Now that I’m settled into my new job in California, I’m rolling over my 401(k) and looking at my asset allocation.  Ooh, how interesting!  Next week: statistics for advanced accounting.  I’m going to outline my strategy here and invite critical discussion from my savvy readers.

I think of investments in four categories:

• Cash
• Bond
• Domestic Stock
• International Stock

It’s possible to subdivide each category, such as Small-Cap vs. Large-Cap stocks.  But I don’t hold any theories on the different performances of such subdivisions so I’m lumping them together for the purposes of this discussion.

I have a separate IRA supporting Highrock’s mortgage.  To keep things simple, I am leaving it there, where it earns 5%, tax-deferred.  That counts as the Cash portion of my retirement portfolio, leaving me to balance my 401(k) across the remaining 3 categories.

I’m going to omit Bond funds from my portfolio entirely.  In my opinion, the expected return on those funds doesn’t justify the increased risk from recent and continuing mortgage-based bond defaults.  That leaves only Domestic and International Stock funds.

I believe in index funds.  The majority of actively-managed mutual funds underperform their benchmark index, while charging higher maintenance fees.  Why pay more for less?  Along those lines, my other key metric is to minimize the expense ratio.  So that leaves me looking for one Domestic index fund, and one International index fund.  Fortunately, my 401(k) administration website allows me to run searches and dump the results to a spreadsheet.  So I found the following funds which matched my criteria:

Domestic: VTSMX, tracking MSCI US Broad Market Index, 0.15% expense ratio
International: GIXIX, tracking MSCI_EAFE, 0.37% expense ratio

I’m simply going 50% into each for both current funds and future allocation.  Are there any problems with my logic or assumptions?  For your own 401(k), do you pursue more sophisticated strategies, or less?

“Anyone under 30 who isn’t a liberal has no heart.
 Anyone over 30 who isn’t a conservative has no brains.”

To a liberal, the greatest sin is being selfish.  By not sharing with the less-fortunate, you are going against the fundamental moral principle of fairness and the The Golden Rule.

To a conservative, the greatest sin is being stupid.  Without being smart and realistic about money, you can find yourself without the basic necessities of life.

Maybe that’s a false dichotomy.  Most of us feel a bit of both: we want to be both wise with our money, yet generous also.  Time to bust out the 2×2 matrix!  On one axis: smarts.  On the other: generosity.  If you have neither, you are just selfish and stupid — typical Disney villain sidekick.  If you have smarts but no generosity, then you are a Scrooge, or a “conservative” as painted by the liberals.  If you have generosity, but no smarts, you and your money are soon parted (“to a good cause!” you may exclaim).  And finally, if you have both, you’re golden.

I have a few thoughts on why it’s so hard to be both.  Basically, money is like The Dark Side.  The more you get, the more likely you will be consumed by it, leaving no room for generosity in your soul.  To accumulate money generally means working hard for it (the whole “money doesn’t grow on trees” thing), and your identity becomes more wrapped up in the making and having of money.  The Gospels say, “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”  I used to think that meant: “give your money to a cause, and you will care more about it.”  Now instead I believe it means “where you spend effort, is where you define worth.”  If I practice piano hours every day, I think of myself as a pianist.  If I play WoW for hours each day, I think of myself as a gamer.  And in both cases I value the skill or achievements I have built for myself.  It’s hard not to feel contempt or condescension for those who have not put in the same hours and effort.  Back to the idea of money, the better I am at making it, the more I believe that *I* deserve it, and the less I believe that others deserve it.  In some cases, there is truth to that.  If you and your brother both have the same background, and you work hard to make a lot of money, and he goes all prodigal in Sin City, it’s hard to take him seriously when wants a loan to buy a new Hummer.  On the other hand, the villager in Haiti isn’t in that situation — with no education, capital, or infrastructure, he can’t get ahead no matter how hard he works.

My other thought on money is a development of an analogy that Gary and I used in our Economic Discipleship class: money is like a radioactive element — if you accumulate critical mass, it will kill you.  Now I think money is more organic, like the plant Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors: the more you have, the more time it takes to maintain and grow it.  It’s a self-perpetuating cycle that again, takes mindshare and blocks out your sense of generosity.

That’s all I have for now.  Does anyone else have any ideas on how to deal with your dual inner natures — to keep your shrewd snake from corrupting your innocent dove?

Last week was one big long birthday celebration.  I only worked on Monday, because on Tuesday jglee and bryanche flew out to visit and stay with us.  On the ride from the airport, I mentioned that I should have made commemorative T-shirts for their visit.  Well that idea became, “Let’s make 4 colored T-shirts and reproduce Ed’s xanga logo.  And then let’s wear them while riding around San Francisco on Segways on July 4th!”  At this point, June was probably looking for divorce options, which are surprisingly hard to get just before a holiday weekend.

Unfortunately they had to leave Saturday morning, and thus missed our hike and BBQ.  It turns out June had made a digital scrapbook for my birthday and collected 80 pages worth of pictures and well-wishes from my friends.  The cover is even more embarrassing than the T-shirt picture above — underwear is involved — so I won’t be posting it here.

First: it’s important to know the difference between dishwasher detergent and dishwashing detergent.  Notice the suffix change:

• -er means it’s for your automatic dishwasher, the machine with buttons on it.  The liquid/powder/gelcap will burn your bare skin, so be careful.
• -ing means it’s for manual dishwishing, that is your hands and a sponge.  It only comes in liquid form.  It’s safe on your hands but will flood your kitchen if you use it in an automatic dishwasher.

