Katrina's not a hurricane quite yet. But she probably will be soon, and so we act accordingly. Headed straight for Ft. Lauderdale no less. She'll hit us late tomorrow or in the wee hours Friday morning.
She's picked up strength and speed, she's over warm open water, she's bulked up to the west, and the Bermuda High is keeping her steered toward the west, not north. She's a slow mover still and has lots of rain, perhaps 15-20 inches just for us. This is all bad news.
They think she'll only be a 1- or 2-force storm. The only other good news is, if it goes just a little bit to the north, we'll take much less water. The north/northeast side of the hurricane - called the "dirty" side of the storm - has the most rain and tornadoes.
What you really don't want to be in is the center, in the eye. Unfortunately, unless she changes path, Katrina's eye will go right over my house.
Here's lookin' at you, kid.
The Water Management District has opened the floodgates to lower the water level in the canals and help prevent flooding. Here in Broward County, schools are closed tomorrow and Friday, and non-emergency workers are off. Me, I'm all supplied up, and I'll head to Mom's condo tomorrow to pull the furniture away from the windows.
Dade County better not make up a bunch of phony FEMA claims again. They're crying over the Video Music Awards show this weekend, they'll lose a lot of business. Most people in Broward and Palm Beach counties don't feel much sympathy this time. Sticking the garden hose in the living room window to "flood" yourself. Honestly!
Well, well, here we go again, huh?
Katrina cooked up from a long-meandering nothing wave, to a rather sudden intensification only 230 miles from shore.
She surprised us.
Andrew surprised us, because he came barreling along on a straight path and intensified. He was actually pretty little but boy was he mean.
The No-Name Storm of a few years back surprised us by forming very suddenly right off land, starting up in SW FL.
Charley surprised us by taking a sudden turn into the coast, instead of heading up north over water like so many planned he would.
Then, of course, we had Floyd. The scariest looking hurricane I've ever seen, bar none. Millions were evacuated, setting records. Floyd surprised us by not hitting Florida at all. Not that he didn't run amok through our friends to the north. However! No longer as powerful as he might have been. That's a very good thing indeed.
I love hurricanes.
The only thing is, I wanted to go to Yeehaw Junction.
l like Yeehaw Junction, too.
This time I like it extra, because Walter is there on a little layover. We had plans for me to drive up and bring him supplies, and go road tripping about in Florida together.
If I were his employer, I'd want my big rig out of there. Like yesterday. Hurricanes have a way of going where ever they want, and there's no reason Katrina can't eat Yeehaw Junction - and Walter's rig - as she goes over the state. Still, I need to take Walter his stuff, and who knows? Maybe we can drive around hurricane-hunting just a bit. I think the bar-b-q plans are off though.
So...We'll see. I do know that I can't go leaving the house unattended in the middle of a hurricane. Gracious! The poor cat!!
Maybe I'll run up to deliver Walter's things, visit a bit, and turn around and head back home. We're both exhausted just now. Time to sleep. We'll see what the hurricane news is tomorrow. Then we'll know what we can and can't do for fun.
*sigh*
This is one of those situations where a person has too many good things to choose from.
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Cows are Silly, Too
Chickens are inherently silly. There's just something in their nature that makes them prone to hissy-fits, and a chicken having a hissy-fit is a purely funny sight to see.
A whole coop of 'em will send you off giggling by the truckload.
Desert Cat knows these things, and is entertained accordingly. http://desertcat.blogspot.com/2005/08/way-with-words.html
Cows, now, are pretty silly too.
Sometimes it's because people do silly things through their cows. One of my favorite dubious human/cow interactions is a game called Tax Cow. Which, actually, is maybe more practical than silly.
As a theoretical example - nothing more - say you're someone like the Winningest Coach in Football History. You may have this problem: too much capital, and too little time or interest to watch over it very closely. You do, of course, want it to be safe.
But the good news is, being a big-time football hero, you can get away with a few things that others can't.
So, say you invest some of that capital in a parcel of raw land in Miami Lakes, FL. It's urban property, ideally located, surrounded by campus-type office developments. One day, this piece will also be ripe for such picking. But not yet. Best to sit on it a while, first. The value is only going to go up.
Problem with raw land is that there's rarely any income from it. I mean, that's the whole point. It's waiting to be developed and generate income. Urban raw land, anyway.
This shouldn't matter much, since raw land has few expenses. A little mowing and fence repair, maybe some liability insurance...And taxes.
Agricultural raw land has very low taxes. That's true all over America. It's been done that way historically to give farmers a break. Farming needs bigger pieces of land, and a higher tax rate would wipe them out in one year.
Urban raw land is a different story. The county property appraiser is no dummy. The appraiser's office understands this is quite valuable nonagricultural raw land, intended for future commercial use, and taxes it accordingly.
This puts you seriously in the red on your land, as you sit letting it ripen. What a dilemma! More time to ripen is very good. But more time also means "feeding the pig" in the face of no current return.
So: Perhaps the problem can be fixed if we turn it into farmland.
Thus, the birth of the Tax Cow.
If you can just put some cows on that land, it's not urban any more! It's FARMLAND! Why, look! it's growing COWS!
And your taxes decrease accordingly. Say in a ratio of about $10,000/year to $100/year in taxes.
Neat trick, huh?
Of course, people growing 5 acres of bell peppers in Homestead - it really was homesteaded, those little bits of land with a little house - anyway, those low-income farmers have to pay property taxes for a HOUSE. Not for ag land. It costs them another $1000 - $3,000/year or so, because they're zoned residential now. Even though it was homesteaded, and intended to be ag land, and is growing actual cash-crop food on the land, which enterprise is usually called Farming.
I never did get that one.
See, Tax Cows don't actually do anything with that land but walk around on it. There's no food or water for them because it's not ag land. Really, you wouldn't want them eating there anyway. You know what urban raw land looks like, broken glass and trash and rusty wires and illegal chemical dumping and unhealthy weeds and crap everywhere. And, generally speaking, no cow tank (ie pond) for them to drink from. Should you be comfortable with them doing so.
But you save so very much on taxes, it's worth it to you to truck in their food and water every day.
This creates a cow who believes that Food is something that Humans bring to the Fence and Chuck it Over for you to Eat.
A not unreasonable belief, on the cow's part.
So one day, I was driving around the Florida countryside scarfing rocks. Nice big fossiliferous lime rocks, for landscaping my yard. This is legal if it's on public right-of-way and if it's legal to park. No nefarious deeds there.
The public right-of-way generally starts at the shoulder of the road, and goes to where the ranchers etc. put a fence. The county employees who mow the right-of-way don't like encountering rocks there. They chew up the mowing machines and disrupt the smooth rhythm of their work. So if a rock is in the way, they'll toss it over to the fence, right on the property line, out of everyone's way. Now they can do their job.
And here comes k, pulling the car up to the fence to get that obnoxious tossed-away rock, poor thing getting all disrespected when all it ever wanted was a good home where it's appreciated and --
Where was I?
Oh yeah.
We grow lots and lots of cattle here, more than Texas sometimes. That's a lot of cows. I often see them off in the distance on the other side of that fence. As I did this fine day.
I was working on a particularly large rock, muscling and leveraging it into the car. Walter is always impressed to see my takings. It's really quite absorbing work.
When I came up for air, I felt a Presence close by. Very close by.
