Murphy's Law
Last Friday I was going to meet with my "mom" in Atlanta. She lived in Florida and made me feel guilty for not seeing her before year 2005 was out. I kind of promised her that but my trip to France made me have to break that promise. The reason for us to meet in Atlanta was a tango event there. Also I'd like to see Susan to see how she was doing since her father passed away unexpectedly last November.
The Murphy's Law started to apply as soon as I boarded the airplance in Salisbury. A mechnical problem made us wait for about 20 minutes, then our plane in Philandelphia waited on the runway for 30 minutes for the weather to be clear. On the way to the hotel from Atlanta airport, there was a medical emergency on Marta (the subway) that held the train for about an hour. Yesterday on my way back I had to wait in Charlotte, NC because the plane did not arrive some 45 minutes late.
C'est la vie.
Credit Score Question
One of my credit card companies offers me 2.99% until balance is paid off without any transfer fee. I'd like to use it pay off my home equity loan at 7.5% (variable and tied to the prime rate). I wonder if carrying a large balance on the credit card would adversely affect my credit score. Please advise.
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I did my own research and found the following from http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/credit/scoring.htm
What can I do to improve my score?
Credit scoring models are complex and often vary among creditors and for different types of credit. If one factor changes, your score may change — but improvement generally depends on how that factor relates to other factors considered by the model. Only the creditor can explain what might improve your score under the particular model used to evaluate your credit application.
Nevertheless, scoring models generally evaluate the following types of information in your credit report:
# Have you paid your bills on time? Payment history typically is a significant factor. It is likely that your score will be affected negatively if you have paid bills late, had an account referred to collections, or declared bankruptcy, if that history is reflected on your credit report.
# What is your outstanding debt? Many scoring models evaluate the amount of debt you have compared to your credit limits. If the amount you owe is close to your credit limit, that is likely to have a negative effect on your score.
# How long is your credit history? Generally, models consider the length of your credit track record. An insufficient credit history may have an effect on your score, but that can be offset by other factors, such as timely payments and low balances.
# Have you applied for new credit recently? Many scoring models consider whether you have applied for credit recently by looking at “inquiries” on your credit report when you apply for credit. If you have applied for too many new accounts recently, that may negatively affect your score. However, not all inquiries are counted. Inquiries by creditors who are monitoring your account or looking at credit reports to make “prescreened” credit offers are not counted.
# How many and what types of credit accounts do you have? Although it is generally good to have established credit accounts, too many credit card accounts may have a negative effect on your score. In addition, many models consider the type of credit accounts you have. For example, under some scoring models, loans from finance companies may negatively affect your credit score.
Scoring models may be based on more than just information in your credit report. For example, the model may consider information from your credit application as well: your job or occupation, length of employment, or whether you own a home.
To improve your credit score under most models, concentrate on paying your bills on time, paying down outstanding balances, and not taking on new debt. It’s likely to take some time to improve your score significantly
paths to financial freedom
I read something on BusinessWeek interesting last night. It was about some bloggers that wrote about their paths to financial freedom. They specify their goals, and actions taken to achieve them. The following are the mentioned urls:
pfblogs.org
pfblog.com
moneyblognetwork.com
myopenwallet.blogspot.com
savvysaver.blogspot.com
Another related news. Google dropped 7% today. I just thought this morning it was on its way to recover some of the recent hefty losses. Now we need to wait till Thursday to see what they are going to say on their first ever investor conference.
Am I Corrupted? (1/21/2006)
I did a little shopping at the duty free stores before departing. At the end, I became penniless in terms of Euros. This was a good indication that it was time to go.
The flight back was uneventful and smooth. I managed to sleep for five hours. For the last two weeks, we were always on the go. This was the first time when we had a chance sitting and doing nothing. Other than sleeping, I read, watched "Cinderella Man." playing blackjack, eating and drinking. We arrived in Dulles on time but our luggage got delayed for more than an hour. Our bus rolled in Salisbury around 6:00pm.
