We Are Having A Flood Here!

I am almost through talking about the weather. It is not raining today, so our weather will return to mostly clear and definitely hot. Yesterday was another matter. I work on the banks of the mighty Rillito River. You say you never heard of the mighty Rillito? Well, that could be because it normally doesn't have any water flowing in it, so Rogers and Hammerstein never felt the urge to immortalize it in song. They should have been here yesterday. The top picture is the river as it appears 364 days a year. The bottom shot is yesterday. Our fair city was deluged and things got messy for a while. Roads got closed, bridges were shut down and the local news people rushed about looking for a place to film themselves explaining the obvious. At the peak of the flow the river was running at 30,000 cubic feet of water per second. That's 224,400 gallons passing a given point per second. As one guy in my building pointed out, "That is a sh*tload of water. It is also a record flow for the Rillito. "Old man river, that old man river, it keeps on rollin'..." Anyway the sun is shining and I have to go to work. Yuk. Merle Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Hooligans

This is a view of a dry wash in my neighborhood. In some parts this would be called a creek, but since it normally is dry, we call it a wash or an arroyo, a Spanish word meaning stream, more or less. These are natural drainageways the city built around. Several days of rain have given us this welcome change. The vegetation is mostly palo verde and mesquite trees. (click to enlarge) On a less sane note, if you google the word hooligan you will find that it means soccer thugs, or football thugs to the Europeans. In the lexicon of Merle, hooligan is applied to anyone who annoys me with uncivilized behavior. Which brings me to today's "Hooligan Report". I read in the paper today that two hooligans broke into a church near here and destroyed the interior of the place. They broke windows, doors, smashed a computer, threw food from the kitchen all over walls and floors. They destroyed musical instuments, tore up religious materials and in all, caused $50,000 in damage. The two 17 year-olds were apprehended in the act. The question is what to do with them? As an aside, the news report never used the word hate-crime. This is a Christian church, so hate towards it is offically excused. Had it been a Muslim congregation, my-oh-my, what would we do? In the good old US of A these two lowlifes will get off scot-free because we are so sensitive. Several decades of liberal policies have robbed us of the will to respond appropriately to adolescent misbehavior. I think Singapore's policy of caning the little monsters would serve us well. But that's just me. Instead, we turn the other cheek. Then we have the case of the cretin at the mall. I took Sneedlet to play at the mall playground today. The rule is that you must be 6 or under to use this facility. There were three 10 to 12 year-olds standing on top of the equipment and leaping as far as they could. Three 60 lb bodies hurling through the air. We also had 50 toddlers racing around. This was a disaster waiting to happen. One of the moms told the three big kids to stop jumping and that they were too old to be in the playground. Their punk father, a 40ish short man with an attitude told them to tell her they were 5 and a half and to mind her own business. A confrontation in the making. What to do? Do I butt in and risk short man making a big scene or worse yet take a swing at me? Not a chance. I got the mall security guy to interevene. Security told short guy that he and his brood would have to leave. He, of course, wasn't about to let the security guy tell him what to do, so he told the kids to sit down and he refused to leave. His position was he could sit in the play area if he wished to, so long as the kids didn't play. Every jackass knows his rights. The security guy hung around him until short guy tired of the charade and left. Another jackass for the world to have to deal with. Public flogging, I tell you, is the answer. The night before last, some miscreant pulled up two of my nice yard lights and smashed one to smithereens in the street. A little creep like this needs to pay and pay with the hide of his butt. I say we need a public beating for the little hyena. It's time for them to turn the other cheek, butt cheek, that is. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Eating Out

We just came home from having lunch at Michas del Norte, with daughter Sneed, one Sneed son and of course, The Sneedlet, seen here. He is a handsome lad, don't you agree? We have had a fairly steady deluge of rain these past few days. How much rain, you ask? Well, enough that the airheads on the local newscasts have gone from asking the quirky weather guy if it will ever rain, to asking him when it will stop. They have a limited repertoire. Thursday is garbage pickup day for the Sneed family. We have a green garbage can and a blue recycling can. Both are picked up by a city sanitation truck from the curb in front of Casa Sneed. Wednesday night I rolled them out at 8:30. Because of the makeover of Casa Sneed, the bins runneth over. They really needed to be emptied. When I went out Thursday morning my cans had been moved to the center of my driveway and a car was parked at the curb blocking where I left them. The recycling truck had already come by and my bin was still full. Apparently, the guy next door realized that he had parked in front of them and tried to move my cans from behind his car this morning. He was too late for the recycling truck. Luckily for him I called the city and they were able to get the truck to come back. When I came home Thursday afternoon it was emptied. I really don't need this aggravation. Dr. Timothy Johnson, in an ABC News story, revealed this shocking bit of information. Restaurant food is generally full of fat and calories. That's right America, those fries are fatty. It turns out that if you load up your salad with ranch dressing...not that good. As a guy who eats every meal out, this is not welcome news. If I don't actually read the nutrional inofrmation will I be skinnier? My lunch with the family today consisted of chips, followed by more chip, then the very fine number 7A (two cheese encilladas, rice and beans), plus a flour tortilla and afterwards, ice cream. I did drink a lot of iced tea, with artifical sweetner. That has to conteract some of the lunch. That is my only meal of the day, so I will only gain about a pound or so. Let's see. If I gain a pound a day I will weight 1500 pounds when I am 60 years old. That's not so bad. Lastly, I see in the paper that some drooling jackass in Kansas has been arrested for keeping 68 pit bull dogs in the house with his two kids. Kids and dogs have been removed to protective custody and drooling jackass is in the slammer on a variety of charges. This being the good old US of A he will get a lawyer and his day in court, where said lawyer will try to peddle the story that these were 68 companion dogs and that the mountain of feces in the house piled up while he was incapacitated or something equally inane. As a side note, I just asked the lovely Mrs. Sneed if I had spelled feces correctly. She is a career G.I. nurse, so she knows feces. She remarked that feces is her business, it butters her bread, so to speak. And you wonder why I eat all my meals out. Merle. Geez, it is raining again. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Happy Birthday

Today is daughter Sneed's happy birthday! I am not saying that she is getting up there in years, but Nixon was president when she was born. You figure it out. The lovely Mrs. Sneed and I are so proud of daughter Sneed. Life has kicked her pretty hard, but like my dad's oleanders, she just keeps coming back, bigger than before. We love you, daughter Sneed. We have reached my favorite time of the year. My company does not give me sick time, per se. I am given 35 days off per year to do with what I please. If I don't take them, I lose them. The 35 days off cover my vacation, sick time and personal needs. I now have more remaining days off than there are Fridays left in the year. I will be off work every Friday for the remainder of the year. Yipee. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Pennies From Heaven

