On a sad note

My wife's family, me included, said good-bye to a great family friend and family pet, their dog Auggie. That boy was the smartest dog I have ever seen, and loyal through and through.

I have never seen a dog that could understand what people were saying so well, and had the ability to play ball with himself so well. He could soccer kick his tennis ball around the house, as well as run his paw accross the ball so it would pop up into the air and into his mouth. I spent many a times over the years dog sitting for him, so we were really close buddies. We ran around playing in the backyard on many treasure occasions, while playing keep-away.

We'll all miss him. Rest in peace, boy.

Las Vegas Review

OK now I can finally give the wrap up the Las Vegas trip. The flight in was great. A little early and cold to start the trip (it was -1 when we left the truck in the parking lot at O'Hare). But the flight itself was great. There was spectacular scenary to be viewed as we flew over the Rockies and into Las Vegas. We landed and were off of the plane early if you can believe that. We spent most of Christmas Eve at the Sahara where we stayed. Both eating at the buffet and playing some of the machines. Angie was the luckiest one for the trip, she managed to win 1000 credits 3 different times on a nickel machine while playing Dueces Wild Poker. She hit her first jackpot Christmas Eve night.

The only thing we did outside of the hotel was to drive down to Aladdin's and check out the mall they have within their grounds. We saw their little rainsstorm that they do, and frankly it was a little disappointing. We look at some Christmas stuff, but even on Christmas Eve, very few places had much stuff on sale.

Christmas Day we all got dressed up and drove around to the different places that had done special things for Christmas. First stop was Sam's Town, which I had never seen before. For being a ways off of the strip it was a pretty cool place. The hotel part had an Embassy Suites style set up with all of the rooms looking out into a main atrium square. Down on the ground they had a bunch of animatronic animals that did a show coordinated to music, and accompanied by dancing water streams. Sam's Town also had a full bowling alley and an 18 screen movie theater within its grounds.

Next it was on the Bellagio, where they had their atrium done up for the holiday season with an incredible amout of work and money being put into it. They had polar bears that consisted of 25,000 carnations apiece, Gigantic Christmas bulbs made entirely of red roses, a 50 foot decarated Christmas tree, and cranberry pools. While there I managed to throw a dollar in a slot machine and win five on a single pull of the one armed bandits. I took a dollar token for a souvinier, gave one to my father-in-law, and cashed in the other 3.

After that we checked out Mirage's atrium next, and had a drink in one of their little bars nestled within their shrubbery.

Then it was accross to The Venitian where we had the nutjob cab driver from hell. In the course of driving accross the street from Mirage to Venetian, he managed to about run over a mother and kid in a stroller in the crosswalk, argue and get banned from ever coming back to the Venitian by trying to blow throught their security check, and then throw a tempertatrum when he only got a 10% tip. In the Ventitian we walked through their mall, which is modeled after the canals of Venice, complete with opera singing gondola rowers, and living statues. As a bonus they had a group singing Italian Christmas carols. After we were done in there, we watched the volcano eruption from the balcony, and then headed back to the Sahara.

Sunday we got up early and headed out of town 18 miles due East, and checked out Red Rock Canyon park. It was absolutely incredible. The scenary was beautiful, and they actually let you climb and explore into the rocks and mountians. I did a bunch of climbing and exploring myself, and took some incredible pictures in the process. I also managed to grab a couple more neat looking rocks for my own rose garden. Among other things they had a 13 mile driving trail they had through the park which we did. It was definately my favorite part of the trip.

That night Ang and I went and saw the Cirque Di Solie production Zumanity. It was their take off on Sex. Let me just say as an uncultured creatin, it was a strange, strange experience. Some of the things that went on, on stage, we pretty bizzare. Though the production was pretty incredible and detailed.

Monday unfortuneately was the flight home. On the bright side the flight home was under 3 hours, and the drive home was just as good. After some confusion over where our luggage was coming from, we managed to get from the parking lot at O'Hare to my inlaws house in an unspeakable 1 hour and 10 minutes.

All and all it was an awesome trip.

Tsunami relief

After spending a couple of days reading about the disasters in the Indian Ocean, I did want to put info out there for those who are interested in aiding in the recovery for the people affected by the tidal waves.

