Monday Night Memes

Settling Into Las Vegas

For the person who has everything..

The money supply is at its worst level since the Great Depression

European births, Q3 2023 update

This is an chart of births across 40 countries in Europe. The trend is alarmingly downward:

It’s the Holiday Season again and I decided to venture forth without my husband, whose visa drama is still a work in progress and who is taking care of the dogs and cat. For those who are into these type of divining things, what is your mantra for 2024? Mine were connection, love, power and gratitude

Las Vegas is okay. The house needs cleaning which me and my older daughter have been busy bee at. The Christmas decorations are pretty basic by my standards, but the family is here and the Internet is about 10 times faster than I’m used to lately. There’s things to be grateful for, despite prices being up and velocity of money being way down. Perhaps it is a year people are choosing to forego gratuitous presents.

Speaking of money supply I have a warning to google play subscribers to any service. Check your bills especially on small amounts. I was signed up for google play for extra email storage and my younger daughter had some very small like .99 subscription services for a time. When I came back here I checked my Chime account which was debiting off of google play and noticed multiple bills for “Google Play” services which I did not recognize. At first they’d hit the account for very small amounts even like .99 and $1.99. Then they moved up to $4.99 and $9.99. Google Play did not have the charges on their service.

Long story short they had hit my debit card almost 20 times and I had no choice but to file a fraud dispute, which will not refund until January 2, while the new debit card will not arrive until January 2 either. This combined with bank problems on BofA on a deposit from FactSet. Money used to arrive reliably from my editing work on the morning of the 9th of the next month, but then during the Pandemic they switched payment processors. Since that time money arrives whenever the Hell they feel like depositing it, usually by the 13th through 15th of the month, but sometimes delayed until much later. This was obviously a sign not to depend on them too much for anything and of course nothing has come in yet. In real terms what that means is that I have access to $9 in my BofA checking account. It’s going to be a pared down and very creatively inspired Christmas on gifts, whether we wanted it to be or not.

But I’m thankful that I am here. Airplanes have not been falling from the sky.

Merry Christmas to all!

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