The difference between something left alone in its wrapper and the same object sitting naked is something uncomprehendable.
Dust and water vapour introduces weird congs into a previously smooth and efficient running machine. I ran my printer for the first time in a year toay. Not having used it for such a long time, I had assumed that it would run with the same flawlessness as the very first time it did running out of its bubblewrap.
So it came as a total shock when I returned from the kitchen to find my whole stack of plain paper printed with nonsensical symbols. Almost immediately, thoughts of a paranormal entity entered my head: was my printer possessed?
I toggled the power switch. It flashed its led indicator lights randomly, before spewing forth even more weird symbols.
The printer stopped in the midst of chewing up another hapless piece of paper after I pulled the plug out of the neurotic machine.
It seemed to work fine again after I forcefully dragged the victim right out from under the entire feed tray. I printed a test page, which came out with alternate bands of light and darker ink, something that did nothing to reduce my ire. Though things improved after cleaning the cartridges, I knew that this printer would not survive another period of dis-use.
In The Cashflow Quadrant, Robert mentions the typical man (or woman, for that matter), trapped in the rat race of constantly fighting for raises in a job. When he gets one, he finds himself nudged into a higher tax bracket, which means more money out of his pay even before he gets to see it.
To make things worse, banks encourage these people to upgrade to a new and better property, with a very attractive refinancing plan, and of course, the nice interest to boot. After all these, the happy man goes out on a spending binge with his apparent raise (after all, he deserved it), and gets into all kinds of debt.
I am not particularly good at explaining such concepts (and I know that this is not an accurate portrayal of his ideas), since they were never my forte in all my years in school. (Come to think of it, neither were any of my friends.) But I assure Dear Readers, if you have been thinking that a job is all you ever need to be financially secure for life, then The Cashflow Quadrant is going to be a wake up call; rude but hopefully timely.
I am not going to get any benefit out of promoting this book, since I am not an affiliate selling the book (I should probably join though). So take my word for it. Get the book, sit down for one afternoon, and get financially educated.
Footnote: There is no particular reason why my typings have gotten so rotten (at least it looks so from my point of view). Perhaps if somebody would be kind enough to point out any blatantly obvious flaw, I would be really grateful. Thanks. I really had some tough time hammering this out on my keyboard (it is taking the brunt of my annoyance with the printer). Inspiration escapes me these days.
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