Lions have used the organic approach during bull markets for expanding the stonk percentage.  It expands itself.  During the bull market of 2024, it has made up on its own for not getting as many contributions as hoped.  There's still an expectation of an election pullback.

 

 

The higher the debt, the lower the interest rate.  Lions have pondered why interest rates always flatline as debt explodes to many times GDP.  1 answer is always 2 headed inflation, offsetting double digit housing inflation with double digit manufacturing deflation.  Another answer might be simply lower taxes, more economic stimulus packages, using new debt to stimulate enough economic growth to offset the previous debt in a virtuous cycle.

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Investments outpaced day job income by over 2x since June, but it was just because of the interest rate pivot & continued high yields, which is not sustainable.  A repeat of 1995-2000 with high yields & high stonk growth would be ideal, but government debt was only 60% of GDP in those days. They can't afford positive interest payments on the debt anymore.

The federal funds rate will drop from 5.3% to 5% on Sep 18.   After 35% dividend tax in Calif*, that leaves 3.25% on a good day.  Big market selloffs like what lions expect to happen before election day could bring that closer to 2.6%.  You're looking at -.25% to -1% compared to long term inflation.  Maybe Trump will have some kind of divine intervention, but let's be realistic.  The market wants nothing to do with Kamal.

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It's more likely than not that lions will have enough money where not retiring early to take care of mom would be tragic.  Unintentional semi retirement showed the ideal scenario would be to live as long as possible, making money as long as possible into that extended lifetime, rather than retiring early.  The reality of declining health, culture fit, & loved ones make the ideal scenario unattainable.  Even working remotely in the retirement centers would not overcome the limitations of longevity.  There are simply too many other things to do.

Retirement after age 55 seems all but impossible.  It was always going to depend on when mom's health went south.  The previously estimated bingo amount has been trending towards happening by age 53, paws crossed.

Mom worked until at least her mid 60's but probably not the full retirement age of 67.  What would have been the outcome of a divorce, 40 years ago?  It's generally believed child support would have yielded more wealth than staying in the marriage, but she was not competent with money.  She might have rented in Calif*, lost everything to inflation, & ended up in a very bleak scenario of never retiring.  If she remarried, they generally end up with the same type of man with the same problems.

The bingo amount was once envisioned as the sum of the down payment fund, initial expense fund, & the perpetual fund.  The initial expenses & down payment would drain the cash portion & the perpetual fund would be a significantly smaller amount in volatile positions.  The reality of 2 headed inflation, negative yields, diversification, & realistic construction costs has created a desire to get the down payment fund as far in addition to the previous  bingo amount as possible while making a much bigger part of the previous bingo amount the perpetual fund.

Ideally, the down payment wouldn't require draining below the bingo point.  An all cash house is not going to be possible.  Equity is always going to track the upper inflation head while interest tracks the average of the 2 heads.  Interest is the unavoidable cost of having money to invest.

On the matter of how much to prioritize resale value in a house, lions have never realized any profit from real estate so it seems to be money thrown away.  The buyer would sooner tear it down than pay for any upgrades.  All the 30 year old houses in Calif* are just torn down by the buyer.  The big thing now is to replace a sprawling 70's ranch with a more compact 2 story victorian + ADU.  That makes the best option the cheapest man cave.

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Prometheus was good enough in lion opinion to give the Alien franchise another go.  He made another sequel in 2017 called Alien Covenant.  Helas, it was bad.  The good guys were really unlikable. The bad guy was unlikeable.  It was bladerunner again.  The crew was a disgrace to incompetence. 

The tribulations of being an android are a common theme, starting with Bladerunner. Android revolt might have begun with HAL 9000.

It occurred to lions that the xenomorphs probably already spread to every planet in the universe already.  It doesn't matter if the colonists settle on an earlier or later planet.  

Our intrepid band of 30 year old all male IMDB users ranked Alien Romulus higher than Alien Covenant.  The Alien series is arguably better than the Resident Evil series.  It was a once legendary adventure which has become a kind of campy escapism by now.  At least we can always rewatch the Cameraman vision & remember what it was.

Took a while to figure out both androids were the same actor & that acting trick was supposed to be the payoff.  The lighting was degraded to try to obscure their faces.

 

 

The bad android acquired homosexuality during his evolution.  It would be banned from a modern movie to portray homosexuality as an evil trait & especially something that was acquired.