girls, pts.1 & 2

harry rag

i have been sick for five days now. my ears are clogged and everything sounds like i'm underwater.

no matter.

this still does not change the fact that the kinks are severly underrated and underappreciated. kinks albums, i'm coming for you. all of you. actually all of you before lola, i think after that you kind of suck.

smoke detector

rilo kiley is so lame, but so hot and tight at the same time. i listen to it for two or three songs and love it. and then i hate it. and then i want to make love to it. and then i want get some space from it.

i love you jenny lewis.

no i don't.

love like a sunset, pt. 2

"come in number 51, your time is up."

the fed as a giant counterfeiter. great article that clearly spells out the inflation based fiat system of money we have.

the website that article comes from is http://www.mises.org/. i highly recommend checking into this website daily for great reads and articles on economic and political topics.

"tu ne cede malis."

apparently chris dodd is going go out on top, by killing the financial reform bill so he can go work with the very same financial institutions it tries to wrangle in.

paul krugman looks north to the boring canadiens as a great example of how to base our financial policies.

"i don't believe in beatles. i just believe in me. yoko and me. that's reality."

books of moses

yo la tengo was great. i can't shake the feeling though that i don't belong at concerts anymore. i'll still go, oh yeah, i'll still go and some i do feel like i belong. like when i went to blind pilot and the low anthem. but at yo la tengo we were standing around like 16 year old kids who all had the same haircut, all moved the same way and all attached amazing importance to every movement of sound. i know this because i used to be those kids. but now i'm older and i like going, but i don't like the standing, i don't like the crampness, i don't like the screaming. i need a personal performance in my garage. when i get a garage.

there was one girl there who overheard me talking to pete about how the first band sucked. and she started shaking her head, telling me i was wrong. i made a smart-ass comment in her direction and then she proceeded to ask me to name my top ten bands of all time because that's how she determines character in her book. that's how she said it. so i named hanson, foreigner, deep blue something. i couldn't name all ten because she was instantly dying on the inside because she actually believed these were my top ten bands of all time. but it was how she said it, "that's how i judge character in my book." and i thought, do i do that? i don't think i do. character is not something i attach to what kind of music you listen to. some of the best people in my life, the most honest people i've ever met listen to absolute shit. and some of the most untrustworthy, lying, deceptive people i've ever met listened to great music. so a judge on someone's character? no. a judge on their ability to artistically judge something worthwhile and meaningful? yes. so maybe that's what she was getting at, but used a different word that i didn't appreciate. who knows. she was wasted. and married. and hitting on me.

i will be going to another concert very soon. sunday i'm seeing girls at walters. that sounds promising.

autumn sweater

going to see yo la tengo tonight.

boo-yes.

boo-yesh.

boo. yes.

yesh.

too much caffeine.

butter the soul

"those funky days are back again."

obama is set to take on wall street. we'll see. he's listening to paul volcker, which is a good sign. i know that loss in massachusetts had to awaken him to the fact that we are pissed about wall street banking while the rest of us are floundering when the caused they shit in the first place. hopefully, he'll nail them.

i'm set up to take the audit part of the cpa test again in february. i'm going to nail it. i feel it this time. last time was like rocky I, when he battled apollo to a draw/loss, with apollo retaining the title. he felt like he won even though he lost. in rocky II, he fought hard and trained hard and he took apollo to the last round and knocked him out. that's what i'm going to do.

"this is the last round."

everything can be related to rocky. everything.

i think ur a contra

another sign that the world is ending: vampire weekend's newly released "contra" is the number one selling album in the country.

what? yes. it's true. i have sources.

it's actually a really good album. couple that with the new spoon album and it's been a pleasant start to 2010 as far as music goes.

what is horchata though? this is what it is.

is love forever?

it's interesting i found this article yesterday. i've since found three other articles saying that january 19th, january 24th and january 26th are the most depressing days of the year. funny how they all occur in january. i found it particularly interesting because yesterday was the 15 year anniversary of my sister's death. i turned 30 last year, so i have now lived half my life without my sister. i don't really remember what it's like to have a sibling, someone who you grew up and lived with. the last thing i ever said to my sister was not verbal, but i laughed at something she said. i had been stuck on some joke for some time and she took the joke and used it for herself and it made me laugh. and that was it. she was gone. the next day. the only reason time heals all wounds is because there are tiny battles everyday that help you forget that you're missing something so bad. there are tiny hurdles and games to be played every day. the distance is what heals. and it doesn't heal completely. ever. and in some ways, it shouldn't. there should always be a scar there. otherwise, you might completely forget. and i've already forgotten enough.

spoon's new album is out today.

elizabeth warren is out fighting today. love her.

a bank levy will not stop the doomsday cycle.

written in reverse

"i'm writing this to you in reverse."

honey in the sun

so the gala was pretty sweet. my wife went nuts at the silent auction and bid for a craig biggio signed baseball, that we won, and dance lessons, that we won also. so the good comes with the bad. but as far as galas go, i enjoyed it. my wife got dressed up like she was the wife of a diplomat and looked amazing. i broke out the old suit and dusted it off and after i made some alterations to the pants, (apparently, i've put on an inch since i got married) i was ready to go. there were some big wigs there, but not as many as i expected. the live auction was lackluster because apparently wall street greed leaves all of us with no money, even the big wigs. but all in all, i would totally go again.

now it's back to the real world and study, study, study.

coming up

i'm going to a gala tonight.

a freaking gala. that is hilarious.

i've been using the word gala.

the plan

step 1 is complete. i am joining the ranks of the "move your money" people. i've been thinking about doing this for some time. but this movement has got me re-invigorated. step 2, this weekend. and as the new kids said, three 3 it's just you for me.

i love when a plan comes together. i really do.