AMERICAN RED CROSS:
http://www.redcross.org or call (800) 435-7669

DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS:
http://www.doctorswithoutborders-usa.org/donate or (888) 392-0392

MERCY CORPS: http://www.mercycorps.org or (800) 292-3355 Ext. 250

CARE USA: http://www.careusa.org or (800)
521-2273

AMERICACARES: http://www.americares.org or (800) 486-4357

UNICEF: http://www.unicef.org

Coming soon... my Vegas review.

Snow removal, KY style

I am borrowing this story from a fellow Soxtalk poster who lives in Louisville Kentucky. This is so incredibly funny, I had to share it.

"Some of you may not think this is funny, but oh well. I thought it was pretty hilarious.

So we got a lot of snow down here in Louisville last night. I probably shoveled the driveway 5 times yesterday and then once again this morning.

So as I was shoveling this morning at 7am, I look across the street. 2 male "partners" live at the house. One was trying to help the other get his car out of the garage out of the driveway, which is a bit hilly. First, he started using a broom to try to brush the snow away. Keep in mind this is about 12-14 inches of snow.

After the guy realizes he isn't doing a damn thing, he decides he is going to be a hero. The moron fires up the LAWNMOWER. Never in my 22 years of existence have I heard of the lawnmower as a snow removal device. He proceeds to "mow" the driveway for about 10 mintues and the whole time I am laughing my ass off along with my mother. Finally he stopped and I turned to my mom, she was laughing hysterically, to which I then asked her if they were going to bag the snow. Obviously, they weren't, but I just found this pretty damn funny that someone would opt for the lawnmower over the conventional snow shovel. "

Christmas Wrap up

Well so far the snow has held off, relatively anyway. There are maybe another couple of inches of snow on the ground in MC, but there is still the possibility of more.

Sox fans got an early Christmas preasant with the signing of Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez. According the Chicago Tribune, The Duke is going to be penciled in as the #3 starter in the rotation next year. Personally I feel that with his injury history, he would be better suited as the #5 starter, that way he gets some of his starts skipped. Skipping starts might save that arm a little bit.

Now the Sox really are only a back up middle infielder away from a damned good off season. Supposedly the Sox are targeting David Eckstein, formerly of the Angels, and Alex Cora, brother of Sox 3B coach Joey-and former Dodger. Personally either one would make me happy.

And finally 24 hours from now, barring disaster, I will be on a plane to Las Vegas for Christmas! God I can't wait.

Merry Christmas to all, and may all your wishes come true!!!

Blizzard part 2?

It has begun snowing in Michigan City again. Supposedly we are looking at the possibility of another lake effect blizzard. Everything is in place, it just all depends on which way the wind blows. Hopefully it stays north of us, and the highways stay clear so that we can get out of town to OHare on time to make our flight to Vegas Christmas Eve morning.... Stay tuned.

Michigan City pictures

To get a feel for our snow storm, copy and paste this link into your browser and enjoy.

http://www.soxtalk.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=27493&view=findpost&p=536692

Here's your card

http://www.livejournal.com/community/chicago_el/85269.html

Someone had the excellent idea of cards to leave for the more obnoxious of people on the trains and buses.

F@#$ing Wonderland reprisal

So Michigan City ended up with somewhere around 2 feet of snow on the ground in the Blizzard of '04. And the funny thing about lake effect snow, about 10 miles in either direction got only a dusting of snow on the ground. MC ended up declaring a snow emergency yesterday afternoon. They began ticketing or arresting anyone who was out driving around. I was one of those fools of course, almost burying the new car in a 3 foot, or so, snowbank. I was on a curve when I hit it, and was just guessing at where the road was, while trying to turn up the wipers to clear the snow off of the windshield. Luckily my aim wasn't too bad, and we didn't get stuck.

The part of town that probably got the emergency declared was about a mile from the lake, where a pretty decent sized hill rises up, which took plenty of victims. People kept trying to navigate up the hill, but kept slipping, sliding and spinning out. So they kept ending up blocking the plows from clearing the main north/south road in town.

You always know that you have had a complete snow storm, when instead of clearing off your car with a snowbrush, you just take the shovel and push all of the snow off of your car.

And finally in the most shocking development of all, the South Shore was only about 15ish minutes late this morning. And most of that was caused by a balky door that refused to close at 57th St in Chicago. It took 3 collectors to figure out what to do (kinda sounds like a lightbulb joke to me). But we were soon on our way. And I always love walking into work after a snow like that, because I always get the "Damn I didn't think you would be here today" line from someone. This is the lake effect belt, we don't hide in our houses from 2 feet of snow!

