I Need a Case of the Blews

After the first week of trading in 2012, I was pretty ecstatic.

I don't really recall the details anymore, but I was way ahead of the S&P for those first few trading days, but had I just matched the overall market's performance I would have been happy, as the year was getting off to a good start.for everyone other than the Godless short sellers.

As the prayerful believers intone during the Passover Seder, "Daienu" - it would have been sufficient, as God is thanked for each successive miracle that he bought to a fleeing people in the desert. One such miracle would have been enough, but two? Three?

There's nothing like a series of miracles to chase a bad case of the blues.

For what it was worth, I was also hearing the fruits of my laborious efforts on air at CNBC as the crew of "Street Signs" was continually referring to their new word of the year, "Eurosis," which coincidentally enough I had submitted in response to their request for viewer submissions.

It was going to be a very good year. Miraculously so? Probably not, but as Szelhamos would say "Good enough."

Money and ego. How can you go wrong with that combination? The former feeds the latter and then if you can independently build the latter as well, all is good, as long as the ego doesn't give you a false sense of invincibility.

Then along came Ben Bernanke.

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Judgment: Flawed or Impaired?

As I get older, I often find myself questioning very basic beliefs more and more.

I do, however, understand concepts such as why humans must have a mechanism to register pain.

For example, while it seems meaningless to have a kidney stone associated with pain, perhaps the utility of the pain is to send a message that you have to change some lifestyle choices.

That assumes, however, that human beings have the desire to practice preventive medicine or that they even have the ability to learn from past experiences.

Our judgment is often flawed, even in the presence of compelling data. I know and am constantly being told by Sugar Momma that I need to drink more, yet I continue a camel's existence, coffee notwithstanding.

That kidney stone example may be stretching it a bit, just as it needlessly stretches that ureter, but more concretely, it's probably a good idea to sense pain if you put your hand inadvertently on a hot stove burner. You really want to have some feedback mechanism that would give you the incentive to remove your hand before it became completely roasted.

Delicious, yet destroyed.

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What a Week

I love extrapolations and projections, so based on this past week, I'm getting ready for a great 2012.

Even though this was a holiday shortened trading week, I definitely got my fill of thrills.

I'm not exactly certain how I should categorize the kidney stone that helped to welcome in the New Year. I guess that not all thrills are positive ones, but at the very least it didn't cause me to miss anything other than some pain free stretches of time. It also seemed odd sitting in my usual perch on the La-Z-Boy without being able to extend the leg rests.

At that point, it's just a chair, so what's the point of a La-Z-Boy?

The unexpected probing was also an unwanted thrill, but this time the prober did not at all look like Woody Allen and had no sense of humor about him.

Slam, bam, than you man and that was it. No dinner, no drinks and certainly no conversation.

What I found somewhat unusual was not paying in cash to have my asets handled so unemotionally.

Sort of like the relationship with your stockbroker.

I suppose that the kidney stone is something that I'd prefer not to extrapolate. The thought of giving birth to a 7 pound bundle of crystal by years' end isn't as appealing as it may sound.

But how could you not love a week when inserted between every verbal comma was mention of the Hungarian currency, the Forint? With all of the discussion of how trivial the Greek economy is in the big picture, imagine where Hungary sits.

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