I played tennis this morning and lost. But I could have won — if I had trained harder.
The key is to do what you’re good at, enjoy the most and then concentrate on it like crazy.
All my rich (and happy) friends specialize. Most times when they move out of their milieu, they lose their shirt.
I have friends who actually make good money day trading. But every time I mention day trading on this blog, I get inundated with “Are you crazy?” emails.
Which brings me back to today’s stockmarket, which I don’t like. But it is edging up. Which I like. So it’s good to have one’s toe in it.
I made a little money today on the market. VZ, BSV, NKE and LEAI were up.
I had this idea: Pick a bunch of successful companies. Now look at their stocks over the past ten years. A good strategy would have been to own a handful of all of these. But look at how differently they performed. Divide the last price by the first price. Apple is a ten-bagger but no one else (at least of these four).
And to own a little of an index fund, which, you’ll note, didn’t do nearly as well as these four:
Interestingly, the winner over ten years was Apple, followed by HD.
Things I like about Apple today:
+ Apple Pay. No more losing your credit cards. No more stealing your PIN numbers, etc. Apple Pay is fast and convenient.
+ Facetime. Video with the kids and grandkids. Saves having to babysit them and change their diapers.
+ Shared Photo Albums, also called iCloud Photo Sharing. Send one photo to many, instantly. The recipients can “like” and comment. It’s brilliant.
+ I buy something online from Apple and pick it up at the local store. Better yet, they email when it’s ready for my pick up.
+ They don’t have cash registers at Apple Stores. Any employee can ring up your purchase and email you a receipt.
+ The new, smaller SE phone is not for you or me. It’s for poor people who are going to get rich, one day. Like people from India. The SE will suck them into the Apple milieu. To Apple, each phone is a source of immediate and (most importantly) longer-term revenue, from apps, from music, from movies, etc.
Sadly, I personally don’t feel any incentive to buy anything significant from them — no new iPhone, no new iPad, no new laptop. I’ll find something. And I did — two things:
The first is the Lightning to SD Card Camera Reader ($29). Take the SD card out of your camera. Put it in this. Insert the cable into your phone. Suddenly new software appears which lets you easily transfer photos you took with your camera to your iPhone or iPad. There are two reasons for this. A big camera takes better pictures than an iPhone. You need the photos from your camera on your iPhone to send out for shared photo albums — so all the family can see the kids.
The second is the Lightning Digital AV Adapter ($49). This lets you broadcast the images on your iPhone (e.g. movies) onto a much bigger screen. It sends an HDMI signal to a computer monitor or a big TV. The second hole is to power the cell phone. Plug your power supply in. Brilliant.
New Zealand is the place to go.
It’s got everything. Mountains. Glaciers. Beaches. Rivers. And few people. (More sheep, in fact. Australians say New Zealand is the land where the men are men and the sheep are scared.) NZ as 3 million people and 60 million sheep, about 22 sheep per person.
Yesterday I said go there or Australia — both places being safe. A reader emailed he’s going. He’s visiting Milford Sound, and Doubtful Sound. He’s tramping the Routeburn Track, ferrying the Cook Strait and hiking the Tongarino Alpine Crossing.
Check out those places on Google maps, earth view. You’ll be blown away with New Zealand’s beauty. Here’s an overview:
Nice political (?) comments
A flight attendant was stationed at the departure gate to check tickets.
As a man approached, she extended her hand for the ticket and he opened his trench coat and flashed her.
Without missing a beat, she said, ‘Sir, I need to see your ticket, not your stub.’
+++++
Paulette was picking through the frozen turkeys at the grocery store but she couldn’t find one big enough for her family.
She asked a stock boy, ‘ Do these turkeys get any bigger?’
The stock boy replied, ‘No ma’am, they’re dead…’
Harry Newton, who likes his 2 1/3 year old granddaughter, Eleanor, especially when she’s asleep. This kid has more energy than a truckload of Everready batteries.
New Zealand also has the greatest oysters in the world…eat them on the half shell. Their butter is beyond belief…the New Zealand Dairy Association once gave us 10 pounds to take home…FREE…we would have paid a premium.