A Winter F@#$ing Wonderland

Well the inevitable is finally here. The first big lake effect "event" of the winter is upon us. We are getting buried by a band of snow that is no longer than 5 miles wide, yet is about 50 miles long, and aimed right down the lake at us. It is one of those snows, where you can barely see the house accross the street. Boy the commute to work Monday ought to be fun.

Thank God there are only 5 days until I am in Las Vegas!!!!

Leave your mark on my "Boring" blog

If you feel so inclined, feel free to click the link to sign the address book. I would like to see who reads the site, and what they think.

Thanks ;0)

Trader Kenny

So 9 days until Christmas and Kenny Williams is working the phones hard to try to put that 5th starting pitcher under Sox fans tree. Two big rumors are Randy Johnson and Matt Clement. Arizona is asking for every decent low paid player that the Sox have, and have pretty much been laughed off by the Sox and the Yankees now. Matt Clement seems much more plausible both for his asking price of 9-10 million dollars a year, and his connections to Chicago. Either move would pretty much end the Sox aquisitions for this off season.

All in all if one of these two guys is on the southside next year, this was a great year. The Sox are being reformed into a team that more closely aligns with their coaching staffs philosophy of how to play ball. I also think Sox fans will appreciate the style of games Ozzie and his staff want to play.

Lets hope 2005 is the year we get over the top, and these are the moves that do it!

A Very "special" Day

Ever have that day at work where every single time you pick up the phone, you get an incredibly dumb question? Well today was "Stupid Question Day" at my desk. I work at an institutional trading desk (dealing exclusively with professional traders) with 5 other people, so you would think the people who call us would know what the hell they are doing, right? WRONG! I couldn't believe the sheer stupidity of some of the things asked today. And the sad thing is, most of the questions came from professional traders. The whole time I am thinking to myself

"people send you their money? My God, how stupid are they?!?!"

Moral of the story: If you ever decide to open a trading account with a certified trader, ask them a lot of questions. If they have to get back to you, they are calling someone else for their answers. This means your money decesions are being influenced by some underpaid, disgruntled clerk at a discount brokerage -like me- who, if they knew all of the answers, wouldn't be answering phones at a discount brokerage in the first place!!!!

Happy Trading

C ya CLee

The White Sox continue the Grinderation of the southsiders, sending Carlos Lee to Milwaukee for Scott Podsednik and Luiz Vizcaino and a PTBNL. The only way the Sox win this deal is the parlay the $6 million or so saved on payroll into a big named pitcher.

Weekend Update

So the birthday weekend went off pretty quietly. Unlike about 5 years or so ago, we missed the birthday blizzard. The snow stayed north, thankfully. Other than the Bears fiasco, it was pretty tame.

The White Sox did nothing at the winter meetings, but they weren't alone. Pretty much nothing of consequence got done this year by anyone. The Sox did release Danny Wright to free up another potential roster spot. And with the rule 5 draft coming up, it makes you wonder if Kenny Williams has something up his sleeve.

Welcoming the Newest White Sox fans

This is from chicagotribune.com. This is a great example of why Brooks Boyer taking over as the Public Relations VP of the Sox is a stroke of genius. This is a really cool story.

Every baseball team is searching for the best free agents available, so Mike Wallin figured now was a good time to become one.

Before wondering if Wallin has any pop in his bat or a 95 m.p.h. fastball, realize this: Wallin isn't a player. He's a fan.

"I just decided to solicit for a team," Wallin said. "So I sent an e-mail to every Major League team and basically just told them we're looking for a team."

Mike grew up in Buffalo and has lived in Indianapolis for 7½ years with his wife, Stephanie, and daughters, Leah, 8, and Lael, 6. They're baseball fans and made frequent trips to Cincinnati to see the Reds, but grew disillusioned.

"They weren't, in my opinion, trying to win and make it the best family atmosphere possible," he said.

Last month, in search of a team for his family, Wallin sent out a brief note to each of the 30 MLB teams that read, in part: "To the team we vote to cheer for, we promise our allegiance through good and bad times. We will purchase and wear only our team's merchandise and will attend as many games as possible each and every season."

The response to the Wallin family's free agency was hardly overwhelming. Just seven teams responded, and one, the Philadelphia Phillies, actually wrote back to tell him they weren't interested.

"They basically told me it's not their place to tell me who to root for or what team to pick," Wallin said.

