TGIF

[shadowkat]

1. Discovered that the Crazy Org's headquarters in downtown Manhattan - it doesn't own. The owner is a corrupt Russian Taxi Cab Driver who won some money and invested in real estate, and is now a corrupt landlord. He owns the land and the lease. Crazy Org engaged in the most expense five year lease on a building in NY State History, and the reason they ended up in the building is a corrupt Senator accepted a $500,000 bribe. Breaking Bad told me that the Senator was nickname Senator pothole - because he'd collect 2% commission to collect payment to fix them. Crazy Org spent over 500 Million renovating the building.

Sigh.

Also, very important to check title - when buying anything. Who owns the land is important, as well as who owns the house, and what are the community zoning rules and regulations.

There was an office building in NYC that originally sold for $325 Million and in resale, went for $8.7 million (less than many apartments). But the land is still owned by a Real Estate Development Trust - who charges around $200-300 K a month.

Right now apartments (to buy) in Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens are going for $1.9 -2 M, and in Manhattan $4-10 Million.

This, my friends, is why I rent.

Owning a car in NYC ranges from $6-12 thousand a year, or in some estimates $1,000-1700 per month depending on where in the city you live.

Only reason to have one in NYC is if you like to drive out of the city on weekend excursions or weekly ones. If you don't? It's a waste of money and energy. The other reason? If you live on the outskirts of the city in the predominately residential areas such as Dyker Heights (and have a driveway or garage), Staten Island, Sheepshead Bay, basically anywhere south of Kensington and West of Flatbush Brooklyn and in most of Queens. People in those areas tend to have cars or take a lot of buses.

I live about as far as I can go without needing one, in a highly walkable area where I have five grocery stores, twenty restaurants, five pharmacies, even a T Mobile outlet within walking distance. Also I'm close to four subway lines, two huge parks (by huge, as big if not bigger than Central Park), bus lines, and numerous citibike outlets.

In short? I don't need a car. I also have trains to get pretty much anywhere and uber and lyft, and taxis.

2. Watching the Women's Gymnastics.

Co-worker stated that Simon was the World's Greatest Gymnast.

My response? For now.

It's temporary. And I'm willing to bet that in 20 years, we'll forget about her.

Also, you can't really compare to the previous gymnasts since the apparatus are completely different. They are different than the ones I had to use in the 1980s in gym. (I wish we had those apparatus and mats, ours were bloody dangerous in comparison. And not nearly that level of padding.)

Here's Mary Lou Retton on the Vault in the 1980s:



Here's Simon Biles in 2024 -



See? Hardly comparable. The old vault was a nasty piece of work, the new one is rather padded and lot easier. I was afraid of the vault in high school. And someone actually seriously injured themselves. This was the old vault - similar to what Mary Lou Retton had. No padding. Hard. With a wooden ramp. And not a lot of padding or matting around it. Everyone injured themselves on it - even professional athletes. Hence the upgrade.

The Horse or Vault resulted in a professional gymnast paralyzing herself in 1988 (See I was right to be afraid of it.)

That said, it's lovely to watch these gymnasts compete. And Simone is amazing to watch. At the end of the day - it's fun to watch. And I'm glad I'm not the one doing it. I also really like Gabby Laurie Hernandez (Simone's former teammate from Rio) who is the female sports commentator for the women's gymnastics. Among the better commentators.

3. Rainy weekend and the next few days are supposed to be rainy. We had major thunderstorms around 7-8pm.

View out of my living room window of clouds after the storm: