I take a late lunch, and go over to the gym to work out. I do this because the gym is much less crowded in the afternoon than if I go right at 12. While I do my 1 hr cardio workouts, I have been reading The Essays of Warren Buffett: Lessons for Corporate America. It is a fantastic read. Buffett’s style of prose is both easy to read and amusing. What is more however, is his remarkable insight into business shines through in every page.

I am reminded as I read it, of Richard P. Feynman and his book “Surely you are Joking Mr. Feynman.” While the topics are different the authors view of the world is the same. That is, they both break down topics that initially appear to be complex into their simplest components. Boiling down a subject into the easiest pieces is both the best way to understand it, and the fastest.

Feynman also said that if you can’t explain a topic to someone in 60 seconds, then you don’t really understand it yourself.

While reading Buffett’s work I came across something I had read in his financial reports before (they are all well worth reading) and it struck me just as strongly as I had read it the first time. Currently, the market is falling badly, and bank stocks in particular are taking a hit. Some of them should be taking a huge hit as they are in danger of a collapse, others should not as they are fundamentally strong.

And that brings me to Buffett. Everyone is panicking and selling bank stocks, regardless if the bank is actually strong or not. In fact, the stronger banks are falling in price, and the ones in serious danger of collapse have their share price going UP. So, in light of that, I reprint the Buffett Quiz:

A short quiz: If you plan to eat hamburgers throughout your life and are not a cattle producer, should you wish for higher or lower prices for beef? Likewise, if you are going to buy a car from time to time but are not an auto manufacturer, should you prefer higher or lower car prices? These questions, of course, answer themselves.
But now for the final exam: If you expect to be a net saver during the next five years, should you hope for a higher or lower stock market during that period?
Many investors get this one wrong. Even though they are going to be net buyers of stocks for many years to come, they are elated when stock prices rise and depressed when they fall. In effect, they rejoice because prices have risen for the “hamburgers” they will soon be buying.
This reaction makes no sense. Only those who will be sellers of equities in the near future should be happy at seeing stocks rise. Prospective purchasers should much prefer sinking prices.

This quote, attributed to Baron Rothschild in 1871 should be the mantra of any person calling themselves an investor. And by “investor” I am referring to the Ben Graham use of the term as found in his classic work, The Intelligent Investor.

There is another full market panic on today, I bought some stocks in a US based bank yesterday, and wish I had more capital to do the same again today. Are there risks associated with this purchase? Yes. Have I taken steps to mitigate this risk? Of course. Still, everyone is panicking, and bank stock prices are in free fall mode.

Strangely, no one seems to remember the “buy cheap, sell dear” advice. Everyone seems to be selling their shares to “protect” themselves. They are taking a loss so they can buy the shares back at a higher price when things are more “stable”. The funny thing is, 10 years from now, everyone will look back at stock prices today, and wish they had bought.

There is indeed blood in the streets, some big banks are in trouble and it is serious. So what to do? I say listen to Baron Rothschild.

On March 7th, I stopped by Future Shop to purchase a game controller for Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. As I did so, I absent-mindedly left my wallet on the counter. Afterwards, I quickly noticed my wallet was missing. I first checked my truck, then my place, and saw no sign of it. I knew the last time I had seen it for certain.

I phoned Future Shop, and they said that they did not have the wallet. So, I searched my truck again, and my place again… nothing. This was getting alarming. Concerned that my wallet had been stolen, I started the annoying process of getting my cards replaced. Then, a few days ago, I received a blog post from Kelly McCaig of Sims Recycling, checking to see if I was the George Walford who had lost a wallet.

I replied that I was, and immediately got a phone call. Speaking with Kelly, I immediately asked him if he had found my wallet in Future Shop. He informed me that the story was stranger than that. Much stranger.

It seems that I left my wallet at Future Shop as I had thought, and a thoughtful cashier left it in the register to be picked up… And this is where things went awry. The register was recycled and sent to Toronto for disassembly. Where Kelly found it. Kelly then had to secure permission from IBM who actually owned the till to send me my wallet, because technically, any items in the till belonged to them. Fortunately, I quickly got a call back, and he had secured permission to send me my wallet.

Getting my wallet today at Purolator was a bit amusing however. The woman behind the counter asked to see my drivers license, so she could hand me the package. I told her that she had it, and that it was actually IN the package that she was holding. This created a bit of a recursive problem in that she needed my ID to be allowed to open the package, and my ID was IN the package.

Fortunately, I had a new Costco card that I obtained using my passport, and I was able to use that to get enough confirmation to open the package, and then use my drivers license, which was in the package to finally accept… well, the license itself and the rest of the wallet!

At least I have my wallet back, now I need to find a way to thank Kelly as the Beer Store in Toronto does not accept remote payment.

I have had a busy past week.

