Hi Daddy,
This has become the country you feared. America, land of easy money, no income and subprime mortgages, and so much more tha would shake your sometimes rational CPA’s mind, and moral center.

Bear Stearns went under a couple of weeks ago and in this info at your fingertips world, every frigging, let me call myself an expert, has been imparting negative psychology to make bad situations even worse.

I wish that I hadn’t thought 40K so much money when I bought my apartment and spent 40K more so I could have had a luxe apartment with an incredible kitchen.

People who can’t cook and have never set in the kitchen still like to have “name” stoves, fridges and dishwashers. It’s been status to live like a king, since you died seventeen years ago today, even if you have to postpone paying bills, and/or tap into your equity or what might be equity someday.

40K more is nothing today; chump change. Though tomorrow it might be everything.

I don’t know if you were negligent in your guardian angel duties or it was meant for so few people to come to my open house so I could lower the price and somebody like me, somebody who pays her bills

Stumble it!

I put the post I wrote on the sidebar as I wanted this to be front and center. If this bores you don’t read it. I have to get it out.

The real estate blog I read was filled with people exuberant over the “death of the Manhattan real estate market.” One man in particular has been all over the threads and in posting so much spreads negativity.

He has a very vested interest in seeing others suffer as he wants to buy at depression prices. He cashed out. Or something. You never really know who commenters are. I gave up on political writing for large blogs a long time ago (as defined by the “youthful age of blogging”) because so many commenters had an agenda and would refuse to listen to any other POV. They and a few other people know everything and they know it well.

If they did, they would understand that a bad housing market is good for nobody as is a bad stock market which does go hand in hand. I caught this man talking about putting 250K into the stock market instead of a down payment. He mentioned putting it in one stock that would pay eight percent therefore paying $20,000 a year in interest.

In that one statement he showed ignorance in everything that he was trying to be an expert in. Nobody puts or should put that amount of money in one stock, one stock fund, bond etc. The 250K–put in a diversified portfoli– might go up but will probably go down. Therefore eight percent is eight percent of a lower number that is probably constantly changing and can’t be reliably predicted this year. He created a perfect stock market scenario which is exactly the opposite of what he says for the real estate market. You can’t have it both ways.

But what do I know? And for the record I don’t comment on that blog. It’s not worth it.

These people don’t seem to understand that that many of us bought not thinking of an apartment as an investment but were forced to by the very media that now tells us we never should have thought that way. And the psychology of entitlement that pervaded this country.

I never bought into that. I have never felt entitled to anything including being comfortable with my own intelligence and/or talent. This lack of feeling entitled caused me to wait too long. Or maybe not as I priced my apartment too high for me to feel comfortable with but I did that to see if anybody would bite. It was a couple of days before Bear Stearns went under but that was one event that shouldn’t cause an entire city to give up.

I know longer no what a fair price is but I know it’s not 100% less than somebody with a comparable apartment who sold last month. I have bills to pay and a life to maintain. Unfortunately it is that simple. I don’t have a mortgage so I can afford to be more flexible than most people but….

If my apartment doesn’t go into contract in x amount of time I will take it off the market. I can’t afford to pay maintenance and rent indefinitely. A strict coop board might be forced to let me rent me out.

Personally times are very different for me than during the last recession. I’m older. I can’t afford to wait ten years for housing prices to spike back.

I think new media and the affect of it on MSM can be very dangerous. People should bear some responsibility for what they say and not be content saying “the public has a right to know.”

The public doesn’t have a right to feel fear needlessly. And so far much of what’s been happening in Manhattan specifically is very fear generated. It might be a one industry town–the stock market–but it is different for many reasons I don’t have the time to go into now.

Tosay is seventeen years since my father died. That day was also the day the government officially said the stock market began its long trip upward.

I refuse to give into either fear or depression so I’m getting my hair done. Of course it’s pouring and very cold for the South.

I think murdering a contractor who took my money and stopped working and kept begging me for another chance would be considered justifiable homicide. I don’t want to get into that mind frame.

We are all in this together and we have a responsibility to look for answers that help all of us, not feed our own agenda.

Stumble it!

I’m just in love with that title and concept. It opens the door to so many possibilities. “No, it wasn’t me who….I was under fire in Bosnia.”

I know I’m a bit late with this but I had to stop a war earlier this week. Gail Collins didn’t. Continue Reading »

Stumble it!

I was one of the many thousands of girls, in the early-mid 60’s who couldn’t stand being a “good girl.” As I was about thirteen, too young and scared to do anything about my status, this song stood in for me.

