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	What's New (as of May 5, 2005) May Update A trip to Virginia with old pal Jim Erler and his sons Nick and Ashton netted the unfortunate fish pictured here. In other developments, I have launched my blog/wEssay page, and hope you''ll take a moment to read my stab at humor "If Only Writers Had Uniforms." I have also updated my "reviews" link (see the menu above if you're curious) and my "feature articles" page. A sample chapter of my novel "I-State Lines" is also available via a link above; the book is slated to be published in April 2006 by Permanent Press of New York. March Update I just returned from a week in Hawaii, playing guitar with the Bunker Band, of course, and also in my first jazz jam. A photo of me with my illustrious friend/instructor Steve Toma can be seen at right. In another first, my illustrious friend/instructor Gayland Baker and his son Christian gave me my first surfing lesson. Eighteen years as a resident and another eighteen as a visitor since, and my first attempt is at this late date... credit the improvement in sun screens, hats and lightweight wetsuits. The waves were sporadic and small, perfect for a beginner, and I half-caught two waves out of about a dozen. Good fun, but hard on your shoulders if you're not used to paddling. An Important Book For anyone who has money invested in the stock market, either directly or through a 401K, I strongly recommend "The (Mis)Behavior of Markets: A Fractal View of Risk, Ruin and Return" by Benoit Mandelbrot and Richard Hudson. Mandelbrot's fame rests on the Mandelbrot Set of fractal geometry, which he applies to the stock market. The fundamental point is that markets do not act "rationally," but are apparently random. The randomness is not quite pure, for he finds fractal patterns in the market's charts. Indeed, a fractally derived chart looks eerily like a "real" historical chart of a stock's activity. Mandelbrot believes "modern portfolio theory," which includes the Black-Scholes method of pricing options and other complex mathematical ways of counterbalancing or offsetting risks, are wholly deficient in one key way: they cannot predict the sudden market collapses which occur with striking regularity. These events are the cause of major wealth destruction, to the tune of trillions of dollars, but the Standard Model cannot account for them. This is indeed a troubling deficiency. The book is light on math, and therefore accessible to any reader with an interest in markets. I cannot help wondering if today's incredibly low VIX (a measure of future options' implied volatility) is not an example of the complacency Mandelbrot says is most dangerous. The VIX is a reading on how much volatility the market perceives 30 days ahead, and so it is not the only measure one should consider. But still, it is saying the market expects little volatility at all in the month ahead. Meanwhile, the market hasn't had a shock since 9/11, a very long time if you consider the Asian Contagion Crash of 1997, the Long-Term Capital Management Crisis of 1998 (in which the Black-Scholes' model led to the collapse of a highly leveraged super-sized hedge fund), and the popping of the Nasdaq Bubble in 2000. Three sharp reversals in four years, and here we are, 3.5 years after 9/11, without a single unexpected "event." According to the theories and evidence laid out in this book, that run of luck will very likely end soon.   Photos 2004 (in no particular order) "What's New: March 2005" "What's New: January 2005" "What's New: October 2004" "What's New: September 2004" "What's New: August 2004" "What's New: June 2004" "What's New: Feb. 2004" "What's New: Jan. 2004" "What's New: Sept./Oct. 2003" "What's New: July/Aug. 2003" "What's New: June 2003" "What's New: May 2003" "What's New: April 2003" "What's New: March 2003" "What's New: February 2003"