BEAR WARNING

In the late afternoon today I received a studio-wide e-mail from facilities warning employees about reports of a bear wandering near the campus. Our studio was built on forested land and the back portion of the campus is next to undeveloped land with nature trails that people use. It was this trail area that the bear was originally spotted, which makes sense since it would be familiar to the bear. The warning told employees to stay out of the trails and that general area until further notice. On sunny days, like today, it’s common for some employees to take a quick walk through some of the trails for a break.

I’d never heard of a bear in this area before so I wasn’t sure of the veracity of these sightings today. It turns out there was indeed a bear in the area. News reports and video from an area adjacent to the studio show the bear in a tree. Conservation officers had to tranquilize the bear and take it away. There have been no reports about what they’ll do with it. Crazy!

WHOOPS

On the weekend I inadvertently jetlagged myself by staying up until 5am both on Friday and Saturday nights (or more correctly Saturday and Sunday morning). I’ve been playing The Last of Us Remastered on PS4 and I was near the end. The gameplay and narrative are thrilling, which made me want to play on for hours at a time. I would get to the next segment of the game and I said to myself I would quit here but then I wanted to know what would happen next, so I played on. Before long, I could hear birds chirping outside and the sky started to get light again. That the sign I really need to get to bed.

Unfortunately, I did this two nights in a row, which most likely has moved my body clock to want to sleep as the sun rises. As I need to go to work Monday morning, I bet I’m going to feel pretty crappy tomorrow when I wake up. I don’t regret it though, I finished the game this evening and it is one of the best games I’ve played in my long years of playing games. I’d recommend it to anyone.

PROPERTY TAX 2017

I received my property tax notice in the mail yesterday. Paying your property tax is one of the joys in life. More so than other years, I was interested in seeing what the damage would be this particular year. If you’ve been following along, my apartment’s assessed value for this year jumped about 20% from last year, bringing it to its highest assessed value ever. There’s a common belief that your property tax is somewhat tied to your property’s assessed value. This isn’t necessarily true and every municipality calculates their taxes in slightly different ways.

A few weeks ago, I went onto my local municipality’s web site where they had a property tax estimator. I entered in all my info and the number that got spat out wasn’t too bad. Still, this was only an estimate and the real number came in yesterday. To my delight, the property tax I have to pay this year is the second lowest amount ever. Three years ago, I paid over $300 more than I will this year.

At least for my municipality, this does prove that your home’s assessed value cannot predict your property tax with any degree of accuracy.

OFF THE WAGON

I’ve been trying to eat healthy (for realz) for the last two years now. Sometimes I fail here and there but for the most part, I try real hard to make the right choices.

For some reason, last week, I fell off the wagon a bit. On Tuesday, I had poutine for the first time in months. Not only was it just poutine but poutine with chunks of chicken strips tossed in hot sauce. It was so good. Then on Wednesday, I had pizza for dinner. On Thursday, I found a coupon for A&W and had a teen burger with onion rings for dinner. While I was ordering, I saw a sign that told me A&W was now offering blueberry turnovers. I could resist, so I got one of those as well. Then on Friday, for the start of the long weekend, a friend and I split a bucket of ten pieces of fried chicken for dinner.

You could say last week was a bit of a binge week. I’m over it now though and I pledge to eat healthy once again. Tomorrow, I am having a salad for lunch and then choose a sensible dinner. Did I mention that the A&W turnovers are dusted with cinnamon sugar?

AH LONDON

One year ago I was in London, having an amazing time. It’s difficult to believe it was that long ago. I remember my trip with fond memories and dream of the day when I can return once again.

It was on this trip that I discovered the joy that is the full English breakfast. Such a breakfast is not common here in Vancouver and I would love to find a convenient establishment that would offer that on their menu. I shall dream tonight about eggs, beans, bacon, sausage, toast, and that grilled tomato.

LONG WEEKEND

Usually long weekends take me by surprise and I realize very late into the week that I don’t have to show up for work on Monday. This long weekend, however, is something I’ve been looking forward to since the previous weekend. I’m very tired and feel kinda run down for the last several weeks. It’s mainly due to my lack of sleep during the weekday. I gotta do a better job of going to sleep earlier.

Anyways, tomorrow is Friday and I can’t wait for the long weekend to start. May you all have a pleasant end to the week.

GREAT TIMING

Late last year I envisioned that a Trump regime would send the global financial markets into turmoil. I was so worried about this that I actually sold off many of the mutual funds and stocks that were in good standing. My thinking was that I would be foolish not to realize those gains and solidify them to insulate myself against turmoil.

It didn’t surprise me that the Trump regime wasted no time in doing or attempting to do terrible things. What did surprise me was how Wall Street wasn’t phased by any of this. The markets didn’t even wobble when the Muslim ban came into effect. There was barely a blip when they tried to repeal the ACA healthcare bill. The DOW marched towards 21K even as the National Security Advisor was fired.

I was thinking nothing could phase Wall Street as stocks kept on going higher and higher. Perhaps yesterday I was proven wrong. On the news that Trump asked now-fired FBI Director Comey to drop the investigation into much maligned NSA Flynn, Wall Street appeared to finally been spooked. Markets experienced a pronounced decline, as the DOW lost almost 400 points.

On a personal note, the timing of this is just the sort of luck I have or the lack thereof. The first batch of my restricted stock units vest in exactly one month. I won’t be a millionaire or anything but the number of shares vesting isn’t trivial either. Note that the EA stock price cleared $100 USD for first time in history this month. Unfortunately, because of today’s downturn, my RSUs lost 6% in value in less than 24 hours.

Hopefully the markets will rally again before my shares vest next month but who knows what crazy news will come from the White House in the meantime.