Prior to the trip one of the objectives of Memo and Bob's was to "corrupt" me in France since I was developmental faculty. I don't know if they achieved their goals, but one aspect of corruption was for sure. I went to a local diner to eat the night when we were back because there was nothing in the refrigerator. To my dismay, the food was tasteless. So it is safe to say that I have been corrupted by French food!
I was saddened that the whale in the Thames River died. My hope for a Hollywood ending like Free Willy was dashed. It was too bad that we couldn't save it.
Our Days in Paris
The TGV fast train took us back to Paris in the Wednesday afternoon. Both Chris and Julian came to the Grenoble train stop to bid our farewell. When we got to the Paris train station, our tour guide was already there waiting for us. She, a petite energetic French woman, led us to a bus that was waiting for us outside the station. From there we started our three hour bus tour of one to the greatest cities in the world. It took us to various important landmarks and some of them reminded me of my visit in 2000. I enjoyed the tour very much. It gave us a good overview of the city.
On Thursday while having breakfast Bob and I decided to go to the Musee d’Orsay, which had impressionist art works. It was a good complement to The Louvre which had classical arts prior to the impressionist era. In the elevator coming down, I bumped into Julian, a British student of French and Philosophy in a Scotland university who came to Paris for five days during his winter break. We met briefly during the breakfast. When he found out where we were going, he said he was going there, too. So I invited him to come along with us. He happily accepted.
The museum was really impressive. It was in an old train station, which was built for the 1924 Olympics. It was supposed to tear down after the games, but the French felt into with it. They filled a petition to keep it. Now it has been turned into the Musee d’Orsay. When compared to the Louvre, it was small. There were three levels of displays. It was possible to go through it in a day. It chroniclized the development of impression style arts from pre- to neo-impressionists. I like the post impressionists very much, in which more bold color and shape schemes were attempted.
In the afternoon, we decided to pay our respects to one of the greatest Frenchman. We went to Napoleon’s tomb and the Army Museum. The contributions of this great man, not only military but civic conducts, to France and the world were well documented. I’d like to read more about him and this part of history in the future.
In the evening, Bob and I went to a fancy French restaurant Lasserre along Champs-Elyses. Memo couldn’t join us due to a family obligation. Bob had been there before and had many interesting stories to tell. We ordered the testing menu which consisted of 7 courses while Bob offered to pay for a bottle of wine. The food was excellent, but this kind of restaurants was billed for their service. The waiters wore different uniforms to signify their duties. There was even an elevator operator. We sitting there didn’t have to do anything except for sending food to our mouths. The water and wine glasses were (almost) always full. It did take once 10 minutes to get Bob’s wine glass filled. So when the waiter came I said subtly “just about 10 minutes.” After that, I think he got the message. When the bill came, we just wanted to know how you were going to pay for yours, Dick?
On Friday, we went to see the Church of sacred hearts in the morning before did some shopping. Bob had a mission from his wife to buy a loaf of bread from this particular bakery shop. It did not take us long to find it. Bob bought a loaf of 2kg round bread to bring home. Then we were on mission to find a chocolate shop recommended by his wife. But the address did not make any sense so we decided to give up on that. We had a dinner cruise to go to at 6pm.
The dinner cruise was great. We saw the Eiffel Tower lit up brightly and the Status of Liberty. We also saw Notre Dome, the Louvre and different buildings along the Sein River. For dinner, all but two had lobster. The wine bottles came and went. There seemed to have unlimited supply of wine. For this reason, a couple of students went a little over the board. At one point an on board violinist played tango song. Under Bob’s urge, I went to ask Nicole to dance. I was amazed by her ability to fellow for she had never learnt how to tango. While we were dancing, an old couple also joined us and started to dance. Near end of the cruise, Memo requested the violinist to play La Compasita. Here Nicole and I went to the dance floor again. She was doing even better than the last. After playing the song, the violin player told me that he was to play waltz and asked us to continue. With the music, Nicole and I swirled around the floor. I did not know how she did it. For sure she had never danced Viennese waltz before. But she was able to follow me most of the time. After dancing, she was really excited and wanted to do something when back to Salisbury. Since she already did some recruiting, there seemed to be enough of interests to set up a club at SU. I was very happy for the possibility as well.
