In honor of My sons 21st birthday, a guide to imbibing like a gentleman

1. If heading out for an evening of imbibing, have cab far in cash in your pocket even if using a credit or debit card for the tab.
2. Learn your bartender’s name. No one likes to be called “hey you.”
3. Unless they piss in your drink, tip at least 20%
4. Run a tab rather than pay as you go so they know you tipped fairly, especially if you intend to be a regular.
5. If you can afford it, a little extra tip at the holidays marks you as one of the good guys and will pay off in spades over the years
6. Bartending can be a tough job. They put up with enough drunken assholes. Do not be one.
7. Fighting in bars is stupid beyond belief. Do not do it for any reason.
8. Most bar fights are over women. If someone hits on your date and she ignores it, you do the same. She is with you and he has to live with the burden of being a dick.
9. If she does respond, congratulate him on his skill in identifying a weak willed shameless slut. Tell HER to pay her own god damned bar tab.
10. A wedding ring on a woman not just no. It is not no fucking was not even if she offers blatantly. It will happen at least once in your drinking career and NOTHING good will come from it.
11. Drinking shots until you puke/pass out/become overtly obnoxious does not make you cool. It makes you one more drunken ass hole that only other drunken assholes will want to be around
12. Drunken assholes make poor friends
13. If you have a friend who likes to get into fights. Leave him home. His reputation will hurt yours.
14. If someone asks for your keys, surrender them. If another drunk thinks you are too drunk to drive, you are. Use the cab fare in your pocket.
15. If for some unfortunate or idiotic reason you are asked to leave an establishment, just leave. You are not going to talk your way back in.
16. Go back in the morning and apologize to the owner/ manager if this happens, especially if you are a regular.
17. If you could not dance or sing when you came in, you cannot dance or song later either.
18. Before leaving with a cougar or chubby always run the idea by your friends. You need a two thirds majority before proceeding. Alcohol often distorts perception.
19. Do not get suckered into buying drinks for groups of girls. Cutting one out of the flock is difficult at best and those $8 cosmos add up quick.
20. There is a difference between funny and obnoxious. Learn the difference. It may save you from a horrendous ass beating one night.
21. Never clock block.
22. If someone does it to you, do not drink with them anymore. They will do it again.
23. Never fruit whiskey. It is inelegant and unmanly.
24. Sport fucking women you meet in bars without a condom is like paying Russian roulette with 5 bullets in the gun. I mean really, do you think you are the only one she has ever done this with? Wrap to ride.
25. If someone you do not know wants to play pool for money, you are probably going to lose.
26. Should you bet on anything, pay your losses immediately.
27. Never give someone a second chance if they do not do the same.
28. There is reason the state runs Keno in bars. That reason is not to give your drunk ass money to pay the tab.
29. If you offer to buy a girl a drink and she switches from draft beer to some shit with an umbrella in it, walk away after paying. You cannot afford the kind of leeching this chick will do to you.
30. If a friend buys a round, it is incumbent upon you to return the favor.
31. Should a friend not reciprocate more than once, quit buying him drinks. Introduce him to the girl in #29
32. If you no longer recognize the language you are speaking, it is time to call that cab.
33. Wearing Ravens gear into a bar in Pittsburgh is probably not conducive to your health and well being.
34. If you and your buddies insist on referring to women as cunts, ho’s or bitches, rest assured that the one woman you set your sights on will overhear you. Dead Man Walking.
35. Be polite to friend’s wives, girlfriends and dates even if you think they are unattractive and bitchy.
36. Odds are the bar stool is not wobbly. You are drunk. Think cab.
37. If drinking at a Dock bar determine what number of drinks requires you to stay away from the edge.
38. If you bump into someone, apologize. If you spill their drink, buy them another one.
39. If you spill your own more than once, it is time to go.
40. Unless you can actually sing (see #17) or are Tom Cruise singing karaoke love songs to random hot chicks is not going to work.
41. Talking on 3rd down or a 3 and 2 count in the ninth inning is just fucking rude.
42. Before using a pick up line, ask your sister how she would respond to it.
43. By the time a woman is 25, chances are she really has heard them all.
44. It is true; some women are hopelessly attracted to assholes.
45. Those women are not worth the high price of becoming an asshole no matter how hot they are.
46. Men will swarm around the tens. Somewhere in that bar is an 8 with a better personality who is would love some attention.
47. Do not bet basketball with Travis Coleman no matter what odds he gives you. Little fucker is lucky although he does owe me $20 from the Boston game.
48. More than one martini will probably have an unfortunate ending.
49. The barmaid is probably not going to fall in love with you.
50. Above all do not be THAT guy. If more than one person mutters “oh shit” or the bartender frowns when you walk in, you are on the way to being THAT guy and need to adjust accordingly

Market Thoughts 3-14

Now that last nights ruminating and bloviating is out of my system (temporarily I assure you) let’s turn our attention and focus to more important matters. We finally got a rally in the stock market this week with 4 actual honest to god up days in a row. Hats off to Doug Kass for a brilliant bottom call. Frankly I am amazed it took so long to develop. Every indicator I have ever used was oversold, in most cases ridiculously so. I starting saying a few weeks ago we were probably due for a good little rally in the market. Day after day I watched the market fail to get a bid and just drop lower. There was a global buyers strike in equities. Now, we finally have a little bounce here, up about 10% in just the last four days. Let the rejoicing begin, the Bear is dead!

Umm.not so fast. In my mind to believe the stock market has pout in a bottom you have to believe that two things tha just do not hold up to examination. First, you have to believe that real estate has stopped going down. Plunging real estate prices and soaring foreclosure rates are the major problem in the economy. According to RealtyTrac foreclosures jumped 30% last month on a year over year basi., More than 10% of homes with a mortgage are at least one payment behind. A little basic supply and demand math tells you that all these homes being dumped on the market are going to push prices lower still in the months ahead. We still have a wave of ALT-A and Option Arm loans to reset this year. A very high percentage of these 2006-2007 loans are going to default. The buyers could not afford the reset payment rate if their life depended on it. Design all the government mortgage bail out plans you want. Short of giving these folks the house or charging 0 %interest for the life of the loan, as well extending the loan to 50 years in term, they are going to default.
Much was made of the fact that housing inventories declined a little in January and February. Except, not really. There is an estimated 700,000 homes in some stage of the foreclosure process, including other real estate owned on bank balance sheets that are not officially listed for sale yet. ZI have seen estimates as high as 3 million total foreclosures this year. That would be about a 60% increase in inventory levels if it comes to pass. The only buying we see in housing is on the courthouse steps these days. So far, there is not enough vulture activity to soak up the supply and allow prices to stabilize.

The second belief you must hold if you think the rally is an actual bottom is that earnings will get better in the second quarter. To those of you who hold such a belief I shall simply ask, “ Are you high?” Where will such earnings growth come form. Retail? Not a chance. Any sales truncations consummated these days are done to levels designed to clear inventories with little or no margin. Financials? Didn’t you just love the Citigroup memo the other day that they were profitable on an operating basis nit including speciall items. Special items like credit losses and asset write-down’s. I have to check this but I am sure that Citi was profitable without considering the gargantuan losses in every quarter since the crisis began. It’s the losses that have sucked up the $100 billion or so of private and public capital the bank has used to keep the doors open. Financials still have a lot of real estate related problems ahead of them in my opinion. Energy? Sure with falling demand and lower commodity prices their earnings should just explode this quarter. Tech? Last time I looked technology companies sold products and services to other companies and consumers, both of whom are scared to death, over levered and not spending money. We justput in the first quarterly loss ever for the companies that make up the S&P 500 and I just do not think the second quarter will be a hell of a lot better. Everyone thought I was drunk or insane when I said last year we would put a 6 handle on the S%P 500. I was right. I think I am right this time as well. We have not seen a real bottom in this market.

I would love to be proven wrong about this because I am tired of wrestling with the daily dichotomy of a poor stock market and the unbelievably cheap asset values I am seeing on a daily basis. My good friend Corban Bates, a budding value investor and recent grad of Hudson High, sent me a spreadsheet last with week with over 100 companies that trade for less then net current asset value. The last time we were anywhere close to that was the net cash bargains created in the internet blow up and the majority of those paid off handsomely over the next couple of years. You can buy stocks like ADPT, TECD, and ESIO for less than the value of the company’s liquid assets. You can literally build a portfolio of 40-50 of these that have a good credit scores, viable businesses and excellent recovery prospects. That’s enough to make me salivate at the possibilities for gains over the next several years.

DIS trade for about two thirds of my appraisal value. That is provided we give no value at all to the film library or character rights and price the parks as raw land and put a 5 multiple on after tax earnings DELL trade for less than two cash. HTH is a pile of cash in the hands of a proven investor in distressed banks and other financials. As a bonus the company landed aback door bank charter and will be able to bid on distressed assets and institutions. Southwest Airlines is stupid cheap, trading below tangible book value. Oil service companies like RDC and PTEN trade below net asset value at these levels. I like the idea of buying the Forest City senior debentures at a 30% YTM and what looks to be more than adequate asset coverage. Whitman has been a buyer and although struggled with everyone else last year, he is one of the best credit analysts and distressed guys around. Assets are cheap and normally I would be looking to go all in here.

So far I have resisted the urge. It’s worked for me as week after week the market has moved lower. We have seen a few little rallies but they sputter and fade. I am trying to play good defense whole accumulating cheap assets. It would be hard to play the traditional value game of buy and hold here as assets that look cheap drop another 505 or so, No mater how confident you are of your analytical ability that type of loss generates acidic vomitosis and takes a long for recovery to occur. Instead, I have held inverse ETFS to offset my long exposure. I have sold calls on rallies. The worst that happens is that the stock gets called away and I have to buy it back. In my former life as retail broker high commissions made this unpractical. Today, paying less per trade than the cost of an all night drink cup on ladies night in a dive bar, it’s not an issue. In the case of Southwest Airlines I bought 2001 $5 calls for $2 to create my position. Southwest, the best run airline in the country over 7 in two years? Hell, book value is almost seven. I ll take the bet every day.
For the most part I am avoiding the financials. I noted the other day that the giant distressed firm Oaktree Capital has almost no exposure to the most distressed industry on the planet. I agree with the choice. The major banks are just highly toxic piles of shit. Book values are fiction. Some of the community banks like SVBI and ANNB are stupid cheap but the on going real estate problems are going to plague them for a while yet. We have no idea what rules, regulations and restriction the banks will have to operate under going forward. Until we do, it is hard to make an educated investment in bank stocks. I love community Banks and traded them for years. I paid for one marriage and two divorces because of community bank stocks. I look forward to doing so again but not until we see the new rule book. Financials will not lead the market to a new bull. There are so many other bargains it is easy to ignore them and stay out of the minefield they created for themselves.

The values are there and I am confident that over a span of years I will get paid. I am aware however that there will be more downward pressure on prices and it will be some time yet before an economic and market recovery is affected. We have a ways to go as a nation. Before the bubble consumer debt was less than 70% of GDP according to reports I have seen. It is almost a 100% today. When we were great and growing a s a country we saved for what we bought. We used debt for large purchases and paid it off as quickly as we could. Wed id not take a credit card and spend our home equity on a trip to Barbados or a new pair of Jimmy Woos. We put money down on our homes, qualified for a mortgage and lived in the damn things. To really put things back on track we have to work our way back to that again. It takes time.

I ll buy a little here and there as things become too cheap not to own. But I m going to hedge my bets and use options as much as possible to create and protect positions. In my mind it is foolish for an investor not to do so. I have no interest in calling a bottom or executing short term directional trade right now. I have seen two many guys and girls carried out on their shield in the last two years to even think the reward could be worth the risks. Protect capital, find deep undervaluations and be damned careful.

Next time out I will cover really important shit like baseball and why the Orioles have a great team of position players but the usual collection of rag arms and no names on the hill will make it difficult to compete again this year. Maybe talk about why a happy many could make the Dodgers the best of the NL and Teixeira taking the Yankees back to the playoffs. Goes without saying that we will examine why the god damn scum sucking rat bastard Red Sox are the very definition of all that is evil and foul in the world today

Books, Broads and Booze

There are times when one must sit around of a Friday eve and watch basketball, sip whiskey and contemplate, if not ruminate about the world and ones role within it. Such a night would seem to be upon us. Translated this means that there is not much going on around the island tonight and the ACC tournament is on. As I begin my latest epistle, Maryland is leading Wake Forest in the second half, my glass is newly filled and all would seem right in the universe for the moment. Of course, I drink faster and the Terps have blown bigger leads so we shall see how long the world stays so happy a place.

