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Weekly Linkage
There’s a bit of everything in week’s internet cruising: The higher-education bubble (continued): Students are drowning in debt – How's this for ridiculous: student-loan debt now surpasses credit-card debt. Literary Agent – Traditional Versus Self-Publishing – Ted … – Amanda Hocking and Barry Eisler on their strategies of traditional- and self-publishing. 10 Tips on Growing Your Garden Without Growing Your Expenses – Given my gardening bug this year, this is a handy read. On Digital Identity, Technology Dependents, and Death – Much like the comprehensive backup solution I linked to so long ago, this is a great guide for getting started with digital identity management. 1Password is also great on…
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2011 Gardening: The Start of Awesomeness
This spring–and, admittedly, my impending marriage–brought out my green thumb. The prospect of moving this summer to an apartment that will probably have fewer windows makes me want more green in my house. Much to Greg and Chris’s amusement, I’m planting almost everything I get my hands on: a peach pit (planted before winter in the hopes of a spring sprout that hasn’t come), cilantro (from packaged seeds), basil (also from packaged seeds), tomatoes (packaged seeds), garlic cloves (unused in a risotto dinner), orange seeds (from a late-night snack), and a green onion (unused from a frittata meal) This is all in addition to my two trusty cacti (a saguaro…
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Surprise Wedding Shower!
I try not to be all weddingy at work, although I have a few close colleagues I geek with. (Drama-inducing colleagues, I’ll add. They think I should be super-stressed and overly-picky.) In fact, I’m not sure all my colleagues knew I was getting married at all until I mentioned it to one of the admins on the floor a couple of weeks ago. Regardless, two of my closest buddies snuck around behind my back–literally, one of them sits behind me–and crafted a wonderful party/shower that they dropped on me yesterday. The whole team showed up. There was both cheesecake and a tasty lemony cake. The whole thing was decked out…
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Bogleheads’ Retirement Planning: Self-Employment Account Options
A 401(k) for MacGregor? Muy awesome. I had no idea that there were traditional or Roth 401(k) options for the self-employed. I figured that Greg was due to be stuck with only IRAs, as well as a tangle of alphabet soup even I didn’t want to swim in: SEP-IRAs, SIMPLE IRAs, Keoghs, spousal IRAs. This totally changes our game plan, even though we won’t hop to a 401(k) immediately.
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Science Night in the Avery/Weir/Frisina Household
Given a large block of dry ice and the following substances, create an hour of fun for three people: Warm water Dishwashing liquid Isopropyl alcohol Laundry detergent A piece of lettuce Dark cola A Ziploc baggy I was very late picking up the camera and had a hell of a time getting the 55-200mm lens to focus, but here are some shots: