Interesting New Yorker article, via BoingBoing.

Oh, and this weeks Grand Rounds is up.

Coming from someone that’s leaving a job in the financial industry and seems to have a good understanding of how the markets work, he sure seems risk averse.

But, to offer my two cents: The banks are in the business to make money and they are going to try to make the most money possible in the shortest time, interest only products have got to make the balance sheet more attractive. Think about it: customers are choosing to delay payment even more on a huge debt (in this case $211,000), so the total interest paid is much bigger than a traditional mortgage, boosting profits for the bank.

I agree with the post 100%, if you can deal with the risk, take the plunge and flip the property for a profit before you have to pay any principal. But, my pessimistic ways would give me an ulcer if I knew we were going to have our mortgage payment double in 3 years. And, the bottom has to fall out someday, having what equity you gain tied up in the next property you buy when that happens is going to hurt.

$179,000? Sure, just let me find my charge card. With metaphors like this:

The SL65’s rear tires aren’t just bringing a knife to a gun fight, they’re bringing a pair of left-handed safety scissors to a nuclear war.

How could anyone resist? (Via Jalopnik)

That sure is some attractive wallpaper and vinyl flooring. We found the flooring under another layer of vinyl and a layer of carpet. It even inspired me to fire up Photoshop and make a new background for the title above.
More photos, including a shot of the other upstairs bedroom.

Why is it that every time I’m reading some financial advice column, they say something like:

CUT. UP. YOUR. CREDIT. CARDS. YOU. FOOL

Can the human brain not be taught to understand the pitfalls of the credit card industry? Most financial columnists seem to think this is about as likely as Farleigh-Dickinson winning the NCAA basketball championship this year.
Luckily, this college professor is a little more positive:

I taught a unit on financial mathematics. I found this section a lot less interesting than the rest of the course, but taught it with the same enthusiasm that I bring to all of my classes. And something strange happened: for the first time ever (other than at camp), my students were more interested in a topic than I was. One kid, who sat front row centre, summed it up: “This stuff is useful.”

(Via this weeks’ Carnival of Education)

This has parallels to the sex education debate, but most people aren’t going to like the ones I draw. Telling students about the ways to stay safe while doing things does not mean you are forcing, or even encouraging, them to do anything, you are just giving them the tools to protect themselves if they so choose. So, spending a week or two in high school explaining why paying the minimum payment on a $2000 credit card bill every month with an APR of 19.9% isn’t going to get that balance down just might be a good thing.

I will grant that some people simply cannot control themselves when given the temptations of a seemingly limitless source of cash and they should follow the financial planner advice, but surely not every twentysomething falls into this category.

Alisha and I visited the Krannert Art Museum last night to see the Apocalypse Then exhibition and to look at the rest of the collection. It’s really hard to believe that artwork can survive hundreds of years, or even centuries, without being destroyed. Especially when it deals with overt religion like many of the ancient stone Buddha sculptures.

I’ve upgraded to WordPress 1.5, yay! Let there be new functions.

All the drywall on the ceiling is hung, only took us another 4 hours or so. When you are putting up whole 12′ sheets without cutting them, it goes much faster.

Now Dad needs to insulate the walls and find someplace to get 8’x54″ 1/2″ drywall so we only have one seam on the walls.

Since my relatives like to ask me what tuition costs at the University now, here’s a nice page from the Office of Admissions and Records with all the stats.
An article in the DI and another from the News-Gazette, about the recent drop in applications.

Trying to figure out what all the 802.11blahblahblah means? One of the handlers at ISC has written a nice summary of the future letters. And there’s a nice one slide presentation from the IEEE as to what the earlier ones are for.