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Sorry, we started this on Wednesday.....
Yesterday, Tuesday, as I was sitting with Ellen on the Veranda. Not to worry it was not Veranda Time, it was go through the mail time and remind me of all the things I forgot to do over the last two weeks.
As she could see we had dog groomers, gardeners, audio vision guys running here and there, she asked if Devin and I had ever sat on the Veranda, just the two of us, alone and enjoy the quiet peaceful property.
I said yes, just yesterday (Monday), we sat here enjoying a glass of wine. Then I realized we had been interrupted by Gustavo, our gardener and then had Antonio our foreman deliver a carpet that had been dropped off at the Barn. So, the answer was no, there is always someone here.
Today, (Wednesday) there was hope for a quiet day, but then our general contractor called and said all our parts and pieces were in for some plumbing repairs we needed. Oh goodeee.
Then Devin remembered that a furniture store had good news for us, that the furniture that was supposed to be 5 weeks out was ready for delivery. Oh goodee.
Then when I went to unlock a few doors this morning, I discovered that three of our small koi had jumped the wall and entered the large pond. I was going to be koi hunting today. Oh goodee.
So it is barely 10:30 and we have a house full of contractors, plumbers, and awaiting the delivery of furniture, and the distinct possibility that we will have to call koi man to catch the escapees.
I went to get Jack at the appointed time and arrived home to find Dennis and Jerene, fully emerged in more moving stuff. I took care of some business (It's tax times boys and girls.) and then headed down to the barn to see what Antonio and Dennis were up to.
If you remember, last week Dennis and I were training for the Pruning Olympics. That resulted in 25 rows of trimmed vines. We have to get the vines and dispose of them. In considering how best to do this (As I am sure somewhere in the 1800 page bylaws of Coto and Los Rancho's Estates CC&Rs they would frown upon bonfires.), I asked Antonio if I did not see a chipper somewhere?
His eyes lit up and said "Si". Having become almost fluent in Espaņola in the last two weeks I know he either said Yes or The Ocean.
He dug out the chipper and I asked Dennis to help Antonio to get it back in running condition. When I made it to the barn, Dennis and Antonio were working of the flat tires. I asked if the motor worked and they both looked at me as if to say, "We don't know?"
Maybe I was an executive too long but before I would fix the tires on something with an engine, I'd like to know if the engine works. Well it turns out, any idiot cn make an engine work, so they were not concerned.
They were right. After fixing the tires and a few pulls on the engine cord pulling thingy-a-bob, it was fired up and smoking and spitting out dirt and rocks. The three of us stood next to and looked at much as if we were the first guys in history to make a fire.
Once we had it in place, none of us was very excited about putting our hands down into the chute. Remember this is the kind of chipper that made Jimmy Hoffa so hard to find. Since I own the place I took first stab at putting vines in the chute.
Whoa! What a rush. It took the vines out of my hand and wanted to take me with it. After a few minutes, we were all sticking sticks and vines into the deafening chewing machine.
After about 3 hours we had made a mole hill out of mountain. We had taken two huge stack of vines and chipped it down into a nice stack of chips which we will use for mulch.
Just another manic Wednesday.
I am a koi catcher. After 35 minutes of being frustrated and outwitted by a six inch koi whose brain is the size of a pea, I captured all three of the renegade koi.
I thought having my dog with me would be nice so I let Jacee (Named after my father J C John Cronin.) hang with me while I hunted my trophy koi. Jacee soon spotted the fish in the ponds.
Some people have bird dogs. Apparently I have a fish dog.
 
Jacee went crazy and put her face in the water several times. The fish were a bit confused as well. They thought Jacee was there to feed them so they kept coming to the top as Jacee barked and swatted and tried to fetch the fish.
End of the day, week, month, and quarter.
The market will close here in an hour and it will be the end of the first quarter. Truly a first quarter to remember. For 5 months the indexes have been chugging a long. By historical measures, that has not happened many if any times.
We have tapped the record 1,565 on the S&P 500 a few times and as I type this remain above that emotional, psychological, and technical resistance number, despite some disappointing economic news this morning.
If we can hold the 1,565 at the close our next resistance will be 1,576 as that was an interday record about a week ago.
In the Salve Lucrum account we bought SPY (The ETF that tracks the S&P) yesterday anticipating a short trip above 1,565. It is up about a half a point and we are looking to make 2% in a short period of time. (less than a week).
Other than that, we are tightening our stops as we think this relatively quick and powerful run up may cause the old adage "Sell In May, comeback in November", a little late in its call. We are thinking the overdue correction which seasonally can happen in May, might come early.
We want to be read and we will be looking at taking some profits next week.
Beyond that, we hope you have a happy Easter Holiday weekend. We are enjoying the company of my very good friends and readers, Butch and Debbie. They are coming in to see the new joint and hang with us a few days.
We will be enjoying a nice dinner at Hanna's tonight, some Veranda Time, a trip to the San Diego Wild Animal Park (We have reserved one of the open wagons for a bunch of us which is real cool as you get to feed the giraffes and pet the rhinos.
Easter morning, after church we will be having Easter brunch at Coto Country Club. It should be a special weekend and we will pray that someday soon we will figure out the lights on this property.
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