poisonwood's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- comparison A brief, interesting interview regarding Romney's recent speech and a comparison to Kennedy. 4:11 p.m. - Dec. 06, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- kindle This is an interesting review of the Kin*dle. The reviewer actually made me more interested in the device, but for now, it seems it isn't worth it. I thought two things were especially interesting. First, you must pay to read newspapers. Since you can do this free for most papers on the internet, that seems unreasonable. Second, you can't "share" with friends, something you can do now. To me, you should be able to pass a book from your Kin*dle to someone else's. The book would be removed from your unit and be on the other person's, just like a real book. 12:37 p.m. - Dec. 06, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- flooding I have emerged relatively unscathed from the flooding that has hit western Washington. SW Washington is worst hit. I do seem to have gotten water in my heating system. I can hear gurgling from all the vents when the heat runs. This morning it sounded like a waterfall whereas now it is much less, so I'm hoping it will simply go away in a day or two. 6:44 p.m. - Dec. 04, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- why worry We drowned this weekend. It rained and rained and rained. I work in a flood zone. As I may have mentioned a time or two, I'm pretty convinced that I attract floods. It took an hour to get to work this morning, what with the flood detour. I would have worked from home, but I had an interview. I'm not sure anyone would come to work here after seeing Seattle today. It was that kind of gray and miserable that reminds me of the west of Ire*land in the winter, the kind where it never seems to get light. It was like that this weekend as well. The rain actually started out as snow, so I woke up to see my lawn covered in white. We went out and played with the dog in the snow. It was good fun. Sunday, I drove around Seattle looking at pianos. I finally bought the fourth one I saw. It was only $300, which I consider a great deal. It was built on the order of 100 years ago, but it's in great shape. The sound is amazing, better than any of the others I looked at despite the fact that this is probably the oldest. I have to have it professionally moved, which will probably cost another $200, but all in all, I'm very excited and feel the cost is well worth it. With my jaw, playing the flute hasn't been as fun lately and I've been really missing a musical instrument. 3:40 p.m. - Dec. 03, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- admissions I love the WSJ. They always pull together great data. Big surprise - the best schools to go to if you want to get into Har*vard cost 30 grand a year. Check it out. For the #1 school, in addition to being rich, you should also be male - but fear not, there's a girl's school at #2, though it costs $31,300 instead of $29,100. Are rich people smarter? I happen to be familiar with the #1 school because I know someone who went there. (He went to Har*vard and got into every Ivy Lea*gue school he applied to.) He applied to get in when he was 3 or 4. By virtue of passing that 1/2 hour interview when he was practically a toddler and his parents having the financial resources (and desire) to send him to that school, he practically had a ticket to school. I don't know anyone in my graduating class of 400 who applied to Har*vard, though it's possible some applied and just never mentioned it. Certainly no one got in. Yet, in my friend's class, MOST people applied to Ivy Lea*gue schools. Look at the article - of those who attended his school, 26% of the senior class went to Harvard, Princeton, MIT, Williams, Pomona, Swarthmore, the University of Chicago or Johns Hopkins. 26%!!! In my graduating class of 400, not one person went to a single of those schools. NOT ONE. If I recall correctly, there was one girl who was admitted to the University of Chicago. I was admitted to Johns Hop*kins. (They give out a very small number of merit scholarships - I didn't get one, so that was out.)
No doubt there is some association between being rich and being smart. Certainly it is easier to get rich if you are smart. But this article makes it pretty clear that if you want to go Ivy Lea*gue, being rich is clearly the most important thing. Your only alternative is to one of the small number of excellent public schools that serve as Ivy feeder schools. For most, this is not an option. Is this important? I think yes. Having attended both Stan*ford and Georgia Tech, I don't think Stan*ford is a better school - in fact, I think GT is better for engineering - but when it comes to applying for jobs, having Stan*ford on my resume makes a big difference. It's kind of sick. Personally, I believe in public school, and I'll send my kids to public school, but articles like this make me think twice. 9:53 a.m. - Dec. 01, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- snow day B and I saw the Sonics beat the Pac*ers last night. It reminded me of how much I like watching basketball, especially live. I really couldn't care less about baseball or football, but I really enjoy basketball. The game was close all the way through, and the Son*ics (3 - 14, previously 2 - 14) were definitely the underdogs to the Pacers (8 - 9), but they pulled out the win. Kevin Dur*ant, Sea*ttle's new superstar, scored a career high 35 points. It was the kind of game where the crowd is excited and really screamed like crazy at points, especially at the end. Sea*ttle's oft-abused stadium is small enough that you can see quite nicely even with seats in the second deck. Anyway, suffice it to say that I will be extremely displeased if the Son*cs go to Oklah*oma City, as seems very likely at the moment. Meanwhile, there's perhaps an inch of snow on the ground outside my house. I love snow! 8:57 a.m. - Dec. 01, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- middle class I found this article on who constitutes the middle class rather interesting. I consider myself middle class. I consider the family I grew up in middle class. I consider virtually most of my friends from high school middle class - even the girl from my cross country team who lived in Hunt*ing Hills, one of the most expensive neighborhoods in the county, and bought clothes from Americ*an Eagle full price. (Things seem so different now, looking back.) From the article: Obama replied: "Understand that only 6 percent of Americans make more than $97,000 a year. So 6 percent is not the middle-class. It is the upper-class." When Obama says this, does he mean "people" or households? A household making $97,000 is very different from a person making that much. Also, where does our 97 grand income person live? I was just looking at condos in NY with my friend S, an investment banker who I imagine exceeds 97 grand. She wants to live in Man*hattan - not unreasonable given that even living IN Man*hattan, her commute is still 40 minutes. For a 450 square foot studio, you will pay $420,000. The cheapest one bedroom we looked at was not very nice and cost nearly $600,000. S often works 80 hours a week. She's nearly 30. When one adds in tax and maintenance, 97 grand a year is probably not enough to pay for the 450 square foot studio - and studios don't support roommates. So is she rich if she can just afford that studio? I say no - she's well off, but upper middle class, not rich. On the other hand, an individual in Sea*ttle making 97 grand may be borderline rich, but what about all the single income Micro*soft familiies living in Belle*vue? Most of them have incomes of 97 +, I imagine. You're back to needing at least that much to afford a house - ANYWHERE in Belle*vue. In my opinion, it doesn't make you rich to be able to afford a house within a 20 minute drive of where you work. Maybe times are changing. Maybe property ownership isn't part of being middle class in a large city - or maybe 1 hour commutes is. Another quote from the article: Obama doesn't want to lift the payroll cap entirely, according to one of his campaign's senior advisers. Rather, Obama has said he would consider a "doughnut hole" arrangement, in which people would not have to pay any additional payroll tax until they had made at least $250,000 or $300,000. The adviser said of Obama: "He has always said that the people he expects to pay their fair share are households with income above $250,000." I think 250,000 is a good demarcation of being "rich" today, but that number should change every year with inflation. The whole idea of setting income limits and then not changing them for decades is absolutely ridiculous (think AMT). Clinton has this comment: Clinton has cited that same figure, saying households with income above $250,000 can pay the marginal rates set in the 1990s when her husband was president. She would also give married couples with estates worth less than $7 million an exemption from the estate tax. How does 250K a year compete with 7 million in total value? I think the estate tax exemption is rather too high. The estate tax itself seems very high. Perhaps a lower level of estate tax could be set, but in my humble opinion, estates above 1 million (at the most) should be taxed. Grumble, grumble. I actually love this description: "The middle-class aspirations include a decent home in a good neighborhood with a good school, and the ability to save for college and to make sure that your children have the opportunities to put themselves on a path to match or exceed yours," Bernstein said. "If you're upper-class, you think about whether you want to move your horse from one barn to another barn." Here are a few things I associate with "rich people," other than horses: 2:23 p.m. - Nov. 27, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- travel eve I'm flying through New*ark tomorrow and Monday - the two busiest travel days of Thanks*giving - and maybe of the year. I'm not sure about the latter. In any event, it should be fun. Friends have said that I have "bad luck" with travel; I personally think your airline luck is a function of how many times you fly through Chi*cago. Regardless of what the article says, I feel good knowing there's no Chi*cago for me this year. Over Christmas, I'm flying through Dul*les, which should be great. If I'm stranded, my parents can come pick me up. It's a 4 hour drive, so it's inconvenient but definitely doable. I remember arriving back in the US after my trip to Eur*ope in '02. That was without doubt the most insane airline trip I've ever taken. I left Malaga at 3:45 AM. I arrived in London a few hours later in Gatwick, I think. There I bid farewell to John - the last time I ever saw him. Then I was off on a bus to Heath*row. That afternoon, it was finally time to get on my flight home. I flew from Gat*wick to Chicago. Naturally, my flight was late, and I wouldn't make my flight to Roa*noke. I can't really remember what transpired next, but I ended up in Greensboro. It took either one or two flights to accomplish that. That would have been fine, since Greens*boro was only 2 hours from home, but it was after midnight. My parents were *not* thrilled. At the time I was rather unsympathetic, having been up for God knows how many hours. (I have never been able to sleep on planes, no matter how tired I am.) I still remember that the airport insisted on X-raying my suitcase, something that has not happened to me before or since upon arrival in a new city. All this rigamarole was to save money. My round trip ticket to Europe that year - in high season - cost a little over $300. 4:21 p.m. - Nov. 20, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- wednesday Sometimes I wonder if these travel advice-givers actually travel. Others of them I suspect work for the airlines. (There is a third helpful set, too.) This quote from CNN made me wonder about the first: 'I-Reporter Linda Jenkins of Alpharetta, Georgia, had her own tips to pass along. "The best time to travel during the holidays is on the eve or the day of the actual holiday," she wrote. "You will miss the hordes going to visit their families several days before the holiday."' The article is about Thanksg*iving. One of the two most-traveled days on Thanks*giving is the Wednes*day preceding it - the on which Ms. Jen*kins advises one travel. 10:37 a.m. - Nov. 19, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- flying B was complaining about the amount of flying he has to do before the end of the year. I noticed that I have at least 6 and probably 10 flights between now and January 1, depending on whether a planned business trip happens or not. Argh! The good news is that if the business trip happens, four of those flights will be leisurely hops to and from Te*xas on US Air. This particular trip tends to be uncrowded and very pleasant. 12:44 p.m. - Nov. 15, 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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