That Ain't Working

Yesterdays P&L: GBP - 540.00

Yesterdays Booze: Nothing, alright nothing, (do I sound irritable)?

Yesterdays Soundtrack: 80's madness but mostly Dire Straits


Another lousy day trading, I over traded and caught the market wrong every time. when I brought DAX30 futures it was at the top of the market and when I sold FTSE100 futures it was just at the bottom of the market. Another bite out of my rapidly dwindling trading capital. Damn. I am too old to go on the game. Still at least I am learning to cut my losses quickly. This has always been my major problem as a trader, I hang on to losing trades far too long, convinced that I am right. This is overconfidence that kills you. I may be almost as smart as I think I am but the market doesn't care. If you do what I do to make a living the golden rule is ride your profits and cut your losses. I know this but I also hate admitting I am wrong.

My music was eighties, mostly Dire Straits. No longer a fashionable band and looked down upon by most people but I disagree. I think Mark Knopfler is a genius the sound he makes from a guitar is exquisite. He was born in Glasgow but moved to Geordie land, (talk about out of the frying pan into the fire), when he was a child. His parents brought him a guitar but failed to take into account that he was left-handed. Most other guitarists in his position restrung the guitar and played it upside down. Knopfler simply played like a right-handed person would, which probably accounts for his extraordinary finger picking style.Picking just five of his songs is hard as my favourites change all the time. Its easy enough to pick the huge hits like Money For Nothing, when Dire Straits were for a while the biggest band in the world. I remember buying a copy of Brothers in Arms on vinyl the day of its release and knew it would be huge, it was one of those moments when everything aligns. MTV siezed on the , now laughable, cgi video but moreso it was the decision to release it on cd. At the time there was really only a few cd production plants in Europe and Dire Straits were selling so many copies that they effectively closed one down, forcing other artists to delay their releases. Anyway my five favourite songs:

It Never Rains - from the Telegraph Road album, this song is a hymn to the down on their luck. But its more than that it is about how human nature is to fight against all the odds, because when all is said and done, what else can you do. For me it reminds me of a lot of key moments in my life when, by coincidence it was playing on my walkman. When we arrived in gray old Tilbury and split up this is the song I was listening to as I wandered where I was going to live and if I would ever see my family again. When I lost my first job, this was the song that was in my headphones on the train home The line that gets me every time is at the beginning, "The bigger they are babe, The harder they fall on you, And you you're always the same you persevere, On the same old pleasure ground
Oh and it never rains around here, It just comes pouring down". The emphasis he puts on "you persevere", just cuts through to my heart.

On Every Street - The lead song from the record that had the unenviable task of following Brothers in Arms. It seems every artist that has colossal success with a record struggles afterwards. Wacko Jacko after Thriller, Fleetwood Mac after Rumours and Pink Floyd after Dark Side of The Moon has this problem. All the follow up albums were good and all went multi-platinum but the expectations were so high. Still I suppose there are worse problems to have. To me this song is about lost love. It reminds me of every break-up I ever had. They all end badly, if they didn't they wouldn't end at all. Knopfler is no singer but he uses words beautifully, "The lowdown - a picture of your face, Your injured looks, The sacred and profane, The pleasure and the pain. Somewhere your fingerprints remain concrete. And it's your face I'm looking for on every street" Reminds me of going to places where old girlfriends used to go, just to see if they were as unhappy as I was.

Telegraph Road - I song I discussed in a previous post. The story of the beginning, the achievement and the end. Both the town that was built around the telegraph road and the life of one of its inhabitants. The song speaks for how dreams fade and how love can wilt if circumstances conspire against you, "I'd sooner forget, but I remember those nights".

Sultans of Swing - I have also discussed this song in greater detail before. The Sultans, such a grand title for a London pub band. This song is about dreams. I love this song but it reminds me mostly of my guitarist, he came from a shitty background and really wanted success but life got in its way. I am sure he is happy enough now but if he had the chance to go back, to really push and to become what he dreamed about, I think he would snatch it in a second. It was different for me, He had all the faith in the world in me but I just lacked the urgency, I couldn't see the clock ticking while he felt every second of his life draining away.

Communique - Is this song about the messiah? What would it be like for Jesus in a second coming, "Maybe he could talk about the tricks of the trade, Maybe he could talk about himself, Maybe he could talk about the money that he made, Maybe he'd be saying something else". I have the terrible feeling that if there was a second coming it would be televised and Simon Cowell would probably say, "No I'm sorry, the sandals just don't fit the market and the beard is all wrong, Sorry Jesus but you are not going through to the next round".

Tunnel Of Love - A song about growing up and about leaving home. "She took off her silver locket and said remember me by this, she put my hand in my pocket, I got a keepsake and a kiss". Life leaves its marks on all of us, we all end up bruised and scarred in some way, but just imagine how terrible it would be if it didn't happen.
Imagine never feeling the pain of that first heartbreak, or the excitement of that first crush. This is what makes life worth living. I think my biggest problem is I am just too jaded.

So thats Dire Straits then, I listened to lots of their songs the ones that nearly made it were Espresso Love, Private Investigations, Waterline, Love over Gold, Your Latest Trick, Walking In The Wild West End and Portebello Belle.