List of Unusual Deaths

An endless source of interest.

1959: In the Dyatlov Pass incident, Nine ski hikers in the Ural Mountains abandoned their camp in the middle of the night in apparent terror, some clad only in their underwear despite sub-zero weather. Six of the hikers died of hypothermia and three by unexplained fatal injuries. Though the corpses showed no signs of struggle, one victim had a fatal skull fracture, two had major chest fractures (comparable in force to a car accident), and one was missing her tongue. The victims' clothing also contained high levels of radiation. Soviet investigators determined only that "a compelling unknown force" had caused the deaths, barring entry to the area for years thereafter.

Steady State Scenario

So I think I've finally hit equilibrium with everything nowadays. I'm used to my job out here in Jersey, used to the landscape, used to the people. Overall, my decision to come out here hasn't been that bad of one. Even if I end up returning to Minnesota or moving on to somewhere else, I'm definitely better for the experience.

Anyway, this weekend is a big mystery to me so far. I was originally planning to go to a concert on Sunday night, but with my daytrip companion seemingly gone in a puff of smoke, I'm not exactly sure where those plans rest now. It sucks to waste $100, so I asked a few friends, but none could make the drive over to Atlantic City with me. Oh well. I may just end up giving the tickets to Whitney, 'cause hopefully somebody could make use of them.

In other news, I got my bills for the month today and apparently my electric bill is about 1/4 of what it was in July. My air conditioning must be ridiculously out of whack; for a 1000 square foot apartment, there's no way I could have used $340 worth of electricity unless there's something seriously wrong. The differential between July and this month is $260 for gas plus electric. This means that apparently running my air conditioning costs me just under $10 per day. Sweet. I guess I'll avoid using it for the next forever.

It's raining now, downpouring even. I can hear it through the roof of the building, which is weird since it's never happened before. If the giant ship on top of this building falls on me and crushes me as the roof caves in, Leigh gets my stuff.

God, it's October in 56 minutes. I've been living here officially for four months. This is my sixteenth week at work; already done with about 33% of a work year. Crazy.

This American Life

Now, I know I've been on a financial kick as of late, but this is truly worth checking out no matter what your opinion is of the whole bailout fiasco.

http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1242

Seriously. The most gut-wrenching part, for me:

"Steve Pennington: It means they're 90 days, basically delinquent on their loan.

Adam Davidson: Is this the matrix? Where the guy is looking at the green digits, and says there's the redhead and the blonde. Are you, Steve, seeing lives here?

SP: I definitely see lives.

AD: For the record, I see cccc36c36. I do not see human drama.

SP: The drama here is you have someone paying their loan, then something happened. They've gone 3 months, delinquent...They got to this point of 6, then fought back to current.

AD: Now that I've learned the code, I see it. Like here, he was on time for a bunch of months. This one, he was on time, 30 days, 30 days, then he went two months behind, came back. And now he's just behind.

SP: And what's really hard about this, is you can watch people cycle on and off."

As far as my schedule in the coming week:

Monday - 16:00 to 24:00 (8 hours)
Tuesday - 15:00 to 24:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:00 to 24:00 (26 hours)
Thursday - 7:30 to 16:00 (34.5 hours)
Friday - 10:00 to 16:00 (40.5 hours)

Very easy week. Already have three days of comp time built up, too!

Internet!

BREAKING: John McCain pulls fire alarm to avoid taking midterm

So the newsmedia has been abuzz about the "sudden" economic crisis everyone has seen coming. The solution has to walk a fine line; it has to be effective enough to pour confidence back into the market and lift the troubled firms back to a self-sustainable point, but it can't let Wall Street run rampant. That rampant running is what got us into the mess in the first place.

The solution? In my mind, the Democratic Congress needs to come up with a sound and comprehensive plan to dole out the necessary funds in a way that can be controlled, contained, and tracked. The discretion of such a large sum cannot be in the hands of a monarch or oligarch; it needs to be given a maximum level of scrutiny by economists working for the government. Without oversight, greed could take the reigns again and the bigwigs will hop out of the plane with their golden parachutes in hand.

