Vanilla is a fascinating ingredient. It is one of the most popular flavors worldwide and is incredibly common in baked goods. The process of creating vanilla flavoring is time-consuming and labor-intensive, which is why in its purest form it is also one of the most expensive spices in the world. Vanilla’s widespread use and high…

While a series of profitable years is wonderful, we all know the ride comes to an end at some point. When that happens, financial advisors seeking to manage or reduce clients’ risk level can be held hostage to the gains that have built up in taxable accounts. As advisors add new clients/accounts and plan for…

As parents (myself included) apprehensively sent their kids back into the classroom for another pandemic-influenced school year, it put me in the mood to chip away at my own reading list, a collection of research papers that had accumulated in the “to read” folder on my desktop. Now, before you condemn me to the nerd-set,…

I love the beach, but I am not a huge fan of the ocean. Maybe I’m alone here, but after watching “Jaws,” National Geographic programming, Shark Week on Discovery, and “Sharknado” 1-6, I just cannot shake that uneasy feeling when I’m venturing into the surf. Even when I’ve had the privilege of swimming or snorkeling…

What are your re-watchable movies? For me, it’s several cult classics from the mid-90s. It doesn’t matter how many times I’ve seen them, if I happen to catch them when flipping through the channels, I’m going to stop. Unfortunately, I usually end up only watching briefly until my wife rolls her eyes and asks, “Again…really?”…

In a time when seemingly all assets are “melting up,” allow me to invoke one of my favorite Saturday Night Live characters, Debbie Downer, and provide a less-than-rosy dose of reality: U.S. government bonds, which have a “market cap” that’s equivalent to 2x the U.S. stock market, have all entered a bear market. If you…