Klaro Now

watching foodnetwork 'food truck race'

2011-09-04T21:44:00.002-04:00

For those not familiar with the concept, the challenge is, to make the most money. Everyone is given the same amount of seed money. The truck can make any food they see fit.

This year, there the variety of trucks goes from a vegan food to korean bbq...

The episode airing right now, plays in Manhatten (KS). And all is supposed to be sold for less then 1$.

This means, concepts need to change, portions sizes go down.

Watching one of the food truck going shopping and things are getting thrown around,

'how cheap can I get it, and I just deep fry it'...

I understand the pressure of wanting to win the challenge. There is some serious price money.

But on the other hand, wouldn't be the question be how much does it take for somebody to sell the roots of his business, the things that one set out to accomplish?

I have no clue what type of consideration is given to the trucks that drop out.

So how far would you go?

healthy salad

2011-08-31T23:37:00.002-04:00

In a big bowl, add 6 table spoons of extra virgin olive oil, 3 table spoons of balsamic vinegar,

salt, pepper, hand full of dried oregano and basil each, chop an onion finely, add 4 diced fresh tomato's, add 1 sliced cucumber, lots of chopped parsley, mushrooms from the can or fresh, 1 thinly chopped jalapeno pepper, 1 can of garbanza beans rinsed, feta cheese.

Stir up up and let it rest for a couple of hours, taste again and season if needed.

Serve with fresh bread.

Irene

2011-08-28T00:17:00.003-04:00

Some TV station had a dude on the phone, that was in the direct path of Irene. His concern was the property after Irene passed, not being able to get back in time.

I understand all the things, but to be honest, not a SINGLE dime should be spend on people that refuse mandatory evacuation orders. Irene was on the horizont for a week, so there was plenty of time to leave and secure a building.

Sure, looking at Katrina, nothing went as planed. Comparing Katrina and Irene....

Irene is a lot larger in size.

I am all for people, that do not have the means personally to get evacuated, to help them with state/county what ever help. New task for FEMA?

but everyone else staying behind despite mandatory evac orders only get from me... 'sorry dude/gal', those people should get no consideration with the insurance e.g. live etc. nothing above and beyond any other policy holder gets... what was her name ... katrina?... or any thing in case they need rescue.

Split estates

2010-02-09T19:20:00.005-05:00

Some time in January I watched on BBC America a story about split estates. As a land owner one owns the surface but not the mineral rights. They can belong to either the state or some corporation. If on the property oil, gold, gas or anything is found, the owner of the mineral rights can come onto the property and mine them. No consent from the land owner needed....
I remember that because last night Jim Cramer talked to Congressman John Sullivan (R) from Oklahoma. John said that in 75 years of hydraulic fracturing nothing ever has happened. There has not been any incidences where water got polluted. According to him New York Times prints with respect to this are all lies (http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/20/gas-drilling-techniques-under-fire-again/?scp=2&sq=fracturing&st=cse).
May be he should watch http://www.splitestate.com/ and catch up on the reality. It is only a matter of time, when the next Erin Brokovich emerges.
I wonder what he would say if an energy company comes onto his property and starts mining gas within 200 ft. of his house...
Claiming that there has never been an incident not even an accident is like saying there aren't any car crashes.
To bad that Jim did let him off so easy as he repeated those statements 2 times. I guess the more one repeats the same argument the more it becomes true.... may be.....

New Food

2010-02-07T01:46:00.002-05:00

The other day I went with friends to a Vietnamese restaurant. Their specialty is Pho. That is a noodle soup and one can add different sausses to make it more or less spicy. Darn was that good.
I do now my own version of Pho at home.

Wall street and Social Security

2010-02-05T21:29:00.002-05:00

I caught parts of Rachel Maddow's show last night. She made the following remarks:

"Democratic candidates all over the country are eagerly awaiting Republican votes in favor of the AIG bonuses, again this time around.

