Just watching this scares me.

I’m writing this from my little palapas-roofed pavilion next to my pool overlooking a great expanse of the Pacific Ocean.

I’m here by myself because I told K that I was going to spend at least half of January in Rancho Santana whether she came with me or not. It’s 48 hours into my solo sojourn, and I haven’t admitted that I’m lonely and I wish she were here.

I haven’t left my property since I got here, working non-stop responding to emails and writing my blogs and book chapters. It’s just me and my laptop and all the thoughts I’ve been wanting to send out into the universe. So, don’t cry for me. You could only wish you were so lucky as to be here, working on something you think is worth working on, lifting your head and seeing this…

Get Ready for a $6 Trillion Transfer of Wealth 

In the next 10 years, according to a new report from brokerage Coldwell Banker Global Luxury reviewed in the WSJ, 1.2 million people from around the world whose net worth is at least $5 million will pass down their wealth – a total of at least $38 trillion – to their children.

That’s a lot of money.

A good chunk of it – about $4.6 trillion – will be in the form of real estate. Half of those properties are in the US, and some of them are already changing hands because many Baby Boomer parents would rather see the transfers happen while they are still alive.

This is a serious opportunity for brokers, contractors, home decorators, and other service providers. As the lucky youngsters begin to gain ownership over their pieces of this multitrillion-dollar giveaway, they will be buying and selling homes and hiring professionals to make them fit their inexperienced style.

I couldn’t even guess at what they will be buying and selling, nor what sorts of changes they will likely make. But if I were in my 30s or 40s, I’d be working on figuring out how these Gen Xers and Millennials will be directing their newfound wealth.

 
G7 Shocks the World and Makes a Sensible Decision 

This year’s G7 summit has been delayed because the date conflicted with Trump’s White House birthday party, which will showcase, among other Trumpian amusements, an MMA (mixed martial arts) fight in or around the Oval Office.

I’ve never had a high opinion of the annual get-together of the seven so-called world leaders, because they rarely arrive at a course of action that makes economic sense. And when they do, they don’t follow up on it.

But now, after 52 years of loony thinking and wasteful spending, they’ve done something that makes perfect sense. Going forward with the meeting without Trump while half the world is watching a cage fight would have been an embarrassing mistake.

Trump Says He’ll Impose a Credit Card Interest Rate Cap 
Is That a Good Thing? 

President Trump has announced that he plans to cap credit card interest rates at 10% for one year.

It was the first time in more than 10 years when nobody – neither Democrats nor Republicans – was outraged by an executive order he issued.

In fact, it felt like everyone liked the idea.

But as with the capturing of Maduro, it’s likely that the nice people with TDS will find a problem with it. And I’m pretty sure I know what that is. If a 10% limit were imposed, it would force credit card issuers to get tougher on their credit rating standards, which would prevent millions of deadbeats from acquiring cards and buying things they can’t afford.

Good News on the US Economy 

New orders for key US-manufactured capital goods increased more than expected ​in November, suggesting business spending on equipment ‌maintained a steady growth pace in the fourth quarter.

Non-defense capital goods orders excluding aircraft, a closely watched proxy for business spending, rose ‌0.7% after a downwardly revised 0.3% ​gain in October, the Commerce Department’s Census Bureau said last week.

Economists polled by Reuters had ‍forecast these so-called core capital goods orders increasing 0.3% after a previously reported 0.5% advance in October. Shipments ⁠of core capital goods rose 0.4% after gaining ‍0.8% in October.

I didn’t know she had died, so when I saw this, it took me aback. Here, in a theater in Dublin, Ireland, a 1,000-member choir sings Nothing Compares 2 Uin memory of Sinead O’Connor.

Since I didn’t know much about her – other than she had a nice voice and wrote some fetching songs, including Nothing Compares 2 U (which went platinum) – I googled her biography. She had quite the fucked-up life. A blend of Joan Baez, Mary Black, and Amy Winehouse.

Here’s a video obituary of her career.

Where did the idea of mentorship and apprenticeship come from? Social scientists tell us it’s based on “reciprocity” – a relatively new term that we hear a lot these days in discussions about human relationships, especially in business. But I can trace it back to a concept that’s a lot older than you might think. Older than companies, ancient kingdoms, or even agriculture.

It probably started with a fish.

(One You Will Almost Certainly Disagree With) 

It wasn’t exactly a New Year’s Resolution. It happened circumstantially. But since the beginning of this year, my three brothers and I have been doing something that we did sporadically in 2025: having Zoom conversations after dinner on Sunday evenings.

One Zooms in from California. Another from Massachusetts. The youngest and I take the call from the Swamp House (in Paradise Palms) at 6:00 pm, after the friends and family (and HF, K’s mom, who’s 93) that gather there every week have caught up with one another and gone back to their homesteads, leaving JF and I alone on the porch with our alcohol and smokes.

The most recent conversation was about something we’d talked about before: the idea of virtue.

Here’s how it played out…

She’s completely wrong, but I love Elle Cordova so much that I gave her top honors for this spoof!

Today, I look at “equal rights” in this country and make the argument that some forms of discrimination cannot – or should not – be protected under the law.

I’ve been working late these past several weeks – into the wee hours after midnight. That’s not good, because my best hours are in the morning when I have more energy and a clear head. What is good is that I’m not sleeping late, which is what I would have done in the past. I’m getting up at 5:30 regardless, which gives me the time I need to get some important work done before my quotidian business demands kick in.

To compensate for the lost hours of sleep, I take two half-hour naps during the day. It’s surprising and encouraging to discover that this seems to work.

When I am sleep-deprived, as they say, I have a strong urge to tell my trainers and grappling companions that I’m injured and must postpone exercise until the following day. But these guys know me too well to believe me. “We will start out easy and work up a little sweat,” they say, “then see how we feel.”

After 10 minutes of riding the Airdyne and five minutes of calisthenics, my physical and mental ennui evaporates and I feel – quite miraculously – okay. I then agree to put on a 40-pound weighted vest (to match the 40 pounds of body weight I’ve lost in the last 6 months) and get to the training, which is always some version of brutality… but the sort that leaves you feeling good when you’ve survived.

Today, when I was on the bike, my trainer was listening to some YouTube news channel featuring a young black woman complaining about how she felt victimized by White Privilege, and especially by “Old White Rich Men.” Which left me wondering, “Is she talking about me?”