Month: October 2008

Yesterday I went to the KFC buffet in downtown Salt Lake City. Yep, welcome to Utah, home of the world’s first Kentucky Fried Chicken. So a buddy forwarded me this:

KFC Art. Masterful!

If this doesn’t get you pumped to play I don’t know what will…

Michel Camilo – Jazz

For a long time, I’ve had qualms about saying how much I make. It felt as if it were somehow boasting. But I realized the other day that I’m certain there are a lot of middle-income Americans in the same boat as I am. As one middle-classer to another, here’s a shared data point I wrote in response to an email from a friend.

On Thu, October 9, 2008 16:58, Sue wrote: > Yes, this money thing is SO depressing. Especially for people in your age > group. I see some of my kids truly struggling to keep it together on > salaries > (adjusted for inflation) that were great when my Ex and I were in those > young years. There are a dozen studies that prove that income has not > increased > at the same rate as inflation and cost of things. It’s about 1/3 less!! No > wonder everyone is struggling so hard!

Here’s a breakdown:

I earn $80,000 per year. I thought that was a great salary when I got it in 2000… and it kind of was. But it has not increased one cent since then. As of last year:

I paid $12,000 in Social Security and Medicare taxes. Note that I’ve been at the cap for Social Security for ten years, and this money is basically wasted at this point as the Congress uses it as a blank check of IOUs to my retirement.

I paid $10,000 in state and federal taxes… AFTER my income tax return, not before!

I paid $26,400 on my home. Most of this, of course, was interest, though some small part was principal.

I already own both of my aging vehicles free & clear, but I really can’t afford to replace them right now.

I paid $15,000 towards my wife’s college education.

I paid $1000 toward electricity, and counted myself lucky that we had a small, energy-efficient home.

I paid $1000 toward water, sewer, and garbage, and was glad I had a tiny lawn.

I paid $600 for Internet service. The thing that saved our budget last year was freelance work on the weekend and evenings, and this was a big part of that, so I don’t regret a penny.

I paid $1000 for hosting my web sites; this also has brought me freelance work, and is money well spent.

I paid $350 for phone service.

I paid $3000 for gasoline; 70% of that was my 35-mile commute to work in my 50-MPG Honda Insight, and the rest was for our minivan to run kids and my spouse around. This year is worse; luckily, my main job is allowing me to work from home a day or two a week to reduce the expense.

That left $9,650 for the budget to feed and clothe a family of six… and I’m certain I left a few things out. Kudos to my wife for making that budget work, since she does most of the clothes-shopping and food-purchasing around here.

This is why I had three jobs last year. And now I’m back to looking for a second and third one, so that I can bring in the critical extra dollars to improve our quality of life rather than just surviving.

And we count ourselves lucky that the only debt we carry is our home. We are better off than some of our neighbors who are really barely scraping by… or not making it at all.

–Matt

Moved from http://barnson.org/node/884#comment-32901 -ed

NEW YORK (AP) — The National Debt Clock in New York City has run out of digits to record the growing figure. As a short-term fix, the digital dollar sign on the billboard-style clock near Times Square has been switched to a figure — the “1” in $10 trillion. It’s marking the federal government’s current debt at about $10.2 trillion.

According to the debt clock today, your family’s share is now $86,017.

I’d like to think that this one blog thread alone has done a decent job of showing just how fast and disastrous the U.S. economic picture has grown bleak. I attribute this to one thing – the Bush administration. For years now the state of economic and budget management affairs have grown weak and I feel like the Republican party in the White House has perpetrated one big avoidance tactic, focusing everyone’s attention on anything but the disaster-in-waiting.

OK.. so maybe you legitimately don’t like ’em.. but more often than not I am hearing “oh, I never watched that because..” and this is my top 10 list.

In No particular Order:

1) STAR WARS EPISODE 3: What started me off, someone said, I saw the first 2 and never saw the third. His loss, since it is the best since Empire and really captures that old spirit, despite some real missteps.

2) STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE: Based on TNG fans who tried the first season and a half and checked out before it got REALLY good.. becoming, in my opinion, the best trek ever.

3) LOST: For 2 reasons. Half the people who tell me its not their thing think its a reality TV show. The other half checked out in the terrible first 8 eps of season 3, and missed out on it getting AMAZINGLY good.

4) BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER: I was on this list. Was never gonna watch that WB crap, saw the flick, hated it, end of story. Whoops. The best show on TV, exceeded only maybe by…

5) ANGEL: See DS9. People didn’t dig the 1st season, so they checked out. It is a darker, richer show, and one that I fnd casual viewers like more. Season 5 is a MUST SEE.

6) TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES: Just the idea turned people off.. it seemed like a dumb ripoff.. it would be so easy to be bad. Its not. Its very good, and I look forward to it every week.

7) ARMY OF DARKNESS: Evil Dead 3. Looks like your typical zombie movie, right? Wrong. Classic comedy with Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi at their finest. I show this to people against their will, and they thank me for it.

8) THE ABYSS: SPECIAL EDITION: People walked out of the Abyss scratching their heads saying “What was the point?” – Well, the point is in the 40 minutes of cut footage.. watch the Sec. Ed, and suddently the movie takes on an entirely different, and better tone.

9) THE HOWARD STERN SHOW: Yup. He’s crass, and sometimes asks women to take off their tops. BUT.. more often its a frank, funny, soap opera that follows the lives of the cast. When its good (see: Artie’s blowup) its worth buying a Sirius subscription for.