It wasn’t one of those annoying sweet songs. And I will take it over present day pop any day.

It broke boundaries. It didn’t sound like any other song. It told a story. The Shangri-Las’ were one of a kind. More like the “angry young men” in British films than the Beatles. I always was a Stones girl

It made me daydream. It made me want a bad boy so badly. That it was by girls from Long Island, not Brooklyn or some place girls were known to be bad only made it that much better.

Mary Weiss is restarting her career.

I have a CD of early 60’s death songs that has a bonus track; Leader of the Laundromat. I think that’s supposed to make a statement but I have never figured it out.

On Monday I’m having my hair dyed and highlit. For the first time in over 30 years my hair is being touched by somebody who isn’t a good friend. I think that means I’m settling in.

Stumble it!

I put the posts on top of this in the sidebar category. I’m a bit in love with this post. Here’s what my Dad wrote when adopting me.
My father was a CPA who disliked accountants. Found them boring. He did love accounting. I thought of how ashamed he would have been during Enron, and he would be more ashamed now of accountants role in the subprime mess that is affecting us all.
As usual I thank Bone for the words
Hi Daddy,
Seventeen years and five days ago, we were meeting at Bloomingdale’s, 40 Carrots, for dinner. I was working for SSI, in Jamaica, Queens, and all the subways there went down. Only the truly rich had cells then and it was a bitch getting in touch with you. But I knew you would call mommy, your personal drill sergeant, psychologist, and the love of your life. Oh how you fought, oh how you made up.

When I finally got to Bloomingdale’s,almost three hours later, I saw you sitting on a bed decorated by Ralph Lauren. I thought you looked so old and tired. Funny the things we remember the last time we saw somebody really alive. You said you were just about to leave but I knew you would have waited for me forever and a day.

I don’t remember what we talked about but I know you asked me a question or two about my job. You liked me working for Social Security but you thought I should have been a claims rep for SSA with the “normal” people, and not work for SSI. It was one of our many ongoing arguments.

The following Monday night, you yelled at me because I didn’t want to watch The Academy Awards. You said The Academy Awards was a significant event. I said i had to get up at 5:30 and sleep took precedence. We settled on me recording it, though you couldn’t understand how I could miss such an event, live.

Uh, daddy, Monday had been your poker night most of my life. I know you were an early advocate of multi-tasking, but I could never see how you could focus on an award show when there was poker to play and interesting people to talk to.

It wasn’t the first moon landing, something else we argued about. I never told you that you were right. It should have taken precedence over my teenage love life.

The following morning you yelled at mommy, because she was there, about Kevin Costner being an idiot who didn’t deserve to win. I have always been proud of you for being an early-Kevin Costner hater.

Nothing was abnormal about breakfast, you had a glass of orange juice, wheat toast, fake cream cheese mommy would make out of pot cheese, and a cup of Postum.

Then you went down to your office. I don’t know exactly when you had the stroke. Mommy was going out and she yelled to tell you. You didn’t answer. She went down and found you. Elka and I have always laughed, because that’s what people do, at the thought of 5′0,” 100 pounds, mommy trying to pick you up.

You were supposed to pick Elka up at the train station as she was working for you. You insisted that both of us work for you at different times. You thought that Elka would make a great CPA and envisioned both of you in practice together but you really wanted us to understand the stock market. We do as much as anybody can these days. It’s changed so much.

Nobody picked up the phone at the house and Elka took a cab. By the time she got to the house there was an ambulance and the entire town fire department. I can’t imagine what Elka felt.

I didn’t get any of my famous “feelings.” It was just another day at work. Then I went home to my apartment and called the house. Mommy answered. Something about her voice was a bit off, and I screamed:
“What happened?”
“Daddy had a little stroke. Nothing major. Nothing to come home for.”

You were mommy’s world. For the first time in her life, at the worst of times, she went into deep denial. I listened to her but by the next day went to the hospital after work. I put my hand on yours. You held it up to your mouth and kissed it. Elka claimed that it was a reflex action, but I have always believed you knew it was me.

You gave us so many gifts over the years. The greatest gift was the six days you lay in your hospital bed “like a lox,” as mommy always said. We had time to get used to you dying.

They were going to make us tell them whether or not we wanted life support the following Monday but on Sunday your breathing was different. It was the breathing Native Americans think is the soul leaving the body. I would like to think so also. Elka and Eddie went out to dinner that night. Mommy and I stayed for a couple of hours. As we were leaving I left the room so mommy could be alone with you. I couldn’t help watch her throw her body on yours. It was so out of character I almost laughed.

