About a chicken

Integrety

2010-07-21T21:56:00.002-06:00

What is Integrity? I looked it up in the dictionary:

in·teg·ri·ty
/ɪnˈtɛgrɪti/ Show Spelled[in-teg-ri-tee] Show IPA
–noun
1. adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty.
2. the state of being whole, entire, or undiminished: to preserve the integrity of the empire.
3. a sound, unimpaired, or perfect condition: the integrity of a ship's hull.

Fine. The real question is how much integrity does someone have. Surely no one has 100% integrity and no one is pure evil (not even W). I've decided you can see someone's integrity when they choose to do the "right" thing even when its hard and they have every incentive to do the wrong thing ...

Recently, I've been doing more management tasks. I came to the realization that one of my employees isn't progressing, but is doing enough to get by. I could easily do nothing and string them along doing my "bitch" work. They would probably do it for years without saying anything. However, this nagging voice kept whispering to me (if someone knows how to turn it off please let me know.). I ended up having the "hard talk" with them. Basically the kick them in the ass talk (I've also heard it referred to as the "come to jesus" talk. I don't really get the reference. it sounds cool.). Any way I think it was hard to have the talk, but it required more integrity than doing nothing. If thought it doesn't feel like it, I think that's a good thing. Right?

Its been a while ...

2010-07-21T21:50:00.002-06:00

Its been a while since I posted. Well the biggest update is I'm married! ... And I'll tell you the best part of getting married is when its done because getting married is hard work. Everyone has a opinion and you quickly learn that the wedding isn't about your wife and you, its about your family. Ok I'm done complaining. It was a great day/week and I had a lot of fun!

Now if I can just find the time to post those wedding photos ...

The EIP (Enemy Investment Play)

2009-07-16T22:25:00.003-06:00

Today my girlfriend and I saw a movie called "Food" . The basics is that the big food industry is screwing the people and covering up the whole thing. Anyways I got into an argument with my girlfriend about investing in one of the companies in the movie. She thinks that if the company is bad then as an investor you should boycott the stock. After thinking about her argument I came up with another crazy plan, the EIP (Enemy Investment Plan) ...

I contend you should do the exact opposite. If I had an organization that was fighting some evil company, I would raise cash (to fund the operation) and invest in the firm I'm fighting. What! That's right. Sun Tzu teachings (wrote the Art of War) say you should "Bring war material with you from home, but forage on the enemy".

By investing in your enemy, even if you lose a battle in the short-term and your enemy grows stronger, your organization profits and grows stronger in response. As your campaign succeeds your enemy grows weaker and your organization shrinks (a natural balance). If your enemy dies (or goes bankrupt in this case), your organization naturally shuts down. Too many times a noble cause doesn't have a life time that matches the injustice its fighting (think GM's labor unions). The heros live long enough to see themselves become the villain.

Imagine if Peta employed the EIP and had a member sitting on the board of a meat packing company. The havoc they could cause!

New blog ...

2008-04-09T18:56:00.001-06:00

I started a new blog that is purely about financial stuff. I don't update it much, but just a FYI ...

chicken cents

Fund Times: Dodge & Cox Reopens Two Great Funds to New Investors - Morningstar Fund Times

2008-02-04T20:13:00.000-06:00

The moment everyone has been waiting for:

Fund Times: Dodge & Cox Reopens Two Great Funds to New Investors - Morningstar Fund Times

Chengster photo

2007-03-11T21:54:00.001-06:00

IMG_4476
Originally uploaded by ©hengster.

This is sweet. If you get a chance head over to Cheng's flickr and check out his pictures from China!

Self fulling prophecies

2006-12-12T08:49:00.000-06:00

Self fulling prophecies are all around us. I find it very interesting how easy it is to create one. For example, our group admin put a table out where people could put goodies (like cookies) to share with everyone. I first thought that there was no way this was going to work. However, I was wrong.

The table of goodies is a self fulling prophecies. She started out by putting a few goodies out there. They looked good and tempting, so people walking by ate them. However, these people started feeling guilty (I'm guessing) and brought goodies to put on the table. The cycle continued. Now the table is covered in goodies!