As they do so often on quiet nights my thoughts turn to the formative forces and times of my life. By any counts it has thus far been an interesting journey with twist and turns worthy of a novel, provided Hunter Thompson, SE Hinton and F. Scott Fitzgerald had collaborated on such an adventure. I would love to include Hemingway but I haven’t boxed in over 35 years and hunting and such bores me shitless. The 16 year old high school drop out I once was had no idea that life would turn out the way it has. It’s been fun, it’s been educational and quite a ride. Like all thrill rides it has had some bumps and scary times. (Although I am blessed with that special stupidity that is rarely afraid. More like curious as to just what the fuck else is going to go wrong). Somehow I have managed to have a career in an industry no one in my neighborhood had any idea existed. Hell, working on the line at GM or Sparrows Point, maybe a nice government job was the height of our ambitions. Somehow I got form there to hear and one has to wonder what the chief forces have been that drive such a life. The answer of course lies in the 3B’s of my existence. Books, Broads (yeah, yeah I know politically incorrect and all that shit but female acquaintances and companions doesn’t have the same zing does it?) and booze.

Books have been the chief driver of my intellect and what paltry accomplishments I have achieved. I cannot claim that I did anything to spur my love of reading. I was just born this way. My mother encouraged it and each week through my youth we made the trek to the Drug Fair parking lot to check out books form the bookmobile service provided by the public library. I loved that damn thing. Just a big old bus full of books free for the taking. Mom never told us what we could or could not read. Whatever struck us was fair game I could check out some Alistair McLean adventure novels , Churchill’s histories or even some racy Harold Robbins novels. I read everything and anything. I almost looked forward to being grounded when I was a teen. In the summer I would climb a tree in the yard and read for hours, hidden from the world. I was a teenager when I read Solzhenitsyn. I read damn near everything he ever wrote the summer between 7th and 8th grade. I still remember poor old Mr. Taylor calling me a liar when we did the first day of school what did we read over the summer role call. There I stood in cuffed jeans, greasy hair and Chuck Taylors talking about the Gulag Archipelago. The class ended, as did a lot the rest of the year with the hood and the teacher arguing about books while the rest of the class fucked off.

Books have been a driving force in my life. Both parents were brilliant people who were big readers. I was literally born a speed reader. To this day I read just about a book a day. I read everywhere. I have read in schools, churches and jails. I read on the beach, on planes, wherever I find myself. My apartment is a literally cluttered with books most of the time. As my son says “ya know Dad, I feel like I live in the worlds messiest library.” Without them I would probably still be that high school dropout.

Who influences me the most? I think they all did. Shakespeare who opened my eyes to the romance and excitement of words and the world they described. Hunter Thompson ,who taught me to embrace the weirdness of it all. Ayn Rand is how I finally figured out that I was responsible for my own actions. She has some fucked up ideas about relationships and has the compassion of a damn stone but she does exude a passion for life and achievement.

COMMERCIAL BREAK” Maryland did it. We beat Wake and go to the semi’s. The NCAA doesn’t put us in the dance now they should be horsewhipped like the brainless, soulless dim witted fucktards they are. We should play Duke next and I cannot with for another shot as those bastards.Books eventually set my career. As a young salesman I read all the Ziglar and Hopkins I could find. I read the Norman Vincent Peales and Napoleon Hills to discover the power of the mind. Back in the days of my door to door sales career these helped keep me focused on the next door and forget the last three slammed in my face.

A lot of value investors tell me that Ben Graham’s writings were their epiphany. For me it was when my mentor to be (reluctantly I promise you. I was a pain in the ass) gave me a copy of Marty Whitman’s Aggressive Conservative Investor. The concept of asset based investing just made an enormous amount of sense to me. From there I moved on to Graham and Ed Altman and learned equity and credit analysis. I loved Victor Neiderhoffers Education of a Speculator. His unusual and unique way of thinking about markets helped me avoid getting stuck in my ways and approach. My eventual friendship with the author after email exchanges was one of the most positive influences in my life and my career.

The lessons of history are there for the taking. Jefferson to Churchill. Thomas Paine to Ronald Reagan. He stories of the patriots, pioneers and ner do wells that birth a nation. The seriously demented authors of Mein Kampf and the Communist Manifesto who sought to destroy a world. All available for the taking merely by opening a book. Hell, you can damn near learn history by reading historical novels. WEB griffin for one has made the story of the US Military for 1940 through current time’s fun to read. Bernard Cornwells Sharpe novels make European history interesting. Patrick O’Briens Jack Aubrey books bring the life of the British navy alive and understandable.

Then there are the just for fun writers that I read just to escape. Robert parker (although truthfully one could learn to cook and fight reading the Spencer series). Randy Wayne Whites Doc Ford series has become a favorite. Travis McGee remains my hero and role model. If Christopher Moore is not the funniest son of a bitch whoever set paper to pen, he is a candidate. How can you not love a drunken lecher like Charles Bukowski? Dorothy Parker could have easily been the great love of mu life if not for that multi decade difference in birth dates. The poems of Cumming with their aggressive sensuality, Yeats with his lyrical quest for love and freedom, Baudelaire’s Be Drunk, all of these delight the mind and inflame the inner mind.
Books taught me romance. They taught me history, math, passion, and an appreciation of life.They have entertained me. My career path was shaped by them. They are easily the most dominant of the B’s.

Which of course brings us to broads. Women, the fairer sex, the delight of my soul and bane of my existence. Nothing else in life can take you as high or lay you as low as a woman. From the majesty of a first kiss to the soul crushing wine drenched break up that leaves you a blithering idiot for days on end, they are the best and worst of life. It has been my experience that it is far more the former than the latter. I have finds that have been crushed enough times in the dance of romance that they give up and avoid anything that might look like a relationship. Fuck that. There is always a chance that I find the Bacall to my Bogart and that will always be worth the risk of heartbreak (although I could do with out the lawyers and the judges when it turns out to be Sinatra and Gardner instead).

I will always be an Irish romantic. To give up on romance and the mere possibility of finding that perfect partner, she with whom I match on all levels, a partner and lover, would seem to me to take much of the meaning out of life. I confess that at 47 at times the search is a pain in the ass and I have come to loath the early stages of the dating process but sometime there is a click for however ling that continues to offer a glimpse of possibilities. If I never find it, at least I ll have a lot of fun, nights of dancing at the dock bar to blues under the stars, dinners with eyes sparkling in the candlelight,, that first anxious clumsy fingering enrobing, the comfortable sensuality of a familiar lover and all the other moments that are forever frozen in my memory.

Like everyone else my age and still single, there have been successes that did not last as well as spectacular fuckups along the way. Some were my fault. Some were not. From each of them as time passes and the scars fade I find that there are memories that I would trade for the pain of the aftermath. Quit? Not going to happen. Ill take the scars if I can have those moments that do work. A rainy Sunday morning with the coffee and New York Times, Nat King Cole on the stereo playing footsie at the breakfast table. Lying on the beach together barely touching but deeply aware of the touch. A long conversation about hopes dreams and desires over a bottle of three of wine. Goodnight kisses and passionate awakenings. Finishing each others sentences, laughing at private jokes, slow dancing with no music playing, love letters and late night phone calls. Are you telling me the me risk of getting hurt outweigh these, or the possibility they last the proverbial forever? What a chicken shit way to live.

Bringing us of course to booze. Like so many other Irishman before me I am an unabashed drinker. I really don’t give a shit what anyone thinks about it. I laugh out loud at people who tell me that drinking alone is not good for me. Shit I like MY own company. A book with a glass of wine and I m a happy fucking camper. Put a baseball game on turned down low at the same time and that about as happy as I can be with my clothes on. Bring me a bunch of friends and a long boozy dinner at the bar with lots of laughter and I consider that a great evening. Long conversations with old friends over a cigar and a good scotch are among my favorite things. Cruising down the bay with a frosty gin and tonic as the sunset paints the sky is a joyous occasion. I have toasted my weddings with champagne and endured divorce with Rumpleminz( okay so maybe that wasn’t such a good idea). I made the final decision to switch career paths last year over a glass of Famous Grouse. I have fallen in both love and lust over a bottle of wine. I have lifted a glass in a final toast after too many wakes. I miss the days when booze and cigarettes were an accepted part of life I don’t miss work because of the prior night with the exception of March 18th and the day after a jimmy Buffet concert. . I tell every first date I smoke and I drink and I have no attention of stopping. I don’t drink until I can’t work, I have never needed a drink but I do enjoy one. In the poetic words of my Celtic forefathers, fuck you I drink.

The three B’s. Now if I could just find a smart romantic sensuous woman who likes cocktail and books, life would be complete. Until then, I ll have a drink and finish my book.

Thoughts on snow

from the archives but captures my thougts on the white stuff


About 11 I decided that a nightcap was the just the thing and off to bed. Pouring a tumbler of Irelands finest single malt I stepped out on the deck to see what changes the weather had wrought. The snow was falling fast and furious, racing through the lights on the edge of the grounds, dashing to and fro in a jumble of flakes, the flaky confusion resembling an airborne version of the original mosh pit at a grateful dead concert. The ground now was covered, each fallen morsel piling on the other, flake by flake, stitch by stitch, weaving a soft white blanket over the earth, the mundane parking spaces now a snow covered playground. The trees off in the distance, those stark, bare branches that usually cut the sky with slashes of winter grey ugliness, now almost majestic in appearance, branches bending into intricate patterns, ice sculptures carved by a maniac snow queen for a winter celebration. Over the frozen waters of the creek off to my right, the snow continued to fall, swirling patterns of ice shaved off some celestial diamond bouncing and skipping with the wind as they covered the icy layers of Thompson creek. The watermans work boats, usually hulking industrial looking crafts covered in netting and cages, now rose like snow covered hills off some surrealistic arctic landscape, these white masses rising from the ice, the harsh workday edges rounded off by the falling snow.The piers extended over the water ways of ice, fingers of whiteness untouched as yet by footprints, just suspension bridges of snowy symmetry and perfection over the ice.

I paused and sipped my glass looking at the newly formed wonderland of wintry excellence, listened to that unique lack of sound that comes on snowy evenings, as the snow covers and muffles the earth and the clouds hang low to earth, disgorging sound baffling clouds of wintry wetness over the earth.

As I stood there, beholding the changes upon the earth, the mundane everyday turned into a painting by some heavenly currier and ives, breathing in the quiet and dampness quality of suspended noise from the world, regarding all that had happened to the world with just the arrival of one small winter storm, I had but one thought at regarding such sights

MAN, I HATE THE FREAKING SNOW.......I GOTTA MOVE SOUTH

Letter to an adult daughter

written after reading what I thought was horrible advice form a man to his daughters.


I too am big on the randy pausch book and thinking of getting a "be a tigger" tatoo. But with the exception of being competent and kind to children, my daughter would be in deep trouble should she take the rest of the advice. think horse whipped.

Tims words to a daughter:

marry a man you love and consider your equal, your friend and your partner. To marry for comfort or money demeans you, my daughter, and implies that you are capable of achieving neither comfort or financial independence on your own. Should that be true, I have failed you as a father. Dress to please your self, but if you choose to dress sexy all the time, understand that some if not many men, will treat you as a sex object and never see who you are. I would suggest a stylish and classy manner of dress that while not deemphasizing your sexuality, allows the rest of you to show through as well. A real relationship will involve your mind and heart as well as your body. Trust me, any man worth his salt can still tell you are sexy without dressing the part. Personally your father finds blue jeans and a tee shirt on a smart woman just enjoying her self and her life about as sexy as it gets.

as an side, unless I marry again, your future husband will NOT have an attractive mother in law. sorry . thems the breaks. some of us age better than others.

your sexuality is YOURS. If you prefer direct then be direct. If not, dont. The man who loves you will not only respect your sexuality but probably help you develop it along with his. Under no circumstances act like gennifer flowers. Although many men may like the accompaniment of an occasional trashy slut, as she found out we dont keep them long.

Never , under any circumstances divorce, romance from the life affirming and practical matters of your life. Do not for one millisecond dismiss a single fraction of who you are or what you believe to get a damn man. I am one. Most of us are not worth that kind of sacrifice. One who is will not ask for it nor desire it.

Indeed judge all men by what they do and not what they say.all women too. dogs and cats as well for that matter

be yourself my daughter. In all things. You are a smart capable young woman who is also beautiful. Be who you want in all things. Live, as dagny taggert did, to your highest ideal and purpose. The man who belongs with my daughter will see all that and want to be a part of it, not in control of it.

latest thoughts

One is reminded that it has been far too long since I contributed so much as a word to this space. All the way back to the sweltering days of summer the space has lain vacant of new thoughts and ideas, frivolities and ramblings. The baseball season and indeed even the hallowed time of the World Series has passed wordlessly. Why, you might ask if you actually gave a shit whether I wrote here or not? Neglect, I suppose. Writing for a living has been a blast and I find I do not take the time I used to just to write for myself. But tonight, I shall again return to my pages, free of censor and unbefouled or besmirched by an edito (note” the ones I work with on a daily basis are actually very good but its such a great line I had to use it).r.
Summer is indeed gone and the flowers are all dying. It was another good one. There were the usual misadventures and boating excursions and escapades. They seemed a bit more subdued this year, The War of Tic Tac and Peru continued unabated until late summer when some sort of mysterious ceasefire occurred and the battle has fallen silent. I suspect some sort of nefarious drug is being used but since TT would swallow any combination of pills anyway, we shall never know. New York was a frequent excursion where as always I managed to liberally mix business and pleasure. I traveled I beached, pooled and enjoyed the living shit out if it as always. Ah summer you fickle slut. Dancing in with hit days and warm nights, endless waves , sweaty cans of beer and frosted gin and tonics. You brings us fast boats, bikinis, star filled nights and so many pleasures and vices that make life such a journey of pleasure. Like all true women of a certain morally causal attitude that I have come to adore, you stay far too short a time before moving on but what a delight while you tarry with us.

