Day 1300 – Maybe it’s Best Not to Look

Ok, as Kai Ryssdal pointed out “what does it tell you when a 300 pt drop in the Dow is no big deal?” It tells me that we’re (as a country if not an entire segment of the planet) going to hell in a bucket. Thus maybe it’s best not to look and focus on something else.

Beautiful sunset this evening. My wife is flying down from Seattle and ought to have a smooth time of it. I’m still employed… (might not be after the first of the year, or certainly after June 30, 2009) Oops, i looked.

I’m more impressed i made it to day 1300 in Boise and i’m largely doing just fine. My finances and outlook and approach to web design and photography mirrors my brain wave pattern since i started taking sertraline. In fact it brings to mind a tv commercial i saw years ago that showed (or purported to show) a typical teenager’s eeg waves. The first screen showed this alarming spiky, erratic pattern reminiscent of an oscilloscope hooked to a cd playing a song by Sonic Youth. The next screen purported to show the same brain after smoking some unnamed quantity of pot. Smooth, rounded waves ebbed and flowed like waves at the seaside. HOLY CRAP! I don’t even smoke pot but wanted that pattern. Such was the immediate reaction of everybody i know who saw that commercial.

Wedding rings on martini glass made of ice
Wedding rings on martini glass made of ice

So i can’t affect the global financial landscape. So what. I can control my own spending and i can control, to a certain extent, my own earning. I can honestly say i own all the material things i have ever truly wanted, i know what my value is to the outside world, i have no unsecured debt, my house increases in value with every degree the temp drops over night (assuming the furnace keeps working), and my wife is flying down from Seattle and staying for a week. I covet nothing. No worries, mate.

But what about this: OPEC announced a production cut today. True, the cut is meaningless since they already exceed their stated quota by a bazillion barrels per day and the price of oil didn’t even burp, but what if the US really jumped on this as an opportunity. OPEC announces a production cut, the US announces dramatic conservation measures that build on what consumers are already doing (driving less). Basically we flip OPEC the bird and accelerate down the road we’re already on. The geezers who run big oil must be losing at least some sleep.

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