Foregone Vacation

I was supposed to fly to Florida last week and be on vacation for 10 days. With the economy on shaky ground in the news, and with me personally suffering from a tremendous lack of business, I decided to forego my trip to Fort Lauderdale and Walt Disney World (where I figured that I would spend at least $560 and lose out on earning some money). Do I regret not going? Well, at first I kind of did regret it, but to get over that I decided to concentrate more on some of the things that I normally lament about when I'm on vacation. Things like: another year, another vacation to Walt Disney World, and no screenplay written. Come on, David. Either write a screenplay or forget about it forever. Another thing: prepare for your taxes. Look at your bank statements. Make adjustments in who you pay, and how much. Do you need to switch phone service? Are you going to send the information to your lawyer today? Overall, I decided, that it was not worth leaving Los Angeles at this point, when so much is up in the air for me. Better to put my head down and concentrate on success, and concentrate on producing more income.

So this past week I've taken in about $150. If I'd gone to Disney, I'd be out of the $560. This way, i'm in the positive $150, a $710 swing.

Another reason I'm glad that I stayed home is that I probably would have missed the opportunity to trade away the Ebay stock in my Mom's account like I did just before Ebay announced their earnings on Wednesday (I had a feeling to sell that stock before any news. It was going up mysteriously on Wednesday, so I said, "screw it. Whatever news comes, it won't help the stock, it can only hurt". I was right. It just so happens, I have been looking at another stock that my Mom owns, Build-A-Bear Workshop. It had been going down over the months, gradually and seemingly without end. I was waiting for a bottom. The price of the stock was beginning to look cheap, but I've learned over the years that until you see a bounce, you gotta leave the stock alone and let it keep on going down. Well, I saw Build-A-Bear stock go up today solidly, by like 5%. I also looked at the chart, and saw that it seemed to be breaking out of the low and going back up. I decided to buy 100 shares of that stock, with the proceeds of the 25 Ebay shares that I sold. I've heard it said that Build-A-Bear would be a great takeover stock for some companies, like Berkshire Hathaway, for example. I even could see how a company like Disney might consider buying it, since it's so cheap compared to the price that it was 6 months ago, and that Build-A-Bear might compliment Disney's Club Penguin acquisition, which was completed a few months ago for $300 million (at today's price, Build-A-Bear is valued by the market almost at that amount). Build-A-Bear was up on Thursday, big-time, after I bought it. The company's stock had been severely punished over the last few months, which is kind of weird for a relatively small company (with only 20 million shares) that is still, at least, moderately profitable. Anyway, Mom has 200 shares now.

So, I'll just be content to go to Disney's Grand Californian for 2 nights again this weekend. Hopefully it won't be raining as much as it is right now (boy, I don't remember this much rain in L.A. in recent years!) I'm planning another trip to Walt Disney World, for May or June. I'll be better prepared to take the trip at that time, hopefully (with that new "Stimulus Plan" that Congress probably will enact, I'll get some money from the government to help pay for that trip!) We will see.