Not an hour later you died. We never talked about it but we knew you were too considerate to die while we were there, or to hang on any longer.

After they called to tell us, a nurse called to tell us how handsome you looked. You were a very handsome man. Why couldn’t you ever photograph the way you truly looked? Even in your MTV commercial, you looked, well, bewildered.

I think you had too much personality. No photograph could ever capture that.

I’m not sentimental when it comes to pictures or a person’s possessions. The only things I kept were the kaleidoscope Elka and I gave you two years earlier, and the Turkish shoe shine box you carried all the way through Turkey. There’s a long story about it that I can never remember though I must have heard it 80 times.

Possessions are just a token. It’s the real man I remember, and write about so that you will live in your granddaughter’s memory and maybe a few more people will learn about you.

The decade after your death was difficult. Mommy went totally blind. They say a decade begins and ends with significant events. My 90’s began with your death and ended with mommy’s in 01.

I hope there is some kind of afterlife and you are somewhere where Postum is always available. I hope you found mommy and ushered her up. I can imagine you arguing over many things and making up, but what do I know? I’m down here.
You were mommy’s God. Men asked her out:
But how can I when I had the best?

I will always carry you both in my heart and soul.

Love for all time
#1 daughter

I do carry my parents with me. Just wish they could answer a few questions. There is a second part to this letter I will post in a few days.

Stumble it!

Oddly enough Bush told Texas to reopen the case of a Mexican condemned to the death penalty. I love the following quote. It’s from People for the American Foundation, the political arm of People for the American Way, a First Amendment org founded by Norman Lear. Please don’t tell me that you’re too young to know who Lear is. He only changed TV.

This deeply troubling opinion is a reminder of how much the Supreme Court has changed during the Bush administration, and how important future nominations to the Court will be,” said the group’s president, Kathryn Kolbert. “Our individual rights and respect on the world stage depend on the future makeup of the court.”

Stumble it!

That was the title of a post I wrote yesterday. I was so excited because I changed the battery to a smoke alarm. The smoke alarm is in what many of you call the “spare room.” There’s a smoke alarm in the master bedroom, another in the hallway over the stair case and two more downstairs. It went off when I took a shower in the master bedroom.

In New York we name all of our rooms. Actually we give five names to different areas of the living room. Here’s the study (pretend there’s a picture of a desk). Here’s the dining room (see imaginary desk,) This is the library. Over there is the sitting area, and that section is the actual living room.

I was feeling very proud of myself. In New York I would have gone to the house phone, spoke to the doorman, told him it was an emergency and have the handyman come up. I do have much higher ceilings in New York.

Did I mention I’m scared of heights and equally scared of live wires? When I first opened the smoke alarm, I saw live wires and almost fell off the ladder. But I went on. I had to. The smoke alarm had stopped its long siren call and went into a one a minute high pitched sound guaranteed to drive a person crazy.

This morning I took a long shower. The smoke alarm in the computerspare room went off. I can’t imagine that steam from a shower set it off….I’m calling a handyman. The high pitched sound hasn’t happened. It might. My BFF, Lucia is convinced it’s only a matter of minutes.

I haven’t been here three weeks yet and I’m relaxed. Or as relaxed as I’m capable of being.

I had some business that occupied most of my time for the two weeks before I came here. Everything was finally finished Saturday and I was able to go to the beach, two blocks from my house, in March.

That is worth everything to me. I think I love it here.

I have been watching the complete first season of Friday Night Lights. Dillon is a small Texas town where everything revolves around football. Personally I find football to be incredibly boring, and have been to exactly one game in my life. Friday Night Lights transcends football.

I forget that I’m watching TV and feel intimately involved in each person’s life. It’s an amazing show that deserves to be renewed for a third season. The first three episodes can be slow at times but are necessary to set the stories up.

I also have the first complete first season of 30 Rock, Gone, Baby, Gone, No Country for Old Men, and four of James Spader’s best films.

I’m not watching as much TV as I had planned to. It’s so beautiful here and I feel compelled to be outside as much as possible. This particular area feels like the North Fork of Long Island but with a real ocean–can’t help it I’m from Long Island and tend to compare places to places I know. It’s very country like.

When I’m inside, it’s even fun to clean. I was running the dishwasher and washer/dryer every day but have come down to earth.

Life is good and getting better every day. I reserve the right to change that last sentence.

