Winter Depression

Like all animals and plants in this planet, I follow the length of the day in my biology. Just now it is dark outside, there was no blue sky or sun all day, it is raining all the day, and I am feeling depressed. I spent half a day in bed and cannot start working. Light therapy may help - after two weeks, may be. No time for that. Having started, half of the job is already done. So, I am starting.

Calculate the path of Oumuamua

Nobody can. It’s velocity and predicted path started to change right after it passed by the Sun, which can’t be explained. Right after it passed by the Sun it immediately started traveling faster. Since it is not emitting gas jets, it must have another source of energy. It is a solar wind sail. 

Buying Bayer

Bayer is a120 years old German chemical company, the best of the best. It made the mistake of buying Monsanto, an American agricultural chemicals company, producer of glyphosphate herbicide. Der Spiegel has a decent article on the following debacle and crash of Bayer's worth. Since I know that the product is not toxic and it is being attacked by the green ecology movement without any scientific basis, I believe that stupidity will not prevail and Bayer will extricate itself from this "migraine". Bayer is a buying opportunity. That company have made many people wealthy in the past, and I expect to keep prospering in the future. 

Hantavirus Epidemy

The Hanta virus has mutated and now it is able to travel in small drops emitted by sneezing. It appears as a regular cold that takes up to forty days to disappear. That is when it does not kill the next day of the infection. The focus of the mutation is in the Province of Chubut, Argentina, and already there are three people dead in La Plata, some 2000 km north. The Hantavirus normally lives in the country mouse in the Argentine pampa. Just now, I have a serious cold and can't stop sneezing, also my daughter Nomi is ill in the kibbutz. I hope this mutated virus did not reach Israel yet. If this blog dies, now you know the cause. It is looking at you in the pic.                

Leadership in Beowulf

Leaders in the Beowulf poem are called Kings, Givers of Treasures, that is, they are who distribute a raid's spoils between the fighters. That seems to be the source of their hold on the retainers, and the necessity for having them in the group. They don't really seem to rule, but mostly they give presents, rings and twisted gold chains. Therefore I am a bit surprised by the election as representative of a New York barrio this 29 old healthy good looking portorriquena, Alexandria. I have difficulty in imagining her as an effective politician, although the fact that she made her peregrination to the Holy City of Flint before her campaign is indicative that she has good instincts.

The leadership of the socialist movement in America is heavily Jewish, I mean Jews (not real Jews in my opinion, but in a general sense) are its hard core. Only recently the movement was dying of old age, when it renewed itself by putting in the front visibly non-Jewish furiously anti-Israeli candidates. Not only two colored women were elected (Alexandria and Rachida) but suddenly the movement grew from 30 to 150 chapters. The strategy works. In a metaphorical way, it can compared to Jewish anti-Communists funding the national socialist party in the early nineteen twenties. I feel uneasy with Alexandria and Rachida, but success is success.

Interestingly, in Beowulf there is not one dispute about leadership. The main activity of the Vikings seem to be robbing gold and taking slaves, as well as revenging blood offenses. There is no one lording over them and giving orders. In comparison, the proto-Greek raiders of the Illiad are always competing for leadership - the whole Illiad is the story of the rebellion of the leader of the Mirmidons (the Ant clan) against the authority of the organizer and supreme leader of the expedition. Apparently the Vikings have evolved better genes for co-operative activities. 

Arab-Uyghur Love Affair

I am wordless. 

Disaster at Ayalim Hedge Funds

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The Marker (a supplement of the infernal HaAretz) writes about Ayalim Funds that lost in 2018 about 9 billion sheqels = 2.5 billion US dollars. It is a lot of money for Israeli savers. Apparently the fund invested in high-yield corporation bonds, like Kardan, Africa Israel, IDB Pituach (I have all of them) and lost over 30%. Well, I still believe that it is paper loss, those companies will pay their debts or renegotiate them in better terms. The 5% loss in sheqel managed funds caught my attention, how that happened? I went to Ayalim website and checked that fund, and it sent me to the TASE website. Seems the page was deleted and the link changed. Not nice. In 2016 Ayalim was the star fund, and that may have gone to their heads.

My portfolio has a positive yield in sheqalim, but I am losing in dollar terms. The reason is the strength of American economy and possibly the imperceptible devaluation of the sheqel vis-à-vis the dollar, possibly because the political uncertainty in Israel. I think that the robots that trade following key-words (trying to evaluate the political-economical sentiment of the country) are to blame, that is, they read the media that is consistently anti-Israel (in the word) and anti-government (in Israel). Reading HaAretz one could think that I am living in Equatorial Guinea and not in prosperous Kever Benjamin City.