The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => History => Topic started by: AugustWest on May 27, 2004, 04:15:34 am
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OK, here's the scenario.
Two years ago you won the biggest Powerball evar. $500 million. You officially have a shitload of money. You've spent the last two years engaging in hella debauchery. You've bought the stuff -- the houses, the cars, the drugs, the sexual partners. It's starting to get boring. You feel the deep seated need to approach some great task or undertake some wild undertaking.
What do you do?
Assume that you've already done and bought all the self-indulgent stuff that you'd ever wanted and you still had Scrooge McDuck type assets. You're Bill Gates at 50. You're pretty much utterly free to do whatever the hell it is that you want. What is it?
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Jeopardy winnings burning a hole in your pocket, cuz?
I'd visit somewhere that people don't usually visit on vacation, like Nepal or South Africa. Don't stay in a hotel - rent a villa - integrate yourself into the local population as quickly as possible. Sing songs with the childen.
Have a total stranger killed for your amusement.
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Damn...ummmm...I seriously have no idea. I'd like to think I'd figure out around how much it would cost me to live relatively comfortably for the rest of my days and then start some sort of fund to spend the rest of the money, as decided by a group of advisors. I'd probably would actually spend the money on building a "Milennium Falcon" of my own, but I'd like to THINK....
I don't know, man. I'd feel so much responsibility, I don't know if I could take it. How would you decide what to fund, and how to fund it? For instance, is it better that we cure AIDS or end world hunger? If we end world hunger, and the world simply becomes overcrowded, until the carrying capacity of Earth is passed and millions die out, is it your fault?
Wow, I almost made a reference to a comic book. I guess I will. In the latest issue of "Enginehead," this completely wacked out comic about this bizarre ***** thing, the superhero ***** thing realizes that, because he saved the life of one little boy from getting hit by a truck, the trucking company will get sued out of business and at least 4 people will commit suicide. If you have some sort of special ability, or you're just mind-bogglingly rich, do you have an obligation to help people? What if you just fuck things up even more? The road to hell is paved with etc., etc.
I LEARNED MORALS FROM DC COMICS.
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This is gonna sound so lame, that all your eyes are going to roll simultaneously with a force that might make the earth wobble on its axis.
I'd start a family foundation.
:roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:
Seriously! I mean, on first winning the money, I'd pay off my house, my credit cards, and my student loans, and put aside money for grad school. Then I'd pay off my parents' houses and credit cards. Then I'd pay for my brother and his wife to have a new house built, since they outgrew their current home about two kids ago. Then I'd pay off my in-laws' house, credit cards, and send my brother-in-law to college. Then I'd buy a second car. Maybe one of them electrical hi-breed thingers.
Then I'd have about $0.50 left.
Hah. Seriously, if I could do all those things and still have more money than I could use right away, it's always been a dream of ours (mine and Pedro's) to start a family foundation that raises and donates funds to various charities. I'd want to support research on diabetes, Crohn's and autism, since those three have a serious impact on my immediate family. And I'd want to provide scholarships for autistic preschoolers whose families can't afford occupational therapy. I'd want to support historians-in-training who intend to study minority groups in the US through research grants and scholarships. I'd want to form a think tank to study different ways to improve healthcare in America. And I'd probably do a good deal of donating to the college theatre program Pedro came through. So a family foundation makes more sense than just splitting the money up among various causes, since its whole purpose is to make the money grow and become more useful to other people. Plus, it's a nice tax shelter.
Or, what the hell, maybe I'd just run for Governor or something. If there's one thing Brewster's Millions has taught us, it's how to waste the most money in the least amount of time.
I LEARNED MORALS FROM RICHARD PRYOR MOVIES
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Predictably, I'd use the money to try to save some endangered ecosystem full of excellent small mammals. Probably in Central or South America where all the best animals live.
But I'm having a little trouble focussing on the details instead of thinking about what I'd do in the two years of debauchery first.
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I'd probably try to slowly establish a series of after-school centers for kids here in Southern California. Places where kids could go in the afternoon and take classes for free, or just hang out in a safe environment. Start with one, see how that works, and then work from neighborhood to neighborhood.
I'd also buy myself a blimp.
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Have a giant laser constructed and burn the word FUCK into the moon just to prove it's not a "bad" word and won't hurt anybody.*
Or I'd build a giant super villain castle, following all the rules from the Evil Overlord (http://www.eviloverlord.com) list, and make it the coolest ass theme park EVER. For a small fee you and your friends take on personas and attempt to overthrow the dictator with all the usual movie scenes. You get thrown in the dungeon, offered money and power to defect to my forces, leaping away from an exploison. For an added fee add a staff member to your party to offer hints and suggestions.
