Doc Smith

Doc Smith.. I was talking to you not too long ago, driving to Charlotte, NC. Unfortunately I got a new phone a few days later and didn't get to add your number to my phonebook. If you see this... comment and give me your number or email! Are you on Facebook?

I have only begun to write...

Up to this point in time I have been reluctant to make any changes, really, to this blog.

Despite my failed attempts to be a habitual blogger, day after day, I remain committed. As my high-school gym coach always said "you're all heart son." Ok, so not really...

*SIGH* I so strongly wish to put out quality material that is baked in a temperature of sarcasm and wit, yet I just can't seem to find the time. I always thought that excuse would buy me some time, along with the intellectual property contract I signed with Hot-Shot Private Bank... Aint gotta worry about that second one no more!

To give a very brief update, i've developed an inverted posture allowing me to better see what i'm working with. I can't necessarily expect all of the readers to understand what that last sentence means, so in lamens' terms I'm going to start writing about what I know and do.. I mean did.. for a living (despite my recent separation from said Hot-Shot Private Bank).

So from now on, expect to get some good commentary and insight on all topics Finance and Financial Planning related, since it's what I do and know the most about. Oh yes... and the occasional update on everything going on in the loud and irrational Barno household.

Feel free to email some Financial Questions, and I promise to give you the most bang for your buck, without any of that salesy bullshi* I have come to loathe at my former employers. Yes, all the beef, no filler.

Thank you for your understanding in the matter.

And God Bless America

Dan

Help!

I quickly pen'd this paragraph in a very blurting style. It's a combination of anger, uncertainty and an uncanny feeling of calm in one of my favorite towns in America.

Let me know what you think...

"A raw and unfinished description of me would be very simple indeed. Mild, to put it succinctly. I believe in humility and the ability to mesh into one's surroundings. You claim you are a survivor? Then prove it and step outside of your protective bubble.. by living in another person's web.

In a world going to hell (and that's a broadly stroked statement), I think the pompous and pretentious need to step back and look at things from a lesser platform. My best friend Adam once said "In the end, everybody gets a pat on the belly with a shovel." Folks, no truer words have ever been spoken. So enjoy the time you have in your role on the planet and chill the F*** out."

Guys like my dad

Make sure you read this article, or get an idea of what it's about before reading my post...

Have you read it?? GOOD!

Now where was I? --

Ah yes, pearls of wisdom imparted by the quintessential magazine for all heterosexual men. In fact the man described in said article is less likely to have any use, whatsoever, for publications of this sort. At the least the type of man I know... I've grown and spent the majority of my life in small, rural and sometimes backwards SouthWestern Pennsylvania. The blasphemous nature of my comment cannot be pegged to the "backwards" remark, but the way I make it clear that REAL men DON'T read Esquire magazine.

Let me talk about way back when... and possibly give you an idea of what a real man is..

This is a true salute to my father, and other men just like him, who faithfully and honestly represent (whether they realize it or not) the hardest working of the hard working in this country on a day in day out basis. This is a story of the type of man I want to be. This is the definition of a true man, as told by a boy (now a man) raised from a blue-collar family and told all his life to make something of himself and be the white-collar. This is my salute and my pronouncement that i've realized why Blue-Collar is the glue that holds the fabric of this country together. Afterall... what good are the manicured hands of rainmakers without the calloused mitts of the steelworker and coal-miner. How many more a pompous asshole in a mercedes/BMW does the world need anyway???

Guys like my dad are hard to come by, these days. They aren't exactly cut from the same cloth, or built of the same foreign cheapo materials found in your Mazda Protege. No sir, guys like my dad are made out of good old fashion American steel, forged with the water of the three rivers in Pittsburgh and smelted with the purest ore from the darkest and richest coal of the West Virginian mountains. The same steel used in the old Buick's that use to line the once proud streets of downtown Pittsburgh. Yes sir, guys like my dad are made of the toughest materials the earth sheds. There was no cost-efficiency formula or foreign outsourced think-tank devised lightweight polymer design in mind when they built the guys like my dad... No sir, these are the real unsung heros of this country and they are made of the good stuff... from this country.

Guys like my dad don't need a shined foreign car to let the neighbors know of their success. Guys like my dad just need a dependable ride to get them to work. And once more, when they have that reliable pick-up truck Guys like my dad leave for work plenty early and stay until the jobs done.. RIGHT! And when the work is finished and no hard-feelings are shared among the brood most will punch the clock and head home.. to a family.. to eat supper.. do it all over again tomorrow. Yes sir, guys like my dad know when the work days done.

Guys like my dad always have just a little extra energy left for a wrestling match or a piggy back ride through the living room... It's your choice, choose wisely. Guy's like my dad never forget to give that advice only a dad can give to that future major leaguer out back. That is the kind of dad I had.. Where there was always a pair of boots and a flannel shirt by the front door. Guys like my dad knew the difference between an italian label and a ensemble of dependable attire. Infact, scientists now say the most dependable of men will choose the most dependable of clothing... Yes sir, guys like my dad are not worried about appearance.. they're worried about cohesion.

While I could go on and on about why "Guys like my dad" are what made and still makes this country great, I'll just include a list. It's late.. and I doubt many have read to this point. I just think it's important to point out that Guys like my dad are not found in abundance. Like the precious piece of coal most guys like my dad look to mine on a daily basis, they too comprise only .03% of the entire make-up. A sought after rarity to be sure.. Guys like my dad are the following:

-Can fix anything by hand (or give it a try)
-Can cook any type of meat by flame, smoker or the like
-Are able to find excitement from the lack of movement, in the woods
-Know the value of one dollar and how luck we are to have that one, lone, dollar.
-Can remember the stats of most major league ball-players
-Can recall historical events with precision just shy of a computer and just slightly better than a notebook
-Speaking of notebooks... Notes are meant to be taken by Paper and Pencil.

More later...

My Iraq War and Education Assistance

I read your article on the CNN homepage about the Iraq war vet who was billed for his own leg amputation. I'm confident that if you asked that veteran, or anybody else who has been caught up in the web of non-sense and insanity they would tell you what a complete lack of common sense oozes from situations like that.

I, like the veteran in the CNN homepage story, have had my own share of battles pertaining to my military service. This is an account of my own personal battle with the nonsense that comes with serving your country with honor, and being blindsided when you get home and out into the civilian world.

I had the unfortunate belief that the military would actually honor their educational assistance promises when I enlisted. Little did I know that after dropping out of school, on two seperate occasions, for deployments to Kosovo & Iraq that the military would refuse to continue payment for my undergraduate degree once I returned home from my final 18 month stint in Iraq. I was told I "would need to re-enlist" if I wanted my educational assistance to continue. I felt this was complete lunacy, as the fact is it was not my choice that I had to continue leaving my education behind for deployments. It's quite the scam they have going on!

Secondly, about 2 months after returning home and finding a job in the civilian world I receive a letter in the mail. The letter was from the education assistance group who basically administers the military's tuition payments to schools for the soldiers. The letter read to the effect that they had receive notice from my unit that I did not honor my obligations, contract and duty and therefore was required to payback the ENTIRE amount of what the military had paid for the time I attended school, while I was enlisted. I was furious to say the least and phone the agency everyday for the next week and a half. Finally, after dealing with obnoxious employees who insisted I owed this money back, I talked to a supervisor who said this was a complete mistake on their part. I was told to "Forget about it," and like that it was corrected. It left a sour taste in my mouth to say the least.

Stepping back to the final two months of my tour in Iraq, I decided I was not going to re-enlist (despite a huge bonus offer) and I would make my bread in the civilian world. Following that notion, I decided to finish my undergraduate degree online and I took absolutely no money from the military in the way of tuition assistance. I was so angry about the refusal to pick up the remainder of what I was owed in tuition assistance so I just decided in final two months, "to hell with them," and took out my own student loans through Wachovia to pay for the remainder of my undergraduate tuition.

