Friday

I returned from my trip to Virginia and found out my neighbor had been evicted. He is the friendliest and most generous person I've met in Florida. He and I went out and got rip-snorting drunk one night, no lie. We were trashed. His ex-wife had taken the kids that night for the first time in forever, so he was really wanting to whoop it up. So we did.

Anyway, his wife really did him wrong and continues to do him wrong. She cheated on him and left him -- with two little kids. She barely ever takes them when it's her turn. She sends him hateful text messages. She tried (apparently successfully) to sabotage a thing he was trying to develop with a new love interest. She cornered his love interest in a bar and told her all this hateful horrible crap. I would say that the ex-wife is a total freakin loser, but she's a fireman (fire(wo)man), so I guess she pumps some good kharma into the economy.

So his luck wasn't bad enough, so now's he's evicted. He moved into these crummy apartments because he couldn't hold down his house due to the mortgage/real estate bust. He was in construction. The work dried up. His mortgage payment probably adjusted north in a big bad way, so income definitely fell away from the outlay.

How many people are there out there like this? The economy is pinching hard. When will it turn around? A year? Two? I think it'll come back piece by piece. Education, then jobs, then housing, then global. What do I know? Ask an economist. Ask a futurist.