Where will the market go next?

Last week the 50 day moving average of the S&P 500, dipped below its 200 day moving average. In the financial world, this is known as the "looming death cross". Jim Cramer wrote a funny blog about it here. As you can tell from the graph of the last 10 years of the S&P 500, this has only happened 5 other times, and at least 2 of those times it directly preceded a recession (2001, and 2008).



So are we doomed to be double dipping into another recession? My thought is no. First, we are already in one, and the two times it preceded the recession were relatively good times for the market, which is not the case now. Secondly, I believe that the cross between the moving averages simply signifies change, of any kind, in the market, good or bad. And if I have some time I would like to look into its significance from a time analysis point of view. Both of the times when the "looming death cross" occurred but did not signify a recession, the 50 day MA was able to cross back above the 200 day MA within 1 or 2 months. So, my thought is that that second cross will occur in this case as well within the next few months. If however, it does not occur, we will all have greater things to worry about than markets!

Berry picking

Today I went berry picking at Impossible Acres, a cute little farm off of Covell blvd, on the edge of Davis. I was surprised by their selection of berries and other fruits. Not every variety was ripe yet, but I picked some Rasberries, Mungo berries (a variety of blackberry), Boysenberries, and Marionberries for my berry basket. Everything came out to a little over one pound. I was charged a grand total of only $3.25, about 3 or 4 times less than what I would have paid at the grocery store! And I had a lot of fun. So I think I'm going to continue picking my own berries while I can instead of buying them.

Actually, today started with getting up at 8:30 in the morning for another reason all together. The hunt for an elusive berry known as the black rasberry- a fruit that has been elevated, in my mind, to almost mythical proportions now. I had not heard of this berry until my friends told me about it recently. According to them, it has the taste and look of a blackberry, but more antioxidants than a blueberry. And is so rare that its picking season is only two weeks out of a year. There are only two places close by that grow this berry for picking, one is in Grass valley and the other is in the mountains by Placerville. We drove to one of the places today, only to find that it was not open yet. And spent the rest of the day shopping, eating korean food, and picking some more ordinary berries, which was just fine by me.

Phillip picking berries in his mom's hat.

Me and Phillip showing off our berries. He had more in the hat, but took them out to weigh them.

Boggle

One year over... I feel slightly nostalgic about my first year ending, even though I will still be in MSB almost every day. It wont be the same. Today I walked by the office where everyone would hang out during the year, and the door was closed (which almost never is the case). And it reminded me that I wouldn't see those people for a while. I'll miss the random conversations, statistics puns, problem solving, general dorkiness, and playing games on the computer... Speaking of which, I am officially obsessed with wordsplay or boggle in other words (I know boggle sounds like what my grandma would play if she was white, but trust me this is different). The one I play is on wordsplay.net, and the board is timed. You get 3 minutes to make as many words as you can on a 5 by 5 board, competing against anyone else that is playing at the time. When your time runs out, you get to see your ranking and all the words you made and missed, and what everyone else made. Try it! If you like scrabble or text twist, you will love this. Btw- how many words can you make from the board above? Partial answers below... (don't peek!)

MSB kind of reminds me of Hogwarts, only instead of learning magic and wizardry, you spend every day learning math, until eventually you're decent at it. You hang out with and see the same people every day, except during the summer. There are also the good and the evil professors... but there isn't nearly as much excitement or danger, or cool shifting staircases and secret rooms and stuff.

Take me in a time machine

Do you ever wonder what it would be like to have grown up in the 60's or 70's? I often do... there's a part of me that's a strong free spirit, despite becoming more and more of a realist and less and less of an idealist as I have aged. I think in my heart I'll always be the six year old that wanted to be an artist when I grew up, or the college kid that scared her roomate because she thought that locking doors was unnecessary (if people are poor enough to steal, they must need it more than me).

Sometimes when I see pictures of people from that era, I wonder what kind of people they are now. Whether they became yuppies, or still hippies or if they were soccer moms and trophy wives and wore bumper stickers that said "my son is a honor student at ___ high school" bumper sticker. Sometimes, I wonder, if my parents had grown up in the US, whether they would have been hippies... Would they have hummed along to the Beatles, and Led Zepplin, and gone to school dances in bell bottoms and big, flowery skirts? Would they have gotten caught smoking pot in the boy's locker room, and thought they could change the world with free love, and peace?

I know this post is about to take a sharp philosophical tangent, but I feel like we, as a generation, on average, are less idealistic than our parents generation was about things. We care way too much about material possessions, money, and are way too obsessed with looking hot and not aging. If you look at the commercials on tv, every other ad is some anti-wrinkle/cellulite cream, lip plumper, butt minimizer/maximizer, diet pill/miracle weight loss inducer, and etc... All our models get photoshopped and airbrushed so that they are perfect when we see them in magazines. I totally admit, I get caught up it too, but I feel like it's a pressure that my parents or grandparents generation didn't have to deal with as much.

