Operation Simba – Vauban Would Be Proud

Brinky is very capable of entertaining himself–with the help of a big-screen TV, toys, books, and the run of an entire playroom that used to be our family room–but he won’t even try to entertain himself unless and until he has been forced to accept that he has no way to escape and/or wreak havoc.  For months I’ve been experimenting with the positioning of furniture in the family room, trying to find a combination that would prevent Brinky from damaging anything in the FR–including himself–while allowing him to enjoy himself and STOP TRYING TO GET OUT.  This is the Holy Grail for me–STOP TRYING TO GET OUT YOU DON’T NEED TO GET OUT–and it has been ever so elusive.  If Brinky can get to the gate, he shakes it and screams FOREVER AND EVER, like he’s Indiana Jones in a snake pit.  If he can’t get to the gate, then…holy cow did you see all these blocks?  Dad, did you know this room is full of blocks?  And Dora?!  Dora’s on the TV?  Why didn’t you tell me?  Thus the engineering problem facing me is not preventing escape–he’s strong, but not that strong–so much as it is creating the illusion that the FR isn’t a prison (it is).

Yes, I’ve imprisoned my son.  Well, he’s turned my life into a prison, so I say turnabout is fair play.

Pulling the big couch up to the gate so that the gate is covered and Brinky can’t rattle the bars worked for about a week six months ago.  Then he realized he’s big enough to just climb over the back of the couch and lower himself over the gate to freedom.  I hate freedom, because freedom breaks things and puts the things it doesn’t break in the toilet.  My last failed furniture arrangement left the couch close to the gate at an angle, leaving about a foot-and-a-half between the back of the couch and the gate.  When I sweep and mop in the FR (during naptime), I often lean Brinky’s mattress up on the recliner or one of the sofas to get to the floor underneath; one day several months ago, I forgot to put the mattress back down–and it was the best thing that ever happened to Brinky.  He ran up the mattress and slid back down for hours.  It was like I’d added a cushioned slide to his playroom.  Just a few weeks ago I realized that if I prop the mattress up on the couch so that it the end extends out to the top of the gate, Brinky can’t get down to the gate to resume his protest.  Even better, he doesn’t really want to, because mattress slide!  I am more than willing to leave the mattress propped against the couch, but I haven’t been able to secure it.  Brinky’s leaping and climbing and sliding invariably causes the mattress to slip, however gradually, back down onto the lower part of the couch and then onto the floor.  Today I’m trying a slightly more radical approach:

I’ve tied the mattress to the railing on the other side of the wall so that it won’t slip–and so far, so good.  Brinky hasn’t escaped, and joy of joys, he hasn’t tried.  He’s playing with his blocks and watching semi-educational programs in relative peace like the good boy he isn’t.  I don’t mistake this for victory–victory is Kindergarten–but it’s not an infuriating (for him) and disheartening (for me) disaster, and that’s good enough for today.

Of course the most important thing is that my beloved son is having a pleasant morning.    I say all’s fair in love and shut up boy.

FSX Friday Update

This was the biggest earnings week of the quarter, with a slew of highly-anticipated reports following the market close each day.  No doubt you all were glued to CNBC between 4:00 and 6:00 every evening—as I was—so I’ll spare you the details.  All eyes were on Apple…until they were on Facebook, and then on Amazon.  Apple results weren’t as bad as they could have been—bearing in mind that EPS estimates for this quarter had come down from $12 a year ago to $7 before the report—and the stock climbed 5% as a result.  Amazon reported a 2-cent loss when the Street was expecting a 5-cent profit, but AMZN trades on insanity and not on earnings, and insanity has been on a tear lately, so naturally the stock rose two percent to an all-time high above $311.  If the company had met earnings expectations—and it bears repeating that they missed—a $0.05 quarterly earnings run rate would result in a P/E ratio of 1,500.  That sounds bananas if you don’t know anything about stock valuation, but for reference, the S&P 500 P/E is around 18, Google’s is 25, and Apple’s is 10.  But that’s okay because Amazon’s earnings are growing, right?  Well…not so much.  Again, Google is instructive.  Here are GOOG’s quarterly EPS for Q2 going back four years:

2013: $9.54

2012: $8.42

2011: $7.68

2010: $5.71

Not too shabby, eh?  Now here’s AMZN’s comparable EPS results:

2013: -$0.02

2012: $0.01

2011: $0.41

2010: $0.44

Every year is worse!

