BeCos(play) It's Friday

More mostly safe for cons below the break, as always bonus nerd points if you recognize a character.

Beware: Sirens

In a likely futile attempt to save certain sailors from a premature trip to Davey Jones' Locker, I am posting the following cautionary images. More Not Safe For Seamen below the break.

Also....

Scotch Nature: Student Loans

I'm wading into the deeper end of the "not broke" pool today with student debt.

Let's start with a case study of a bight young married couple: he has graduated a protestant seminary and she has a BA in music. He wants to be a youth pastor and she wants to be a homemaker who helps in the "praise band" at church. The problem with this lovely plan is that they have a fairly modest level of student debt, $80,000 and $40,000 respectively believe it or not this is me likely understating how much money they are likely to owe with these degrees.

Now student debt, currently, has a very low interest rate, but guess what, it never goes away the principal amortization most people pay are akin to mortgages. You cannot bankrupt out from under it and it is one of the only things that will garnish even your social security. So let's say they only pay 2% interest.

Our bright young couple graduates(you still have to pay even if you don't) and amazingly gets their dream jobs. He now makes $21,000 per year as a youth pastor and she makes $3000 leading the praise band. They are now paying $2400 per year in interest. So instead of staying home with their first child she now has to go get a part time job making $12,000 per year while paying $6000 in child care and other expenses of working outside the home. Do I really need to say that their marriage isn't as happy as if they didn't have to pay a tithe  to their debt before they even have tithed their church?

I am currently enrolled at my local state university for 12 credit hours this semester my bill came to a bit less than $2500(I'm not living in a dorm). If I were trying to do a whole BA in four years it would likely be less than $3000 but let's round up.

So if you aren't paying for dorms(you live with your parents) a full four years would come to around $24,000 at about $6000 per year.

Now let's go back to our young couple and assume they both worked part time, got as many hours as possible at a state or community college, and only have an aggregate student debt of $40,000. $800 in interest expense a year still isn't good but it isn't going to derail your personal or professional dreams.

Other options include:

• GI Bill: This is probably why grandpa didn't have a student loan payment, he exchanged a few years of shooting commies for his education. This is being stupidly tightened up by our government but it still is there.
• Student Loan Forgiveness Programs: For example a friend of ours went to teach at a poor rural school that didn't pay very well but would forgive her student debt in 5 years, probably boosting her real salary by $10,000 per year. Another friend did even better with social work and a masters degree in the same.
• Higher Paying More Employable Fields: Let's face it $120,000 in medical school debt is a lot more manageable than $120,000 in seminary debt.(or at least it was before Obamacare) So go into some STEMM field that will get you a salary that can actually pay off that debt, because the only thing sadder than a Feminist Art History major working at Starbucks is one who also has a 100k in student debt.

Of course if you want to save your children or grandchildren from this particular learning experience you could make interest work for instead of against you by socking some money into a 529 account. It does give you some tax benefits,  just don't expect immediate gratitude unless you have very mature children/grandchildren. That comes later when they see that they can buy a house or feed their families without food-stamps while their college friends can't.

Tuesday: Tapp, Rack, and Bang

Proposition 1 Critics Vindicated

Just look who bought all the farms around Pioneer Preppy.

More not safe for fake protectionists below the break.

Monday Made Me Laugh

Swept under the rug so hard, that they swept the rug into the closet

Prosecutors: Suspect Charged In Murders Of NJ College Student, Seattle Men Was On ‘Bloody Crusade(blogger's edit: Jihad)’ To Punish US

So what's a media to do when one of their groups of special protected people starts killing another group? I can't say for certain but their feet see to be wet and they're looking at some pyramids.

Let us be clear a group of Muslim men used a gay hookup mobile app to murder four gay men. Of course this will never even get a hearing as a "hate crime" or a minute of national press coverage.

ht: Gateway Pundit

BeCos(play) It's Friday

More Mostly Safe For Work(if you have a cool boss), and as always bonus nerd points if you recognize the character being portrayed.

Shiny

More Not Safe for Natural Fibers below the break.

Cult of Tacticool: DeathBug

Scotch Nature: The Lottery

Lottery: A tax on people who are bad at math.

Marx was wrong, religion isn't the opiate of the masses; lottery tickets are.

