Archive for September, 2008
READ DAVE RAMSEY’S THOUGHTS CONCERNING THE FINANCIAL CRISIS.
The financial crisis has me asking a lot of unanswered questions. When the government talks about spending an additional 700 billion dollars, I have to wonder how bad things really are. How many people are really going to default on their mortgages? What will the repercussions be? Most importantly…
Am I going to be feeding my family cabbage and beans for the next 10 years? Am I going to have to turn my yard into a garden and get a milk cow?
Seriously — I would like to hear from my readers. What are your thoughts on the impending economic crisis and the government’s role in repairing it. So, for the next few days, I am turning off my comment blocker and asking you to sound off.
I’ll tell you what I think. I think the American people don’t have all the facts. In fact, I doubt anyone has all the facts. I don’t think there are going to be any good decisions or outcomes. Apparently, a lot of people have let their representatives know that they are not in favor of this “bailout.” That doesn’t necessarily mean they are in favor of the alternative, either.
What frustrates me is that a lot of prudent, frugal, financially careful and wise folks are going to end up footing the bill for a lot of foolish, careless, people who took on more debt than they knew they could handle. I’m one of those prudent, careful people and it really makes me rather ill to think that I am going to have to pay more taxes to rescue people who should have known better.
What also frustrates me is that the government thinks it can take taxpayers’ money and “fix” this. Face it, the government is rarely able to fix anything. Our government is too big and continuously steps in where it really doesn’t have the constitutional authority to do so. We forget the this is a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” Usually it seems we are focusing on the “for the people” part and ignoring the rest. Where do we think the 700 billion is going to come from? More international loans and more taxes. And, by the way, future taxpayers will be responsible for those loans. I’d like to see the national debt being lowered, not raised.
On the other hand, I don’t want to see the economy crumble — high unemployment, high rates of inflation, sagging dollar, etc. Small businesses failing, large businesses failing. I don’t want another depression - who does?
I’d like to know what the rate of failed mortgages is really going to be. Are that many people in trouble? Are the banks in that much trouble? Would it help if they offered incentives for financially able borrowers to pay off their mortgage early? How about incentives for investors who buy troubled property, with cash, of course? That would cause an influx of money.
I’d also like to add that blaming the government or the current administration for this is just wrong. I won’t say that the current administration is perfect, but I’m pretty sure it’s the lenders and the borrowers who are at fault here. I’ve applied for a mortgage, I know the routine. They try to convince you to buy about twice as much house as you can really pay for. I always want to roll my eyes and say, “Hey, I can do a budget and I know what I can pay for, and this ain’t it.”
September 30th, 2008
We vacationed at a little cabin getaway this summer with our extended family. By that I mean MY family - Mom and Dad, my three sisters, two of my brothers-in-law, everyone’s kids plus my nephew’s new wife. When you do the math, (and we did have to do the math here) it came to a grand total of 24 people. We had an age range running from nearly born (my nephew’s wife was pregnant) to the sixties. A regular family reunion! We had a great time, hidden away in the woods, on the edge of a small lake, of the northern part of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan.
Coming from a family of cooks, where we take very seriously phrases like, “homemade”, “comfort foods”, and “from scratch”, we took turns cooking dinner for the entire family. (My dad even made curly fries over a propane burner 2 nights.) For breakfast and lunch, everybody sort of found their own food, usually by taking advantage of a stockpile of lunchmeat and hot dogs in the fridge and pounds of goodies that were prepared beforehand and brought up by my mother and sisters. I had the disadvantage of distance - we had to fly to Michigan so I couldn’t bring pounds of cookies.
The one particular baked good that became our favorite breakfast that week was my sister Sue’s Zucchini Bread. My, OH, My - was it good! She brought - I think- at least 6 loaves of it and I believe we had it all polished off by the end of the week. It became the perfect food to set out and let everyone slice off a serving as they got up and got ready for whatever activity we did that day.
Sue has graciously shared her recipe for Zucchini Bread with me and I, of course, am going to share it with you. A wonderful way to use that zucchini that is so plentiful.
ZUCCHINI BREAD
3 c. flour - I use half white and half whole wheat
1 1/2 t. ground cinnamon
1 t. baking soda
1 t. salt
1/4 t. baking powder
2 c. sugar
1 c. oil - but I use 3/4 c. oil and 3/4 c. ground flax seed
you can substitute 3 T. of flax seed for 1 T. of oil when baking, so you can play with this and use more or less flax seed
1 T. vanilla
3 eggs
2 c. shredded zucchini
1/2 c. chopped nuts (sometimes I use them and sometimes I don’t)
Sift together dry ingredients except sugar, set aside. In a large bowl using mixer at medium speed, beat sugar, oil, vanilla and eggs until well blended. Reduce speed to low, beat in dry ingredients until well blended. Pour into two greased loaf pans.
Bake at 350 for 1 hour or until done. Cool in pans 10 minutes, remove and cool completely on racks.
If taking on vacation, triple the recipe and bring copies.
September 29th, 2008
This blog post is specifically for any of my personal friends or family who are still wondering how we fared….
http://www.familychowhall.com/2008/09/15/to-my-friends-and-family/backyard-after-ike/
…Now we have lived in the Houston area for 7 years and have experienced our first hurricane. First of all — to whoever is still wondering, we are all okay and obviously, I have power, internet, water, etc. 2 days after the storm passed. Hooray!
Most folks here aren’t as lucky, from what I read on the news - most people in Houston don’t have these niceties and I can attest that not knowing how long it will be is quite torturous. For 2 days, we watched our neighborhood slowly come back to life while we sat in the heat and the dark. Four streets over, they had power Saturday evening. Two streets over and another section of the neighborhood received power on Sunday morning. A few more Sunday evening. Finally this morning our electric came back on. Trust me, 2 days in hot and humid weather feels more like 2 months. We are far too dependent upon our air conditioner. We never lost our water privileges, so that was a treat. Like I said, people in Houston are not so fortunate, so pray for good weather and calm tempers.
Since we are a bit inland, the winds around us peaked around 60 mph with 80 gusts (yes, that is a guess) and we didn’t have much rain, but I don’t know an official measurement to report to you. One neighbor had 2 1/4 inches in her rain gauge. Trees around the neighborhood are down, some having landed on houses and cars. We suffered no personal or structural damage. The winds blew for hours, kicking up around 5 pm on Friday evening and building until 3 or 4 am Saturday, then slowly dying down until about noon on Saturday. Winds coming from the north buffeted the end of our house which has no windows, so it did not seem very noisy to us, but most people will have a different story to tell about that. Our large pecan trees got a good trimming, compliments of mother nature, but we lost no branches that could not be lifted by one person and drug to the curbside for the chipper truck to come through.
http://www.familychowhall.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/hurricane-ike-003.jpg
Having given this report, I will say that hunkering down has its upsides and downsides. Of course, in a densely populated area such as Houston, the logistics of evacuation are extremely complicated and it’s probably impossible to leave town without facing traffic problems, gasoline troubles, and accommodations shortages. The upside is that you are out of harm’s way and don’t have to face days, possibly weeks without electricity and possibly water. Each storm is different and we will have to make these decisions as each one approaches and threatens us. Above all, we are thankful to have each other, and to have you our family and friends to lean on, and most of all, to have God with us every step of the way.
September 15th, 2008
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