During that time, Google’s stock has risen 80% from $500 to $900—again, not too shabby.  But Amazon, over the same period, has seen its stock climb from $100 to $300—it tripled!  One day this madness will end.  I don’t know when, and I don’t know what the trigger will be, but when it does end—look out.  If Amazon’s technical momentum cracks, there is no valuation support whatsoever underneath it.  Yikes.

Facebook isn’t cheap either; if I apply the same earnings run-rate method to FB’s latest quarter, it results in a P/E of 45.  In effect, that suggests that Facebook’s growth prospects are nearly twice as strong as Google’s, which I think is preposterous.  But unlike Amazon, Facebook delivered a blowout quarter, crushing estimates on the top and bottom lines and reporting truly phenomenal growth in mobile ad revenue.  It was a fantastic quarter, and bears were caught completely flat-footed.  The stock leapt 30% on the week, and critics of the company’s leadership (myself included) were served a big plate of crow.  So does this mean that the Facebook IPO last year wasn’t the all-time debacle we thought?  Nope.  In fact, it confirms that Facebook’s IPO was the most egregiously mispriced stock offering since the dot-com bubble burst.  FB came public at $38 a share; after a 30% surge this week, the stock trades at…$34.  Facebook may be a great company—the jury’s still out—but the IPO was as awful as they come.

The Family Stock Index was all-but unch this week.  If the FSX doesn’t want me to talk about it…you know what?—that’s fine.  Keep your unch, FSX, and don’t make me tell you where you can stick it.

Advancers

• Jenny (JNY) +10%.  Jenny turned 12 last week, and as all the relatives she’s visiting this week are learning, she looks at least two years older than she is.  Happily, Jenny also watched the premiere of Teen Beach Movie this week, and she discovered she’s not too old yet to enjoy a crappy Disney Channel musical.  I never thought that would be a reassuring thought for me, but life is full of surprises.
• Ruby (RJET) +5.9%.  Ruby reported Q2 results this week, beating on the bottom line while missing on revenues.  Cost-cutting can only propel a stock for so long; eventually Brinky comes to visit and breaks everything you have and then expense control is pretty much out the window.
• Katie (CATY) +3.5%.  The garden we planted behind the pond is going like gangbusters, with zucchini and cantaloupe and tomatoes all over the place.  It turns out Katie’s got a green thumb, which is probably the most surprising thing I’ve learned about her in at least fifteen years.  Alas, if my thumbs are ever any color other than my natural pink, they’re brown.  If you could see how many packs of raisins Brinky’s eaten this week alone, you’d understand why that is.
• Nicole M. (COLM) +2.8%.  I’m sure Nicole and Mario would’ve liked to have more time with Jenny and Reagan this week than their Philly stopover permitted, and yet…the abbreviated visit also limited the potential for Teen Beach Movie contamination.  In contrast, poor Charlotte (ICE -1.1%) was trapped in the car with Jenny and her iPod for more than 10 hours; there’s more than a little relief baked into this move in COLM.

Decliners

• Nicole E. (NICE -3.3%) and Reagan (REGN -2.1%.).  There was a secret plan in place whereby Reagan would hide the Brinky Bowl in a Pillow Pet and deliver it to Nicole during this week’s New York trip.  Alas, Reagan talks in her sleep.  But if it makes Nicole feel any better, I doubt I have much longer to enjoy the Brinky Bowl.  I expect Brinky himself to break the eponymous Bowl any day now.
• Brinkley (BCO) -3.2%.  Oh, he’s going to suffer for this week.  He’s going to pay.  When Katie and I die—at age 100, in battle with Russian werewolves—and our will is read, then he’ll see what his interminable high-pitched squealing, fit-pitching, and world-breaking has wrought.  Jenny will get half the gold and jewels, Reagan will get half the gold and jewels, and Brinkley will get a bill for unpaid services rendered.
• Jodi Ann (JOY) -2.8%.  Oh, she’s going to suffer for the (in all probability) giant baby Marcus put in her.  The finish line is still months away, and stretch run is the swollenest.  That’s a metaphor, of course—stretch run—except for the ‘stretch’ part.   I don’t advise running during the stretch run unless you want to end up in the emergency room because an uncontrollable boob flew up and broke your nose.
• Lee (TGI) -9.2%.  Part 1/Book 1 of the Drawing Wolves dilogy/trilogy goes to my siblings on August 1, and I’m limping and shuffling to the finish line.  No, that’s not true—limping means standing, and shuffling means zombies.  I guess I don’t know what I’m doing, and, after all, maybe that’s the problem.  Or maybe the problem is that dilogy isn’t even a word.