10) BARENAKED LADIES: Their fans are rampant, but to most, they are the “One Week” band. That is not their only, or best song. Not every album is perfect, but there are gems like “Born On a Pirate Ship” and “Everything to Everyone” that REALLY shine.. and “Gordon”, their first album back in 1988, is Seargeant Pepper’s Good.

(EXTRA CREDIT: The Beatles: People think they don’t like them based on their early work, and when they hear the later stuff, they change their tune.. Do NOT underestimate this band. they’re themost respected for a reason.)

Between prep work for an upcoming conference, overtime at work, and general satisfaction with my lot in life, I have little to blog about right now. But I’m alive 🙂

As most of you probably weren’t aware, this week I went to Motorcycle Safety Training at Murray High School in Salt Lake City, UT.

On the recommendation of a co-worker, I signed up for the $180, three-day motorcycle course: one Wednesday evening from 6PM to 9PM, all day Saturday, and all day Sunday. “All Day” really means from 7:45 AM until some time between 2PM and 4PM. I had some misgivings about if I actually needed the course — after all, I’ve been riding for several months on my learner’s permit without incident — but wanted to get my waiver without having to book time with the tester at the Driver License Division of the Utah Highway Patrol.

If you’ve ever been to a Utah DLD, you know why I want to avoid that particular bureaucracy as much as possible. It’s simply an excruciating wait to get anything done.

So I showed up to the Wednesday class on my bike. I needed to take one U-turn on the way, and this reminded me why the class would be a good idea: I was having a lot of trouble finishing my U-turn in a reasonable amount of space. I thought perhaps it was simply the size of my bike. After all, it’s a big 1100CC.

Anyway, Wednesday classroom time focused on keeping your bike maintained, the benefits of riding, and managing risk. It was quite boring, actually, and I was worried that if this was all there was, it might have been a waste of my money.

Saturday dawned rainy and cold. I drove the car to the high school. This was our first “range day”. The first half of the day would be spent outdoors on the motorcycle, getting acquainted with the controls and learning the very basics. Since I arrived early, I got first pick of the bike. I could pick one of a Suzuki GZ250 (I think it’s called an S30 now), Honda Rebel 250, or the one Kawaski Ninja 250.

I have fond memories of friends having Ninjas in high school, so I picked that one. It’s a very serviceable beginner bike, and it hauled around my 230+lb butt just fine. It was also the only bike in the class easily capable of greater than 75MPH at our altitude (4200 feet), which would be a good bonus for anybody else from Utah who’s looking for a starter bike.

Since I had already ridden for a few months, at the start of the class I was quite bored. However, I learned that I had a few bad habits that I needed to address, such as only braking with one brake or the other, rather than using both brakes all the time. As I began working on those, the range class became more interesting.

By the end of the time practicing on the range, I was soaked to the bone despite my rain gear, and very sore, particularly in my left “clutch” hand. We spent a few more hours in class discussing how to maneuver the bike safely in traffic and around hazards.

The third day of class, Sunday, also dawned rainy, but much colder than Saturday. This was to be an all-range, all-day class.

Utah’s motorcycle licensing is tiered into three categories, and what you take your test on dictates what you’re allowed to ride. The three tiers are “-250cc”, “-650cc”, and “+650cc”. I rode my 1100CC Honda V65 Sabre to class, despite the driving rain, in hopes that I could take my riding test on it. However, the instructors said I would first have to pass the -650cc test on the Ninja 250cc bike, and after I passed that, if they had time, interest, and the weather was OK, they’d test me on my bigger bike. Otherwise, I’d just have to pay my $15 and come back another day, or else schedule a regular exam at the Driver License Division on my bigger bike.

This range day was MUCH more interesting. We practiced everything covered in the Motorcycle Test: panic stops, swerving to avoid a collision, the offset cone weave, clean entry and exit from a turn, evaluating turn speeds, etc. A focus was kept on keeping your speed up during many maneuvers, because attempting to perform them at too low a speed might lead to dropping your bike.

After hours of practice, my hands, shoulders, and legs were quite sore. It’s far more physically demanding to wrestle around a motorbike at low speed than to drive a car. Finally it arrived:

Exam Time.

The skills evaluation was actually really straightforward. Everybody in our class passed except “Scooter Lady”, so named because she had ridden the day before on her 90cc scooter. She didn’t bother showing up for the second day on the range. Perhaps she assumed, incorrectly, it would be called on account of the constant, steady rain.

By the end of the exam, the sun came out and it started warming up. I got my -650cc endorsement card, then Twila (one of the instructors) told me to go warm up my big bike. She let me dry-run through all the tests several times on the bigger bike.

I had to score 20 points or fewer to pass. Final score on the 250cc Ninja: 8 points. Final score on the 1100CC V65: 1 point, given only because I went one foot past the stop-line on the panic-stop test.

The bike weighs twice as much as the little bikes. You’d think that would be taken into account.

Well, regardless, I’m going to go back and spend several hours in Hell — I mean, the DLD — tomorrow to get my new driver’s license with full endorsement.

I just hope they don’t insist on me taking another riding exam.

Hey all.. still toiling away on the flick. I wanted to share with you a side endeavor I am executive producing.

www.suckcast.com

It is a podcast that is movie-based, but really, is just a funny, crass, ridiculous 30 mins. Please check it out. I came up with the name, concept, and I cast it.. but its these 2 hilarious guys that make it worthwhile..

WARNING: Not for the kiddies.. f-bombs galore.