Looks like the folks at SXSW have put out a complete schedule of when the podcast/mp3 versions of the panel presentations will be available. If you check out theSXSWi panel podcast schedule, you'll see that my panel's audio will be available on April 6. If you didn't attend the panel or are just curious, that will be when you can participate after the fact.

It's also an interesting schedule to look at because it will let you know when any of the other panels you were interested in or missed (which is all of them if you didn't attend).

If you are lazy and just want to grab all of the MP3's as they come out, you should put the podcast RSS url into a podcast receiver like Juice and let it take care of grabbing them as they come out and you can filter through them after the fact (that's what I'm doing).

While I agree that much of the benefit in attending is in meeting people, etc. I am not anywhere near convinced that that is the primary or even the majority of the benefit. Personally, to me, experiences like this are valuable in how they provide a wide array of input into your thinking. With 3-4 sessions per day, a couple of meals per day and your evening leisure, the permutations are gigantic. Each person who attends actually attends a completely unique conference. And, because it's 4 days of constant input, you tend to think about things on day 2 that wouldn't have occurred except for what the events of day 1 stimulated you into thinking.

Thus, I think the primary purpose of these conferences is mental stimulation. And, that stimulation *can* happen using just the podcasts. So, if you can't go to conferences, take advantage of these files and don't let people tell you that they aren't valuable.

A while back, I posted about the house next door going on the market. It sat on the market for quite a while with a couple of price drops and then the sign just went down. No "Sold" sign or anything, so I figured they gave up on selling it and would try again in a few months (been there, have the scars).

So, this week, when a UHaul showed up in their driveway, I was surprised. Having lived near more than one of these kinds of houses before, my first thought was that someone was moving in. Nope. Stuff was going in to the truck.

OK, maybe they're just putting some stuff in storage to actually make a legitimate attempt to sell the house. Nope again.

Next thing we know, the picture you see in this post is what the house next door looks like. Everything is either gone or in that dumpster. All of the lawn mowers on the side of the house, all of the vehicles, all of the garbage, everything.

I'm thrilled, even if I don't know exactly what happened. I don't know if they were forclosed on or if an invester bought it as a rehab or what, but they are gone. I can't wait to see what happens to it next. It'd be great if someone puts some effort into that house.

Does anyone know of a reasonable place to buy ISO/European paper sizes, particularly A5 either local to me or online? I'm looking for places that don't have it priced as though it's being handcrafted by virgins in the Andes. Sorry, I'm not paying $29 for a ream of basic copier paper. I'd like to have a couple of reams of A4 and A5 on hand for a couple of projects, but can't find it in any of the office stores and the online places I found are those high priced ones.

I didn't expect this to be difficult. It's the same dang paper, just cut to a different size, right? Apparently not.

I got an email a week or 2 ago from someone who read my article on Moho (the animation software) and was looking for a copy of the documentation. I've been helping him try to get started with it. Turns out, the guy is Ernie Colon, who drew the Richie Rich and Casper comic books for 25 years. I read quite a few issues of those things as a kid, so this brought back some memories.

He sent me a drawing of Richie Rich and Cadbury the butler as a thank you for helping him out. It arrived last night in perfect condition (you never know with the post office) and is now sitting ready for me to go get it framed.

I took a photo of it at an angle, attempting to show it off without violating either Mr. Colon's copyright or the trademarked characters. If it disappears, it's because I didn't go far enough in that effort.

Photo: Lisa

Bruce Sterling wrote a book a while back that dealt with the societal fallout of what happens if/when medical advancements cross the line where people can live indefinitely. It's an interesting book that's well worth a read.

It comes to my mind whenever a range of topics come up, including retirement planning. Conversations with several people who are over 80 today have convinced me to think differently about retirement timelines than lots of folks. When they were my age, they expected to live pretty much right up to the age of 65, possibly just starting to collect on Social Security. If they lived beyond that, they'd have a few years. As a result, several of them are dealing with what happens when you plan to live off of your retirement savings for 20 years longer than you planned.

Combining those conversations with the concepts in the book had me thinking about "indefinite" retirement this weekend. I was curious what it would take *today* to live a given lifestyle indefinitely.

So, I did some math. I took annual incomes of $50,000, $75,000 and $100,000 as my basis. I was after the lump starting sum that would allow you to live at that exact same level *forever*. I used 8% interest on the big pile of money and 4% inflation. I also added the interest before drawing the annual income. Changes in any of those variables would change the outcomes.

I tested up to 10,000 with a variety of combinations. The table below shows the exact numbers that reached "escape velocity". These are the after-tax numbers you'd need to inherit, win or have in the bank today to live your lifestyle indefinitely.

Interestingly, the last dollar added generally moves the duration that the amount lasts from 400 years or so to 10,000 years. So, if you want to spend that dollar, you fall back to running out of money in 400 years. I know, you're heartbroken.

It's obviously not terribly useful for real retirement planning, but mostly as an exercise to think about what happens if you retire at 65 and live to 125. Do your 401K planning spreadsheets account for lasting 30 years? What if you live 50 more? What if they somehow cross the line?