Yesterday I was just kicking back on my lunch break in my car just taking a short nap when I received a phone call. " 'MY RL 1st Name' This is Grandpa!" My response, "Umm, Ahhh, I don't have a Grandpa" His Response, "Sorry I must have the wrong number."

Seriously, I have heard of EVP and other weird electronic communication devices, but I haven't had a grandpa since 1987. That's the year both of them died. Second one of them didn't even speak English, he only knew Polish. Plus the guy didn't sound anything like my "American" grandpa, from what I could remember. Anyway logically I knew it was most likely an honest mistake, but on another level it kind of weirded me out.

Then as I was leaving work, I received a text message wishing me a very happy belated birthday from the two women I had brief relationship with a few years back! It just caught me as something a bit out of left field. Seriously did Obama's election cause a tear in the time space continuum to have strange communications sent to me yesterday?

As I kid I watched the Berlin Wall come down and the Eastern European countries shake off the Soviets and become free. There were always shots of crazy crowds in the streets. Yea, Obama winning may not be no par with ending 45 years of communist rule by the shear will of the people, but at least I can get a 1/4 idea of what it would be like to see people go nuts in the streets. I guess it was kind of a "nonviolent revolution" after all.

Some on the right calling the the end of life as they know it. That's a totally self defeating mentality. You can make money in any kind in any kind of economy or situation outside of some kind alternate universe economy as North Korea. Just take for example Warren Buffet buying the Washington Post in the mid 70's knowing that he would get a great ROI with Jimmy Carter expanding government and thus the D.C. economy. Heck him and George Soros one of my heros for being a wicked trader backed Obama. Do you think he wants to donate all of his wealth? These guys know ways to profit from what may be in store as policy changes. The challenge is to try to figure out what they are doing and follow suit.

This may be the turning point for the American worker as they come back from being Squeezed to actually getting some union respesentation once again for better benefits, wages and working conditions. It sure won't happen next year or anytime soon, but the pendulum may start to swing in the opposite direction.

None the less these should be interesting times.

I had to find an alternative, since I think that this 2 party system absolutely sucks. So I voted for Ralph Nader. It took me a minute to find him since he was beyond the bottom of the rows. It's pretty sad when his "Populist" party was below the Socialist Workers Party.

Libertarians from my personal experience are kind of are nuts. We need government for a great number of things. Plus I can't get behind Bob Barr or Wayne "500 * COLLEGE CONFERENCE GAME OF THE YEAR" Allyn Root. Seriously why did he drop the Allyn on the ballot? Did he not think that people would connect that he he the same guy on Saturday morning selling his sports betting picks?

The Green's, well (e:drew) kind of enlightened me on her, Cynthia McKinney at the party on Friday. Thanks Drew.

So Yea, with all the non literal "communist parties" available to cast a ballot from above, out side of the two corporate bought and paid for parties that is who I voted for in the end. Someone who did not support the Wall St Bailout, since Both Obama & McCain voted for it.

Plus New York State is going for Obama anyway, it's a "Winner Take All" System meaning that any ballot cast for a loser is an absolute waste. So why not make a real statement and vote for a third party. That way if they get enough votes, they won't have to push petitions in the future just to get on the ballot.

Well the Bills lost, big deal they have never been the indicator of anything except the mood of people's mood going into work on Monday around here.

The real game is going to be played on Monday Night when The Steeler's play the Redskins @ Fedex field. Supposedly if the Redskins win their last home game before the presidential election the incumbent party stays in office. If they lose then the challenging party takes the White House.

So if you're for Obama, you're pulling for Pittsburgh. If you're pulling for McCain, you want Washington to win. Yea, it's not perfect but 94% is more accurate than any California Psychic. I was listening to a betting show this morning on the Fan 590 out of Toronto and the Sports Book Director @ Caesar's Palace on the strip said that it does have a slight effect on the betting lines.

ALSO Both candidates will be appearing for quick interviews during Halftime in a kind of almost 11th hour closing the deal type of way...

I have a day off today & it' the first one since before labor day that I have actually had the time to relax and unwind. So what do I get this morning? A cold call from some broker trying to sell me an idea for a trade! Seriously you make one great trade and then these guys find you and try to get you to put some of recent earning at risk. Thanks, but I'm just going to hunker down for the time being. It's kind of nice that the market has had just 2 days recently that were not moves of 100 points or more in absolute number terms, but I'm not up for trading. It has taken me quite some time to get myself to the point where I am now, I actually want to enjoy it now without the stress of trading.

In a way it's kind of like how I was back in the day when I was trading off of an inheritance my great aunt left me 10 years ago. I would just sleep until noon if I didn't have a good feeling about any direction for anything I just slept until noon. Maybe I'd go out to Damon's on Sheridan Dr & meet my buddy that worked for Amex at the time for lunch, but that would be about it.

