Liquidity

From the outset of the financial crisis that our country is still working it's way through I have heard the term "inject liquidity into the system" used quite a bit.  Let me be honest, when I listen to or read financial reporting I probably understand 30% of it.  It goes by so fast that I feel like I can kind of put the pieces together and get the jist.  I feel like I should really understand what they are talking about if I'm going to pretend to pay attention to such things.  So, I googled it.  Here is a short and to the point answer to what bank liquidity is:

"Liquidity for a bank means the ability to meet its financial obligations as they come due.  Bank lending finances investments in relatively illiquid assets, but it funds its loans with mostly short term liabilities.  Thus one of the main challenges to a bank is ensuring its own liquidity under all reasonable conditions. "


Wow, so simple!  I did a little more reading and have come up with what I think is bank liquidity in uberlamens terms:

Liquidity is a short term loan (think of it like a credit card) for a bank to be able to use to pay off another short term loan. 


Hopefully that makes a little more sense.  Also I hope that I'm right.  Apparently, what a lot of big banks do is loan really large sums of money to big corporations or countries or very wealthy individuals.  They do this by borrowing that money from somebody else at a smaller interest rate than what they are lending it at.  That is how they make money.  Seems kind of weird doesn't it?  I always thought that a big takes in deposits from people like you and me and maybe from businesses then loans that money out and charges interest on it.  That was probably how it was done 50 years ago, but not today.  That method of banking probably kept a lot of people out of trouble.


I saw an article today about some rally happening on Wall St.  Occupy Wall St, I think it was called.  Something like 5000 people got together and staged a "sit in" in front of some big bank or maybe the stock exchange.  I'm sure it will come and go as a minor nuisance to those who have to move around in Manhattan today.  I wonder if any of those people know what bank liquidity is.


I mapped out a 6.5 mile route around Signal Hill that takes me down Cherry to PCH, then down to the river bed, then to Willow and finally back to Cherry.  I think I saw a homeless guy taking a picture of himself with his smart phone.  It was a nice day for a run.

The Willow St bridge around 8am.

Sparky likes Mexican Food

So I went ahead and paid my fine and opted for driving school.  Luckily you can now do your driving school online.  It is clever how they force you to actually read through the material.  Each page has a timer that forces you to keep the page open for about 10 minutes and they sprinkle random sentences into the course work like "Sparky likes mexican food".  Then after each page they quiz you on some of what you read and sometimes about Sparky.  It's not that hard.

I forgot to mention that I got Sydney up and riding a bike with no training wheels on her second lesson.  She is using Derek's old bike so it is a bit heavy and too big for her.  The only thing she has a problem with is stopping.  I forgot how much running was involved in that process.  I'm glad I'm in shape for it.

Fraud Alert

I was recently researching the possibility of getting a credit security service like Lifelock.  After doing some digging I found out that one of the main things they do for you is to put a fraud alert on your social security number with all the major credit bureaus.  Then it maintains this fraud alert for as long as you pay them.  The thing is you can do this yourself.  You just have to remember to reapply the fraud alert every 90 days.  A bit of a hassle?  Not really it took me about 5 minutes to do it and I saved myself $160 (lifelock fee).  Unless you are one of those people that likes opening up lines of credit at stores like Best Buy or Pep Boys then this is a no brainer.  Everybody should be doing this.  Click the link below to find out the details:

http://www.fightidentitytheft.com/flag.html

Here are the specific links that you'll need:

equifax fraud alert form, just click here and fill out the form
https://www.alerts.equifax.com

Experian  fraud alert form, same deal
http://www.experian.com/fraud

Transunion doesn't have an online form, you will have to call them and pay a fee of $10.  However, from what I read on their website this alert does not come off unless you remove it.  So you only have to do it once.

1-888-909-8872

Charlie Brown

I found this today while perusing The Piano Guys youtube channel:

That's some fancy playing Mr. Schmidt.

Diesel Question

Why doesn't the government support diesel more?  I know that 20 years ago diesel was associated with loud black smoke belching buses and big rigs.  However this is 2011, we've got clean diesel with 97% less sulfur.....which is good I think.  Diesel cars really aren't that loud anymore either.  Mine is noticeably louder than a regular gas engine, but it's easy to ignore.  The newer diesel cars are even better.  I really don't see the downside to the government supporting diesels more (don't we own a really big car company now?).  I know that diesel is the cheapest gas to make however it is the most expensive consumer gas to buy simply because of taxes.  I don't know for sure but I would guess that the taxes go towards maintaining our nation's highway system.  I wonder how much this tax really hits all of us though.  Think about it, who uses more diesel than anybody.  Big trucks that haul things.  Milk, computers, car parts, paper towels, you name it chances are it got to the store you bought it from in a diesel truck.  Imagine how much the price of all goods in America would drop overnight if the government lifted the taxes on diesel.  Our cars would also average 45 mpg.  Imagine how that would effect our foreign oil dependence.  Because we got such high gas mileage with the cleaner diesel fuel that we have today imagine how that might effect the environment.  Honestly, what is the downside?

Target Spotted

I think I have a race narrowed down for 2012.  Behold...the tough mudder:

http://toughmudder.com/events/socal-2012/

This sounds a lot more interesting than just running.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not giving up on marathons.  There is a good chance I'll try for the Long Beach marathon in October 2012.  I first heard about this race from the one in England.  That version is called the Tough Man.  It looked positively miserable but fun.  I was thrilled to see that they made the same race in the states based off the Tough Man.

I got out for an early morning Signal Hill run yesterday.  It was early so there weren't a lot of cars out.  It was weird that the first part of the run is a steep down hill but I never felt like I really came up hill that much coming back.  That is fine though.  In Chino Hills it didn't matter which way I went I knew it was going to be a nasty up hill climb at the very end of the run.

Obisbo around 7am.  God getting some early morning painting in.

High Tide

Why is the tide so high right now.  Somebody explain this to me.  Is the moon mad at us?  Whatever, it looked interesting on my run today.  Me knee did this weird jab of pain thing right at the end.  That wasn't so nice.  Going to have to hit the pain stick later to work out the ol IT band.

Also, it would be nice if things could stop breaking in my new house.  That would be great.