It was about 300 head of cattle, all looking at me through the barbed wire.
This barbed wire suddenly didn't look so substantial.
Especially when being bent outward by the pressure of 300 hungry cows, who thought I was bringing Food. Of the kind that Humans bring to the Fence and Chuck it Over for you to Eat.
They must have been passed the word from Miami Lakes.
Luckily, these were Simple Country Cows. Not those Urban Tax Cows. They were curious and hopeful, but perfectly polite when I explained I had nothing to feed them with.
Nonetheless, I got into that car and drove off.
With my rock.
Of course.
A whole coop of 'em will send you off giggling by the truckload.
Desert Cat knows these things, and is entertained accordingly. http://desertcat.blogspot.com/2005/08/way-with-words.html
Cows, now, are pretty silly too.
Sometimes it's because people do silly things through their cows. One of my favorite dubious human/cow interactions is a game called Tax Cow. Which, actually, is maybe more practical than silly.
As a theoretical example - nothing more - say you're someone like the Winningest Coach in Football History. You may have this problem: too much capital, and too little time or interest to watch over it very closely. You do, of course, want it to be safe.
But the good news is, being a big-time football hero, you can get away with a few things that others can't.
So, say you invest some of that capital in a parcel of raw land in Miami Lakes, FL. It's urban property, ideally located, surrounded by campus-type office developments. One day, this piece will also be ripe for such picking. But not yet. Best to sit on it a while, first. The value is only going to go up.
Problem with raw land is that there's rarely any income from it. I mean, that's the whole point. It's waiting to be developed and generate income. Urban raw land, anyway.
This shouldn't matter much, since raw land has few expenses. A little mowing and fence repair, maybe some liability insurance...And taxes.
Agricultural raw land has very low taxes. That's true all over America. It's been done that way historically to give farmers a break. Farming needs bigger pieces of land, and a higher tax rate would wipe them out in one year.
Urban raw land is a different story. The county property appraiser is no dummy. The appraiser's office understands this is quite valuable nonagricultural raw land, intended for future commercial use, and taxes it accordingly.
This puts you seriously in the red on your land, as you sit letting it ripen. What a dilemma! More time to ripen is very good. But more time also means "feeding the pig" in the face of no current return.
So: Perhaps the problem can be fixed if we turn it into farmland.
Thus, the birth of the Tax Cow.
If you can just put some cows on that land, it's not urban any more! It's FARMLAND! Why, look! it's growing COWS!
And your taxes decrease accordingly. Say in a ratio of about $10,000/year to $100/year in taxes.
Neat trick, huh?
Of course, people growing 5 acres of bell peppers in Homestead - it really was homesteaded, those little bits of land with a little house - anyway, those low-income farmers have to pay property taxes for a HOUSE. Not for ag land. It costs them another $1000 - $3,000/year or so, because they're zoned residential now. Even though it was homesteaded, and intended to be ag land, and is growing actual cash-crop food on the land, which enterprise is usually called Farming.
I never did get that one.
See, Tax Cows don't actually do anything with that land but walk around on it. There's no food or water for them because it's not ag land. Really, you wouldn't want them eating there anyway. You know what urban raw land looks like, broken glass and trash and rusty wires and illegal chemical dumping and unhealthy weeds and crap everywhere. And, generally speaking, no cow tank (ie pond) for them to drink from. Should you be comfortable with them doing so.
But you save so very much on taxes, it's worth it to you to truck in their food and water every day.
This creates a cow who believes that Food is something that Humans bring to the Fence and Chuck it Over for you to Eat.
A not unreasonable belief, on the cow's part.
So one day, I was driving around the Florida countryside scarfing rocks. Nice big fossiliferous lime rocks, for landscaping my yard. This is legal if it's on public right-of-way and if it's legal to park. No nefarious deeds there.
The public right-of-way generally starts at the shoulder of the road, and goes to where the ranchers etc. put a fence. The county employees who mow the right-of-way don't like encountering rocks there. They chew up the mowing machines and disrupt the smooth rhythm of their work. So if a rock is in the way, they'll toss it over to the fence, right on the property line, out of everyone's way. Now they can do their job.
And here comes k, pulling the car up to the fence to get that obnoxious tossed-away rock, poor thing getting all disrespected when all it ever wanted was a good home where it's appreciated and --
Where was I?
Oh yeah.
We grow lots and lots of cattle here, more than Texas sometimes. That's a lot of cows. I often see them off in the distance on the other side of that fence. As I did this fine day.
I was working on a particularly large rock, muscling and leveraging it into the car. Walter is always impressed to see my takings. It's really quite absorbing work.
When I came up for air, I felt a Presence close by. Very close by.
It was about 300 head of cattle, all looking at me through the barbed wire.
This barbed wire suddenly didn't look so substantial.
Especially when being bent outward by the pressure of 300 hungry cows, who thought I was bringing Food. Of the kind that Humans bring to the Fence and Chuck it Over for you to Eat.
They must have been passed the word from Miami Lakes.
Luckily, these were Simple Country Cows. Not those Urban Tax Cows. They were curious and hopeful, but perfectly polite when I explained I had nothing to feed them with.
Nonetheless, I got into that car and drove off.
With my rock.
Of course.
Saturday, August 20, 2005
Where Have My Blue Boxers Run Off To Now?
These days my life is filled with more mundane concerns than failed banks.
I have no idea how six pair of blue boxers could disappear overnight.
I mean, it's not like I leave the house much.
And dryers usually just eat socks.
Little Miss Attila had a nice discussion of the Tighty Whities vs. Boxers Etc. a while back. I didn't weigh in because it was about guys, pretty much.
For me, they aren't always underwear. I can wear them as shorts, too.
Allergic people get underwear issues. All sorts of clothing issues, really. You're allergic to the material itself, or laundry soap residue, or your own sweat held against your skin by clothing. Some materials are particularly adept at having pollens or animal hair stick to them.
So imagine my joy when I finally discovered I could wear underwear in the form of boxers.
I like blue. Most of mine are sky-blue, but I also have one pair white, and one pair dark blue. Those are my Serious Businesslike Boxers. I wear them to the doctors'.
Last Christmas, I explained to nephew whyisthis about acquiring the blue boxers. And, that my friend Burke would have been proud of me on at least five levels.
He decided he didn't want to know the details.
That's probably for the best. Nephews may not benefit much from a better understanding of their eccentric auntie's blue boxers.
So nephew dear, if you're reading this, skip the rest.
I. Blue.
2. Izod. Always go for good quality.
3. Extra cheap at Sam's - 3 pairs for $12.00.
4. Boxers. Ever so loose and comfy. And: Cotton. More comfyness.
5. Not just undies! Shorts, too!
But where have they GONE?!?
Really, I can't find them anywhere.
I have no idea how six pair of blue boxers could disappear overnight.
I mean, it's not like I leave the house much.
And dryers usually just eat socks.
Little Miss Attila had a nice discussion of the Tighty Whities vs. Boxers Etc. a while back. I didn't weigh in because it was about guys, pretty much.
For me, they aren't always underwear. I can wear them as shorts, too.
Allergic people get underwear issues. All sorts of clothing issues, really. You're allergic to the material itself, or laundry soap residue, or your own sweat held against your skin by clothing. Some materials are particularly adept at having pollens or animal hair stick to them.
