Absolutely Anything Else

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fluffy2560 wrote:

Investing in Sea World sounds a bit fishy.

Groan....

fluffy2560 wrote:

The thing about land is that they are not making any more of it (except in Volcano Land).

Well, they are making less of it, with rising sea levels.

fluffy2560 wrote:

There was talk of a stop on the metro 4 here

Apparently there still is, and talk of extending M1 (which I would imagine would be technically rather difficult, unless you are somehow going to lengthen all the old station in the city centre). They were also going to try to join up M2 with the HÉV 6/7 at Ors Vézer tére which would seem fairly simple but of course would need upgrades to signalling, change in voltage, etc etc.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Be good if they just built a cycle path to the next village.  I'd be happy with that to start.  They sort of messed about with that idea but it never really got used as it fizzled out about 300m from the village at the airport. No-one used it so it wasn't a serious effort.

That seems to be the way with cycle paths worldwide. Draw a line down a street, or convert a public footpath into a cycle path by putting up blue signs with bicycle symbols on them, voilá we have made 555km of new cycle path. The real investment, priority at dangerous junctions, separation of traffic, repurposing disused railway lines etc etc doesn't happen very often.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

I'll have to see if that is available on Netflix or not.
My sister mentioned that show/movie in the past.
I have been looking lately at allot of "thruther" channels on U tube.
Tried to stay away from these truth sayers but my son and cousins have been going on about them for ages, I wanted to keep my head in the sand.
One just played a old documentary from the mid 1970's explaining how the US Army used volunteer US soldiers in mind control , drug and LSD experiments and never did any follow up on them after the testing.
Oh well, again, I have misplaced my tin foil hat...
Wish this wasn't real and I was just making it up.

Where did you buy your tin foil hat?

Sounds like the Manchurian Candidate all over again.  Seems like fake news.   British  did their own experiments:

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Investing in Sea World sounds a bit fishy.

Groan....

I'm trying.

.....very trying....

One needs to have a porpoise in life.  Find a plaice to exercise your mussels.   Otherwise we're all prawns.  Trawling around here is good use of the net.

I'll get my coat.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

Devaluation would be like saying, today, water boils at 175 degrees Celsius. Again, the temperature of the water hasn't changed, the name of the scale hasn't changed, you've just devalued Celsius. You've printed more Celsii without changing the amount of the underlying commodity.

I am not sure that works as you're comparing a physical constant with scaling.   Like, what's in a name?

It's like comparing gravity with devaluation.

No, it isn't. It is like comparing the measurementof gravity (in G) with the value of a currency. If you measure gravity in some other scale (metres per square second, say) you get different numbers but it doesn't change the amount of gravity. What devaluation does is not to say "let's measure gravity in F#s instead" but "one G isn't 9.81 m/s2 any more, it is 10.5, so gravity is cheaper". But there's still the same amount of gravity around, and more G's to buy it with, so gravity, er, rises. The cost of gravity settles at 10.5 G so that oil doesn't gush out of Venezuelan wells into crooked pockets any quicker than it already does, and everyone's back where they started.

fluffy2560 wrote:

What I think you need to say is the temperature increase changes in terms of bang for your buck.   So I put in the same amount of energy and instead of getting 100 C, I get a lower temperature.

You're putting the cart before the horse. I am saying if you devalue the degree celsius, you can't buy as much energy with it. So you now need 175 celsii to get water to boil instead of 100, if you only put 100 in, it won't boil any more. And of course now if you want to buy Fahrenheits or Kelvins or Reaumurs, they will cost you more celsii (the exchange rate has changed). In short, devaluation doesn't work.   

It might work with height.  The higher you are, you cannot heat water at 100 C due to lower pressure, it will boil earlier.   In higher pressure (lower down), it's less ....errr..inflationary.....

I left out the assumptions of standard atmospheric pressure, pure water etc, for brevity.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Investing in Sea World sounds a bit fishy.

Groan....

I'm trying.

.....very trying....

One needs to have a porpoise in life.  Find a plaice to exercise your mussels.   Otherwise we're all prawns.  Trawling around here is good use of the net.

I'll get my coat.

Why make us suffer? Is it just for the halibut?

fluffy2560 wrote:

Why is more disposable income inflationary?   This is actually a spending boost to the economy.  It's only inflationary if prices are rising more than increasing income.  So that's just a reflection of the economy.

If you have more disposable income, you have to dispose of it somehow. Either you can save it (i.e. lend it to someone else) or you can spend it. Chances are you're not going to stick all of it under the bed, otherwise it would be pointless printing more money. If you save it, you are lending it to someone else who in turn has the choice to save it or spend it. Ultimately, sooner or later it gets spent.

So printing money, on aggregate, increases the propensity to spend. Since there's more of that, sellers can increase their prices because people are not as niggardly about bargains, they buy more stuff, they buy better stuff, or they buy the same stuff sooner. There is more demand and (I assume) the same supply so in the short to medium term, prices go up.