Now, fall is among us and the leaves swirl through the roadways in the colorful annual dance that bids fond farewell to summer. The night air sweeps in crisp with the foreshadowing of winter on its wings. Soon it shall be upon us that most evil ex wife of a season. Although there will be moments of incredible beauty and even sensuality hidden in winters icy cloak, at heat she remains an icy foul hearted bitch of a season that tears at your soul with cold snow dripped fingers and cuts through your loins with icy northeast winds. There is only one thing to do at such time. That’s right, fuck it I m going to Florida! Give me the warm embrace of the luxurious sands and the welcome feeling of the warm winds upon my soul as the sun casts its protective warmth on my face. I ll be back for the worst of winter, but I ll spend December in Florida pretending the bitch does not exist and sleep untroubled by frozen dreams.

Lt us tackle the foul tasting subject of the stock market and economy before we move on to more pleasant subjects like fetid bowl movements and mid life circumcision. When this shit started last year I wrote that the persistent government intervention would make this all much worse. Big fucking surprise they have done exactly that. Had we just stepped back and let these fucking rocket scientists and idiots that make up Wall Street. The greedy shits who bought too much house based on a pipe dream a mentally challenged six year old could see was false as a strippers tits would have lost their houses, They are losing them anyway. The greedy scum sucking mortgage assholes who sold them that dream would be waiting tables. They are. A bunch of Wall Street firms would have gone under. They have. The market would have dropped 50% or more. It has and will continue to do so. Had we not not in our governmental wisdom intervened this all would have been over. Like new growth after a fire, there would have been new companies emerging by now to keep the financial markets vibrant. The larger regional banks that did not participate in the toxic rancid stupidity created by their larger brethren would have stepped in to fill the void ny now. We would be recovering. The market would have worked. It would have been painful, but could it possibly be worse than the ass raping we are currently seeing the market? I think not. We have trashed the balance sheet of the central bank, sold the soul of our constitution to Goldman Sachs and the greedy cocksuckers that created the mess in the first place. Now the line is forming for money. Please. Let us sell our souls for federal money. Take my hear, my soul , my balls and my brains . Just give me the money. You stupid fuckers should be fired and run out of town. You ruined your banks and brokerages. You fucked up the auto industry with stupidity and greed. For that matter fuck that pious son of a bitch from the UAW. Give me a god damn break. No concessions? Fuck you then, no job. This is the biggest rip off of not just our money but the character of our nation itself. We are nationalizing our financial industry s well as others. They strip away our rights for own protection with the patriot act and now they steal our very birthright to “preserve the financial system.” Listen you miserable ass wiping motherfuckers; you cannot get away with this. We are going to revolt. Right after the Simpsons, or maybe at halftime. It seems Jefferson is tight and a prosperous people will never preserve liberty. We will change as a nation as a result of this and I wonder what we will become.

As for the market itself there is a fortune to be made over the next several years. I see companies that are profitable trading for less then 3 times E/EBITDA. I see an ever growing list of companies that sell for less than cash in the bank. We are fast approaching the depths of an ugly bear market and there is money to be made. I am buying DAR, HDNG, DOW,ASH and other like a crack addict at a rock convention. I am shorting bonds because anybody that thinks we wont have to turn on the printing presses to pay for this clusterfuck is dumber than me with a naked woman in the room. I am hedging every thing I do. You have to. There is a fortune to be made but the trick is not to lose one while trying.

Let us move on to more pleasant subjects. It has been a good sports year so far, or at least interesting. I remain an Orioles fans for reasons that escape my tortured soul. Every time I am ready to give up on this wretched franchise and walk away to a better team to exhort, they do something to reel me in. Appointing McPhail to run the team and then letting him do it may actually work. We have a decent core and a lot of talent in the farm system. I tool several trips to Bowie this year and the double a club has some serious talent that is a half season or three away from coming up to the bigs. The Weiters kid has the tools to be one of the great catchers There may be brighter days ahead. Of course, just as we got some light, the damn Devil Rays got great. .They may have lost the Series but that is a very talented young ballclub. Add them to the yankees and goddamn scum sucking whale shit slurping red sox as perennial obstacles for my beloved birds. Torre made it to the playoffs while the Steinbrenners did not and the Cubs broke Chicago’s heart once again. It was baseball and I look forward to its return.

Navys football team is playing well and is bowl eligible already. They didn’t beat Notre Dame but they gave them a run for it. Maryland has been the surprise. They were not supposed to be this good. If they beat Florida State Saturday they have a pretty good path to the ACC title. The ravens are much better than expected. The kid Flacco appears to be the real deal and the defense is just plain fucking mean. The combination of violence and half dressed women on the sidelines continues to be one of those things that make the fall and winter a little easier to tolerate. Be even better from a beach bar in Florida next month.

It has been a great book year so far. Doc Ford has shown up as have all of parkers characters. All of my favorites have been prolific this year and the UPS guy is a regular delivering the new ones hot of the press on a regular basis. I have made several journeys to the book thing exchanging literally crates of books. Right now I am reading Michael Dobbs fictional trilogy based on Winston Churchill and they are a seriously good read. There has even been a release of unpublished Bukowski material. Andrew Greely had a new one and I almost went to mass after reading it. There are more in the next month and I intend to take bunch to the Sunshine state with me. Needless to say much of the depth of the cold shitty wet, nasty ass winter that awaits my return will be spent reading.

AH women. The saga of that continues in an unending circle and circus. Women, you foul, wonderful, evil, delightful, heartless, loving, repulsive , attractive, frigid, sexy creatures. The very bane and cause for my existence. Why must you always try to change me after we meet? How can you look at me , drink in one hand, cigarette in the other, playing poker while talking to my bookie on the phone all the while sitting in my apartment that I faithfully clean every Christmas and think I am going to change? Once again a contender for the one has turned into the Nag trying to change what she liked about me in the first fucking place. But onward I plunge. Faint heart never won fair lady and it doesn’t get laid very often either. I may never find her, the Lauren Bacall Dorothy Parker hybrid of my dreams, but I shall continue to search. It may perhaps be somewhat quixotic to do so but at least instead of dueling windmills I shall be undressing attractive women. Seems like a reasonable crusade from this seat.

The journey continues. The stream of this thing we call lie continues unabated until it no longer does. We do not when it ends or what comes next. Like the mind of a woman it is unknowable. What matters then must be the journey. What a cornucopia ( I can use that now. It is almost thanksgiving) has been laid before us. Drunken nights and summer days. Good books and great music. The smiles of our children, the laughter of our friends. First time sex and goodbye kisses. Coffee in bed on a winter morning. Fast boats and slow cruisers. Scotch and steak. First love and broken hearts. Fond hopes and bittersweet memories. They are all the fabric of our lives and we weave the tapestry as we progress along the way. I briefly contemplated the idea of growing up not too long ago and taking it all seriously. I cannot. I will not. I much prefer the childlike approach to life. In his book, The Last lecture, randy pausch said that one of the most important decisions you will make in life is whether you will be a Tigger or an Eeyore. I choose Tigger with abundant bouncing from misadventure to adventure. If tears be the occasional price of laughter then I gladly pay it. If the cost of drunkenness, bit it on booze, women, knowledge or beauty, is a hangover then I pay that price happily. Life is a gift f undetermined time and value beyond understanding. To grow up and approach it a mature somber fashion strikes me as pure idiocy.

It is for friends that I shall give thanks next Thursday. I am cooking this year. The kids and all those demented young adults they call friends shall descend upon my abode demanding copious amounts of free food and drink and I will revel in it. At some point however I shall raise my glass is a quiet toast to my friend, even those who insist of getting married and having babies thereby reducing our quality drinking time. From the Chicago crew to the new Yorkers, from tic tac to the talented blonde. Mr and Mrs tire Guy (dude you so married up), the bible pusher to the shacked up freeloader, the curmudgeonly options guy to the shaky electrician, from Kent Island to California and back again, it is you my friend who add the spice to this adventure. It is for you and to you that I give thanks.

Without them there is no us

Ah, the 4th of July, Independence Day is upon us once again. The smell of charcoal will waft across the nation as back yards everywhere become a monument to mans eternal desire to cook meat over open flames while consuming malt beverages and yelling at the kids. The streets of our towns and cities will be bedecked in red white and blue. There will be parades and old soldiers will suck in that gut and wear their uniform proudly down Main Street once again. High school bands will march sharply and play badly and politicians will wave at the crowd. There will be fireworks all over the country form NY harbor to Armpit Alabama there will pyrotechnic celebrations of our nations founding. I ll be right there with as always. I have a bunch of firecrackers in the closet, a few roman candles and bottle rockets to shoot up the neighborhood on Thursday. We are into gin and tonic season and I ll have a few of those as I celebrate my PETA (people eating tasty animals) membership by grilling up the largest steaks I can find. There will be friends and family, boats and fireworks and all the trimmings as we celebrate the 4th Kent island style.

I will, as I always do, stop and think of all that has gone into our 232 years of existence as a nation. So many have given so much to make and keep us a great nation. One of course think of the military, the soldiers, sailors and marines who have fought ot preserve our cherished freedoms. From the scare citizens who stood on Concord green, hearts beating wildly beneath buckskin as they held a musket in sweaty hand to the scared GI who mutters a quick Hail Mary before leaving the green zone the commitment and sacrifice they have given our country is staggering. I talked to a friend who returned today form visiting Normandy. He talked of the raw powerful emotion he felt looking at the beaches and cliffs those young men assaulted and took. He wept at the cemetery where so many of those young men found their final resting place. Our military won our independence form Britain over 200 years ago and has protected and preserved our status and place in the world ever since. There is no thank you large enough. Without them, there is no us.

I have written before of the contributions of businessmen to our nation. These are often overlooked as men of business are too often vilified and perceived as bad, or even evil. But the contributions of Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, The Rockefellers, the Bill gates and even the Warren Buffetts to our society cannot be ignored. In the name of profit and gain they have spurred technological innovation and industrial revolution. They bought light into our homes and automobiles into our garages. Beause of them we can fly across the globe, have microsecond access to just about anything form a laptop computer. They have provided jobs and contributed generously to build schools, libraries and cultural centers across the United States. Again, without them, there is no us.

Then there is the other businessman who makes our nation great. The little guy. Maybe he owns a tire shop and repair center that provides 7 or 8 jobs. He keeps his customers cars maintained and safe, saving them money and possibly their lives. Perhaps she owns a small accounting service helping others deal with intricate financial and tax problems. Or a restaurant that serves thousands of people a year good food at decent prices. Dozens of people will be employed at such a place, form youngsters with their first job to the middle aged waitress who is raising a couple of kids and works hard to give you the best possible service and dining experience. Small business owners have ink stained hands form their printing press, grease under their fingernails that will never come out entirely, they have sunburn from long days providing landscaping and yard services. They have eye strain from late nights reviewing budgets and payrolls. They live on a curious mix of Mylanta , Hope and energy. They make our r communities better places to live; they provide countless jobs, pay endless taxes and are the financial support for thousands of local charitable and cultural organizations. Without them, there is no US.

Then there is the so called average men and women. They go to work at a variety of jobs each day. The manufacture the products we sue, they provide services to make out lives better. They raise their kids to be better educated than they are and hopefully have an even better life. They spend the money that supports business and industry.hey pay the taxes that make the country function. They go to church and pray for a better world. They socialize with friends and neighbors and share each others burdens and joys. They may live in Wheatfield, Mo or the upper east side of New York City. They are us. Their daily efforts to make their own lives better is what makes the country a little better and a little stronger as the years go by.
I know we are far from perfect. There is no perfect man and no perfect nation. I know that the rest of the world is not that fond of us at times. We are perceived as arrogant and materialistic, spreading the gospel of hip hop and coca cola around the globe. Of course, if the citizens of the governments that despise u sdid not WANT hip hop and Coke, we would not be successful at this. There are more peole who are free on this planet because of us. Without us Europe would be either a German Dictatorship of a Soviet colony. Here would be no communist China. They would be part of the Japanese Prosperity Zone. Latin America would be Spanish and Portuguese America. We have never gone to war over territory. We have never annexed a defeated foe. We have taken the sons and daughters castoff by ther nations and turned them into Americans who have given the world far more than the world has given the United States. Perhaps we are not perfect, but I will take out imperfections over dictatorships and theocracies that still dominate many of the governments of the world.

