In Other News.... Don't Fake Sign Langauge

I don't know how I missed this, but apparently someone thought that they could volunteer to be the sign language translator at Nelson Mandela's funeral (yup, you hear this right) without actually knowing any sign language. So that's embarrassing. Don't do that.

After multiple sources from different countries confirmed that all of his signs were gibberish and he wasn't actually signing anything, he blamed it on a schizophrenic episode and said that he had started hallucinating during the presentation (which was why he was just waving his arms about, essentially, instead of, you know, helping deaf people).

The Markets. They Be Bubbly.

I love Bill Gross. I really do. In some ways, he reminds me of a slightly more outspoken, more-in-the-news Warren Buffet. He has the same folksy, let-me-break-it-down-for-you-through-an-adorable-metaphor-story-ism, he has the same look of someone's highly intelligent, very sharp grandfather. He inherently exudes a sort of presence that clearly says, "Don't mess with me. I've done this since before there was a stock market. I know all there is to know". Whether or not that last one is actually true is a different story, but the comment still stands.

He has been taking to the airwaves recently, calling the markets bubbly, claiming that the easy money policies have created artificially priced assets. He claims that, eventually, investors will realize that they are taking far too much risk for far too little reward, and then (I think this is his implication) will vacate those types of assets for something more stable, say, a fixed income vehicle of some sort. Who doesn't love a good solid bond?

Maybe it's because he's currently looking at his 7th month of negative cash flow from his fund at PIMCO, (totaling approximately $3.7B in cashouts, this would keep the fund on pace to be its biggest ever yearly outflow) that has got him in a tizzy. Whereas Gross' fund has given investors a loss of 1.72% this year, U.S. stocks have rallied 20% this year. (However, in all fairness, I need to note that in the past three months the fund has outperformed 93% of its peers and provided a 2.44% return.)It makes me a little sad to see PIMCO struggle like this, being from my hometown and the employer of many of my friends, but, as everyone says, we're at a turning point. The market is beginning to pivot, and any person in their right mind would never put their money in fixed income when (taking on more risk) they could see a great return as the market recovers. I, for one, have never really liked investing during the winter season as I think that there's too many variables to be able to accurately guess (because that's what all investors are essentially doing, no matter what they say) how the market will react to things-- especially when news outlets are releasing data about sales, profits and volume spent seemingly every 30 seconds. So I'll sit on it for a month before I make any decisions, but maybe I'll put a little more into my PIMCO Total Returns. Just to help 'em out.

Things I've Learned from Working

 

I was in a deep discussion the other day with one of my friends around what our worst and best jobs were. We thought deeply about what makes a good job a good one and a bad job a bad one.

All the normal characters were brought out-- a bad job? Well that would entail that you had at least one weird coworker who was always strangely (or outrightly) inappropriately sexual in the workplace, or a boss that tried to use the common approach of feedback ("Hey! Let's grab coffee, I want to hear about how you think that went") to be a truly awful person ("Is that soy? Did you order that with soy?", "Yes, I'm lactose intolerant...", "But soy is so fattening! Do you really think you need that right now?").But we soon realized that it was actually much easier to pinpoint what our favorite (best) job was then our worst ones, because even our worst ones taught us something about this crazy life we live. So I'm not going to comment any further on which one is my favorite or least favorite, but here's my list of things I've learned from each of my jobs:

