It is disturbing that I am this sore after a mere day of wandering around Artomatic.

OK - Saturday I carried 4 CRT monitors and some other computer equipment up from recalcitranttoy 's basement. (Fortunately I didn't have to carry the SAR Flags and Bases up from GW's Tomb to the parking lot up a hill and across the estate this year.)

Sunday I ended up doing floors 9 down to 4 of Artomatic, with a break of walking up to 8th St with vvalkyri  for dinner and back.

This morning my ankles were sore.  After my meeting in Bethesda I went back to 8th St and had lunch at the relatively new Molly Malone's and as I got up the Delayed Muscle Soreness hit my quads big time.

I thought I was doing enough walking to and from our remote parking lot that this wouldn't happen.

I need to swim/bike ride more or I am going to be a wreck after a few days in Montreal....

We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. I say after eight years of this administration, we have just as much unemployment as when we started... And an enormous debt to boot!

Henry Morgenthau Jr.,
Treasury secretary to then-President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
May 1939 before the House Ways and Means Committee.

Despite being a chief architect of the New Deal, Morgenthau came to the House to repent... six years after the New Deal's inception, the unemployment rate had climbed back to 20%. The New Deal failed.

From the Heritage Foundation:


However the Government can be counted on to do everything in their power to prevent what needs to be done in the long run to fix the country.  This is not your run of the mill inventory driven recession.  This is a balance sheet depression.  People (and the Government) need to correct their balance sheets rebuilding a pool of savings, housing values need to come down to a normal ratio to other goods (either the average housing price needs to be cut in half or other goods need to double in price), and the Government needs to deal with the Unfunded Entitlement Problem that will make our current problems look like pocket change.

The six Sundays before St. Patrick's Day there is a dinner concert series at The Old Brogue in Great Falls.  There are four left in the current series and where they used to sell out three sittings they seem to be a bit light this year so I'm spreading the word...

These concerts bring in excellent talent in the Celtic Music Scene.

They have three seatings each night at 4PM, 6PM and 8PM.

Info at the Barnaby Productions Website

Of the remaining groups I highly recommend Beth Patterson (this week), Al Pettaway & Amy White (next week), and IONA (the organizers) on week 5.  I am certain the last group is also good, but I haven't heard them before.  I have tickets for the 8PM seating for each week except the last which I reserved for 4PM so I could go to Dance Night afterwards.

If you like what Americans think of as Irish Food, the food is good too...

For those of you with an Irish ancestry, or wish you had an Irish ancestry -

Moneygall is a small village in County Offaly , Ireland . It has a population of approximately 300 people, has a Roman Catholic Church , five shops, a post office, a national school, a police station and two pubs.

President-elect of the United States Barack Obama 's great-great-great grandfather, Falmouth Kearney, emigrated from Moneygall to New York City at t he age of 19 in 1850 and eventually resettle d in Tipton County , Indiana . Kearney 's father had been the village shoemaker, then a wealthy skilled trade.

And now for the SONG ... Crank up your speakers.

The Barack Obama Irish Song

In some ways this explains a lot.

I don't usually post these unless I am traveling, however it was a wonderful, if very, very, busy weekend, so having memory keys for future use is worth keeping...

( Friday: Potluck, AFRH Dance... )
( Saturday - My Birthday )

( Sunday - Shipping and Cleaning... )

One of the best birthday weekends I have ever had!  Many thanks to everyone involved.

This has to be one of the more non-sequiter pieces of spam that has gotten past the spam filter at work. 

As they had a link to the mesage as a web page I will spare you copying out the text...

I wonder what I did to get on their mailing list...

about LJ e-mailing you that your own birthday is comming up. 

I really need to stop trying to use Sidestep to talk myself out of a silly trip.

I thought that with the improved dollar/euro exchange rate it might make sense to hop over to Europe and open a Euro Account for future use and hit the Boku Ball (which I have been to the last two years) while I was in town.

In order to talk myself out of it I figured I would look at Sidestep and as the airlines have not given up their fuel surcharges that they slapped on during the summer I would be sticker shocked and get over it.

There is an Iberian Air flight.  It is under $500 round trip.  It has really horrible layovers.  However I collect such things as a way to pick up new cities on the cheap.  This one had about 5 hours on the front end and 18 hours on the return flight.  In Madrid.  Which I haven't been to. 

Then one of the Vienna area Marriott Hotels (the Rennasaince Imperial Riding School) is having a stay two nights, get the third free sale.

This is not helping.  :-)
If it had been Rome I would have been a goner.

I went insane and drive up to Philcon Friday afternoon. In spite of a Massage Appointment on Capitol Hill, Saturday Afternoon, a Dance Party that evening in Merrifield, a Holiday Luncheon on Sunday and Dance Night...