Working at a convince store in the past I observed people who could ill spare $10 or $20 buying putting every spare dime into scratch-off tickets. Even worse whatever was won on these would be used to buy a continuously diminishing supply to buy still more tickets. Of course everyone traded stories of the few who "hit it big" almost like a religious litany.

So let's look at how much a modest $20 per week lottery habit adds up to:

So my state's scratcher's games pay out an average of 69%  meaning that your $20 is now $13.80 but you just have to go back and get some more tickets to "win big" so now your $20 is $9.52. I'll give people an overly large bennifit of the doubt that they stop there.

So our hypothetical modest lottery player is paying the state $10.48 every week or $544.96 every year.

So combined with last week we are up to a total of $1844.96 from brown bagging it and failing to contribute to a non-mandatory state tax.

Have You Met Lydia?

More Barely Safe For Work, but not at all safe for those of you who don't like tattoos on women, below the break. You have been warned.

Tuesday: Tapp, Rack, and Bang

Monday Made Me Laugh

This will not end well.

Why You Beware Sirens

Because if you're a dancing pirate captain they'll distract your crew just as you're about to fight a sea monster.

BeCos(play) It's Friday

More MSFW below break.

Beware: Sirens

Yes summer is winding down but this is no time to let down your guard against these water-born perils. More Not Safe For Sailors below break.

Permission to Change Pants Sargent?

Scotch Nature: Brown Bag

Alright let's start with an easy one, Bring Your Fucking Lunch instead of eating out.

"Value Meal" $7.00 by the time you add tax and larger fries you don't really need and a larger drink even though they have free refills.

Two slices of bread $0.10

Four Slices of Ham $0.75

Two Slices of Cheese $ .50

Mustard $0.02

Bag of Chips $0.25

Can of Soda $0.25

Now I admit it might not be cool or "a break from work" or as satisfying to do this every day. I personally love to eat out as a luxury, but if you don't have any money for when you break a tooth or when a tire blows fast food isn't much help now is it?

Let's go over how much the difference adds up. $5(I'm rounding down to be on the safe side) times 5 working days equals $25 per work week equals $1300 per year.

So was it the King, Jack, or Ronald who took your emergency fund?

SHTF Insurance

Only 48 percent said that they could easily handle an emergency expense of $400 without running a balance on their credit card.

I know that hyperinflation is a serious possibility in the current world, but come on people. If you don't have ANY reserve funds it wont take a big nation shattering event to break you just a broken water-pump in your only car.

I know I'm a financial nerd but I think I'm going to start a series on Wednesdays about ways to be Scotch Natured, of course none of the this will do the tards who go out and blow their money faster than they can make it even in the "good times" any good. However maybe just maybe someone who is at a personal tipping point and who can be reached might enter just the right internet search and stumble across it.

Because if this is the case we'd better hope PP's assurances about the non-viability of face colanders(TM Tam) is right.

Tuesday Tap, Rack, and Bang

Monday Made Me Laugh

Gallow's Humor by the Lowest Bidder

Old NFO has an awesome rant on recent defense cuts, I'm not as reliably verbose so.

BeCos(play) It's Friday

As always bonus nerd points for recognizing characters, more MSFW below break.

Seeing Red

 More MSFW below the break, that might have you seeing red too.

Tuesday Tap, Rack, and Bang

Monday Made Me Laugh(a Lot)

The Oiginal:

BeCos(play) Anybody Can be a Killjoy

Group claims harassment not a fantasy at Comic-Con

 Okay, message to angry feminazi's who probably don't know Star Trek from Star Wars: When a young lady puts on a metal bikini and goes to a con it's a very unsubtle way of saying, "I would like some attention please." And for the most part(no humans are perfect) that attention will be flattering and polite. If a young lady puts on a pair of jeans and a Starwars T-shirt she is subtly saying, "I don't feel like attention, thankyou." and she will be overlooked in favor of the young lady in the metal bikini who desires the attention while she goes and gets autographs and memorabilia.

By the way the guy from the gym who's doing the 300 cosplay will probably be getting a lot of "attention" as well.

BeCos(play) It's Friday

I've been sick so this will have to do, sorry PP but it isn't totally free of XY chromosomes.