Is the world too much with us? Wordsworth’s wonderful line resonates far beyond what the simple Anglo-Saxon words represent. They suggest a certain weariness, a sigh at the realization of the incessant to’ing and fro’ing that life demands. Yet, to and fro we must if we are to find profitable enterprises that will keep us to’ing and fro’ing for yet another day.
The nation’s employers continued to shed jobs at frightening levels, according to the Automatic Data Processing survey, suggesting Friday’s employment data from the United States Department of Labor will yield a number close to the consensus estimate of another 550,000 jobs lost in May. Expect renewed sightings of green shoots if the number comes in lower. A good sign – initial jobless claims were lower in the latest week.
Meanwhile, technicians espy hope in the S&P 500 moving above its 200-day moving average this week, a sign, so they say, that the path of least resistance is higher equity values. Speaking of which, Novavax (NVAX) soared 74% today on news that a study of its flu vaccine had begun under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health. If only Kev had bet the ranch! This could be a big winner or big loser and is not for the faint of heart. PALM continued its climb in anticipation of the Pre smart phone to go on sale Saturday.
But enough of serving mammon.
“The world is too much with us; late and soon,Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;Little we see in Nature that is ours;…” (William Wordsworth)
Respite was found in the soggy turf of Dyker Beach, where carts were forbidden this morning and Kev and his companions walked 18 invigorating holes. A frisky squirrel investigated our ball on the fairway, and for several seconds Kev was sure the furry rascal would carry it away in expectation of a full day’s meal. Thankfully, he realized it was not edible and scampered as we approached with hybrid club in hand. And though the youthful two of our foursome were natural athletes who inspired heroic efforts on the part of the aging, the latter failed to break 100.
But the putting stroke has improved tremendously. Must have had four lip out after perfect reads today. Offsetting, though, was a nine on the fifteenth hole after reaching the rough just off the fringe in three and expecting to chip on and putt for par. Needless to say, disaster resulted. Can someone have the yips with a wedge?
Showing posts with label Dyker Beach. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dyker Beach. Show all posts
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Summertime
Put away the long pants, sweaters, windbreakers, hunched shoulders and sneering cynicism. Forget the calendar. Summer is here. Time to gorge on golf, bask in baseball, tone the tan, pick the ponies, tweak the tennis serve, pen poetry, marvel at Miss Market and indulge in any other alliterative activity that makes the heart soar and shoves the blues to another season. Fly me to the moon.
Scolds who wish the profligacy of the United States in recent decades will visit yet more plagues on the citizenry have seen their best days. They will be left behind, scowling and snorting about “kids these days” while the car stereos blare obnoxious “music” and the car companies, insolvent or not, jockey for position to provide a carapace for one man’s insistence to share his entertainment with the rest of the world walking by.
Auto sales last month were better than expected, even for GM. They were down year-on-year, but up significantly from April. Pending sales of existing homes ratcheted up for the third month in a row in April, according to the National Association of Realtors. Oil rebounded late to close a couple of pennies lower, but it’s fast closing in on $70 a barrel. China keeps growing. To feed itself it must.
Green shoots are showing buds if not flowering, though skies remain menacing. To come tomorrow is the ADP data on layoffs, and on Friday the May nonfarm payroll numbers from the United States Department of Labor will help clarify things.
The arguments for and against recovery are as contentious as the never-ending contretemps among pinstriper fans over whether Joba Chamberlain should start or be the setup man for Mariano. Will a collapsing dollar and rising interest rates sink the USA, or will fiscal and monetary stimuli restore American vigor? Both outcomes are plausible, but for now summer seduces me. Staying in equities and commodities, those things we use to build things, seems the more summery outlook. And we are nothing but summery now after seeing the promised land by breaking the sound barrier of 100 on the golf course.
In the meantime, got a tee time at Dyker Beach on Thursday. Anyone who would care to join me will see a new putting stroke perfected on the living room rug that insures birdies – that’s right, birdies, not par. It’s summer and the fish are jumpin’. Catch ‘em if you can.
Scolds who wish the profligacy of the United States in recent decades will visit yet more plagues on the citizenry have seen their best days. They will be left behind, scowling and snorting about “kids these days” while the car stereos blare obnoxious “music” and the car companies, insolvent or not, jockey for position to provide a carapace for one man’s insistence to share his entertainment with the rest of the world walking by.
Auto sales last month were better than expected, even for GM. They were down year-on-year, but up significantly from April. Pending sales of existing homes ratcheted up for the third month in a row in April, according to the National Association of Realtors. Oil rebounded late to close a couple of pennies lower, but it’s fast closing in on $70 a barrel. China keeps growing. To feed itself it must.
Green shoots are showing buds if not flowering, though skies remain menacing. To come tomorrow is the ADP data on layoffs, and on Friday the May nonfarm payroll numbers from the United States Department of Labor will help clarify things.
