Yesterday was a bad day to be stuck on the sidelines. I was stuck with only unsettled funds and decided I wouldn’t buy anything unless I knew I could safely hold it overnight, as the funds settle today and I could then sell it if I needed. So, I watched my favorite CTDC rally and close over 60%! I thought about getting in this morning, because it looked like the rally continued into after-hours trading last night. But in pre-market today, there has been a dramatic sell-off. I don’t know if it’s just a pull-back or if the rally will continue. So I’ll wait and maybe catch the ride if it starts moving up again.

Anyway, I’m still holding CDS and CFC which went up a tad, leaving me up $81.50 for the day, down $1164 overall.

Speaking of CDS, it’s showing some interesting pre-market activity as well. Last night I noticed some after-hours trading slightly above the day’s high. That’s continuing this morning. Maybe CDS is preparing for a run.

The other I’m keeping my eyes on: CSUN. It too rallied late yesterday and pre-market activity shows it just might continue.

As of Friday, I’m up about $242 for the day, and down about $1210 overall.

I got really lucky. I was right in my original prediction about the solar sector and making the SOLF play. However, as I mentioned, my entry was horrible and I therefore held it overnight hoping for a continuation of the uptrend. As luck would have it, the sector tanked the next day. But on Friday… wow. Look at the chart. There was a small move up in the morning followed by a dip. Next came another move up a bit higher followed by a dip, but not as low. To me, this was the confirmation I was hoping for that the stock was about to rally. And did it! At about 12:30p, it really took off. Once it got up high enough, I went conservative and took my 3% profit, exiting at $27.40. As this was a sloppy play on my part, I was happy with that. But… hehe… the stock continued to go up throughout the afternoon, reached a high of about $29.65 and closed at $28.76. So, I could’ve really made a killing, but I didn’t deserve to.

Hopefully, with more experience, I’ll get better.

CDS barely moved and CFC was down, so I opted to hold them til next week and see how it plays out. I know I have to accept the losses here, but I’m trying to cut it down as much as I can.

Down $262 for the day.
Long on: CDS, CFC and SOLF

Sector Glance: Solar Stocks Fall

I should have sold SOLF yesterday. I should have sold it during one of the many opportunities I had today to cut my losses. On the other hand, I have ‘the news’ (see the link above) and the fact that the December options expire tomorrow, which I believe is helping to drive the price down. I’ll look for an uptick tomorrow, but might just hold and see what Monday brings. Then again, I’d like to be 100% cash over Christmas.

In other news, CDS and CFC both were down today, CDS (again) accounting for the largest chunk of the loss.

As I mentioned before, I couldn’t trade anything on Tuesday, except to sell, so I was just an observer. CFC was down slightly. CDS was up slightly, but not enough to trigger my sell. So I held on to both, and was up $78 for the day.

Yesterday, though, the funds were settled, which would allow me to sell any new purchases should they tank right away. I got up early and noticed that the price of oil was up in Asia due to the U.S. crude inventories report due mid-morning. Something I’ve noticed is that solar energy companies tend to spike on news of higher oil prices. So I did some quick research on some stocks I’d been holding in my queue as possible plays someday: CSUN, SOLF and CSIQ. I also considered LDK, but it’s a bit too pricey for me.

So, knowing there would be news to boost any pre-existing turn-around, that’s what I looked for. SOLF would be the play.

But I did a bad thing. I put in a bid slightly lower than the last trade hoping to have it filled on a short pull-back that never came. Rather than accepting that I had missed my entry opportunity at $25.40, I chased the price just to get in, and finally got filled at $26.55. Yikes! Perhaps I should’ve taken a little profit on one of the spikes above $27, but I didn’t. The drop was a late-in-the-day drop likely because others were just taking profits. But the general up-trend should continue today.

CFC was again down slightly, and CDS was nearly unchanged except for a last minute spike up, putting me up about $270 for the day and down about $1190 overall.

Holdings: CDS, CFC
Status: Down $357 for the day, down about $1539 overall.

Today wasn’t a good day to be holding on to anything. The DOW closed about 172 points lower than Friday and the market as a whole was crap most of the day.

What really sucked was that Scottrade was also down for much of the morning. So I couldn’t get out of my positions even if I had wanted to. But I wouldn’t have sold anyway. I’m waiting for a relative “up day” for both of them… which will hopefully come by the end of the year. I want to cut my losses, but will definitely sell both before the end of December and take whatever loss on my taxes.

The other crappy part is that I am waiting for my latest CTDC sale to settle (which happens on Wednesday). Today would have been a great day to buy something low knowing it will likely recover tomorrow or the day after. But since I couldn’t sell tomorrow if I had to, well, I’m afraid to get into that situation again. That’s partially what got me into this mess!

I’m starting a new section here regarding stock trading. The following is a re-cap of what I’ve done so far. Stay tuned.
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As I’ve become a more active trader, I’ve definitely learned a few things. The most important thing is that once you have a plan/system… stick to it. Deviations can be quite costly.

Prior to opening my online brokerage account I did some research into the technical analysis that most day-traders and swing-traders use. To ensure the least amount of risk, even though my profits would be small, I found a candle-stick pattern that would form the basis of future investigations to find ‘good trades’. I ‘paper-traded’ this way for a few months and it seemed fairly reliable. The next step was to try it out with some real money.

I started with an initial $5500. With that, I bought 300 shares of INTV at $8.58/share. Within a week, the price went up to $8.85. Being conservative, I thought a 3% profit was good, so I sold it there and pocketed about $67 (after brokerage fees) which equated to a real profit of about 2.6%. So I learned to include the brokerage fees into my profit projections.

My next trade was to buy 90 shares of DTSI at $29.20. This one, though, started to go too far south than I was comfortable with, so I sold it at $28, accepting the loss. The trade itself was worth -$122 (after fees), which brought me down -$55 overall. Ugh! [Read more →]

Today’s adventure turned out to be quite an interesting science project. I started this morning studying about moss and lichen, debating whether to order some for the vivarium. After reading various articles about moss and lichen, I decided to venture into the rain and see what I might have growing in the woods out back. I hit the jackpot!

I’m going to, once I finish writing this, hunt a bit online to see if I can identify what species of moss I found. But what I noticed (and harvested) are at least three different kinds distinguished by where they were growing.

First, there was the stuff that grows on the ground (close-up). It’s kind of spikey, and reminds me of a palm tree. I also got a clump that had spore capsules.

Next is the stuff that grows on rocks (close-up). This moss seems to be a combination of two different kinds. What you mostly see are broad-leaves with a few fern-looking stem/leaf combinations thrown in. In this picture, you can see also that growing along with this moss are what appear to be clovers. Since it happened that way naturally, I left it.

Finally, there’s the stuff that grows on trees (close-up). This type definitely looks fern-like. The other interesting observation is that, unlike the other two that seemed to grow in random directions, this stuff grows directionally in nature , with the stems all aligned vertically and growing/pointing up the tree-trunk.

So, I put the moss in the vivarium in the same places I found it outside; ground-moss went on the ground, rock-moss went on rocks and tree-moss when on/near wood. I also decided to remove some plants and rearrange things. After doing more research about the plants I have, I’m afraid that the palm and ferns are going to grow sufficiently that some of the other ‘fillers’ in there would just be too much.

So, as of right now, here’s what it looks like.

In the previous episode we were left with me waiting for shipment of some Terra-Lite. Well, it arrived as did the cork tube that would serve as the waterfall.

So, I put down the Terra-Lite and on top of that, a layer of vinyl screen material to keep (hopefully) dirt and other stuff from working its way down into the water supply. On top of the screen, I put the substrate, which is a mixture of about 2/3 potting soil and 1/3 peat moss. This picture shows the substrate and is also a good view of the working waterfall.

After that, all I had to do was put some plants in the ground. You can see pictures of some of the plants here. I actually only used about half of what I bought because after I got home and did some research, I found that the palms and ferns are likely to get HUGE. I opted to go light for now and give them room to grow.

So, with that, I’m just going to let it grow for a while and we’ll see how it looks in a few weeks/months.

I finally got a good picture of that damned woodpecker who has been pecking the hell of out of my house the past year or so.

Enjoy.

While he’s an asshole, I suppose he is a pretty bird.

A long, long time ago, and some of you remember, I set up a really cool tropical vivarium that housed all sorts of plants and critters. Some of you also remember that after I moved into the country, maintenance of said vivarium became increasingly difficult and it turned into a graveyard. The tank sat for years in the back room with dry ground and dead plants (among other things).

About a week ago, I finally got around to cleaning it out. The plastic cylinders you see were the base of the “false bottom” I used in Vivarium v1. Those came out too, as I’ve decided not to use the “false bottom” concept this time around.

The idea for this one will be similar, but a bit more complex. Here is the test placement of rocks and wood pieces I’ll be using. There will again be a small pond in the middle to support water-growing plants. There will also, again, be a waterfall. But this time, rather than just having the water shoot from a hose mounted to the back, the waterfall will consist of a stream dripping through a small cork-tube (still on order). Under the pond (and around the front and sides) will be a shallow layer of small river rock. The pond will be enclosed by a slice of cork bark on one side and some large rocks on the other.

From this angle you can see where I’ve added Terra-lite behind the cork bark slab. Unfortunately, I didn’t have very much, so I’m also waiting my new shipment to arrive. But conceptually you can see how it will work. The Terra-lite will come up about 3″, then be covered with nylon “screen” material to keep the substrate mixture from settling in it. The substrate, a mixture of topsoil and peat-moss, will cover the Terra-lite forming the “land” areas of the terrarium.

Cool so far, eh?