This can be tempered in a number of ways. Sooner or later, we hope, domestic supply will increase to meet the demand, so the economy gets on its feet. But in the short term, before the factory gets its new plant so that it can step up production, either the price of the existing supply goes up or it gets bought from a factory in Shanghai instead, which increases the pressure on the exchange rate.

Inflationary pressure is not really a reflection of the economy. It is part of the economy - a big enough part that it cannot simply be considered a kinda sensitive measuring instrument that barely affects the sample being measured. An increase in the headline inflation rate tends to lead to increasing wage demands, and we all get sucked into the inflationary wage whirlpool.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

.....  It's like comparing gravity with devaluation.

No, it isn't. It is like comparing the measurementof gravity (in G) with the value of a currency. If you measure gravity in some other scale (metres per square second, say) you get different numbers but it doesn't change the amount of gravity. What devaluation does is not to say "let's measure gravity in F#s instead" but "one G isn't 9.81 m/s2 any more, it is 10.5, so gravity is cheaper". But there's still the same amount of gravity around, and more G's to buy it with, so gravity, er, rises. The cost of gravity settles at 10.5 G so that oil doesn't gush out of Venezuelan wells into crooked pockets any quicker than it already does, and everyone's back where they started.

fluffy2560 wrote:

What I think you need to say is the temperature increase changes in terms of bang for your buck.   So I put in the same amount of energy and instead of getting 100 C, I get a lower temperature.

You're putting the cart before the horse. I am saying if you devalue the degree celsius, you can't buy as much energy with it. So you now need 175 celsii to get water to boil instead of 100, if you only put 100 in, it won't boil any more. And of course now if you want to buy Fahrenheits or Kelvins or Reaumurs, they will cost you more celsii (the exchange rate has changed). In short, devaluation doesn't work.   

It might work with height.  The higher you are, you cannot heat water at 100 C due to lower pressure, it will boil earlier.   In higher pressure (lower down), it's less ....errr..inflationary.....

I left out the assumptions of standard atmospheric pressure, pure water etc, for brevity.

Hmmm.....I am not convinced.  This looks like the full 1/2 hour. 

Leave the gravity idea floating for a bit.

I think the model of merely changing temperature is too simple because it doesn't consider external factors.

Celsius is just a convenience as are currency swaps in Kevins, Nigels, Rodneys etc.  All you are doing is changing ratios as far as the outside world is concerned.  1:5 is the same as 10:50.  If you wanted to finance oil imports, you have to pay in Trumps, not Vlads.  It might be devalued inside the country but if you have to import all goods, it's done nothing at all.  But if you keep real wages stagnant, then yes, that's inflationary inside the country but externally, it's done nothing as no-one will want your Vlads (or specifically will need a lot more of them). Devalued, sure, but so what.

My water boiling analogy works better because it includes pressure, temperature and energy.  It doesn't work without it. So whatever energy you put in (i.e. proxy for currency), you get  less hot water, e.g.  less value.  In other words, devaluation by height and incidentally slightly less gravity. 

I think what I'm saying is that there's a third variable.   

As for gravity overall, it's weighing on my mind. I'm not sure what a 3rd variable is*.  Obviously it does work if you are trading gravity futures from different planets but that's a whole other world.

*Might be mass or distance (bloody height again)

fluffy2560 wrote:

Hmmm.....I am not convinced.  This looks like the full 1/2 hour. 

Leave the gravity idea floating for a bit.

I think the model of merely changing temperature is too simple because it doesn't consider external factors.

Indeed. Like all models, it simplifies reality. But inő my model, water still boils at the same temperature. Temperature hasn"t changed. Only the temperature scale has changed, to New Celsius with boiling point of water = 175 degrees New C.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Celsius is just a convenience as are currency swaps in Kevins, Nigels, Rodneys etc.  All you are doing is changing ratios as far as the outside world is concerned.  1:5 is the same as 10:50.

I don't see the point. You've not changed the ratio there at all. You've just quoted it in different notation.

fluffy2560 wrote:

My water boiling analogy works better because it includes pressure, temperature and energy.  It doesn't work without it. So whatever energy you put in (i.e. proxy for currency), (...)

Ah... this is where our models differ. In my model. the temperature scale, not energy, is the proxy for currency. Energy (and thus temperature) is the proxy for value.

fluffy2560 wrote:

(....)I think what I'm saying is that there's a third variable.

Oh, hundreds of 'em.

fluffy2560 wrote:

As for gravity overall, it's weighing on my mind. I'm not sure what a 3rd variable is*.  Obviously it does work if you are trading gravity futures from different planets but that's a whole other world.

Gravity is a myth. The world sucks.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

those poor greyhounds in racing don't have homes, they live on the race grounds.
Makes me sad.

in the UK most greyhounds are owned by relatively poor people as pets-who-also-are-quite-quick. It has always been a kinda working-class pastime like that, far cheaper to keep a greyhound than a horse.

Unfortunately dog tracks are closing a lot, partly because of the way betting tax revenues are now doled out (i.e. to rich people who own horses, no surprise there) and partly just I guess how society has changed now, the idea of going down the dogs on a Friday night more for the night out than the betting, somehow seems less appealing to the yoof of today than playing DogTrackSimulator on their eyepads or whatever.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Hmmm.....I am not convinced.  This looks like the full 1/2 hour. 