If that‘s not enough Wall Street love for you, consider that the top House Republican on budget matters has proposed his own alternative budget to the president‘s budget. The Republican one proposes the biggest, wettest kiss to Wall Street yet: privatizing Social Security. If Republicans get their way Americans will be able to invest a portion of their Social Security payroll taxes into secure funds consisting of equities and bonds."

The full transcript can be found here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35263801/ns/msnbc_tv-rachel_maddow_show/

If I could invest my social security the way I wanted it, I would HAVE social security when I retire. Trading stocks is a skill that can be learned like reading, writing, driving a car or working on a computer. Some of us are better at those and some of us are not.

But really, why do we need to make people afraid of everything. Life is risky. I can get hit by a bus, slip in the shower and tons of other things.

I don't get it. ohhh yeah, I forgot, there is a profession of financial advisors and that is how they make money. I fired mine and ever since I am doing good. It did cost me tons of time and it still will cost me lots more time. But at the end of the day, I can not blame anyone and if I do well, I can pad myself on the back....

"wissen ist macht und nichts wissen macht nichts...." (dont know how to translate it)

Beans and Rice

2009-09-01T20:53:00.003-04:00

You need
can of tomato sauce
can of garbanzo beans (also called chick peas)
can of red beans
rice
onion
garlic
water
Hungarian wax pepper
olive oil
sweet Hungarian pepper (powder)
oregano (flakes)
hot pepper (powder)

The relation between the beans and tomato sauce is best at 1:1:1 for me.
Start with cooking the rice per instructions.
Heat a large skillet with olive oil, add the onions and let them get translucent (do not burn them).
Open the cans of beans and wash them until there is nothing left from the caned liquid (they shouldn't foam anymore when you rinse them).
Add the chopped garlic to the pan and 2 min later add the beans.
Let it heat up and then add hot pepper, oregano, sweet Hungarian pepper and about 1 cup of water to taste.
Turn the heat down and let it simmer until 1/2 of the liquid is gone, add the tomato sauce and the chopped Hungarian wax pepper.
Turn heat down a little more once it started to boil again.
Turn off, when the sauce has the right consistency for you.
Drain the rice, add it into the skillet and stir.
You can serve it as is or add parsley or cilantro or sour cream or a combination of it.
Enjoy.
This was my dinner tonight and I love it.

Food

2009-09-01T20:48:00.003-04:00

I am getting tired of packaged food even if it sells tons of healthy things on the label. And some of them really are good with respect of the contents.
A new movie came out, Julia and Julie. That inspired me to cook a lot more for me myself.
This is a hard thing to do though if one lives in America in the land of giant everything.
A dinner for 1 usually ends up in a dinner for 4 even if one uses the smallest sizes of everything.

Megan wants a millionaire

2009-08-22T00:33:00.002-04:00

yeah, me too.
One that does not talk back and pampers me 24/7. How boring.
After only 3 episodes that thing is finally off the air because Ryan Jenkins is accused of murder.
That leads me to the questions:
Reality shows are usually done taping when they start airing. So what went wrong when they do their background check?
Megan could it be that you can never tell us who captured your heart, the punisher or Sex-Toy-Dave or somebody else. Nothing against Dave's profession, but a stripper pole in the living room? Yeah, true, watch the video.... I'd rather have that one in the bed room.
Anyways since I am usually only zapping through the channels, I am fine and will not miss anything.
Megan, after so many TV shows, how about getting a life or creating a brand out of yourself
or may be using your brain to get a step further. Despite popular believe: money does not grow on trees.
BTW, Megan's buttler was awesome, I love his humor (or who ever has written it)

Have a good weekend everyone.

tracking bills in congress

2009-07-29T16:36:00.001-04:00

Today I found a nice website, where one could read all the bills submitted to congress as well as leaving comments and vote. To leave comments and votes, one has to register, but that is free and just requires an email address and a zip code.

Check this out: http://www.opencongress.org

stop signs

2009-07-28T17:40:00.002-04:00

I live on a T-intersection that has a stop sign. Why is that that so many people just ignore that stop sign? 9 out of 10 cars just drive through it. Never mind that it is hard to see if something is coming from the left as there is a little hill top further up the street. So cars will only be seen at the last minute....

changes

2009-07-27T21:42:00.002-04:00

I thought of a few changes that I will make to my blogg.
I will comment on everything and anything that I encounter in my life. That can be TV sessions I happen to catch, what I experience in grocery stores, politics, life as an unemployed person, food, simply what ever comes to my mind.
Let's make that interesting....

and another month gone

2009-05-08T00:08:00.002-04:00

I was pointed to the following video on youtube from a friend.
Check it out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

and here is another one
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbh9FBOXTS8

just do me a favor and don't watch the second one before the first one,
otherwise you will not get the story, that I am trying to tell...

what an inspiration

2009-05-03T03:48:00.000-04:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

it has been 3 month

2009-04-06T01:54:00.002-04:00

yeah, it has been 3 month since my last blog. Geez, time flies
- Trying to connect with former colleagues.
- find myself listening to NDR2 via internet for the great music (NOT to figure out how life is in Germany...)
- listen a lot more to Wolfgang Petry and Pur (brings up nice memories, that I wont be able to re-create...).
- No, I don't plan to come back, but does help
- I miss the conference calls and the chats with C.G. (found him and his phone number) and others.
-working on getting the phone numbers from others....

Another year done

2009-01-01T22:07:00.002-05:00

2008 is gone now. I was surprised that the company, where I learn more about trading was working until 11pm my time on New Years Eve. So that is what I did. I followed the teachers and asked questions and questions. Everybody else would be parting by then.... This is was one those days when I realize how much I miss my friends, the awesome parties with them and their companionship.... A computer just doesn't cut it. (Although for the most part I like, that he doesn't talk back, with the exception, when he doesn't tell me, what exactly is wrong...
Last night I was fighting with saving a file and it did save it, just when I went back with the Vista file browser the file was nowhere to be found. Geez, how much do I love my Linux systems....lol...)
In any event:
I wish everyone a Happy 2009 and may all your wildest dreams come true.

Colors

2008-12-24T01:08:00.002-05:00

I am subscribing to another guys blog and I read it twice a day (yes it is related to trading).
He has a black back ground and a white small font. After reading just a couple of lines it all starts to become one big white smear on a black back ground. I can't make out the letters anymore.
I copy/paste everything from that day into a document, save it, read it. (of course I note the time, that I know, where I have to follow up with the next copy/paste section. Yeah, it is a lot of work and may be not worth the effort. So far I don't know yet if he is either genius or a wannabe... Well, the subscription does not cost me anything, and I am open minded and willing to learn. In all of my life teachers that I had a beef with usually taught me a lot, so I am willing to stick with it, even though I may not like what I hear.)
To come back to the original topic (hard to see things): may be I should check if I need glasses.....
It made me think, even though my dark blue and a white font is does not have an extreme contrast, may be some people may still find it hard to read.
So I decided to change the colors of the blog (personally I like the other one better). Other people may not have the patience and just skip my block. I guess to make it easy on my eyes may also help other people.

How nice it is to have a warm house

2008-12-23T19:02:00.002-05:00

This afternoon the repair man came for my furnace. The circuit board failed. Then he started to put everything back together and the furnace started out nice and then stopped again and started again and stopped again. Not a good sign. So after a few more tests, he figured, there is not enough air coming to the burner. We had joked earlier about replacing the motor for some other part because it was making noises. He had to replace the motor and then everything was working fine and I was only out 200$. Both parts were still under warranty (for another 9 month...lol... phew).
Otherwise it would have been more expensive.
Last night I debated with myself, if I move upstairs into the warm (without a TV to fall asleep at) or if I stay in bedroom and have a TV. I decided to go for the latter. Being nicely tagged in a down comforter just the remote sticking out, it was OK. Although I could feel a cold draft in the room as the ceilings are 12' high.
This morning I had plenty of hot tea instead of my usual cold coffee with tons of milk.
It is nice to have a heated house again.
The duck in the oven right now. I can smell it. This will be my Christmas Eve dinner with mashed potatoes and red cabbage.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to every one.

Trouble comes when you don't need it.

2008-12-22T21:05:00.002-05:00

Last night my furnace broke. So I called the repair crew this morning and they can only come tomorrow. So here I am sitting in my cold house listening to my classes. At least I got some Gluehwein :) .
The bonus came in Friday. I guess where that money goes now....

It is almost Christmas

2008-12-18T23:06:00.002-05:00

It is almost Christmas. A little less then 1 week left and I don't feel like Christmas.
We have 54F and it is 11pm. I have the window open.
Back when I was in Ottawa, I would have cranked up the heat. I am sure, they still do that.
I am off now for 1 week and I still feel like vacation. It is funny though.
I don't feel the urge to look for a new job right now, well that may change very soon.
I actually really enjoy the time off.
This weekend I will get a rabbit (not a live one), that I can make for Christmas Eve dinner.
I love rabbit. For me Christmas Eve is the main day of Christmas.
I have yet to order my Macy's gift certificates from my airmiles. that I have accumulated.
I will get a new pair of earings, since I lost 1 of my beloved earings, that I was wearing for
5 or 6 years now. :( Those airmiles are not enought to get a flight, and will expire eventually.
So I might just as well convert them in Macy's gift cards. I will not save the economy, but spending this is a good thing.

That was really it

2008-12-12T21:13:00.002-05:00

Today was my last day at work.
I am sorry for all of the people that I was unable to reach per phone personally. My apologies.
Thank you all for the warm replies that I got from my farewell email.

Another chapter in my life is closed now. (Well I am on my 5-6 year big change cycle that established itself since I was 14).
I am ready to open a new one.

The first order of business is to get my house in order that I have neglected or a long period of time. I hate cleaning. I hate cleaning. Did I mention I hate cleaning??? ;)

Second order of buisiness: get ready and practice my day trading skills on paper money.

May be for Christmas:
I still have vouchers and gift cards for BestBuy. I think I might get another monitor for my
Vista computer. ( 1 year ago I got a really nice graphic card for free and didn't have a computer to put it in, so I bought a new computer for the graphic card 1 year ago. Since it does support dual output I am considering a second monitor. That's how you make people spend money..... Give them a free bee for something that they can use, but don't have the equipement for....lol...)

Well the purpose of the second monitor is, that I can look better at charts and can have multiple time frames to detect trends and trend reversals. Having all of that on 1 screen, is kinda hard to see, if you want to be a day trader. It is to crowded even if you just use 1 study set per chart.
I will have to do some investigation how to set this up. I don't know much about Vista.
Linux is a different story. I know a more about that. Unfortunately all trading platform are Windows (Vista)... :( Time to make companies change....

To every one, that I may have forgotten

2008-12-10T21:04:00.003-05:00

Today I send my farewell email out to most of the people. I also called up a few people (some where not there. unfortunately). I have received some nice replies from fellow colleagues. I really do appreciate their response and I do mean that.
I think, I might have missed a few people, I will send out more "farewell emails".
If somebody that reads this post and didn't get a farewell email, I am appoloizing not to have addressed you personally. If you can forgive that oversight, and you managed to find that blog, then contact me on LinkedIn.
I promisse I will reply.

The remaining trades and other things

2008-12-07T18:22:00.002-05:00

The remaining trades:
ANR exit at target for a gain of 380 paper dollars
BIG stopped out for a gain of 50 paper dollars
AET stopped out for 0 gain
AMZN stopped out for -20 paper dollars
BTU stopped out for 20 paper dollars.