As usual with Philcon I book a room at a Courtyard some distance away because it is 1) less expensive, and in prior years had the advantage of free parking. This year they moved into the 'burbs so they had free parking as well, but were sold out anyway and only 3-4 miles from the Courtyard.

As I didn't leave until 3:30PM traffic was slow and I hit a band of fluffy rain (non-sticking snow) on the way up, missed my hotel's exit and wasted some time looking for it before realizing I had actually taken the exit to get to the Con Hotel. I finally arrived just in time to rescue Lynn Perkins from having to be on a panel she didn't really want to be on.  We went to the Art Show and helped her finish hanging her Art.  I met her former babysitter Vicki who lives nearby (so does Lynn) who had been lured to Philcon this year by proximity and Lynn.  Lynn, Vicki and I went to dinner at the Hotel Restaurant buffet.  Which was not first quality but not badly priced for hotel food.  We then went to a party hosted by Ray Ridenour notionally for a online group known as "The Spammers" (They usually only do it to each other - honest!)

After that I went to my hotel, which was easy to find now that I had reestablished by bearings.  Lynn went home because the hotel would not provide a rollaway (room too small) and was charging extra for the third person.

In the morning I dwadled too much to take a swim (LJ/E-mail is a bad influence) so I went down to have Breakfast.  The title is a reference to the Hotel Restaurant's service mark.  "Eggs are IT"  Which was on the napkins, menu, and signs in the restaurant. They had everything on the buffet except eggs (and the potatos that should have been in the warmer with them.)  I figured they would be out and got the bowl of oatmeal that is usually a 2nd trip to the buffet.  Go back, still no eggs.  So I ask if I was too late for eggs and the server goes to show me where they are (and from his body language thinking what an idiot I am) and sees that the warmer is empty.   He promises they will be out soon.  My server comes up a few minutes later and promises the same thing. At this point there have been no eggs for 20 minutes and it is 10 minutes to closing.  At 5 minutes to closing they put a fresh serving on the buffet.  I felt this was sort of wasteful.  At other Courtyards (for example the Denver Airport and the Courtyard Schoenbrunn in Vienna) when the buffet was out of eggs and it was close to closing they just made eggs to order.  They did at least comp my breakfast, which was nice as if they had had them in the first place I probably would have taken 15-20 minutes for breakfast instead of 35...

Then I went back to the Hotel, got a one day membership.  Registration was slow.  Attempting to do data entry in real time so the badge label could be printed and to avoid delays in post con activities several months away by having the info in softcopy from jump is a bad plan if you only have one data entry person.   As later I saw people with hand written badge I assume they came to their senses.  (Or after mentioning the issue with Joni Dashoff during a discussion in the art show about my impressions of the new venue, she may have gone off and fixed this putting the committee's convenience over efficient customer service.)

While in the Art Show I did a "quick sale" on a piece of Lynn's art I liked.  Arranged with TR to pick it up later and bring it back to DC as I had to leave before I could pick it up, hung out at the Capclave and Reno Tables for a while. (Bad Covert!, backsliding into bad habits...)  Then after Lynn was presented with some Birthday Presents (Monday) we went to lunch.  Then I had to scram for my appointment in DC.  I arrived only a few minutes late, however Ruth Anne was running late too so it was all good.

As I got to the Dance Party Location well ahead of time I decided to hang out at the local Silver Diner where they have free wi-fi.
Now off to Kim's Dance Party....

Forwarded from Kim, my first dance instructor.

Hello Dancers!

It's the 4th Saturday coming up already. I am inviting everybody to
shake off the cold weather blues and dance 'til you drop. We play it
all: Ballroom, Latin, Swing, Salsa, Argentine Tango & Hustle.

I am also offering a holiday sale of 10% off any private lessons
package for anybody who signs up at the party. Get a refresher course
just in time to be ready for all the Holiday parties. Dance lessons
also make a great romantic Christmas gift.

The All Out Dance Party goes from 7pm to Midnight At Crown Dance
Studio, 2820 Dorr Avenue, Fairfax, Virginia 22031

7:00 pm 1 beginner and one intermediate Rumba group class
7:45 pm 1 beginner and one intermediate Waltz group class 8:30 pm to
Midnight PARTY

Two Classes and Dance 12 Dollars!
One Class and Dance 10 Dollars!
Dance Only 8 Dollars!


For more info call (703) 868-0982.
Feel free to forward this to other dancers (or wanna be dancers).
Thanks and Hope to see everybody on Saturday!

