Tag Archives: my_life

Real Estate with Ethics

I’ve continued to read Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki and it continues to put this driving question in my mind. How can we invest in Real Estate in a way that is ethical?
Currently though only thing I’ve come up with is to do Real Estate in rich areas where it’s not directly affecting the poor. As I said in a previous post, so many options of making money in Real Estate seem to be doing so at the expense and oppression of the poor.

So, here is the deal. I want to make a lot of money. I want to make money so that I don’t have to raise it, or break my back working for it; I want to have money so that I can do all the things I desire to do and not have to worry about it. The stock market sounds interesting to me as does Real Estate. Lucrative business ventures are great too, but here’s my catch. I want to invest in things and in ways that I believe are ethical.
I’ll try the real estate thing, but not if it means ripping off someone just because they are in a tight spot, and not if it means pushing the poor out of their neighborhood, and not if it means charging oppressive rent prices.
I’ll try the stock market, but I don’t want to invest in companies that run sweatshops. I don’t want to support companies that make their millions in alcohol, pornography or the slave trade. I want to make money helping the world become a better place.

Anyone know of any good places to go for that kind of financial advice? Because I haven’t a clue.

2005 in a minute (or five)

UPDATED: Now with Pictures

It’s the wee hours of 2006 and I thought this would be a good time to reflect just a little on where I’ve come in a year. A lot has happened.

This time last year Mindy and I still weren’t sure where we would be in the fall. She had only applied to Vanderbilt and was still waiting to hear back before applications for other schools where due. Mid-January she received her letter of acceptance, and shortly there after we got word of the financial aid we would receive, and our decisions was made. We were going to Nashville.
As soon as I knew Nashville would be our home for the next couple years I started looking for friends. First I told my long time friends from Madison, Chip and Kristen, that we would soon be neighbors. I then connected with one of my most helpful resources and Nashville confidants, Justis on RelevantMagazine.com’s Message Board. From there it was on to searching for a church, or at least information about church. I had an very interesting encounter with one church while on the phone. The second church I connected with, through a phone call and their online message board, was the one we would settle into when we got to Nashville. LeslieMe was an amazing help in preparing for our move down.

Meanwhile, Mindy and I enjoyed our last semester at Wheaton. We’d had a wonderful first semester of our senior year. I finished my IDS project and was set for a relaxing spring semester. Mindy had just finished a grueling semester of multiple labs and tough classes. The spring semester was full of interesting classes, teachers, and assignments. I had a wonderful time in Advanced Developmental Psychology, discussing everything from sexism to racism, coming of age and racism. In Contextualization I had the great opportunity to put together a Tithing project to encourage the 400+ graduating seniors at Wheaton to make a commitment to tithe 10% of their income once they started “real” life after graduating. I audited Sociology of the Family with Dr. McMinn, mostly because she is awesome and I had to at least one more class to take with her. I was still playing basketball on Saturday’s with the boys at Cook County. I helped Keane do a project about Roosevelt Road. Basically, we drove down about twenty miles of Roosevelt from Wheaton to Lake Michigan, interviewing people in the neighborhood every two miles and taking pictures as well.

on the beach
Saturday mornings for the last few feeks of school were spent talking with friends about what it means to be good stewards of our money and lives after graduation. The idea came from some good conversations during out amazing spring break trip to Florida. Some of the last Sundays we started having potluck’s with friends which was a absolute highlight of the year. Springtime found us losing the championship IM soccer game, but taking home a wonderful First place in IM Water Polo.

Me The Fine's
Graduating was nothing too exciting, but it was an absolute joy to have my parents and Mindy’s folks all come down for the occassion. We chilled at the apartment for a week or two longer and then it was out of Wheaton forever. Speaking of the apartment, second semester was our first time sharing our living space. Zach lived in the second bedroom of our two bedroom apartment during second semester. It was great to enjoy some community, and realize it really isn’t uncomfortable at all to share a bathroom, kitchen and living room.

