The Worst of The Greatrnk

All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling – Oscar Wilde

 

One day I was doing what I do best, which is being busy doing nothing, and basically minding my own business when someone who loves my blog (that is what she said) and is good looking (that is what I am saying) found it wise to ask me what inspires my writings. I decided to answer her in the form of, not one, but three posts! Yeah, I am cool like that. These posts will focus on my behind the scenes or what was going on through my not so smart thesaurus when I penned them down. Today I focus on the posts that did not make it: The worst of The Greatrnk.

 

1. El Fifa del World Cup

The title was supposed to look like a soap opera title. The inspiration behind that must have been Chiira’s Inflated Skins vs. Air Heads. At that time, I was less than a million seconds old in blogging and the only blogger I knew was the guy I mentioned above. It was a day to the start of The 2010 World Cup. I think the post is humerous. I must add, as I did in the post, that the questions were asked and answered in a South African Tourism Website. I even added a poll for people to vote for the country they think would win the World Cup. Most people, apart from me, thought Spain would win it, followed by Germany and Argentina. I do not think it deserves to be among my worst posts.

 

2. The Stock Market: Types of Stocks

This was my first real post, after the introductory post. The research that went to this post was enormous but I did not share it in the post. In researching, I learnt a lot about The Stock Market. I had planned on writing more posts on the stock market but somehow, that was not meant to be.

 

3. Top Ten

After two months of blogging, in which I wrote posts that at times sucked, I was wise enough to know that the only way to get better was to read and copy from what I read from other blogs. Remember when I started out I only knew one blogger. By this time, I had stumbled on blogs by the queen of twitter in .ke savvykenya, the funny itsnowrc, the not so noisy on twitter but talented writer sheblossoms, anyiko (Before I made the huge discovery later on that she was a celeb) and a few others. This post was my all time Top Ten best blog posts I had read. I am sure some of those post are not in my current top ten anymore, but these bloggers are still doing a great job. This is the best way to say the five bloggers mentioned thus far were my inspiration and mentors earlier on.

 

4. The World Cup…….as I Saw It

There were just three matches left to the end of the World Cup. I wanted everyone to know that I had all along known England and Argentina would not win the World Cup. The team I supported, Brazil had been kicked out, and I blamed Dunga for not calling up Ronaldinho. We all know what had happened to Ghana. Much of the Ghana disappointment is portrayed in the post.

 

5. Where Did The Vowels Go To?

I love this post, and it beats me that people did not relate to it. Facebook had introduced the “see more” feature where long updates were half posted with the option of clicking on the “see more” so as to see the update. As lazy as I am, I could not, and still cannot, get my fingers to click “see more” and I kept thinking why people kept on writing long updates. There was also the issue of shortening of words such that words no longer had vowels, which still infuriates me. And of course, the worst sin of all: The Laughing Out Loud or Lots Of Love acronym. The guys who use it fall in my List Of Losers!

 

6. Participants of the Stock Market

Just as the first post on The Stock Market, I did massive research on this post. It was a continuation of the first post. When I wrote it, I knew I would continue with the subject, which has not happened ever since. If I am not wrong, the next installment was to look at how stocks are valued. Maybe one day I will post something to the effect.

 

7. Int or Duction

This was the first post I ever wrote, which was to mark my triumphant entry into the world of blogging. I was so excited. I was just free styling and ended up with no words to end it. I like the post, even though someone once read it, compared it to what I am writing now and duly informed me that I had come from a far. I beg to differ, I have always thought I am getting worse at this writing business, but that is a story for another day.

 

Have a look at the posts and tell me if they deserve the punishment that is The Worst of The Greatrnk.

 

THE DAY’S

Quote: I said to my girlfriend, “Do you want to see me pull a really ugly face?” She laughed and said, “Go on then.” So I grabbed hers. – Anonymous

Bonus Story:

Mugabe’s Chauffeur ran over a pig. Mugabe asked him to go and tell the ranch owner what had happened. One hour later, he reappeared, staggering with crampy clothes, an unzipped trouser and champagne and a cigar on either hand.

