There’s mist in the air. A slight breeze. The autumn leaves are floating down. It’s Fall. A precious time of the year. I drive slowly. I let the leaves brush my windscreen. I stop in a forest on a back road and savor it. It’s a magic moment.
WMHT is playing Beethoven. The announcer is waxing lyrically on how classical music allowed her to survive the Pandemic. She’s right. I listen to them every day. They play Mozart and Bach.
Tennis this morning was wonderfully exhausting. I hit some nice down-the-line backhands and lost gracefully (I think I lost gracefully).
This stuff alleviates stress. Many of my friends have high stress. It shows up in weird ailments that seem only to get worse as my friends age. I wish I could help. I think it’s part of their essence.
My favorite stress story:
In the middle of 1996 my partner in our technology publishing industry, Gerry Friesen, said he wanted to sell the business because it was causing him stress.
A year or so later in September 1997, we sold the business. He retired to California to play golf and do whatever else they do out in California.
A year or two later, I asked him how the stress was going? He looked at me with a twinkle and said he still had stress.
I asked what could be causing his stress since we no longer had the business to worry about.
He answered “Golf.”
I nodded. I know how stressful golf can be.
I don’t have any solutions. I know what seems to work for me — daily tennis, lunchtime naps, learning to not get crazed if my stocks drop (like today) and being careful and conservative what I invest in. I don’t pay much attention to things I can’t control (or at least affect). I have a piece on that coming.
Today, it’s hard to look at my portfolio and say, “Wow, look at that, I’m losing the value of a nice house.”
Then I console myself, I didn’t want another house, anyway.
Yesterday I played tennis twice. And this morning once. It’s almost time for my noon nappy pooh.
There’s an ironic end to Gerry’s stress and the sale of our business. Within two years, the Internet came along and ate the paper publishing and in-person convention business we had sold for a handsome amount. Had Gerry not had stress, we probably wouldn’t have any money, either. But he would still have stress.
It’s a funny world.
PayPal looks like the greatest bargain.
To my tiny brain, at its now much-lower price, PayPal looks like the greatest bargain. Tell me how many other fast-growing technology companies can report this:
How many other fintech companies would not give their eye-teeth for this deal:
So what happened? Here’s the way CNBC reported it when they first saw PayPal’s third quarter results:
+ PayPal (PYPL) — PayPal shares fell more than 4% premarket after the digital payments company reported quarterly results. The company’s revenue of $6.18 billion fell short of the Refinitiv consensus estimate of $6.23 billion. PayPal also issued a fourth-quarter forecast that fell short of analysts’ expectations and provided disappointing guidance for next year.
I don’t know who Refinitiv is. I frankly don’t care.
PayPal’s third quarter results didn’t disappoint me. I listened to PayPal’s conference call and I read the accompanying deck. Furthermore, anything and everything I buy online I buy through PayPal. I couldn’t be happier.
Most happiness: After enjoying their cheap trial, I used PayPal to cancel me the now-expensive subscription to a service I now found valueless. Yipee, it worked.
I haven’t sold a single PayPal share. If it gets any cheaper, I’ll buy some more. Today, however, it’s up a little. Maybe this is the bottom?
So how good is Apple at photography?
The answer will blow you away.
Here’s a picture that I just took with my beautiful Canon G5X:
Here’s a picture I just took with my new, beautiful iPhone 13 Pro Max.
By applying my best Photoshop skills to the Canon photo, I got it to.
It’s still crap compared to what Apple produced — no Photoshop — just straight out of the iPhone.
Now you know why Apple is my largest holding. Also Warren Buffett’s.
I did this test because I’m going to a wedding this weekend. I used to be a wedding photographer. I’m good at it. In those days, I shot in Kodak Tri-X, which is a black and white film you can do wonders with in a darkroom. I started to write “you can’t do that with an iPhone.” Then I thought, “maybe I can? So I did this in Photoshop. I still think Tri-X is better and it’s still available! I’m tempted to buy some real film for this weekend.
My small holdings
My Ford is up 51%. My GE is up 4%. My EL is up 3%.
I bought some KIND because I liked the nonsense the CEO spouted to Cramer and his resulting enthusiasm. He is so easy to pump. I originally thought KIND would be a great competitor to Facebook. But I was wrong. They’re not a Facebook. They’re a “find me a local plumber” app. Not one that likes or doesn’t like Trump. Just a simple fellow who can fix my leak.
Something about ownership
A pretty girl is standing next to a fence, watching a bull mate with a cow in the field.
The farmer comes up and leers at her, “Look at what that bull is doing to that cow, that is what I would like to be doing right now!”
And she replies, “Well why don’t you, it’s your cow.”
Today
Sincerest congratulations To Francis Greenburger whose wonderful Art Pavilions at Chatham project was unanimously approved by the Chatham Planning Board last night.
Tomorrow
On a whim, I googled Stress Beds for Dogs. Here’s a tiny bit of what came up:
I then google Stress Bed for Humans and found one for $3,100. It’s called a Pod Pro Mattress and looked like a normal bed to me.
My nap is calling. See you tomorrow, or so. — Harry Newton