So imagine my joy when I finally discovered I could wear underwear in the form of boxers.
I like blue. Most of mine are sky-blue, but I also have one pair white, and one pair dark blue. Those are my Serious Businesslike Boxers. I wear them to the doctors'.
Last Christmas, I explained to nephew whyisthis about acquiring the blue boxers. And, that my friend Burke would have been proud of me on at least five levels.
He decided he didn't want to know the details.
That's probably for the best. Nephews may not benefit much from a better understanding of their eccentric auntie's blue boxers.
So nephew dear, if you're reading this, skip the rest.
I. Blue.
2. Izod. Always go for good quality.
3. Extra cheap at Sam's - 3 pairs for $12.00.
4. Boxers. Ever so loose and comfy. And: Cotton. More comfyness.
5. Not just undies! Shorts, too!
But where have they GONE?!?
Really, I can't find them anywhere.
Friday, August 19, 2005
Changing My Life
I've told others this: If you don't like your life, change it.
It's mostly attitude. You can't make changes if you don't believe improvement is both possible and permitted. So very many people seem to feel they don't deserve a happier life.
Of course, some things aren't in our control. I can't make the rain stop or make the sun shine. I can't change past events that damaged me in various ways.
But, as they say, I can control my response to those things.
I can control how I interact with the events that I can't control.
And I've been living life on an emergency basis for several years now, and I don't like it. So as far as I can, I'm going to change that.
The work I used to do before I got disabled was emergency type work. We liquidated the banks and S&L's that failed in the banking crises of the 1980's and early 1990's.
Here's a general description of how that works.
A bank's loans are its most significant assets. When enough people and businesses stop making loan payments, the bank fails. In come the regulators to shut the bank down. Those are bankbusters, in our vernacular. Formally, they're usually called something like Closing Specialists when they do it full time.
But on closing day itself, anyone and everyone may be called upon to pitch in. It's an extraordinary event, often involving the FBI and subpoenas and handcuffs and forcible lockings of vaults. You'll have crime scene or evidence seal tape all over the ATM machines and drive-through tubes and night deposit box. Police may be posted all around the outside of the bank, since past scenes included bankers sneaking out the window with seriously incriminating files in hand. The tension in the air - as bank managers, employees, bankbusters, and law enforcement stand around listening to the bank seizure subpoenas being read off - is unbelievably thick.
The insured deposits and other healthy parts of the bank are usually transferred to another bank. The non-performing assets, mostly delinquent loans, are slowly liquidated by Liquidators, and the proceeds repaid to whatever entities covered such liabilities as insured deposits - say the bank insurer, the FDIC. The remaining accounting niceties, often just entries on paper, are generally credited or debited to zero and formally closed by Terminators.
These formal job titles make company softball contests especially fun.
I was a Liquidator, assigned to Major Assets. Our task was to recover everything we could on non-performing assets like delinquent mortgages, notes, and REO (Real Estate Owned, already foreclosed upon but not yet sold). Essentially, I did fancy collections on big commercial loans, usually commercial real estate mortgages. A wonderful variety of collateral secured the mortgages: office buildings, apartment complexes, hotels, shopping centers, restaurants, medical centers, failed real estate developments, oil and gas interests, churches, raw land; plus, odder bits like a funeral home or radio station or monogramming machine. Over six years my portfolio totaled about $243,000,000 to $350,000,000, depending on how you measure it. Say a quarter billion dollars.
It was extraordinary work, fraught with great troubles and scary events. Assets burning, bomb threats, delinquent borrowers committing suicide, and others who said they would. There was a terrible sense of a profound economic collapse under way, and we just tiny figures trying to plug up the holes in the huge cracking leaking dam looming over us all.
Add on a government who laughed, dismissive, derisive, at our efforts. Who thought funding was unnecessary, or organization, or efficiency. Reason, sense.
Not to mention, having the IRS or other superior lienholders foreclose your interest out unexpectedly, because your files were incomplete and/or the other guys didn't have the liquidation teams' new address.
We were way overburdened. Especially at the beginning, the size of our portfolios far exceeded guidelines. It was simply physically impossible to stay on top of your accounts. We'd work killer hours, seven days a week, usually 80-90 hours a week. But for months on end, it wouldn't be enough. You'd never lose that uneasy sense that something awful was about to blow up in your portfolio. And often enough, it really did.
This added up to a lot of stress.
Sometimes new liquidators, usually seasoned and professional bankers, would hire on by mistake: they were technically qualified, but couldn't handle it emotionally. After all of one or two days they'd quit. But they wouldn't tell anyone. Instead they'd just disappear into the sunset, abandoning their desks and their stuff, never saying where they went, never even picking up their first and last little paycheck.
Me? I loved it.
I loved creating order out of that extreme chaos. I loved how multidisciplinary it was: real estate, finance, economics, business, commercial loans, bank and other fraud, bankruptcy law, title issues, marketing, appraisal issues, significant property management, tax deeds, rehab, on and on. Analysis and disposition of real estate and business assets. Criminal referrals to the FBI. Foreclosures. Workouts galore.
Ha! Psychology. Wheeling and dealing. Healing financial illness. Morgue humor. A sense of family, of being on the front lines with other liquidators in a way that binds you tight forever and ever. A sense of destiny. Of history. Being square in the midst of events of true significance, of lasting importance.
We were firemen, putting out fires. And the best and highest achievement, to me, wasn't that final asset disposition. Instead, it was when my portfolio became non-emergency.
My peers would ask how I could do that so fast. It was particularly startling because it was my nature and my strength to handle the worst of the worst: the messiest loans, say with different human and partnership and corporate entities as borrowers, multiple pieces of collateral including movables like machines or oilfield pipes, participation loans with other banks.
Then toss in environmental issues, like your collateral property contains a mysterious bulging 55-gallon barrel of who-knows-what and how-much-will-it-cost-to-find-out-what-it-is and then what-do-we-do-with The Bulging Thing. Or you have a seriously contaminated site, with a negative appraised value. That means it costs more to clean it up than the property is worth. (Disposition Directive #1: DO NOT FORECLOSE!)
Since most asset managers in their right minds would avoid such accounts - they take all your time, and give you big headaches but little recovery, making you look bad in your performance statistics - anyway, since I liked them and was good at them, I usually got 'em.
So: How to stop playing fireman and become an orderly asset manager?
Simple. Just douse only the immediate fires, then sit down and treat it like any other account. Prepare for anything that might happen.
There was a standard approach that would cover almost everything. You list all the pertinent factors: amount, owners, guarantors, collateral. You order title searches and borrower asset searches and appraisals. Those things take time to come back, so now that it's in process, you go on to the next account.
Don't wait. That's a common unwise asset management decision. You don't need to learn all the details of the account to know you must have a current appraisal on your collateral. So take what legal description you've got, and order the thing. Sure, maybe you're missing another piece of property. But if so, you can catch up on that later. Meantime, you have at least one of the valuations you'll need.
You prioritize. If one loan comprises two entire filing cabinets, needing about a week to read, you flip through the basic stuff first, order your info, and leave the filing cabinets until the end, after all your other fires are banked. But then - do go through those files. That's another way a lot of asset managers screw up. So often, that careful diligence turns up a whole another avenue of collection. Another piece of collateral, another guarantor, an avenue for civil recovery from fraudulent acts.
