Friday

Another warm and sunny day in San Antonio.  In another time, I would have ventured downtown to check out the scene on the River Walk last night, but my disinterest in traffic and the hassle of parking, made the open bottle of wine at my hotel an easy choice.  I doubt if The Alamo has changed much since my last time through town a few years back.

Still a couple more sessions of abuse this afternoon.  I'm taking away from this conference a concern that my business will need to be tweaked in no small way to accommodate the new Department of Labor rules that are scheduled to become effective January 1, 2011.  Lots of disclosures, documentation, policies and procedures that make an advisor's life uncomfortable.  And that's not just because no one's coming for the bull. (Remember that one, 4?)

The Friday NYT crossword got me this morning.  The rules in my mind have been that the Friday puzzle is hard, but not a "trick" puzzle.  Today's was definitely a "trick" puzzle with half the solutions requiring a vertically inverted solution to the down words on the right hand side of the puzzle.  Very cool, but I wasn't expecting the "trick". Goes to show ya', when you aren't looking for it, reality hits you head on.

Interesting days as the nation digests the elimination of OBL.  Sounds as though Seal Team 6 did a clinical assassination of one of the worst bad guys.  Now the politicians and their spokes-people are in "spin" mode  and that story continues to unfold.  The over-riding incongruity is to watch/listen to the Left reconcile their built-in reluctance's toward military solutions with the windfall-ish rewards of this publicly-welcomed event occurring on the watch of this President.

Personally, I find it hard to justify random (or organized for that matter) public celebrations for this kind of thing.  The soldiers want to remain in the shadows.  The target played in the trade of death, so I have no qualms about our guys taken him down (whether he was armed or not).  Let's just keep pedaling on this front too.  There are other enemies.  Get after the new Number One.  And keep giving thanks to our guys out there in the dark.

Then there's light-hitting Derek Jeter who hasn't found his stroke for the Yankees yet this season.  It makes GM Brian Cashman look prescient when he drug his heals in giving Jeter an open-ended check on the contract last Winter.  I hope Jeter can come around and be at least a little productive.  A slow bat doesn't last long in The Show.  Nor do 37 year old shortstops.

More later.

BCOT