Best Picture Award - Mrs. Miniver

This movie was the 1942 Best Picture Academy Award winning movie.  The setting was England during World War Two which is interesting since the movie was made during World War Two.  It is a story of war, of love, and of death.  Somewhat predictable but well done none-the-less.

Mrs. Miniver is the main character in the movie – thus the name.

47 Best Picture movies seen.  Only 33 left to see.

Best Picture Award - The Great Ziegfeld

This movie was the 1936 Best Picture Academy Award winning movie.  A long movie that was pretty boring to boot.  It is a musical and I admittedly don’t care for musicals but I think this one was worse than most.  The story line about Ziegfeld has some interest but not enough to keep me from dozing a couple of times.

The movie is named after the main character – Mr. Ziegfeld.

46 Best Picture movies seen.  Only 34 left to see.

Best Picture Award - Cimarron

This movie was the 1931 Best Picture Academy Award winning movie – the fourth year the award was given.  The movie is set in Oklahoma prior to 1900 when it was first opened up for settlers and takes the story through 1930.  There is a horrible love story about a guy that is never around and the lady that loves him.  It makes him out to be a star of some sort but I just think he was a jerk.  Interesting, at least to me, is that this movie also had a prominent character that had a stutter.  His stutter was different than the character in “The Broadway Melody” the movie that won the Academy Award two years prior.  Not sure I remember any other movies with a character that stutters.

The title of the movie comes from the name of the child of the main characters – although he doesn’t figure in the story very much.

44 Best Picture movies seen.  Only 36 left to see.

Best Picture Award - Annie Hall

This movie was the 1977 Best Picture Academy Award winning movie.  A love story between two very different people. The movie has its light moments, its humorous times, and parts that drag.  I picked up several lines and sayings from pop culture that obviously originated with this movie.  However, I didn’t like the movie.

Annie Hall is the name of the female character in the love story.

45 Best Picture movies seen.  Only 35 left to see.

Investment Club - Jan 2010

Investment Club YenoM recently met with 7 members in attendance.  Our portfolio is in pretty good shape based upon the criteria we are using to manage it.  We need to add more small cap stocks that are not in either the technology or healthcare sectors.

We decided to sell all of our Linear Technology (LLTC) stock and use the proceeds of the sale and $1,000 in cash to purchase Neutral Tandem (TNDM).  Neutral Tandem is a company that provides “interconnection services principally to competitive carriers, including wireless, wireline, cable, and broadband telephony companies in the United States.”

We made these decisions for the following reasons:

Sell LLTC:

1.      Lowers our technology holdings which were above the amount the club set as the upper threshold

2.      No one in the club has the background to properly understand and follow the products produced by LLTC

3.      Eliminates the next to the lowest PAR stock in the portfolio (PAR was 8.3% vs portfolio PAR of 14.3%)
 
The only downside of selling LLTC was it lowered our percentage of stocks of the mid cap size - something we are trying to increase.  However, the positive aspects of reducing the holding outweighed this negative.

Buy TNDM

1.      Adds exposure to a new sector (Telecom)

2.      Increase our small cap holdings which were well below the targeted amount

3.      Increases the overall PAR for the portfolio (PAR for stock is 19.2% vs 14.3% for the portfolio)

FW: Best Picture Award - The Broadway Melody

This movie was the 1929 Best Picture Academy Award winning movie – the second year the award was given.  It was a musical but not too much music so that part was OK with me.  However, it was a cheesy love story that centered around a couple of women trying to break in on Broadway.  The love story takes a couple of predictable twists.  One guy I liked in the movie had a stutter which was humorous.  He had lines like, “I’m going to shoot you with my gg… g.ggg… ggg…… revolver.”

The title of the movie is the same as the Broadway show that was depicted in the film – The Broadway Melody.

43 Best Picture movies seen.  Only 37 left to see.

Review - 2009 Goal 2

My second goal last year (2009) was to run a half marathon in under 2 hours. Goal was NOT ACHIEVED but I was still successful.

Running a half marathon in 2009 was going to be my fourth. When I set the goal I knew it was aggressive since my personal best time was time in the previous 3 half marathons was 2:05:43 and I’m not getting any younger. My running partner, Melodie, agreed to the goal and we started training in January. At the time it didn’t sound all that hard to knock 5 minutes out of a two hour time period.

