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Friends and Acquaintances

Life, Relationships

“Friends help you move. Good friends help you move bodies.”

-unknown

Some people have dozens of friends. I’m not that guy.

I have 6.

Everybody in the world can be divided into 4 categories.

Strangers. A xenophobe’s nightmare. These are the people you don’t know, whether they are passing you on the sidewalk, or newborns on the opposite side of the world.
Acquaintances. These are the people you’ve met, mostly in passing. They tend not to have much effect on your life. You may pass a friendly bus ride in conversation, but it’s nothing that sticks. A waitress, the clerk at the store, a friend’s latest date; these are the people you interact with for just a moment and rarely think about further.
Friendlies. Most people call these folks friends. I don’t. I’m friendly with them, hence the name, but it’s not true friendship. Often, they are either my wife’s friends, or my friends’ wives. Sometimes, they are a friend of a friend that I only see at parties, or a coworker that I get along with, but never see outside of work. We’re friendly, but not obliged. I may help with some things, but it’s not necessarily a priority. I’ll go to a funeral, but probably won’t help plan it.
Friends. To me, calling someone a friend is a big deal. I’m willing to do a lot for my friends. They are able to command large amounts of my time, and ask any number of favors. If needed, I’ll open my home or help demolish their’s. Loyalty, honesty, trust, respect, and companionship are all a part of my definition of a friend. If a friend needs help, I’ll come running. In return, I expect the same.

Family tends to fall into the same analogous categories.

It sounds cold, but I hesitate to let people graduate into the final category. My wife used to try to “set me up” with people that she thought I’d like to be friends with, thinking I was sad to have so few friends. It took years for her to realize that I was happy. It’s a matter of quality over quantity. Most of the friends I have, I’ve had for 10 years or more. I’ve known each of them for at least 5 years, not that time is a requirement.

Moving people into the “friends” category is a lot like dating. You get along, so you invite the potential friends out for a drink, one on one. You feel them out to see if they are compatible. You meet their families, share some food, build some history. If it all works out, eventually, you consider them a true friend, even if you couldn’t mark the date of the transition.

You wouldn’t marry everyone you date, so why would turn everyone you basically get along with into a friend?

Do you have a lot of friends? What marks friendship for you?

Appearances Matter

Business, Life

As my wife ramps up her job search, I’m reminded of this post and decided to bring it to the forefront.

A few weeks ago, I took my son out to my favorite Chinese buffet. There were two women there with names tattooed on their eyelids.

When you have someone’s name tattooed on your eyelids, you are limiting your job prospects to tattoo-shop employee or drug mule. You have disqualified yourself from a burger-flipping career.

When I turned 21, I had 13 piercings in my face and dyed-black hair past my ribs. Everybody is the factory I worked in got used to my bullring in time.

When my son was born, I decided I’d had enough of 12 hour graveyard shifts and not seeing my family, so I pulled out my piercings, put on a nice shirt, and got a corporate-style job in a call center.

Within a week or two, I put most of my piercings back in, and let everyone get used to it.

Six years later, I got laid off, and again, took out my piercings to look for work.

Appearances matter.

I know, for certain, that I wouldn’t have the job I have right now if I still had long hair and enough metal in my face to get me “special” attention at the airport.

A ring of steel through your nose kills the first impression in a business environment.

When you are walking into a situation for the first time, it’s important to pay attention to the persona you are projecting. Ladies, if the gentleman in the picture showed up for a blind date, would you be inclined to go anywhere with him? Men, would you expect anyone to go anywhere with you, if this was you?

Visible tattoos are called job-stoppers for a reason. If you can’t cover them with normal office attire, you won’t get hired in a professional setting. If that fact is a surprise to you, your lack of judgement means you wouldn’t be a good hire, anyway.

Like it or not, people make most of their decisions about others in the first few minutes of meeting them. Some studies show that it’s done in the first 30 seconds. If that time is spent on your facial art, the expletives on your t-shirt, or the briefness of your skirt, don’t expect to have anything else matter. You may be a genius, but your potential boss will never know that because you’ll be out on your butt before they have a chance to look at your resume.

Taco Seasoning

Recipe

A few weeks ago, Edward at If You Can Read, You Can Cook sent me a jar of his taco seasoning to try.

Yum.

He’s got four flavors: hot, medium, mild, and sweet cumin. Since I’m the only one in my family who likes spicy food, I asked for the sweet cumin.

This is a jar of pure taco flavor, without any of the burn. Tacos, burritos, omelettes, or Rice Krispies, nearly anything could benefit from a dose of this stuff.

Seriously, we’re done with the little paper packets from the grocery store. From now on, Edward is getting our taco seasoning business. We do large batches of tacos 2-3 times a month, so I’m looking forward to trying the other flavors, too.

http://www.ifyoucanread.com/if-you-can-read-you-can-cook-taco-seasonings-original-page-2/ I was not compensated for this post, other than getting a free jar to try. It’s just good.

Becoming a Landlord

Business

Over the weekend, I had some family and friends over to my mother-in-law’s house to price things–thousands of things–for the upcoming garage/estate sale. If you’ve ever felt a need to own 30 identical paring knives, you should stop by.