1. "Street Marketer". Nope, this isn't code for "took her clothes off for change", though, in California that's entirely a possibility. No, what this meant was that, for a summer, I was that annoying person that snuck around car parking lots and put little flyers on your window for when you came back. The flyers advertised a pizza place on Main Street in Huntington Beach that you probably would've gone to anyway. But hey, it paid $20/hour, and that was a lot when you're 13! Things I learned:
• Car alarms are surprisingly sensitive, particularly around the windshield area. You're actually much more effective if you tuck it into the window on the drivers side because then i won't slip down and they'll see it as they get into the car
• You might think that parking your car in a garage might give you a little added safety, since there's a person sitting there taking money and watching people come in and out of the garage. That person is usually some high schooler who couldn't give less of a crap about someone coming in and touching your car. I'm sure it helped because I was a 13 year old girl in a jean mini, but don't hold your breath that I couldn't grow up into a 27 year old miscreant in a jean mini
2. Basketball Coach. This one is kind of self explanatory, except that it was for 9-11 year old girls. 
• This age group is confusing as hell. They're beginning to understand that they are supposed to be holy terrors in about a year or so, but they're figuring out (slowly) how far they can push their boundaries without getting in trouble just yet. Best bet is to treat them like you would a younger sibling
• This age group also hasn't figured out yet that sports are good! They're cool! They keep you in shape throughout your high school (and if you're lucky) college years and beyond! The answer to this misconception is to make them run suicides
3. Secretary and Counselor for the Boys and Girls Club. This was kind of awesome. Check in the kids, answer the  phones and then go help them with their homework or play kickball. 
• I got a little metal stool that I could sit on behind the desk, which changed my life. Would highly recommend this as sometimes the parents just want to chat when they pick up and drop off their kids
• You get sick a lot more when you're around this many children of all different age groups. Because. Well, children are just walking biohazards really. You also develop a favorite age group (mine are the 5-6 year olds because they still think you're cool and they still love you and will listen to you)
• You realize that the idea of having children is terrifying. So this is the perfect job for a teenager
4. Student Worker at the Local Cafe on Campus. This was kind of awesome because, well, free food that wasn't cafeteria food. And, it was right across the street from my dorm
•  Uh free food? Awesome. Making random new types of food with the given ingredients? Awesome.
• Not awesome was the mandatory over night shifts we had to take a few times a semester and cleaning up puke during this overnight shifts because it always happened on the weekends
5. Summer RA. For girls dorms. For sports camps, alumni reunions and whatever else happened on campus
• Adults, when put into dorms, turn back into students
• Young girls, when at sports camp and away from their parents, turn into squealing psychos (seriously, they terrorize each other)
• The best type of people to RA are nuns and priests that are here for what I assume are nun and priest conferences

 Then I graduated and got a "real job". *sigh* I guess you can't have it all....

Jon

When I was young, my parents owned a small deli in our tiny little town. Every day, Jon would come in. I was probably 4 or 5 when I made my first memory of Jon, but apparently he had come in to my parents deli every day since before I was born.

Everyday, he would buy a pack of Camels. Which I always thought was fitting since he always had a grizzly, blond, 5 o'clock shadow and kind of looked like what I imagined a camel would look like. His specialties were talking about the weather, wearing a different colored (but same) flannel shirt every day, making Donald Duck noises and telling me inappropriate life truths for someone of my age. My mom was always nice to him, and would always give him a free cup of coffee for his 3 hours of out-loud pondering (while he chain smoked at least a quarter of his pack-- everyone smoked inside back then, it was the thing to do), because I think we assumed that he didn't have anyone else. Any time that we tried to ask him about his children, he would always change the subject or just brush us off with something like, "Well, they're much older than this little one here. Enjoy her while you can! They grow up, and then they forgetcha."

I remember that, once, I asked him why he worked, because in my mind, my parents didn't work. This was just their life. They were born into the making of sandwiches during lunchtime and providing candy to kids on their way home. That was just science. As usual, when I asked a question that maybe struck Jon in an unexpected way, he paused in his blowing of smoke into the general cloud that surrounded him and stared hard at me like I had just materialized in front of him.

"That's just what you do." He said.
"Is it fun? Do you get to be with your friends?"
He laughed. "After awhile, even if they're not your friends, they're your friends."
I stayed quiet because I sensed I was about to be exposed to an inappropriate truth, which in my mind were just "adult secrets".
"Some people work because they want things. But don't you ever fall into that trap. You don't actually need things. Most people need very few things. You should stay away from people who try to tell you that you need a lot to be happy. They're just trying to make themselves feel better because things are the only things that make them happy."
"But I want things." (This was true-- I really wanted that Little Artist Set at the craft store that my mom told me repeatedly was too expensive.)
"Try giving some of the things you have to someone else." And then he made a Donald Duck noise and went back to making a cumulonimbus (or at least a very heavy fog) around himself.

I did end up getting that Little Artist set that year. I used it once but quickly lost interest. For my birthday, I got a very similar "art for kids" set. I told my mom to donate it to someone else since I already had one.

Now, every Christmas season, I think about Jon. He's probably long gone by now, but I still think about how simple his life was, and how much perspective he brought to my life-- even today.

"The Logic of Stupid Poor People"

Came across this article and had to share it.... Super interesting.