The difference is approach. Are you being reactive or proactive? Any reasonable person would see that reactive was perfectly understandable in those circumstances. Necessary, too. But in the end, you need to get control, for the best disposition of the asset. And that means going proactive. You really can work toward both at once.
Now, all these years later, I can see that I've let my life turn towards the reactive.
And I don't like that.
I don't want to be a fireman.
I want to sit down and calmly toast my dinner around glowing coals.
Is this possible, in the presence of strange unpredictable health emergencies, and hurricanes, and such?
Sure.
If I could do it under those failed bank conditions, I certainly can do it in my current life.
I could, and should, have done it before. But I can't change the past.
What I can change is my actions in the present.
It's mostly attitude. You can't make changes if you don't believe improvement is both possible and permitted. So very many people seem to feel they don't deserve a happier life.
Of course, some things aren't in our control. I can't make the rain stop or make the sun shine. I can't change past events that damaged me in various ways.
But, as they say, I can control my response to those things.
I can control how I interact with the events that I can't control.
And I've been living life on an emergency basis for several years now, and I don't like it. So as far as I can, I'm going to change that.
The work I used to do before I got disabled was emergency type work. We liquidated the banks and S&L's that failed in the banking crises of the 1980's and early 1990's.
Here's a general description of how that works.
A bank's loans are its most significant assets. When enough people and businesses stop making loan payments, the bank fails. In come the regulators to shut the bank down. Those are bankbusters, in our vernacular. Formally, they're usually called something like Closing Specialists when they do it full time.
But on closing day itself, anyone and everyone may be called upon to pitch in. It's an extraordinary event, often involving the FBI and subpoenas and handcuffs and forcible lockings of vaults. You'll have crime scene or evidence seal tape all over the ATM machines and drive-through tubes and night deposit box. Police may be posted all around the outside of the bank, since past scenes included bankers sneaking out the window with seriously incriminating files in hand. The tension in the air - as bank managers, employees, bankbusters, and law enforcement stand around listening to the bank seizure subpoenas being read off - is unbelievably thick.
The insured deposits and other healthy parts of the bank are usually transferred to another bank. The non-performing assets, mostly delinquent loans, are slowly liquidated by Liquidators, and the proceeds repaid to whatever entities covered such liabilities as insured deposits - say the bank insurer, the FDIC. The remaining accounting niceties, often just entries on paper, are generally credited or debited to zero and formally closed by Terminators.
These formal job titles make company softball contests especially fun.
I was a Liquidator, assigned to Major Assets. Our task was to recover everything we could on non-performing assets like delinquent mortgages, notes, and REO (Real Estate Owned, already foreclosed upon but not yet sold). Essentially, I did fancy collections on big commercial loans, usually commercial real estate mortgages. A wonderful variety of collateral secured the mortgages: office buildings, apartment complexes, hotels, shopping centers, restaurants, medical centers, failed real estate developments, oil and gas interests, churches, raw land; plus, odder bits like a funeral home or radio station or monogramming machine. Over six years my portfolio totaled about $243,000,000 to $350,000,000, depending on how you measure it. Say a quarter billion dollars.
It was extraordinary work, fraught with great troubles and scary events. Assets burning, bomb threats, delinquent borrowers committing suicide, and others who said they would. There was a terrible sense of a profound economic collapse under way, and we just tiny figures trying to plug up the holes in the huge cracking leaking dam looming over us all.
Add on a government who laughed, dismissive, derisive, at our efforts. Who thought funding was unnecessary, or organization, or efficiency. Reason, sense.
Not to mention, having the IRS or other superior lienholders foreclose your interest out unexpectedly, because your files were incomplete and/or the other guys didn't have the liquidation teams' new address.
We were way overburdened. Especially at the beginning, the size of our portfolios far exceeded guidelines. It was simply physically impossible to stay on top of your accounts. We'd work killer hours, seven days a week, usually 80-90 hours a week. But for months on end, it wouldn't be enough. You'd never lose that uneasy sense that something awful was about to blow up in your portfolio. And often enough, it really did.
This added up to a lot of stress.
Sometimes new liquidators, usually seasoned and professional bankers, would hire on by mistake: they were technically qualified, but couldn't handle it emotionally. After all of one or two days they'd quit. But they wouldn't tell anyone. Instead they'd just disappear into the sunset, abandoning their desks and their stuff, never saying where they went, never even picking up their first and last little paycheck.
Me? I loved it.
I loved creating order out of that extreme chaos. I loved how multidisciplinary it was: real estate, finance, economics, business, commercial loans, bank and other fraud, bankruptcy law, title issues, marketing, appraisal issues, significant property management, tax deeds, rehab, on and on. Analysis and disposition of real estate and business assets. Criminal referrals to the FBI. Foreclosures. Workouts galore.
Ha! Psychology. Wheeling and dealing. Healing financial illness. Morgue humor. A sense of family, of being on the front lines with other liquidators in a way that binds you tight forever and ever. A sense of destiny. Of history. Being square in the midst of events of true significance, of lasting importance.
We were firemen, putting out fires. And the best and highest achievement, to me, wasn't that final asset disposition. Instead, it was when my portfolio became non-emergency.
My peers would ask how I could do that so fast. It was particularly startling because it was my nature and my strength to handle the worst of the worst: the messiest loans, say with different human and partnership and corporate entities as borrowers, multiple pieces of collateral including movables like machines or oilfield pipes, participation loans with other banks.
Then toss in environmental issues, like your collateral property contains a mysterious bulging 55-gallon barrel of who-knows-what and how-much-will-it-cost-to-find-out-what-it-is and then what-do-we-do-with The Bulging Thing. Or you have a seriously contaminated site, with a negative appraised value. That means it costs more to clean it up than the property is worth. (Disposition Directive #1: DO NOT FORECLOSE!)
Since most asset managers in their right minds would avoid such accounts - they take all your time, and give you big headaches but little recovery, making you look bad in your performance statistics - anyway, since I liked them and was good at them, I usually got 'em.
So: How to stop playing fireman and become an orderly asset manager?
Simple. Just douse only the immediate fires, then sit down and treat it like any other account. Prepare for anything that might happen.
There was a standard approach that would cover almost everything. You list all the pertinent factors: amount, owners, guarantors, collateral. You order title searches and borrower asset searches and appraisals. Those things take time to come back, so now that it's in process, you go on to the next account.
Don't wait. That's a common unwise asset management decision. You don't need to learn all the details of the account to know you must have a current appraisal on your collateral. So take what legal description you've got, and order the thing. Sure, maybe you're missing another piece of property. But if so, you can catch up on that later. Meantime, you have at least one of the valuations you'll need.
You prioritize. If one loan comprises two entire filing cabinets, needing about a week to read, you flip through the basic stuff first, order your info, and leave the filing cabinets until the end, after all your other fires are banked. But then - do go through those files. That's another way a lot of asset managers screw up. So often, that careful diligence turns up a whole another avenue of collection. Another piece of collateral, another guarantor, an avenue for civil recovery from fraudulent acts.
The difference is approach. Are you being reactive or proactive? Any reasonable person would see that reactive was perfectly understandable in those circumstances. Necessary, too. But in the end, you need to get control, for the best disposition of the asset. And that means going proactive. You really can work toward both at once.
