Archive for the 'Money' Category

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Buffalo Bill Gates Buys Lake Irma, May Have Started Holy War Against Cloistered Monks. Do I Love It? Ayup.

Bill Gates, the richest man in the universe, decided that the exact hunk of  Wyoming – the same place that some monks wanted to cloister themselves (is that still legal in Wyoming?) -  is a vast spread of Wyoming he wants.

The monks have been trying to raise the almost $9 million it would take for them to live on the few hundred acres near Yellowstone to be alone.

Instead Bill Gates swoops in with Thousand Dollar Bills flying from his underwear, like Underdog, and snatches this pristine land from these peaceful God-loving men.

In a solitary monastery under the Rocky Mountains in northern Wyoming, the Carmelite Monks of Wyoming seek to perpetuate the charism of the Blessed Virgin Mary, living the Marian life as prescribed by the primitive Carmelite Rule and the ancient monastic observance. This new monastery of contemplative monks lives a life of faithful orthodoxy to the Magisterium, where joy and peace abound in a manly, agrarian way of life.

Take a look, and tell me who belongs more to this land… The Dark Lord Bill of Prickdom, or the Carmelite Monks of Wyoming.

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Aside from the fact that the monks blend in too much and might get mistaken for a trophy elk, who could argue that these men belong here.

Even Buffalo Bill, who used to live on the Lake Irma Ranch, would agree.

The fabled South Fork ranch is 21 miles from Cody and includes Buffalo Bill Cody’s historic hunting cabin. Cody named the 492-acre property after his youngest daughter.

So Nerdy Bill Gates is a two time loser on this deal. He buys land out from under a cult of religious fanatics and it’s land once owned by a revered American hero.  Has Bill Gates ever toured with somebody like Annie Oakley and Sitting Bull?

No, he plays bridge with rich old white guys.

Here’s how one of Bill Gates future neighbors put it:

“What a drag they are on the rest of us who would simply like to be invited up for dinner occasionally. I for one just wish them and all the tourists and the oil companies would leave here and let us work toward being like Medicine Bow, or Burgess Junction, or Powder River. “

Usually the rich are good care-takers of the land. But in this case, Bill Gates is a Prick.

Carmelite Monks would have been best care-takers of this land.

I sense a road trip coming on.
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I Knew It, I Just Knew It. She’s Important.


I knew she was on a covert, undercover mission and had to return home because of the new administration and the extreme danger she faced if she remained at her assignment.

Otherwise, why would she be so mysterious? Other than the fact that she is a single boomer woman writing stuff on the internet?

Now that her mission is over (obviously she accepted) and she has safely returned, she is beginning to carefully integrate herself back into a routine life until she is needed again.

Choosing to live the polar opposite of the life she left, she decided to accept the offer of residence in a small quiet village.  She needed that cone of silence and solitude.

Slowly, she reached the decision that her cover had held. It took time and a lot of reassurance by her handlers.  She even returned to the site of her assignment for a period to reconnoiter her former warm home and the cold streets.

Surprising those who knew her career, she began to make limited appearances at family functions to practice returning to a more open way of living.

Satisfied of her safety, but with some reluctance, she agreed to make the short trip to the nation’s capital to quietly accept the accolades for her service to her adopted homeland.

It’s not that she was living the life of avoiding contact with law enforcement, she just had to be careful. She might be called to perform a service of great national importance on a moment’s notice.

Certainly she had a code name.  Something like Hannah Vanna Montana! Which of course, sounds much better in the native language where she was stationed. As knowledgeable as I am on the ways of covert living, I would also know that when challenged she would need a response phrase, which normally takes the form of noun, participle phrase, verb, adjective, noun. Peter, while waiting at the bus stop, jumps the coffee barista. Rose, sitting in her office, erased audiotape.

She pretended to live a simple life in a foreign country, all the while living with the haunting feeling that in the coolness of an evening, the call would come.

Sometimes that feeling still washes over her unexpectedly and she is startled. (I read that on her Facebook page.)

Generally her life was easy. If you call never knowing what is around the next corner easy. She was a student of life and her surroundings. This is what she wrote. This is all she could write with a modicum of calm.

Nevertheless,  she revealed little about herself through her writing, preferring to talk about the wonderful and mysterious surroundings that were her world.

On the other hand, maybe her employment contract expired, she moved home, and she just has a hot date in D.C.

The truth is out there. Trust no one. I want to believe.

Kentucky Pregnant Paintballer Bachlorette Party


Paintballers are pretty nuts. But very dedicated. Paintballers invest heavily in specialty guns, paintballs, and protection. Stands to reason that this ultra-luxe paintball range on the other side of the state would want a bunch of young women running around giggling and shooting each other.

Offering a free round of paintball for future brides when accompanied by a dozen friends will no doubt be a smash.

Call us to talk about planning your Ceremony here too!

Nothing says “I DO” like a machinegun on full auto. Rent our 11,000 sqft Party on the Green with a kicking sound system. Set your band upstairs your Dance floor downstairs for an edgy wedding you’ll never forget.

Always use protection when balling.

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Congress Kills Our Free Travel on Southwest


The credit card companies need to clean up their act. But they will not change willingly so it takes an Act of Congress.
I think the last time the credit card companies acted like they really wanted our business, Rod Stewart was a Young Turk.
The last time the gummit got involved to big extent, they took away the tax deduction for all consumer loan debt, including credit card debt. Thanks Ronnie! Of course, we were head over heels in consumer loan debt, and that hit us pretty hard. We didn’t change our spending habits, so that amounted to a big tax increase.
We’re now free of credit card debt, but we still use our Southwest Airlines Visa card for EVERYTHING. Because we like to fly free on Southwest Airlines.  After Toronto, Milwaukee was our next target.
Southwest still has the best plan when it comes to earning free travel. For every $1200 charged on Visa,  Southwest Airlines awards one credit. Sixteen credits earns a free round trip ticket anywhere Southwest flies.
We earn about four free tickets a year, and have been averaging that for a decade.

I anticipate that credit card companies will begin charging interest from time of purchase, rather than giving us time to pay them off completely and earn those free rewards. After all Congress took away all those other fees and terms and conditions that they leveraged into gigantic revenue streams.

If that’s the case, our credit cards will go away and we’ll start using a debit card, and (sigh) start paying for airline tickets. Southwest will probably still get the bulk of our travel biz because the are the Low Cost Airline that flys in and out of NashVegas.

Bummer.

We’ve Forgotten What It’s Like to Fly a Legacy Airline


Mid-June will are flying to Boston by the seat of my pants.

Docker’s had a deal if you buy a bunch of pants they would give you an airline ticket. I bought enough pairs of pants to get two free tix.

We had a choice of about eight cities and we decided on Boston because 1. we wouldn’t have to fly on a plane all day, and 2. neither one of us had been there since childhood.

We will be flying from BNA to BOS on American Airlines.

Since we haven’t flown anything but Southwest for ages, it just occured to me we would have to pay all the new fees involved. (Southwest isn’t on the fee bandwagon yet.)

We would like our bags to fly with us so I guess we will be paying the $40 fee for a couple bags. I’m such a bargain hound, I think I could buy a wardrobe for four days on $40, Nancy OTOH, (and she is a bargain hound too), would spend that much on underwear. She says she won’t go commando like I would.

We usually don’t eat on the airplane, so we won’t be spending $10 for a sandwich.

Another “feature” we had forgotten about is having an assigned seat!

Then again, the plane we will be on only has 40 seats, so it’s not that big a deal.

We have the Southwest thang down pretty good. We don’t freak out over not getting an A group (first 30 to board) because on Southwest there are at least a dozen family members or travelers needing assistance anyway. And we don’t stand in line for 45 minutes before boarding, because we don’t freak out if we can’t sit beside each other for a three hour flight.

The adventure has begun.

BTW: Rhea is helping out with BOS tips, if you have any, we welcome any advice on things to do, eat, see, buy. Priceline put us up in the Intercontinental Hotel on the Waterfront.