Many decry our culture. Yes, I am afraid we did give you McDonalds and MTV. We also gave you jazz and Ernest Hemingway. From our lands came Faulkner, Twain, Updike, Kerouac and Mailer. Yes, Brittany Spears is our fault. But we made up for it with Bogart, Sinatra and Katherine Hepburn. From the American soul came the blues and rock and roll. Elvis, Dylan and Robert Johnson all are cut from American cloth. Charlie Parker, count Basie and Miles Davis may be well loved across Europe but they are form the United Sates and their sound and culture was born and thrived here. True we are responsible for the genetic cesspool that is the NBA, but we also give you baseball with Babe Ruth , Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio and Cal Ripken. Our sports are not reserved to the upper classes. A baseball game can be enjoyed by anyone with a ticket, or on a radio while changing the oil or a local tavern television while enjoying a cold adult beverage with a few friends. The good and the great that has come out of our nation far exceeds the average or bad.

The United States of America. Born of a desire to be free to govern, worship, think and live the way each wished. Expanded by the speculations of Thomas Jefferson and the explorers who sought knowledge and land. A land where risk taking and speculation to better ones life is encouraged and supported, where an uneducated immigrant can someday see his sons and daughters attend world class universities. A country where you can, through your own vision and hard work, be who you want and live how you want to live. A place where you are responsible for you own life, but your neighbors are quick to help. A nation that is always first to respond to a disaster whether at home or in a far off land.
We are not perfect. But I still have not seen anything better. The single most important export of the US has been our concepts of freedom and principles of Liberty. It is a nation founded built and protected by the individual efforts of its citizens. It is the land of the free and Home of the brave because of the men and women who are born here, immigrate here and live here. They are US

So be it the backyard grilling burgers and hollering at little Johnny to stop squirting the damn hose all over everybody; or on a terrace in Manhattan; by the lake in Chicago, in the wastelands of Wisconsin with a G&T in hand and gleam in your eye;a boat on the Chesapeake with beer and bikinis in great abundance; or wherever this 4th of July finds you. Remember for a moment to raise a glass in honor of all those who served, who lived, who built, learned, worked, raised kids and strived for a better life. In their strivings, we have found a better nation.

Ramblings from the train

Heading back form an eventful trip to the Apple, sharing a crowded Acela Express I find that I am an ready to be out of the city. I love New York but having to dress like an adult is something of a pain in the ass. Two days of having to wear big boy shoes is wearing thin. I need my faded cut offs and flip flops to feel comfortable and myself again. I went to the bull and bear at the Waldorf last night and have to agree it is a lovely bar. Wonderful old style New York décor, great bar conversations, decent drinks and a running ticker tape to keep track of the world. Of course it should be wonderful for $17 a fucking drink! Give me red eyes and cold gin in a plastic cup with a savings of about 13 bucks a drink any day. I stayed at the Double tree hotel on 51st and Lex and while the location was perfect, the hotel itself was far from it. The hotel surpassed the Algonquin for the smallest room I have ever stayed din. It was beyond tiny. Damn good thing I was traveling alone since the room was not big enough for any wild drunken sexual romps without serious injury to one or more of the participants. Over 330 dollars for a room that would fall short as a closet in a lot of places is a bit much.

The number of foreign tourists in the city is staggering. I heard half a dozen languages tossed around the bar last night. This is not necessarily unusual for me but I was still sober at the time. The one benefit of our government’s heartfelt desire to turn our currency into toilet paper is that all those wealthy Europeans and Asians who hate every ounce and fiber of the American Being and Persona can come over and swizzle scotch at a substantial discount. It is a great time to be selling week old hot dogs and stupid tee shirts in NYC as all the vendors seemed to be doing a brisk business in tourist crap and bad food. A strange world where everyone hates us but rushes to buy the tackiest crap we can sell them.

As for the market, what can I say.?It sucks. It has sucked and by all indications it will continue to suck. This is the Linda Lovelace of stock markets. Oil just will not go down. They raised the price in China and no one cared for more than a few hours. Demand is not going away. An economy that is growing at 10% needs fuel. The tow choices are coal and oil. Both a e higher and probably going to stay that way for the future. I was berated wildly last year for buying ICO and JRCC as they both went down initially. Both are up multiples of the purchase price now and the gain has more than justified the waiting. Food prices are high and getting higher. The Midwest flooding has ruined the already tight grain supplies and this will filter across a wide variety of food oriented commodities. I am not happy about this at all. First cigarettes went up because of Gov RockandRoll Dumbasses tax hike, scotch went up as the dollar fell and now a damn hamburger is going to increase because of flooding and an energy policy that has raped our food supply to make inefficient ethanol. Is this a great country or what?

Financial stocks continue to have a tough go of it as well. Key Corp and Fifth Third were thought to be conservative banks. Until they blew up this week. FITB had to raise a$1 billion to clean up its mess. KeyCorp needed $1.65 billion. The fact that banks can continue to get capital is simply amazing to me. This has to either be foreign money hoping to gain control of the US banking system or some of the dumbest rich guys in the history of the world. Investor s are giving ore money to the same idiots who caused the problems in the first damn place. Bad loans,. Securitized crap, securities they didn’t understand but put a few billion into to gain 50 basis points, the mistakes are almost ludicrous. And now they are raising billions like they had cured cancer.I once thought of changing my name to Tim.Com and doing an IPO. Now, I think I will become TimBancorp and sell a few billion of perpetual preferred stock to fund my next few marriages. The financial system has deep problems and the poor consumer is screwed some many ways right now they must fell like a gang banging porn star who just found out they are doing another take of the pile on. Higher food, higher energy, home price falling. What direction will we get fucked from next? Here’s a clue. Interest rates are starting to rise. I continue to think that only an illiterate deaf mute kamikaze could be aggressively long the US stock market. Of course there are lots of those around. We call them mutual fund managers.

At least it is summer. Last week Richard Ford the noted novelist wrote a piece in the NY Times lamenting summer as the season that disappoints. Like the character in his books it seems that the season falls short of his expectations. Actually I would suggest that Mr. Ford falls short of summer rather than the opposite. Ford is a brilliant writer bit I tire of the life as serious of failed hopes and everyday despairs. As I age I find that I prefer the characters of Richard Russo. The residents of Mohawk know that they grabbed the shitty end of the stock and have been beaten with it in many cases. But they embrace themselves as who and what they are and find a way to get the enjoyment out of life the angst ridden seldom find. You are disappointed in summer? Guess what? Summer is real fucking disappointed in you , pal.

Summer is a season of opportunities. We have suffered through dealing with the moody bitch ice queen that is winter, drudging through snow drifts on sun shortened days, winds that bite like the words of an angry wife wondering just where the hell you have been until 4 am. We have endured the flirtations of the nipple flashing virgin that is spring with her sexy promises but delivering only a peek and a peck pf what summer can deliver. Summer is the denim shorts and halter top clad, bare foot dancing girl of our dreams. She will dance the months away if you only ask.

If you sit and wait for summer to come to you, you will be disappointed. But if you get off your ass and go get it summer will be what you want it to be. There are days of great weather, there is boating ( I will even include you “we have the right of way and could you slow down because the noise hurts muffys ears “pain in my ass rotten shit sail boaters here), there are hammocks under shade tress and lemonade, docks bars and gin and tonic while the band plays rock and roll under the sweaty night sky, there is pace ball in the Bronx and at the yard. They are going t play nine at Wrigley and at fen way and 26 there stadiums this year. This of course does not include the minor league parks all over the country. There is golf if you like dressing up like schmuck and chasing a little white ball. Tennis. Swimming. Little kids playing in the sprinkler. Ice cream sodas. Cold beer. Burgers and dogs on the grill. Sleeping off a hangover on the beach trying to match the rhythm of the waves to the ones pounding in your head. Watching the girls walk down 5th avenue in sundresses. Watching the girls at Redeyes wearing damn near nothing. Fishing in a stream or a lake, trolling in the bay for rockfish
.
It doesnt matter what it is you want, Summer can deliver. But you have to get u off your dead ass and go get it. If you spend all your time whining about the heat or focusing on the everyday the you god and fucking well deserve to miss out. Can you really give a shit that the laundry isn’t put away when the Yankees and birds are playing at the yard and there is a smoking band at the deck bar. Is dusting more important than screaming across the bay at 75 mph on a clear day basking in the sun and the speed? Which would you rather do? Cut the grass and clean house or join a bunch of friends for a raft up at conquest beach, spending the day swimming in the river, drinking beer and laughing your ass off? Me too.

There are things we have to do. Even I know that. There are articles to write, the markets will be open even if they are going down with the regularity of a fat girl at closing time in a tequila bar, and we all have to earn a living. But seriously, save the mundane shit for a rainy day. Play ball, Start your engines, hell ,hoist the mainsail if you must.

But if summer disappoints you, it is your own damn fault. Shes right over there beckoning at you to come play, to dance, to live. If you sit there and wait for her to come to you, like most other things in life you will be sorry.Its summer. Get off your dead ass and go live a little.

latest thoughts

I confess this new career thing is even better than I expected. Writing for a living and managing money for a few select clients is working better than even I ever imagined. On the money front I can hold cash without it affecting my income, I can short stocks without 16 different legal approvals; and trade options withut a decree from on high cosigned by six separate archangels. The writing thing has been wonderful. To write each day and get paid for it is a dream come true, something I never expected and enjoy more than I have words to express. The morning commute to the living room is relatively quick, the coffee is much better than the office and sweat pants are considered appropriate attire. The only thing I have missed is writing just for the hell of it with no assigned topic or deadline. I have not been able to write about island life, sports, or the markets in my own unrestrained voice just for the hell of it for time reasons so I am going to do so now. I find myself with a modicum of spare time (provided I ignore my children’s impassioned pleas to finish their tax returns anyway).

First, the stock market. To this market I can only say “Ipse Cummingo mingere minxi mictum vos”. Loosely translated from the Latin, “I piss on you”. This market is a joke. The rally of late is predicated on things not being any worse than they have been. Sweet freaking Jesus, if they were any worse the financial system may have collapsed. Subprime related losses are going to total almost half a trillion dollars! The fed has sold out Main Street for the benefit of Wall Street, debasing the currency and ignoring potential inflationary pressures to prop up the balance sheets of major financial institutions. They have created new ways to allow banks and brokerages to dump assets onto the public balance sheet and access taxpayer cash to offset bad investments and stupid loans. The economy is just horrible. Orders are falling, backlogs are down and inventories are rising. The consumer is in debt up to his and her eyeballs and for the first time in years they cannot refinance the family castle to pay down their credit cards. There is currently more mortgage debt than home equity in the United States and the number of houses in foreclosures is growing at a rapid rate. Business is off at UPS and Federal Express as both consumers and corporations cut back orders. Retail sales are vapid at best. Consumers are broke and as they account for 70% of our economy I can’t see any reason for a sustained rally. Today’s 3% rally on moderate volume smacks of a short covering inspired bear market rally. Even if I am dead wrong here I think the risk of being fully committed to stocks carries too many risks for the idea of a margin of safety to exist. I am willing to miss this run up to protect capital. There appears to be very little common sense being used on Wall Street these days when it comes to the overall economic and financial matters, as well as a total lack of fear. Bottoms are accompanied by fear and loathing not cheerleading and bottom predictions. The bullish arguments are laughable. Anyone who does not clearly see that the recent pullback in gold and other commodities is deleveraging by hedge funds in light of recent volatility is not looking close enough. Anyone who thinks that the bank write offs are at an end has just simply lost their mind. Yes, eventually they will write all this crap down too far and it will create an opportunity. I particularly look forward to moves like that of UBS to separate the bad assets into separate vehicles as this will create huge pools of underpriced and unloved mortgage assets that no one wants to own, reminiscent of the Texas bad Banks of the late 80s and early 90s. But that time is not now. Small community banks will thrive and benefit from the tighter credit conditions and steeper yield curve. But not yet. Patient investors will see one of the best buying opportunities of their lifetimes. But it is too soon.

I went to opening day yesterday for the first time in years. Along with Mr. and Mrs. Tire Guy I headed up to the yard to watch the birds take on Tampa. The team was as bad as I thought it would be but we had a blast at Pickles and after an extended tour of Baltimore parking garages the NGF (new girlfriend) joined me. Any day at the ballpark is a good time. A day at the park with a beautiful woman is a great time. The team is a s bad as I had feared. However, for the first time since Davey Johnson was fired there are signs of hope around the yards. Instead of just signing whatever over the hill high priced free agents were available, Peter Angelos handed the reigns over to Andy McPhail to start a real rebuilding process. It was hard to see Eric Bedard leave. It will be even harder when he pitches against us this weekend. It will be hard to see Brian Roberts get traded before mid year. But he will, hopefully to the Cubs since they are one of the two teams I am hoping to see in the World Series. A rebuilding year is hard to take from a wins and losses perspective. However, it makes going to the ballpark more fun than going to watch a team that is bad with no prospects. Now instead of watching overpriced over aged talent screw up the game, we can watch for the improvements that have positive implications for next year. Can Adam Jones learn and get better at a major league level? Can Nick Markakis add the 10-12 home runs and 20+ RBIs that take him from good to great? Can Daniel Cabrera throw strikes two games in a row? Does Hernandez’s glove make up for the offense we give up? Can Melvin Mora get hot enough at the plate so we can trade him for a young third baseman who can play defense as well as hit? Does Adam Lowen live up to his seemingly limitless potential? How long before Luke Scott takes his bible and his pistol back to the minor leagues? The wins and losses will be awful but at least there are reasons to watch the games. I am going to cheer for the Orioles to get better, the Twins to outlast Detroit and sweep the goddamn miserable shit eating red Sox in the ALCS and face the Cubs who will have crushed the damn you for 1969 you miserable bastards New York Mets in the NLCS.

The final four is upon us as well. For the first time the four number one seeds will face each other. This promises to be weekend of incredible college basketball. Look at the matchups. UCLA –Memphis is the first game. UCLA’s young star Kevin Love is having an incredible tournament. He is averaging 21.8 points a game and 11 rebounds. Can Joey Dorsey shut him down, or at least slow him down? Freshman derrick Rose of Memphis shredded the much vaunted pair of Texas guards. Can he do as well as the UCLA tandem that already play at an NBA level? Can Memphis make free throws? Will Coach Ben Howlands defense shut down the free wheeling Memphis offense? The edge here is UCLA but Memphis has been shutting up critics for the entire tournament. North Carolina was my preseason pick to win it all and they are in position to do exactly that this weekend. How will the saga of Roy Williams coaching against his old team play out? Can Kansas find a way to stop Tyler Hansborough, who is averaging 21 points and 9.5 rebounds a game? Can Brandon rush step up and have the huge game he need sot for Kansas to have a chance? Wll ty Lawson play to early season form? The edge here is Carolina who has scored an average of 93 points and beaten opponents by an average of 25 points so for in the big dance. The dream matchup here is North Carolina and Memphis in the final. Not coincidentally, it is also the one that saves my bracket!



Spring is upon the island. It may be just me but the Narrows seems to have an air of anticipation about it these days. Although the nights remain somewhat chilled, the days are warming and you can feel the hint of summer on the way. There is talk about who is putting their boat in the water when and what changes they are making. I confess to some concern that the Tic Tac kid is lightening his boat after some of the airborne adventures we experienced last year. Boating is not supposed to include passengers in the fetal position praying for mercy while we are looking down on the bald spots of guys in another boat! Tic Tac is the only guy I know who needs FAA clearance to leave his slip! Coming out of Annies Steak House the other night I could see the construction of Red Eyes new stage in preparation for another summer of bands and bikinis parading across the docks. There was just a hint of high performance gas and roiling BBQ smoke from the food stand in the air. There are steamed crabs and fresh rockfish in the near future, long nights of dock bars and music, the multiple colored summer sunsets on the narrows and all the things that make the island one of the best places on the planet to be in the summertime.

Another sure sign of spring is the fast approaching Keeneland expedition for the Blue Grass Stakes. The annual gathering fo friends and assorted degenerate gamblers and desperate drinkers is one of the best trips of the year and it is now less than two weeks away. We will suffer from the absence of the Kentucky Colonel who is apparently inconsiderate enough to schedule childbirth during racing season. The group will be a little smaller as Texas Tim bough his now wife, then fiancé, last year, and is not allowed to associate with us anymore .The Iowan is suffering from dementia bought on by excessive consumption and promotion of ethanol and other corn based biofuels and is unable to attend. However, as always Crossman and I will be there to provide entertainment and the Bet the Pink Mets fan will be there. The voodoo prof is putting in an appearance and the listmaster, with his iron Curtain contingent are scheduled to show up. So is “fuck it just sell more” Thompson from Chicago. For the first time ever in the multi years of the event (without checking bail slips and bar tabs I cannot recall exactly how many years this trip has continued) I will be bringing a girlfriend. Naturally, the degenerates have started a pool on how long before she flees in terror. I have the over on this one. She’s already seen me with a snoot full of Irish on St Patrick’s Day! We will have a great day at one of the more scenic and historic racetracks in the country, have great food at deShays and drink too much at McCarthy’s and put yet another memorable After Dark trip into the memory books.

Life could not be better right now. In a lot of respects I am living my dream and fully aware how lucky that makes me. Both kids are doing great, working and doing well in school and I have resisted the urge to dispose of my son’s menagerie while he was at work. For the first time in recent memory there is actually someone I like and care about enough to call a girlfriend. Spring is here and summer is coming. Baseball is back and it looks to be the best final four in memory. Life is an adventure and right now I seem to be on the sunny part of the trip.

So far the year has started off with a bang. A lot going on around the island and of course the market is generating its own special sort of BANG. 2007 is fading into the rearview mirror and it was quite a year. Between the island crew and the after dark specs one never lacks for adventure. The year featured the usual assortment of trips with a lot of airplanes and at least one flying boat (many thanks to the tic-tac kid. I never knew a boat could get that far out of the water without a catapult!). Chicago and Kentucky figured heavily into my travels, as they seem to do every year. Melvin B’s is gone now a casualty of urban renewal and it will be missed. We have plotted the overthrow of the financial system at the outside café bar, consoled each other over women, markets and bets gone bad and I have many great memories of the joint. It was the coldest racing weekend in Kentucky that I can remember but that little fact did d not dissuade us from our usual weekend of degenerate behavior and wild eyed gambling. We did tone it down a touch this year since Hesselsweet bought his lovely bride to be. Jason bought Wendy as well but I am pretty sure she just ignores us all. New York of course was a frequent stop and we started the year in Naples Florida enjoying the warm weather, old friends and at least one difficult damn woman. The tire guy married up- way up- at years end. There were great times with old friends and a lot of new ones found along the way. The kids both continue to do well and I haven’t threatened to kill my son in at least a month now. They are both working, going to school and thriving. The markets were horrendous for much of the year, especially in value and special situation stocks as financing for transactions died off quicker than one of my relationships. No real contender for the next incarnation of the one true love of my life but the interview process was as much fun as always. I spent time with several very attractive intelligent women but none who could fill my eyes with what I now call the Hillman Twinkle. It was one hell of a year by all counts. The local sports scene was a bit dismal with the Orioles and Ravens having terrible years, the terps going out of the tournament early and the Maryland football team average at best. As usual Navy was a bright spot, beating army and going to a bowl game and playing some very exciting football.



On to 2008. The market is just horrible right now and I don’t think it gets better real soon. The next three weeks feature a string of earnings reports from financial companies and that does not bode well. In addition to the continuing stream of mortgage and credit write downs, home prices are still falling and the yield curve is not steep enough to allow profitable lending. Its ugly. It will be interesting to see if the technology report in late January, early February will give the market any legs whatsoever, I think we may actually get to my long term oversold point down around 1275 on the S$P before this over with. That level will set up one of the best buying opportunities we have seen since 2001. The plain truth is that as difficult as this environment is, not all mortgages are going to default and real estate is not going to zero. There is going to be a stopping point to the carnage sometime in 2008 and it will bet time to buy. The small local banks that trade down below book value but have positive earnings and sound balance sheets with high capital ratios and adequate loan loss reserves will be incredible bargains. There is a life cycle to this part of the industry. The small banks proliferate during boom times and after the bust comes the shares fall to lows like we are seeing right now. The larger institutions begin to buy the smaller competitors to acquire their clean loan books and reserves. A wave of consolidation moves through the banking industry, good times return to the economy and new local banks begin to spring up again. The last time we saw this was after the banking and S&L crisis of the late 980’s and early 90’s. Many of the local banks sold below book and it was about as much fun as I have ever had in this business. We were buying stocks at or below book and 10 times earnings that were taken over at twice book and 20 times earnings. It was easy money and it was extraordinarily low risk. We are coming back to that type of market and I cannot wait. I am also looking at the trading side of some of the midsize banks such as SOV to buy one-year calls once I think the slide is slowing down. WM calls look like a buy here as well as it is inevitable that someone steps in and buys them. On a sell off At the money, or slightly in the money long term calls will be a good bet. Banking aside I think the pendulum in the market will continue to favor growth stocks that can generate cash internally. It will be a bit of time before the financing needed to fuel a value revival will come to pass. Growth stocks to me are trading and surfing instruments but the surf is roiling and boiling so it will be a good time to surf in 2008. The dollar will probably stay weak and energy will stay strong so international and energy stock will provide some trades for the year as well. I am going to play special situation and activist stocks by selling puts when the market sells off and collecting the premium. It seems to be the way to make money in that corner of the market right now. The on factor that will loom large as near the third quarter of this is the dividend tax reduction that expires in December. Should that not be renewed and a democrat is winning the race for the White House we will see what I think will be the largest sell off of my life time. It is very much a traders market right now. With the exception of the little banks I have a hard time buying stocks for the long term when I think the short term could take them much lower. Buckle up. This could be as much fun as boating with the tic-tac kid when he’s been fighting with his girl friend!



So on now to 2008. There will new adventures, new books, new ideas all through the year. The Orioles will suck (news on the wire that they are probably trading the bus ballplayer on the club to the Cubs. Think I might be a cub’s fan this year. At least they are trying to get better!) ,s always, the Ravens will get a new look, Maryland basketball will be interesting and Navy turns a new corner with a new coach. There will be sunsets and setbacks, celebrations and defeats, first kisses and sad goodbyes. Some will be born, and some will pass on. There will be fast boats and slow summer evenings, rainy nights and hot summer days. Tic Tac will hit awake sideways and fast Freddie G will hit a few stationary structures in and around the bay ( he will have a tough time topping last years sandbar adventure however), Shorty will have a few poker games, I will do something stupid involving a ditch or a woman (lets hope there are no dog stories this year), we will laugh a lot, maybe cry a little at times but is should be one hell of a good year.Life has all its up and downs as we all know and 2008 is positioned to bring with it more than its share on both a professional and personal level. I look forward to it all. It should be a year full of life, full of surprises with opportunities to live life the way it should be, greedily and with great abandon.

don't think Obama can win it all?

here is the bet to make on intrade.com

short obama, long any dem at 60 long mccain, guilliani, huckabee and romney for total cost of 39..

make 61 if one of four repubs win +43 on obama short lose 60 on any dem total gain 44

if dem besides obama wins..40 on dem trade + 43 on obama short total gain 44


obama wins make 40 on any dem, lose 43 on short + 39 on repubs total loss 42

two out of three win..only an obama victory is losing trade

christmas thoughts on a bullish friday

As I sit here on the Friday before Christmas watching Santa and his mentally deprived elves drag stock prices higher in the long awaited rally, I find myself contemplating a long weekend full of activities, friends, family and general holiday cheer. Tonight kicks things off with the first annual Island of the Misfit Toys celebration, a gathering of the lunatic friends of Kent Island in a celebration of the resort life style we all live here, the times we have had and the friends that we have made over the years. It promises to be quite a shindig filled with great friends and excessive inebriation to the point we decided hiring a car and driver was one of the more enlightened things we could do. Good times, Good friends it gets no better.

Grocery shopping fills the agenda later this afternoon. I have lost count of how many people are coming by for the annual Melvin Christmas Eve bash. The kids and the friends of the kids will be there and a lot of my friends will be by over the course of the night. I will start cooking on Sunday right on through until dinner grumbling and bitching the whole time but loving every millisecond of it. There will be music, stacks of presents; the bar is fully restocked and ready to be emptied once again and there will be enough food to feed a small army. We put a big tree this year, Tommy cleaned the carpets last night and I even hired a cleaning service to shovel the place out for the party. It is one of my favorite evenings of the year and I love how much my kids brag to their friend’s about how incredible Christmas Eve at dad’s house is. Tomorrow’s agenda is filled with package wrapping and stocking stuffer shopping with heavy drinking in the evening around the island. Sunday is of course, the NFL and prepping for the big dinner.

It has been one hell of a year with all the usual ups downs and sideways moment (Including a few inverted but that’s what I get for boating with the tic-tac kid). Reminiscing and ruminating about the year is a subject for next week’s demented ramblings as the year-end arrives. Now is a time to think of all the good things that life has to offer and the things that we celebrate this holiday season. I know its supposed to be a religious holiday but all signs seem to indicate that Jesus was born in the summer and Christmas was realigned to replace the old mid winter pagan festivals that were a celebration of life and harvest. There is family to think off, my daughter now grown so smart and beautiful, earning success in life and in school pretty much on her own drive and talent. She has finally become a bookworm like her old man and I love it; My son, still a bit of a goofball but to my surprise after his record in high school and a hard worker and thrifty as hell. He becomes a little smarter every day and seems destined to do well in whatever he chooses in life. I am incredibly proud of both of them. There are fiends, so many that its impossible to name them all here. Friends form the island, friends form the speculative world, I feel incredibly lucky to have met and become friends with so many wonderful people. The importance of friends was driven home to me last week when one of my childhood friends passed away and it hit me hard. I hadnt seen much of Jimmy over the years in spite of the fact that we live in the same town. I felt guilty for letting life get me so caught up that I lost touch with a huge part of my life. I stopped by his brothers the other night and caught up on the years, swapping stories of the old days and the misadventures we had. We talked of those gone, some to jail, some dead, some just gone. We laughed at the memories of it all and wondered how in the hell we were still alive. Back then the rest of the world looked at us as poor white trash hoods and perhaps we were. But to us, we were king of the fucking world and all we surveyed. Its that rough and ragged background and group that I owe much of my who cares what other people think approach to life and it has served me very well as I have made my through.

