Happy New Year!

Happy new year everyone! Have a great 2008!

Eeeewwwwww

How much for the little girl? How much for the women? Bring them to my heated bouncy tent.

Link Tuesday

Learn mafioso charm.

Hair dye : Chinese leaders as what is to Farah Fawcett?

Note to single guys: wear Speedstick and get laid. Where the hell are the PR people on this one?

Venezuela decides to offset their clocks by 30 minutes, just to give the bird to the rest of the world.

Advocating randomness in sport.

USPS to Netflix: O HAI. UR IN TEH MACHINES, CLOGGIN TEH STUFF. I CAN HAZ PROFIT MARGINS? KTHXBI.

Feel shitty for the day: Figure out what other people did by the time they were your age.

Funds employing math majors: 0. Funds employing psychology majors: 1.

December rocket, ready for liftoff

Expected Fed rate decrease at 2:15.

December performance is generally +1.7% in pre-election years.

People like Jim Cramer saying: "If we got a half-point cut from the Fed on Tuesday, I think you could see as much as a thousand-point rally on the Dow between here and year-end."

Chart of the last 5 days here.

Update: Wall Street to Bernanke: You suck.

Myers-Briggs meets trading

Interesting post on how a Promethian temperament (xNTx in Myers Briggs) impacts stock trading / financial behaviors.

Capitol christmas tree is up

Courtesy of CapitalWeather.com:

Sampras v. Federer

I finally have time to watch the Sampras v. Federer exhibition matches that took place in Macao. Check them out for yourselves, courtesy of the Tennis Channel here.

Check out the fun Sampras forehand the 3rd match, 3rd game (Sampras serving at 40-0).

Serenity's vision of the future is one step closer...

Hedge fund superstar Jim Rogers has three pieces of advice: "Get out of the dollar, teach your children Chinese, and buy commodities.''

He's moving his own family to Singapore.

Swiss IT

2008 is apparently the "Year of IT" in Switzerland. Facing a shortfall of skilled IT workers that can fill the gap created by those that are retiring or leaving, the Swiss IT sector has declared that they "will be producing T-shirts for the Chinese in 40 years time" if nothing is done.

If the banana hammock boxer briefs in the men's section of Globus are any indication of Swiss clothing style, Chinese men will start looking like International Male model rejects.

Gawker Stalker for DC

This post on Wonkette made me start to think why they don't have a Gawker Stalker for DC celebs (unless it's illegal in some strange way). Who wouldn't want to walk by Perrys and see Sen. Craig or crack up seeing Bernake getting a haircut at Bubbles in Pentagon City? I see a perfect partnership for Gawker and Wonkette.

Selective Blindness

Watch the video here. Your goal is to count the number of times the basketballs change hands. After you have finished watching the video, click here for the analysis.

This test was completely similar to the GMAT.

Your IQ Is 120

Your Logical Intelligence is Below Average Your Verbal Intelligence is Genius Your Mathematical Intelligence is Genius Your General Knowledge is Above Average

A Quick and Dirty IQ Test

It's been a tough day...

Low Expectations = Happiness

An article in the NYT studies the citizens of Denmark and finds that they are AMAZED when they don't get charged to supersize.

Generation Y Facts

Learned some interesting facts about Gen Y in my class in Chicago last week - facts that I remembered when I heard an NPR story about the topic this morning:

• Gen Y is defined (generally) as people born after 1980
• Average debt of Gen Y before entering college is $19,500
• After college average debt is $22,000+
• Trend in Gen Y is to move back into their parent's homes after graduation (see Chicago Red Eye article here); nicknamed the "boomerang" generation for obvious reasons
• Gen Y'ers expect to be promoted after 1 year of working

Interesting link here about job market differences between Y and X.

Time to get a job in the UK

From FP this morning:

Time to cancel that weekend trip to Europe:

Euro-dollar exchange rate, last 3 months

Or to Britain:

Pound-dollar exchange rate, last 3 months

Documented abuses against the French language

A recent posting on a website brought back a flood of humorous memories from last summer. Lots of Americans think that the correct usage of the French word voila (in essence, meaning "well, there you go") is REALLY spelled walla, wallah, vwallah.

Let's see how much Sarko loves us now.

Awesome random pic of the day

Khaaaaaaaan!!

Pandering to the Masses

Q: How do I pronounce Talloires (French town outside of Annecy)?
A: "Tahl-WAHR" + funky French lip thing at "Wah" sound + accent (bonus points)

Great Falls

Spent one of the last warm weekends in DC at Great Falls. Playing around with Autostitch...