This lovely little flower is an oleander bloom. Oleander is native to the Mediterranean region, extending eastward across southern Asia to China. Oleander is a drought tolerant plant that is commonly used around here in landscaping, it is especially useful for making hedges because it is a dense plant with multiple stalks. The plant is poisonous if ingested which makes it unsuitable for families with small children. To some it is an attractive and practical ornamental. To others it is a noxious weed. It is so hardy that it is difficult to kill, even if you are trying. My father battled two 10-foot tall oleanders for several years when I was a teenager. He hated them and originally tried to dig them up, quickly realizing that it was going to prove impossible for a guy armed only with a shovel. Technically, he was armed with a kid (me), with a shovel. His part involved shouting, "dig here", while flailing at the plants. He finally hit on the idea of just cutting them down. Periodically he would take a saw and cut them off at ground level, only to see them back to height within the year. Withholding water was also futile. We eventually moved away and I swear we heard mysterious hoots and jeers coming from the lawn as we drove off. We awoke to unusual weather today. It was socked in and raining. The rain lasted most of the day and it was not our usual rain for this time of year. Our summer storms tend to be sudden and violent downpours in late afternoon. This was a steady day-long drizzle, more like winter weather, except of course it was warm out. Even so, it was a welcome break from 100 degree days. The rainfall varied from a couple of inches of precipitation near the mountains to a quarter of an inch at the National Weather Service's official gauge. Most areas of our fair city get much more rain than is offically measured by the NWS. Most of the city is closer to the mountains than the NWS gauge, which I believe is kept indoors at the airport to protect it from the elements. Hence, we get only 12 inches of rainfall offically. And I think we all know what wet weather means. That's right, it means the smokers at my building crowding together at the back door like a herd of frightened sheep with cell phones, yamming and stinking up the joint, while trying to stay dry. Evidently they fear getting wet more than fear getting cancer. It makes a guy wish he had a fire hose handy so he could test the negative effects of secondhand water on morons. Whoops, mean Merle is out of his hiding place. "Get back in your hole, you devil!" Bad Merle: "Make me!" Good Merle: "I control you buddy." BM: "Do not" GM: "Do too" BM: "Moron" GM: "Be civil" BM "Double moron" ....anyway, This is a photo of the mountains north of our fair city shrouded in the clouds. The highest of these peaks is about 8700 feet above sea level, or 6000 feet higher than the city. This is nearly same shot without the rain and without the zoom. Best wishes, Merle (the good one). BM: "Are not" GM: "Don't start" BM: "Shut up Sissyman" GM: "Don't call names. How would you like it if I called you a monster?" BM: "I'm not a monster, I am a maniac!" GM: "See what I dealing with here?" Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Beep, Beep!

(click to enlarge) This is a Greater Roadrunner. It is the state bird of New Mexico, not Arizona. Our state bird is the Cactus Wren. I was working and I spied this guy in the desert. He (or she, they look similar) would dash from prickly pear to prickly pear in order to evade me. He finally stopped beneath a Palo Verde tree long enough from me to get a photo, although not a close up (click to enlarge). Notice his crest is standing up, indicating he is on alert, because of my presence. Roadrunners can run up to 15 mph and will fly for short distances. They undergo torpor (at state of induced hypothermia) at night to save energy. In the morning they lie in the sun, wings spread to warm up. On a less sane note. I was thinking about bumper stickers today. There is someone in my parking lot at work that has two bumper stickers. One says, "Born okay the first time" and the other says, "Don't be born again, grow up." My cubicle neighbor finds them offensive and she's the one who pointed it out to me, so when I left work I sought out the car to get a look. My friend is a devout Christian and is incensed that someone would put these stickers on their car. It is personal to her. (click to enlarge) I don't understand why people put combative stuff on their cars. What is missing in their lives that they have to go out of their way to offend? I think bumpers stickers ought to be supportive of something or at least entertaining. Have you ever noticed that there is an inverse relationship between the quality of a car and the number of bumper stickers? I guess people with nice cars don't want to junk them up. I've also noticed a direct correlation between the number of bumper stickers and the freak quotient of the car's owner. I also don't get vanity plates. I see a older woman on my commute home that has a vanity plate on her car that says "FOXY". She has flaming red hair, a bunch of makeup and a ton of jewelery. She reminds me of Mike Myers portraying Linda Richman on SNL. Someone needs to stop her and confiscate the plate. Why do people pay the state good money to make a statement, especially when it is frequently incomprehensible. Often times the sentiment the plate expresses is just an inside joke anyway. I saw a car with a "2SCOTYS" plate. It appears they have 2 Scotish Terriers. So what? I don't get it. Someone told me that it is just fun to have a vanity plate. Maybe I am missing my "fun gene" or something. Anyway, now I am just being mean. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Don't Let This Happen To You!

Before I forget, if you have an emergency fund (and you should), it may be time to ask your bank, credit union or brokerage if it is doing as well as it can. I was in my credit union the other day and the teller asked me if I had considered a CD for my savings. The savings at that account is for emergencies and stuff that comes up, like painting the house. I told her that I needed it to be liquid. It turns out I could put most of that money in a 3-month CD, earning 5.25%. It was only getting 2% in the savings account. That was a no-brainer. The difference in interest in 3 months is $100 bucks. Not bad. I was doing some work in the southeast portion of our fair city and I stopped to snap a picture of an area that is especially heavily vegetated with cholla and prickly pear. Cholla and prickly pear are closely related. As you can see they spread easily if there is not much competition for their environment. If you click to enlarge the image and notice the prickly pear in the foreground, you can see the stress the hot summer has put on the plant. The pads have shrunk as the water in the plant has depleted. This is normal for this time of year. If we get significant rain the pads will swell up as the plant retains mositure. I went back to see if the Curved-Billed Thrasher eggs had hatched yet. I hope they are viable. I haven't seen any sign of Mama Bird, but the nest looks as though it is being used. It is so smooth that it look like a woven basket. If you compare it to the picture from 2 weeks ago, it is obvious she has been sitting in the nest since the last picture. I did take this picture of a blossom on the cholla that the nest is in. While I was taking the picture a Black-Chinned hummingbird (I think) stopped by an adjacent blossom for a quick snack. I could not get the camera redirected quick enough to snap a shot. You don't want this to happen to you. Only an idiot traipses through cholla territory in sandals. I do have a fine looking heel, don't you think? Merle Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Fool's Errand