I've learned that all you need to create a landslide effect is:
1. a simple strategy (the good table).
2. advertising (the email telling everyone what the table was).
3. some initial startup fuel (the first batch of goodies).

San Francisco

2006-12-08T18:39:00.000-06:00

Went to SF and it was great. The highlights include going to an amazing sushi place with Stephen and Grace, Muir Woods, Hot Chocolate at Ghiradeli, Wine Tasting, and Alcatraz.

mamako

2006-12-08T18:18:00.000-06:00

swahili for "your mama".

Contractions!?

2006-12-08T18:15:00.001-06:00

food for thought ...

The phrase "you are not" can either be contracted "you're not" or "you aren't". How come no one ever contracts it "you'ren't"? Seems to work to me.

George Washington Carver

2006-12-08T18:14:00.000-06:00

Just saw a documentary on George Washington Carver. I think this guy could have been the smartest most humble person ever born in this country. I think I have a new hero (sorry Tyler Derdon).

Here is link if you want to read about him:

http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa041897.htm

Billard Balls

2006-12-08T18:13:00.001-06:00

I've come across a briliant plan and before I sober up I feel compelled to commit the plan to pen and paper (sort of). I'm name the idea the BBCP (Billard Ball Contengency Plan) not to be confused with the ZCP (Zombie Contengency Plan).

Recently there has been a lot of talk of terrorists hijacking plans. Airports have elaborate screning processes and airlines have been placing armed air personal on plans. Just the other day an air marshall shoot dead a passenger.

Personally I don't feel a gun or an air marshall is required for passenger protection. Instead airlines should imploy the BBCP. How it works is simple. Each passanger is issued one and exactly one billard ball. That's it. Nothing more.

You may be thinking how this solves anything. Its simple; one billiard ball isn't enough to hijack a plane with. However, no matter what weapon you bring with you, if everyone else has a billlard ball you aren't hajacking shit. One to four men with guns verse 200 people armed with billlard balls. Where would you put your money?

I can't beleive I give this shit away for free.

Chris Rock Quote

2006-12-08T18:12:00.000-06:00

Chris Rock's Quote of the Year:

"You know the world is going crazy when the best rapper is a white guy, the best golfer is a black guy, the tallest guy in the NBA is Chinese, the Swiss hold the America's Cup, France is accusing the
U.S. of arrogance, Germany doesn't want to go to war, and the three most powerful men in America are named 'Bush', 'Dick', and 'Colon'. Need I say
more?"

Zombies!

2006-12-08T18:10:00.000-06:00

I've been getting a lot of flack lately about Zombies. Apparently, its crazy to think that it will ever happen...

If you told a person who lived a hundred years ago that people would be able to fly around in airplanes, clone animals, blow up entire cities with one bomb, fit most of the books in a library in a little digitial box, or that no matter what channel you watch on TV there is a reality show on; they would have thought you were crazy.

I have a hard time believing that zombies are really that far fetched considering all the cutting edge things we are doing with cloning and drugs.

All I'm saying is a ZCP (Zombie contengency plan) costs maybe $20 ($35 if you buy a bat too). If zombies retake the earth (yeah I think the've been here before, but that is a whole different issue), a ZCP is worth all your money and all the money you can barrow. So take the probablity that Zombies will retake the earth (A); multiple by all the money you have and can barrow (B); (A) times (B) is (C); if (C) is greater than $20, then you should go buy a ZCP.

QED

Quotes

2006-12-07T22:37:00.001-06:00

While some quotes sound good, this one also makes sense:

"The genius of a good leader is to leave behind him a situation which common sense, without the grace of genius, can deal with successfully. "
- Walter Lippman

At first I thought George Bush said this...

"The leader of genius must have the ability to make different opponents appear as if they belonged to one category."
-- Adolf Hitler

Lets start with a simple quote...

"Anything I've ever done that ultimately was worthwhile... initially scared me to death. "
- Betty Bender