Packages run from small half-day scenarios like foiling a general in a minor skirmish all the way up to vulgar displays of wealth which follow entire campaign story-lines allong the lines of Morrowind or Arcanum.
*Unless, of course, the laser weakens the moon's integrity and it cracks apart showering rocks onto the earth like in Cowboy Bebop.
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If I'd alread done all of the self indulgent crap? But I keep thinking of all the self indulgent crap. I guess spending money, no matter what, is really self indulgent in some way. Even charity has it's own rewards, really.
But if I'd already fulfilled all my selgiraffe needs (which I really can't imagine being possible. Really, I'm that selgiraffe.)? I suppose I would then like to buy Canada and make David Suzuki our leader. I don't pretend to be smart enough to fix the worlds problems, but I think Suzuki could do so much good. It's be a fun experiment.
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Predictably, I'd use the money to try to save some endangered ecosystem full of excellent small mammals. Probably in Central or South America where all the best animals live.
That's weird - because I was just thinking of the opposite.
I'd use the money to have Endangered Species dinners like in "The Freshman." It'd be neat to eat the last of a number of species.
Then I'd buy up lots of rainforest land and have it paved-over and huge Jetsons high-rise apartments built.
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If I'd alread done all of the self indulgent crap? But I keep thinking of all the self indulgent crap.
That's the problem with these lottery fantasies, isn't it? The "two years" part is the part my mind keeps going back to.
Yes, it's interesting to think about what I would do for others. But not as interesting as the house in Brentwood...and the weekend house on the beach in Malibu, and the summer house on Cape Cod, and the condo overlooking Central Park, and the jet on standby to take me to those places, and the long weekends in France and London, and the trips to Vegas for high-stakes table games and guitar shopping, and the personal trainers and yoga teachers, and the contributions to politicians and lobbyists on both sides of the aisle for favors and influence, and the parties upstairs in the dark room at Sushi On Sunset with piles of drugs and ingenues from WB shows....
So, sure there'd be some charity stuff. But there'd also be a blimp. With the word JIM! painted on the side in huge purple letters. Shag carpeting and overstuffed sofas inside. And a lobster tank. And various sous chefs from famous restaurants taking turns in the kitchen. And bowls of French quaaludes and condoms. Partying with Jude Law and T. Coraghessan Boyle and the Olsen twins on the way to Maui, where the staff awaits the arrival of the limos carrying the mainlanders to their long weekend of freak-getting-on.
I LEARNED MORALS FROM ROBIN LEACH
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I'd build libraries. Or maybe give a bigger endowment to existing ones (particularly crappy small town libraries).
And I'd also get a bunch of private tutors to teach me various languages.
Once all the debauchery is done, I'm basically a very boring person.
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I'd use the money to have Endangered Species dinners like in "The Freshman." It'd be neat to eat the last of a number of species.
I knew it! You are Montgomery Burns! (http://www.tvtome.com/tvtome/servlet/GuidePageServlet/showid-146/epid-1408/)
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The little animals - They're so wretchedly adorable.
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I would buy a major league baseball team. If the team needed a new stadium, I'd build it with my own money, like they did in San Francisco. I'd promote the game to people of all races, genders, and incomes. I'd make sure there were always $5 tickets out in the bleachers, and $10 tickets in the upper deck. I'd keep food and drink prices reasonable. I would also charge a shitload for luxury boxes.
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I would buy a major league baseball team. If the team needed a new stadium, I'd build it with my own money, like they did in San Francisco. I'd promote the game to people of all races, genders, and incomes. I'd make sure there were always $5 tickets out in the bleachers, and $10 tickets in the upper deck. I'd keep food and drink prices reasonable. I would also charge a shitload for luxury boxes.
The only way you'd ever get me to a ball game is with free booze. Would there be free booze?
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I'm in kind of a foul mood:
I'd start a dynasty. Why not? First I'd use my money to purchase oil companies. Then I'd run for a series of offices ending up in the presidency. Blow my opportunities to do something good in the world by following in lock-step with my predecessor. Meanwhile, I'd father a couple of clowns, make sure they don't get drafted, buy them into and out of prestigious schools, and hook them up with some of the meanest people I met in public office. This way, even though I won't last more than one term, at least I've set up a viable dynasty where one of my failure offspring can take over for me.
Some version of this plan has worked for centuries. It's worked for the Sauds, the Jordans, the Bushes, the Gores, the Doles, the Kennedies, the Adams, and it could work for YOU!
