Farmer Diaries

The end game is afoot for Greece, the first member of the EU looking at default and maybe/probably exit from the Euro.  The austerity package has been a disaster for Greeks at large.  The promised revenues (and asset sales) have not occurred and the budget deficit is not actually shrinking (as a proportion of GDP) but rising as the country's economy collapse from absolute reduction in government expenses -- that's what happens when the government accounts for 50% of GDP (I know, I know the gov't produces nothing -- but indulge me here).   Germans who've been trough the German unification process (and cost) are not too keen on doing this again, especially since they view the Greeks as layabouts (not making a value judgement here -- just reading the mood).  So the great European experiment has come to a cross road and some hard choices have to be made soon (they could fudge it and delay until 2013 -- but the political landscape may have ...

The "Defense against Marriage Act" or the "Patriot Act" are exactly the opposite of what they preach to be, that's the conservative way -- give it a name that sounds good, so that people will listen to you, and the do what you want (for those of Canadian persuasion the first is against Gay marriage and the second is to ensure that civil liberty are further eroded)! Liberals are cretins:  This morning on the radio some group called "AgainstPPP" (which means Public Private partnership) made lots of noise because a hospice run as a PPP was using hiring methods that would be illegal in the public sector -- except this institution is not in the public sector (which makes their whole argument moot by the way).  Anyway, this group's statement was that this hospice should be run by the government and that these people were crooks!  Finally, and this is the funny part (hence the stupidity of this group) there are no complaints about patientcare...

Weekend was somewhat miserable because of the weather.  Around 11 am I contemplated returning to Montreal early, just to catch a movie.  Well this morning a colleague told me that she left here cottage  (in Mont Laurier) at noon, and got home at 5.  A two  1/2 hour journey took 5 hours! Eventually, I decided to leave at 7 pm, and got home at 8:20, I was on cruse control the entire way, the best way of avoiding speeding tickets.  Turns out that was the right decision -- the road was empty of traffic (it was also dry).  Just goes to show, procrastination sometimes pays off!

First off, after a glorious summer, Labour Day weekend was mostly miserable, so it was three wasted days, which means lots of reading.   Certain themes resonated for Canada: Swiss national bank pegs the Swiss Franc – they’ve had enough of the wild ride.   Not sure how it will work, because commentaries from the ECB seem to indicate that this was all news to them.   This means that many countries that are perceived to be sound (Canada, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway and Australia) may resort to the same process.   We know that the Bank of Canada is very concerned about all they “hot” money flowing into Canada (about 7% of GDP).   How do such economies protect their industry and citizen from global market fears? Europe decided that a good old fashion panic was on the cards for Monday – while America celebrated “something” – but certainly not labour. Spider futures were wild on Monday, but Tuesday morning things cooled down.   BTW as of 6 am Tuesday AM (EST) ...

Just too funny (Source:  The Big Picture Blog)

Its not for a lack of desire, its just been a little busy over the past few days. This is a short post, yesterday I had a bit of a China Syndrome episode. It seems that last week I spilled a soft drink onto my keyboard, nothing really, but yesterday four keys were operating with some difficulties. I called the help desk and they told me to fill a requisition and that something would show up in a few days/week -- hardly satisfying! On a whim, I asked the computer tech on the trading floor (where I exist on the edge) if he had any idea where I could get a keyboard fast! He bent under his desk and pulled out a brand new keyboard. Working in a dealing room where each trader has between 5 and 10 screens (we look like NASA) we order about 10-20 new computer per month. In the past we would only order the computer (no keyboard or monitor), but about two years ago, we noticed that if we ordered the a keyboard it was cheaper... than if we just bought the machine. The impact, we have lo...