8 Things Rich People Buy That Make Them Look Dumb

By Stacy Johnson

 A few years ago, I was invited, along with a group of my friends, to a party at a waterfront mansion here in Fort Lauderdale. The house featured two elevators, about 20,000 square feet, and a living room that resembled an upscale hotel lobby.

As we stood in a small group marveling at a side of life we’d never seen, one of my friends said, “Doesn’t this make you wonder what you did wrong? I mean, why don’t we have houses like this?” My response: “Really? I was just thinking about how long it would take to walk from the garage back to the master bedroom when I left my keys on the nightstand.”
Since my first mansion party, I’ve been to many others. I’ve also ridden on mega-yachts, kicked back in vast home theaters, and otherwise enjoyed the spoils of other people’s good fortune. I’ve learned something along the way: It’s fun to know rich people. But I’ve also learned that trying to impress people with ostentatious displays often creates the opposite effect. In other words, things you think are earning envy may be causing people to think you look silly.
Here are some of my favorite examples…

1. An expensive sports car

“Want to see how fast it will go?”
That’s the question I’ve been asked all three times I’ve been a passenger in a Ferrari. My answer was consistent, “Please, no. I’m begging you.” It doesn’t work. Instead it’s zero to 100 in 5 seconds on a city street.
I’m sure there are lots of people who enjoy riding in loud, cramped cars that can theoretically go more than 200 miles an hour. I’m not one of them.
While these guys (yes, in my experience they’re always guys) probably imagine themselves envied at every traffic light, are they really getting the status they paid for? They’re getting attention, all right, but maybe not the kind they wanted. When I’m stopped next to a Ferrari, all I’m seeing is someone who’s combined a mid-life crisis with a big checkbook.

2. A boat

If you take a ride down the Intracoastal Waterway here in Fort Lauderdale, within 5 miles you’ll pass more than a hundred million dollars in largely unused boats.
But if boating’s a crime, I’m guilty. As I write this, I have two 30-foot boats docked behind my modest waterfront home. I love boating, and I love working on my boats. But the only advantage to actually owning one – especially a big, complicated one – is that it makes any other indulgences you have seem practically free. I’ve owned boats for many years, and I can state unequivocally that I’d be better off if I paid $1,000 to rent a boat for the day whenever the mood struck.
When someone asks me, “What’s the best boat?” I say, “Someone else’s.”
The only thing you can do to make boat ownership dumber is to borrow the money to buy one, or to buy a new one. Think cars depreciate when you drive them off the lot? Chickenfeed. Boats sink in value so rapidly, it’s truly astounding. They also tend to sit unused for long periods of time, which is the worst way to maintain one. And with gas prices where they are today, the cost of an all-day fishing trip is measured in the hundreds.
Boats are no way to stay afloat, and unless you have money to burn, this pastime may not bring you the status you think it will.

3. Plastic surgery

You think you look younger. What you might look like is someone who’s so insecure they had to pretend they weren’t getting older by getting plastic surgery. And don’t even get me started on breast enhancement, especially the (literally) over-the-top variety.

4. Jewelry

Tasteful jewelry, especially on women, can definitely add to one’s appearance. But if you’re wearing too much, you might as well just wear a dress made of $1,000 bills. It’s brassy, not classy. As for men, there’s a fine line between good and gaudy.

5. Houses

I get it: If you have millions of dollars, you’ve got to put it somewhere, and where you live is as good a place as any. But if you’re borrowing heavily to impress your friends with a house that’s way bigger than you need or can afford, you’re not looking rich, you’re looking crazy. Besides, who wants to walk the length of a football field to let the dog in?

6. Servants

Nothing wrong with having some maid service if you can afford it. But live-ins?
Maybe if I was rich for long enough, I could get used to the idea of having people I don’t know all that well living with me. But I’ve had friends with live-in drivers, butlers, cooks, and “personal assistants,” and to me it feels awkward having employees standing around. I’ve always wondered: Do rich people have to get dressed if they want to raid the refrigerator in the middle of the night?
It’s a house, not an office building. If it’s so big you need a bunch of employees to run it, maybe it’s too much.

