New Stock Market Terms for 2008 and beyond

These are not original with me, but I can identify!

CEO --Chief Embezzlement Officer.

CFO-- Corporate Fraud Officer.

BULL MARKET -- A random market movement causing an investor to mistake himself for a financial genius.

BEAR MARKET -- A 6 to 18 month period when the kids get no allowance, the wife gets no jewelry, and the husband gets no sex.

VALUE INVESTING -- The art of buying low and selling lower.

P/E RATIO -- The percentage of investors wetting their pants as the market keeps crashing.

BROKER -- What my broker has made me.

STANDARD & POOR -- Your life in a nutshell.

STOCK ANALYST -- Idiot who just downgraded your stock.

STOCK SPLIT -- When your ex-wife and her lawyer split your assets equally between themselves.

FINANCIAL PLANNER -- A guy whose phone has been disconnected.

MARKET CORRECTION -- The day after you buy stocks.

CASH FLOW-- The movement your money makes as it disappears down the toilet.

YAHOO -- What you yell after selling it to some poor sucker for $240 per share.

WINDOWS -- What you jump out of when you're the sucker who bought Yahoo @ $240 per share.

INSTITUTIONAL INVESTOR -- Past year investor who's now locked up in a nuthouse.

PROFIT -- An archaic word no longer in use.

Did it fall off - or do they still have probles?

And if this doesn't make sense to you, just click on the "SkyView" label below.

Not even Dr Pepper?

The Texas Longhorn football team is nowhere near the top of the "Bad Boys" list, but in spite of Mack Brown's best efforts - and he evidently puts forth a great deal of effort - they still have some players who end up in close personal contact with the Austin Constabulary. DUI seems to be the act of bad choice. After a recent incident, a local sports writer informally asked some of the other 21-year old players if they drank, even though Mack asks them not to. Most said they did not. A few said they did. Colt McCoy said he has never had an alcoholic beverage and stopped drinking carbonated drinks on September 15, 1999. And he was a six Dr Pepper-a-day guy back then. "Water's good for me." he said. I don't know the significance of the date. Maybe I could ask the next time I see him - in church.

Given Colt's heritage it is not surprising to see him on Sunday mornings - even mornings when you know the team didn't get back to town until the wee hours. At first it was a little awkward - he, and usually Jordan Shipley and sometimes another teammate - would come in after services started and duck out before the Amen to avoid creating a scene. I'm sorry to say there were even a couple of autograph seekers at first, but thankfully we've gotten over that and now they usually come and go with the rest of us. Colt usually has a lady friend with him now, and a lot of folks want talk to him, but it's not a groupie thing - just being friendly to folks you see at church regularly.

I'll bet Mack wishes the rest of the team came with him.

Am I in the right classroom?

For some reason, my Conversational Spanish class is meeting in a room that is obviously set up for teaching would-be health workers. There are glass cases full of skeletons and skeletal parts; there are cases of anatomically correct plaster body parts, including one partial body with the label "Annie." There are charts of the muscular system, the nervous system, the gastric system and some systems that I am not sure of. I know that in the closet there are several resuscitation dummies. It's a little unnerving.

However, this might come in handy when we get to the really conversational part of this class. I mean, how better to teach those really important words that you need to know than by pointing to plaster replicas? So far, Aunt Bea has refrained from doing this, but I'm sure that if this class is truly meant to equip one to speak like a native we'll get to that soon.

The sign saga continues...