 

Name	Ticker	7/26/2013	Change
Brinkley	BCO	$26.71	-0.89
Charlotte	ICE	$177.28	-1.71
Dustin	DST	$69.56	+0.07
Ghost Marisa	MOLXA	$25.16	+0.05
Icarus	FAST	$46.68	-0.13
Jenny	JNY	$16.85	+1.48
Jodi Ann	JOY	$48.83	-1.43
Justin	SCI	$18.54	-0.11
Katie	CATY	$23.95	+0.80
Lee	TGI	$77.22	-7.78
Lisa	LNCE	$31.33	+0.59
Lucas	LEI	$1.41	+0.08
Lulu	LULU	$69.02	+1.32
Marcus	MCS	$13.06	+0.15
Mario T.E.	MGEE	$59.31	-0.99
Mario T.Y.	MAR	$41.26	-0.36
Namilita	NL	$11.01	+0.05
Nicole E.	NICE	$37.23	-1.26
Nicole M.	COLM	$64.71	+1.76
Reagan	REGN	$269.21	-5.65
Ruby	RJET	$13.57	+0.76
Wilson	WILC	$7.02	-0.13
Winston	ED	$59.93	-0.55
Zero	ZAGG	$4.85	+0.13
Zondro	ZQK	$6.33	-0.11

Brink TV

Was there ever a show called Television on the Brink?  Was that maybe a tagline for a show?  Let’s pretend like it was, because

my “Brink on the Television” joke works better that way.

I have to admit, it’s not entirely clear to me how he got up there.  What is clear is that either he couldn’t get down or he didn’t want to.

It looks more like the latter, doesn’t it?

I have to admit, also, that I was very reluctant to get him down.  So…can we all agree to pretend that I wanted to leave him there because he looks so happy?

FSX Friday Update

This was the first big week of Q2 earnings reports, and so far we’ve learned that the state of the economy is…meh.  Bank earnings were as strong as expected—JPM, WFC, BAC, and MS all hit multi-year highs—while tech earnings were surprisingly ugly—GOOG, EBAY, INTC, and especially MSFT all got clobbered.  Ben Bernanke testified on Capitol Hill this week, and he gave the economy more like a meh+.  The net result: the Dow hit a new all-time high, but with a gain of only 0.5%, even that felt awfully meh.

The Family Stock Index likewise reached an all-time high on Monday—for the kajillionth time this year, I think—before trading back down to close near the flat line.  It’s too damn hot for us to be just trading up every day like this.  I got spiders and kids and dogs and cats walking around—and penguins, too, for all I know—and everybody’s making messes and eating and wearing clothes and it doesn’t get cool enough upstairs for me to sleep well until about 3 a.m.  So if the market could just lop about five percent off the FSX and keep it off until, let’s say…mid-August?—that would be great.  Capisce?

Ugh.  I can’t believe I thought that.  I’m not the one who’s Italian around here—I’m sort of a mottled pink-purple something-or-other.  It’s Reagan’s fault—the capisce-ing, not the pink and purple.  Do you know that Reagan’s started saying ‘capisce’ all the time, only she doesn’t use it right.  It’s supposed to be like this:

Me:  You’re going to go back upstairs and flush the damn toilet before you do anything else, capisce?

Reagan:  Okay.

Instead, Reagan uses it like this:

Me:  You’re going to go back upstairs and flush the damn toilet before you do anything else.

Reagan:  Capisce.

You see?  It’s supposed to be ‘do you understand?’ not ‘I understand,’ at least colloquially.  Mario can correct me if I’m wrong.  I wouldn’t recommend it, but he can.

