SimonSimple

A bouquet of flowers on my recent ‘re-tyrement’

Hi People

Si—–mon! The voice at the other end was sweet and appreciative. She had just received a surprise SimonSimple Carrot Cake from us in the afternoon (I had to leave it with her secretary as she was out for a meeting) and called to thank us, for the cake and the kind thoughts that went with it.

She was my lady boss from 10 years ago and I happened to be around her current place of work givng a lunchtime talk that day. From her tone of voice, I gathered that she was indeed surprised to receive a home made cake out of the blue and quite pleased at that! The moral of the story is that I felt nice baking and giving her the cake, she felt nice and thanked me for it and I felt nice that she called me up to chat. I call this the positive syndrome of feeling nice. We can spread this around a bit more. The world will be a nicer place for it.

Yesterday I noticed the button to close the lift door was jammed and I thought I had better do the civic thing and called up the town council. A sweet sounding voice answered and said she would attend to the matter. An hour later when I had to use the lift again, I saw that the problem was fixed. This morning I rang up and spoke to the same lady, a Miss Jeminah, and thanked her for her prompt action. She appreciated that I had bothered to call again but was modest about what she had done. I think we must make an effort to send ‘bouquets’ for a job well done. It’s nice to remember the good that people do (including public servants) instead of just ‘brickbats’ in their direction.

In fact the subject of my lunchtime talk was His Needs & Her Needs (made famous by Dr Willard F. Harley Jr.) and one of them, especially for Her, is Affection. It is the expression of love. It symbolises security, protection, comfort and approval - vitally important in any relationship. A hug, a greeting card, thank-you notes or calls, a bouquet of flowers, and in the right context, the appropriate holding of hands, walks after dinner, back rubs, phone calls and conversations with thoughtful and loving expressions can all communicate affection with the ones you love ie. your spouse, your children or friends.

I illustrate, even with sms messages with my eldest daughter, it goes like this:

Dad: Hi darling, sorry I was not around to send you to the train station this morning. Have a great day ahead.

Daughter: It’s OK daddy. Cycle tonight?

Dad: Sure, see you later.

Daughter: Great. Love you Dad.

***

This could go on and on. My point is simply this: It’s nice to be nice. A win-win situation.

Hi People

The picture above is for the football crazy people who will wake up this thursday morning to watch the Champions League final in Moscow.

But you protest, why a picture of Arsenal when it is Manchester United playing against Chelsea? The reason is that Simon wanted to play for Arsenal but Arsne Wenger said “No way. If Simon is playing, then no point for Arsenal to make it to the finals of the Champions League or to top the Barclays Premier League!”

Yes, we all should “stick to the knitting” and let the experts do their job. One expert I have grown to admire greatly is Warren Buffet. Like great footballers, you don’t become an expert just by being lucky. It is sheer hard work, a disciplined lifestyle. Slack a little and let your guard down and it is down the slippery road like Ronaldo of Barcelona. That is a negative example.

Here is a positive example from Warren Buffet and how he thinks, taken from “Investing Ideas in a Simple Way” …..’I read all day….all I did was read the annual report and bought $500 million in PetroChina and sold them 5 years later for $4 billion’.

I extract some more of this great investor’s thoughts from FORTUNE magazine, 28 April 2008 in a Q & A format.

***

Q. What advice would you give to someone who is not a professional investor? Where should they put their money?

A. Well, if they’re not going to be an active investor - and very few should try to do that - then they should just stay with index funds. Any low-cost index fund. And they should buy it over time. They’re not going to be able to pick the right price and the right time. What they want to do is avoid the wrong price and wrong stock. You just make sure you own a piece of American business and you don’t buy all at one time.

Q. The scenario you’re describing suggests we’re a long way from turning a corner.

A. I think so. I mean, it seems everybody says it’ll be short and shallow, but it looks like it’s just the opposite. You know, deleveraging by its nature takes a lot of time, a lot of pain. And the consequences kind of roll through in different ways. Now, I don’t invest a dime based on macro forecasts, so I don’t think people should sell stocks because of that. I also don’t think they should buy stocks because of that.

Q. What should we say to investors now?

A. The answer is you don’t want investors to think that what they read today is important in terms of their investment strategy. Their investment strategy should factor in that

a) if you know what was going to happen in the economy, you still wouldn’t necessarily know what was going to happen in the stock market and

b) they can’t pick stocks that are better than average.

Stocks are a good thing to own over time. There’s only two things you can do wrong:

a) you can buy the wrong ones, and

b) you can buy or sell them at the wrong time.

And the truth is you never need to sell them, basically…..Then they just have to worry about getting greedy. You know, I always say you should get greedy when others are fearful and fearful when others are greedy. But that’s too much to expect. Of course, you shouldn’t get greedy when others get greedy and fearful when others get fearful. At a minimum, try to stay away from that.

***

We must always follow good examples, and great ones too. Better still, to set good examples, and great ones too.

Be greedy and be fearful….at the right time.

Hi People

I just completed 100 days as a stay home husband since 1 February 2008 upon retiring from the office scene. Actually I have not retired. I shall call myself a Re-tyred Old Mario, like the picture above. That’s me in front of the Super Mario icon in Melbourne, Australia.