Now, all these years later, I can see that I've let my life turn towards the reactive.
And I don't like that.
I don't want to be a fireman.
I want to sit down and calmly toast my dinner around glowing coals.
Is this possible, in the presence of strange unpredictable health emergencies, and hurricanes, and such?
Sure.
If I could do it under those failed bank conditions, I certainly can do it in my current life.
I could, and should, have done it before. But I can't change the past.
What I can change is my actions in the present.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Estivating
In summer I estivate.
And like a bear hibernating in winter, from time to time I'll stir in my sleep, poke my head out of my den.
But that doesn't mean it's over.
It will be, not very long from now. You who know me long and well already understand that this quietude is just the usual seasonal stuff with me. I get very sick with increases in airborne pollen. According to news reports, more and more people do, and more and more are experiencing the effects I feel.
It's not always what you'd expect. Sneezing, wheezing, coughing, watery itchy eyes - well, sure. But once you're extremely allergic to thousands of substances, it goes way beyond that, into being totally incapacitated.
There's profound fatigue, weakness, dizziness, loss of balance, copious sleep, cognitive problems, total airway obstruction, inability to communicate. Itching that leaves you bloody every morning from scratching your skin off in your sleep. It's the allergies - not my other health problems - that render me so disabled that I can't work. It's why I lost my dream job and went on Social Security Disability.
This time of year, healthier people sometimes lose patience with me. Some can't understand how I can do physical things one day, then be totally useless again the next. Or, when I'm not bedridden, how I can move around doing stuff, but find it almost impossible to communicate.
Sometimes when they hear my strange hoarse almost-silent voice I suddenly I see the little light bulb go on over their head. Like they connect the voice with the histamine gumming up my synaptic gaps.
At the same time I can't express myself, I'll have trouble understanding others. My perceptions are flawed: --Are you mad at me?! --no, wasn't even thinking about you!; or, --Isn't this FUN!! --no, actually I'm going home now, ok?
So then this failure to relate becomes a two-way street. And perhaps a bit annoying.
Someone who's like a brother to me knew from his allergic wife how this illness affects personal interactions. He talked with me about its impact on one's relationship to the world.
I like his perception. It's like you can't interface quite right, and you know you can't, but you're not sure how or where it's gone wrong. You try to scramble about to understand and fix it, but that only seems to make it worse. You end up with damaged relationships yet you can't quite figure out why. You may lose jobs or friendships, and be left with nothing but utter confusion about how it happened.
It all adds up to a bizarre juxtaposition of hard and "soft" symptoms and when they can't understand it, sometimes people lose patience with me. And I can't fault them for it.
So I tend to drift along in silence until I get a better grip on health. I'm almost there, it's August, and the turnaround starts up soon.
Still...
Enough really interesting things are happening that maybe I'll overcome my distaste and dislike of the little cognitive glitches and such I'd have to swim around in order to blog.
This time of year is always good for object lessons in the limits of my logical self.
And like a bear hibernating in winter, from time to time I'll stir in my sleep, poke my head out of my den.
But that doesn't mean it's over.
It will be, not very long from now. You who know me long and well already understand that this quietude is just the usual seasonal stuff with me. I get very sick with increases in airborne pollen. According to news reports, more and more people do, and more and more are experiencing the effects I feel.
It's not always what you'd expect. Sneezing, wheezing, coughing, watery itchy eyes - well, sure. But once you're extremely allergic to thousands of substances, it goes way beyond that, into being totally incapacitated.
There's profound fatigue, weakness, dizziness, loss of balance, copious sleep, cognitive problems, total airway obstruction, inability to communicate. Itching that leaves you bloody every morning from scratching your skin off in your sleep. It's the allergies - not my other health problems - that render me so disabled that I can't work. It's why I lost my dream job and went on Social Security Disability.
This time of year, healthier people sometimes lose patience with me. Some can't understand how I can do physical things one day, then be totally useless again the next. Or, when I'm not bedridden, how I can move around doing stuff, but find it almost impossible to communicate.
Sometimes when they hear my strange hoarse almost-silent voice I suddenly I see the little light bulb go on over their head. Like they connect the voice with the histamine gumming up my synaptic gaps.
At the same time I can't express myself, I'll have trouble understanding others. My perceptions are flawed: --Are you mad at me?! --no, wasn't even thinking about you!; or, --Isn't this FUN!! --no, actually I'm going home now, ok?
So then this failure to relate becomes a two-way street. And perhaps a bit annoying.
Someone who's like a brother to me knew from his allergic wife how this illness affects personal interactions. He talked with me about its impact on one's relationship to the world.
I like his perception. It's like you can't interface quite right, and you know you can't, but you're not sure how or where it's gone wrong. You try to scramble about to understand and fix it, but that only seems to make it worse. You end up with damaged relationships yet you can't quite figure out why. You may lose jobs or friendships, and be left with nothing but utter confusion about how it happened.
It all adds up to a bizarre juxtaposition of hard and "soft" symptoms and when they can't understand it, sometimes people lose patience with me. And I can't fault them for it.
So I tend to drift along in silence until I get a better grip on health. I'm almost there, it's August, and the turnaround starts up soon.
Still...
Enough really interesting things are happening that maybe I'll overcome my distaste and dislike of the little cognitive glitches and such I'd have to swim around in order to blog.
This time of year is always good for object lessons in the limits of my logical self.
Monday, July 11, 2005
Sometimes Bad News Can Be Good News
As Hurricane Dennis approached us Friday night, I got an email from our mortgage holders.
Our application for the refi is, for now, turned down.
I'll say it's on hold for 2 months instead, since they kindly asked us to come back then. Our credit scores are too low. They actually went down after we applied.
That's because just after we applied, Walter's employer decided to lay off everyone in his division.
Which was a couple weeks after he went back to active duty, after 15 months off on Worker's Comp, getting shoulder surgery.
But, true to form, he was only off for one week before getting hired by a larger company with a higher rate per mile pay, and he's getting more dispatch miles, too.
So I think we'll be able to improve those scores fairly quickly.
In the meantime...I keep wondering why I don't feel terrible about this.
It's probably because we weren't really ready. The house still needs a lot of work, and I can't keep rehabbing at the pace I've been. It's killing me.
Now, suddenly, this burden of time pressure is off my shoulders. I'm almost at a loss.
Almost.
I still need to do a lot of work, of course. It's just that now, I can do it at my own pace. Enjoyably. Much less painfully.
I do still feel a sense of shock. Not such a big one, but it's there.
And one thing hurts bad: thinking of those three people we owe, that I want so much to pay back tomorrow, and can only repay with the refi: my mother, my father, and our friend and former employee H.
That one hurts.
Now, since I can't change it just yet, I'll have to chase it back into its box. Compartmentalize.
And do everything I possibly can - as fast as I can - to build up funds to get those scores back up.
Send me good thoughts, folks.
Please.
Our application for the refi is, for now, turned down.
I'll say it's on hold for 2 months instead, since they kindly asked us to come back then. Our credit scores are too low. They actually went down after we applied.
That's because just after we applied, Walter's employer decided to lay off everyone in his division.
Which was a couple weeks after he went back to active duty, after 15 months off on Worker's Comp, getting shoulder surgery.