This Christmas I shall raise my glass and toast this incredible life we live. Sure it has crappy moments and things do not always go our way. There will be moments of pain when some misfortune or failed relationship will strip away the flesh of our very souls and leave us stunned at how painful it is. For every one of those however, there will be five of a child being born, a first kiss, a sunset of spectacular color and glory, A symphony that fills the hall and the heart with the sounds of Beethoven, Bach and Vivaldi. There will be failures and setbacks. There will be even more comebacks and victories. Stubbed toes and bad trades are going to happen. So are long nights sitting on a friends pier drinking beer and grilling steaks, full blast boat rides and beer soaked Chicago strategy sessions. There will be tax audits and ex wives. But there will also be pretty girls in a Chicago snowstorm and nights where romance and sensuality fill the air.. Life is messy. But it also the ultimate gift of a generous creator, whether that be some deity or just the universe itself. This Christmas I shall raise my glass and toast life it all its messy, shitty, bloody wonder and glory. Amidst the flow of wine, the sparkle of lights, the colorful packages, the roasting turkey and heaps of pies I shall raise my glass and toast life. Standing there with the laughter and chatter of my children surrounding me, I shall toast you my friend. I wish you Life and a Merry Christmas

live form the new world headquarters in chicago

As I sit here in my new temporary office space (why all these people keep calling it Starbucks instead of the new world headquarters of Tim inc is beyond me) on Rush Street in Chicago I take a few minutes to reflect on the world, the markets and the state of things in general. There is a lot going on in the world this December as we rush headlong into the Holidays. The markets are roiled, the economy is confused, yet the lights sparkle and friends shout Holiday Greetings and the world rushes on.



The George Mitchell baseball report is out and it seems every body used them the starts, the failures, the whole damn league down to the bat boy was going for the whole small penis bulging biceps approach to the game. The game is tarnished and will need a much stronger and smarter commissioner than Bud Selig to recover from this fiasco. What frustrates the shit out of me is apparently all of the Orioles were on the stuff except Ripken and we still cant win a damn baseball game. The ravens just flat suck in spite of a strong effort in one game against the patriots. Had they played like that all year they would be in playoff contention again this year. A very lack luster season indeed. Navy has lost its coach but I suspect the Hawaiian assistant head coach who was promoted is up to the job. He has been with Paul Johnson a long time and knows the spread offense as well as anyone on the planet. We will find out next week when the Mids take on Utah in San Diego. I had the pleasure of going to the Army navy game this year and it was an exciting team to watch. Maryland basketball team is young and so far just a step or two away from being good. Gary Williams tends to excel with these type teams so the late part of the season could be interesting. Lets hope.

The markets are interesting. Both the PPI and CPI are up strong showing signs of inflation even while other indicators point to the possibility of a recession ahead. Oil prices are off their highs a bit but remain above 90 a barrel. Interestingly the PPI was up a lot more then CP which in my limited little brain might indicate a possibility of margin pressure as manufacturers were unable to pass their higher cost on to consumers in their entirety. Large financial stocks are just screwed here for awhile In 1998, long term capital threatened the economic system when their leveraged bets turned bad threatened to wipe out its 4 billion of equity. Right now a write down of 4 billion of equity due to bad levered bets is a slow morning. I move ever loser to the opinion that one must have two portfolios to survive and thrive in the environment I see going forward. First is the 5 year and forget about them stocks. The commercial high yield reits such as JRT, NRF and CSE belong here. SO does Severn Savings. Your AMCC’s and ADPT’s as well. Buy them forget about them. They are too cheap and most will recover and thrive going forward. Changes in business conditions and outlooks might matter to these type of classic ben graham stocks but day to day market fluctuations do not. However in the type 70s style gyrating markets I see in our future I think a trading component needs to be added. I do agree with navellier and others that growth will supplant value for the next few years. The lack of buyour financing and pressure on financials will weigh hard on the value guys. But most of the growth names I think are trading stocks, not owning stocks. They tend to feature sharp moves in both directions. I have learned a lot form all the fantastically talented and weird friends in Chicago, New York and Deltaville the least 7 or 8 years and am working diligently to add these techniques to my arsenal. At the moment I still like the idea from FISJM’s long Swiss franc against the euro trade. I think Crossman is right that the carnage in large financials and mortgage insurers and am looking to sell bounces though puts and risk reversals in those situations.



Next year promises change. Changes I have been threatening to make for years and just never got around to pulling the trigger. Now, the opportunity is on the table and my bluff has been called. More details on all this later as the situation progress but it promises to be an exciting, interesting year. I find myself looking forward to the New year more than usual this year. All my life I have advocated taking more risk and not being afraid to fail. Time to live up to that pithy little saying.



Sitting here in Chicago I am again reminded that there is nothing quite like a major city during Christmas. The decorations and the lights sparkle and shimmer. The Prudential center is topped with red and green festive lights. The hawkish winds blow in off the lake and the street side lights jump and twist in the wind turning the streets of Chicago into a winter festival. Shoppers rush up Michigan ave bundled with packages of all sizes and colors. Holiday music floods the stores and clubs and you can start to feel a little Christmas in the air. Last night the Chicago contingent met for dinner at maggianos on canal and grand for a night of too much food , too much wine and too much conversation. The whole gang was there. The publisher and her builder husband with tales of puking newfies and new books in progress. The adventure traveling Eurodollar trader was there preparing for yet another trip to a part of the world where most of the inhabitants are devoted to the cause of killing Americans. FIJSM Thompson was there with stories of a the anguish and pain of only being up 17000% for the year. I feel his pain. Tonight we meet again with the stated intent of making sure the Eurodollar kids liver and blood stream are imbibed with enough alcohol to allow him to survive the trip to the booze starved Middle East.



More on this trip later as we have already produced a story or tow by crashing the Christmas party of US Scrap metal corporation at Prado’s last night and I havent even been here 24 hours yet. Parties abound and we shall slip through the frozen streets of Chicago in search of adventure and misadventure and as usual I suspect we shall find plenty of both

Signing off from the world headquarters of Tim Inc where you can worthless advice and a double mocha latte pretty much on request

the christmas collection

Yes Virginia, there is a spec list.Your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the mindless prattle of the media and the hordes of salespeople pushing inferior products and approaches to markets and life. They do not believe what is not from the lips of maria or cramer. They think that nothing can be which is not spoken on television or delivered in 4 color glossy brochures. They would have you believe, Virginia that all minds are little and that eagles are earthbound. Unfortunately in this great universe of ours, with virtually limitless knowledge available merely for the price of exploring, there are way too few willing to invest the effort and time to develop the intelligence needed to even begin to grasp the wonder,beauty and magnificent nature of the world we live in. There are a few groups of men and women who investigate, read learn explore, test, count and celebrate their discoveries.The spec list is such a place.



Yes, Virginia, there is a spec list.



It exists as surely as the market opens at 9:30 and bob prechter is bearish. The open discussion and exploration of markets, of books, of music, horse racing , math of a higher nature, and of course BBQ. How dreary the world would be if we didn’t have such discussions, if we didn’t count out our theories and swap ides with some of the best minds of the day.It would be as dreary as if there were no virginias or victors. There would be no boundless optimism, no randian faith in ones own ability to achieve ones dreams, or to recover from whatever disaster life might throw our way..as dreary as if there were no voodoo profs with bike rides and bqq lessons, no yale with silly jokes and beautiful stories, no mr e with ice cold logic and liberal baiting, no wizz with constant technical advice and back door one liners...no crossman to drink with and tell stories late at night, no omid to assess the middle east for us,no david hillman to laugh at my stupid jokes and look like kenny rogers, no jack to bring his years of experience to bear as the prez of the club...no book ideas, or musical suggestions, no trading and investing discussions, ..no bbq recipes from higgs and mcnabb...we would have no enjoyment and learning save what we found on our own The eternal light with which the search for knowledge fills the world would be extinguished.



Not believe in the spec list. You might as well not believe in ben franklin.You might watch for us and not see us, but that doesn’t mean we dont exist. At the soldiers and sailors club at 37th and lex, the starbucks on rush street, the shanty on the edge of the chesapeake, the inside rail at keeneland, in the university libraries, on the squash courts and football fields,atop floats in the mardi gras parade,hunched over chess boards and checkers games, in front of bloombergs and pcs, we are there.Just because we are not on morning squawk or paraded through barrons every Saturday does not mean the list does not exist. The lack of full page ads touting the spec list in technical analysis of stocks and commodities does not mean the speculators of the list are less real.....just that they toil and explore out of the public eye with no desire to tout their success.



You can explore the meaning of life and markets and never discover it if you stay among the accepted readings and viewings. The writings of the abelsons, the magees, the oracle of omaha and other such, along with the talking head prattling of cnbc, cnn , the false gods of technical analysis and friendly trends are places where many search for the rhyme and reason of it all. They ignore louis l amour, patrick o brien, francis bacon, they setle for the background noise of endless disagreeing commentators instead of beethoven, bach, gershwin,coltrane. They look for life’s secrets in tuedays with morrie and dr phil, ignoring cervantes, shakespeare and galton. Only faith in ones self, an unending quest for knowledge, an appreciation of the beauty , wonder and romance that is life, a belief in the markets and a free society to unlock the secrets of it all. An open mind, a searching heart, a hunger for knowledge, a desire to succeed and an ability to get up from life’s little failures are the hallmarks of the spec list. Is it all real?..Ah, Vrginia, there is nothing more real abiding and meaningful in the world than the quest for knowledge in the company of friends.



No spec list? Thank whatever god you do or don’t believe in that there is and those of us fortunate to belong have expanded our knowledge, gained friendships to last a lifetime a source of inspiration, poetry, market knowledge, poker and horse racing strategies, music and literature..and of course BBQ. We probably cannot claim the 10 times 10,000 years the new york sun granted santa, but hopefully it endures as long as minds search and hearts hope for a better, more meaningful life. So long as knowledge is discovered and shared, music inspires, books enlighten and bbq is eaten, there will be a spec list.



Happy holidays



Each year at this time, I take a shot at warping yet another holiday tale into a speculative fable, and this year shall be no different. We have in the past twisted the night before Christmas and yes Virginia there is a Santa clause with mildly amusing results and so the tradition continues.This year we shall look a the holiday classic ‘it’s a wonderful Life”. As you surely recall in the classic film, george baily in utter frustration over the trials, tribulations and broken dreams of running a small savings in loan in Bedford falls decides to end it all by leaping off the snow covered bridge into the turgid icy water below. At the moment before his final, fatal leap, Clarence the angel shows up to save him, showing him how much better the world was with george a part of it, and the difference he made in so many other lives….

Join me now as journey to the bridge, a lonely speculator, staring into the icy waters, contemplating the leap. Tired of the long hours, the pressure, the constant stress, the loneliness of fighting the market mistress, he takes one last long gulp from the Maalox bottle in his jacket pocket and climbs the rail to take a final plunge….enter our angel one Clarence ( Dow). Unlike the movie angel, our Clarence(dow) isn’t looking for his wings but reenters the earthly realm with hope of a nice 23 claret and perhaps another shot at business machines inc in the teens as his reward for saving this poor struggling soul….

Before you jump, my good lad, implores our angel, twirling his cold tipped cane to emphasize his words, lets look at what the world would be like without you, what kind of world would exist if you didn’t spend all your days buying to early and selling too soon, churning up stomach acids being long vol in a low vol world, what kind of world would endure if you didn’t continue selling the crack spread, buying cheap debt or sweating out expiration date short the 1190 puts as the market collapses closer to your position…..it is not just you my good man who suffers if you choose to end a life in front of quotrons and spreadsheets, but countless others..to say nothing of my own shiftless descendants who need the dividends from dow jones stock to keep them in caviar and champagne…..come with me now and peer into a world with no speculators, no one to risk capital to provide liquidity, price risk and capital for new innovations…

A farmer out in the heartland of America comes in at days end in early spring, tired from plowing, planting and overseeing his operations. He sees that corn is selling at near record prices. He knows that if he can sell the corn he just planted at such a price, he can pay off the debts accumulated over prior years bad crops..he leaps to the phone and calls Chicago to forward sell his crop but in the pits at the board of a trade a few lonely brokers stand staring at each other, picking their teeth with trade cards and discussing the cubs game..there is no one to take the other side of the poor farmers trade..he wants to sell. None of the other commercial interests have instructed their brokers to buy…who wants to buy at record prices? There are no locals, no speculative off floor traders to buy his crop in hopes of breakouts…the farmer shall have to pray that he gets a good crop, but not so good that prices fall to record lows over the next 4 months…..