This is a Yellow Trumpet Bush in my neighbor's yard. It is a naturally occuring desert plant that is used in landscaping because it tolerates hot temperatures and dry conditions. It produces yellow flowers from May through October and like many desert plants produces seed pods that it drops, to be spread by animals, birds and the wind. The flowers are pollinated by carpenter bees and Sonoran bumble bees, both large bee species. (click to enlarge) On to the less sane stuff. I picked an argument with a member of our local media and his boss over their coverage of a tragedy this past week in our fair city. It is possible that I am wrong, its just not very possible. You judge for yourself. This past week a 50 year-old convenience store clerk was working the graveyard shift alone when 3 young punks came in, took some cases of beer and left without paying. The clerk followed them outside and they shot and killed him. These three proved once more that crime doesn't pay mostly because the criminals are just really stupid. If stupidity was an Olympic event, these jackasses would be gold medalists. They stole beer from a convenience store in full view of the security cameras and then shot the poor clerk. It took one day for the cops to ID them and about another two days to apprehend them. Wanton murderers and world-class idiots. Where the argument comes in is in the TV coverage of the aftermath of the shooting. The victim left behind both a wife and an ex-wife plus some kids, including a 9 year-old. The wives, evidently close friends, invited the TV people into their home to share their memories of the victim, or something. The actual living arragement remains murky. What was broadcast on TV, however, was a scene of the two distraught women, sprawled on the floor in front of a homemade shrine, wailing uncontrollably. Not sobbing mind you, but full on shrieks and wails of grief so pronounced that it made me feel embarrassed to be watching. In the mean time our intrepid reporter voiced over the wails to tell us what was going on. The crux of the piece seems to be that the victim left behind some very sad people. Thanks for letting me know. I found it to be exploitive and insensitive and I fired off an email to the station brass telling them so. I suggested that the story was in poor taste. That's the part that seemed to piss them off. In reply, both the reporter and his boss condesendingly told me that the family asked them to come to the house and had no problem with how they looked on camera. So what? We don't have the right to be entertained by the travails of others. Families in the midst of tragedies often lose perspective and do things they later regret. I expect the news people to use a little judgment, rather than trying to one-up the other stations. Unfortunately, I am frequently disappointed. As the lovely Mrs. Sneed pointed out, Peg Bundy's attire was always tacky and in bad taste, but you could never convince her of that. Same thing. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Birthday

We celebrated daughter Sneed's birthday today. How a young guy like me got to have a 36 year-old daughter is a mystery. The entire Sneed family got together to eat breakfast, except Cletus Sneed, our youngest son, who has forsaken his family for a life of vagrancy and drugs. His loss. Of course no day would be complete without a call from Cletus trying to beg a few dollars. He called this morning just as we got home, on the pretext of seeing if anyone left a message for him on our phone. Once he had established that we were home, it was just a matter of time until he called back asking for money. About four I got the call. I told him no. We had a nice breakfast this morning. Guest of honor, daughter Sneed was there of course, along with both other sons Sneed, daughter-in-law Sneed and a couple of Sneedlets. Son and daughter-in-law Sneed shared that they have paid off their credit card debt. They are so proud and of course, so are the lovely Mrs. Sneed and I. I took the Sneedlets on a walk after breakfast. It is our little custom. It is a little like herding cats though. They sprint off in two directions leaving me to round them up. I spent the remainder of the day hanging the new light fixture in the foyer of the house, and putting the blinds and fixtures back up that were taken down by the painters. Have a nice evening. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Taking Stock

This is a post about getting serious about paying off your debt. Last year at this time the lovely Mrs. Sneed bought a new Honda Pilot so that she could chauffeur the Sneedlets around in safety and style. It may strike you as a dopey reason to buy a $30,000 vehicle, but that was her reasoning. The Sneeds are partial to Hondas, the Pilot being our 4th, including the one we bought used from Grandpa Sneed last year when he could no longer drive. Hondas are reliable cars that provide years of service and don't cost much to maintain. Apart from scheduled maintenance we have had few problems with any of the cars. The lovely Mrs. Sneed put $15,000 down on the Pilot and financed $16,518. She set an objective to pay off the balance in 12 months. As of today she owes $1,040 and will pay that off in August. Not quite 12 months, but real close. In the past 12 months she has paid down $15,478 or about $1290 per month. In addition I try to lower our mortgage's principal balance by $1,000 per month. In the past 12 months I have paid $10,980 on our principal. This means that we have reduced our debt by $26,458 in the past 12 months, or $2205 per month. The lovely Mrs. Sneed and I are very fortunate that we have good jobs, that produce good incomes. Our take home pay for the last 12 months, after taxes, 401K contributions and expenses for health care has been $98,174 or about $8182 per month. That is a lot of money where we come from. More than 1 in 4 dollars we brought home went to pay off our debt. Our total debt stands at $78,263 as of today, including our mortgage. Beyond the $1040 owing on the Honda we have no consumer debt. We can be debt free easily in 3 years. It should be obvious that even plunking $2200 directly on the principal of our debt monthly still leaves us $5900 take home per month. I recognize that $5900 per month is a lot of money and is real easy to live on. But that is not the real point. There are tons of people making double or triple our salaries that are up to their eyeballs in debt. The real point is that when you get serious, you get out of debt. Lest you think we live an extravagant lifestyle, here is where our $5900 that was left each month went. 1. Housing costs for interest, taxes, utilities, repairs (principal payments were in the $2200 we already deducted) were 25% 2. Car expenses for fuel, repairs and insurance were 7% 3. Gifts to others 15% 4. Vacations and travel 8% 5. Household supplies and goods 13% 6. Eating 15% 7. Clothing 3% 8. Cash 14% I like to deal in cash so it is a big percentage of our spending. It was spent on the listed categories above but I am too lazy to track it. All our entertainment spending is from the cash category. Our savings are deducted from our paychecks before we take them home. We contributed about $19,000 to our 401K accounts in the past 12 months. This equals 15% of our gross salaries. Of course, our favorite Uncle Sam takes his bite. Our federal and state taxes accounted for a cool 24% of our gross income. Our 15% saving to our 401K plans saved us from sending the government an additional $3000. So that's where it went. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Pack Your Bags And Grab Your Hat