But, true to form, he was only off for one week before getting hired by a larger company with a higher rate per mile pay, and he's getting more dispatch miles, too.
So I think we'll be able to improve those scores fairly quickly.
In the meantime...I keep wondering why I don't feel terrible about this.
It's probably because we weren't really ready. The house still needs a lot of work, and I can't keep rehabbing at the pace I've been. It's killing me.
Now, suddenly, this burden of time pressure is off my shoulders. I'm almost at a loss.
Almost.
I still need to do a lot of work, of course. It's just that now, I can do it at my own pace. Enjoyably. Much less painfully.
I do still feel a sense of shock. Not such a big one, but it's there.
And one thing hurts bad: thinking of those three people we owe, that I want so much to pay back tomorrow, and can only repay with the refi: my mother, my father, and our friend and former employee H.
That one hurts.
Now, since I can't change it just yet, I'll have to chase it back into its box. Compartmentalize.
And do everything I possibly can - as fast as I can - to build up funds to get those scores back up.
Send me good thoughts, folks.
Please.
Monday, July 04, 2005
Declaration of Independence
www.archives.gov
July 4, 2005
The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within. He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands. He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers. He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance. He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation: For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury: For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies: For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments: For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:
Column 1 Georgia: Button Gwinnett Lyman Hall George Walton
Column 2 North Carolina: William Hooper Joseph Hewes John Penn
South Carolina: Edward Rutledge Thomas Heyward, Jr. Thomas Lynch, Jr. Arthur Middleton
Column 3 Massachusetts: John Hancock
Maryland: Samuel Chase William Paca Thomas Stone Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia: George Wythe Richard Henry Lee Thomas Jefferson Benjamin Harrison Thomas Nelson, Jr. Francis Lightfoot Lee Carter Braxton
Column 4 Pennsylvania: Robert Morris Benjamin Rush Benjamin Franklin John Morton George Clymer James Smith George Taylor James Wilson George Ross
Delaware: Caesar Rodney George Read Thomas McKean
Column 5 New York: William Floyd Philip Livingston Francis Lewis Lewis Morris
New Jersey: Richard Stockton John Witherspoon Francis Hopkinson John Hart Abraham Clark
Column 6 New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett William Whipple
Massachusetts: Samuel Adams John Adams Robert Treat Paine Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins William Ellery
Connecticut: Roger Sherman Samuel Huntington William Williams Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire: Matthew Thornton
Page URL:
http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/charters/declaration_transcript.html
U.S. National Archives & Records Administration8601 Adelphi Road, College Park, MD, 20740-6001, • 1-86-NARA-NARA • 1-866-272-6272
July 4, 2005
The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within. He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands. He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers. He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance. He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation: For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury: For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies: For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments: For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:
Column 1 Georgia: Button Gwinnett Lyman Hall George Walton
Column 2 North Carolina: William Hooper Joseph Hewes John Penn
South Carolina: Edward Rutledge Thomas Heyward, Jr. Thomas Lynch, Jr. Arthur Middleton
Column 3 Massachusetts: John Hancock
Maryland: Samuel Chase William Paca Thomas Stone Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia: George Wythe Richard Henry Lee Thomas Jefferson Benjamin Harrison Thomas Nelson, Jr. Francis Lightfoot Lee Carter Braxton
Column 4 Pennsylvania: Robert Morris Benjamin Rush Benjamin Franklin John Morton George Clymer James Smith George Taylor James Wilson George Ross
Delaware: Caesar Rodney George Read Thomas McKean
Column 5 New York: William Floyd Philip Livingston Francis Lewis Lewis Morris
New Jersey: Richard Stockton John Witherspoon Francis Hopkinson John Hart Abraham Clark
Column 6 New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett William Whipple
Massachusetts: Samuel Adams John Adams Robert Treat Paine Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins William Ellery
Connecticut: Roger Sherman Samuel Huntington William Williams Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire: Matthew Thornton
Page URL:
http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/charters/declaration_transcript.html
U.S. National Archives & Records Administration8601 Adelphi Road, College Park, MD, 20740-6001, • 1-86-NARA-NARA • 1-866-272-6272
Independence Day
Yesterday, for the first time in months, I spent hours outside. I weeded the front yard and started on the back.
Free. Free. Free.
We've been getting so much rain every single day for so long that everyone is swallowed up by plant growth. The water makes everything grow phenomenally fast. At the same time, you can't get out to weed or mow lawns - because it's raining.
And here we are, with a holiday upon us, and everyone is all embarrassed because their yards look like weed junkyards.
but WAIT! That surely means...I'm NOT the only one!
So me, I settled in to weed at my own pace, not worrying about what others thought of my efforts. (Or tardiness thereof.)
Not that I was so worried about that, anyway.
I stayed up way past my bedtime. My back yard fence neighbor, Peter, came out in his yard, oh I've missed him. It's Peter's mango tree. We talked mangoes, and squirrels and blue jays eating the mangoes, plus possums and coons, and the caterpillars eating up our Snow on the Mountain shrubs
He's one of these horribly overachieving multitalented people. He acts, sings, dances; he's handsome and sweet and funny and very, very smart. He's a jeweler in both gems and metals, and was a consultant to the Met in New York. He's also a world-class painter.
And broke.
Which is the only way I can say, Just like me.
So I told him about my plans to have a Yard and Plant Sale - which unbeknownst to Peter, include him too. I decided on the weekend of the 16th instead of the 9th; I'm slow, and I could have twice as many plants ready to sell if I waited just that bit. He said, Good idea, give it another week. When you push things too hard they break.
See? Smart.
I told him I want to do this twice a year, which is the limit where we live, and that I'd be happy to sell anything for him if he'd like, he doesn't have to be there. He has lots of plants he can put in. Lots of baby mango trees, coming up volunteer. ;-)
And...although as I told him, he's WAY too good for this...he might put together some simple inexpensive sketches to sell, too. And/or maybe bring one of his "real" works out. So many of our neighbors are blessed with both excellent taste and excellent bank accounts these days - no reason to assume a pricier work won't sell. Who knows, he may even get a commission out of it. I tell you, his portraits are breathtaking, extraordinarily fine.
I told him, --If not this sale, then the next one, in fall - we'll have a few months to get our plants growing big by then - you will make enough money to buy a computer. You must get a computer, Peter. You have to read my blog. And start your own.
What it all comes back to, you see, is independence.
Today I think of all of us who want more independence in our lives. Against the backdrop of our nation's Independence Day, that glorious ideal we grew up with, I put all of us as individuals. I say to us all, Be more independent. Be as strong and free as you can be.
Is it all entirely in our control? Well...Yes and no. Yesterday my health gave me my "Get Out of Jail Free" card. But when illness turns me into an involuntary shut-in, it still can't imprison my spirit. Even when it shuts me up. And I have this blessing that many other disabled people don't: sooner or later, I get better enough to get out of bed, and then to go outside again. I treasure that freedom, I treasure that day. I value it tremendously, when others don't even feel the goodness of what they have. So tell me: who's better off?
Poverty can have a perverse sort of freedom to it. In some societies, not even so perverse. But finding that key to not letting your possessions own you is much harder in our urbanized society. It's become difficult to even grow our own food, especially meat, much less get by without cash for rent or mortgage payments, electricity, water bills.
