Depending on where you live in the country, you may or may not have any knowledge about Chinese superstition with respect to numbers. . I’ve got a passing understanding of it, which is why real estate ads like these (which I just tore out of the morning paper) strike me as intended for Asian buyers here in the SF Bay Area.
Slope of Hope Blog Posts
Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.
Taking The Good with the Bad
I suppose it’s a symptom of being the youngest-born child in my family, but I’ve always had a special fondness for Christmas. Now don’t get me wrong – – I can’t stand the consumerism, and I’d gladly forego the entire getting-and-giving-of-gifts for the rest of my life. And yet there are some sustained pleasures of the season which I wanted to consider as we approach December.
Sturgeon’s Law still holds sway, however, as i does everything in this life, so there is no shortage of awfulness to deal with at the same time. I have, over the many years of this blog’s tenure, written many times about various cultural artifacts of the holiday season, but I thought there would be no harm in sharing a few more off-the-cuff thoughts. This time, in the interest of balance, I wanted to propose five favorite things about the holidays and an equal number of baddies. We’ll start with the good stuff. (more…)
Tower Records
When I was growing up, Tower Records was the place to be. I would spend just about every weekend there. Sadly, the company shuttered over a decade ago, but I stumbled across an absolutely marvelous documentary. For those of you who get Amazon Prime Video, it’s free, and I’m sure it’s elsewhere too. If you were a Tower kid, or if you like business documentaries, I cannot recommend this movie more highly.
Life in a Minor Key
Preface: I’m quite aware what happened with Doha; I’ve been following it every second; but I thought we’d all just take a break from market talk until Monday’s regular open.
It’s obvious that music is a big part of the lives of Slopers, as it is one of the most frequently-shared and discussed items in the comments section. There is no shortage of posts specifically about music, and I thought I’d add another.
When I was in high school and college, a question I’d invariably ask a person I just met was what kind of music they liked. It was, for me, somewhat of a litmus test, just as effective as glancing at the contents of their bookshelves. The worst answer was along the lines of, “I like anything, as long as it’s got a good beat and I can dance to it.” Such an answer assured me I would never want to talk to this person again.
