Taxes

Today was the first day of tax season for us. It did not go smoothly, but we muddled through and hope that the IRS and our tax software program get their act together soon.

Men's Tennis

Novak Djokovic showed yesterday that he is still number one. He beat Nadal in the longest grand slam final ever played. It was almost 6 hours. It was his third major victory in a row and all were against Rafa. That's pretty impressive as Nadal has a will to win that keeps him fighting for every point.

Women's Tennis

There is a new number one women's tennis player today. Victoria Azarenka clobbered Maria Sharapova in the finals at the Australian Open to take the title and the top spot. The match only lasted 1 hour and 22 minutes, and Azarenka won 12 of the last 13 games.

Republican Race

I hate to keep posting about the Republican race for the nomination, but that's the big news story. (It also beats talking about Demi Moore's hospitalization.) In any event Mitt Romney went on the attack in last night's debate. No more mister nice guy for him. Plus Bob Dole, a former presidential candidate, absolutely slammed Newt in an open letter. He said that "it is now time to take a stand before it is too late" and "'Hardly anyone who served with Newt in Congress has endorsed him and that fact speaks for itself." Tough words, now let's see if they make a difference on Tuesday when Floridians go to the polls.

Gabby Giffords

Gabrielle Giffords officially resigned from Congress yesterday to focus on her recovery. There wasn't a dry eye in the House as her resignation was read, and in a rare show of unity, her border security bill was passed unanimously.

Oscar Nominations

I used to be a movie junkie. I went all the time, but not any more. There are no theaters in my town, and the prices have gotten too high. I do follow them, however, so the announcements yesterday were still big news to me. No surprise to see Meryl Streep nominated again. She's clearly the greatest actress of her generation.

Tax Returns

Mitt Romney finally released his tax returns and they showed that he made over $41M in 2010 and 2011 and paid over $6M in tax. That's about 14%. Considering that it's primarily from dividends and capital gains, that's reasonable, as they are capped at 15%. Not a bad deal, but also the reason why the tax code was attacked by Warren Buffet.

News Stories

There were lots of big news stories this weekend. Newt Gingrich won the SC primary. There were tornadoes in the South. The Patriots and the Giants won their conference titles and will play in the Super Bowl. Maybe the most significant one, however, was the passing of Joe Paterno, the legendary football coach at Penn State. He was one of the greats.

The Weather

Winter weather is usually a topic of much debate around here with all the bad storms that we get. This year however has been virtually snowless, so there hasn't been much to talk about. Thus today's snow is relatively big news. It started about 7:30 am and should last all day. Nobody likes shoveling the stuff, but it will be nice to have it look like winter for awhile.

South Carolina Primary

Yesterday was a wild one in Republican politics. Rick Santorum was declared the official winner of the Iowa caucus by 34 votes. Rick Perry dropped out of the race (no great loss there), and they had a heated debate. The picture has certainly changed dramatically in the last few days. It looked like Romney might win 3 in a row, and now he might be 1-2. Anyway the voters will decide tomorrow.

Australian Open

Most of the tennis professionals really enjoy playing here. The fans are friendly and the atmosphere is more relaxed than the other majors. One player however was definitely not happy yesterday. Marcos Baghdatis was losing his match when he sat down during one of the crossovers. At which time he took his racket and smashed it to the ground until it was in pieces. Usually one hit to the ground is sufficient, but he didn't stop. In fact he didn't stop at one racket. He took another one out of his bag and smashed that one to the ground. I've never seen that before, but he still wasn't done. He did it again and again for a total of four rackets obliterated. Talk about a sore loser. It wasn't the racket's fault that he got beat.

Laptop Memory

You learn new things every day and yesterday I learned how to replace the memory in the laptop I use to do taxes. It runs a little slow and I thought maybe more RAM would speed it up. I already knew how to replace memory in desktops, but not laptops. Well YouTube had two videos showing how to get access. I even tried it, and it was actually pretty easy once I knew how.