Fast forward to May when we ran the Cellcom Marathon in Green Bay. To achieve the time of 2 hours flat on the half marathon (13.1 miles) we needed to average 9 minute miles for each of the 13 miles. We started the run on a sunny morning with a temperature of 37 degrees – about perfect for our run. At the one mile mark we were at 8:37 – much faster than we needed so we slowed down. At mile two our time was 17:40 or 8:50 per mile. At this point I said to myself and then to Melodie, “This is the perfect pace – we are right on target.” At mile four we were still on pace for 9:00 minutes per mile and I felt pretty good.

We crossed the 7 mile mark at exactly 54 minutes or 9 minute miles. It was shortly after mile 7 when the race fell apart for me. I remember it well. We were on a slight uphill just after crossing Lombardi Avenue in a neighborhood where an old boyfriend of my daughter’s lived. It was just a slight uphill but it took everything I had to make it to the top and that is when I was pretty sure we were falling off pace. I thought to myself – that’s what a running partner is for – Melodie will have to keep pace and I’ll just stay with her. At mile 8 we had fallen way off pace and I told Melodie to not worry about me, to pick up the pace so she could hit the goal. Unfortunately, she didn’t have any get up and go left either. After the race she related to me that she ran out of gas – “shortly after the slight hill right by the porta-a-porties” or essentially the same place as me. So neither one of us could “pull” the other one along.

We kept running and at each mile marker we were falling further and further off our hoped for 9:00 minute per mile pace and then the goal became to finish the race. Running is as much a mental exercise as a physical one and the realization that we weren’t going to achieve our goal weight heavily on me. However, I’ve never quit a race and this one was no exception. We kept at it and much to my surprise and delight we crossed the finish line at 2:04:59 beating my previous personal best time by almost a full minute. In retrospect, I’m very proud of that time and I still have hopes of improving on it. However, my goal for 2010 is to complete my first full marathon (26.2) miles.

My training for the run began on Jan 4 2009 and will be tested at the Cellcom Marathon on May 2010.
Here is another person's 2009 Cellcom story.

Review - 2009 Goal 1

My first goal last year (2009) was to read four non-fiction books.  It was ACHIEVED.

I read plenty of fiction books but it is just harder for me to want to sit down and read a non-fiction book.  

In February I read “My Life on the Run” by Bart Yasso.  Bart was the guest speaker at the Cellcom Marathon kickoff party in January so I decided to read his book about running.  If you are a runner I think you will like the book.  I also learned how to request a book at the library.  No not how to find it on the book shelf rather how to submit a request for the library to purchase a book so it can be loaned out.  Bart’s book had just recently been released and the library didn’t have a copy.  I didn’t think I wanted the book for my library and, being cheap, I wasn’t going to buy it.  The process to request a book from the Brown County library is real easy and, in this case, worked quickly.

In April I read “Lost!” by Thomas Thompson.  I found this book in a old Readers Digest condensed book we had around the house.  It didn’t have much of an impression on me as I don’t remember anything about the story and I’ve given the Readers Digest to Goodwill.

After taking the summer off from reading non-fiction I completed “The Intelligent Asset Allocation” by William Bernstein in September.  An excellent, excellent primer on how and why to do asset allocation as an investment strategy.  William Bernstein is an excellent author and this book as well as some of his others is currently guiding my personal and professional investing portfolio.

Finally, in November I completed reading “48 Days to the Work You Love” by Dan Miller.  An well written book to provides practical guidance on conducting  a job search.  I liked the book so much that I’ve purchased additional copies and have started giving them to people that have lost their jobs to help them get back in the game.  I would also recommend someone reading this that wanted to find a different job.  Great advice on networking.

Running Recap for 2009

For Christmas 2008 my wife gave me a Garmin Forerunner 305 exercise watch.  I had been looking at it for some time but just couldn’t justify spending that much money for a running watch.  Since it was a gift I was “obligated” to use it. 

Best Picture Award - Crash

This movie was the 2005 Best Picture Academy Award winning movie.  This is a very interesting movie and well worth the time to watch it.  From the title I thought the movie was going to be some cheesy story about cars and crashes.  But it wasn’t and that is a good thing.  The story reveals and revolves around many ethnic and racial stereotypes.  No current stereotype is left untouched.  The movie is well done and not offensive.  In an interesting twist the characters portrayed initially as “good guys” end up being bad and “bad guys” as good, although some of them die.

The title Crash comes from the different people, cultures, and races all “crashing” into one another over a 36 hour period of time.

41 Best Picture movies seen.  Only 39 left to see.