A young couple goes into the bank to discuss a mortgage. They have good jobs and are embarking on hat they hope will be a long and joyous adventure together through this mystery called life. They enter the Potter Savings and loan, hoping to negotiate mortgage on the perfect little house on the edge of town. They are expecting their first in a short time and wish to have extra room and a yard for junior to play. The bank would of course love to accommodate them, with the standard 20% down payment, no prior credit lapses and a nice high interest rate. There’s no way for the bank to continually expand its lending capability and profits by selling off loans into the speculative market for it simply doesn’t exist….Mr Potter knows that he will have to keep this loan on the books for the full mortgage term and needs to maximize his return and minimize loss potential by squeezing as much rate and collateral out of the young couple as possible..So much in fact that their dream of home ownership must be abandoned. This scene is played out all over America and apartments flourish, Clarence (dow) shows our speculator, where he recalls single home communities with playing fields and lovely homes full of hopeful young families. There is a certain relationship between deposits and loans available and with no secondary market to sell off mortgages, lending is constrained to only the very best risk with the highest down payments…..The government has set these guidelines to ensure the safety of the banks and there is now around them..

A pension fund manager of one of the worlds largest corporations reviews his portfolio and knows that if he can find a way to increase his exposure to equity, he can earn a higher return than on the bonds and bank cds he holds. He can offer higher retirement benefits to tens of thousand of loyal workers, the men and woman on the front lines, on the factory floor, the sale floor, the mailroom..he can offer a better way of life to these thousands of people. To do this he needs to offset the risk off being wrong so that in his desire to help, he doesn’t harm….at the merc the phones rings in cavernous silence..there is no one there to take the other side of his trade,,,the building is but a large empty warehouse on lasalle street, gull of cobwebs and discarded patches of red and yellow trading jackets no longer needed in a world free from speculation…the retires will have to make do with whatever benefits he can pay from holding treasury bonds until maturity

Speaking off the government…these fellas have some problems in our brave new world as well. Without the wild eyed speculative boys from Chicago, debt issuance is pretty limited as the only buyers are those willing to buy and hold paper until maturity. They have been forced to sell off all those lovely assets. Yellow stone national park now features over 2million acres of parking, condos and resorts, all to allow visitors to the wholly owned theme park, a subsidiary of Disney and dream works inc, to witness the amazing animatronics recreation of bears, wolves, ride the amazing old faithful water ride that has a scientifically recreate splash effect from an engineered geyser….next year they will be opening the Yosemite rock wall experience where you will be able to climb actual recreations of half dome in miniature scale,,the real half dome long ago be leveled off and turned into a unique condominium complex…one department of the federal government prospers in this brave new world of no speculation,Clarence(dow) points out to our friend…the IRS is in over drive seeking new funds, collecting back taxes and creating new ones to keep the government afloat.

To the mall off this brave new world..there is of course a sears, a montgomery wards ..wait wards they went bankrupt….not in a world of no speculative capital to finance new stores and new ventures or expand old ones..there is no saks, no abercromie and fitch..no borders, no barnes and noble,,, certainly no circuit city or blockbuster..therefore there is no price competition to eliminate older unproductive enterprises. You may shop at sears, at monkey wards or a few mom and pops…but all the stores have pretty much the same stuff at the same prices. There is no need for an electronics store…there was no venture capital to create ipods, video games,dvd’s or vcrs. You can get a nice TV, perhaps a hi-fi to play your record albums. With no speculative capital to create new ventures and products, there is no need to expand creativity to hold market share, the consumer is locked into very limited choices….

Look around this world with no rooms full of specs wheeling dealing, buying and selling at lightening pace. Personal computers re limited to very high end IBM machines..they saw no need for computers for the masses and there was no money for bill gates or steve jobs to prove them wrong..who after all but a speculator would take a chance on two potheads in a garage building a computer for everyman? There is internet beyond limited academic and government use as it required billions of dollars of pure speculation to get the internet where it is today…phones are limited to ATT…there was no junk bond money to finance Mci or sprint ..without the access to capital (speculative) that milken made available to steve wynn, vegas stops at the old desert inn. In new york, there is no financial district, just the bowery and waterfront. The museums are dark and empty, unfunded by wall street grants…Chicago is just a brutally cold city of stockyards and shipping docks, no downtown, no rush street…companies that stumble are dead as there is no base of capital investing in distressed turnarounds..great ideas go unfunded as there is no IPO market, much less venture capital.

Enough of the world at large Clarence(dow) says to the dejected speculator. Without speculation what becomes of your old friends the spec..let us visit them in the new world…the chair is of course, a college professor in new England somewhere, dismayed that there is no tennis in the long cold winters, the wizz is seen homeless wandering Harvard square punching endless sequences of numbers into a tattered calculator, muttering incoherently of deviations and sequences….crossman is an overweight sporting goods salesman in Peoria with a wife of gargantuan proportions and 7 kids..mcnabb has been forced to actually get a job,,haag is teaching 7th grade music and looking forward to conducting the annual holiday concert, mr e owns a combination haberdashery and burger stand in Newark….Depew a lonely race track tout wandering the back roads of Kentucky looked for a mispriced exotic...george zachar, the world's most overeducated nanny,ross miller teaching business math at chino state community college and penal facitlity,larry williams an out of work volunteer emt and firefighter in moose fist montana,pam editing in children’s book in a suburb of Detroit, forced to have a few smallish poodles rather than the collection of beautiful newfies you yearns to own…carstens a truck driver for an Oregon paper mill, lackey a bicycle mechanic and part time Sunday school teacher in east armpit Georgia(he wanted to go to florida but ran out of money before he got to the sunshine state…) and Melvin..poor Melvin, tending bar in a strip joint at the edge of town, trying to read the latest hard case novel by disco light reflected off of flashing sequins, pouring drinks for hard men who want to drink hard liquor and get drunk fast so as not to reflect on the lack of means and method to chase their dreams…..(in a prime example of the law of unintended consequences famous grouse scotch in so longer available in the us but rebel yell bourbon at 3.99 the gallon flourishes)…

No, my speculative friend, come down off the rail..the world is a far better place when it contains you and your like…those who wish to offset their risk my sell it to you, you provide the risk capital to make ideas realities, to rescue firms in distress, to create jobs, invent markets..as george benard Shaw so eloquently put it “All progress is unreasonable..therefore all progress is the result of the actions of unreasonable men”..and you my brave young speculator are the prime example of the unreasonable…you risk your capital and your thoughts on an idea, you provide liquidity and price discovery where there is none, industries where only dreams were….the world is far better for your existence…now please my good man, begged Clarence(dow)..if nothing else before Melvin gets too comfortable at the strip joint and refuses to rejoin reality…..our man, invigorated and gals to find himself again part of the world reaches in his pocket and finds,,,yes..its zuzus trading slip..with triumphant shouts of joy we hear him run off..Hello Wall Street, merry Christmas merc, happy holidays you miserable old cboe……..

And every time a bell rings, good old Clarence ( dow) enjoys yet another sip of his 23 claret

Happy holidays specs……

the grinch

Every spec
down in specville
liked trading a lot
but the grinch
who lived just north of specville
did NOT

The grinch hated trading
The whole market, each and everyone
He didn’t even think it was fun
It could be he had bought up some losers or a flamer
Perhaps he had been trading on tips from old cramer
Maybe he had a socialist daddy and mommy
But mostly I think he was just a damn commie

But whether it was his purse, or just his mind that was a wreck
He stood there before the open hating each spec
Deep in his cave he hated each one he could see
And dreaded the open of the NYSE
For he knew that the specs down in specville below
Were ready to trade and try to prfit from order flow
And they re checking their charts and running their stats
Look at them trade the filthy damn rats
He snarled to himself that this really must stop, they must trade no more
I must find a way to keep those trades from reaching the floor

For at the open he knew


All the specs, the girls and the boys
Would holler and yell, and make all that noise
They would yell and they would holler as they keyed up a trade
Or as the market moved, Mozart and cole porter would be played
The noise, the noise, the noise, the noise He could not stand
They were just too loud as they picked and they panned

And after they would sit down to plot the next day
Each of course doing it a different way
They would count and they’d plot, they would graph and they would chart
10qs and 10ks,stats and TA would be taken to heart
they would talk and they would chat and beat each idea to death
the grinch would hate traders until his last breath



but what he hated really the most of it all
was the buying, the selling of both large cap and small
trading of options and futures and forex and grain
winners bought smiles and losers bought pain
but they bought and they sold, they sold and they bought
all day long each other and the markets they fought

they would trade! and they would trade! And they would trade!
Every damn day the trend they would fade
The more the grinch thought of the specville and specs
He knew these markets he must wreck
For centuries he thought I ve put up with it now
I must stop traders from trading!..but HOW?

The he got an idea
An awful idea
The Grinch got a wonderful awful idea

I must dress up and get into town
I ll tax and I'll regulate and close them all down
I ll write movies and books, and even tv shows
And show all the people that capitalism blows
I ll talk and the talk and look just like a spec
And from inside their system I ll wreck

So headed for Dc to wreck the whole fed
While passing through MD he saw two specs,Tim and old fred
Sitting in a dock bar arguing about stuff they had read,
Talking about stocks and girls and swilling down beer
The grinch snuck around the two quickly with fear
Thinking “though Im the grinch my livers not strong
Starting with those two would really be wrong”

On his way to Chicago to give the merc and the cboe a whammy
He ran into another spec of some note, little spec pammy
Nothing to see here he said, no need to even look
Run away now, little spec pam, and perhaps I ll have andy beal write you a book
He saw them all there,Jason and ryan and brian and all the other chi town speculators
They were all there, the breakout boys , the arbs, and even trend faders
He closed the cboe,closed the board of trade, even the merc home of the spooz
He closed them each, he closed them all,now they cant trade, they cant win, they cant even lose




Now to new york to close out them all, the nyse,amex and even the pits that trade oil
There was no one, not even one spec who could the grinchs grand plan foil
No more of this trading, no more of this buying, none of this selling
No more screaming in the phone, no one in the pit yelling
I ll take their computers, their charts and their graphs,why..I ll even take their stats
Ill take their colorful trading jackets, flaming pink pants and even their lucky trade hats
No more systems or averages, I ll leave nothing not even a candle stick or even a band
There will no more trading, we ll remove all the profit and all will be grand
No one, no man, no woman or spec these markets will be saving
Why,Not even krisrock with all his ranting and raving

I ‘ll close them all all over the land, and do without a single care
Even in Weston, I ll close down the bold one they call chair
And even spec steve and Duncan and doc, the dude and young tim
From the east to the west, Europe and even the pac-rim
I ll stop all this trading and close all the markets I find
No more of this profiting from your courage and mind
No more coaxing reward from great risk
Because all the markets,all of them, away I will whisk

And the specs will fall quiet all over the land ,no trading no more
Not even carstens or florida dan,no on the wire , not on the floor
Not even the two professors, not ross and not the bbq voodoo
nothing even the gambler or the listmaster can do
From rollert to sogi, from Nigel to ari and lackey back to young ott
From zussman to rudy, fromm north to south, east to west how silent they will have got

Back to his cave toting his load went the grinch
Closing these markets was really a cinch
I have the numbers,their charts and their q’s, theres nothing to count anymore
I ve taken their systems and books,closed the web and even the nyif store
No more brokers,buyers or sellers, no funds neither mutual nor hedge
No breakouts ,flags, stochastics,%r flags or patterns..not even an ascending nor descending wedge
No roe, roi,,current assets,debt to equity,no ratio of p over e nor value of book
No trading slips, no order screens,trading desks, all the these I closed or I took

He looked down from his cave at Specville as morning was breaking while evilly humming
Because soon the specs would rise and see no trading day was forthcoming
They are just waking up and I know just what the will do,they will stand their and sob
Now they cant trade, they cannot sell nor buy..they might even have to get a real job
And that’s sight and a noise I must hear,So he stood with his hand to his ear
It started out low and started to grow,first a slight murmer but now near a roar
Bbut the sound wasn’t sad, there was no sad sobbing, and the grinch shook to his core
Because all thos psecs down in specville were
TRADING!!!!!!!!!!