Well, it was 110 degree's F today in our fair city. A new record for the date. Glad I was able to be here for it. That is hot no matter how dry it is. You New Yorkers suffering through 90 degrees can just tone it down. I am not sympathetic. The painters finished up today at about 4 pm. Casa Sneed is looking good. Steve, the contractor, called me to give me the exact amount to settle his bill for sprucing up our house. I had expected a big hassle because he underbid the job and probably lost money on the deal. We had two items that he was not able to complete and they needed to be deducted from the settlement. To his credit he was quite fair about it. Anyway, I hope to have spoken the last of our remodel and can move on to more interesting things. This little bugger is a bark scorpion, one of three common types of scorpions in our area. This one is highly venomous to humans and its bite can be quite a problem to children and older people. When I moved to our fair city from the Midwest as a child, I refused to sleep under the covers for weeks because I was sure things like this lurked beneath the bed covers. I have been here over 40 years now and can say I have never actually seen one in the house. Daughter Sneed on the other hand has seen them many times in her place. She lives in the desert whereas the lovely Mrs. Sneed and I live in the city. In the central city there is little in the way of suitable habitat for a scorpion. Perhaps you have noticed that local TV news people tend to be kind of dopey. We are having our rainy period here and the insect activity, including scorpions, has picked up. One of the local news folks was just doing a story about scorpions and actually said, "now is not a good time to get bitten." Exactly when would be ideal? Geez. Also, for their news story they had a scorpion crawling around on a table as a prop. You know, a "this is what we are talking about", type of thing. Seeing as how our local scorpion varieties tend to be smallish and kind of bland looking, they figured that they would just juice things up a bit. They rounded up a gigantic African scorpion, called a Black Emperor scorpion (not indigenous to Arizona) from somewhere and had it crawling around. It is probably someone's pet. I guess they figured that they would aid the international traveler too. Knuckleheads. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Evening Update

(click on image to enlarge) 8:00 am 7:00 pm Well, the painters showed up on time and spent 12 hours working on our job. They will be done at noon tomorrow. They are doing a great job, when they show up that is. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

On Vacation Without Leaving Home

(click on image to enlarge) This is a picture taken at the trailhead of a hiking trail in my area. Notice the large saguaro in the foreground. Some act of nature broke it halfway up the trunk and it has recovered and is now orienting upward once more. The saga continues. In the old days when the lovey Mrs. Sneed and I had a houseful of Sneedlets, we often vacationed in San Diego because it was only a day's drive from home and they have cool days and an ocean there. We usually packed our own meals and ate in the park. This is still a source of hilarity at Sneed family gatherings. Our motel of choice was a homey $12-a-night affair called the Anchor Motel. When they converted the Anchor to a "no-tell" sort of joint, we began to patronize a place I call the Sleazy 8. I believe the Sleazy 8 corporate motto was, "Sleazy Eight, Its Best Not To Remove Your Socks". This morning I feel like I am back at the Sleazy 8. The painters have us cornered in the master bedroom, every other room is shrouded in plastic. I dragged the coffee pot in here and it is set up in the bathroom. The lovely Mrs. Sneed has a bunch of bananas to fend off starvation. I am sitting in a chair with my feet propped up on the end of the bed as I type this. I expect a knock at the door and a cry of "housekeeping" at any minute. The painters better show up today or I am going to hunt them down and hurt them. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Just When You Think They Have Hit Bottom

(click on images to enlarge) This hovel is Casa Sneed. The knuckleheads painting the joint disappeared again. They taped off everything yesterday and started painting. We can't get to any food, or dishes. We can't get through most of the doors in house. To put the icing on the cake they have my glasses inside one of the items of furniture that are wrapped in plastic. This was supposed to be a three-day job, today marks two weeks with several days to go. When they finished yesterday, they asked if they could leave everything masked until today. It would save them a bunch of time they said. Evidently they used the saved time to take the frickin' day off. The boss called me at 9:00 am to explain that one of his guys was at the doctor and the other was having car trouble. Second car mishap for him in two weeks. The boss assures me that the job will absolutely be done on Friday. I may have to take hostages here. I hate contractors! Merle Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Fire 'Er Up!

Toaster Strudel® is a registered trademark of Pillsbury In the 1970's Peggy Lee hit the charts with a song called, "Is That All There Is?". In the song she waxed existential about the disappointment of life itself and that at the end of the day, death was just another disappointment. Maybe this is a thought you have had, I have. We humans desperately want to believe that our existence transends our earthly humanity. That is why we have faith of one kind or another. We are convinced that our demise is a cruel misunderstanding that must be reversed. So we cling to the hope of eternal life of one sort or another. At least most of us do. I was just reading an article about the booming cryonics business. You know, where they freeze your body or at least your head, in the hope that someday science may make it possible to thaw you and bring you back to life. There is this outfit in Scottsdale, AZ., where this is being done. For a cool $150,000 you can get frozen for all time. Or until they figure out the next step. That's the fly in the ointment, no one knows what will actually happen. This company is committed to caring for the frozen for as long as it takes, and I'm sure they mean it, but I am hard-pressed to think of a 200 year-old company yhat is still operating, so I am skeptical. The clientele is an interesting mix of individuals, including a 99 year-old guy. Let me see if I have this right. He hopes that someone will figure out how to reverse the ravages of old age and fire him back up. So, in 200 years he pops back to life as a 300 year-old guy, culturally speaking. Makes no sense to me. It would be like Ben Franklin suddenly knocking on your door to borrow a tip for his quill pen. Here's a scene from the future. "Hey, Harry. What do you think is in these steel tanks? Holy crap!!!!." You get the picture. I guess the bottom line is that this seems like just another grab at immortality by the latest bunch of self-absorbed knuckleheads. I guess they figure there is no down side to trying to beat the clock. I am reminded of the words of the poet Dylan Thomas. "Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light." You can run, but you can't hide. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