Leave the gravity idea floating for a bit.

I think the model of merely changing temperature is too simple because it doesn't consider external factors.

Indeed. Like all models, it simplifies reality.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Celsius is just a convenience as are currency swaps in Kevins, Nigels, Rodneys etc.  All you are doing is changing ratios as far as the outside world is concerned.  1:5 is the same as 10:50.

I don't see the point. You've not changed the ratio there at all. You've just quoted it in different notation..

That's entirely the point.  Devaluing has done nothing outside the borders as far as exchange goes.  It's just substituting one pile of paper for a bigger pile.  And it's the same proportionally for all other currencies too.  It's just scaling.

It may have however improved exports and caused additional growth seemingly putting more money in people's pockets but conversely it's made imports more expensive nullifying the higher income.

What was the question again?

SimonTrew wrote:

Ah... this is where our models differ. In my model. the temperature scale, not energy, is the proxy for currency. Energy (and thus temperature) is the proxy for value.

The amount of energy is always the same at sea level.   To boil 1L water at sea level takes the same amount of energy over time each at and every time.  There's no mechanism to change it.  It's a fixed amount regardless of the label or scale we put on temperature.

We can only have control on the amount of energy (or the actual liquid) for some other change in the liquid.   To change the value of boiling point according to the amount of energy we have, we need to change the pressure, i.e. go up a mountain (i.e. inflation/deflation etc).  There comes a point where no matter how much energy we put in,  the boiling point never changes.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

I don't see the point. You've not changed the ratio there at all. You've just quoted it in different notation..

That's entirely the point.  Devaluing has done nothing outside the borders as far as exchange goes.  It's just substituting one pile of paper for a bigger pile.  And it's the same proportionally for all other currencies too.  It's just scaling.

It may have however improved exports and caused additional growth seemingly putting more money in people's pockets but conversely it's made imports more expensive nullifying the higher income.

What was the question again?

The question was whether gambling is the same as the stock market. I think the answer to that is roughly 'from a technical point of view they are largely the same, but since investments on the stock market tend to return a profit over time, whereas bets tend to return a loss, there is a quantitative difference'.

In the meantime, I think we have agreed without quite saying so that quantitative easing is just a slimey political word for devaluation.

The question remains whether devaluation can ever be a good thing. I think it can't ever, you think (or rather I think you think) that sometimes it can.

The half-hour is nearly up.

SimonTrew wrote:

In the meantime, I think we have agreed without quite saying so that quantitative easing is just a slimey political word for devaluation.

The question remains whether devaluation can ever be a good thing. I think it can't ever, you think (or rather I think you think) that sometimes it can.

The half-hour is nearly up.

29.59.

I don't think quantative easing is the same as devaluation.  It might seem to do that but it might just be lubricant by easing cash flow by increasing the money supply, especially if, for example, it was coupled with lowered interest rates.  If I remember, that was the case.

Yes, I think devaluation  can be a good thing.  In the short term, it can improve exports and therefore expand economy and growth.  In a large economy, with few imports, then sure, why not.  China might be a good example. 

Actually in Hungary, they had something called crawling peg devaluation in earlier years post-change.  It was a gradual devaluation. It stopped a major crash and expanded the economy.  Quite interesting and it seems to have worked. Been relatively stable since they floated the HUF.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

Ah... this is where our models differ. In my model. the temperature scale, not energy, is the proxy for currency. Energy (and thus temperature) is the proxy for value.

The amount of energy is always the same  (...)

Yes indeed. Which is to say (in my model) the amount of value stays constant.  That's just an axiom of my model. How you measure it (the proxy for currency) can change.

In your model (if I have you right) the amount of energy can change. That's a perfectly valid model too, and perhaps more realistic, but it's not my model. So we are arguing about somewhat different things. I'm assuming that value - that is to say, how much the world is worth as a whole - stays constant, whereas of course the world gets richer over time. On the other hand I am also saying that value is a subjective thing - relativistic if you like - which seems contradictory with saying it is constant. It's not really constant even for me the observer since how much I value a cigarette depends on when I last had a cigarette, etc etc.

But I was trying to get round to discussing your original posit of whether we should include inflation in e.g. what a "real"  interest rate/rate of return is. I think in most day-to-day things, we tend to dismiss inflation. This ugly expression, "in real terms", which means "the same after adjusting for inflation", is obviously just recursive nonsense. My Máttyás doesn't magically change from being 1.000 Ft to 1.065 Ft just because inflation is 6.5%. "In real terms" something that increases in price costs me more. What people mean by "in real terms" is "in completely imaginary terms".

In short, do we tend to adjust for Net Present Value? And I think generally we don't do that in day-to-day transactions. On longer term things like annual pay rises (remember them?) we usually do. With our mortgages we hope inflation is high so that we can repay them later with cheaper money, with (private) pensions we hope it is low so that our savings will still be worth something when the government kindly deigns to allow us to get at them.

