I have often joked with the kids about only thinking about buying a single lottery ticket if the winnings climbed above 500 million. A bag of chips costs more, and if I traded a bag of chips for that ticket...........?
Anyway, I had some time today in the car, where I was just sitting for 40 minutes waiting for someone. I really had nothing to do, and one of the radio DJ's said something about more than half of Arkansas' population had purchased numbers. They also mentioned how big the winnings are ($640 million), and I got to thinking.....What would that be like for "normal people"? You know, not companies, or overpaid athletes, or "stars" who count their paychecks in 7, 8 and 9 digits. What would be "relateable" to us "simple folk"?
Well, small calculator handy, time to kill, so here are my "findings".
All of this assumes, for the sake of simplicity, that one is dealing with a lump sum, post tax "leftover" of 297 million. (which is what several of the talkshows and radio programs indicated would likely be the amount left after state and federal taxes, for a single winner). It also supposes no investments, no bank interest, no further income, just imagine a big pile of money dwindling down like in the movie "Brewster's Millions". Now we also assume a 10% tithe or the like. Leaves just at 267 million.
I thought about housing, food, braces, education, missions, jobs, cars, travel and pets, just to "keep it relatable".
Here we go: You could:
a. put 3700 students through 4 years of college (assuming $20 grand per year and only 4 years)
b. employ 200 people at $74 K per year, and guarantee that employment for 20 years! I guess if the group was smaller, you could guarantee a regular pay raise.
c. do the following for 330 people
1. a $500 thousand housing "allowance"
2. 2 nice cars
3. $ 12,000 for a vacation
4. $100 K cash, just to spend/invest/whatever
5. a 4 year college education (aforementioned assumptions, see "a")
d. feed over 4000 people for 20 years, assuming $200/month per person.!!! That's a lot, by the way!
e. put braces on 3300 kids every year, for 20 years!!!
f. randomly pay for 100 heart transplants/year, again for the next 20 years!
g. buy 11,000 gallons of gas PER DAY for 20 years, if the price averaged $4/gal !!!!!
Oh, and still have about 3 million to just "live off of".
Yikes!!! Maybe I should go scrounge some coins from under the car seats or in the drink holder!
Friday, March 30, 2012
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Double standards!
I just have to say something here about the latest flap over public offenses. As most have probably heard, one major, conservative radio talk show host said some derogatory things about a young lady pertaining to her part in the "big" contraception debate in national politics.
Nutshell version, in case anyone has missed it: White House wants to force "health care providers" to subsidize contraception, regardless of that organizations' religious opposition to contraception. ie. Catholic universities, hospitals and insurance providers would be "required" to provide payment for contraception, even though it violates their religious beliefs. Young woman speaks out in congressional hearings.
Back to double standard. Said radio host made some bad comments, got called to the carpet. Has issued an apology! Is it over? OH, NO! Not by a long shot!
You see, those who don't like this host are calling for him to be silenced, screaming for boycotts, asking advertisers to pull their ads (which many have done), etc. They say nothing about the number of times that absolutely vile things have been said to and about conservative women and women politicians on the conservative side. The leadership of the left has never, and will never, denounce vile, vicious and even threatening comments made against women who do not share their views, but they scream and throw a fit about a war against women when someone on the right messes up. (apology or not)
You should look up Louis CK , the headline "comedian" for the upcoming "Washington Correspondants' Banquet" or whatever it's called. His foul mouthed and salacious comments about Sarah Palin and her child with Down's syndrome should have any "honest" women's movement outraged, not to mention foundations and charity groups focused on Down's syndrome. He is a recently single dad, makes me wonder what his "woman" felt about his attitude towards women?
Yet he is the chosen entertainment for the media muckity-mucks who rub elbows with, (Oh fine, "fawn all over") our President and his left-wing cronies. Go figure. War on women? You better figure out who is really on what side.
Nutshell version, in case anyone has missed it: White House wants to force "health care providers" to subsidize contraception, regardless of that organizations' religious opposition to contraception. ie. Catholic universities, hospitals and insurance providers would be "required" to provide payment for contraception, even though it violates their religious beliefs. Young woman speaks out in congressional hearings.
Back to double standard. Said radio host made some bad comments, got called to the carpet. Has issued an apology! Is it over? OH, NO! Not by a long shot!
You see, those who don't like this host are calling for him to be silenced, screaming for boycotts, asking advertisers to pull their ads (which many have done), etc. They say nothing about the number of times that absolutely vile things have been said to and about conservative women and women politicians on the conservative side. The leadership of the left has never, and will never, denounce vile, vicious and even threatening comments made against women who do not share their views, but they scream and throw a fit about a war against women when someone on the right messes up. (apology or not)
You should look up Louis CK , the headline "comedian" for the upcoming "Washington Correspondants' Banquet" or whatever it's called. His foul mouthed and salacious comments about Sarah Palin and her child with Down's syndrome should have any "honest" women's movement outraged, not to mention foundations and charity groups focused on Down's syndrome. He is a recently single dad, makes me wonder what his "woman" felt about his attitude towards women?