Last Tango in Grenoble
After the farewell dinner, a group of students (Bobby, Brooke, Justin, Megan, Michelle, Min and Nicole) and I went tango dancing. They just wanted to see what tango was. I was happy that they were interested. It was raining and the girls wore high heels, so we decided to take the tram for just one station ahead. Julian looked puzzled. He might be wondering why we did not just walk since the distance was so short.
When we entered the room, the people were kind of stunned by such a big crowd of strangers. One of the ladies signaled us to find seats and sit down. The girls seemed excited when they saw people dance on the floor. They wanted to learn how to do it and asked me to teach them. I declined because I didn’t want to interrupt the flow of the floor. I told then I would start to teach tango in Salisbury soon and they said enthusiastically that they would sign up. In addition to tango, they also wanted to do salsa. So tango and salsa would be a dynamic duo.
The students wanted to see me in action. They asked me to find a partner and dance. I saw a lady nearby who I danced with a week ago and thought was a good dancer. I went up to her and asked her to dance. While we were dancing, the students took some pictures of me. In the middle of the second song, I saw a French guy walked up to the girls asking for a dance. From distance I could see the girls horrified. They gestured in frenzy to tell him they did not dance at all. This lasted for a while. At the end, I guessed the guy was rather persuasive that Nicole stood up and started to dance with him.
When I finished dancing with the lady, I walked up to the group and wanted to know how they felt. Nicole proudly told me that she danced her first tango. The rest also seemed really interested in the dancing. We were discussing setting up a tango club at the school when we return. While we were chatting, a lady walked up to me and said something in French. I didn’t know exactly what she said but kind of knew what she meant. I said “oui” and we were on the dancing floor. During the third song with her, I saw our group stood up and were ready to leave. I stopped the dancing while trying to tell my partner that I wanted to say goodbye to my friends. She must have misunderstood me. She kissed Michelle and said something in French to her. It was obvious that she thought Michelle and I were partners and I wanted to dance with her. A good example of language barriers.
While we were saying goodbyes, a guy approached me and asked me if I was Jim. Then he said he was Miguel, the person who sent me the email a week ago informing me of the tango in Grenoble. While we chatted the gang walked out the room. All the sudden I remembered that Jacqueline was supposed to be here. I asked Miguel if she was here and he pointed her out from the crowd. Jacqueline was my initial contact for tango before I left for France. She was a friend of friend of Deirdre a.k.a. Justine. So there was a 4 degree separation between us. She was very helpful in providing information and making sure that Miguel contacted me. She lived in Valence (100km from Grenoble) but drove up here tonight just to meet me.
The rest of night belonged to us. We danced really well together. It was kind of strange that we had never met before but could instantly click. Tango did its magic again. We just danced and chatted. Her English was better than my French. She told me that her son lived in New Zealand and married to a Chinese woman who did not speak French. So she had to learn English to be able to communicate with her daughter-in-law. At one point when we stopped for a rest, an older couple I met a week ago greeted me. The gentleman complimented me by saying that I was a good dancer and he enjoyed watching me dance. A compliment from a stranger really meant something to me. This encouraged me to keep on dancing.
Jacqueline and I continued our dancing. We never parted from each other for the rest of the evening. At one point when I asked her if she would like to dance with someone else she responded that she preferred to dance with me. I had no objections to that. We continued. Before long it was past the midnight. I tried to tell her that the last tram would come soon but she did not understand. I thought it was 12:34 for the last tram and I said to myself I could dance till 12:30 and still was able to catch it. It was hard to stop but fortunately the music was stopped. I rushed out of the room after saying goodbye to Jacqueline. It was still raining outside. Only when I got to the station did I find out that the last tram left at 12:18. So I was singing in the rain while walking back to the hotel.
Last Day in Grenoble
In these few days' newspapers there had been a lot of coverage on this Japanese guy who signed with one of the local soccer teams. It seemed like quite a big deal.
We had an invited speaker who gave a talk on the single currency Euro and its impact on France. Professor Phil Eyre was British and his demeanor showed that. His gentle and statesman style contrasted Oliver's warm and open French style. There was a definitely difference between English and French. From his talk I could discern his leftist position regarding EU and English’s resistance to convert its currency to Euro.