Not only does Reagan say ‘capisce’ all the time and use it incorrectly, but she says it weird and different every time.  I’ve heard coopeese, capachee, capushe, and I don’t know how many other permutations.  That’s really my own fault, though, mine and my brothers’.  We think it’s hilarious to say words wrong and put them in the wrong places (‘the ring that cut the blade from Sauron’s face’), and the more you think it isn’t funny, the funnier we think it is.   Reagan’s right there with us.  I guess you seep what you row.

Katie and/or Reagan and/or Jenny are going to handle the advancers and decliners, because it’s too damn hot for me.

Advancers

• Ruby (RJET) +10%. Boo-boo’s heading to Philadelphia tomorrow for a fun visit with Uncle Mario and Nicole. By fun visit, we mean trip for work, but she still seems excited.
• Ray Gun (REGN) +3.3%. Reagan: Why. Am. I. Up? I can text Chawly. I went to the pool today. I’m going to New York in 4 days, and I’m very excited. I didn’t break my patella yet, but we’ll see. (She thought she broke her patella yesterday.) (She says, she didn’t think. She knows.)
• Nami & Lita (NL) +3.3%. They’re looking forward to some alone time with Zero. They’re going to eat Zero. It will be a great meal.
• Lee (TGI) +2.7%. Reagan: He’s really excited for me and Jenny to be gone so he can party with his son all day without us interfering. Lee: That’s what I do all day anyway while you two sleep and stay away.
• Brinkley (BCO) +2.7%. He’s also ready for the party with Daddy. Also, he has discovered that he’s in love with Fruit Rollups. And Reagan said he’s also excited that he’s going to be a ballerina when he grows up. At least that must be why he practices spinning around all the time.
• Mario the Elder (MGEE) +2.6%. Jenny: Grandpa’s up because he’s looking forward to having the house to himself. Would it be bad to say he’s up because Boo-boo’s leaving?

Decliners

• Jodi Ann (JOY) -2.5%. Jenny: She’s getting stressed about having all those people there. Reagan: She’s upset because we’re not getting there sooner. Katie: Hot + pregnant + having two kids around isn’t always easy. I know. Good news though – the girls are relatively self sufficient, as long as you feed them every once in a while. And give Reagan some tea. Lee: Are you saying something terrible about me?
• Marcus (MCS) -2.8%. Lee: So are they not excited to see you guys? Reagan: He’s down because his wife is stressed. Lee: They’re running to Canada right now. And Marcus doesn’t remember enough French, so they’re going to get trapped in Canada. And Jenny can’t go get them because she doesn’t remember any of her French. Jenny: I remember my French! Lee: I know more French than you do.
• Jenny (JNY) -4.3%. Jenny (in an excited voice): I’m down…wait, why am I down? (She was clearly expecting me to say she’s up.) Reagan: She’s down because those iPod cases she ordered are never going to get here. Jenny: They’re being meanie-butts. Katie: All the big turning 12 excitement is over. She’ll never get to experience watching Breaking Dawn Part Two with her dad for the first time ever again.
• Zondro (ZQK) -6.4%. Reagan: Cause he is just so, um, dumb. And Wilsie never lets him eat. Katie: He’s down because I KNOW that he’s the one who trampled my second zucchini plant to death.
• Zero (ZAGG) -12%. Katie: He’s down because he’s going to miss #euregirlsminuskatieroadtrip. (I just decided to hashtag in the middle of this blog post to see what Lee says about it.) Lee: He’s scrawny like a bird, like a big bird. So the cats are going to eat him. (As previously mentioned.) I haven’t seen them, but I imagine them as giant cats. Like leopards. Like panthers.

 

Name	Ticker	7/19/2013	Change
Brinkley	BCO	$27.60	+0.72
Charlotte	ICE	$178.99	-1.68
Dustin	DST	$69.49	-0.21
Ghost Marisa	MOLXA	$25.11	-0.30
Icarus	FAST	$46.81	-0.31
Jenny	JNY	$15.37	-0.69
Jodi Ann	JOY	$50.26	-1.30
Justin	SCI	$18.65	+0.05
Katie	CATY	$23.15	+0.38
Lee	TGI	$85.00	+2.24
Lisa	LNCE	$30.74	+0.33
Lucas	LEI	$1.33	+0.07
Lulu	LULU	$67.70	+1.34
Marcus	MCS	$12.91	-0.37
Mario T.E.	MGEE	$60.30	+1.51
Mario T.Y.	MAR	$41.62	-0.11
Namilita	NL	$10.96	+0.35
Nicole E.	NICE	$38.49	-0.11
Nicole M.	COLM	$62.95	+0.44
Reagan	REGN	$274.86	+8.86
Ruby	RJET	$12.81	+1.18
Wilson	WILC	$7.15	+0.13
Winston	ED	$60.48	+1.28
Zero	ZAGG	$4.72	-0.63
Zondro	ZQK	$6.44	-0.44