You Have To Get A Bill Pay Service

I was working at a new office building today and I snapped a few pictures of the landscaping. There is very little grass used in landscaping here in the desert these days. That is unless you are a complete ignoramus. As you can see this landscaping job consists of desert plants requiring limited water and rocks. The dirt areas are covered with decomposed granite in this development. Watering is accomplished through the use of underground drip irrigation. This minimizes water loss due to evaporation. (click on images to enlarge) Our favorite Uncle Sam knows something about human nature. What he knows is that if he wants to collect the income tax, his best bet is to get the money before the little people get their grimy mitts on it. So we have withholding from our paychecks. You and I know this too. That is why we have our retirement savings deducted from our paychecks before we get them. It is why the credit union likes to take the loan payment from the check. Get it before we do, or suffer the consequences. Would you send in your 401K payment faithfully each month if you had to write a check? Me neither. Here is another technique you might like to try. I have posted before about my credit union's fine bill pay feature. It is made especially good because it is free and you can't beat free. More than free though, the biggest benefit of bill pay is the convenience of theservice. I find it to be a vital step in implementing my overall financial plan. A good financial plan needs to be proactive and this feature is just that. If your plan is to hope you have enough money to pay the bills when they arrive, you are losing the battle. Time to take charge. I recommend that you use Quicken or MS Money to track your checking account. Look back in the archives to read about how I use Quicken, if you like. The short version is that if Quicken is your check register it is dynamic, your paper register is static. You can change things at will and Quicken (or Money) will show you what your balance is a any given time. This is especially useful if you schedule a check to be written in a week or two. You can see your balance based upon your plans. At the beginning of the month make a budget (or at least a list of your bills), outlining all the places you need to spend money this month. It will include a list of all the checks that you will be sending. Online bill paying allows you to schedule the checks when you make the budget and to enter them in your checkbook right then. They still get sent when you ask for them to be sent, but they are now taken care of. It is almost like having your obligations deducted directly from your pay. We all know that not having the money hanging around is a good thing. What is left in the checking account is what you have to spend in cash. You will make better spending decisions this way, trust me. Most people get paid every two weeks and pay some of the bills each time. Do this process twice a month if needed. Those items, such as utility bills, that vary can be scheduled for approximate amounts and adjusted when the bills come in. Plus, the online bill pay services will get your bill electronically for you if you choose. That is one less piece of mail to drag in and open. The only thing that I don't pay online is my mortgage payment because I pay additional principal every month and Chase Mortgage won't allow me to do that online. Unless I pay them a fee, of course. So I write them a check every month. You are probably thinking that you could go ahead and write out the checks at the beginning of the pay period. You could, but believe me when I tell you that having scheduled them to be paid has a powerful psychological effect on your spending. Just an idea. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Sunday Morning

This is a picture looking north at a portion of the Tanque Verde Valley area east of Tucson, Az. The low place in the middle of the shot is the Tanque Verde creek, a seasonal waterway. Tanque Verde is a spanish name meaning Green Tank. The area likely got its name because of the algae that grew in stock tanks when the area was settled by ranchers. The thick vegetations is mostly mesquite which flourishes because of the high water table in this area. Arizona Sycamore grows near the creek. Despite giving the appearance of being a low spot in the Tucson basin, it is actually relatively high in elevation, at about 2600 ft above sea level. The Tanque Verde Valley is bounded on the north by the Santa Catalina Mountains, visable in the background, and the Rincon Mountains, which are to the east (right) out of view. The area is affluent, with relatively low density housing, and good schools. It is not incorporated in any way, resisting annexation efforts. It is a part of Pima County. (click on images to enlarge) This would be Casa Sneed if the lovely Mrs. Sneed had been more successful in making money. Its 0800 local time and Sneedlet is up and at 'em. As you may be able to see, he is watching a DVD on the portable player his grandma bought him. The temperature here in the Sonoran Desert of Arizona has dropped below 100 degrees F., so naturally a guy's thoughts turn to winter and specifically to the Christmas season. Sneedlet is watching a Christmas DVD. Only 162 watching days until Christmas. The grey blotch behind Sneedlet's head is drywall under construction, not really poor housekeeping! Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Evening Update

Well, Sneedlet has arrived for his Saturday night visit to grandma's house and we are having so much fun. He is presently watching a video called Wheels On The Bus. A week ago yesterday I went to Circuit City to talk to them about my problem-plagued Toshiba laptop that they sold me about 18 months ago. You may recall that I have posted about this machine and its problems before. I bought the 4-year extended warranty with the computer because the guy who sold it to me said they would replace it if it developed recurrent troubles. He also said that they would replace the battery when it went bad. These were lies. In 18 months it has been in the shop for repairs 5 times. The latest was from 5/16/06 to 6/13/06 for a failure of the AC power input. Since they fixed it it has improved from doesn't work at all to works some of the time. The computer manager promised to makes some calls to see if Circuit City would replace it and get back to me. He never did. I talked to the store manager today and he basically said that I can just keep sending it in for repair because it is out of his hands. He will gladly give me a discount on a new computer, but won't honor the warranty he sold me. At least he won't honor the promise to replace it. By the way, it turns out that my warranty doesn't cover batteries either. I am done buying anything from Circuit City. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Retirement and Some Other Stuff

(click on image to enlarge) This is a picture I took of a Round-Tailed Ground Squirrel recently. There is nothing remarkable about spying one of these guys, they are everywhere around here. Notice how he blends into his surroundings. This is a survival adaptation. These squirrels are omnivorous. They eat mostly plants and seeds, but also eat insects and carrion. They are active during the day and at twilight. They hibernate in winter and estivate (sleep during the hot summer). They live in colonies and their numerous burrows can be a nuisance.' Here's something about men that I have observed. Ask 99% of 30-year old men if they would like to chuck their work-a-day lives for a life of leisure and they will say yes. We all think we want a life of leisure, when it comes time to make that choice, it is a another matter all together. I have a friend who decided to quit work in his early fifties and devote his remaining years to doing what he darn well pleases. That was 6 years ago and he has never looked back with a moment's regret. He found a hobby that takes much of his time and he says he doesn't worry about money and never runs out of things to do. I, on the other hand, continue to work and I worry about money all the time, despite having much more money than my friend. I am not sure what I would find to occupy my time if I didn't have to go to work. I imagine I won't have enough money to maintain my so-called lifestyle. I have thought a lot about why we are so different in our view of retirement. The lovely Mrs. Sneed gave me a copy of the latest Harvard Mental Health Letter because it had an article about happiness in retirement. The article was in the Questions and Answer portion of the newsletter, written by Dr. Michael Craig Miller, Editor In Chief. The question asked was, "What are the signs that a person will be happy in retirement?" His answer seems obvious, but knowing and doing are different things. In his answer Dr. Miller cited a the work of Dr. George Vaillant, also from the Harvard School of Medicine. Dr. Vaillant and his colleagues have conducted a study called the Study of Adult Development which has followed 700 men born around 1929, for the last 30 years. In his findings Dr. Vaillant found that men who organized their lives around their work tended to be less happy in retirement than those who had a more well-rounded approach to their lives. Men who have jobs that are more prestigious and pay well tend to have a harder time letting go of them than men who see a job as just a job. They seem to define their value by what they do or how much money they have. Men with friends, family and interests outside their work are happier in retirement. I suppose I better get a hobby or I will be working until they carry me out. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Home, Sweet Home

