Media Consumption: Baby Boomers are the biggest consumers of traditional media like television, radio, magazines, and newspaper. Despite being so traditional, 91% of baby boomers have a Facebook account. This generation has begun to adopt more technology in order to stay in touch with family members and reconnect with old friends.
Banking Habits: Boomers prefer to go into a branch to perform transactions. This generational cohort still prefers to use cash, especially for purchases under $5.
Shaping Events: Post-WWII optimism, the cold war, and the hippie movement.
What’s next on their financial horizon: This generation is experiencing the highest growth in student loan debt. While this might seem counterintuitive, it can be explained by the fact that this generation has the most wealth and is looking to help their children with their student debt. They have a belief that you should take care of your children enough to set them on the right course and don’t plan on leaving any inheritance. With more Americans outliving their retirement fund, declining pensions, and social security in jeopardy, ensuring you can successfully fund retirement is a major concern for Boomers.
Generation X
GEN X
Gen X Birth Years: 1965 to 1979/80
Current Age: 45 to 60
Generation Size: 65 million
Other Nicknames: ”Latchkey” generation, MTV generation
Media Consumption: Gen X still reads newspapers, magazines, listens to the radio, and watches TV (about 165 hours’ worth of TV a month). However, they are also digitally savvy and spend roughly 7 hours a week on Facebook (the highest of any generational cohort).
Banking Habits: Since they are digitally savvy, Gen X will do some research and financial management online, but still prefer to do transactions in person. They believe banking is a person-to-person business and demonstrate brand loyalty.
Shaping Events: End of the cold war, the rise of personal computing, and feeling lost between the two huge generations.
What’s next on Gen X’s financial horizon: Gen X is trying to raise a family, pay off student debt, and take care of aging parents. These demands put a high strain on their resources. The average Gen Xer carries $142,000 in debt, though most of this is in their mortgage. They are looking to reduce their debt while building a stable saving plan for the future.
Millennials (Gen Y)
MILLENNIALS
Millennial Birth Years: 1980 to 1994/6
Current Age: 29 to 44
Generation Size: 74 million
Other Nicknames: Gen Y, Gen Me, Gen We, Echo Boomers
Media Consumption: Most Millennials still watch TV but Netflix edges out traditional cable as the preferred provider. Cord-cutting in favor of streaming services is the popular choice. This generation is extremely comfortable with mobile devices, but 36% would choose to use a laptop to make larger online purchases of $150 or more. They typically have multiple social media accounts.
Banking Habits: Millennials have less brand loyalty than previous generations. They prefer to shop products and features first, and have little patience for inefficient or poor service. Because of this, Millennials place their trust in brands with superior product history such as Apple and Google. They seek digital tools to help manage their debt and see their banks as transactional as opposed to relational.
Shaping Events: The Great Recession, the technological explosion of the internet and social media, and 9/11
What’s next on their financial horizon: Millennials are powering the workforce, but with huge amounts of student debt. This is delaying major purchases like weddings and homes. Because of this financial instability, Millennials choose access over ownership, which can be seen through their preference for on-demand services. They want partners that will help guide them to their big purchases.
Gen Z
GEN Z
Gen Z Birth Years: 1997 to 2012
Currently Aged: 13 to 28
Generation Size: 69 million
Other Nicknames: iGeneration, Post-millennials, Homeland Generation
Media Consumption: The average Gen Zer received their first mobile phone between 10 and 13 years old. Many of them grew up playing with their parents’ mobile phones or tablets. They have grown up in a hyper-connected world and the smartphone is their preferred method of communication, spending around 4 hours a day on their mobile device.
Banking Habits: This generation has seen the struggle of Millennials and has adopted a more fiscally conservative approach. They want to avoid debt and appreciate accounts or services that aid in that endeavor. Debit cards top their priority list, followed by mobile banking.
Shaping Events: Smartphones, social media, never knowing a country not at war, and seeing the financial struggles of their parents (Gen X).
What’s next on Gen Z’s financial horizon: Learning about personal finance. They have a strong appetite for financial education and are opening savings accounts at younger ages than prior generations.
