Coffee heat rising

How Has YOUR Dollar Done This Decade?

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Be afraid, my friends. Be very afraid. If you have no fear, click on the image above for a larger, clearer picture of what’s slouching toward Bethlehem.

That thing came in a report from my money managers today. It tracks the value of a dollar invested in my portfolio from June 30, 2000 forward.

Now, if you take a ruler and lay it horizontally across the page so that it passes through the start point on the left-hand side of the page and stays parallel to the x-axis, you will see something alarming. In all that long, eventful decade, only a tiny little nubbin pokes up above the top of your ruler.

That’s right. A dollar invested in my vast holdings was worth a dollar or more for two out of ten years, between third-quarter 2005 and third-quarter 2007. For the other eight years, it was worth less than a dollar. Sometimes significantly less. In third-quarter 2001 it was worth about 68 cents. At the end of June 2010, when this report was generated, that year-2000 dollar was worth about 85 cents.

Suspicions confirmed. Some time ago, it occurred to me that the amount in my investment account was about the same as the amount I recalled coming away with from the divorce, some 20 years ago. Statements from those days have been packed away, and offhand I couldn’t say where they are. They may even have been discarded. But the figure that sticks in my mind is…well, just about the figure on the bottom line of the statement that comes in the mail once a month.

Still think long-term investment in the stock market is the way to grow your savings? Read on…

On the phone with the investment guru:

“Is there a reason to believe keeping money I will need to live on for the rest of my life (which we may sincerely hope will be short) in the stock market is a good thing to do? Unless these funds grow or at least quit losing money, there won’t be enough for me to live on. I can’t keep on forever putting in 16-hour days, 7 days a week to scrabble together $15,000 a year, which is what happens when  you’re ‘self-employed.’

“Should we be considering some other investment strategy? Maybe we should take a chunk of dough and pay off that damn mortgage on the downtown house, so I don’t have to worry about where 10 grand a year is going to come from to pay for it. If M’hijito pays rent to me, then about $600+ a month would come from him to me, instead of me having to fork over $800 a month. After the kid moves on, I could probably rent that place for $1,000 a month. Or sell my house and move into it, banking $235,000 in the exchange.”

Well, of course, the very idea is anathema to an investment manager. Put your money in real estate, and he doesn’t have anything left to manage!

The conversation that ensued was eye-opening. The firm has moved large amounts of funds into income-producing instruments, which my guy says are returning 7 percent just now. So even though the apparent value of the securities appears to drop, they’re still bringing in cash.

Couldn’t prove that by me, but then you can’t prove much by me.

He then said that the consensus among his partners is that the future of investing is off-shore; that effectively the U.S. economy is done, and smart money is going to emerging economies. He believes China’s economy will surpass America’s within ten years. The jobs we have lost in construction and manufacturing—where the bulk of job losses have been—will never come back. Jobs in the service sector, which is where most of the remaining employment resides, are poorly paid and will never be anything but poorly paid.

If you thought the middle class in this country is disappearing, you thought right. A young person, he suggested, would do well to look for employment overseas. Americans are in demand in Hong Kong, he said, although given Americans’ reluctance to learn languages other than English, Canada or Australia is probably a better bet. He would, he added, seriously consider moving to Canada if he were younger (and hadn’t yet started his family and career) or older.

Not scared enough? Well, put on your 3-D glasses and look up your address on Zillow. For jacking up your adrenalin level, that beats any chainsaw movie.

My house, whose value held steady through the bubble-burst at $235,000, has suddenly dropped to around $200,000. The downtown house house is between $50,000 and $60,000 underwater. Real estate values have not stabilized; they continue to drop steadily. When I mentioned this to Investment Dude, he said yeah, his place also had fallen in value even more than it already had, which was plenty; he and his wife managed to get a refinance, but only because no appraisal was required—the lender accepted a recent valuation. If they’d had to have the house appraised, they could never have gotten a new loan.

