cainmark

This comment I made (once it's approved) should show up after this link:

http://huntsvilledevelopment.blogspot.com/2009/09/housing-authority-shifts-to-lowe-mill.html

here;s the comment with irritating mispellings included:

That's not good. not good at all. Lowe Mill is already benefiting. It's already gone from alternative underground with the Flying Monkey Arts Center to above-ground with the Lowe Mill stuff aroudn it.

this happens againa and again ins city after city. The creative class risks going through and living in a rougher part of town, makes it more interesting and the new "cool" place to go and the upper crusts wants to kick out the pople who already live there? Let's not let Huntsville make the same mistake and instead work with people who need help instead of shuffling them off where some people dont' want to see them because it makes them "feel uncomforatble".

And I'm terrified.

I was fine until we talked to the mortgage broker. Devon was anxious until we talked to the mortgage broker.
We have a really, really good mortgage broker.
Now I'm anxious and Devon is perfectly at ease.
We love the house we're renting.
But we'd have to have a conventional loan, more money at a higher interest rate, as it doesn't qualify for FHA.
The great First Step program I found last month that would have really, really helped us-is completely out of money.
We gross too much for the excellent Next
Step program. So that limits some of our options, even though we do qualify for the $8,000 federal.

The old house we're in needs a LOT of work. But it's structurally sound with a good foundation and a good roof. I figure if it's lasted over a hundred years, theyete

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But lousy insulation.

The houses we've looked at aren't even close to compare for character or location (at least to me).

We live in a neighhborhood, with trees with branches over the street, and extremely walkable. When we went to the suburbs, whoo it was HOT from the asphalt and sidewalks and no coverings. The only trees were up against the houses.

We live near a railroad track and 565 and still the noise pollution was so much worse by Research boulevard at the suburbs we were looking at. 2 of those houses needed as much maintenance as ours, built within the last 20 years, but they were $60,0000 more expensive. So no go.

But we don't want to be trapped in an endless money pit if we buy where we are at, either.

But while the other house we look at, the 3 bedroom ranch houses have 3 bedrooms, they're really, really small bedrooms.

But that could save us a lot on insulation. Then we have a storage problem.

We found some really good deals in the Merrimack area. But every one of them is still a fixer uppere with a ton a maintenance needs. But lots and lots of storage space. Great if your an investor, but not so much for a first time home buyer.

We were happy with our realtor until we realized he wasn't going to be doing much negotiationg for us as buyers. So looking for someone else. Nice enough guy, but not a good fit for us.

I'm mainly just writing these down so I can find the information later when I need it.

We knew this part would be difficult. Now instead of Devon freaking out, I'm freaking out. There's so many variables going into this.

AAAAAAUUUUUGHHH!!!

UPDATE: after looking at several other options and havig one of them ripped away from us,we decided to go with the houe we're in. No FHA, but price is low enough forus to do conventional. Once we get it, we need to do 3 things. Get a new energ efficient refrigerator, buy a sofa that pulls out into comfortble bed for guest, and proper inuslation so our gas heating bills aren't so feaking high.
I'm scared and excited about this.

These are one day behind. I don't know why.

• 21:42 Wife and I watched Superbad, good movie, and The Great Debators, great movie last Sunday.
  Currently reading book: Do It Wrong Quickly. Neat. #

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These are one day behind. I don't know why.

• 15:30 READ:Chris Anderson, Jared Diamond, John Forester, Malcolm Gladwell, Michael Hart, Naomi Klein, Steven Levitt, Bill Moyers, Eric S. Raymond. #
• 21:46 @Ohmu, all non-fiction authors I believe everyone should read works by. Hope Thai Garden food was as yummy as ours was! #

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Surveill the Surveillance. Let's take back the Constitution's hijacked 4th amendment as soon as we can.




http://www.aclu.org/privacy/spying/surveillancesocietyclock2.html

These are one day behind. I don't know why.

• 20:12 Marvelling at how genuinely bad that ABC debate was (yes, I'm late to the party.) The moderators seemed more elitist than anyone else there #
• 21:32 For many creators, inventors, etc. Their "one-off" quick idea often gets them more money and/or success than any thing they've labored over. #

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Both Roy Scheider and Steve Gerber died earlier this week.

This post sums up eveything I started to write about Steve Gerber:

http://www.amptoons.com/blog/archives/2008/02/12/steve-gerber-creator-of-howard-the-duck-1947-2008/

And his after-blog has some great remeberances of the man and his writing:

http://www.stevegerber.com/sgblog/

and this is a good write-up

http://www.comicsreporter.com/index.php/steve_gerber_1947_2008/

Howard the Duck was incredible for the time it was written (Forget the movie, I'm talking about the ground-breaking comicbook). In the 1970s, you never saw questioning of everything like that anywhere else. And his run on the Defenders with the Headmen and Nebulon and the Bozos was fantastic. His Foolkiller miniseries is still one of my favorites, and I've been really enjoying his take on Dr. Fate in Countdown to Mystery, which sadly, may never be finished now if he didn't plot to an end point. Great writing from him and his ideas will be missed.


Roy Scheider was a great actor. He was the Sherriff in Jaws and a thinly-veiled Bob fosse in this part:

http://www.newsfromme.com/archives/2008_02_10.html#014805

Wil Wheaton has a funny clip from UnitedHollywood about the WGA writer's strike and why it's important. Kind of nice to see unions having a legitimate complaint getting decent support form the public.

http://wilwheaton.typepad.com/wwdnbackup/2007/11/not-the-daily-s.html

This is satire.
Please let this be satire. And let it stop happening

http://www.predatorylendingassociation.com/

LibraryThing has a post about Radiohead's new pricing business model for their upcoming Oct. 10th album. Nifty summation of stuff and some nice links here:

http://www.librarything.com/thingology/2007/10/radiohead-magnatune-librarything.php

I really really like this. It takes wikipedia and turns some of the pages into mindmaps, which is more useful to me as I'm so visually oriented.

http://www.wikimindmap.org/index.htm

From Barbara Ehrenreich, author of one of the best books about working in middle to lower class America Nickle and Dimed

"Could You Afford to be Poor?"

http://ehrenreich.blogs.com/barbaras_blog/2006/07/could_you_affor.html

http://ehrenreich.blogs.com/barbaras_blog/index.rdf

Here's a crazy idea that will never happen:

Stop having a volunteer army. Instead have a draft. Of only people over 60 who make over $100,000 (in 2007 terms-adjust accordingly). And no offshore accounts, my-corporation-is-a-person-I-don't make-anything shelters, either. Takes care of overpopulation from the baby boomers, those jobs are now open so those from below can rise in the ranks of business, freeing the lower tier stuff for the younger people learning to provide resources, gives retirees who want something to do-something to do. Plus, they're older so they have experience on their side so they'll be better at strategy. And they will do anything in their power to prevent a war from happening.

utopia=no where.

I was going to write a short story from this, but think it's such a good idea someone has had to have beaten me to it. Anyone read anything like that, some old science fiction short story?

Mayor Spencers blog. of Huntsville, AL.

http://216.180.9.99/index.php?

Animator Nina Paley has a good post about Art and Responsibliityl

http://www.ninapaley.com/2007/04/art-and-responsibility.html

Tim at Librarything discusses Worldcat's Cathedral model. (See Eric S. Raymond's essay "the Cathedral and the Bazaar" http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/ )

http://www.librarything.com/thingology/2007/04/worldcat-think-locally-act-globally.php

I agree with most of this. I prefer to use Sakegewa dollar coins, but am okay with the new ones. I don't like using the dollar bills so much as they are very uneconomic. My cat just took a paper dollar bill from my desk just now and trotted out of the room. Just where is he going to spend it?

http://www.slate.com/id/2161901/fr/rss/


RTM add several cool features, one I've been wanting since I started to use it.
The great Remember the Milk taks lists has added lots of cool features. adding tasks to smart lists, operators listings and printable search results. Woo hoo!

http://blog.rememberthemilk.com/2007/03/little-things.html

Good article by Doc Searls. Go read here.

http://www.linuxjournal.com/node/1000182

This part really struck out at me.

""Good. Now let's say you know something about textiles. And the two of you get into a long conversation where both of you learn much from each other. You learn about the origin of the garment, the yarn used, the dyes, the name of the artist, and so on. He learns about how fabric is made in your country, how distribution works, and so on. In the course of this you get to know each other. What happens to the price?"

"Maybe I want to pay him more and he wants to charge me less".

"Yes. And why is that?"

"I'm not sure."

"You now have a relationship".

He went on to point out that, in his country, and in much of what we call the developing world, relationship is of paramount importance in public markets. Transaction still matters, of course. So does conversation. But the biggest wedge in the social pie of the public marketplace is relationship. Prices less set than found, and the context for finding prices is both conversation and relationship. In many cases, relationship is the primary concern, not price. The bottom line is not everything."

http://www.linuxjournal.com/node/1000182