Bill Gates is not exactly an exemplary human being, but back in the 90s I read a book about him and one thing that stuck with me was the idea of the "bozo bit". A bit being the most basic element of computation, a thing that it either a 1 or a 0, on or off.
The idea was, Gates would interact with someone and if they turned out to be a bozo, IE unreliable, unintelligent, etc., in some way a waste of time, the "bozo bit" flipped and he gave up on that person.
Ken didn't come by last night even though I'd called him in the afternoon and he'd said he'd come by. So he just plain forgot, or is juggling money such that he's had to pay something else and didn't have money left over for me (after all I'd told him if it comes to it, pay the electric company before he pays me because w/o electricity I can't get any work done) or something.
I'm pretty sure the bozo bit idea didn't require one knowing why the other was a bozo, just determining that they're a bozo.
I was thinking the 3rd car (SUV) Ken and his wife bought might have made their finances suck. Being devout Suburbians, they have to have N+1 vehicles and there are two of them in their McMansion, so a 3rd vehicle is as necessary to them as fish on Friday is to a devout Catholic. And as per AAA figures, it costs a bit over a thousand a month to own and operate the average vehicle in the US.
But, firstly, the SUV is his wife's and she may have bought it with her own money. She may have even paid cash.
Secondly, when Ken, with my help, got out of the storage units here and into that one large one in Milpitas, he decreased his expenses by about a thousand a month.
So, I don't know, Ken's just bad at managing money.
And our numbers are really good lately. We're talking 9-10 thousand dollar months. And it's not like Ken's buying the stuff I'm selling; he's got so much stuff it's just been drawing down on the huge pile of stuff.
But this happens, where a business will be doing really well but the expenses are too high or things are mismanaged and boom! They're out of business.
Plus there's that August 31st "deadline" where a new lease must be signed. Whether the rent's raised or lowered depends on how good and reliable a tenant we are.
I've said it ad nauseam but I really want to hang in here and white-knuckle it until September of 2027. I'll be turning 65 and will have another year of savings. But if we're thrown out of here, or given notice, on 31 August this year, that gives me two weeks to mid-September, and I can gather up my stuff - just box it up! - and throw it into the storage across from Tom's and sleep at his place or in a hotel while I sell off everything I haven't sold off already, figure out what I'm going to use for luggage, etc.
This is where Tom can be a real resource, because he flies to Alaska a lot, and I should pick his brain about luggage. I think I want something to carry on, and something big that can swallow up the cornet in its box, the cornet gig bag, clothes, etc.
It's too bad in a way I'm not going to New Orleans, because then it's just hop on the Amtrak. But then I'd end up picking piss-soaked weed roaches off of the sidewalk, smoking crack, etc. No. Thanks.
I packed a few more small things, gave myself a haircut, and took off almost an hour earlier than I'd usually take off for downtown. I dropped off trash, dropped off food things at the little free library, went to the Amazon place for bubble mailers (only got a few) then went to my bank and checked my balance. It was OK, so the last check I got some Ken hadn't bounced.
I went over to Whole Foods and got "a small snack" of chicken, a little mashed potatoes, and broccoli, and a tall can of Lagunitas IPA because they were out of Guinness pints again. I had a few rolls of masking tape with me to give to Petition Guy but he wasn't there. I remembered him saying he was about done; that almost all of the petitions had enough signatures now.
Basically not being paid, between buying and cash backs I took about $200, half of one paycheck, out of my bank account. That's my basic plan; put $400 in the bank each week, spend $200, and the other $200 is savings.
I got a 12-pack of Lagunitas but they didn't even have the six packs of the sour little bottles of Guinness. A perfect time to check out "Kuik Stop", I thought. This is a liquor store on Taylor street that I've gone past a ton of times, and seems to be very busy and popular with the ahem, "urban camping" crowd. Maybe their prices are really good, I thought.
So I went over there and checked it out and they didn't even have Guinness, and had your typical bodega type groceries, the cheapest beers, and nothing had prices on it. Run by Indians it seems. Meh.
I rode over to First Street and to U-Save where I got my six-pack of sour little bottles and a bag of pork rinds, and rode back here.
I found, on my desk, my pay check dated today, some mail, and one of those awful gun magazines "Concealed Carry" that Ken subscribes to. So, Ken was probably juggling a lot of things yesterday and just plain forgot. He *does* forget things. And I can deposit the check on Monday.
After the IRS cashes my check my bank account will be down quite a bit. This is why I'm really hoping things will be stable enough for me to sweat out an additional year here, saving money.
I put things away and put the trailer on the bike, and a big box that had to go to FedEx on the trailer and rode up to FedEx and dropped that off, and bought stuff in H Mart.
On the way back I hunted for packing stuff and found some so that was good. I also found two loaves of French bread which I dropped off at Tom's place.
A funny thing, though: On my ride out with the big box, I'd seen something rectangular and shiny on the bike lane so I stopped and picked it up. It was a package of Indian cigarettes, and they were all in there except one. I put it in my pocket.
So after I'd picked up the 2 loaves of French bread, I was riding around the back side of the strip mall out onto Brokaw, and there's a red truck with a topper that someone's obviously living in. It's been there for weeks, and I saw the person moving around, doing something. She shouted something out, to me or to whom I had no idea, but it sounded similar to "smoking" which reminded me of the cigarettes. So I circled around and asked her if she smokes and sure she does (we were now talking through the constant yapping of her small dog) and accepted the cigarettes thankfully, then went into how she's shouted to me "but you rode by so fast" about some *snow tires* she has that are for sale.
Like, who sees a bicyclist with a trailer with a plastic tub on it, in warm weather, in an area where it never snows, and thinks, "Aha! That's just the kind of person who's always looking for snow tires!".
I said I didn't need 'em, that in the snow on my bike if it gets thick enough I just walk it, really. And got the fuck out of there because who knows what other random things she was going to try to sell me.
This is a classic example of a certain type of homeless person, who always has this, that, and the other, for sale. Always hustling. The goods might even not be stolen. They could always put the things on Ebay or Craig's List. But that takes being organized and shipping things out on time, and in the case of Craig's List that's often where people look for things that have been stolen.
But snow tires.... that's just so fucking random.