Celebrities Archives - Lazy Man and Money

Welcome to Jack Johnson Week

April 24, 2017 by Lazy Man 1 Comment

This week I’m going to do something a little different. Don’t worry, we’ll still cover personal finance like we always do. I’ll just be covering some broader topics as well.

I’ve been wanting to write about Jack Johnson for some time. I had planned to simply write about his wisdom when it comes to personal finance and one other topic. However, it felt like writing about Michael Jordan and not mentioning basketball.

As this point, some of you may be thinking, “Who the heck is Jack Johnson?” The rest of you are probably thinking, “He’s that singer who sings that song from 2002.” (The song is Flake and the lyrics don’t don’t mention the title.)

I can’t imagine anyone is thinking, “Hey I need to read a week’s worth articles about this guy.”

Trust me, you do.

Why Now is Jack Johnson’s Time

There are two reasons why this is the perfect time for Jack Johnson Week.

This past Saturday was Earth Day.
While Jack Johnson is known for his music, he might be best described as an environmentalist who happens to play guitar. I’ll pay tribute to that tomorrow in a longer post.

Because saving the environment has oddly recently become a political issue in the United States, I feel it’s a great time to emphasize that we all benefit from things like clean water.
I’d like to recognize the amazing things that can some from a single person from an island in the Pacific.

I will be the first to admit that Jack Johnson comes off like a big hippie. What else would you expect from a former professional surfer/singer/acoustic guitarist/environmentalist? I’m sure his style isn’t for everyone, but I can appreciate messeages of sharing love. And as a father of a 3 and 4 year old, the message of sharing toys has been invaluable.

If this kind of stuff isn’t your thing, then I ask that you kindly check back next week.

Plan for Jack Johnson Week

Nothing is set in stone for this week, but here’s what I’m aiming for:

Tuesday: Jack Johnson on the Environment
Wednesday: Jack Johnson on Personal Finance
Thursday: Jack Johnson on Miscellaneous Topics. (This highly likely to change)
Friday: Jack Johnson on Something Different. (This is a bit of a surprise. A surprise that I don’t think even Jack Johnson could expect.)

Where Did the Idea for this Jack Johnson Week Come From?

I should make it clear that this isn’t an advertisement, but because I’m a big fan it may sound like one. He’s how I became a Jack Johnson fan in the first place. After all, five years ago that I was probably like you, a person who didn’t think twice about a one (or two) hit wonder from 15 years ago.

My fandom couldn’t have been more innocent. Our newborn loved this Curious George Opposites book. Back in 2013, I described it as one of the best frugal baby “toys”.

So with a background that our pre-toddler loved Curious George, it made sense to get the Curious George Movie.

That Curious George might be a top ten movie of all-time. It sounds crazy and if it is, then just blame it on me being sleep-deprived, new parent. I have rewatched more than 50 times… and not because the kids like it. (They did for the first 20 times and then they decided their father is crazy.)

Here are my Top 3 reasons why it is so good:

3. Drew Barrymore as a unique cartoon figure – Her character is an extremely intelligent teacher delivering the most insightful line of the movie. Also, from a male perspective, it’s refreshing to see her get a little tongue-tied talking to a man she has a crush on… and her self-effacing reaction for not doing better with the conversation. (Maybe it’s because I have been on the other side of that my whole life.) The illustrators made her physical appearance stand out, but not in an overly ridiculous way like Jessica Rabbit. Finally, Drew Barrymore’s voicing is just perfect for all the above.

2. Will Ferrell as The Man in the Yellow Hat – I am a huge Ferrell fan and I’d say this role might be one of his best. From the DVD extras it appeared he created much of the dialog and jokes… he wasn’t just lending his voice. It takes a special talent to keep a 2-year old and 40-year old entertained.

1. Jack Johnson’s music – Musicals are my wife’s thing, but I feel like the movie was a borderline musical. And why not? Kids love music! Every song does exactly what a good musical should do (IMO) which is “amp up” the emotion of the moment by 10x or 100x. There’s a reason why it was a best-selling soundtrack.

Jack Johnson’s music was so good that it bested a top comedian’s great performance and an iconic cartoon character (especially considering the limited screen time.)

(I’ve probably oversold the movie, but I came in low expectations. I love Office Space and Serenity for the same reasons.)

My wife bought that soundtrack. The last 4 or 5 songs are lullabies which are perfect for young kids (even better in a car!). I’ve been listening to many of his other songs on Amazon Prime via the Amazon Echo. Unfortunately the soundtrack isn’t available on Prime streaming. Fortunately, I’ve learn a lot from the other songs that are available on Amazon Prime.