The same guys who predicted 109 degress F yesterday also forecast dry conditions. Of course we had rain last evening, not that I am complaining mind you. Today's paper predicts more of the same. Imagine that, hot in Arizona in July! Here's another thing. Perhaps you have seen this commercial for the Suzuki Grand Vitara. A guy in a suit, kisses his wife goodbye and leaps off a cliff with a parachute, lands next to a Suzuki Grand Vitara, which is sitting on flat ground. He climbs in and presumably goes off to work. My questions are, if he parachutes from his house to his car, why does he need an SUV and how does he get home at night? Parachute back up? What is the message they are trying to send us? These are very cool pictures. I was out wandering around, looking for something to photograph and I spied a nest in this cholla cactus. If you click on the image above and look closely at the center of the plant you might see a few twigs from the nest. Closer inspection revealed that the nest contained two eggs. I am 99% sure that they are Curved-Billed Thrasher eggs. The nest, which appears to be in the open in the photo below, is deep within the cactus. Your humble writer risked being impaled to get this shot. I weaved my arm into the plant holding my camera and shot several images blindly. This type of cholla has fewer needles than the Teddy Bear variety and the segments don't detach as easily. I thought I had escaped unscathed only to discover 4 or 5 needles in my upper arm. They have barbs on the end which makes them tough to pull out. The eggs are bluish with brown speckles. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Update, Update, Update...

The National Weather Service predicted a high temperature of 109 degrees F. today. The high has only been 105 degrees F. A freaking cold snap. The humidity is up a bit so it feels like a sauna. This is the work left undone. My guy promised to have the drywall taped and the first coat of drywall mud applied today. When I spoke to him at noon he told me that it would absolutely be done. Imagine my surprise to discover that he is only 90 percent finished. Evidently, he ran out of drywall compound and it was easier to knock off until Monday, than to go get more. I know he won't be back tomorrow because the compound won't be dry enough to sand until Saturday (he doesn't work Saturday) and there is too little for him to do to make a special trip to finish the remaining work. So he won't. My guess is Monday. This is what it should look like at this stage. He also told me that he and another guy will paint next week. I will believe it when I see it. I haven't heard from the boss either. Contractors, geez. Merle Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Incremental Progress

From Merle's Dictionary for Life. Financial Hipster n. one who encourages others to take unacceptable financial risks either because of greed or ignorance. A financial hipster is usually broke. I was just reading that the fine folks at Forbes magazine have determined that the homes in my area are seriously overvalued and due for a correction. Why are we bothering to fix up Casa Sneed? The sky is falling, what will I do if the housing market crashes? As I have posted many times, the value of your home ought to be irrelevant to you unless you plan to sell it. Alas, for too many folks the increased value of their home means that the balance in their personal ATM has also increased. This also means they can further endanger their financial life and future, by pulling out home equity to pay for crappola they don't really need and can't afford in the first place. If you borrowed too much on your home and are now concerned that it may not be worth what you owe, you indeed have a problem. For some people the question is not how much should they borrow on their home, but rather how much can they borrow. As we all know, the financial hipsters have said for years that only suckers pay off their home mortgage. Well, who's the sucker now? Well, there is some progress in the makeover of Casa Sneed, just not much. Our guy finished the drywall yesterday and says that today he will do the tape and texture work. Sometime after that we may actually get some paint. The carpet contractor is coming Friday to measure and likely to explain why our job will requires some "extras". We always have extras. I just saw on the local news that it will be 109 degress F. tomorrow. I can't wait. Each year the heat becomes more oppressive. I really need the lovely Mrs. Sneed to get rich enough for us to spend the summer in San Diego. Of course, here in the Sonoran desert, summer runs from May 1 to about Thanksgiving so we will be gone awhile. This is a picture of the infamous "Jumping Cactus" of western lore. This is a Teddy Bear Cholla and it has segmented arms that break off and stick to anything unfortunate enough to brush against it. This makes it seems like it can jump. This ability is an adaptation that allows the plant to reproduce. The unfortunate man or beast that treads too near, carries the segment away from the plant and when it is dislodged, it falls to the ground where it may take root, creating another cholla. In our corner of the world we have free-ranging cattle in some areas and it is not uncommon to see a cow with a cholla segment stuck to its body, often to its face. That has to really hurt. Getting a segment stuck to your person is very, very unpleasant. An accidental encounter with a cholla makes one long for a snakebite. Just kidding, but not much. Click on the photo and note the bird's nest in the arm of the cholla. It is most likely a Cactus Wren's nest. It seems to me like building your house in a mine field. Getting home is an adventure, but it also provides excellent protection for the bird's eggs and youngsters. Anyway, if you stay indoors with the air conditioning running and a cool drink, summer in the Sonoran desert can be very pleasant. Of course the payoff is the 75 degree days in January! Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Of Mice and Contractors

(click on image to enlarge) At first glance this appears to be a picture of a pile of debris. It is actually a picture of the top of the home of a White-Throated Woodrat, commonly called a pack rat. It is called a midden, which is a cool archaeological term meaning garbage pile, or something close to that. It is constructed among the pads of a prickly pear cactus. The rat builds the midden from stuff it collects and uses cactus to create a fortress for its nesting area which lies beneath the covering. In my fair city, folks living in the desert areas have to contend with pack rats gnawing at whatever strikes their fancy. Car wiring can be an expensive favorite of the creatures. Sometime the critters will take up residence in the walls of houses. Which can't be good. Speaking of places that look like a pack rat's midden, my contractor's guy was supposed to finish our drywall and tape and texture yesterday. I waited for him to arrive before going to work. When he didn't arrive by 8:45 am I called his cell phone. He explained that he needed some material and that he couldn't reach his boss to get the okay. I called the boss, who professed astonishment, and told me he would call me right back. When he called he said the guy was on his way and would be here by 10:30 am. About an hour later the guy called me to say he wasn't coming today, because he couldn't finish today and would have to come back another day anyway. I guess his point was that he had a full day's work and only four hours left in the workday, so he might as well come Wednesday and do it at once. The contractor called later to make sure that his guy and worked it out with me, like I got a vote or something. It looks as if we are fortunate this debacle will be done sometime next week. Geez, its no wonder these contractors get a bad name. We did go and order carpet and in a couple of weeks that should arrive. The work is being done by another contractor so hopefully it will go smoothly. Lastly, today is the drop-dead day for paint colors. Picking paint from a sample book sucks. It is impossible for me to figure out what a whole room will look like from a 1" x 1" swatch. Also the one trillion shades of white can be tricky. We picked a basic color called Swiss Almond. Why do I suspect it will turn out to be white when applied to the whole joint? I have been hearing complaints from the lovely Mrs. Sneed for over ten years now that the inside of the house is too darn white. I hope this isn't another decade of the same. I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of the guy to finish drywalling. Have a good one. Merle Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong and sometimes just full of it.. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

RAM? I Don't Need No Stinking RAM!