So…how has your investment dollar been doing? Dollar, heck… Can you spare a dime?

Blogging: It takes over your life

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Do you believe there’s such a thing as an addiction to the Web? Personally, it’s the kind of nonsense I discount as pop-psych woo-woo. These folks, for example, claim Internet addiction is “a growing epidemic,” pretty alarming considering the whole concept stems from a satire. Dubious as the idea seems, sometimes I wonder. There’s no question I’m spending way too much time blogging and way too little time living real life.

It can’t all be blamed on blogging. About 99 percent of my work is done online, whether it’s editing or teaching. Last night I worked until 12:30 a.m. trying to finish the course prep for the English 101 class that starts next month. Got to bed around 1:00 and then, naturally, awoke at 5:30.

I’m getting fat because I’m not getting enough exercise, and I’m not getting enough exercise because I’m parked in front of the computer from dawn until the middle of the night. Day after day after day. To some extent that’s abetted by the heat: it’s just too darned hot to go out trotting around the park or the desert. But the truth is, this was going on a long time before summer arrived.

Normally I stumble into the office and start blogging the minute I roll out of the sack. This means starting some time between 3:30 and 5:30 a.m. Write from one to three hours. Then get up, feed the dog, feed myself, in summertime water the outdoor potted plants. Then it’s right straight back to the computer for editing, teaching tasks, Internet cruising, or more blogging. Stuck there till around 2:00 or 3:00 p.m. Get up, grab a snack, sit back down in front of the computer. Come 8:00 or so, realize the dog hasn’t eaten. Feed the dog. Maybe grab another snack; rarely fix a real dinner. Back to the computer until I can’t hold my eyes open, a state that usually occurs around 10:00 or 11:00 p.m.  Sometimes when I get up I’m so stiff from having sat in one position for so long, I can barely walk.

Socializing with my friend KJG for a day and a half, I learned that she spends most of her at-home time on her feet. Her house is spotless and her acre of land is immaculate because she’s busy attending to it. My house—the parts you can see around the clutter—is awash in dust and dog-hair dunes because I’m too preoccupied with the computer to clean, and my yard is overgrown and tired-looking because I never bother to trim the plants and my idea of weeding is dribbling a few drops of Round-up here and there.

This. has. gotta. stop.

As I reflected a while back, too much of my supposedly entrepreneurial time is being spent on highly unprofitable endeavors. The teaching makes the most consistent return on time invested, but it’s not returning much. Blogging? Today I made $3 and change; that works out to about a dollar an hour. Editing pays $30 to $60 an hour, but only when there’s some work coming in, which just now is not the case because I’ve been too busy sitting in front of the computer to market myself.

This morning I decided to get up and do something instead of padding into the office. Even though the four-hour nap (these cannot be called “a night’s sleep”) left me struggling to keep my eyes open, I started in on the neglected yardwork. Repotted the long-suffering hibiscus and lashed it to a standpipe so it won’t blow over in the next monsoon wind. Dragged a bunch of pots whose plants have fried in the heat back to the yard-gear storage. Dragged the hose to various plants. Stuck a number of succulent cuttings into the pockets of the murderous giant strawberry pot, probably to be pulled out soon by The Yanker, a curved-bill thrasher with a fetish for small, juicy plants. Washed down the deck, after a fashion.

Then it was back to work on the 101 class, whose “couple” of remaining small tasks expanded to fill all available space. Midafternoon, I fell asleep on the sofa and stayed out till 5:30. Back to the computer; remembered to feed the dog around 8:30. Finally finished—finished!—the course prep and got the entire, endlessly time-consuming BlackBoard lash-up ready to go.

So it is that I write this at 11:19 p.m.

It’s time to consider whether this blog should continue at all, and if so, in what form. Next semester is going to be hectic. Each of my classes is just eight weeks long, and so students will be turning in stuff in every class meeting. Even if I succeed in controlling the time spent reading student papers—which you can be sure I will not—the schedule does not lend itself to spending two, three, or more hours a day writing and cruising the Web.

