The other day I started trying to install Oracle on my home computer… I didn’t quite realize how old those suckers were.
Neither of my two servers have enough RAM to run Oracle server. How sad is that! I have both an AMD 64 3200+ with 512 Megs of RAM and a Pentium 4 1.6ghz with 1 gig of RAM. Both of which are RIGHT at the minimums for Oracle to run. Later that day, I was doing one of my FAVORITE past times of Stumbling. And I found this great site with a list of all the processors and the associated benchmarks. My oldest computer is the 5th from the bottom at 221 and my other computer is at 401! :'( I gotta upgrade those suckers! They are sooo slow!
I can get a Dell $500 computer which would be rated at 1,400 on that list! :'( Too bad I can’t afford SHIT anymore!
Speaking of, I was looking over my finances the last couple months and there’s about $900/month that I can’t account for. I know I’ve been spending a lot more lately then normal, but MY GOD! $900/month worth! That’s fucking insane.
I have taken actions to rein in my spending today. First, I changed my direct deposit so that savings money is AUTOMATICALLY transfered to my savings account. Second I have changed banks so that my spending and my bills account are at SEPARATE banks, the direct deposit change also changed so that these will be AUTOMATICALLY funded with the correct amounts. And lastly, I have paid off my Amex card (which thanks to the new car had ballooned to over $7k!!) and will not be using it anymore except for in emergencies and buying stuff online.
I am also creating a new rule for myself, any purchase which must be funded by a loan, must be kept and used for twice the length of the loan. IE. I financed the new car for 3 years, it must be kept for a minimum of 6 years. Although I am personally shooting for closer to 10 years, unless gas prices go crazy high.
In gas news, Congress passed the new CAFE requirements, so the average vehicle will be getting 35mpg by 2020. Personally, I think it should be 2015 at the latest, but at least it’s a start in the right direction… uhoh! There I go with the whole Pot, kettle, black thing!
This past weekend was really great, Saturday night we had the last dinner party of the year. Constantine bought the group UNO Attack. It’s SO much fun! Everyone should go out and buy it! Jason of course cooked an amazing dinner of Chicken Catchatori and I made Eggnog CheeseCake. Delicious! I was so fat buy the time the night was over!
Sunday I had a business meeting at 9am and then Constantine, Jason, Erick and I went out to Noah’s in Manhattan Beach for breakfast. I did laundry the rest of the day and cleaned the house, I emptied out all my cabinets and washed every dish I own, washed the cabinets themselves, and some other stuff.
Monday I started cooking our dinner for Wed, I made the dessert and the noodles. I’m making Constantine a traditional Black family holiday meal. Although, not as CRAZY as our real family gatherings with all the candies, and side dishes, the 800 pies and what not. Just the standard main fair of Roast, Mashed Potatoes, Noodles, Corn and one dessert! 🙂 It’s going to be delish! I can’t wait!
I also bleached basically everything in my house last night, the counter tops, the stove, the floors, the bathroom. It’s almost as if my cleaning lady had come again! Oh how I miss her! :'(
Tonight we are going to the Charles Phoenix Holiday Jubilee and before that we’re going to dinner at Philippes the ORIGINAL home of the french dip! Should be a wonderful night!
Tomorrow Constantine and I are having our holiday festivities with the previously mentioned meal, and then present opening! I can’t wait to see if he’ll like what I got him! I sure hope so, because that boy doesn’t give ANY hints about what he wants… And he’s seen how my family does christmas shopping.
“Hey mom what do you want?”
“Oh, an all in one printer”
“Do you have any models in mind”
“Not really”
“Ok, I’m going to go out and get it”
So shopping without hints was hard for me! But I feel that I got him something he’ll really like. 🙂
I don’t like to give ideas to Dean, either. My feeling is that we haven’t known each other so long that it should be that hard to figure out something nice to do. Maybe I’m a bitch that way, but I think that it’s the way that things should be. Of course, my family always subscribed to the surprise theory on Christmas. IE – if you found out what you were getting, they would take it back. Needless to say, I never snooped! 🙂
I agree in part, but you and Dean have known each other for YEARS! Constantine and I have known each other for about 6 months, so although I have ideas about what he wants. It’d just be nice to get a little bit more hard evidence. IE, just simple little hints like when we’re out shopping saying things like. “Oh, I like this”, etc.
I had a lot of ideas at first, but then I talked to one of his friends and he was like. “Oh he already has all that stuff”. It’s also very hard because I’ve never been able to see his room, to see what it’s like or what he might need. etc.
I understand what you’re saying, and six months really isn’t that long, for sure. The kind of hints you’re talking about are the kind that I’d expect to be picked up on automagically just by spending time together. That said, six months just isn’t that much time. It’s the list stuff that I won’t do for Dean. He tends to do pretty well, though. I also know the problem with already having stuff. That’s me. I tend to just buy whatever, but I’m certain to stop sometime before Christmas. It’s definitely got to be harder having never been in his room. ….GET IN THAT BOY’S BEDROOM! Sorry, I couldn’t help the dirty and lame joke.
Dude in re: to your money managing stuff… I’ve found 2 great apps that have pretty much put my finances in autopilot. I’m writing about them and will post on my site soon… but take a peak at them. They are about to replace all the money management process and tools I’ve been using for years now (eg, spreadsheets, quicken, receipt inventorying and stuff like that).
Aside from all the automatic shuffling of money around to various accounts which I handle directly through my bank’s online features. I manage the rest of my cards, bills and get a very useful snapshot at any time of what my finances are/were/willbe.
Its all simplified for me with the help of mint and expensr, google ’em, sign up, and feel much more freedom and comfort in regards to your finances.
BTW. r u going to Prosper Days in Feb?
BTW2… I dig the auto-preview feature on the comments.
OG, yeah I’m already signed up for Mint, but they don’t have my old bank in there. So I won’t beable to get any history of transactions.
I’ll have to play around with expensr. I don’t really want to have tooo many places that I have to go and look at account information.
Haven’t really heard anything about prosper days, I’ll check it out, is it free?