The Daily Dish - March 2, 2012

Note – the Dish will be on hiatus next week. Next couple weeks may be choppy actually. It will return at some point in mid to late March.

A little Friday humor …

Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other man pulls out his cell phone and calls emergency services. He gasps to the operator, “My friend is dead! What can I do?” The operator in a calm, soothing voice replies, “Take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.” There is a silence, then a shot is heard.

Back on the phone, the hunter says, “OK, now what?”

—

A man and a friend are playing golf one day. One of the guys is about to chip onto the green when he sees a long funeral procession on the road next to the course. He stops in mid-swing, takes off his golf cap, closes his eyes, and bows down in prayer. His friend says: “Wow! That is the most thoughtful and touching thing I have ever seen. You are truly a kind man.”

The other man replies, “Yeah, well, we were married 35 years.”

I told my daughter last night that she had to get off the laptop and read a book or play with something non-electronic. She starts whining and moaning about how I’m treating her like a little baby (she’s three), how she’s a big girl now, and basically how she’s gone past the Dora the Explorer and children’s books part of her life and is now more interested in computer games and “Jessie” and “Shake it Up” on Disney.

Then, in a sign that I am officially getting old, I launched into a diatribe about how good kids these days have it. And the luxuries that they have that I didn’t when I was growing up in the eighties. When I was little …

I had to walk like half a mile to my bus stop. My son’s bus, they basically pick every kid up at their homes.
There was no internet. My son recently had to do a project on John Glenn. We knocked it out in 30 minutes using the John Glenn Wikipedia page. I had to spend half a day at a library doing that same project when I was little.
Email?? Pffft!!! I actually had to write people letters, mail them, and then wait days for them to receive it!
I actually got spanked! Try and spank a kid today! I tried it once on my son a couple years ago, and he lawyered up! I lived in fear of the wooden spoon as a kid. And it worked.
When there was a song I really liked, I couldn’t just immediately go to iTunes and download it. I would wait all day with a blank tape, listening to the radio for hours and hours on end so I could record it.
Cell phones? Call waiting? Weren’t around. If I wanted to use the phone, I had to wait until my mom or sister was off of it.
There were no microwaves. A quick meal consisted of waiting 20 minutes for the stove to heat up, and then another 30 minutes to cook it.
Cartoon Network? Cartoons on all the time, every day? I had to wait all week until Saturdays!

Could you picture how crazy this town would get if the Browns did make a move to draft Robert Griffin III, and he turned out to be all that and a bag of chips?

People forget what a Browns town this is. People forget how insane it was here in the mid to late eighties. The songs on the radio, the whole town being dressed in orange and brown on the weekends, the city shutting down on Sundays from 1-4. There was no Steelers stuff in stores, and a lot less Steeler fans around in general. How the team played on Sundays dictated the mood of the entire city until Thursday, at which point we focused solely on the next opponent.

I had second row Dawg Pound season tickets from age 13-16. I saw things happen down there that were just disturbing at their core. I painted my shoes orange. I spoke completely in barks for hours on end. I ATE DOG BISCUITS AND LIKED IT.

It would be sheer insanity here if the Browns could bring in a guy as exciting, personable, and charismatic as RG3. This organization needs it. This town needs it. Make it happen Bob.

Quote of the Day …

“Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.” ~ Author unknown

Insane Fact of the Day …

Everyday, Americans collectively buy 5 million products that are related to Mickey Mouse.

Market …

Should be a quiet day to end a BUSY week for the markets. We saw a slew of economic data released this week, most of which was right around expectations and indicative of a continued, slow, still somewhat painful economic recovery as we head into the spring.

Investors were encouraged by jobless claims, which once again came in around the 350,000 mark … dragging the more meaningful four week moving average down again. The other economic indicators we got yesterday were either at or below expectations, but markets didn’t care. The clear focus right now is on housing and jobs here in America, and also the developments over in Europe … which could seriously impact our economy if it gets worse over there.

Yesterday was a positive day for stocks. The Dow ended the session up 28 points to close at 12,980 … just below the 13,000 mark that the most closely monitored US stock index has been teetering around these past couple weeks.

Stock futures are down this morning after Spain’s prime minister said his country will miss its deficit targets this year. Also, high oil prices continue to be a concern for the markets, as it could be a big detractor to the current economic recovery efforts. Crude jumped to $110.55 a barrel after an unconfirmed Iranian media report of a pipeline explosion in Saudi Arabia. Saudi officials later denied the report. Oil prices have risen from $96 last month amid fears that conflict over Iran’s nuclear program could trigger a disruption in global crude supplies.

Even with that, all the major US stock indices are looking at their 9^th straight week of gains, the longest such run since Jan of ’04.

News …

~ US Housing Lays the Foundation for a Recovery

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-02/housing-in-u-s-lays-foundation-for-recovery-as-economy-coaxes-buyers-back.html

~ Cleveland Fed President: NE Ohio Recovering from Recession Better than Others

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2012/03/northeast_ohio_is_recovering_f.html

~ Ohio Manufacturing: Good Times are Back (Sort of)

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/ohio-manufacturing-good-times-back-101400108.html

~ Retailers February Sales Beat Wall Street Expectations, but How Long Will Rally Last?

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2012/03/retailers_february_sales_beat.html

~ The Day Ahead: Quiet Session to Busy Week

http://www.mortgagenewsdaily.com/mortgage_rates/blog/249585.aspx

~ CoreLogic: 28% of US Homes Now Underwater