For example I placed a £1 bet last June  (when I was last in the UK) that Theresa May would not be Prime Minister of the UK by new year. I got 5/2 which I thought was a bit mean. Let's assume I won. I would have got £3.50 back:  £1 * 5 / 2 +  £1 (my original stake). But that £3.50 would have been worth slightly less in the January than it would have been in the June, i.e. the pound had depreciated because of inflation. But I would probably think, oh, I have won £2.50. I wouldn't think, oh, I have won £2.46.

Since the half-hour argument is well over time I am now arguing overtime (at time-and-a-half).

SimonTrew wrote:

The question was whether gambling is the same as the stock market.

I should also qualify that by saying gambling that has an element of skill. Gambling on games of pure chance is just a mug's game of course and nothing like the stock market (except perhaps penny shares etc where the element of chance is overwhelming).

A few statisticians have compiled long-term records on e.g. football pools. spot-the-ball etc and found that they are indistinguishable statistically from games of chance, although are classified as games of skill (because UK gambling laws make quite a distinction between the two). So I think one has to use a bit of common sense to decide whether something is a game of chance or game of skill (or, more commonly, a combination of the two). I don't find much fun in playing games of pure chance, myself.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

Ah... this is where our models differ. In my model. the temperature scale, not energy, is the proxy for currency. Energy (and thus temperature) is the proxy for value.

The amount of energy is always the same  (...)

Yes indeed. Which is to say (in my model) the amount of value stays constant.  That's just an axiom of my model. How you measure it (the proxy for currency) can change.

In your model (if I have you right) the amount of energy can change. That's a perfectly valid model too, and perhaps more realistic, but it's not my model. So we are arguing about somewhat different things. I'm assuming (which is patently false) that value - that is to say, how much the world is worth as a whole - stays constant, whereas of course the world gets richer over time. But in the short term, which we were originally discussing, we can dismiss time from the equation. Otherwise we have to include inflation in things like "real" interest rates/rates of return (which was one of your original posits in bold, not in quite those words). In short, do we tend to adjust for Net Present Value? And I think generally we don't do that in day-to-day transactions.

For example I placed a one pound bet last June that Theresa May would not be Prime Minister of the UK by new year. I got 5/2 which I thought was a bit mean. Let's assume I won. I would have got 3.50 back - 1 * 5 / 2 +  1 (my original stake). But that 3.50 would have been worth slighty less in the January than it would have been  in the June when I placed the bet, i.e. the pound had depreciated because of inflation. Yet we tend to leave that out of betting equations. Indeed, which is what you touched on, we tend to leave inflation out of most of our day-to-day decision making about money. We just hope that our savings and income increase faster than inflation.

Since the half-hour argument is well over time I presume I am now arguing overtime (at time-and-a-half). Whether this argument is good value, I leave up to you.

I'm arguing in my spare time  - not really, I'm in an office and always bored now.  I'm getting too old and cynical, I should retire when my Lotto numbers come up.

But anyways I think we're converging to a common understanding which is of course a good thing.   But moving on from models of vapour pressure, height, energy etc....(btw, not linear as in your scaling example)....

NPV  is used all the time to calculate yields etc and it occurs in projects when there are year on year cashflows.  A bond is just a specific description of the finances of a project.

Some projects are over many years - like building a dam - could be 10 years construction and 50 years return.  Anything less than about 3 years return, don't bother (as you say).

The problem is always deciding the depreciation rate.  How can guess 50 years into the future?  Basically past about 10 years, it's just all guesswork anyway.

Now I am idly musing my time away, it might be an idea to work out what is the return on electing The Donald or Teresa "Strong and stable" May over their political term.  Do they actually provide a measurable (in cash) return? 

I don't think that can be modelled performance wise - previous performance is not indication of future performance.  Unlike possibly the gee gees (and definitely not the Bee Gees).

Obama was a hopeful racehorse and he turned out to be very disappointing to many.  Calculating odds on elections might be quite easy compared to financial return on election. But could one come up with a number on presidential or PM profitability?

I remember an article in The Economist sometime ago.  It was the return on George Dubya's war on terror.  It was basically zero or negative.   There was more return on not doing anything other than regular policing etc.  But obviously unacceptable to do that.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Actually in Hungary, they had something called crawling peg devaluation in earlier years post-change.  It was a gradual devaluation. It stopped a major crash and expanded the economy.  Quite interesting and it seems to have worked. Been relatively stable since they floated the HUF.

Yes, I understand the mechanics there but it's a puzzle why it worked. I mean, if you know your forint is going to be cheaper next year, why not just wait until next year? It would seem to discourage any kind of long-term inward investment. Perhaps just a case of "better the devil you know..."

There was of course a black market in forints being exchanged for hard currency, but on a relatively minor scale. (The size of the black market will of course depend on how easy it is legally to convert the currency into something else.)

SimonTrew wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

The question was whether gambling is the same as the stock market.

I should also qualify that by saying gambling that has an element of skill. Gambling on games of pure chance is just a mug's game of course and nothing like the stock market (except perhaps penny shares etc where the element of chance is overwhelming).... I don't find much fun in playing games of pure chance, myself.

