Inclement Markets

Winter storms and housing crises. Looking for a safe place for your earnings is a lot like trying to find the stray cat you've adopted during a rampaging snowstorm.

Zooey usually hangs out around her house, my one extravagance (fortunately not foreclosed). In storms like today, though, she's not in her reliable places. Today I went all through the woods and down by the stream to see if I could find her. Nothing. Just some deer tracks & scat, and some beautiful steam rising off the stream as it cut through the snow.

Meanwhile, inside my nest egg has been taking a hit. I don't have a whole lot-- some index funds, a few stocks I bought on a hunch, an IRA. The housing crisis caught me off-guard, before I could move anything out into bonds, my MMA, or even hide it under the mattress. (I understand better now why my great-grandfather, he of the Depression, didn't trust banks.)

But then I saw some nice clues:


Namely, the Fed's recent aggressive cuts, their plans to forestall foreclosures, and Congress' thankfully fast action on this anti-recession drug. I was never convinced that the housing crisis was going to be that cataclysmic, anyway. We're a lot more intertwined with the rest of the world now than we were in 2001, even, so the way our economy goes does not necessarily mean gloom for the earth. Also, markets usually do better in election years. I'm trying to wait this one out, and hoping to find a few bargains out in the financial woods.

But I am no economist. I am but a humble cat owner, thankful to have a roof over his cat in her timeshare.