I went to the car wash the other day, and after all the bug innards and avian fecal matter had been washed off, I noticed on one of the doors a pretty big mark that looked like a plastic shopping cart impact point. Oh well. My car is almost six years old, and I don't care too much anymore about bumps and scratches. There was about a three month period when I first got my car when I would've been upset by the tiniest scratch. But I quickly got used to a simple fact: My car is a utility car. It serves the function of transporting me. I don't use it to pick up chicks, or to impress my friends, or to win car beauty contests. As long as it still works, I'll live with the dings and scrapes. And I've discovered that a simple trip to the car wash and some tire cleaning spray can go a long way. #travel
Tragedy struck the town of Maple Grove last night when a monster broke into the room of six-year-old Barry Davies. The creature brutally murdered and devoured the boy despite the presence of a protective Power Rangers nightlight. A forensics report says the beast violently shook the child, making him tastier through the release of flavor-enhancing adrenaline. The monster tore off and ate the boy's limbs first, enjoying his screams until the very end. The Consumer Product Safety Commission is calling for a full-scale investigation into the nightlight's failure.
It's often said that the worst investment you'll ever make is purchasing a car, not only because it's a big ticket item, but also because it leaves you with nearly no resale value in the end. So basically, you're dumping a ton of money into something that gives you nothing in return, which could be accomplished just as easily by gambling or starting a heavy drug habit.
But I think this is a flawed way of thinking. Sure you're putting money into an investment that generates no return, but you're neglecting the fact that a vehicle provides a service: Transportation. And the act of transporting oneself from home to work, or work to store, or store to Hawaii, isn't free. It's hard to put a value on that service, but it's pretty logical to think of it in terms of gas mileage, e.g. my car gets 30 miles per gallon, and since work is 10 miles from home, it costs 10/30 = 0.33 gallons, which at today's rate (~$2.50/gallon) costs about $0.83.
But thinking in terms of gas mileage ignores the other costs associated with owning a car, such as the actual cost of the car, gas, scheduled maintenance (oil changes, new brakes, new tires), unscheduled maintenance (new windshields, body work), insurance, speeding tickets, etc. With that in mind, a pretty useful way to pseudo-visualize the true cost of owning a vehicle is to think of things in terms of cost per mile. To aid in this, I created the following calculator (go ahead, change some numbers):
The default values correspond to a car that costs $20,000, a monthly gas expense of $100, a monthly insurance expense of $100, a yearly maintenance expense of $300, a yearly "etc." expense of $100, owning the car for 6 years, and driving a total of 120,000 miles. This equates to a cost per mile of $0.31, which is significantly more than simply looking at gas mileage ($0.83/10 miles = $0.08 per mile). And it doesn't factor in the hard-to-quantify things like carbon emissions, junkyard costs, and other environmental factors. But hey, it's a start.
So my 10-mile commute to work this morning cost about $3.10, which is kind of a lot. #travel
A woman in Wisconsin recently got caught shooting random people with a blow gun and a slingshot simply because she liked hearing people say ouch. To me, this sounds like misplaced talent. Perhaps she could be more gainfully employed as a professional torturer. Or one of those people who shoots wild animals with blow darts so they can be moved to a different location or have a snare removed from their leg. Most people see failure; I see an opportunity. #psychology
Certain organizations can be grouped together and made to sound more nefarious than they might actually be. There's Big Government, which takes all our money and gives it to someone else; Big Oil corrupts poor people in foreign countries, then pollutes the ocean; Big Pharma charges us too much for life-saving drugs that eventually make our limbs fall off. There are some lesser-known "Big" groups too. Big Agra genetically modifies our food and uses too many pesticides; Big Chema makes all the pesticides, as well as all the plastics that crowd our landfills; Big Corn over-saturates the market with cheap products that make us fat. It's funny when you use this same methodology to describe otherwise normal groups. Big Candy is out to trick us into eating sugar-free treats that are still bad for us; Big Toy wants to get kids hooked on games early so they'll transition nicely to consumers of Big Video Game; Big Tech keeps making cell phones with crappy cameras and computers with not enough hard drive space so that we'll be forced to buy more Big Tech. #business
I asked one of my friends if he saw the recent Lost finale, and he said he never really got into the show. I told him he missed some pretty cool stuff and that he's throwing his life away by not watching good TV shows. I think our culture has finally (thankfully) gotten over the whole idea of TV rotting the brain. In fact, I think it's come full circle -- not that people who don't watch TV have underdeveloped brains, but that they're often missing out on things. There are interesting plot lines, compelling characters, action, adventure, and entertainment galore. Sure we could all sit around and read books and write poetry (or whatever cavepeople did before TV), but people are finding that TV isn't the brain-melting downward spiral it was originally believed to be. Perhaps this is because the people who used to complain about TV are all old and gray now, and the people who grew up watching TV as kids are now in positions of influence. Or maybe TV just got better (aside from the dancing programs). Either way, it's good to be able to watch TV, enjoy it, and not feel bad about it. #entertainment
I saw a lady with a Mercedes S500 the other day at Walmart. That particular car goes for somewhere north of $80,000 (actually probably north of $90,000, but honestly once you go above $50,000, it's all the same to me). Walmart is the merchant of the common man, i.e. they sell cheap things to cheap people (and I'm a frequent customer). They sell some expensive things like TVs and jewelry, but they generally stick to mass-produced, widely-available consumer goods. I understand the idea that rich people have to shop somewhere, but I can't help but think there's a bit of a discrepancy there. This lady was willing to spend a good annual salary on a car, but she still felt the need to save $0.15 on laundry detergent? Perhaps she can afford a luxury car because she's a penny pincher in every other area of life. But that explanation makes me like her even less. #business
I live in New Jersey. But unlike 98% of the population of the state, I am neither Italian, Catholic, nor Jewish. I live nowhere near the Parkway. I don't wear cologne or body spray, and I've never gotten a spray-on tan. Nonetheless, I'm a New Jerseyan, and this is a short list of what my people do:
Jersey Salute - Giving someone the finger while driving, likely as a result of something they did wrong. Jersey Bump - Gently hitting (a.k.a. love-tapping) the car in front of you and behind you while parallel parking. Jersey Crawl - Not coming to a complete stop at a stop sign. Jersey Jump/Scoot - Making a left turn as soon as the light turns green, cutting off a person moving forward in the opposite direction. Jersey Shuffle/Slide/Sweep - Crossing three or more lanes of traffic without pausing, usually to get to an exit. Jersey Massage - Beating someone with your fists. #sociology