So I'm just siting out and coming up with my next idea. So please don't call me.



in the mean time does anyone know a good IRC chat for mac? There's this S&P trader that has a chat room on his site & I figure that on my day off I could stop by and look at his trades.

With the "Worse Yet to Come" it's kind of funny to see this deal go down locally

Then again Buffalo is a good place to ride out a recession.

So after work tonight I just had a craving for a glass of Merlot. The first place that comes to mind for me that has a descent wine selection is Allen St. Hardware. No problem I love the place and I haven't been there in months. I am just going after working 2 hours of OT and just want to play my usual "invisible man" role, look at the beautiful people and be done with it.

The problem arose when these 5 women in their late 40's & early 50's roll in the joint. From my perspective they belong in some bar like Macaroons, but they did the ghost walk and wanted to unwind. I just freaking hated how they asked me all these questions like what's my name, where do I live, what do I do. Look I just want to drink my wine, look at the people although I have to say not as interesting as I would have hoped, but it was only 10:00.

What drove me nuts was the way they behaved. I experienced 18 year olds behave better at the Transmission Dance Party than they were acting. The worst part is when the 47 year old divorced twice ringleader just screamed @ at ultra high pitch for no apparent reason. Seriously I don't want to hear your Freaking life story about your 2 ex husbands and your kid that is calling you up on a cell phone asking who you are with and such.

What drove me nuts what this ringleader's sister who is "50 & desperate" seriously that is how she was introduced to me as they were probing my marital & relationship status. Just had to bend down at my crotch, 1 inch away from my phone as I was trying to text someone when I was sitting at my bar stool. I just got up, grabbed my wine glass and went to the back room to chill out a minute before I flipped out. Then to the bathroom and the side door to disappear into thin air.

Fuck, if I wanted that kind of experience I could have meet my Ex at a white trash bar somewhere in the LaSalle section of Niagara Falls. In some f'd up way i guess I know how all you women feel when someone just won't leave you alone, but just keeps on trying no matter how far you try to be polite and give them signals that you just don't want to be bothered.

The best part is I only knew them an hour & I can see why they're divorced. This is why I have to either move far away from here to find myself a wife or marry someone that is not from Buffalo if I want a successful marriage. If this is how women end up when they turn around 50, then married life would be very miserable to say the least.

Needless to say I was bit by a dog last week, this was more traumatic than that I must say...

Here are some other pics I took off of RT-15 along the Susquehanna on the drive home.

Well I had to do something to celebrate my birthday. My choices were A. Going to Vegas or B. Going to D.C. Since I went to Sin City in August I decided to hang out with my buddy & his family in Northern Virginia. I left on Thursday after I hooked up with a friend of mine for dinner on Wednesday.

I arrive around dinner and then proceed to chipotle for dinner before my college buddy and I head over to a meeting of his investment club. It was a bit interesting to see how older guys think about the market. Observing their meeting and stock pick was a pretty entertaining evening for myself. The best part is one of the members who did also go to Niagara had 2 extra tickets for the Browns/Redskins game. So we took him up on his offer.

Friday I ended up going to Richmond for the day since I didn't want to hang out at his home while him and his wife were working. If I wanted to watch CNBC I could have do it here. So I explored a city of which I wanted to visit and had a good time. Especially since they still have an independent record store, Plan 9 I ended up sticking around until late evening as I meet up and hit Carytown with a friend of mine. I then went back to go out locally with my buddy in Northern Virginia.
This pic is just to piss off (e:jason) as PBR is placed between Sam's and Stella


my catfish lunch

Just places around Carytown






Plan 9's basement


Friday Night we ended up going to the Capitals/Devils game. He scored tickets off of Cragislist for $25 less than face value. The best part was they were Center Ice 7 rows up! Sadly even their face value of $105 is cheaper than what the Sabres are asking for these days.

Here are some pics @ the Verizon Center






























Then I went to my 3rd current or 4th all time NFL Stadium. After learning that Redskins tickets are hard to come by I felt really good about grabbing them. Our Alumnist friend as a guy that originally lived in North Tonawanda as his tailgate buddy. You can just tell by his setup that he is from Buffalo & serious about his food.





























There is a guy in the tree playing a Sax for tips! He said that he thought the attention would get him more $




This is the police carrying some guy that ran out on the field away.






The sporting events. All I can say is that we didn't plan going to one game let alone making it a double header weekend.

So in honor of my birthday I'm taking off for a long weekend in D.C./NoVa. My original plan was to pass through Pittsburgh just to have lunch at my favorite hamburger stand Fatburger. Well I was unable to verify if the two locations are still open at this time. There was a blurb on their website that the parent company bought back the franchises but nothing if they were open or not, especially since they were not listed on the website or calling the corporate office :-( I did find out that they did have some locations around Cleveland. So the next time I feel like some good grease I may just drive out the Cleveland, especially since they also have my other favorite Waffle House. It's just that I may not find a "Yankee" Waffle House authentic enough for my taste.

So I'm off to take whatever route the GPS takes me on.