Wow, I can't believe I forgot to add this story to the posts about what I'd been reading recently: From the New York Times, Aug. 22, a story about a guy who spends $30,000 a year on lottery tickets.

Last week, an application turned the iPhone into a megaphone to proclaim: “I Am Rich.” That is the name of a downloadable program that promised to do nothing except signal to the world that its buyer was wealthy enough to have spent $1,000...

I think this rule has never been truer than now, during a financial crisis of historic proportions. It remains to be seen how the credit crunch will play out, but why did it happen in the first place? People bought too much house.