40th Birthday present.... which is approximately 7yrs and 9 months from now or 2,825 days from now.

You know how guys are supposedly bugged out when they are 40? This would be an awesome birthday present - amongst many other nice things of course :)

Cayman S Porsche Design Edition 1 for only between $69,900 to  $83,900K

I have a lot to be grateful for, and for me this "Thanksgiving" is a special one, especially with regards to family, friends, colleagues and all loved ones.

Give Thanks.

Check out these stories of scandals in the church.

1. Senate Investigation of 6 well know ministries, where the pastors are getting Private Jets and Rolls Royces -

_ Randy and Paula White of Without Walls International Church and Paula White Ministries of Tampa, Fla.;

_ Benny Hinn of World Healing Center Church Inc. and Benny Hinn Ministries of Grapevine, Texas;

_ David and Joyce Meyer of Joyce Meyer Ministries of Fenton, Mo.;

_ Kenneth and Gloria Copeland of Kenneth Copeland Ministries of Newark, Texas;

_ Bishop Eddie Long of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church and Bishop Eddie Long Ministries of Lithonia, GA.;

_ Creflo and Taffi Dollar of World Changers Church International and Creflo Dollar Ministries of College Park, GA.

Senate inquiry targets six televangelists - Politics- msnbc.com

Megachurch leader in mega-sized sex scandal

80-year-old Georgia man slept with brother’s wife, fathered her child

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21656821/

Nun pleads no contest in Wis. sex abuse case

Former school principal accused of sexual encounters with male students

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21760393/

This is truly one of those random thoughts posts.

1) I didn't go to church this Sunday, but I had church. Online baby. First was a worship session on Pandora. Then there was message from Sister McPherson (founder of foursquare church herself). Bible reading from Bible Gateway complete with commentary and amplified bible version. Evening service is going to be on Zune (my worship collection) and a message by Brother Sunday Adelaja.

Yes - I didn't go to church, but by golly, I had church even my Papa will be proud of in his CAC way.

Real Estate Valuation

In 2008, the Global Investment Performance Standards (GIPS) will require quarterly valuation of RE investment portfolio. I wonder if the recent implosion/flight to quality is preceding this. Additionally, we can expect to see more volatility is real estate valuation globally.

Costa Rica

I will be blogging about Costa Rica later on, but an observation I notice was that the country seems young. A fellow passenger that I commented to, thought it was because you tend to see the young up and about. I disagreed, and I was right I just confirmed my observation from the CIA world fact book. Median age in Costa Rica is 26.8 years. Compared to 36.6 years in the US and 18.7 years in Naija.

One more thing..

Before I forget, this has just been on my mind - "Everyman for himself, God for us all" - I read somewhere that realizing the truism of these saying is becoming mature? What do y'all think?

While I can see why someone will think that way, I am not sure it is true.

There is no smoke without a fire? Really? What about smoke-like fog?

What lessons can be drawn from China's spectacular and sustained economic growth?

As Hu Jintau remarked at the 17th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, the period since the previous Congress five years ago has been extraordinary. China's economic achievements have been arousing not only astonishment and admiration but also some anxiety.
In the past twelve months alone, The People's Republic of China (PRC) has overtaken Canada as the biggest source of imports to the USA, and overtaken the USA as the biggest source of imports to the European Union. Concern about the low level of investment in Africa has been displaced by concern about the effects of the high level of Chinese investment in Africa; there is now even anxiety about the effects of investment by Chinese state-owned firms into the Western economies.

The Chinese Communist Party is also expressing concerns. The themes of its 2007 Congress included protection of the environment and the achievement of social harmony. According to some estimates, China has displaced the USA as the world's biggest source of greenhouse gases. Inequality is rising as fast as pollution: China now has over 800 individuals with a personal wealth of more than a hundred million US dollars each, up from 500 in 2006; while the average income in rural areas of China is 480 dollars per year.

How China rises - 21st Century Socialism

There is really only one person who would understand this blog completely, I hope the person reads it.

As a college grad or maybe shortly before during my first corporate job - I had a distinct idea that although I may not know what I want to be,  I do know I don't want to be one of those drones or automations who take the 5.45am metro north train to New York City for the same job for 26 years.

In business school, this idea re-manifested itself as the "concept of middle management hell". This is like a lab rat running around in a wheel and not knowing why.

Currently, I am reading the book "the 4 hour work week by Timothy Ferriss" and I know that I am either on the verge of falling into this mindset or I have already, but there are several things that I am doing to avoid it.

A quote that capture it for me now is "The man who know how, will always have a job, the man who knows why, will always be his boss"

Now I need to discuss with a friend - for an intelligent and understanding viewpoint on this conundrum.

Starting with IRC back in the days, I was quite the chat champ. Wanting to write "bots" is actually what got me into programming. Now I haven't chat in years in face since MSN shut down the chat service and I don't have yahoo installed in my machine anymore, I simply stopped chatting. And this is is not IMing people I know, this is chatting with complete strangers and connecting.

I remember my old IRC and Yahoo chat friends  some taught me a lot about life and people and some I was an unpaid shrink for. All in all, it was good fun, coming home from work and looking forward to chatting with my virtual friends. Not to talk of the chat parties - man were those weird - Chicago and Columbus.

This is social networks before MySpace, so are people still chatting these days? And where so they do it these days?