Just Rambling

A few quick takes:

The best investment I have made recently was the purchase of a couple of hundred “forever” stamps. They were worth 40 cents apiece when I bought them and now they are worth 44 cents. That’s a 10% return on my investment. Oh, how I wish my brokers had the same results.

A house down the street from us recently went on the market for $350,000. Now we live in a nice neighborhood, but not many houses out here would bring that kind of money. I can think of four or five that might. My home is not one of them.

Yesterday the real estate agent held an open house so I went to see what that kind of money would buy. They have a nice in ground pool and a beautiful view of the lake. But the house is really chopped up. Two bedrooms and two baths on the second floor (no showers), and one bedroom and two baths on the first floor. One does have a shower. A sunken living/great room with a stone fireplace. A kitchen with formica counter tops and rather inexpensive appliances. They took in the original garage to make a family room and added on a deck with a room above the carport for a game room. And the interior colors…..lime green and purple. A purple dining room and one bedroom and two lime green bedrooms. I sure hope it sells for that price or something close to it. Yes sir, I do hope.

I don’t know what can be done about people texting and driving or even talking on their cell phone and driving. It’s obvious that 99.999% of the population isn’t talented enough to handle the combination of those tasks. Just this week I have had an 18 wheeler almost run off the road. One driver was weaving from one side of the lane to the other. Another was going 29 miles per hour on the interstate. I wish the law enforcement officers would ticket them for reckless driving. We need to get this in line with drinking and driving….with big fines, jail time and felony charges if they cause a wreck with serious injury or death.

Finally, I went to a local car dealer yesterday just to look at a couple of cars. I’m not planning to buy for a couple of years, so I was just looking. I noticed the dealership had added all sorts of silly extras and enhanced the price by several thousand dollars. I ran across that one time before. The solution??? Make them order a car to your specifications with nothing additional added. They’ll gripe and moan and even try to make you a real good deal on one in stock. But wait the six weeks that it usually takes and you will be a satisfied customer without any pressure from the sales people.

Of course in this day of instant gratification, six weeks is a lifetime. But, hey, you get a car that was made just for you. How personal can you get?