On Saturday I headed out to paddle the Nanaimo River again. On the river were Tim and his daughter Cara (or Kara?), Larry, and Jessica and myself. The level was good, but much lower than before. The level was dropping off fast. I had a good time, and did not have to roll once. In fact, in my last 5 runs out, I have not flipped once at all! (That includes Sunday).

Jessica did great for a relative new paddler, even after following me down a bad line at the A-Frame drop. I chose what was a good line at high level, not knowing that there was a massive pillow and rock in the center of the river. I boofed it, and the rock below, but turned back to wave her off, but she boofed it as well. Pretty good for someone who is just getting her roll dialed in on the river! Cara was paddling amazingly well - especially given her age. She gets to go to Montreal soon for Kayak Slalom racing. pretty impressive.

I was set to head out to Vancouver on Sunday morning, but my paddle on Saturday was so good, I elected to head to the Cowichan as well! On the river were a whole bunch of people. I did not get to know all their names. There was Gerald who took a picture of me just coming out of final drop. I look a bit weird in it as I am just recovering from a face full of water. There was also Jessica, Cara, Tim, and about 10 or so other people. I am meeting more and more paddlers, and this is just awesome. I hope to get involved in a subset of the VI club for the Victoria area so I always have people to paddle with.

The Cowichan had dropped considerably, and there were not many features around on it. Not for me in the jive anyways. Or i thought so. As we got lower down the river, I found a few fast surfing waves that I had to work to ride. Most everyone else was in the new smaller boats. Tim was in a kevlar C-1 Cara in Kevlar kayak, and Jessica and myself in Jives. So we had the biggest boats on the river.

After I ran last drop (as seen in the photo) I continued on down to try the wave below final drop. It was unbelievable. It was just a phenomenal wave. And because it was running so fast, and I had the Jive as opposed to the Super Ego, I could surf up a storm on it. It was a great ride. But then a guy swam, and I had to break off to go rescue him. Unfortunately I did not have my river booties (I thought I had lost them, but I had just left them in my car) and I had a long walk back to the take out after the rescue with no footwear. No big deal, except the rocks on the Cow are very sharp. Fortunately, the guy I helped rescue (I also helped him swim by encouraging him to try the wave - my bad!) came back down and carried my kayak back for me, because the walk back was taking me a long time.

My left leg goes numb often in my Jive because I am too tall for it. It was numb for a long time on Saturday, on Sunday I think I pulled my calf muscle while paddling, but because my leg was numb I could not tell I had cramped it up. I found that out starting Sunday night…

After heading back home, cleaning up my gear, I shot off to the ferry to get over to Vancouver (where I am as I write this) for my VMWare ESX/VI3 course. I have been so terribly busy out here. My brain hurts from VMWare information and the labs. I have had lots of requests to visit friends, but I sadly don’t have the time to see them all. I did get to visit Christine, but then I had to drop off her computer system! The VMWare course is great, I should be able to take the exam in Victoria soon. But I will have a good amount of study before the test to become VCP certified.

Other than that, because I finally have my first real cash flow card, and because I feel I have worked so hard, and made so many sacrifices, I dropped $1650 at Ikea today. You know you are an adult when you are exited about buying furniture at Ikea… What ever happened to wanting toys? At least I did it smartly, I got it all on credit for no interest, and I am taking the money I would have used to buy the stuff outright and putting it in a GIC so I earn interest, and pay off the card before the end date.

I hope there is more water to paddle this weekend… The island is drying up fast. Still, I can head out to Wenatchee and Clearwater to get my Whitewater fix on long weekends! Provided that I can walk normally once my calf heals up…

I check my credit rating every November. It always pays to keep track of it. The last time I checked, my FICO score was 715. A bit low because of a black mark that I have, and I have to wait until 2008 for it to disappear… However, I had $350.00 sent to a collections agency by ADT alarms for an account that should have been canceled. However, they made an error on the issuing of a new contract, and failed to cancel the old contract. Since my name was also connected with the original contract, they sent the supposed “outstanding” amount to collections. And the first I heard about it was from the collections agency - about an account that was no longer mine!

After months of effort and phone calls, I managed to finally get that account removed from collections. The collections people “suggested” I pay the $350, which I refused, because it was an error first off, and secondly, that would have had zero effect on my credit rating! Thus I fought it. Today I confirmed that it was in fact removed, and my credit rating jumped up from 715 in November, to 743 as of today. I am just shy of the 750 mark, and I eventually want to stay above 800. A number of people think I am a bit silly tracking my credit rating like this, but just a few points adds up to thousands and thousands of dollars on a mortgage. In fact, with my new rating, I should be able to get a rate that is lower than what I got originally, even though the prime rate is higher than when I got my mortgage.

