Engagement Party Pics

From the last weekend.....lots of drinking and karaoke (note - you do not want to hear me sing...so glad that these are pictures and not videos). 

thanks for everybody that came.......

I weep for humanity

so, I'm a procrastinator...and I'm waiting until April 10 to finish and file my taxes.......and I'm workign on the my taxes in Turbo Tax, when I come across this crazy gem.

honestly...on a tax forum, you ask about Michael Jackson??  what's wrong with you people? i'm looking at you "V-State"

Monkey Martial Arts

So awesome that it had to be reposted...

found via Brave New Traveler

Wolverines fans get on board for MSU...reluctantly

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/ncaatourney09/columns/story?columnist=schlabach_mark&id=4044768


Having just returned from Ann Arbor this past weekend, it was incredibly weird seeing MSU fans come out of the woodwork.  I was at Scorekeepers (Skeeps - in Michigan terms), having some free beers, and watching the MSU/UConn game. 
 
Every UConn bucket, boos...
Every UConn foul, cheers....
Every time Tom Izzo is on screen, cheers....

The bar was a sea of green and white.....and I didn't like it.

So while I took a lot of crap for my U-U-U Conn cheers, I look forward to seeing the Carolina Tar Heels win yet another national title in Mo-Town.....

Go Heels!

Trouble Understanding the Recession?

Join the club....

I work for a consulting firm, I invest my money in the stock market, and I like to think that I kinda know what's happening on Wall Street, but the reality is....I don't know jack squat!

In an attempt to protect my dwindling investable assets and actually do something useful with my google-search skills (can i put this on my resume?  "able to search the google better than 95% of the general population"), I embarked on a journey to learn more.

I trolled through the Wall Street Journal, but found the information either too basic (i.e. Obama is going to tax us, we are f'd) or too technical (i.e. "LIBOR is down 0.000045%", but not really explaining why I care about the London Interbank Offered Rate).  The Economist was decent, but still not really what I was looking for.  And articles in Forbes and Fortune proved fruitless as well.

After almost giving up hope, I chanced upon a site that I now consider my holy grail for understanding the financial crisis.

http://baselinescenario.com/


Written by a combo of MIT Sloan Prof, London School of Economics Prof, and former McKinsey consultant, the Baseline Scenario gets really technical, but also does a great job of explaining the logic behind the numbers.


I'm slowly going through their "Financial Crisis for Beginners" series of posts, and its been very educational.

check it out if you've got the time and interest....and are sick of checking wikipedia for arcane definitions.....

Where have I been eating the past 4.5 years?

For the past few months, I've been having some issues with my corporate expenses getting paid on time. Yes, I was submitting my receipts in a timely fashion, but there seemed to be some lag getting reimbursed.

After spending way too much time on the phone with American Express and my Expense Department, I finally ordered a reconciliation report.  Basically, I wanted a log of each time I swiped my green corporate Amex card.

2 weeks later, I recieved an excel workbook in my email......I'm happy to report that the issue was resolved, and my Amex bills will now be paid in a timely fashion.  But, with all this wonderful data in hand, I decided to test my pivot table chops, and figure out exactly where I've been eating Monday - Thursday for the past 4.5 years.

While I had a good idea of where I've been eating, I was still a bit shocked by the results.  I can safely say that I am officially not a health conscious person anymore...and in fact.....I'm a bit amazed that I'm not at least 150 lbs heavier than I currently am.  Anyways, here's what I found:

Restaurant - # of Times Charged

• Starbucks - 163
• McDonalds - 69
• Papa Johns - 53
• Burger King - 32
• Subway - 22
• Arby's - 20
• Au Bon Pain (really, I eat here???) - 19
• Caribou Coffee - 19
• Panera Bread - 17
• PF Chang's - 14
• Taco Bell -13
• Chili's - 8
• Applebees - 7
• Wendy's - 7
• Jimmy Johns - 5
• Boston Market - 5

 I also ordered room service a ridiculous amount of times (at least 50..likely more, because some of them are likely rolled into Hotel expenses).  Also, I've had "HMS-HOST" (generic category that covers just about every airport) at least 78 times (again, likely more because I got bored with I was classifying each expense).

And last but not least....1 white castle expense.  literally 1 time going to white castle, and its damage was enough to make me never go back.

edit - I just realized that these numbers are a bit skewed.  they only represent the times that I put the expense on my card.  I know for a fact that I've been to Taco Bell more than 13 times in the last 5 years, but somebody else on my team probably grabbed some of those expenses.

