about my views on the G7. I'm embarrassed to say that I don't have any well-formed views, but the question serves as a provocation for further exploration. Bill Cara recently opined that the Central Banks should not be independent of government. That comment, and MY WANTING to have an opinion on it, but my lack of knowledge found ME WANTING.
I have a meandering point, so bear with me......
I'm too cheap to hire people to clean my home or do my laundry. Both are really time consuming, and if you came to my home unannounced you'd see immediately that I don't spend much time there! But if you were an invited guest, my home would be pristine (though you'd be politely confined to the lower level) and you would be able to eat your dinner off the floor it would be so hygienic.
I don't watch much TV. If I'm home, though, I'll keep CNBC on in the other room while I'm engaged in other activities. When I do watch TV I fold clothes (it helps me feel like I'm not being a complete time-waster). In fact, I find folding clothes oddly therapeutic (it helps me recover from those oddly maudlin moments that Russell points out!). I even have one of those shirt folding contraptions that helps you get the T-shirts just so. It really does work.
One show that I enjoy is America's Test Kitchen on the public TV station. They test and modify many recipes as well as conduct tests on kitchen gadgets and taste various prepared foods. Yesterday it was refried beans that they were tasting. As all of the tested products were so bad, they felt compelled to come up with a recipe that you could make in 20 minutes with canned pinto beans.
It was a terrific inspiration, and as my husband loves refried beans, I made homemade chicken enchiladas, Mexican flan and the re-fried beans. The mole sauce for the enchiladas was homemade too, and nothing fills your home with such a tantalizing aroma as making that sauce! The meal was beyond delicious, but fairly labor intensive (I started with uncooked, whole chicken). But the dinner reflected the labor that went into it.
My point is simply this....as we expand our knowledge domains, we bump up against "stuff" that leads us a little further along. Banker's comment about the G7 as well as Bill Cara's comment about the need for central banking integration with government are two areas that I really don't know very much about. So I'll pursue that, and that better formed knowledge will make me a better investor AND a better world citizen, just as being inspired by a recipe makes me a better cook. [I would say that it will be interesting to watch how China is treated in the upcoming years and whether or not we have an advance of the number 7 to 8 or if someone gets kicked off the G-7 island! (1)]
Despite one's inspiration and perspiration to build anything of meaning (a meal, a portfolio, a business, a relationship), a careless moment can bring it down irreparably. Accordingly, vigilance must accompany all worthwhile endeavors.
(1) I make this remark having NEVER watched survivor NOR American Idol.
1 comment:
Isn't the G7 now the G8?
In any case asking what ones view is, is a little like asking ones view of NATO. Unless you are an anarchist, Marxist or some other person opposed to our current economic world order, you are not that likely to have much of a view.
The Central Bankers get together and talk to each other: OK.
It seems more like a matter of interest to a policy wonk.
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