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The only way you'd ever get me to a ball game is with free booze. Would there be free booze?
I'd throw "Achewood message board night" at which there would definitely be free booze.
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I'm down with the sports team thing. I was going to say I would take a bunch of pointless tilts at trying to win the presidency and do all sorts of good stuff, but who the hell am I kidding. I'd buy the NFL team that I follow (cause they suck) and put them on the road to recovery. It'd probably take more than a billion, though. I'm not worried about the NHL team that I follow; they're doing ok on their own.
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I'm down with Carlos. Brng baseball back to the people. Every other loge should have homeless people living in it. Because rich people have too many opportunities to ignore the harsh realities the rest of us see every day.
I thought about buying a team but more than that, I would endow in every major city and in some small ones, too, Baseball Leagues. I want to see kids playing baseball. Not soccer. baseball. I guess I would also give money to soccer because I think kids aren't active enough as it is, but I want to see a resurgence in the Grand Old Game.
What I'm saying is I would try to get more kids away from the TV and the fritos and get them outside doing something that causes expansion of thought, improvement of health and development of good habits or even social responsibility.
And I would still be a Republican while doing all this.
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Step one: Buy all the residential real estate in all the delapidated/ing neighborhoods of my fair metro area, and at a fair price.
Step two: Carve out a nice estate for myself, the wife, and the help (and families) to live in - daycare center included, because I don't want any kids in my damn house.
Step three: Hire contractors to restore each of the homes to current codes and amenities, respecting the historical integrity of each neighborhood.
Step four: Push through the local and state legislatures a bill that bans new billboard construction in said metro area.
Step five: Buy each and every last billboard in said metro area, and tear them down.
Step six: Sell the houses (but not the estate, of course) at an incredible markup.
Step seven: Invest heavily in local businesses that do their jobs better than national chains, pumping up their values so much that they can afford to build new branches in each of the restored neighborhoods.
Step eight: Repeat billboard procedure with Starbucks, McDonald's/Wendy's/BK, Wal*Mart, etc.
Step nine: Retire in a paradise of my own design.
Step ten: Build an automobile collection that would make Leno fill his #####.
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In rough order of least to most self-absorbed:
1) Charity work -- libraries, the cure for everything, pretty much the whole schmeer.
2) Subsidization and promotion of science education. Too many people in this nation believe that science is frightening or somehow immoral, and that mortifies me. Biology is your friend, people. DNA will not eat you. This would probably also get into heavy subsidization of genetic engineering research, AI research, and such.
3) Paying for public buildings and art fixtures, starting with significant donations to my college to de-uglify the campus. In the era of cookie-cutter houses and Office Depots, we need some beautiful public architecture. If they could do it in the Bronze Age and the Dark Age, why can't we do it now?
4) A family foundation; this may go under charity work, but overall I think it's a noble idea. (My mother's family actually established one after my grandfather's death, in his name, to give scholarships to students from his hometown heading to university; who could argue with that?)
5) If I never have to work again, it's time to learn how to do something useful. I'd try to gain some useful and interesting skills, from brushing up on my high-school German to finally taking Tai Chi. I would almost certainly have a substantial wood shop installed on my rambling palatial estate and get down to making furniture.
Of course, if I end up actually doing research science for a living, even with gigantic scads of money, I'd probably keep working. I'd just have to buy...
6) ... a working Jacob's Ladder and workbenches filled with conical flasks of mysteriously-colored bubbling liquids. And possibly a disembodied brain in a jar to advise me on my evil plots.
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Biology is your friend, people. DNA will not eat you.[/i]
Not yet. NOT...YET.
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I'd buy the kraft mac n chesse instead of the generic.
and real top ramen instead of "smack" ramen.
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Dream the big dreams Sailor, dream the big dreams.
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At least one of us should have offered to pay all the server costs for this messageboard. Shame.
Or would that count as part of the two years of debauchery?
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At least one of us should have offered to pay all the server costs for this messageboard. Shame.
I was planning on doing that, right after I won the World Series of Poker. Unfortunately, I was unable to win my way to the big event this year, so it'll have to wait until next.
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At least one of us should have offered to pay all the server costs for this messageboard. Shame.
Yes, but not just the server costs. Showering Jough in cash would also be appropriate, though for tax purposes I would probably have to put him on the JimCorp payroll. I'd throw in a free ride on the JimBlimp, too.
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I like the direction this thread is heading.
Carry on, citizens.
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How about showering Jough with gold bars, or other heavy objects with pointy edges and corners?
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And lots of expensive oil . . . in barrels.
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I'd invest in private space travel (http://www.scaled.com/projects/tierone/).