Aside from this, this week is my last week at work. I am looking forward to not having to drive in and having time off.
I am going to miss the interaction with my colleagues in Munich.
I am going to miss the exchange of the latest internal news and rumors, the discussion of new methodologies and yes, I am going to miss the fights, we had, about the best approach to a problem.
I am going to miss the lunches with the co-workers.
Every thing is breaking up.
On another note: I am also looking forward to lean new things in trading. I have been very active in the user communities in the past 3 weeks, where I bought the program from. I am finding more and more fellow traders where I can learn with.
Dave Johnson (one of the teachers) said: if you treat investing/trading as a hobby, you get hobby results. If you treat it as a business you can achieve business results.
I am finding myself getting more and more determined to make this work.

Trade updates

2008-12-02T16:21:00.002-05:00

Trade 3: BBBY bought 2 puts for 5.90 and sold it for 6.60 for a 140 paper dollars profit. I actually kicked myself out from the trade, because I couldn't fill out the numbers correctly. It really helps, if one reads what one puts into the system....lol.....
Trade 4: BDK bought a put for 8.90 and sold for 9.50 (stopped out) for 60 paper dollars profit.
Trade 5: CSX bought a put for 10.30 and sold for 12.10 (@target) for 180 paper dollars profit.
Trade 6: WHR bought a put for 7.40 and sold for 10.50 (@target) for 310 paper dollars profit.

5 more trades open.

Trading results

2008-12-01T16:30:00.002-05:00

I promissed to publish the trading results of finished trades.
Note this is are all paper trades. So no real money is involved. I am only testing my trading rules. So do NOT try that at home with your real money. It will be definitely to late, when I publish the results. I can not and do not give any financial advice or to buy or sell anything.
Trade 1: BXP: bought a put for 12.30 and sold it before closing as it did hit my target for 15.80. Profit 350 paper dollars less commission.
Trade 2: GOOG: bought a put for 36.00 and sold it 1 minute before closing at my target for 48.90
Profit 1290 paper dollars less commission.
I would never trade GOOG in my real money account as there is way to much money at risk.
The options are way to expensive for what I can trade in my real money account.
I have another 11 trades open where 2 of them came within cents of my target. Well, I will see what happens tomorrow.
The big sell off that started 1 hour before closing, for sure did help my trades.

The week in review

2008-11-30T18:14:00.002-05:00

The last week I had to do lots of training. It is a funny feeling, when you train other people that will continue your job once you are gone. Now I only have 2 weeks left. It is time to clean out the desk and bring all the personal items home. I would hate it, when I have to do that the last day.
The market really went up 4 days in a row. Well Thursday was a holiday and Friday only was half a trading day, but still.
This weekend I listened to some of the trading rooms from my education package and picked 1 trading rule, that I will paper trade for the next 4 weeks. I like the rule and I should be able to follow it. Let's see how that works out.
I will post the results once the trades are done.

The market tanked today

2008-11-19T20:01:00.003-05:00

The market tanked today. I have no idea what it will do tomorrow. We broke a couple of major supports today. The futures are still down while I am typing this. I thought 2 days ago, I just should buy a put on C. I should have done that, but I didn't, because according to my trading rules there was simply no entry. I really like trading systems, but I think I am more a discretionary trader (which does not ensures any type of success and is not repeatable). Well I am still learning all of that and try to make sense of that.
Based on the charts, I think we have another major leg down even though there may be a short big rally in between. And then, what do I know...
I am just a bluddy beginner. I do protect my capital though and put in stop loss order.
I worked to hard for my money......

Well the first time is always the hardest

2008-11-18T17:12:00.001-05:00

This is my first blog. What do I write?
Lost my job a few weeks ago and I am looking for something new.
The problem is, I don't quite know, what I want to do. After University I always worked for high tech companies. I moved several times and each time it was either to the other end of the country, a different continent and/or a different country.
I am tired of moving and moving and moving. After the 3. move you can basically scrap all the furniture and start over. Quality isn't anymore what it used to be.
My passions:
1) Poker, I am getting good at it. So me be I should switch to become a professional poker player
2) Stock market. In my personal account I am NOT down 30% like the market is. So I outperformed the market this year with just a 4% loss. Cash is a position.
I could become a portfolio manager...
Decisions, decisions, decisions.....