In Spirit

Well, as you may be able to tell, I've been pretty silent on the blog lately. But I've been here in spirit.

Just too busy to really write about it.

So lets start with the basics and a little catch up of events, both with sports and stocks.

Sports:

Fantasy wise, I am doing OK. I will most likely make the playoffs in both my Fumbled Returns League of Experts and even in my other Borderless league. There, I am top point winner but currently 3rd out of 12. I think I stand a good chance of getting in but I was really, really hoping to be top in my division so I get that all important 1st round bye. But James has to loose and I have to win this week for me to even have a chance of that happening and I have a tougher match up than he does.

After being the wise old man that I am and drafting handcuffs to Frank Gore (Anthony Dixon) and Chris Johnson (Javon Ringer) in the beginning of the year, I subsequently dumped them when everyone stayed healthy and I needed players during the bye weeks. Now with Gore out for the season, folks are scrambling to get Westbrook. But he is hurting too and Dixon could become a factor yet. I think I will take a gamble and pick him up just in case. In looking at the waiver wire both are amazingly still available. Strangely enough, Byron Westbrook was picked up . . .

Hmmm I wonder if somebody made a silly mistake . . . Yes, (an email confirms it), yes he did ( wow )

A lot of folks around here are talking about the Skins but unfortunately they have performed just about they way I had expected. There were just way too many weak spots to address and way, way too few draft picks to work with. Personally, I think Shanny and Allen have done a really good job with the hand(s) they were dealt with. It will be a few years before we can get back to the glory days.

And speaking of glory days, while in NY over thanksgiving, my father in law had out on the table an anniversary edition of the history of the Giants. What I was really struck with was all the good ol’ shots and stories of football from the days before AstroTurf, over protective / restrictive rules, and domes. This is probably why I enjoy working with and watching youth football so much.

I am putting natural turf, celebration dances, less restrictive player rules on my NFL Christmas Wish List.

Stocks:

My Share builder November list did really well. MOTR was the big winner and, though I did have a few lose money, none were big drops. Overall my investments returned a healthy 6% for November.

I did learn one very important thing about Share Builder and Auto Investment Watch Lists. If you have Sharebuilder set to auto invest, as most accounts will, and you sell a stock that has done really well, like I did with MOTR, move the proceeds out to your regular savings or checking account. Otherwise, whatever stock(s) you have listed in your Auto Invest list will be purchased with said proceeds on your next scheduled Investment Tuesday.

But other than that little bone head ‘gotchya’ moment, I have been very pleased with my experience with Sharebuilder. I just wish it had better research tools to use for building my watch lists. But that is OK, I got that covered elsewhere.

Speaking of watch lists, yes it is December, but I will not be able to get my December list(s) out before this weekend. So stay tuned.

I saw today that ARO took a tumble because of an analysts downgrade. I think people just might be pleasantly surprised by the retail returns this holiday season so this downgrade just might be a good opportunity to get in on the low end of this stock price.

And speaking of buying on the low end, MSFT recently appears to have bounced off of a key support level and is rising back up as is TRLG which is up nearly 14% as of today.

And last but not least, here is a bit of holiday spirit courtesy of my daughters 7th grade band. They have been practicing really hard all year and her music teacher is really one of the best I have ever met. He has a funny little saying which he tells them when he thinks they are not doing well and that is

“you are all playing like 7th graders . . . “

I believe he did not say that during the holiday concert. But you can be the judge.

Oh and this is sports related because, as you can see in the video, there is a basketball hoop and backboard in the background! The holiday concert was obviously held in the acoustically challenged school gym.