This.

Even more gone.

Another stack of vinyl, maybe 50 or 60 LPs, including all Boomtown Rats LPs, most Guided by Voices, all REM, old crappy punk. Most of what I have left now is worthless and will hopefully go away in a yard sale. Then what's left goes to Goodwill, except for some Robyn Hitchcock and Tom Waits.

Also went through my closet and got rid of six bags of old clothes, including a 1990 black Gap long-sleeve hooded t-shirt, and a black trenchcoat with metal studs on the shoulder.

What's next? More CDs I guess. Some books too probably. It's not just books and LPs that are gone: The stock market is very depressing. It seems unlikely we will end 2008 with as much as we started with, even if we continue to work for the whole rest of the year.

reading: Perfectly Legal, an in incredibly depressing book about how rich companies avoid taxes and stick working people with the bill.

oh yeah - also

Also sold vinyl copies of:

Portishead 2nd LP

Jim O'Rourke: 2 Drag City LPs.

2 LPs by Link Wray.

Beastie Boys electronica side project LP on Grand Royal: BS2000

The Big Itch Vol. 5

Several garage comps from Crypt Records.

What DId I get rid of Today?

Albums! Long players. that went long unplayed. Many of these have not been played since I was in college 17 years ago. Others since high school. Yeah, really - high school. There was very little I don't have on CD or some digital version of, and even the stuff I didn't - I don't need it.  so, what went away?

Husker Du: Candy Apple Gray.

REM: Automatic for the People.

Velvet Underground: First LP, and White Light/White Heat

Bauhaus: Burning from the Inside

Elvis Costello: Impreial Bedroom, King of America

Sisters of Mercy: Floodland (I kept the way rare Reptile House EP, for now.)

Pole: 1

Tones On Tail

Beck: everything except the Bong Load vinyl which I had already sold to people in Japan and Germany for hundreds of dollars

Sting: Bring on the Night

U2: 12" singles form Joshua Tree

I'm still terrified of becoming a packrat, living in an apt piled high with books, newspapers, trinkets, three million CDs and who knows what else, so that I have to wander through various pathways among the mess. (shudder).

The 'middle-class millionaire'

Story

Trickle-down effect:

These traits may differ from those in the middle class but their offspring, in the form of goods and services, are making their way "downstream."

"From life coaches to luxury vacation rentals, concierge medical care to high dollar prep course into the Ivy League [these things] are making their way downstream, steadily becoming available to a much broader population," Prince and Schiff say. "What was once the province of only the super rich is now being created and packaged for the 'downline' population or for those with fewer zeros in their net worth, but similar aspirations."

It's a whole new level of keeping up with the Joneses.

Take the OnStar navigation system. It began as an emergency road service for high-end luxury vehicles. Now it's even offered on midrange trucks. Similar trends are occurring in real estate, vacations, airline travel and other services.

---

In other words, people are being told that ridiculous, pointless luxuries that the rich used to waste their money on, are now being marketed back to people who are definitely not rich. But they're told these things are now necessities, and of course people believe them. So instead of saving their money, they'll spend it on these things, then complain they can't get ahead. 

No one really seems to want to get off of the treadmill. 

Americans poorer than a year ago

Despite the slowing in mortgage debt, households' equity in their homes fell for the third straight quarter, dropping by $286 billion, or an 11% annual rate.

Household equity fell to a record low 47.9% of home values. Over the past three quarters, the bank or lender owned more of the average house than the "homeowner" did -- the first time this has happened.

Total household assets fell by an annualized $308 billion to stand at $72.1 trillion, while liabilities rose $226 billion to $14.4 trillion.

http://federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/Current/

Third Term

First he was for the war, then he was for the war.
Don't give these fuckers another four years.


Old balljaw and the howlin' monkey.