Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness (and lots of dancing)

A friend of mine asked me a question about investing. Here’s my answer.

Hey buddy,

You were asking me about “Your rate of return of investment in the foreign currency trade” and “How should I start?”

I’ll tell you what I think about investing in today’s market, and you can do what you want about it. Right now we’re at the edge of a cliff. There are derivatives totaling hundreds of trillions of dollars. They seem to be a form of insurance against market volatility. One party lowers their risk in exchange for the potential of higher returns. I don’t really know enough to say. But I do know that it’s going to have a domino effect. Some corporations buy one derivative and sell another to offset that risk. Bankruptcies mean that the risk they thought they had insurance for is still there – and when they find out they’re not insured after all, they’ll go into bankruptcy too.

Plus we have many other problems like the housing market meltdown, the national debt, the national deficit, the possibility that countries that have huge foreign exchange reserves in dollars may try to cash it in. If this doesn’t lead to an outright crash in the market, it will lead to hyperinflation as the central banks try to flood the markets with more money (credit) so that the economy can spend its way out of the problem.

So the bottom line is, there’s a very big chance that the markets will crash. [Read more →]

I’ve ordered stuff for years and years online. It’s all too easy to forget what you ordered. This means if it doesn’t show at all, you don’t remember until it’s too late. So here’s my simple system for remembering.

I’ve got three folders:

• Ordered
• Received
• Registration

Here’s how it works:

Ordered: Stuff that gets ordered goes in the Ordered folder unless it’s instantly downloaded. Even then, if I think it might be crap, I’ll put it in Ordered. Once a month I go through the Ordered folder and see what I’ve actually received.

Received: Once a month the Ordered stuff goes in Received, if I want to keep a receipt. Otherwise I’ll delete it entirely. If I don’t have it and should have, I just move the email from Ordered to my inbox, and send a follow up message.

Registration: Stuff that’s registered goes in Registration. This is usually memberships, web hosting information (with passwords, setup info and such), or links.

One last note:

Sometimes if I need to follow up with someone in a month, I’ll also put the email in Ordered. That way I’ll remember to follow up. Nothing to it.

The system works great and keeps my inbox squeaky clean.

A couple weeks ago I read Rebel Without a Crew by Robert Rodriguez.  Amazing book about how he put together an award winning film, El Marachi, for just $7,000.  People in the film business thought his trailer (advertisement for his movie) must have cost him more than he paid to have the whole film made.  (BTW, the trailer kept him motivated to keep editing his movie.)

 It’s an amazing story about how he challenged assumptions to make his movie quickly and on the cheap.   People complicate things – Robert made it simple.  He couldn’t afford for it to be complex.   In fact, his equipment was horrible – the camera was LOUD so he had to shoot the scene first, then later dub the audios.  Since the audios tended to drop out of synch, he would have to cut away to a different shot to avoid the rubber lip problem common to dubbed videos.

 There’s at least one lesson to be learned here.

 I saw El Marachi long ago, and his movie Desperado (with Antonio Banderas) has the best, most fun gunfight scene ever.  I’m looking forward to seeing what else he’s done.

Just talked to a friend of mine who is poor because she joined a “vacation club”.  Basically it’s a timeshare where you get points and can “buy” or trade weeks of vacation all over the world.

I sat through one of the presentations in Cancun once.  The math was complete and total BS.  Everything sounds good, except for basic finance.  They add up the total value you’ll get over the years, which sounds pretty sweet.  But would you pay $720 today for a week’s vacation in 10 years?  Even if it’s a beachfront hotel on the shimmering sands of Cancun?  I don’t think so.   That’s why their “grand total” ain’t so grand.

That’s called the time value of money.  Money now is worth far more than the same money in the future.  There’s a reason we earn interest.  There’s also a reason you can buy these things for about $1 on ebay, with closing fees of about $300.