GAME05

During Police Academy someone asked a detective if she watched COPS. She said she did at first but now it was like turning on the tv only to be right back at work. I still like those shows, though. Especially Appalachian Outlaws because the locations are a 20-minute drive for me. BTW, you touch the back of the car for two reasons: One, because if you get killed your prints are on the car, and two: to check that the trunk is shut in case of ambush. I'd play Reno 911 24/7 if it ever came to Netflix.

Well, I'm about finished with the book Rule #1 by Phil Town. The first 30 pages of the book is a lot of "Only 15 minutes per week! Make money guaranteed!" and the usual bad salesman nonsense. Common sense says none of that is true, as with the example he gives of a couple buying a stock conveniently at a low point, selling at all the peaks, and repeating. But to his main points, I like the approach to evaluating a stock for the long term, what to look for and how to value a stock based on those numbers. Ideally, Town requires 10, 5, 3 and one-year numbers in EPS, Sales, Equity, Cash and ROI in order to look at the moat of a business. He notes that having less than this increases the risk and lessens probability. I won't be in a position for many months yet to be buying anything, but I was spending a long time this morning just going to many different sites and at least trying to find those numbers. I could find five-year, and Fidelity had 8-year numbers on AAPL, but 10-year numbers are all locked behind paywalls. But I found a blog post which mentioned many public libraries have subscriptions to Morningstar's Premium services. And sure enough, it looks like my parent's home library does, and offers it from home computers using the card number. So check your local library and see if it does and not pay $30/month. Town also has you look up Future EPS Growth Rate and Estimated Future PE (along with current EPS, which is easy to find). I haven't attempted to look for those yet. Once I finish Rule#1, I think I'll pick up The Manual of Ideas by John Mihaljevic and Active Value Investing by Vitaliy N. Katsenelson

The Good Place--very engaging storyline. The Season One finale was a great ending. I thought it dipped a little bit the next season, but it's picked up again. Superior Donuts--Ever have one of those shows you watch but don't know why? One you fully recognize is garbage but for whatever reason you still use it as a time-killer? Don't get me wrong, if you haven't seen it yet, don't bother. Baskets--It's a good show, though I haven't bothered with the last couple of seasons for some reason. Bob's Burgers--The best comedy on tv. The characters really grow on you. Fresh off the Boat--It's a decent show. The Last Man On Earth--I hated the first season apart from the finale, but since then it's been really good. I haven't liked many of these current Mexican house episodes, but all in all it's been really good. To a degree they're stuck trying to have celebrity episodes to boost ratings and try not to get cancelled, when the writers would otherwise be moving the story forward more.

Can someone correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't there an exception to the early withdrawal penalty of a Roth IRA in order to purchase a house? I've finished paying my total debt, but don't yet have enough to start investing with. So I'm devouring investment books and also trying to figure out just where to put my savings. Challenging part is I'll retire somewhere between 55-60, so not old enough to start pulling from an IRA, but I'm currently in work housing, so I'll need to rent/buy a place to live. Also thanks for the advice Nate82. I think as I learn more I'll become more confident in how to do things myself along with how to do it that I suppose I wouldn't really need an analytics tool to do what I should be able to do myself. Plus if I don't know how to do it myself I shouldn't be using a tool to self-invest in the first place and at that point an Index fund would be the better option. Buffett has said "You should invest as if you can only do 20 trades in your entire lifetime," so I don't plan on being crazy-active buying and selling in the first place. And just to have it posted, here's a link to Buffett's annual letters to his shareholders, which are all a must-read and included the one written last week: http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/letters.html

My folks rent out their second house when they're not there. They pay to have it listed on a site, pay for the property manager, and pay for the cleaning lady to come in after. For the most part it pays the monthly mortgage but isn't any real profit-earner. I'd also imagine the insurance is pretty steep since you've got to replace damaged furniture. I think if I were going into property, it would be purchasing a larger plot of land to hunt on, camp, and for firewood. You take the hit from the property taxes but the value increases as nearby towns grow larger. I see rental property as one of those things where it isn't much of an investment if I can't somehow add value to it, myself, whether that's from knowing how to fix things yourself or other tricks to avoid higher costs. ---------------- I was looking at the stock analyzer Old School Value yesterday. Not cheap at somewhere around $30/mo, but I think when I start being able to put real money away per month, that would really help me to figure out stuff like the Graham Number without near as much work. My usual route is to start with DataRoma, find some interesting recent buys, and then analyze those myself. The downside to it is I lose some time in waiting to see what the Superinvestors have done instead of noticing something right away on my own, but the upside is I'm letting smarter people than me make the initial decision, and I think that's still an overall plus.

One of Charlie Munger's basic rules for investing is not to invest in an industry you don't understand, so that pretty much puts me out of Bitcoin. I could see it succeeding if the dollar starts to fail as the world's standard currency, but I'm not betting my own money that that's going to happen anytime soon. My father made a pretty quick $1k off of SiriusXM. I don't think he has much faith in it long-term, but it's one he seems to keep an eye on and just noticed it was undervalued.

