Summing up Spring 2012: Purdue, Part II, Beyond & Debt

Friday, it will be done. Five more classes I will attribute fonder remembrances to only if the grade meets my economic expectations. (Inflated ego or inflated grades?)

Yet, it was easier this go. Amazing what time management does for you as one gets older. When I was younger, I never had time - probably because I wasted it on people (or as I've seen, in hindsight, talking too much about them:see that presently in college) - and so, one rushes around, and presently, they whine a lot. I whined a lot too, then. Not this time.

Not to jinx it, but I should come in around 3.5 GPA-wise. That is the best semester I have turned in since I was in high school in the 1980s. (First college go: 2.7 was my best semester.)

Monday, I start Job #23...or is it #25? I forget, and should stop counting. It will pay for rent and food, and give me the additional finances to do another year I suspect at ol' Purdue. More importantly, I will focus on these three things, and only these three:
1) This job for enough cash and tighter money management (cushion for my screw ups)
2) Completing the book - yeah, been a real slacker on that one...July!!!!
3) Studying and taking the GMAT by end of August 2012: $250 bones for that, and whatever these applications cost

That last one will be the decision maker for my future in 2013. Apply to grad school in Indiana - IUPUI, Purdue, maybe Valpo...or too, some-always-admitting grad school somewhere else. I may also retake the LSAT, by October, but that's rather non-critical - yet if I could gain admittance.JOINT DEGREE!

But you get the idea: I will become grossly indebted ($120,000+), and as a result, by 44, I will also have my advanced education, one way or another. Some may say, "You'll never find the job to match since you'll be only productive, what, 10-15 years?" Well, maybe I'll be productive 30 or 40 years? As it stands, I am not productive or considered worthy via my current background, so, why not go into debt --it's the American way!

And also, in the long run, we all pass from this mortal coil. (History lesson: Many kings died insolvent back in the Medieval times...(Judith Bennett, Medieval Europe, 11th edition, 329) Anyone care? (Creditors) President Jefferson was deep in debt as he pass in 1826. Anyone chasing him through the ages? Nope. So why should I care? Or why should you care?)

I think I know enough about life's importance and debt too now.

My mother will be gone a year come June. And so, what I do is often a reflection on what she would hope I had done since her passing. Not everything - I am no saint - but when I stick to a higher purpose or thought.

That's all for now.

Alphaville: Forever Young plays us out....

20-10 Visions: Don't Let the Aughts go for Naught

A decade of decadence. A span of spam-filled E-mails from Nigeria. A quest for queries that made little difference to the malaise of life. A cadre of crass-filled, celeb-ME! quirky shows that made you vomit, or you ogled them more intently in utter disbelief. A boom-bust cycle for bankers from Bali to Bombay to Boston. A gaggle of whatcha-think-of-this websites where Google reigned surpeme.

Oh yes, the Aughts were a fun-filled, debt-laden, country-screwed-up-on-celebrity time. The Roarin' Twenties Redux?

As 2010 hits you in the face, with the problem of writing the date right, unless you have that all automated in your life, now, we hope again that the New Year brings hope and answers. Normally, it is a time to tighten up, get on swole, and flip da scrip, without blaming others for your flab, drab, and shabby life. (Another facet of the Aughts: language is changin' fast and TTYL, LOL, ROFL, BRB and POS borrowed from the acronym-laden computer field.)

From Lily Allen's The Fear:

I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore
I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore
When we think it will all become clear

‘ Cuz I’m being taken over by The Fear

People fear A LOT these days. Governments. Economic Woe. The Loss of Community while being sucked into the rabbit hole of the internet via Google and Facebook. 2012...

Yet, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself" to worry about.

The days and decade ahead should be one of fantastic visions filled with some version of what we want to become as people. And how we should figure out and live on the best path to a environmentally friendly, economically-beneficial and everyone-is-included situation? Clean up our act. Spend wisely. Think about future ramifications.

Of course, some will deny any changes need to be made at all, even after some of the more drastic events of the past decade. (Katrina & New Orleans, A Multi-Trillion-dollar banking meltdown, Oil price fluxuations, costly guerrilla wars in the Middle East, and BRIC's rise in economic dominance.)

So what can we do? What should we do to make the aughts lessons leap forward into the teens?

Self-improvement. Ben Franklin had his method for getting the most out of his life. He spent 2 years (approximately) working on these things. (from mysimplerlife.com):

1.TEMPERANCE. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
2. SILENCE. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
3. ORDER. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
4. RESOLUTION. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
5. FRUGALITY. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.
6. INDUSTRY. Lose no time; be always employ’d in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. SINCERITY. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. JUSTICE. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. MODERATION. Avoid extreams; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. CLEANLINESS. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, cloaths, or habitation.
11. TRANQUILLITY. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12. CHASTITY. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dulness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.
13. HUMILITY. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

If we can do these things half as good as Franklin, we probably will be a much better person to be around. We aught to do better in life.

My personal resolution: Start a Publishing business by forming an LLC. (In process.) It will center around sports and personal stories related to sports endeavors, at first. Hopefully, it will also take advantage of green technologies, like Kindle, instead of printing more books than are really needed. Downloadable files instead of a printed copy. Audio books in the near future. And whatever else seems to work.

For others: Maybe you have a hidden talent or a penchant for certain things or ideas. Utilize them more. Create something. Innovate it. Make America (I am an American) better in the teens. The world has gotten our Capitalistic message loud and clear. And they are doing things elsewhere we seemingly could never dream of. Education is a key too.We need to promote it, fund it and find a way to get those eager youths coming up with amazing technology that will annoy the best of us - and freak out the narrow minded amongst us. No matter. We need those things.

Happy New Year and Decade!!! 2010!!!

Yahoo!!! (Ok, they are so 1990s...)