The Small town of Glennville New York is a nice quiet place to settle down and raise your family. At least that is What Sheriff Kyle Stevens thought when he retired after being a detective in New York City for twenty years. And Glennville, for the most part was quiet. Respectfull. Safe. Until the day Kyle’s deputy for the body of a young girl out by the old abandoned school building…
The prison uniform, now discarded in a shadowed alcove, lay like a discarded skin, a molted shell of a former self. It was a stark visual representation of his transformation, a physical shedding of the past. #Prison #crime #Thriller #Drama
My head swam. I tried to focus, to piece together what had happened, but my memories were fragmented, blurred like a badly scratched photograph. Images flickered – a flash of bright light, the deafening roar of something immense, the sickening crunch of collapsing structures…and then, nothing. Only the darkness before the agonizing awakening in this hellish landscape.
The ‘Sea Wanderer’ was more than just a vessel; it was their home, their adventure capsule, a testament to years of planning, saving, and dreaming. It was a forty-foot sloop, built to withstand the rigors of extended ocean voyages, her hull a sturdy, reassuring blue, her sails crisp and white against the deepening azure of the sky.A few weeks into their ocean cruise life for the Robinsons takes an ominous turn when a sudden storm wreaks havoc on the ship and family…
The Earth Fleet’s perspective was one of cautious analysis, tempered by apprehension. They saw a world of breathtaking beauty and advanced sophistication, but also a world that, in its very uniqueness, posed an unprecedented risk. The question now was not simply whether humanity could survive among the stars, but whether it could evolve, whether it could learn from a civilization that had, in its own way, already achieved a form of transcendence. #SpaceSettlement #SpaceExploration #StarTravel $SciFi #Kindle
“We survived the descent,” Jameson continued, her voice firming with resolve. “That’s more than many could have managed. The Odyssey may be broken, but we are not. We will assess, we will adapt, and we will survive. This is not the end of our journey. It’s just a… very, very difficult detour.”
The words, meant to inspire, were met with a heavy silence. The sheer magnitude of their predicament was too vast, too overwhelming, to be easily dispelled by mere words. The Odyssey was no longer a starship; it was a tomb, a monument to their fallen comrades and their shattered dreams. #SpaceSettlement #SpaceExploration #StarTravel $SciFi #Kindle
Andrea, back in her humble dwelling, noticed it too. The birds, usually a raucous chorus at dawn, were unnaturally silent. The insects, a constant hum of life in the humid air, seemed to have retreated. The vibrant colors of her small herb garden appeared to have dulled, as if a fine layer of dust had settled upon them, a dust that wasn’t visible but could be felt, a muffling of the world’s sensory output. She found herself looking over her shoulder, a habit she had never possessed before, an instinctual awareness of being observed, even in the solitude of her own small space. #Dystopian #ApocalypticFiction #PostApocalyptic #Survival #Kindle #Audible
Intro I don’t know anything I thought I knew… It’s like my life was stuck in A Minor or something… Instrumental——–Pick up main———————————————————-
Verse One: I spend most of my time filling the holes in my head. Sitting in this cell thinking about the life I’ve lead. It’s all free food and therapy, but I may as well pay for something I can see… This room has a view but all I really wanna do is talk to you… It’s been so long… How could that be wrong? (spoken) Everything we had was based on sex money and lies. When you left you took it all… Nothing to keep but alibis…
Bridge One: What I kept don’t amount to much, but I was never fixed in this world anyway… I’m just sitting here waiting on a bus for the next… May as well take my time, I got… Plenty of it… Sometimes it runs late… But I ain’t entertaining offers while I wait.
Hook One: I could never tell you nothin’ real. It was all about me all of the time. It was easier to hide the way I feel, like you were talking on my dime. I used to believe it was easier to hold it all inside… I never gave you anything… And I know how hard you tried…
Instrumental———————–Into Verse Two——————————————
Verse Two: (spoken) I Just want to make this right before I go. Pay my bill or at least knock it down, I don’t know. I wish I could set you free from what I’ve done, but I figured it out, you ain’t the only one… (sung) That bus is still running behind and sometimes I get so tired of standing here looking stupid… (spoken) What the hell am I hoping to find… Anyway…
Bridge Two: (sung) Thought about hoping a train… Getting there quicker… But thinking like that only makes me sicker… It’s like my life is stuck in A Minor or something… I don’t know what to do about it, but I know I gotta do something…
Hook Two: So maybe I could tell you something real… It’s a hell of a deal… But I can’t hide myself inside.. I need something to call mine… If we never really had it, what was it we pretended? Was it over long before us or only started once it ended?
Instrumental———–Finger picked back to Verse Structure———————–
Verse Three: Anyway, I just had to write this out… Learn to walk before I fall again. I’ve been working on living, cleaning up some of this sin, but I don’t know… What’s the use in being me if what I was is all you see? Where’s the good in change if the world’s still strange? It’s like I’m still stuck in A Minor or something… I don’t know what to do about it, but I know I’ve got to do something.
Bridge Three: Can’t stand up… Keep falling down… And the little ball keeps spinning around Livin’ my life in blue… … … Tell me what I can do…?
Hook Three: But I could never tell you nothin’ real… And I ain’t sayin’ nothin new… It was easier to hide the way I feel… Can you see it the same way too? If we never really had it, what was it you pretended… Tell me, how long will it be ’til this broken life is ended…?
Xtro: I don’t know anything I thought I knew… I don’t know… I don’t know anything I thought I knew…
Instrumental———-Finger picked to stop————————————————-
Principal Chords: Written In C Major Played from A Minor. Instrumental piece… Am= Am – A4th – Am – A9th +7th – Am = 8 beats Dm= Dm – D4th – Dm – D9th +7th -Dm = 8 beats Intro/Xtro Am G Dm F Fma7th Am G Dm Am Dm Am Verse Dm Am Dm Am Bridge C G Dm F Fma7th C G Am F FMa7th C G Am F FMa7th C G Am F Fma7th C Hook G Am F FMa7th C G Am F Fma7th Am G Dm Or Alt C G Dm F Fma7th C G Dm F Fma7th C G Am F Fma7th Am
Why I Wrote It: This is the first song I ever wrote. It was written around October 1st 2006. I was teaching a music class and one of the students thought we should write our own songs to perform at the coming Christmas show. This song is about my life before prison. What changed inside of me in prison because of the people I came in contact with, and because I was tired of being me. Also, I was sober. Something I had not been for over thirty years at the time I came to prison in 2002.
There is music for these lyrics. I’m writing this in October of 2012 as a free man after ten years in prison. Yes, it’s very long, about nine to eleven minuets depending on the instrumentals. It should be here somewhere recorded as should the sheet music…
The inhabitants of Bend City were as weathered and worn as the town itself. They moved with a slow, deliberate grace, each step measured, each glance calculating. There was a shared fatigue in their eyes, a weariness born not just of the relentless sun and the hard work, but of years of hardship and struggle, of dreams deferred and hopes shattered. #Action #Western #Epic #Suspense #Amazon #Kindle
A hardcore crew of thieves running a tri-state crime origination comes to the attention of a detective who has been putting the pieces of the crimes together to achieve a solution for how and why the crimes are done. All pros in their fields of expertise, each member has a job to do. Like them, the detective sees the job that he must do and sets out to narrow down the scope and catch them in the act… #Crime #Suspense #Thriller #Drama #Kindle #Amazon #Audible
The Wastelands are the ruins of America after the biggest extinction event in 75,000 years hit the planet Earth. Billions of people died, those that didn’t had no help because the governments, military all crumbled and fell apart.
But a virus was born during the destruction and bred in the billions of bodies. A virus that reanimates the dead. Some believe the world governments released it, some believe it was developed and nurtured by nature, just an occurrence that was bound to happen. It wouldn’t be the first time that the human race was nearly toppled by a virus, after all. Meet the survivors and their daily struggels to stay alive as they make their way through the destruction in search of other survivors, food, and water… #ApocalypticFiction #Horror #Readers #ProphetX #SameWolfe #ZombieFiction
