By Mike on Jan 22, 2010 | In Life and what it throws you | No Comments »
This weekend I will be suffering through a midterm for my Law and Ethics class, so I am posting my weekend links today instead of Saturday.
So that’s it for this week. Read and enjoy the links while I am toiling away in a classroom all day and taking my midterm.
By Mike on Jan 18, 2010 | In Finance and Stocks | 2 Comments
This may not be of value to very many, but for those few it may be VERY valuable. For those with a “traditional” IRA or a “rollover” IRA, you may be one of the people that it’s VERY valuable for. As we’ve covered before in our “Do the minimum” retirement post, there is one major difference between a traditional (or rollover) IRA and a Roth IRA. With a traditional, the earnings of the money in the account are tax deferred. With a Roth IRA, they are tax free. This is a large advantage of the Roth for those that will have large amounts of appreciation in their IRA accounts. The traditional IRA does have something in its favor however, and that is it reduces your taxable income for the current year. For example, if you make $50,000 and contribute $5,000 to your traditional IRA, you will pay taxes on $45,000. Read the rest »
By Mike on Jan 15, 2010 | In Life and what it throws you | 3 Comments
Throughout my life, there has been no galvanizing force, no emotional punch in the face, no dose of true reality on the level of a tragedy. Growing up in the 1980’s and 90’s, the largest tragedy we had was Pearl Harbor. My grandparent’s generation would all remember what they were doing that day. The same can be said for the assassination of president Kennedy. Every teacher I had from grade school up to professors in college could tell you what they were doing the day that Kennedy was shot.
Our generation hasn’t been so lucky…
The past decade has had, what it seems to me at least, a heaping dose of epic tragedies. From 9-11, the Tsunami in the South Pacific, Hurricane Katrina, and now the earthquakes in Haiti, the past ten years have had their fill of tragedy. And please believe me when I say this is by no means an exhaustive and definitive list of the tragedies we have faced as a world, but they are some of the ones which had the largest effect in recent time.
I will never forget where I was on 9-11. I was driving up I-93 to Andover listening to the radio when Howard Stern got a call about it. I made the mistake of switching to a news station thinking that they would have more information, when it turns out Howard stayed on the air and had callers giving eye witness testimony for the rest of the morning. When I got to work, some co-workers had found a TV and I was able to see exactly what was happening. I had, unsuccessfully, been trying to get a hold of my sister Laura who lived and worked in Manhattan.
Read the rest »
By Mike on Jan 13, 2010 | In Music | No Comments »
I just found out that Chuck from Black Flag has decided to sell his record collection. The first few records including an obviously rare “Slip it in” test press are available here.
By Mike on Jan 12, 2010 | In Fun and Games | 5 Comments
I’ve only been playing it for a few weeks but I am absolutely in love with
Ramp Champ. For fans of Skeeball, Ramp Champ puts a fun twist on the classic boardwalk game. Ramp Champ comes with 4 built in levels, and has in-app purchases that allows you to download “packs” that include more levels and more prizes.
Prizes? Yes thats right. There is loot in Ramp Champ. As you can see in the picture here, I’ve collected some sick prizes by spending the tickets of my winnings. The expansion packs that you can purchase from the app store also include new prizes to spend your tickets on.
In addition to collecting tickets for each game you play on these levels, there are three specific goals of each level to strive for. For example, one simple goal is always to reach a certain point level, usually 10,000 points, but sometimes higher.
As far as gameplay goes, its a very straight-forward flick of the screen to fire the balls at the targets. It’s a very short learning curve, but it takes a while to master.
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By Mike on Jan 11, 2010 | In Finance and Stocks | 3 Comments
Most of us are used to hearing this question whenever we pull out the plastic from our wallets. Over the past few years, I have flip flopped on my answer to this question depending on my current situation. And now, that I have worked myself out of debt, I think the situation may be even more complex. Let’s go over the history of things to see how we got into this situation.
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