Fresh Ideas

Archive for November, 2008

Thanksgiving in the United States is not only a federal holiday to celebrate about with family and friends over the feast table with roasted turkey on top, but it also starts the Christmas shopping season, and the day after Thanksgiving is called “Black Friday” and traditionally the biggest shopping day of the whole year.

Every shopaholic, or compulsive shopper as a more formal term is waiting for this day as malls, retail stores and boutique shops open up early in the morning after Thanksgiving Day to start the Christmas shopping season with a bang!

Both buyers and retailers are looking forward to this day. Consumers are eagerly waiting for this day, even waiting in line as early as dawn and some are already sleeping in the pavement just to be the first people to check out the real deal on the biggest sale of the year. Retailers are also looking forward to this day to stock up their inventory and earn real profit.

However on the recent years, the following Monday after Thanksgiving day, which was known today as “Cyber Monday” to be popular these days because it is fast becoming the biggest online shopping day of the year.

Many online shops are offering big discounts that cannot be found on local stores and it really attract consumers to buy online.

Many people considered not to buy on “Black Friday” because of the real hassle it brought about. Excessive crowd discourage would-be buyers. Many are persuaded to wait for the sale on “Cyber Monday” and purchase online and just sit comfortably in their homes rather than squeeze in with the mob in searching for the best buy.

Today is Thanksgiving Day in the United States, November 27, 2008. Thanksgiving is celebrated every fourth Thursday of November to commemorate the end of the harvest season, and is considered as an annual American holiday.

I will not talk about the origins of this holiday because you can simply research this on Wikipedia or in any credible site that provides information. I will talk about how American celebrated this holiday.

Thanksgiving are sometimes referred as “Turkey Day” because thanksgiving will not be complete without the roasted turkey on the feast table for Americans together with mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie and sweet corn.

Usually, family and friends take days off to celebrate with their loved ones, and this is one of the busiest season because it’s a four-day or five-days weekend vacation spree for everyone.

Parades are usually held on some parts of the country, particularly in New York City where it starts at Macy’s flagship store and parade floats abound the street.

Also, Football takes a good part of the festival because it is usually played in this day and families and friends crammed up in front of the television to watch their favourite team host the game.

And of course, Thanksgiving is the start of the Christmas season shopping. The day after Thanksgiving, which no doubt is Friday is called “Black Friday”, where almost all stores packed their inventory for items for Christmas shopping. Also, this day is still considered a part of the holiday so that people will be given a long holiday off from their everyday work.

I envy Americans for this kind of holiday, which promoted piety and strong family connection. And of course, I will be a hypocrite if I didn’t mention the joy it would bring to me for the long day off this entails. But all in all, everyone benefits in this tradition, common person and businessmen alike.

Billabong in cooperation with Stoked Inc. will host its 2^nd Grommet competition on November 29-30, 2008 in Urbiztondo Beach, San Juan, La Union.

Groms in the surfer world are young and aspiring surfers, ages 15 years and below.

Last year, 41 young talents beat each other out, let’s see who will stand above the rest this year!

Chocolate Crinkle Cookie

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
8 oz. semisweet or bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup sugar
4 tbs. unsalted butter
2 large eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup sifted confectioners sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Instructions:

1. In a saucepan, melt the chocolate and butter stirring nearly continuously.
2. Remove from heat as soon as melted.
3. In a large bowl, beat the eggs and the sugar until it gets fluffy.
4. Beat the vanilla extract in.
5. Stir the melted chocolate and butter in.
6. In another bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking powder.
7. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients (the chocolate mixture) and stir just until it is blended.
8. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 3-4 hours. Overnight is best.
9. When ready to prepare, preheat your oven to 325 degrees F (170 degrees C) and place rack in center of oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper, and set aside.
10. Sift the confectioners sugar into a shallow dish.
11. Grease your hands lightly and roll a small amount of the chilled dough in your hands to form a 1 inch ball. Roll the dough ball through the powdered sugar until it is well coated and no chocolate is seen. Remove the ball and place on a prepared baking pan. Keep forming balls and rolling through powdered sugar until all is complete. If the dough seems to get too sticky to roll, go ahead and place it back in the refrigerator for about 20 minutes or more and then retry.
12. Bake cookies for 8-10 minutes at 325 degrees. You want the outside a bit firm, but the center to be chewy and moist.

Red Horse Beer Muziklaban, the country’s premiere rock competition for young amateur bands is on its 10^th year now in providing budding talents with a venue to show their wares and creating a name in the recording industry.

It’s been a decade already since the first Muziklaban was held and this year will surely be so intense because bigger prizes awaits the winners and also not to mention Sepultura, a renown heavy metal band in the United States will grace the finals of the event.

Red Horse Beer, the sponsor for this event really knows how to organize and bring together fresh talents. This will be one hell of a battle for young amateur bands that will compete to be the best of the best. And the best thing here is, beers are free for every ticket!

10 nationwide grand finalists will compete head on for P1 million in cash prize with 20 local guest bands and featuring foreign rock metal band Sepultura.

The finals for the event is set on November 29, 2008, Saturday at the Marikina Sports Complex.

For more details, visit http://redhorsebeer.com/events.asp

Europe was officially in recession last Friday, November 14, 2008. The 15-nation Euro Zone economy fell by 0.2% in the second quarter in a row and in other words, this really means recession.

