Gasoline, Crocs, Ipods and Beer

A friend of mine made an interesting comment to me the other day. He simply stated that I didn't give him enough information on what to specifically invest in, although I always stress to him the importance of investing.

He actually gave me grief for not "sharing."

Deep breaths... 10...
9...
8...
7...

I'm in a no win situation here. If I'm right with every recommendation (which I'm not) and he makes lots of money, he'll only want more recommendations. If I'm wrong, I'll never hear the end of how I lost him money. So in my infinite wisdom...

... I continued counting.

Then let my Ivy League BA, Harvard MBA, Stanford PhD. buddy realize how difficult he was making this "investing thing".

All we all have to really do is ask the right questions, if we truly want the right answers.

So I asked Mr. 1580 SAT, "What's ridiculously expensive right now?"

"Everything!"

"Everything like what," I smirked. He looked at me and pointed to a sign across the street.

$4.09 Premium.

Hmmm. That's all it took.

Expensive gas prices--Oil companies are at 5 year highs. Ever heard of Exxon Mobil? Last quarter they made a gazillion dollars. Remember $2.00 gas? How everyone cursed and screamed, blah blah blah! What if you asked the right question...

"What if this is only the beginning?

You went online, typed in yahoo.com, went to the finance section and found the symbol for Exxon Mobil -- Genius!!

Jan 06 XOM is $50, today $95! That would have paid for a couple gallons of gas.

The Ipod is a no brainer but again paying a little attention to your surroundings can make you big money. But for those of you that missed it (another one of many)--Apple Computer stock the last 52 week high and low $202!! The low $93.

75% of you reading this post own some type of Ipod but not one single share of apple stock.

You've owned how many pairs of Nike and never bought a share of stock?!

Gap Jeans?!

Those of you with teen age daughters that had to have a pair of furry Ugz. Should have bought the stock. How many of you hate those little rubbery, plastic pink, green and purple CROC's? If you'd bought the stock 3 years ago.

$9 to $80?!

Lord that's a lot of money!

What do people do when they're happy?

DRINK!

What do people do when they're sad?

DRINK!

If you're a beer drinker, how about you make a deal with yourself and buy 10 shares of Budweiser stock for every case you drink? I've heard crazier investing strategies.

Lets face it, no investment strategy is "fool proof" and any day trader or billion dollar money manager will agree. But every stock has a story behind it. The stock market is literally there for the taking with a little money, a little patience and a lot of common sense.

For my Harvard buddy, he now drills his poor 13 year old daughter as to why she has to change her ring tone every other day but continues to miss the point.

Hmmm, ring tones? I just got a brilliant idea.