Academy Awards Post Party

Earlier yesterday [link], I posted about the predictive markets on intrade, and how the "market" thought the Oscars would fall. 

Now that the winners have been announced, we can see how close the markets were:

Spot On:

• Cinematography - Slumdog
• Animated Feature - Wall E
• Director - Danny Boyle (Slumdog)
• Supporting Actress - Penelope Cruz (Vicky Christina Barcelona)
• Supporting Actor - Heath Ledger (The Dark Knight)
• Actress - Kate Winslet (The Reader)
• Best Picture - Slumdog

Off:

• Actor - picked Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler) by a wide margin to win.  In reality, Sean Penn won his 2nd Oscar instead

So, to recap, the intrade markets are fun to pay attention to, and are actually pretty acurate.  

The Academy Awards Prediction Markets

Its no secret that I'm a huge fan of the prediction markets on intrade.com.  Intrade is basically a boolean predication market, where you "invest" on the likelihood of a something either happening or not happening.

So if you were a political junkie, you could on a daily basis track what the "market" thought about Obama or McCain's chances last  year.

But with the Oscars less than 30 minutes away, and since I've been bad and haven't seen any of the favorites besides Slumdog and Milk, I'm going to rely on the "market".

Usually each choice is binary...but since this is multi-choice, I'm not sure why the percents don't add up to 100%.  either way, just use them as a rough proxy, i suppose.

Here's the current predictions:

Best Cinematography:

• Winner:  Slumdog Millionaire - 73% chance to win
• Benjamin Button - 28%
• Reader - 17%
• Dark Knight - 11%
• Changeling - Not being traded anymore

Best Animated Feature Film:

• Winner - Wall-E - 97% chance to win
• Kung Fu Panda - 5%
• Bolt - Not being traded anymore

Best Director:

• Winner - Danny Boyle (slumdog) - 95% chance to win
• Gus Van Sant (milk) - 5.9%
• David Fincher (benjamin button) - 5%
• Ron Howard (Frost/Nixon) - 5%
• Stephen Daldry (Reader) - 1%

 Best Supporting Actress:

• Winner - Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona) - 60.4% chance to win
• Taraji P. Henson (Benjamin Button) -  20.9%
  
• Viola Davis (Doubt) - 18.7%
• Amy Adams (Doubt) - 14%
• Marisa Tomei (The Wrestler) - 5.7%

 Best Supporting Actor:

• Winner - Heath Ledger (The Dark Knight) - 98.5% chance to win 
• Josh Brolin (Milk) - 5%
• Michael Shannon (Revolutionary Road) - 4.9%
• Philip Seymour Hoffman (Doubt) - 4.3%
• Robert Downey Jr (Tropic Thunder) - 2.9%

Best Actress:

• Winner - Kate Winslet (The Reader) - 85% chance to win
• Meryl Streep (Doubt)- 15%
• Anne Hathaway (Rachel Getting Married) - 5.5%
• Melissa Leo (Frozen River) - 2.0%
  
• Angelina Jolie (Changeling) - 1.9%

Best Actor:

• Winner - Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler) - 66.2% chance to win 
• Sean Penn (Milk) - 33.7%
• Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon) - 4.9%
• Brad Pitt (Benjamin Button) - 1.4%
• Richard Jenkins (The Visitor) - 1.4%

 Best Picture:

• Winner - Slumdog Millionaire - 90.3% chance to win
• The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - 8%
• Milk - 4%
• The Reader - 3%
  
• Frost/Nixon - 1.4%
  

Book Review - "The White Tiger" by Arvind Adiga

The White Tiger

While being labeled as from the same vein as Chuck Palaniuk (see Fight Club, Choke, and his other masterpieces), I just didn't find this book to be that compelling.

Well, I should back up.....

The White Tiger is written as a stream-of-consciousness open letter from Balram Halwai to the Premeire of China.  In his rambling letter written over the course of 7 nights, Balram relates how he rose up from being a member of the servant class to ultimately becoming a sucessful entrepreneur.  Balram interweaves his story with his observations on Indian society, Chinese society, and the wider world. 

So, sounds like a great story, right?  where does it go wrong?  well, Balram spends a ridiculous amount of time setting up the finale, but when you reach the end, you are left incredibly underwhelmed.  I wanted to stop reading the book many times, but I kept going with the promise of a payoff.  I reached the end, and wow, I was disappointed.  No grand payoff, no great revelation, nothing.  I reached the end and felt cheated...and that's the worst feeling after dedicated a large chunk of time to a book.

