Vegas Cirque on 3-D Coming

AVATAR creator James Cameron is planning a 3-D movie featuring a story line with gobs of Las Vegas Cirque du Soleil acrobats involved. Planned for 2011.

Baccarat Bed Bug

I am the baccarat bed bug v. Las Vegas.

I invade LV high rollers through their greed door.

I continue to defy the recession by drawing gamblers willing to part with a fortune on a simple game that takes no strategy- no more than a coin toss. The house juice is only 1.1 % vs about 2 % black jack but the game generates tremendous revenue for the casinos.

I create mystique. Exclusivity. Minimum bet per hand $25,000, max $600,000 . A college education. Players build a high fix with these stakes.

Now new Asian casinos need baccarat bed bugs too.

Run Turkey, Run

PIMCO'S Bill Gross writes a scathing critique of the present state of American politics and cautioned investors on the outlook for the economy in anticipation of QE 2 easing.

Go to Pimco Investment Letter November 2010.

Hawaii Peace Corp

As I was ready to exit the Federal Prison dentist position, I was juiced to stay. I had been industrious and inventive, appreciated by staff and inmates alike.

They offered my family a transfer to Hawaii to care for the people in the Peace Corp, coming and going.

HMMM. I was already a Lt Cmdr in rank and in just 16 more years I could retire at half pay and trumpets. For life.

I sought the advise of a dentist friend who retired after 14 yrs with the USPHS with only 6 yrs to go until early RT.

He said, "Ron, the flowers end at about year 12, then they believe one is trapped. Bad transfers occur. The orchids of Hawaii become the weeds of Alcatraz."

Twofers for MR J

99+% of my 25 years of recreational basketball play was pick up, shirts vs skins, mainly on M & Th nights, beginning in Denver. The few leagues we played in we were consistent winners and were formed from players who played rec ball together.

So I have been blessed with many friends from basketball play.

One of my buds, a CPA, great guy was getting married, Mr. J ("MJ"). His bride to be arranged a party so that her friends could meet MJ.

It sounded that he was marrying upscale as her papa owned the most sheep in North Dakota.

Well, the meeting was held in a watering hole in down town Denver. Happy hour was in effect so everyone buying a drink or a slammer for MJ brought him two more to imbibe.

During a lull, MJ disappeared. Finally somebody inquired, "Where's J ?"

They soon found him slumped over, sitting in a bathroom stall, an obvious victim of Acute Alcoholic Induced Diarrhea.

But there was a problem. He hadn't pulled his pants down.

The 911 called paramedics soon arrived and carted him past the well wishers.

He is remembered by the phrase PARTY POOPER !!

"FLASH-CRASH" Ruse Exposed

Meet the "FLASH-CRASH" scapegoat. A report by regulators blamed May's spectacular market break on a single trade by a single "mutual fund complex" identified in the press as Waddell & Reed.

This was as ludicrous as blaming Mrs. O'Leary's cow rather than lax building codes for the Great Chicago Fire. The official explanation of the May 6 tumult, which saw the Dow plunge by nearly 1,000 points before largely recovering, does not hold up beyond a reasonable doubt.

In fact, the jargon-encrusted back pages of the report suggest that far greater damage was inflicted on investors that day by their brokerage firms. The brokers abandoned them to the wildfire. Call it progress: Never before have so many lambs been roasted so quickly.

fr Barrons 10/10/10

Hoover Dam

President Franklin Roosevelt 75 years ago this week officially opened the Hoover Dam in a ceremony at Lake Mead Nv, 20 miles from Las Vegas. His speech was broadcast nationally by radio as an attempt to boost morale midway through the decade of the Great Depression. I was 2 weeks young.

Men came across the vast desert looking for work. 124 men died on the 4 year job, some tumbling down the steep canyon walls. The first and the last to die were a father and his son.

If someone couldn't work he was instantly replaced from a queue of job seekers. The government built a "company town", Boulder City Nv to house everyone.

Lake Mead still is the largest man made body of water in the country. Los Angeles, Phoenix, Tucson, Las Vegas, Imperial Valley all use the water and power from this dam.

Sept Stock Rise

This surprise Sept stock rise is the highest Sept gain since 1939. Hitler invaded Poland on Sept 1, 1939. Remarkable that this war attack would ignite a stock market surge back then. Remarkable.

A WW2 Scene

I was 10 years old when WW 2 ended. There were countless horrors in the war. In "Kaputt", 1946, author Malaparte observed an atrocious scene.

He was sitting in the Europeiski cafe' in Warsaw, he writes, when he saw German troops returning from the front: Suddenly he was struck with horror and realized that they had no eyelids. The ghastly cold of that winter had the strangest consequences. Thousands and thousands of soldiers had lost their limbs; thousands and thousands had their eyes, their noses, their fingers and their sexual organs ripped off by the frost. Many had lost their hair. Singed by the cold, the eyelid drops off like a piece of dead skin.

Their future was only lunacy.

Res Ipsa Loquitur

While in high school a friend learned how to fly a Piper Cub. He offered to teach me to fly, free of charge. "Sure" I said, without a second thought. When young, one doesn't think of danger or risk.

So I told my Dad that I would like to fly. He didn't answer. In a moment he said, "Come with me".

We drove downtown Iowa City in the Packard and stopped at our insurance man's office. Dad told Charlie of my desire to fly a private plane. Charlie pulled out a large book and showed me how much more it would cost to insure my life if I flew a private airplane. The numbers jumped at me.

I chose not to fly. The facts spoke for themselves--res ipsa loquitur !!

Morticians Stiff Monks

Covington, La. Five years ago, Hurricane Katrina gave the Benedictine monks at St. Joseph Abbey a new calling.

After the storm pummeled much of a pine forest, they had long relied on for timber and income, the monks hatched a fresh plan: They would hand-craft and sell caskets.

But now, the local funeral directors are trying to put a lid on the monks' activities. The state funeral regulatory board, dominated by industry members, is enforcing a Louisiana law that makes it a crime for anyone but a licensed parlor to sell 'funeral merchandise.'

The morticians are serious. Violators such as the monks can land in jail for up to 180 days. Monks are being stiffed. wsj

Chill Out !!

July was the hottest month in Las Vegas EVER. Any month. Any year.

Everyday in July had temperatures in the triple digits.

Business flourished at the Ice House Bar located at the Mandalay Bay. All the tables and chairs are made from blocks of ice. The room is kept at 23 degrees and $30 gets you 30 min and two chilled martinis. BRRRRR !!

Graduation Day

I was 25.

A third of my life had been in college resulting in BA and DDS markers. I was soon underway, in three weeks, to be a federal prison USPHS dentist.

But my signature recall of all my scholastic events was my Dad,withered at 55, bound in a wheel chair, looking deeply into my eyes as if a throw, saying two words. "Congratulations Doctor."

Like a baby turtle in a tar ball gulf, the annual skim of smokers soon took my Dad away, and an uncle and others.

Debate Champion

Congratulations to our grandson, Peter of Houston, on winning 1st place in a national middle school forensic debate.

Do a google search for "Peter Oathout debate" and there are various comments about the debate and his active Lanier Middle School. The finals were held in Des Moines this year.

HIP HIP HOORAY !!!!!!!

Presidents Who Died on 4th of July.

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of Independents Day July 4, 1776.

James Monroe died 5 years later on July 4.

The Wall Washer

During the last week of my freshman year in high school I was taken from class and told to report to the principal's office. Yikes !!

In the office I met a Prof Stewart from the university. He owned an apartment house at the end of Iowa Ave. It was 3 story, high end, adults only, low turnover as many residents were professional university staff. Each summer the Prof would use a high school mule to wash all the interior walls of all the apartments and hallways. His current mule, Bill F.,was graduating and needed to be replaced. Prof Stewart went to my school for a recommendation for a new rookie mule. Would I...

Would I !!!! Unless one lived on a farm in Iowa there was little summer work for youth. No McDonalds...no 7-11s...an occasional push reel mowing of a neighbor's

lawn for 75c or a buck.

I would be supervised by the live-in manager/housekeeper and of course the old farts who resided there. M-F for about 10 weeks.

A potential gotcha surfaced. I would be paid the same as Bill F. was paid per apartment, I was a 14 year old greenie following an 18 year old.

This turned out to my good fortune as I finished the whole job in about 6 weeks each summer for 4 years while being paid for 10 weeks.

Bill F. played football for Iowa and achieved a perfect 4.0 in med school.

Best States for Business

From Chief Executive magazine, a survey of 651 corporate leaders on ranking state taxation and regulation, quality of work force and living environment (50 states + Wash DC).

The Best--

1. Texas 2. North Carolina 3. Tennessee 4. Virginia 5. Nevada

The Worst--

47. Massachusetts 48. New Jersey 49. Michigan 50. New York 51. California

First Summer Day

A Dusty Miller plant crows in the desert sun.

Golfers cars are parked below.

D-Day in 1944 June 6th

1st triple digit heat of the summer 110 degrees.

Millions come to this isolated town in the middle of a vast desert.

Ten !! Play the hardway !!

Stock Market Crash Frequencies

It's impossible to eliminate the risk that is inherent in the stock market. Therefor it is dangerous to attempt to prevent the market from crashing like on May 6 as the regulators are trying to do. Though 10% drops are rare, their average frequency over long periods of time is quite predictable, happening once every 6 1/4 years.

Researchers derived a complex mathematical formula for predicting the frequency of large daily stock market movements. Though they believe that their formula rests on a solid theoretical foundation, the proof of the pudding is in the eating.

So they tested the formula not just in the U.S. stock market, but also in foreign stock markets as well as in the foreign-exchange arena. Their formula worked in those other markets too. The periods of testing were 80 years.

The researchers believe that their formula captures a universal trait of the investment world: Every market, to a more or less similar degree, is dominated by its largest investors. In this country, for example, the trades made by the large institutional investors are many orders of magnitude greater than any of ours.

And when those large investors together want to get out of stocks, the market will plunge. Yes, those institutional investors might have gotten spooked last Thursday by an erroneous trade. But we're fooling ourselves if we think it's possible to legislate away the herd instinct among the largest investors, or to prevent them from ever being spooked again in the future.

The corollary? To the extent that the regulators' trading curbs and circuit breakers and the like have any effect, it will be merely to postpone the selling for a day or two.

If the researchers are right, regulators are tilting at windmills in trying to find ways of preventing the market from rapid dives. Investors would be far better served by recognizing the big price drops, though infrequent, are an unavoidable price to pay for being invested in the stock market -- and to design their financial plans accordingly. --from marketwatch

Toothbrush Classes

Inmates would arrive at the prison after sentencing, in poor health. Some were held in a county jail for weeks before trial. The feds would pay the municipality a per diem during this holding period. There often was graft with this money. Few had toothbrushes. I found an old microscope in the pharmacy and special ordered quality natural bristled toothbrushes.

I sent out the word on the fast prison grapevine of a toothbrushing class which would give the inmate a break from work and a new toothbrush. Upon arrival at the dental clinic the inmate would brush his teeth at the sink. Next I would swipe a tooth with an instrument and transfer it to a slide, add a drop of blue phenol and have the inmate view the slide through the microscope. Seeing all the werbels got their attention so I could show them how to brush effectively.

Inmates would often arrive at the prison with a black, greasy comb sticking out of a back pocket, serve their time, then depart with a black, greasy comb AND a natural bristled toothbrush sticking out of a back pocket.

Another prison story

New prisoners("fish") had a dental check which was nothing more than an accounting of missing teeth with using a dental mirror. All were afforded optional dental treatment. Many requested an examination including x-rays and instrument probing, fillings, cleaning, scalings, etc. There was a lot of dental trauma from fights, but nobody ever ratted, it was always "I fell down in the shower". Rats could be severely beaten by several men.

One inmate had a missing upper wisdom tooth. I took a 2nd x-ray centering on the corner of his eye. BINGO. The wisdom tooth, thimble sized, was under the cheek bone. I had to carefully remove it completely by feel.

The next day the inmate told the guard that he wanted to talk to me.

He had a BIG smile on his face and said, "Doc, I've had a stiff neck and shoulder for years, have had many manipulations and pills. My pains are GONE !!"

It was referred pain from that ectopic wisdom tooth that caused his suffering.

The Return of King Kong to Manhattan ?

Like Pearl Harbor and 9/11, cyber-thugs raided our financial markets last Thursday and scooped billions of dollars away within 6 minutes.

And we have no clue !!! No clue !!! We are HAND CHECKING each of the millions of transaction tickets for that day.

No, not kidding.

the game of Monopoly

I liked games with a mathematical twist. One day I said to the kids while pulling out the Monopoly box, "let me show you how INFLATION works. When one passes GO it pays $400 instead of $200". It wasn't long before Boardwalk was being sold for $500, then resold for $800.

Some players would save a wad of cash, then swoop down on a withering player and scoop up prime properties for a song. Others would go for a big hit on every roll of the dice. Inflation at work, winners and losers.

How about DEFLATION ? As one passes GO collect $400 still, but pay $300 tax upon landing. One can only think about the results of a grind like this.

WOW !!

It takes a million million to make a trillion.

We the people are in debt for ten trillion dollars.

Think of that !!