Back to Politics

The Republicans had another debate in South Carolina, and all the candidates took potshots at Mitt Romney. No big surprise there. He's the front runner and has a big lead. Thus he should win easily, but he still doesn't have a very strong following. He's ahead primarily because there isn't a viable alternative. All the remaining conservatives have major flaws and are splitting the vote.

New York Giants

I hate to post about football two days in a row, but the Giants beating the Packers yesterday was huge. The Packers had only lost one game this year and were playing at home. The win was similar to their victory over the Patriots a few years ago in the Super Bowl. You've got to give the Giants a lot of credit.

New England Patriots

All the football fans in Boston are very happy this morning because the Pats clobbered the Denver Broncos last night. No miracles from Tim Tebow. It was all about Tom Brady. He was great and the team looked terrific.

Ship wreck

Terrible news about the luxury liner running aground near an island in Italy. Everybody on board must have been terrified. The good news is that most survived. Now we wait to find out why the ship was so far off course. The captain has some explaining to do.

Rained out

We had a nasty day yesterday with heavy rain and high winds. Fortunately it wasn't cold enough to snow or we would have had a terrible blizzard. Today will be more of the same, so I'm staying home.

New Hampshire Results

Mitt Romney is now two for two with a convincing win yesterday in the NH primary. It's the first time any non-incumbent Republican candidate has ever won both. Now it's on to South Carolina. In some respects that will be his first big test. In Iowa it was all about organization and resources. In NH he had the "home court" advantage. Now he has all the conservatives attacking him relentlessly. Plus he has another huge disadvantage. He's from the North. SC is a very southern state and they hate Yankees. It should be interesting.

New Champs

Congratulations to the new college football champions: Alabama. They beat LSU last night 21-0 to win their second title in three years.

Unemployment

As announced yesterday the unemployment rate fell to 8.5%. It's lowest level in 3 years. Is this a trend or just a spike from seasonal temporary hiring? Is the economy finally recovering? Of course nobody really knows, but at least it's a good sign.

Ballroom Dancing

If you are interested in what's happening in ballroom dancing on the Cape, check out Ellen's Dancing on Cape Cod blog (www.capecodsocialdance.blogspot.com).

Good cause

The Monument Beach Polar Club had its 15th annual New Year's plunge to raise money for the Bourne Friends Food Pantry. The water temperature was a balmy 40 degrees this year, but that's still pretty chilly. I volunteer at the food pantry and considered doing it, but fortunately I had an excuse: a bad cold.

Iowa Results

Romney and Santorum basically tied for first, so they are both very happy. Meanwhile Perry and Bachmann may have to drop out. That's what Iowa does. It rarely picks the winner (final party nominee), but it always eliminates some candidates and narrows the field.

Go Ducks

Oregon won the Rose Bowl last night for the first time in 95 years in the highest scoring game ever played. I'm not sure how much respect they will earn with those "eye-catching" uniforms, but they won.

Nudism

This site is not primarily about nudism, but I thought that I'd post about it since the title does contain the word "naked". Most Americans are prudes. They are shocked by any view of the naked body and equate nudism with sex. It is considered evil and obscene. In some places merely sun bathing nude in your own backyard can get you arrested and labeled a sex offender. Meanwhile nudists simply choose their lifestyle for relaxation, stress relief, positive body image, and increasing self-esteem. Self-esteem is enhanced in the nudist world, where body acceptance is the norm. A one day respite spent clothes-free seems to relax people more than an entire weekend elsewhere. Without clothes, stress seems to melt away as they enjoy the comfort of the freedom from clothes. Why this is bad is beyond me.

Good Deal

I just read an article about the new head of Chrysler, Sergio Marchionne. He has done a remarkable job. Sales were up 25% in 2011, and they have paid off the bailout loan from the US (with interest) 6 years early! Thus we saved jobs and made money. Plus the merger of Fiat and Chrysler looks like a very good fit. That's a good deal.