My advice to you, the reader, is that unless you are very interested in reading a unique perspective of India, skip this book.  Rather than reading something in the same vein as Chuck Palanik, just read some Chuck Palanik.  everybody already knows the story from fight club, so skip that.....and start with Invisible Monsters.  It won't let you down

Check out my other book reviews here

538.com's Ben Silver take on the Economic Crisis

Being a political junkie, I religiously followed and tracked the very excellent fivethirtyeight.com during the last election. 


538 pairs the most recent polls with some strong statistical analysis to forecast and predicts local, state, and national elections.  And he (Ben Silver) has an amazing track record.

Before politics, he used his data analysis skills to make a killing in fantasty football and baseball. 

the man is a genious with excel, and he has an interesting take on the current economic climate.  check it out, its in Esquire magazine

Forbes as the contrarian

With Obama in the White House, Batman still pissed off, and Blago safely away from power, most pundits and newsfolk consider Chicago to be on the rise.

Not so fast.....Forbes points out some of Chicago's pitfalls

the weather is awesome for 2 months of the year..and sucks the rest.

the cubs are in first place all season, to blow it in the playoffs

we have public transportation, but its slow (still beats Boston in my opinion!)

yes Chicago has its drawbacks and teases...but, I still don't think it belongs on a list entitled "America's Most Miserable Cities".

Here's the full list:

1. Stockton, CA
   
2. Memphis, TN
3. Chicago, IL 
4. Cleveland, OH 
5. Modesto, CA 
6. Flint, MI 
7. Detroit, MI 
8. Buffalo, N.Y. 
9. Miami, FL 
10. St. Louis, MO

 check out the article here

Do we need a new web?

In today's wall street journal, L. Gordon Crovitz argues that the country (and especially the financial sector) would benefit from a complete redesign of the web.

In the article, futurist (side note - coolest job ever...the dude just lays around thinking about the future) Ray Kurzweil explains that the web currently doesn't have a relationship database structure that can be easily queried.  So instead of having information freely available to all, and being accessed and used in ways well beyond its original intentions, we have a bunch of fractured databases in propreitary formats.

As a wanna-be data junkie (you hear that Chicago Booth!!!), I like the idea of having tons of raw data available to people that want to use it.  But this article was way too simplistic, and I'd want some more details about this new web and how we can use it to spurn innovation...

either way, its an interesting and quick read..check it out here

The Dream is gone.....

the dream of being #1 in the world at blackberry brickbreaker..

for the last 2 months, I've had one massively epic game of Brick Breaker going on my blackberry.  I'd play while waiting for buses, trains ,and flights....and I was racking up some huge points.

Of course, being a blackberry, my phone eventually crapped out on me, thereby losing my ridiculsouly good score in the process.

So long high score....RIP.....

1 million points, and I still had 55 guys left to do more damage

Tracking the SLAs - Week 1

Last week, I wrote about trying to apply SLAs (Service Level Agreements - aka, business/consulting term for goals) to my life.  On a weekly basis, I'd like to provide some updates....here's for the week ended January 31, 2009:

1)  Redefine my body

Goal -  exercise 3 times a week
Actual - I worked out 3 times.....Went for a 3 mile run on Tuesday, 45 minutes on the ellitical on Wednesday, and did my first HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) session on treadmill on Friday.

Goal Accomplished

2)  Redefine my mind

Goal -  Read 2 books a month
Actual - I finished my 4th book of the month this week, and it was incredible.  Book reviews to come shortly!

Goal Accomplished

3)  Expand my horizons

Goal - Take at least 1 trip abroad a year
Actual - Well, I booked a trip to Maui, but that doesn't really count since Hawaii is part of the United States.  I started researching South America, and am seriously considering spending 6 weeks backpacking my way around South America before I start grad school this fall.

Progress Made

4)  Learn to Relax

Goal - Meditate once every two weeks
Actual - I didn't get a chance to meditate...and since I haven't meditated in maybe 10 years, I actually grab some "guided meditation" MP3s off the net.  I plan on using them this week, just need to do it.

Not accomplished.

Overall, not a bad start to my quest for a new me.  Accomplished 2 of my weekly goals, slacked on 1, and made some progress on the 4th.

Of course, now that I'm starting to think about goals, I seriously want to add 2 more....better a better photographer, and relearn Spanish.  but I'm not going to hold myself to metrics on them...I have too much else on my plate right now

Taxi drivers

without fail, every cabbie is always on the phone.

