A case study in housing collapse

Thanks to Infinitefetish for this story:

TAMPA — Thousands of miles from the trading floors of global stock markets, an abandoned house in one of Tampa's poorest neighborhoods is an improbable place to learn about why the world's financial system is collapsing.

But if you want to understand how we got into this mess, the stucco house at 4809 N 17th St. isn't a bad place to start.

Coach class

Back when I was still unemployed, a former rowing coach asked whether I wanted to volunteer to help him out with Central Florida Rowing, UCF's club crew program, just a couple of days a week, because he needed the help, and well, I wasn't doing anything at the time.

I'm glad I took him up on the offer, because I've been surprised at how much I've enjoyed it and how much I care about the kids. (I can't stop myself from calling them "kids," even though the group of 8 or 9 whom I coach are college freshmen and sophomores.)

I think it's been a win-win for both me and them. It's been a personal-enrichment exercise for me as far as trying to convey processes and techniques, as well as help develop what little leadership skills I have.

At the high-paying software-company job I left earlier this year, I played a similar role of instructor -- but it was of technical information at which I myself was not an expert and therefore uncomfortable explaining. (I still think I could have become an expert eventually, but not before I rode the elevator to the roof of the swanky office building in which I worked and leaped off.)

But rowing: I do know rowing well -- at least the fundamentals -- and uncharacteristically, I can say that with confidence.

I coach two afternoons a week, riding in a launch just like this and barking out simple orders like a drill sergeant. I've always been soft-spoken, which has caused some trouble because I have to not only make sure the rowers hear me from 30 feet away, but I also have to shout over a motor. But that's all part of the personal-enrichment exercise I guess. I've been learning to yell, and I sometimes come home hoarse.

I even find myself thinking of coaching (read: work, even though I'm unpaid) on my days off, coming up with exercises and drills, thinking of what "we" need to work on or what needs improvement. I've rarely held a position that occupied my thoughts on my days off. I show up thoroughly prepared, with LED lights (it gets dark during the time we're on the lake, and we're all supposed to wear lights, a la cyclists, for safety), tools, reporter's notepad, athletic tape, seat pads and various other pieces of equipment.

The aforementioned former UCF coach once saw me walking across the beach with my little reporter's notepad -- I carried it because I'm horrible with names and I was adamant to learn them -- and said to me, "The good news, is you're organized. The bad news is, you're organized." The implication was that I could easily give myself an ulcer at this job, because trying to stick to a plan is futile when one little unexpected occurrence, such as a single rower no-showing, will inevitably be a monkey wrench. (Which immediately harkened me back to my failure at the software-company job. I think I tried too hard to be methodical, which is in my DNA. When things happened so fast and so chaotically there, I was doomed to fail.)

Coaching also has helped me feel useful, important and productive professionally. I feel like the kids are getting something out of it, too, since they're doing drills and learning techniques with which they're not familiar. They seem to respect me, and a few have even followed me to my car after a practice and asked if I could help them get better at X or Y. I have another story with this item, but I'll save it for our next convo.

It's a new position in which I find myself, and I'm having fun with it so far.

BFFs

SuperTarget or Bloomingdale's?

The new SuperTarget near our house is da bomb.

Rooftop garage parking. Escalator for your shopping cart. It's so cosmopolitan.

But foot traffic has been slow, so it's new, clean — and empty.

I never want to shop anywhere else.

SuperTarget

The Aldi report

I'm not adverse to buying weird-label, generic stuff, if the ingredients on the label are identical to the comparable name-brand item.

I'm cheap like that. As long as the can/bottle/package doesn't have high fructose corn syrup listed among the first 4 or 5 ingredients, and the ingredients match the name brand, I'm all over the Great Value, Archer Farms, all-white packaging.

And I know many people aren't as fortunate, but I'm generally not in a rush to get my shopping done. So I have time to read the labels.

So I think I have to give Aldi a thumbs up, but...

I doubt I would ever consider it my "main" grocery store.

We have an Aldi right close to us. It's by no means an out-of-the-way trip. (I guess that says something about the neighborhood in which we live, since Aldi stores would be laughed out of Bay Hills and Heathrows.) Also within a few miles of Chez R-H, we also have a dingy strip-mall Walmart (is that a redundancy?), at least two Publixes and, as of this Sunday, a shiny new SuperTarzhay.

Since Aldi is in our vicinity, I think just their price of milk ($2.80) is worth a regular trip. That's about a buck cheaper than most other places. If we were well off, I'd be more concerned about buying organic and hormone-free, but for now, I'm my conscience is somewhat clean by eating vegetarian. I'll go nondairy or organic when money isn't as much of a factor.