How can this be thought the grinch, how can they put in an order
There are no electronics, no internet, no brick,and no mortar?
I took their charts, their graphs,their stats and fundamentals
There are no markets, not stock, not bonds, not oilt not even grains nor even lentils
But the sounds of the market across across the land, a thousand bida t a half, sell the jan sevens
The specs of specville were buying and selling, the sound rose to the cave and beyond to the heavens

How can this be he pondered for hours,that trading goes on withoutall their stuff or their places
And then it dawned on the grinch as clear as the focus on spec faces
Perhaps trading wasn’t just noise and pointless selling and buying
But perhaps about the courage of specs to take risks, risk falling but keep trying
Perhaps trading was about providing markets to feed one and to feed all, a way to earn profits, to learn and to grow
That all the specs in spec land had learned to love risk and studied their craft with great care
Learning that the meaning of life,was just perhaps, about the courage to live and the courage to dare
That spec bet on the markets was really a bet on themselves in ayn randish type fashion
That these specs of spec ville lived unlike most others, they lived with great passion

They say the grinch burned his communist manifesto that great day
And rushed right down the mountain and entered the fray
Sold a few bonds, bought a little oil and went long a few spooze
He learned out to trade, he learned how to win and he learned how to lose
He learned how to arb, which trend to follow and which trend to fade
Into the trenches he learned the meaning of life and learned what it meant to TRADE
He learned to never quit searching nor trying,That living was learning
That traders,especially in specville, use their heart and their wit to do all their earning
He would have highs and he would have lows, win great victories and suffer great blows
Somedays flush with piles of cash, others having to count his fingers and toes
But our grinch learned that day, and went on to a life spent as a hard working trader
Out of his cave to a mansion he moved and thought that all in all nothing could greater!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



Here we are, Early December. That can only mean one thing. That’s right dear readers it is time for Tim's annual holiday classic. Each year, for some twisted reason know only to myself..Well to be honest I don’t even know why I do it, I bastardize, plagiarize as just generally rip off some well known beloved Holiday yarn giving it a speculative, capitalist, libertarian and just plain weird spin. I of course insert characters from the spec world and sometimes from the real world to make it entertaining to all..or just because I think its funny. I like to do this early in the month so everyone has time to print it off in time for holiday bedtime reading. Surely even Mr., brooks needs a holiday classic to read this time of year eschewing those classics his kids love, the NRA manual and Bambi-He's What's for Dinner. The quest for a new story gets harder every year..We have done Yes, Virginia, It’s a Wonderful Life, naturally the night before Christmas and my all time favorite of them all, last years immortal yet easily forgettable rewrite of the grinch who stole Christmas. This year, I shall tackle the Granddaddy Christmas tale of them all..A Christmas Carol. And stand it firmly on its head

Our hero, Ebenezer Speculator sits at the end of the trading day, marking to mark his current positions. Good day for his egg nogg crack spread (long one, long one milk, short two bourbons) broke even on his march candy Cane short but as always the long Fruitcake trade settled heavily on his p and l. It seemed to him that he had been doing this forever and the watching of green and red blips fall across the screen seemed to be a non productive way to spend his days. I should be ding something productive with my life, something that adds value to the world, he thought to himself.” Feeding the poor, promoting world peace, teaching white men to dance, something that would add real and permanent value to the world. Sure, I am making money and all that and I employ a few people and helped others learn the tricks of the trade and make money. But what real value do I add to the universe sitting here greedily racking up profits for my own benefit while others fail and starve around the world. Surely, I could be a more productive member of society is some way.” At that point his nephew Fred burst through the door in his Cleveland Indians baseball cap, excited with the sprit of the season. “Quick, Uncle” he cried, “ housing starts are down, mortgage defaults are up and the world is awash in debt. We must short, we need to sell calls. Tis the season for economic collapse and profits all around!” Ebenezer look at his nephew and chided him for thinking only of profit for himself and not the plight of the poor around the world.”Bah Humbug. I am tired of all this buying and selling, selling and buying for no purpose other than to fill my own purse.”

The thoughts stayed with our hero as he made his way through the streets. He noted the homeless with their dire condition. He gave generously to the faux Santa’s ringing bells over little kettles, giving freely of his cash so they could continue the good work of forcing winos and degenerates of all forms to sing hymns to get a chicken supper and providing child care so the crack mamas could get to the corner and not worry about the fate of their little ones. He noted all the dregs and depressing things of the human condition. Of course had he lifted his eyes from the gutter he might have seen the towers of steel and glass that provided jobs for literally millions, the apartments full of people who earned their living through productive effort and cared for their families and raised their children to understand the value of education and hard work. He didn’t see the procession of cabs, buses and trains that provided cheap transportation to the public at a profit, or the store windows full of consumer goods, clothes, electronics and appliances that were sold at a profit to give us entertainment sustenance and make out lives easier while providing jobs for millions around the planet. That of course would negate the need for the rest of the story so he trudged homeward, eyes cast down not seeing the triumph of efforts and capital spread before him.

As he took his supper along with a generous glass of Irelands finest he read over the headlines of the evening papers. War here, war there, hunger, pestilence, disease. He knew that he must somehow find a way to make a difference in the world.


He awoke with a start to the clatter of chains and a soft moaning that grew increasingly louder. He recoiled in horror at the sight of a ghost, the ghost of his old trading partner when he first struck out on his own, the ghost before him was that of none other than Karl Lenin Marx Marly. They had separated after a few very profitable years when Jacob driven by the guilt of his wealth and desire to save the world. He had died in Outer Somalia when he was fried and eaten by a pack of savages who vastly preferred deep-fried ex day traders to the food presented by the various aid agencies. They were horrible fat(this was 2001. there was a excess of deep fried ex-day traders around) little men who dispatched of our crusader in quick order with a nice merlot on the side.“Karl,” cried our hero,” you have been dead now these many years. Why do you torment me at this hour? I must sleep as I have many fundraisers to attend this weekend for many liberal charities with heavy overheads and bizarre cost structures.”

“I am here Ebenezer to save form the mistake you are near making, the same fatal mistake of mistaking charity for a productive use of your time and effort..The type of mistake that leads to one being served up with a nice merlot deep in the darkest parts of the world.”

What chains are these you wear?

“The chains of every stupid do good welfare handout, government inspired relief programs that squelch the natural instinct of man to improve himself that I ever supported. The chains of every relief program that I ever collected money for only to have the cash sucked up in more fundraising drives and salaries for those who told us we were saving the world while what damn few supplies we ever sent to the poor were seized by roving warlords and midlevel bureaucrats. Tonight you shall be visited by three ghosts each with a lesson and warning for you. Take heed Ebenezer, take heed, lest you share my fate. The first shall be upon you at the stroke of midnight.”

As the ghost fade, or hero blinked in disbelief and swore he must be hallucinating. It must have been bad oysters or too much whiskey, a dream, nothing but a bad dream .Not as much of a nightmare of any his marriages, but still a bad dream. Back to bed, back to sleep he told himself.

At the stoke of midnight the first visitor did indeed arrive. Clad in pink slacks and a teal sports coat, he roused Ebenezer by smacking him firmly over the head with a copy of dimson marsh and stautons triumph of the Optimists, a most weighty tome capable of rousing one for sleep or knocking one back into it as the case demanded. “Come and see the past, of the profound impact on world history that speculators and investors have made.” With a flash they were gone into another time and another place. “But that’s me, as young man sitting at the ancient quotron cold-calling strangers to get business. Me, with no gray hair, no bifocals. Look at me so young and foolish thinking of nothing but making money.” And he watched himself as time and space compresses as I can do because its my story, watched himself in those first few years as a young salesman peddling stocks and bonds for companies no one had ever heard of, Golden Nugget, MCI, Microsoft, Amgen, Netscape. He watched as he helped raise money for companies that transformed the world with their technology and their medical devices and drugs. The specter whacked him now with Stigler Statistics on the table and they sped though days past seeing whole new industries, airlines, automobiles, computers created. Created with money raised in financial markets made possible by the liquidity provided by traders and speculated. Men who speculated to raise their standards of living and endowed educational institutions and libraries that made it possible for others to expand their knowledge, not with a hand out but an opportunity. He saw the million per cent a century return of the capital markets raise standards of living virtually around the globe and for the first time he began to realize that maybe, just maybe business and capitalism did far moregood than harm. Another smack to the head with a copy of Galtons Art of travel and he saw the history of other approaches, the complete and total failure of communist and socialist systems over the years and around the planet.

With a thump they land back in our hero’s apartment. “Why show me these things spirit. Surely in spite of these things I saw, I can still do more good acting out of charity than avarice.” With another smack of the optimist tome. Our spirit departs leaving Ebenezer crumpled to the floor.

As the clock strikes one, the second ghost, the ghost of speculative now shows. He looks disturbingly like Kenny Rogers and is wearing some sort of cheese apparatus as headgear with a twinkle in his eye like David Hillman might have if he ever did actually find someone incredible to actually agree to marry him..Oh wait that did happen and Hillmans been twinkling ever since. The spirit yanked Ebenezer from the floor, stuck a gin and tonic in his hand and off they went.

First to nephew Fred’s where he sat around with his boon companions and fellow traders Jason and Ryan. Jason sighed wearily: this market is killing me. After today’s trading debacle I m only up 913% for the year. I tell you I’m getting desperate..” Ryan was quick to agree ‘ If this keeps up next year I ll only be able to go to outer Mongolia and the north pole. I may actually have to skip paying a fortune to slip into communist dictatorships that are sworn enemies of the US. The horror of it all!”

“Guys”, said Fred, I am worried about Uncle Ebenezer. Why just yesterday I went into his office and showed him some great housing shorts and an ingenious way to be short stocks and long volatility at the same time. He didn’t pay any attention. He was too busy writing checks to the sierra club and the feed Sally Struthers s foundation! He’s losing his drive and mumbles all day of doing good.”

“Enough of the gloom” shouted Jason. “We shall go now to Melvin B’s and drink copious amounts of beer and then gather around a brightly decorated cell phone and call Chesapeake slim and berate him for his nefarious bad habits of drinking, smoking,and gambling, to say nothing of chasing women with Kentucky accents and only buying stocks under book value. It is after all, a holiday tradition.”

With the splash of a lime in a fresh G&T they were off again. They looked upon the voodoo prof and Elena living in Deltaville, va living a life of trading teaching and boating, said aforementioned Slim on his island, wring strange documents and perusing vague financial documents, mandatory glass of Famous grouse at his side enjoying the benefits of a capitalist society that allows a man to marry as many times as he likes and still figure out a way to pay for it, they saw the wiz and the Weston crew, trading and living lives, raising families, gaining knowledge as well as profits that enabled them to enjoy the fruits of their efforts, they passed over Hawaii where Mr. Sogi continues to trade and dabble in business enjoying the companionship of his incredible wife and the Pacific surf, Scott brooks , stalking profits all week and innocent fuzzy animals all weekend. All of them trading and investing in the markets, using the profits they reap for the betterment of themselves and the ones they love.


Thump back into the apartment, the spirit snatched way the gin and tonic mumbling about being in a hurry to get back and make dinner for Paula and departed. Before Ebenezer could compose himself the clock struck 2 and the last spirit appeared. With an I pod full of Cajun rock and roll tunes, a U of C bobcats sweatshirt and smelling of small town Chesapeake breezes he hurled Ebenezer into the future, a future where capital markets failed, there was no innovation. The poor die first and frequently as there are no innovators figuring ways to ever cheapen the cost of food and clothing, disease was rampant as the government stepped in and removed the access to capital markets and the profit incentive, no new drugs were discovered and those that remained were expensive. Energy costs were prohibitive as there was no capital to develop new alternative source or search for new discoveries of oil and gas. There were no new jobs created and the taxes collected to support the ever-declining system ensured that business could not expand and create new opportunites. It was a bleak world, one without the hope for improving the lives of ones self and loved ones. There were no traders or investors to put money into new ventures, no speculators to provide liquidity or generate profits that create jobs and support families. The only wealthy folks were those that worked at charities paying themselves fine salaries to collect what little money remained to dispense to those less fortunate..Which of course is everybody but you and I.

“This my friend”, spoke the spirit as he sipped a rare 30 year scotch from some obscure Scottish village” is what happens when there are no markets and no traders.” And he was off, back to fight the battle of the neighbors light pole.
“What a fool I have been” cried Ebenezer.” Thinking of my self as non-productive because all I did was trade an invest. How could I fail to notice that I have provided jobs for dozens of employees, taught many to make money in the market and support their families and put their children through school, or that the money I invested helped to create new technologies and industries, providing jobs and opportunities for literally thousands.”

He dashed to the window and cried to a young boy passing below.” You boy. What day is this” Saturday said the boy, Christmas eve” “Thank the gods I haven’t missed it..Boy do you know the newsstand around the corner. Take this 20 bucks and run round there and fetch me today’s Barron’s, FT and NY times. I must prepare for the next weeks trading.” Of course this being modern times and not dickensian London the kids was never seen again most likely spending the twenty on cheap booze and porno. We can only stretch our fiction so far. later our hero had to go to the newsstand himself to obtain copies and make his way over to starbucks to sip a large (grande,venti my butt. It’s a large coffee) coffee

An Ebenezer spent a nice Christmas with good friends and family, chatting with Jason, Fred, the voodoo prof and all the specs about trend and trades in the market, ready to return with a new zeal and new appreciation for the life of speculation.

“Heck,” he though to himself.” I may even call Slim and see if he’s got any of those weird little cheap stock ideas. It is after all the holidays.”

Best early wishes to all for a wonderful Holiday season and a may you trade well and learn much in the new year.