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Nigella Lawson and the High Cost of divorce

Celebrities

Nigella Lawson Eats A Banana
Nigella Lawson Eats A Banana (Photo credit: Kaptain Kobold)

Heartache and heartbreak are hard enough to endure but imagine having to go through the loss of a relationship while the world looks on. Such is the high price of celebrity divorce and the latest victim is the beautiful and talented television chef, Nigella Lawson. Shocking photos of Nigella apparently being choked by her husband, Charles Saatchi, surfaced in the media following the June 9th dinner at Scott’s restaurant in Mayfair, London, where the incident occurred. Saatchi’s advisors urged him to humble himself and admit a public apology for the assault. Saatchi denied any wrongdoing, saying he never assaulted her and in fact, was actually removing mucous from his wife’s nose. Nigella was stunned by the admonition of “nose-picking” and his refusal to apologize. She left Saatchi and their family home in Chelsea.

The two sides continued to disagree about the pictures; Saatchi claiming it was just a “playful tiff” and Lawson hurt and humiliated by the public’s assumption of her as victim of domestic violence and her husband as her tormentor. Insult was added to injury on July 7th, when Saatchi announced his intent to divorce his wife in the media instead of directly to her. Lawson, who had been waiting for a public apology, was blind-sided by his cruel divorce announcement. Lawson and Saatchi have been married for 10 years; Saatchi has claimed that the couple had become “estranged” the last few years. Saatchi claims that he had no choice but to act publicly since his wife “failed to defend” him with a statement to the media. In fact, Lawson has remained silent at the advice of her publicist so as not to further affect their children. Lawson (53) and Saatchi (70) have three teenage children from previous marriages that they were raising together.In addition to the “he said, she said” controversy, Lawson and Saatchi will have to fight over $150 million in shared assets, including their $12 million Chelsea, West London home. Both brought substantial assets into the marriage. Charles Saatchi is worth $100 million from the high-profile, highly-successful New York advertising firm, Saatchi and Saatchi. Nigella Lawson is a celebrity chef, bestselling author and television star with a net worth of $15 million. By the time lawyers for both sides duke it out in court and attempt to untangle the shared assets, those net worths will be considerably less.But it’s not just a monetary cost to this celebrity divorce. Saatchi had grown increasingly resentful of his wife’s high-profile career that he helped established. It’s a common theme in celebrity couples; one partner becomes the higher earner or the more recognized celebrity and the other gets bit by that green-eyed monster, jealousy. In Nigella’s case, there is the public humiliation at the hands of someone she loves to endure. It seems that Saatchi is determined to do whatever he can to make her suffer in the media. And then there are the children; children always suffer in a divorce. It can be lessened when parents work together to keep it private and amicable. But it’s incredibly painful to have your lives dragged through the media. In this case, it is Nigella and Saatchi’s children that are paying the ultimate price.

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I Won the Lottery!

Finance, Life

No, I didn’t, but this is what I’d do if I won an obnoxious amount of money.

  1.  Take 6 months or a year, hire traveling tutors for the kids, and see the world.  This gives the extra benefit of being completely out of reach for anyone trying to borrow money.
  2. Pay off the mortgages of a few close family and friends.
  3. Set aside a big chunk to support my decadent, extravagant lifestyle.
  4. Create a fund.

This fund will have the purpose of making all of my descendants live life on the easy setting in perpetuity.   It will give them enough money to cover the major hurdles everyone has in life, without giving enough that they don’t have to work.   Here’s the money I see them getting:

  • Upon the birth or adoption of a child with my last name (Because I’m a jerk like that.  My name will last forever!): $10,000
  • Graduate high school with at least a B average: $5,000
  • Attending college while making progress towards graduation: $10,000 per year, up to 8 years(to allow for doctors and rocket scientists and stuff)
  • Graduating college:  The amount of college costs (tuition, room & board, etc.) up to $200,000.
  • Marriage, provided my descendant maintains my last name: $20,000
  • Starting a business, up to twice in a lifetime: $50,000

Each of these items that occur after the recipient becomes an adult would have the stipulation that their will gifts half of their estate back to the fund.  That way, everyone who got this headstart will help pay it forward.

