Wahooo!

A while ago we went to a play place. Caroline was doing a little filming and by chance happened to catch this moment on video. Ironic she ends up being embarrassed that she captured it. :)

When my family would go camping as a kid, my mom would usually buy a box of capri sun for hikes or whatever. I was excited when I opened the fridge and saw this:


The funny thing is I didn't remember that is was spelled "sonne". That's funny...

I ate a few chips this morning. Well, that's not entirely true. I ate an entire bags of chips...that's certainly more than a few.

They were yummy. Though after finishing the bag I was a little concerned to read the expiration date. Not because it had passed, but because what it says right below it.

checks this blog any more. It's been over two years since my last post. But just in case you are wondering I'm alive and well.



Not sure about that guy ^ though?

The other day something interesting happened. I hadn't taken a lunch to work. Forgot to bring this along:

(my actual lunch box it quite similar to this). So I decided to go out for lunch on my own. I went to a noodle place a co-worker had taken me to before. They didn't have an English menu so I pretty much pointed at the one that looked similar to what I'd had before and told them "that one".

They quickly prepared my order and soon I was happily on my way back to the office to enjoy my noodles. When I got back to the office I asked my co-worker what I'd purchased. She said it was pork. I was cool with that. Then she continue to describe what kind of pork. It turns out my noodle didn't have meat in them so much as they had pig organs in them. Don't worry they cut up the organs so they were bite size. Pretty soon I came to realize that I had a digestive organ in my noodles. A large pig digestive organ...that is to say the large intestine of a pig was cut up and cooked with my noodles.



Okay, I thought that's interesting. I can try it out. See what it's like. When I opened the lid of my bowl (which began to seem awfully large at this point) I could smell what reminded me of pig pens. I'm pretty sure you all know what kinds of materials the large intestine houses. And I'm pretty sure you can imagine how housing that over the life-time of a pig my thoroughly saturate it with a particular smell. What I'm guessing you can't imagine is why anyone would eat that!

I tried it. I started with a very, very small piece. I'm happy to say it didn't taste quite like the bowl of noodles smelled. So I tried about half of my bowl before I decided I couldn't do anymore. One time the scent got to me as I was chewing a piece and I almost lost it. That's always a good sign you might want to stop eating something. :)



Have a nice day.

So there's been a bit of pandemonium over a blizzard warning the weather service issued for last night and this morning.

News weather men were issuing all sorts of cautions:

"Hunker down, wait it out a bit. It's going to be that significant." -- Glen Merrill, NWS.

News headlines read:

Residents urged to prepare for expected blizzard conditions

Tuesday blizzard likely to deliver a whiteout punch.

The power companies were panicking:

"Rocky Mountain Power says this major storm could knock out power."

So what did this end up doing to my front yard? Well this is what it looked like this morning when I left for work:



It's a miracle we survived. Something we have to be thankful for on Thursday.

# posted by Ryan : 8:48 AM  4 comments

Dear Senator Hatch,

Recently there has been a lot of talk about extending the Bush tax cuts. I think for the most part Republican legislators want the tax cuts extended at all levels. The President has come out in support of extending the tax cuts for everyone's first $250,000 of income and allowing the top two tax brackets to return to 2001 levels.

Senator Hatch are you in favor of extending the Bush tax cuts to everyone for only their first $250,000 of income? You mentioned a frustration that politics is getting in the way of extending the tax cuts via your twitter feed. The most reasonable and best plan I've heard at this point is to extend the tax cuts to only the four lower tax brackets. Households' whose marginal tax bracket is one of the bottom four tax brackets constitutes 98% of American households. What good reason is there for not extending the tax cuts to them?

They are the ones that are most impacted by the difficult economy. They are the ones who've been struggling the most. They are the ones who've been losing share of income over the last several years. They are the ones who deserve a little bit of help. They are the ones who with the extra money are most likely to use it in ways that can help get the economy humming again. They are the ones who you ought to be concerned about most.

The arguments about small business getting hit with large tax increases are over stated. Less than 3% of small businesses reach the fifth tax bracket. And even if they do only their income over $250,000 (after expenses) would be taxed at a slight increase of about 7.5%.

The argument that the economy needs the tax cuts seems like a good one. The tax cut extension will be most useful for the lower and middle classes. The top the 1-2% of Americans are the ones who by far received the largest tax breaks in 2001 and 2003. They are the ones whose incomes have been growing the most. They are the ones who are least likely to spend a small tax break on consumer goods. They are the ones who don't need that help. Consumer spending is the biggest driver of our economy. Lower and middle class Americans have the biggest impact here.

Extending the tax cuts to all tax brackets seems unwise. Many from the right have complained about government spending especially since the past election. Why would you compound the deficit issue? Clearly cutting off revenues does not stop congress from spending more.

If you are upset about politics preventing a tax extension from passing then step up Mr. Hatch and tell the senate that you will work on getting the tax cuts extended for the bottom four tax brackets. They only need one senator from the right to get this moving. One brave man willing to stand up for what is right. I understand the dilemma you must be facing considering a good portion of your donors are likely from the top 2% group. Please don’t forget you represent 100% of us not just 2%.

Resources:
2001 Tax Rates
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-prior/i1040tt--2001.pdf


2010 Tax Rates
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040tt.pdf



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So it's been a while since I've been to Wahooo. Apparently, I was so happy with my bracket a year and a half ago that I decided I didn't need to post again. Well I didn't do as well on the bracket for 2010.

Here are a couple of other cool places I hadn't been in a while:

Delicious
Evernote
Flickr
Linkedin

later.