Operation Sudsy-Bleach Is Go

I have become dangerously sentimental.  The Great Basement War is now three years in the past and relations with the Yard Dominion of the Spiders this summer have been downright amiable, so perhaps I can be forgiven for feeling a sense of soldierly camaraderie.   I have been planning to clean the front porch for the last several weeks, as it is filthy and festooned with active and abandoned webs…yet I have delayed taking action.  Only a few days ago I found myself watching through a window pane as a spider wrapped one of those bugs that look like leaves; it was much larger than he, yet he went about his work with industry and–dare I say–aplomb.  Is this such a terrible state of affairs? I thought to myself.

This morning I have received my answer from the gods of war themselves.

After taking a break yesterday evening to watch Breaking Dawn Part 2 with my ladies–a thoroughly enjoyable film, I thought–I returned to beating myself in the face with Round 3 of rewrites this morning.  Two hours in, I was feeling pretty good about the (relative) quality of the work, and certainly about my level of productivity.  That’s when a spider charged across the bottom of my keyboard directly at my exposed right hand.

I didn’t fall over backwards into the bookshelves behind me, but it was a very close-run thing.

This spider came from the front porch; of that, I have no doubt.  The front door is approximately fifteen feet from my desk, and my gross underestimation of the peril facing me during these past few weeks seems, in hindsight, if not criminal, than certainly contemptible.  I have a great deal of face-beating-in to accomplish today, and there is Brinky to consider.  But doubt not that this weekend I shall bring a sudsy bleach barrage against the front porch the likes of which has not been seen since…probably last October.

Spoonman

Brinky decided several months ago that silverware could no longer be kept in the silverware drawer, as there was not enough room in said drawer for said silverware to be arranged in an aesthetically acceptable fashion.  Rather, the silver was to be laid on on the kitchen counters and/or stacked carefully on a stool or a chair.  I prefer my silverware to be functional, so I was forced to move all of it to a single container that could be pushed back on the counter far enough that Brinky couldn’t reach it.  It’s not ideal, but it beats listening to Brinky pitch a fit when I desecrate his art/set the table.

This morning I was beating myself in the face with Round 3 of rewrites and I decided to let Brinky have the run of the downstairs.  He was quiet for a while, so I went into the kitchen to see what he was up to.

He was working on spoons, of course.  I’d neglected to stack the chairs one upside-down on the other to prevent him from using them to get to the counter, but after all, a devoted artist always finds a way.

I wondered briefly if Katie or I had put the spoons out for some reason or other, but of course I know nothing about spoons or what to do with them.  I wouldn’t presume.  In fact, the only reason Brinky tolerates my container-o’-silverware is the fact that I make no attempt to arrange the pieces.  He’s learned to ignore his blockhead father’s insistence on using things to do things.  Art is for Brinky.

This morning’s project was painstaking work.  He had to inspect each spoon,

move it from hand to hand, turn it upside-down, and–in extreme situations–bite it.  Only then could he be certain of its final placement.

Then it was snack time, so Brinky decided to knock all the spoons off the table lest I should get it in my head to help him with his art while he enjoyed Dora and an apple.  He’s not big on collaboration.  He is big on apples and Dora.

 

FSX Friday Update

There it went!

Did you miss it?  The bull market correction?  The buying opportunity investors have been waiting for since the beginning of the year?  It happened!  From June 18 to June 24 the S&P 500 pulled back from 1652 to 1573—a 5% correction that was even sharper in market-leading sectors like biotech, utilities and homebuilders.  Since June 24, the S&P 500 is up 100 points, setting a new all-time closing high just yesterday.  So that was it.

Oh, you were on vacation that week?  Whoops.

