Back to the grindstone. Let’s shake off that holiday cheer and spread opinions like COVID at a Sturgis Motorcycle Rally.
Remember when one-way grocery aisles were going to save us from COVID? I’m not sure that worked. Remember when riots were ok, but motorcycle rallies were not? COVID mitigation was a very complicated mix of rules and regulation.
Anybody heard from the plexiglass industry? You gotta think their sales are down a bit, plexiglass can’t help those monkeypox cases. But again, I’m certainly no expert on monkeypox.
The Monday holiday after the Sunday New Year’s Day is the most awkward day in the history of mankind. People just milling round, not knowing what to do, mostly trying to avoid family, but still with family.
I don’t do New Year’s Eve. Gave it up a couple of decades ago. I’m a random Thursday night party kind of guy, so anything that ends with “bash” is not my style. Considering that, I treated the wife to quite a New Year’s Eve with a trip to the Dwight Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, Kan.
I know, romantic, right? I wasn’t born with this swag; it took me a few years to develop it.
Anyway, it’s a perfect day trip from Kansas City. Except for the fact that it is located in Kansas, I thought it was a good experience. Eisenhower never forgot his roots, despite the fact he left and never again lived in the area. The only house that he owned was in Gettysburg, Pa. His boyhood home still sits in the same location. Originally located on a little over two acres, they have acquired another 20 acres around it and he and his wife, Mamie, and a young son who died when he was three are all laid to rest there.
I’m sure many of you know more about Eisenhower than I do, but the most interesting tidbit I gleaned from the tour is how he sure married right. His wife was the daughter of John Doud, who retired in his 30’s after owning meat packing plants. His generosity to his daughter and son-in-law helped them weather many a struggle that might have prevented Eisenhower’s rise to fame.
Anyway, if you want to impress your significant other, load her up in the car and take her to Abilene, trust me.
Like many of the people from that time period, especially servicemen, Eisenhower smoked like a fiend. Some reports indicated that as D-Day approached he was downing 25 +/- cups of coffee and five or six packs of smokes a day. Lol. You guys thought it was dangerous having old men in charge of the nuclear football, yet the guy that planned the storming of the beaches of Normandy was all jacked up on caffeine and nicotine.
Interesting to note the that the 22-acre library site is a no tobacco, no COVID zone, caffeine still allowed.
In other news, President Eisenhower reportedly died of heart failure.
Been nerding out on some housing stats. The wave is coming, folks. The coasts always lead these things. At the peak of the most recent housing boom in San Francisco, the prices were up 43.3%. As of the most recent data available, the prices are down 27.6%. When you figure in inflation over that time period, the entire housing boom has almost been erased in that area.
Another interesting take is the number of realtors during housing booms. In 2007 the number of realtors topped out at about 1.37 million. It dropped to below one million in 2013 and steadily increased to over 1.6 million in 2022. That’s definitely more anecdotal type data, but when placed in context of what is happening across the country it’s easy to see that we are in for an interesting and challenging 2023 when it comes to housing.
(Guy Speckman can be reached at gspeckman@me.com or ripping cigs at the Eisenhower library)