Might as well just chuck the money out the window.  But random chance can be a winner.

Look at Marilyn's chance of being the next Hollywood star.   Random chance someone saw her and she had an audition, could have got the part etc.  Good return on a wide brimmed flowery hat in the flower power era.

I was reading about Jameela Jamil
(who?) this morning.  Almost random chance she made it to Hollywood and landed a decent part in a TV series. I thought it hilarious she had to learn how to act on the job from Ted Danson.  I've seen that show and she does a pretty good job of it too.  Never heard of her before but she'll go far I think.

Don't tell the Baccarat players that it is not a game of skill.
You would not believe how serious they are about betting player or banker.
They spend hours sitting watching the game keeping a serious eye on the electric scoreboard.
Believe me if you slip up and forget to register the winner they all scream at you to light up the board.
They KNOW when a Tie bet is coming etc. Or so they think.
I had a daily player on my bac table who owned a Chinese buffet place in Vegas.
By accident we once went in there to eat and all of a sudden, I was no longer hungry.Saw his face and lost my lunch. He wouldn't look me in the eye inside his shop, he knew exactly who I was, not his friend at all.
A few years later, his business was shut down and boarded up.
Seems he was dipping into the till a bit too often with his daily baccarat.
Seen that happen more then once.
People all dressed to the 9'ns and a few years later looking like a bum with a home made haircut, like a bowl was put on their heads...
All their money went to gambling.
Sad.
Another time in a very high end nice Hong Kong style restaurant in Vegas I ran into another bac player who was never very nice with the dealers.
My son's GF was well known in the Chinese  community in Vegas. She was a "powerful" lady who knew everyone in town.
She was about 10 years my son's senior but was beautiful and tougher then nails. Nice as can be with us but otherwise feared in the Chinese community, she has several business things going on, not all legit.
She treated me like gold all the time, called my auntie and always went out of her way for my comfort. She even got a fully furnished apt. for us and paid a months rent without us asking when we returned to Vegas. She hired her own Chinese movers when we got a different apt. and gave us a full apt. full of furniture.
Unreal and super respectful to my husband and I.
Anyway, at his restaurant the waiters face dropped when he saw me with her.
He I know wanted to poison me for all his bad bets but didn't dare do anything but bow and scrape because I was with her.
How odd it was.
He would go to the casino with his friends and act all bad a*8 but in real life he lived with several room mates, worked as a waiter and wasn't at all the person he tried to pawn off as a slick gambler.
No matter, he never tipped the dealers, my son's ex tipped hm for his service , not so sure I would of tipped him if I was picking up the tab.
Another time I was enjoying the pool at our apt. building.
I was the only person out there but 2 men were sitting inside the rec. area, then they sat outside near the pool.
I got out after my laps and one guy came over to me and said, "I know you,you took all my money"!
That was really creepy. I left the area after saying something silly to him, like "sorry that's what I get paid to do."
Hate working with the public like that.
Used to cut hair and often people would say hi to me and I didn't know who they were until they turned around and I noticed my haircut... That's very uncomfortable too.
Glad I always tried my best to give a good cut so no one ever screamed at me later.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Actually in Hungary, they had something called crawling peg devaluation in earlier years post-change.  It was a gradual devaluation. It stopped a major crash and expanded the economy.  Quite interesting and it seems to have worked. Been relatively stable since they floated the HUF.

Yes, I understand the mechanics there but it's a puzzle why it worked. I mean, if you know your forint is going to be cheaper next year, why not just wait until next year? It would seem to discourage any kind of long-term inward investment. Perhaps just a case of "better the devil you know..."

There was of course a black market in forints being exchanged for hard currency, but on a relatively minor scale.

It was a stability mechanism. It could move up and down in a range so there was "give" in the system.  It just stopped it crashing outside of the range.  Of course, people have to change money to do their business and create a return. Sticking it under the bed and not making it work is not helpful at all - same as holding gold really as it's an asset unused.  It's better to use the cash than sit on it as effective interest rates were too low to let it idle.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Might as well just chuck the money out the window.  But random chance can be a winner.

Those two sentences are contradictory. If you gamble on a game of chance you have at least some chance of winning  whereas chucking it out of the window you have nearly no chance. Of course that's assuming that the game is not rigged etc.

fluffy2560 wrote:

I was reading about Jameela Jamil (who?) this morning.  Almost random chance she made it to Hollywood and landed a decent part in a TV series. I thought it hilarious she had to learn how to act on the job from Ted Danson.

Who?

Yes, learning acting from Ted Danson would be like learning table manners from Gordon Ramsay. I suppose you just learn to do the opposite.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

.....
A few years later, his business was shut down and boarded up.
Seems he was dipping into the till a bit too often with his daily baccarat.
Seen that happen more then once.
People all dressed to the 9'ns and a few years later looking like a bum with a home made haircut, like a bowl was put on their heads...
All their money went to gambling.
..... but otherwise feared in the Chinese community, she has several business things going on, not all legit.
She treated me like gold all the time, called my auntie and always went out of her way for my comfort. She even got a fully furnished apt. for us and paid a months rent without us asking when we returned to Vegas. She hired her own Chinese movers when we got a different apt. and gave us a full apt. full of furniture.
Unreal and super respectful to my husband and I.
.....