Julian arranged me to meet with professor Chapelet, the Director of Center for Applied Research. I was impressed by his efficiency. I mentioned to him yesterday on the bus to our field visit that I still wished to meet some professors here to explore collaborative research opportunities. Voila, a meeting was arranged for today.
We showed up at 4:30pm as scheduled. A job candidate happened to be there as well. I did not feel wanting to interrupt his schedule. So I told him that I would wait outside his office while he conducted the interview.
About 5:15pm, we stared our meeting. He was very nice and helpful. He briefly told me what the center was about. It was operated as an outreach of the school to the business community similar to our BEACON at SU. After learning what I was interested to do, he recommended a few professors I could get in touch with. I'll definitely do that when I return.
Tomorrow we are going to leave our beloved city Grenoble for Paris. I don't think we will get internet access as conveniently as here. There will be internet cafes but will my USB drive work? So you might not hear from me for a few days. But rest assured that I’ll keep blogging and post them as soon as possible.
Last Day in Grenoble
In these few days' newspapers there had been a lot of coverage on this Japanese guy who signed with one of the local soccer teams. It seemed like quite a big deal.
We had an invited speaker who gave a talk on the single currency Euro and its impact on France. Professor Phil Eyre was British and his demeanor showed that. His gentle and statesman style contrasted Oliver's warm and open French style. There was a definitely difference between English and French. From his talk I could discern his leftist position regarding EU and English’s resistance to convert its currency to Euro.
Julian arranged me to meet with professor Chapelet, the Director of Center for Applied Research. I was impressed by his efficiency. I mentioned to him yesterday on the bus to our field visit that I still wished to meet some professors here to explore collaborative research opportunities. Voila, a meeting was arranged for today.
We showed up at 4:30pm as scheduled. A job candidate happened to be there as well. I did not feel wanting to interrupt his schedule. So I told him that I would wait outside his office while he conducted the interview.
About 5:15pm, we stared our meeting. He was very nice and helpful. He briefly told me what the center was about. It was operated as an outreach of the school to the business community similar to our BEACON at SU. After learning what I was interested to do, he recommended a few professors I could get in touch with. I'll definitely do that when I return.
Tomorrow we are going to leave our beloved city Grenoble for Paris. I don't think we will get internet access as conveniently as here. There will be internet cafes but will my USB drive work? So you might not hear from me for a few days. But rest assured that I’ll keep blogging and post them as soon as possible.
Things Do Change
Not until this morning did I find out that my late arrival last evening from the ski trip caused a small scare. My returning bus was delayed due to the heavy traffic coming down from the mountain. It was almost 8pm did we arrive the bus station. I decided to grab something to eat on the way to the hotel so I could go to bed early. On the other hand, Bob and Memo expected me to join them for dinner. Because of my no show, they started to speculate various outcomes. They thought to call the local hospitals or the ski resort. At one point they were convinced that one of the flying-by helicopters was carrying me to an ER.
I was surprised that I only felt some stiffness in my legs this morning.
In the afternoon, we paid a visit to syrup factory which made French famous brand Teissire. They did not expect a large group like ours and we had to be divided into two to three small groups at times. The presentation was good and production was modern. One of their new hires, Christian, was there to learn the operation as well. We had long talks along the way. He spent many years in Asia promoting French wine. He spoke some Cantonese. Now he was charged to promoting the syrup in the Asia market. He said he would visit china next month. I gave him my business card so that he could get in touch with me if he needed some helps and pointers.
Over the weekend, I was wondering about the NFL payoff game results. Not until this morning did I get a chance to get online. To my surprise the Colts lost again. It looks like now Seattle is the team to beat.
We went to a family owned restaurant highly recommended by Bob and Memo based on their personal experiences. But the food turned out to be disappointing when compared to our prior high expectations. Late we found out that the ownership was changed. So, things do change.
I think I discovered one of the answers to Bob's accounting question. French women rarely used elevators at the school. They preferred to walk upstairs.