One option is to demonetize the site, so it no longer feels like a job, and so it doesn’t really matter much whether something gets posted every day.

Another is to change my work habits so as to spend evenings sitting in a more comfortable chair in front of the TV and writing on a laptop, instead of in a bone-crushing desk chair in front of a desktop. This is how Funny started: it was an idle hobby to cut the boredom of the awful, violent and mind-numbing fodder that is prime-time television. After shifting the blog-writing time to early morning, I stopped watching television altogether (because I’m now working into the night, every evening).

And a third is to stop blogging altogether.

I’d be sorry to do that. Funny about Money has become part of my life (obviously) and part of my identity. But I’ve got to get up from in front of the computer. If I can’t find a way to do that in the very near future, some major changes will have to take place.

What do you do to keep this occupation, such as it is, from becoming a preoccupation?

Interesting Day…

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Last April my friend KJG’s almost-new RAV-4 was totaled when a speeding chucklehead ran the signal at an intersection as she turned left. Fortunately she was not gravely injured, although she spent a couple of nights in the hospital.

The police found witnesses who said the other driver had run the red light, and KJG was exonerated of any fault in the wreck. Her insurer proceeded to go after the perp.

So she was surprised to receive a subpoena for a court hearing in Peoria municipal court. The perp, it appeared, was contesting the ticket!

Because she was a bit unnerved by this, I volunteered to go with her to provide moral support. Meanwhile, she reported the development to her claims adjuster at USAA, who, upon looking into the matter, discovered that the guy who got the ticket for running the red was appealing on the grounds that he was not the driver, but that his brother had been behind the wheel. KJG already knew that the car’s owner had not reported the accident to his insurer, but this new twist was as surprise.

It turned out to be a pretty entertaining afternoon.

A witness to the accident was also subpoenaed, and the cop who wrote the report, a razor-sharp woman who reminded me vividly of Deputy Jo Lupo on Eureka, showed up. She was startled to learn, in the course of KJG’s testimony, that the witness got the story wrong and had her driving in a different direction from where she was coming from, but fortunately that proved to be neither here nor there.

The defendant alleged that his brother was driving the car, which belonged to his father, and that he—defendant—had not seen a police report and didn’t even know where the accident had occurred. When KJG and the witness said that despite a strong family resemblance they didn’t think he was the driver, the judge gleefully dismissed the charges against him.

Deputy Lupo The officer, with evident relish, announced she was going after the real perp, this time for the felonies of misleading an officer of the law and stealing his identity.

So a good time was had by all (except, presumably, for the brother, believed to be on the lam). KJG was not challenged on the issue of her innocence in the accident. The alleged driver was proven not to be the driver at all. The judge was grinning like a Cheshire cat at the details of this little drama. And Deputy Lupo got a new perp to chase.

Aren’t you glad he’s not your brother?

When Is a Splurge a Good Thing?

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Not, one could argue, when the Splurger is supposed to be pinching pennies to get through a ridiculously tight time.

That bit of logic notwithstanding, today I blew $400 out of my monthly diddle-it-away fund, reducing the balance to just over a thousand bucks. After the glasses and the clothes episodes, this might (one could argue), just might not represent the highest pinnacle of wisdom to which I have ever aspired.

But it’s not bothering me. Here’s why:

Today’s purchase is a new gas grill, a Weber Spirit E-210, which sells here, there, and everywhere for $399. It’s small—only two burners—but it comes highly recommended by reviewers on several sites.

I love my charcoal grill, which replaced the last gas grill. But…it’s just enough extra work to make me not want to fire it up for dinner. Even when I feel like hassling with it and then scrubbing charcoal dust out from under my fingernails, at this time of year it feels unsafe. During monsoon, a stiff wind can come up with no warning; the hardwood charcoal I favor shoots out hot sparks and cinders with the élan of a magnesium sparkler. In a stiff breeze, they blow into the shrubbery and trees, and frankly I’m concerned about starting a fire in these hot, dry conditions.