7. Clothes

Clothes may make the man, but super-expensive clothes might make that man look like he’s trying too hard. As with jewelry, there’s a fine line between good taste and tasteless.
In my 10 years as a stock broker, I learned there was an almost inverse relationship between a person’s true wealth and their apparent wealth. In other words, the guy in the jeans driving the station wagon is the rich one – the guy in the fancy suit driving the Porsche is the one trying to sell him stuff.

8. Conspicuous consumption

Last week a 23-year old currency trader racked up a $320,000 bar tab in a British night club. What fun! Upstaging your friends with gratuitous physical possessions or other forms of conspicuous consumption might do more than make you look rich: it might make you look shallow.
Ever see the bumper sticker, “He who dies with the most toys wins?” Dumber words were never spoken.

If you’ve got it, it’s no crime to flaunt it.

If you’ve spent money on items in the list above, you probably found my critique inaccurate – even insulting. That’s not my intention.
Having wealth is good and spending money is fun. So what separates the shallow nincompoop from someone leading a life well-lived? It isn’t about the amount of money you spend or what you spend it on. It’s all about why you’re spending it.
If you don’t like yourself or live in fear that others don’t like you, no amount of money or possessions will change that. That’s what makes you look dumb: spending to boost your self-esteem. On the other hand, if you like yourself and are spending to indulge a passion, or to make your life more interesting, good for you. You’re the type of spender I want to hang out with.
But I still don’t want to see how fast your Ferrari will go.

You Lucky Bastards....

Yes..you...you...you orang Malaysia.

I have read your Budget for next year and I am stumped.

And as a woman, I rejoice when I read about the free mammgrams for women .

Here, President Barack Obama has made many women happy:.

Check it here.

But hell...the rest sounds good.

Yep.. you lucky bastards.

What A Lot Of Asians....

Asians have surpassed Hispanics as the largest group of new immigrants to the United States, according to a new study from the Pew Research Center.
The study, called "The Rise of Asian Americans" and released on Tuesday, reveals that Asian-Americans also have the highest income, are the best educated and are the fastest-growing racial group in America.
About 430,000 Asians—or 36 percent of all new immigrants—arrived in the United States in 2010, according to U.S. census data. About 370,000, or 31 percent, were Hispanic.

[Related: U.S. Census: Minority babies now majority, surpassing whites for first time]

The wave of incoming Asians pushed the total number of Asian-Americans to a record 18.2 million, or 5.8 percent of the total U.S. population, according to census data. By comparison, non-Hispanic whites (197.5 million) account for 63.3 of the U.S. population, while Hispanics (52 million) and non-Hispanic blacks (38.3 million) account for 16.7 percent and 12.3 percent, respectively.
The influx of Asians reflects "a slowdown in illegal immigration while American employers increase their demand for high-skilled workers," the Associated Press said.

"The educational credentials of these recent [Asian] arrivals are striking," the report said. Sixty-one percent of 25-to-64-year-old Asian immigrants come with at least a bachelor's degree—more than double non-Asian immigrants, making the recent Asian arrivals "the most highly educated cohort of immigrants in U.S. history."
[Also read: The full Pew report]
The study also found that Asian-Americans are "more satisfied than the general public with their lives, finances and the direction of the country, and they place a greater value on marriage, parenthood, hard work and career success."
Last month, data released by the U.S. Census Bureau showed that there were more minority children born in the United States than whites for the first time in history—signaling what the Washington Post called "the dawn of an era in which whites no longer will be in the majority."
According to the census report, 50.4 percent of children born in a 12-month period that ended July 2011 were Hispanic, black, Asian-American or from other minority groups, while non-Hispanic whites accounted for 49.6 percent of all births in that span. In 2010, minority babies accounted for 49.5 percent of all births.
(source: The Lookout)

Wither April Fools' Day...

(source:LiveScience)

No joke: Researchers say we are moving away from personal, real-world pranks and into a world of media-driven jokes and Internet tomfoolery. Does this spell the end of April Fools' Day as we know it?

Though pranksters and joke-lovers in many countries now gleefully prepare to dupe friends and loved ones on April Fool's Day, no one knows exactly when or why, or even where, this tradition began.

