Strange Machines

Yeah I seriously plan in advance. So now during sale season I can’t help but think what new togs we need for the new baby when it is born.

I think we’re doing ok with slings. I have a wardrobe full. We’ve adapted (actually credit goes to Mom) the cot to accommodate Wolf for now so I can stretch a bit. Although these nights I end up sleeping in it. Sigh… We’re still a co-sleeping family so we’re going to keep with it with the new baby too.

Car seats – the biggie and probably the most expensive. I was lucky to have a bunch of seriously expensive car seats handed down to me from my sibs, but with one in our car, one in grandma’s, one in grandpa’s, we would need to buy 3 more good car seats to drive to anywhere!

Okay, maybe not. Wolf is almost 1m tall at 2.5 years old so he could use a booster. I’ll have to see if that is safe. But there’s no harm in looking out for a well-made safe infant car seat for baby for now. After all, April won’t be sale season.

In other news, I am still horribly nauseous and tired all the time, which is why I haven’t been blogging much. I must have missed the memo that said nausea and exhaustion DOES NOT stop after the first trimester.

My smart hubby (he doesn’t read this blog so I know I’m not just buttering him) said this 2 years ago but no one listened. Not even me when I rushed out to buy Google shares amid promises they’d hit 1000. So he found this for me to watch.

Watch all 5. Ok I confess I made it through 1 and 2 only but I got the idea. The world economy is a pack of dominoes, leveraging on money that doesn’t exist. The dominoes have begun to fall.

Basically, a serious recession is imminent. So keep cash, sit tight and wait for everything to crash. Then buy blue chip stocks and/or well-located properties.

If you have money in funds or worse, structured products, cash out. Those products may go bankrupt like Lehman Bros (et tu Lehman!) and you get nothing, plus don’t forget these guys charge you 2-7% a year service fee for investing your money badly.

5 years of badly managed funds can cost you an average of a 25% loss and that is not compounded, just my guestimate. So the alleged 8% yield (non-guaranteed of course) – in reality, more like 2.5% – is a joke.

2.5% – 5% = -2.5%

No wonder most funds lose their clients’ money. And that is during good times!

So cash out. At least now you get back your 50% (the other 50% lost now), which held and invested in blue chips or property, in 5-10 years, depending on recovery, you’ll make easily 80-90% (that’s a bet 30-40% gain anyhow).

Stocks and property are one-fee transactions (note: properties have annual taxes, and some have maintenance fees but that is worth the rental income plus capital appreciation). Charge when you buy and charge when you sell. No silly annual fees for doing nothing. And the beauty of being able to hold it till you’re ready to sell without worrying about compounding costs of simply holding it.

The market has fallen some 30-60% since last year and there’s still a good way to go. So spend less, save some money, and wait. Patience favours the wise investor.

No guarantees you won’t go mad halfway but they’re better than nothing. I’ve chalked up a minimum of 900 hours nursing Wolf to bed (counting the first sleep only, mind you) while lying in the dark. You can’t surf on your phone or read a book – baby will see the light and not sleep. So here’s what I’ve been able to make up to do instead.

1. Relearn the multiplication table – good practice for future math tutoring.

2. Remember your baby’s birth. Wasn’t it sweet?

3. Remember the best times in your life.

4. Remember the worst. Isn’t it nice to be nursing in the dark instead?

5. Consider alternate histories. My latest thing I made up tonight. Got stuck on conversation but it was interesting. Might make for fascinating dreams.

6. Plan for tomorrow, next week, next year.

7. Plan baby’s next birthday party: who to invite, what food to serve.

8. Run through any of the WoW dungeons in your head. (Former WoW players only.)

9. Fantasize about a contact lens that works as a monitor for you to surf or play games online with a thimble for a mouse. You can see I’ve been thinking about this a while…

10. Replay a favourite movie in your mind. Or select scenes if you have a bad memory.

What do you think of when you’re nursing in the dark?

Not yet. But in some 30 weeks another baby is going to make that journey out into the big blue world.

It’s been a challenging first 10 weeks though. Let me count the ways:

1. Hyper sensitive nipples: agonising nursing.
2. Stuffy nose (cured by excessive rest, interestingly).
3. Exhaustion (no cure, unfortunately).
4. Extreme nausea.
5. Food aversions to almost everything.

As a result, a rather tired and moody human achieving very little every day. Hence the low rate of blogging. Shockingly I have even fallen asleep after putting Wolf to bed.

Wolf is thrilled to have a baby brother or sister and changes his mind about his preference for its gender every day. Now to go force feed myself more food…

And just for the hell of it, a useful article in case anyone complains about my making Wolf sleep 12 hours every night: The Connection Between Sleep and Growth.