Stumble it!

I think we are a country worth saving. But first we have to acknowledge that an entire race has been unfairly treated. This post isn’t by me. I put it in as it says so much

But first Kenny, who is part of a multi-color, brilliant family I feel so honored to be part of

Why is it that the “blacks” are expected to “transcend” race and racism?
Since when is the onus on the victim to transcend their victimization? Is
the abused expected to transcend abuse? The rape victim expected to
transcend the horror of rape? By this line of reasoning, we can reduce the
budget by dismissing all of the employees working for the criminal justice
system and require the victims of future crimes to simply “transcend” crime.
We can fix healthcare by transcending disease and illness.

Listen, like it or not, The African was kidnapped, enslaved, forced to watch
their parents, children and siblings sold away to distant plantations,
raped, lynched, subjected to inferior schools, Jim Crow laws and racial
profiling yet the expectation is on them to transcend racism?

Why is it that black Americans are forced to suffer quietly and not offend
their victimizer by voicing their anguish over the continued victimization?
Why is Barack wrong for not hating the victim and allowing the victim their
day in the sun? Isn’t the beauty of America that you can verbalize your pain
to your elected representative without jeopardizing their ability to serve
their community.

A lot has been made over Dr. Wright’s comments. He has been labeled a hate
monger and a racist. Since when is it wrong or racist to voice your anger over the treatment a black man certainly experienced during the Jim Crow era of American History? Why is a black preacher’s verbal attack on America racist in the first place? Unless white people truly believe that America is THEM and they alone are America.

Dr. Wright has been labeled and dismissed as a cook because of another
accusation. One that accuses the US Gov’t of creating AIDS and putting it
into the black community. If you are one who agrees that this point is
absurd, I have 2 words for you, “Tuskegee Experiment”. For forty years
between 1932 and 1972, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) conducted an
experiment on 399 black men in the late stages of syphilis. These men, for
the most part illiterate sharecroppers from one of the poorest counties in
Alabama, were never told what disease they were suffering from or of its
seriousness. Informed that they were being treated for “bad blood,” their
doctors had no intention of curing them of syphilis at all. The data for the
experiment was to be collected from autopsies of the men, and they were thus
deliberately left to degenerate under the ravages of tertiary syphilis-which
can include tumors, heart disease, paralysis, blindness, insanity, and
death. “As I see it,” one of the doctors involved explained, “we have no
further interest in these patients until they die.” In 1997, President Bill
Clinton had this to say “The United States government did something that was
wrong-deeply, profoundly, morally wrong. It was an outrage to our commitment
to integrity and equality for all our citizens. . . . clearly racist.”

Do we really not understand where the passion and pain with which an Al
Sharpton or a Louis Farrakhan speaks is born? Do we really not understand
why their perspective infused with the same passion that was exhibited by
Dr. Wright resonates with so many Black Americans? Might this also be the
reason that our “conservative” countrymen and women are so discomforted by
these truths being expressed? Are we to dismiss the truths of their
statements and sermons simply because it causes discomfort in the hearts of
the weak and wicked? Those who coincidentally, happen to have a lock on the
opinion shaping instruments of our time.

The blacks are America’s Bastard Children that, to her great chagrin,
cannot be gotten rid of; and the media’s stance on this painful issue makes
the point. For “conservatives” and “blue collar whites” this is
entertainment. It is an exercise in avoiding the real issue and impact of
America’s ugly past on her Black citizens, veterans, teachers, firefighters
and police officers; for blacks this is a promise that the caseeds that
spawned the hell that the American experience has been for their forefathers
is still alive in the children of their original oppressors.

For all of the problems that America faces, it is ultimately an unwise
decision to continue her practice of proactive disenfranchisement against
such a vital and significant percentage of her population.

Yes! We can.

Why is it that the “blacks” are expected to “transcend” race and racism?

Since when is the onus on the victim to transcend their victimization? Is
the abused expected to transcend abuse? The rape victim expected to
transcend the horror of rape? By this line of reasoning, we can reduce the
budget by dismissing all of the employees working for the criminal justice
system and require the victims of future crimes to simply “transcend” crime.
We can fix healthcare by transcending disease and illness.

Listen, like it or not, The African was kidnapped, enslaved, forced to watch
their parents, children and siblings sold away to distant plantations,
raped, lynched, subjected to inferior schools, Jim Crow laws and racial
profiling yet the expectation is on them to transcend racism?

