OK, Mom, I'm listening...

Mom was always very diligent about taking her medication.  I'm not.  That worried her and, well, mother's are always right.

I knew I hadn't been taking my thyroid medicine lately and that can cause a lot to go wrong in the body.  Today's blood results are not bad, they are "no need to worry about retirement savings" bad!  Cholesterol at 430.  Some other numbers just as off-the-chart bad.  

*****

Today is the last day of the month and I've been good at working out.  I missed 9 days out of 31.  (That's more remarkable considering how low my thyroid level is - I should have trouble getting out of bed in the morning.)  The threat of giving money to Republicans gave me the incentive to work out.  I only ate fast food once. 

Now I just hope the incentive of not dying will be enough to make me take all the new meds I've been prescribed.  Next checkup will be in January.  I have two months to be good:  Workout, eat well, and take my medicine.  If the numbers come down, great!  If not?  I'm buying a 60" TV.  

Achilles' heel?

Short of something earth-shattering happening, Mitt Romney will be the Republican nominee.

His biggest weakness in this economy is that he was a CEO of a holding company that shipped jobs overseas.  Also, he won't release his tax returns... so what if it turns out that Romney (net worth $190 million) pays a lower percentage of his income in taxes than a family making $50,000?  The Obama team must be salivating at the opportunity.

Even more amazing:  A fellow Republican is calling him out on this.

Ahh, life in the Emirates

From the "you couldn't make this stuff up" department:

Today I went to the hospital to make an appointment to see a doctor.  I was told I had to come back at 11.  I said, "So I have to make an appointment to make an appointment."

"Come back at 11, sir."

THIS is why I have put off getting the prescription for high blood pressure medicine... to get the prescription would cause my blood pressure to skyrocket.

As much as I love pugs...

...I found this funny.

Good day trumps bad day

In the space of 20 minutes friends half jokingly said I was old, fat, and threw boring parties.

At the same time I got an e-mail from my boss offering (another) huge raise.

I wonder what the going rate is for better friends.  I might be able to afford them now.

Double Whammy

First, I wasn't able to make it to the gym yesterday or today so adds $300 to the bill I owe the Republican party.  I'm still net ahead, but it is disturbing.

Late this afternoon I ran into a former student in the mall.  After talking for a few minutes he said, "Sir, you need to go to the gym."

Gee, thanks.

And your mother said you'd go blind...

Christian Right pastor says masturbation is a form of homosexuality. 

And they say gays only make up 2-3% of the population.  Hmm.

Penguins - giving guys a bad reputation

I thought calling a guy a pig was the right insult.  Having grown up on a pig farm I never saw piggy theft:

I hope someone will tell a colleague, “You’re such a penguin”, and let me know how that goes.

Throw out the scale

I am doing well on working out.  I go at least every other day and usually it is two out of three.  Yesterday the eliptical I always use was busy so I decided to use the rowing machine.  My stomach is still on fire 24 hours later.

According to the scale I weighed in at 215 a month ago and I'm 215 today.  The difference?  Yesterday and today I wore pants that were very uncomfortably tight a month ago.  Now they are just tight.  Maybe I'm actually gaining some muscle to replace the fat.

Anyhow, it is progress.  Slow, but sure.

Hey Gus!

Dear Gus,

If you let yourself go you end up looking like this:

Let's not let that happen.

Love,
Steve

Ruh-roh Romney

A couple of days ago I predicted the 2012 Republican ticket would be Romney/Rubio.  It's not a particularly bold or daring prediction, but it's one I had meant to make two months ago.  Why?  Because while I was back in Iowa I listened to Rush.

Rush always hated John McCain.  He was desperately trying to get support for someone - practically anyone - else.  He clearly loved Fred Thompson but he proved to be a terrible candidate.  After Thompson and Huckabee split the evangelical/conservative vote in South Carolina, Rush changed his tune quickly on McCain.  Listening to him before Florida I said, "Rush won't endorse McCain but clearly the powers-that-be in the party have convinced him to stop bashing him.  McCain will be the nominee."  McCain won Florida and the rest is history.

This summer Rush fielded callers that wanted to bash Romney.  Rush never supported Romney but didn't go out of his way to egg his listeners on - which is a very typical tactic used by El Rushbo.  Ergo, with establishment support and the lack of Rush attacking him Romney will be the nominee.

That makes this quote from yesterday's show quite a surprise:

"Romney is not a conservative.  He's not folks.  You can argue with me all day long on that, but he isn't... This isn't personal, not with what the the country faces and so forth.  I like him very much.  I've spent some social time with him.  He's a fine guy.  He's a very nice gentleman.  He is a gentleman.  But he's not a conservative."

Interesting.  Very interesting.

Dexter?

Tonight a friend said I reminded him of Dexter.  I've never seen the show but I know he kills people.  Alrighty...

I also like this quote about the guy who was supposedly conspiring with the Mexican drug cartel and Iran to kill a Saudi ambassador.  A college roommate of his said, "His socks would not match.  He was always losing his keys and cellphone. He was not capable of carrying out this plan."

