So, a witch called today…
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Category Archives: People are weird
A Man of No Party
While I pay attention to politics, I usually don’t weigh in, preferring to just go vote and have my voice heard that way. As an independent, I feel mostly free to vote for the person I consider to be the best candidate. I don’t agree with any party’s full platform, so it’s easy to tally up the pros and cons of each candidate and vote accordingly. That said, I try not to throw my vote away on a candidate that is unlikely to win. I don’t like our current two-party system, but usually it is one of their nominees who is going to get the job. So I pay particularly close attention to those two.
Driving Mr. Li
It was the 6th of July, and we set out on a beautiful day to drive over to Dawson City via the Taylor and Top-of-the-World highways. After loading the camper, we made a quick stop at the store for gas and hit the road with deli sandwiches for lunch. It was an easy drive to Tok, where we gassed up again before arriving at Tetlin Junction and heading north toward Chicken. Up there in the high country, past Mount Fairplay and back below treeline, it began raining. We pulled over to camp in a gravel pit and relaxed for the evening.
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Brexit upside — books on sale
It’s still hard to believe that a whole country would shoot itself in both feet economically on purpose. Oh well, books over there are on sale now at about 11% off Thursday’s peak and about 15% off where the pound was a year ago:
Graph courtesy of www.x-rates.com
Update, 6 July 2016: Unlike the US stock market, the pound is not recovering. It continues to drop and is now almost 14% off of its recent peak less than a week ago.
Graph courtesy of www.x-rates.com
Update 27 August 2016, showing long-term decline, sharp Brexit drop, and sustained low value.
Graph courtesy of www.x-rates.com
Update 6 October 2016: Renewed action on Brexit takes the pound to new lows.
Graph courtesy of www.x-rates.com
Wow — one day later, renewed Brexit talk has really shaken the pound again. Here is the one-month graph, followed by the one-year graph:
Graphs courtesy of www.x-rates.com
Update 8 October 2016. Good article in the New York Times today explaining the “hard Brexit.” Another reminder (as if we need one, given Trump and the Colombian vote against peace) that the voter is not always right. Here is the dollar/pound exchange rate over the past month:
Graph courtesy of www.x-rates.com
Update 4 November 2016. As soon as it was ruled that parliament would have to vote for Brexit to actually occur, the market reacted quite positively (because there is a new chance that it won’t happen). Great real-world experiment in the economic damages of isolationism in a global economy:
Graph courtesy of www.x-rates.com
Update 16 Jan 2017: Brexit continues to keep the value of the pound depressed.
Graph courtesy of x-rates.com
Dude, It’s So Hot!
A couple of summers ago Rose had some friends visiting, and we all went into town for the Midnight Sun Festival. It was a beautiful day, and it seemed like all of Fairbanks and a lot of tourists were out in the streets having a great time.
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