5. Diversification in your remaining equity portfolio should focus on big, multi-national solid, market leaders. Here’s some neat statistics:\u00a0About 70 percent of companies on the MSCI World Index that reported quarterly earnings since April 12 have beaten analysts\u2019 forecasts, according to Bloomberg data. Employment in the U.S. increased in April by the most in four years, the Labor Department said May 7, indicating the recovery is becoming self- sustaining.<\/p>\n
6. Bonds make some sense. But you have to be ultra-careful since many municipalities are broke, are likely to default and are not likely to be bailed out by the Federal Government.<\/p>\n
In short, cash and gold are king. This mantra sounds like the coward\u2019s way out.<\/p>\n
\u201cHarry, I should read this column to hear you tell me to do nothing, except buy a little gold?\u201d<\/p>\n
Yes. I was about to say also stay with some of your favorite stocks — like Apple and Google. But look at their recent cratering.<\/p>\n
Google Alerts are useful. Want news on something you’re following? \u00a0Sign for\u00a0\u00a0the free <\/span><\/span>Google Alerts.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n The sagging market for breast implants.<\/span><\/strong> So sad.<\/p>\n Woman sues salon after fallling through window<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n A Chicago woman who drunkenly fell through the window of a hair salon is suing its owners for having the wrong sort of glass. Melanie Shaker admits she lost her balance during a drunken fight with her husband, but says the salon owners should have installed special safety glass, since the sidewalk out front is \u201cfrequently traveled by intoxicated pedestrians.\u201d<\/p>\n The one that got away.<\/span><\/strong> From the May 14 issue of The Week Magazine,<\/p>\n Living on a retirement pension in a remote California desert town is the little-known \u201cthird founder\u201d of consumer electronics giant Apple. Back in the early 1970s, Ronald Wayne, now 75, worked with Steve Jobs at Atari. Jobs was about to launch a computer firm with his friend Steve Wozniak, and asked Wayne to draw up the partnership agreement. It gave them each 45 percent, and Wayne 10 percent. The idea was that he would act as a \u201ctie-breaker\u201d between the two bosses. But after two weeks, Wayne got the jitters. A previous venture had left him saddled with big debts, and he didn\u2019t have the nerve to get involved in another start-up. \u201cI was getting too old, and those two were whirlwinds,\u201d he tells the London Daily Telegraph. \u201cIt was like having a tiger by the tail.\u201d So he gave up his share, and in return received a check for $1,500. Today, that stake would be worth about $23 billion. But he\u2019s not bitter. \u201cWould I like to be rich? Everybody would like to be rich,\u201d he says. \u201cBut I couldn\u2019t keep up the pace. I\u2019d have been the richest man in the cemetery.\u201d Instead, he says, \u201cI will be a footnote in history because I happened to have known someone.\u201d<\/p>\n The richest man in the cemetery is total B.S. If Mr. Wayne had $23 billion, he could do a a great deal of good in the living world, before he made it to the cemetery.<\/p>\n Adobe has a new version of Photoshop. <\/span><\/strong>It’s called Photoshop CS5. Adobe\u2019s Photoshop CS5 recently became available, and as usual, there\u2019s plenty of magic for photographers under.<\/p>\n The star of the new Photoshop is without a doubt Content-Aware Fill. This technology takes Content-Aware Scaling, which first appeared in CS4, to the next logical level by enabling you to select an object \u2014 a stranger who wandered into your photo shoot, for instance \u2014 and then delete him from the photo. Content-Aware Fill will then examine the background surroundings and fill in the white space where your object formerly resided. It\u2019s fun and often amazingly accurate. A video \u00a0shows how it works. Click here<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n Also in the realm of magic is the Puppet Warp feature. Puppet Warp lets you recompose part of an object to achieve specific design goals. For instance, you can select an elephant\u2019s trunk and change the curve of the trunk. Puppet Warp isn\u2019t as easy to use as Content-Aware Fill and you won\u2019t use it as much, but it\u2019s cool nonetheless, reports the New York Times.<\/p>\n Adobe also has made it easier to select and mask intricate images with improvements to its Refine Edge tool, an enhancement that is less fanciful that Puppet Warp but will certainly be much more widely used. The software enables you to more accurately isolate an object from its background, and it\u2019s particularly helpful with complicated edges like human hair.<\/p>\n Fans of high-dynamic range (HDR) photography will appreciate the HDR enhancements. The HDR Pro tool enables you to merge identical images taken at different exposures and combine the exposures to create a single shot with a very wide dynamic range. The tool also includes a Remove Ghosts feature that automatically removes artifacts that often occur when merging overlapping shots.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re working with a single shot, however, the HDR filter is a fun addition that enables you to easily adjust the toning of the image to mimic the effects of HDR photos.<\/p>\n The Camera Raw 6 plug-in, which ships with CS5, has been updated to support new camera models; in all, 275 models are supported. Camera Raw 6 also has improved sharpening and noise removal, and lets you apply film grain when editing a RAW image.<\/p>\n Adobe also added a lens-correction feature that corrects the three most common lens-based errors: geometric distortion, chromatic aberration, and vignetting. You can also create custom profiles of your lenses.<\/p>\n As usual, Photoshop doesn\u2019t come cheap. CS5 is $699 for the full version, or $199 for an upgrade from previous versions.\u00a0You can download a fully-functioning trial version for free from here.<\/a> <\/strong>Beware the dowload is the biggest I’ve ever seen — 980 megs.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.technologyinvestor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/05\/AppleCratering.jpg\" "\\"AppleCratering\\"")
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\nThe recession has triggered a sharp decline in plastic surgery, especially breast implants.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n