Of course, I am now about to take on massive levels of debt in order to finance a second home - and I have been approved for the second mortgage, which really surprised me. So I am taking some significant financial risks doing this, but I am getting closer to my goals. That does not mean of course that it is not worrisome. However, at least living out of a real home as opposed to a motel room will be nice when I finally achieve that.

Investigating more into my water meter issues at home, I checked my water meter reading. Calling the City of Nanaimo today, I found that according to the meter, I was using over 8000 gallons of water a day since my bill noted below! That is $2215.15 worth of water in 53 days!

Top that off with the fact that I have to move out of the place that I am house sitting, but I canceled the hotel room I had - even though I had it until the 22nd! Oops.

Well, that means I go back to commuting for the rest of this week. At least I will be in the Okanagan for a bit, and hopefully have some sort of accommodation in January. Least ways, I hope so by that point.

On the upside, I got the city of Nanaimo to send an emergency crew out to my house to check the meter and the line. However, when I phoned back, I was told that “8000 Gallons a day is not an emergency”. I don’t know about you, but a water bill in excess of two thousand dollars sounds like an emergency to me! On the upside, there is a good chance that it is a broken water meter. Lets hope so.

If it is, I think I will do a few runs of Apex on my tele-ski’s to celebrate. Or, at least fall down a few of them.

So, I get my water bill, and from October 26 to Dec 08 I have apparently used 153120 Gallons of water. That is 696 Cubic Meters of Water. Now, I don’t have any clue where that water could be going, as I have checked for leaks. But this means I now owe $518.16 on my utilities bill - and that is for water alone! To make things worse, I have not even been home for much of this time, so my water usage should be severely decreased, not increased!

I have to check my main water meter on my property line - if I can find it - and see what the reading is there. I may have a break in my main water line. The total bill comes to $615.47. That is much much higher than normal.

This is really annoying. That certanly reduces some of the spending money I had hoped to have over Christmas.

The last 4 months have been tough. Commuting for such a long time, and such a long distance was very hard. For the last little while I have had hardly any social contact outside of work, and nearly zero exercise.

Now, I am in Victoria, but don’t as yet have permanent residence. That is something I have been working on. Couple that with the other choices I have had to make in the last few years. My car is in bad shape now, commuting 1250+ km/week with a bad exhaust valve will do that. Could I afford a better one? Sure. Then I have a nicer car… and that takes me further from my goals. That just sets me back.

I am getting so much closer though. Close enough to almost taste it. I know within the next 2 years, that these constraints I have put on myself for my financial goals will pay off. Just a little more, just a little longer. Nearly there.

The worst part about these choices is not having my Attack Schnorkie with me:

Limiting myself in so many things has been hard, but not being greeted by this 10 pound furball when I get through the door is one of the harder things. Daisy, however, is probably having a blast being pampered at my Mom’s place.

So close… So close…

Penn and Teller’s award winning show Bullshit is fantastic. You simply have to go out and rent these shows on DVD, or watch them on showcase if you are able. Jonathan first pointed these shows out to me, and I am grateful that he did. Ironically, my views have become more libertarian (see lower post) since watching them. You might find that they use a large amount of profanity, and they do. It turns out that you can’t be sued for using profanity, but you can be sued for calling someone a quack or a fraud.

Season 5 is currently in production, and I don’t think seasons 3 or 4 are available on DVD yet, but you simply must check this show out. Probably the best thing around on television.

The Pirate Bay has been back online for a bit, while seedler.org seems down for the count. The MPAA published a document claiming that they had managed to stop The Pirate bay for good, and they trumped that as a victory. A Pyhrric victory perhaps.

Within days, The Pirate Bay was back online in Amsterdam, and now, back in Sweden once again. The servers are being rebuilt, and most of the site is back to normal. To make matters worse for the MPAA/RIAA cabal, The Pirate Bay is as popular as ever, and the people of Sweden are not amused that the MPAA pressured the U.S. government to pressure the Swedish Government, to pressure the Swedish Police to seize the Pirate Bay servers.

This means that not only are the Pirate Bay servers back online, but they just got a whole bunch of free PR, and the Swedes are very unhappy at their local laws being violated on the orders of a U.S. corporation. What this means is that The Pirate Bay will become more popular than ever, and that the MPAA and RIAA will continue in their downward spiral.

Of course, you cannot blame these companies for doing this. P2P file sharing represents a direct threat to the MPAA and RIAA themselves. Much more so than the threat to the actual artists and movie studios. If online distribution of music and media takes full hold (as it certainly seems to have done) and it becomes decentralized (as it is likely to be) then there will be absolutely no need for the MPAA and RIAA to exist at all. So when you see these organizations attacking sites like The Pirate Bay to “support the artists” what they are really doing is trying to preserve their business model of being the distributors for this kind of media. But the distribution model is changing, and they will go out of business, and it looks like sites like The Pirate Bay will keep going on.