I think we also can pick up other nonperishable items there, such as canned fruit -- Aldi's "Fit N' Active" no-name brand, LOL -- and non-calorie sweetener without worry. (I suppose you could concern yourself with how much or how little each company is compensating their workers to pick the fruit you're eating, but I'm sure there's always something you could be outraged about.)

I'd have to sample Aldi's other dairy products and bread before deciding whether it's edible/worth it. I'm very picky about yogurt, cheese, cottage cheese and bread. I hate thin yogurt -- I hated yogurt period until a few years ago -- and insist on buying 100 percent whole wheat bread that isn't enriched, which I could not find there.

We get our fresh fruit from a local produce market. Their prices are low, which, like Aldi, tends to attract the lower-income crowd. But it's always clean, there are middle-class shoppers there, and I love the strong smell of fresh produce that hits you when you walk in.

Definitely not on my Aldi grocery list: the $0.50 vegetable soup (shudder -- full of high fructose corn syrup), the pasta sauce (heard it was runny) and things such as garbage bags that we've been burned on when buying generic in the past.

As for their reputation: When we visited, the place was clean -- but it is a brand-new store -- and the aisles were packed full of low-income shoppers. We wondered what the over/under was (couldn't be long) on when the inside of the store would start looking like the Walmart down the road. One man who passed me smelled not so fresh. Again, not anything that I hadn't experienced in the aisles at Sprawlmart at 3 a.m. I liked that you had to insert a coin to get a cart; there weren't any abandoned carts floating randomly in the parking lot.

I'd say for us, since it's nearby, it's fine as a convenience store. Good for popping in for milk and canned goods. But for the bulk of our groceries, we'll stick with Publix or SuperTarzhay's Archer Farms.

Thank you, Dubya

I'm so proud of my dad.

I visited him the other day, and he dropped a bombshell on me: He registered to vote, and he's voting this Nov. 4 for what he says is the first time in more than 40 years.

To know why that's huge is to know my dad.

He is the quintessential crusty old veteran. Yes, that get-off-my-lawn, white-undershirt-wearing grouch who's socially conservative and handy with all things mechanical. As her father's daughter, I also know he has a heart of gold and a soft side, but as you might expect, he's very good at hiding that part.

He's also a 20-year enlisted man and a Vietnam vet. I love listening to his war stories, from how he cowered in a jet's cockpit as a VC sniper shot at the air base he was stationed, to how the servicemen there were paid (in "Monopoly money," so U.S. greenbacks wouldn't circulate overseas), to how he stood in line at the mess tent and and watched a large Marine, fresh from the jungle, get shot in the leg, only to insist he get his food and eat.

He's never said a bad word about our military and never will. Neither will I.

But over the course of the past couple of years, I've listened to how disgusted he's become with Washington. He's now convinced our current leaders have made a complete mockery of the uniform, have damaged our military hierarchy and tarnished our country's good name. And he's fuming mad.

"Why did they use funny money in Vietnam but bring real dollars to Iraq?" he asked me the other day, his voice and blood pressure rising. "Now, millions are missing. Disappeared. They'll never find it."

Also:

"Why aren't these [Wall Street execs] in jail? They knew what was coming."

"She can't name one newspaper she reads? Not even the Anchorage paper? Or one Supreme Court decision?"

"It's such a mess over there [in Iraq]. What are we doing?"

I just shake my head. Not because I disagree with my dad, but because I am in awe that a military retiree could hate the war(s) that much. He's become a big supporter of getting our troops outta Dodge.

I laughed out loud so hard when he recalled to me how a GOP supporter proudly sporting McCain buttons canvassed his neighborhood lately and knocked on his door.

"Mr. H, I see you're not registered to vote yet."

"Yeah, what business is that of yours?" (classic dad)

"Did you know that..."

"I'm voting for Obama."

"Sir, I think that would be a big mistake..."

"Who are you to tell me I'm making a mistake -- on my property? Goodbye."

Of course, a Democratic Party supporter also happened to be working the neighborhood that day, and, in true form, my dad quickly ushered that man off his property, too.

"Mr. H, I see you're not registered to vote..."

"How do you know I'm Mr. H?"

"Um, are you...?"

"What business is that of yours?"

So my dad went and registered. He's voting. This is a man who's vowed to me in the past that he never has had any interest in voting because he's completely disgusted with politics and politicians. As long as I can remember, his attitude has been, "They're all corrupt. There's no one to vote for. Waste of time. Why bother."

He says he's never cared this much about an election since JFK, the last time he cared about a candidate. "And the last guy I liked was shot" -- which also has him concerned. But this monumental change in my dad couldn't have been possible without the policies of the Bush administration. So I guess I owe him some gratitude.

Florida's Amendment 2

Don't voters have more important issues to worry about other than whether people they may or may not know can marry? What about education, the economy? I am trying, but I just can't wrap my head around conservatives' priorities.

To my sister: Moles