The biggest mistake I could have made was to place value on anything the military would offer me next. As a combat veteran with over a year of combat service I was eligible for MGI-Bill active duty benefits stipend (since I was once again enrolled in school full-time, paying my own tuition). Please keep in mind, I did not seek or go looking for these military educational benefits. The military/veteran affairs organization PARADES the different benefits, under the different codes, out in front of the veterans and claims that a veteran or soldier/sailor/airmen will be paid X amount of dollars for this many credits if enrolled in school, simply because of their service. As a young person who was exiting the military, I thought this sounded great and I would apply. Unfortunately, I was approved for the benefits after I had applied and the administration looked at my service, record etc...

Fast Forwarding again... I was home for about 1 year, finishing my undergraduate degree online and receiving the monthly GI-Bill payments that I was APPROVED for (after APPLYING) and working full-time, with a wife and newborn, when I received the letter. The letter from the Veteran's Affairs claimed they had made a mistake a year ago when I was approved and that it shouldn't have been approved. As a result of the VA's mistake I now owed something to the tune of $5,500 back to the Veterans Affairs administration. The best part of this was that interest was being tacked on to the balance, DAILY!! I contacted the VA and was told I would need to repay this over a 21 month period or I could appeal. By this point the interest had put this debt upward in the range of $7,500, obviously, I was going to appeal. The rude woman from the Veteran's Affairs administration claimed she would notate this account letting them know to NOT turn this over to a collection's agency. As I built my case, typing a formal complaint letter and gathering my paperwork, letters and material to fight the debt, I received a letter from a collection's agency claiming it had been turned to them and I was going to be forced to pay in short-time. I called the collection's agency and talked with the gentleman handling the account. I find humor and some comfort in the fact that the collection's agency said they see this kind of thing all of the time from the Veteran's Affairs and they were sorry and would work with me on this. Isn't it nice to know there are other Iraq war veterans who were chewed, ingested and regurgitated back out into the world with absolutely nothing to show, but some debt, as result of their war-time service?

The third and final chapter is based around the useless result my visit to a local U.S. House Representative yielded. I went to the local office, pleaded my case and was told they would look into it. A month later I received a letter from the Representative's office and was told the exact same thing the Veteran's Affairs administration told me. That it was their error but as a result I would need to repay it. They did however grant me respect for my service in one area, they knocked the interest off the debt and now I just owed "Principal" !!! Wow, how nice of them (please note my sarcastic tone).

I doubt anybody will respond to this email/comment and I doubt anybody should care as this is my battle. Needless to say this is my fight through and through (which I doubt i'll win) and I have learned my lesson with taking to bank anything the military says or offers monetarily.

Thanks,

Daniel Barno
Camp Habbiniyah, Iraq: OIF 05-06
Pittsburgh, PA
910-233-7183

The Weekend

Hola, certainly nice to be at the very beginning of the weekend. It's amazing how an endless string of stress, small fires and crisis control 24/7 in my industry can just put you at the brink come Friday afternoon. 

Of course, Friday evenings I just simply don't have the stamina that I use to. My friends that aren't married and without kids think i'm joking when I say 9PM is late-night for me. 

Despite G-Baby and Kathleen going to bed around 1030 last night I tried to stay up and make the most of my quiet time. I read two different magazines I haven't had time for (Because new issues come Saturday morning) and I introduced myself to "Breaking Bad" on AMC. Has anyone seen this show yet? It seems there hasn't been a lot of traction with this show, just a Cult Following. I saw a few commercials a couple of days ago for this show, but never actually watched an episode. I think and I hope that i'm wrong, this will be one of those shows that you end up liking (and everybody else you talk to does) but is taken off the air after 1 season. Replaced most likely by another show about two faggy-guys living in some Manhattan loft with a wise-ass kid interacting with a spectrum of trampy women. No real substance and no real acting... Do yourself a favor, check out the Breaking Bad website and try to catch a couple of episodes. It's dark and dingy but it's on the line of making it an all the better show and completely wretched garbage. It's the former of those two.

Moving into the weekend, this morning I think it may be appropriate, given the weather', to spend some outside Father Daughter time. It seems like all I do sometimes is say "don't do this, don't do that" and I don't have a chance to do exciting things with her. Given the chance I'd take fun anyday.

Of course after all the good stuff it's on to school work. Thank God it's almost over.

More to Follow...

Talk but no substance

Incase anyone was wondering, here's the "plan". An account of how they plan on doing all that stuff he talked about last night.