CafeChatNoir

When I initially announced to my friends that my brother & I would be living under the same roof, the reaction was pretty much the same:  “I know you two get on very well, but you’ve lived alone for 5+ years - won’t it drive you crazy?!”

I did fully admit the possibility of insanity arising from the arrangement, but knowing that my brother had the same hermit-ish tendencies as I did, I figured we could make it all work.  And we have - quite well, since our paths only cross once a day at best in the house.

Everyone assumes that because we live together that we have these awesome, deep conversations.  Well, yeah, not so much, LOL.  Our “in-house” conversations are usually along the lines of, “I’m going for lunch, would you like something?” (D-love) or,  “I’m hitting the store, what do we need besides Coke?” (Me.)

Our very deep conversations over sports or pop culture take place up at the pub.  Honestly, for the most part we might as well live quite far apart and have the same pub.  (That and he helps when my cable box decides to go Linda Blair on me like it has done this evening.)

That all being said, the bugger has been out of town since Thursday, and I miss having the little git about.  It’s not quite the same to text him about how I’m sorry that MNF turned out the way it did vs. being able to holler down the basement stairs.

He’s back tomorrow, and the next lunch is on me.  (Or tomorrow night at the pub, whichever situation presents itself first.)

Amazing how you get used to having someone about, even if they’re the perfect “invisible” roommate.

Oh, and in his absence, I have become the SUPER-PROVIDER of biscuits to the pup.  The morning biscuits (99.9% me), the “heading to the pub” biscuit (70% me), and the, “I just got home from the pub and you go out and be done by the time I am done going to the loo and getting a drink” biscuit (95% little bro) - I AM THE QUEEN! ;)

*To be sung to the melody of “Come home Snoopy, Come home!”

Maybe I’ve been in DC too long and am just too close to the politics.  Or I just spend way too much time watching CNBC.

But, I will admit I was very surprised when I heard that various Rep’s said their constituents were overwhelmingly against today’s package being passed.  (Of course, this was after the Republican’s came out and said, “Pelosi hurt our feelings so we changed our votes.  Oh, the maturity!)  But somehow, the S&P 500 dropping 8.78% in a day is OK?

Has it been reported everywhere else in the country as just a mechanism to protect “The Rich” on “Wall Street”?  Cause the current credit and banking liquidity issues that the country is facing really do extend beyond the hedge fund managers and bankers on Wall Street.  Regular non-Wall-Streeters who *haven’t* bought a house they can’t afford, or a car they can’t afford and have saved and invested are having their portfolios hammered.

I really do wonder how this is all being reported outside the DC area, and in non-business-focused news programs.

ETA: After it was all said and done, I went to see how my rep voted.  Both my current rep and the one from my last district, both Republicans, voted for it.

Well, sort of.

Looks like Wachovia Bank is next on the chopping block.  Of course, my grandmother has 2 accounts there…

Given that her FAVORITE activity is to actively seek out things to worry about and to then expect me to have all the answers, this should be fun.

Hopefully a few things will happen:

1.  She’s not paying any attention to the news.

2.  That it is just a matter of the name changing on the bank - trust me, having her deposits liquidated and sent to her will cause more heartburn than I even care to imagine.

Watching the Banking Committee hearings this morning on CNBC re: market bailout.

It would be more comforting if the members understood what a reverse auction was.

OK, so over on the trading forum I follow, it seems there have been some folks that have had problems getting to their online brokerages (mainly TD Ameritrade it seems) and they are understandably ticked off over the situation.  (It’s not like today’s volume in the markets is unprecendented, and one would reasonably expect that the site could handle it.)

Here is someone’s comment on all this:

Do people not understand volume that has hit the markets today? It is not necessarily the company you trade with, but more than likely your computer or router. The amount of data streaming into a personal computer will close certain ports if it exceeds what the computer sees as safe. The problem is on you, and your equipment, and your connection….not the multimillion dollar broker systems. Try using some common sense, and blame your mistakes and lost profits on the user.

Why on earth would E*Trade be sending me any more data when I log in today than it would any other day?  OK, there is that one extra hyperlink on the home page so I can read the list of financial companies that can’t be shorted for a while (pdf), but somehow I don’t think that is enough to shut down the ports on my computer and keep me from the website.

If a site is overloaded, it’s overloaded.

I wonder if he’s trying to justify upgrading his computer and buying a T1 line to his wife…

I got a tech on the phone at Cox Communications who…

– Had a sense of humor
– Wanted to be helpful (though there really wasn’t anything he could do)
– Saw no need to “pull up my account” just to give me info on the outage in my area

I called to see if I could get any info on the cable beyond the generic recording of “they’re working on it” and I got a very nice guy who explained that they didn’t have a timeline on when it would be done, because it was a fiber cut and they just didn’t know how long it would take to fix it.  Then he asked,

“It wasn’t you that did it, was it?”
“Um, no, pretty sure it wasn’t me.”
“Are you sure?  Because if it was, I am going to call all the other customers and send them to your house.”

Usually I get some cranky beeyotch who insists on pulling up my entire account history before she sees fit to give me any system status information.

If you don’t like roller coasters, obviously this has not been the best week to be following the stock market.

However, if you are like me and actively follow the stock market, you may agree that today is a really crappy day to have the cable go out and not be able to get your CNBC fix.  (But Cox Communications has assured me that “technicians are in the area and they’re working on the problem!”)

Still picking through multiple news pages to get the details of what the government has in mind for all this.  Fun!

XKCD.com on the eve of the potential end of the world…

Is on it’s way out and has been crazy insane scary a bunch of rain…

Not much wind, lots of rain.  Scattered power outages, Huntington is flooded (not unusual) and Rt 1 is shut down in several places.  Went out to run some errands, roads are a little messy with standing water but nothing really bad.

Nice day to stay in and bake up some pumpkin bread.

If TS Hanna turns out to be a really big nothing around here, I confess it is my doing.

Why?

Because this week I finally got out and picked up the weather radio that has been on my to-do list all summer long.  It occured to me that I am rarely watching live TV, so I miss pretty much all the severe weather alerts, and our weather has been getting more screwy lately, so I decided it wouldn’t be a bad idea.

We have flashlights and batteries and non-perishable snacks and water and the grill, so we can reasonably deal with a couple days of no power.  I just really hope we don’t lose water altogether like we did with Isobel - our hot water heater is gas powered, so as long as we have water pressure, I can still take hot showers.  (Honestly, I think that was the most annoying and icky part of Isobel…)

Let the tropical storm parties begin!

So, Palin’s 17 year old daughter is pregnant.  Already seen lots of snarky comments floating about re: the parenting skills of the VP candidate and her husband.  Eh, as far as I am concerned, it’s more of an “it is what it is” situation.  They’re hardly the first to try to do their best with their kids and still have a 17 year old that gets pregnant.

Lots of speculation that the young lady had no say in the matter as far as keeping the baby and marrying the father are concerned.  Then again - I doubt she’s the only teen to get pregnant that found she had no say in the matter.

I did read the rumors that Palin had faked her 5th pregnancy and it was really her daughter’s child.  Just a tad far fetched, don’t you think?  Though I’ll admit I did giggle at the Fark headline of “Bristol Palin pregnant with second child.”

What really surprises me is that McCain supposedly knew and still picked Palin as his running mate. I really would have thought that would have been a dealbreaker.