A sudden and vicious attack of the vapors, the vapids and the willies at two in the morning had my heart ploppitating, my elbows itching and my hand reaching for the phone. Doc Kronkite my sophistic but never insipid shrink, and former Barney Fife stand-in answered on the 10th ring.
"Doc" I moaned, "you gotta help me. I think I'm in crisis."
"Oy, boobeleh" he mumbled. "Again? Can't you be in crisis during office hours? What is it this time? A new phobia you invented maybe? Another nightmare about Maria B? Cock-a-roaches in the kitchen 'prhaps? Come by me boobeleh, come by. Bring coffee, lots coffee" he sighed.
I made it to Doc's office in record time. I flew in, assumed the position on his lumpy couch. The doc was snoozing in his chair. "Doc" I hollered, "you can't sleep now, I'm in crisis!"
"Crisis, schmisis" he said. So talk on me, talk already."
"Well doc, you know I'm a day-trader, right?"
"Trader, schmader. Right. Continue."
"Well doc, up 'till now I've always done my own analysis." I said.
"You do analysis too?" he replied. "What kind? Fruitian? Gevalt? What, what already. You do hyptonizing maybe? Very good, hytonizing. Maybe I should hyptonize you." (the Doc was a top-shelf malapropist).
"That's hypnotize doc" I corrected.
"Exactly, hyptonize. Now tell on me your problem of the day, er night."
"Well, as I was saying, I'm an analyst, a technical analyst. It's how I decide which stocks to buy, which stocks to short" I explained.
"So wherefrom is a problem? Talk on me a problem. I'm a specialist on problems you know. Didn't you read my book, "Problems, Puzzles and Pending Pyorrhea"? Chapter 62, a steal at only $27.79. Don't wait for the movie boobeleh, a mish-mash those goobers made out of my book."
"The problem doc is that I'm in a slump. When I buy a stock it goes down. When I short a stock it goes up. I'm losing my nerve doc and it hasn't been good for my er, conjugation relations with Suzy."
"You mean conjugal relations" the doc corrected.
"Exactly" I replied. "And doc, I've been having a little problem with premature congratulations" I said sheepishly.
"That's premature ejaculations dunderhead!" he said, throwing a pencil at me. "Anything else?"
"Yeah doc" I said pulling the Eberhard Faber #3 out of my arm, "It's Jenna and Market Gems."
"What's a Jenna? What means Market Gems? he asked.
"Jenna's a trader doc, and Market Gems is her thread."
"So talk on me already, the problem on me talk."
"Well doc, last Monday I bought 200 shares of QGENF at 52. I was sure it was going up. Then I got worried that the market was gonna drop, so I sold 100 shares. Five minutes later it starts to take off. Did I buy it back like I usually do? No. Do I add a few hundred more shares like I normally do? No. I sit on my hands and watch it go up without me. Meanwhile Jenna is buying and selling, shorting and covering...one good trade after another. How does she do it doc? How come she doesn't worry about the market like I do doc?"
"Talk more on me about your trading woes" he said.
"Woes is right doc, woe's me. I see NITE making a nice bottom in the mid to high 20's. Then I say to myself, 'Nah, I'll wait for the breakout, it could be another month before NITE really takes off. I saw the volume on the NYSE and NASDAQ buts through a billion shares a day, then a bil-two, bil-three. The on-line brokers are on their way to a monster quarter if this keeps up. But I didn't make the connection to NITE doc!. I froze doc, my noggin froze. Doc, you gotta help me. Then yesterday I look at 40-50 charts, see that COVD looks ready. COVD gaps up 1 1/2 on the open. I put in a buy order at 53 5/8. COVD backs off, hits my bid and I buy it right. It runs up to 54 1/2 and I enter my stops at 52. A little while later some yutz at Merrill lowers his target for Intel from 100 down to 90. Big deal. But the market starts to tank and COVD plummets, hits my stop, drops another 7/8's and promptly turns around. It closed around 63 doc! And did Jenna get stopped out? No. And did OJ, Sosmartinov, RoseK, Nokomis, Tradelite, SusanG or Small Fry get stopped out? No doc, they were all kvelling over the great COVD run. Me, I spent the day in bed with the covers pulled up over my head. Doc, I think I've lost my verve."
"You mean nerve. Stop already with the malapropisms. A very bad sympton, malapropisms. I did a whole chapter on it in my book "The Truss: Friend or Foe" the sequel. Chapter 84. Read on it boobeleh, read. Now go home already. I gotta call my broker, Stoker-the-Broker. What's the name of that stock, COVD?"
"Yeah doc, COVD. But it's up 10 already doc."
"Ten, schmen. It's gonna run boobeleh, it's gonna run."
"Thanks doc. See you next week."
(Lee) |