This will require management, so I would appoint trustees to manage it.   Their job will be to grow the fund and adjudicate any requests.   They will have the authority to buy property, invest in businesses, or whatever will grow the fund to support future generations of my spawn.   Three, because that way there can be no ties.   Each of the three will have a named successor, who must be one of my descendants.   They will, of course, earn salaries.   I don’t see this being part-time work.   A salary that puts them at the 80th income percentile in the US seems fair.   They won’t have the ability to give themselves raises, beyond a statistical adjustment.

Amounts can be adjusted to cover rising costs, inflation, or potential depletion of the fun upon the majority vote of the Council of Three, with the overriding goal of making sure the fund survives to help future generations.

I actually see the organization of this being a corporation built around the management of a trust fund, but I’m not a lawyer or an accountant, and this is a fantasy, so I can see it however I want.

Yes, I follow the patriarchal model of maintaining my last name.   Sue me.   My last name, a parent who is descended from me and has my last name, and a will that states you’ll do your part to continue the awesomeness isn’t a high price to pay to avoid nearly all of the expensive things that hold people back.

That’s my master plan to take over the world, in the future, by proxy.

 

Blacksmithing, or Quality Time With a Teenager

Parenting

For the past few months, I’ve been taking blacksmithing lessons with my 16 year old son.

Diagram of a coal forge. In the book:"Pra...
Diagram of a coal forge. In the book:”Practical Projects for the Blacksmith”, it was noted that a forge like this can be made based on a barbeque-pan. This, by adding a hole and inserting a T-junction with a hairdryer (the whole costing about 60 € new, or $5 for both items when obtained secondhand/from the junkyard) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It’s something I’ve wanted to do for quite a while, but my schedule never lined up with the places that teach near me.

Then I forgot about it.

Last year, the History Channel started a new series called Forged In Fire, that made me think about it again. Better, the boy was interested, too.

If you don’t have a teenager, here’s some interesting information that’s almost universal:  teenagers suck.   You spend a dozen years of your life essentially doing everything for them.  Then one day, they have their own interests and want nothing to do with their parents.  I get it, it’s good for them to be independent and all, but it sucks for the parent who wants to spend time with the kid.

Enter blacksmithing.   I’m interested, the boy’s interested, and I’ve dropped most of my side projects to have more time for my family and myself.   Let’s do this.

Class number 1:  5 miles away, teaches Tuesday evenings at the height of rush hour.  That’s a 45 minute 5 mile drive.  It costs $350 each for an 8 session class, that I’d have to leave work early for and would cut into the kid’s homework.

Class number 2:  15 miles away, teaches full-day classes over eight consecutive Saturdays…for $120 each.  That’s awesome.   Except they book their entire year’s calendar of classes within 3 days of posting the schedule for the year.   When they got my paper registration in the mail(seriously, paper?  In 2015?), they called to tell me we were 6th on the waiting list.

Class number 3: 2 hours away.  Full day classes on Saturdays.  Held every Saturday, so we could come on our schedules.   Cost $100, but $200 total for a class as we want them is way more affordable than the $700 up front for class #1.   I’m sold.

Four classes into it, I find out that that’s the most classes I can pay for.   I’m still welcome to use the facility, but now I have to supply my own charcoal.   From here on out, it’s $50 for gas and $20 for charcoal to forge all day…and still get taught.    If we pass some tests, we can officially join and sell our creations in the gift shop.

Totally sold.

So now, the boy and I are making the drive once a month.   We talk during the drive, we work together on the forge.   I love my kid, and I love spending time with him.  I love making things, and I love sharing that love with my kids.   In a few years, he’ll move out, but he’ll remember this for the rest of his life.  It’s worth every cent.

 

30 Day Project Update – January

Misc

For those who don’t remember–or are just tuning in–I am doing a 30 Day Project every month this year, sometimes two.  For the month of January, I am doing two projects.  I am waking up at 5AM every day, and I had planned to read to my kids every night before bed.