Kim Bosch van Drakenstein
Owner & Wedding Dance Instructor

First Dance Impressions
Fairfax and Warrenton Locations
703-868-0982
www.FirstDanceImpressions.com
Info@FirstDanceImpressions.com

Why?

Here's how he put it in a recent issue of Resurgence magazine: "I believe singing is the key to a long life, a good figure, a stable temperament, greater intelligence, new friends, increased self-confidence, heightened sexual attractiveness and a sense of humour.

There! That got your attention."

http://resurgence.org/magazine/article2548-Freestyling.html

He also cites a 30 year Scandinavian study that sought to find the common traits among people who lived long, happy, lives. Three traits that stood out were Camping, Dancing, and Singing.

If Almost Heaven and Baitcon count as Camping vvalkyri will be lighting up the world for a long time... :-)

While I sort of expected this to happen, it is not going to be pleasant for an economy that is 2/3 consumer spending to readjust to a more traditional model of living within one's means.

Things were quiet at my polling place when I showed up to vote. I was in and out in maybe 10 minutes. However that may have been because the polling place was prepared for a massive turnout.

For decades there have been three voting machines at my polling place. (Really, going back to when I went to Elementary School there.) This time in addition to the three electronic machines there were 5 school desks with privacy screens and you had the option to use a paper optical scan ballot. They briefed very carefully about filling the ovals in completely - no "X"s or circles. They had two lines marked out "A-L" and "M-Z" with tape on the floor, and directional arrows taped out to lead you out the appropriate door.

With the ability to service 8 voters where they normally could only service 3 things went quickly. They were more rigorous about identification. This time they actually asked for it rather than just asking your name and then "verifying" by asking your address.

The only downside of the setup was that they only had the sample ballots and info on the bond initiative on a table on the "M-Z" side and not on the wall on the "A-L" side so the "M-Z" line would probably get much longer under stress from "A-L" voters looking at the info.

It seemed like the Obama folks got the better polling location in they were on the sidewalk from the parking lot and the McCain tent was on the walk from the street. I did not pass either of them on the way in as where I live relative to the school causes me to come in along the front of the building and avoid both of them.

Now get out and vote!

We have heard a lot about Sub-prime mortgage resets. What we haven't heard about is the resets that will be a result of two brilliant ideas of the Mortgage Industry came up with when they started running out of potential borrowers good enough to qualify for sub-prime mortgages, but knew that if their pace of mortgage originations slowed their stock price would get hammered.

So out came the following two genius ideas:
Option ARM
This product allowed borrowers to pay interest only, or even a below interest payment, in order to get a larger loan amount than they could traditionally afford.

Alt-A
This form of loan is often referred to as the "Liar's Loan" as it purported to be made to people with excellent credit, but who's income came from diverse sources so it would require an onerous amount of paperwork to prove it.

The assumption in both cases was that housing prices would continue to rise, creating artificial equity and the borrower would be able to refinance before the payment reset to something they couldn't pay. What was not to like? The loan originators were not being paid by the income off the mortgages, they were being paid to make deals, both to do the loan, and to package them up into various forms of Mortgage Backed Securities for sale. So they could look forward to periodic repeat business of these borrowers having to refinance later. Of course the assumption that prices would continue to rise has hit a bit of a snag.

As you can see from the chart above, 2009 will be relatively quiet for Mortgage Resets, but 2010 and 2011 will be hell. Things will quiet down again in 2012 in time for the next election but the damage to the next Administration will likely have been done. At a minimum the incumbent is likely to face a challenge from their own party in the primaries, much as Gerald Ford (ok there were other issues than the economy with him,) Jimmy Carter, and Bush 41 did.

Of course as many of my friends are probably getting tired of me pointing out this is all just a light warm up to the real problem -
$50 TRILLION (and growing) of unfunded Medicare and other entitlement liabilities.

Found this in AccountingWeb, something I subscribed to a while back on a whim.
Seems that in addition to the resume, and credit check, hiring managers are now looking for people's social networking sites to determine if they are a good candidate.

http://www.accountingweb.com/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=105988

I suppose I can see the value.  If you are looking for a Tech Writer and the applicant's myspace page is chock full of spelling and grammatical errors or they kvetch a lot and reveal sensitive info about prior employers it might give pause...

This is probably of less interest in LJ-land where at least in the corner I inhabit most people are going to some effort to obscure the direct link between them and their journal.  (I have run across LJs where the link is not hidden, and there are plenty of Non-LJ Blogs out there where the author is upfront about who they are.)

Interesting.  I haven't looked for a new job in 13 years.  Back then, yes I am certain the Govt looked at my Credit Report during my clearance screening, but the world wide web as we know it today didn't exist.