I'm pretty sure many of my friends would say the same about me.  Who knew I could have so much in common with a murderer and a bumbling terrorist?

"Why 158 acres of corn costs $1.5 million"

That's the title of a blogpost and podcast from Planet Money.

Farmland has become ridiculously expensive in Iowa.  Yes, corn and soybean prices are running about double what they were five years ago but land values have tripled.  Meanwhile, the cost of inputs from fertilizer to seeds have gone way up in price.  A couple of years ago prime Iowa farmland went for $3000/acre.  The woman selling a farm in this story received $9,900/acre.

It's hard to get the feeling this is yet another bubble... but the thinking is that as the world population grows the demand for grains (that get fed to animals) will grow and grow.  I don't think farmland is selling for $9,900/acre based on current prices but, rather, the expectation that it will be $10+ in the relatively near future.

I wouldn't bet the farm on that.

"Let he is without sin cast the first stone"

If I remember much from my catechism growing up, that's what Jesus said when asked what he'd do with a woman who had been sentenced to being stoned to death for committing adultery.  (What I don't remember ever reading was the punishment for the guy.  Even 2000 years ago it took two to tango.)

I thought about this quote today because it's National Coming Out day and, sadly, there are far too many who call themselves Christian who have no problem declaring gays will go to hell.  A couple of weeks ago a Republican debate audience booed a gay soldier in Iraq.  Booing a soldier.  How patriotic. 

This weekend a pastor at the richly named Values Voter Summit called Romney's Mormon church a cult.  But since beating Obama is the ultimate goal, he'd still vote for Romney.

This segue is to make a prediction I've been wanting to make since late August:  The 2012 Republican ticket will be Romney-Rubio.  There's a reasonably good chance America will get its first Mormon president and Hispanic Vice President.

The non-sequitor student

Non-sequitor:  Latin for "it does not follow."

(It's a term I never use so I had to be sure I had the right meaning.)

Every once in a while I will get that student: Almost always cheerful and perky and willing to chime in on questions asked in class.  Unfortunately, the answers leave me speechless.

After explaining the basics of an assembly line a student said, "Oh, like Apple making all of their earphones white!"

"Umm, no," I replied.  At this point my brain is trying so hard to make a connection that I have trouble moving on.

Ten minutes later I'm talking about maintaining inventory at a store and I hear, "Like going to a beauty salon!"

I never had a course in education.  I wonder how they teach teachers to deal with such responses.

Final thoughts on Apple...

...for at least a week.

This weekend I was reading news from my phone while walking in a mall (yes, I'm one of those people).  A Pakistani guy(?) stopped me, pointed to my iPhone and made a sad face.  I shook my head, "Yes, yes, it is very sad."


*****
There were almost as many tributes to Steve Jobs among my Arab FB friends as there were my American FB friends.  That blows me away.

Why didn't Apple's stock drop like a stone?

Apple's stock fluctuated less today than it does on a normal day.  Unquestionably, all eyes on Wall St. and around the world were on AAPL today.

I got the news about Jobs' death from an e-mail from a friend:

"Buy the stock you say?  If I had money I would be mad at you because the stock is going to drop."

After it didn't drop he wrote, "How did the stock not drop?  Are they sentimentally buying Apple stock?"

The answer is the one I gave a few days ago:  By virtually any measure Apple is a cheap stock right now.  There was simply not much room for it to go down.  (Which sounds odd for a company whose share price is $380.)

Also, remember the saying, "I don't care what the newspapers say about me as long as they spell my name right?"  Apple has received hundreds of millions - probably billions - of free advertising today.  Someone who's never thought about Macs, iPhones, iPods, iPads is likely feeling a craving to know what everyone is talking about.

I swear, I wish I had money to buy this stock.

*****
A student contacted me to ask, "What will be the first sign in the change of leadership at Apple?"  I replied that we saw the answer on Tuesday at the launch of the iPhone 4S.  Steve "I want my products to be the best" Jobs was probably not a big fan of selling two year old technology in the iPhone 3GS.  New CEO Tim Cook is a supply chain guy who saw how cheap they could be made and couldn't pass up the opportunity to reach consumers who can't or won't pay for a iPhone 4S.

The good thing is that more people will experience Apple products under Tim Cook.  The bad thing is what we'll never know:  What incredible product could Steve Jobs have thought of in the future.

What more do you need to know?

Ann:  Someday I want you to tell me the story of the guy who had Steve Jobs fired from Apple.

Me:  He came to Apple from PEPSI!

Ann:  I think there's more to the story.

Of course, there is more to the story... and the horrible guy who came from PEPSI wasn't really horrible.  In fact, he gave one of the better interviews on explaining Jobs' way of thinking.

Separation anxiety

Tonight I said goodbye to the first Arab friend I made in this country.  He was a student from my first semester and we kept in touch after he was out of the class.  Last year we became friends as I hired him to do translating work for my training courses.

Abood is doing his internship in Qatar and will most likely start his career there.  Geographically, Qatar is closer to the UAE than Chicago is to Iowa, but in reality a move is a move.  It's just never the same.