cage the songbird

events and happenings, exciting and not:

1. getting my car's oil and inspection done tomorrow
2. tonight i will watch the new star trek movie
3. i am taking my money out of a tarp bank and moving it to a smaller bank next week
4. i am attending an economics conference next weekend
5. tanner just burned me five awesome albums including the woods, the wooden sky and other voices
6. girls, yo la tengo, akron family and noah and the whale is coming up
7. i have a hot cup of coffee sitting right next to me
8. i found a new workout that is going to transform my body (in a good way!)
9. i just ate a banana
10. it's likely that i will have lunch with my wife at red lobster today, home of the cheesy biscuits

what a life.

whole lotta losin'

this month promises to be exciting already.

i have dates for the yo la tengo concert, the girls concert and the akron/family concert. i do not have a date for noah and the whale, but i'm not worried.

i'm also signed up for this: a symposium on the failure of keynesian economics. ron paul will be there speaking. totally, totally excited about that.

this month and february are the worst of the year for me, but with stuff like this, hopefully i can keep a positive attitude.

i wanna be your man

it's 2010. it has been for a while. things are changing already, even before the new year. wow. since i was 15 in my first job at kroger, we never stopped hiring. we never started firing unless you fell asleep, were drunk or made out with the cleaning lady. but that's changing. keep your heads on straight. and pull up your socks. i have to pull up my socks all the time. seriously. it's like the elastic only keeps for a year maybe. but these socks are old probably. i bet i haven't bought new socks since i was 16 or 17 and i didn't buy them. my mom probably did.

i like to do this thing where i look at what i'm wearing and try to figure out how much it cost me. the other day i was wearing shoes that pete gave me. total so far: $0.00. my pants were from goodwill. total: roughly $4.00. the shirt was given to me by my wife, so that cost me nothing. and my jacket was from goodwill too. so with the pants and the jacket, my total outfit cost me $6.00. nice! but that doesn't count socks and underwear, cause to be honest with you, i'm not sure where any of that came from. i think i was given socks and underwear when i was born and i still have it.

so to the serious stuff:

great article in the atlantic about the demise of america. what does that mean? is it born into our culture? is for real this time?

matt taibbi is back and railing on fannie mae and freddie mac.

seriously, where do my socks and underwear come from? i should clarify that by saying "underwear" i mean whity tighties. boxers, those i bought. i remember buying those. those did not come with my birth. the rest, i think did.

bluebird

"i'm a bluebird, i'm a bluebird, i'm a bluebird, yeah, yeah, yeah."

accidentally like a martyr

"enjoy every sandwich." that's what warren zevon said.

murray rothbard breaks down the case against the fed.

how overhauling derivatives died in the WSJ.

niall ferguson breaks down the ascent, not of money, but of the new east dominance.

percussion gun

i think i know what i'm doing for new years and it doesn't involve drinking or standing around with a bunch of people i don't like. that is great news to me. way to kick off 2010. start with something different. start it up right again. this decade needs to be a return to a way of life i surrendered about a decade ago. clean. pure. honest. focused. easy. slow. content.

i went walking with my wife on sunday afternoon. we walked down to the arboretum and she took along her tree book and stood around for about three hours trying to identify trees. it was probably some of the most fun i had all month. it was free. it was enlightening. i learned stuff. i got to see my wife in her element, out amongst the trees and nature. it was wonderful. that's what i'm talking about. my 20's were a great time, but i'm glad they're done. lots of ups and downs. lots of influence and questioning. lots of unnecessary stress. lots of people who came in and now they're gone. there are quite a few people still in though and those are the people i should be concentrating on. some of them have kids. i need to spend more time with these people and their families.

here is what i expect to happen in the next decade (of course if i had done this at 2000, every word of it would have been wrong, so bear with me on this):

1. i will pass the cpa test in 2010-2011
2. my wife and i will make a drastic change location wise
3. my wife and i will buy a house
4. we will vacation in a foreign land
5. i will finally buy a new car
6. my professional career will take off
7. my wife will start a new business
8. i will have the same friends i have now (i can count five)
9. we might have a kid (possible)
10. we will have two dogs

that's it. you really don't know, do you? so much could happen that we don't expect. i just know i want the simple life with my wife. i want flowers and gardens and coffee and seasons and hikes and bikes and a fireplace and two dogs. i can't wait.

i got you (at the end of the century)

christmas is over. my wife's birthday is over. the vacation is over. i'm back at work. my wife's birthday was awesome. we went to mark's american cuisine for dinner. totally awesome restaurant. we had all sorts of delectables. and some good vino. then we went to a comedy club where i ran into kena, an old friend from fox sports who promotes comedians. she was managing two of the dudes that performed that night. one of the dudes was making fun of how white people dance (real original material right?) so since we were sitting right up front, and i mean right up front, he singled us out. well the daughter of the couple we went with actually got up on stage after he asked her to and she danced her ass off, so much so that the dude lost his routine and had no idea what to say. he basically dropped the mike and left the stage.

so later, as the event was winding down, kena runs up out of nowhere and yells that it's my wife's birthday. so the whole club starts signing happy birthday to wife stevie wonder style, which was sweet. i wasn't able to sing it, because i didn't know stevie wonder style. but it was fun. good, good times.

christmas was good time. i'll gloss over that.

so back to business right? back to studying and reading and getting smarter. so here's some stuff to read:

paul krugman shows how the last decade was basically a wash.

apparently john mccain wants to reinstate glass-steagall. i applaud him for his efforts and i hope it passes.

in his new book, the evolution of God, robert wright looks at changes in religion during times of war, political unrest and the shrinking of the world.

anybody interested in the school of austrian economics? go here and read the theory of money and credit by ludwig von mises. good stuff.