In perspective, the sun is 93 million miles away.

10,000,000,000,000/93,000,000 is

107,527 $1 trips to the sun

Click Link Below

Journeys from our 30's

http://www.openmyeyeslord.net/ALookBackInHistory.htm

Keli Mcgregor

Keli McGregor, died last night in an Utah hotel during sleep. He was 48.

He was president of the Colorado Rockies Baseball Club. Born in Iowa, he played tight end at Colorado State and then the NFL.

We had prime seating at Coors Field for the Colorado Rockies, adjacent to the dugout. When the Rockies wanted our seats to remodel a VIP section, Keli called me and accepted my trade of my ticket rights for 12 free seats a year in the shade by the toilets, parking in the owners parking lot---AND-----Billie to throw out the 1st pitch of the game vs the Dodgers for her July 18 birthday.

He accepted.

1860

The sermon in church today dealt with historical regression.

Bounce my life back in reverse would land me on 1860, the last year before the Civil War began. Abraham Lincoln was elected president running on the new Republican Party ticket, an offshoot of the old, tired Whig party. (Any resemblance here?)

The pony express began operations in 1860, running between St Joseph Mo and Sacramento Ca. It lasted less than a year but was an historical hay ride...

No Hitter

Jiminez pitched the 1st no hitter for the Rockies franchise tonight. Rox 4, Braves zip.

Actually a batter hitting for the "cycle" s-d-t-hr is more rare than a no hitter.

One night at Coors Field we saw Marbry hit for the cycle in that exact order: s-d-t-hr-Gatorade.

Date Night

A good friend of ours took a date to a college burger joint last night.

Near the end of the meal, the date confessed that she felt "old, fat and tired".

Our friend said, "check, please".

Too Much Taxes ?

A resent poll inquired, "Do you think we are paying too much taxes" ?

70 % answered that we were yet 49% pay no income tax.

Reread my 11/18/2008 blog.

Inheritance

My Dad had an identical twin brother, his only sibling. Their Mother leftt them when they were just six weeks old. Relatives raised them. They dropped out of school after the 8th grade and shortly thereafter they took embalming school. After graduation they purchased a funeral home on a shoestring in Iowa City. The year was 1929. It was a time of hard times for many years incl the death of Dad's twin from TB in 1938. WW2 followed, ending in 1945.

One day in about 1955, an elderly woman came into the Oathout Funeral Home. She told Dad that she was his Mother ( my gma). She had never written, called, nada. She was down on her luck. So my parents, the great caregivers that they always were, bought her a house in Marshalltown, large enough to rent out a portion and titled it to Gene and I after she died. Well, a week before she passed, she willed the house to the renter and we got nada.

The point is: NEVER COUNT A BUDDING INHERITANCE until it happens. AND NEVER THINK that you won't get a much smaller piece than anticipated.

Failed State

A failed state is one in which the central government has lost control over significant areas of the country and the state is unable to function. It seems that the Mexican government has lost control of the northern tier of Mexico to drug-smuggling organizations, which have significantly greater power in that region than government forces. Moreover, the ability of the central government to assert its will against these organizations has weakened to the point that decisions made by the state against the cartels are not being implemented or are being implemented in a way that would guarantee failure. Mexico seems to be a failed state.

The core problem is the high consumption of narcotics by the United States. This means that extraordinary profits can be made by moving narcotics from the Mexican border into the United States. There is little cooperation between the competing producers resulting in open warfare in northern Mexico.

The heartland of Mexico is to the south, far from the sparsely populated region of the raging drug battle. The Mexican government largely stays uninvolved; indeed, the amount of money pouring into Mexico is stunning. This money is washed and surfaces as investments in legitimate enterprises throughout Mexico and beyond.

Yerrrrr OUT !!

Baseball !! Red Hots Red Hots !! Cotton Canda !! Beer Here Ice Cold Beer Here !!

Another opening week of the sport that has outlived every person.

I was the neighborhood dad who loaded the kids into the wagon on a home Saturday, to see the Denver Bears. The kids could buy a Cub Badge for a dollar and go to all the games free.

This is a special time for me, every year.

Joshua Flower

Atop the joshua tree in the center of the picture is our first flower on any of our three joshuas that we transplanted when we moved in 9 years ago.

Neither of us has seen one in bloom in Nevada. The root span is 8x the tree height. Tough plant. It can take all the heat of the summer and -5 in the winter.

I think that God gave us a "Thank You" for our joining the Desert Springs Methodist Church this year.