Almost everyone I know and care about has suffered real financial setbacks in the last few years. It affects our independence. We struggle. We try everything we can think of - work more, spend less, take classes, work out debt, even sell the house. Then maybe we think of having a Yard and Plant Sale, too. No shame in that. Fun, actually.
In the meantime, I send my thoughts out to all you people - millions of parents, certainly mine, are among them - who are working harder than they should because they're helping out their grown children and other loved ones who've been hit bad by economic setbacks.
kmom and kdad, I promise you, we're almost done, almost out of this 2 1/2 year hole. It won't be much longer now, and we'll have a good chunk of our independence back. Soon, soon, we can support our own selves the only way we really want to: by working. And when our independence returns, we can stop impinging on yours.
To those of you who came here to America seeking that independence - including my own fine man - I say, Welcome. Welcome to this great country. I don't care why you came here - I mean, as long as the reasons were righteous enough to exclude committing crimes here, or escaping punishment for crime there, of course.
If your reasons were economic, fine. That's why most of our own forebears came here, and it's hypocritical to say you should only come here to escape ideologies we dislike. You'll hear some say that immigration hurts our economy. Bogus. We really need it to thrive. You help us, not hurt us; and if your presence feeds into the competitive cycle, what's more American than competitive markets?
Some of those naysayers are the same people who believe this idiot called Laffer, who thinks that rich and powerful persons and companies let their money flow downhill to working people. (Have you ever seen them do that?) This is what happens when people with no training or experience in real-world economics are presented with something that Sounds Good. I won't tell you why just now, but I can claim some serious expertise in that field, and l'm here to tell you, that theory is so bogus it's actually not even an economic theory.
Don't want a degree in economics? I don't blame you. Here's a shortcut. I call it, Look In and Look Out. 1. Look In your wallet. Is there money in there? 2. Look Out to your friends, acquaintances, neighbors. Are they able to pay their bills?
The answers to those two questions will provide about 90% of the information you need to understand how the economy's going. And when you vote? (and DO. It's FUN!) here's a nice American saying: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. If a politician tanks a robust, healthy economy, don't vote for them again.
It's not all economics, of course. If you wondered if things like xenophobia and bigotry are behind anti-immigration feelings, sometimes you're right. Only sometimes, though, because really we're not all like that. Others may notice that immigrants - maybe believing in those principles of free speech and independent thought - tend to speak their minds much more freely than many Americans do these days. That'll scare some right there. Not me. That's another reason this country needs you all, and why I say welcome.
Sometimes it takes immigrants to remind us why we're a great country. Not perfect, no. But great. And seeing this country I love so much with clear eyes, including and forgiving her faults, means I love her at least as much as those who insist she's perfect, when no one on earth ever is.
To our forces, those in the armed services and contractors too: I know good and well that you're not robots who think with one mind and speak with one voice. I myself am adamantly opposed to the war in Iraq, and always have been. However, I have never, ever been opposed to you.
Whatever the reason you're over there, whether it's because you truly believe this is essential to our freedom, or for sympathy for Iraqis; for economic reasons, including that education awaiting you on your return; or because you were swept up in the fervor and are stuck there now; or never believed it was right but said, That's my job, it's time to go do it - I don't care; you are entitled, absolutely, to your own reasons, your own beliefs. I support you in your efforts - all your righteous efforts, understand - and I hope so much for your safe and whole return.
To those who felt their belief system tilt and shatter - including you who experienced it when you were told to shut up, to no longer voice your opinions to reporters - you have my special sympathy. You know there are those who would despise you, would call you unpatriotic, would say if you disagree with your president you aren't a Real American. I am not one of them, and I believe those people are quite wrong.
Thinking for yourself, speaking freely, believing in truth - those things mean independence. This day is for all of you, whatever side(s) you come down on.
To the little kid in all of us, eating our bar-b-q's and corn on the cob, running around with sparklers and spitting watermelon seeds - Enjoy the holiday. That's what it's there for, too. A real holiday is something for independent people; if you're not independent, you can't really let loose.
And enjoy the fireworks tonight. I love them, myself; but I can't go there any more, and I have to check out now. I'm afraid I've become a terrible killjoy over the illegal fireworks and shooting issue, so I won't burden you with my thoughts on that topic on this day of pleasure. Except to say I will try really, really hard this year not to call the cops unless the bottle rockets or bullets actually come IN one of the dozens of windows in my house. And I hope that Vietnam vet down the street can stay cool this year, too.
It looks like, here on the 4th, we're going to have the first day without any hard rain - a real-for-real Full Sun Day - since any of us can even remember.
Happy Independence Day!
Free. Free. Free.
We've been getting so much rain every single day for so long that everyone is swallowed up by plant growth. The water makes everything grow phenomenally fast. At the same time, you can't get out to weed or mow lawns - because it's raining.
And here we are, with a holiday upon us, and everyone is all embarrassed because their yards look like weed junkyards.
but WAIT! That surely means...I'm NOT the only one!
So me, I settled in to weed at my own pace, not worrying about what others thought of my efforts. (Or tardiness thereof.)
Not that I was so worried about that, anyway.
I stayed up way past my bedtime. My back yard fence neighbor, Peter, came out in his yard, oh I've missed him. It's Peter's mango tree. We talked mangoes, and squirrels and blue jays eating the mangoes, plus possums and coons, and the caterpillars eating up our Snow on the Mountain shrubs
He's one of these horribly overachieving multitalented people. He acts, sings, dances; he's handsome and sweet and funny and very, very smart. He's a jeweler in both gems and metals, and was a consultant to the Met in New York. He's also a world-class painter.
And broke.
Which is the only way I can say, Just like me.
So I told him about my plans to have a Yard and Plant Sale - which unbeknownst to Peter, include him too. I decided on the weekend of the 16th instead of the 9th; I'm slow, and I could have twice as many plants ready to sell if I waited just that bit. He said, Good idea, give it another week. When you push things too hard they break.
See? Smart.
I told him I want to do this twice a year, which is the limit where we live, and that I'd be happy to sell anything for him if he'd like, he doesn't have to be there. He has lots of plants he can put in. Lots of baby mango trees, coming up volunteer. ;-)
And...although as I told him, he's WAY too good for this...he might put together some simple inexpensive sketches to sell, too. And/or maybe bring one of his "real" works out. So many of our neighbors are blessed with both excellent taste and excellent bank accounts these days - no reason to assume a pricier work won't sell. Who knows, he may even get a commission out of it. I tell you, his portraits are breathtaking, extraordinarily fine.
I told him, --If not this sale, then the next one, in fall - we'll have a few months to get our plants growing big by then - you will make enough money to buy a computer. You must get a computer, Peter. You have to read my blog. And start your own.
What it all comes back to, you see, is independence.
Today I think of all of us who want more independence in our lives. Against the backdrop of our nation's Independence Day, that glorious ideal we grew up with, I put all of us as individuals. I say to us all, Be more independent. Be as strong and free as you can be.
Is it all entirely in our control? Well...Yes and no. Yesterday my health gave me my "Get Out of Jail Free" card. But when illness turns me into an involuntary shut-in, it still can't imprison my spirit. Even when it shuts me up. And I have this blessing that many other disabled people don't: sooner or later, I get better enough to get out of bed, and then to go outside again. I treasure that freedom, I treasure that day. I value it tremendously, when others don't even feel the goodness of what they have. So tell me: who's better off?