This week’s rally was—surprise!—all about the Fed.  The June swoon was driven by fears (unfounded, as it turns out) that Ben Bernanke was preparing to stop doing asset managers’ jobs for them by inflating bond prices directly and all other asset classes indirectly.  The other Fed governors have been swearing up and down that short rates aren’t going up any time soon, and the market has rallied in response, but it was really off to the races after Bernanke himself echoed that message in a Q&A Wednesday evening.  The result?  Traders bought everything Thursday and then gave themselves a three-day weekend.  After all, if the Fed’s not going anywhere until 2015, Wall Street might as well decamp to the Hamptons.

Less than two weeks after breaking through the 100-day moving average on the downside, the Family Stock Index made a series of all-time highs this week, ultimately closing up 2.6% to 16,141.  Traders rotated through the high-beta younger  FSX members: Lucas popped 15% on Monday, Jenny rallied 10% through Wednesday, then finally Reagan took the baton for an 11% two-day surge to end the week.  Brinky refused to help (+0.7%), as is his wont.

Advancers

• Reagan (REGN) +14%.  Reagan went to Colonial Beach in Virginia with her friend Faith and Faith’s grandparents for a four-day vacation, and she’s confirmed that four days is too long to spend without any family around.  Know thyself, as Socrates said, sometime before he was executed for knowing too much.  Reagan discovered she doesn’t like life without her family, and there are worse things.  Being executed, for example.
• Jenny (JNY) +10%.  Jenny’s been stockpiling moolah ahead of her 12^th birthday next week, and she’d led me to believe she was planning on spending it on books and music.  Imagine my surprise when I learned—from CNBC, no less—that JNY was popping on news that Goldman Sachs has been hired to advise on terms of a sale.  Yes, the boost to the FSX was nice, and yes, we can find Jenny a new ticker, but a heads-up would have been nice.  I remember the days when my daughter would tell me if she’d been meeting with investment banks to discuss strategic options, but I guess those days are gone.  Why do teenagers have to be so secretive?  Does she think I’d have pushed her towards Morgan Stanley?  I mean, I would have, but it would have been a loving push.
• Mario TE (MGEE) +6.6%.  Grandpa’s always watching his weight, and thus a lot of delicious pasta passes through this world without being properly savored.  But now, with Brinky’s inaugural Hilton Head visit just weeks away, it’s time to load up on carbs.  Grandpa can expect to burn a solid 10K calories a day chasing that big boy around the island.
• Jodi Ann (JOY) +5.6%.  I think Jodi Ann might be halfway through her nine-month term of swollen servitude, give or take.  Admittedly, I’m coming at it from the husband/father perspective, and I’m fuzzy on the math after a few years, but I remember half of forever seeming pretty much like forever.
• Lisa (LNCE) +4.8%.  Lisa has been on a tear since she visited Hawaii, up 25% in that time.  Trading at an all-time high and valued at 33 times earnings, the stock looks very overextended.  Unless the market knows something I don’t, Dustin and Lisa still plan to slum it here in the 48 through Lucas’ high school years.  Lucas better get his Doogie on or else investors are in for some disappointment.
• LULU +4.4%.  Here’s what Katie and I had to say about Lulu yesterday:

Me: Did your cat do anything interesting this week?

Katie:  It’s your cat.

Me:  Terrible is the interesting it does.

So there you have it.

• Nicole E. (NICE +3.2%) and Justin (SCI +3.4%).  Justin and Nicole are going to take my terrible mess of a giant novel and parlay it into wealth and acclaim—that’s the rumor in the market, anyway.  No pressure, though.

Decliners

• Charlotte’s Zero (ZAGG -2.2%) and Charlotte’s cats (NL -2.9%).  Charlotte and her nieces are going on a road trip in two weeks, and the market doesn’t think Zero and the cats have a chance without her.  I think it’s far more likely that the cats eat Zero than that he eats the cats, but I understand investors playing it safe by selling both.
• Lucas (LEI) -6.7%.  This was going to be the week.  Lucas cleared $1.40 on Monday, then $1.50, and finally $1.60 in early Tuesday trade.  The breakout was finally happening.  Only then the stock rolled over, closing at $1.46 on Tuesday, $1.38 on Wednesday, $1.31 on Thursday, and $1.26 today.  That about does it for me.  I’ve been rolling with LEI since the beginning, but if it can’t even hold $1.40, it isn’t ever going to escape penny-stock purgatory.  Lucas needs a change of scenery, and I’m not talking about Hawaii.  I’ll see what I can do.
• Nicole M. (COLM) -6.1%.  Nicole hit a new 52-week high above $66 on Monday and, like Lucas, she couldn’t sustain the breakout and succumbed to a wave of selling.  In contrast to my feelings on LEI, though, I don’t think it’s time to throw in the towel on COLM.  This week’s drop didn’t violate any key technical levels and the short-term bull case remains intact.  The 50-day SMA crossed above the 200-day at the end of March and the stock hasn’t looked back, so investors still have room to be patient.  We’ll find out in the next week or so if Nicole will need to fall back on long-term support ($56.50, if you’re interested).

