Author: Rev. Joe Dirt

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National Curmudgeon Day

Since I am always  trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, reverent and occasionally prepared, I did not bring up this proposal on October 15, that being National Grouch Day.  I did not want to rain on their parade.

Just as an aside my daughter’s birthday is the 15th of October, and while I am sure, like all of us, she can be grouchy at times, that is not how I think of her.  She can be, however, very opinionated and does not hesitate to mount a soapbox if the need is there.  She truly cannot Continue reading “National Curmudgeon Day”

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Rev. Joe’s Random Thought #5,975

yeah I know you did not ask!

Señora for Christmas last year bought me a tear off calendar with daily puzzles. Most are fairly easy, but some require a little thought.  This is the one that popped up October 14.

Which one does not belong: 22  45  51  96

It was proof positive that 30 years of programming have warped my mental processes.  I looked at this, and immediately decided that 96 was the odd man out.  Why? We all know about 2 character state codes, AL, MO, AR, OK, MS, etc.  But there are many software applications that use a two digit state code ranging from 01 to 51, and for the purpose of these applications the District of Columbia being counted as a state.

When I looked at the answer I knew my logic had been twisted by bits and bytes.  As you are racing to tell me, the correct response is 22, being the only one when divided by 3 that does NOT result in a whole number.

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WikiHow Article – How to Become a Curmudgeon

Looking for an image, I stumbled across an article on WikiHow titled, How to Become a Curmudgeon. Today, October 15,  being National Grouch Day, it is a good day to share the article – link is at the bottom of this posting – and a good day to release my blog post into the wild.

To begin with, I did not realize that there are souls among us  aspiring to be curmudgeons.  I thought it was something you simply grew into as you became older and wiser. Or alternatively, by the proclamation Continue reading “WikiHow Article – How to Become a Curmudgeon”

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Social Security cost of living bump

”I heard a cynical comment to the recent announcement of a 5.9% cost of living adjustment to Social Security benefits, “Oh that is just Biden attempting to buy votes!

Just a few bits of data for grinding the old mental gears on:

  1. The current US monthly inflation rate is running north of 5%. If that continues the COLA will be mostly wiped out by inflationary pressures. The consumer price index is in the same ballpark. I’ve not researched it, but I do not believe past COLAs have kept up with inflation.
  2. A recent study found that 40% of Americans are living solely on Social Security. Forbes, among others, disputes this study as being inaccurate and biased (for my part, I always assume Forbes has a conservative agenda to push).  Whatever the real number is, there are a fair number of our fellow citizens solely reliant on SS benefits for their daily bread.
  3. Pension — Less than one-third (31%) of Americans are retiring with a defined benefit pension plan today. For those who do retire with a pension plan, the median annual pension benefit is $9,262 for a private pension, $22,172 for a federal government pension, and $24,592 for a railroad pension.
  4. The average 401(k) balance for a 65 year old is $216, 720, but the median amount is $64,548. By definition, the implication is that 50% of this age group has less than $64,548 in these types of plans. At 65 you have a good chance of living another 15 or 20 years…not a lot of savings for that time frame.
  5. They talk about the 3 pillars of retirement: Social Security, a defined benefit plan (pension) and savings, 401(k) etc. Most of us are sitting on 1 or 2 legged stools.
  6. The average Social Security benefit was $1,543 per month in January 2021. The maximum possible Social Security benefit for someone who retires at full retirement age is $3,148 in 2021. The average amount works out to $18,516 a year.  A 5.9 % bump works out to $91 a month.  I am reasonably sure the commenter would think he was living in poverty at twice or even thrice the average annual amount.
  7. Purely anecdotal, but when I was in college I did a survey for the Department of Transportation about the need for public transportation in under-served areas. The area I surveyed happened to have a high percentage of retirees. One of the questions on the survey was about income.  Of course, people will almost always lie about two things, money and sex  However, many of these folks were very open about giving me their income information (I did not ask about their sex lives… that would not have been professional).   It was very scary what some folks were trying to live on, many of them solely dependent on a SS check.  I vowed then to work towards having a retirement not solely dependent on SS.

Continue reading “Social Security cost of living bump”

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Typo in Joan of Arc by Mark Twain article

One of our subscribers, channeling his inner Mark Twain, pointed out a typo in my blog posting: Joan of Arc by Mark Twain.

“immorality of the soul” – I think he did believe in that

Immortality, on the other hand, he might have struggled with

Here at Curmudgeon-Alley.com we are always open to corrections, and semi-open to differing opinions since we consider ours as the unsolicited, unreasoned, uninformed and unapologetic ramblings of a very tired old Okie.

And so it goes.

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Joan of Arc by Mark Twain

I would have to call this book a two-fer. You have a historical novel, accurate in its facts about the subject, Joan of Arc, delivered by a masterful story teller, Mark Twain. It was the last book of Twain’s published while he lived, and he considered it his best work.  Who am I to argue with Samuel Clemens?  It is remarkable that this book is not better known.  I had no idea until a few weeks ago that he had written such a book.  I had bought a two volume set Continue reading “Joan of Arc by Mark Twain”

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Cuz he can…

Señora and I decided to have a wild couple’s night out, something we had not done for quite some time due to COVID.  We have gone out to dinner a few times, always attempting to dine outside, but we went absolutely crazy Saturday evening.  First we went to one of our favorite restaurants in the metro area, a Vietnamese restaurant, Pho Grand. As always, they came through, and we both had a very enjoyable meal.

St. Louis has an iconic folk music venue, The Focal Point. The term folk music seems to be morphing into the category of roots music, but a rose is a rose.   We are both big aficionados of this style of music and Continue reading “Cuz he can…”

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Word of the Day – Croquis

  • Noun: Croquis
    1.  a rough draft
  • Synonyms: (Being a stolen French word in specialized use in the art world, not many English synonyms found)
    1. sketch
    2. line drawing
    3. cartoon???
    4. under-drawing
  • Usage:
    1. “But what’s your ultimate goal, you’ll say. That goal will become clearer, will take shape slowly and surely, as the croquis becomes a sketch and the sketch a painting…”
  • Encountered:
    1. While reading a didactic wall panel at the Beyond Van Gogh exhibit here is St. Louis

To see more Words of the Day, visit this link: Words of the Day