Poverty can have a perverse sort of freedom to it. In some societies, not even so perverse. But finding that key to not letting your possessions own you is much harder in our urbanized society. It's become difficult to even grow our own food, especially meat, much less get by without cash for rent or mortgage payments, electricity, water bills.
Almost everyone I know and care about has suffered real financial setbacks in the last few years. It affects our independence. We struggle. We try everything we can think of - work more, spend less, take classes, work out debt, even sell the house. Then maybe we think of having a Yard and Plant Sale, too. No shame in that. Fun, actually.
In the meantime, I send my thoughts out to all you people - millions of parents, certainly mine, are among them - who are working harder than they should because they're helping out their grown children and other loved ones who've been hit bad by economic setbacks.
kmom and kdad, I promise you, we're almost done, almost out of this 2 1/2 year hole. It won't be much longer now, and we'll have a good chunk of our independence back. Soon, soon, we can support our own selves the only way we really want to: by working. And when our independence returns, we can stop impinging on yours.
To those of you who came here to America seeking that independence - including my own fine man - I say, Welcome. Welcome to this great country. I don't care why you came here - I mean, as long as the reasons were righteous enough to exclude committing crimes here, or escaping punishment for crime there, of course.
If your reasons were economic, fine. That's why most of our own forebears came here, and it's hypocritical to say you should only come here to escape ideologies we dislike. You'll hear some say that immigration hurts our economy. Bogus. We really need it to thrive. You help us, not hurt us; and if your presence feeds into the competitive cycle, what's more American than competitive markets?
Some of those naysayers are the same people who believe this idiot called Laffer, who thinks that rich and powerful persons and companies let their money flow downhill to working people. (Have you ever seen them do that?) This is what happens when people with no training or experience in real-world economics are presented with something that Sounds Good. I won't tell you why just now, but I can claim some serious expertise in that field, and l'm here to tell you, that theory is so bogus it's actually not even an economic theory.
Don't want a degree in economics? I don't blame you. Here's a shortcut. I call it, Look In and Look Out. 1. Look In your wallet. Is there money in there? 2. Look Out to your friends, acquaintances, neighbors. Are they able to pay their bills?
The answers to those two questions will provide about 90% of the information you need to understand how the economy's going. And when you vote? (and DO. It's FUN!) here's a nice American saying: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. If a politician tanks a robust, healthy economy, don't vote for them again.
It's not all economics, of course. If you wondered if things like xenophobia and bigotry are behind anti-immigration feelings, sometimes you're right. Only sometimes, though, because really we're not all like that. Others may notice that immigrants - maybe believing in those principles of free speech and independent thought - tend to speak their minds much more freely than many Americans do these days. That'll scare some right there. Not me. That's another reason this country needs you all, and why I say welcome.
Sometimes it takes immigrants to remind us why we're a great country. Not perfect, no. But great. And seeing this country I love so much with clear eyes, including and forgiving her faults, means I love her at least as much as those who insist she's perfect, when no one on earth ever is.
To our forces, those in the armed services and contractors too: I know good and well that you're not robots who think with one mind and speak with one voice. I myself am adamantly opposed to the war in Iraq, and always have been. However, I have never, ever been opposed to you.
Whatever the reason you're over there, whether it's because you truly believe this is essential to our freedom, or for sympathy for Iraqis; for economic reasons, including that education awaiting you on your return; or because you were swept up in the fervor and are stuck there now; or never believed it was right but said, That's my job, it's time to go do it - I don't care; you are entitled, absolutely, to your own reasons, your own beliefs. I support you in your efforts - all your righteous efforts, understand - and I hope so much for your safe and whole return.
To those who felt their belief system tilt and shatter - including you who experienced it when you were told to shut up, to no longer voice your opinions to reporters - you have my special sympathy. You know there are those who would despise you, would call you unpatriotic, would say if you disagree with your president you aren't a Real American. I am not one of them, and I believe those people are quite wrong.
Thinking for yourself, speaking freely, believing in truth - those things mean independence. This day is for all of you, whatever side(s) you come down on.
To the little kid in all of us, eating our bar-b-q's and corn on the cob, running around with sparklers and spitting watermelon seeds - Enjoy the holiday. That's what it's there for, too. A real holiday is something for independent people; if you're not independent, you can't really let loose.
And enjoy the fireworks tonight. I love them, myself; but I can't go there any more, and I have to check out now. I'm afraid I've become a terrible killjoy over the illegal fireworks and shooting issue, so I won't burden you with my thoughts on that topic on this day of pleasure. Except to say I will try really, really hard this year not to call the cops unless the bottle rockets or bullets actually come IN one of the dozens of windows in my house. And I hope that Vietnam vet down the street can stay cool this year, too.
It looks like, here on the 4th, we're going to have the first day without any hard rain - a real-for-real Full Sun Day - since any of us can even remember.
Happy Independence Day!
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Thursday, June 02, 2005
I'm B-A-A-A-A-A-ACK!!!
It is SO good to be back online. It's only been a week but it feels like a year. Our beautiful little laptop will probably have to get shipped back to HP for some warranty work. How the modem got fried, I don't know. But fried it is.
Walter and I spent a good hour on the phone(s) with HP's free support unit: Walter on the cell phone in my left ear, and HP in my right. Such a nice lady, in India. Very, very good, too.
But it was all to no avail. We were supposed to call back after doing backups and getting certain installation etc. CD's together, to do a "repair" run. But Walter knew what to do from there without them. So he and I spent about six hours on the phone, me working on the laptop in safe mode, running diagnostics, reinstalling Windows Professional - only to have it all get knocked out again upon trying to turn on the modem.
So, we ended up fixing the house computer instead. That only took an hour or two.
I read about regular people doing such things all the time. But k the phobe never, ever has. As a phobe, of course, this stressed me out. I had to work to summon up some serious self-control. It was quite an experience. We got through it. Walter was driven to the limits of his endurance, I have no doubt. So was I. I'm proud of us both.
Now I need a little catching-up time. It's been a difficult week. Better now, much. In a day or two I'll get back to you all, and answer your emails too.
It was really nice to see your notes and such, getting back online. So...cheery, and sweet. Thanks for the kind thoughts.
Walter and I spent a good hour on the phone(s) with HP's free support unit: Walter on the cell phone in my left ear, and HP in my right. Such a nice lady, in India. Very, very good, too.
But it was all to no avail. We were supposed to call back after doing backups and getting certain installation etc. CD's together, to do a "repair" run. But Walter knew what to do from there without them. So he and I spent about six hours on the phone, me working on the laptop in safe mode, running diagnostics, reinstalling Windows Professional - only to have it all get knocked out again upon trying to turn on the modem.
So, we ended up fixing the house computer instead. That only took an hour or two.
I read about regular people doing such things all the time. But k the phobe never, ever has. As a phobe, of course, this stressed me out. I had to work to summon up some serious self-control. It was quite an experience. We got through it. Walter was driven to the limits of his endurance, I have no doubt. So was I. I'm proud of us both.
Now I need a little catching-up time. It's been a difficult week. Better now, much. In a day or two I'll get back to you all, and answer your emails too.
It was really nice to see your notes and such, getting back online. So...cheery, and sweet. Thanks for the kind thoughts.
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