A giddy spurt of practical joking seems to have coincided with the coming of spring since the time of the Ancient Romans and Celts, who celebrated a festival of mischief-making. The first mentions of an All Fool's Day (as it was formerly called) came in Europe in the Middle Ages.

The importance of this day of prank-pulling freedom is no laughing matter. It's integral to American culture, a day of funny is important to society, and also helps humans bond. Researchers say our take on comedy is changing, though. And that may mean fewer pranks in the future.

"The usual pranks that we would see 50 years ago are much less common," Gary Alan Fine, a sociologist at Northwestern University in Illinois, told LiveScience. "I think we are seeing the decline of interpersonal pranks." [5 Fake Scientific Breakthroughs]

Pranking or bullying?

"At one time, prankstering played a bigger role in American society. Some of the prankstering was also very harmful," Joseph Boskin, a professor emeritus of history at Boston University, told LiveScience.

This type of harmful prank-playing was usually directed toward marginalized sections of society. "Pranks have played a very big role in this situation, so I'm glad that the prankster part of it has declined, but the poking fun at life in general goes on," Boskin said.

The big problem is knowing where to draw the line between playful pranks and meanness on the verge of bullying, Fine said.

"Practical jokes of a certain sort shade into bullying, they shade into meanness and we are very concerned as a society about meanness," Fine said. "Finding out what that point is, is difficult for a society."

Equality and social control

Because of our conscientiousness and desire to ensure equality, Americans may have drawn that line too far along the spectrum, hedging out playful pranking. And traditional pranking may be left out in the cold, Fine said.

Sometimes, a funny prank pulled in one group would be seen in another group of people as inappropriate.

"Treating every incident as unique in itself on one level makes things easier, but then it means that someone who did X [a given prank] would be treated differently than someone else who did X [the same prank in a different group]. In society, that's not fair," Fine said. "How do you find that balance in that society where there needs to be rules that apply to everyone?"

This focus on equality may mean fewer interpersonal pranks are being played on April Fools' Day. "That's not a bad thing…the world's not a worse place without practical jokes. Without pranks, it might even be a slightly better place," Fine said. "On the other hand, the downside is we put all of these institutional controls on people, and that may not be such a wonderful thing."

Corporate pranking

While personal pranks may be on their way out the door, the spirit of April Fool's' Day is still alive in corporate hoaxes, Alex Boese, curator of the website Museum of Hoaxes, told LiveScience. When asked if April Fools' Day is dying, he said:

"I think it's just the opposite. It's more prevalent and stronger than ever, because it's been so strongly embraced by advertisers and corporations."

"It’s a great marketing opportunity for them," Boese said. "They come up with … these elaborate April Fools' Day jokes because these jokes turn viral, and they get quite a bit of free marketing out of them."

You can follow LiveScience staff writer Jennifer Welsh on Twitter @microbelover. Follow LiveScience for the latest in science news and discoveries on Twitter @livescience and on Facebook.

Anwar doesn't Know How to Choose His Chums...

I mean, consider that some of the people closest to him parted ways with him and -- bared all...or some would say -- kiss and tell.
Let's see, there were Ezam and Anuar, to name just two. Then Chandra Muzaffar. Aah...his erstwhile confidante and tennis buddy --Mr Nallakarupan.

And what about Raja Petra Kamaruddin?????

OMG Anwar...either there's something wrong with these people, OR, there's something really wrong with you!

Here's Another Way of Looking at the Anwar Sex Video...

Hell, yeah. When you stop being emotional, just step back and look at things objectively, and you begin to see things in perspective.

You can still love him if he is actually that guy with the China Doll, it's up to you...

Just read the red Saga's take on the issue "You Are Found Wanting":

It is important for Malaysians, especially Malays, to understand the issue of the Anwar Ibrahim sex video clip in the proper perspective.

Bearing in mind that there are two sides to a coin, of course, we can then argue which perspective is the right one?

Bear with us. And if you do not agree with the perspective that we present, then ignore it as just another ranting of a delusional mind.

Firstly, why did the sex video clips emerge?

Obviously they are to prove that Anwar is not as saintly as he portrays himself to be.

HAPPY HAPPY 2012!

Long break. Too long.

Me and my Harley.

Happy new year, guys!