A while back, one of our in-laws (on Elaine’s side of the family) passed after a bout with cancer.  Her passing was a tremendous loss to all of us. Then, a few weeks back, her surviving husband dropped by for a visit and a quick round of “back country golf.”  He, and his late wife … Read More

There were a couple of factors that pushed the Dow Jones Industrials down 200-odd points Monday.  But, to our way of thinking, this is likely a pre-shock of a much-more dangerous period ahead for the market. The softness in housing numbers and a not-so-hot 0.3 percent annual growth of GDP forecast by the Atlanta Fed, … Read More

I’m big on using  templates and thinking-models in order to short-cut a lot of mental effort. Being lazy, as I am. Simply put, you can take a successful product and, by cloning the processes and using existing templates you can skip all kinds of wasted time. In my “George the Consultant” life, I’m going exactly this with … Read More

Advanced Chargers,  Inverters, and Grid-Tie In today’s chapter, we’ll turn you into a prepper who “knows their stuff” about power inverters (that make AC from DC sources) as well as be inducted into the nearly occult world of computer controlled solar chargers using something called MPPT. By the time we’re done, you’ll be ready to … Read More

It’s getting on toward that time of the year when things begin to sprout and when we face the sometimes-daunting task of keeping ahead of our 28.82 acres, more-or less. As I recently reported, I became hell-bent on fixing two Poulan PP126 Weedeaters that have failed over the years. Looking back, I think there two … Read More

A short, but useful thought-experiment after we roll through the personal income figures out today.  Let’s start with those: Real DPI increased 1.0 percent in December and real PCE decreased 0.6 percent. The PCE price index increased 0.1 percent. Excluding food and energy, the PCE price index increased 0.2 percent. The increase in personal income … Read More

We will, of course, jump into this morning’s GDP report, but first, we need to have a little “come to Jesus” about nuclear war because there are relatively high odds of one this summer. Tensions between India and Pakistan (Indo-Pak) have perhaps never been higher.  Because both sides have nuclear weapons, as our military affairs … Read More

How Much is Enough?  No, I am not “George_the_Uber-Driver.”  That’s my son, FB page here. (sheesh). After a short discussion of his experience with  how “cream always rises to the top” and “nut doesn’t fall far from tree” plus new Trade figures and our highly unorthodox look at the financial markets, we will drill into … Read More

Most people are dreadfully confused when it comes to work, money, play, and prepping.  In fact, there’s a dirty-little secret among the rich you may not be aware of. What separates them from the peons is that they have more choices than the underclass.  Makes sense because they can buy more and different than an … Read More

That’s my son, sky-diving instructor, EMT’ing George II who has been written-up by Forbes and you can see the article over here for handing our a “ride menu” when he’s delivering people in the Seattle area. Talked to G II this morning and he’s finding the whole uproar of going viral both wonderful but also … Read More

While the Census Bureau can’t seem to nail down their housing data release dates any closer than TBD lately, thankfully Case-Shiller/S&P/CoreLogic is more dependable.  Private enterprise, you say? Here’s their latest: ANNUAL GAINS FALL TO 4.7% TO END 2018 ACCORDING TO S&P CORELOGIC CASE-SHILLER INDEX YEAR-OVER-YEAR The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA … Read More

Dow futures were down 85, or so, earlier this morning.  And because this is the last Tuesday of the month, we will be posting this morning’s diatribe in two parts, with the second coming at 8:15 Central when we’ll put up the detail on the Case-Shiller housing report. Breaking Data Just out is a delayed … Read More

Although people use the term pejoratively, the word Paranoid is not a bad thing.  If it’s fed with actual life-experiences, it’s a great example of how the human species learned to avoid injury (and death) in our formative millennia. I mean, you stick your hand into a bee hive – resulting in a massive bee-stinging … Read More