 

Name	Ticker	7/12/2013	Change
Brinkley	BCO	$26.88	+0.18
Charlotte	ICE	$180.67	+3.64
Dustin	DST	$69.70	+1.57
Ghost Marisa	MOLXA	$25.41	+0.15
Icarus	FAST	$47.12	+1.31
Jenny	JNY	$16.06	+1.42
Jodi Ann	JOY	$51.56	+2.74
Justin	SCI	$18.60	+0.62
Katie	CATY	$22.77	+0.24
Lee	TGI	$82.76	+1.86
Lisa	LNCE	$30.41	+1.39
Lucas	LEI	$1.26	-0.09
Lulu	LULU	$66.36	+2.81
Marcus	MCS	$13.28	+0.26
Mario T.E.	MGEE	$58.79	+3.64
Mario T.Y.	MAR	$41.73	+0.33
Namilita	NL	$10.61	-0.32
Nicole E.	NICE	$38.60	+1.21
Nicole M.	COLM	$62.51	-4.03
Reagan	REGN	$266.00	+32.52
Ruby	RJET	$11.63	+0.28
Wilson	WILC	$7.02	+0.08
Winston	ED	$59.20	+2.04
Zero	ZAGG	$5.35	-0.12
Zondro	ZQK	$6.88	-0.07

Push It To The Limit

Last night I ate four peanut bars in about ten minutes.

I should have stopped at three.

What Is This New Stinkery?

Five days ago I had two noseplugs; this morning I have none.  That leaves me defenseless against a Brinky with two packs of raisins in him.  I suspect he and the cat realized it would be too difficult for one individual to dispose of both my noseplugs, so they formed a Stink Alliance to divide the work.  The first noseplug disappeared on Monday–no doubt the work of Lulu, as her litterbox was conspicuously loaded on Tuesday.  That means Brinky stole the last noseplug sometime between yesterday afternoon and this morning.  I expect he ate it.  If so, those raisins may yet work in my favor.

Raisins plus bleach equals victory.

FSX Friday Update

This week Katie and Jenny will be handling the advancers and decliners while I beat my face in with the worst book in the history of the universe (current word count – 254,791).  If you’ve ever listened to ‘One’ by Metallica…basically that’s how I feel about opening the file to start working every day.  Like this guy:

I still did the market analysis piece because Katie and Jenny would just crap all over it if I left it to them, and who would the market blame for that?  Me.  The market would blame me.

Market Analysis

The S&P 500 added 1.6% on a very short week (3 ½ trading days), with most of the gain coming Friday following an above-consensus employment report (non-farm payrolls +195K in June, May and April revised up 70K).  Volume was very, very light this week.  Alcoa kicks off earnings season when it reports Q2 results on Monday.  Earnings reports should drive market action over the next month to six weeks, although a surprise result in the July 21 Japanese parliamentary election could destabilize forex rates and interest rates, with negative implications for global stocks.

The Family Stock Index gained a whopping 2.7% on the week, including a 239-point gain on Friday.  The FSX closed in the green every day this week, and Friday’s close at 15,735 was the first above the 50-day moving average since June 18.  Breadth was strong as well, with advancers beating decliners by a 4-1 margin, and we finally saw the return of 52-week highs (CATY, COLM, LNCE), a once-weekly phenomenon notably absent of late .  All three ladies made strong statements: Nicole M. notched her highest close since May 2011, Katie hit her highest level since April 2008, and Lisa closed at an all-time high.  Maybe we should all move to Hawaii.

Ha ha sharks!—it’s never happening.