The money may very well be necessary, or at least that's what a lot of top economists are saying. Without it, interdependent business could be dragged down next until only commodity stocks are left standing. This leads to a ridiculous amount (projected 20-30% by some sources, such as Bernanke's testimony) of dollar devaluation, slows imports, and loss of assets/liquidity.

The Democratic Congress needs to author a bill that they can accept, with the necessary transparencies and regulations strapped to it. They can't compromise on this; it can't be pushed through haphazardly no matter how necessary it is now. The bill must have an amount of oversight and control that allows the government to slip its tendrils into the banks it is helping directly. If the banks recover, they owe what they got back; it might take a phased recovery cycle, but it is necessary to hold the banks accountable for what they received in help. And if they fail? The US will have more problems than $700 billion of loans.

Once the bill is crafted and passed, Congress can adjourn. The President can take or leave the bill; if he accepts it, he's making concessions he doesn't like (oversight, regulatory changes, etc). If he vetoes the bill, well, hold on tight because in all likelihood it's going to be a bumpy ride.

The bottom line is that the Democrats need to grow a spine and stand up to the deregulatory, lock-step Republicans on this one. Put provisions in place that will tighten the regulations on the entire banking industry with the bill. Make sure this never, ever happens again.

EDIT: http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=798161
Yes, let's inflate our way out of the problem. This is exactly the wrong thing to do; devaluing the dollar further is digging the hole deeper.

A very good description of a possible scenario
lending freezes up. Companies can't get short term financing to pay wages, fly their sales people around etc, and start falling over (LOTS of companies are profitable, but only get cash at certain times of the year depending on when people pay them, so they borrow for day-to-day and pay it back as needed.). People can't start new companies because nobody will lend them money. Tons of people lose their jobs at the same time. The 11 trillion dollar debt that the govt has probably wont help them attend to the unfortunates. Bio fuel farms are converted to cabbage farms to supply soup kitchens. unless this 700 odd billion dollar injection helps us deflate the bubble in an orderly fashion.

GNV FLA

"We have our history
Just you and me
But our future gets talked away
Steps three and four
Staying drunk and sit on this porch
Planning out how to escape
We're two trucks stops off the interstate
The promised land with a twist of fate
We're a town for all the lost and found
So sit tight in your smokey room
Still buzzed from this afternoon
I may be going broke
But i'm never broken down

He says Florida is slowly sinking
Sinking into the ocean
He says the housing tracts are built on half facts
And the rest on half fiction
And I can't argue that statistics
Are becoming the definition
Of just standing still between glass and steel
Drowning in this quicksand.

And the city's skyline hasn't looked the same
Since the boom in south Florida's real estate.
It's turning into more than I can take.
Too much too soon, too little too late."

Schedule for the Weeeeeek

So it's late but oh well.

Monday - 15:30 to 24:00 (8.5 hours)
Tuesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (17 hours)
Wednesday - 15:30 to 24:00 (25.5 hours)
Thursday - 11:30 to 24:00 (38 hours)
Friday - 7:30 to 16:00 (46.5 hours)

So plenty of overtime to be had, wahoo. Lots of late evenings, and a semi-painful Friday which requires me to get up somewhat early, but it shouldn't be too much of an issue.

Hahahahaha. 1983 UN Resolution: Declares that education, work, health care, proper nourishment, national development are human rights (132 to 1; vetoed by USA). UN Resolutions against apartheid South Africa (110 to 1, 149 to 1, 140 to 1, 145 to 1; all vetoed by USA).

21:23 - An interesting graphic about the Security Council's veto activity.

