Into the Wild, Review

I just read Jon Krakauer’s, Into the Wild. Good book. It’s about a 20-something year old, McCandless, who has a falling out with his parents and society and tries to live off the land. His biggest challenge is Alaska, but he fails and dies. I liked the way the story was written; it was not so much in chronological order as a progression of the people and events that influenced his last adventure and death. Upon first hearing of the story, a person might think that McCandless was a total nut, ill-prepared for an extended stay in the Alaskan wilderness. Krakauer was pretty good about presenting an objective view of the details while at the same time injecting his personal experience to give a perspective on what McCandless may have been thinking and experiencing during his adventures. I don’t think McCandles was a nut. He just made a couple of mistakes, and those, coupled with a little bit of bad luck resulted in his death.

I definitely recommend the book. It’s quite an easy read and a very good story.

I haven’t seen the movie yet but I just added it to my Netflix queue.

Save the Seals

Did you know that Canada has a yearly seal hunt? Seals, including babies, are brutally killed and often skinned while they are still dying. Why? For their fur. How sad and inhumane is that? There is a lot you can do, including boycotting Canadian seafood and writing letters to the Canadian Prime Minister and Embassy. And most importantly, you can let other people know.

Middle-Class Crunch

I always hear about a “middle-class squeeze” but the evidence I saw made me believe that people were just making bad choices. I know that a lot of a family’s income goes towards the mortgage, especially if the houses were purchased within the last 10 years in expensive real estate markets (New York, San Francisco, etc.). However, to me it seemed that people were preferring to buy the $400 Coach bag and pay $10,000’s more for a luxury car rather than save money for a possible layoff or health emergency. But according to this article, it turns out that people are actually spending a lot less on the extras than they were 30 yeas ago. Huh?

So there are 2 main thing happening here: a lot of the luxury items (such as the dishwasher, having 2 family cars, weekend clothes) are a lot cheaper today than they were 30 years ago and a lot of the money people have is actually going to the essentials (health care, mortgage). For example, a mortgage 30 years ago in today’s dollars was about $5820/year, while today it’s about $10,250/year. On the other hand, basic appliances that might still be a luxury in some households (dishwasher) cost almost 1/10th of what they cost 30 years ago. One shocking fact is that incomes are the same now as they were 30 years ago (adjusted to today’s dollars). It’s true that families today have a lot more money because usually both parents work (compared to a single-income family of the mid-1970’s). However, with both parents working, there are usually other expenses—child care, 2 family cars, etc.

My husband and I are dinks—dual income, no kids. It’s a more realistic description of the yuppy (young urban professional). We have good jobs, no debt, a nice savings account, and yet it will be years before we can afford a house in the Bay Area. Granted, we are being slightly conservative—we could probably easily be approved for a loan in which 40% of our gross income goes towards paying off a small, fixer-upper on the bad side of town. But what would happen if one of us lost our job or we had another emergency? So for the time being we will have to be satisfied renting our small townhouse. While our rent increases every few months, it is still at 1/3 of what a mortgage would be.

Flower Mishap

A bride is suing her florist because the florist substituted “pastel pink and green hydrangeas for the dark rust and green ones she had specified for 22 centerpieces.” That could be valid. How much did the flowers cost? $27,435.14. The bride’s case should get thrown out in court because she’s an idiot and spent so much on flowers. I wonder what the total bill for the wedding was? Probably more than the $400,000 she is suing for.

Priceless

"A woman was arrested after she called local police to help 'get her money back' after she was unhappy with the crack cocaine she purchased."

One of the fun things about being a cop.