In the Doherty Roadhouse offices there were Quotron machines in the sixties and early seventies, big stuffed chairs and a couch, a few straight chairs, and free coffee ... lots of really old guys sitting around and coming and going, many of them over fifty even, geez what a bunch of ancient wrinklers, lol ... in Nanaimo on the island, across the street and up the stairs there was an almost continuous poker game, koan would have liked that, you'd see many of the same guys as at the broker's, once i bought a pickup from a car dealer at that table, sight unseen, he said this is what you need, i said ok, couldn't say anything else, he ranked me by virtue of age, it turned out to be maybe my best deal in vehicles ever
Interaction around the quotron machine would have made a fine subject for anthropological studies, if it wasn't for the observer effect, which would have been considerable ... it was like an internet thread in a way, except reversed, you didn't start right up with somebody talking about stocks, you had to do the light conversation thing, talk about weather or politics or even better, other people you knew ... there was huge resentment of the TSE and Bay Street, all of Backeast in general, it had not been so long since Keevil got disgusted with that bunch and came to Lotusland to fire up the old VSE ... everybody had held Teck and made money, spoke highly of it, just was waiting to get back in a little cheaper, i never recall anybody actually holding it at the time ... there was a lot of bullshit around, by accident more than design imho, everybody would caution against being a True Believer and then would turn around and preach the flawless virtues of their favourite plays du jour ... one old guy, long retired and had a few bucks, was almost a daytrader, didn't like to hold much overnight especially if it had run ... this was quite a trick in those days of high commissions, but stocks ran better in those days too, you could stick in an offer way above market with a reasonable chance somebody would take it - instant universal information has levelled and smoothed markets, also companies have so much more paper out now, two or three millions shares used to be considered a sloppy share structure, 'tight' meant under one million, sometimes way under
Pine Point and Pyramid - for days you could not get in that office, probably the phone was busy if you'd tried to call ... many locals had held it, later gloating was about how cheap they'd gotten in, one guy would show you his confirmation slip to prove his number, it got all dogeared, lol ... don't mind me i'm just sippin an typin waiting for la patrona
ecu.v - i passed on this one, 'too much paper', aargh ... ah well, another silver bus will leave shortly, and another after that, and i'm on several .... well everybody have a great weekend .... cheers |