Movies Are Always Better With Explosions

So apparently the 35W bridge magically reappeared this morning after thirteen months of being collapsed. The opening ceremony was muted, consisting of a couple troopers driving over first and keeping everyone from racing across to be the first across the newly-christened bridge. (If objects need names to be christened, my vote is for the new bridge's name to be Queen Elizabeth II) It'll be cool to go back and drive across it after the hullabaloo that was the collapse last August.

To appease Scott's numerous requests, I'll tell about a couple good sights I've seen in the past few months. First, on the evening when I went alone into Philadelphia to meet up with my friend Kate, I saw several interesting people. First of all, was a gentleman in a full cowboy getup. White suit, white slacks, boots with spurs, huge cowboy hat, and he carried with him one of those horse heads on a stick like you had when you were a kid. I was hoping in the time that I could watch him he would "mount up" and gallop regally down the street, but sadly he simply strode around the corner. Also of interest were the two lovable street urchins playing the fiddle and dancing. I wanted to ask them to play "Come On Eileen" for the dollar in change I gave them, but decided not to. The park near the 12th and Locust station was lack of any free benches thanks to the homeless people (stereotypically) sleeping on them with newspapers covering their faces.

My local 7-11 is now home to a very interesting character! I don't know where he came from or if he even works at the place, but I've seen him on three occasions cleaning up the parking lot. He sweeps up the trash into a dustpan-thing and then empties the dustpan by the door. I don't know if he later cleans it up, but it doesn't seem like the 7-11 parking lot has been any more sparklingly clean than usual. He also has a habit of muttering to himself constantly. I've seen him do this from my car several times, as his mouth is always moving. The time I walked by him into the store, he said "well that's what happens if you get in front of it, the spray's gonna hit ya" before I managed to escape earshot.

Financial Woes

Fair warning that this is probably going to be a tirade against the powers that be in the financial sector.

So I'm certain everyone is aware of the bank crisis we're coasting through at the moment as a country. Beginning with the big-time housing GSEs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, things have started crashing down - big time. Following was Bear Sterns, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch (which baited a buyout before things got too bad), AIG, and soon-to-be WaMu.

The root of the problem, in my opinion, is deregulation. The ability of banks to issue mortgage loans to investors who have no business receiving such a loan is ridiculous; a couple with a combined income of $80,000 purchasing a house for $400,000 is utterly atrocious. Who is to blame is not the matter at issue here, but rather who it affects. Jim-Bill and Annie-Jo the investors can walk away; their credit is trashed and they are likely to lose their property, but for the most part they can get away without much repercussion. The large banks backing the mortgage-givers, however, are trapped with bundles of largely useless and worthless properties.

With the ninety's drive for more of an ownership society came what was supposed to be more accessible housing. And granted, the number of Americans owning their own home grew, definitely. The demand kept with supply and the housing market was booming, until demand started outpacing supply due to Average Joe wanting to make a quick buck by tossing money into a second mortgage after paying off his first. Housing prices inflate, and soon enough you have the median home price floating up to $300,000 in areas where the median income is $50,000. What happens? Do people realize that they're not going to be able to "flip that house"? Do they realize that after the first year of "interest only" payments, they're still going to own the property and thus be forced to start paying principle? Did they ever anticipate that the variable rate mortgage might balloon a lot sooner than they thought, preventing them from getting rid of the property?

Of course not. People are greedy and stupid; banks and mortgage lenders are similarly greedy, and you would think they'd be a little smarter. Mortgage brokers, though, don't lend out the money. They check out the lendee (poorly) and make their commission just the same, whether or not the loan ever gets paid back. So people get in over their heads - their rate goes up to the point where they can no longer afford the payments, they have to keep the property too long and have to start paying on principle, or they simply didn't anticipate having to shell out money long-term for the mortgage.

Where does it leave us? The housing market will be in dire straits no matter what. The only correction possible is to let the market correct (or force it to correct) to ensure housing prices lower to non-ridiculous levels. The golden standard seems to have always been about three times the household income of the lendee. Of course, the massive and sudden depreciation of real estate isn't the ideal solution, but it may be the only solution.