That brings us full circle on why I’d have a Jack Johnson week.

I can identify with the lyrics and I feel he presents a positive message that we should all embrace.

The Genius of Weird Al Yankovic

July 23, 2014 by Lazy Man 2 Comments

For those who haven’t been disconnected from the world over the last couple of weeks, “Weird” Al Yankovic has been busy promoting his new album Mandatory Fun. It’s an ingenious promotional campaign where he put out new videos every day for over over a week.

Personally, the last thing I remember from him is Amish Paradise. That was nearly twenty years ago and it has been thirty years from his heyday in the 1980s. Everything is cyclical and Weird Al is showing that he still has some cheese on his fastball (to evoke my favorite Eckersleyism… hopefully the “weird” and you can see why he’s been successful.

I’ve been racking my brain for hours trying to come up with anyone who has done it better. I can’t think of anyone who has one of these:

This has got me thinking about the value of being an expert versus being good in a lot of little things. I find it very difficult to focus on one or two things. I know this may not surprise anyone given my previous cheese tangent, but sometimes I feel like I have a little ADD, switching from one thing to the next. I think I see more value in getting somewhat proficient in a new skill than trying to squeeze the last ounce of perfection in a current skill such as blogging.

I’ve often wondered about how this translates to my blogging in general. Regular readers know that I usually don’t take time to find an image and put it into article. In fact, and I hate to admit it, but I don’t proofread many of articles. While it’s easy to just say it’s “Lazy being lazy”, it’s really because I’ve got a lot of other things going on. These other “things” often contribute to the very thing that I think get people to read my articles. For example, looking for investment properties is not quick or easy. However, having been there and done it, I can confirm it is a lot of work… but it also can deliver a large amount of “relatively” passive income.

To bring this back to Weird Al, I wonder if he’s continually practicing his music to play better polka. My hunch is that he isn’t. I’m sure he’s continually trying to write better parodies and honing his craft there. I’d love to ask if he’s trying to squeeze the last ounce of comedic genius out of his brain or if he’s learning new skills because that’s of interest to him. My hunch there is that it is the former.

Kanye’s $120 T-Shirt vs. One Direction’s $2 Million Champagne

July 24, 2013 by Lazy Man 3 Comments

In the past week or so a couple of stories of celebrities and money caught my eye. I don’t usually write about celebrities (much less pseudo-celebrities who didn’t do anything for their fame), but every now and again it is worth taking a look for a little perspective.

The first story is about One Direction’s Liam Payne buying a $2 million bottle of champagne for his friend. Who hasn’t splurged a couple of million a good friend, right? The news story cited that he took home around 7.5 million (converting from pounds to dollars) last year. It seems like that was a gift of around 25% of his earnings, which is pretty sizable for anyone. Even worse, it’s not an asset as they drank it. Not since Montgomery Brewster mailed an extremely rare stamp has so much money been blown so quickly.

The other story that caught the attention was that Kayne West is selling plain white T-shirts for $120. If you are looking to get in on that, tough luck, they are already sold out.

When I first heard these stories, I had an idea to write an article asking the readers “Which is worse?” Now I see the stories as two very different things. Liam Payne’s decision seems to be a wreckless waste of his own money while Kanye seems to be simply maximizing his business potential and taking advantage of his fans (in my opinion).

As for the people themselves, I recently learned that One Direction is not same band as One Republic, and not at all related to the New Directions on the TV show Glee. I also don’t know much about Kanye other than his famous rant during Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech at an awards show.

Here’s what I do know. Macklemore needs to do a follow-up to Thrift Shop. The $50 Gucci T-shirt he raps about “getting tricked by a business” is a bargain compared to Kanye’s $120 t-shirts.

Justin Bieber Wants Teens to Bill Their Parents? It’s Not SpendSmart.

January 7, 2013 by Lazy Man 5 Comments

My boy is less than 4 months old, but if he was a different gender and maybe 13-14 years old, I’d be very concerned. There are no shortage of reasons that would make me want to Rapunzel her until she’s at least 28. (Yes, I’m talking about you Sexy Baby documentary.) Perhaps it would be wise to get into the tower building business.

And then there is Justin Bieber. He might actually be more popular than Jesus especially with that teenage female demographic.

Combine that popularity with a prepaid debit card with tons of fees and parents have a potential problem. Yes, Justin Bieber is going to offer his own “SpentSmart” prepaid card through BillMyParents.com. My wife jokes that she’s going to tell Little Man to go to IGotAJobToPayForIt.com or ICollectedCansAndSavedForIt.com when he gets older. She’s not really joking though as “Bill My Parents” is just not going to fly here.