My first apartment in college was where I re-created the Great Flood and learned the difference between the two.

But this post is really about dishwasher detergents.  One of life’s great disappointments is to load a dishwasher, run it, and open it to find a thin white film baked onto your dishes, glasses, and silverware.  Once that film is there, no further dishwasher cycles will remove it.  You’ve got to take them out and rewash them by hand.  Your dishwasher has changed from a cleaning device to a dirt transformation device.  Avoiding this fate means paying attention to your brand of dishwasher detergent.  Fortunately, people at Consumer Reports love this kind of testing, so in August 07 they did a full review and found:

• “Six Cascade detergents topped the ratings of 22 detergents in Consumer Reports’ latest dishwasher detergent reviews…”
• “The presence of enzymes appears to be key in dishwashing detergents that performed best in CR’s latest detergent reviews…”

Here is a link to the summary article, and a link to another set of independent user reviews:
http://www.housekeepingchannel.com/a_649-Six_Cascade_Detergents_with_Enzymes_Top_Consumer_Reports%92_Ratings
http://www.viewpoints.com/Cascade-Complete-vs-Electrasol-Advanced-Dishwashing-Detergent-reviews

While traveling around New Zealand in March, I found myself fixing and
upgrading a number of people’s PC’s.  Since they had problems common to
most users all over the world, I’m going to summarize the information
in this post.  I’ll make special notes about why certain
special-interest groups don’t publicize specific bits of information,
as indicated by the conspiracy theory nut:

I’m assuming you already own a PC and want to make it run better.  A
Mac is prettier and easier to use for computer novices, especially for
multimedia, but is also a lot more expensive for anything beyond a
bare-bones machine.

1) Memory

The #1 factor in how fast your PC runs is not the processor speed; it’s
the memory.  Now I’m talking about “fast” for everyday applications
like switching between email, web browsing, and basic Microsoft
Office.  Here’s my recommended memory chart.

You can save a lot of money by installing your own memory.  PC
Manufacturers make money by upcharging you on memory that brings you to
the “Fast” and “Optimal” levels, the same way movie theaters make money
by charging you $4 for a Coke.  So buy a low-memory PC, order more
memory off the web, and install it yourself.

2) Browser

Go to www.mozilla.com to download and install Firefox.  Then Google
“adblock plus” and install it.  That will make your browsing experience
both faster and safer.  If you’re really paranoid, Google “noscript”
and install that too — but know that it will block active elements
from all websites, forcing you to ok each time you visit a new site.

3) Antivirus

I don’t run any antivirus programs.  My opinion is that they slow down your PC and provide no real benefit.

Antivirus software companies want you to live in fear.  Their
programs take a long time to run and look like they’re doing a lot. 
They often cause incompatibilities with other programs, resulting in
more problems than they prevent.  Go commando and just practice safe
computing, avoiding these 5 risky practices:

- visiting harmful websites with Internet Explorer on low security settings

- clicking on links from emails (a friend of mine was infected after clicking a link forwarded from his CEO)

- opening attachments from emails
- downloading disreputable software and porn

- running peer-to-peer file-sharing programs

4) Backup

Your computer can die at any time.  Realize this, and take precautions.  Divide your data into three categories:

- Unchanging (photos, music, and old documents): burn these to DVD’s.
- Changing (current documents): copy to a USB flash key, or use an online service
- Secure (financial and very private): use CD/DVD encryption software
like CD-Lock, or a fingerprint flash key, or a secure online service.

1997 Acura 2.2CL, 82k miles, $4900

Good condition, Kelley Blue Book value of $5365, 4.8/5 stars.

4-Cyl. 2.2L VTEC

Automatic Transmission

Air Conditioning

Cruise Control

Power Steering

Power Seat

Power Windows

Power Moon Roof

Power Door Locks

Dual Front Air Bags

Alloy Wheels

Sony CDX-M630 retracting FM/AM CD player

All 4 tires changed in September 06 (remember this?)

Runs perfectly, but ABS light stays on.

After more than 10 years in Massachusetts, we are moving back to
California!


While we’re not looking forward to higher taxes and expensive housing,
we will be glad to be closer to June’s family and seeing our Bay Area
friends again.  Ed has accepted an offer with Telegent Systems in
Sunnyvale, CA starting April 1.  June will look for a job once we arrive
in California.


We’re leaving Boston at the end of February, and will spend a few weeks
in March traveling the Pacific.  We’ll look for a more permanent address
in the Bay Area, once we recover from jet lag!


—

—

Lastly, we’re looking for renters or buyers for our loft.  If you know anyone
looking for a lot of bookshelf space in Cambridge, please check out the website: http://147sherman.com/.  Photographs courtesy of bryanche.

Nothing like having web experts reviewing your diagrams… here’s my updated picture:

My most recent quickie project was to summarize how the internet works in a 1-page diagram.

Since I couldn’t find any single source with a good summary, I browsed a lot of wikipedia and howthingswork.com pages and came up with this:

I intentionally left out details of the network stack, since the IETF has made a strong point of not adhering to formal layers [link].  And only network engineers need to worry about protocols; everyone else basically surfs on the application layer.  Any web experts out there who can point out anything wrong or missing from my diagram?

I wonder how much of this NYT Opinion article is true.

If it is, I wonder what it means for the growth of Christianity in China and the shifting balance of economic power between China and the US.  Hmm…

Full article here and in the first comment (at xanga.com/changed if you’re reading off a news feed).