That’s how I feel. Great and punching the air with a victory cry every day, giving thanks to God for my situation. Enviable? You can join me too. Life is full of choices.

I shall not review the full 100 days. But here is a sampling of the week that just went by:

Sunday: A leisurely start with the morning papers and wife; and a quiet afternoon alone without wife.

Monday: My regular checkup at the hospital had great news awaiting me. My HbA1c diabetes reading was down to 7.1 and the doctor was happy to pronounce me good enough to be discharged to the neighbourhood polyclinic to monitor my medical condition. This means less travelling time and more money.

I spent the whole afternoon at the Woodlands Regional Library. What a wonderful resource centre, cheap and good. I intend to visit all 22 public libraries in Singapore within a year.

In the evening it was quality time with eldest daughter on our weekly cycling jaunt and meal together.

Tuesday: Morning was spent preparing lesson for 6 couples in the evening to help equip them for their marriage. When we took the train for the class we could not help but observe the packed trains and the tired looks on the commuters. While I do not envy their lot I am most grateful for mine.

Wednesday: Morning marketing with wife and then back home to enjoy a home cooked meal. Son also got to enjoy his specific request for mom’s kiam chye tofu and mushroom soup.

In the afternoon, time with son in the swimming pool with practically not a soul in sight. What luxury. Son enjoyed the 20 laps - and I enjoyed watching a once little boy grow into a disciplined full-bodied young man.

Thursday: Morning spent mentoring someone in Human Resource matters and thinking that whilst I have retired from this field, my feel of such issues are still sought after. I guess there is still wisdom left in this silver-haired man.

Lunch was catch-up time with 2 dear ex-colleagues. They let in that some people miss me in the office. But what they really wanted to know also was whether I miss the people in the office. The truth is: I miss the people but not the office.

Friday: In the morning, feeling guilty about not working on my book I promised to write, I did put in my fair share of hard work. I also reviewed my activities for the past 100 days: I conducted 20 sessions of public talks/workshop sessions; did 5 bakes of carrot cakes; did several pro bono HR consultations; took 2 overseas holiday trips; had many bonding times with my 3 children jogging, swimming & bowling together; many more walks with wife and family dog and best of all - lazy days and peaceful nights (and at times romantic to boot).

Evening was catch up time with the cell group full of food & fellowship & learning & growing together.

Saturday: Morning saw me driving dear wife to a warehouse sale closeby for bed linens.

At 5 pm we tuned in on Suze Orman on CNBC on how to manage our money. I like her take on how everything about money has to do with choices. Indeed, the bottomline is: It’s about choice. I know George Soros recently mentioned on TV that the USA is populated by credit junkies, so I am really glad that at 26, our daughter is the proud owner of NO credit cards.

In the evening it was a family get-together to celebrate my grandnephew turning 3 years old. I had fun catching up with him and carrying another 2-year old grandnephew and a 4-month old grandniece.

Came home at around 11 pm, all tired out but wishing and thinking how grand it would be to carry my own grand…………………in time to come.

I think I will thrive and wife will survive my ‘re-tyrement’.

Happy days & a Hi-Five to all!

Hi People

We flew home on a humid night on Monday. The first thing that ‘heat’ us after cool autumn days & nights in Melbourne & Sydney is the tropical heat of sunny Singapore.

We had an amazing 11 days holiday with our daughter who is studying in Sydney as our tour guide (much better than commercial tours). It was a great time of sharing (including meals, their portions are huge - and sometimes 3 of us would share 2 meal orders) and bonding. Lots of sightseeing, walking and cappucinos.

At the famed Blue Mountains we had a wonderful bus driver called Peter who pointed out to us interesting details (not found on a package tour, I am sure) about the sights at a few of our stops - the 3 Mysteries: Birth, Life & Death - the 3 Sisters (actually huge rock features located in the Blue Mountains) and how you can’t see them on a misty day because they are out galavanting with the 3 Brothers. In fact that may account for a ‘Little Rock’ that has sprouted out next to the 3 Sisters!

Whilst in Melbourne and Sydney, my wife spent much time browsing the stores or merely window-shopping and picking up little souvenirs to keep as mementoes. As for me, I took the chance to browse through the books at the bookstores.

I really enjoyed going into the quaint small bookstores. Some items, although a little dated, can be had for a mere A$1 or A$2. They have large stores too. At Dymocks, I picked up two books - Australia’s Money Secrets of the Rich by John R Burley and Noel Whittaker’s Golden Rules of Wealth.

Invariably there is a topic on the Rule of 72. There is another fact I gleaned from these books. And that is the Rich are also disciplined in the way they keep records of their spending details. If you don’t know where your money is going each month, how can you start cutting back on the non essentials?

I woke up this morning and saw the front page of the Straits Times - Rice and cooking oil lead price rise. Seeing that we just had Labour Day on 1 May, a few days ago, I thought I would start tracking again for the whole month of May to see where my money is going.

Why the 4 photos above? These were the hotel rooms we stayed in. And the numbers are a reminder to be a ‘devil in the details’ of your spending habits.

Good luck with your tracking of May’s spending habits and then see how much you can save, despite the rise in the rice and cooking oil prices.

God bless.