I Want My Truck!!

So, this has been the slowest week ever. I wake up every morning and I'm like "Is it Saturday yet? Can I get my new car?!" And every day the answer has been no.
I know it's only a 97 pathfinder, and that it's not really the greatest truck in the world. But, it will be all my own, to do with as I please. What I please may involve some offroading next week. I'll keep you posted.

In other news, someone has managed to hook a Commodore 64 up to a PC via USB. I don't care how non-geeky you are, if you don't think this is at least a little cool then you're a loser.
http://www.engadget.com/2006/08/31/connect-your-commodore-64-keyboard-to-your-pc-via-usb/

Back to an investing mindset

Rummaging through my CFA notes has led me to start thinking about investments again. Not that I have the money to worry about such things for myself, but my mom wants me to help decide what to put the proceeds from the sale of my grandmothers house in. That being said, it looks like my Grandmother got out of the housing market at the right time.
http://money.cnn.com/2006/08/24/real_estate/pluggedin_
tully.fortune/index.htm
Hopefully in a year or two the price of a home will have dropped enough to make it cheap for me to buy a house. Although, that means that all of my friends who buy houses now will lose thousands of dollars. Well, I hope they don't. Homes really are like other assets. During a bear market there are always stocks that shoot up in value. Same with home prices. You can't use the market as a measuring stick when deciding on a specific home. You can find a steal in a really hot housing market by looking for fixer uppers and property in older, dirtier neighborhoods that are cleaning up (I'm looking at you Queen and Carlaw http://www.mls.ca/PropertyResults.aspx?Mode=0&Page=1&vs=1&rlt=&cp=&pt=0&mp=0-300000-0&mrt=-1-0-0&Beds=3-0&Baths=0-0&f=&ft=all&o=A&of=1&ps=10&ptgid=1&aid=3347&MapURL=%3fAreaID%3d6368 That's right folks, 3 bedroom homes for under 300,000 that are steps from downtown!). That being said, I don't have much faith in the new homes going up in Vaughan.

The Great Stevia Wars

So, my friend Cynthia came down at break and we were chatting. I mentioned that I felt like having my diet Dr. Pepper. I pulled out the can and then she starts bugging me about Aspartame. I told her that I haven't really ever heard of any real studies linking aspartame to health problems.
So, I got to looking for research and found this interesting website:
http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame/
which contains a lot of reports on the health detriments of Aspartame. Unfortunately for them, I couldnt' find any genuine studies they had done linking Aspartame to anything truly bad. Also, they have the word "holistic" in their name, which is a synonym for "bat-shit crazy".
Here is the Monsanto site about their profitable little chemical:
http://www.aspartame.org/

And here is a CBC article about a natural sweetener which is running into all kinds of regulatory problems in Canada and the US despite the fact that it is used by Coke to make Diet Coke in Japan. This is actually pretty interesting. There might be some serious money to be made on that front.
http://www.cbc.ca/consumers/market/files/food/stevia/

The end of a weekend...

.. involved buying a car. The '97 Pathfinder from the last post to be specific. I go to pick it up next weekend. It seems in great shape. Everyone wish me luck.
Now on to Ultimate Fighting. Wow. Chuck Liddell truly is the man. He KTFO'd Renato Sobral in about one and a half minutes. It's not like it was even close. The only bad part about it is that 'Babalu' Sobral was the only person in the UFC in a position to challenge for the 205 belt. Still, it's great to see a real champion in the wings.
However, I watched the show with a group of 20-22 year olds. Talk about feeling old. They all seem very similar in age to me, except that while I'm out in the real world, they're in college etc. However, Rory already owns his own house and everything and they seem to have firm grasp on reality. Firmer than my grasp at least. But, I'll have to take some pictures of Rory's basement and post them.. Coolest basement ever. Seriously.

Shopping for a car...

... is turning out to be more challenging than I thought. It seems like every time I find a vehicle that might be a good deal it turns out to be already sold or not in very good shape at all. Tonight I'm heading into TO to go car shopping, and I'll be stopping in Aurora to look at a Nissan Pathfinder tonight on my way in. It looks like it's in decent shape:

On another note, I made it to the final table at the local poker game again. 8th place this time. So, I'm probably sitting in 6th or 7th place overall in the rankings.