That's one of the things about gambling that makes me disinterested  (or even scared about it). Correct me if I am wrong - it all seems decidedly dodgy and criminally oriented.  I guess it's from reading about Al Capone and the origins of LV.  I found it interesting to see LV but from the punters side it just looked like Disneyland for adults with too much money and not enough sense!

fluffy2560 wrote:

Of course, people have to change money to do their business and create a return. Sticking it under the bed and not making it work is not helpful at all - same as holding gold really as it's an asset unused.

It's a wonder that anyone holds gold as a store of value. I'm building a perpetual motion machine in the shed, which I am going to attach to a philosopher's stone to grind unicorn muck into gold, and then I will control the market as the largest player.

It's very pretty in jewellery, and quite useful in electronics, but apart from the cost of extraction, its high value is due mainly to its scarcity. Suddenly we find a couple of thousand tons of it lying around in Tanganyika or Gordon Brown's attic and the market gets flooded and the price plummets. The only way to avoid that is to control the supply (De Beers, OPEC...).

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Might as well just chuck the money out the window.  But random chance can be a winner.

Those two sentences are contradictory. If you gamble on a game of chance you have at least some chance of winning  whereas chucking it out of the window you have nearly no chance. Of course that's assuming that the game is not rigged etc.

fluffy2560 wrote:

I was reading about Jameela Jamil (who?) this morning.  Almost random chance she made it to Hollywood and landed a decent part in a TV series. I thought it hilarious she had to learn how to act on the job from Ted Danson.

Who?

Yes, learning acting from Ted Danson would be like learning table manners from Gordon Ramsay. I suppose you just learn to do the opposite.

What I meant was chucking it out the window in the hope it falls on something useful!

fluffy2560 wrote:

That's one of the things about gambling that makes me disinterested  (or even scared about it). Correct me if I am wrong - it all seems decidedly dodgy and criminally oriented.

Well, makeing something illegal doesn't stop it happening.

My own experience of gambling (in places where it is fairly liberally governed) has not been one of crime 'n' disorder. The gambling industry makes enough money legally not to need to make it illegally. But in places where it is illegal, the usual thing happens, of course.

Then again I am just a wishy-washy liberal. It's fair to say that gambling is in some sense a waste of money, but then so are many other enjoyable things; man cannot live on bread alone. (sings) It's illegal, it's immoral, or it makes you fat...

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Might as well just chuck the money out the window.  But random chance can be a winner.

If you gamble on a game of chance you have at least some chance of winning  whereas chucking it out of the window you have nearly no chance.

What I meant was chucking it out the window in the hope it falls on something useful!

Well the taxwoman is always standing below the window ready to catch your pennies from heaven. Whether she does anything useful with them is, I am told, a matter of some controversy.

What you'd really have to worry about is if the taxwoman came upstairs and stood behind you, encouraging you to throw them out. That's why all sane governments ban state lotteries,

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Of course, people have to change money to do their business and create a return. Sticking it under the bed and not making it work is not helpful at all - same as holding gold really as it's an asset unused.

It's a wonder that anyone holds gold as a store of value. I'm building a perpetual motion machine in the shed, which I am going to attach to a philosopher's stone to grind unicorn muck into gold, and then I will control the market as the largest player.

It's very pretty in jewellery, and quite useful in electronics, but apart from the cost of extraction, its high value is due mainly to its scarcity. Suddenly we find a couple of thousand tons of it lying around in Tanganyika or Gordon Brown's attic and the market gets flooded and the price plummets. The only way to avoid that is to control the supply (De Beers, OPEC...).

Wot you too?

Anyway, how's that going to happen when all the unicorns are in my back garden along with my tulip futures?

Thing about gold is that it's formed when planets form and it's a limited supply.  It's quite a good material as it's mostly inert for body parts - works for some people (usually further East) in their teeth.  It's a brilliant conductor too - great for your silicon chips. 

But if you look at history and folklore, having some bling was to have easily transferrable and semi-liquid asset.  Like pirate gold earrings - supposedly the cost of a decent funeral.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Anyway, how's that going to happen when all the unicorns are in my back garden along with my tulip futures?

Simple. The unicorns eat the tulips and you offer the solid muck as future tulips, I take the piss and turn it into gold. We form a limited liability partnership for end-to-end processing.

fluffy2560 wrote:

But if you look at history and folklore, having some bling was to have easily transferrable and semi-liquid asset.  Like pirate gold earrings - supposedly the cost of a decent funeral.

Sure, it's a commodity. But again, we might find a lot more of it. That's what happened when the Spanish discovered the New World, of all the things they could have brought back, they brought back all the gold. The gold price, and the Spanish economy, just went haywire. They had to start making haywire out of gold because they couldn't afford hay.

A few atoms of gold have been made in atom smashers, but it's not worth the while to do it commercially (yet).

