A Look At Summer
Don’t you hate it when you spend 10+ minutes typing something and accidently delete it all? That’s what just happened to me. I had a pretty long entry written out and tried to hit Ctrl+T to open a new browsing tab. Instead I hit Ctrl+R and reloaded the page. I lost the entire entry. Now I have to retype it. Grrrr…
In: Driving, Health & Fitness, Philosophy
Trading going well, summer project determined
Other than 2 finals I have this coming week, school is now out for the summer. That means I can concentrate on trading, investing, and speculating. May options expired on Friday and I took full advantage of it. I sold covered options on Wednesday and Thursday and managed to make over 11% return on my entire account after broker fees by the close of the markets on Friday! I can still count the number of trades I’ve done on one hand so overall I’ve been doing very well. I’ve only had one small losing transaction. Overall my account is up 16.25% after fees. Did I mention I’ve only been trading for 1 month? I still have one more open position. Assuming the market doesn’t go up more than ~7% in the next month (very unlikely) my total gains will be almost 19%.
Addition to investing goals, $1 million here I come!
I’ve been doing some thinking and some math. I’ve figured out that I can have $1 million in 5 years if I start with $25,000 and earn an average return of 6.35% per month (76.2% per year), compounded monthly. I believe this is achieveable since I’m already earning more than that. If I reach that goal I’ll be a millionare before I turn 30.
My investments are rapidly approaching $25,000 so I’ve almost met that goal. The problem is that I’ve been living off of my investments. If I continue withdrawing enough to pay the bills I won’t be saving enough to reach that goal. This leaves me with a few options.
A Sickness and an Update
Finally a new update! Last week I was sick with a head cold for a few days. It was the first time I’ve been sick in 2 or so years. I was really only down for one night so I guess I can live with that. It just so happens that allergy season started at exactly the same time. Out with the cold and in with a runny nose.
Excercise Continues
Here’s an update on how my workout routine is going. I started working out on Feb 13, 2006. Now, two months later, here are my results thus far. I’ve gained over an inch around my chest, over 1/4 inch around my arms, and my weight is up to 150 lbs from 139 lbs. I also have gains elsewhere, but those are the most pronounced.
Wheat Pizza with Chicken
Believe it or not, this is a recipe for healthy pizza. It tastes great and still has tons of cheese on it. Unlike most reduced fat cheese, the one I selected for this recipe actually has a lot of flavor. This pizza is made in the traditional margherita style, with tomatos slices, basel, and cheese. I recommend using dried seasonings to help absorb some of the liquid created from the tomatos and ricotta cheese.
For those who are inexperienced at stretching pizza dough this one might be a little tricky. Using a rolling pin to form pizza is NOT how you do it. I include basic instructions below but it does take some practice to get it right.
Another Day, Another Sleep Pattern
I apologize for the lack of updates. Between school, projects, and extra sleep I haven’t had much free time. I’ve changed me sleep pattern yet again. I found that the pattern I was on (2 1.5h core naps, 3 20 min naps) just wasn’t cutting it. I was frequently oversleeping and was tired during the day. I slept monophasicly this past weekend and found something interesting. I woke up after 6 hours and had trouble falling back asleep. So maybe 6 hours is what my body wants. To test this I’m trying two 3 hour sleep periods, one 11:30PM to 2:30PM and one 3:30PM to 6:30PM. This allows me to maintain my eating schedule and have some extra time at night to shop, prep food, or do whatever. Last night was my first trial. I ended up adding an extra 20 min nap in there. Today I was wide awake all day. I had no trouble paying attention during class. I found it much easier to focus on the subjects. This may be the best solution for me. We’ll see how it goes.
New Car!
Wow, it’s been a while since I last posted. I haven’t had much to discuss, but I’m going to try to update at least a few times this week.
The news is that I’m finally getting a better car. I’m picking up a 92 Eagle Talon TSi AWD this week. It’s setup for street and SCCA STX autocross racing. I’ll finally have something fun again. I’m setting up a new company, Perfect Apex Racing LLC. The car will be owned by the company and the goal is to get sponsorship. More details to follow soon, including a sponsorship proposal.
Book Review: “Fooled By Randomness”
I picked up “Fooled by Randomness” by Nassim Nicholas Taleb at the store about a month ago. While looking for a mathematical options trading book (big surprise, not found) this caught my eye. Randomness has always interested me so when I found a book in the trading section about it I couldn’t pass it up.
A Week’s Sleep In Review
This week’s sleeping went quite well. There were oversleeps here and there but overall I’m satisfied. Both school days went perfectly as did last night. Tonight should also go well. What I’ve found is that with the 2 core naps I can skip a 25 min nap when necessary and still function fine. However, the likelyhood of my oversleeping at my next nap in this situation is very high. When I do follow it and take all of my naps oversleeping either doesn’t happen or is much shorter.