Never Forever

Today's P&L: GBP 150.00

Today's Booze: 2 large Talisker Whiskies

Today's Soundtrack: Kate Bush

I am still stuck in malaise, but surprisingly irritable today. I am not often a snappy person, I am normally quite laid back, but today everything seems to be getting on my nerves. Perhaps its the reduced alcohol intake.

The markets are still difficult to trade, There was an initial sell-off in the US which I should have made more of because my overall view is bearish, (looking to fall), but liquidity is still thin and movements are as snappy as my mood.

Nothing much happened in the markets today, Bank of America announced pretty poor profits, in line with Citibanks yesterday. Morgan Stanley announced it will give staff compensation amounting to sixty two percent of revenue or fourteen and a half billion dollars. I am an ex banker but this just seems madness to me, I believe solid performance should be rewarded with bonuses but it is quite clear the banks have learned nothing after their humiliation last year. the governments sat down and played poker with them and surprise, surprise they lost. In the UK it was made quite clear that the government went into a panic attack when faced with the possibility of the public going to cash points that had no money - So we had the concept of "too big to fail". Now everyone knows where we stand, the banks hold too much power and for all the hard talk from the government they know they have the upper hand. The only fly in the ointment is if the governments have taken too much on by shifting the risk from the private sector to the public sector. It is just so annoying that an insignificant bank like Northern Rock is bailed out by the government to the tune of one hundred billion pounds of tax payer money when the entire budget of the NHS is just ninety billion for a year. And yet we are told that alcohol costs the NHS four and a half billion a year, that cigarettes cost nearly two billion, (bearing in mind that the exchequer raises nearly nine billion from tobacco taxes). This bail out money could have been spent more wisely.

Listening to mostly eighties music today, but mostly Kate Bush. She is quite an odd artist, she is one of the few female artists that has always had complete control over her music and is something of a recluse now. She lives quite near where I am currently hanging my hat in Windsor. She was discovered by David Gilmour when she was sixteen. Almost everyone my age in the UK remembers hearing Wuthering Hights, her first single, which was a huge record. Anyway my top five Kate Bush tracks:

Wuthering Hights - A song that defined her and an instant success. Very passionate. For me it is her wailing at the end, it really reminds me of the lunatic ex who would howl in rage when she couldn't express her fierce emotions any other way.

Breathing - A weird song but if you lived in Britain at the time you remember the protect and survive leaflets, ("If you hear the warning, paint your windows white to deflect the blast"), The test radio broadcasts of a world where nuclear war not only seemed possible but likely. The song suggests that no matter what happens there will be survivors. This song also suggests an intimacy between mother and child that is alien to us men.

Cloudbusting - famous more for the video featuring Donald Sutherland. A song of hope but with menace from the government. My mother worked for the foreign office and I am never adverse to a conspiracy theory. The stupidest thing is believing that what happens in other countries doesn't happen in yours.

Hounds Of Love - To me this song is about the risks of falling in love. I have always been a reckless character, I remember jumping on a plane in New York to get to a girlfriends party in Jakarta, cost a fortune at the time - last minute first class flights are never cheap, but it was worth it.

WOW - A song about actors, I suppose few of us show our true faces.

Its hard to just choose five of her songs, I also listened a lot to Running up That Hill, Army Dreamers, This Womens Work Is Done, Babooshka, There Goes a Tenner, James and The Cold Gun.