. in chapter three, he mentions this video by the ECB that helps to explain inflation.

here is the link. it's actually pretty good. i mean there are some parts that are broad generalizations that exist outside the realm of reality, but it's good anyway. check it out.

the other book i bought was "twilight in the desert" by matthew simmons. i've been talking about this guy for a while on this blog and i finally get to read his book. can't wait. can't wait.

and finally, "in bruges" is one amazing film. it's written by this playwright named something. i saw his play at the alley and it was the funniest, bloodiest thing i'd ever seen on the stage. there was buckets of blood in the final scene, but it was good. and the film was even better than the play.

now i must continue to eat cookies.

dig lazarus dig

i wrote something the other day:

"i cannot think of anything worse than being a woman
marginalized
by waistlines
by the style of shoes you wear"

and in typical perverse fashion, i can't finish it. it needs to be corrupt and yet sympathetic. it should humiliate but offer understanding. i thought of this while i was driving to school after work listening to nick cave. maybe i should recreate that experience and see if anything else comes.

if i can't finish it, hopefully one of you can.

have a great thanksgiving. i'll be out tomorrow.

4 minute warning

so citigroup has intercepted the auto industry's money and run with it. they're going to be bailed out. during the hurricane, i kept hearing the phrase "hunker down" which i used before but probably won't again after hearing it a million times on the news. the same goes with bailout. although i don't use that phrase very often. i won't start for sure. bailout. bailout. bailout. now it's out of my system.

here's more detail on the citi bailout. bailout. bailout.

it's pardon time. you have to love it when the outgoing president sits in a big, comfortable chair and listens to why everyone should be pardoned. that has to be one of the greatest times during the presidency. here's the list so far.

is there anything better than chick-fil-a?

even though i only did it in my head and i didn't tell anyone, i did pick the jets to beat the titans this past weekend. i did, seriously.

there is a film about harry nilsson that has not made it to a large distributor yet. here is the trailor. it looks freakin' great.