Meanwhile, cooking in the kitchen also creates a hassle. Every time I get that darn stove clean, I end up splattering more grease all over it. Last night I cooked a piece of steak and, craving a little enhancement, poured in a few drops of wine to deglaze the pan. Even though I’d turned the heat off under the pan, the wine and hot grease exploded all over the kitchen!

So with dinner congealing on the plate, I got to break out the de-greasers and scrub down the walls, counters, floor, and even the counter all the way across the kitchen from the stove. That was fun.

When I’m tired, which is most of the time, I just don’t feel like making another mess to have to clean up, like having to scrub a frying pan and at least one or two other pans if I make side dishes.

The result is, I’m not eating well. Sometimes I’m not eating at all. I just don’t want to be bothered with the mess.

Half the time I snack on cheese and crackers, often washed down with a beer or two. If I feel energetic enough to cook, it’ll be a pot of pasta, because I can prepare the pasta and a quick sauce in the same pan. As a result, despite not eating much, I’m getting even fatter than I was.

This isn’t healthy.

When I had the gas grill, I usually tossed meat and vegetables onto the grill to cook. All that had to be washed was a dinner plate, a glass, a knife, and a fork. The stove never needed to be scrubbed more than once a month, if that often. I ate well because it was easy to eat well.

Now I’m eating badly—when I eat at all—and I’m getting fatter and fatter.

You see where this is going? I regard that $400 as an investment in my health, not an extravagance. I have got to get back to eating properly!

This little grill, which actually cost a bit more than I planned, is just about the right size to cook one or two portions. The big charcoal grill can be reserved for when guests come over or when I have enough ambition to cook up something that tastes smokey and good.

I think I got a pretty good deal on it: commenters at Amazon revealed that the version sold at Home Depot comes with cast-iron grates; most Weber Spirit models have sheet metal grills, far less desirable. Went over to Lowe’s and found the Weber Spirit there, and sure enough, theirs had the chintzy grates. Lowe’s was having a sale on a larger, fancier model, but the $500 asking price was more than I could afford. On to Home Depot: yea verily, for the same price, their Weber Spirit 210 has nice, heavy cast-iron grates. Not only that, but the Depot will assemble the thing for free.

So I think this is a case where a splurge is not a splurge.

♦ Did I already have a charcoal grill? Yes. But because it’s charcoal and not gas, I use it less and less.
♦ Did I need a gas grill? Probably not, given that a perfectly fine charcoal grill is standing out there in the backyard.
♦ But really, do I need a gas grill? Sure, if I’m going to get back to eating healthy again. Or eating at all.

Cheese & crackers vs. meat and veggies? No contest. I really do think this is not a splurge but a wise move, in spite of the bad timing.

Have you ever had a splurge that was not a splurge? What did you not-a-splurge on?

Yakeziites in Action

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This morning I was pretty entertained to find that the ineffable Evan, my favorite conservative PF blogger at My Journey to Millions, created a lively stir with a provocative post, “Why Teachers Anger Me.” He got quite a rise out of Budgeting in the Fun Stuff, another of my fave PF bloggers, who replied with verve in a whole post at her own site. Both posts elicited a terrific series of reader comments—33 comments at BFS and 56 at Journey, for a healthy total of 89 responses between the two writers.

Both are members of the Yakezie Challenge. Evan has risen to the 55th slot in Wisebread’s Top 100, with a current Alexa ranking of 89,759, and BFS’s ranking of 85,392 puts her in the 49th place.

Not bad, folks! Keep up the good work.

Meanwhile, Financial Samurai, the instigator of the Yakezie Challenge, has risen to the 19th spot with an Alexa ranking of 40,237. His most recent post will will give you something to think about: he reflects on some startling figures about the ratio of elderly to teenage workers.