Who do they talk to all day? What do they talk about all day? How expensive is their phone bill??

Applying SLAs to my life

For the last two days, I've been in meetings to discuss Service Level Agreements (SLAs).  For those that don't know, SLAs are contractual terms that are used to guarantee certain levels of service being provided.In the consumer world, they are sometimes used by internet providers for something like 99% uptime, certain bandwidth, or latency provisions. 

So its not enough to say that you want a 99% uptime (for example), but you also have to have a reliable way to measure it and report on it.  And this conversation really got me thinking about my personal life.  What service levels do I have for myself?  I mean, outside of the basics (food and shelter), really what services are am I providing for myself?

I thought about this more (yes, I should have been thinking about the client, but what can I do), and realized that the reason my past New Year's Resolutions failed wasn't because I got lazy or because I was too ambitious, it was because I didn't have a reliable way to measure them.  Well....on second thought, I was too ambitious, and I am lazy..but that's a side point.

I've written earlier about the power of measurement, and now, I'm ready to apply it to my own life.  Each goal henceforth must be presented with a way to measure success (and failure). 

so with that, I present Sharad's 2009 Resolutions. 

1)  Redefine my body.  My past goals failed because they were nebulous.  This year, I will not fail because I will set the bar low enough to suceed.  I want to be superbuff, but I know it won't happen.  I want to work out 5 days a week, but with my work and travel schedule, it won't happen.  So, 3 times a week, I will exercise.  I will mix weights and cardio.  I may crank out a half-marathon, but if I do, its just gravy.  The goal is simplicity, and I will achieve it with 3 workouts a week.

2)  Redefine my mind. I have really been slacking on keeping my brain engaged lately.  Work is blah, and since I travel 90% of the time for work, my life is blah.  So, I'm not going to promise myself that I'm going to learn a new language or become a zen master.  Instead, I'm going to shut off my computer, and read a book.  Less blogs (and blogging), more reading.  2 books a month.  That's 24 books in the year.  I've already nailed January ("Middlesex" and "The Meaning of Night"), so I'm working on building up a buffer....let's keep it up through the year.

3)  Expand my horizons.  As I mentioned in point 2, I travel literally every week.  I'm always gone.  Tampa, Boston, New Jersey, Dallas....I'm there.  While I hate work travel, I love personal travel.  So here and now, I'm pledging to expand my horizons at least one time, but leaving the good ol USA, and exploring a different land.  I have a long list of places that I'd like to see (more on that in a future post), so let's start checking them off.

4)  Learn how to relax....I'm always on the go.  And when I'm not rushing around, I'm in front of the tv.  I've always wanted to learn how to meditate, and to further that objective, I'm going to meditate once every other week.  I could probably do more, but let's just start with baby steps.

Oscar Nominees are out

I just saw that the 81st Annual Academy Award Nominees were announced this morning at 5:30 am (pacific). 

http://www.oscar.com/nominees/?pn=films

Scanning through the list, some of the big "winners" (in my opinion) are:

• The Curious Care of Benjamin Button
• The Dark Knight
• Doubt
• Frost/Nixon
• Milk
• Slumdog Millionaire
• Wall-E

Since I like to see the big players before the Oscars, I still need to see

• The Curious Care of Benjamin Button
• Doubt
• Frost/Nixon

Anything I need to add to this list????

Lost is back

the tivo (or dvr...sorry, bit torrent machine) is set, and I"m excited....

some things I'd like to see happen:

1) small mysteries start getting solved!

2)  no new major mysteries

3)  tell me why the numbers are important....

that is all

Twitter

So I've finally joined the year 2007, and signed up for twitter. Keeping with my progression onto social networking, I'm a bit late to the game.

I've added twitter to my sidebar, and am looking for tips on how to get started.....any regulars have any advise for a poor, confused newbie?

Newest obsession - everyblock

Everyblock.com is an incredibly innovative (and creepy) new obsession of mine.  This site gathers data from both public and private sources and provides news updates for each and every block of your city.
So far, the site has indexed the following cities:

• Boston
• Charlotte
• Chicago
• Los Angeles
• Miami
• New York
• Philadelphia
• San Fransisco
• San Jose
• Seattle
• Washington, D.C.

So, if your city is listed...start checking out news for your street!  For my street, the news wasn't the most excited.....a couple restaurants were reviewed by yelp, another restaurant successfully passed a city health inspection, and a apartment rental owner was able to refinance their debt...

but, the site is very promising, and I will be scanning for updates regularly..

check it out at www.everyblock.com