Why is it that black Americans are forced to suffer quietly and not offend
their victimizer by voicing their anguish over the continued victimization?
Why is Barack wrong for not hating the victim and allowing the victim their
day in the sun? Isn’t the beauty of America that you can verbalize your pain
to your elected representative without jeopardizing their ability to serve
their community.

A lot has been made over Dr. Wright’s comments. He has been labeled a hate
monger and a racist. Since when is it wrong or racist to voice your anger over the treatment a black man certainly experienced during the Jim Crow era of American History? Why is a black preacher’s verbal attack on America racist in the first place? Unless white people truly believe that America is THEM and they alone are America.

Dr. Wright has been labeled and dismissed as a cook because of another
accusation. One that accuses the US Gov’t of creating AIDS and putting it
into the black community. If you are one who agrees that this point is
absurd, I have 2 words for you, “Tuskegee Experiment”. For forty years
between 1932 and 1972, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) conducted an
experiment on 399 black men in the late stages of syphilis. These men, for
the most part illiterate sharecroppers from one of the poorest counties in
Alabama, were never told what disease they were suffering from or of its
seriousness. Informed that they were being treated for “bad blood,”1 their
doctors had no intention of curing them of syphilis at all. The data for the
experiment was to be collected from autopsies of the men, and they were thus
deliberately left to degenerate under the ravages of tertiary syphilis-which
can include tumors, heart disease, paralysis, blindness, insanity, and
death. “As I see it,” one of the doctors involved explained, “we have no
further interest in these patients until they die.” In 1997, President Bill
Clinton had this to say “The United States government did something that was
wrong-deeply, profoundly, morally wrong. It was an outrage to our commitment to integrity and equality for all our citizens. . . . clearly racist.”

Do we really not understand where the passion and pain with which an Al
Sharpton or a Louis Farrakhan speaks is born? Do we really not understand
why their perspective infused with the same passion that was exhibited by
Dr. Wright resonates with so many Black Americans? Might this also be the
reason that our “conservative” countrymen and women are so discomforted by
these truths being expressed? Are we to dismiss the truths of their
statements and sermons simply because it causes discomfort in the hearts of
the weak and wicked? Those who coincidentally, happen to have a lock on the
opinion shaping instruments of our time.

The blacks are America’s Bastard Children that, to her great chagrin,
cannot be gotten rid of; and the media’s stance on this painful issue makes
the point. For “conservatives” and “blue collar whites” this is
entertainment. It is an exercise in avoiding the real issue and impact of
America’s ugly past on her Black citizens, veterans, teachers, firefighters
and police officers; for blacks this is a promise that the caseeds that
spawned the hell that the American experience has been for their forefathers
is still alive in the children of their original oppressors.

For all of the problems that America faces, it is ultimately an unwise
decision to continue her practice of proactive disenfranchisement against
such a vital and significant percentage of her population.

Yes! We can.
••••••••••••
Go Richardson

i have to add that the first time I heard somebody speak about 9/11 as “payback” it wasn’t an “angry Black pastor,” but an adorable almost stereotypical suburban housewife–my mother. My sister and I learned from our parents that a society is only as great as the worst treated member.

Stumble it!

Thanks to the people who think Small Wars should be made into a novel. I can’t as I don’t find the main character empathetic. As I was compulsively writing it, I found myself screaming at her.

I like women with cojones. Some years ago I was going to visit my mother. It was rush hour and there were two trains five minutes or less apart. I took the later train as it was an express. Continue Reading »

Stumble it!

Darn forgot: this was prompted by the words in Three Word Wednesday So is the post below where we properly thank Bone for the words. The post below is dark
Delane wanted to fall in love. She wanted it so badly she couldn’t think of anything else. All her girlfriends talked about how wonderful love was. She would see them cuddling with their boyfriends and she felt so lonely.

Her parents would tell her to give it time. Someday a boy would be swept away by Delane’s beauty and brains. She didn’t believe them. Her father would feel sorry for her and give her extra money on a Saturday for shopping. She already had two credit cards. But cash was always welcome.

That Saturday she was supposed to see her best friend Alexa. When she went to Alexa’s house, Alexa was all tangled in her boyfriend Joey’s arms.

Delane knew what girls did when they were depressed; they went to Juicy and bought some new clothes, pocketbooks and accessories. So she did. It felt as if nobody understood that she was truly depressed. They all said “someday.” Delane wanted someday to be today.

She looked real good the next day when all her friends came over. Her mother had wanted to do something really big. But Delane wanted a pool party for her eleventh birthday.

Stumble it!