We spent a tiny bit of summer with family and attending our friends, Joel and Mel’s wedding. Right after that we took the 10 hour drive down to Nashville, our new home. We crashed at Kris and Chip’s for a week while we looked for an apartment and a job. We quickly found our apartment just four short blocks from Godchaux hall where Mindy would be attending nursing school.

living room

I had high hopes that I would get a job at the Oasis Center, just blocks from our new apartment. That and a couple other close jobs didn’t work out until I scored the Life Skills Specialist position at Monroe Harding.

Megan, Nana and Mindy Yankees Game
Before we entered full time life in Nashville we took a little vacation. Mindy headed further south for some quality girl time with Megan and Nana. I headed to New York with Keane for some good ol’ brother bonding. The vacationing ended with a weekend in Wheaton with friends for Chris and Rebecca’s Wedding. Then it was back to Nashville for life to begin (all be it with a broken down car).

Chris and Rebecca VOGT!

Gorgeous bridesmaid car2
During our first weeks back we bought a new car (okay, new to us). We were renting out our second bedroom. We were hanging with folks from Mosaic. Life in Nashville was off to a good start.

vandy nursing student

My job was and has been very exciting. Some of the highlights have been Life Skills Jepordy, making a movie with the Parenting class, model cars, flag football, PG-13 players skits, and going to a High Rope Course. Still in the works are a book project, a rap workshop, web design, typing, and video classes, basketball, and maybe some sports tournaments. Mindy’s first semester included both difficult classes and very exciting clinicals. She’s made some good friendships and learned a lot of important things.
Some of the year end highlights included Mindy kicking some major butt on her finals, spending Christmas in Minnesota (and a lot more for Mindy), and some quality time with new friends.

A bit longer then you might have been looking for, but that’s the year for ya.

A short break

sorry for the short break.

I was in Minnesota with my wife’s family for the weekend. It sort of took me a little while to get back on track after getting back to Nashville.

I then got a little carried away and decided to upgrade to WordPress 2.0, which I’m not sure if I like it just yet, it seems a little too bulky. I wish I could downgrade but it doesn’t look like it’s gonna happen.

So as you can see the layout looks a little different, and i’ll probably change it again soon. Sorry about the dust.

Nervous at the airport

I’m sitting near the gate at the Nashville airport listening to some live jazz music, bouncing my foot to the beat. I’ve got my bags packed (carry on only) and I’m pretty confident there is nothing in my bag that would get me held up at security.
I just trimmed my goatee (to about an inch) so as not to look to “terrorist” like. Most people will probably laugh at that and to some degree I try to as well. I’ll be honest though, sometimes it makes me sad, other times it makes me nervous.
I find it sad that I feel the need to conform to a certain dress and look to avoid what I would consider nothing less then racial profiling. It’s okay with me cause I could care less about what I dress like and it doesn’t bother me much to trim my goatee. For many though their look is a big part of who they are, some for religious reasons, other for image, other for culture, the list goes on. I find that sad.
I also get a little nervous when going through security. Granted, nothing has ever happened to me personally; in fact I’ve been stopped less then most people I know, but I still get a little nervous. You remember what happened in London this past Summer? A Brazilian man, an innocent man, was shot dead in the subway. On a personal level, that sort of situation makes me nervous. I wonder if that sort of thing might ever happen to me; I don’t worry about it muchl but at a time like this, it is on my mind.

Interviewing myself

Okay, so this might be weird but I’m gonna try it. I’ve been doing a bit of podcasting as you know and I’m always looking for things to spark a podcast. So, I have come up with the idea of interviewing myself. I say interviewing because I think that train of thought would create the most podcastable talk from me. The basic format will be like a job interview or something along those lines. The other reason for this is that It will help keep me answering questions with the three minutes that I can record on Odeo.
I’m sure I’ll be able to come up with a handful of beginning questions, but I’d sure like some help coming up with others.

Got a question? Send it my way.

Dual monitors

So, it’s official I’ve got two monitors. I saw a friend with two monitors hooked up once, and I thought it would be cool to tryout.
Anyways, I found a guy giving away a free monitor and I picked it up on my way home from work. And now here I am, dual monitoring it up.

Now I just have to figure out how best to utilize the space. It’s great for web design and people like me who like having a lot of windows open at once (ask my wife).

For those who have a second monitor check out this program.