Hi everyone. I wrote a book and it should be available soon on Amazon Kindle. The book is called Taming Zika. Just like my other book Taming Ebola, this book also goes into origins of Zika, how it can be transmitted, treatments, government efforts etc. Hope you will support me by buying it. A few days ago when I mentioned that I was working on this book to a few friends, one of them said “Why do you write books about boring topics?”. Instead you should write about sex because sex sells. I reminded him that I have a reputation to protect. Most of my friends and contacts know me as a scientist, author etc. Besides I can only write about my knowledge and experiences. But he does have a point. So far the royalties from my two books: Taming Ebola and 50 Things To Do If You Get Laid Off; can’t even buy me a beer. But it is okay. As I said, it would be nice to make money from my books, but that is not my primary objective or motivation. I just want to educate people and perhaps give them a different perspective. Anyway, if I do decide to write about sex, I will definitely do it under an assumed name and perhaps advertise on a different forum. But jokes apart, I have said this before and i will say this again; please let me know what other topics you (not related to sex) would like to see addressed in my future books.

Hello all. Before I get into today’s blog, I want to correct  something in my blog about Harambe the gorilla that was killed at the Cincinnati Zoo. In that post I said that a 12 year old boy fell into the enclosure. But one of my readers, a mother of a 4 year old corrected me. She said the boy was actually 3-4 years old. So I would like to thank that reader. Also, I want to say that I usually check my facts before I share them with the readers. This one slipped through the check. So I apologize for this error.

Now for todays post. Since it is about financial matters, I want to mention that what I am saying should not be taken as financial advice. I am not a certified financial planner or other such professional. Before investing, please talk to a certified or licensed professional and every situation is different.

If you want to retire a wealthy person, you have to start small and if possible, start early. Warren Buffet started investing at age 11 and thought he started late. Also start by saving a small amount everyday, but do it consistently. In the book Rich Dad Poor Dad, Robert Kiyosaki talks about putting aside money for 3 things. Savings, investing and charity. Many other advisers recommend a similar strategy. Thanks to the Federal Reserve’s near zero interest policy, money in the bank will not grow that quickly. But you should keep some part of your money in a state where you can get to it quickly in case of an emergency. When you invest money, seek investments that are conservative so that you don’t lose the principal. Finally charity. Make a point to donate some part of your money to charity. I remember a few years ago when I lost my job, I still donated to charities. Going back to investing, if you invest $10 everyday at a growth rate of 5% for 40 years, you will get almost a half a million dollars. If you can put aside more or if you get a better growth rate, obviously, you will have more money. But the trick is to start early, start small and be consistent.

Hi folks. Have you called a doctor or customer service for a credit card and greeted by a live person. I doubt it. Instead you are greeted by the dreaded automated phone menu. Recently I called our son’s ENT doctor. All I wanted to do was cancel an existing appointment. I had to go through seven different menus to get to a live person. My actual conversation with her took a few seconds, but to get to her, I spent several minutes negotiating the menu. Sometimes you get so many choices that you forget if you wanted option 1 or option 5. Well they have a solution for that: to repeat the menu, press *. Many times, what I do is keep pressing 0 until the system says “I will transfer you to a representative”. Another annoying thing is regardless of the time of the day or night you call, you still get “All our representatives are currently busy assisting other callers. Your call will be answered in the order it was received”. I honestly think that the customer service people are sitting there drinking coffee or soda or playing video games on their phone. The other annoying part is when the person you get cannot answer your question and they say they will transfer you. Again you get a different set of menus. There have been times when I have gotten “We are experiencing unusually high call volume, please leave a message and we will get back to you”. I realize that hiring people is expensive and that automated menus can efficiently (?) route your call to the right person/department. Some companies discourage phone calls. When you call they direct you to a website and you have to fill out a form. I have noticed that this process takes longer and usually your question is not answered completely. In our case, our kids’ pediatrician is really good. You do get an automated menu, but within seconds you select an option and speak to a live person.

Hi everyone. There is a saying: “One bad apple spoils the bunch”. So can a few fans give a city a bad name? I am talking about the city of Philadelphia. We are passionate about our sports teams. We cheer them when they are winning, but we boo them when they are losing. But a few days ago, things went too far. In a baseball game, one of the players, Ryan Howard, got out. It was the last out of the game and Philadelphia lost the game. As Howard was walking back, a fan threw an aluminum beer bottle at his feet. Obviously, Howard was upset. I remember in the early 2000’s, Philly football fans were upset with their Eagles and they started hurling snowballs at the opposite team and Santa Claus. Is nothing sacred anymore! It was during the same time that Philadelphia had a sitting judge during the Eagles games. But when you look at polls of worst fans, Philly fans get top ranking. But I bet you, if you polled for the best fans, I think they will get top ranking as well. Going to any sporting event for a family of 4 is an expensive affair. Depending upon the game, you can easily spend between $200 and $500. So if the team has a poor performance, fans are going to let them know how they feel. Some fans get more emotional and demonstrative than others, but does that mean everyone else is bad. For instance, there were 25,000 other fans on the day Howard got assaulted. But only one fan did that. So I don’t think it is fair to brand a whole city for thoughtless actions of a rotten few. We need to remember that athletes are human beings first.

Hi everyone. Before I dive into today’s post, I do want to mention about the weekend. May 27-30 was a long weekend in the US. May 30th is called Memorial Day. It is a day on which the US remembers their fallen war heroes. I know most people, including me, look at it as a holiday. But it is more than that. So I would like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to those that made the ultimate sacrifice, not just in the US but all over the world, and not just in war. Heroes are found in other situations like natural disasters, people who save accident victims and many more.

Talking about the ultimate sacrifice, I am not sure if people have been following the news in the US. For those not familiar, couple of days ago, a gorilla called Harambe, at the Cincinnati Zoo was killed by zoo officials. A twelve year old boy somehow managed to bypass the barrier and fell into the moat surrounding the gorilla enclosure. Harambe, a male lowland silverback gorilla, was seen charging towards the kid and dragging him to a corner. Zoo officials made a split second decision and killed the gorilla to save the child. I am not an animal activist, however, I could not help but think whether Harambe had to die? Lowland silverback gorilla is a sub-species that is considered endangered. Could he have been tranquilized? Was the child really in danger? Some eyewitnesses said that they felt the gorilla was actually protecting the child. They felt that his parental instinct took over. Others say that he was “displaying”. Displaying is a behavior male gorilla’s in the wild use to deal with challenges from another male. But once the gorilla realized that the intruder was not another gorilla, he would have backed off. I guess we will never know. But being the most evolved animal, do human beings have the right to kill those lower on the evolution ladder? What about the parents? Isn’t it their responsibility to make sure that their children don’t wander into unsafe areas. Was the gorilla enclosure not adequately equipped to keep intruders out? There are a lot of questions and maybe over the next few days, we will get some answers. Regardless it will be too late for a gorilla who paid the ultimate price.

Please let me know what your thoughts are.