I just built two ikea dressers. I think I'm only missing one little wooden connector piece. There's always something missing, I think ikea packages must be put together by sleepy swedes manually counting out parts. The parts count is never quite right. I wish I had Kate's hammer here instead of having to bang on nails and plastic connectors with a hardcover book.

I finally got my speakers back from the repair shop. It looks like they swapped out my wireless receiver for a new one. But it's all working! It connected right away without me having to fuss with anything. We have achieved 5.1.

I did write a stern letter to United Airlines, requesting to be shown where the 6-month thing was a Vietnam or USA regulation, or if it's a United-specific requirement then customers should be notified ahead of time. I thought about posting it here as some kind of "open letter" but that seems silly. And Rachel said that I deserve an extra free flight, but I'm not going to demand anything like that. If it turns out to be United's fault, I'll let them apologize in whatever way they see fit. I certainly wouldn't turn down any free flights.

It looks like I'm going to owe LOTS of money in taxes in April. I made a bunch of extra money by investing in stocks just in time for the rebound last spring, but taxes never got deducted for it. It is time to start saving.

(from the "criticisms" section of a Wikipedia article about stock trading taxes)
No offset for gains due to inflation: The capital gain upon which the tax is calculated is not inflation adjusted. Thus for example, a gain that is entirely due to inflation, is not a real gain at all, nevertheless this illusory gain is taxed.