I know everyone hates goodbyes but I think I'm worse than most.  Sometimes I think the real reason I never wanted children is that I knew someday they'd grow up and move away... and I don't think I could take that.

Apple lays an egg

I was tired last night but decided to stay up for Apple's big announcement.  If only there had been a big announcement...

Apple took over 100 minutes to make its announcement and I'm pretty sure they pitched the ability to send a greeting card via regular old mail before they got around to announcing the iPhone 4S.  I'm not 100% sure because I was nodding off before the show was over.

Today there is much hand-wringing over how small of an improvement this phone is compared to the iPhone 4.  My complaint?  The screen is still 3.5.  Perhaps I'm a size queen but other phones have been over 4 inches for a year and a half.  Hey Apple!  My eyes aren't getting any better!  I want a larger screen!

The fatal flaw, however is in the design.  Buyers of Apple products should be ashamed of paying too much but instead most carry it as a badge of honor.  This says it all:

The only reason I upgraded from the 3GS to the 4 is that my carrier gives one year data connection free.  So upgrading saved me $50/month that I would pay for the internet.  In February my year will be up and I'll probably buy the iPhone 4S. 

Apple, I wish I could quit you.

...but will still make tons of money

Investors seemed to be as underwhelmed as I was about the announcement; Apple stock went from $381 on Friday to a low of $355 yesterday.  That's a pretty big 7% drop.  Today the stock has almost regained all of that loss while bad reviews of the iPhone 4S continue to come in.  Nobody is excited about this phone.  So is the stock holding up?

1.  By every measure the stock is still cheap.  (The point I made over the weekend..)
2.  Apple is continuing to sell the 3GS and 4.  Want an iPhone but don't want to fork over hundreds of dollars?  You can get a iPhone 3GS for free, FREE! with a new phone contract.  If I were a cash-strapped Apple envy guy like I used to be, I would be taking that offer.  In other words, Apple is now able to appeal to the snobs who want the latest and greatest and the common guy on the street.  By increasing their pool of customers they will make more money.
3.  The iPhone 4S will be sold on more networks.  Namely, Sprint will now carry it in the US and they've added more companies across the planet.  Again, more potential customers.

So I'm not recanting my weekend post of wishing I had money to buy Apple stock.  Here they sell iPhones with no contract.  That makes the price about $760.  Right now that would get me two shares of Apple stock.  That sounds like a better deal than iPhone 4S.

Called to the Dean's office

As I was walking out of my office I saw an e-mail from my dean asking to meet with me.  It's a first in 3 years and given my experience at Hamilton I was in his office in two minutes.  He looked startled, "Were you waiting in the hallway?"  He then said I'd have to come back in an hour.

I'm just not a patient guy and there is nothing worse than wondering if you are in trouble for something and having to wait.

It turned out to be good news:  I've been asked to teach in an entrepreneurship certification program.  I don't have details but it would mean more money, a little bit longer hours, fewer classes and fewer students.  Most importantly for me:  It's something new.  Teaching the same courses for four years is beginning to drive me batty.   It's easy, don't get me wrong, but boring.

So we'll see how this goes....

*******
Workout update:  I was good for October 1, 2, 3 but didn't go yesterday.  Now the problem is that I may not have time today.  Missing two days in a row means the Republicans gain $200 today... I have to find time to go workout...

Question of the day: How much do teachers affect a student's love for a subject?

Tonight I was talking to a student who said, "I hate xxxx class because the teacher is clearly here just for the paycheck."

I often wonder how much a teacher affects a student's attitude towards a subject.  I was bound for political science and/or economics when I came to Coe.  Unfortunately, the political science profs left a lot to be desired.  And I loved my econ classes.  What if the reverse had been true?  Would I have graduated a poli-sci major and not econ?  Wow, how different my life would be.

Apple

Apple closed on Friday at $381.  I so wish I had a pool of money because I would buy Apple at this price in a heartbeat.  I won't bore you with financial equations, but by virtually every measure Apple is undervalued, and once the new iPhone rolls out next week they will see a new sales explosion and the stock will be at $500 in less than two months.

So why is Apple cheap?  The law of large numbers.  A company that has seen the phenomenal growth that Apple has usually can't sustain it.  Yeah, so they doubled their profits in the past year, they surely can't do that again... right?  Maybe not, but I think they'll come close.  Even if they only increase earnings by 25% they are still a good buy.

Wow, I wish I had money.

(Before my friend (and future lawyer) e-mails and tells me to add the disclaimer, I'm not a financial planner and I don't even play one on TV.  Any choices you make should not be based on anything I write in this blog!)

Workout incentive

Matt commented that his incentive for working out is basically getting laid.  That won't work for me.  Working out every day for a year won't change that.

I decided to go with the simple approach that has worked for me before:  I pledge $1500 to the Republican party of Iowa.  Every day I work out in the month of October I can subtract $100.  (Goal is to work out every other day.)

Given my personality I could see working out 15 days in a row and calling it quits so there's a twist:  If I go two days without working out $100 gets added to the pledge.

I must get in better shape.  In a month I'll be going to Nepal and walking around Nepal is quite fun.  Right now it sounds like a chore.