Yet he is the chosen entertainment for the media muckity-mucks who rub elbows with, (Oh fine, "fawn all over") our President and his left-wing cronies. Go figure. War on women? You better figure out who is really on what side.
Exploring!
I am having a moment or two of rebellious procrastination, right now. I have a significant amount of reading to do for my UALR classes; I still have a few late papers to grade from my Conway students before grades are uploaded tomorrow morning; there are several things which need to be done in the chicken houses; and I don't feel lke starting, because then I will just plug through until I fall asleep, or until I am mentally "done". So I am spending a few moments doing something more relaxing.
I am still at my same weight, but I am feeling much better. Those last 2 weeks, I was not able to get out much to walk or hike or anything. Last saturday was looking like another "chickenhouse til dusk" kind of day, but that was contingent upon Bob having a couple of pieces of equipment and some specific supplies. He had not made those runs during the week, so I ended up with the afternoon free. YEAH
I took Kaylee and Ben, and we went to hike! ( Ian did not get to go, because he stepped on something "sharp" and spent the morning in the ER dealing with a puncture wound. He was still sore, so he did not feel like 2 hours of hiking would be much fun).
We started over at Sugarloaf mountain. I was dumb, and forgot to take a camera, but next week, I will take some pictures and see if I can't figure out how to upload them. Sugarloaf is one of the biggest "hills" around here. It is sort of a "stand-alone" left-over from the surrounding region of bluffs. Hard to describe, exactly. It doesn't tower over the surrounding hills, it actually juts up from a valley that is kind of like a big bowl, meaning it is about the same height as the surrounding hills, just isolated.
The trail up the "mountain" is only 1/3 mile, but it is fairly steep. We were breathing hard at the top, but decided it would be "fun" to climb through the rocks to the top. "Chimney's" is what the climbers who went up ahead of us called them. Very narrow, fairly steep, but "do-able" even without ropes or equipment. A few spots would have made me very nervous if we hadn't gone up behind some people who knew the climb. (oh, that, and the fact that they were helping a 3 year old up, which made me confident that I could probably make it.)
NICE VIEW! Nothing like the Rockies or the Alps, but for this part of Arkansas, very much worth the climb! (and not nearly so "scary" as looking off the edge of a 600-700 foot drop.) Then we hiked back down, and decided to go over to the trail by the dam. we hiked it "backwards", that is we started in such a direction that the long stairs at the far end of the loop were climbed, rather than coming down. Made for 2 solid hours of hiking. Good afternoon!
I could feel it in my legs the next morning, but nothing hurt! That is progress!
I am still at my same weight, but I am feeling much better. Those last 2 weeks, I was not able to get out much to walk or hike or anything. Last saturday was looking like another "chickenhouse til dusk" kind of day, but that was contingent upon Bob having a couple of pieces of equipment and some specific supplies. He had not made those runs during the week, so I ended up with the afternoon free. YEAH
I took Kaylee and Ben, and we went to hike! ( Ian did not get to go, because he stepped on something "sharp" and spent the morning in the ER dealing with a puncture wound. He was still sore, so he did not feel like 2 hours of hiking would be much fun).
We started over at Sugarloaf mountain. I was dumb, and forgot to take a camera, but next week, I will take some pictures and see if I can't figure out how to upload them. Sugarloaf is one of the biggest "hills" around here. It is sort of a "stand-alone" left-over from the surrounding region of bluffs. Hard to describe, exactly. It doesn't tower over the surrounding hills, it actually juts up from a valley that is kind of like a big bowl, meaning it is about the same height as the surrounding hills, just isolated.
The trail up the "mountain" is only 1/3 mile, but it is fairly steep. We were breathing hard at the top, but decided it would be "fun" to climb through the rocks to the top. "Chimney's" is what the climbers who went up ahead of us called them. Very narrow, fairly steep, but "do-able" even without ropes or equipment. A few spots would have made me very nervous if we hadn't gone up behind some people who knew the climb. (oh, that, and the fact that they were helping a 3 year old up, which made me confident that I could probably make it.)
NICE VIEW! Nothing like the Rockies or the Alps, but for this part of Arkansas, very much worth the climb! (and not nearly so "scary" as looking off the edge of a 600-700 foot drop.) Then we hiked back down, and decided to go over to the trail by the dam. we hiked it "backwards", that is we started in such a direction that the long stairs at the far end of the loop were climbed, rather than coming down. Made for 2 solid hours of hiking. Good afternoon!
I could feel it in my legs the next morning, but nothing hurt! That is progress!
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