What about the bailouts? Honestly, all I can say is "you can't have it both ways." We can't go on privatizing profits and socializing losses. Bailouts are fine, but you have to have something to back them up - windfall profit taxing seems prime here. If a company is making a ridiculous amount of profit on what amounts to a scam, you have two options. Tax the crap out of them, because they're headed south and will need the padding to soften their fall lest they break into a billion pieces; OR regulate them heavily enough that they can't offer up irresistable get-rich-quick scams to the populace.

If it wouldn't drag our economy into, dare I say, depression to let these companies fail, I'm all for it. They squeezed every ill-gotten-gain from the system, and now they depend on it to catch them as they tumble toward insolvency.

Helpful Flowchart

Also I like these pictures:

I Want a Poster of Noam Chomsky

Less Enthusiasm

I seem to have much less enthusiasm for the schedule this time around. Splitting shifts so much sucks, so I'm going to try to minimize it as much as possible.

Monday - 7:30 to 20:00 (12.5 hours)
Tuesday - 7:30 to 12:00 and 15:30 to 24:00 (25.5 hours)
Wednesday - 3:30 to 12:00 (34 hours)
Thursday - 18:00 to 24:00 (40 hours)
Friday - OFF (thank god)

I don't know what I'm going to do for the Tuesday night plus Wednesday morning stuff. Brian won't be here Monday, Tuesday, and early Wednesday so I'll just have to cope. It won't be fun, but at least I'll be essentially done with the week by noon Wednesday.

We Stand at the Door

So I've been at work for a bit under two hours so far and have come equipped with candy and caffeine in hopes that I can survive the night. It really shouldn't be so bad; I slept from about four in the morning last night until eleven this morning, a respectable amount of sleep. I tried to nap later in the afternoon but that failed - oh well. I'll get off of this shift at noon tomorrow, and I'm sure I'll be able to sleep then. Twenty-five hours between sleeping is quite a stretch, though, so hopefully I can make it.

After that, I'll probably get up later in the evening to hang out with Whitney and play some Rock Band. I decided to purchase it for my Wii, but have yet to find a place that has it. I'll go hunting later in the day tomorrow if I feel like it. The next shift I work is early Thursday morning. I figure since I'll be sleeping from noon to seven or eight on Wednesday, I can just stay up until that shot ends at eight in the morning. My only obligation after that is a 12-16 shot on Friday, which I can easily catch a good night's sleep for.

EDIT: It's now 1:35am and I think this is officially the earliest time I've ever been at a job thus far in my lifetime.

My second wind arrives at approximately 4:45am. Very strange. I've noticed a pattern with former military folk: they hate being called sir, even in the context of 'yessir,' my default affirmative response.

Wait a Second...

Swing on the Spiral

I leave behind a strange, strange weekend. After feeling a little under the weather for most of the weekend, I spent most of it lounging around and trying to recover. The downside of this is the massive amount of thinking you do when you have downtime, which I tried to avoid by watching TV and reading.

Saturday was fairly entertaining. In the early afternoon, I was talking to Kate, my big city, New Yorker friend, as she was preparing to rent a car to pick up a dresser from Ikea. Now, despite there being an Ikea in Minneapolis and having been there a few times, I've never actually bought anything from there furniture-wise. I volunteered to brave the mean streets of Philadelphia to take her to buy a dresser, which seemed pretty straight forward. I wandered around a bit before finding her, but it worked out. I ended up purchasing a vase and some bamboo stalks to liven up my bedroom a little.

About two or three hours after dropping her off, she discovered that apparently the box wasn't self contained. Apparently, all the tools, screws, and other miscellaneous pieces were apparently in a separate box. Sadly, it might be necessary for her to go pick it up on her own time, defeating the purpose of the trip. Oh well; remember when I said I'd never bought any furniture there? With no signage to indicate that there was another piece to the puzzle... we were clueless.

Yesterday I managed to sit through some football, including the Eagles routing the Rams and the reports of Tom Brady being out for the season. Haha - even the remote chance of Daunte Culpepper returning to toss some footballs at Randy Moss is hilarious. Tonight's when the real fun begins though, with the Vikings and the Packers squaring off, granted I have nothing else to do, which I hope I do.

THE LAST SIX MONTHS IN REVIEW

I learned a lot. I learned that you can't always get what you want, but if you work hard you'll get enough. I learned that sometimes letting go of something is the best thing you can do. I learned that you can't plan everything out in your head and expect real life to follow. I learned that I have some awesome friends.

Strangest Schedule Ever

So the schedule for next week is utterly insane. Just wait until you get a load of it.

Lunes - 7:30 to 20:00 (12.5 horas)
Martes y Miercoles - 19:30 to 12:00 (29 horas)
Jueves - 3:30 to 10:00 (35.5 horas)
Viernes - 11:30 to 16:00 (40 horas)

So no overtime, since I'm skipping a few shots to pull that gigantic sixteen hour marathon. Kind of sucks to go through that giant leap and not get much out of it, though, since I'm scrambling for forty hours as it is on this schedule.

The biggest plus seems to be that sleep will be plentiful. There's almost 24 hours between my Monday and Tuesday shifts, over fifteen between Wednesday and Thursday, and more than twenty-four between Thursday and Friday. Not too shabby; I'll have to buy a book to speed through on my Tuesday/Wednesday megashift.

Beautiful Ground

So I'm at work. Right now. I'm working a 4am to noon shift, which might seem like a hassle, but I'm not minding it all that much. Right now it feels like it's really late at night rather than early in the morning as I come up on six.

I slept from about nine last night to 2:30 this morning, so I've got a nap to catch this afternoon before going out and hopefully shopping for some new clothes and grabbing a bite to eat.

School's in the Air

So it's strange. For the first time in eighteen years, I won't spend September in a classroom. There are good things and bad things about that notion, but my subconscious is being strange and keeps thinking that I'm going back soon. Maybe it disagrees with me that this place is a good one to be in? I'm content enough here, at least enough to survive tomorrow. One day at a time may as well be my mantra at this point.

Today has not been the best of days. I woke up with a strange sense of forboding after enduring a dreamless sleep filled with vague memories and futures; the kind that inspires feeling without giving you a single clue as to what happened while you slumbered.

I went to the dryer to grab attire for the day and noticed that a pen had been along for the ride, had burst, and left some spots on a lot of my clothing. I fished out a shirt that only had a single little blotch on it just above the breast pocket and threw it on, no worse for the wear. I'll have to hit the shops to pick up some new shirts and maybe some of the OxyClean stuff the bearded man on television yells about so much.

Since I've been slacking on the schedule posting, here's what my next week looks like.

Monday - OFF (8 hours)
Tuesday - 08:00 to 16:00 (16 hours)
Wednesday - 03:30 to 12:00 (24.5 hours)
Thursday - 07:30 to 20:00 (37 hours)
Friday - 07:30 to 16:00 (45.5 hours)

A healthy bit of overtime that should push me over two full days of compensatory vacation time. In a month or two I should have at least five days banked, maybe even more, that I can use to take off on Christmas for quite awhile. The virtue of being a sidekick at the moment is I'm not hard pressed to find someone to cover for me when I'll be gone for a week or whatnot.

Drunk Sincerity

"Wiiiiiiiiiiith steam, heat and rhythm
In the back seat of the car
An adolescent perspective projecting life's
Forecast to the stars

You heard 'love' from the lips
And were rapt by the hips!
The promise was eternal
But you couldn't see that far!

There's hope in the words
And emotion in the eyes
It's so easy to be misled
By the sad and gentle guise

And like fools we trust
The delivery
But it's all just drunk sincerity
It's all just drunk sincerity."