Category: Living

Living by Joe WilcoxMar 24, 20066:59 pm

Housing Prices Decline

After warm weather temporarily boosted home sales in January, reality has returned. According to a CNN Money article, today, home sales dipped in February. More importantly, home prices receded—to an average $230,400, or decline of $6,900 (3 percent)—compared to February 2005.

I am no economist, but I expect an acceleration of the trend. Many U.S. consumers had been using home equity like bank accounts, greatly contributing to overall spending and GDP growth. Trouble signs are everywhere—and well beyond the housing sector. With the exception of some very profitable oil companies, last quarter’s earnings announcements hinted of troubles with consumer spending. When companies like Intel, even Wal-Mart, lower earnings estimate (as they did for first quarter), something’s amiss. And it is.

Photo by Joe WilcoxMar 19, 20062:11 pm

Bun Bun Suns

Washington is cooler this Sunday than the last. But a little chill isn’t stopping Spring, or Bun Bun (not her real name) getting out for a run.

Bun Bun will be three years old this year. We bought her on an August day from the Animal Exchange in Rockville, Md. The store was a pitstop to pick up pet supplies before purchasing a bunny from the Montgomery County Fair. My daughter fell in love with this lone bunny at the store. She was big, perhaps six months old, and a risk. Young kittens are easier to train and to hold.

News Media by Joe WilcoxMar 15, 20064:19 pm

Numbers

On the plane from Washington (DC) to Washington (State) today, I got to thinking about numbers, and the shenanigans businesses–and even journalists—get away with because of them.

Lady seated in front of me had a newspaper open with headline about some company paying $1 billion for something. What struck me was the $1, not the billion. People tend to associate with the familiar, and the numbers zero to nine are pretty familiar. The obvious association is everyday usage, which is $1 as $1, whether there is a million or billion that follows. The impact of the number’s real value is insignificant.

Living by Joe WilcoxMar 12, 20064:31 am

Twisted Tales for Girls

In today’s New York Times, author Naomi Wolf looks at “cute” books for teenage girls that are anything but sweet.

Teenage girl series, such as “Clique” or “Gossip Girls”, are fitting to the adage, “You can’t judge a book from the cover”. Beneath the banal paperback covers are pages rife with status, shopping, and sex. Excerpted from one of the “A-List” series novels, one teen describes sex with her boyfriend: “We used to jump each other, like, three times a night. When we went out to the movies, we’d sit by a wall and do it during the boring parts”.

Living by Joe WilcoxMar 11, 200610:57 am

Smokers’ Revenge

My daughter and I hauled over to Quiznos for lunch. On Saturdays, kids meals are 99 cents. More importantly, it’s about 20 Celsius in Washington and perfect day for eating on Quiznos’ outdoor tables. Humph. […]

Politics by Joe WilcoxMar 10, 20063:53 pm

Shame on Congress

I have my differences with President Bush, but there is one issue about which we agree: UAE. Congress’ unwillingness to accept a United Arab Emirates company’s taking oversight of some U.S. ports brought to a close on Wednesday a visible disagreement between the President and his Republican allies on the Hill. American flags around the Capitol building should be lowered in shame.

The ruckus started about a month ago when the UAE company bested a rival to buyout London-based P&O, which had a contract for six U.S. ports. The UEA company, Dubai Ports World, will walk away from the U.S. ports deal, following a stunning 62-2 House Appropriations Committee blocking vote. Democrats, lead by Sen. Hillary Clinton, had made big noise against the deal—and she’s supposed to be a presidential candidate in 2008?

Society by Joe WilcoxMar 4, 20068:56 am

Where Milk Matters

My quote of the year (so far) goes to Vermont Governor Jim Douglas, explaining why the state isn’t cracking down on illegal immigrants working on dairy farms: “I respect the laws of the United States, of course. But the cows have to be milked”.

The governor is quoted in a New York Times story about Vermont’s massive exodus of young people. One result is a worker shortage that makes it hard for businesses to justify staying in the state or simply expanding operations. Fewer jobs mean more young people looking elsewhere for work. Fewer young workers mean fewer businesses offering jobs. Pick a term: Negative feedback loop, perpetual motion machine, or the economic equivalent of song, “There’s a Hole in the Bucket“.

Education by Joe WilcoxMar 3, 20064:38 pm

Seneca Schoolhouse

This afternoon, my daughter wrote a delightful post on her Weblog about a trip to the Seneca Schoolhouse in Poolesville, Md. But her post vanished in a wisp before she could save it to TypePad. Argh.

Molly encountered the same problem that a month ago had me cursing by name all 60,000 Microsoft employees (yes, it was exhausting but therapeutic). When she went to insert a photo, an Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Preview pop-up warned about secure and unsecure content. Clearing the warning was supposed to let her post the picture. Like my experience, the process instead erased the entire post. Molly was so upset that she, like her dad, couldn’t redo the post.

Education by Joe WilcoxMar 2, 20067:59 pm

Homeschooling in Maryland

A Reuters story on homeschooling looks at a growing phenomenon. Story leads off with two homeschoolers in in Columbia, Md., dressing up in period attire to study about the Renaissance. I can speak from experience that Columbia, Md., is a booming area for homeschooling. We’ve shopped in homeschool stores there and around the area.

My daughter’s homeschooling continues. I have confidence in my wife’s abilities as a teacher, although she and my daughter do have occasional down days (let’s just say that 11 is a difficult age).

Politics by Joe WilcoxFeb 24, 20065:44 pm

The Buck (Shot) Stops Here

I simply cannot resist. Well, actually I did resist for a few days—OK, maybe a day—but cannot any longer. Some broadcaster named Bob Rivers has got this in-bad-taste but funny Flash movie, “Cheney’s Got a Gun,” poking fun at the Vice President’s recent hunting accident.

Yes, I feel for everyone involved in the incident. But this bit of Flash foolery is just too good to pass over. I’m a fan of political humor—all targets (pardon the pun) accepted, whether conservative, liberal, Republican, Democrat, or some other political persuasion. I’m not partisan.

Living by Joe WilcoxFeb 21, 20066:14 pm

Be Responsible for Your Kids Online

Over the last couple days, I’ve seen an awfully good AP story, by reporter Matt Apuzzo, stir quite a flurry of fallout about kids online safety at blogsites. Matt focuses on MySpace.com, but the problems of too much information disclosure are persistent.

In December posts What Kids Reveal Online and Minimizing Kids’ Online Risks, I explored the dangers of teen blogging and what kids foolishly reveal.

Living by Joe WilcoxFeb 18, 20068:11 pm

How Rude!

I get so steamed sometimes by some people’s rude behavior. My daughter and I stopped into the local 7-Eleven this morning for a quick burrito. While we were standing in line, this lady jabbering Spanish over a cell phone made a huge mess at the cappuccino machine (I use lower-case “c” because 7-Eleven Cappuccino isn’t).

She used the wrong size cup, which overflowed all over the machine and made a huge puddle of milky gunk on the floor. And she didn’t care! She continued talking on the cell phone!