Also, I've been studying for the CFA. Now, that's a lot of boring, dry material that I am going to need to cover in a relatively short period of time. But, since most of it is review of things I learned in School, I'm not that afraid.

John Hemming got married

Wow, so my cousin John from St. Catherines got married this past weekend. It's strange because he's the same age as me and now he's heading off to start a family and whatnot. I hope that he and Diane are happy. They should be happy, they're in St. Lucia right now. Meanwhile I sit and rot in Midland. Yaaaayy... to echo Justin Hartwig from Grade seven (my EDPS peeps will know what I'm on about).
I'm taking the day off of work on Friday to go shopping for a car. I'm actually looking for a little SUV so I get decent ground clearance back home. So far the best deals I've found are on Nissan Pathfinders. So, I may be driving one of those by this time next week.
Last night after I got back from the Gym I finally sat down and started studying for the CFA. I set up a schedule for studying and then read a bit about Ethics. Tonight, after gymnastics, I'm going to make flash card copies of the "cheat sheet" that comes with the Schweser notes. Then I can start memorizing LOS's (learning outcome statements) on my walk to and from work. I was much more worried about the test last week, but after reading over the material I've realized it's mostly a regurgitation of material from school. So, I shouldn't have too much trouble putting the information into my head. I hope.

Poker and BP

So, I'm quitting Boston Pizza for a position as assistant coach of the Midland Secondary School senior cheerleading team. Which is kind of funny, because some of these kids have waaaay more experience than I do. But, it should be fun, and it's only 4 hours a week. So, it's shouldn't conflict with my CFA studying.
On another note, I played in the weekly poker game at Bleachers last night and came sixth! We don't play for money (or at least, I don't), but I managed to come 6th out of about 60 people. I played fairly loose at the start while the blinds were small which led to a run of catching top pair and other small hands. But, those small hands were enough to win me the pots. Then once the blinds went up I started playing more conservatively. Finally, I was at the final table and in sixth place. I also had the smallest stack of chips. I caught K-10 suited hearts and went all in. I got called by a dude with A-10 suited clubs. I caught a K on the flop, but he got his A on the river. So, I packed my bags and went home. Fun night though!

NAFTA superhighway

http://www.nascocorridor.com/

Not sure if I posted this before. But, pretty cool how they're integrating these highways and making a supercorridor.

Long Live Free Trade!

CFA studying

Ok, so, I've just realized that there is no way in Hell I will be able to pass the CFA AND work at Boston Pizza. It just WILL NOT happen. I've got skills, but not those kinds of mad skills.
I kind of need the money, but I need to pass the CFA more. It kind of sucks, but I've got to make this decision. Boooooo!! I just wish I'd realized this before I had started training at BP. Now I look like an ass.
But yeah, I went onto this website http://www.analystnotes.com/index.php and started reading some of the exam hints in the forums. They seem to recommend 3 hours of studying per day, for 6 months leading up to the exams. I don't even have 6 months left. Only 108 days. really, only a little more than 4 months. So, I've gotta get my ass in gear.
Wow, I'm really freaking out here.

Boston Pizza

Well, tonight at 5:00 I start my new part-time job. I'm going to be working at Boston Pizza. No, I don't know what I'm going to be doing there, and no, I didn't quit my current job here at NEBS to take this.
I'm just thinking it would be nice to work 3 or 4 nights a week in a social atmosphere, instead of spending my evenings sitting around playing video games. Also, some extra money is never frowned upon. The big downside is that this will make it more difficult to get to the gym. But, I already told Andy, the manager, that I won't be able to stay on if it's too much work.

In other news, I bought a music CD last night. I haven't done that in a while. I was in CD plus and the CD they were playing just sounded so cool I had to have it. The CD is called 'Madvillain' by Madvillainy. Madvillany is composed of Doom as the MC and Madlib as the DJ. It's just really strange stuff. And the entire album has this comic book feel to it which is very interesting.

Either the grossest or most delicious thing ever. You decide.

When my friend Raymond showed me this, my stomach almost emptied itself. But, by the time I got to the bottom of the article my mouth was watering and I was starving!

http://www.blackwidowbakery.com/demo/meatcake/