The arguments for and against recovery are as contentious as the never-ending contretemps among pinstriper fans over whether Joba Chamberlain should start or be the setup man for Mariano. Will a collapsing dollar and rising interest rates sink the USA, or will fiscal and monetary stimuli restore American vigor? Both outcomes are plausible, but for now summer seduces me. Staying in equities and commodities, those things we use to build things, seems the more summery outlook. And we are nothing but summery now after seeing the promised land by breaking the sound barrier of 100 on the golf course.
In the meantime, got a tee time at Dyker Beach on Thursday. Anyone who would care to join me will see a new putting stroke perfected on the living room rug that insures birdies – that’s right, birdies, not par. It’s summer and the fish are jumpin’. Catch ‘em if you can.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
The Wedge Will Return
Kev is a melancholy baby, not because he has anything to complain about, but because he is embarrassed by his riches when much of the world is filled with danger and sorrow. Golf score was in triple digits again today, but he is enthused about his full swing under the tutelage of a good friend and smart guy in the sun and breeze of Dyker Beach.
The check will hit the bank tomorrow. He has tickets to the U.S. Open and Belmont. His supply of diet coke and Hungry Man TV dinners will keep him hydrated and fed. His children are beautiful and healthy. The Athletics pulled through for him tonight against the Rays, more than compensating for his loss by taking the O’s vs. the pinstripers, who used the jet stream to knock three homers in a row off an otherwise artful moundsman.
Didn’t have to worry about bombs lobbed onto the first tee by drones. Enjoyed deepening his tan and head of hair that needs a crew-cutting now that summer is upon us. Didn’t have to care that he lost his sand wedge at a prior hole, knowing, somehow, that it would return.
No, we are brought to our knees by recalling the verse of John Keats, a genius who died at the age of 25, who wrote of the nightingale’s immortal life beyond the experience of those who wave a wand at a dimpled ball and pretend it means something.
“What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last grey hairs,
Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;
Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs.”
What a description of putting strokes, or stock picking. Kev grows worrisome about the stock market. To paraphrase Keats, there is no long run for the sentient species. Somebody told me that homo sapiens are the only animals that laugh because they are the only ones who know they will die.
But let’s not despair in our inability to reach the green in two. The wedge returned, finished 18 with a double bogey and that lucky ol’sun will be out tomorrow.
Palm has killed us recently, Ford has hung in, AMD has been a stalwart. NYT is up because takeover rumors are rife. Life is good. Buy oil.
The check will hit the bank tomorrow. He has tickets to the U.S. Open and Belmont. His supply of diet coke and Hungry Man TV dinners will keep him hydrated and fed. His children are beautiful and healthy. The Athletics pulled through for him tonight against the Rays, more than compensating for his loss by taking the O’s vs. the pinstripers, who used the jet stream to knock three homers in a row off an otherwise artful moundsman.
Didn’t have to worry about bombs lobbed onto the first tee by drones. Enjoyed deepening his tan and head of hair that needs a crew-cutting now that summer is upon us. Didn’t have to care that he lost his sand wedge at a prior hole, knowing, somehow, that it would return.
No, we are brought to our knees by recalling the verse of John Keats, a genius who died at the age of 25, who wrote of the nightingale’s immortal life beyond the experience of those who wave a wand at a dimpled ball and pretend it means something.
“What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last grey hairs,
Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;
Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs.”
What a description of putting strokes, or stock picking. Kev grows worrisome about the stock market. To paraphrase Keats, there is no long run for the sentient species. Somebody told me that homo sapiens are the only animals that laugh because they are the only ones who know they will die.
But let’s not despair in our inability to reach the green in two. The wedge returned, finished 18 with a double bogey and that lucky ol’sun will be out tomorrow.
Palm has killed us recently, Ford has hung in, AMD has been a stalwart. NYT is up because takeover rumors are rife. Life is good. Buy oil.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Are We Not Men?
The stress test of dating Miss Market is getting the best of me. I have passed the midterm but worry about the final. This mischievous minx has been keeping me up beyond what my late years can stand. As I crush another cigarette into my 22-year-old crimson OU Sooners ash tray, pour another diet coke, ponder my winning line to the New Yorker’s cartoon caption contest, uncap my pen to do a week’s worth of crossword puzzles and struggle to meet a Monday deadline, the sporting life beckons.
In one’s fifties, the best, the definition of which is up for debate, is behind you, but more subtle pleasures resonate with a tang that the impatient young can only laugh at – for now. My golfing buddies and I pulled into the parking lot with trepidation. The course was chock-a-block with men seeking a spring day in the sun, a hotdog at the turn and a chance at glory before the weekend duties of family, laundry, gardens and a spouse’s “honey do” list descended.
Almost an hour and a half transpired between the first tee shot and completing the second hole. Two of my harried partners were making phone calls and thumbing Blackberries to keep the commercial world at bay, yet they managed to engineer heroic shots – one with a cigar clenched in his teeth, another after taking a munch of his apple. It takes all kinds. Banter of awry domestic life, wayward business deals, tips on wayward swings (siblings and friends were probably bemoaning us, errant drives and Miss Market on golf courses of their own) and the futility of pleasing our cruel mistresses, Miss Market and three-putts among them, filled the interstices.
For my part, didn’t slice all day, which I consider a victory, though I hit my usual score of 104. I say victory because I can see the possibility of cratering my handicap. It lies just beyond the swale of the 18th hole at Dyker Beach. One crisp approach shot and I could have two-putted for par. It was not to be this glorious Friday, but it awaits me on Fridays or Mondays or Thursdays to come. I chunked it and cursed, but I could see the future as surely as Cotton Mather, Thomas Paine and Al Capone sensed the exceptionalism of the New World. It’s just a seven-iron away.
For a few hours, the Taliban were retreating to their caves, all our children were above average (like the banks, all of which I predict somehow passed Geithner’s stress test) and significant others were cheerful helpmeets while the lords of the manor frolicked after finding an entry on to the Gowanus.
Yet mistakes abound, such as my disastrous attempt to get out of a greenside bunker. Miss Market beckons with a smirk. Hey, big spender, she simpers, how about a smidgen of Viagra? No, thanks, darling. No leverage required in this environment. A scorecard with 90 at the end of 18 is all but assured. But wise men never fall in love so how are they to know.
Ford has enriched us with its $1.4 billion loss in the first quarter, less than expected, and refusal to take bailout dough. Palm continues to romance with the Pre smart phone. AMD is hanging in there. And this just in, Matthew Stafford will get gazillions in the NFL draft because he is young and strong.
But the old and weak can be winners, too, when they are misperceived as such. This is the due diligence or wishful thinking of the stock picker. Either it's cheap or cheap for a reason. Pessimism on real estate could be at a turning point. Adding Developers Diversifed Realty Corp. (DDR) at $3.90, up 11% on Friday.
After all, bogey golf would put me at 90, a milestone not to be sniffed at. Just a seven-iron away.
In one’s fifties, the best, the definition of which is up for debate, is behind you, but more subtle pleasures resonate with a tang that the impatient young can only laugh at – for now. My golfing buddies and I pulled into the parking lot with trepidation. The course was chock-a-block with men seeking a spring day in the sun, a hotdog at the turn and a chance at glory before the weekend duties of family, laundry, gardens and a spouse’s “honey do” list descended.
Almost an hour and a half transpired between the first tee shot and completing the second hole. Two of my harried partners were making phone calls and thumbing Blackberries to keep the commercial world at bay, yet they managed to engineer heroic shots – one with a cigar clenched in his teeth, another after taking a munch of his apple. It takes all kinds. Banter of awry domestic life, wayward business deals, tips on wayward swings (siblings and friends were probably bemoaning us, errant drives and Miss Market on golf courses of their own) and the futility of pleasing our cruel mistresses, Miss Market and three-putts among them, filled the interstices.
For my part, didn’t slice all day, which I consider a victory, though I hit my usual score of 104. I say victory because I can see the possibility of cratering my handicap. It lies just beyond the swale of the 18th hole at Dyker Beach. One crisp approach shot and I could have two-putted for par. It was not to be this glorious Friday, but it awaits me on Fridays or Mondays or Thursdays to come. I chunked it and cursed, but I could see the future as surely as Cotton Mather, Thomas Paine and Al Capone sensed the exceptionalism of the New World. It’s just a seven-iron away.
For a few hours, the Taliban were retreating to their caves, all our children were above average (like the banks, all of which I predict somehow passed Geithner’s stress test) and significant others were cheerful helpmeets while the lords of the manor frolicked after finding an entry on to the Gowanus.
Yet mistakes abound, such as my disastrous attempt to get out of a greenside bunker. Miss Market beckons with a smirk. Hey, big spender, she simpers, how about a smidgen of Viagra? No, thanks, darling. No leverage required in this environment. A scorecard with 90 at the end of 18 is all but assured. But wise men never fall in love so how are they to know.
Ford has enriched us with its $1.4 billion loss in the first quarter, less than expected, and refusal to take bailout dough. Palm continues to romance with the Pre smart phone. AMD is hanging in there. And this just in, Matthew Stafford will get gazillions in the NFL draft because he is young and strong.
But the old and weak can be winners, too, when they are misperceived as such. This is the due diligence or wishful thinking of the stock picker. Either it's cheap or cheap for a reason. Pessimism on real estate could be at a turning point. Adding Developers Diversifed Realty Corp. (DDR) at $3.90, up 11% on Friday.
After all, bogey golf would put me at 90, a milestone not to be sniffed at. Just a seven-iron away.
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