We in Nevada are Last

The Brookings Institution released a study this week with a poor finding for Nevada. The state is LAST in the amount of money it receives per capita from the federal government on Senate Leader Harry Reid's watch.

Nevada received $742 per person in the fiscal year 2008, about half of the national average of $1469 per person.

--from LV SunPublish Post

Poker Tour

When in high school Jr-Sn, we had a male poker game every Sunday night at 6:30. Sunday was a no girl date night. Period. Nickel-dime, 7-card, 7-card no peekie. No beer until college. Home at 9:30.

College at a fraternity. Poker right after supper. No beer while playing...STUK, a match pot game based on a variation of 21 was the most intense game I ever played.

90 % bluff. A bud once threw his Jaguar keys on the table as collateral.

Bought my 1st stock at 15 and visited Reno and Vegas on my honeymoon at 20.

So gambling has been part of my life. The stock market is rigged, like a poker game with a crimped card or two. Tough to beat. But I have so far.

Cocktails............Cocktails

Keep an Eye on George

March is an important basketball month. It reminds me of a story told to me by a patient, George, in Colorado.

George was playing in a spirited bb game in Canada. On jumping for a rebound he was cuffed on the side of the head and one of his eyeballs popped out of the socket, hanging by the meat.

Fortunately there was an eye doctor in the house who rushed out to his car and brought back a small bag which he opened and removed a spoon-like instrument. George told the doctor that he had vision but "things looked a little funny".

With the spoon the eye was quickly moved back into the socket. After some massaging, the eye seemed to function properly and George returned to the bench.

After a few minutes the coach sent George back into the game and said, NOW REBOUND !!!

Why I Left Iowa City

March 1st. Today.

Reflecting back. March 1, 1961. It was my senior year in dental school at Iowa.

Our VW had run out of gas along the side of the road. A friend had taken us to the gas station for a canister of gas. He parked in back of the VW and he and baby Kurt and my wife, Jeanette, with Mark in the oven, all moved up to the VW while I was pouring gas into the forward gas tank of a VW bug with the hood opened.

I awoke the next morning in the hospital with a spider of tubes spinning out of me and an elevated left leg in a full cast and a monstrous head ache.

I asked the nurse what had happened and she brought me the morning paper with pictures and the story of the accident. Apparently a drunk smashed into our friend's car from the rear at high speed which then forced the two cars into the VW and the hood jack knifed me 30 feet through the air and I landed on a bed of dirt, next to the concrete highway, below signs and soaked in gas.

God reduced the carnage that could have happened to any of us and He wanted me to treat patients from the federal prison system and from Colorado.

No Doubt Oathout

Our three dogs were pictured in the paper today under the title "most spoiled dogs" and Billie had her name published as the owner.

Sooooo, the phone rings later and it's a lady with her last name also Oathout, from Wisconsin. She pronounced her name "O-dout as in "no doubt".

She has Jerry Oothoudt's book also. There's no doubt she is a cuzz.

Tough Times Ahead for Greece

If Greece defaults it does not necessarily mean they have to leave the EU, any more than if Illinois defaulted they would have to leave the United States. Greece, the size of Alabama, could still use the euro and life could go on.

EXCEPT. The markets would no longer lend the Greek government money at anything close to a livable rate. Greece would be forced to balance its budget. Since they are part of the euro, devaluing the currency is not an option. The results of controlling their fiscal deficit would not initially be pretty and would almost insure a serious prolonged recession or depression in the Greek area, with fall out in the region. It would be a sad decade for Greece. But in the long run, it is a better option than default.

Stockmarket and Vegas

The dealers wear suits in the gambling pits here in Vegas.

They wear suits on Wall Street. Both drain the customers, drip drip.

Customers come to Las Vegas, for a good time with the allure of a hot streak. The allure stays as they return for another Vegas trip, time after time. The house makes billions of dollars on a 2 mile strip of foolish fun.

Wall Street doesn't have to parade the shows and cupcakes to get the billions. They even have the govt (us) to see that they stay afloat in any potential collapse.

Wall Street and Las Vegas have much in common.

That being said, I'm betting by buying into this sudden drop in the market.

One gets only 2-4 windows a year to make good buys. That leaves Wall Street with plenty of shots at one's 401-K + the fees.

I don't have a BLACK JACK in the present market but I have a 19 vs a 6 up for the friendly dealer.

It's hard to make predictions, especially about the future--Yogi Berra

Pray For Our Nation

www.greatdanepro.com/Pray%20For%20America/index.htm