unrelated, but still.

so, as i said before...i'm home alone (save for my teenage son...who would relish the thought of kicking the snot out of an intruder). which is one thing. and it's practically summer. like it started at 60, and got to 70. which is another.

i got two phone calls in 5 minutes. from my neighbors. at 8:45ish. telling me that my garage door was open. really? 

when does being neighborly stop and being annoying start?

day one of “jon’s in moldova again.”

i've cleaned the house...dennis has cleaned his room. he's watching tbs which means more jim carrey than i'd like, but hey, he's quiet. we just had lunch. me: turkey & spinach sandwich. him: leftover pasta with...tomato soup on top. what? he said it was good.

we've started to go to saturday night church and i have to tell you...it's wonderful. it's like having two saturday mornings. 

when i was little, we always went to church. i remember skipping once...when i had the CHICKEN POX. that's about all that would get you pardoned from sunday school. well, my dad let me in on the best show ever -- sunday morning on cbs. he'd kind of taunt us with it. it would start and then it was off to church. 

as i've gotten older...the one thing i love, love, love is being able to catch sunday morning. i don't dvr it. it's a great show, but it really must be watched on sunday morning. it reminds me of a connection with my dad, who, truth be told, back then would have rather stayed home to watch it. i don't condone missing church...usually. it's just now, i get to go to church and see sunday morning. with coffee. with max. while my teenager's still asleep.

so this morning was really great. barbie and pelican island. and a commentary from ben stein. you probably remember him from ferris bueller's day off. remember? bueller....bueller...bueller?

below, i'm going to do the unpardonable and NOT link. i'm pasting the entirety of his commentary. please read it all. i've been shouting this inwardly for the past month, and it was both vindicating and inspiring to hear it spoken. enjoy. and then go shopping, please.

Okay. Let me put on my weather-beaten economist's hat again and try to explain something important. 

As we all know, we are in a recession that is bad and getting worse. So, basic question: How do we get out of it?

Well, look at it this way. The economy grows because of two factors: M, which is the quantity of money in the economy, which is controlled mostly by the Federal Reserve; and V, the velocity of money, or the rate at which it changes hands - or, as one might say, the speed with which it is borrowed, invested and spent.

Mr. Ben Bernanke, head of the Federal Reserve, has been doing a fine job of keeping the supply of money pumped up. Score one for him.

But the velocity of money has slowed dramatically. 

People at every level are afraid to spend because they fear conditions will get worse and they're going to need the money in the future just to survive. So they don't spend it.

One of the big contributors to fear is the big goombahs in the society saying how bad things are. When Mr. Obama or his economists tell us how terrible things are and how they're going to get worse, they're shooting fear into the economic bloodstream and that hurts velocity and kills stocks.

Notice that recently Ben Bernanke said the recession might end this year, and the stock market rocketed up that day.

What we need, as Bill Clinton aptly pointed out recently, is more cheerleading and less fear-mongering. We elected Mr. Obama to be the National Spirit Leader, not National Scary Storyteller. 

If Mr. Obama and Mr. Geithner, his Treasury Secretary, and Mr. Volcker, his well-respected advisor, and some real superstars like Warren Buffett and Jack Welch came out and said, "The recession will end within 12 months. We are sure of it," the recession WOULD end in 12 months.

It's all about confidence and the confidence of heavy-hitters means a lot.

After all, no one is bombing our cities right now or poisoning our rivers. This whole thing is about confidence. Ninety-two percent of us are still employed. Roughly 90+ percent are not behind on our mortgages. If we had some confidence, we could get this ball rolling again.

Let's roll!