Also, I read a news story about how most college graduates nowadays are more interested in how much money they can make with their degree, than what they can learn (this was a survey style study, and I guess they had polled college graduates from other eras as well, and compared the answers to recent college grads)... regardless, I don't blame them. The economy is shit, and it's a totally valid concern to look out for your own future well-being. I just wish it wasn't a necessary choice- that we could offer something better to these young people who are still relatively naive- that they did not have to choose between something they want to do, and something they do to make a secure future for themselves.

Which blogs do you follow, and why?

I used to think that reading blogs of people you didn't know in real life was very strange... why not just read a book? But now I find myself expanding my ever growing list of blog reads. Recently, through links from blogs on beauty/fashion, I discovered a treasure trove of blogs devoted to financial wisdom for 20 something year olds, from investments to what banks to choose, to saving plans.... it makes me think a lot about what I could be doing to earn more money that I'm not doing. The advantage of reading a blog as opposed to reading a book, is that all that knowledge is distilled into short, easy-to-read chunks that are within the intervals of my attention span, and I enjoy the feeling of vicariously living through someone else. So I'm curious, what blogs do you read, and why?

Here are the blogs I read broken up by genre:
Personal - people I know
Humor (dating/advice)
Financial
Creative (photography/crafts/graphic design/thrifting)
Skincare/fashion
Celebrity gossip (because it's a habit)
Statistics

Without listing them, this list consists of some 30 or maybe 40 blogs, only less than 5 of which I check on a daily basis... the rest I will read in a clump usually if I miss a few days. Does this make me a blog reading addict?

Greatest finds from today's blog reads that I want to share with you guys:
Top 5 Android/Iphone applications to save you money - This article is so cool. Did you know, for instance, that the ShopSavvy application on android phones can scan actual barcodes and run price comparisons between stores?

$ Making money from your blog using Google Adsense - PennySense talks about her own experience using Adsense on her blog

10 places to make money online - A variety of websites that allow you to make some money, provided you have the time/skills.

Another thing that I realized while thinking about blogs is that my blog will never fall under a simple category like finance or photography, because there's never just one category of thing that I am thinking about. One week I might write about statistics, and another week I might blog about DIY craft project. I will keep this blog about a wide variety of things, hopefully a little something for everyone!

marriage is so scary...

So I meant to make a longer post last night, but I was too tired to write anymore.

I visited a good friend last night, who is very unhappily married to her husband of five or so years. Initially the talk was on me, about how come I haven't been dating, and etc... but then somehow it metamorphasized into something bigger and more catastrophic in nature. There was some arguing back and forth as my friend and her husband gave differing responses/advice for me with my friend saying things like "he's only saying that because you're here" or "that's not what he really thinks"... the guy kept on trying to steer the conversation back to me, lol, but my friend kept on putting the spotlight on him (admittedly he was a cheater and probably deserved all the vitriole/angst/resentment she was throwing his way), but it was just very..... uncomfortable.... Then my friend turns to me and says, "if you think being alone now is bad, it's a thousand times worse to be married and alone".

:(

I mean I know she's right. Of course it would be. Everything I see about their marriage makes me fear for everything that could go wrong in mine one day (if). It's totally-mind-blowingly-mortifyingly-God-awfully-craptastically scary. I'm glad it's not me in her position actually, as much as I hate to say it. It just reminds me that I need to be so careful about who I let into my life, and get involved with. Even though nowadays it's relatively easy to get a divorce, it's not like divorce undoes the pain that people go through, and when you have kids, nothing can really separate you from that person. So basically, you can't undo it, ever. It's this permanent bad decision that you've made that ties you to this person, and that's like totally and completely terrifying to me.

Yeah, of course people have good marriages... people who know how to compromise and play fairly, and have relatively good heads on their shoulders, and not too much excess baggage. Those are generally the people who have good marriages.

Collectively, are our morals and values less than they used to be though? I wonder that a lot. I can't help but feel that way after reading story after story of some celebrity cheating scandal, or experiencing/hearing about it from my friends . It just seems like expectations for men are less than they used to be.

fresh(ish) fruits and veggies

So today was my box day... The day I got my very first box from Eatwell farms! For those of you who don't know, eatwell farms is a local farm in Dixon that supplies boxes of produce fresh from their farm to the local community on a membership basis.

I was looking forward to getting my box all week. That is an understatement. It was the highlight of my week... (I guess it gives you a little idea of what my weeks are like), but anyhow, I have to say that I am a little underwhelmed with what I received in my box today. There was a fair variety of greens and some fruit, but the veggies were very dirt-y. I say dirt-y, because it's supposed to be a good thing that they were just picked out of the dirt yesterday or maybe even sometime today... I mean it IS a good thing, that means they are extra fresh, right? Except that they have A LOT of dirt on them. Like so much that I'm scared even if I wash them 5 times, that I will still be eating dirt. Is it really that scary to eat dirt? Probably not. But I'm just not used to looking at my vegetables like they just took a mudbath.

We will see what I end up making this week with my nubby carrots, Asian stir fry greens, and various other veggies.....