Day 1176

The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit an all time high today. Unfortunately, my own portfolio is still nowhere near its all time high. This seems irrational and even a bit irritating to me. You'd think that my investments would have recovered proportionally with the rest of the market. They probably would have if I had just left them alone. It's hard to leave well enough alone when the whole world is in a panic though. When the big market crash hit toward the end of 2008, I tried my best to stop the bloodbath, just like a lot of other investors. Five years later, the results are in and they aren't pretty. Instead of frantically buying and selling and putting money into gold, I should have just done nothing. During the big financial crash of 1987 that was exactly what I did. I didn't look at my brokerage statements for almost three years, and eventually I recovered virtually everything. It was a lot harder to do this in 2008. All the pundits were predicting Armageddon and nobody knew whether it would take five years or fifteen years for the market to fully recover. I'm a bit chagrined by today's market news. I guess it just proves that the more decisions you make in life, the greater your chances are of being wrong.

I had to sit around and wait for the FedEx guy today, so I actually got quite a bit done. I couldn't leave the house until I had signed for my package and I had no excuses. I redoubled my efforts to annihilate the bugs that have invaded the house. I wrote several articles. I updated several websites. I even got caught up on my invoices. If I had to wait on the FedEx guy every day, who knows what I might accomplish.

What I didn't do today was spend much time outside. There was a fierce wind all day that made it seem much colder than it actually was. The dogs ears were flapping in the wind during our walks today and I think Dot and Dash were both happy to return to the house where they could take a snooze on their warm new velour blankets.

Tomorrow, the first of the roofing companies I asked to bid on replacing the roof is coming over to give me an estimate. I kind of dread this whole process, because I've been through it before with contractors. Everybody talks a good game. You get all excited listening to the sales reps explain all the benefits you are going to get and then when the workers show up later with their hammers and saws it is usually a huge disappointment. Contractors typically plan on doing a job as quickly as they can, so they can keep prices reasonable. I'm always envisioning having a group of master craftsmen around for an extended length of time who will do everything according to my specifications. Not very likely! Contractors hate people like me who work out of their house. They'd much rather do their work when the homeowner is away at the office somewhere. At any rate, I'm still hoping I can find a good roofer.

Rory is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day