While we were over there, I had my contractor look at the house (Thanks, Dad!). Shortly after the sale, we want to start working to bring the house up to date.

Here’s the list of repairs so far:

Replace storm windows all around the house, since all of them have had the screens and screen frames vanish.
Trim the windows that are missing trim and replace the trim on the windows that have oddly colored trim.
Put locks on all of the windows.
Trim the window between the kitchen and the living room that used to be an actual window. Add a shutter.
Trim the archway between the dining room and living room.
New linoleum in the kitchen.
Remove two cabinets in the kitchen to open up counter space.
New ceiling panels in the kitchen.
Sheetrock and plaster repair all over the main floor.
Remove linoleum from the dining room.
Sand/buff/varnish hardwood floors under the dining room’s linoleum.
Replace attic access panel.
Seal bathtub surround.
Replace front screen door.
Replace back door
Install ceiling tiles in basement.
Finish basement bathroom.
Finish basement walls. They are sheetrocked, but not mudded, taped, or painted.
Paint basement floor.
Paint basement steps.
Paint the entire main floor.
Install spare cabinets in the basement for a utility area near the washer and dryer.

While that’s happening, we’re having the outside landscaped. We also need to take the city-mandated landlord class and file for the business license that will allow us to rent a property that we aren’t inhabiting.

The good news is that we have potential renters already. Assuming they are still ready to shack up when her lease is up in February, we won’t have a tenant hunt. My wife has known the couple for years and is positive they’ll be responsible people. If not, that’s what a security deposit is for.

A Problem With Life Insurance

Finance

It’s pretty common for someone to buy a life insurance policy and make a minor child or grandchild the beneficiary.

English: $10,000 life insurance policy for Pre... — English: $10,000 life insurance policy for President James A. Garfield, the twentieth President of the United States. Discovered in a family scrap album dating from the late 1800’s. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Bad idea.

The reasoning is usually something along the lines of making sure the money goes with the kid, no matter where he ends up, but that money is mostly worthless until the kids grows up. With the UGMA/UTMA (Universal Gift/Transfer to Minors Act) laws, depending on your state, it can be nearly impossible to access that money or use it for the support of the child.

For example, in Minnesota, I would have to go through the following steps:
Complete a Petition for Appointment of Guardian and Conservator with a $322 filing fee and request it be reviewed without a hearing.
Notify any interested parties.
Consent to and pay for a background study.
Establish a custodial account at the bank and maintain separate accounting for the money.

That’s just to access the money. As a conservator, I’d be able to use the money for “support, maintenance, and education”, but that does not include investing in a 529 college fund. I could theoretically invest in ultra-conservative growth funds, but if the investments shrink, I could be on the hook for the difference. I’d be a “conservator”, charged with conserving the asset.

After all of that, when the kid turns 18 (or 21 depending on the setup), the money is his to do with as he pleases.

Have you ever met an 18 year old who made really good decisions about money? I had a friend who had a settlement trust pay her a lump sum at 18, 21, and 25. Each time, she bought a new car and partied with her friends for a month before the money was gone. That was nearly $100,000 down the drain.

It’s a much better idea to visit an attorney and set up a trust. Make the trust the beneficiary of your life insurance policies. Then, define who will be the trustee under what circumstances. That way, you can make sure your kids and grandkids can actually be supported by your money.

My Favorite Present

Parenting

My favorite Christmas present this year was the one I gave to my 13 year old son.

Allow me to walk you through his evening….

First, he opened one of his presents. It was just a small box, about 3 inches by 4. A Japanese puzzle box. Inside the box was a note that read:

Closed off in the smallest room you will find a clue to bring you closer to your prize.

When he checked the cabinet below the sink in our basement bathroom, he found another note that sent him to my business website one a page with a url that contained “the square of my children”. When he eventually figured out that I meant their ages, not their quantity, he found a clue on my website.

This lead him to a section of his Minecraft server. It’s effectively a no-man’s land because he and his friends set off a nuke and turned it into a giant pit. They fall down and die there. Inside the pit was a cave. Inside the cave was a clue. The clue read:

Grandma and Grandpa love you.

What do you do when someone says they love you? You either get scared of the commitment and end a perfectly good relationship, or you say “I love you, too”. When the kid finally called his grandparents to tell them he loves them, they told him to give his parents a kiss.

I’m a jerk.

He came over and gave me a hug and a kiss. I handed him a piece of paper. When he looked at it, he asked if it was supposed to be torn in half. I reminded him that he has two parents, so Mom got a hug and a kiss, too. The resulting clue read:

The Answer to the Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything

Naturally, this points to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, but the boy hadn’t read far enough into the book to understand the reference, so he had to hit google. After spending time looking for chapter 42, he finally thought to look at page 42, which had this clue:

My Little Pegasus

Two steps to the right

Two steps forward

Two steps up

This clue started at the My Little Pony I set next to a Pegasus in my daughters’ room. The boy was in dense mode because he had to ask his sister what a Pegasus was. She also had to suggest he open the closet door when one step forward made him bump his nose on it.

For all of that work, he got the Ticket to Ride game. He laughed the entire way through the treasure hunt, then decided he hated the whole process. However, for two nights running, he’s stopped the video games to play his new game with his family.

It’s a present he’ll remember forever.

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