Mugabe: What the … happened to you?

Chauffeur: The ranch owner gave me this champagne, the wife gave me the cigar and their 19 year old eer….

Mugabe: My God, and what did you tell them?

Chauffeur: I just went in and told them that I am Robert Mugabe’s Chauffeur and I have just killed the pig!

 

 

Participants of the Stock Market

A market is the combined behaviour of thousands of people responding to information, misinformation and whim – Kenneth Chang

I begin the second episode of The stock Market. In case you missed the first, a repeat of it is available here. Just like a Soap, you can easily follow through without having to refer to the previous episode and you will get what is going on but I recommend you have a look at the first part.

There are various participants of The Stock Market, and I outline a few of them here:
Stock Investor:

An Investor is an individual/Party that commits money to investment products with the expectation of financial return. Generally, the primary concern of an investor is to minimize risk while maximizing return, as opposed to a speculator, who is willing to accept a higher level of risk in the hopes of collecting higher-than-average profits. Stock investors are firms or individuals who purchase stocks with the intention of holding them for an extended period of time, usually several months to years. (Warren Buffett, a Master at this recommends holding a stock for not less than five years.) They rely primarily on fundamental analysis (we shall see about this later) for their investment decisions and fully recognize stock shares as part-ownership in the company. Many investors believe in the buy and hold strategy, which as the name suggests, implies that investors will hold stocks for the very long term, generally measured in years.

Stock Traders:

Stock traders usually try to profit from short-term price volatility with trades lasting anywhere from several seconds to several weeks. This is a practice heavily denounced by Buffett mainly because one loses in the long run in terms of brokerage fees etc.

Market Maker:

A market Maker is a broker-dealer firm that accepts the risk of holding a certain number of shares of a particular security in order to facilitate trading in that security. Each market maker competes for customer order flow by displaying buy and sell quotations for a guaranteed number of shares. Once an order is received, the market maker immediately sells from its own inventory or seeks an offsetting order. This process takes place in mere seconds. Most stock exchanges operate on a “matched bargain” or “order driven” basis. In such a system there are no designated or official market makers, but market makers nevertheless exist. When a buyer’s bid meets a seller’s offer or vice versa, the stock exchange’s matching system will decide that a deal has been executed.

Floor Trader:

A Floor Trader is a member of a stock or commodities exchange who trades on the floor of that exchange for his or her own account. The floor trader must abide by trading rules similar to those of the exchange specialists who trade on behalf of others. These are the guys in the pit waving their arms frantically to make trades. However these men and women who still operate in an  “open outcry” system are increasingly being replaced by automated trading systems and computers that function without human interaction and are specifically designed to match buyers and sellers.

Floor/Pit Broker:

A Floor Broker is an employee of a member firm who executes trades on the exchange floor on behalf of the firm’s clients. Basically, floor brokers receive orders from their firms, which have been placed by the firms’ clients, and executes these orders at the best possible prices. Floor brokers should not be confused with floor traders who execute orders for their own accounts.

Broker-Dealer

A Broker-Dealer is a company or other organization that trades securities for its own account or on behalf of its customers. When executing trade orders on behalf of a customer, the institution is said to be acting as a ‘broker’. When executing trades for its own account, the institution is said to be acting as a “dealer.” Securities bought from clients or other firms in the capacity of dealer may be sold to clients or other firms acting again in the capacity of dealer, or they may become a part of the firm’s holdings. Although many broker-dealers are “independent” firms solely involved in broker-dealer services, many others are business units or subsidiaries of commercial banks, investment banks or investment companies. Look out for a continuation of The Stock Market in a few weeks’ time.

THE DAY’S

Quote: I never attempt to make money on the stock market. I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five years – Warren Buffet.

Cool Blog: The Teacher by Lucy Muthoni (Not the First Lady) talks about the Actuarial Profession in Kenya and the rest of the World.