The card appears to be anything but “SpendSmart.” Here’s a list of the fees (rounding up the nickels):

$3.95 monthly fee to have the card… which is around $50 a year. If you are loading $1000 on the card, and I think that’s extremely generous to give a kid that’s a ~5% annual fee
Loading charges of ~$3 from a credit or debit card and $0.75 from a checking or savings account. This discourages loading the card often with money, but that’s exactly what you’d want to do with a teen so that they don’t have access to $1000 at one time.
Lost card replacement fee of ~$8. I don’t know if I was a typical teenager, but I lost things fairly often, so I could see this adding up.
ATM charge of $1.50 to withdra the money, and 50 cents for a balance inquiry. So the card costs me money to carry with the annual fee, money to see how much I have there (at least at ATMs) and money to access the money (at ATMs). I’m sure this doesn’t cover the fees of the company that owns the ATM itself, so that’s a double hit.
An inactivity fee of $3 if the card isn’t used for 90 days. So even if I’m paying to carry the card, if I don’t use it, there’s a fee.

If you were going to get this card for your teenager and put $1000 total throughout the year in small regular increments, I could see it adding up to about $75 in fees or about 7.5%. If that sounds terrible, you’ve got a keen ear.

In BillMyParents.com’s defense they seem to build some good technology into the card that could actually help parents keep track of their child’s spending. Also, let’s be honest, Justin Bieber’s branding isn’t going to come cheap either.

I didn’t like Suze Orman’s pre-paid debit card. Few liked the Kardasian Kard with fees so high it was canceled due to consumer backlash. Even though some view the Beiber card as a “middle of the road” option for the pre-paid industry (see Lauren Saunders quote on the 3rd page of this Washington Post article), I don’t like it any better.

I don’t like the intentional mixing of emotion (Bieber) with high fees. I won’t even a get a Red Sox credit card, because their rewards are simply not competitive with other credit cards.

Spending a Million in a Weekend… or When Crazy Calls you Crazy

July 3, 2012 by Lazy Man 9 Comments

I was reading Peter King’s Monday Morning Quarterback yesterday and a little bit of personal finance slipped it way into what is the best weekly football read there is. Due to the summer off-season, the NFL slows down a little and Peter King took a vacation. Writing in his place was the Indianapolis Colts’ recent high draft pick from Stanford, Coby Fleener.

It is a very well-written article and in it Fleener goes into detail about the orientation the NFL has for rookies. What really caught my eye was that they got Adam “Pacman” Jones and Terrell Owens to talk on a stage to the rookies. This was a shining example of getting a pair to show players what not to do.

“Pacman” was the first defensive player taken in the 2005 draft and showed remarkable talent in two things, playing football and occupying the backseat of police cars. Repeated incidents, including a shooting, lead to numerous suspensions. When he got back on the playing field karma seems to have caught up with him in the form a couple of neck injuries that ended a season and slowed him down in another. He still seems to be playing football, which was a surprise to me. He’s certainly not a factor that opposing teams prepare anymore.

Terrell Owens is a little more well known. He had a very productive career, but one in which he had been traded or simply released many times because of disagreements with ownership. Many people witnessing his antics have concluded that’s bipolar.

With this background knowledge in mind, Adam “Pacman” Jones was telling rookies about the things that he regrets in his time in the NFL. Fleeney didn’t report on how many hours the talk went on, but at one point “Pacman” Jones “regretfully recounted spending $1 million in one weekend” and Terrell Owens turned to him and said, “Man, you crazy!”

For the first time in my life, I’ve heard what a crazy person thinks is beyond crazy. On the flip-side of things, I can’t imagine what “Pacman” Jones’ life was like. He estimated that 90 percent of his childhood friends in Atlanta are now either dead or in jail. I wish I could have connected with him and said, “Hey, here’s a chance to use that money to save some of those friends.” I’m betting that a few people tried to tell him that along the way, but he might not have listened. After all, it’s his money, and if he wants to go to the strip clubs and make it rain money, that’s his business. However, in just a few years he’s talking to the rookies telling them about how much he regrets spending that money.

Unlike many of my articles, I don’t have any practical advice here for the average reader. Unless your rich uncle Brewster puts you in the situation to spend millions, you and I will probably never see that. However, if you do find that situation, I suggest you put the money to good use. At the very least, set aside a few dollars for star NBA players who can’t afford lenses for their glasses. Also, please get Katy Perry some Ambien.