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Anyway, how's that going to happen when all the unicorns are in my back garden along with my tulip futures?

Simple. The unicorns eat the tulips and you offer the solid muck as future tulips, I take the piss and turn it into gold. We form a limited liability partnership for end-to-end processing.

I can take the front end processing of the UPU (unicorn processing unit), you take the back end.

But we agree to profit sharing and costs and my tulip futures are a separate part of the UPU supply chain and you agree to exclusively buying the inputted tulips from Fluffy Tulip Farm Futures Inc.

fluffy2560 wrote:

Anyway, how's that going to happen when all the unicorns are in my back garden along with my tulip futures?

That seems obvious.

Kill the unicorns and harvest the horns, as the most valuable part. Sell the carcass to the meat packing plant for dog food (that is just the horse part anyway). That way you make some extra cash and protect your tulip futures. After all, your tulip futures are what is really important. 

fluffy2560 wrote:

Thing about gold is that it's formed when planets form and it's a limited supply.

Actually, from super novas or collision of neutron starts. But that is a minor detail.

fluffy2560 wrote:

But if you look at history and folklore, having some bling was to have easily transferrable and semi-liquid asset.

Or as a gift if one is a potlatch devotee.

P.S. If you are, by chance, a potlatch devotee, let me know, and I can give you may address. And, just as a trivial trifle, of no real consequence mind you, and I hesitate to mention it, but I assume..... you do have only the best Kaufmanniana or Viridiflora Tulips? Correct?

klsallee wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Anyway, how's that going to happen when all the unicorns are in my back garden along with my tulip futures?

That seems obvious.

Kill the unicorns and harvest the horns, as the most valuable part. Sell the carcass to the meat packing plant for dog food (that is just the horse part anyway). That way you make some extra cash and protect your tulip futures. After all, your tulip futures are what is really important. 

fluffy2560 wrote:

Thing about gold is that it's formed when planets form and it's a limited supply.

Actually, from super novas or collision of neutron starts. But that is a minor detail.

fluffy2560 wrote:

But if you look at history and folklore, having some bling was to have easily transferrable and semi-liquid asset.

Or as a gift if one is a potlatch devotee.

P.S. If you are, by chance, a potlatch devotee, let me know, and I can give you may address. And, just as a trivial trifle, of no real consequence mind you, and I hesitate to mention it, but I assume..... you do have only the best Kaufmanniana or Viridiflora Tulips? Correct?

At these moments, I look for lessons learnt:

Give people a unicorn, and you only entertain them; give them two extra-friendly unicorns and you have more unicorns.

I'll answer in semi-random order.

1. You're making a beginner's error.  There's a common misconception unicorns are horses with horns.  I could not for example pass off a horse with traffic cone or paper cone party hat painted and glued to its head. No expert will be fooled by that old chestnut.    So, I'm hedging my bets by also having unicorns and not harvesting their horns. A happy unicorn is a horned unicorn. A happy unicorn means more unicorns. 

Oh, and I'm not Belgian.

2.  Neutron stars:  Yup, that's the fella

3.  Potlatch used to be illegal. I'm old school.  But I have watched  lot of Alaskan reality shows.

4. In the world of Tulip futures, any tulip will do.  It's tulip hysteria after all.

5. At this rate, I'm going to have to refer myself to the TEC and UEC....Tulips Exchange Commission...and the Unicorn....well you get the picture.

fluffy2560 wrote:

1. You're making a beginner's error.  There's a common misconception unicorns are horses with horns.  I could not for example pass off a horse with traffic cone or paper cone party hat painted and glued to its head. No expert will be fooled by that old chestnut.

You mean horses with traffic cones and party hats glued to their heads are not unicorns?

Well, I'll be.... 

Then I guess that cyclops I saw last night was really a motorcycle like everyone tried to tell me.

Now you have me worried. Maybe I also am misjudging the tulip market. And maybe I should unload my tulips. But that may cause a panic, because I have a lot. Maybe as many as six.

Well filming "wrapped up" last night on our street.
It actually was a rather peaceful movie shoot this weekend.
After the first set up day, we hardly heard a thing from the crew.
Last night they brought in a few early 1940's European cars, covered up our st. lights and had white screens against the hospital wall, they also wet down the street like it had rained, really we couldn't figure out if it had rained or they did it for the movie,
Movie magic.
Looks like some sort of WW11 movie was shot.
They had a practice run in the afternoon with a guy dressed in modern clothing walking with his hands over his head and a fake gun pointed at him.
All that for a short few moments of actual camera time.
Interesting though how they make these films.
They seem to love to use the church down the street for a background in movies.
Would sort of be nice though if they at least told us the working title for the movie in case we ever wished to view it.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

Well filming "wrapped up" last night on our street.
It actually was a rather peaceful movie shoot this weekend.
After the first set up day, we hardly heard a thing from the crew.
Last night they brought in a few early 1940's European cars, covered up our st. lights and had white screens against the hospital wall, they also wet down the street like it had rained, really we couldn't figure out if it had rained or they did it for the movie,
...
They seem to love to use the church down the street for a background in movies.
Would sort of be nice though if they at least told us the working title for the movie in case we ever wished to view it.

