Mending of the Gown OMGOMG

Okay.

So I went to see Sunset Rubdown last night at Empty Bottle. I went stag. To the early show. Which is pretty much the most emo fucking thing ever. I was supposed to go with this girl, but she's extremely kellogs and canceled last second on me after already making me get the early show tickets instead of the late show.

Now most of you, I hope to God-Allah-Auron, have never been to such an early emo rock show. But because you're minds are all sorts of inquiring on what it is that happens and such things, I shall tell you.

There are bearded white dudes. They nod a lot. The end.

The show itself was actually pretty tight and was mostly new stuff. (Much to the dismay of the bearded "I wish I were Mike Cera" fanboys crying for shitty ballads all night) But the lack of dancing killed it for me. I can't deal with the "I'm digging the vibe but am too cool to dance" thing. It's gay. Nobody likes the person that acts too cool for their environment. You engage and go balls deep or get the fuck out. Live your life, balls deep.

Don't go urban dictionary 'kellogs' by the way, I have no clue wtf those nerds are thinking. Kellogs = flaky. GOD.

Notice my font is back to normal, I don't really know what the fuck happened two posts ago. It was scary and I can't promise it will never happen again, but I can promise to really regret it when it does.

On to finance-y thoughts:

The two things that are not getting coverage are insurance (life, disability, whatever) and consumer credit (credit cards, auto loans). They're getting some attention, fair enough, but not enough. Understand that these are the areas where there is major economic risk.

I'm going to oversimplify a bit, and if you're pissed at me doing so, I'll gladly argue with you in comments on details, whatever, but let's talk life insurance real quick.

The idea of life insurance is that you have tables that predict when you're client will die and you'll need to pay out his coverage. (say 1 million bucks) So you figure how long that'll be, figure out what the implied compounded interest rate that is implying, and you charge your customer payments so that you can cover that inevitable liability and turn a profit. This is similar to a bank except that you are simply taking in lots of money and instead of actually lending it to other customers, you're synthetically lending it by promising to pay a lump sum in the future. Because you're synthetically lending money at some interest rate, you need to be able to borrow money at a lower interest rate to be profitable. When markets are good, you make money on every side of this business. It is cheap to borrow dollars and you're able to turn a profit on the payments you're receiving by investing in the stock market. You pick up "edge" on both sides.

However, there is nowhere for insurance companies to invest right now that is going to yield the interest rates they need to cover their synthetic loans. Moreover, they cannot borrow money effectively due to the credit crisis. As the credit situation remains stressed, the insurance companies stare at ever increasing liability pools without anywhere near the assets to match. This hasn't exploded yet, but is an inevitable concern for both the insurance companies and those who hold insurance policies. (Insurance policies are insured not federally but by the states -- typically not in excess of 300k. Sorry bro on that 1M life insurance policy!)

Consumer credit is the other fuckshow. Credit cards charge rates that reflect the fact that people simply don't pay off their debt. (which is retarded to me, and btw, is almost ALWAYS the best investment you can make-- paying off cc debt) The same problem arises in consumer credit as in mortgages. As defaults rise and funding becomes more expensive, the spread that has been profitable for credit cards in the past quickly becomes insufficient. (If everyone in America maxes out their credit cards right now, no more America... the same could probably be said for any part of the world, but the fragility of the economy currently magnifies our dependence on debtors being generally reliable on their payments -- if they aren't, there simply isn't the liquidity out there to the financing necessary)

This is not meant to be doom and gloom or anything like that, just ranting. The markets are already pricing all of this in. If you're wondering why insurance company and credit card stocks are tanking especially hard over the past two or three weeks, this is generally why. (They are pretty much the hardest hit parts of the economy outside of core finance)

why can't I find the "oh my god, you're gay" Stifler quote from the first American Pie on youtube, FUCK