Blended Living

• Its seems such a long time since I’ve aimed my camera
• besides the occasional social snap of a birthday or an out of towner visiting
• I mean the more artistic, and less practical usage of the time freezing megabit logger
• that is, my trusty Lumix
• hoping its like the proverbial bike,  rusty but not forgotten
• upgraded my google storage space
• mostly to get the free Eye-fi card
• but what to do with that 200 gigabytes of space now?
• after the left brain logical thoughts of archiving, and facilitating wealth accumulation
• I spent a few minutes exploring Picasa
• and I’m back at the first thought, I really need to play with that camera more
• bought some new gadgets, a HDTV for my mom and sis
• (yeah they got it already and I don’t wrap presents or feel compelled to give them on the day)
• another larger monitor for my charts and the sporadic movie
• and the thing that I’ve been waiting the most for…
• a ebook reader
• decided on the Sony Touch, it has expandable memory via cards, a touchscreen, renders many formats including PDFs, CHMs, and will be able to download free content off NYPL
• so no excuses for many more pleasurable reading hours in 2010
• and importantly I can reuse a lot of shelf space at home, as I gradually manipulate paper books to digital formats
• it will either be time consuming or costly
• not much that I have thought of in terms of getting around that…
• Oh good, Picasa allows different levels of content sharing
• finished a hutch or shelf for my desk, so got another 42 inches of monitor and computer gadgets space
• I actually timed that one well
• the window seat /work bench/ spare bed project got fouled up
• as I need more lumber, and the mattress arrived already
• but its hard to get those 2x4s home in a snow storm
• the 24 inch monitor should arrive in the next 48 hrs and I got the spot ready for it
• got a good DK photography book out of the library but we’ll see if it lives up to its name
• “absolutely everything” is pretty bold
• and is an example of types of books that wouldn’t be as suitable for an eReader
• since its grey scale and not color and a small screen
• but very portable and battery lasts for 2 weeks at a time
• next to search through the freely available content out there
• and start making a list
• as well as a virtual book budget as I have put off buying books for quite some time now
• I’m starting to like the dark stain on the bench 2 projects ago
• and yes I should note somewhere to not saturate the wood with the stain
• like I did basically while in a rush to get it done
• still wondering what to do with Wave, Voice is kinda cool but not utilizing it well yet
• and I’m itching to get my hands on that Sony reader, and hoping it ships before the long weekend
• so much to do, so little energy and free time and that shy sun isn’t helping my mood
• but I’m feeling like we turn a corner here soon, and is it coincidence that the winter solstice is upon us
• its late and I’m hungry and imagining smells of food
• but breakfast is a few hours away.

• rain rain go away!
• should have taken that walk when the sun came out earlier
• 4x is humming along, albeit at a muted amount
• still best to work out the kinks with smaller amounts
• and I’m still learning things about this craft after having made so many trades in the last decade
• or should I say I am learning things about me?
• that good cup of coffee today is keeping me up now
• rolling along like its was early evening right now
• good thing (or maybe bad) that the 4x markets don’t sleep at all
• more time to practice, and its good to do while I’m not at my best
• to sort of stress test myself and my trading skills
• some days I would hesitate to call these skills
• but I’ve proven to myself that they are skills
• just that I’m sometimes not in the right frame of mind to pay attention
• to the little subtle signals
• and the competing voices that habitate my mind
• oh that Kindle DX is tempting
• just when I thought I owned everything I want
• along comes a device that could be the answer to 3 needs
• a platform for me to read more on (especially fiction and current stuff)
• a way to ease some clutter
• a prize for trading well, or perhaps hitting my fitness goals
• I’m getting that feeling…
• that sweet nexus of ideas, practice, and technology
• the sticker price is steep
• but the probably 2 year costs come out to under 2 bucks a day
• and I will likely use it enough to justify that
• besides if my solution seeking engine (my mind) fixates on that prize
• it helps to focus me sufficiently to not do the little stupid things
• that can sabotage a good trade setup- like fear and greed and impatience
• just exited that trade with 2 Kindle DX days worth of profit
• hitting my marks, should be time to up the ante.

at Oprah.com

You need to become a “member”.  Basically sign up.

Read the first few pages, they divide people into these broad categories:
The Wealthy (Ws), the Financially Comfortable (FCs), the Paycheck to Paycheckers (PTPs), and the Further-in- debtors (FIDs).  The first two have some different mindsets and skills, and the premise is that they can be learned.

Happy reading.

Free book to download from Oprah’s site.  Good until the 15th.

2009 Action Plan,  227 pages with chapters on saving, spending, credit, real estate and retirement.

Update:  The section on how the big financial meltdown happened is worth the download and read.  The tone is very conversational – very much like her TV show, which makes for easy reading, if a tad annoying at times.

The advice is laid out in scenario format so its easy to locate sections that apply more closely to your situation.  So far its all making sense and it sounds like good advice.

Suze believes that this downturn may last until 2014 which I agree with.  The stock market may rebound strongly between now and then but the economy may languish for several years.