A quick Google showed up the following possible movie (others not the right vintage -scifi or too modern):

"....Meanwhile, a new six-episode television series by the creators of Downtown Abbey will focus on the secret love affair between Doctor Zhivago writer Boris Pasternak and Olga Ivinskaya. The film, set to be shot in Budapest, is based on the book Lara by Anna Pasternak, great-niece of the Nobel-Prize winning writer....."

Sounds like a bundle of laughs. 

I doubt I'll be watching it as no robots, time travel, spies, unicorns or space ships.

I missed Downtown Abbey by moving to Hungary.
So far have not found a way to upload that show.
I used to love watching the old "Upstairs/Downstairs "series on PBS tv in the states.
Sci-fi isn't may forte but I did just finish up the 3 season of the Flash on Netflix, guess that's sci-fi.
Marvel comics at least or is it DC comics?

There's a show on Netflix called, Windsors" just makes me laugh.
They just aired  a special episode on the latest Wedding with Harry and MM.
Really spot on actors and over the top silly.
Another fun UK show which was fun was,"Peep Show" ultra dumb but funny.
I enjoy those UK shows allot more then most of the US shows.
Twisted humor,which could go over ones head if they aren't paying attention.
I think most US shows have so dummy downed to get a canned laugh, they do not give much credit to the intelligence of their viewers.
Also just became aware of Tommy Robinson in the UK.
Never heard of him before his arrest a few days back.
Wish that was  fake news, not sure what is going on in the UK right now but it looks nasty.

klsallee wrote:

......
Now you have me worried. Maybe I also am misjudging the tulip market. And maybe I should unload my tulips. But that may cause a panic, because I have a lot. Maybe as many as six.

Are you sure it's only 6?  If they are in the ground, they've been replicating while you haven't been looking.  Are they moving closer to your house?

Hmmmm...unicorn futures....genetic engineering.....rhinos...aha! Artificial rhino horn substitute for the  Chinese market!  Yay, forget unicorns with rhino horn DNA, I've cracked it, just rhino horns. I could just grind up some cow horns and sell it on the dark web, they'll never know the difference.

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

Anyway, how's that going to happen when all the unicorns are in my back garden along with my tulip futures?

Simple. The unicorns eat the tulips and you offer the solid muck as future tulips, I take the piss and turn it into gold. We form a limited liability partnership for end-to-end processing.

I can take the front end processing of the UPU (unicorn processing unit), you take the back end.

But we agree to profit sharing and costs and my tulip futures are a separate part of the UPU supply chain and you agree to exclusively buying the inputted tulips from Fluffy Tulip Farm Futures Inc.

I'm not sure that arrangement would work well for either of us. If you're selling tulip futures you are just setting up competition with yourself. I guess it depends on what you mean by "exclusively buying", i.e. am I your only customer, you my only supplier, or both? But then I am already beholden to you for unicorn muck (and you did say you had all the unicorns) so really how you produce that muck should not be my concern as long as it is genuine unicorn muck and not just a load of bullshit.

But if I am your only customer I also can hold you ransom by refusing to buy, especially if gold production is not my main business. If I branch out into, say, catching falling stars as a hedge against diurnal precipitation, my demand for unicorn products may decrease.

I think we would need to agree a guarantee of supply (and demand). At a fixed price, natch.

SimonTrew wrote:

fluffy2560 wrote:

SimonTrew wrote:

Simple. The unicorns eat the tulips and you offer the solid muck as future tulips, I take the piss and turn it into gold. We form a limited liability partnership for end-to-end processing.

I can take the front end processing of the UPU (unicorn processing unit), you take the back end.

But we agree to profit sharing and costs and my tulip futures are a separate part of the UPU supply chain and you agree to exclusively buying the inputted tulips from Fluffy Tulip Farm Futures Inc.

I'm not sure that arrangement would work well for either of us. If you're selling tulip futures you are just setting up competition with yourself. I guess it depends on what you mean by "exclusively buying", i.e. am I your only customer, you my only supplier, or both? But then I am already beholden to you for unicorn muck (and you did say you had all the unicorns) so really how you produce that muck should not be my concern as long as it is genuine unicorn muck and not just a load of bullshit.

But if I am your only customer I also can control your interests in the opposite direction. If I branch out into, say, catching falling stars as a hedge against diurnal precipitation, my demand for unicorn products may decrease.

Hmmm....you've thought this through more than me but since we are here.

Think of it as joint venture with royalties along the lines of mining.

I control location of the resources (unicorns and stables) but you process their output (unicorn muck) vis-a-vis I grant you a license to collect and process my unicorn resources whereupon I receive a royalty. However, to process my unicorn resources on my land, you must resource tulips to create the aforementioned unicorn by-products from me.   Bringing competitors materials to the muck plant would not be acceptable.

You'll have to talk to other contributors on falling stars.  Could start with Roseanne Barr.  More like vertical kamikaze plummeting stars in that case.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

I missed Downtown Abbey by moving to Hungary.

That's certainly one good reason to move to Hungary.