No problem. The Phillies didn't want him; he didn't want the Phillies. So he directed his attention to the teams that did respond, which were the San Diego Padres, Anaheim Angels, Cleveland Indians, Toronto Blue Jays, New York Yankees and the White Sox. He's still waiting to hear from the Cubs.

The Indians and Blue Jays sent what seemed to be form letters, the Yankees merely directed him to their fan message boards, and although the Padres and Angels sent nice personalized letters, the decision wasn't even close.

The White Sox blew everybody else away.

"When I showed [their response] to my wife, I didn't say anything beforehand, just let her look it over," Wallin said. "She was like, 'Oh, my God. Eleven people responded.' "

One employee wrote to the Wallins about the "South Side family tradition." Another mentioned the Dog Day promotion, where a few hundred fans can bring their dogs to a game.

The best, and most honest, may have been from the employee who argued that they should pick the White Sox because, "It would be too unbearable to be a Cubs fan."

The Wallins were given 47 separate reasons to become Sox fans. White Sox director of public relations Katie Kirby, who spearheaded the drive to bring the Wallins into the fold, said hundreds more have come in from other staffers.

And that's how the White Sox picked up four new fans. The Wallins plan to buy White Sox gear, visit U.S. Cellular Field several times a season and also watch them play on the road. Mike Wallin knows a bit about the team and thinks he'll probably become a Joe Crede or Paul Konerko fan.

"I've never hated (the Cubs), but I can see that's probably the direction I'm going to go if I'm going to be a White Sox fan," Wallin said. "You can't have them both."

Especially if only one of them writes you back.

Amendment for the South Shore rules

One more addition that I forgot... LOCK THE BATHROOM DOOR!!!

My God, how can you use a bathroom in a public place, without locking the door? Twice in the last two weeks I have opened the door on someone.

Heard on the South Shore...

Couple of construction guys get up and get in line to get off of the train. One is kind of limpy and said to his buddy,

"Damn I need to get my ass cheek woke up"

God I love public transit.

White Sox sign Jermaine Dye, for real this time

So now it is supposedly official, the White Sox have signed Jermaine Dye to succeed Magglio in RF. I posted it when I saw it, but then ESPN1000 backed away from their initial report, only to announce about an hour later that Dye had indeed signed.

Decent move for the Sox, it leaves then payroll room to fill their last two needs of a starting pitcher and a middle infielder.

White Sox sign Dustin Hermanson

Kenny Williams is definately flying under the radar here. I haven't heard Hermanson's name mentioned before, yet he is a southsider now.

http://www.soxtalk.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=26944&st=0

Commuting for Dummies

This is the worst time of the year to be a commuter on the South Shore railroad. The month between Thanksgiving and Christmas sees a huge influx of tourists who want to go into the big city, see the lights, and go shopping. It is these very people who are the bane of the everyday riders exsistance. So now I am going to offer them a public service, and give them advice on how not to attract the ire of the commuter.

First and foremost, one ass=one seat. There is no quicker way to piss off people who have been working all day, than for them to get on the train and see some idiot with 16 Marshall Fields bags spread out over 4 different seats. We work hard all day, in intense enviornments, many people spending all day on their feet. Your bags have no rights to any seats.

Second-No one cares about your conversations, keep your voices down. Many people have an hour plus commute on the south shore, and would like to catch a nap to relax from a hard day at work. This becomes impossible when the whole car can hear about the sales at American Girl Place.

Third-Use cell phones judiciously and respectfully. Close to the same idea as number 2, no one cares about your arguement with your girlfriend, keep it down.

Fourth-Control your kids. The train isn't a playground, don't let your kids run around and do whatever they want. You really don't want us disiplining your kids for you. The train ride can be long, so make sure your kids have something to entertain them.

Fifth-Pay attention. Know when your stop is coming up. If you don't know, ask, someone will tell you. Commuters know the schedule and the stops just as well as the collectors do, and would much rather be asked a question, than to stop and delay the train because you just missed your stop.

Following these five basics can make everyones ride much more enjoyible for all.

It'll be a green, green Christmas

The other big news going on, is that we are going to Las Vegas for Christmas. The in-laws are popping to take us (the wife and I), along with their other daughter and fiance to Las Vegas. It will be odd to be in Sin City for Christmas, but I can't wait to see what it feels like. We are staying 4 days/3 nights, and staying at the Sahara. We fly out Christmas Eve morning and return on Monday the 27th. If anyone has suggestions on the best sportsbooks, I would love to hear them!