Waking up hasn’t been that difficult. I’m tempted to snooze the alarm, but I haven’t done that yet.  My routine has been to wake up at 5, watch or read the news until I am fully awake, have breakfast, get ready for work, read all of the websites I follow in Google Reader, then get the kids ready.   Until this month, my routine was to get up at 6:30, rush to get ready, rush more to get the kids ready, head out the door.  This has been more relaxing and it let’s me start my workday fully awake, which wasn’t happening before.   I’m hoping to get some writing time in there and next month, exercise time.   The interesting thing is that I haven’t adjusted what time I go to bed by much, so this has actually added 90 minutes to my day.

It’s been interesting.   I’m dead tired at 9PM, but I’m surprisingly wide awake by 5:30.  It hasn’t been nearly as hard as I had feared.   I’m looking forward to spring, when I can greet the sunrise. 

Reading hasn’t gone as well.  At the beginning of the month, I told the girls I would read to them every night.   We started out wonderfully.   Then, the real world came in uninvited. I had a meeting at school that ran late.  My son’s wrestling season started.  Things just kept getting in the way of a bedtime story.  The solution?  We modified the deal.  It’s not a bedtime story any more.  I am reading to the girls whenever there is time.  I may not be home at bedtime every day, but I am certainly home at other times.  We’re making it happen, even if it’s not exactly as planned.

It’s just a demonstration of the old rule:  Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans. A small amount of flexibility has turned a potentially failed goal into happy family time.  It’s still a win.
How are your resolutions progressing?

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-03-20

Misc

  • Crap. Replacing the power jack on my laptop means ordering out for the piece. #
  • @mymoneyshrugged Engraved pocket knives were a hit with my groomsmen. in reply to mymoneyshrugged #
  • Movies that force previews suck. Dangit, Invention of Lying. #
  • RT @Lynnae Carnival of Personal Finance #148 http://bit.ly/adRZQo #
  • @jimmyjohns – 35 minutes is not "so fast I'll freak". #
  • @jimmyjohns "Can you send the store info to bit.ly/jjfeedback? Thx!" – Done. Normally service is excellent. in reply to jimmyjohns #
  • Pizzeria with the family. Yum! #
  • RT @FrugalYankee: Fact: In 1873, there were 4131 beer breweries pumping in the US. 1973 only 41 brewers operating 89 plants. Now around 1500 #
  • Mango pudding is the king of all nummy. #

What’s In Your Wallet?

Finance, Life

A picture of a wallet.
Image via Wikipedia

Seeing Crystal play copycat made me want to play, too.

This won’t take long.  I quit carrying a wallet a few months ago in favor of a Slim-Clip.   That helps eliminate wallet clutter.

Here goes nothing:

  • $0.   I usually carry a $150 or so all the time.  I haven’t made it to the bank in a few days, and I spent my last $7 on parking.
  • USBank Flex Perks VISA check card.  0.5% back on all purchases and, theoretically, up to 25% back on some.
  • Penfed Platinum Cash Rewards VISA card. 1% on everything, 2% on groceries, 5% on gas.   We don’t use this much, since we are primarily a cash family.
  • Driver’s license.
  • My health insurance card.
  • Wells Fargo VISA debit card for my business account.
  • Expired health insurance card.
  • Car insurance cards.    Car, truck, and motorcycle.  1 expired and 1 valid for each.
  • AAA card.
  • Carry permit.
  • Business cards for 2 attorneys.
  • Dental insurance card.

If I go through the rest of my pockets, I have a pocket knife, 16 cents, a Gerber Artifact, and my library card.

Including my jacket pockets will add a Cold Steel Sharkie, business cards, a lighter, another pocket knife, a fingernail clipper, a small moleskin notebook, a ticket to Evil Dead: The Musical and matching brochure, a pad of checks, hand-sanitizing wipes, and a diaper to the list.

Now that I’ve gone through my stuff, I threw out the expired cards.   My jacket will certainly accumulate more stuff over the winter, but it’s spent the last 6 months in the closet.

What’s in your wallet?