We’re Moving…

I’ve been contemplating this for a few weeks now.  This has been my first foray into blogging and it’s been a learning experience from the start.  I’ve enjoyed building this site and have seen the traffic begin to grow.  I appreciate you taking time out of your day to spend it with me and my thoughts.

WordPress has been a great help.  Boy do they make it easy to set up a website and go live.  However with ease of entry does come some limitations.  There are areas of control I’d like to have that the free hosting at WordPress.com does not allow.  Because of that it’s time to move to a different hosting arrangement before this blog gets any bigger and more difficult to migrate to an independent host.

For that reason, I’ve chosen now as the time to make the jump.  I hope you’ll come with me.  Minding My Own Business is still in business…so to speak, just with a different address.  Please update your bookmarks and RSS feeds with the new links.  There’s lots of excitement ahead….

http://www.mindingmyownbusiness.net

Semper Finance!

From the Halls of Montezuma,
To the Shores of Tripoli;
We fight our country’s battles
In the air, on land, and sea;
First to fight for right and freedom
And to keep our honor clean;
We are proud to claim the title
Of UNITED STATES MARINES.

Now that every US Marine presently surfing the internet is standing at attention, I’d like to draw yours to Semper Finance, a blog I recently happened upon that has a lot of great information.

Semper Finance is authored by Ryan Delany who is a former Marine…well, once a Marine always a Marine as my sister service likes to say.  He writes about a wide variety of topics ranging from managing personal finances (Ryan knows how to Mind His Own Business 🙂 ) to great pieces on the basics of the Stock Market and how it operates.   He’s even put together an interesting read on the history of the Stock Market.

I have a special place in my heart for the Marine Corps.  I spent the better part of five months at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida as an Aviation Officer Candidate with my face in the dirt, soaked in sweat while the drill instructor, Staff Sergeant Wilson, United States Marine Corps yelled at me to quit messing up his dirt and get back into the push-up position.  Just like my DI, Ryan knows his stuff!  He’s written several guest posts for a variety of finance blogs and is quickly growing his site as well.

Check it out and let Ryan know what you think.

-Jeff

I’m Minding My Own Business, are you minding yours?

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I’ve Been Stimulated…So to Speak

On May 9th, 2008 my stimulus check arrived, right on time, just as forecast.  There was no fan fare, there was no congratulations.  Just the quiet whir of my computer’s fan.  There it was, staring at me in my money market account, $1800 that wasn’t there the morning before.  Should I tell the money spender?  Communication is one of our strong suits and a key to our personal success as a couple, so I have no choice in the matter, I have to tell her.  She’s happy we’ve received it and has allowed me to save it for now.  🙂

Are You Educating Your Kids? The US Jobs Report Says You Should!

Yesterday I blogged about US Unemployment and whether it was as bad an issue as I believe it’s being made out to be in the media. Today I’d like to take a closer look at the Jobs Report for March 2008 and focus on a breakdown of the data that is available on the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Employment Situation page.

I first heard about the availability of the breakdowns and the tale they tell after listening to a podcast of Bob Brinker’s Money Talk program during my morning workout on Monday. During that podcast, Bob talked briefly about the Jobs Report data and focused on how the numbers point to the importance of education. I liked the points he made so I thought I’d share them here with you.

Unemployment…How Bad Is It?

This morning I went to work via the gym.  I try to head there before work on Mon, Wed and Fri to take care of my physical well being.  I’ve been getting a bit bored with the same run of country music on my iPod Shuffle so lately I’ve taken to loading podcasts on topics ranging from real estate and investing to self-improvement.  It’s a buy one get one free sale at the gym now, a mental workout for the same low price of punishing my body.

Enough about my workout, except to say that while I was on my back at the bench press, trying to not let the barbell land on my face, I was listening to a discussion on the recent jobs report that came out Friday, April 4th.  I found that discussion interesting and it got me thinking about unemployment and whether things were really as bad as the media portrays.  So I decided I’d dig a little deeper into the jobs report and unemployment data and share what I learn with you here on Minding My Own Business.  I read some of the articles on the internet including this one at the NY Times, and spent some time routing through the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) website.

Iran Wants OPEC to Stop Valuing Oil in US Dollars

I’m not clairvoyant, I swear. A couple days ago I shared my thoughts about the US Dollar. In the middle of that post I got off on a tangent about the price of oil, the fact that it is traded in US Dollars and that I believe the preservation of foreign wealth in a declining dollar environment is a contributing factor to the continuing run up in oil prices. You can catch up on my comments here.

The US Dollar

The strength of the US Dollar, or rather the lack there of, is certainly not a new story, but rather one that has been gather steam for quite some time. I can remember when I bought my first Euro while on deployment in the Mediterranean in late 2002.

The Dollar and the Euro were at parity. Nearly 1 to 1. Even Steven.

That’s a far cry from today’s exchange rate which is approximately $1.57 per Euro (at the time of this writing). That’s a total return of 57%. Not too shabby in my book.

In the Spring of 2003, during that same deployment, we made a stop in England before coming home to the US. At that time you had to pay an average of $1.55 for each British Pound. Today’s rate is $1.99. That’s a 28% return on your money in 5 years. I’ve got investments doing better than this, but even so, you would have made money investing in the Pound.

In hindsight, I should have invested in some foreign currency (the Euro). Instead, during those port calls I invested in foreign wheat, barley and hops…in a liquid state. 🙂