My theory is that most people prefer one thing over another given a choice between them. You either like Coke or you like Pepsi, Cheez-Its or Cheese Nips, NFC or AFC, Venus or Serena, Windows or Mac. You get the idea. At the moment I am thinking about Best Buy or Circuit City (we don't have Fry's). Based upon sales, it seems most people prefer Best Buy for their electronics needs. Go to any Best Buy and the joint is packed with shoppers. Circuit City? Not so many. I used to try to support Circuit City because they are the underdog. That's changing. My pocketbook is now voting. I bought a Compaq Presario desktop computer from Circuit City about three or so years ago. It came with 128K of RAM. I didn't know much about the inards of computers when I bought it, but I thought I was living large. I soon found out I was wrong. The thing was so slow that it was painful. So I added a 256K memory chip in the available expansion slot in an effort to speed things up. It brought my RAM to384K and worked pretty well. Now I was cooking with gas! The thing about electronics stores is that they make the real money on the extra stuff like cables, cases, batteries and especially on extended warranties. Hardware and othe major items, like TVs, are so competitive that they have a low markup. My 30G Ipod is between $289 and $299 no matter where you buy it. The crappy case that costs about a buck to make is marked up to $30. That's the big profit. You will also notice that the salespeople at these electronics stores use a gambit I call the "yeah but it is really a piece of crap" to upsell you. For instance, I would not normally spend that $30 bucks for the $1 case for my Ipod, except that the salesguy tells me that the Ipod is prone to screen scratches, so you gotta have the case. Despite its techno-appeal, the Ipod is really a piece of crap. See? Sunday I see in the Circuit City ad that they are having a real deal on memory chips. It occurs to me that I can buy another 256K card to replace the original 128K one for my older Compaq Presario and have 512K of RAM. Minimal by today's standards, but my Compaq keeps working fine so I do what I can to squeeze the last mile out of it. Mostly, I use my laptop, anyway. So I go into the Circuit City store near my home and listen to some mind-numbing explanation of RAM from some kid. The upshot of the deal is that my "older" memory isn't on sale. The new stuff is. The cost for mine is $90. I sugggested to the kid that they ought to sell the older version cheap, because no one wants it...except me. No go. He tells me check online, because I can get it cheaper there. What I did instead was to march over to Best Buy, where they had the same damn memory chip, same brand, same packaging,on sale for $39 bucks, down from, drumroll please, $89. What this tells me is that there is a huge markup on this stuff. I also needed an extension cable for a USB 2.0 port. My old Compaq was built before USB 2.0 so I had to add 2.0 ports to my unit. They are on the back of the computer, so I figured I would get a cable long enough to reach the front so that I could easily use one of them for my external hard drive. The price for a stinking cable? Best Buy $37, Circuit City $37. It occurred to me to check at Target. They had one for $9.99. Again with the markup. My point is that it pays to shop around. Don't let that burning desire to have it now, get the best of your wallet. Merle. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Home Remodeling and Other Stuff

(click on images to enlarge) This is a picture of Sneedlet 1 and Sneedlet 2. Son Sneed turned on the keyboard to play a song automatically and these two guys think they are playing. Of course they are only 2 1/2. When daughter Sneed took piano, there were adults playing at her recitals that thought they were playing too. The renovations in progress at Casa Sneed are moving slowly. The plan is to extend two interior walls, 1 by two feet and the other by four feet. The goal is to create more wall space so that more furniture will fit in the living room. Then the interior of the house gets painted and we recarpet the new and improved living room. So far our contractor has had one guy on the job. The guy came Friday and extended one wall by 2 feet. This wall used to be a half wall dividing the living room from the hallway. He extended it upward to the ceiling as a part of the job. He left two 2' x 2' openings. The lovely Mrs. Sneed didn't like the look so on his agenda for today was moving one of the openings. He arrived today just before 8 am and immediately left to get his materials. I left to go to work. Once back he framed in the other wall and moved the opening on the first. I came home at noon to see what was going on. He started to drywall and said he would finish that up and come back tomorrow to tape the new drywall and apply the first coat of mud. I went back to work. Evidently, he left as soon as I did, because it looks the same as it did at noon. Our contractor was also supposed to get carpet samples for us to look at but hasn't. The lovely Mrs. Sneed told me this wouldn't work out. We need the samples in order to pick paint for the living room. I called him today and he said that he was having a hard time getting around to it. I told him to take the carpeting off the contract. He was relieved to do so. We are going tomorrow night to buy our own carpet. This should speed things up. Contractors, geez. Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

