Tony K's Blog

Settlers of Catan is the hot new boardgame. I read about it in Wired magazine ( here ) and it's time to buy.

Me taking Mini Cooper off a ski jump.

Dear Saint Mary's Professional MBA students, I am looking forward to meeting you in class. Here is a brief description of my background. I am Manager of Portfolio and Planning for Chevron Corporate Business Development. I have a BSc in Geophysical Engineering from Colorado School of Mines. I did exploration work for many years, but found myself attracted to the business side. I received an MBA from the University of St. Thomas in 1999, effectively completing a long gradual shift from the technical to the commercial and financial side of the business. In the late 1990s, I built the cash flow model that we used in our new country entry into Brazil. I transferred to San Ramon in 2001, and since then, have been an advocate of portfolio methods and improved planning and decision methods at Chevron. My current position is responsible for ensuring that asset and corporate acquisitions will be a good fit with our corporate strategies. Overview Monte Carlo and Portfolio Management...

November 27, 2008 was Thanksgiving Day and unfortunately a sad one. Our family pet of 10 years, a 15 year old greyhound died. We think he was born in about February, 1994. He raced in Tampa in the mid-1990s as "Armed and Dangerou s." He was a good racer, big at 75 lbs. The problem he had is that he would tend to get injured from trying too hard or something. Maybe his connective tissues were not robust enough for a dog his size. They retired him from racing and he lived on the farm for a few years to father some more racers before sending him to the greyhound adoption people. Sparky was a good as pet as one could hope for. He was playful, mellow, eager to please, and naively intelligent. Greyhounds Like a dragster, he was built for straight-line speed. He had no flexibility in his joints except back and forth. Sitting like most dogs do was a chore for him. Contrary to what many people think, greyhounds are not hyperactive. Owners call them "40 mile per hour couch potatoe...

Not since the day before we went into Iraq have I been so proud to be American. Obama is such a picture of class and grace. At last, we can leave the idiocy of the last 6 years behind us. My mother would have called and sad, "He's from Chicago you know. But he's a Sox fan." Yes we freaking can!!!!!

The Economist magazine has a "World Electoral Vote Simulation" going on right now. http://www.economist.com/vote2008/?sa_campaign=publisher/september/gec/ The outcome will be fascinating I'm sure.

The following article appeared in Business Week magazine recently. I tried to write to them, but their website did not work for me. Here's the link to the original article. Here's the text. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SAVING MORE (It was called "Short-term Thinking May Be A Saver's Best Friend" in the print version) Financial planners often suggest clients figure out how much they'll need to retire and save toward that huge number. Utpal "Paul" Dholakia, associate professor of management at Houston's Rice University, thinks people would do better to think about how much they'll save next month. A paper he co-wrote with Leona Tam of Old Dominion University found that those who planned savings for the next month did far better than those who tried to plan further out. In one experiment, people said they'd save an average $287 next month but saved $440. When asked to plan ahead four months, they said they'd save an average $946, but put aside jus...