Dear Uncle Mike,
A good friend just
inherited close to two million
dollars. He's just an average
guy in his forties, has a job
and a life he likes. I love the
guy like a brother but he has no
business sense. He plans
to just put the money in the bank.
I hooked him up with a
stockbroker I know, but my friend seems unable to make a decision. He
reads your column and maybe if you said something he'd listen. I hate to
see him miss out on building a nest egg for retirement. Can you help?
Vince R., Eugene
‘• Ü k .-:-
Dear Vince,
Uncle Mike would love to help. He's that sort of person. He does
however shy away from fixing things that aren't broken. So your friend
fell into a couple mil. Good for him. So he likes his job and his life.
Gangbusters. Uncle Mike loves to hear happy stories and is sad to hear
this one is causing you distress. For every silver lining there's a cloud.
Money is the root of many possibilities. One of them is to not let its
presence, or absence, warp your perspective.
Like any drug, money can
become an end rather than a means. Someone once asked J. Paul Getty
why he was the richest man on the planet. He answered that money had
always been the most important thing in his life. To Uncle Mike, this
makes you a junkie. When someone mailed J. Paul's grandson's ear to
him along with a request for an amount of cash J. Paul could have blown
on lunch, the old jackal didn’t budge. Uncle Mike sees this as false grit.
So your friend is resisting the entreaties of a stockbroker. Uncle Mike
likes him more by the minute. Yes, there are socially conscious
investment opportunities, ventures that don't involve some form of rape
and pillage (third world economies, hundred dollar sneakers, toxic
moneyfills). And yes, there are socially conscious stockbrokers. Sadly,
they make their daily bread on commissions. As sharks must swim to
breathe, brokers must buy and sell to eat. To say a broker will encourage
you to keep turning your money like compost is to understate the case.
Maybe your friend doesn’t want to do that. Maybe he doesn't want to
think about money.
And, by Uncle Mike's figures, he doesn't have to. So the hopeless idiot
wants to just put his two million in the bank. Even passbook interest on
it would be. . . put down the zero, carry the one. . . ninety thousand
dollars.
Unless his retirement plans include marrying Imelda Marcos,
this should keep him in shoes.
Your friend seems to have mastered one of life's greatest challenges:
being content with what you have. You, on the other hand, seem to be
wrestling unsuccessfully with another:
learning to mind your own
business.
Dear Uncle Mike,
I'm 32, attractive, intelligent, and single. I think I love you.
married? Are you cute? Do you ever date your fans?
Alicia M., Portland
503 * 738-4134
Dana C. Anderson, M.S.
P.O Box 2485
Gearhart • Oregon 97138
When I can no longer bear to think of the
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Dear Alicia,
Forget to take our medicine, did we? Listen carefully, Alicia. You don't
know Uncle Mike. It follows that you cannot be both intelligent and in
love with him. Uncle Mike is flattered you find his disembodied presence
worthy of daydreams. For him, it's Sinead O'Connor and Lena Olin. Uncle
Mike can obsess with the best of them. The only difference between him
and you is that he'd open a vein before humiliating himself by writing to
them.
Is Uncle Mike married? Only to his bad habits, his daydreams, and his
reluctance to inflict them on someone he loves. Is Uncle Mike cute?
Kittens and bunnies are cute. On a good day Uncle Mike looks like the old
dog he is. Does Uncle Mike ever date his fans? Uncle Mike never dates
anyone.
Neither his nurse nor his poker support group feel it's time yet.
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Dear Uncle Mike,
I read in the papers Elaine Franklin, Packwood's executive assistant,
makes $136,000 a year. Can this be right?
Jeff S., Salem
Dear Jeff,
Interesting word, 'right'. If you mean right in the context of childcare
workers making five dollars an hour and waitresses being taxed on their
tips, no. If your question is, how much would it take to persuade a normal
human being to shill for a lecherous scumbag with the political ethics of
a diseased weasel, $136,000 isn't a whole lot of money. Having met Elaine
Franklin, Uncle Mike thinks she's worth every penny. He only wishes
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