Actually, I am not a financial analyst or economist in any way and I don’t know about money market, and even I cannot handle my own personal finance, but I am fond of researching on things that I don’t know, and it’s only recent that I got the chance to know the real meaning of recession. This term does not bother me because I don’t really know what the heck it is, and according to one reliable source, it means that it is a contraction phase in a business cycle wherein it is a period of reduced economic activity. Well, I think these terms will blow my brains out, so let’s just get to business shall we?

According to reports, more than $30 trillion has been deducted from the value of global equity markets this year and $966 billion was the sum of credit losses and writedowns in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

House prices are falling sharply in the U.K. Santander, a prominent Spanish bank that owns the U.K. mortgage lender Abbey has also lost 6.9 percent. BNP Paribas, France largest bank dropped also at 8.1 percent to 43.02 euros.

Germany’s biggest cement maker, HeidelbergCement, dropped to 22 percent to 39.90 euros. Bodycote Plc, U.K. supplier of metal-strengthening services to Ford Motor Co. also dopped to 22 percent to 96 pence.

U.S. economy was hit heavily by the financial crisis. Citigroup, one of the financial companies being relentlessly bashed by the crisis, plans of cutting off jobs by as much as 20% of its workforce.

Sun Microsystems Inc, announced it would layoff 10% of its staff to cut off cost.

Freddie Mac, the second-largest US home loan financing provider, reported a $25 billion quarterly loss as the housing loan spiraling down, and asking a $100 billion lifeline from the Treasury Department.

Fidelity Investments, the world’s biggest mutual fund company, announced also that it will need to lessened 1,700 jobs on top of 1,300 already announced.

There is also the possibility of mass layoffs on automobiles manufacturers, particularly at General Motors Corp, Ford Motor Co and Chrysler LLC.

Almost the entire community right now are in great danger due to the financial crunch that hit every nation and leaders of G-20 held a two-days summit to discuss on ways to resolve the crisis.

I really don’t know much about finance because I for myself didn’t finish with a business degree. I actually graduated with computer engineering course so please bear with me in explaining what I only read on the news because for me, it is really troubling. No doubt, world finance is really sick, and I really don’t know how a simple guy like me can help but just to report the current news.

One of the breaking news today is the plan of a massive layoff of Citigroup Inc. It is estimated that 53,000 jobs will be slashed in order for the company to cut cost and to prevent it from further plunging due to financial losses according to the post on its website.

As of this moment, it is still not clear on what department that the company will slice of its workforce, but there are speculations that it will come from the investment banking and wealth management divisions.

Citigroup, U.S. second largest bank in terms of assets and behind by JP Morgan Chase was hit massively by the credit crisis and lost more than $2.8 billion over the last three quarters.

It is really awful that investors are now wary because the stocks fell nearly 3% in the morning trading in the New York Stock Exchange and in 2 weeks alone, it lost one-third of its value.

There are also speculations that officers in the upper management might not receive hefty bonuses this end of the year and executives might also be affected by the proposed cutbacks.

Congratulations to Barack Obama, as he captured the presidency of the United States. He is now America’s 44^th president!

Young and optimistic, and with an excellent oratory skill, Obama blasted through racial barriers into becoming the first African-American to sit in the Oval Office and won 349 to 147 in the Electoral College. Electoral votes only needed 270 votes to win, but the result was landslide because of his party’s historic campaign.

To the amazement of everyone, Obama won Florida and Ohio, which is critical on the President Bush’s twin victories. Obama also won Colorado, which is the base of religious rights and Virginia, which for 40 years haven’t won any Democrat president.

McCain conceded defeat shortly after 11 p.m. EST, telling supporters outside the Arizona Biltmore Hotel, “The American people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly.”

Obama won California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin.

McCain won Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming.

Actually, the 2008 election has a record turnout rate of 64.1 percent, which is really high.

President-elect Barack Obama will definitely need all the support and help that he can get because of the several burdens he has to carry now that he’s the new driver of this nation: A very big government debt, two failed foreign wars, rising health care cost, an aging society and failed energy policies.

The real question now is, can he do all that he promised on his campaign?

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… C: wait… SD: wait…

Are you worried about the outcome of the ’08 U.S. presidential election? Some have already voted and some haven’t. 5 percent of American voters are still left undecided. Some are still battling with moral issues.

But for us Filipinos, majority doesn’t care what will be the outcome of the election. But if you will think a lot farther, this event will impact almost every country. Of course everyone knew that the United States of America is the world’s biggest economy and the result of the election will be sensitive in terms of helping the U.S. navigate its economy in the right direction again in the next years to come.

Moral issues will be tackled by this administration and also foreign policies. And by foreign policies, all of its neighboring countries and allied nations will feel what it will implement.

I actually don’t care much for the result as long as the U.S. will be mature enough to decide on the candidate that it knows best to steer it clear of deadly waters.

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… C: wait… SD: wait…

Presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain make their final address to voters as election draws near. With one more day until election, these candidates are racing against time to campaign around the country on several more states that are considered as battleground states.

According to several news sources, Obama is leading significantly in the survey, 51 to 43 percent but who knows, no one can never tell in the final stretch.

The chances might be slim for the republican candidate because Obama is leading among African-American, Latinos, blue-collar workers, 18 to 34 year olds, independents, Catholics and suburban voters.

However, McCain is leading among white men and women, 65 year olds and older and evangelicals.

U.S. election is very hot these days, but as you well know, this also has great impact on other countries, more over because of the U.S. financial meltdown.

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… C: wait… SD: wait…