The fall of the almighty dollar

I came accross this link that someone posted on Soxtalk. It is interesting, except it is complete garbage.
http://feeds.bignewsnetwork.com/?sid=191c7b9599f51f92


Why are economists avoiding the obvious? The US government wants a weaker dollar to save American jobs and exports. The US keeps getting unduely screwed by the WTO. The US isn't allowed to protect its markets from activities that would get US companies drug into antitrust courts. Forgien governments subsidize things like steel, which allows them to sell below cost, yet the WTO rules against the US for protecting their industries. The WTO keeps ruling against the US in these type of suits, which means the US has to protect its economy in another way. What they are doing now is devaluing the dollar in order to bring the unfair cost of exports into a reasonable level. How well is this strategy serving America? Right now many of our key industries are beginning to recover from their unfair attacks.

Once again using the example of steel, huge consolidation and many bankruptcies took place within this industry. Many people lost a lifetime worth of work and pensions, all because of these predatory practices. But the WTO deemed this as immaterial in reference to the protective tariffs that the US tried to use to save American jobs and industry. Now the US has moved the dollar in an amount relative to the tariffs that they wanted in the first place. Now all of the worlds imports an subject to what amounts to an artificial tariff on anything that they import to the US. They either have to drop their prices in their home currency to a respective level to match the fall in the dollar, guarenteeing a lose in revenue- or leave their prices the same, and have less people in the US buy their goods because they are now that much more expensive than their relative US competition.

The whole song and dance about savings rates, and debt spending is also misleading. If you look at exchange rates for a currency like the Yen that has been around, and also at debt levels in relation to GDP, and you will see that the mid 80's saw much higher debt%'s and much higher values in what the Yen was based at vs the dollar. The whole idea that we owe more money so the dollar is collapsing is ludacris. The writer seems to forget that the whole economy is much, much larger than it was at his reference points. If you have more money, you can spend more money, seems to be a basic lesson to me. Once again, the percentage of the debt vs GDP is lower now than in the mid 80's, yet the dollar held strong against the yen, which was then considered to be the dollars main rival. The dollar didn't devalue against the Yen until the late 80's, which happened debt/GDP% was crashing. Kinda puts someholes in the authors theory IMO.

The other thing that the author seems to forget was the ending of the gold standard in the 70's, and the oil shock that was going on. When the gold standard ended it meant that the dollar had no guaranteed value anymore. Prior to the 70's the dollar could be traded for a dollars worth of silver and gold, which was guaranteed to be on hand, by the US mint. When the gold standard ended, it was siezed upon by conspiritalists, who figured that this meant the dollar would collapse vs the rest of the world, because now its only value is what relative to what confidence people have in the dollar.

And as for the stagflation of the 70's people were also dumping the dollar because oil prices had just murdered the American economy. Fuel charges went up 10 fold at the pump over the course of of a few years. Prices exploded, while the economy tumbled. Stocks collapsed at the sametime. The American economy was way overvalued because of this stuff, and the dollar collapsed because of it. It had nothing to do with how many dollars were in circulation, that's just ridiculous.

And as for the Chinese, that is ridiculous as well. Long ago the Chinese pegged their Yuan to the value of the dollar, and took whatever artificial means it needed to support those levels. For a decade at least the Yuan has been extremely overvalued, that has been well reported. About a year ago, the US government asked the Chinese to remove the peg, and let the Yuan float, like all of the rest of the worlds major economics powers let their currencies float. The Chinese refused. Now that they American dollar has been artificially pushed down again, the Chinese are forced to take action in order to maintain the value of their own currency, because of its artificial valuations. The Chinese are subscribing to an opposite theory trying to maintain a strong Yuan, as they have been, as they have locked out forgein competition, so they have no consequenses for having an artificially strong Yuan.

This guy really needs to go back and review his history a little bit in relation to his macro classes.

Welcome to My Blog

Hello all and welcome to my first attempt at a Blog. I haven't quite visualized what form exactly this will take, but I am guessing it will be part information, part funny, part persuation, and part my interests.

For a little backround, I am an avid Chicago White Sox fan who lives in NW Indiana, and works in the financial district in downtown Chicago. Having just broken into my 4th decade of life, I love to consume information of all sorts. I believe the more knowledge you can consume, the more you can understand and appreciate the world around you. I have been married now for 4 years, and am living in my hometown. Usually you can find me hanging out at my favorite spot on the internet http://www.soxtalk.com.

Well that seems as good of a start as any. Welcome aboard.