Scenes From The Mall

I have noticed that people determined to get into financial trouble refuse to be dissuaded by common sense or the facts before their eyes. Take car buying for instance. I have been watching the A&E series, The King of Cars, lately. I am fascinated by the dynamics of car buying. More often than not a sale is made not on the total price of the car but on the monthly payment. The number of payments seems irrelevant. Customers will tell the salesman that they want to spend $300 per month, for a $20,000 auto that they have their eye on. Plus they only want a 5 year loan. The saleman will run the numbers and find that the payment is $395 or so. They need to pony up $5000 in down payment to get to $300. Rather than doing it they extend the loan to 72 months, simple. That is no way to buy anything. Most people fall for the "I will always have a car payment trap". The problem with this thinking is that in 2 years when they want the next new car they will find out that they are upside down and will roll they shortage into the new deal. On to saner stuff. On Saturday, the lovely Mrs. Sneed and daughter Sneed decided that they needed to go to the mall to shop for clothes. The lovely Mrs. Sneed also discovered that I still have a shirt and a pair of jeans hanging in our closet, so she figured that there is room for her to get another item or two. I will be getting my own armoire as soon as the Uhaul store gets the large wardrobe boxes back in stock. I'm guessing it will look real nice next to our garden shed. Although the sight of me in my skivvies getting dressed in the yard could startle the neighbors. The lovely Mrs. Sneed and daughter Sneed have some sort of ongoing deal with a national women's clothing retailer. They get these 30% off coupons, good on purchases of $100 or so. They go in together, as near as I can tell, and buy a bunch of sale merchandise, apply the coupon and walk out with bags full of stuff for cheap. The Sneeds, mother and daughter, like to look chic. While they bag their limit of loot, Sneedlet and I look for ways to entertain ourselves. We ride the escalator, look at the puppies at the pet store, play in the playground and, of course, have a ton-o-snacks. You know that you eat too much candy when the candy store manager knows you by name. I am also vigilant for photo ops. I snapped this photo of three adolescent girls in the mall. Evidently plaid is in among the alternative crowd. Black from head to toe is sooooo over. Daughter Sneed entitled it "parochial school goes bad". I cropped the faces to insure privacy, but the crowning touch (pun intended) in the ensembles was the 3-point pirate hat the girl in the middle was wearing. Also note one fishnet stocking up and one down. That's a classy look, no matter what the occasion. Later, at lunch I found quite a surprise in my bowl of chips, the chip of a lifetime. I read that someone found the image of Jesus in a grilled cheese sandwich and another the face of the Virgin in a painted wall. Me? I found a chip that looks just like the bottom of a bikini bathing suit. I have overlayed the chip on an original drawing called "Woman in Ball Point on Napkin" so that viewers get the full effect. I am offering it on Ebay and the reserve price is $100,000. Act now before the bidding gets out of hand and before hoards of hillbillies begin lining up at my place for a look see. If you buy the chip I am throwing in a pair of fishnets, gratis. Merle Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

We Love The Rain

Here in the Sonoran Desert we have a summer period we call the monsoons. It is our rainy season and we look forward to it with much anticipation of a break from the blistering heat. Every year at this time, the local news outlets open their files of seasonal stories and drag out several predictable ones. Don't drive in flooded areas, watch for lightning, have a flashlight in case the power goes out, blah, blah, blah. One annual rehash is that our monsoon rainfall is not a monsoon at all, which refers to wind patterns not rainfall, per se. They usually have some university know-it-all explain it to us in tedious detail, while some news hairdo pretends to follow along. I'm unimpressed, so I will still call it the monsoons. For most of the year our winds are westerly and because the Pacific ocean is cool, the air is dry, really dry. Dry air means no rain. Oh sure we sometimes get a cold front that brings rain in the way most places get it, but not much. Which, coincidently, is why we are a desert. The moonson wind shift begins in late June or early July bringing us moisture from the warmer Gulf of Mexico and/or the Gulf of California. The heating of the desert floor causes this moister air to rise, where it cools and voila!, you get a big old thunderstorm, with lightning and intense winds. Or at least that's what I think happens. This weather pattern brings us much of our annual rainfall. In southeast Arizona, where we live, the average annual rainfall is between 12" and 20" more or less, depending upon the elevation that you live and how far north you are in the area. Generally, the farther from the Gulf of Mexico you get, the less it affects your weather. This is why Montana gets almost none of our monsoon rainfall (Thank you folks, thank you. I'll be appearing here all week). Another thing about our rainfall is that it is very spotty. Yesterday at Casa Sneed we had over an inch of rain in less than an hour, but five miles south, there was almost no rain. This leads to a lot of discussions like this. Guy 1: "Get any rain at your house?" Guy 2: "Nope you?" Guy 1: "Man, it rained like a sum-a-bitch for about an hour. Wind tore off my neighbor's roof." Guy 2: "Well, I wish we would get some rain." This conversation could literally take place between two people living a mile apart. Anyhow, it has rained some and we are glad. (Click on images to enlarge) In our fair city the mountains that surround us on the north and the east drain through the city via a series of dry washes and rivers. This is a photo of what happens when we have a heavy rain. During our rainy season (now) the desert soil quickly becomes saturated and the rain runs off. The water collects and runs to the northwest, which is downhill away from the city. This river bed is about 300 feet wide and was absolutely dry this morning when I got to work at about 9 am. The water is not only running heavily in the clear part of the channel, but extends to the left about 100 feet beyond where the vegetation appears to line the channel. The vegetation is actually in the river bed. This picture was taken at about 4 PM. Have a good one. Merle Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor

There's My Time and Then There's Contractor Time

I was reading about a survey done by Watson Wyatt, an employee benefits consulting company. It seems that 34 percent of middle managers were rated as above average on their last performance review. That means that 66% were average or below. Wouldn't 50% be average or above and 50% average or below? Seems fishy to me. The lovely Mrs. Sneed opined that she would be interested to know what percent were rated below average, because in our experience managers are reluctant to be honest enough with underperformers to rate them as such. That got me to thinking about a customer service experience I had yesterday. The lovely Mrs. Sneed and I are having some work done at Casa Sneed. We are having some interior walls extended and the joint painted. Work was to start yesterday. The contractor had promised to call me when his guys left the shop so that I could get home to let them in. The approximate ETA was 10:30 am. First problem, no call. Since I didn't have the contractor's cell number on me, I left work at 10:30 and drove home to see if they were idling in my driveway. They weren't there. I called my guy and he said the truck broke down, but that the workmen would be there by 1:00 pm. I waited and I waited. At 1:45 pm I called him again. No answer but I left a message. At 2 o'clock, one guy showed up in what was clearly not a work vehicle. He came in surveyed the situation and said he would be back at 8:00 am today. Then he left. Most of my day was wasted. My advice for business, as well as life, is to do what you promise and the world will beat a path to your door. Now on the saner things. (click for larger image) This is a Fishhook Pincushion Cactus. This tiny cactus reaches about 6" in height. It has dense needles so thick that it is difficult to see the actual body of the plant. There is a ring of blossoms around the top, with one open flower. Like many desert plants this cactus blooms during the rainy season. It typically grows beneath a "nurse plant" that provides shade from the desert sun and protection from predators, accidental trampling and other dangers such as frost. Saguaro Cacti with the best chance to reach maturity also grow beneath nurse plants. This photo shows a Saguaro that has out grown its need for the nurse plant, in this case a Palo Verde tree. It is difficult to gauge the age of a saguaro, but this one is likely 30-40 years old, in my opinion. The Saguaro often outcompetes the nurse plant for valuable water resulting in the tree's death. Have a good day. Merle Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor