Lion ponderings

 The 10 gig download of black cauldron was a rare 80's miss.  Even the beastmaster & the evil dead movies were better.  Basically, they had to throw someone in the mcguffin to destroy it.  The obvious sacrifice was the evil king, but instead, they sacrificed the dog.  Then the evil king got killed by the cauldron's super powers anyway, they recovered the dog, & the mcguffin finished unscathed.  It was all a bit pointless. The mcguffin had some power to reanimate the dead into an army.  It reminded lions of the dead being reanimated in Army of Darkness which didn't come until 1992.          Lions saw elements of snow white getting reused, manely the 7 dwarfs making a brief reprise in the form of the thousands of dwarfs.  British accents required playing it at 1.5x.  ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Watching Stripes again for the 1st ti...

 Another amusing dream which began in an urban highrise apartment with wraparound windows.  The bathroom had wraparound windows & lions assumed there was an LCD curtain function.  From there, the lion kingdom decided to venture into the underground complex of Resident Evil.  The underground complex was now full of H1B zombies.  They weren't attacking but it seemed only a matter of time before they did.  They were filing things.    The complex descended down & down.  ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Lions have recurring dreams about urban highrise apartments, but probably don't care where they live.  They spent the 1st 40 years in suburban locations & now are in the most urban location of all of them.  It was converted into a city center in the last 5 years.  Every place before 2020 would have been considered suburban.   ...

After paying another huge tax bill & pondering more cash in tax advantaged accounts, the problem was the chance of capital gains tax actually being higher than regular income tax.  The 12% tax bracket when counting standard deduction is now up to $63k.  The 1st $12k are only 10%.  If the stonks are in a after tax account, interest rates or the cash balance is 0 by the time the stonks are sold, lions could pay 15% instead of 12% on the capital gains.  Most of the IRA funds are currently in dividend paying stonks, which would be taxed at 24% in Calif*.  The dividend is less than what cash is earning, though, for now.  The amount of cash which could be moved to the IRA's would still be paltry, despite every effort to decrease the tax burden.  A lot of cash is going to be needed for housing & transitioning.  It could cost 15% capital gains instead of 12% income tax to raise it from stonk sales in the after tax account.  On the other paw, ...

  More exercise brings home more food, which requires more exercise to burn off. Such is the fundamental crisis lions face.   Weather continues to track the 7 day CO2 oscillation.  Very good alignment with the work days, this week. CO2 levels are down because there's no middle east oil.  That's the most significant factor in our late season boost in rain.                        

 Lions pondered how their current day job income is much less, relative to expenses, than it was when they 1st started working 26 years ago.  Rent, food, utilities have risen 250%.  Salary has risen by roughly 210%.  It's basically an entry level salary relative to inflation.  The absolute number is much higher & investment income briefly boosted the total but today, the stonk market is flat & interest rates are negative again.  The lion kingdom savings rate in terms of absolute buying power is actually lower than it was 26 years ago.   If anything, it shows just how good lions had it when they started.  It was no pittance by today's standards.  1 question is whether it reflects an industry decline or individual movement.  Getting significantly ahead of 26 years ago would entail making the $300k level that gootubers are quoting, but that includes stonk options & bonuses, assumes they don't leave, & it entails much hi...

    1st time in the lion kingdom's lifetime when the view of the moon also included humans traveling between here & there.  This is how it's always going to be as more & more humans travel to the moon.   The view we knew all our lives of the moon as a lifeless place is going away. Lions thought the moon program was a joke when Trump unveiled it in 2017. It was just a political stunt to have a moon landing during his 4 year term, with no chance of happening in time. Who knew a trip around the moon would actually happen & his re-election would line up with it, as if the 4 intervening years were all planned.      Everyone who ever lived is looking mighty small in the window.  Pondered if they're using any cameras better than a phone at all.   2 more shots on the night before the flyby.  These shots won't be possible after the highrises are finished.  Another shot from near the path might still be possible.  Bein...