I've also heard Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare has a great single-player campaign. I actually own the game but haven't played the single-player yet. I've played the campaign for Black Ops III and it wasn't anything special. But you've got older iterations like Ghosts which you could probably get for a decent price. --------- I brought my Playstation VR machine home for Christmas and it was pretty fun to see the reactions people had to it. Everyone thought it was pretty neat and a lot of funny moments. I went into YouTube and loaded up some VR roller coaster videos and my brother had the idea that we should all stand up and watch it. It wasn't easy to keep your balance.

TooLiveBrew, you may also want to check out Battlefield1 and maybe Battlefield4. BF1 is a WW1 shooter. I used to play COD but I wasn't any good and didn't like the insults with the online community. With Battlefield, kill/death rate isn't crucial and certain classes get a a good amount of points for helping teammates. If you want to see how a game plays, download Twitch (free). I know I mentioned it earlier in the thread, but see Captain Shock's youtube videos if you're into Call of Duty. Great for strategy and map awareness which will definitely help your kill/death rate.

I have a lot of job-bouncing on my resume, too. At one interview the guy looked at it and said "You sure have a lot of jobs here, but I can see they're all working toward something and you're advancing." I think that's appropriate if you've got a lot of jobs and the direction I'd take with explaining. You've bounced around because you're working toward something, every new job was some kind of advancement toward that goal, and it just so happens that this job I'm interviewing for is my end-goal. So you'd still be able to talk about sticking around even though your history doesn't show it. But I totally agree with nate82, loyalty isn't a factor anymore. Companies no longer see layoffs as a last resort and won't hesitate letting someone go, so employees coming and going is only fair. Like telling your wife you really enjoy going clothes-shopping with her, "I could see myself retiring here" is just one of those things you're expected to say but everyone involved knows it's a lie.

That comment really stuck out to me. I don't know how many people could really say that about their job. When you talked about your current job you went right into what you like about it and didn't really mention any negatives. When you started talking about the new job the first things you listed were the negatives. I get it if the pay raise represents a significant boost to your lifestyle, but if it's not enough to make for any real change, I doubt you'll be factoring that into your "Did I make the right choice" decision later on. You mentioned neither job is in your long-term future. Do the new and additional duties of the new job make you more marketable for your future career? SuperCollector makes a good point about the money, which would make the decision come down to additional job responsibilities and how much those are worth vs. a job you already enjoy. And if neither company is permanent, how much can those new duties really be worth? The other option, though not always wise to do, is if you really start to lean toward the new position, present the option to your current boss and use it as leverage to get another benefit. Maybe it's a slight raise, or maybe you can ask them for more tuition help to cover (in some part) classes which would benefit you in your next career.

I was up 38.5% with a stock. Then they had a cash merger and I lost $1.73 in total. I'd been hoping to pay off my student loans within two years, but life happened and I'm still a year away. Pretty anxious, as any delay costs me a lot of compound interest. I may be a year away.

"It's Back" would be my vote.

I don't want to say exactly since I'm in a law enforcement position, but I'm in the Southeast, moving from a flat park to a mountain park. There's some things I miss about my old job already. It sounds lazy because it is, but you were either 100 mph or 0, and the 0 meant long lunch breaks when it's slow, parking it at home if it was raining, or four-hour "lunch breaks" in the off-season. Not too much law enforcement here, which means everyone gets busy with projects year-round and is pretty hard-core about it. I no longer have the option of leaving late because I neglected to make coffee. There can be a lot of good to no real supervision or training, or anyone looking over your shoulder. But that does make professional growth a lot slower, which is ultimately why I moved.

I got my transfer. Looks like I'll be moving. This is actually a demotion, but I believe having an additional supervisor will help me in the long run, at least professionally. This park is heavier on search and rescue than law enforcement, such as looking for lost hikers until 2am. More maintenance work, which I like, though more teaching classes, which I won't like. But a lot of hiking trails around me, which suits me. Currently the best trails are 45 minutes away. And I'm now 3 hours away from a good friend of mine, as opposed to 6 hours, which should hopefully mean a lot more visits. Pretty happy. I think this is a good move for me.

The Jimmy Show Sexy Beast Dummy

Had an interview in order to transfer to a different park. It's actually a demotion but with no pay change. I think my chances are pretty decent, but of course it's not up to me and I don't know a thing about any other applicants. Every other police department has what's called a Field Training program--you get sworn as an officer, but you assist an experienced officer for a long time to learn the ropes and how to do things. My agency doesn't have that and it's hurt my professional growth. The demotion gives me more immediate supervision, which I believe I will benefit from. Right now I'm in a more independent position, so if I make a mistake it's not noticed and rectified until the proverbial fan gets dirty. And when it's other people having to step in and make the corrections, it's a good time to reassess. Yesterday, hearing "We tried to tell you to do X, Y and Z, but it didn't get done" cements that a move is a good idea. I don't ignore suggestions, but they either weren't done appropriately or completely (not necessarily related to law enforcement actions), and more immediate supervision should help resolve that.