Advancers

• Katie (CATY) +11%. Lee may think this is a stupid reason to be up (he does in fact think it’s stupid), but I cleaned my office at work this week for the first time in….almost ever. Definitely since before Brinkley was born, so it’s been a while. And it’s really awesome. It probably won’t last, so I better enjoy it. (Lee: If cleaning your office drives your stock to a five-year high, we’re talking basically an EPA Superfund site with a desk and some file cabinets.)  Jenny thinks I’m up because Reagan left today for a trip with Faith and her grandparents.
• Zondro (ZQK) +7.9%. Zondro’s up because he’s still here. He survived the Fourth of July again. When we finished last night’s festivities, we realized we had no idea where the dogs were and all the doors and the fence gate were open at various points. But guess what? Zondro didn’t run away. We have no idea where he hid, but wherever it was, it helped him survive. Jenny’s taking it a little far (and wrong) – she thinks he had fun.
• Jenny (JNY) +6.5%. I think Jenny’s up because Reagan’s gone and she’s very much looking forward to her 12^th birthday in a couple weeks. She thinks she’s up because Grandpa and Boo-boo gave her a new power cord for the Macbook as a good report card reward, so she’s able to use that computer for the first time in about six months. It makes her VERY happy.
• Nicole M. (COLM) +6.2%. Nicole’s really looking to the future – she has a plan for Ed Winston to be the leader of the pet conference next year.
• Brinkley (BCO) +4.7%. Jenny (who’s not trying as hard as I am) says that Brinky’s up because he poured a juicebox on himself earlier. I don’t understand how that would make his stock go up. She says it’s because he did something he wasn’t supposed to. And also because he experienced fireworks last night for the first time. Which is also not true because this is not his first Fourth of July. I think he’s up because he loves me. So there.
• Dustin (DST) +4.3%. Jenny says it’s because maybe they fixed another computer? I think he’s up because there’s nothing he loves more than celebrating the birthdays of his loved ones – and he has Lisa, Lucas’s and Dad’s to enjoy all in this one month!
• Reagan (REGN) +3.8%. Road trip! Reagan’s off having fun with Faith and her grandparents like I mentioned. She feels very comfortable with them because they give good hugs. Jenny says she’s up because she gets to go to the beach and because she enjoyed the Fourth of July.

Decliners – Pets That Aren’t Zondro

• Ed Winston (ED) -2.0%. Jenny says there has recently been a conference with all the animals. Something bad happened. Zondro was the leader, but he turned against them (that’s why he’s up). They’re depressed because they lost their leader. And they’re also angry, making them not focus on keeping their stocks up.
• LULU -3.0%. Cats were also at the conference described above.
• Nami & Lita (NL) -3.3%. Besides the conference, all these other cats are offended that Jenny is taking care of one of her friend’s cats this week while her family is out of town – feeding the cat and changing the litter. She’s NEVER done either of those things for any of the family cats. So I guess they know where they stand.

(Lee:  Notice that Jenny and Katie didn’t include Wilson in the Pets That Aren’t Zondro.  I take that to mean they’re plotting to kill him…just as he’s always suspected.)

Name	Ticker	7/5/2013	Change
Brinkley	BCO	$26.70	+1.19
Charlotte	ICE	$177.03	-0.73
Dustin	DST	$68.13	+2.80
Ghost Marisa	MOLXA	$25.26	+0.40
Icarus	FAST	$45.81	+0.02
Jenny	JNY	$14.64	+0.89
Jodi Ann	JOY	$48.82	+0.29
Justin	SCI	$17.98	-0.05
Katie	CATY	$22.53	+2.18
Lee	TGI	$80.90	+1.75
Lisa	LNCE	$29.02	+0.61
Lucas	LEI	$1.35	+0.06
Lulu	LULU	$63.55	-1.95
Marcus	MCS	$13.02	+0.30
Mario T.E.	MGEE	$55.15	+0.39
Mario T.Y.	MAR	$41.40	+1.03
Namilita	NL	$10.93	-0.37
Nicole E.	NICE	$37.39	+0.50
Nicole M.	COLM	$66.54	+3.89
Reagan	REGN	$233.48	+8.60
Ruby	RJET	$11.35	+0.02
Wilson	WILC	$6.94	+0.08
Winston	ED	$57.16	-1.15
Zero	ZAGG	$5.47	+0.12
Zondro	ZQK	$6.95	+0.51