Been thinking more about transferring to a different park. There's things I like here, though. But I don't appear too popular (work-wise, not personality wise) and I'm a little tired of everyone quickly getting really quiet when I walk into the office. There's a couple places I've wanted to go to, though they don't have openings often and transferring is based on seniority (and I don't have terribly much). But others open up fairly often and of course they come with their plusses and minuses.

Normally I wouldn't touch bitcoin but I recently heard something about China opening up to the possibility of allowing internet currency. http://finviz.com is a good stock screener. http://www.ruleoneinvesting.com/podcast That's a link to the podcast I like the most. The idea is that he's a successful value investor (more long-term than short) hosting with his daughter, who plays the part of the novice investor and asks questions. It's good beginner stuff, though not insultingly simple at all. I'd mentioned dataroma before, but here's a link: http://www.dataroma.com/m/home.php http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/letters.html These are also good reads. Warren Buffet writes an annual letter to his shareholders, which he makes public.

Yeah. Pension pays 2/3 of what I make now, plus an extra benefit which basically pays social security from when I retire until 65 years old. My only 401k right now is that I get 5% of my salary (as a bonus, not taken from) put into that. I'm in work-supplied housing right now, which is why I'll need a place to live after retirement.

I don't expect I'll ever have that much tied up in IRAs because I'll be retiring at 54 and as soon as I do I'll be needing to buy a house/condo/apartment.

I agree with you in a sense. I definitely would make more money in the long term by investing additional money and not being in a rush to pay off the loans. Even at a modest return I'd calculated about $800 more that I'd make with investing to the point my loans were paid. But I decided that being entirely debt-free is worth more than $800 to me. I'll still check out the calculator you posted and see if my own figures were about right, though. Thanks.

This should be a fun thread. I'm slowly getting into investing since I've finally found a job. It's partly to feed my gambling itch and partly because 401Ks don't tend to beat the market and so I want to do a lot of it myself. I have 5% going to a 401K (I either use that or get nothing at all, so obvious choice) but want to focus on paying off my school loans before I start putting a lot in each month. Rule #1 Podcast is a good place to start to learn about basics and terms. It's focus is value investing and not a lot of short-term moving around. I also use this Graham Number Calculator: http://dqydj.com/graham-number-calculator-for-stock-ticker-you-enter/ I also use Dataroma.com a lot. Any fund worth $100M+ is required to list their buys and sells with the SEC quarterly. It doesn't hurt to just do whatever Charlie Munger is doing, but I tend to look for people who don't move that much around, look for something whose value hasn't changed significantly since the person purchased it, make sure it's in an area I understand, and do my own research on it. A UNLV study was actually done on this covering about 30 years' time--they bought the stocks that Warren Buffet bought on the day it became publicly known at the worst price that day, and then sold it when the sell became publicly known at the worst price that day, and that still resulted in an average 25% gain per year.

How does shareplay work? I have never done it. I've never done it, either. But as I understand so long as one person owns the game and has PS Plus (at least I think they have to have PS+), you connect with another person who doesn't have to own the game and they can play it. You're booted after an hour, but you can just re-connect and get another hour. But maybe someone who has done it before could correct me on it. My online name is "mattresspad". https://www.playstation.com/en-in/get-help/help-library/apps---features/share-and-broadcast/share-play-on-ps4-and-how-it-works/

stoutdude, maybe we'll have to set up shareplay so you can try out Battlefield for a while. Black Ops III was my first COD game and I got a bit sick of the jumping around, too. I've seen videos of BOIII people making it all the way around a map without ever touching the ground. A friend of mine will only ever play Call of Duty. Refuses any other game, I guess because he's good at COD and pretty bad at anything else, as if anyone cares how good he is or not. But if anyone plays a lot of Call of Duty and is looking to get better, I highly recommend Captain Shock's youtube videos. The simple/cheap game my friends and I are addicted to is BlazeRush. A lot of fun as a couch multiplayer game.

I didn't see a thread dedicated to video games in the search, so maybe it would be one of some interest for reviews or comments or whatnot. I got a PS4 a year ago after a long time of not playing. I'm certainly not any kind of big gamer, but there's really nothing to do around my town, so it fits as a good time-killer. Plus one or two co-workers come over after work and play, so it's helped socially. I've played a lot of Call of Duty, but just a few days ago I've become hooked on Battlefield 1. It's more intense, the graphics are far better, and I especially like that you can be a contributor to your team without necessarily getting a lot of kills. I'm marginal-to-bad on Call of Duty, but so far I'm middle of the pack in BF1, which for me is great. I've also been trying to play Dirt Rally. Bought a wheel for it and everything, but still haven't figured out the best settings for it. Still fun, though.